She already had the main part of the evening meal, the meat and vegetables, cooking in the pot. After her brother and One Eye left the cabin, she would then begin preparing the bread.
Knowing that it was best to divert the talk away from his sister’s upcoming nuptials, Swift Horse gazed over at One Eye and said, “I saw it in a vision that the hunt will be good for both your clan and ours.”
Unable to quell her excitement at being so in love and soon to marry the man she adored, Soft Wind giggled and drew both her brother’s and One Eye’s attention back to her.
“I saw it in a vision that I was already Edward James’s wife,” she blurted out. “In the vision I was enjoying living at his and his sister’s home.”
Soft Wind could not help but notice a look that came into her brother’s eyes at the mention of Edward James’s sister, Marsha, and knew that he, too, had fallen in love with someone of a different skin color. But he had not yet talked openly of this to anyone but Soft Wind.
“It was also in my vision about Marsha’s tidiness,” she then said. “She is so very tidy and neat.”
Swift Horse laughed softly. “Yes, you will be able to relax in that respect while living with Edward James and his sister Marsha,” he said. “You are neat and tidy, too—so much sometimes that I am afraid to step into this cabin with my moccasins on.”
Soft Wind giggled. “Sometimes while I am at the trading post and watching people coming and going for trade, I sense that Marsha would like for them to remove their moccasins, too,” she said, her eyes dancing. “For certain she has changed the neatness of Edward James’s trading post. Everything is in its place.”
“I had noticed the difference in the trading post and had suspected that the white woman was responsible,” Swift Horse said. “There is suddenly a place for everything. I had even noticed the same color blankets lying together. . . .”
His words faded to nothing as he heard a commotion outside his lodge. He rose quickly to his feet and went to the door and opened it. His jaw tightened with anger when he saw two cows running through the village and then into the corn crop, trampling through it.
“Not again,” Swift Horse groaned to himself.
“What is it, brother?” Soft Wind said as she, then One Eye, stepped outside with Swift Horse.
She followed the path of her brother’s gaze, and saw the cows making their way through the corn crop, leaving so much destruction behind them.
“The cowkeeper’s cows,” Swift Horse said, doubling his hands into tight fists at his sides. “The cowkeeper has not heeded my warnings about allowing his cows to run loose.”
“They come into my town, too, where they also trample and destroy our crops,” One Eye said heatedly. “Come. We must kill them. Now!”
Swift Horse reached a hand out for One Eye, stopping him from going to his horse and grabbing a rifle from its gunboot. “No, not while they are in my village,” he said tightly. “I cherish the lives of all animals unless they are needed for food for my people, or for clothes.”
“What, then, will you do?” One Eye asked, his voice tight with anger.
“I will capture and take them to the cowkeeper, and again warn him,” Swift Horse said, breaking away from One Eye and Soft Wind. He ran into the corn field, and with the help of two of his warriors, soon had a rope around the necks of the cows, and stopped them.
“Tie the cows behind my horse,” Swift Horse said to the warrior.
“I will go with you,” One Eye said, already mounting his own steed.
“It was my village that was wronged today, so I will go alone to again try to rectify it,” Swift Horse said, swinging himself into his saddle made from a puma skin. He smiled at his sister. “I will be home in time to share the evening meal with you.”
Soft Wind nodded. She watched her brother ride away from the town with the cows trailing behind him, then turned her eyes to One Eye, who was riding from the village.
Soft Wind went back inside and began cleaning up the mess she had made while making meal, wondering what her brother would say to the cowkeeper. He had been given that name by the Creek because of how many of these strange animals he owned.
And he not only owned cows, but also hogs that he kept in pens, and chickens that he allowed to roam as free as he did the cows.
She smiled when she thought of the many times she had found fresh eggs that had been left behind by the man’s chickens. At least in that respect, she found something positive about the bare-headed, red-whiskered white man who came onto land that had at one time belonged solely to the Creek.
She thought again of her brother and his task at hand. She hoped that he made the cowkeeper understand the problem of allowing his animals to roam free, destroying what belonged to the Creek.
She didn’t know what else might be needed to make him understand. She knew that her brother was a man who ruled with a peaceful heart, but even he could be pushed only so far.
Chapter 2
No more be grieved at that
which thou hast done.
—William Shakespeare
Swift Horse sat in his saddle as he gazed down at the tall, thin white man whose hair was gone, yet whose face was covered with a thick red beard.
“Take your cows,” Swift Horse said flatly, his hand on the rifle in his gunboot. “But this is my last warning to you. Keep your cows from our crops, or else I—”
“Or else what?” Alan Burton, the cowkeeper, said, his right hand resting on a holstered pistol at his right side. “You don’t own the land. It’s free. My cows can run free, and you ain’t gonna do nothin’ about it or you’d have already tried.”
He glared up at Swift Horse. “You’re yeller through and through or else you would have done more than talk when you get so riled about my cows bein’ where you say they shouldn’t be.”
Alan went and untied his cows from Swift Horse’s horse, then waved his right hand in the direction of Swift Horse’s village. “Get on with you, Injun,” he snarled. “Go back to where you belong.”
He started walking the cows toward a part of his land that he had fenced off for them, used only at milking time. He looked over his shoulder at Swift Horse. “Remember this, savage,” he shouted. “This land is free. There ain’t nothin’ you can do about me—or my animals—being on it.”
“You do not know the true interpretation of ‘free,’” Swift Horse shouted back, watching Alan Burton walking away from him. “Let me explain some of the meaning to you, Cowkeeper. If you continue allowing your cows to run free and destroy my people’s crops, you will soon know the true lack of freedom. You will lose the freedom of being able to enter our village to purchase supplies at the trading post. You will be a prisoner of your own making because there are no more trading posts in this area. You are at the mercy of this one that sits amidst my Creek village.”
Alan stopped and turned and glared at Swift Horse. “Your threats mean nothing to me,” he snarled. “I will go to Fort Hill and tell them that you threatened me.”
“Go there,” Swift Horse said with mischief in his eyes. “The soldiers there, under the command of Colonel Harris, have been my people’s ardent friends and allies since my Creek people helped the Americans against the British in the War of 1776.”
Alan glowered, for he did feel alone, more than ever before since his move to Kentucky from Missouri. Not all that long ago his wife and children had been slain by a renegade. He hadn’t found a woman to replace his wife, for there weren’t any settlers close by who had unwed women among them.
Swift Horse wheeled his horse around and rode away, assured this time that he had gotten his point across and that he surely had nothing to be concerned about from the cowkeeper.
Chapter 3
My brain is wild
My breath comes quick,
The blood is listening in my frame.
—Percy Bysshe Shelley
It was another autumn day, in which strange strings of cobwebs floated through the
air, attaching themselves to anything and anybody.
Marsha Jane Eveland was fussing to herself as she removed some of those cobwebs from her long golden hair as she came into her cabin after hanging clothes on a line outside the back of her home. Sighing heavily to herself, she turned and looked around at the cabin that until recently had been occupied by only her older brother Edward James.
Upon her arrival, she had stepped into a masculine setting, but she had placed the pretty doilies that she had crocheted on the end tables and on the back and arms of the couch that sat before the fire. She had also placed braided rugs here and there on the oak floor, rugs that she had helped make with her mother while they had lived in Georgia.
“Mama,” she whispered, a sob lodging in her throat at the remembrance of that horrible day when renegades had attacked the wagon that had carried her and her mother and father, as they had been traveling from Georgia to Kentucky. They had left the only home that Marsha had ever known to be near Edward James.
Her father, who had a strange crippling disease, no longer had the strength to keep up their farm, and had thought it best to get the family together again. Marsha knew that her father had agreed to the move for her mother’s sake—“worry wart,” her father had called her mother. Her mother hadn’t been able to get Edward James off her mind from the moment he had left for Kentucky to be a storekeeper at a trading post established in an Indian village.
They had almost arrived at the Creek village when a band of renegades had attacked. Her parents had been killed immediately, but Marsha had managed to survive the attack when what was left of the cavalry, who had been escorting them to Kentucky, managed to chase off the attackers.
But before they fled, Marsha had seen the one-eyed renegade who was solely responsible for her parents’ death. A shudder shook Marsha when she recalled how often she had dreamed of that man and how her dreams of him haunted her.
She turned again and gazed into the rolling flames of the fire as they caressed the huge logs, her heart aching anew after recalling that wretched day. Slowly she turned her eyes upward and found herself gazing at herself in the large mirror that hung above the mantel. It had belonged to her mother, and had originally hung above the lovely mantel in their Georgia home.
How often had her mother brushed Marsha’s waist-length hair for her in front of that mirror as she stood before the fire, warming herself before her day’s activities had begun? She lifted her hand to her hair and ran her fingers through the golden, thick tresses.
That day of the ambush, she had seen one of the renegades gazing at her hair. She had, as quickly, seen how he had yanked a knife from a sheath at his right side. She knew what his intentions were, abhorred by even the thought of being scalped by that evil red man.
She could hardly make out his features, for they were marred by ungodly streaks of red and black across his face. “War paint, I imagine,” she whispered.
Just as he had let out a horrendous, mind-shattering war whoop and had begun making his way toward her, she heard the report of the gun that had downed that heartless man. Marsha would never forget how frightened she was. She couldn’t move a muscle in her body!
She remembered how his knife dropped from his hand as he clawed at his bloody chest before falling from his horse, dead. One of the cavalrymen had downed the man, saving Marsha’s life.
“I’ve changed since then,” she whispered to herself, now slowly moving her hand over her facial features. Until that day, she had been so happy, so content with the world. But since then, she had found it hard to smile.
She doubted, now, how anyone could think she was pretty, for surely she wore her sadness on her face, and even in her violet eyes.
She tried not to. She knew that she had to move on with her life, but she just wasn’t sure what that life was to include. For now, she was taking it a day at a time, caring for her brother and trying to put the past behind her.
Marsha went to a table and picked up her crochet work and sat down before the fire. She had worked hard all morning, washing and cleaning. It was now time for her to indulge herself before preparing the evening meal.
When she had first taken up her crochet work after having arrived at her brother’s home, her fingers had shook too much to be able to hook the thread with the needle.
Finally, her fingers were no longer trembling, and she intended to make many more pretty things for her brother’s cabin—even though she could see his look of “Oh, no, not something else lacy for my house” when he gazed at what she sat crocheting.
She only gave him a sweet smile, which usually would do the trick. Since she was a child, with an older brother to look after her, that smile had been able to win her anything from him.
And now?
Yes, when she smiled she could see how relieved it made him, not only because he had always loved her smile, but because he could tell that, day by day, she was getting past the tragedy and was finally becoming the sister he had always known, someone who was always there with a smile and comforting words when anyone had a bad day.
“Big brother, I will be all right,” she whispered to herself as she looped thread around a finger, and then around the crochet hook.
She got lost now in thoughts of her brother. He had moved to Kentucky two years ago and had established a trading post at a Creek Indian village. The Creek people had seen that it was in their best interest to have a post in their village, for they didn’t have to travel far to make their trade. Other clans came from far and wide to deliver their deerskins, furs, hides, tallow, oils, and honey to the trading post, knowing that her brother paid well for the supple hides.
Her brother had explained that trading with Indians was a lucrative business for him; that a traders’ life followed seasonal rhythms linked to the autumn hunt. He had also said that he enjoyed having his post at the Creek village because he felt much safer surrounded by a peaceful Indian such as the Creek, instead of being at the mercy of those who killed whites for pleasure.
Again Marsha was reminded of that renegade who killed her parents, a man who not only had the one empty socket where his eye had once been, but also a livid white scar that ran down from the socket, across his right cheek.
Forcing this man from her mind again, she continued thinking about how things in her life were, now that she lived with her brother.
She had been there for one month now. Upon her arrival, she had been surprised to see how different this Indian village was from others. She learned that the reason these people were called Creek was because their impressive towns lined the banks of beautiful creeks and streams.
She also found that instead of living in tepees, the Creek lived in cabins. The roofs of their cabins were shingled with bark. The sides were made of poles and sticks plastered with mud. Marsha had noticed that one of those cabins was larger than all of the others. Her brother had told her that it was occupied by the village chief, whose name was Swift Horse.
“Swift Horse,” she whispered beneath her breath as she paused with her crocheting.
She smiled as she thought of this man and how he had greeted her on the day of her arrival at the village. His dark eyes had lingered on Marsha for a moment or two as her brother had introduced her to him; Chief Swift Horse was even more handsome than any white man she’d ever seen or known. He was broad-shouldered, muscled, and spoke with a gentle kindness.
But she had looked quickly away. She was confused by her attraction to the handsome chief. This was the last thing she would have ever imagined happening. She wanted to hate all Indians, not be infatuated by any. She kept reminding herself that her parents were dead because of Indians.
She hoped that her brother would change his mind soon and agree to return to Georgia. But as each day passed, she became more doubtful of that ever happening. He was enjoying mixing with the Indians, as well as others who came from other villages to trade with him, while she was filled with warring emotions!
How could she trust Indians—any
of them?
How could her brother?
“I’ll just keep on minding my own business as best I can,” she murmured, resuming her crocheting.
Marsha paused again from her crocheting when she heard the drone of voices in the store of the trading post.
Her ears perked up when she heard a familiar soft, feminine voice. It was the voice of a Creek woman she now knew as Soft Wind, who was Chief Swift Horse’s sister. She came often, and Marsha did not want to think about why she was there so much.
Could the maiden have fallen in love with Edward James? Was her brother in love with her?
“Well, by George, I will not put off asking about her any longer,” Marsha whispered to herself as she again resumed her crocheting.
But the truth be known, she was afraid to hear her brother’s answer.
On those days when she’d heard Soft Wind’s voice, when Edward James came back to the living quarters, she could see a flush to his cheeks and something different about his blue eyes. She shuddered at the thought of his having fallen in love with Soft Wind.
On several occasions, when he had left for a lengthy period of time and without good reason, Marsha had begun to suspect that he was with a woman, but didn’t ask. She was afraid to hear, for she knew of no close-by settlers, and her brother was not gone long enough to have traveled far to meet a lady. That had to mean that he had met someone in this village.
Marsha lay her crochet work aside, for she was aware of the sudden silence in the storeroom. That meant that Soft Wind had left. She hurried from the couch to the window and slowly drew aside the sheer curtain.
She saw a young, petite, beautiful maiden dressed in doeskin, her coal-black hair hanging in a lone braid down her back, walking away from the trading post with her brother Chief Swift Horse. Soft Wind’s smile was so radiant that Marsha was afraid that it meant the maiden did have feelings for her brother.
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