Rachel and Fain were turning toward each other in the last minutes of the ceremony when Berry raised her eyes. She looked straight into the mirrored depths of Simon’s eyes and was caught there. The impact was as vivid as if he had reached across and touched her. A bead of sweat appeared on Berry’s upper lip. After a moment she swallowed, and with an effort she drew her eyes away and refused to look at him again.
The wedding was over in minutes. To Berry it seemed awfully short to bind a man and woman together for the rest of their lives. Then Fain was kissing Rachel. Biedy was chortling happily at Rachel’s confusion, while Fish, Simon, and Isaac were slapping Fain on the back. Rachel’s eyes were shining and Berry’s were misty as they hugged each other. Then everyone moved out into the yard where the wedding feast was spread out on a plank table set in the shade of the walls of the new room.
The men crowded in, drinking a toast to the happiness of the bride and groom from a clay jug set on one end of the table. Biedy and Berry moved about uncovering dishes of food, slicing the baked turkey, and cutting slabs of cornbread and suet cake. Israel and Eben hung back until Fain urged them forward. He filled their mugs with whiskey and Biedy filled their plates with food.
Simon stood by quietly, but Berry knew that nothing escaped his eyes. When she saw him move away from the others and come toward her, she tried in vain to still the frenzied beating of her heart. She moved quickly to the table and wedged herself between Biedy and Rachel.
Later she stood in an agony of embarrassment when Isaac got out his fiddle and struck up a tune, and Silas and Biedy began a mad gallop about the yard. She had never danced in her life and this was only the second time she had seen it done. She hoped desperately that no one expected her to do it! She started guiltily when someone touched her arm, but relief flooded through her when she saw it was Fish.
“Will you dance with me, Miss Berry?”
“No! Oh, no! I . . . don’t know how.”
“You don’t have to know how,” he said teasingly. “All you do is hop to the music. Come. I’ll show you.” He took her hand and turned her to face him. “Put your hand on my shoulder,” he said and grasped her waist. “Now . . . first on one foot and then the other. I’ll propel us around. All you have to do is follow.”
Berry had the hang of it in a matter of minutes. Laughter, sweeter than the sound of the fiddle, broke from her lips. “What’s the name of the song, Fish?”
“It’s called ‘Yankee Doodle.’ It’s been around since the war for independence.”
“Do you know the words?”
“There are many verses. Some people make up their own:
“Oh, Yankee Doodle is the tune
A-mer-i-cans de-light in;
’Twill do to whis-tle, sing or play,
and just the thing for fight-in’.”
He finished singing the verse and whirled her around until the skirt of her weathered dress billowed out behind her.
The dancing fascinated Berry. She bounced lightly with Fish across the dirt yard. “Sing another verse,” she urged.
“All right . . . let me see. . . .” He slowed their steps.
“A-mer-i-ca’s a dandy place,
the people are all brothers;
And when one’s got a pumpkin pie,
he shares it with the others.”
Berry laughed delightedly. The sound reached the tall man leaning against the side of the house. Simon couldn’t keep his eyes away from her. He’d not had a chance to speak to her alone for the entire two days he had been here working on the new room. It galled him to see her laughing with Fish. The young squirt wasn’t even dry behind the ears yet! He didn’t understand why Berry had been avoiding him, but it was clear as day that she had been doing just that. She had stuck so close to Rachel and Biedy you’d’ve thought she was glued to them, he thought with irritation.
When the dancing couple passed close to him, Simon was tempted to reach out and snatch her to him. Her head was thrown back, her red mouth open as she gasped for breath. Never had he seen a woman so beautiful, so alive. He wondered for the hundredth time why her skin was so clear and white, why her hair was so shiny, and why the sound of her laughter was like the joyous ringing of a bell.
“Sing ‘Sally Goodin,’” Fain called out to Isaac when he lowered the fiddle to take a break. He was dancing with Rachel, holding her as if she were a precious piece of fine glass, moving with slow, sure steps, being careful not to tire her out.
Isaac played a few bars of a fast tune, then lowered the fiddle to sing:
“I had a piece of pie, ’n’ I had a piece of puddin’, I gave it all away to hug Sally Goodin.”
He played the fiddle between the verses, stomping his booted foot on the ground in time with the music.
“My Isaac c’n sing and clog as good as anybody,” Biedy shouted as Berry and Fish whirled past. “All my boys c’n cut the pigeon wing and ride a short loper with the best.” She and Silas had stopped dancing and were clapping their hands to the music.
Silas moved up beside his son and his singing voice carried into every corner of the homestead.
“How old are you, my pretty little miss?
How old are you, my honey?
She answered him with a ‘He, he he.
I’ll be sixteen next Sunday.’”
When one song was done, Isaac started another, the dancing continuing all the while. Rachel stopped and leaned against Fain. He fanned her flushed face with a turkey wing that Biedy had left on the bench.
“No more dancin’ for you, Miz MacCartney. You get in there ’n’ rest yourself while ya tend to Faith. I’m a-goin’ to dance with Berry.”
The dance was long and exhausting; as Isaac stopped fiddling, the dancers flopped to the benches, and the black men, who had been shuffling their feet, flopped to the ground.
Simon sat on the woodchopping stump, Fain’s pet crow on his shoulder. He fed the bird bits of turkey meat. The brim of his hat was pulled low over his eyes, but Berry knew they rested on her often. What was he thinking? Did he think she was making a fool of herself carrying on like that? Did he think dancing was frivolous? He hadn’t danced with Rachel or Biedy and certainly not with her. She jumped up to help Biedy clear the table, and Fain moved over to hunker down beside Simon.
“Ya can’t beat the Cornicks for gettin’ up a shindig. I’m plumb glad. I wanted Rachel to have a grand weddin’ day.”
“It appears like you wore her out.” Simon nodded toward the doorstone, where Rachel sat holding Faith to her shoulder. She had removed her shoes and her bare toes wiggled and dug into the cool grass.
Fain gazed intently at his new wife for a long moment before he spoke. “She needs some fixings for herself. I’d be obliged if you’d send up a parcel from your storehouse.”
“Send Fish or Eben down and get what you want.”
“I’d trip in with ya myself, but I want to get back to work on my guns.”
“No need of it, if you tell me what you want.” Simon drew his gaze away from Berry and saw the excitement in Fain’s eyes. “You getting close to working the bugs out of that new piece?”
There was exhilaration in Fain’s voice when he answered. “I’ve about got it worked out in my mind how I c’n insert the bullet at the breech. But I gotta figure out a device stout enough to hold the powder explosion. If’n it’ll work, I c’n load in half the time, even if the barrel is fouled from previous firings. Think on what that would mean, Simon!” He struck his palm with his fist. “My gun would be favored over them German short barrels and that flat-faced hammer French rifle.”
“If you’re on to something you’d better keep it to yourself,” Simon said quietly.
“I’ve been thinkin’ on that, too. I don’t want this to get out to no other gunsmith till I can get my stamp on it. You’re the only one that knows what I’m working on besides Fish. The kid’s a good shot. He c’n hit a man-sized target at a hundred yards seven times out of ten, but he’ll not make no gunsm
ith. He’s not got the hands or the ‘stick to’ for it.”
“Has he mentioned anything about moving on?”
“You wantin’ him gone?”
“It makes no never mind to me if he goes or stays, but there’s something queer about a feller with his background a-hangin’ around a place like this. You’d think he’d be a-tryin’ to better himself.” Simon looked steadily into Fain’s twinkling eyes.
Fain chuckled, picked up a twig from the ground, and stuck it into the corner of his mouth. “I’d say he’s a-workin’ on somethin’, or ain’t ya noticed?”
“I noticed! I’m not blind! He’d be about as much use to her as tits on a boar!”
“Maybe he ain’t plannin’ on settlin’ on a homestead. He might be plannin’ on goin’ back to the East and a-takin’ her with him. She’d be a beauty all dressed in fancy clothes.” Fain goaded his friend while watching him closely.
Simon swung his head around so his eyes could follow Berry. “I can’t see a strong-willed woman like her getting took up with a slack-handed kid.”
“He mightn’t be slack-handed if’n he found his niche.” Fain shook his head. “Ya never know about women. Maybe ya don’t have nothin’ to worry about.”
“Who’s worrying?” Simon snapped.
Fain let the remark pass. “Maybe it ain’t marryin’ he’s got on his mind. Maybe he’s just a-bidin’ his time. He talked some ’bout joinin’ up with Pike.”
“Bullshit!” Simon snorted. “Pike’d not take on a kid like him. He’d not last through the first portage.”
“Pike’s got a lot at stake. It’s said he’s takin’ Wilkinson’s son on this trip upriver.”
“I can tell you, Fain, but it’s not to be let out. Wilkinson’s ordered Pike to make a journey of exploration into the country to the south and west. It’s the route Manuel Lisa’s planning to take. You can bet your bottom dollar Lisa’ll not stand aside and let someone else open up that trade. He fights dirty.”
“Is he still after you to invest in the venture?”
“He don’t give up easy. It don’t set with him or Chouteau that I’m doing a little fur business. Course, what I do is nothing compared to Lisa or the Chouteau family operations.”
“Watch Lisa. He ain’t above doin’ a little arm twistin’.”
“I trust him about as far as Wilkinson. He’s got his feelers out for a profit. I’d trust neither one as far as I can throw a mule by the tail.”
“It’d be like him to have his spies out a-checkin’ on Pike. Have ya run into anythin’?”
Simon was silent for a long moment. “You could say so.” He dropped the news and waited for Fain’s reaction. A puzzled frown crossed his face. “I was sitting on my doorstone a few nights back and saw something on the river. I got out my glass and could see a canoe plain as day in the moonlight. I went down to the river to get a better look and saw another canoe pulled up on the bank a ways downriver. I cut through the woods to see what they was up to. When they pulled to shore, a man came out of the timber and talked to them. I couldn’t get close enough to see who he was and could catch just a few words they said, but I did hear one say something about ‘by any means you can.’ After a while one canoe went back downriver and the other one crossed over.”
Fain chewed on the twig for a while before speaking. “What do you make of it?”
“I don’t know. I don’t care what Manuel Lisa or Pike do to each other as long as they leave me out of it. I’ll not invest in Lisa’s expedition. What I’d really like to do is get out of the trading business and start building up my farm. I’m going down to talk with Ernest. We got a share of the business to outfit Pike and I don’t think Lisa was happy about it.”
Fain chuckled. “What can he do?”
Simon grinned. “He could burn me out, but that would be too obvious.”
“We’ll keep an eye out . . . huh?”
Simon wasn’t listening. His eyes went past Fain when Berry’s laughter drifted across the yard. It was in response to something Fish had said to her, and she dodged around him and dashed into the cabin, only to come out minutes later with the laughter still on her lips. She threw a pan of dishwater out into the yard dangerously close to where Fish was standing. When he jumped back, musical, girlish laughter rang from her lips again before she darted back inside. Simon watched the play and listened to the happy sound. As always, the sound of her laughter gave him a surge of pleasure, and his eyes lingered on the empty doorway.
* * *
It was deepening dusk when Berry came out of the cabin and crossed the yard to her wagons. It would be strange, she thought, to sleep in the wagon without Rachel. It was something she would have to get used to doing. It had been a long time since she had been alone, and the emptiness of it pressed down upon her. Don’t look back, she cautioned herself, lest you stumble for naught. She couldn’t remember when she had first heard the familiar old saying. Perhaps it was something Rachel had said to her.
Fain and Rachel had gone into the big, new room. Fain had promised to put in a plank floor and build a big double bed. In the meanwhile they would sleep on pallets on the smooth dirt floor. When they had gone inside and dropped the hide flap that covered the door, it was like the final parting for Berry. Not that she wasn’t happy for Rachel, but . . . oh . . . there was a sick, empty feeling in the pit of her stomach.
Berry sat down on the trunk and looked around her at the things she had known all her life: the pine chest, the spinning wheel, the barrel churn, and the tin chamber pot. She had come here to gain comfort from being among these familiar things.
“I want to talk to you, Berry.”
Simon! His voice was an impassioned whisper in her ears. The constant awareness of him was fire in her veins and energy in her fingers. All day she had worked furiously, danced furiously, to keep him from consuming her every thought. She saw his outline at the end of the wagon and stood slowly feeling puzzled and self-conscious. She looked into his face but could not speak.
“Come on down,” he said and reached for her. His head was bare and his hair looked wet, as if he had been in the pool again. His hands circled her waist and lifted her down. “Let’s walk out a ways.” It wasn’t a request, it was just simply—“let’s walk out a ways.” She felt dwarfed as she moved along beside him.
“We’ll walk down by the river. Soon the mosquitoes will take over and it’ll be misery to be near the river when there’s no breeze.”
Berry drew a deep breath and tried to calm the unease that had been fermenting in her breast. There was something sweetly fascinating in being beside him in the near darkness. Down the faint slope lay the shimmering river with its unbroken border of trees. The night sounds had commenced around them: the low swish of the river, the faint hoot of an owl, the scrappy twit of a bird.
He drew her to a downed tree trunk and they sat down. What did he bring her here to say? She turned away from him, letting her glance move over the great river with its acrid, muddy smell of decay, over the little islands that seem to float on the river, tapestried in the pale green of budding cottonwoods. Berry drew a long satisfied breath, consciously permitting herself to enjoy the view.
She must speak, she told herself sternly. She must speak casually, trying to deny with her tone how shaken she was. “It’s . . . pleasant here.”
“Beats a town all hollow, doesn’t it?”
At something in his tone she looked at him. He was not smiling, but there was a wicked mischief in his eyes; she could tell by the tiny creases that fanned out at the corners. She dropped her eyelids and focused on the loosely fitted white shirt that covered his broad shoulders and chest. I wonder who washes his clothes. It was her last coherent thought as a strange feeling swamped her, as if she lacked breath and could not speak, as if she were sad to the point of tears; and yet through it, like a rainbow through clouds, the promise of excitement and joy appeared.
He put his fist under her chin and lifted her face. “Are you unhappy that Rac
hel married? Is that what makes you look so sad?”
“I’m glad for Rachel. She deserves the best.”
“She’s got it. Fain’s the best man I know. He’ll take good care of her and the babe.”
“I know that.”
“Fain said you’ve got it into your head to go on out to the land your pa filed on. I can tell you, now, that land will never be under a plow, will not grow anything but willows and swamp grass.”
“How do you know? You don’t even know where it is!” She cast him a challenging glance.
“Rachel showed me the map. It’s low and swampy.”
“How do you know?” she repeated softly, although she wanted to shout at him.
“I’ve been there. I’ve been twenty, thirty miles back all along the river, and the land your pa filed on isn’t good for anything but water moccasins. Even the Osage stay clear of it.”
“You’re just saying that. Papa wouldn’t take swampy land.”
“He didn’t see it before he filed. He only knew what the land man told him, and he hadn’t seen it either.”
“I don’t believe a word you’re saying! I’ll go and see for myself.” She stood. Simon grasped her hand to keep her from moving away. “I’ll not ask you to take me there, if that’s what’s worryin’ you,” she said scathingly.
“I’m not worried about it at all. I wouldn’t do it,” he said matter-of-factly, his voice deep and low, a smile hovering at the edges of his wide mouth. His very attitude of quiet self-confidence jarred her taut nerves.
“Fish will take me,” she said abruptly.
“Hellfire!” He snorted. “You’d more’n likely have to take care of him.”
“I don’t need anybody,” she said recklessly. “I’ll go alone and take Israel.”
“No, you won’t. I won’t permit it.”
“You . . . won’t . . . what?”
Dorothy Garlock - [Annie Lash 01] Page 16