Dorothy Garlock - [Annie Lash 01] (26 page)

“You think I can’t clean and cook a rabbit!” she said, “You’d like an excuse to kill me.” Her green eyes flashed a confidence she didn’t feel. “You ugly, disgusting, stinking polecat! What do you think I’ll clean them with? My teeth?”

To her surprise, he reached for the knife in his belt. With a flick of his wrist he sent it into the ground at her feet. She had heard somewhere that most Indians knew a little English. She wondered just how much these two knew.

Berry dressed and washed the rabbits and took them back to the fire. The Indians were sitting cross-legged on the ground—arguing. The young one was angry. The sounds he made were clear and distinct. The old one mumbled, but Berry got the impression that he was having the last word. Their talk exasperated her. Instinctively she knew they were arguing about her. Damn them! She would do some talking herself and see how much English they knew.

“When Simon Witcher comes to get me, he’ll cut off your heads and feed them to the wolves. Simon Witcher . . .” She said the name slowly and distinctly. “He’ll bring Fain MacCartney, Zebulon Pike, Manuel Lisa, and soldiers.” She kept her back turned to the now-quiet Indians and searched her memory for names of prominent people. “The people in Saint Louis will be looking for me. I’m the daughter of Auguste Chouteau. The scout called Light will send his knife into your backs.” She heard a small grunt but didn’t look around. She bent her head over the rabbits and repeated, “The scout called Light . . . will come for me.”

The hand on her shoulder spun her around and slammed her to the ground. The ugly Indian, his face twisted in anger, wrapped the thong about her wrist and tied her to a tree. What had she said that made him so angry? Which of the men she had named did he fear? He knew at least a few English words—she was sure of that now.

The meat on the spit was done, and the smell of it caused Berry’s stomach to rumble and her mouth to water. She watched angrily and resentfully as the two men ate. Finally, when they finished, the old one came to her with a hind leg and a piece of the back that was crusted and blackened from being so close to the blaze. Berry took it gratefully and her sharp teeth tore into the meat.

The young Indian stamped out the fire, muttering angrily at the old one, who sat and watched impassively, the calm expression on his face never changing. Berry also watched, amazed at how completely he erased all trace of the fire. He doused the coals with water, carried the blackened pieces of wood away from the camp, and buried them under a thick layer of leaves. Then he covered the place where the fire had been with dirt, raked it, and laid leaves over it until it was impossible to tell that a fire had ever been built in that place. He also removed all traces at the site where she had cleaned the rabbits. Berry now wished she hadn’t been so neat. She could have splashed so much blood over the rocks that it would have been impossible for him to remove it.

Ugly stood over the old man, glowering, arguing, and pointing toward the distant hills. The old man folded his hands over his stomach and belched. Ugly grew more insistent, raising his voice. Berry watched in terror as he drew the knife from his belt and brandished it with swift, unmistakable motions.
He wanted to kill her!
A thousand tiny hammers pounded in her head while she waited to see what the old man would do.

Finally he got slowly to his feet and folded his arms over his chest. He straightened himself proudly and shook his head. The word he spat out was the harshest she had heard him utter. He shook his head and pointed to his chest.

Ugly stared at him and walked away. Berry realized that a crisis had been averted. When the old man came for her, she got to her feet and walked behind him down the rocky slope. The mare was chomping on the grass at the bottom of the hill and Ugly stood waiting.

They traveled all day. They waded upstream in a creek that stopped abruptly when they came to a spring. The country is full of springs, Berry thought absently. They pushed through green meadows. Bees hummed thickly in the air. Elk and deer suddenly bounded from the shadows as Berry and the Indians passed through wooded valleys, but she was too miserable to see the beauty.

After three days and nights of riding, the pain that would have been unbearable was somewhat dulled by the curious blanking of mind that nature provides to carry one through suffering. Days and nights, trees, hills, and streams—food she determinedly swallowed. Snatches of sleep. They rode on and on. The whole world seemed contained in the movement of the mare, the slap of the brush against her legs, the sound of the hooves—the Indians. Her head hung forward and she didn’t have the strength to straighten her neck.

Hours after she had passed the desperate need to lie down that had plagued her for these past days and nights—when she thought she would go on and on forever like this, and that there would be no end—they stopped. She was powerless to move. Strong hands pulled her from the horse. She lay crumbled and dazed. A curious cone-shaped shelter danced before her eyes, but its meaning eluded the grasp of her mind.

Her eyes closed. She drifted into darkness.

S
imon passed through the country with eyes as bleak as Berry’s had been when she passed through it. The only difference was that his eyes searched for signs of her passing. He thanked God for the time he had spent with Light and for all Light had taught him about the wilderness. Unerringly he followed the trail the Indians had taken, guided by a broken branch, a scuff mark on a stone, or the strands of silky black hair left caught on a brush or a low limb. He made his way rapidly through the forest by day, pausing only when darkness came.

It had not taken much wilderness training to read the sign the morning he found Berry’s camp. Two Indians, more than likely renegade Shawnee, had surprised her as she prepared to camp for the night. It was plain that there had been a struggle and that she had been knocked to the ground. She had crawled under a bush, and when she stood, she had been knocked to the ground again. Simon found where she had been tied to a tree; found her discarded grub bag and saddle. The Indians had made no attempt to erase the signs of the abduction.
They must have been sure they wouldn’t be followed.

Simon was no longer able to whip up his anger to crowd the heavy worry and dread from his mind. He knew his only hope of finding her alive was to stay on the trail and pray that he caught up with her and her abductors before they caught up with the rest of their party.

At night, while attempting to rest, he relived every minute of the time he’d spent with her. It haunted him now, the way she had returned his kisses and pushed her trusting young body against his. Beset with loneliness, his thoughts turned inward. He thought back to the evening he first saw Berry bending over the cookfire. He felt once again her difference from all other woman—her boundless pride, the stubbornness of her will, and her deep-rooted integrity. There is much more to Berry Warfield than her startling beauty, he decided solemnly.

Simon was not naive enough to believe in love at first sight. He was not even sure he knew what this thing called love was all about. He’d only heard about it. But it was reasonable to believe it could not flower until the seed had been fertilized with understanding and nurtured by acceptance. It seemed that Berry had neither understood nor accepted him, or she would have been waiting for his return.

Did he love her?
He felt a strong animal hunger when he was near her, but he didn’t regard that physical urge as a sign of love. He’d had that feeling before. But right from the start he’d felt a need to help Berry. He thought about that fact very carefully; that, and the happiness he felt when he was with her. She made him laugh, made his heart sing.

God, what a fool he’d been to think he wanted her merely as a nucleus around which to build a family. It was torture now to think he had laughed when she had said she wanted love. At last he realized the truth about his feelings for her, and it was a truth that was both frightening and exhilarating. His feeling for her was deep and eternal, and it bound him forever to this girl who had first touched his heart.

“Goddammit!” he hissed under his breath. “Why was I such a fool? Why didn’t I just marry her when Fain married Rachel?”

He dozed and his dreams were filled with haunting memories of silky black curls spilling down on snowy-white shoulders, clinging arms, and firm young breasts. Strange, pleading green eyes looked out of the darkness and begged him to hurry.

At daylight he saddled his horse. When I find her, he vowed silently, I’ll keep her with me always.

At noon he found traces of a bivouac of the preceding night and knew he was closing the gap. This time care had been taken to remove the sign. Wilted leaves on an overhanging branch were evidence that a fire had been built beneath them. A careful search revealed rabbit hair at a spot beside the spring where the grass was trampled down, and where a knife had stabbed the earth. Droppings from the mare indicated the direction in which they had gone.

The heat became blistering. Swarms of gnats, flies, and mosquitoes plagued him. He paced himself and conserved his strength and that of his horse as he followed the trail of the Shawnee braves and Berry.

As he traveled deeper into the wilderness Simon was quick to note that the braves were becoming increasingly careless again and made no attempt to cover their trail. Finally Simon surmised that they were traveling at night. Their haste made Simon uneasy. He was almost sure they were hurrying to meet a larger party.

At dusk one evening he detected the odor of a wood fire. He slowed his horse to a cautious walk. Taking care to make no noise, he glided through the trees, his rifle cocked and ready for instant use. When he heard the sounds of shouting and raucous laughter in the distance, he dismounted, tied his horse, and crept toward the edge of the woods. The noise became louder, and soon he saw that a clearing lay beyond the trees and brush. He crept closer, moving at a snail’s pace. A bright glow told him that a cookfire was burning.

He crouched behind the trunk of a giant oak. The first thing he saw was Berry. The sight of her was both startling and sickening. Her thick black hair hung in a tangle down her back. She wore nothing at all except her thin shift. Her hands were tied behind her back with a thong, and she looked as if she was about to drop in her tracks. Her captors had doused her with water so that her shift clung to her young body like a second skin, revealing rosy-tipped breasts and the dark patch between her thighs. Her captors were forcing her to dance around the campfire.

Shouting and leaping, two braves danced in and out of the firelight and around Berry as she was forced to keep pace with them. Another Indian and two squaws sat cross-legged on the ground. Although the language was impossible for Simon to understand, he knew they were heaping insults on her. However, verbal abuse was the least of her torments.

One of the braves, one with the ugliest face Simon had ever seen, reached with both hands for her breasts. When she jerked away from him and tried to kick him, the other brave wrapped his hand with her hair, forcing her to stand and endure the rough fondling. When the dancing resumed, a fat squaw lashed at her legs with a makeshift whip of supple vine. She cried out in anguish and the entire party became still more excited and howled with laughter.

Simon shielded his eyes from the glare of the fire. Attempting to close his mind to the pain Berry was forced to endure, he made a careful assessment of the camp. In addition to the two braves who were dancing, a third was sitting quietly beside the fire, and another lay in the grass beside the ragged, ill-kept tepee.

The two squaws, both fairly young, rose to their feet. One was wearing Berry’s dress, the other her shoes and stiff-brimmed bonnet. The one in the shoes fell and lay in the grass giggling. She reached for a bag and squirted some of its contents into her mouth.

They were drinking fermented berry juice!
The two squaws and the old Indian beside the fire were drunk. Simon didn’t know about the one lying in the grass or the two who danced beside the fire. He was sure the two dancing braves were working themselves into a frenzy and that he’d have to act soon.

He steeled himself to the sound of Berry’s cries as the squaws continued to lash her. The situation was discouraging. He had one shot and the knife. He’d not have a chance to reload before they were on him unless he could take them by surprise and take out at least two of them. Berry’s sobs increased his sense of helpless frenzy while he tried to form a plan of action. He had little fear of the squaws, but four braves were more than he could handle at the moment, and he couldn’t stand by and wait for them to tire of their play and bed down.

Thunder rumbled in the distance. A few spatters of rain fell. The wind picked up and sent sparks from the fire flying off into the night. Simon backed off, circled the camp, and came up behind the tepee. Carefully he cut the leather lacing until the skins were hanging on the poles. On his hands and knees he crawled to where the brave lay sleeping in the grass. In one quick, dispassionate movement, he drew his knife across the brave’s throat, stopping his drunken snores.

A crack of thunder sounded and a flash of lightning illuminated the sky. The storm was moving swiftly, and a strong wind, hot and humid, suddenly sprang up, making the loose skins flap on the poles. It’s too much to hope the wind will blow the skins toward the fire and cause a diversion, Simon thought. The Indians seemed indifferent to the approaching storm.

Simon circled the camp again and came as close to Berry as possible. She lay prostrate on the ground, the women capering around her. He dropped to his knee and chose his target. The ugly Indian seemed to be the most dangerous. Just as more thunder shook the heavens he squeezed off a shot. The Indian clutched his chest and dropped to his knees, then stretched out in the grass. Simon waited for the confusion he was sure would follow. He could scarcely believe his good fortune when he realized that none of the others were aware of what had happened. Simon’s shot had been lost in the boom of thunder. He quickly opened his powder bag and prepared to reload. At that moment the earth shook as a crack of thunder split the sky. A deluge of rain drenched the entire area. He grabbed for the bag. Too late! His powder would be too wet to use for many hours. The downpour reduced the fire to a few faint embers, then darkness.