Johann set Katarina aside, and his bright smile dragged down in a grim frown.
Fear balled in the pit of Annie’s belly. She focused her attention directly on Johann’s somber face. “Is he here? Johann, please tell me he came back.”
Johann shook his head, and tears welled in the big German’s blue eyes. “Sorry, I am, Annie.”
Chapter 18
The faint, sweet sounds of a church bell wafted through the barred window of Brock’s cell.
He gripped the bars and pressed his face against the cold iron, craving any confirmation that he was still alive. Inhaling deeply, he breathed in the scents of woodsmoke, drying leaves, and autumn sunshine. They offered only a sliver of comfort.
In truth, all he needed to do was to look inside himself to verify his mortal state. His gut still sizzled at the memory of Ezra’s betrayal.
Aided by a moonless night, Brock, Johann, and Ezra had managed to slip out of Fort Deux Fleuves undetected. For the better part of four days, Brock had safely led the other two men southwest, over forty miles of hilly, thickly forested terrain to Fort French Lick. He’d thought the three of them had built a strong camaraderie, so when they finally reached their destination he was completely taken by surprise when Ezra produced a tattered and yellowed scrap of newspaper—a wanted notice listing Brock as a deserter and murderer. The notice also declared that whatever person delivered said fugitive to army authorities would be rewarded in one hundred dollars gold.
Turning away from the window, Brock pressed his back against the cool stone wall of his cell and slid down to the filthy blanket on the hard-packed dirt floor that constituted his bed. The place stank of every bodily secretion imaginable, and as he’d done countless times before, he fought the urge to retch.
The memory of the shock, disbelief, and helplessness on Johann’s face when soldiers clapped the irons on Brock’s wrists and ankles still twisted his insides. With no time to explain to the German the details of the events that led to the charges against him, Brock had only a moment to beg Johann to explain to Annie what had happened and to see that she was taken care of.
Compounding his treachery, Ezra, for the purpose of claiming his reward, had traveled with Brock and the contingent of soldiers assigned to escort Brock back to Newport Barracks for trial. The thought that the scoundrel might return to Deux Fleuves and marry Annie gouged at Brock’s innards. But surely when she learned what Ezra had done, she’d never agree to marry him.
Brock drew his knees up and rested his chin on them. The notion of any other man but himself marrying Annie slashed at his heart. Still, if he could believe that she and the amiable Johann might make a match, he could go to the gallows feeling far easier about her future. That, however, seemed unlikely. During the second evening of their trek to Fort French Lick, Johann had confided that he hoped to rekindle the relationship he and Katarina Hoffmeier had shared back in Hanover before he married his late wife.
So, like a sweet vine, Brock’s love and concern for Annie continued to grow uninhibited, twining around his heart so tightly it throbbed with the pain.
Only the absence of Colonel Stryker had delayed Brock’s court-martial and, almost certainly, his subsequent execution. Apparently, the colonel had led a contingent up to New York to fight under the command of General Van Rensselaer. So for the better part of two weeks, Brock had languished here, not knowing if Johann and the rangers had made it safely back to Fort Deux Fleuves, or if Annie was safe.
Annie. She ruled his waking thoughts and nightly dreams. Was she this moment thinking of him as he was thinking of her?
The back of his nose stung, and he blinked wetness from his eyes. He should have told her he loved her. Behind the garrison house when he informed her of his plans to head for Fort French Lick, he should have told her. He should have done what he wanted: taken her in his arms and kissed her and told her that whatever happened, he loved her—would always love her.
He squeezed his eyes shut tight. Annie’s image appeared behind his lids, so clear it seemed as if he might reach out and touch her. Her voice echoed in his ears. “I want to see you in heaven one day.”
An overwhelming desire to know that whatever happened to him, he would one day see Annie again gripped him.
Another voice sounded in his head—a dear voice from long ago. “‘I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.’” Those same words—among the last his mother ever spoke on this earth—had come into his mind the night he and Annie swam for their lives from the Shawnee.
Brock brushed the wetness from his whiskered cheeks. Once again, he sat at his dying mother’s bedside. Her faint voice strengthened as she gripped his hand. “Don’t cry, son. You will see me again one day in heaven. It says so in the Good Book.”
For many years, he’d forgotten Ma’s last words. He had shoved them back into the dark recesses of his mind, along with the awful circumstances of her and Pa’s deaths, and locked them away with chains of bitterness.
Brock lifted his head and looked up at the barred window above him. Through the black wrought-iron bars he could make out a wispy white cloud drifting across the azure sky. Was Annie already somewhere behind that cloud with Ma and Pa? With Christ?
Like a beckoning whisper, her words filled his mind and convicted his heart. “You must ask Christ to come into your heart. Just ask Him to forgive your sins and take you into His fold, and whatever happens, one day we will meet again in heaven.”
Fresh tears drenched his face. Rolling onto his knees, he bowed his head and clasped his hands in prayer as he’d done as a child. “Dear Lord. When Stryker’s noose chokes the life from me I want to see Ma and Pa and Annie again. Forgive my sins, make me fit for heaven, and take me into your fold.”
A peace he had never before felt washed over him. Stryker could do his worst, but because of Christ, the hangman’s noose had lost its power to separate Brock forever from the ones he loved. As joy bubbled up inside him, so did a desire to get word to Annie—if she still lived—that she no longer needed to concern herself about his soul.
Footsteps and a rattling sound in the hallway outside his little cell turned Brock’s attention to the locked door. Running his sleeve under his nose, he scrambled to his feet and stepped to the door. Solid, except for a tiny nose-high barred window, the heavy oak partition opened only three times each day when his meals were delivered. Brock relished these respites, however brief, from the otherwise crushing solitude.
But at this moment, despite his growing hunger, it was not food he craved, but pen and paper.
Metal rasped against metal, followed by a click, then the door creaked open less than the span of a man’s hand. The savory smell of meat and cooked vegetables made Brock’s stomach grind. He reached out a hand to accept the wooden bowl of lukewarm stew.
Before the fresh-faced private could slam the door back in place Brock grabbed it and held it open, overpowering the weaker youth. Stryker could return any day. This might be his last chance to get a message to Annie.
For one instant, fear flicked in the boy’s eyes. His hand flew to his belt dagger hanging at his hip.
“I mean you no harm.” Keeping his eyes trained on the private’s face, Brock set the bowl of stew on the floor. “I need to write a letter to … to someone dear to me. If you could just get me a piece of paper, a pen, and some ink …”
The soldier scowled and shook his head, making the white tassels at the side of his shako hat shiver. “That ain’t allowed. You outta know that, havin’ been a soldier.”
Brock kept a firm hold on the door, and the soldier kept his hand on his belt dagger. Any moment the nervous private could call out for assistance to the soldiers talking and laughing—obviously playing cards—in the adjoining room.
“It—it’s for my sweetheart,” Brock said honestly. That Annie didn’t know she was his sweetheart didn’t change the fact that he considered her so. “There are things I need to tell her before—before Stryker retu
rns.” Yesterday, Brock had overhead the private mention his own sweetheart to another soldier in conversation. Perhaps if he appealed to the young man’s sense of romance, he might yet have an opportunity to get a letter to Annie. “I reckon if you had a girl, you’d know—”
“I do.” The boy’s hand slipped away from his weapon, and empathy shone from his eyes. His brow scrunched, and he caught his lower lip with his teeth. He glanced over his shoulder as if assuring himself no one was listening, then turned back to Brock. “I’ll do what I can,” he whispered.
Chapter 19
A single large snowflake lit on Annie’s dark wool cloak just as she glanced at the spot where it settled. The late-December sun glinted off the speck of moisture. For a brief instant, she glimpsed the intricate detail of the lacy flake. Its wondrous beauty struck her even as it disappeared beneath her warm breath.
She blinked away tears. God took the trouble to fashion elegance into a snowflake that might well have gone unnoticed. Walking toward the fort with the Dunbars, she gazed at the snow snaking across the worn path before the winter wind. How many such delicate works of God’s hand made up the growing patches of white decorating the base of trees and the brown grass along the bottom of the fort’s palisade? Yet the Almighty did not find it prudent to reach down and save Brock from the hangman’s noose.
She tugged the heavy folds of the cloak closer around her, resentment swelling in her chest. God could make unnumbered snowflakes that doubtless few would appreciate, and some may even disdain. Yet hours and hours of prayers for Brock’s life had gone unanswered. Since the letter she’d received from him in October, there had been no further word of his fate.
She held her Bible with the precious missive tucked safely within its pages close to her chest. The smudged words Brock had penned on the bits of tattered paper played over again in her mind.
My dearest Annie,
I have not the ink or paper to convey all that is in my heart. I must simply say that I am writing to express my love for you. I know now that I should have told you of my feelings months ago, and I greatly regret that cowardly omission. I pray that this letter finds you, so that at last, you may glimpse the depths of my affection for you.
I have not yet stood for my court-martial as Colonel Stryker has been away on campaign. Just this hour word has reached me that he has returned to Newport Barracks, so my trial may well be at hand. My incarceration has given me much time to think, and I have thought a lot about what you said about my soul. My dearest, if my life should be taken from me I want to know I will one day see you again in heaven. This day I fell on my knees and asked Christ to save my soul, sorry as it is. I thank God every day for the sweet gift of having known you. The example of your strong faith helped lead me to salvation through our Lord. So my heart is eased, knowing that one day we will meet again in heaven. I pray daily for you and your babe, and that God will see fit that you keep that land you hold such store by. Be assured that my last thoughts on this earth will be of you, and your sweet name will be the last utterance of my dying tongue.
Forever your devoted,
Brock
As the group approached the fort’s open gates, shame nipped at Annie’s conscience for her anger toward God. It was Christmas. Like Brock, she should thank God for the gift of His Son that bought them hope of one day reuniting in paradise.
Still, the sight of Katarina clinging to Johann’s arm as the pair entered the garrison house filled Annie’s heart with regret and her eyes with fresh tears. If only things had been different. If only she and Brock, like Johann and Katarina, had been given another chance to pledge their love and lives to each other.
Annie kept her head down, trying to hide her weepy eyes beneath the hood of her cloak as she followed Bess and Obadiah into the building. Since receiving Brock’s letter, she’d cried enough tears to fill both the White and Muscatatuck Rivers three times over, it seemed.
Inside, she settled on the trestle board beside Bess. As her gaze roamed the room, she was reminded that hers was not the only grieving heart this Christmas Day. Several families had lost loved ones during the siege. And the Buxtons, Polly and Amos, still carried on their faces the shame and grief caused by their son’s actions. Annie watched Ezra’s mother, Polly, swipe at her thin, dried apple face. Though she tried to maintain a cheerful facade, her hollow eyes and slumped shoulders spoke of the toll her son’s treachery had taken on her spirit. Not only had Ezra turned Brock in for the reward money, they learned that he’d headed out to the western wilderness without stopping by Deux Fleuves for so much as a parting word to his folks.
Seeming mindful of the sundry heartaches afflicting his flock, Obadiah’s Christmas sermon encouraged his congregation to simply rejoice in the gift of salvation God sent to earth in the person of His Son.
The preacher’s gaze touched briefly on Annie. A gentle smile softened the lines in his kind broad face. “‘To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you,’” he read.
The scripture struck Annie full force. After her promise to Papa last February, nothing had seemed more important than keeping his and Jonah’s inheritance.
As Obadiah led the congregation in singing a hymn, Annie ran her hand across the mound in her lap and smiled. Her precious babe answered her touch with a kick. Annie was indeed glad that her child had an opportunity to inherit the land that had meant so much to his father and grandfather. But over the past year she had learned how fragile such an inheritance could be. She finally understood that no scrap of land—nothing on this earth—could compete in importance with God’s eternal inheritance. Though her heart moaned daily in grief for the loss of Brock, she rejoiced all the same that he had embraced Christ’s salvation before it was too late.
A sudden gust of cold wind dried the tears on the cheeks. The singing faded until a hush fell over the room. She looked toward the door, wondering who could be so late for the service.
The soldier filling the doorway trained his gaze directly on her. A shower of snowflakes fell as he doffed his shako hat, and a gasp exploded from Annie.
Brock!
Annie.
Every muscle in Brock strained to dash to his beloved, sweep her up in his arms, and hold her fast against his pounding heart. But such an action would not be respectful during the Christmas worship service.
Instead, he nodded mutely toward a beaming Obadiah and slipped in beside Annie.
Her cinnamon eyes, brimming with tears and questions, gazed up at him unbelieving, while a tangle of emotions flashed across her pale, damp face.
Though he longed to tell her all that had transpired, there would be ample time for that later. He took her hand in his and gently squeezed her warm fingers. They trembled against his palm as he joined the congregation in the singing of a hymn.
After Obadiah’s benediction, Brock surrendered to his longing and embraced Annie in a tender hug, whispering her name over and over.
Blissful moments passed as he reveled in the warmth of her embrace. Her bonnet slipped back, and he pressed his face against her thick, mahogany tresses, inhaling the sweet scent of her.
She clung to him as closely as her growing child allowed. Her muffled sobs against his chest tore at his heart even while they sped its pounding to triple-time cadence. In the arms of his beloved, winter melted into spring, his heart sang like the long-absent robin, and hope bloomed. If God called him home this moment, he could die a happy man.
The next moment he was set upon by the Dunbars, Johann and Katarina, as well as a dozen or so other curious folk bombarding him with a barrage of questions.
With reluctance, he relinquished his precious captive, but only to a point, keeping an arm around her waist. He’d come close enough to death to smell its fetid breath. For the past three months, Annie’s touch had been something he only dreamed about. He would not give it up lightly.
“It was not right, then, Ja?” Johann’s confused but happy face peeked ar
ound Obadiah. “Ezra’s paper, it was …” His broad brow scrunched as if searching for the right word. “Fehler. How you say—”
“Mistake.” Katarina, clinging tightly to Johann’s arm, supplied the English word.
“Yes, it was something like a mistake,” Brock murmured the half truth, careful to not look at Obadiah. Or Annie. They had to know he would tell them everything in good time, but this was not the time or the place to do so.
Nodding, Johann gazed down upon Katarina fondly. “Sehr gut! Mein Frau … wife, know the English better.”
Brock seized upon his friends’ good news, eager to offer congratulations on their marriage while diverting attention from himself. But Johann would not be dissuaded from his questioning.
“Why then you wear the clothes of soldier?” Johann asked after Brock had pumped his hand and placed a congratulatory kiss on Katarina’s cheek. It was the question he knew must be buzzing in everyone’s minds, and the question he most dreaded.
“I’m sure Brock has many exciting tales to tell by the fireside this winter,” Obadiah broke in, herding the group toward the door and earning Brock’s silent thanks. “But Christmas dinner awaits.” He patted his stomach. “And I’ve never been a man to leave roast fowl languishing.”
Brock bid his German friends good day and good Christmas, allowing them to ponder the details of his release. It would doubtless provide interesting conversation at the Hoffmeier clan’s Christmas dinner table.
When the well-wishers and curious had gone, Bess patted Brock’s face and told him how peaked he looked. “Better come to our place for Christmas dinner. Me, Annie, and my girls have been cookin’ and bakin’ all week. We’ll put some meat on them sorry bones o’ yours so that uniform won’t hang on you like you was a scarecrow.”
“I will do that.” Brock gave a little laugh, the first such sound of mirth he’d produced in a very long time. Bess’s maternal fussing felt good.
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