Turning to Annie, he suddenly craved to hear her voice, but dreaded the inevitable subject of their conversation.
Without a word, Bess and Obadiah shooed their brood out of the fort while Brock and Annie lingered in the yard.
The snowing had slowed until only a few fluffy flakes dusted the shoulders and hood of Annie’s dark cape. But the wind’s icy gusts whipped at the folds of her cloak and made her cheeks rosy beneath the sprinkling of golden freckles. At least he attributed the color in her face solely to the cold temperature. He should get her into the warmth of the Dunbars’ cabin as soon as possible.
An odd mixture of sadness and pride registered in her eyes as she examined him in his uniform. When she finally spoke her voice cracked, breaking his heart. “I got your letter.” Her brown eyes glistening with tears, she slipped a soiled and tattered envelope from her Bible. His heart throbbed, imagining her reading over and over the tender words he’d penned to her months ago.
A brave smile quavered on her rosebud lips. “My heart rejoices at your salvation, and I praise God for whatever miracle has brought you safely back to me.” A tear escaped its lovely confines and slipped unheeded down her cheek. “But you are not staying, are you, mon amour?”
Chapter 20
Annie sat beside the blazing fireplace, her fingers busily working the white linen thread and tatting shuttle. Yet it was not the crackling fire that warmed her through, but the rich tenor of Brock’s voice.
With Christmas dinner cleared away and the last pot cleaned and hung, she’d been left with no outlet for her nervous energy. A swarm of wild emotions surging through her would not allow her to be still. So she tatted around the collar of the baby gown she’d made last week.
The moment Brock appeared in the garrison house doorway, she knew her prayers had been answered. Somehow God had found a way to save him. But at the same time the uniform he wore told her God had not saved him to be with her. She’d known the answer to her question before she posed it to him. No, he would not be staying. She wanted to believe she’d seen regret in his eyes, but sorrow and perhaps a touch of guilt was all she could honestly attest to.
Even as Brock regaled them over the dinner table with the fantastic tale of his deliverance, knowing he’d soon be leaving had blunted Annie’s joy.
The incredible occurrences that had set him free remained the singular topic of conversation long after Bess sent the children to bed in the loft rooms above them.
“I’d say it was nothin’ less then Providence that kept Colonel Stryker from presidin’ over your trial.” Obadiah looked up from his whittling, the carving knife becoming still against the little piece of wood in his hand. He shook his head. “Now, do not take me wrongly. Far be it from me to rejoice in any man’s suffering. But it seems to me that by allowin’ the colonel to be wounded in battle, the Almighty, in His infinite wisdom and mercy, found a way to save both your life and the colonel’s.”
“Yes.” Brock gave a solemn nod as he reached down and patted Cap’n Brody, snoozing at his feet. “It was indeed a blessing that Colonel Rodgers, an impartial, fair-minded man, replaced Colonel Stryker as post commander, and so became my court-martial judge. But it was Private Buchanan’s testimony that saved me.” His voice became thick, and he focused his attention on the dog as if he desired to avert his features from those around him. “I never imagined that the boy I saved from Driscoll’s beating had lingered in the shadows and saw all that transpired.”
“But why didn’t he come forward sooner?” Bess’s forehead knit together as tightly as the yarn she worked around the two long wooden needles in her hands.
“Said he was scared.” One side of Brock’s mouth lifted in a crooked grin. “Can’t say I blame him. He said when he heard I’d be standing for court-martial and might be hanged, he felt compelled to come forward and bear witness to what he’d seen the evening of Lieutenant Driscoll’s death.”
“So you were cleared of the murder.” Obadiah resumed scraping the wood with the knife. “But what about the desertion charges?”
Brock grinned. “I suppose in part, the war helped. The army needs every soldier they can get. Colonel Rodgers said he understood why I ran and took into account my years of unblemished service to the army and my action in going after help to break the siege here. Said as long as I returned to duty, he reckoned my good service mitigated my desertion.”
“So when will you be leaving Deux Fleuves?” Annie strove to make her voice sound flat and indifferent. But judging by Brock’s wince, she’d failed miserably.
“I must return to Newport Barracks by the first of January and serve another full year to make up for my time away from the army. After that I can either stay in the army or take a general discharge.” Brock’s gaze slid from hers, and Annie’s hopes of him returning to Deux Fleuves after his required year of service melted like a snowflake beneath a puff of breath. Had he truly meant what he’d written in his letter to her? Or were those sentiments simply the outpourings of a doomed man and regretted now that life and freedom beckoned? The thought clawed at her heart.
A pounding on the cabin door shattered her melancholy reverie and yanked Cap’n Brody up from his snooze, instantly alert. Setting his carving aside, Obadiah rose with a grunt and crossed to the front door. He opened it, letting in a rush of frigid wind that swirled snow around a bewhiskered stranger in fringed buckskins and a dark beaver-fur hat. The man cradled a long rifle in the crook of one elbow.
“Don’t mean to interrupt your Christmas celebratin’.” The big man dragged his furry cap off long gray-brown hair that straggled about his shoulders. Clutching the cap to his chest, he made an awkward attempt at bows toward Bess and Annie.
“You are interrupting nothing, friend. We celebrate our Lord daily here. Come in and warm yourself at the hearth.” Obadiah ushered the man in the room and toward a stool near the fireplace.
“I won’t bother long,” the stranger said as he leaned his long rifle against the wall by the fireplace. He settled himself on the stool and with murmured thanks, accepted the cup of hot sassafras tea Bess handed him while declining her offer of victuals. “Thank you kindly, Missus, but I just came from the Buxton cabin where the good wife there fed me to near bustin’.”
He cleared his throat. “My name is Bartholomew Pickett, and I was told that the tale I have to tell would be received with interest by them herein.” His dark eyes shining from the midst of his weathered face held an intense look.
Obadiah made the introductions, and Bartholomew’s keen gaze swept the group, lingering with interest on Brock’s uniform.
Aside from his rough appearance, which was not so different from many who regularly came through Deux Fleuves, Annie found nothing especially alarming about him. Yet the man’s presence caused a foreboding to stir inside her. She did, however, derive comfort from both Brock’s presence and Cap’n Brody’s unconcerned posture. After investigating the stranger with a few sniffs, the dog slumped back to his place at Brock’s feet where he yawned, then lay down and commenced thumping his tail on the floor as if to avow that the newcomer presented no threat.
Bartholomew took a healthy swig of the tea. He crossed his feet, which were clad in high-top moccasins that came nearly to his knees. The soft hide cut in decorative fringes around the boots’ tops bounced with his every movement.
“Like I said, I jist came from Amos and Polly Buxton’s place. It only seemed right to tell them first. Hard.” He shook his grizzled head. “It’s a hard thing I have to tell, and on Christmas, all the worse. But ’tis my duty.” He shot a quick grim smile at Brock. “Somethin’ I’m sure you understand, soldier.”
The uneasy feeling twisted harder inside Annie, and she wished the man would just get out what he’d come to say.
The flickering firelight burnished the man’s silhouette with an eerie glow.
Bartholomew glanced around at his audience as if assuring himself that all eyes were focused on him and all ears were keenly attuned to hi
s words. He took a deep breath and began.
“It was a couple months ago—way down in October—when young Ezra Buxton joined up with me and four other fellers headin’ out West to trap along the Mississippi.” The mountain man’s eyes took on a distant look, as if he were seeing something the others in the room could not see. “We never made it to the great river, though. We’d just crossed the Wabash some miles north of Vincennes when we was set upon by a fierce band of Miami braves. For several hours we carried on a right valiant battle, but in the end all perished but me.”
Annie gasped as a deep sorrow for Amos and Polly gripped her. She agreed with Bartholomew’s earlier words. How awful for the Buxtons to learn of their boy’s death on Christmas night.
Bess clucked softly. “Poor Polly. I must visit her tomorrow.”
Obadiah, too, voiced his desire to comfort Ezra’s folks.
When the interruptions faded to silence again, Bartholomew resumed his narrative.
“Thing is, young Buxton didn’t die right off. He lingered for some time after the Miami left us.” He cast apologetic looks toward Annie and Bess. “Pardon me for sayin’ so, ladies, but they took his hair.”
Bess gasped, Obadiah sighed, and Brock groaned. Annie simply sat stunned, trying not to allow the picture Bartholomew had painted with his words to form in her mind.
The man forged on. “When I seen we was outnumbered and had no chance, I hid in underbrush, hopin’ the savages didn’t take time to count. When they’d gone, I went to see about the others in my party and found none save the boy still breathin’, and him jist barely.”
Bartholomew bent forward as if relishing this part of the story. “The boy grabbed the front of my shirt with his bloody hand and pulled me down so’s I could hear, then commenced to bare his soul before he went to meet his Maker.” Bartholomew clutched at his deerskin shirt, and in the firelight, Annie could make out a dark brown stain. Ezra’s blood?
“He made me promise to come here to Deux Fleuves and repeat what he told me. He asked God’s forgiveness and begged the Almighty to take his soul to heaven. Then he asked his pa and ma to forgive him for leavin’ like he did.”
Bartholomew’s gaze flitted between Annie and Brock. “Ma’am, he said he wanted to ask your forgiveness for the wrong he’d done Mr. Brock Martin, here…. Said you’d know.”
Annie nodded. With his mouth set in a grim line, Brock also gave his head a quick bob of acknowledgment. She could only wonder what emotions must be rolling through him, learning that the reward money Ezra had collected for turning Brock in had taken Ezra to his death.
The mountain man’s piercing gaze pivoted to Annie where it settled. “The last Ezra had to say was to you, ma’am, and a most remarkable confession it was.”
Annie abandoned the needlework to her lap as the quivering in her midsection increased.
“Ezra said after the Good Lord, he craved most desperate your and your dead husband’s forgiveness for his heinous crimes. Said to tell you it was him what shot your man with an arrow from a quiver a Shawnee brave traded at his pa’s post.”
“But why?” The breathless words puffed from Annie. Had Ezra killed Jonah out of pure jealousy? But that didn’t make sense. He must not have been that smitten with her, for after she refused to sell the land, his interest in her had seemed to fade.
“Somethin’ about land and wantin’ to sell it for the money to outfit him for an expedition. Said you’d understand.” Bartholomew’s statement made chilling sense of Ezra’s actions.
A quick and deep sorrow for the boy she’d once intended to marry struck Annie. How tortured he must have been about what he’d done, especially finding it was for naught. She said a silent prayer for Ezra’s soul, hoping that like the dying thief who petitioned Christ, he was taken to the Father’s bosom in paradise.
Bartholomew shook his head sadly. “I don’t condone what the boy did, but reckon some men’ll do ’bout anything so’s not to be bound to one place.” He drained his cup, then rose and set the empty vessel by the hearth. “Thank you kindly for the warm drink,” he said as he retrieved his firearm. “Night will be comin’ on soon, so I reckon I’d best be headin’ back to the fort. I beg your pardon for bringin’ such grievous news on Christmas.”
He turned his intent gaze on Obadiah. “If it eases your mind any Rev’rend, though I don’t consider myself an especially pious man, I prayed for the salvation of the boy’s soul as it left his body.”
Obadiah stood and reached out his hand to grip Bartholomew’s. “Thank you, friend. That means a lot to me, and to Ezra’s folks, too, I’m sure.”
Brock rose. “I’ll be staying the night at the fort as well, Mr. Pickett. So if you don’t mind my company, I’ll walk back with you.”
Cap’n Brody wakened, stretched, and yawned, but didn’t follow Brock. Instead the big dog loped over to Annie and settled down at her feet.
Brock gave Bess a hug and shook Obadiah’s hand. “Thank you for the fine meal. I bid you good evening and happy Christmas.” He turned to Annie, and his intense look smoldered like a hot coal, burning all the way to her soul.
“Happy Christmas, Annie. I should like to call tomorrow if it be convenient.”
Annie managed to make her head bob in a wooden nod.
After Brock and Bartholomew left, she sat numbly, unable to fully soak up all the astounding revelations of the past hours. Brock had made it clear that his visit tomorrow was specifically to see her. To say his final adieus? Bartholomew’s words echoed hollowly in her ears. “Reckon some men’ll do ’bout anything so’s not to be bound to one place.”
Chapter 21
Don’t fuss so. I will not have this child today.” Gripping Brock’s arm, Annie waddled to the wagon, wishing she could make her steps quicker. She’d scarcely slept all night, at once longing for and dreading this moment when she and Brock might have some time alone. But with the six Dunbar children squabbling and racing about, creating the tumult that generally held sway over the Dunbar household, no niche within the cabin offered seclusion for an intimate conversation. So when Brock arrived for his visit this morning as promised and mentioned he planned to stop by her cabin to visit Johann and Katarina Arnholt, Annie, against both Brock’s and Bess’s objections, had insisted on joining him. If they were to say their final farewells, she wanted it to at least be in private.
His strong arm linked with hers, Brock bent closer as if to shield her from any gusting breeze. “I am not convinced a drive in an open wagon is a good idea. Bess is right. It could be dangerous should you take a chill or become overtaxed.”
Annie glanced up at the sun shining from a cloudless sky and glinting off the skiff of snow that decorated the frozen ground. “Bess is sometimes too much the mother hen. It is a lovely day, I have a good warm cloak, and the cabin is only a mile away. There is no reason I should not go with you to visit Katarina and Johann.” She’d spent a sleepless night and waited agonizing hours for this chance at time alone with Brock. At this moment, a team of horses couldn’t drag her back into the Dunbars’ cabin. “I am eager to see what Katarina has done with my cabin.”
After the siege, with winter and her laying-in time drawing near, Annie had finally acquiesced to Bess and Obadiah’s insistence that she move in with them until spring. In the meantime, she’d offered Johann and Katarina Arnholt her cabin until Johann and the Hoffmeier men could build the couple one of their own.
She grasped the wagon and began to climb, forcing Brock to help her up.
“Besides,” she said as she settled herself on the wagon seat and tugged on her woolen cloak to arrange its folds around her, “Indian women work up until the moment their time comes.” She couldn’t help thinking of Yellow Bird, who had surely given birth to her own child by now and wondered how the Shawnee girl who’d called Annie “sister” fared.
Brock climbed to the wagon seat that creaked and rocked gently with his movements as he sat down beside her. For several minutes, silence fell between them, br
oken only by the jangling of the harness, the squeak of the spring beneath the wagon seat, and the clop of the horse’s hooves plodding over the frozen road toward her land.
Her land.
She gazed over the fields decorated with yesterday’s snowfall. Beneath the sun, the rolling landscape sparkled as if it were encrusted in jewels.
Together, she and Brock had kept her promise to Papa and Jonah. The babe, whom she’d already begun referring to as Jonah Gerard, having no doubts it would be a son, kicked her as the wagon bumped in and out of a frozen rut.
She stole a sideways glance at Brock. His strong, angular jaw displayed only a hint of the russet stubble he’d allowed to grow into a fiery beard during the siege.
Her heart ached. She looked out across the white field and blinked hard, knowing it was not the sun reflecting brightly off the snow that generated her tears. Last spring she would never have agreed to give up her land—her mérite des ancêtres—for anyone. But now she would give it up in an instant if doing so would keep Brock here with her.
As the ache in her heart deepened, a flash of anger ignited inside her. The tender words of love he’d written to her from his jail cell remained etched on her heart. Every evening she removed the precious pages from her Bible and read them over again to keep the sweet sentiments fresh in her mind. But since his return scarcely twenty-four hours ago, Brock had yet to utter the first endearment to her. As she’d feared last night, he had obviously found it easy to pen such words of love and devotion when he thought he would never be required to prove them with any commitment.
“Johann says Hermann Hoffmeier’s boy, Ernst, wants to join the army.” Brock’s sudden words shattered the silence, assaulting Annie’s senses like the gusts of winter wind that stung her nose and cheeks. His approving tone rankled.
“You may think that a life spent in the army, fighting gallant battles and constantly moving from place to place, is a fine way to live,” Annie didn’t even try to blunt her sharp tone, “but I doubt Ernst’s family is pleased with his decision. Mr. Pickett, I think, was right in what he said last night. Some men will do anything rather than be bound to one place.” She couldn’t keep the bitterness from her voice.
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