by Karen Kay
Bobby held his hat in his hand, turning it over and over until it more resembled an animal than a hat. He agreed “Six will be fine. I’ll be there.”
Alys smiled. “I’ll be looking forward to it.”
She turned, then, to begin her trek home, but called back over her shoulder, “Six o’clock tonight. Don’t be late.”
Bobby grinned back at her. “I won’t.”
“What were you about today?” Moon Wolf caught her as soon as she opened the cellar doors. Her purpose had been to retrieve a few jars of jam; however, she was just as happy to come face to face with Moon Wolf. He had clearly been anticipating her, and without awaiting her reply, went on, “First you flirt with Lieutenant Warrington and now the owner of the general store. Do you purposely do this in order to offer my mind up to the Above Ones? Perhaps I should just declare to these white people that you are my wife and take on the world and what they will do to us because of it.”
“Perhaps you should.”
He gave her a silencing look. “We have been through this before. I will not have you ruin your life because of me.”
“Maybe I should be the judge of how I could ruin it.”
He shook his head, smiling blandly. “We leave the point. What were you about today?”
“How did you see me?”
He hesitated. And though she could sense his irritation with her, he asked in a kindly voice, “Do you always answer your questions with another well-chosen one?”
She grinned at him, baiting him. “Do you?”
She heard his slight chuckle, saw him shake his head, and, despite the darkness of the cellar, noted the tender mirth in his eyes. She leaned in toward him. “Moon Wolf, it is dark in here, we have only a few more moments together. Could we not spend it in a more amicable way?”
“We could. You will tell me what you were doing today with the storekeeper and then we can share those few stolen moments.”
She pouted, “Do I have to account to you for everything that I do?”
“I am your husband,” he pointed out, his hand coming up to touch her lips, where she frowned, his caress soft, loving. He said, “We should have no secrets from one another.”
“Are you jealous?”
“A little, perhaps.”
“There is no need to be.”
“I know that, too,” he admitted, “but even if there were a reason to be suspicious, I would listen to you quietly and try to understand you. A man should not become overly angry with his wife, even under the greatest provocation. No good ever comes of it. Now tell me, what were you trying to do today?”
She sighed. She did not want to share her plan with Moon Wolf, certain that he would object to it and try to stop her. Still, with the touch of his gentle gaze upon her, she found herself weakening. “I…I…” She caught herself. “I lost my necklace and asked Bobby to help me retrieve it.”
“That is not what it looked like to me.”
“And where were you? I don’t remember seeing you.”
“Were you looking for me?” he countered. “From where I stood, you did not appear to notice anything else around you except that merchant.”
“How could you be jealous of Bobby?”
“Very easily, I think.”
“Well, ease your mind, Moon Wolf. I am not romantically interested in Bobby Thompson.”
“He is coming to have dinner with you tonight?”
She nodded.
“And you asked him to do this?”
“Yes,” she admitted.
“Why?”
She chanced a quick glance up at him. “To thank him for helping me find my necklace.”
He gave her a shrewd look. “A necklace that you placed very deliberately below the boards.”
Did nothing escape this man’s attention? She raised her chin, but said nothing.
“What do you do, Little Brave Woman?”
“Nothing,” she insisted. “I am simply being neighborly.”
“I think it is more than that. I think you are planning something.”
“Do you? Then you are wrong.”
“You lie, too, I think.”
She tilted her head back at a more defiant angle, remaining otherwise silent and oblivious to the cunning gleam in his eye.
“Let me take care of this latest problem that we have with the lieutenant, Little Brave Woman,” he said. “Go you about your duties as usual and leave the rest to me.”
She struck a pose. “And never see you again?”
“Aa, so you are planning something.”
She gazed at him from beneath the shadow of her lashes. “And if I were?”
“Do not do it. The lieutenant, the people who watch you, are dangerous. Do not do anything to bring grief upon yourself. Let me take care of this. You must learn to be patient.”
“Why?” she countered, throwing back her head. “Why must I be patient? I am already like a prisoner in my own home.”
He visibly flinched and became silent; noticeably and suddenly withdrawn. He dropped his hand from her and took a step away from her.
His withdrawal was so instantaneous, so unexpected that she reached forward as though to bring him back. She asked, “Is something the matter?”
“It is nothing,” he said, “but you are right. You should go now. You must not be here long and draw attention to yourself or to your cellar.”
She hesitated. He hadn’t answered her question. She asked again, “Did I say something to offend you?”
He jerked his head swiftly to the left. “Words do not hurt a person. If there was offense, it is my problem, not yours.”
“Then what is it?”
He shook his head. “It is a bad thing when a man cannot mask his reactions from his wife. I have been too long gone from my people, I think, and like the white man, I begin to show my feelings so that all can see them. It is not a good thing.”
“Moon Wolf, please…”
He hesitated, preoccupied. At length, he said, “I will tell you this once, but I must have your word that you will not show pity for me or for what I say, for I do not want it.”
She nodded. What, for land sakes, had she said? She uttered, “I promise.”
He inhaled deeply, then began, “Long before my grandfather’s grandfather, my people roamed this land, free. Always my people have been independent in this, our homeland. We fought for our home, too, and many times we were successful, but our fighting was not enough. No matter the fights won, the white man’s diseases came and took many of us away, too many of us, and we became weak, always weaker, when the white man became always stronger.
“And now,” he continued, “look at what we have become. With the arrival of the white man, with his cattle and his treaties, our home has become a white man’s prison, and we Indians the prisoners in it, though the bars are invisible, drawn on the maps of the white man’s creation.”
It was now her turn to remain silent.
He continued, “You sounded very much like my people when you said that you felt like a prisoner in your own home. I have heard those same words often, but from the lips of my people. And it made me fearful for a moment that our cause, yours and mine, might have the same outcome as that of my people.”
Her heart wrenched for him, for those close to him, perhaps for the two of them, too. But what could she say? No mere words would heal these wounds. She said, “I…I’m sorry.”
“There is no need to be. How could you have known?
And it is not pity that I feel for my people. Never pity.”
“But—”
“Pity is for the weak, for the old people and for the feeble. This I do not wish upon my people. For those I love, I would see them again strong and happy…free.”
She nodded. “Yes, I understand.”
“Know, too, that I do not intend you to be as a prisoner for long. I have a plan.”
“Do you?” Her eyes grew wide, and she took a step forward. “What is it?”
“There is not the time to tell you now, for you must go soon. Know only that I have one. But before you go, you must tell me why it is that you flirted today with the storekeeper.”
She gave him a shy glance. “I…I cannot. There is not the time and I must go, you know I must.” She spun around.
He caught her. “You do remember that you are a married woman, do you not?”
“Am I?” she countered recklessly. “I don’t believe our marriage has been consummated in the traditional sense. As you put it, I am still virginal, at least in body.”
This was clearly not the response he had expected. “Do not play with me, Little Brave Woman, for as long as I live, you are my woman.”
“I know,” she said, “and I will not forget. I vow this to you. Now I must go.”
“Humph,” he said. “Do not forget tonight in all things that you do that you are my wife.”
“I won’t.”
“I will be watching.”
“But there is no need,” she said in a rush.
“Humph,” was again his quick response. “I think perhaps there might be.”
“I have no more time to stand here arguing with you.” She stepped around him to grab a couple of jars of jam. “Just you remember, if you do come tonight, that my bedroom is the second one on the left.”
Moon Wolf chuckled, his only response to her suggestion, and before she could become consumed with embarrassment, she fled up the narrow cellar stairs.
Moon Wolf, crouching behind a bush, watched her from the shadows of the house where she stood near a window. He had easily stolen to this spot in the quiet of the night, once he had observed the posted sentry through a crack in the cellar doors. The hour had become late, and the lackey had at last grown tired. And, as the man had sat back for a nap, Moon Wolf had escaped.
Looking at her now, Moon Wolf knew a moment of pure panic. She was beautiful, so very beautiful. And she had invited another man to be with her tonight.
How could a man, who was any man at all, resist her? But worse, how could he ever attempt to hold on to such a person? She, with her exquisite taste in clothes and her white man’s ways?
He had observed in the past that each time he saw her, she wore a different gown. He was not disappointed with that observation now. Her dress tonight looked as though it had been spun from the clouds, so fragile and vaporous was its material. With every step, she seemed to float, as though she were taking a walk amongst the clouds.
He chided himself. Women were such delicate creatures, having need of such things; for the frills and luxuries of life. Luxuries he could not supply, he reminded himself.
It was not a matter of whether she would stay with him despite his poverty. Her integrity had never been in question. No, the question was rather, If he lived, how could he make her happy without these things? Was such a deed possible?
Certainly she had denied that she needed beautiful things, but a man had to live by his own instinct, and he could not envision this charming creature being happy amongst his own people, living the simple life.
Nor could he be content within the confines of her society. His beliefs were such that, as it was in the old days, so it was still: only the weak or the men who had become too much like women desired material wealth.
“I have something to ask of you, Bobby.” Moon Wolf stopped his line of reasoning to listen to her.
He could not hear Bobby’s reply, but as though she were drawn to the man who crouched down in the shadows, Alys stepped closer to the window.
“I am in some trouble,” she said, speaking to the man behind her, though she faced the window.
“I reckon I’d do most anything to help you, Miss Alys,” the gentleman said. “What is it you need? Money? I’ve been in a good spell now for a while, and I reckon I could loan you whatever you need off the reel.”
“It’s not money I’d be needing, Bobby.” She spun around to face him. “Do not be alarmed, but I fear it is you that I need…”
The young man actually jumped backward, so taken aback was he. Moon Wolf, himself, stood up, oblivious that he was now fully exposed.
“Let me explain,” she went on, obviously not immune to Bobby’s reaction. “I…I am having some trouble with a persistent suitor, and it is my desire to discourage him.”
“Miss Alys, you had only to say so, and I—”
“It is not you that I am speaking of, Bobby. In truth, I am looking to you for my salvation.”
Moon Wolf gritted his teeth.
“Why, Miss Alys,” Bobby was saying, “you know I would do most anything for you, but—”
“I am hoping that you will. For you see, Bobby, it is my desire to become…engaged to you….”
“Miss Alys!”
For a moment, Moon Wolf could not move. “Engaged to you.” The words echoed over and over in Moon Wolf’s ears. “Engaged to you.”
She was already seeking one to take the place of her husband?
Moon Wolf didn’t wait to hear more. Creeping away, not even bothering to determine if he were being watched, he stepped out of the shadows.
And so caught up was Alys in the success of her plan, she didn’t hear the rustle of the bush outside the window, nor was she aware of the emotional explosion taking place under her very nose.
And when a skirmish took place between two men, one white, one Indian, outside her home, she remained unaware of it, at least for the moment.
Chapter 16
“Engaged?” This time Bobby took three steps backwards. Three big steps. He twirled his hat in his hands. “Why, Miss Alys, th-this is unexpected…and I…I…”
“Not a real engagement, Bobby, only a betrothal to discourage this particular suitor. As soon as the suitor withdraws, you will be free, and I…I am willing to pay you for your trouble.” Her voice held a note of hope.
Bobby’s face, in the meantime, had become a bright shade of red. He said, “I…don’t rightly think I could take money from you, Miss Alys.”
“But I understand that I am putting you into an awkward situation and so I am willing to—”
“It’s not that, Miss Alys. I’m willing to help you with most anything, but…and you don’t need to feel obligated.”
“But I would,” Alys pressed her point. “I know this is an imposition.”
“I…I…couldn’t—”
“Is it because of your mother?”
“My mother?”
Alys nodded. “Yes, I know she might be upset, you being her only boy and all. But perhaps you could explain it to her and then she wouldn’t—”
“It’s not my mother.” The hat in the little man’s hands twirled even faster.
“Then—”
“Miss Alys, excuse me, but it’s just that I don’t think that I…I…that I’m…in love with you.”
She sighed. “I know that.” Her voice held a patience she was far from feeling. “That’s why the engagement would not be a real one. It would only be something to discourage this—”
“But if I become engaged to you, then I’ll never get her…”
Alys stopped absolutely still, as though suspended. She lifted her head, her chin jutting forward as she repeated, “Her?”
“Abigail Flint.”
“Abigail Flint? The young girl in the store?”
Bobby nodded.
“You’re in love with that girl?”
Bobby’s eyes looked momentarily dreamy. “Ever since the first day she walked into my store. She’s as pretty as a picture and as sweet as a drink of water on a hot day.”
Alys spun around, away from Bobby, retracing her steps toward the window. She said, “But she’s the daughter of one of the richest, most influential people in the territory, and she’s only here for a few more months.”
“I love her,” Bobby reiterated, “and I couldn’t think of marrying anyone but her.”
“I see,” Alys said slowly. “Then I guess I will have to help you to get her.”
“And so you
see I couldn’t possibly think of entering into an agreement which…wh-what was that, Miss Alys?”
Alys whipped around to face Bobby. “Then I will have to help you court her, won’t I?”
“C-court her? Y-you would do that for me?”
Alys nodded. “Yes, I would, provided that you are willing to also help me with this unwanted suitor.”
The man glanced over to his left, to his right, looking much like a cornered raccoon.
At last, however, he glanced at Alys, down at the floor, back at Alys. After some time he said, “Then I reckon we got ourselves a deal, Miss Alys.” He moved forward, stealing slowly toward her until he at last grinned. “Or should I say partner?”
Alys smiled, accepting his handshake in the spirit in which it was given. She said, “Yes, Mister Bobby Thompson, I think we have ourselves a deal.”
She stood at the French window of her bedroom, waiting for him. She knew he was out there.
Where was he? She had invited him here. What kept him?
She had donned her white nightdress. The light silk of the material was very thin, very scandalous, but it was the perfect complement for what might be her true “wedding night,” if he ever decided to grant her an audience.
She needed to speak to him, to let him know her plans. Now that she had Bobby’s agreement, she should explain the mock engagement to Moon Wolf before he found out about it from someone else—and without her reasons for doing it.
She faced outward as a warm wind whispered through the chiffon of the curtains, pushing back her hair, outlining her figure against the light touch of her gown. Still, she didn’t move.
Something grazed a strand of her hair. She shook her head but didn’t turn around, her attention outward, into the night.
A finger trailed over the nape of her neck.
Gasping, she spun around.
“Do not worry,” came a familiar baritone voice. “It is your husband.”
“Moon Wolf, you frightened me.” One hand at her throat, the other on her heart, she stared at the man who was her husband, even though the shadows hid his figure. “How did you get in here? I had expected you to come, if you were coming, through the window.”