Comanche Woman (20 page)

The hunters had straggled back to the village in the late afternoon, surly, angry, because for some inexplicable reason the buffalo had turned at the last moment and escaped death at the precipice. Now the herd was miles from camp and still running. The villagers would have to follow the shaggy beasts and hope they could find them again soon. Otherwise they would spend the winter hungry.

Bay knew that tonight many a mouth watered at the thought of what had been missed as a result of the failed hunt. She could see it all in her mind’s eye—the children crowded around begging for portions of raw liver covered with the contents of the gallbladder, the women feasting on a mixture of raw brains and the marrow from leg bones served in a dish made from the slaughtered buffalo’s ribs, the men stuffing themselves with the roasted haunch.

It was no wonder she’d felt more eyes on her than usual. From overheard conversations, it was clear the entire village blamed her for the forfeited feast—as well as Many Horses’ injury. Bay shivered when she heard another angry whisper. Unfortunately, she knew no way to counter their accusations. She could only ignore them. Bay picked up the kettle she’d dropped and continued on her journey to the creek.

Outwardly, she remained calm. Inwardly, her mind was turning every shadow into something horrifying. As she gradually became aware of a presence stalking her, her vivid imagination ran wild. It could be a roaming Tonkawa. It could be a hungry puma. Or it could be someone who wanted to make sure she could cause no more bad medicine for the village.

Whoever or whatever it was, she didn’t plan to be a willing victim. She dipped the kettle into the creek, but only filled it halfway, so she’d be able to lift it easily. The enormous shadow moving closer sent her into action.

Bay recognized Long Quiet too late to stop the forward motion of the kettle, and the water drenched him from head to foot.

“I . . . I’m sorry! I thought you were . . .”

How ridiculous her fears seemed now! How could she admit them to the forbidding man who faced her? She dropped the kettle and fled, uncaring where she ran, simply needing to escape the humiliating situation and the wrath she felt sure would fall upon her for her rash act.

“Don’t run from me!”

Long Quiet’s shouted warning set Bay’s heart to pounding in real fear. She looked back and saw him pursuing her. As it turned out, she was heading away from the village, so there was no hope someone would interfere and save her. Not that anyone would have dared to come between a warrior and his wife, she thought.

Bay scooted into a gully and followed along it looking for a place to hide. Just as she found a narrow crevice through which she might escape, Long Quiet’s arms closed around her, dragging her back into his wet embrace, soaking her from shoulders to buttocks.

“I told you not to run,” he snarled into her ear. “Stop struggling!”

Bay moaned once in defeat and then sagged in his arms, panting from exertion.

Long Quiet held the frightened woman as gently as he could, appalled at what had just happened. Did she fear and dislike him so much? He’d only meant to speak with her, to explain his feelings about the circumstances that had been thrust upon them. It was clear she wasn’t yet ready to become his wife. And yet he had no choice except to demand she come to him.

His arms circled her waist, coming to rest beneath her breasts, and he could feel the rise and fall of her chest as she tried to catch her breath.

“I only wished to speak with you,” he murmured in her ear. “Why did you attack me?”

“I didn’t know it was you,” she admitted. “Then, when I’d soaked you with water, I thought you’d be angry so I—”

“I am angry.” Long Quiet felt her tense beneath his touch. “I’m angry that you don’t trust me not to hurt you,” he said.

Bay wished she could see his face. “I don’t know what to expect from you,” she whispered. “You said you would wait until I was willing. Now you drive ponies to my tipi and my feelings mean nothing. I’ve dreaded the sunset, not knowing what the night would bring.” She paused and sighed wearily before adding, “I don’t want to be your wife.”

Long Quiet’s grasp tightened, the only sign of his agitation. “Do you want to return to your white family?”

“Nothing has changed. I can’t take Little Deer with me, and I won’t leave her behind.”

Long Quiet swallowed hard before he asked, “Is there another man you would have for your husband?”

Bay’s eyes widened in surprise. She didn’t know how to answer him. There was no man in the village she desired for a husband, but perhaps it would help him understand her feelings if she explained to him about Jonas. “There is a man I love, but—”

“Who is he? Is he willing to take you as his wife?”

Bay shook her head and let it fall forward. “The man I love is from the world I left behind. I have no idea whether Jonas would be willing to marry me after . . . after everything that’s happened to me.”

Long Quiet’s jaw clenched at the name Bay had mentioned. He’d wondered if she still cared for Jonas Harper. Now he knew, and the knowledge upset him more than he cared to admit. Long Quiet grimaced, glad Bay couldn’t see his face. He could hardly blame her for clinging to an unrequited love. Hadn’t he done the same thing all these years? Yet despite the force of events that had pushed them together too soon, it was his intention to make her his wife. If he had to wait for love to come, then he would wait.

To be absolutely sure of what other obstacles he might be up against, he asked, “Are you certain there’s no other man in the village you would rather have?”

“No. There’s no one else.”

He turned her in his arms and tipped her chin up so they could look into one another’s eyes.

“Then I don’t see that either one of us has much choice. I have taken you as wife. I am not sorry we are to be together, only sorry for the timing of it. But even that will come to some good. I know of no more sure way to stop the wagging tongues of those who would send you from this village than to make it clear that those who threaten my wife must answer to me.”

“Their words are only that—words.”

“Their whispered words will send you from this place to make your way alone, with no help from anyone! If you do not look for such a fate, you would do well to heed me.”

“This is not the way I would have chosen to take a husband,” she said wistfully.

“Nor I a wife,” he replied. “We will simply have to make the best of the situation.”

“I can never love you.”

Long Quiet’s face sobered. “You will bear my children. We will grow old together. Perhaps over the years your heart will find a place for me.”

Bay was surprised at the earnestness in his voice and the somber expression on his face. She hadn’t really thought about her relationship with Long Quiet in terms of years. Or children. She hadn’t allowed herself to think at all. “You want children?”

“Of course. Do you not desire more children?”

Bay searched Long Quiet’s face, wondering if her answer would make any difference to him. She decided to be honest, in case it did. “I don’t wish to bear sons who will be murderers and thieves. I don’t wish to bear sons who will torture and rape and enjoy it.”

“I am Comanche. My sons will be Comanche.”

Bay could feel his body trembling with fury. She swallowed her fear and said, “You asked how I felt. I’ve told you.”

“White men also murder and steal. White men also torture and rape. They are not blameless in the conflicts that cause such hate between our two peoples.”

“It’s not like this everywhere,” she argued. “In the East, there is no strife.”

“There is no strife because the white man has pushed the Indian off his lands, with no regard to who was there first,” Long Quiet snarled. “The white man treats all Indians as animals, not as human beings!”

“I can’t change what’s happened in the past,” she said, “but I can do my best not to continue the enmity between our two peoples. I want to teach my children not to hate.”

“To trust the White-eyes is to ask for death,” Long Quiet said. “Their history is one of deceit, of lies and more lies. You would teach a son to listen to promises that will not be kept?”

“Someone has to take the first steps toward peace. Why not a son of ours?”

Long Quiet opened his mouth to argue, then realized what Bay had said. He’d lost the battle, but won the war. “A son of ours. That has a good sound. I like it.”

Bay was shocked to realize their conversation had led her to think of
their
children as though they were a possibility, even a reality.

“Come,” Long Quiet said. “Night is upon us.”

Bay walked beside Long Quiet as though in a trance. Her life had turned onto a new path and she wondered what awaited her along the way. When they reached the creek again she stopped to pick up the kettle, but he took it from her hands. The gesture of a white man, she thought, from one who’d just defended the Indian ways. She smiled, but said nothing.

When they arrived at their tipi, Bay took a deep breath and asked, “May I have some time alone to . . . to prepare myself?”

“As you wish. I will see to the welfare of my pony and then return.”

Bay watched Long Quiet as he walked away from her. He moved with grace, his muscular body lithe. She shivered at the thought of his hard, muscular flesh pressed against her own. But the fear she’d expected to rise within her didn’t come. Sometime in the past few minutes, Long Quiet had replaced her apprehension with expectation.

Bay spread the buffalo robe across the dirt floor and plumped the rabbit fur pillows, thinking what it would mean to lay her head next to Long Quiet’s for the long years ahead. Would she feel more of the tingling feelings she’d experienced when they kissed? Would he be gentle with her?

Her thoughts went around and around as she left the tipi to make arrangements for Little Deer’s care. When she returned, she built a small fire and prepared a dinner for Long Quiet. Her nervousness increased as time passed and he didn’t return. She jumped when the tipi flap finally lifted and Long Quiet stepped inside.

Bay’s instincts told her to flee, and she began to struggle to her feet, held back by the fringes of her poncho, which had tangled beneath her knees.

“You need not rise,” Long Quiet said, misunderstanding her attempt to stand. He crossed quickly and sat down beside her.

Bay froze.

Long Quiet’s hand reached out to the small metal pot of food warming on the fire. He dipped a finger in and tasted. “It’s good.”

“It’s ready whenever you’re hungry,” Bay managed to say.

“I’m hungry now. Shall we eat?”

“If you wish.”

Bay served portions of the venison stew to both of them in carved bowls. She sat as far away from Long Quiet as possible and ate her food as slowly as she could, to postpone what she was certain would follow.

Despite her efforts to appear calm, Long Quiet was aware of Bay’s nervousness. He sought a subject on which they could talk that would ease her time with him.

“Where is Little Deer?”

“I thought it better she stay with Cries at Night for tonight . . . I mean if we . . . that is . . . she wouldn’t be . . .”

Long Quiet searched for another safe topic and said, “Cries at Night said she had enough rabbit skins with the two I caught today to make a pillow to replace the one she gave away.”

“I didn’t know you needed a pillow,” she said.

“It’s for both of us to share.”

Bay flushed. “Oh.”

Long Quiet recognized the futility of his efforts. There was no safe subject for them to speak of tonight. What was to come was too much on their minds.

“Come here to me, Shadow.”

“My name is Bay.”

“Bay was the name given to the daughter of Rip Stewart. Shadow is a good name for a Comanche wife. Come here to me, Shadow.”

“Please . . .”

“Come.”

Bay dared not disobey the command. She stood and walked the few steps that separated her from Long Quiet. She couldn’t bring herself to sit down again.

Long Quiet reached out a hand and twined his fingers with hers, gently tugging on her hand until she was on her knees before him.

Bay was unprepared for the gentleness of his touch. She quivered as his callused thumb traced its way across her cheekbone and then down to her mouth.

“Look at me.”