Her eyes widened with love. “Oh, no, Adam, it isn’t that at all! Surely you know that! You’re the most beautiful, honorable, wonderful…you’re so much more than I deserve. I feel almost unworthy of you.”
“Don’t ever say that, Andrea. Not ever again, or I will truly be angry with you. I mean it. You are a woman of honor and beauty and goodness. We will never look at each other as Cherokee and bad white girl. Our love takes us above such foolish thoughts. We are both better than that. I am proud to be Cherokee, and you are proud to be my wife. Is that not so?”
Her eyes teared again. “You know it is.”
“Then that is all we need to remember. I will not have my wife going around with her head hanging, not for any reason! I mean it, Andrea!” His hands gripped her face firmly. For the first time he was truly giving her an order. “Do you understand me?”
Their eyes held. “I understand,” she said quietly. “Don’t be mad at me, Adam. I can’t stand for you to be mad at me. I love you so.”
He loosened his grip slightly, bending down and kissing her forehead. “I am mad at your father, not you. But I will be angry with you if you ever again say that you are bad or hang your head in shame. You are the beautiful and honorable Mrs. Adam Chandler.”
She smiled through her tears, and he hugged her close. Adam then met the reverend’s eyes, thankfully. “I know you did not have to tell us what you did. I thank you, Reverend Jessup.”
The man sighed. “Just remember you are the only ones who know, besides my lovely wife. Not that I think I’m unworthy myself, but there are some who would pull me out of the pulpit if they knew, and I want to preach. So I don’t tell them.”
“I understand. You are a good man, Reverend Jessup.”
The reverend donned his hat. “Well, I just wish I could find your little boy. But I’m afraid we’re going to find nothing but dead ends. Something tells me that even if we find the school where Andrea was taken, they’ll not even acknowledge she was ever there, even if we use the name Marie which they used on her records. They are apparently a very careful outfit, and my guess is Andrea’s father was telling the truth when he said even the school doesn’t know where the babies are taken. I think the two of you should prepare to face the fact that you will probably never find your son, Adam. My advice is to have more children, as soon as possible. It will help fill the void in your wife’s heart. And we can all pray very hard for the son that was taken from her—pray that God will watch over him and keep him safe.”
Andrea cried harder at these words, and Adam held her tightly.
Then the reverend mounted up. “I’ll leave you two alone. But you’d better hurry up and get over to the other side, Adam.”
Adam nodded. Andrea’s horse was ambling back toward them as the reverend rode off.
“Andrea, we have to head back. Come on, honey. It’s all over now. We’ll be okay.” He hugged her tightly. “Let’s go home. If we’re to have more babies, we can’t do it standing here, can we?”
She looked up at him, held back a sob. “Oh, Adam, I love you! Don’t ever leave me!”
He grinned. “And why would I do that?” He kissed her eyes, tasting salty tears. “Andrea, Andrea, I am my own man. I have chosen you. What else is there to ask or to worry about? I am so happy you have come back. Every day I fear something will take you from me. Why on earth would I leave the woman I love?”
“I…don’t know. I just get scared.”
He smoothed back her hair, one arm still firmly around her. “You told me once you would never be afraid as long as you were in my arms, remember? Were you fibbing?”
She managed a smile then. “No.”
“Then why are you afraid now? Am I not holding you? Don’t you sleep in my arms every night?” He took the handkerchief and wiped her eyes. “Stop being afraid.” He kissed her lightly. “And I think the reverend is right. I think it is important that you have another baby as soon as I can get my life to grow in your belly. I think we should go home and work on it. What do you think?”
She stared up into the handsome face and teasing eyes, feeling a rush of love and desire. “There is nothing I want more in the whole world than to have your children. I would like another baby, Adam. But I’ll always love the one I never saw.”
He sobered then, his own eyes tearing. “Of course you will. And so will I. But right now he’s in God’s hands, and we must trust God to take care of him, pray every day that somehow, someday, we will find our son.” He reached out and pulled her horse forward. “Come on now. We should get away from here. We can’t ride them too hard now. The poor things are worn out and will need a good rubdown when we get them home.”
She mounted up, patting her mare apologetically. “I hope I didn’t hurt them, Adam,” she said with concern, noticing that his horse was still panting and was lathered.
“They’ll be all right if we walk them the rest of the way. Besides, it’s a pretty day, and on the way back our hearts will be a little more relieved than when we came. Right?”
She glanced back at the farm, far in the distance now. She would never go back. She truly was free now. But what of her mother? Her mother would never be free. She looked back at Adam.
“I’m so glad I found you, Adam Chandler. Some women are forced to marry men they don’t really love. I feel so lucky.”
His eyes ran over her lovingly. “I am the one who is lucky.”
There followed a time of peace, of calm before the storm. The black clouds of debate over Indian Removal remained on the horizon and still did not move in as Adam and Andrea Chandler had their own home built, smaller than the elder Chandler’s brick estate, but just as elegant. Those first few months Andrea was so afraid of being apart from Adam, he did little more than help on his father’s farm, sharing the profits, so that he could be close to his wife. And their heated nights of lovemaking, which seemed to grow ever sweeter, brought the pregnancy Andrea so wished for.
But by the spring of 1830 the clouds had rolled in a little closer, and now the thunder could be heard all the way from Washington. Copies of Congressional debates were reprinted in the Cherokee Phoenix. Theodore Frelinghuysen of New Jersey, who would one day be called the Christian Statesman, sympathized with the Cherokee. “I ask in what code of the law of nations…their (Indian) rights have been extinguished?” he said. “Where is the decree or ordinance that has stripped these early and first lords of the soil?…Who is the injured, and who is the aggressor?…Do the obligations of justice change with the color of the skin?…We…(are) about to turn traitors to our principles and our fame, (are) about to become the oppressors of the feeble…”
But those in favor of Indian Removal spoke the most frequently, the loudest, and the longest; men like John Forsyth of Georgia. “We will not take the trouble to interfere with such questions,” he declared. “The United States obtained, by treaty, the power to legislate over the Cherokees, and transferred it to Georgia…Georgia stands justified in her course; I shall proceed…”
Congressman Wilson Lumpkin, soon to become governor of Georgia, declared that his state stood “charged before the House, before the nation, and before the whole world, with cruelty and oppression towards the Indians. I deny the charge…our political opponents have availed themselves of the aid of enthusiastic religionists, to pull down the administration of President Jackson…the undefiled religion of the Cross is a separate and distinct thing, in its nature and principles, from the noisy cant of these pretenders…The inhumanity of Georgia…is nothing more nor less than the extension of her laws and jurisdiction over this mingled and misguided population who are found within her acknowledged limits…if the heads of these pretended mourners were waters, and their eyes were a fountain of tears, and they were to spend days and years in weeping over the departure of the Cherokees from Georgia, yet they will go!”
This last and most threatening speech made everyone uneasy. Adam lowered the paper and looked across the table at his wife, heavy with child and due i
n two more months. He had been reading the speeches to her. Now he noticed that she knitted the baby blanket she’d been working on with more vigor. Her face was flushed and her breathing shallow.
“Andrea?”
She finally met his eyes, her own red with tears that wanted to come. “It’s preposterous!” she said in a desperate, angry whisper. “They can’t just come here and make all of us leave. What in God’s name have you done! Name one thing the Cherokees have done wrong, besides become educated and successful! They’re jealous! That’s all it amounts to! You were supposed to remain uncivilized. You’re supposed to be living in tipis, running around half-naked and eating human flesh! That’s what they want, Adam. But the Cherokee fooled them! They proved they were intelligent people who learn quickly and who could be as successful as the white man, perhaps more successful. Now you live on soil that is becoming more and more valuable, and they want it!” A tear slipped down her cheek. “It makes me sick! And it frightens me.” Her voice broke. “What…will happen to us? What will happen to our baby?”
Adam came around the table, pulled the knitting from her hands. “Nothing will happen to our baby, or to you and me. I won’t let it.” He sighed deeply. “Andrea, I want to go to Washington for the vote. There is still time. I want to be there. John Ross is going, and Elias and—”
“No! Don’t leave!”
“You can go and stay at Reverend Jessup’s. You’ll be safe there. Even if they vote for removal, Andrea, nothing is going to happen right away. Anyhow, I’d get home faster than the news could get to the rest of Georgia. And believe me, the last thing the government wants is to look bad. They will emphasize that forced removal is to be avoided at all costs. Even if they vote the bill in, it will take years to make it work, and we’ll fight it all the way. We won’t let them win, Andrea. There are a lot of people in this country, even around the world, on our side. Washington does not want to be embarrassed.”
“They’ll get out of it by handing it all over to Georgia, and I don’t think Georgia cares about being embarrassed! They’ll find a way to make it look right.”
He wiped at her tears and ran a hand over her swollen stomach. “Either way, nothing is going to happen in the next couple of months. I’ll be back in less than three weeks, and certainly in time for the birth of our baby. I wouldn’t miss that for anything.”
She flung her arms around his neck. “Promise me! It was terrible the first time, so painful! I was so afraid, Adam, and I called and called for you.”
He rose, picking her up as he did so. “It won’t be like that for you this time.” He kissed her hair, then leaned over to blow out the lamp. “Come on. It’s getting late.” After carrying her down the hallway and into their bedroom, he placed her gently on the bed, then lay down beside her, pulling her into his arms. “I don’t have much longer to make love to you,” he told her, running his hand over her stomach again. “Pretty soon we’ll have to quit. I don’t want to do anything that will interfere with having a nice healthy baby, and at the right time.” He kissed her several times over, moving his hand to a full breast. “Is it still all right, Andrea?”
She could not forestall the blush that came to her cheeks, in spite of all the times he had been one with her, all the places he had seen and touched and tasted and invaded.
“The doctor said it would be for a couple of weeks.” She buried her face in his shoulder. “Adam, I’m so big. How can you possibly want me this way?”
“What did I tell you about that once?” He unbuttoned the front of the dress, leaving the lamp lit so he could see her better. “It’s the love that counts. Besides, that’s my child in your belly, and as far as I’m concerned, you’re prettier than you’ve ever been. I’ve never loved you more.”
He pushed her dress open and, placing his lips on her shoulder, raised up slightly to pull it down to her waist. He then kissed each full nipple; her breasts were getting larger now, in preparation for nourishing an infant. Unbuttoning her dress past the waistline, he helped her ease out of it. Andrea wore a specially made dress to accommodate her full belly, and she wished she were slender and shapely for him, though she saw the love in his eyes when he ran his strong, dark hands over her stomach, holding them still for a moment to feel the movement. He smiled then, his eyes shining.
She loved him so much that it almost hurt, for she knew that he was trying to keep her from worrying, while deep inside he was himself torn with agony over the Indian issue. Surely his heart screamed at the thought of leaving his beloved and sacred Georgia mountains. This was the land of his ancestors. His blood was in this land. To leave it would be to cut out his heart. He had said so more than once. Now that threat was getting worse. He leaned down and kissed her belly, then rose to remove his own clothes.
“This might be our last time for quite a while. By the time I get back we won’t be able to do this anymore.”
“You won’t go to one of those wild girls while you’re waiting?” she teased.
He laughed lightly, tossed his clothing aside. And as Andrea drank in his masculine beauty, she knew a fiery jealousy at the thought of any other woman touching him.
“No, I will not go to one of those wild girls.” He thought for a moment about Mary Means and how she had turned out. He had never mentioned it to Andrea, and he would not do so now.
“It will be as hard for me as for you,” she told him, reaching up for him.
He gave her a seductive look as he lowered himself beside her to devour her lips, groaning lightly and catching her hair in his fingers. Her locks were getting longer and longer now. “And how shall we compare?” he teased, moving hungry lips over her breasts—kissing, tasting, moving his hand to secret places and making her gasp.
“I…don’t know,” she whispered. She reached up and touched his face. “You’re so beautiful, Adam. It’s so easy for women to want you.”
“And am I married to a woman that men would not want? I think perhaps it is I who need to be wary.”
Her eyes teared. “Never. I will never want anyone but you.”
He met her lips again, parting them in his hunger while his fingers moved magically to make her forget her swollen belly. So strong he was, yet so gentle; and so handsome, yet he wanted only his Andrea. The kiss grew hot and hard, their breathing heavy; and the familiar, wonderful explosion rippled through her, telling him she was ready for her man. He moved his lips back down over her breasts. To him she was beautiful, perhaps even more beautiful now. He moved between her legs. Parting them gently and raising himself because of her stomach, he grasped her hips firmly to support her as he planted himself deeply within her. He did not want her straining when she arched up to him, so he pulled her up himself with strong hands and arms, making her cry out with the pleasure of it.
He would never tire of her. He was very sure of that. There were some things that made a woman so beautiful that each union with her was special and new. Andrea was like that. She had suffered for him. Now she carried his child. A man did not lose his appreciation or desire for such a woman.
They moved in gentle rhythm, accustomed to one another now, knowing how to move, how to please, how to satisfy and take pleasure in return. She would not think about tomorrow, about his going away. He would not think about the important vote on the bill to remove Indians from Georgia. They would both try in these moments not to wonder what had happened to their first child. The boy was in God’s hands. Still, they would keep searching. They would not give up.
He forced himself to hold out. He wanted this to last, for such sweet pleasure would not be his again for perhaps three months. How would he bear being near her for that long without touching her? But her health came first, and the baby’s. In that light, he could wait.
His love for her was finally released in passion, and with whispered Cherokee words of love. He pulled the covers over them then, lying down beside her and holding her close, enjoying the feel of her breasts against his bare chest.
“Promise m
e you will not worry, Andrea. I will be fine. And you will be safe with Reverend Jessup. You do get along well with his wife, and perhaps she can help you know how to make this birth easier. She has had four children. Don’t be afraid to ask her about it. Let her help you. She is a kind woman. Promise me you’ll talk to her about it.”
“I promise.”
“My mother can help, too.”
“Why don’t I just go and stay with her and Ruth?”
“Because my father is going with us. Mother and Ruth will stay with Elias Boudinot’s wife, as will Mrs. Ross.”
She pulled away from him, studying his eyes. “They’re afraid, aren’t they? The women are afraid.”
He held her eyes, reaching out and caressing her hair. “These are bad times, Andrea. It is true what I told you, about there being no real trouble for a long time yet. But neither can we be too careful. The citizens of Georgia cannot be trusted, and certainly the militia can’t. They are straining at the bit. It does not hurt to be a little more careful than usual, in case they decide to harass us. They cannot yet come in and make us go, but they can try to make us want to go.”
She closed her eyes and grasped his wrist, suddenly thinking of Douglas Means. He would gladly come if he had the legal right, and he was full of jealousy and hate. She had always been afraid of him, now that was even more the case. She snuggled against her husband then. Such fears vanished when she lay here like this, his strong arms around her, his life in her belly. Nothing could harm her when she was with Adam Chandler.
Chapter Fourteen
Adam stared down at this gathering of the most important men in the United States. These men governed the America he lived in, the America his people had occupied since long before any of the white men below or their ancestors had set foot on its soil. The words still rang in his ears, the long, agonizing roll call, the yeas and nays. So close! It had been so close! One hundred and two in favor of Indian Removal, ninety-seven against. It had passed.
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