Witch Dance (15 page)

“Katie? It’s so good to hear from you.”

“How are you, Mother?”

“Fine, just fine.” When had Martha Malone ever admitted to anything else? “How are things with you?”

“I’ve had better days.”

“Anything I can do, honey?”

Yes. You can kiss the hurt and make it go away.

“No . . . it’s just my period coming on. . . . Is Daddy there?”

“He’s . . . I don’t know. . . . Let me check, okay?”

Kate heard Martha’s footsteps tapping lightly against the wooden floor. It would be polished to a high sheen and smelling of lemon wax. Sun spilling through the beveled glass door would be casting a rainbow on the wall.

Suddenly homesick, Kate sank to the floor and cradled the phone against her shoulder.

“Who is it?” she heard her father shout. There was murmuring in the background, then Martha came back to the phone.

“He’s not home yet . . .” Martha’s voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m sorry, Katie.”

“Me too, Mother.”

“Do you want me to tell him anything for you when he gets home?”

“No. Nothing.”

What was there left to say? They’d said it all the day she’d left Charleston.

Kate got the broom and dustpan and cleaned up the mess in the kitchen.

She wished it were that easy to clean up the mess in her life.

 o0o

Leaves fell from the trees and lay on the ground like colored confetti. Winds buffeted the wooden sign against the sides of the clinic.

Dressed in her white lab coat, Kate stood at the window, looking out. Even the watchers on the hill would have been a welcome relief from the tedium of emptiness.

Two weeks and no one had come. Her father had been right: She should have stayed in South Carolina with her own people.

But no, she had to do it her way. She had the stubborn Malone pride. And look where it had gotten her. She’d lost her father, her practice, her best friend . . . and Eagle.

She pressed her hands to her temple. She couldn’t bear to think of Eagle.

Dust rose from the road, and Kate strained her eyes into the distance. The car slowed as it approached the clinic. At last she was going to have a patient.

Kate grabbed her stethoscope and hung it around her neck, then stood waiting. The car came almost to a halt. An old Indian man leaned out the window and yelled something she couldn’t hear; then the car picked up speed once more, moving away from her as fast as it could.

She stood at the window awhile longer, rigid with shock and anger; then she flung her coat off, not caring that it landed on the floor. The packing boxes she’d used to move her equipment into the clinic were still in the back room. She ripped her blouse getting to them. Possessed of self-righteous fury, she jerked medical textbooks out of the bookshelves and flung them into boxes.

Sweat dampened her blouse and the edges of her hair.

“Kate?” Deborah stood in the doorway. Kate hadn’t even heard her come in. “What are you doing?”

“I’m leaving.”

“Leaving?” Deborah raced across the room and clutched her arm. “You can’t leave. We need you.”

“The people here don’t need me, Deborah. They want nothing to do with me.”

“
I
need you, Kate.”

Quick guilt slashed Kate. She put her hand over Deborah’s. “I’m sorry. I see no other way.” Turning her back on her friend, she took an armload of books off the shelves and dumped them into a box.

Deborah watched quietly for a while, then she jerked books out of the boxes and began putting them back into shelves.

“You built this clinic in spite of what everybody said and did to you, and I’m not going to let you turn tail and run now just because nobody happens to be sick.” Color flushed her dark cheeks as she swung on Kate. “Have you ever thought of that? Maybe everybody in Witch Dance is well. Maybe they don’t need a doctor right now?”

Tears wet the corners of Deborah’s eyes, then streamed down her cheeks. “Hal left and now you’re leaving, and I’ll be stuck forever at the general store, waiting for somebody to come along and take me away and give me babies.”

All the steam went out of Kate. Of course, she couldn’t leave Witch Dance. The people needed her and she needed them.

“I’m afraid I let my Irish temper get the best of me, Deborah. Help me put these books back.”

“What do you think I’ve been doing all this time? Whistling ‘Yankee Doodle’?” Wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand, Deborah grinned.

They worked side by side, not talking, not needing to talk. When they had put the clinic back to rights, Kate made tea.

“Have you heard from Hal?” she asked.

“Once. He’s working in a garage in Tulsa. They fix racing cars. I wish he’d come home. It’s hard at the general store without him.”

“You don’t have to spend the rest of your life at the general store, Deborah. And you certainly don’t have to depend on a man to set you free. Have you ever thought about leaving? I’m sure you could get into one of the good nursing schools. I’d help you prepare.”

For a moment Deborah’s face was alight with excitement, then she hid her expression over the teacup. “Eagle is very popular with the Tribal Legislature. They say he sometimes addresses them in the ancient tongue.”

Kate understood only too well the mesmerizing power of Eagle’s ancient tongue.

“All right. You don’t want to talk about nursing school.” Kate sipped her own tea. “
I
don’t want to talk about Eagle.”

“You could get him back, Kate. I know you could. They say women in Ada swoon in the streets when he walks by, but he never even looks at them.”

“You shouldn’t pay attention to the idle gossip of busybodies.”

“Oh, pooh. Where’s the fun if you can’t repeat gossip?” Deborah’s hair, grown to chin length, swung when she tossed her head. “Anyhow, someday I’m going to be old with nothing to do but scold my many grandchildren and entertain myself with titillating gossip. If you’re not too busy making geriatric love with Eagle Mingo, I’ll invite you over to listen.”

Kate threw back her head and laughed. It was the first time she’d laughed in two weeks.

 o0o

Eagle was building his house near the Blue River. Sitting atop the rafters that would soon be a roof, he could see his summer campsite and hear the river’s music. How could a sound soothe and lacerate at the same time?

He worked without his shirt, enjoying the feel of the sun and the autumn breezes on his skin. In the paddock, his black stallion whinnied. A plume of dust on the horizon announced a visitor, arriving on horseback.

Shading his eyes, he watched into the distance. The white mare came into view, and then Kate’s flaming hair. With nothing to give him strength except his own resources, he climbed down from the roof and waited.

Kate drew her mount to a halt a few feet from him and nodded her head in greeting. Neither her eyes nor her face betrayed her thoughts.

“Mahli is ready.”

“Good. If you’ll leave her here for a few days, I’ll take you home.”

“That won’t be necessary. She’s in standing heat. Once will be enough.”

She dismounted and handed him the bridle, careful that their skin made no contact.

“You can wait in the shade. There’s a thermos if you get thirsty.”

“No. Mahli is mine. I’ll go with you.”

“It’s not something you’ll want to see.”

“Don’t treat me like a hothouse flower.” She shoved her hair off her flushed face. “I’ll decide what I should and should not see.”

“As you wish.”

How polite they were. Like strangers.

They walked side by side to the paddocks, not touching. The air around them was charged. Eagle felt the electric currents on his skin.

“How are things at the clinic?” he asked as if he didn’t know, as if he hadn’t driven by a dozen times and parked on the hillside to watch and wait.

“Is your inquiry official or personal, Governor?”

“Kate . . .”

“I’m here for one reason, Eagle—so your stallion can cover my mare. Let’s get it over with.”

His hands tightened on the reins. She wanted to get it over with, did she? He’d be only too glad to oblige.

“Wait here.” He left her at the fence railing and led Mahli inside an empty paddock. He didn’t dare turn his stallion loose with her until he was safely outside the fence. Already the big black was pawing the air.

Kate leaned over the fence, fascinated.

“Stand back, Kate.”

Her quick Irish temper ignited. By all the saints, she was through being told what to do, especially by the man who found her good enough to bed but not good enough to wed.

“You may be governor of the Chickasaws, Eagle Mingo, but as you so clearly told me, I’m not Chickasaw.” She tossed her head so that her red hair went flying around her face. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

“Stand back under your own power or under mine. Take your choice.”

“I choose to stand right here.”

They struck sparks off each other as their eyes met.

“My stallion is at stud. He’ll be dangerous.”

“Aren’t they all?” She didn’t budge an inch.

“You’re an exasperating woman, Kate Malone.”

Eagle unfastened Mahli’s bridle and flung it over the railing, then he vaulted over and lifted Kate off her feet.

“Put me down.”

He plunked her down without ceremony a few feet from the fence, but not before he’d paid a terrible price.

“You will stand here, and you will not move any closer.” His jaw was clenched hard enough to break teeth.

“Barbarian.”

Her chest heaved with anger, and her nipples pushing against the thin fabric of her shirt were hard. It took all his willpower to keep from throwing her onto the ground and taking her as fiercely as his stallion would cover her mare.

“
Wictonaye
.”

“Don’t . . .” She held out one hand as if to ward him off.

“You’re in no danger from me, Kate, only from my stallion.”

He stalked off and let the big black into the paddock. The mare whinnied and exposed herself. Winking, the technique was appropriately called.

And so the mating ritual began.

Eagle stood a few feet apart from Kate, rigid. Every ragged, angry breath she took burned his lungs; every small movement she made jarred his bones.

In the paddock the stallion circled, snorting and sniffing. Mahli pranced, teasing him. Screaming, the stallion mounted, his front hooves flailing the air. Mahli sidestepped, and the stallion bit her neck.

“Stop them.” Kate rushed toward Eagle and grabbed his arm. “For God’s sake, stop them. He’s going to kill her.”

“He’s holding her in place, Kate. It’s natural.”

Eagle balled his hands into fists and resisted the urge to cover Kate’s hand with his own. She stood beside him, tense, her fingers hot coals upon his skin.

In the paddock, hooves pounded the ground and dust billowed with the fury of the mating. The stallion’s triumphant scream went on and on.

“There’s nothing natural about it. Stop them.”

“No. Not until the stallion’s seed is planted.”

“If you don’t stop them, I will.”

He had her in his arms before she’d taken two steps.

“Put me down.” She beat her fists against his chest.

“I’m taking you back to the clinic.”

“I’ll scream.”

“Scream. There’s no one to hear.”

“Damn you, Eagle Mingo.”

Her heart beat against his, and the wind blew her soft hair against his cheek. Wide-eyed, she stared at him, her lips slightly parted. He leaned close, so close, her warm, sweet breath mingled with his, so close, their lips were almost touching.

She wet her bottom lip with her tongue, and Eagle died inside. Slowly he set her on her feet.

“I am already damned.”

 o0o

The thunderstorm made her baby restless. Anna pressed her hand over her stomach and felt the hard kicks, as strong as either of her boys. She smiled. Her Mary Doe was going to be a tomboy.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right, Anna.” Cole hovered anxiously over her. “I don’t have to go into Ada.”

“Dovie needs you. It’s too hard on her to drive Winston home in this rain.”

“Eagle can go.”

“Eagle needs to finish his house.” Anna kissed her husband and shooed him out the door. “This little one is not due for another two weeks. If you’re not back by then, I’ll send the sheriff after you.”

Cole was laughing when he left. Anna was pleased. All of them had much to laugh about these days. Winston was getting about with the aid of a walker; Eagle had forgotten the pale-skinned medicine woman, and soon another little Mingo would be coming into the world.

She went into the kitchen, humming, and began to assemble ingredients for gingerbread. From the den came the sounds of a Bugs Bunny cartoon and her sons’ laughter. Anna rolled the dough onto her floured board, then reached under the cabinet for her cookie tin.

A pain doubled her over. She clutched her stomach, groaning. Another pain hit, and she felt the hot sluice of liquid between her thighs. The front of her dress stained red as blood ran down her legs and pooled on the kitchen floor.

“Cole! Cole!” she screamed.

“What is it, Mommy?” Her boys appeared at the door. When they saw her, their faces crinkled in horror. “Mommy!”

“It’s all right,” she said, knowing it wasn’t. “Run, catch Daddy”

Clint and Bucky raced toward the door, screaming for their father. A small eternity passed before they returned, an eternity in which her baby’s secure world was being torn from her body.

“He’s gone! Daddy’s gone.”

The children huddled around her skirts, staring down at the blood.

“What’s wrong, Mommy,” Clint whined.

“Your baby sister is trying to be born, and she needs you to help her. Bucky, go to the bathroom and get some towels. Clint, help me to your daddy’s truck. We’re going to Ada.”

“How?” he asked, knowing his mother never drove.

“You can shift gears, and I’ll hold it in the road.”

Blood trailed behind her to the door. So much blood.

 o0o

Eagle was atop his house, finishing the shingles, when he saw Cole’s pickup truck weaving down the road. Alerted, he stood up and shaded his eyes. The truck was going at a snail’s pace, veering sharply now.