Runaway

by Donna Cooner

  “She’s going to really love living here now!” Robert informed Jarrett, his eyes rolling.

  “Didn’t the missionaries ever think it might be a good idea just to give up?” Tara asked.

  “The king suggested they leave,” Robert said, “but the missionaries were men of God—on a mission. They stayed. Then Spain demanded a ‘corn tax’ be put on the Indians, and the chief of each band was to carry the Spanish government’s payment in corn to the collection sites. Now, the priests knew that the chiefs did not do such work, so they tried to sail to Havana to have the order repealed. But their ship sank, they didn’t reach Havana, and the Indians and whites went to war.”

  “So that ended the missions?” Tara said.

  “No. Governor Moore of South Carolina came to Florida in 1702 to make war against Spain, and the missions were all razed. But you must bear in mind that they did serve a purpose. The priests taught the natives, the natives learned from them. They brought horses and cattle. They made their mark. But when Florida came under a British flag, what remained of the missions naturally began to die out. By the time Florida was returned to the Spanish, Spain hadn’t the money left to reorganize them. You have to remember, Havana was always the most important port for the Spanish in the New World. Florida became a burden, and of course, our government certainly helped that along! Our government, and of course, Jarrett’s good friend Andy Jackson.”

  Tara glanced up at her husband, who had moved away from the book, leaving her and Robert to peruse it alone. He stood before the fire, his back to them. He turned to face Robert with a brow arched.

  “I have never pretended to approve all of Jackson’s deeds,” he said.

  “I realize that,” Robert murmured. “Tara, I doubt if you’re old enough to remember, but there was a huge furor when Jackson came here and actually attacked Spanish positions. You see, according to our government at the time, Jackson was simply leading troops against Indians who had crossed the border into Alabama and Georgia and threatened American lives and properties. But you have to realize, all this happened just after the War of 1812. If the English had won the war, the Indians in the North Florida area might have taken back lands that were now American soil. But the Americans won, and there were a few Englishmen around who were ready to urge them to attack Americans. When Jackson came in, he was brutal.”

  Tara stared at Jarrett. “You fought under Jackson here?” she asked.

  He shook his head, annoyed. “I fought under Jackson at New Orleans. He was an extraordinary commander, an extraordinary man. But he was at times less than humane. He had two British men executed by a military court when he’d no right to do so; he took Spanish property when he’d probably no right to do so. And God knows, he has always been eager enough to take all Indian lands. If you two will excuse me, I think I’ll find some fresh air.” With a slight inclination of his head he left them.

  Puzzled, Tara looked at Robert. “I shouldn’t have brought up the old days,” Robert murmured.

  “Why?”

  Robert turned a page in the book. She gasped slightly, for his next picture was another watercolor, and an exceptionally excellent one. It was of Jarrett and James in the midst of a green hammock, their backs to one another, their expressions grave. Jarrett was dressed in a dark frock coat, high boots, tight breeches, frilled white shirt. James was in doeskin breeches and boots. A single silver crescent hung around his neck, a red turban was wound around his ink-dark hair.

  “It’s so strange, they are both so very passionate about the territory,” Robert murmured. “And so caught up in the tumult of it. Jarrett has always seen great things to come for the territory. He has tried to wear blinders regarding the Indian question. He has fought for schools and roads, and in his heart he is eager for statehood. But he’ll not become involved with politics, he can’t. Especially now. Because we are at war.”

  “But he is always trying to use his influence.”

  “Yes, and there are other men who are temperate as well, and there are very many who think that the Indians here—as well as elsewhere—have been wronged. But their voices are like the lonely cries of wolves at night howling to the moon. Roads are being built, the territory is growing. And with the growth come more and more people demanding that the Indians be removed, and so those who fight for their rights are like those trying to fight the surge of the tide. So Jarrett throws himself into the activities of his own land and tries to do what he can.”

  Tara listened to him, nodded, then kissed his cheek. “You’re a wonderful friend.”

  “Thanks. I think I’ll go find him and get down to business. Prowl where you will.”

  Tara nodded. He left her, and she turned another page. Robert had done a pen-and-ink drawing of an Indian girl by a stream, dipping her hands into the cool water to bathe her face. The girl was beautiful. Expression and nuance had been caught in the drawing. The girl must be someone he knew and knew well, she thought, but when she turned to see if she could catch him and ask him, he was gone.

  She closed the book and wondered if she should ask him about the girl, or just let it be. There had been something unique and special about the drawing. To ask him about it might well be prying.

  She set the book back on the shelf. One day, she hoped, he would offer more information.

  She became engrossed in a pirate novel and hadn’t even realized that it had grown dark when she started, aware that she was being watched.

  Jarrett stood in the doorway. She wondered how long he had stood there.

  “Enjoying the library?” he asked her.

  She nodded. “It’s very nice. But then, so is yours.”

  “Ours,” he said.

  “Ours,” she repeated, flushing softly.

  “Still, I imagine I could lose you here for days,” he told her.

  She shook her head. “No.”

  He came to her chair, kissed her on the top of the head, then reached for her hands, drawing her to her feet. “Dinner is about to be served,” he told her.

  It was late when they returned to Cimarron that night. Jarrett did not come straight up to bed with her when they arrived, but stayed below with Rutger, going over some of the business he had discussed with Robert.

  When he did come up, Tara was half asleep. Yet she became aware again that he was watching her from their bedroom doorway.

  He doused the last of the candles. She heard him stripping off his clothing and he came to their bed naked, his flesh feeling as if it were afire.

  He quickly woke her, making love to her passionately, roughly. He lay awake after, staring up at the ceiling.

  She wanted to talk to him, to reach out, to say something. But she knew if she were to question him, she would open the way for him to question her again. And she was afraid. Something had developed between them that was infinitely sweet, yet so very fragile. She couldn’t tell him the truth about herself as yet. She wanted to. She just didn’t seem to be able to.

  So she lay silent, curled within his arms.

  The tempest of the times would not let them be.

  By the following morning they had been back from his brother’s village less than two weeks. Tara paused in gathering flowers, hearing a commotion down by the dock. She walked around the lawn, biting her lip with worry as she saw that another military ship had arrived from downriver.

  “Damn them!” she swore. “Oh, damn them all!” She seemed to freeze for a moment, yet she knew there was no way to make the military ship disappear. She hurried to tell Jeeves that it seemed they would be having company again.

  Jeeves was in the breezeway, instructing one of the young maids on just how he wanted the silver polished.

  “Tyler Argosy is back, I believe. I don’t know how many men he is with, but I’m certain we’ll have at least three extra for supper.”

  Jeeves nodded. “I’ll tell the cook, Mrs. McKenzie.”

  Tara handed him her bundle of flowers. “Please—see that these go on the hall table. And�
�enlarge the wild-turkey menu we had planned … choose any wine. Jeeves, I’ve got to know what they’re doing here this time!”

  Without waiting for an answer from him she spun around and hurried out of the house once again, almost running for the dock. Jarrett wasn’t about, she realized—he had ridden to the far side of his fields, and though he would have been quickly informed that the ship was arriving, he had not made it back himself. Neither was Rutger there. Leo Hume stood on the dock, ready to greet the men who would soon spill from the ship.

  “Morning, Mrs. McKenzie,” he said.

  “Good morning,” she returned, smiling pleasantly and waiting very determinedly at his side.

  He looked at her with unease, but as the ship came in and docking orders were shouted out, she held her ground. Tyler Argosy was the first man to stride off the ship, and he was immediately pleased to see her. “Tara McKenzie!” he said, saluting first, then stretching out his hands to take hers. “Hello, Leo.”

  “Hello, Captain. Men have been sent; Mr. McKenzie will be on his way right soon.”

  “Thank you, Leo,” Tyler said, and gave his full attention to Tara. “That’s fine. Mrs. McKenzie is really much prettier.”

  “Ah, Captain Argosy! What a flatterer!” She lowered her voice to a soft modulation. “All to ease the blow! To what do we owe this great pleasure?” she demanded.

  “Oh, Tara! How lovely you are today,” he said softly, coming closer to add, “You’re not thinking that my appearance is a pleasure at all, are you, my dear? You’re wondering why this wretched soldier has come to take your husband away again.”

  “You are taking him away again?” she asked.

  “Not for long, I hope. Yet, I swear to you, Tara, there is no help for it.”

  She didn’t get a chance to say more because Jarrett came riding up hard on Charlemagne, slipping down from the stallion, his brow knit in a frown as he greeted their visitor, pulling off a riding glove to offer his hand in a firm shake. “Hello, Tyler. What is it?”

  Tyler gazed at Tara. “Perhaps we could talk in your library.”

  “Perhaps we could all talk in the library,” Tara said softly.

  “Tara …” Jarrett said.

  “Are you alone today, Captain?” Tara asked. “Where are your young sergeants?”

  Tyler looked at Jarrett. Jarrett took firm hold of her shoulders, turning her about to propel her toward the house. “My love, please go tell Jeeves that Captain Tyler will be joining us alone.”

  “My love,” she responded swiftly, turning back. “I’ve already spoken with Jeeves.”

  “But he won’t know that Tyler is alone. Tyler, have you a preference for wine?” Jarrett asked.

  “Definitely! That same fine Bordeaux.”

  “Tara, if you will, please?”

  The words were firm. The men wanted her gone.

  She stared at them both. “You’ll have to tell me what’s going on eventually!” she said, her tone level and hard. She turned regally and strode back toward the house.

  When she reached the porch and looked back, she thought that Tyler had brought very grave news. He and Jarrett were deep in conversation and Jarrett’s features were more taut and drawn than she had ever seen them. Leo and a number of the other men on the dock had gathered around, all of them listening gravely.

  Tara found Jeeves, then paced the hallway. She waited for the men to make their way to the library.

  But it seemed they had determined to do their talking on the lawn—now that she was off it!

  Jeeves came to the breezeway where she was pacing. He watched her unhappily. She paused in front of him at last. “It’s madness!” she told him. “They’re always trying to protect women from words, but words don’t bring about evil—they can only warn against it! I’m sure the husbands of wives killed in their homes were very careful not to let them know the danger before they lost their scalps!”

  “Mrs. McKenzie, you know you’re in no danger.”

  She closed her eyes for a moment. Poor Jeeves! He couldn’t begin to know what danger might be out there—waiting in the world—for her.

  “I’m sorry, Jeeves,” she murmured to him. “Did you want something?”

  “Mr. McKenzie sent word that they wouldn’t be returning to the house until dinner; he’ll see you at the table at six.”

  She went very still. “Fine!” she said softly. What did they think they could hide from her? The newspapers still arrived, even if very late. Eventually she would know what was going on.

  “Thank you, Jeeves. I will see the gentlemen then.”

  She went upstairs, shaking with both worry and anger as she dressed for dinner, going very much out of her way to be as perfect as possible, coiling her skeins of hair atop her head, finding a low-cut emerald gown and then a tiny pearl drop necklace to draw attention to the graceful bodice. She was spraying a dab of perfume at her earlobe when there was a knock at her door.

  Not Jarrett. He never knocked.

  She walked to it, throwing it open, expecting at first that Jeeves had returned to tell her the men had decided to dine aboard the military ship—and thus avoid her all night.

  But it wasn’t Jeeves standing there—it was Robert. She cried out in delight and threw herself into his arms, hugging him fiercely.

  He hugged her in return, but then quickly pulled away, holding her at arm’s length. “Now, that, Mrs. McKenzie, is the kind of greeting that’s going to make me go away just so that I can return once again. Unfortunately, I think it might also get me shot!”

  She smiled. “Well, not until later, at any rate. Jarrett is avoiding me. He’s with that Tyler Argosy.”

  “Oh,” Robert said, and she was certain that some instinctive desire to hide things from her as well came instantly over his eyes.

  “Robert, if you know something …”

  “You do want to get me shot, don’t you?” he accused her.

  “Robert …”

  “There’s really nothing I know that you don’t,” he said, “but if you’ll come downstairs and offer me a whiskey like a good hostess, I’ll be delighted to share what I do know.”

  “Come,” she told him, heading for the stairs. “I’ll absolutely douse you in whiskey if it will enlighten me at all!”

  In the library she poured whiskey for Robert, a brandy for herself, and sank into the comfortable sofa in the center of the room, watching her husband’s best friend as he paced to the long window, looking out on the lawn. Waiting.

  But he wasn’t going to give away his secrets so easily.

  He turned and smiled at her. “How have you been? I heard about your outing into the wilderness. But you’ve been home some time now too. How are you faring here now?”

  “Very well,” she replied, then lowered a finger at him. “You should have told me about Jarrett’s family. And how do you know about my excursion into the wilderness?”

  “It wasn’t my place to tell you about his family—Jarrett would have gotten to it.”

  “Perhaps—when we were old and gray and on our deathbeds.”

  Robert grinned. “He is too close to his brother to have let it go that far! I know about your excursion because I’ve just come from the village. I’ll tell you more about it, but you finish first.”

  She shook her head. “I’m fine.”

  “You look it. In fact you look wonderful. More beautiful than ever.”

  “Thank you. Well, perhaps I am fitting in,” she said softly, then looked at him and admitted, “I’m scarcely jealous of Lisa at all anymore! Oh, Robert! I went to her grave, and then Mary and Naomi told me what happened to her. I was so sorry! For everyone.”

  Robert looked down at his glass, a curious smile curving his lips. “Yes, it was a tragedy. But you never should have been jealous of her. You would have liked her.”

  “It’s just that …”

  “What?”

  “Jarrett still loves her.”

  He was silent for a minute. “Tara, he can
still hold love in his heart for her and love you as well, you know.”

  She shrugged. “Ah, but there’s little I can hide from you! You know exactly how I came to be here.”

  “How you came to be here doesn’t matter. That you are here does.”

  “Thank you,” she said again softly. “And now, no more procrastinating, sir! What is it that you know that I don’t?” she demanded.

  He shrugged after a moment, then looked at her. “Things are getting very serious in this war, you know,” he told her softly.

  “But what can it be that I haven’t heard?” she asked him. “Not much could sound more terrible than what befell Major Dade!”

  Robert took a big sip of his whiskey, rolled it in his mouth for a moment, then swallowed hard. He looked at her. “James McKenzie is moving his people,” he told her, setting his empty glass down on Jarrett’s desk.

  “What?” Tara gasped. “But I thought that his land—”

  “His land is being overrun by the military. The Treaty of Moultrie Creek is no more than a worthless piece of paper with politicians playing games with every point.”

  “But Jarrett owns so much of this land.”

  “Tara! Tara!” Robert walked over, kneeling down in front of her. He took her brandy glass from her fingers and set it on the side table, then took both of her hands. “James was born with white blood, and he reveres his father’s memory. But his mother is Seminole, his wife is Seminole, his children are Seminole, and his life is Seminole. This war has come too far, and too close. He must begin to move out of the way of the soldiers crawling the woods for battle and searching for Indians to ship west. Don’t you see, James has no choice.”

  “But Jarrett will—”

  “No, Tara. Jarrett won’t stop him. It would be wrong; he could endanger his brother. You have to understand.”

  “This is so insane!” she told him. “Jarrett and James are brothers. You have made good friends with these people. I don’t see—”

  “Tara, that’s exactly it!” he said with a sigh. “We have brought it down to people. To flesh and blood. Little children we love. Men we admire, women we like.” He smiled. “Even you’ve done that now, Tara. Yet remember how frightened you once were of the very idea of the Seminoles?”