Rosa was too startled to respond at once. She had not let herself hope that Jem might want her as his woman, but that seemed to be what he did want. And yet it didn’t seem credible. Why would he want to leave a rich woman for a poor Mexican who had been misused?
“I am . . . surprised,” she told him. “You are no longer to be with your wife?”
Jim shook his head. “You saved me when you grabbed that bridle,” he told her. “Otherwise I would have killed all these people.”
“Yes, I did that—but it’s past,” she told him. “You are not killing anybody now. I expect your wife is a good wife. Why would you leave her for a poor woman like me?”
“I’m better with you than I am with Tasmin,” he said.
Beyond that he couldn’t explain.
Rosa waited, but he said no more. Yet she thought she must make him be clear.
“Jem, are you asking me to be your woman?” she asked, watching him closely as she said it.
Jim nodded. “And you mean to send away your wife?”
He nodded again.
Rosa said no more. Jim waited, nervously. He wanted an answer, but Rosa didn’t immediately give him one.
“Will you, then?” he asked. “I don’t know,” Rosa said quietly. “I am glad that you want this, but I don’t know.”
“When will you know?” he asked.
Rosa took his hand and squeezed it, to show that she was not being hard.
“When I’ve met this wife you want to send away—then I’ll know,” she said.
60
Davy Crockett, sober and somber . . .
YOU KNOW, CROCKETT, it’s rather odd,” Lord Berry-bender said. “I started my military career attempting to shoot small brown men through the dust and the smoke, and here I am at the end of my military career, still attempting to shoot small brown men through the dust and the smoke. There’s a certain symmetry to it, wouldn’t you say?”
Davy Crockett, sober and somber, mainly wished the old lord would stop talking. The siege of the Alamo had lasted almost two weeks, and the mood inside the old mission was not optimistic. Inside the walls of the mission’s courtyard Mexican bodies were piled in heaps; and yet there seemed to be an endless supply of soldiers, ready to fling themselves at the Texans as Santa Anna commanded. Jim Bowie was sick, they were almost out of ammunition, and yet old Albany Berrybender went on babbling endlessly about battles he had fought in Portugal and Spain. Probably half of what he said were lies, Crockett thought; but then perhaps the old fellow was wise to relive old battles: it might distract him from the fact that he was likely to die in this one, a fact for which Davy Crockett knew he bore some responsibility.
“I fear I rather misled you, Albany—I supposed this would be mainly a lark,” he admitted. “I would never have supposed General Santa Anna would have come at our little company in such force— not when he has Sam Houston waiting for him on the plain of San Jacinto.”
James Bowie, very weak from typhus, sat up on his cot and began to sharpen his knife—the big knife with the handle guard that he had designed himself.
“Why, Crockett, this is just a warm-up,” he said. “Santa Anna thought he’d get an easy victory—probably wanted to get his soldiers’ blood up. I doubt the man supposed we’d be this tough.”
Around the shadowy interior of the old church, Texans were grimly counting bullets. William Travis, their leader, spent his day at a little lookout post, with his spyglass. What he was looking for was some slight sign that Santa Anna might be tiring of the siege. He knew he could overrun the Texans eventually, but on the other hand, the cost in men was not small—Travis had no time to count bodies but he supposed the Mexican casualties must be approaching a thousand men. The Texans had most of them lived by the rifle—they could shoot, and they had, day after day, for almost two weeks. A wise general would not sacrifice a thousand men to overrun a force of less than two hundred; and yet generals were not always wise, and the men were being sacrificed. The wisdom of generals was a topic Lord Berrybender was happy to expound upon, on chill evenings, in the old church.
“Napoleon—brilliant of course, but hardly wise,” he said. “Got cocky after Austerlitz and let the Russians suck him in. I suppose that’s what we’ve done with General Santa Anna. We’ve sucked him in and your General Houston can mop him up.”
“Rather rough on us, of course,” Lord B. added. “Fortunes of war and all. Luck bound to run out sometime.”
The last remark set Davy Crockett grumbling. “Speak for yourself, Albany,” Crockett said. “I’m not ready to have my luck run out. I didn’t come to Texas to die—always rather fancied dying in a brothel, if you must know.”
“An original choice, certainly,” Lord Berry-bender replied. “I expect we could find a few whores around here, if only the Mexicans would give us a pass. Easy enough to get passes at such times in Europe—officers’ honor and all that, but it doesn’t seem to have caught on here.”
“Nope, they mean to have our gizzards, and no entertainment allowed,” Jim Bowie remarked.
“If we’re to be slaughtered I hope it happens before the brandy runs out,” Lord Berrybender remarked. “I have rather an enviable reputation as a drinking man. I’d hate to be sober when I draw my last breath.”
Davy Crockett didn’t like the cheerful tone in which Lord Berrybender spoke of the likelihood that they would all be killed. It might be true enough, but why talk about it? The thing to do was keep one’s focus on life.
“Well, America’s a grand place—my only regret is that I never got to shoot a grizzly bear,” Lord Berrybender said. There was every sign that another charge was coming. The Texans had repulsed many, perhaps they would repulse this one—and yet, perhaps not.
“Deplorable uniforms!” he yelled, when the Texans’ guns had all but fallen silent—the brown men, at last, began to pour in.
“I’d speak to somebody about those uniforms— they make you look like clowns!” he yelled to the fellow who was rushing at him with the shining bayonet. Jim Bowie, he saw, was up and whirling like a dervish, jabbing and striking with his big knife.
Lord Berrybender just managed to parry the bayonet with his rifle, but another soldier came rushing just as fast and this time the blade went into his chest with a thunck, as if someone had stabbed a big ripe melon. Very surprising it was, that melon-struck sound. He thought he must remember to mention it to Vicky; but then, as he sank down, he realized that he would not be mentioning much else to his Vicky—how he had always liked that long, slim body of hers. The soldier in the clown uniform was trying to pull the bayonet out of his chest, but the bayonet seemed to be stuck. It was all more surprising than painful. He remembered the look on Señor Yanez’s face when the Pawnee boy ran at him and stuck the lance deep into him. Surprised was how the small gun-smith had looked: perhaps that was how he looked at the moment—surprised. Then the boy did jerk the bayonet out and Lord Berrybender sank to his knees. All around him men were struggling, but he himself felt rather like stretching out. Time for a nap, gentlemen, he thought—time for a nap.
61
. . . dark rumors began to reach them . . .
THE AUSTIN COLONY was all in a turmoil, would-be soldiers arriving almost hourly to fight for the Texas Republic—volunteers departed at an equal rate, hoping not to miss the glorious fight, though uncertain as yet which battle offered the best chance for glory. Petal and Elf particularly enjoyed the confusion. Both were popular with the soldiers—they were given frequent horse rides by men homesick for their own children. George Catlin was impatient—he wanted to press on to Galveston and see what boats were going where, but Tasmin and Vicky were reluctant to leave without their husbands. Vicky expected to see Lord Berrybender come up the road from San Antonio any day.
Then dark rumors began to reach them—the Texans were said to be besieged in something called the Alamo; the Mexican army was said to have an overwhelming advantage. And yet the news was all vague. It was reported that William Trav
is had drawn a line in the sand with his sword, with all those prepared to die for Texas independence on one side of it while those on the other side, who didn’t care to commit themselves, were free to leave. Some said Jim Bowie was with the stalwarts, some said Crockett was with him, but no mention was made of Lord Albany Berrybender at all.
Vicky Berrybender became deeply apprehensive—her husband, after all, was notably reckless. When Mr. Austin, even more grave than usual, came to deliver the sad news—not only Lord Berrybender but nearly two hundred defenders of the Alamo all dead—Vicky was not really surprised. What surprised Lord Berrybender’s daughters was the depth of Vicky’s grief. She not only sobbed, she screamed so loudly that her frightened son, Talley, ran to Buffum for reassurance. Tasmin could do nothing with Vicky, nor could Father Geoffrin or anyone else.
“What do you suppose she would do if Father had ever been nice to her?” Tasmin asked.
“Perhaps there was something about him that we missed,” Buffum suggested. “After all, Mama had all of us by him.”
“The ability to get women with child is a very common one,” Tasmin remarked. “It’s useful insofar as it keeps the race going, although whether that is a good thing might be debated.”
“Is debated—that’s what philosophy is all about,” Geoff told her.
“Drat you, I don’t care about philosophy!” Tasmin told him. “That old brute, my father, has now left us stranded in a place we have no reason to be. I’m his daughter. I wish I could feel something positive, but I can’t. His life was one long selfish folly, and we’re the victims of it.”
“That’s harsh, Tassie,” Mary said. “Speak no ill of the dead.”
“An absurd sentiment,” Tasmin answered. “I cannot subscribe to it.”
In fact she felt bitterness, not grief, when she thought of her father. The roll call of those who had died because of his selfishness—which included three of his grandchildren—would not be short, once it was tallied up.
“Almost two hundred heroes died at the Alamo,” Mr. Austin intoned, in his sententious way.
“If you’re counting our father, make it one hundred ninety-nine,” Tasmin said, not caring if the comment shocked her sisters. “I’m sure he shot plenty of little Mexican soldiers before he died—children most of them, like our Corporal Dominguin.”
Mr. Austin was deeply offended. “Hardly a patriotic view, under the circumstances,” he said, frowning.
“Not meant to be patriotic—but not unfair, either,” she retorted. “What could you know about the trail of dead we’ve left behind us?”
“I merely meant that it would be an inconvenient thing to say just now, when everyone is hot to kill Mexicans,” he said, shocked by the English-woman’s temerity.
“Not everyone is hot to kill Mexicans—it’s just you intemperate Texans,” Tasmin told him, where upon Stephen F. Austin turned on his heel and went away.
Geoff, George, and Tasmin’s sisters all seemed stunned by what they had heard.
“Well, am I expected to be polite to a fool like that?” Tasmin asked. “I suppose I ain’t polite enough for this fine new republic.”
“I ain’t polite either,” the cheerful Petal said.
62
She felt a stir of unease.
VICKY DIDN’T TRY TO EXPLAIN to Tasmin why she grieved so when the news came that her husband, Lord Berrybender, was dead. She found it easier to talk to Buffum, who, after all, had lost a husband also—perhaps a better husband than Albany Berry-bender could ever have been. There were men who dissembled and men who changed, and then there were men who could only be what they were. Lord Berrybender was a man of the latter sort. He had been many things that were not nice. He had been violent and he had been cold; he had been drunken, unfaithful, and brutal; he begged shamelessly when she refused him, yet he thought no more of lying to her than he would have of lying to a fly. Cruelest of all, he had shown no interest in their children, had scarcely ever invited either boy into his lap, where Tasmin’s brash Petal installed herself without bothering to ask permission.
“There is always more than people on the outside can see,” Vicky told Buffum. “He was so sweet sometimes, Buffum—so infinitely sweet. I vowed a thousand times not to forgive him, and yet when he looked at me in a certain way I could not hold to my purpose. I forgave him countless times. Do you think I’m wrong?”
“No,” Buffum said. “When men are sweet there’s no holding out.”
“They say the flesh is weak—it’s a true saying,” Vicky told her. “And yet if one is not weak—if one is strong, like Tasmin, it seems one must be mainly alone.”
She sighed.
“I was not made to be alone,” she said.
“Nor I,” Buffum told her. “I fear that Tassie is very likely to end up alone. She is so very unbending.”
“I’m certainly nothing of the sort,” Tasmin said indignantly, when Mary repeated the remark to her. “How dare she say that? I’ve yielded, I’ve compromised, I’ve abandoned position after position in order to avoid being alone. I don’t know what Buffum means. Even now all I can think of is when my husband will appear. I’ve spent more than half my marriage waiting for Jimmy to appear. I won’t have Buffum telling me that I don’t bend.”
Cook was out early the next morning, hoping to find a few eggs—the hens in Washington-on-theBrazos were skinny things. Cook felt it was better to rely on them for eggs than to attempt to cook such wiry specimens.
It was when she looked up from a nest with a single egg in it that she saw Mr. Jim coming. Behind him, on other horses, were some very ragged people. Riding beside him, at his elbow, was a brown woman. Something in the way the two looked at one another caught Cook’s attention. She felt a stir of unease.
Nonetheless she at once woke Tasmin, to give her the news.
“What? Where is he?” Tasmin asked, jumping out of bed.
“He’s just stopped to speak to Mr. Fitzpatrick,” Cook said. She was in rather a quandary about what it was best to say.
“Why do you look that way?” Tasmin asked. “Is Jimmy hurt? Tell me.”
“No, he’s not hurt,” Cook assured her, wishing she had never spoken. But Tasmin had known Cook so long that dissembling was impossible.
“There’s a woman with him,” Cook at last said. “A woman? What do you mean, a captive?” Tasmin asked, more puzzled than concerned.
“Just a woman—I shouldn’t have mentioned it,” Cook said.
63
She had been fearful of being scorned . . .
PETAL, FRIENDLY AS COULD BE, put her short white arm next to Rosa’s brown one, comparing the two tones.
“I wish I was brown—it’s prettier,” she concluded.
“You better just stay white,” Rosa told her. “If you’re white maybe you can be the queen someday.”
“Yes, and she’d certainly like that,” Cook observed. “She acts like a queen already, this little miss does.”
“I boss her,” Petal said, smiling. “I boss everybody. I even bossed my grandpa, only now he’s gone’d.”
“Your pa’s dead?” Jim asked, very startled, when Tasmin told him the news. “I didn’t think anybody could kill that old man.”
“There were said to be five thousand soldiers with General Santa Anna—I suppose it was enough to do the job,” she told him.
Tasmin refrained from asking Jim about Rosa, who had met all the Berrybenders and now sat with Petal and Cook. Jim was just back. Tasmin intended to resist her impulse to be the prying housewife. Tasmin assumed Jim had rescued Rosa, and then came to like her. It was easy to see that he did like her. Meeting the Berrybenders had made Rosa a little nervous, but not very. What they all noted about her was that she seemed very calm.
“I suppose it’s because she’s had to put up with worse things than meeting a bunch of half-addled Europeans,” Geoff remarked, trying to put his finger on the quality of Rosa’s calm.
“But does she want my husband?” Tasmin wondered
. “It’s clear that Jim wants her—but it’s not clear that she intends to accept him. What do you think, George?”
“She was taken by slavers—undoubtedly a rough experience,” George said. “Remember what happened to Buffum at the Mandans’. These hothouse questions probably mean nothing to the woman. She’s far from home—she has nothing but the clothes on her back. What Jim wants or doesn’t want may be the least of her problems.”
“But it’s not the least of mine,” Tasmin told him. “I’m not criticizing her, George. I think I like her. Whatever she is, one can see that she’s not cheap. Jim didn’t bring back a whore.”
Though Tasmin didn’t say it to the company, the questions she wanted to ask did not all have to do with Jim. The man who had ridden away, flinty faced, to revenge the murder of a wife and son was not the man who had come back, leading ten captives and a dignified Mexican woman. Jim had always been lean—it was one source of his appeal. Tasmin had always disliked fleshy men. Master Stiles had been lean, Pomp had been lean, Jim was lean. But now he seemed a skeleton, hollow-faced, haunted. He wore a look of deep unhappiness, which only changed when he looked at Rosa, or sat by her for a moment. Tasmin felt perplexed. Jim had fought fierce battles before: with the Piegans, with the Pawnee boys, with Obregon and his men. He blazed with rage, became the Sin Killer, then slowly came back to being Jim. Only this time it was clear that he had not come back. He was not the old Jim—even Petal could not quite reach him. Whatever they had gone through together had left Jim in great need of this quiet woman.
Despite her curiosity, Tasmin felt hesitant about trying to get the story from Jim—he never liked it when she questioned him. While he was busy with the horses, listening to Tom Fitzpatrick fill him in on what was known about the terrible massacre at the Alamo, Tasmin saw an opportunity and sat down by Rosa.
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