“But your sister and father are still alive?”
“Yes. But so many of the others died. And God knows what kind of living they can be scraping out of the fields now”—Michael groaned—“and then this….”
“The Navajo. Yes, I see,” said Elizabeth. “You are seeing the same faces, the same hunger….” It had been terrible enough for her, thought Elizabeth, seeing the emaciated bodies, passing the outstretched hands when she brought food to Antonio. But her family had never starved to death before her eyes. They had been slaughtered, yes. But her mother and father’s suffering had been short, compared to the Navajo. And Michael’s people.
“ ‘Twas an awful march, Elizabeth. Old and young were dying by the wayside. From Ballina to Llano Estacado.” He shook his head and smiled a bitter smile. “Ye see, ‘tis crazy I am. I can’t keep it straight. The only difference is that Cooper ordered them shot, the ones who couldn’t keep up. Even the English didn’t do that.”
“What about Serena, Antonio, and the baby, Michael?” Elizabeth was almost afraid to ask.
“Still alive, by some miracle. They made it to Sumner, God help them. Maybe ‘twould have been better to let them die. There is nothing there, nothing. Even the soldiers have had their rations cut in half. Over six thousand Indians, no shelter, no food, and the water hardly drinkable. And nothing I could have done. I keep thinking there might have been something, if I’d stayed,” he said despairingly.
“Michael,” said Elizabeth, taking his head in her hands and looking into his eyes, “your family wanted you to survive. To live a fuller life. Somewhere where famine wasn’t a danger. They wanted you to keep the Burke family strong and alive. It was good to leave, although it was so painful.” She paused. “And there is nothing more either of us could have done to save the Diné.” All of her own grief and anger surfaced as she said passionately, “I hate it, I hate what is happening. I could kill Carleton myself, I would if it would change anything. But this is something that started before we even got here.”
Elizabeth stroked Michael’s cheek. “Come back to bed, my dear. It is too cold out here.” She stood up and took him by the hand and led him back to bed as though he were the eleven-year-old boy she had never known.
* * * *
They heard the bugle call reveille only a few hours later, but only stirred in each other’s arms and went back to sleep.
When Michael finally opened his eyes the sun was streaming in under their bedroom curtains. Elizabeth was asleep still. He took a deep breath and realized that the pall of darkness had lifted. The grief was still there, would always be there, but not true despair. He was here in his own bed with his beloved wife. He was alive. He had a future ahead of him and he owed it to everyone in his family and to all of his people to live that future. He couldn’t give their lives back to the dead and he couldn’t change the lives of his da and his sister. But he could give them his own life by living it. And by living on through his children.
He turned toward Elizabeth. He was so lucky to have found her, his beloved. He traced her eyebrows and her cheek and then her lips. Her eyes flew open and she looked at him questioningly.
“Thank you, Elizabeth, for holding me last night,” he whispered.
Elizabeth reached up to his face. When her thumb touched the corner of his mouth, he bent down to kiss her gently.
Her mouth opened hungrily and she heard his sharp intake of breath as he deepened his kiss. When he finally pulled away she slipped out of her nightgown and helped him pull his nightshirt over his head. Then her hand found him and both were surprised at how quickly desire had overtaken them.
“Easy,” Michael groaned as she stroked him. He drew his hand between her legs and felt that she was already wet.
Elizabeth loved the usual slow, considerate way Michael aroused her before he entered her. But this morning she didn’t need it. Didn’t want it. She wanted him inside her right away and, as though he could read her mind, before she guided him with her hands, he was on top of her and in her.
It was as though all the released anger and grief had freed them for an altogether different release. Their hunger could only be satisfied by one another and at the same time both felt it could never be satisfied, Michael tried to get deeper and deeper, into her very self, her soul, and Elizabeth drew him in, arching up, opening herself to him even more than she had ever done before. When he climaxed, Elizabeth was close to her own and only a few strokes of his finger brought her up and up and then down all the way to meet him. And in the moment he flooded her, she knew, because she wanted him so much and because she wanted his child, that this morning’s love-making would bring them a son or a daughter.
* * * *
Between the time it took to process Michael’s discharge and the time it took to pack, they had a week at Fort Defiance.
Elizabeth had been setting aside some of her housekeeping money and between that and Michael’s pay, he was able to purchase an old wagon and two mules to carry their furniture and belongings. They both spent the week packing and saying their farewells, Elizabeth to the officers’ wives she felt close to and Michael to his men.
“What are your plans, Michael,” Joshua Elwell asked him the night before they were to leave.
“Raising sheep and horses, Josh. I know a little about sheep and a lot about horses,” said Michael with a laugh. “ ‘Twould be better the other way around, to be sure, for the sheep will be the moneymakers. But I’ve always wanted to breed Frost and see what kind of foal she produces.”
“Are you staying in the territory or heading north?”
“South. Not too far south from here. I’ve heard of some good land near Zuni. They’re running cattle there, but there is room enough for sheep.”
“If the cattle ranchers agree with you,” Josh warned him.
“Well, ‘tis hardly crowded there.”
“So, you’ll be meeting more Indians.”
“Em, I suppose I will. The pueblo isn’t more than thirty miles from where I’m thinking of.”
“Maybe I’ll come down and visit you someday.”
“There’d be a place for you, Josh. I could always use a good hand with horses.”
“And sheep!” Elwell gave him a mocking look of distaste. “Well, I’m not that far away from retirement, Burke. I may take you up on it. And bring Mrs. Casey with me!”
“She’d be welcome, too. As long as you married her, boyo!”
“Should I say good-bye to Mary Ann for you?” Elwell asked slyly.
Michael blushed. “Em, yes. Indeed, and I was going to ask you to anyway. Tell her…em, tell her I appreciate her…kindness.”
“Anything else you appreciated?”
Michael jabbed him with his elbow. “Begone with ye now. I am a happily married man.”
“I can see that, Burke. You are a lucky man.”
“I am that, Josh, I am,” said Michael fervently. He gave Elwell a pound on the back, shook his hand, and said, “Don’t forget your promise, Joshua. Good-bye then till we see ye.”
“And you deserve your happiness, Burke,” said his friend when Michael was gone. “You are not just a lucky man, but a damned good one.”
* * * *
It was almost as hard to say good-bye to Mahoney.
“Will ye be staying in the army, lad?” Michael asked him.
Mahoney’s eyes lit up. “I am hoping to make sergeant in three years, sir,” He paused. “I only hope I’ll be as good with my men as you were with us, Sergeant Burke.”
“Michael to ye now, Mahoney. And you weren’t thinking that the first week I had ye!”
Mahoney kicked the dirt with his toe, watching the pebbles fly as though their trajectory were very important to him. When he lifted his face, Michael could see the tears glistening in his eyes. “I was a stupid young git, wasn’t I, Sergeant? I’ve learned a lot since then. I hate to see you leave.”
“And a part of me hates to leave, lad. But you have a fine career ahead of you. And if ye’re ever in need of a place to work, ye’ll always be welcome.”
“Thank you, Serg…I mean, Mr. Burke…Michael.”
Michael drew the boy into his arms and gave him a quick hug, after which both men became very busy, one with his neckerchief and the other turning and slapping his hat against his leg to get the dust off.
“Good-bye then, Mahoney,” said Michael, turning away quickly.
“That’s Mahoney, Mr. Burke,” the boy called after him. “I’m an American!”
Michael smiled when he heard the boy’s protest. “An American, eh. Now what in the world is that, boyo?”
They left early the next morning, Elizabeth driving the wagon with her mare tied behind and Orion sitting next to her, just barely able to restrain himself from jumping out. Michael was on Frost. He was wearing his cavalry boots and a relatively new pair of uniform trousers from which Elizabeth had carefully pulled off the yellow stripes. But his shirt was an off-white linen one and his hat was stopped of its insignia. It was strange to see him out of uniform in the daytime, thought Elizabeth as she slapped the reins on the mules’ backs and they started off.
The big gates swung open and then closed behind them for the last time. Elizabeth wondered if Michael felt the same pang she did, leaving the army behind.
When they were about a half mile from the fort, Michael, who had been riding a little ahead, came back and motioned to her to stop the mules.
“I’d like to make a little detour if ye don’t mind, Elizabeth.”
Elizabeth tilted her head questioningly and Michael dropped a quick kiss on her lips.
“ ‘Tis the little canyon north of here. I want to leave something there. Maybe even camp there tonight? ‘Tis a lovely place and I’d like to say a proper good-bye to the red rock country.”
“Yes, Michael, I would like that.”
So they turned north. When they reached the entrance of the canyon, Michael kept his eye out for the spring he had seen the day he had arrived at Fort Defiance two years ago. There were still a few prayer sticks and feathers, but nothing recent, for the people were long gone from here. He dismounted and pulled his old wallet out of his pocket. Elizabeth watched him as he dug deep and pulled out a small metal disk.
“What is that, Michael?”
“Well, Elizabeth, ‘tis what ye would have called a papist superstition before ye met me!”
Elizabeth blushed and Michael came up to the wagon and held his hand out. “ ‘Tis a medal, Elizabeth, with a picture of Mary, the Mother of God.”
Elizabeth ran her fingers lightly over the portrayal of a woman hammered into the silver.
“Caitlin had it from me mother and then gave it to me.”
“And you would leave it here, Michael, after treasuring it for so long?”
“It seems to me me mother would think it a good thing to do. To leave it here as a thank you for you and all I’ve been lucky to find in this country. And as a prayer with the other prayers…that someday the people will be able to come home.”
He attached the medal to a small stick and planted it a little ways up from the spring. “I don’t want to disturb anything, you see,” he explained. “I don’t think anyone would mind, but out of respect….”
Michael rode ahead and Elizabeth followed. She didn’t know what she thought about such images; her Protestant soul recoiled from the idea of elevating the Mother of God…. And yet, there had been Changing Woman…. She knew what she felt about her husband, though: she loved him with all her heart.
They tied the mules where the canyon began to narrow and then walked a little further to make camp, Frost carrying what they needed.
Orion had been tied to the wagon and was ecstatic at being finally released. He ran in circles and then took off downstream.
“I hope he doesn’t disappear, Michael.”
“He’ll be back.”
They set up camp and then Michael peeled his boots off and put his feet in the water. “The sun will be going down soon, Elizabeth. But the water is warm here, where ‘tis shallow. Do ye want to wash the dust off ye?”
Elizabeth giggled. Michael was standing almost in the spot where she had first seen him washing the dust off of him.
“Ye like the idea, do ye?” Michael quickly stripped off his shirt, exposing the white skin under his brown neck. His trousers followed and he waded in, his back to her.
This time, she could look to her hearts content. This time she could quickly strip off her own clothes and join him. This time, she could run her hands down that white back and over his muscled buttocks.
Michael shivered when he felt her hands slide downward and when he turned to face her, he was fully erect.
Elizabeth laughed.
“Ye think it is funny then,” he said with mock outrage. “Ye weren’t laughing the other night, me darlin’.”
“Oh, Michael, it is only that you still look like a piebald.”
“Still?”
Elizabeth ducked her head and be pulled her chin up. “I have a confession to make.”
“Sure and I thought ‘twas only papists who went to confession,” he teased, reaching down to the water and splashing her lightly.
“Do you remember the first day we met?”
“I remember the first day I saw ye, standing on the porch and looking at me with great disdain!”
“Well, earlier that day I had come sketching to this canyon….” Elizabeth felt her whole body grow warm with the memory. “I was walking downstream and I came upon this naked man.”
“
Día
, ye were there watching me!”
“Not for long. I could hardly avoid it, could I? I turned around and left immediately. Well, almost immediately,” she added with a shy smile.
“So ye’d seen me naked bum before I even knew you existed?”
“I did. And it was hard not to keep looking at it again in your blue trousers. You filled them so much more satisfyingly than Mr. Cooper.”
“Old Bony Arse. I should hope so!”
“Serena agreed with me. As did Mrs. Gray,” Elizabeth added demurely.
“And here I am thinking that respectable women only discussed recipes and embroidery and ye’re comparing men’s bums!”
“Only occasionally. You can’t tell me men don’t talk about women’s…bosoms!” she said, aghast at her own boldness.
Michael’s hand reached out and cupped her breast. “I have never discussed your bosom with anyone,
a ghra
. ‘Tis too lovely to describe.”