by Janet Dailey
Two soldiers with rifles at the ready followed Cutter inside the Suds Row shanty. A momentary pause allowed his eyes to adjust to the change from brilliant sunlight to the interior shade; then his glance settled on the uniformed figure sprawled across the bed. A vague sense of relief filtered through him as Cutter crossed the one-room shack. His boot knocked over a whiskey bottle standing on the earthen floor by the bed. It fell with a dull clunk and rolled underneath the bed frame.
The reek of alcohol was strong as he stared at the slack-mouthed, sergeant, a heavy beard stubble adding its black shadow to the already dark skin. Hooker’s uniform was ringed with salty sweat stains and trail grime, unchanged from the day before. Cutter gripped his limp shoulder and shook it hard.
“Hooker! Hooker, wake up!” A low groan was the only response. “Come on, John T. You missed roll call.” Cutter straightened, his mouth tightening with grim impatience, and motioned to one of the black troopers. “Get me that bucket of water.”
It was half full, and he poured it all on Hooker’s face and handed the empty bucket back to the soldier as Hooker came sputtering to life, sitting bolt upright. Almost immediately, he groaned and leaned forward to cradle his head in his hands.
“My head.” The heavy dullness of a hangover was in his voice. “What time is it?”
“Bitterman didn’t answer at roll call this morning,” Cutter informed him. “And two horses are missing from the stable.”
“Roll call?” John T. frowned and focused his bloodshot eyes on the sunlight coming through the door of the tent. “Why didn’t Cimmy Lou wake me?” He looked around. “Where is she?”
“I haven’t seen her.”
“Oh, God, I remember.” John T. buried his face in his hands, his head moving from side to side in mute pain.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?” “Cimmy?” He lifted his head to look around again. “Where’d she go?” Something akin to fear was in Hooker’s expression as he staggered from the bed to stumble to the door. “Cimmy Lou?!”
“Find some hot coffee, Grover.” Cutter snapped the order to the private, troubled by Hooker’s odd behavior and more than a little impatient that a woman like Cimmy Lou was the source of it, and went after him.
No clothes boiled in the iron kettle and no fire burned beneath it. All up and down the line, the enlisted men’s wives were busy with the day’s wash-except here. John T. reeled around, looking lost. He grabbed the arm of a large-boned woman at the next fire.
“Bess, have you seen my Cimmy?”
“Ain’t seen hide nor hair of her this mornin’.”
He came back to the tent shack and Cutter stepped aside to let him in, then followed to watch John T. search the place wildly, throwing clothes in every direction. Private Grover came back with the cup of hot coffee. As John T. sank onto a crude bench in silent despair, Cutter took it to him.
“Drink this.” He fitted John T.’s limp hands around the tin mug.
“None of her things are here,” he said brokenly. “She’s gone.”
“So’s Bitterman,” Cutter said.
“What?” John T. gave him a blank look.
“Bitterman was missing at roll call this morning. And two horses were taken from the stable last night.”
And two and two were beginning to make four, even to John T.’s liquor-dulled brain. “Not him, too.” He hung his head in utter dejection.
“Then she’s with him.”
“She promised me she wouldn’t do it again. I was gonna forgive her.” He drew in a sniffing breath and furtively wiped at his eyes, trying to hide his broken emotions.
“With a woman along, Bitterman won’t be able to travel very far very fast. I’ll send a detachment after them.” Cutter started to turn away, but John T. caught his forearm.
“I wanta go after them.” His red-rimmed eyes were shiny with tears, his black cheeks wet with them.
“You’re in no condition to go,” Cutter denied quietly. “Corporal Haines can take them.”
“No.” John T. came to his feet. “She’s my wife. I can’t let someone else go after her and bring her back. How would that look?”
Cutter saw the desperate attempt to hold onto what was left of his pride, and slowly nodded, silently darmning Cimmy Lou for what she’d done to Hooker. “All right. Take six men and a tracker. Leave whenever you’re ready.” He knew Hooker would be better off if he never got her back, but it wasn’t his place to say it.
“Yes, suh.”
Within an hour, the small detail was mounted and the Apache tracker had located the trail of the two horses heading away from the stables toward the rough canyon country. Cutter watched them disappear into the chaparral, then went back to checking horses and equipment in preparation for the departure of his routine patrol the next morning, the last one he’d lead. He saw the blue roan being saddled and guessed that Hannah would be taking her ride before the midday heat turned the parade ground into a furnace. He felt the rise of an old recklessness, and knew that it was a good thing he’d soon be far away from her.
“I’ll wager that the Ninth didn’t have more than a handful of desertions this past year,” Colonel Bettendorf commented to Stephen as they stood in the olla-cooled shade of the headquarters ramada. “From what I’ve heard, the Fifth had more than two hundred. One thing you can say about these coloreds, they’re not only good fighting soldiers, out they take pride in the uniform they wear. They serve it well and honorably.”
“Indeed.” Stephen stood at ease, his hands clasped behind his back, yet he was anything but relaxed.
“You heard that Hooker’s wife is missing, too, that Cimmy Lou girl? It’s unfortunate when a man can’t control his own wife.”
Wade stiffened, unsure whether that remark had been meant to reflect on him as well. Hannah came out of their quarters at that moment, walking with a free-swinging stride he had come to regard as masculine. He noted the leather riding gloves she wore and the small blue hat on her head. A soldier waited for her, holding the reins to a blue roan—with a regulation saddle on its back.
“Your wife has taken up riding again while you were on patrol,” the colonel informed him, obviously noting the direction of Stephen’s gaze.
“We’ll see about that.” Stephen said tightly, and swung away from Bettendorf.
All of his focus was on Hannah as she fed sugar lump to the horse. The fury in him blocked out everything else. That she should do this without his permission was provocation enough, but to ride astride like an Apache squaw was the ultimate defiance. He was so intent that the first flurry of movement from near the guardhouse and the sudden shout of alarm failed to attract his notice.
The second cry succeeded. “Corp’ral of the guard! Prisoner’s escaped!”
He whirled in the direction of the guardhouse and reached down quickly to unfasten his holster flap. By then Lutero was racing across the parade ground toward the roan horse Hannah held. The tramp of running feet came from all directions, but before the first shot was fired, Lutero was on the horse’s back, kicking it into a gallop. In a cold rage, Stephen drew his pistol and took steady aim at the low-crouched rider coming straight for him. All he could see of his target was the black hair flying and part of a bronze shoulder. He squeezed the trigger.
The impact of the bullet tumbled the Apache from the saddle and rolled him into the boiling dust. Stephen started walking toward him, oblivious to the riderless horse running by him, never taking his eyes off the Apache on the ground. He heard the click of the hammer revolving the cylinder to bring another bullet into position, and felt again the buck of the gun in his hand as the hammer fell. But he didn’t hear the explosions as he watched the jerking of the Apache’s body as the bullets tore into his flesh.
The hammer struck on three empty chambers before Stephen finally realized that there were no more shells in the gun. He lowered the muzzle, letting it point at the ground as he stood over the body. He’d wanted to kill Lutero for a long time and, now that th
e deed was done, a hard satisfaction claimed him.
Hannah saw the look of vengeful pleasure on his face and felt her blood run cold through her veins. No matter what Lutero had done, murder did not condone murder, and that’s what this had been. It sickened her.
“Are you all right?” Cutter was beside her.
“Yes.” The horse had knocked her to the ground, but she hadn’t been hurt. Dust and dirt smudges marked her split riding skirt, but the damage was slight. Hannah was conscious of the steadying influence of Cutter’s presence as Stephen approached her, the killing lust not fully gone from his eyes. When he stopped before her, she knew that many things were dead. Most importantly to Hannah, he had killed their past. She no longer felt bound to him because of the feelings they had once shared.
“Your plan to help your Apache lover get away didn’t work.”
His harsh accusation broke the self-imposed silence that had previously kept her from voicing her opinion of him in front of others. “You are hesh-ke, Stephen, one of the crazies—the unreasonable haters.” She saw his stiffness, his righteous rejection of her claim, and walked away, finding a path through the soldiers crowding around the scene.
“What happened?” somebody asked.
“How’d he git out?”
“The guard took him a fresh pail of water. When he turned his back on him, the Indian jumped ‘im. His back’s broke, the doc says.”
Cutter glared at Wade. His teeth were gritted. “You fool. You don’t deserve her.” He roughly shoved him aside, almost hoping for some physical provocation that would lead to a fight, but Wade didn’t oblige him.
The commotion had drawn their striker outside. When he saw Hannah coming up the path, Delancy opened the door for her. “Did the majuh kill that Indian, Miz Wade?”
“Fetch my trunks, Delancy.” She brushed past him.
“Yore trunks, ma’am?”
“Yes, my trunks. And bring them to the bedroom.” Without a break in stride, Hannah continued down the hallway, tugging off her gloves as she went.
She entered the bedroom and began emptying the wardrobe and throwing the clothes on the bed, separating her things from Stephen’s. Delancy carted a trunk in a few minutes later, looking with dismay at the scene.
“I’ll need something to wrap my mother’s china in when I’m through here. See what you can find,” Hannah ordered.
“Yes, ma’am.” There were a thousand questions he wanted to ask, but he knew she wouldn’t be inclined to satisfy his curiosity.
Delancy brought the second trunk into the room and Hannah set to work folding and packing her things, a tedious and time-consuming task. When Stephen walked in shortly after noon mess was called, she didn’t even pause.
“What’s going on here?” He stood beside the first trunk, which was already packed and locked.
“I’m leaving.” She carefully folded the long skirt of a gown in order to minimize the creases.
It was an instant before he responded. “Well, I’m glad you finally came to your senses. I have been urging you to go back east for a visit for more than a week now. If you had listened to me sooner instead—“
“You misunderstand me.” Hannah turned around to face him, calm and prepared for this confrontation. “I didn’t say anything about going east. I said I was leaving. I’m leaving you, Stephen.”
“You can’t do that.” He was stunned.
“Not as easily as the Apaches, perhaps. Do you know how they dissolve a marriage when one of the partners becomes dissatisfied? One of them moves out. Well, that’s what I’m doing.” She turned to continue folding the gown, but he shoved it away.
“I’m not going to let you go.” The cords in his neck stood out, betraying his tautly checked anger.
“Why, Stephen? You don’t want me anymore. You can’t even bear to touch me.”
“Because he was always between us. I couldn’t stand knowing he was alive. But he’s dead now.”
“Do you think that makes a difference? Do you believe killing him changed anything? You didn’t kill him—-you murdered him.”
“I shot a prisoner who was trying to escape,” Stephen insisted.
“Yes, it was all in the line of duty, wasn’t it? But what does it matter anyway? No officer would ever be court-martialed for killing an Indian. You knew that. That’s why you shot him again and again and again.” She trembled with the force of her anger. “What were you trying to kill, Stephen?”
“You don’t understand.” His fingers bit into her shoulders. “Now that he’s dead, all the stories will stop. There won’t be any trial for the papers to print stories about—there won’t be any reason for them to rake up the past.”
“Is that what you wanted to stop? The stories?” Hannah challenged. “And what if it doesn’t end? What will you do? kill Mr. Boler? You can’t make people stop talking about me.”
“They’ll forget—in time.”
“Will they?” Just for an instant a note of self-pity crept into her voice, the unfairness of the situation stinging her and bringing tears to her eyes. “Oh, the story may get old after a while,” she conceded. “But if I say or do anything that is out of the ordinary, you can bet they’ll look at each other and explain it away by saying, ‘She lived with the Apaches for almost a year.’ And when they do, they’ll always wonder. That’s what it’s going to be like, Stephen, for the rest of my life. Even if I wanted to forget it, people won’t let me. Will you?”
He drew back from her biting cynicism. “You’ve changed, Hannah. You’ve grown hard.”
“I suppose I have.” She grew quiet, her outburst cleansing her of much of the bitterness. She picked up the gown and once more laid it out flat on the bed to fold it. “Even if I could go back to being the woman you remember, you won’t let me. Today your first thought was that I had the horse waiting there for Lutero—“
“That’s how it looked.” He turned from her and raked a hand through his hair, then rubbed at the tension knotting the muscles at the back of his neck. “I admit I was wrong. But I knew you’d been to see him. What was I supposed to think?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore.” She knew the futility of this discussion. All of it had “been said too many times before with the same results—more accusations and arguments. “I can’t live like this, Stephen. Always treated as if I’m unclean, as if I should be ashamed because I didn’t die. I won’t like this.”
“You’re my wife,” he protested.
“But that’s all I am,” Hannah flared briefly, hearing the possessive ring in his voice. “And only when you choose to remember it. All that’s left of our marriage is a piece of paper. The rest has gone—love, trust, respect. I don’t even like you anymore, Stephen. So let’s admit that it’s over. If you don’t seek a divorce, I will.”
When she turned to lay the folded gown in the trunk, Stephen blocked her movement. “You aren’t leaving me, Hannah.”
“That’s what really galls you, isn’t it? That I would leave you,” she realized. “If it bothers you so much, tell people that you threw me out. Tell them how ungrateful I was when you so generously took me back after I had lived with the Apaches—and married one of them. Tell them anything you like, Stephen. Sooner or later you’ll convince yourself that it’s the truth.”
He didn’t try to stop her as she walked around him. Hannah could feel his brooding gaze on her, watching as she arranged the gown atop the clothes in the trunk.
“Where will you go? Back to the Apaches?”
She almost laughed. “You never stop, do you? You still persist in believing that I must have liked it.” A sigh trailed from her as she paused thoughtfully. “I don’t know, Stephen. But I am discovering that the Apaches were more witting to accept me than my own people are. However, to answer your question”— Hannah straightened with a small push and swung around to face him, her head up—“no, I’m not going back to live with the Apaches.”
“Then where are you going?” His frown almost made her b
elieve that he cared, but she knew it was a selfish interest.
“I don’t know yet.” The decision had been made too abruptly for Hannah to plan much beyond the moment. “I’ll go into Silver City and decide from there.”
“This is insane, Hannah.” The sweep of his hand indicated that all of the packing and her intention to leave were included in his disgusted assessment. “What will you do? How will you live?”
“I’ll find work. I could teach or work in a restaurant—or hire out as a lady’s maid. After all, I do know the life,” she reminded him dryly.
“If you leave, you’ll regret it,” Stephen warned.
“No, I don’t think I will.”
“The West is no place for a woman alone. You’ll be unprotected, with no one to look after you.”
“You have forgotten, I was alone before—and I survived.” She took courage from that knowledge. It was something Stephen couldn’t understand about her.
A knock at the bedroom door broke into their conversation. “Come in,” Hannah called, as Stephen turned away in agitation.
Delancy stepped inside, plainly ill at ease with the situation. “I’ve found some ole rags to pack ‘round yore china.”
“Thank you, Delancy. Just leave them in the kitchen. I’ll see to the packing of it myself.” She dismissed him, and the striker left gratefully.
“The china?” Stephen exploded the instant the door closed. “You’re taking the china?”
“It belonged to my mother. I’m taking it and everything else that’s mine.” She had no intention of ever coming back. “Unfortunately, I won’t be able to have it all packed in order to leave before nightfall. Therefore.
I would appreciate it if you would arrange for some kind of transportation to take me into Silver City first thing in the morning. Or shall I do it?”
A grim anger darkened his features. “I will.” He stalked to the door and left.
Hannah felt no sense of victory. Her marriage was over. Six years of her life were gone. In their place came a creeping loneliness; but she had endured that before, too.