Heart's Surrender

by Rosanne Bittner

  The letters came regularly, and it had been a long time since Andrea had been so happy. Adam was working hard, certain that soon he would be licensed and a full partner in the Michael Renfro’s law practice. The firm would be called Renfro and Son, Attorneys at Law, for Martin would join his father in another few months. Andrea could not remember Martin Renfro. She only remembered that soldiers had come and taken her away from Douglas Means. But she wished she could remember this man, and she sent him a note thanking him for his offering Adam employment.

  More displaced Indians flooded into Indian Territory, and the influx of Eastern Indians pushed at the Plains Indians already entrenched in the Western lands. New rivalries began to take shape, and sometimes there were skirmishes between the Eastern and Western tribes. Andrea found it ironic that the once-flourishing Cherokee were now reverting to old warrior ways at times, going back on all that they had achieved in Georgia, yet starting all over again.

  And many were surviving, many were building. A school was opened in the autumn of 1840. Jonas and John attended it. Ruth gave birth to a baby girl, named Rose after her dead grandmother, and James’s farm began to take shape and realize a profit. Adam sent money regularly to help all of them, and Andrea could finally again hope that at last they would be able to start a new life and live the way a family should.

  In the beginning she never wondered whether or not she would have stayed with Adam Chandler, married him, if she had known what would happen. There was no question in her mind. She would do it all over again if she were taken back and knew what she knew now. For she was the wife of Adam Chandler, and that was all that mattered. He had fathered their two beautiful sons, now eleven and ten; and a third son. Nathan Peter would be fourteen now. Fourteen. If he was alive, Andrea was sure he was just as smart and handsome as his brothers. Would the pain of never knowing him ever leave her? She thought not, but it seemed now that if she was ever to meet him, it would have to be after death. But she would not think about that now. There were too many good things happening; there was too happy a future ahead of them now. For the time being she could not and would not look back on all the pain and loss. She must look forward.

  Finally in the spring of 1841 came the letter she’d been waiting for. He had passed his exam and was an attorney. He had found a small but comfortable home to rent and he was coming for her to take her to Independence. Within two weeks Adam would be there, holding her again, making love to her again. How she had missed him! What a long, lonely winter it had been. Now he was coming, and they would leave their little sod house behind them. She had not even lived in it for several weeks. Over the winter James had built a frame house for Ruth, and for the first time in nearly two years they all lived in a real house again, a family. Little Rose was a year old, fat and happy, already walking, and Ruth was pregnant again. Life was good, so very, very good.

  And so when tragedy struck again, it was harder to take than all the other tragedies put together, for Andrea was about to face the worst horror of her life. On a night in mid-June, 1841, her newly happy world came crashing down around her. It started with the sound of rumbling hooves, and the faint sound of war whoops. It was early morning, and Andrea had just finished dressing. Everyone else still slept, none of them yet hearing the horses. Andrea looked toward the door. Although she had never seen the wild, savage kind of Indians she’d heard lived west of the Cherokee settlements, she knew instinctively that she was hearing their cries. Indians! But far different from the gentle Cherokees she knew so well. The Plains Indians lived as the Cherokee had, before they’d become educated and Christianized.

  She yelled for James. Already the yipping and thundering horses could be heard all around the house.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Andrea tugged again at her leather bindings. But the pain it brought to her swollen wrists and ankles was almost unbearable. They rode, day after day, her wrists bound behind her, her ankles secured under the big Appaloosa, her body tied against the cruel Comanche man who carried her on his horse. Her confusion and terror were boundless, and her physical condition was getting progressively worse. At first she had refused to let her head rest against the greased back of the dark Indian who was her apparent “owner.” But now she was so weary she could not help but let her head drop forward. Her mouth was parched, her stomach a tight little ball of hunger.

  Why? Why had they come? And why only to Ruth and James’s house, chopping their way through the door, terrorizing all of them, then taking only her and no one else. The children, thank God, had been left untouched, and Ruth had not been harmed, though James had suffered a blow from a club. Andrea could only hope he would be all right. But the Indians had come right to her, had dragged her out despite kicks and screams and the terrified crying of her sons.

  That had been nearly a week ago. Since then they had ridden hard, stopping only to relieve themselves and eat. They fed her little, gave her hardly any water, and laughed at her when she urinated. But they had not raped her or even touched her in that way. It was as though they had some kind of mission, as though they were delivering her somewhere. Andrea could only speculate because she did not understand their language. To their village? Would she become the captive of some Comanche chief, to be used in horrible ways and then tortured to death? And why? She could not begin to imagine a reason for any of this. Her captors apparently had not needed food or anything else. Nothing had been taken from James and Ruth.

  Adam would be home by now. He would be at the house, happy and eager, ready to take her and the boys to Independence. Poor Adam! What would this do to him? He had such big plans. Would this destroy them? Would he turn to the bottle again when he found her missing? Surely he would come after her—try to find her. Of course he would! She took hope in the thought. Adam would find her, and whatever had been done with her, it wouldn’t matter. He would still love her. He would take her to Independence and they would be happy together. She had to be positive. She had to think of Adam and the boys, or she would lose her mind.

  It was hard to believe that Adam’s own ancestors had once been this uncivilized, this cruel, this hard. These Comanche men were nearly naked, their bodies painted grotesquely, and they carried an array of weapons. Andrea loved and lived with an Indian, yet these Indian men terrified her. She could not understand a thing they said, and only occasionally did she note any feeling of compassion in any of them. The one who kept her with him constantly would at times give her some extra food when the others were not looking, and he always made sure she was kept warm at night, sleeping right beside her with plenty of blankets, but not touching her rudely. She knew that while she was with him, nothing horrible would happen to her, but he refused to unloose her leather bindings, and he stared when she relieved herself. Finally she got used to the stares and the laughter and ignored them. She had a slight hope that the one who looked after her would somehow turn around and help her, but that was dashed when they finally rode into the camp where she saw several men—white men.

  Andrea shivered, even though the day was hot. She knew instinctively what was happening, yet she also knew if she screamed and ran she would be killed. She had to stay alive—somehow—for surely Adam would come. But how would he find her?

  They rode past a row of white women, some young, some old, all tied, their clothes torn, their hair a tangled mess, their faces dirty and tear-stained. Some were crying even that moment. Several wagons and horses were about, and a couple of campfires. Men talked and drank and laughed, dirty, sweaty, unshaved men. One man walked up to a crying girl and slapped her hard, telling her to shut up.

  Andrea was certain she would join the others, and be earmarked for some strange, horrible fate. She had been singled out. There were other white women around Tahlequah. Why her? That was the one thing she could not understand.

  Her Comanche captor dismounted. Untying the strap around the horse, he pulled her off, letting her fall to the ground. She just lay there while men came up to the Comanches, speak
ing in sign language and Comanche both. One of the white men turned and looked at an enclosed wagon. “Mary!” he called. “Come on out here and make sure this is the right one.”

  Mary? Andrea’s heart pounded. It couldn’t be! She sat up and stared toward the enclosed wagon. A woman climbed out, a woman with mousy brown hair and steely gray eyes. She was wearing a red, low-cut dress, and her eyes were heavily painted. She sauntered toward Andrea, smiling more widely as she came closer. Andrea glared back at her. She needed to ask no questions. This had all been planned.

  Mary looked her over, then laughed lightly. “Your precious Adam should never have killed my Luke.” She sneered. “Now he will pay dearly.” She reached down and ripped open the front of Andrea’s dress. “There you go, boys, have a look!” she told the men, overjoyed at the look of shame and horror on Andrea’s face. “She’s the one, all right. Don’t you think the Mexican men will pay a pretty penny to get a mouthful of those nice white breasts and to do whatever else they want with this pretty white girl?”

  They all laughed. Then one of them went to a long box, from which he took a rifle. He held it out to Andrea’s captor. So, these men paid Indians with rifles, and probably whiskey, to kidnap white women. The cost of the whiskey and rifles was probably nothing compared to what they got paid for the women down in Mexico.

  Andrea turned over to hide her breast, struggling not to vomit. Adam! He had to come. He had to!

  Mary bent down, still laughing. “You always thought you were so high and mighty, Andy. What do you think now?” She pushed Andrea over onto her back, then yanked off the rest of her clothes, while the men whooped and laughed. Throwing the torn dress aside, she then sauntered around Andrea’s naked body. “This business of selling my body to men has made me a rich woman, Andy. And I’m getting even richer dealing in the sale of other women to men who would give everything they own to bed a beautiful white woman. You will notice that most of my captives are pretty blondes. They’re the favorites of Mexicans—blonde and redheads. You’ll be a prize package. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be as rich as me someday, when you learn to like it and we can trust you enough to keep you off the drugs.”

  Andrea wondered how she managed to breathe. Never had such horror run through her. Drugs? What did she mean? Mary bent closer to her face then.

  “You’ll be taken to a grand Mexican whorehouse, Miss Uppity Chandler, and you’ll give yourself to every Mexican who comes along and is willing to pay for you—because you’ll have no choice. There are certain drugs we can give you to make you wild for it. You’ll see. It won’t be so bad. Might be the most wonderful experience you’ve ever had. Before long you won’t even think about your precious Adam anymore. Compared to what you’ll be doing, sleeping with him will seem boring.”

  Andrea stared into the face of the woman who had once been her best friend. “You bitch!” she hissed. “You ugly, filthy, worthless whore! Adam Chandler will come for me!”

  “Of course he will. And he’ll find you—or at least he’ll think it’s you. By the time he gets here, I’d say a dead body would be pretty unrecognizable, wouldn’t you? I mean, rotting out here in the sun for over a week, maybe longer, picked over by buzzards.”

  Andrea swallowed back vomit. “What are you talking about?”

  Mary laughed lightly and stood up. She walked over and picked up Andrea’s dress and underwear. Then she pulled off her shoes and removed the locket that hung around her neck—the locket Adam had sent her from Independence.

  “Please don’t take that!” Andrea whimpered.

  Mary kicked her hard in the side. “Shut up!” She sauntered over to the other women, studying them closely, then called to one of her men. “I think this one here resembles her the most, don’t you?”

  The man looked from the terrified young girl to Andrea. “I’d say so…they’re just about the same build…a mite skinny but plenty of flesh in the right places.” He reached out and fondled the girl’s breasts and she cringed away.

  “Take her away from camp and strip her. Do what you want with her, Lonny; then I want you to kill her. Put Andrea Chandler’s torn dress on her. Leave the underwear beside her, but put the shoes on her and put the locket around her neck. Pick up everything else—anything that is not Andrea’s, and bring it back here. We’ll burn up those clothes. Then we’ll leave the body here. By the time Adam Chandler comes along, if he happens to be smart enough to track her this far, he’ll find the body, with his locket around its neck. It’ll be so bloated he won’t be able to tell if it’s really her, but he’ll have to think it is.” She turned to Andrea and grinned. “He’ll bury it and leave. And little Andy will be under my control for the rest of her miserable life.”

  Andrea could not believe what she was seeing and hearing and feeling. The horror of it was beyond reality. The poor girl who was to take her place was dragged off screaming and kicking, and Andrea was left naked on the ground, while men talked and laughed and drank, Mary joining them. The Comanches left, with new rifles and plenty of whiskey. An hour or so later, after the horrible screams of the girl chosen to be killed finally stopped, Andrea heard a gunshot. She rested her face against the dry earth and wept, praying that if Adam did not find her she would somehow die soon.

  Such country Adam Chandler had never known. So, this was the West. The farther he got from Cherokee country, the worse it got—more barren, hotter, harder, more dangerous. There seemed to be a rattler at every turn, and the sun shone down without mercy. James rode with him, and the two of them using their Indian instincts, they followed the probable course the Comanches had taken with Andrea. At times tracking them seemed almost impossible. Their trail would disappear into streams, and it would take hours to find out where they’d ridden out again. The pursuit was taking too long, and Adam’s hopes were dwindling. Even though he was Indian, he did not know this new land. In Georgia, he could find a worm in a pine tree. He could smell out a butterfly in the branches of an oak. But this land was different. A horse’s hoof left only a slight impression on the hard earth, and they were tracking native Indians who knew every rock and crag.

  “I don’t understand it, James.” He spoke up for the hundredth time, his voice strained and tired. “Why Andrea? Why did they single her out that way?”

  “I wish I knew, Adam.” James’s heart was heavy, for he had been unable to fight so many Comanches. His ear and the side of his face were still bruised from the blow of a heavy club. “I guess there could be a hundred reasons. There has been a lot of raiding along the borders of Cherokee land, by Plains Indians who feel we are infringing on their territory. To them the taking of a woman is the supreme insult, the best way to get back at their enemies.”

  “Then why not a Cherokee woman? Why a white woman?”

  “Maybe they thought she was worth more. The more she is worth, the greater the insult.”

  Adam sighed and rubbed at tired eyes. “Do you think she is still alive?”

  James could not look at him. “From the things we have been hearing, she would be better off if she were not. The Comanches are not kind to their captives. But perhaps she is some kind of slave. Perhaps she still lives.”

  Adam stared out over the quiet, hazy horizon, into miles and miles of nothingness. There was not a sound in this country, not even bird calls or the singing of insects. It was as though all life had vanished and they were on some other planet.

  “We’ll never find her. I don’t know how much longer to keep searching, or even if we’re following the right tracks anymore. And I’m keeping you from your farm. But I have to go on…a little longer.”

  He hunched over and wept. Andrea! All his plans, his hard work, his dreams. What was he to do if he didn’t find her? There was no law in this land, no one to help, no one to turn to. The West was wild and untamed, and such vastness could swallow up one tiny woman. Andrea! Andrea! He couldn’t live without her. Not now! Not after all they had been through! And what had she suffered at the hands of the Comanches? Wonde
ring about that, he could not help but think she might be better off if she were dead. But how could he go on if she was? How much was a man supposed to take? If only he could go back, to the days of their youth, to the oak tree. He had waited so long to come home, settled and successful, to hold her and take her and the children to their little house in Independence where they would be a family again. He could no longer control the tears. He leaned forward as he sat his horse, his shoulders shaking. From above, he and James were just two small dots in the middle of a vast, untamed, cruel land.

  It was another week before they saw the vultures circling silently, their black ugliness spelling death. Adam pulled up his horse and James rode up beside him. They stared out from a great mesa to the place far below where the remains of a body lay, something blue beside it. Adam had been told that Andrea had worn a blue dress the morning she’d been taken. Still, it all seemed too impossible.

  “What do you think, James?”

  “I don’t know. We’d better go and see. But those vultures won’t like it. They’re already picking at the body.”

  Adam gritted his teeth. “Worthless, stinking country! How can anything be this big and desolate? How is a person to get help in a land like this? If that is my Andrea—” He made an odd choking sound, then headed his horse down the embankment, chancing its dangerous steepness. Rocks slid and tumbled, but his sure-footed mount did not lose its footing. James followed, but more slowly.

  “Adam, wait for me! Adam, keep a hold on yourself!” He knew that if the body was Andrea’s Adam Chandler would be like a crazy man, but Adam was soon far ahead of him. His horse reared as vultures dove at it. Nonetheless, pulling his rifle from its boot, Adam jumped off, and ran toward the body. As his horse ran off, he shot wildly at the birds, screaming at them, fighting them off. James caught up, dismounted, and fired along with Adam until the vultures left alive flew to rocky perches to wait.