Heart's Heritage

by Cecil, Ramona K. ; Richardson, Lisa Karon;

  Brock only nodded solemnly. The one thing he wanted to avoid was being drawn into a conversation about the army.

  At length, Gray Feather stood and reached out his hand to Brock, who rose, too. “I am sorry Martin is dead. Like his blood brother, Blanchet, Martin was a good friend to Gray Feather. I would honor his spirit by calling his nephew my friend.”

  Brock grasped the Indian’s hand. “Thank you. I would be honored to call Gray Feather my friend.”

  Gray Feather turned to leave, and Brock followed him to the door. Then as he exited the cabin, the Delaware paused. “Tecumseh’s war in the north and east will touch this place, too. It is not good that Blanchet’s daughter live in Martin’s cabin alone.”

  Chapter 6

  Annie opened the cabin door and squinted at the eastern sky where the sunrise smeared streaks of pink and gold across the horizon. In the next hour or so, Brock should arrive to help her with the planting. Her heart quickened at the thought, and she knew the warmth spreading through her had nothing to do with the early morning sun peeking over the knoll.

  She was glad he had agreed to live in Papa’s old cabin. Actually, he seemed content there. So much so that he rarely left the place. Just how long this mutual arrangement would suffice, Annie didn’t know. What she did know was that Brock’s close proximity to the farm made her feel safer … and less lonely.

  As always, thoughts of the man set her heart warring with her mind. Her heart told her Brock Martin was courageous, good, and kind. But her mind immediately challenged those conclusions. Why did he shy away from any talk of his past? And why had he stopped scouting for the army just when the country appeared on the brink of a new war with Britain? It was also curious that he’d declined Obadiah’s invitation to join Fort Deux Fleuves’s militia.

  She pressed her fingers against her throbbing temples and blew out a weary sigh. Her head ached with the bewildering questions. What did it matter? Brock would be gone soon. An unexpected sadness accompanied the thought.

  Sighing, she turned and traipsed to the hearth where an Indian pudding baked in the spider skillet beneath a pile of glowing embers. It felt good to cook for someone other than herself, so hopefully Brock would arrive with an appetite.

  With a muffled “Ruff,” Cap’n Brody sprang from his place by the hearth and bounded out the open door. Annie’s heart jumped with the dog. She didn’t expect Brock for another hour, but someone was doubtless about.

  Snatching Jonah’s musket from above the fireplace and the powder flask from a wall peg, she followed the dog out the door.

  Brock’s now familiar laughter filtered through Cap’n Brody’s welcoming barks, allowing the tension to seep from Annie’s limbs. “Sergeant Martin reporting for duty, Cap’n Brody.” Rounding the cowshed, Brock executed a sharp salute at the big dog, who was bouncing around him like a puppy.

  At the sight of Brock, Annie cradled the musket in the crook of her now relaxed arm. “I fear our captain is not much for giving orders,” she said with a laugh.

  A mischievous grin crept across Brock’s lips. “At least he didn’t meet me bearing a musket.”

  Annie’s face warmed, remembering the comment he’d made that first Sunday about her not needing a musket to get a man’s attention.

  Brock’s eyes narrowed in mock seriousness at the dog. “So Cap’n, how did someone who cannot give orders attain such a lofty rank?”

  Annie stifled a giggle. “Cap’n Brody will not tell you, because he is far too modest. But Jonah said he named him for a commanding officer during the war who was also big and ugly.”

  Brock laughed—a sound Annie decided she liked very much—and patted the big dog’s side. “Well, Big’un, I’m afraid I must disagree with Uncle Jonah. I think you are a right handsome fellow.” Turning his attention to Annie, he smiled, sending her heart hopping. “Thought I’d better come at first light and get an early start on the planting. Hope you don’t mind.”

  “Non.” Giving a nonchalant shrug, she tugged on her bonnet, which hung by its strings at her back, hoping to hide the blush warming her cheeks. If only her heart would not bounce so at his smiles. It was important that he see her as his equal, not a silly girl. She strove for a serious tone. “The seed corn is in a barrel at the west end of the cowshed. You can pick out what looks best and fill the planting bag.”

  “Yes, ma’am!” He gave her a smart salute, which, despite her best efforts to maintain a somber expression, coaxed a grin from her lips.

  Offering a mute nod, she turned and retreated into the cabin. Several minutes later, with her emotions tightly reined and a steaming bowl of Indian pudding in hand, she trekked to the cowshed. “Thought you might require a better breakfast than cold venison jerky before beginning the planting.”

  He looked up from the seed barrel, and his face brightened. “Is that Indian puddin’?” At her nod, his grin widened and he eagerly accepted the bowl she held out to him. Taking it in both hands, he inhaled the sweet aroma. “Mmmm! Much obliged. I reckon I haven’t had Indian puddin’ since I was a boy.”

  Annie’s heart broke lose from its tether to dance at his widening smile. There was no sense in pretending. Brock Martin lit a glow inside her she’d never before experienced. It pleased her that this time he bowed his head, allowing her the opportunity to say a quick prayer of thanks before beginning to eat.

  After he’d gobbled down the pudding, he drew his sleeve across his mouth, then handed her the empty bowl. His green-gray eyes twinkled into hers. “Good as I remember Ma’s. Maybe even better.”

  “Merci.” Somehow she managed to mumble the word of thanks as he handed her the now empty bowl. She struggled to control her raging emotions. Stop acting like a silly girl. He is only staying long enough to help with the planting, and that is all that matters. She cleared her throat and tried to affect the same authoritative tone Papa had used when trading pelts. “Does the corn look good?”

  He nodded. “More than passable, I’d say. At least I didn’t find much mold.”

  “Good. After I tidy the cabin, I will help with the planting.”

  He shook his head. “That is not necessary.”

  Annie’s back stiffened at his dismissive tone. She lifted her chin. “Oui. It is necessary. This is my land and my corn crop, and I will help plant it!”

  A pensive look puckered his forehead. “I had a visitor yesterday.”

  His abrupt change in subject took her by surprise, but she was happy not to have to argue about helping with the work. “Oui?” She was curious as to which of her neighbors had stopped to give Brock a hospitality call.

  He nodded. “A Delaware by the name of Gray Feather.”

  Annie couldn’t help a grin. She’d known Gray Feather—one of Papa’s best friends—for most of her life. How she would have loved to have seen Brock’s face at first sight of the imposing Delaware. She tried to rein her mirth to a sedate smile. “Gray Feather and Papa trapped together for years along White River and its creeks.”

  “So he said.” Brock’s serious expression held. “He also said you should not be living here alone.”

  Gray Feather’s concern touched Annie. She should have known her father’s old friend would be stealthily keeping watch over her. She grinned at Brock’s serious face. Did he believe Gray Feather was a threat to her? “Gray Feather still thinks of me as a little girl.”

  Brock’s demeanor remained troubled. “Gray Feather believes Tecumseh’s influence will reach down here.” He paused for a moment, then fixed her with a pointed look. “Seems to me, it already has.”

  Annie’s smile faded. She knew he was referring to Jonah’s murder. “Did—did Gray Feather have any idea who …?”

  Brock shook his head. “No. Or at least he didn’t say.” He looked past her shoulder out the back of the open cowshed. After a long pause he leveled his intent gaze back on her face. “Annie, I think Gray Feather is right. It might be best if you took the Dunbars up on their offer.”

  Anger flamed ins
ide Annie. Not even someone as charming as Brock Martin could coax her off the land and away from the vow she’d made to Papa and Jonah. Every muscle in her body stiffened, and she met his look with a hard stare.

  “I know everybody means well, including Gray Feather. But know this, and know this well. Nothing anyone says will change my mind. I will stay right here and keep this land Papa and Jonah earned with their service to the country.”

  Brock’s mouth opened as if he was about to say something, but then he closed it. Hefting the gunnysack full of seed corn, he reached for the hoe propped against a corner post. “Reckon we better get started.” Both his jaw and voice had taken on a hard edge.

  Over the next three hours, they worked together planting the field in row after row of corn. First, Brock paced off the rows, sticking a thumb-thick piece of maple branch in the ground at one end of a row. Annie, sighting from the opposite end, did the same. Wielding the hoe, Brock made little gouges three feet apart in the soil, into which Annie dropped a couple of grains of corn. Brock then dragged dirt over the kernels with the hoe and gave each hill a little tap. They repeated this process until half the field had been planted.

  Despite the shade provided by her bonnet, the increasingly hot sun sent rivulets of sweat meandering down her temples. Though half empty now, the bag of seed corn in her hands seemed to grow heavier by the minute. With each step, she shoved her bare toes into the cool dirt for relief.

  Brock paused, took off his hat, and drew his bare forearm across his sweaty brow. “Whew! I’d forgotten what hard work planting a field of corn could be.”

  “You used to farm?” Annie snatched at the opportunity to learn something more about his earlier life.

  He turned his face toward a freshening breeze and closed his eyes for a moment. As the soft wind played with his russet hair, Annie was struck again by his good looks. Il n’est pas mal. Not bad looking at all. Curiosity shooed away the frivolous thought as she watched his demeanor turn somber.

  He curled his fist over the top of the hoe’s handle. Resting his chin against the back of his hand, he stared across the field, a distant look in his gray-green eyes. “When I was a boy, I helped my pa and ma farm our little place in Pennsylvania.” Bitterness laced his tone. “It wasn’t like this, though. It was poor land, chock-full of stones. Plum wore ’em out till they couldn’t fight off the fever that took ’em.”

  “I’m sorry,” Annie said softly. “When Jonah and his family first came here, I remember him telling Papa that his brother and sister-in-law had died.” Along with a sting of sympathy, she felt a sort of kindred spirit with the young boy, Brock, left alone after his parents’ death. Although newly married to Jonah when Papa died, the realization of being orphaned was crushing. It had left a Papa-shaped hole in her heart that no one else could fill.

  Annie lightened her tone, hoping to lift both their spirits. “I remember Jonah mentioning you. He thought if you’d survived, you’d gone to live with your mother’s people.”

  Brock snorted and gave a mirthless laugh. “My Aunt Flora and Uncle Sim had a dozen young’uns and land nearly poor as ours.” He shook his head. “I saw how Uncle Sim treated his boys—worse’n slaves. I wasn’t about to sign on for that.”

  The line of his jaw hardened. “I buried my folks on the land that killed them, and vowed I’d never turn another furrow of dirt.”

  He gave another little snort. “Reckon I was wrong, huh?” he said dryly, and went back to gouging the soil with his hoe.

  Annie silently resumed dropping corn into the freshly dug indentions. She wasn’t at all sure how she felt about what Brock had disclosed. He obviously disliked farming. She assumed that was why he hadn’t sought out Jonah and Clara when his parents died. She had little doubt that as soon as the crop was in and he’d satisfied some imagined duty to Jonah, he’d drift on in search of a new adventure.

  One of the questions that had poked at Annie’s curiosity since Brock’s arrival popped into her mind. “What caused the falling-out between Jonah and your papa? I asked Jonah once, but he wouldn’t talk about it.”

  The pained look on Brock’s face made her regret having asked the question. When he spoke, his voice turned hard. “Land—that is, the loss of it.” He gazed out over the rich, dark ground they’d planted. “While Uncle Jonah was away at war, a slick-tongued land speculator talked Pa into trading the deed to my grandparents’ Virginia land for land in Pennsylvania. Twice the acreage and three times as fertile, he claimed.” Brock gave a sardonic snort. “It was twice the acreage all right, but ten times the rocks and ground so poor it would grow only waist-high corn. That folly ripped a tear in Pa and Jonah’s relationship that was never repaired and sucked the life out of my folks.” Wielding the hoe, he attacked the ground with unnecessary ferocity. “So I found it somewhat amusing when you told me how your pa had talked Jonah into selling his Kentucky land and buying this land instead.”

  Annie was about to remind him that in Jonah’s case it worked out well when Cap’n Brody’s frantic barking intruded.

  At once, Annie and Brock turned and looked several yards west to where the dog seemed to have something cornered on the banks of Piney Branch Creek.

  Brock dropped the hoe and ran for Jonah’s gun and powder flask Annie had left at the edge of the field.

  When they reached the creek, Annie saw that the dog’s quarry was a baby black bear. The cub, not quite the size of its tormentor, growled and swiped its paws at the dog. Cap’n Brody, apparently unfazed by the bear’s defensive posture, seemed to find great sport in bedeviling the little animal.

  Annie threw her arms around Cap’n Brody’s neck, trying to pull him away. “No, Cap’n. Bad dog! Bad dog!”

  But instead of her pulling the dog back, Cap’n Brody trotted unhindered down the creek bank carrying Annie with him.

  Her bare foot hit the slippery, gray-black mud lining the sloping bank, and she slid into the water with a great splash!

  At the sudden impact with the cold creek water, she gasped. But she quickly pushed herself to a sitting position and soon began to enjoy the delicious coolness rushing past her waist.

  Laughing, she struggled to stand and yanked at the sodden skirts impeding her progress. Aware of the ridiculous picture she must make, she braced for the teasing Brock was sure to give her.

  But when he reached the bank above the creek, she found no levity in his expression. Instead, he looked upward and past her. And the horror she read in his widening his eyes shriveled her laughter.

  Suddenly a deep, ugly roar on the bank behind her spun Annie around. What she saw froze her heart in her chest. The huge, dark form of an adult bear—undoubtedly the cub’s mother—loomed above her. Its gigantic claws slashed at the air while white foam dripped from its yellow fangs.

  Chapter 7

  Don’t fuss, Bess. I am not sick or hurt.”

  Sitting on the edge of her bed, Annie leaned away from the wet cloth that Bess dabbed at her forehead with. “You have young ones to tend to. You didn’t need to be bothered by—”

  “Brock was right to fetch me.” Bess managed another dab at Annie’s face. “You might have done yourself an injury when you swooned.”

  “I walked all the way back from the creek, didn’t I?” From the moment she came to on the creek bank and Brock told her the bears had run away, Annie had resisted his help. The last thing she wanted was to look weak in front of him. She chose not to think about him pulling her out of the creek.

  “Only because you wouldn’t let me carry you.” Brock stood at the foot of the bed, relief slowly ironing out the tense lines on his face. “You had a right frightful scare. Women have swooned over less, I reckon.”

  Annie’s back stiffened. It rankled her that he thought she’d fainted from fright. “The bear didn’t scare me into a swoon. I should have eaten more breakfast, that’s all. Too little food and too much sun must have made me light-headed.”

  She started to stand to demonstrate that she was physically
sound, but with the quick movement, her head swam again, and she sat back down.

  “I heard a shot,” Annie said to divert Brock’s and Bess’s attention from her momentary weakness. Just before everything swirled around her and went black, she remembered hearing a musket’s report. “You must be a mighty poor shot to miss from that distance.”

  A slow grin spread across Brock’s mouth and he shook his head. “I couldn’t take the chance of not killing the bear outright. If I just wounded her, she’d most likely have come after both of us. I just shot up in the air, then ran at her hollerin’ my loudest war whoops. Apparently, she wanted no part of a crazy man. She and her cub hightailed it back to the woods.”

  “I reckon I’d best get some food in you, girl.” Bess’s worried countenance turned cheery again as she bustled toward the hearth.

  “There’s about a quarter acre yet to put in corn.” Brock glanced toward the cabin’s front door, then back to Annie. “So if you’re sufficient over your fright, I’ll go back to the plantin’.”

  “I told you I was not frightened!” She shot him a piercing glare that he answered with an infuriating grin.

  “If you say so.” He headed out the door before she could reply.

  “Oh! Il me rend fâché!” Annie fumed. Realizing she’d vented her aggravation in French, she translated to English for Bess, who stood at the table spooning some of the leftover Indian pudding into a bowl. “He makes me so angry, that one!”

  Bess’s plump figure shook gently with her laugh as she crossed the cabin and handed Annie the bowl of pudding. Her tone took on a teasing lilt. “You ask me, where there is smoke, there is fire.” She wagged her finger at Annie. “And Annie Martin, I think I saw smoke comin’ out of your ears.”

  Heat rushed to Annie’s face. Ever since Brock’s arrival, Bess seemed to be sizing him up as a match for Annie.

  Annie exhaled a frustrated sigh and shoved the spoon around the warm brown pudding. “What does it matter? He’s not staying, Bess. And besides, he isn’t even a Christian.”