by Janet Dailey
It was her brief hesitation, her careful choice of words that told Lije she didn't believe—she didn't believe the old feud still had meaning. It hurt that she didn't understand, that she didn't accept it as valid.
But maybe it was best. He thought of his mother and the years of agony she'd gone through, fearing for his father's safety. He didn't know how long the fight with Alex might drag on. There was no way he wanted Diane to go through the anguish his mother had suffered.
"Lije?" Diane frowned, confused by his lengthening silence. "Did I say something wrong?"
"No, you're absolutely right, Diane. Alex is capable of anything."
"Then—"
"Maybe you should accept your doctor's marriage proposal. Right now I can't deal with what's between us. I have too much unfinished business. There's too much going on. I haven't got the time to find out if there's anything for us to salvage."
"Not salvage," she objected to the word. "Something to build on. I won't settle for less."
"You'd better go see if your father needs you," he told her. "I have work to do."
As he walked off, Diane watched him, confused, hurt, and a little frightened. She knew she might have lost the last chance to rebuild her relationship with Lije. But there was still Sorrel's graduation. She'd wait until then before making any decisions regarding her future.
31
Grand View
Cherokee Nation
]une 1867
Lije drove the carriage around to the front of the house and swung to the ground. The sun was high in a sky of pure blue and the air had that warm, lazy feel of summer to it. In the trees, a wren warbled in a musical burst.
Deu came up in the buggy. "Master Lije, will you tell Phoebe I'm out here waiting for her?"
"I'll tell her." Lije headed for the house.
Eliza bustled into the foyer, saw Lije, and paused. "Is the carriage out front?"
"Ready and waiting," Lije confirmed. "Where's Phoebe? Deu's outside waiting for her."
"I'll tell her." Eliza crossed to the rear hall and traveled its length to the butler's pantry. Phoebe was there. "Deu is outside," Eliza told her while pulling on an ivory glove. "Are you ready?"
"Yes, ma'am." Phoebe tucked the ends of the checkered cloth around the sides of the large basket, then used both hands to pick it up by its wooden handles.
"How nice you look, Phoebe. Is that a new hat?" Eliza studied the small-brimmed hat perched atop Phoebe's curls. A spray of blue flowers, the same color as her dress, adorned the brim.
"Yes." Beaming proudly, Phoebe reached to touch it. "Deu bought it for me. He said today was a special occasion, and I needed to have something special to wear."
"I completely agree." Eliza fitted the glove snugly to her fingers, then tugged its mate onto her other hand. "Now you tell Ike that as soon as Sorrel's graduation exercises are over, Nathan and I will come directly to his school. We should be there in plenty of time for the dedication ceremony."
"He will be so glad to have you, Miss Eliza."
"Not as happy as I will be. It's a wonderful thing he is doing, dedicating the school to Shadrach. As his former teacher, I wouldn't miss this ceremony for anything." Eliza smiled proudly, conscious of the tears that threatened to fill her eyes.
"Ike said he was only making Shadrach's dream come true. Shadrach always wanted to build a school for colored children. It's only right for it to be dedicated in his memory."
"Indeed." Eliza nodded in firm agreement, then briskly gathered herself up. "You mustn't keep Deu waiting any longer. We will see you at the school."
Eliza moved off, retracing her steps, her thoughts crowded with a thousand memories. But there was no time to dwell on the past. There was still Sorrel's graduation to attend first. She walked straight to the parlor where the others were gathered—The Blade, Reverend Cole, Jed Parmelee, Diane and Lije, Susannah and Rans.
"What are we waiting for?" Eliza paused in the archway.
"Temple and Sorrel haven't come down yet," Susannah explained.
"What's keeping them? We'll be late." With an impatient frown, Eliza turned to face the staircase.
Sorrel appeared at the top of the curved stairs, dressed in her white graduation dress, a lilac sash around her waist, her flame gold hair caught up with a matching ribbon. Temple was behind her.
"Here they come now," Eliza told the others. "Good, we're all ready."
Diane moved to the archway and paused next to Eliza, looking up. "You look beautiful, Sorrel."
"She does, doesn't she?" Emotion tugged again at Eliza as she watched the young girl—no, she was a young woman now—come down the steps, moving with a regality and grace that reminded Eliza of Temple. Something glittered on her dress. The sparkle caught Eliza's eye.
"What's that you're wearing, Sorrel?" She crossed to the base of the stairs for a closer look and gasped in surprise when she recognized the silver sword-shaped pin with pearls and an amethyst crowning its hilt. "The kilt pin." Eliza's eyes misted as she glanced past Sorrel to Temple. "You gave it to her."
"I wanted Sorrel to have it, and this seemed to be the perfect day to give it to her." Reaching up, Temple lightly ran a smoothing hand over her daughter's fiery tresses. It was a mother's caress, a brief clinging to a child who had become a woman.
The Blade came to stand by the stairs. "That pin has been in the Gordon family for over a hundred years. You should be honored your mother gave it to you."
"I am," Sorrel replied. But Lije noticed it was the gold locket around her neck that she reached up to touch. The locket Alex had given her. He stifled a sigh of irritation when he heard footsteps outside on the veranda. The front door opened, and Lije stiffened.
"Alex, you came!" Sorrel launched herself toward her cousin.
The Blade caught her arm before she could sweep past him. "What are you doing here, Alex?" he demanded as Lije pushed past Diane to stand next to his father.
"Let go of my arm! You're hurting me," Sorrel protested.
The Blade ignored her attempt to twist free. "You haven't answered my question, Alex."
"I'm here for Sorrel's graduation." Alex grinned back at him, satisfaction and confidence gleaming in his black eyes. "She invited me."
"Sorrel made a mistake. You're not welcome here," Lije told him.
"No!" Dismay and shock riddled Sorrel's expression. "I asked him to come."
The Blade ignored her. "Get out, Alex. And don't come near my daughter again." Lije watched surprise, disbelief, and anger chase themselves across Alex's face, a redness rising in his neck. "Don't make me repeat myself," The Blade warned.
Alex hesitated a moment longer, flashed a look of pure hatred at The Blade, then reached backward for the doorknob. "No!" Sorrel strained toward him, but he ducked his head, avoiding her, and slipped out the door. In a fury, she turned on The Blade. "How dare you order him to leave? This is my graduation. I can invite whomever I want!"
"Not him." He relaxed his grip on her arm.
She tore the rest of the way free. "If you won't let Alex come to my graduation, then I am not going."
"Sorrel, you don't mean that." Temple moved toward her.
"I do!" she flashed. "I won't go."
"But everyone is here. Jed and Diane came all the way from Tulsey—"
"Alex came a very long way, too, but he ordered him to leave." Sorrel waved a hand at The Blade. "You can tell them to go away, too. There isn't going to be any graduation!"
"Sorrel," Temple began in a reasoning tone, but Sorrel swept past her and ran up the steps. Seconds later, the door to her bedroom slammed shut. After the heated shouting, the ensuing silence was thick. "I'd better go to her." Temple gazed up the long staircase.
"Let her be," The Blade said. "She's too angry to listen to anyone right now."
"You don't think she really meant it, do you?" Diane murmured.
The Blade released a long sigh and shook his head. "Truthfully, Diane, I wouldn't be at all surprised if she did."
An hour
later it became apparent that Sorrel was not coming out of her room—at least, not in time to participate in the graduation exercises. Lije drove Nathan and Eliza to the dedication ceremony at Ike's school.
The ceremony, like the one-room schoolhouse built with lumber from the Stuarts' sawmill, was a simple one. Afterward, Lije stood at the back of the room and watched Ike as he accepted the congratulations and the heartfelt expressions from the dozen or so Negro families who filled the room. Ike looked proud and a little nervous, but mostly eager and determined.
When the last well-wisher had moved on to the refreshment table, Ike noticed Lije standing at the rear of the room. He hesitated a moment, then made his way past the long wooden tables and benches that served as desks until he reached Lije.
"I'm glad you came," Ike said, a little stiff and reserved.
Lije felt the awkwardness, too. "I'm glad I came, too." He glanced around the room. "This is quite an accomplishment."
Ike looked around, sobering. "It isn't much. Someday I hope to have proper desks and enough primers and slate boards for all my students. And I don't have—"
"It's a beginning, Ike." The minute he said the words, Lije realized he was referring to more than the school. He looked at Ike with new eyes. "Shadrach would be proud of this. He would be proud of you. You are your own master now."
"Yes, sir, I am." He met Lije's gaze squarely, a glint of challenge in his dark eyes.
"That was a helluva stand you and your company made at the hay camp. A lot of brave men died that day alongside Shadrach. I'm glad you weren't one of them."
"Me, too," Ike replied, swelling a bit with pride. .
"Someday we need to get together and trade war stories. I don't think I'll ever forget the sight of you boys charging across Cabin Creek."
"I don't reckon I will either," Ike agreed with a laugh. "The sound of that rebel yell was enough to make a man's blood freeze. Were you at Elk Creek when—" He broke off the question as his wife came up, claiming attention.
"The Radleys are leaving," she told him. "They said they'd be enrolling both of their boys. I thought you'd want to speak to them before they left."
"I'll be right there," he said, then turned back to Lije, a mixture of regret and uncertainty in his eyes. "I guess we'll have to leave tile war talk to mat 'someday' you mentioned."
"I'll look forward to it." Lije hesitated, then held out his hand. Ike looked at it for a long second, then gripped it in his own. They shook hands, for the first time man to man.
During the ride back home to Grand View, Lije reflected on that moment. He had attended the dedication out of a sense of duty, but he discovered that he came away from it feeling good inside. Good about Ike, and good about himself.
He dropped Eliza and Reverend Cole off at the house and drove to the stables to put the carriage and the team away. When he walked back to the house, Lije noticed the fluttering of a curtain in the opened window of his sister's bedroom. Sorrel was still up there, all right, no doubt fuming over what she considered the injustice of The Blade's actions. Her misguided loyalty to Alex irritated Lije. He wished he could shake some sense into her.
Centimeter by centimeter, the sunlight streaming through the window crept across the floor and up the wall. Sorrel sat on the bed and watched it with a fixed stare. Every tightly coiled nerve and muscle in her body threatened to snap under the strain of waiting for the sun to go down. The urge to pace the room was strong, but she didn't give in to it. She didn't want to make any sound that could be heard below for fear they would become suspicious when the noises stopped.
Her empty stomach increased its gnawing pangs of hunger. Sorrel pressed a hand against it, trying to still its rumblings, then ran a hand further down her stomach onto the black material of her riding skirt. It had to be close to suppertime. Why weren't they eating yet?
A second later she tensed at the sound of footsteps on the stairs. She turned her head to watch the door, listening intently. The tread was light, signifying a woman's footsteps. They were slow, not quick and brisk like Susannah's or Diane's. It could be either her mother or her grandmother. Each of them had come to the door once that afternoon and tried to persuade her to talk.
Again the footsteps stopped outside her door. There was silence, a hesitation, then a knock. "Sorrel." It was her mother's voice that called to her. "Sorrel, you have stayed in there long enough." Sorrel deliberately didn't answer right away. "Sorrel, supper is ready. Come down and eat something."
"I'm not hungry."
"Will you stop being so stubborn and come out?" There was an edge of impatience in the demand. "Go away and leave me alone." "You are acting like a child."
Sorrel could have easily argued that they were the ones treating her like a child, telling her who she could see and who she couldn't.
"Sorrel?" Her mother knocked at the door again.
Sorrel ignored it and waited for the silence to end. Finally, she heard a heavy sigh, then footsteps, this time retracing their path to the stairs. She listened until she could hear them no more, then got up and tiptoed to the door, careful not to let the heels of her riding boots strike the floor.
Leaning against it, Sorrel pressed an ear to the small crack where the door butted up to the frame. She could hear voices, muffled and indistinct, but she couldn't tell which one of the downstairs rooms they came from.
Minutes passed. Each felt like an hour. Then came the clatter of silverware. She waited a little longer to make certain everyone was in the dining room eating. Slowly, Sorrel turned the key and unlocked the door. She opened it a crack and listened again, then peered out to see if the hallway was clear.
Stealthily, she slipped out and pulled the door closed behind her. She glanced at the main staircase, then headed in the opposite direction to the backstairs. She crept down, hugging the wall, expecting any moment Phoebe would appear. Somehow she managed to sneak past the kitchen without being seen.
Safely outside, Sorrel walked swiftly and confidently toward the stables. Her plan was a simple one. She would ride to Washburn's place near Salina. If he wouldn't tell her where Alex was, then she would persuade him to get a message to Alex, telling him she was there. If her parents wouldn't let Alex come see her, then she would go to him. But they weren't going to stop her from seeing him.
The first stars glittered in the purpling sky as Alex walked the black mare through the shadowy woods. He spotted the house lights and stopped to dismount. He tied the mare's reins to the trunk of a tree, patted her neck once, then crept forward.
He crouched next to another tree and studied the house. Every time he remembered the way The Blade had ordered him to leave, anger and utter humiliation burned within him. Frustrated by his impotence, he knew he had had no choice but to leave. There had been too many of them: The Blade, Lije, Lassiter. They'd had him outnumbered. The Blade had gone too far this time. And he was going to pay for it. He was going to pay for everything.
A light shone from the study window. Alex moved a few feet to his right to get a better view. Someone was in there, and it was likely The Blade. Was he alone? Alex hesitated. If he was, what better opportunity could there be?
Temple sighed dispiritedly and glanced at The Blade. "Lije thinks we should bash the door in and drag Sorrel out by her hair. I'm half-tempted to do just that. This has gone on much too long. Why can't she see that you sent Alex away for her own good? You didn't do it to spite her." She was nearing the end of her patience with their daughter, yet The Blade appeared to be resigned to the situation. "Why aren't you more upset with her?"
He shrugged, but there was a hint of weariness in the gesture. "Maybe I've gotten used to it. All my life I have been condemned because I acted for the good of others. Why should my daughter react any differently than everyone else has?"
Dismayed by his comparison and the defeat in his voice, Temple swung around to face him, feeling his hurt as clearly as if it were her own. "I never condemned you. I know you did what you thought was best for
everyone. And what you did today—ordering Alex to leave—that was right, too. I know that"
"I hoped Sorrel would—" He broke off the sentence, his shoulders sagging. "It doesn't matter what I hoped. The reality is that she has locked herself in her room. She's up there now—hating me for what I did."
"Don't say that." She cupped his strong face in her hands and made him look at her. "It isn't true. She may be very angry with you, but she still loves you. I know she does. Look at how many times I ranted and raved at you over the years. There were times when I was so mad I wanted to throw something at you—"
"I think you did a time or two." A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
"The point is—no matter how angry I was, I never stopped loving you. Sorrel loves you, too. Even now. You have to believe that."
She looked so earnest, so irresistibly lovely that The Blade couldn't help but smile. He leaned down and tasted the fullness of her lips. The honey-wild flavor of them hadn't faded with the passing years. For a moment his blood ran fast and strong with a young man's intoxication as he fell in love all over again with this proud, spirited woman who could satisfy him as no other ever had. When their lips warmly parted, he gathered her to him, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on the top of her hair.
"I do love you," he said, conscious of the strange contentment that could be found in simply holding her.
"I should hope so."
He chuckled softly at the hint of reproval in her voice and let his arms come away, releasing her. "It's odd," he murmured thoughtfully, moving away toward his desk. "I always expected Sorrel to cause us grief over a man, but I never once suspected that man would be Alex."
"Who would?"
There was a light rap at the door. The Blade pivoted, hope springing that perhaps Sorrel had finally emerged from her room. "Yes? Come in."
Deu entered carrying a tray laden with a coffee service and a small plate of cold chicken in paste, pickled walnuts, and asparagus spears. "I noticed you didn't eat very much at supper this evening, so I thought you might like a little something before you went to bed." He set the tray on the desk. "I thought you might want to join him, Miss Temple, so I brought along an extra cup and some silverware for you."