Woman of Three Worlds

by Jeanne Williams

  Sneezes cooed softly, dark eyes following charms dangling from the hood of his cradleboard, lightning-charred wood, a hummingbird’s claw, a piece of cholla, bags of pollen, a stuffed badger paw, and a tag of wildcat’s skin. Fawn nudged the prisoner with her toe. Her oldest sister leaned down and forced up his eyelid. The other pried beneath the poultice to inspect the shoulder.

  “The White Eye hasn’t been conscious?” asked Big Jaw’s mother.

  “No,” replied Sara truthfully.

  The disappointed women conferred. “Do you think he’ll improve?” pressed Fawn.

  Sara spread her hands. “Who knows? The wound is bad.”

  Again the women took counsel. The oldest sister said, “Even if he cannot feel what we do, we would rather kill him than have him cheat us by a peaceful death.”

  Fawn looked directly at Brittany, beautiful face hard. “If you think he is dying, come quick and tell us,” she charged.

  Brittany’s eyes met Sara’s. There would be no forgiveness.

  XVII

  Through five days and nights it seemed doubtful that Zach would mend, but on the sixth morning he rested more quietly. When Brittany raised him for his tea and gruel, his eyes opened, free of the fever wildness.

  They went wide, so blue they stabbed deep into her. “Brittany!”

  She touched his lips, fighting back tears of relief. “Don’t speak aloud.” She went on to explain his peril.

  His mouth twisted. “Fair enough, according to their rights.” He tried to raise himself, had to collapse against her. “Looks like I can’t give them much argument.”

  Swiftly, she whispered her hopes of escape and explained Sara and Kah-Tay’s gratitude for his rescue of Jody. “That helps,” nodded Zach. “Fine. I’ll act sick when strangers are around, but I’ll eat and get as much exercise as I can inside the wickiup. We can’t stretch the game too far or those ladies may decide to go ahead and kill me.”

  As soon as she had fed him, he slept again.

  His fever went up again that afternoon, fortunately in time to convince Big Jaw’s visiting mother that he was still not a suitable target for their vengeance. After she went grumbling away, Brittany held Zach, gently bathed his hot face and upper body.

  Giving in to irresistible longing, she kissed his eyes, the straight mouth, held him against her heart. He’d told her that this patrol commanded by Michael O’Shea had been only one of many sent to look for her after a sobbing Laurie had trudged into the laundresses’ quarters and poor Harris’s body was found in the road. Major Erskine had ridden out at once but his scouts found no sign, and by the time Zach was sent for, the Chokonens’ route had been completely obliterated by late summer rains.

  “This is a new place for Kah-Tay,” Zach had said ruefully. “I went to all his old haunts and even rode into Juh’s stronghold to see if Kah-Tay was with him and Geronimo.” He smiled faintly. “Juh was so flabbergasted at my coming alone that he let me ride to the top of his mountain. Usually, his Nedhni roll rocks down on anyone who tries that. Juh claimed to know nothing of Kah-Tay’s whereabouts. He let me go, even gave me a feast, but he told me never to ride up his trail again.”

  So he had tried to find her. Brittany’s glow was quickly dimmed by the coolly expressionless way he added, “Major Erskine has offered a private reward to anyone who helped find you. You must be flattered that he holds you in such esteem.”

  Brittany’s stiff smile had hurt her face. “Yes. I’m sure it takes a considerable inducement to get men who aren’t under army orders to track after Apaches.”

  Zach laughed dryly. “Apart from the reward, Major Erskine can be very persuasive.”

  What did that mean? It sounded as if Erskine had offered Zach a secret incentive or wielded some kind of blackmail. He might have hinted that the post would buy hay and wood elsewhere if Zach didn’t cooperate.

  Humiliation at that thought and Zach’s cold manner kept Brittany from letting Zach see how she felt about him. Only when he was oblivious dared she embrace him, losing herself in the achingly bittersweet delight of pressing her lips to his, matching her softness against the hard length of his body.

  As his strength returned, he stretched and flexed his muscles in every way possible within the lodge, squatting to leap up, bending from the waist to sweep the ground with his hands, and “running,” feet falling in the same position.

  Never again did Sara discuss their escape, but at various times Brittany found rawhide bags of food beneath her blankets, extra moccasins, two double-headed water jugs, and two knives. She concealed the supplies in the cache she had dug months ago, but she kept one knife under her bed and gave Zach the other. In case the patience of Big Jaw’s women gave out suddenly, at least he could defend himself, force his attackers to give him a quick death.

  On the tenth day after Zach had been brought in, Big Jaw’s mother glared at the apparently stuporous Zach, who had failed to respond when she drove thorns into his arm.

  “This one is never going to wake up!”

  “I want him to know!” cried Fawn. “I want him to feel everything.”

  Her mother-in-law shrugged. “Let’s wait till tomorrow. Then I want to tie him to a pole.” She eyed Zach speculatively. “Maybe we can wake him up if we take our time. I have seen almost-dead men revive when their skin was peeled off.”

  Brittany’s stomach twisted, but she kept her eyes fixed on the moccasin she was making. When the women left, Sara remarked offhandedly, “Two mules might be hobbled tonight just beyond where the canyon narrows. There might be saddles in the cave behind the big juniper, and rawhide to tie on the hoofs to blur tracks.”

  “There’s no way to thank you.”

  “You did when you were good to my nephew.” The medicine woman sighed. “Peoples war, but perhaps there is hope while men and women feel for each other in spite of their tribes. My brother will have to join the search for you, but I do not think his eyes will be very good. He might even follow the wrong tracks.”

  The hide door fell shut behind her. Zach pulled the thorns out of his arm. “Sweet little old lady!” he winced. “I’d just as soon not find out what she can do when she’s trying.”

  “We have to go tonight.”

  His dark eyebrows met in a frown. “Brittany, stay here. Even with Sara and Kah-Tay’s help, we don’t have much chance of getting clear.”

  “We’ll have at least ten hours’ start.” She spoke confidently, though her heart lurched at his matter-of-fact fatalism.

  “I’ve been in this part of the mountains a time or two but don’t know it. Not the way they do—every wash, every cave, every spring—whether a canyon has a way out or ends in cliffs we can’t scale.” He grasped her wrists, drew her down to face him. “It’s scarcely conceivable that they won’t pick up our trail. Even if they don’t, they’ll fan out and cover the routes we might travel.”

  What he said was true. She’d been as much a fool to think they could get away as to hope that he might love her. Her throat ached and she couldn’t speak.

  He said more gently, “Sara’s giving me the chance to die fast, and God knows I’m grateful. She knows, too, that the warriors won’t kill you except by accident. But that could happen, Brittany. Stay here.”

  If Zach had been completely well, he might have made better time without her. As it was, he was still weak. She could make sure he ate, take care of the mules, save his energy in every possible way, protect his back if they were cornered.

  She could make sure he didn’t die trapped and alone.

  He wouldn’t accept those reasons. Though his hands seemed to melt her bones, she forced a brittle laugh. “Don’t you think I’m sick to death of living with these savages? You may not know this country like the palm of your hand but at least you can get us back to the post. Let’s make a run for it.”

  “You might get killed.”

  Mockingly, she smiled. “Not if Kah-Tay can help it. He wants to marry me.”

  Zach’s fingers tight
ened. “So you flirt with Apaches when there aren’t any white officers around?”

  Stung, she gave one shoulder a careless lift. “A woman has to keep in practice.”

  “Women don’t flirt.”

  “No doubt your experience makes you an expert on the subject,” she jabbed.

  Shifting his grasp, he brought her full against him. His mouth punished hers, but the wild honeyed sweetness of his kiss robbed her of all will to resist. Lips parting, her arms slipped around him till her hands caressed the hardmuscled back of his neck, and she was lost in pulsing, questing hunger, the rapture of being again in his arms.

  With a harsh, breathless sound, he put her from him. “That had better not happen again or I won’t answer to Erskine for your condition.”

  Mortified, she scuttled away. “You could always blame it on Kah-Tay,” she scorned. “I doubt the major would cancel the reward.”

  Zach’s eyes blazed. “Has that Indian—”

  “My ‘condition’ is none of your business.”

  She darted out of the wickiup, but angry as she was, she set about her preparations. Before dusk, alternating trips to the cache and cave, near which late that afternoon she found the mules hobbled, she had all in readiness.

  On her last trip to the cave her heart leaped and she blessed Sara from the depths of her being. Leaned against the rock wall beside the rawhide saddlebags were two rifles and pouches full of cartridges.

  This priceless gift of trust made Brittany resolve even more firmly that they must not fire on any of the band unless absolutely driven to it, and on Kah-Tay not at all. There were many dangers besides pursuers from this camp between here and the post. The rifles greatly increased their chances of winning through.

  While preparing the one main meal of the day, Brittany found an opportunity to whisper her thanks. She also took time to tell Jody several of his favorite White Eye stories, saddened to know she might never see him again but hoping that somehow he’d grow up free, that he would never be caged.

  Kah-Tay’s green eyes dwelled on her piercingly several times as she helped serve the meal. She couldn’t trust herself to meet his gaze.

  He had been many things to her: captor, protector, almost-lover. If it hadn’t been for that barrier of inbred customs and attitudes, if she hadn’t loved Zach, she might have been his woman and lived happily with him this unfettered life that, alien as it was, she would always remember with a sense of loss.

  Glancing from Pretty Eyes, on the threshold of life, to Grouchy, near its close, she implored their Ussen and her own God to protect them.

  As dusk changed to darkness, Brittany’s taut nerves neared screaming pitch as families loitered about their cookfires and did chores they should surely have attended to much earlier.

  Grouchy, after having been in a sulk since Zach’s capture, waxed loquacious and seemed intent on telling every story in the whole Coyote cycle.

  A sliver of new moon vanished behind the canyon wall. Disasters threatened and multiplied in Brittany’s anxious mind. What if the mules broke their hobbles and wandered off? What if someone chanced upon them or the things in the cave? What if dogs barked as she and Zach stole out of the camp? Suppose someone saw them?

  It seemed forever, but gradually one group after another drifted into wickiups. Brittany followed Sara into theirs. Zach shifted on his bed, but there was no way of guessing whether he was sleeping or awake.

  Much as she wished to thank Sara again and tell her good-bye, Brittany sensed that the medicine woman was torn in loyalties and preferred as little acknowledgment as possible. Brittany didn’t undress or even take her moccasins off but simply lay down and pulled the blankets over her.

  Again, time crept. After what seemed hours, the camp was silent. Brittany was easing to her feet when a hand brushed her. Startled, she swallowed a cry.

  Without a sound, noiselessly lifting the flap, she and Zach hunched over as they moved out into the frosty night, keeping low, stepping carefully, testing each advance. Brittany’s heart seemed stuck in her throat, but it could only have been a few minutes before they gained the trees and could walk erect.

  Fortunately scavenging for firewood had cleared the ground of dead branches that might have given a betraying crunch. Brittany led the way to the narrowing of the canyon, and by then her eyes were so accustomed to the night that she could make out the dark hulk of the mules.

  A handful of corn made the animals easy to lure toward the cave. Brittany slipped on their bridles and handed the reins to Zach. “Let me saddle up,” she whispered. “We don’t want you tearing that shoulder open.” She handed him one of the rifles and smiled in the darkness at his amazed delight.

  “By God! A Winchester! Did Sara give us this?”

  “Yes, and another, with lots of cartridges.”

  “Our chances just quadrupled. But if there’s any way to avoid it, I won’t kill any of the band. I’ll aim for their shooting arm or a leg. Can you use a rifle?”

  “No.”

  “Then I’d better show you how when it’s light enough.”

  Cinching the saddles, she loaded on the rawhide bags and tied the blankets behind. There were rawhide scabbards for the rifles. She fastened these at the front along with the water jugs.

  “Good thing we’re moving on mule legs,” Zach grunted. “My own are about to go out from under me.”

  “You haven’t opened your wound?” Brittany asked in quick alarm.

  “No. But to make sure I don’t, I’m going to climb aboard from the top of this rock. Don’t worry,” he added reassuringly. “I’ll get better fast now that I can move around.”

  She did worry, but there was nothing for it but to ride.

  They traveled steadily all that night. It was bitter cold. Brittany kept flexing her toes to keep them from going completely numb. When the mules’ hoofs began to click as they struck rock, Brittany dismounted and, fingers clumsy from cold, tied on new rawhide “shoes,” grateful that these were patient beasts that didn’t kick. They had to ride east for hours before they reached a pass turning north across a valley.

  During all that time Zach scarcely spoke, and though it was no time for chatter, Brittany felt increasingly troubled about him. When she put fresh rawhide on the mules, she insisted that Zach drink and munch some jerky. Dread grew in her like slow poison. When the faintest beginning of light revealed the way he slumped, her heart plummeted.

  Riding abreast, she said urgently, “Zach, you can’t keep this up! Let’s find someplace to hide till you’re stronger.”

  “Mules … would give us away,” he said in a thick voice.

  “I’ll turn them loose,” she said desperately. “Let’s find a cave just as fast as we can.”

  “They’ll find us by nooning.”

  “If we go on, you’ll be slipping off your mule and they’ll catch us anyway!”

  With great difficulty he lifted his head and stared at her. The glassiness of fever made his eyes brilliant even in the gray light. “All right. We’ll hunt a hole if you’ll promise me something.”

  “What?”

  “If they find us, don’t try to hold them off. You’ll just get yourself killed. I’ll fight if I’m able, but if I’m not, prop me up where they’ll shoot me or do it yourself.” He grinned weakly. “I don’t want that sweet old grandma to get hold of me.”

  Brittany couldn’t make such a promise. If they were trapped, she didn’t know what she’d do, but she evaded Zach’s demand by saying, “Before we go any farther, maybe you’d better show me about the rifle.”

  She pulled hers out of its scabbard and passed it to him. “Sara did us proud with these,” he muttered. “Magazine holds fifteen shots. Here’s the loading port, where you stuff the shells in, just in front of and above the trigger.” He handed it back to her. “Now fit the stock to your shoulder and look down the sights. You want to get your target lined up with them, front and rear. Then you pull the trigger—and try to keep your eyes open and your aim true
till at least you’ve fired! It’ll help a lot to lean the rifle on a rock or log to keep it steady.”

  “Thank goodness it’s easy to load,” Brittany said, fitting it into the scabbard.

  “That 1873 forty-four–caliber model is a damn good rifle. Hope Kah-Tay doesn’t raise hell with Sara for letting us have them.”

  “They were probably Sara’s,” Brittany said, trying not to think of the men from whose dead hands they had almost surely been taken. “She’s a warrior as well as a good nurse. Kah-Tay couldn’t help you, because he’s the chief, but I think he’ll be glad if you can get away.”

  “Not with you along,” Zach growled. With obvious effort, he straightened and gathered the reins. “Let’s hunt our burrow. Might as well follow that wash up this next canyon. Might be a spring.”

  The twisting course between jagged walls of rock revealed many shallow grottoes but nothing that offered concealment. Zach’s head drooped. For a time he kept dragging it up, but as the sun rose over the cliff rim it seemed all he could do to keep in the saddle.

  A small side-canyon branched off. Thick with trees, it seemed to offer better cover. Brittany rode down it and Zach’s mule followed.

  Rocks fallen from above nearly choked the narrow passage a short way along it. Brittany was starting to turn her mule when she saw a triangular opening in the cliff beyond the rockslide, close to a lightning-blasted tree. It looked too small, but she was frantic to get Zach to a resting place and run off the telltale mules.

  Tethering the mules, she said to Zach, “I’m going to look up here.”

  He didn’t answer. His dark eyelashes were closed against his flushed cheeks. Brittany clambered over boulders and rubble to a ledge that angled to the jagged hole. Peering in, Brittany rejoiced to see a long though narrow hollow almost high enough to stand up in. The walls and stone floor were dry. Also, as if fate were deciding to be kind, she tested the charred tree and found she could drag it in front of the entrance.

  From a distance the rockslide would probably persuade searchers that their quarry had continued down the main canyon. Though she might have quite a hunt for water, this seemed as good a spot as she would find. Hurrying down, she coaxed Zach’s mule up the rocks and ledge.