The Pursuit of Tamsen Littlejohn

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The Pursuit of Tamsen Littlejohn Page 20

by Benton, Lori


  How he’d discovered they’d been pretending to the very commitment he’d counseled her not to make in haste or fear, she didn’t know. Perhaps Tate or Janet had given it away.

  Tamsen crossed her arms. The day was bright, the sky vibrant blue, but the air held a nip. Everyone’s noses were tipped in pink, and fingers not kept busy grew chilled. Over the farthest ridges to the west lay a blanket of cloud. A change in the weather was coming. Maybe it wasn’t so bad she’d driven them all outside to enjoy the sun, while it lasted.

  “Jesse let the Allards believe we’re married for my reputation at first, and it seemed a good thing he did so when Cade left. But, Reverend, you need to know that we aren’t … I mean, Jesse hasn’t …”

  “I know he hasn’t,” the reverend said, “and that you aren’t.”

  “You do?” Tamsen asked, surprised, but could tell by his face he understood what she was trying to say, and believed her. Too embarrassed to ask how he knew, she hurried on, “I’m just not sure misleading everyone was the best thing.”

  “I take it you’re no more inclined to make it truth?”

  She’d hoped he wouldn’t ask that.

  Everything the reverend had said of Jesse, that day she’d let him talk her out of marriage, had proved true. He was a good man. A godly man. She was grateful to him. She cared for him. More than cared, she thought, minding the feelings he stirred in her when their gazes met. At the same time, she felt she’d traded one cage for another, that she was stuck there at the cabin—hidden away, waiting with her breath held in unspoken dread—unable to decide her future while her past might yet pounce from the shadows, tearing Jesse to pieces for daring to help her. There was still that abduction charge.

  “I don’t know.” Tamsen smiled ruefully, adding in a lighter tone, “All I do know is that I ought to have stuck with corn mush for supper. It’s the one thing I can get to the table without leaving disaster in my wake.”

  She laughed weakly, as the reverend started to reply. But she never learned what he might have said to that.

  Behind them a throat cleared. “Tamsen? Reverend? Pardon my interrupting.”

  Though Jesse had addressed them both, it was Tamsen he fixed in his gaze when they turned. How long had he been standing behind them? Her face heated, until she read the contrition in his eyes.

  “I didn’t know letting the Allards think us married was causing you such upset. I’ll set it right. I’ll tell Tate before they head for home. He can tell Janet if he thinks she needs to know.”

  “You’ll tell him everything?” Luther Teague asked, with emphasis on the last word.

  Jesse’s gaze sharpened on the reverend, a look almost of warning in his eyes. “Yes,” he said shortly, then swung his gaze back to her, his expression softening. “I’ll have a talk with Bethany as well. I’m not best pleased with her at the moment, and I think she ought to know. It’s high time she did a bit of growing up, showed you the respect you deserve as my—”

  She’d been about to ask what they were inferring, and why they didn’t want her to know about it, but mention of Bethany—and what Jesse had almost called her—distracted Tamsen. She saw the blood mount in his face to match her blush. “Jesse, no. That might hurt her worse. Go ahead and talk to Tate, if you want, but … not Bethany. Not yet.”

  “All right. If that’s what you want.” Jesse’s eyes on her were intent, questioning.

  “It is,” she said.

  He nodded, took a step away, then abruptly turned back and closed the space between them. The cabin and the yard and the Allards and the reverend ceased to exist as far as Tamsen was concerned as Jesse took her shoulders firm between his hands and leaned his head down, until their foreheads nearly touched.

  “You listen to me,” he told her, his voice a low, brusque rumble. “I’d rather take corn mush from your hand—morning, noon, and night—than chicken and apple pie from any other. And that’s the plain truth.”

  Then he was gone, striding off and calling to Tate, leaving her breathless and staring straight ahead at nothing … and inwardly at everything. Staring and smiling through the pressure of tears nothing like the ones that had threatened before.

  Then she blinked, coming back to her surroundings, and remembered she wasn’t alone.

  Luther Teague, who’d missed nothing of that exchange, was looking at her with a gentle knowing in his eyes.

  Hickory leaves sifted down like sparks at the clearing’s edge, quickening to yellow-brown flurries as a chill breeze gusted. The target fastened to the shedding hickory was of crude construction, deerskin stuffed with grass, a charcoal circle drawn large in its center.

  Ten paces away, Tamsen raised the pistol, steadied it, drew back the hammer, and squeezed the trigger. There was the tiny pause as flint struck frizzen, then noise exploded and the pistol jerked in her hands. She opened her eyes, squinting through powder smoke.

  “Did I hit it?”

  Beside her, Jesse fought a grin. “It must’ve jumped again.”

  “No!” She’d fired three times and had yet to graze the target. She restrained the childish urge to stamp her foot.

  “Next time,” Jesse suggested, “try keeping your eyes open.”

  “Did I shut them again?”

  “Squinched tight with your nose wrinkled up. Cutest thing I ever saw.”

  It was hard to be nettled in the face of his teasing. His teeth were near white as a child’s, straight save for the bottom front pair, crowded close. She liked how his smile softened his features, how his eyes, golden brown as autumn leaves, sparkled on the verge of laughter, even if it was at her expense.

  She recalled of a sudden how those features had unnerved her back in Morganton. How could she have thought his a reckless face—his character too, by implication? Brave he surely was, and daring with it—enough to turn his life heels-up to help a near stranger. But reckless? Jesse Bird was the steadiest of men, and if his face was disconcerting to her now, it was only because it was captivating. And hawk-wild beautiful.

  “Here. Let me reload it for you.”

  Tamsen handed over the pistol, then drew chilled hands beneath her cloak, watching Jesse retrieve ball and patch from his bullet-bag. He’d opted for the pistol, since she’d been unable to hold the rifle steady enough to aim. Though Cade had yet to return, White Shell’s wedding was drawing near. Jesse wanted to leave her able to defend herself. “Keep nigh the Allards, and there oughtn’t come a need for it. But you should know how to shoot, in any case.”

  Mist had blanketed the creek when they set out to practice. The sun hadn’t risen far before a grim line of clouds scudded in, threatening rain. November was nigh upon them, the flames of autumn cooling as the trees on the ridges bared their limbs to the coming winter. Wedges of geese had arrowed over all morning, honking their way southward—all save one that Jesse brought down, destined for their table.

  “Watch me while I load,” he said now. “You’ll do it next time.”

  She wrung her fingers to warm them as he half-cocked the hammer, then poured a measure of powder down the short barrel. Though she’d watched him load the pistol when they’d begun shooting, his movements had been fluid, too fast to follow. This time he paused between each step so she could memorize it. He wrapped the lead ball in a papery scrap of wasp nest and rammed it in after the powder. “Nice and tight fitted.” He fixed the ramrod beneath the barrel. “Keep the muzzle up … Put a bit of powder in the pan … Snap the frizzen in place, and you’re set.”

  He handed her the pistol. Determined to keep her eyes open, she took aim on the target. This time when she pulled the trigger, Jesse gave a whoop.

  “That’s more like it!”

  Excitement surging, Tamsen hurried forward through the pluming smoke to see not only had she hit the target, she’d hit inside the circle. The very edge, but still.

  “You’ve a good eye,” Jesse told her as she fingered the hole bleeding grass onto the leaf-strewn ground. “All you need do is keep it
open.”

  Thrice more she hit the target before Jesse reached for the canteen he’d brought along, tilted it to drink, and then handed it to her. Her fingers were dark with powder soot. She tasted the residue on her lips as she drank. “Am I all begrimed?”

  “Shooting’s messy business.” He fished a kerchief from his bag. “Ought to have seen me and Cade after Kings Mountain. Couldn’t tell which of us was white.”

  She thought he meant to hand her the kerchief, but he cupped her face with his hand and wiped at the smudges himself. The touch of his fingers, warm against her wind-chilled skin, chased all thought of pistols from her mind. His knuckle brushed her lip. Their eyes locked. His fingers on her stilled. She heard him swallow. He started to bend toward her, then he pulled away and knelt, returning the kerchief to the bag.

  Flustered, breathless, she blurted, “Kings Mountain? That’s the battle where Reverend Teague lost his arm.”

  “And his son.” Jesse took out another ball and wad of wasp nest. He looked up at her, squinting a bit. “Did your stepfather fight in that battle?”

  She hadn’t expected the question. “He managed to do no fighting at all.” In war or business, Hezekiah Parrish was on no side save his own. She tried to quell all thought of him, the lingering dread it brought. She didn’t want it crowding out other feelings. Not now. Just now she wanted Jesse to touch her again, to do what it seemed he’d almost done. Kiss her.

  He stood, extending the pistol to her. Their fingers brushed as she took the gun. She nearly dropped it for the jolt it stirred. Jesse wouldn’t meet her gaze.

  “Why’d your mother marry such a man?”

  Now she was grateful for the distracting subject. “She had to. Papa died, leaving Mama with me and no way to provide. Mr. Parrish is Papa’s cousin.” She’d lost the fleeting memory of his touch and was thinking instead of the bruised clouds spreading across the sky, of her mother lying dead in a near-stranger’s bed. “Have you heard something you haven’t told me, about Mr. Parrish?”

  “There’s been no word of him,” Jesse was quick to reassure. “Or of Kincaid. Not in Sycamore Shoals. Seth or Dominic would’ve mentioned it.”

  The Trimbles had visited twice since delivering the summons to muster against the Creeks. Sniffing after Bethany, who did little to discourage the attention.

  “It’s a long way from Jonesborough to come courting so often.”

  Jesse’s gaze lifted toward the creek and home. “They happened to be in Jonesborough that day we nearly signed us a marriage bond, but they live in Sycamore Shoals.”

  Not even a full day’s ride away.

  “Haven’t they farms to tend?”

  Jesse snorted. “Those two farm? Not hardly. Seth works at the smithy, Dom at the tavern—when they keep off the liquor and don’t get distracted by a horse race or a game of loo.”

  “Or a courtroom brawl?”

  Jesse pursed his lips and shrugged, then seemed to put the Trimbles out of mind, searching her face as if he sought to read her thoughts. “You still worried about Parrish and Kincaid?”

  “Not to lie awake at night, but yes.” If only they could discover whether her stepfather had given up the hunt without revealing themselves in the process.

  “Just remember, when I go—”

  “Stay close by the Allards.” She smiled as she said it, wanting to be brave for him in this one thing at least, because the thoughts going through her mind—thoughts she was too much a coward to share with this man who’d risked so much to help her—were all about wanting even more from him. If her stepfather gave up hunting her, could they have a chance at a true marriage? Could she become the kind of wife a man like Jesse Bird needed?

  She reached for the powder horn he held ready. “I’d best fire this pistol a time or two more, if I aim to be a sharpshooter before you come back from Chota.”

  “If Cade hadn’t taken you away from the Shawnees, would you have become a warrior?” Tamsen’s voice rose above the creek’s chatter as she strode behind him, returning from the shooting.

  Jesse paused on the path, letting her catch up. She hadn’t worn a cap today. With the hood of her cloak thrown back, her hair was curling up around her face with the damp of coming rain on the air. He admired her hair—everything else about her too, but that hair was a glory, near-black and shiny, pinned up off her slender neck and looking so heavy he wondered she could carry her head so proud.

  “I mightn’t have had the chance,” he said in answer to her question. “I told you we left the Shawnees not long after the fighting with Dunmore’s troops?” He steered her ahead of him on the path so she’d hear without his having to shout. “The Shawnees were forced to talk peace. One price of that peace was handing over their children born white.”

  “Their captives?”

  “Aye.” He tightened his grasp on the goose he’d shot and frowned at the trail ahead, sifted over with russet leaves. “But that don’t mean what you might think. Some were glad enough to go back. Most weren’t.”

  “But why not?”

  “Anyone the Shawnees adopt is well treated, cherished like the family member they’re meant to replace. Don’t matter if they’re white, black, or red.”

  “Like you, for Split Moon and Red-Quill-Woman?”

  Behind her Jesse smiled, pleased she’d remembered their names. “Aye. Those adopted young, like me, didn’t recall their white kin. Or if they did, most had no inclination to stop being Shawnee. Some were grown and married, with children of their own.”

  She glanced back at him, looking as if such a thought had never crossed her mind. “And the Shawnees gave them up that easily?”

  He tensed, then reminded himself there was no way she could understand. In his heart he would always straddle the red world and the white, even if he never saw another Shawnee face, but he was getting on in the white world mostly on account he let folk forget he’d ever been anything but a frontier hunter, who happened to have a half-Delaware man looking out for him as a pa would do.

  “Weren’t nothing easy in it,” he said, keeping his tone even. “Many of the Shawnees were desperate for peace. Too many were dead. Hearts were on the ground in those days.”

  Every day since, he reckoned. Peace hadn’t lasted long, despite all the Shawnees had given up for it. Peace never did last, it seemed.

  At a lip of stone jutting across the path where the creek made a little fall, Tamsen stopped and looked at him, the tip of her nose pink from the chill. “Hearts on the ground?”

  “You understand what that means?” he asked, then looked into those dark eyes of hers. Of course she knew.

  “But Red-Quill-Woman. Didn’t it put her heart on the ground when you and Split Moon failed to come back from that hunt?”

  “She’d died the winter before.” He’d been orphaned for the second time that day Split Moon’s chest was blown open by a white hunter’s musket. That day Wolf-Alone saved him.

  “What would you have done,” Tamsen asked, “if you’d been one the Shawnees were forced to give back?”

  Jesse stepped off the rock and turned to help her over the drop with his free hand. He didn’t let go when she was steady on her feet, just went on down the trail, reaching back and clasping her hand, like it was a thing they’d done countless times. She didn’t pull away.

  “I’d have run off, hidden till it was safe to come back.” It amazed him he could sound normal with her small chilled hand in his and his heart banging away with the thrill of it. “Done whatever I could to stay with the People.”

  “You hadn’t any white family to go back to.”

  Her hand was warming in his. He thought of twining their fingers together but feared to go too far.

  “Not without knowing the name I was born with,” he said, thinking of that ritual on the edge of sleep. Always the memories ended in a canoe on a broad river, brown shoulders all around him, strong arms dipping paddles, feathers in scalp-locks twirling in the breeze. In the wake of that canoe lay the
unknown country, his first years on earth, a dark brink that drew him to stand at its edge and gaze into the void. If a bridge existed across that blackness, he’d yet to find it. He wanted to. Even if his admitting to it was likely what upset Cade enough to drive him away.

  “Truth to tell, in my heart of hearts, I’m still that little Cat-That-Scratches. What think you of that?” He looked back to see her lip caught between her pretty teeth. She wouldn’t return his look, but she still held his hand.

  Possessing his soul in patience was a lesson coming hard. He didn’t want to be talking about himself, but of her. Her soul was a country he longed to explore and know as well as he did every stone that pocked that creek path. “Now I’ve told you something of my past, it’s only fair I get to ask something of yours.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  They were nigh the cabin clearing. He glimpsed it through a fringe of red sumac and wished they’d miles yet to walk.

  “How ’bout, what’s the first book you ever read? Or had read to—”

  They’d come out of the trees. With the corn harvested, the line of sight up to the cabin was unobscured. Two horses stood outside the stable. Sitting in the cabin’s open doorway was Seth Trimble.

  Jesse halted, letting go of Tamsen’s hand to grasp the butt of the rifle slung across his back. Two horses. One Trimble.

  Thunder rumbled as Seth caught sight of them. He shot to his feet.

  “Company,” Jesse muttered.

  Tamsen’s face showed no more pleasure than Jesse felt. He started up the slope with the dead goose dangling and heard her following.

  Seth called out something, a greeting perhaps, but thunder murmured again; whatever he’d said was lost. He took a step toward the side of the cabin, then checked, looking back at them approaching.

  Unease gripped Jesse’s chest.

  From somewhere out of sight, there came another sound. A sound like a muffled scream.

  A sheet of red slashed across his vision.

  “Stay clear of this,” he said, catching Tamsen’s puzzled gaze. There was no time to explain. He slung the rifle off his shoulder, dropped the goose at her feet, and broke into a sprint.

 

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