by Pamela Morsi
Now she wasn't able to look Myrtie in the eye. "I don't really have that much to tell you yet, Myrtie. At least not much that I think you'd want to hear." It was the closest Hannah could come to admitting that her husband had not elected to assert his rights on their wedding night. Unfortunately, Myrtie took it all wrong.
"Oh, no!" she wailed miserably. "Was it awful then? Did he hurt you?" She clenched her fists in anger and looked mad enough to spit. "I don’t care how cute he is, if he was mean to you, Hannah, I'm going to hate him!"
Hannah waved away her sister's anger, sorry that she'd got Myrtie on the wrong track.
"No, no, he didn't hurt me." She thought about the tender caresses of the morning and found herself blushing. "He was very kind actually, but you'll just have to wait until your own wedding night for the details."
Myrtie rolled to her side, propping herself on her elbow with a look of disgust. "I just can't believe you're not going to tell me," she complained. "You've always said that these things were natural and that our bodies were nothing to be ashamed of, now finally you've done it yourself, and you get as closemouthed as all the other married women!"
Hannah smiled at Myrtie. She hated disappointing her, and having her sister's undivided attention was something that happened less and less as she got older. Hannah just wished that she had more information to share.
"Okay, I'll tell you this much," she said leaning down beside her sister and whispering conspiratorially. "He was very gentle, and it wasn't unpleasant at all and it made me feel all kind of fluttery inside."
Hannah congratulated herself on not exactly lying. She had accurately described what she had felt in Henry Lee's arms this morning, and she had given her sister enough information to stir her imagination, but not anything that was totally untrue.
"Oh Hannah, I just can't believe that you are really married. Just think, by next spring you could be coming to church with a pretty little cotton-head baby of your very own."
Hannah smiled, surprised at her own delight at such a prospect, but quickly corrected her sister.
"A baby of Henry Lee's would have coal black hair," she said, picturing in her mind the child she would give him. "I'd tie that gorgeous hair all up in pink ribbons and she'd be the prettiest baby the territory had ever seen."
"What if it's a boy?" Myrtie asked laughing.
"Well." Hannah flopped down next to her sister on the bed, allowing her imagination full sway. "Maybe not pink ribbons, but he would still be the prettiest baby in the territory."
"You'd want him to look like his papa then?" Myrtie teased. "Henry Lee is so good-looking! All the girls think so. And you always acting like you never noticed."
Hannah smiled with a bit of pride, pleased at the thought of finding herself the envy of young girls.
Her voice was stern, but teasing, threatening mayhem. "You just tell your friends to keep their eyes off my husband!"
The two sisters collapsed together on the bed, laughing and hugging.
Henry Lee heard their merriment as he came through the house. He'd parked the wagon at the front door, and he wanted to load up Hannah's trunk. Truth to tell, he was ready to get out of here. Nearly everyone had stopped by the wagon to wish him and Hannah the best, and to let them know that the community had forgiven them for, as one farmer put it, plowing the corn before the fence was in. He didn't wish to discuss it any further with anyone. He and Hannah would make a good life together, and the sooner the gossip about them stopped altogether, the easier it would be to make that life.
He was just about to knock on the door when he heard the sweet music of female laughter. One voice high and tinkly, the other low and throaty, like a burgundy wine. Somehow he knew that laugh belonged to Hannah. It spoke to him in a way that sent strange hot sparks through his veins, warming him inside as well as out.
As he tried to reason out the peculiar feeling, he just caught the words in Myrtie's voice.
“Oh Hannah, I'm so happy at how well everything has turned out for you. I can hardly wait until you have that baby. You'll be such a wonderful mother, and I'll be the best aunt you ever saw."
“Now Myrtie, don't you be talking about that where anybody can hear you. We've had enough scandal involved in this marriage already. I don't want anybody talking any more about me if I can help it." Hannah laughed thinking what someone might think to hear a woman talking about having a baby the morning after her wedding.
"Oh Hannah, you know I won't tell a soul, I swear it!" Myrtie giggled tauntingly. "My sister, Hannah, a mother at last, I can hardly believe it."
Henry Lee stood stock-still, frozen in place. All color drained from his face and a hollow pit seemed to have opened inside him. He turned abruptly and returned to the wagon. Somebody spoke to him, but he ignored them. He could barely hear for the roaring rage inside his head.
It all made sense now, perfect sense. She needed a husband and he was simply the one best able to fill the bill. His reputation had done him in. No one would doubt that the genteel Miss Hannah had been seduced by the Whiskey Man.
And he had believed her. He thought her sweet and innocent and foolishly smitten by him. He remembered last night, how she had pretended to be so frightened and he had wanted to spare her. He had wanted to spare her, and she had been rolling in the hay with God-knows-who for no telling how long! He slammed a hay hook into the back of the wagon in anger. The movement startled the horse and he had to hurry to the front to quiet the young gelding.
He stood beside the animal, crooning softly, trying to calm himself as he calmed the horse. She had made a fool of him. She and her lover were probably laughing at him right now. He had thought he was doing her a favor, what a joke. It was a joke all right and it had been played on him. At least the rest of the community didn't know what a fool she had made of him. At least they didn't know it yet.
He wondered why her lover hadn't married her himself. Maybe he was already married, or maybe she'd had so many men that she didn't know who the father was. No, he ruled that out. Had she been round-heeled, he surely would have heard of it. Things like that couldn't be kept secret. But an affair with a married man could be. Obviously it had been.
Henry Lee stroked the soft nose of the horse and worried about what he should do next. He'd given her the benefit of the doubt when they'd been caught at the wellhouse. He didn't feel obliged to accommodate her anymore.
How in the world did she think she would get away with this? Did she intend to pretend innocence in his bed and then claim the baby had arrived early? He heard of women trying to play those tricks, but he never thought that it would really work. In his heart a man would know the truth, or his suspicions would drive him crazy.
Henry Lee was tempted to just hop in the wagon and ride off into the sunset forever. He felt like such a dolt falling right into her devious little scheme.
He knew he wasn't the first man to have been tricked into claiming another man's son, but he sure as hell was not going to let her think that her evil little plan had worked. She was his wife now, and she would learn to rue the day she tried to make a fool out of Henry Lee Watson.
By the time Hannah and Myrtie had everything gathered up, she was very excited. She was going to have her own home, her own husband. It was like a dream come true. She had discovered a new closeness with her sister and a kinship with her stepmother, and other women in the community. She was a married lady. At last, all the rights and privileges of that blissful state had been visited on Hannah.
Talking with Violet as they sorted linens and packed baskets of fruits and vegetables, the conversation drifted to the concerns of governing a household.
“Now I doubt that Henry Lee has much of a garden," her stepmother told her. "You best start right away getting whatever you can out of the ground, it's really too late to plant much but maybe squash and turnips."
"Do you think he'll have much put up already?" Hannah asked her.
"I doubt it. I suspect that bachelors don't even know how
to put things up. Making his place into a home should keep you busy for a while."
Hannah was suddenly very anxious to do just that. She knew she was an excellent housekeeper. She would make such a wonderful home for Henry Lee, he would never regret having to marry her.
Her father carried out her things to the wagon as quickly as Hannah, her stepmother, and sister could get them ready. She kept waiting for Henry Lee to come back inside the house, but for some reason, he continued to tarry by the wagon.
Finally when everything had been taken out and loaded up, Hannah said her good-byes and went out to join her new husband.
He was standing by the wagon, leaning against it and staring out at the distance. As she watched, his gaze turned to her. She smiled broadly at him, but he only continued to stare, his face completely expressionless. This abrupt change in his attitude disconcerted Hannah. However, since her family was beside her, all expecting hugs and kisses and saying good-bye and wishing her luck, she had no choice but to act as if everything were fine and that her future was secured.
Tying on her sunbonnet, Hannah stepped down from the porch, and with only a slight glance back, she went to join him.
Henry Lee helped Hannah into the wagon seat and pulled himself up beside her. Thankfully, most of the other folks had already gone, he thought. It was difficult enough being in front of her parents, who surely didn't know what she'd done to him. He didn't know if he would have been able to tolerate a crowd where, possibly, the father of Hannah's baby stood by watching their progress and laughing at Henry Lee.
Her smile when she had come out of the house had made him flash hot then cold. He still remembered the pleasure of this morning, but the betrayal was more vivid and infinitely more important. He decided it was best not to look at her at all. He released the brake on the wagon and with a curt wave to her parents, snapped the reins, urging the horse out into the lane and headed east toward his own place.
The summer breeze felt cool against his angry cheeks as Henry Lee kept his eyes unfalteringly on the head of the horse and the line of harness running toward the wagon. After a quick glance at her husband's dark visage, Hannah concentrated on the beautiful morning and the countryside. Unlike Henry Lee, Hannah had only good feelings for the day. Even his less than enthusiastic reception when she came out of the house did not upset her greatly.
She assumed that he had been thinking about the trick she had played on him. He would probably want her to explain herself. She wasn't sure yet what she was going to say, but she had confidence now that, as his wife, and the future mother of his children, he would be able to forgive her.
The day was hot, but the nice breeze blowing in from the south made it all seem bearable. The activity of the bees in the clover made a lazy sound that, for all their activity, was strangely relaxing. The sky was an unusual shade of steel blue, so different from the sky she remembered from her childhood in Kansas. She'd come to think of it as Oklahoma Blue, always accented with wispy feathers of clouds hung way high, as if to remind you continually that the weather was changeable.
"It's a beautiful day, don't you think?" she asked, deciding that a good marriage would need to start with amiable conversation.
"Hot."
"But the breeze is nice."
"Yeah."
"Think we'll get some rain pretty soon for the crops?"
"Maybe."
Hannah was surprised at Henry Lee's reticence. He'd always appeared to be a man quite willing to talk, but this morning he didn't seem to have much to say. If he was angry, she wished that he would just say so. It was best to just tear into a sore spot and wrestle it through. She didn't believe in letting bad feelings fester.
The countryside was mostly still in prairie grass, although here and there she could see the beginnings of farming. The land here was hilly, but free of rocks and trees. What trees there were grew concentrated on the banks of creeks and ponds. Since Hannah had never been to Henry Lee's place before, she was curious about her new home. She knew it was located in the Indian Territory, an area much older and more settled than the new Oklahoma Territory just beside it. But up till now she had never had any cause to venture that far.
"You live on this side of Pearson's Creek, or do we have to cross?" she asked, trying to draw out her new husband.
"Cross."
"Does it look like this?"
"Like what?"
"Like this. Like you can see for miles, just grass and sky."
"Woods."
"What?"
"It's woods, it's in the hills, it's not like this." His voice was impatient and there was an undertone of unmistakable anger.
"Oh." Hannah was rebuffed. Obviously Henry Lee considered her attempt at conversation feeble. Well, she supposed that discussing the lay of the land was somewhat like discussing the weather.
"What about the house?"
"What about it?"
"Is it big or little, white or clapboard, tell me about it."
"It's a poled cabin."
"A poled cabin?"
"Straight logs, no split rails."
"It's a log cabin?" she asked excitedly. "I've never even seen a log cabin!"
"There's more timber around the creek and up on the hills."
"Oh, how romantic! Just like the real pioneers. I wonder if it looks like Abe Lincoln's did."
He turned finally to look at her, his face like a thundercloud. "Abe Lincoln was a Republican!" he said sharply.
"Well, yes, I suppose he was," Hannah replied lamely. Politics was obviously another poor choice of subject. She had always been a Jayhawker Republican, because her father was. She wondered if now being married to Henry Lee automatically made her a southern Democrat. She decided that it was best to stick to subjects more suited to a wife.
"I'm sure that I will love the house."
"It's plenty good enough for the likes of you!"
Hannah was taken aback by his rudeness. It was as if he had slapped her. She guessed it was time to try to explain what had happened in the wellhouse. How would she explain it? she wondered. Well, she wasn't going to lie anymore. She would tell him as little as possible, but it would be the absolute truth.
She took a deep breath and said a silent prayer for help from heaven.
"I know I owe you an explanation of what I was doing in the wellhouse," she started, staring straight ahead, not able to meet his eyes. "I realize how angry you are, so it seems to me that we ought to go ahead and discuss it, get it out of the way."
"I never get angry!" Henry Lee barked at her, realizing that he had been furious for the last two hours! He was looking straight ahead again and clenching his jaw. He wondered if she had managed to think up some plausible lie to try to get him to swallow. Somehow he was sure that she had, and that when she told it, things would be worse than they already were. It was time that he took the situation in hand. She was no longer deciding how the game was to be played. Henry Lee Watson was the man she would answer to now!
"I already figured out about what you were doing in that wellhouse."
Hannah looked at him, startled. What could he possibly know?
"Do you think I'm a complete fool? Did you think that I wouldn't find out?"
Hannah was totally unprepared for this. She hadn't told a soul about her plan, how could he have guessed it? Had anyone else suspected?
"How did you find out?"
Henry Lee's look was rough and angry.
"I know, that's the important thing. So there is no need for you to continue to pretend that you have any feelings for me. I never could abide a liar."
Hannah was stung. She wished, unrealistically, that she could just jump off the wagon and walk back home, but she couldn't. She'd made this trouble for herself, and she knew she would have to accept the consequences it had generated.
"I planned to tell you eventually," she answered guiltily. "But I was hoping by then you'd be more used to me and that you wouldn't mind."
"You were hoping that I woul
dn't mind!" He was snarling through clenched teeth. He took a deep breath to control his rising anger. "Maybe I'm not a churchgoer, Miss Hannah, and maybe my folks weren't the finest, but believe me, I mind! I mind just as much as any of those damn farmers."
"Well, of course I knew that you would mind," Hannah backtracked reasonably. "I know that you would not have intentionally chosen to marry me, but I was hoping that now that it is done, well, I ... I think we could make a life together."
His angry silence seemed to last forever. Henry Lee could not make his thoughts coherent. He was a jumble of anger, and he deplored that emotion, considering it a weakness. He concentrated fruitlessly on the horse in front of him as he tried to corral his shaking fury. His stillness seemed to say to Hannah that he didn't want to make a life with her. She had no idea what to say to that. "I'm sorry," was her final choice.
"Yeah, well, I'm pretty goddamn sorry, too!" His voice was rough, and his eyes were blazing.
Hannah was not shocked by his language, but the force of his disdain was frightening. For an instant she feared that he might strike her, but as she watched he seemed to gather his control.
Henry Lee was outraged. It added insult to injury for Hannah to think that he would be so glad to have a woman like her that he would quickly forget that she had been another man's first. It seemed to him the ultimate in conceit, that because she was a so-called decent woman, he should be glad to have her at any price.
She thought she was better than him because he wasn't the offspring of stalwart citizens like those in her daddy's church. He was Skut and Molly's brat and no matter what he tried to do with his life, no one ever let him forget that.
The man he called father, Skut Watson, had moved to Indian Territory after the Confederacy's defeat. Not that politics had meant anything to Skut. He was only thirteen and custom made for trouble when he'd joined up with the rebels. Burning, stealing, and killing became little more than recreation to the rough group he rode with, but it wasn't enough for him. Skut Watson had hoped to make some money out of the war.
He was one of those men who were always just a minute away from success. All his life he spent looking for the easy way, the fast way, the get-rich-quick scheme that never quite materialized. It had led him near and far after the war, searching for that big payoff. Finally it had led him to Fort Gibson on a snowy afternoon in February. The commander was in a mess of trouble. He was, unbeknownst to his faithful wife, keeping a half-breed Cherokee mistress. The pretty, light-skinned beauty was pregnant and demanding the commander marry her. She was threatening to make trouble and he needed to get rid of her in a hurry. The arrival of Skut Watson was timed perfectly; the commander paid real gold to have her taken away.
