A Westward Love

by V. J. Banis

  “But how will we live?” she asked. “We’ve no food, no supplies, nothing.”

  He gave her a peculiar look. “The Indians have given me everything I need,” he said. “And I got a pretty good map from what he told me.”

  Irritated, she got out of bed and began dressing. “Well, you might have told me a little sooner,” she said. “I could have been ready to go by now.”

  “You ain’t going,” he said.

  She paused in the act of lacing her skirt closed and stared at him uncomprehendingly. “I don’t understand.”

  “I said I was going to leave today. You’ll be staying here.”

  “But I can’t stay here, alone, with these Indians,” she protested.

  “I sold you,” he said, avoiding her gaze. “To that Lone Feather. That’s how he come to give me the supplies and stuff.”

  She took a step backward as if he had struck her a blow. “You sold me? My God, you can’t mean it.” She gasped, hardly able to believe her ears. “You can’t be serious.”

  He turned from her, starting toward the opening of the tipi. “I got to go,” he said. “Want to get an early start, ’fore it gets too hot out there.”

  A rage fanned by fear blazed up within her. She ran across the tipi and began to beat upon his back with her fists.

  “You’re mad!” she screamed, beginning to cry. “You can’t sell me as if I were a chattel. I’m an Englishwoman, this is the nineteenth century, do you hear me, you can’t do this, it’s monstrous!”

  For a moment he suffered her pounding. Then in a swift, cruel movement, he whirled about and struck her a blow that sent her stumbling backward and crashing to the ground. She lay helpless, beginning to sob uncontrollably. To be sold like a common slave to a savage Indian. It was inhuman.

  “It’s for your own good as well as mine,” Morton said in a harsh, angry voice. “Them Indians know where they’re going and how to get there. They know where to feed and water, and what to watch out for. At least with them you know you’re safe. There’s no telling what I’m going to run into, and anyway, by myself I can travel a lot faster and easier. It’d take me twice as long with you tagging along, and we might not get there with our skins on.”

  “I won’t let you do this!” she screamed through her tears. “I won’t stay, I’ll leave, I’ll follow you.”

  He gave a derisive snort. “Suit yourself. If you think you can keep up,” he said. “But you’ll be on your own. No food, no water, no supplies, like you said. You won’t last a day.”

  “You’re—you’re....”

  “Loathsome, that’s what I am,” he said. “And you’re a cold-assed bitch, and I’ll be glad to be rid of you, if you want the truth.”

  With that he went out, leaving her sobbing on the ground. She felt defeated and helpless. To have come so far, endured so much, only to become the slave of an Indian. If only Summers were alive; if only she had stayed in London, if only...but what use was that, she was here, within reach of California at last, only to have her dreams turned to disaster.

  She cried until the tears would come no more; but tears would not change the facts. She had been sold. Until she could get to where there were white men, she was the property of an Indian.

  * * * * * * *

  Morton came back a short time later. At first she thought perhaps he had had a change of heart, but his surly manner was not likely to inspire much confidence.

  “Something’s come up,” he said, pausing just inside the door. She did not reply, only looked back at him sullenly. After a moment he went on: “The Indian says they’ve found something back in the hills a ways. Near as I can tell, it sounds like a mineshaft.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” she asked.

  “He says it’s a white man’s place. So, it ain’t likely, but I thought there might be a chance—well, you was looking for your husband, wasn’t you? And he came this way, didn’t he? There’s always a chance. Anyway, he says he’ll take us there, if you want to have a look see. Might be you’d recognize something of his.”

  “I thought you were leaving.”

  “I can leave tomorrow just as easy,” he said, adding quickly, “Don’t get no ideas, though, this don’t change nothing. I’m still leaving, and you’re still staying. But a mine-shaft now, say there was gold. Well, it wouldn’t hurt to know where it was. And you just might find out what you came looking for.”

  It was hard now to remember that she had set out on this quest searching for Peter. So much had happened. California itself had become their goal, and finally it had been simply the will to survive that had kept them traveling westward. Was it possible that now, after so long a time, they might have found Peter’s trail? Perhaps even the end of the trail?

  She got up slowly from the ground, brushing the dirt from her clothing. “When can we go?” she asked, not looking directly at him anymore. She could no longer bear the sight of him, or the memory of what had passed between them.

  “Now,” Morton said. “Soon’s you’re ready.”

  She finished tying her shirt. “I’m ready,” she said.

  When she would have gone past him out the opening of the tipi, he caught her arm and held her. For a brief space in time his eyes caught hers, and she saw something in them that she had not seen before.

  “If you’d been nicer to me—” he started to say.

  She spit in his face. His grip tightened cruelly on her arm, and she thought he meant to strike her again, but with a violent gesture he flung her arm away and pushed out of the tipi ahead of her.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  It was nearly a two-hour hike into the foothills. Lone Feather and one of the braves led the way with Claire following and Morton bringing up the rear. They walked in silence, speaking only when necessary.

  The mine, when they came to it, appeared to be a natural cave, the opening of which someone had widened and shored up with half-rotted timbers. It was not very prepossessing, but the presence of a broken and rusted pick outside seemed to confirm Lone Feather’s assessment that it was a “white man’s place.”

  It was also none too safe looking. Standing in the opening required that everyone except Claire bend down. One could see that some of the timbers used to support the roof of the cave had already collapsed under the weight of the mountain. There were animal droppings just inside the entrance, but these were old, and there was no evidence of recent habitation, either by man or beast.

  “It’s hard to imagine Peter digging a mine out here,” Claire said doubtfully.

  “He was looking for gold, wasn’t he?” Morton replied, advancing into the cave. “Maybe he learned something from the Indians. If anybody’d know where the gold was, they’d be the ones.”

  “They didn’t seem particularly eager to share their knowledge,” she said.

  “He charmed the Pawnee, didn’t he, and they’re a lot sharper than these bastards. Excuse me, I mean the ones that like to lifted our scalps.” This last was for Lone Feather’s benefit, though no change of expression had indicated that he might have taken offense. “Anyways, there’s no telling what might be back inside, maybe the miner himself for all we know. Me, I’m going in. Anybody coming along?”

  The Indians, probably out of curiosity, decided to venture within as well, and Claire, reluctant to be left alone on the outside, swallowed her misgivings.

  They wound some dried grasses about a stick to make a torch, which Morton carried in the lead. The cave led at an angle downward into the hillside. Probably it had been little more than a fissure, which the unknown miner had widened and shored up with still more of the rotting timbers. Claire found herself wondering how far afield he must have wandered to have found so much wood, for even the greasewood was sparse here. That, no doubt, explained the patchy job that he had done, and the fact that the floor was littered with rocks and debris that had fallen in from the walls and roof. They had only to bump a wall to bring down yet another shower of dirt and stones. Even the Indians had begu
n to look apprehensive, glancing over their shoulders toward the fading light in the opening.

  They had gone thirty yards, perhaps forty, when the cave veered to the right and angled sharply downhill. Here they left behind the light altogether, depending upon the flickering torch to light their uncertain path. It penetrated the gloom poorly, making gargoyles of rocks and phantoms of every shadow.

  They all but stumbled over the skeleton before they saw it, sprawled amidst a pile of debris. A cave-in had apparently caught the miner unaware, ending his search for treasure. Here too his mine ended. Beyond was a mere fissure, which he had been in the act of hacking wider with his pick.

  Claire shuddered and looked away from the grisly sight. Animals, or time, had stripped the flesh from the bones but left the clothes, which hung in graceless folds over the skeleton. The fingers still curved about the pick’s handle, and one hand had been lifted above his head, as if in a futile effort to ward off the falling debris.

  “Pretty hard to know who it was,” Morton said, stooping to examine the grim discovery more closely. “Don’t recognize the clothes, do you?”

  “No,” Claire said, without taking another look. One glimpse had been quite enough. And still her questions remained unanswered, for Peter probably had changed wardrobes many times since leaving Virginia, just as she herself had.

  “What’s this?” Morton said, picking up a rock at the miner’s feet. “Turquoise, ain’t it?” He handed it to Claire.

  She took it with reluctance. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never seen one unpolished.”

  “Looks it to me.” He chuckled and looked about, seeking another such nugget. “So that’s what he was after, turquoise, not gold. Looks like he found it too, for all the good it did him.”

  “Or us, if the roof falls in on us the way it did for him,” Claire said. “Let’s get out of here.” As if to punctuate her warning, a shower of dust and pebbles suddenly cascaded down upon them. Lone Feather’s companion had already begun to back apprehensively the way they had come, and even Lone Feather’s normally unruffled expression was slightly uneasy.

  “Not so fast,” Morton said, crawling about to examine the walls of the cave. “If there is a fortune here, I want to know about it. Might make this whole trip worthwhile.”

  He laid the torch upon the ground. Its light sent their shadows dancing up and down the rocky walls. A fine shower of dust cascaded from the roof. A rock fell with a clatter.

  She was not sure afterward. It may have been that one falling rock, making Morton start, that brought it all down. She was certain that Morton jumped back instinctively. Perhaps he had brought his hand down on a lizard, or maybe seen something in the rock that excited him.

  He bumped the support holding up the roof timber. The wood, old and rotted, and no doubt weary of holding up a mountain of rock, snapped in an instant.

  The fine shower of dust became a choking cloud in which larger rocks and clods of dirt began to fall.

  “Christ Almighty,” Morton swore. He looked, saw the roof timber begin to sag and, without pausing to think, leapt to stop it.

  It was a mistake, in an instant too late to be reversed. He might have jumped free. Together they might have outrun the collapse, made the safety of the opening. As it was Morton himself, with his great broad shoulders and powerful arms and back, had taken the place of the fallen timber. It was upon him that the mountain of rock was now resting, as much of it as was not crashing down about them. There was little doubt that if he went, the cave went too.

  His face, even with the strain etched upon it, showed that he too had realized his mistake. “Get out of here,” he gasped.

  Claire moved toward him, narrowly missing a falling rock. “Let us help,” she said. “If we could get something under there—”

  “Goddamn it all, lady, how long do you think I can hold this mountain up?” He looked at Lone Feather; the other brave had already fled. “Get her out of here.”

  She had a last glimpse of him, the veins and muscles in his arms and thick neck standing out in violent relief. Lone Feather snatched her arm and jerked her around. She let him drag her along the cave for a few yards.

  “No!” she cried suddenly, forcing him to a halt.

  It was too late though. With a great roar the roof where they had been standing a moment before came down. She was blinded by the dust, choking and coughing as it filled her lungs.

  Lone Feather got her to the outside. By the time the cave-in ended, only the timbers at the opening remained to show that there had been a mine there at all. The rest had been filled in.

  A turquoise tomb, she thought. With a sense of shock she realized she was still holding the nugget that Morton had handed her. She stared down at it, remembering the one she had seen in Virginia. It had sent Peter westward, seeking his fortune, and no doubt to his death. Morton had followed the same trail, to die in a hole in the side of a hill. She had hated him, and yet they had come together through the mountains and the snow, through the great canyon, and over the desert. He had been her last link with the civilized world.

  With a rush of bitter resentment against the fate that had led them here, she hurled the stone into the dusty mouth of the cave.

  * * * * * * *

  She did not know at first why the Indians lingered at their camp. The water supply was dwindling, and Lone Feather himself had said the time was due for them to return to their village.

  He came to her tipi that night. Though it was late, she had been too restless to sleep and had been pacing the cramped interior. He entered and without preamble attempted to embrace her. When she resisted he seemed surprised.

  “He told me you were willing,” he said.

  “It was a lie,” she said bluntly. “I had no idea.”

  His face remained as expressionless as usual. “I have never forced a woman,” he said with such dignity that she understood that he had never had to force one before. No doubt in his village, among his people, the women must regard him as a fine catch.

  To her surprise, he left. She half-suspected he might return during the night and she slept restlessly, waking at every little noise, but she remained unmolested.

  The following evening he brought her a gift, a long robe made of rabbit skins stitched together. She knew that he could not have found so many rabbits where they were, nor had them skinned and tanned in such a brief time. He must have gotten it from someone else in the camp, or perhaps it was his own. That it was of considerable value was beyond question. Though they were in the desert, it was winter, and their nights were genuinely cold. The robe was very welcome, and she thanked him profusely. He made no reply to this, but again left her to sleep undisturbed.

  The following night he appeared again. This time he brought what proved to be a nugget of gold through which a hole had been bored and a leather string threaded.

  “It was for my bride,” he said, tying it about her throat. He took a strand of her hair in his fingers and held it to the nugget. “Yellow,” he said, indicating the hair and the nugget together. “The same.”

  The third night he brought a platter made of an old piece of wood on which there was some freshly roasted meat—rabbit, she thought—and berries that he had found she couldn’t guess where, along with a slab of bread that tasted nutty and sweet. By the standards of the camp it was a Lucullan feast, one surely fit for a queen.

  This time she was prepared for his visit.

  Over the objections of the women, she had insisted that they accompany her to the waterhole, where she had filled not one but three of the tightly woven baskets with water. They had been carried back to the tipi for her bath. The youngest of the women, grinning slyly, had brought her a little clay urn filled with a faintly perfumed oil. Claire rubbed this into the chapped skin of her lips and hands, as much for softening as for scent.

  When Lone Feather came in, just after sunset as was his custom, she was waiting for him, standing off to the far side of the tipi. She was wearing th
e fur robe he had given her, the gold pendant, and nothing else.

  She opened the robe, removing it slowly and bending to spread it over the ground as a bed for them.

  He was less patient. After a frozen moment he flung the banquet he had brought onto the ground and crossed the tipi in two long strides to seize her roughly in his arms. He would have flung her to the ground as well, but she grasped his wrists in her hands and said gently but firmly, “No.”

  He looked startled and puzzled, but when she guided him to the ground to lie beside her on the fur robe, he came willingly, eagerly. Once again he grabbed for her in a brutish way, as Morton would have done, and again she stayed his hand. She showed him in as clear a way possible how to be gentle and coaxing, where and how to touch with hand and mouth, so that by the time he knelt over her she was ready for him.

  It was necessary after all to pretend her pleasure, but she could see that the pretense pleased him. At least, for the first time since Summers’ death, there was no pain in the act. In this manner she became the lover of an Indian prince and completed her journey to the fabled land of California.

  PART II

  THE CHILDREN OF LIGHT

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  “Here they come!”

  “The Coyotes are winning!”

  “The Jackrabbits have fallen into the water!”

  Claire laughed with the others crowding the ocean’s shore. In the water three boats made of planks and darkened with some thick tar-like substance that made them waterproof struggled against the surf as they made their way toward the beach. The boats’ crews, three competing teams of youths from the tribe, rowed valiantly, with the exception of the Jackrabbits, who had overturned their boat and were ignominiously pushing it to shore.

  The Coyotes came in first, to a loud chorus of shouts and cheers, supporters of the losing teams joining in, as the competition had been a friendly one.