by Laura Frantz
She sensed some terrible inner turmoil within him as her nearness gained the upper hand. Above them, the two candles on the mantle smoked furiously, then the one went out, casting the cabin in further darkness. Here and now there was no chaperone, no Olivia, no impediment. No one need know. What did Scripture say about the way of a man with a maid, that it was beyond understanding?
She shut her eyes, unable to look at him any longer. His hands moved up her bare arms, then lay warm against her shoulders and neck, his fingers entwined in her tumbled hair. She leaned into him, breathless with longing, her palms flat against his chest.
His own voice was ragged with desire, his mouth warm against her ear. “Lael lass, if I kiss you . . . just once . . . I fear I canna stop.”
Then don’t stop.
Oh, Lord in heaven, help us.
Was it her plea or his own? Only heaven could help them now. With a cry she pulled away from him just as he removed his hands from her hair. Backing away, he caught up his hat and was gone, leaving her alone with her weary, wounded heart and all its brokenness.
Long before dawn, with but an hour’s fitful sleep, Lael left her cabin. Loy Tucker hardly needed to complain to both of them, she reasoned, imagining Ian’s surprise when he came to the cabin and found her gone. If he came.
Shame stained her face and soul as she thought of what she could possibly say to him next time they met. Why in heaven’s name had he left the barn raising only to return? Did he mean to tell her something only to find that he could not?
Lael lass, if I kiss you . . . just once . . . I fear I canna stop.
Ever honest he was, yet she was even more shocked by her unspoken response. Then don’t stop. Strangely, there was no pleasure in knowing he desired her. ’Twas wrong what they’d nearly done, what they’d wanted to do. A simple near kiss it was not. Their mutual wanting had pushed them past propriety’s neatly hedged borders to a wild, seductive wilderness beyond. ’Twas wrong before God . . . before Olivia . . . before themselves. Yet, mercifully, some restraining hand had kept them apart.
There was naught to do but leave for Briar Hill. Now. She could follow the fort courier out at week’s end, telling Ransom and Ma Horn but no one else. The thought of escape was like a balm to a gaping wound. Aye, she thought, crying afresh, ’tis the prudent thing to do. Olivia would come soon, but she would leave sooner.
Fumbling with the drawstring on her saddlebag, she reached in as she rode and withdrew a ginseng root. Would that it could cure heartache and dispel desire. Or turn back the clock and erase her folly. What must he think of her now? She was chaste but acted wanton, leaning against him, begging to be kissed. The memory shamed her to her boots. Hadn’t Ma tread the same path and lost the battle? Thinking on it, she felt sudden sympathy for her fickle mother. Were her mother’s sins not her own?
62
Nothing had changed at Lovey Runion’s ramshackle cabin. Patches of snow still lingered in places, and the bee gums sat silent. Smoke curled from the chimney, and the shutters were closed against the cold. A leather hinge had torn on the cabin door and it hung crooked.
Titus appeared and held open the door for her. “Ma’s poorly,” he whispered.
Lovey rocked by the hearth, eyes vacant, puffing on her pipe. But Mourning lay abed, face to the wall as if asleep. Quietly, Lael drew up a chair and sat beside her for a time without speaking.
When Titus quit hovering and disappeared outside, Mourning turned over. “I hoped it was you,” she said feebly. “You need to know what I cain’t keep secret no longer.”
Lael waited, alert. There was a burden about Mourning, in her face and voice, and it bespoke bad news. Just when they’d been faring so well up the branch, Lael thought in dismay, the three of them, safe and sound as they’d ever been.
“I—I’m weak as water, and everythin’ I eat I vomit up . . . It was the same with Titus, only this ’un here’s worse.”
This ’un here? Lael tried to keep her dismay down. It was a skill she’d learned, first from Pa and then Ian, practiced after watching him countless times. No matter the illness or wound or his own conflicting feelings, his countenance remained as smooth and untroubled as a summer sky.
“I know what you must think of me, you bein’ a lady and all—”
“Hush now,” Lael told her. “You’re not the first woman to have a child out of wedlock.”
“Well—he—Hero—” She broke off and looked away, mouth trembling. “Just before he was killed—”
“Don’t you be ashamed. I can just imagine Hero McClary’s tricks, bullying you in all sorts of ways. It’s a wonder you didn’t kill him yourself.”
“Well, I did ponder it a time or two . . .”
Lael sat back, thinking of another McClary with revulsion. She’d brought none of the proper herbs this trip. The thought came—wicked though it was—of what she did carry. Ma Horn had told her the root of black cohosh must be used with care, for it would kill an unborn babe.
“You’ll be needing a bundle to take away your sick stomach and shore you up,” Lael told her. “I don’t have it here, so I’ll need to fetch it from home. I’ll be back before nightfall.”
As she prepared to go, Mourning grasped her arm. “Don’t tell it to no one, Miss Lael. I’m ashamed to be tied to Hero, dead or alive.”
Lael felt a softening, sorry Mourning was so sick. “Don’t fret so, Mourning. I aim to see you and Titus and the baby safely settled in North Carolina with your kin one day.”
Mourning’s tenseness eased, and Lael let herself out, riding down the branch the same way she’d come, backtracking across the same muddy hoofprints, her gun in the crook of her arm. The gloom of the woods was less threatening now. She had Captain Jack to thank for ending the Click-McClary feud. She just wished she could see him and tell him what it meant to her.
A misting rain was falling by the time she reached her cabin. She’d have to hurry and gather the herbs she needed from the rafters, bundling them together and returning to the branch quickly or be benighted in the woods. Spending the night in a balmy summer forest was a far cry from bedding down in the cold damp of late winter. She wondered how Pa had done it.
She was in such a rush that she burst through the door in one long stride. Ransom had gone to the fort to dicker over a plow, and the hearth’s fire had nearly gone out, leaving the cabin cold. She didn’t remove her buffalo robe, just stood studying the bunches of herbs hanging above her head, puzzling over what she needed. As she set one foot on a bench to reach for them, she heard a voice behind her.
“You look tae be in a hurry.”
Startled, her foot came down from its perch and she turned. In her haste she had overlooked Ian’s horse—or perhaps he’d hobbled the bay in back of the cabin. He did not smile. Was he thinking of their parting last night? Or her absence this morning? No matter. He was the good doctor once again, cordial, self-controlled, even commanding, though he looked to have spent a sleepless night and was sorely in need of a razor.
She said all in one breath, “There’s some trouble up the branch. I have to ride back up with an herb bundle.”
“There’s trouble at McClary’s. And I came tae ask you tae go.”
His voice was deep and thoughtful and he looked right at her. She nearly faltered under his scrutiny but for that one word. McClary. If it were anyone else, she would gladly go and see to Mourning as soon as she was able. But not a McClary! Not even a widow, an orphan, or otherwise.
“I must see to Mourning.”
“It canna wait?”
“Nay, it cannot.”
“What is the trouble?”
“One of Hero’s own making,” she replied hotly, and as soon as she uttered it the light of understanding dawned in his eyes.
“I dinna ken such trouble takes precedent over the fever I speak of,” he insisted.
Fever? He was right, truly. No woman had ever died of the birthing sickness to her knowledge, miserable though it was. But she stood her groun
d. “I cannot go.”
He walked to where she stood, but he didn’t touch her. “You canna? Or you willna?”
Aye, it was her will that prevented her and well he knew it. She said nothing, only looked away.
“I have reason tae believe this is no ordinary fever, Lael. I rode over here because I need your help. If you willna do this for the McClarys, then do it for me.”
At this, she almost buckled. His eyes, so gentle yet firm, nearly proved her undoing. There was a humbleness about him that puzzled her, for it was equal to his strength. He stood tall before her, telling her in no uncertain terms that he needed her. He’d ridden miles to fetch her. What was she to do?
Torn, her eyes filled with tears. “Nay—I can’t.”
He took her by the shoulders, and she was cast back to the night before when he’d done the same, only his touch had been far gentler then. “Lael, I beg you tae consider what it is you do!”
She pulled away. “Please—don’t ask me again! I—it’s impossible!”
He was angry now, angrier than she’d ever seen him, and it startled her into speechlessness. The sudden cold fire in his eyes and the rigid set of his jaw made him somewhat fearsome, and oddly, even more handsome.
She took a step away, unable to face him any longer. But she didn’t have to. He was not one to waste time arguing when he was needed elsewhere. The door thudded shut behind him, and he rode away at full gallop.
She looked down at her hands and saw they were trembling. His face remained in her mind—stern yet full of compassion. And deep down inside she felt a faint flutter of fear . . . and the certainty that her simple nay was not simple at all but hurtful to them both in ways she could not fathom.
At dusk Ransom found her in the barn. She’d unsaddled Pandora and watered her but not much else. She sat crying on a pile of hay, face in her hands. He’d never before seen her like this, and when she realized how it rattled him, her own sorrow deepened. He just stood at the barn door, letting the wind and rain soak him. Finally, gathering his wits, he dropped down next to her, though facing away as if to give her some privacy.
After a time she said quietly, “How, Brother, do you become a believer?”
He took a breath. “Well, you got to be sorry for your sins. It helps a heap if you recollect all the mean, low-down, ornery things you ever done.”
“And then?”
“Then you take ’em to the foot of the cross—right to the feet of Jesus—and you leave ’em there.”
“That’s all?”
“Once you ask the Almighty’s forgiveness, you ask for His help besides and aim to be better’n you are.”
She sighed and wiped a sleeve across her wet face. “I am so unworthy.”
He nodded. “That’s why He came, Sister. That’s why He came.”
63
At dawn Lael saddled Pandora and rode to the fort. She knocked directly on Ian’s door, but there was no answer. Dismayed, she crossed the common to Ma Horn’s and let herself in. Things here were the same as they’d ever been. Ma Horn sat by the fire, finishing her breakfast, and smiled when Lael entered.
Lael’s own smile, in return, was hollow. “I’ve come to see the doctor,” she said, sitting down on the hearth and removing her wet bonnet. “I behaved badly. I refused to go to the McClarys’ with him.”
“And now you’re lookin’ to tell him you’re sorry,” Ma Horn surmised. “Well, the doctor’s made of good dirt. He’ll forgive you, once he comes back.”
“He’s still away?”
“Aye, for nigh on two days now. One of them widows is mighty sick. But he should ride in directly.”
But Lael knew she couldn’t wait. As she rode out of the fort’s gates and headed west a great dread nearly turned her back. In her befuddlement, she’d forgotten her gun. Suppose one of the McClary clan shot at her? The mere sight of her would surely raise a ruckus, gun or no gun, though perhaps the lack of a weapon was best. Years before she’d been to the McClary homestead with Ma Horn. Just a child then, she recollected someone having a fever and their breaking it with boneset. Ian had spoken of a fever as well. But this was no ordinary fever, he’d said.
When she reached the north fork of the river, the rain had eased and she paused to let the mare drink. The water was brown and churlish, the current swift. Should she cross? Nay, she thought, but she was wet to the skin anyway so it hardly mattered. Steeling herself, she urged Pandora forward into the water.
She ended up far downriver, and the mare had a hard time getting her footing on the slippery bank. Above the roar of the water she thought she heard hoofbeats. There, coming through the trees, was Colonel Barr on a big chestnut mare. At the sight of her he reined in his horse, no welcome warming his face.
“You’re too late,” he said tersely. “One of the widows is dead.”
She stared at him, speechless. Dead? Of a fever?
“I didn’t go into the McClary cabin, understand, and neither will you. We’ll return to the fort together and sound the alarm.” His face showed his revulsion. “’Tis the pox, Miss Click. The smallpox.”
There was nothing to do but wait. While Colonel Barr gathered men to ride and warn the settlement, Lael sat in Ma Horn’s cabin. When Ian didn’t return by nightfall, she rode out in the heavy twilight toward home and Ransom. Once there, she scoured her medical texts but found little to allay her fears. She rode back to the fort the next morning, increasingly anxious to see Ian.
All around her, birds sang in the still dawn and she marveled that such sweetness could exist alongside the horror of the pox. She was weary, oh so weary, but how much more so must Ian be, working alone as she’d left him to do, facing the dreaded disease. His own parents had died of the same. What memories of that terrible time were being resurrected by all this? Her refusal to accompany him was unforgivable, and guilt dogged her every step, haranguing her till she could make things right between them—if they could ever be right again.
By day’s end he’d returned to the fort to find both blacksmith and sutler in his quarters. Lael was soon at his door, saddlebags in hand, prepared to do what she should have done from the first.
He met her at the door but wouldn’t let her enter. “Go away, Lael. I’ll no’ have you exposed tae the sickness. I have tae shut myself away for a time, tae be sure of the inoculation.”
Inoculation? The strange word might have been spoken in Gaelic.
She returned to Ma Horn, heartsore and bone weary, but her idleness was not to last. By week’s end, five more of the fort’s inhabitants lay ill, and the gates of the fort were closed in quarantine, imprisoning all within.
Those who still stood hale and hearty eyed each other with grim sympathy and wondered who would be the next to fall. It was a tense, desperate time, made all the worse by waiting. Unable to stand it any longer, Lael positioned herself by the shutter, her eye on the far blockhouse.
“Pray that the Indians make no trouble,” Ma Horn told her. “Can ye imagine it? Any unrest would drive the settlement to our gates and what would be the worst—slaughtered by Indians without or the pox within?”
Lael looked up, unable to eat her soup. “Didn’t you hear? Colonel Barr says the Shawnee are sick with the same. Some traders gave them infected blankets upriver.”
The news had only deepened her grief. Her thoughts were suspended between Ian and Captain Jack. She prayed as she watched and waited but felt her petitions were small and hypocritical, yet she continued feebly.
On the eighth day of their confinement, when darkness enfolded the fort like a shroud, the door to the quarantined blockhouse cracked open, casting a triangle of light onto the muddy, empty common beyond. Amazed, she watched as Ian himself slipped out, silent as a shadow, and crossed over to the cabin of Colonel Barr.
With a quick kiss on Ma Horn’s wrinkled cheek, she let herself out and nearly ran to the blockhouse. She cast a quick look behind her but found herself alone in the gloom. She pushed at the heavy door, and the wave of sic
kness—and death—was suffocating. Nauseous, she wondered if she could even enter without a handkerchief to cover her face.
Before her, in the flickering candlelight, lay four men and one woman. Bland Ballinger. Flowner Beel. Jemima Tate. Nathaniel Hart. Galen Wood. She willed herself forward, hand pressed to her nose and mouth. All were lying on pallets, with enough room to walk between them, and all eyes were closed in the fever’s grip or, she guessed, a drug-induced slumber. A fifth man lay apart from the rest, against one wall, and his eyes were open. She stood over him for just a moment before she realized that he—the fort sutler—was dead. And so covered with the great oozing boils she hardly recognized him.
“Lael!”
She spun around at the sound of Ian’s voice. He stood in the doorway, Colonel Barr behind him. The anguish in his face was so plain she felt stricken. But it was too late to turn back, and they both knew it.
“You shouldn’t be here, Miss Click,” the colonel said at once.
“I should have been here from the first,” she replied quietly.
Even Philo Barr was loath to enter. Though he shut the door he stood against it, his eyes roaming the room in apparent horror. But Ian was beside her, looking down at her, his hands on her shoulders.
Oh, those eyes! They seemed to look right through her, past all the turmoil and meanness, and regard her with affection anyway. But then their welcome light faded and a harshness crept in. “You canna be here, Lael. I’ll walk you back tae Ma Horn’s cabin.”
Her own eyes were pleading. “I won’t leave you. Not now. Not ever. You do need me. I—I can see that you do.” Oh, but she wanted to go! Could he sense that? Yet her love for him made her stay. Did he know that too?
He released her and turned back to Colonel Barr who barked, “Where is the dead man?”
Ian moved to the body of the sutler and began wrapping him in a sheet. “You’ll have tae help me move him tae the travois tae bury him.”