by Karen Kay
A movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention.
She stood there in the middle of the floor, surrounded by five or six adoring men, and despite his antagonism toward her, Gray Hawk couldn’t help but admit that she was probably the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. In truth, he had thought so from the first moment he had seen her.
“She’s quite a sight, isn’t she?”
Gray Hawk didn’t spin or in any way turn about to acknowledge Robert, who had come upon him from behind. Indeed, Gray Hawk did nothing more than scowl, though he did note to himself that Robert had read his mind correctly and had commented on his thoughts as if he’d heard them.
“She’s a true English heiress, my good chap.”
Gray Hawk merely raised an eyebrow. He didn’t know what an English heiress was, nor did he care, though he realized it must mean quite something to Robert, to these others, if their adoration toward her were to make sense.
“You could join that circle.”
That had the Indian doing a slow about-face. He was about to comment when—
“Why, yes,” he heard the white woman’s lilting voice, “I do know quite a bit about the American Indian…from my father’s studies, you understand.”
Gray Hawk glared at her over his shoulder.
“Would you like to hear some of what I know about these savages?”
Savages? Gray Hawk narrowed his eyes at her, to the accompaniment of six to ten male voices, all muttering agreement. All except the Indian stared at her in worshipful wonder.
“Well,” she commented, and Gray Hawk could hear the smile in her voice, “all American Indians on this continent wear tanned animal skins, the fine art of producing silk and other materials being wholly unknown to these indigenous people.”
Gray Hawk looked down at his own clothing of breeches and waistcoat, something Robert had fought hard to get him into; indeed, the servant had succeeded in doing so only by hiding the Indian’s own breechcloth and moccasins. And though he hated the white man’s clothing, for the first time Gray Hawk was glad he was wearing it.
Gray Hawk smiled and turned around so that he faced the woman. She had her back to him.
“All American Indians sit upon the ground. Chairs and other furniture of the civilized world are not known to them, nor would the savages know what to do with them if they even saw such articles.”
Gray Hawk immediately sat down in a nearby chair.
“Nor have the American Indians any china: no cups, no saucers, no plates, no silverware. In fact, my father has found that most American Indians eat with their fingers, a most disturbing habit.”
Gray Hawk picked up a cup of tea from a nearby table, and, balancing it saucer and all on his knee—behavior he had seen Robert and other white men perform—the Indian took a sip from the cup.
Someone in the audience chuckled.
The white woman cleared her throat.
“All American Indians, except for a few Mandan Indians, have straight, black hair, and most braid or tie their hair in a bunch on each side of their face.”
Only that morning Robert had shown Gray Hawk a white wig which had once been worn by the “elite” of their society. That wig still lay close at hand.
In a quick movement, Gray Hawk scooped up the wig and plopped it onto his head.
He sat back down.
Someone in the audience coughed. A few more chuckled.
“All of these savages rarely speak, and most scowl almost continually—and they have, as a people, very little cheerfulness. Why, even their women are given to the dour and humorless life of the plains Indian.”
Gray Hawk grinned widely and, putting his hands behind his head, leaned back in the chair.
“All Indians wear moccasins, a type of shoe that wears out much too readily.”
Gray Hawk crossed his legs, the action showing off his booted feet.
A tiny ripple of laughter came from the audience.
“They have no knowledge of smoking, except their clay pipes…”
The Indian lit a cigar Robert had given him that morning.
“They all eat a diet of only buffalo meat…”
The Indian picked up a scone from a nearby table and took a bite.
“They all—” She stopped. Too many in the crowd were chuckling.
She gazed into her audience, then over her shoulder; then gradually she turned all the way around. Gray Hawk grinned at her as he caught her eye, watching as the realization of what he had been doing came to settle upon her face.
She didn’t gasp. She didn’t faint. In truth, she did little more than stare.
And Gray Hawk met that look of hers unflinchingly.
Slowly, with great dignity, she turned back around to face her crowd of adoring fans. She didn’t utter a sound for many moments until at last she murmured, “Excuse me.”
And with that simple phrase, she swept out of the room while Gray Hawk settled back in his chair, a quiet sense of satisfaction settling upon him.
Score one.
Chapter Six
The beat of the drum and Gray Hawk’s voice raised in song could be heard in all parts of the boat. It was a strange tune with an alien melody. Sung in a minor key, it tugged at some inner part of her soul. It made her ache.
“I cannot wait to reach St. Louis.”
Genevieve stood at the railing on the main deck of the steamboat. She spoke to Robert, who reclined not more than a few feet behind her.
“I can’t help but worry,” she continued. “I keep telling myself that it is only two more months. I know I need to hold on for only a little longer, but I keep worrying.”
“The Indian’s song is sad.”
“Yes.”
“He has people at home that depend on him for their food and shelter. I think he worries about them.”
Genevieve looked back over her shoulder. “How do you know this?” she asked. “Did he tell you?”
“Yes.”
She gazed back out at the grass-carpeted land bordering the river. On one of the hills in the distance, an elk raised its head, seeming to stare straight at her. Overhead, the sun peeked out from behind a gray cloud, its momentary brilliance blinding her—if only for an instant. She wet her lips before replying, “I’m sorry.”
Robert sighed. “I know. I knew how you would feel if you understood that he had family at home to care for. I didn’t tell you for some time because I didn’t want to upset you. He told me about this on one of the first days he was here.
“But I do not think you should feel too badly,” Robert continued. “I spoke to some of the traders, and they told me not to worry, that the Indians take care of themselves. They said others in the tribe will care for his family while he is gone. It is their way.”
Genevieve remained silent, her gaze settling upon far-distant hills. She sighed. “I wish I could do something about it all, but if I let him go…”
“I know,” said Robert. “It is why I haven’t mentioned anything before. I only bring it up now by way of explaining his melancholy.”
Genevieve nodded her head.
Suddenly the drumming stopped, and the boat descended at once into silence. She felt herself holding her breath. For what?
The drumming started again. Then the singing, this time a different song, but equally sad. She let out her breath.
“Is he bound when he is drumming?”
“No, but he is watched carefully when he is not tied.”
“Then I needn’t worry?”
“No.”
“He hates me.”
“I know.”
“I shudder to think what would happen to me if he were ever to get loose.”
“It should not happen, milady. We keep a close watch on him when he is in his quarters, and when he is out walking on the deck, he is bound by his own word.”
“Then you believe he will not try to escape?”
“Not while he is walking on the deck. He has given us his word, an
d from what I understand about these people, an Indian would sooner die than break his trust, once given.
“No,” Robert continued. “I do not worry about him when he is walking out on deck, only when he is in his room. We have no promise from him there, and he is careful not to give it.”
Genevieve inclined her head, her thoughts far from the conversation.
She held up a hand to shield her eyes as she stared off across this wild land. Over a month had passed since the Indian’s capture, and still the man hated her.
It didn’t matter how well she treated him, nor how many times she approached him in friendship. Their conversations always ended the same way: he, insinuating that she was somehow lax in her morals, and she, frustrated, giving up and running away.
She had hoped for so much more. She had hoped to befriend him. She had planned to learn his language and to start the studies for her father. It would save precious time.
It was useless.
She still remembered her embarrassment of a few days earlier, when Gray Hawk had mocked her in front of her friends. She had been mortified.
But her feelings then and now had gone beyond embarrassment. She’d realized for the first time how very little she knew about the American Indian. She’d come to see that there was more to learn of these people, of their way of life—more than she and her father had ever suspected.
It was depressing. Her father had a book due in less than a year. Unless he could come to understand these people soon, all would be lost.
But that wasn’t all that concerned her.
Gray Hawk did not act submissive, as she had expected, and this didn’t make any sense at all. Never had she encountered a native who did not bow or cower to her, to her father. But this man…
She grimaced. Why, he had altogether too much pride. In fact, she would credit him with the kind of mind that seeks independence, the sort of spirit that makes laws, that changes societies.
But that wasn’t possible, or was it?
She’d assumed that she knew all about these people. Hadn’t she accompanied her father on several expeditions? Hadn’t he commented on, and hadn’t she then witnessed, the childlike quality of most native peoples?
Didn’t the politicians in the eastern regions of America call the Indians “children of the forest,” or of the plains?
Certainly her father was correct in believing these people to have their own civilizations, but like all indigenous peoples, they lacked the ability to have mature emotions, those of compassion, of charity, of understanding. Or did they?
She closed her eyes and sighed. Something here made no sense. Her father was a learned man. Surely what he proclaimed must be true. Mustn’t it?
The alien voice, raised in song, grew louder, invading her thoughts, her peace of mind.
And Genevieve, turning away from the steamboat railing, knew what she had to do, knew what she had to accomplish if she was to save her father.
She would have to talk with the Indian. She didn’t like the idea, and she despaired of the final outcome of such an action, but it had to be done.
She would have to set aside her prejudices; she would have to grant him all the rights that she would an Englishman. And, most of all, she would have to elicit the Indian’s cooperation.
Somehow.
“You may go. I will watch over him.”
Gray Hawk missed a beat in his drumming, though he kept on with his song. He glanced over toward the spot from which he’d heard the feminine voice.
He scowled. He hadn’t imagined it. There she stood, at the entrance to this room…alone.
He hadn’t been alone with her since the first night of his capture. He didn’t want to be alone with her now.
He continued to sing, ignoring her presence, though he was painfully aware of her.
How could he not be? She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
He thought back to the first time he had beheld her. Up until then, he’d never imagined there was such a thing as a white woman, never completing the thought that where there were white men, so too must there be white women. Though perhaps he should be forgiven this oversight. Factually, he had never been interested enough in the white society to draw the conclusion. Besides, as a lad he had once been detained at a trading post for over a year, and not once had he ever seen a white woman.
But there she’d been, and Gray Hawk hadn’t been able to look away. She had made the small trading room come alive, her reddish hair, her perfectly oval face, her chipmunk-brown eyes and her blushing cheeks seeming to add sunshine to the gray interior of the spiritless trading room. Her strangely sweet scent had filled his lungs until he seemed to sense her even as he slept.
And he’d thought then that because of her presence, his whole journey to the trading post, a trip he’d been reluctant to make, had been worth it. He’d known then that he would have many tales to tell when he returned home, though he feared few would believe his description of the very real beauty of this woman.
Why, with just describing the woman’s clothing alone, he would be thrown out of many camp circles, the reality of it too foreign for most Pikuni to credit.
Gray Hawk took a deep breath before continuing his song.
He had joined the trading party as a last resort, and only then at the urging of his mother and sisters. Gray Hawk himself had been intent on leading a war party against the Snakes, a tribe of Indians whose territory bordered the Blackfeet on their southwestern border.
But his sister was soon to marry a prestigious warrior from the allied Bloods, a tribe of the Blackfeet who lived to the far north, and all the women in Gray Hawk’s family had been anxious to obtain a new assortment of beads to use as decoration for the wedding gown.
And Gray Hawk, after much cajoling, had consented to do their bidding.
It was his duty.
So he had joined the trading party. And the rest of the story…
He disliked thinking that he would not be able to return home with the beads. Worse yet, he realized that the women in his family would be reliant upon friends in the camp for their winter stores of food and clothing.
It was not good, and he felt his anger rising toward this white woman. But he would have his revenge. He would ensure it.
He gave no outward sign, however, of what he felt. He continued to sing.
On and on he continued, giving no notice at all to the woman who stood just inside the entryway, even making up new verses, until at last he had no choice but to end the song.
“May I have a word with you, Mr. Gray Hawk?” she asked at once.
He looked up reluctantly. Haiya, but he wished he hadn’t. Dressed in deep forest green that extended from her hat at the very top of her head straight down to her feet, she dazzled him with her beauty, and he thought at that moment that if she asked for anything, he might very well give it to her.
Luckily, she didn’t ask.
She waited patiently for his reply, and Gray Hawk wondered if she knew that he wasn’t bound, that he had convinced the guard to untie him.
She apparently hadn’t noticed. And he had already noted that she was not the most observant of people. Again, he wondered that she would trust herself with him, even if she thought him to be tied. It was unseemly for a woman.
“I cannot help but notice,” Gray Hawk said, “that white woman dares much to come and see me, especially when there is no one with her to act the chaperone.”
“I wish to speak to you alone.”
Gray Hawk raised his brow at that. A woman seeking out a man who was not her husband? To speak to him? Alone?
Said Gray Hawk, “You dare much.”
She gazed away from him then, looking around her nervously. She murmured, “Yes, I know. But I really must speak to you in private.”
This puzzled Gray Hawk even more, but stoically, he showed nothing. He merely sat in silence, awaiting whatever communication she had to make.
He stared at her.
“I… I…” she began, “I wish to come to some sort of truce with you, if I might.”
Gray Hawk nodded. “Aa, yes, this is good. My freedom for—”
“I cannot give you your freedom.”
He didn’t even delay a second. “Then there is no truce.”
She bowed her head, and Gray Hawk wondered at what game she played. He shifted uncomfortably on the floor.
“Robert tells me that there are people,” she began, “women in your life, a mother, sisters, a wife, that are dependent upon you for their winter supplies.”
Gray Hawk nodded his head. “Aa, yes, it is true, except that I have no wife.”
Genevieve’s head came up. She gazed at him as though she didn’t quite believe him.
She said, “I thought that all male Indians of your age were married.”
“Then you were wrong.”
“Why are you not married? Is there something wrong? Some reason?”
“Did you come here to discuss me? My reasons for not marrying? And if you did, has the white woman of no honor cause for her interest?”
“No, no. I…it’s just that I thought—”
“I am often at war,” Gray Hawk interrupted. “I lead and I follow many war parties. Why would I marry when that woman might become a widow much too soon? Better that I wait until the desire for warring is over within me. Better then can I become a good husband and give to my wife all that a man should.”
“Yes,” she said. “That makes perfect sense, I suppose. It’s only that… Mr. Gray Hawk, I wish to apologize. I did not think to inquire as to your family when you were brought to the boat. It was not a proper thing for me to do. And I wish to know what I can do to make it up to you.”
He paused. “White woman could let me go.”
“I cannot.”
Gray Hawk shrugged. He looked away.
She took a step forward. “Mr. Gray Hawk, please try to understand. Just as you have people you are responsible for, so do I. I cannot let you go. Not yet, at least. My father needs you. I have been truthful with you about that. Isn’t there some other way I could make this up to you…send one of the trappers back to hunt for your family, perhaps? Please, if you tell me what it is, I will do it.”
