Emily took the long hunter upstairs, and Davis settled back down on the bench. As happy as he was to know that Powell was alive after all, he almost wished the man had never walked in. Now he knew that Andrew was likely somewhere close by, probably within a day's ride of Logan's Fort. Davis leaned forward, ran his fingers through his hair, and sighed. The past might go away for a while, but it always—always!— came back.
That evening, Conn Powell regaled the tavern's customers with tales of the adventures he'd had since coming over the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky with Daniel Boone seventeen years earlier. Willy Malone dashed from one end of the bar to the other to keep up with the shouted demands for more whiskey and beer and cider.
Davis, however, walked out back of the building and looked up at the stars shining so bright in the cold night sky and wondered what he should do.
He had listened to Powell's yarns for a while, including what the long hunter insisted was the one and only true version of how he and Davis had rescued Emily from the bandits. The story had been heavily colored, however, and had given Davis far more credit than he deserved. This tale-spinning was a side of Powell that Davis had never seen before. When they had been working together on the Wilderness Road, Powell had always seemed taciturn and even rather dour. Here in the tavern, his caustic wit and colorful speech had his listeners hanging on every word and bursting out in frequent laughter.
Finally, Davis had given in to the worries that occupied his mind and slipped out the rear door, avoiding the living quarters he shared with Emily as he did so. But she must have heard him anyway, or perhaps just sensed his presence, because he had been outside in the chilly air only a few minutes before she appeared beside him, pulling a shawl tighter around her shoulders.
"It's a lovely crisp evening," Emily commented without looking at him. Like Davis, her gaze was directed up at the stars overhead.
"Aye," he agreed. "Lovely."
Emily was quiet for a moment, then she said, "You're thinking about him, aren't you? About Andrew Paxton?"
"He's here, Emily," Davis said, his voice breaking a little. "I can feel him."
"There's more than one man named Paxton in the country, you know. And that description Mr. Powell gave you could fit hundreds, even thousands of men."
Davis nodded slowly. "You're right. But I still know it's him. It's what he would do, joining a band of thieves. Andrew never did an honest day's work in his life."
Emily turned toward him, caught his arm in both of her hands. "What if it is him?" she demanded. "You don't have to go after him. It's not up to you to bring him to justice, Davis."
"No one else is going to do it," he said stubbornly. "Andrew has the devil's own luck. If he keeps riding with those bandits, he'll get away no matter what happens to the rest of them. Andrew always gets away."
"Someday his luck will run out," Emily whispered.
Suddenly, anger flooded through Davis. He looked down at her and said, "Damn it, woman, that man did me the greatest hurt of my life! He killed my wife, he caused my children to be lost to me forever, he made me run for my life to escape being hanged for a crime I didn't commit! And you want me to just . . . let him go?" He shook loose from her grip. "It seems to me that if you loved me, you'd want vengeance on Andrew just as much as I do!"
Emily's face was bleak in the moonlight as she returned his angry stare. "It's because I love you that I don't want you to go after him. If anything happened to you, Davis, I . . . I don't think I could bear it."
Her words penetrated his fury and touched his heart, but they couldn't make the feelings raging inside him fade away. Still, he wanted to try to make her understand. "This has been hanging over me for more than a year now. I've given up on clearing my name with the law. I . . . I just want to be at peace again with myself. And I know now that I never can as long as Andrew is riding free."
"So you're going after him?"
Davis took a deep breath. "I think I have to."
"If you do, I may not be waiting here for you when you get back . . . if you get back." Emily's voice was flat, tightly controlled, not giving away the turmoil she had to be experiencing. Davis thought he knew what an effort this conversation must be costing her.
He certainly knew what it was costing him.
But he said anyway, "I'll be riding out first thing in the morning to see if I can pick up the trail."
Emily made a sound that was half-sob, half-gasp. "Will you . . . will you at least take Mr. Powell with you?"
Davis shook his head. "I have to do this myself."
Now her voice was bitter as she said, "Then may God go with you, if you won't allow anyone else." She turned and stalked back to the building.
Davis didn't watch her, but he heard the door slam and knew that he was alone again—maybe for good. Maybe he had always been alone. Perhaps those moments when people believed they were touching someone were only illusions, fantasies that the heart and mind created to deal with the awful, inescapable fact of human solitude.
Davis stood there for a long time, breathing in the cold night air.
Chapter 17
Davis was up early the next morning, when the sky in the east was only a faint gray and the air was cold enough to make his breath fog in front of him as he walked toward the barn behind the tavern. The little building was more of a shed, really, but it was enough to shelter the two horses he and Emily owned.
Several times in the past, they had taken the horses and gone riding, not straying far from the settlement. It was far enough, though, so that when the weather was warmer, they had felt comfortable enough about being unobserved to make love in the lush blue-green grass of the Kentucky hillsides. Davis recalled those times now, recalled the warmth of the sun on his back, the heat of Emily as she had wrapped herself around him.
This morning the air was cold against his face, and the bed he shared with his wife had been cold as well. There might as well have been a mountain between them for all the closeness Davis felt to her.
He didn't think she had even noticed when he got up, dressed, and left their living quarters.
Roughly, he shoved those thoughts out of his mind. He hoped that when he got back, he could work things out with Emily, but if not . . . he still had no choice about what he was setting out to do this morning. He could never be a whole man again until he had dealt with the specters of the past that were haunting him.
Even though the light was bad, he had no trouble saddling the horse, working mostly by feel in the pre-dawn gloom. He almost had the animal ready to go when he heard the step behind him.
Thinking it was Emily, come to plead with him again not to go after Andrew, Davis stiffened, unwilling to have this argument again. But it was Conn Powell's voice that came to him.
"Fixin' to ride out, Davis?"
"There's something I have to do," Davis said.
"Aye, most men feel that way. They have a task facin' 'em, and they know it won't go away."
"Exactly."
"But you know what happens when a fella goes out and takes care of whatever it is that's doggin' his trail?"
Davis turned his head and looked at the shadowy figure behind him, but he didn't say anything.
"Then there's just somethin' else waitin' for him," Powell said after a moment. "Right up until a man dies, there's always somethin' waitin' for him."
"What are you saying?" Davis demanded. "Since all the problems can never be solved, it's best just to ignore them and not even try?"
Powell shrugged. "Or walk away from 'em."
Davis wondered if that was what the long hunter had been doing all his life. Spending months at a time tramping through the wilderness boiled everything down to a matter of survival. A man who spent his days in that manner wouldn't have much time to worry about sins of the past, or lost loves, or things left undone, words that had never been said. He wondered briefly just what had driven Powell to the wilderness.
But it was none of his business, and besides, he had hi
s own concerns this morning. He had no time for some homespun lecture. He had already eaten a sparse breakfast, and he had a bag of supplies that he had slung over the back of the horse. He was ready to ride.
Turning to face Powell squarely, he said, "I have to be going now."
Powell nodded. "Sure. Reckon I understand." He scraped a thumbnail along the line of his jaw. "Could be those bandits are usin' that cave as a hideout again. That part of the country's 'bout as wild as it ever was."
Davis hesitated, then said, "Thanks."
"You want company? I got no place I have to be."
Davis shook his head and said, "No, that's all right. I can handle this."
"I hope you're right."
So do I, Davis thought as he swung up into the saddle. So do I . . .
* * *
Emily sat up straight in the bed, shivering. She was cold despite the thick nightgown she wore and the quilts wrapped around her. She wasn't sure what had woken her. Her head felt thick and fuzzy, and her eyes were still raw and sore from crying. She looked over at the other side of the bed, not really able to see a thing in the darkness of the room.
But she didn't have to see to know that he was gone.
She reached over, let her hand rest on the thin pillow where his head should have been. The pillow was cold, not retaining even the slightest bit of his warmth. She wondered how long he had been gone.
Her head jerked back the other way as she heard the sound of hoofbeats outside, the noise only faintly audible because of the thick shutters over the window. But she was sure she wasn't imagining them.
Without thinking about what she was doing, she threw the covers back and swung her legs out of the bed. The floor was icy when she put her bare feet on it, but she ignored the discomfort as she ran to the window and fumbled with the catch on the shutters. After long seconds that seemed like hours, she got the catch loose and was able to swing the shutters outward. The sun was not yet up, but there was enough light for her to make out the flicker of motion as he rode away from the shed where the horses were kept.
A desperate cry welled up in her throat, but she caught it before it could escape. If she called after him, begged him not to leave, made her pleas pathetic enough, she might be able to shame him into staying, she knew.
But she couldn't bring herself to do that. She had already told him how she felt, had made it clear that she didn't want him to go after his half-brother. He had made his own choice. If tracking down Andrew Paxton was more important to him than the life he had made here with her, then so be it.
That determination not to cry out for him didn't stop her from sinking to her knees beside the window and sobbing, though.
There was only so long that Emily would allow herself to give in to her emotions. Then she forced herself back onto her feet, dried the tears from her eyes with the sleeve of her nightgown, and began to get dressed.
She had to stir the embers of the cooking fire and bring it back to life so that she could start breakfast for the travelers who were staying in the rooms upstairs. Just because Davis could saddle up and ride away from his responsibilities didn't mean that she could turn her back on them as well.
Conn Powell came in from outside while she was in the kitchen cooking. She looked up at him in surprise, not expecting to see him there.
"Mornin', Miz Davis," the long hunter greeted her.
"What are you doing up and about, Mr. Powell?" she asked. "It's barely light outside."
"I'm an early riser," Powell explained, "and these eyes of mine don't need much light. My eyesight ain't goin' yet."
"I didn't mean to imply that," Emily said quickly. She turned back to the pot she had simmering on the fire. "I'm afraid breakfast won't be ready for a while."
"That's all right." Powell moved over to the table and took a seat. "I'm in no hurry. I was just takin' a walk."
"Did you . . ." Emily paused, then forced herself to ask the question. "Did you see my husband?"
"Yep. He saddled one of the horses in that shed out back and rode off. But you already knew that, didn't you, ma'am?"
She should have known that she couldn't fool this shrewd frontiersman. Without looking at Powell, she said, "I heard Davis leaving. Did the two of you talk before he rode out?"
"We exchanged a few words. Mind if I light my pipe?"
"No. Go right ahead."
Powell packed the long-stemmed briar and lit it with a sliver of wood from the cooking fire. As he settled back on the bench beside the table, he puffed a couple of times on the pipe and blew out a cloud of fragrant smoke.
The smell reminded Emily painfully of Davis, who often smoked an early morning pipe as he sat at the table while she was cooking breakfast.
As Emily blinked away the tears that had sprung into her eyes, Powell went on, "You know, ma'am, the first time I met that husband of yours, I didn't like him at all. Didn't trust him. I could tell just by lookin' at him that he was hidin' somethin'. I don't reckon he's hid much from you, though. I don't reckon I ever saw a fella as much in love with a woman as he is with you."
Emily drew a deep breath. "I hope you won't take offense at this, Mr. Powell, but despite your knowledge of the woods, you don't strike me as a man who knows a great deal about the human heart."
"Could be you're right," Powell said with a grim chuckle. "But I ain't totally lost, either, and I've figured out that I was wrong about Davis. He has his secrets, right enough, but he's a good man."
"I knew that the first moment I saw him," Emily said softly.
"Some trails are easier to follow than others. A fella's got to travel wherever the path leads him. Don't do any good to go wanderin' off."
"That's very philosophical, but it doesn't bring my husband back to me."
"He'll be back," Powell said confidently. "Soon as he does what he's got to do."
"If he's still alive, you mean."
The long hunter shrugged. "Every time you draw a breath, ma'am, you don't know if you're goin' to draw another one. Same's true for everybody else. But if we spent all our time thinkin' about such as that, we'd all go crazy. Life's a gamble."
Emily shook her head. "Perhaps you're right, but I just can't see it that way. I want to know that the man I love will wake up beside me today and tomorrow and all the mornings after that."
"Then you're bound to be disappointed, ma'am, and I hope you don't take any offense at that." Powell pushed himself to his feet, tapped out the ashes from his pipe into the small fireplace where Emily was cooking. "I'll be movin' on soon as I've eaten."
Emily turned toward him. "Can't you stay until—" She couldn't finish.
"Until Davis comes back? No, I've got to be movin' on."
"You saw him leave. Which direction did he go?"
For a moment, Powell didn't reply. Then he said, "East. He headed east."
"Which direction are you going?"
"West. Davis didn't want any help with his chore. He wouldn't take it kindly was I to horn in."
"But if you—" Again, Emily stopped abruptly. She sighed. "You're right, Mr. Powell. He wouldn't want any help."
"Not from me, anyway." With that, Powell turned and limped out of the room before Emily could ask him what he meant.
But she thought about the comment for a long time.
* * *
Powell left after breakfast, as he had said he was going to, walking off toward the west with a casual wave of his hand. Emily didn't know if she would ever see the man again. She felt gratitude toward him, because he had helped save her life when the bandits kidnapped her, but she didn't particularly like him. There was too wide a gulf between them in the way they looked at things.
That day was a long one. She had never had to take care of the tavern by herself before. Of course, she wasn't completely alone. She had Willy Malone's help, and she was grateful to the young man for the way he pitched in uncomplainingly. She had no answer for him, however, when he asked how long Davis was going to be gone.
She couldn't bring herself to tell Willy that Davis might never come back . . .
The next morning was even worse because she spent a near-sleepless night tossing and turning in the empty bed. She had never realized how much his mere presence meant to her until he was gone. She wasn't sure she would ever be able to adjust to his absence if he never returned.
Still, there was work to do, no matter how bad she felt, so she tried to shove her weariness and self-pity aside and concentrate on the chores that went with running a tavern and inn.
Around midmorning, she was sitting outside the front door of the tavern churning butter. Although autumn was advancing steadily and the leaves on the trees were a riot of gaudy color, there were still days when the sun was bright and warm. This was one of those days, and Emily thought she would have been enjoying it, if only Davis had been here to share it with her.
The tavern was on the edge of the settlement, near the woods that came almost to the buildings. It was close enough, though, so that Emily could hear all the normal noises of the other settlers going about their business. A shouted question, a laugh, the creak of wagon wheels, the ringing of the blacksmith's hammer on the anvil . . . the sounds, often heard but seldom really noticed, blended together like a piece of music.
Another noise, the sharp clip-clop of approaching hooves, caught Emily's attention, and she looked up from her churning to see a man riding toward the tavern. She had never seen him before, but there was certainly nothing unusual about a stranger riding up to the place.
But as she watched this man riding toward her, her fingers tightened on the handle of the churn until they turned white and numb.
He didn't appear particularly threatening. He was just a middle-aged man, stern-faced man with gray hair underneath a black tricorn hat. His coat and trousers showed signs of long wear, but they were well cared for. The same could be said for the big chestnut horse the man rode. As he came up to the front of the tavern, he reined in and lifted his hand to the brim of the hat.
"Good day to you, missus," he said with a nod. "Is your husband about?"
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