The Runaway

by Veronica Tower

  She struggled to her feet. Her right foot still could not fully support her weight although the swelling had reduced somewhat. She hobbled around the little room bracing herself with her hand. When she reached the front door she pressed it open slightly and peered out the resulting crack. The orange hues of sunset brightened the western sky and cast long shadows across the land. There was no sign of Carson.

  She cautiously stepped outside taking her first conscious look across the land. There was a little field south and west—it hardly seemed sufficient to support one man much less two. To the east there was an even smaller garden. Behind the house to the north and west stood a barn—small by the standards she was used to but much larger than the little shack that Carson lived in, but still no sign of Carson.

  Delilah limped her way from the shack toward the barn. She caught sight of him kneeling almost directly behind the house near a little pool. He held something in his lap, scrubbing it. After watching him a few moments she realized it was the bowl.

  Carson was cleaning the dishes before their meal.

  The sight made her want to cry.

  She painfully made her way up beside him and sat down, careful to keep her feet out of the water despite thinking that it would feel cool and good on her fevered flesh.

  Carson glanced briefly at her when she arrived but made no other acknowledgement of her presence. He returned his attention to the bowl.

  “I didn’t know where you went,” Delilah told him.

  He grunted. Did that mean he was angry or did he simply not know how to hold a conversation? How long had he been alone?

  He was having trouble with the bowl, scratching at the caked on grit with his fingernails. The dirt was days if not weeks old so why clean it tonight? Was it really for her? She was just a chance for Carson to earn a little money and escape this hovel, wasn’t she? So why had his pride been hurt when she asked why he didn’t leave?

  He finished with the bowl and rinsed out the cup. “We should eat,” he said as he got to his feet. He extended a hand to help her which Delilah surprised herself by accepting.

  He was much stronger than he looked. Every pound he possessed must be made of bone or muscle.

  His long silences were getting to Delilah. She needed to hear some talk. “It’s good of you to help me,” she said.

  Carson grunted.

  “No, really,” she said. “A lot of men would have left a colored girl to die.”

  “That can’t be right,’ Carson told her. Disbelief colored his voice and his expression.

  “It’s true,” Delilah told him. “Colored folk ain’t worth much to most whites.”

  But that wasn’t true, she realized, or the Colonel wouldn’t be coming after her. Colored folk were worth plenty—it just wasn’t the kind of worth a person wanted to have.

  Carson led her toward the small house, still holding her hand.

  Chapter Seven

  Evening

  When Carson finished eating he set his cup by the side of the fire and stood up. “I guess it’s time to call it a night,” he said.

  Delilah shuddered and he wondered if she thought he intended to sleep with her. He wanted to do it. He could still recall the feel of her fingers resting against his when he’d helped her stand by the watering hole and he very much wanted to touch her again.

  Not that that made any difference tonight. Wanting to do something and actually doing it were too different things and Carson wasn’t going to force himself on any woman—no matter how beautiful.

  He rubbed his scruff of a beard thoughtfully. “The blanket’s on top of the bed. It gets cold before dawn.”

  He watched Delilah find the old blanket. She looked confused—uncertain.

  “You need anything else?” he asked.

  She finally spoke again. He wished he was better with words because he loved to hear her talk. “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m sleeping in the barn,” Carson said. “If you want something, you ought to ask now.”

  Delilah’s eyes widened in surprise. “Oh, I didn’t…no, I don’t need nothing else.”

  Carson smiled, glad that he could help her this much. He glanced around at his meager possessions. The old buffalo skin on the wall caught his eye. “If it gets real cold you can take that down. I use it in the winter.”

  Delilah looked at the tattered skin measuring its potential for warmth. “Thank you,” she said.

  Carson couldn’t think of a reason to wait any longer. He made his way to the front door where he stopped and indicated the board leaning against the wall. “You should drop this bar across the door when I leave. It keeps out the coyotes.”

  Delilah shuddered.

  “Now don’t be getting scared. Varmints aren’t likely to bother you. Just best to be sure.”

  He felt winded, talking so much. He turned to go.

  “Mr. Carson?”

  He stopped, looking back at the little woman with her smooth dark skin and that wild tangle of hair. He should give her his mother’s comb to use. And it wouldn’t hurt if he used it himself.

  For the first time, Carson wondered what he, himself, looked like. Did Delilah think him handsome? He knew he was too poor to attract her, but he’d like to think if he’d been richer she would have been interested.

  “Thank you,” Delilah told him. “This will be very nice.”

  Carson bobbed his head and left.

  Chapter Eight

  Suspicions

  Delilah watched the door swing shut behind Carson unable to fully credit that he had left. Had he just advised her to lock the door? Was he saying she could spend the night in peace and he wouldn’t bother her? It was difficult to imagine. Had the past weeks been so hard on her he didn’t find her attractive?

  This last thought disturbed her. She didn’t want Carson coming back in the middle of the night to have his way with her. So what if his hand had been both strong and gentle. That didn’t mean she wanted him to touch her again—that didn’t mean she was attracted to him. White men weren’t gentle or kind! Tomorrow, or even later tonight, the truth would come out. He’d prove to be just like all the others.

  Delilah crawled over to the door and followed Carson’s advice. She put the bar in place then noticed for the hundredth time the long gun which hung across the door frame. As a slave she’d had no opportunity to learn about such weapons. She wondered what was wrong with it that Carson left it here to tempt her. It was evidence that he couldn’t be trusted. He wanted to tempt her into standing up to him so he could cruelly steal her hope and beat her back into her place. That’s how the Colonel would have done it, and it must be what Carson wanted too.

  She left the rifle in its place above the door and crawled back to the little pallet Carson had left her. The fire burning in the center of the room continued to bake the night so she didn’t think she’d need the blanket as she curled up and waited to fall asleep.

  Chapter Nine

  Carson’s Dream

  Carson stood naked in the tall grass with his Sharps .50 rifle in his hands. Ahead of him standing like a small mountain on the plain a buffalo bit the sweet tops of the blades and patiently chewed them.

  Carson sighted along the rifle, aiming directly between the great beast’s eyes.

  Unconcerned, the buffalo gobbled another mouthful of grass and stared at him as it ate.

  Carson’s finger tightened slowly on the trigger. He breathed in, let out half the breath and squeezed the trigger.

  The beast jerked back away from him and collapsed into the grass out of sight. Carson edged forward, carefully feeling each step with his bare toes before he trusted the spot with the weight of his body. Long grass scratched his naked legs and tickled his balls where they hung below him. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t see the buffalo. It was so large it should have been rising like a hill above the crest of the grasses.

  He pushed the waist high blades out of his way with his spent rifle and saw Delilah lying in the grass
before him. Blood welled out of the hole in her forehead distracting him for a moment from the sight of her naked body. Her dark breasts were large and full with even darker nipples standing out from them. Her waist was harder to discern as if a mist had risen up out of the soil to conceal that portion of her body from his view.

  Carson lay the rifle down beside her and touched the palm of her hand with the tips of his fingers.

  Delilah’s eyes opened and her gaze met his. Her fingers ran lightly up his arms, caressing his bare flesh on their way to embracing him. Carson’s arms encircled her in turn. The hard flesh jutting out from between his legs probed toward the mist covering her groin.

  Her mouth opened as if to kiss him.

  A scream shattered the night!

  Carson sat up in the barn, looking around in bewilderment.

  Delilah screamed again.

  He leaped to his feet and ran for his house.

  Chapter Ten

  Delilah’s Nightmare

  In Delilah’s dream she sat in the long swing chair that hung atop the Colonel’s veranda, drinking lemonade and waiting for her gentleman to come courting. Her full hooped skirts bowed in front of her in a most fashionable manner. Water beaded on the glass around her dark fingers.

  Dogs began to bark excitedly as Carson approached. He looked quite dashing in his white jacket and trousers. His scruff of a beard had grown quite full and his eyes sparkled with desire as he looked at her.

  They were dancing together in the meadow. Other couples sported near them, twisting and turning in harmony with the silent music. She couldn’t make out their faces, but that didn’t matter. Carson held her in his arms and for the first time in her life she felt at home and safe and—

  Blood spattered from her mouth from the force of the Colonel’s blow. He hit her again, and again, and again. Gone were the hoop skirts and genteel fancy, replaced by the horrible reality of Colonel Abner Beaumont beating Delilah into submission, ripping open her smock, driving the polished end of his wooden walking stick hard between her legs so that her screams would drive some power into his dick and bring him to erection.

  He thrust the stick deeper inside of her than anything ought to be able to go and cruelly twisted it from side to side. His cock still hadn’t achieved its full hardness.

  He twisted his hand in her hair and pulled her to her knees in front of him, thrusting himself deep into her bloody mouth and cruelly pinching her nipples until she began to suck—

  Delilah woke to the sound of violent blows hammering the door of the shack and shaking its walls.

  “DELILAH! DELILAH!”

  She pulled in on herself, imagining the Colonel had caught up to her. All thought of resistance fled. The long gun above the door frame might as well have been back in Arkansas. There was no way she could risk approaching that door and the Colonel to fetch it.

  The blows lessened in fury. “Delilah! Delilah! Are you all right in there?”

  That wasn’t the Colonel’s voice.

  “I heard screams,” the man outside the little shack called. He wasn’t driving his shoulder into the wood anymore. “What’s wrong?”

  Delilah fully remembered where she was and who was outside checking on her. A wave of embarrassed relief shuddered through her body. The Colonel hadn’t found her. He couldn’t hurt her tonight. “Bad dream,” she croaked, then realized Carson couldn’t hear her.

  She crawled to the water bucket and filled the cup while Carson continued to call out to her. The cool liquid soothed the fire in her throat so she could speak again. “I’m all right,” she said, her voice raised to penetrate the walls of the little house. “I had a nightmare.”

  Carson took a deep breath. She could hear it clearly through the thin walls of the shack. “You’re sure?” he asked. “The way you screamed…”

  Delilah’s heart still pounded against her rib cage. She could taste her own fear lingering from her dream but she didn’t want a man coming inside the little building with her. “I’m sure,” she said. “It was just a dream.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Cleansing

  The next morning, breakfast was a mostly silent affair of warm gruel, cold water, and two small, deliciously wonderful eggs which Carson produced for her inspection like little nuggets of gold. They didn’t talk much while he cooked them. Delilah felt embarrassed over her nightmare and Carson just wasn’t the sort to make idle conversation. He’d clearly been alone too long. He’d forgotten how to be sociable—if he’d ever truly known.

  He left to check his traps after breakfast, taking the long rifle off the hooks above the door and leaving Delilah alone with her thoughts.

  Her thoughts weren’t pretty. The Colonel would be coming and she had to get away. She shuddered to think what he’d do to her if he got his hands on her again. He’d raped and beaten her before he got mad. She couldn’t imagine what he’d do now that she’d humiliated him by trying to escape.

  She examined her foot to see how it was healing. The swelling had diminished but there was still puss within the fevered flesh and she didn’t imagine she could walk very far on it.

  Carson had an animal she could steal, but it wasn’t a horse and she didn’t know how fast it could carry her. The worst mistake she could make was to turn Carson into her enemy. She wasn’t prepared to accept him as a friend—white men didn’t befriend colored women—but whatever his motivation he hadn’t hit or touched her yet. If she stole his old burro and he caught up with her that would change immediately.

  She needed to get her foot healed so she could strike out on her own again. Perhaps if she could clean the swollen flesh properly—make certain that no piece of that bramble remained inside her—she’d be able to walk without pain. She considered using the bucket of water but she was drinking out of it and she didn’t want to contaminate it with her own filth. So she snatched up the rag Carson had used on her yesterday and limped to the door of the shack. Pain shot through her foot with each step, but she could manage it for a few paces.

  Outside the sky looked as barren as the land. She didn’t understand how Carson could try and live in this place. Whatever he thought he had here, there had to be better waiting for him somewhere else. Even the Colonel’s slaves had heard about the gold in California and there was supposed to be miles and miles of farmland out west just waiting to be settled. Why was he sticking it out here in the Indian territory? He was a white man! America was made for people like him!

  She made her way around Carson’s home to look behind it. The watering hole he used to fill the bucket was no more than fifteen feet behind the little house. She limped her way over to it—too proud to stop and crawl despite the agony her movements triggered. There was no sign of Carson anywhere, he was either out checking his traps or looking for game he could shoot—or possibly he was in the barn, but if he were he’d closed the door after entering and that didn’t seem likely.

  Delilah sat down beside the watering hole. It wasn’t much to look at—only four feet across and perhaps a little longer end-to-end. She could easily see the bottom wherever she looked. If she were to stand within it, the deepest portions were unlikely to cover her knees, but the grass grew thicker near the water’s edge which offered her a modicum of privacy from the house and barn.

  She slipped her feet into the water and sighed as the cool liquid caressed her swollen flesh. The chill water rolled over the feverish wound, deadening pain and offering her a little touch of paradise. Who would have thought she could find that in this arid country?

  She slid deeper into the little pool enjoying the feeling of cool water embracing her flesh. Her smock rode up around her waist as her butt pressed into the cool mud at the bottom of the hole. She laid her head back on the bank and luxuriated in the sensations.

  A bird called out sharply, startling Delilah out of her reverie. She sat bolt upright, pushing her formless dress modestly about her body. She glanced left, right, and back again, wildly looking about her but nothing was in v
iew. Gradually, she began to relax again, easing her back against the bank, soaking in the cool clear liquid. The mud at the bottom of the pool seeped around the feverish wound in her foot, giving her a taste of heaven.

  Chapter Twelve

  Spying

  Carson walked home from checking his traps, Sharps .50 rifle in hand and one small rabbit slung over his shoulder. He’d hoped for more—maybe a prairie dog or three—but this would be meat enough to cook a thicker stew. He wished he could catch a rabbit every day.

  He’d seen no game at all that was fit to shoot. A big bullet like a .50 would rip the hell out of smaller animals so he only used it if he saw something worthy. A buffalo would be ideal, but he hadn’t seen one near his farm in nearly two years. A wolf or coyote was also acceptable and a deer would be a blessing, but until one showed itself in the area there was nothing to do but look and wait and farm while hoping for more game.

  He ascended the little hill that climbed from the water hole behind his house. It was a good site to get a look at his land and he still held some small hope that a game animal might appear, coming toward the water. What he actually saw surprised the hell out of him and sent him dropping to his stomach so he wouldn’t be noticed.

  Below him, Delilah bathed in his pool. He couldn’t believe it. He set his rifle and the rabbit to the side and carefully crawled to the crest of the ridge so he could take another look.

  It was true! He wasn’t dreaming!

  Delilah sat in the clear water up to her waist not twenty feet away from him. He could see more of her bare thighs than he had yesterday. Her dress barely covered her groin leaving all that dark flesh exposed to the sky. She’d flung her long hair out behind her and her head and back lay against the side of the pool. He had never imagined seeing anything so beautiful.