Her husband broke in. “Let the man finish.”
His wife simpered and fell quiet.
“I went to the library that evening and borrowed the very same book. Every day I went to the park, and when I saw her next, I held the book out as if reading, hoping to catch her eye.”
Alma stared at her husband. He’d never told her this part before.
“And?” the woman asked, echoing Alma’s curiosity.
“And . . . she walked right past me.”
Alma looked down. Was he saying this to embarrass her? To make her seem cold and aloof? But when he spoke again the timbre of his voice was warm and unaccusing.
“What could I do but follow her home? The next day I returned and peddled my legal services to her aunt—trust and probate matters, land deeds. That sort of thing.” This Alma remembered, his unfamiliar but pleasant voice in the hallway.
“You’re a lawyer,” the woman said. She turned to her husband. “He’s a lawyer, John.”
“Yes, but not a personal property lawyer,” Stewart said. His expression had thawed now and his eyes softened. “I studied for hours every night before meeting her aunt just to figure out what the dickens I was doing.” The couple laughed. Stewart glanced at Alma with a thin but genuine smile. “But I secured the introduction I’d been craving.”
She couldn’t help but recall that first meeting in her aunt’s parlor. He’d shaken her hand with altogether too much vigor. The sweat from his palm stuck to her fingers. But his eyes were tranquil, his demeanor confident without being cocky. She had no intention of falling in love again, had not thought it possible, but it happened nonetheless.
Five years had transpired and even the day’s worry and anger could not overshadow his love. She tried to return his smile, but found the weight of it too heavy to bear. She didn’t deserve his affections, his unflagging kindness.
In the privacy of their own sitting room, Stewart poured them each a finger of corn liquor. The small glass decanter rattled when he replaced it atop the side table. After handing her a glass, he joined her on the divan. Though he rarely drank, Stewart threw back the liquor without a grimace. “What were you thinking today, Alma? What in God’s heavens were you looking for?”
Not what, whom. “I . . .” She sipped her drink and winced as the liquor hit her tongue. It burned the length of her throat, settling uneasily on her stomach. She took another sip. “Harry has a sister. I went to see if I could find her.”
“A sister? Why didn’t you tell me this earlier? I could have come with you, interviewed her myself.”
“No . . . er . . . she’s very shy and not altogether fond of—” Of what? Men? Whites? What lie would assuage him? Certainly not the truth. Not that it was Alma who wasn’t altogether fond of Minowe, that the conversation they were liable to have was not suited for his ears. She had no intention of bringing up the past, but something might slip. “Strangers, not fond of strangers.”
“What did she have to say?”
“I couldn’t find her. Ended up lost. I’ll go back and try another way tomorrow.”
“Certainly not.” He stood and paced the length of the room before returning to the side table and decanter.
“I must. Please. I’m no use to you at the agency. All those ledgers and reports—I haven’t any idea what’s important.”
“The reservation is dangerous.” He poured another drink. “I half thought . . . half thought the sheriff might have . . .” He drained the liquor in one gulp.
“Dearest, it was nothing like that. I got turned around and lost my way. That’s all. Tomorrow I’ll be much more careful.”
“No, you won’t. You’ll stay here.”
Alma stood. He’d never presumed to tell her what to do before. Not like that. “I’m not some porcelain doll to be locked away in a china hutch. Harry is my friend and I shall do whatever it takes to see him free. Whether you approve or not.”
Stewart slammed his glass down on the table. The decanter clattered. He refilled his glass, splattering the doily as he poured. He raised the drink to his lips, his fingers strangling the glass with such force she feared it might shatter, then lowered it as if he might say something. His jaw remained clenched, however. He stared at the wall, his hazel eyes distant, his nostrils flaring with each exhale.
Alma reached out to touch his arm, to stay his hand. He felt like stone beneath her touch, and she pulled away. She thought back to his face when he’d pulled her from the Indian’s mule—his openmouthed relief, the way his eyes clung to her, unblinking, like she might again vanish.
“I have to do this. There’s so much I’ve done wrong. I have to feel as if I’ve helped in this.”
The glass remained at his lips, the light of the nearby lamp reflecting off its tawny surface. Had he even heard her, registered what she said? She always marveled at the control he exercised over his expression. A lawyer trick of his. Yet something always revealed his emotion—a slight lift of the shoulders when exultant, a quick tug at his shirt cuffs when uneasy, a splaying of his fingers when anger got the best of him. It was like a secret code between them—things other people missed that Alma never failed to notice. Not tonight, though. Tonight he gave her nothing. She clutched her arms about herself, fingers burrowing into her flesh. She could not bear the sudden estrangement, but would not back down. She must see Minowe. Alone.
His hand sagged. He unstopped the decanter and poured the liquor back. Its sharp scent perfumed the air between them. He unfastened his bow tie and walked past her into the bedroom. “Something is amiss with the account books and ledgers. I can’t quite put my finger on it.”
He spoke to her in the same cool, detached fashion he spoke to his clerk. But it was better than silence.
“What do you mean?”
“It has to do with this latest land allotment.” He shrugged out of his jacket and unbuttoned his waistcoat. “Indians came up from Minneapolis, Chicago, even St. Louis to receive land, many of whom are not in any previous roll books. And the deed log looks as if it’s been tampered with—names penciled in and later erased, names scratched out, names gone over in ink like they’d been penciled in beforehand.”
“What does all this have to do with Harry?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe nothing. It looks like there was quite an uproar after the proceedings—numerous complaints, even a letter sent to Washington. Maybe Mr. Muskrat was among those speaking out like Mr. Zhawaeshk said.”
Alma did her best to swallow the disappointment rising in her chest. She’d hoped for something more, something definitive.
He turned away from her and stepped out of his trousers. She saw his skin for only a second—the light freckles that dotted his back, the hair that covered his calves—before he donned his nightshirt. He’d dimmed his bedside light and climbed beneath the sheets before she’d even begun to undress. No advances tonight. No impassioned lovemaking where every inch of their bodies hungered for friction, where sweat slickened their skin and moans freely escaped their lips.
Her breast heaved at the thought of it. She wanted so badly to touch him, to feel the crush of his embrace, to know that everything would be all right. A chill took hold of her. A draft no doubt stolen in through the thin drapes and poorly seated windows. She stripped off her gown and unfastened her corset. Perhaps it was best. The distance. There were too many ghosts between them tonight.
CHAPTER 36
Wisconsin, 1891
“Jaha! Who let you out of the house?”
Alma, treading carefully over the rows of black soil and budding sprouts, smiled at . “I escaped. Here, let me help you.” She grabbed seed bag.
“I thought ladies did not work in the field,” Minowe said, coming up beside them.
“Mother thinks I’m napping. You know I’d be out here more if I could.”
Minowe smirked and continued along the empty track of dirt. With each stride, she plunged the long stick she carried into the ground, poking a small hole in the loamy earth
. “Aren’t your fancy La Crosse friends coming this afternoon for tea?”
Alma followed after and sprinkled a few broad white seeds in each depression. “Mother invited them, not me.”
Her friend snickered without looking back.
“Only one seed, Azaadiins,” Hoga said from behind her. “Otherwise the plants tangle and choke one another.”
“Oh.” Holding the hem of her skirt above the ground, she bent down and fished out the excess seeds. “What are we planting, anyway?”
squatted beside her and covered the hole with dirt.
They continued for at least a dozen more yards, Minowe burrowing the hole, Alma dropping a seed, tilling over fresh soil. The sun smiled above in the cloudless sky. Magpies chattered from the fence posts. A soft breeze carried cool air from the nearby forest. How good it felt to be out of the stuffy schoolhouse.
The days since her father’s outburst in the study had stretched on with bitter tedium. True to his word, he guarded against any opportunity that might bring her and together. He forbade her to leave the schoolhouse, even for a walk around the grounds, unless in his or her mother’s company. Under the pretext that Stover now had too many students to cart back and forth into town, he asked Reverend Thomas to conduct a special worship service in the school’s dining hall each Sunday. He even bought two bloodhounds to prowl the grounds at night.
Her mother had made the weeks of estrangement from equally unbearable, disallowing all unnecessary contact with the Indians. No more common meals or afternoon chores. No more Saturday socials or evening study hours. In place of these activities, Alma languished in the stuffy parlors of the La Crosse aristocracy, sipping tea and chatting about a host of banal and insignificant topics. Her mother contrived any excuse to bring them into town, as if sudden immersion in white society would cure Alma of her wicked affliction.
Now, however, Alma hummed as she walked, careless of the mud that clung to her boots.
“What are you so happy about?” Minowe asked. “Two weeks ago you were crying. Now every times I see you, you’re smiling, singing. Chirk as damnation!”
Alma laughed. “Where did you hear that expression? Mr. Simms?”
“ teached it last class.” She raised her chin, pinched her lips, and gestured with her stick in the same jerky manner Miss Wells wielded her ruler. “Copy these words upon your slates, class: Damn, dratted, damnation.”
At that, they all laughed.
“You’d get more than a mouthful of soap for that,” said.
Alma wiped the water from her lashes and swallowed down the last of her giggles. Her eyes hung on Minowe’s gap-toothed smile—a rare sight these days and ever so dear. It drew her back across the years to that night, standing beneath the eaves of the schoolhouse, when first she’d seen it. And laughter, so like a bell—she wished she could bottle up the sound and keep it with her forever. After a quick glance around the yard, she dropped the seed bag and grabbed their hands. Dirt roughened their skin. “I’m running away. With .”
She’d met him surreptitiously in town a week and a half ago while she waited in the carriage for her mother. The street-side door of the carriage had opened soundlessly. Alma had blinked at the sudden flood of sunlight, trying to make out the lithe form that glided in. The carriage did not rock, nor the door creak upon closing. Even before her eyes adjusted, she knew who had entered. Only an Indian could move with such stealth.
placed his fingers over her lips. He closed the window coverings and sat down beside her.
“! How did you—”
This time, his lips silenced her. She threw her arms around him and kissed him back, not just his lips but his cheek and eyelids and neck. His fingers worked the buttons of her blouse until the swell of her bosom above her corset lay exposed. His mouth roved from her jaw to her collarbone, then downward. She shivered at the delicious feel of his lips against her skin.
Too soon he stopped. The recesses of her mind awakened and she buttoned up her shirt. “Mother ran into Mrs. Wright’s shop for a fitting. She’ll return any moment.”
He nuzzled her neck, fighting her fingers as she tried to fasten the final buttons of her collar. Her hands abandoned their charge and wound into his hair. Against the renewed swell of passion, her mind fought for clarity. “Father didn’t write to Mr. Wallis, did he? Recommending your termination. He said he would. You still have your job?”
“He did.” His hand slid over her silk waistcoat and jacket, stopping atop her breast. “Mr. Wallis kept me on in spite of it.”
Alma moved his hand back down to her waist. “He likes you quite well.”
“He does.” pulled back and looked directly into her eyes. “He’s willing to help us.”
“How?”
“Two weeks from today he has a shipment of wagon parts going to Milwaukee. He knows the foreman and said we could ride with the parts in the freight car. It’s a late train, leaves the rail yard at eleven thirty. Come the following morning we’ll be gone, but no one will think we went by trains.”
“What will we do after we reach Milwaukee?”
“I have enough money to buy us tickets to Green Bay, and from there, a wagon to Keshena.”
“The reservation? After my father realizes we’ve fled La Crosse, that’s the first place he’ll look.”
“By time he arrives we’ll already be married.”
“Married? It won’t be easy to find a willing pastor.”
“I know a priest in Keshena who will do it.”
Alma stiffened. “A Catholic priest?”
“Yes.” His dark eyes roved her face and he cocked his head. “You still want to marry, yes?”
She bit her lip.
“Catholic, Presbyterian—does it matter so long as we have the white man’s paper?”
Silence followed. She imagined the pain and fury in her father’s face when he learned she had not only married an Indian, but had done so in a Catholic church.
arms slacked around her. He sat up straight and leaned away. His handsome face bore a pained and bewildered expression.
Her heart clenched and she grabbed his hands. “Of course it doesn’t matter. I love you and want to be your wife no matter who performs the ceremony.”
expression remained guarded. “Life on the reservation is not like here. We don’t have balls and fancy dinners. Even with the money I’ve saved I can’t buy big house or expensive carriage like this.”
“I’d rather be with you than the richest man in Wisconsin.” She leaned in and kissed him. His lips, at first stiff, slowly livened beneath hers until they matched her hunger.
“It won’t be forever, . I can cut timber until we’re settled, then look for work in a carriage shop in Green Bay or Oshkosh. Maybe we can return to La Crosse someday and you can be with your family again.”
A strand of hair had fallen over his face. Alma brushed the soft black lock back behind his ear. “You’re all the family I need.”
He drew her against his chest, but the squeal of nearby door hinges stopped them before their lips could meet. Her mother’s footfalls sounded on the sidewalk.
“Two weeks. Meet me at the bottom of Grandfather’s Bluff.” He’d leapt from the carriage just as the door on the opposite side began to open. “Eleven o’clock, . I’ll be waiting on you.”
Now, as she relayed the story to her friends, she expected to see the same unbridled excitement that hummed inside her lit upon their faces. Instead, the gleam vanished from Minowe’s eyes. lost her grin. “Azaadiins, your parents will be so angry.”
“Let them be angry. I don’t care.”
Silence fell between them. Even the magpies ceased their chatter. Alma’s heart inched into her throat. “It’s the only way and I can be together. Aren’t you happy for me? For us?”
squeezed her hand. “Of course, but—”
“You won’t be happy for long,” Minowe cut in. She pried her fingers from Alma’s and crossed her arms, her seeding stick trapped in the crook of her el
bow.
“How can you say that?”
Minowe snorted and shook her head.
“What?”
Her friend started to walk away. “Nothing.”
Alma grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong with you? You’ve been against me on this from the start.”
“You think because you dance sometimes with us around the fire, because you speak our words that you know what it is to be Indian.”
“I’m not trying to be Indian. I just want—”
“Fancy dresses and parlor games won’t do you no good on the reservation.”
“I’m not without domestic skills.” But in truth, she hadn’t thought about that. The collar of her dress felt suddenly damp and sticky. “I can cook . . . a bit. And sew. And I can always tutor children on the piano if and I need money.”
“Piano?” Minowe rolled her eyes. “You think we keeps pianos in our wigwams? In our shacks or agency-made cabins?”
“I . . . I didn’t think . . . I’m sure—”
“And what about your wiisaakodewininiwag childrens? Half-breeds fit in nowhere. Not your world. Not his.” She shrugged free of Alma’s grasp. “Marry Edward Steele. Live in a big house on State Street. You’d be better happy there in the end.”
“Waú!” said. “Not if she loves .”
“She should love a white man.”
The words struck Alma like a ruler against her knuckles. With Minowe’s smirk came another slap. Had she always felt this way? Didn’t she care that without Alma could hardly breathe? “You sound just like my father.”
“Maybe for once he’s right.”
“And what of us? I suppose we shouldn’t be friends either, you being an Indian.” Alma regretted the words the minute she said them.
Minowe winced and threw her stick to the ground. “Fine.” Her voice was choked. “You thinks we were friends? We were never real friends, Alma. This, all of this”—she flung her arm toward the schoolhouse—“it’s a lie. A lie you’ve tricks’d into believing.”
“You’re just jealous that we’re happy together.”
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