Courting Morrow Little: A Novel (14 page)

"'Twould make a fine wedding dress, he told her.

She gave him a shy smile. "Are you trying to marry me off,
Pa?"

"Strange that you'd say that:" He cleared his throat and pulled
a letter from his pocket. "Yesterday Joe brought this from the
fort-which is still standing, by the way. Your Aunt Etta tells
me she's had a dream about you. That you're to marry a man
of rank. The trouble is, there's so many men of that description
around, I'm a bit befuddled as to who it could be"

Flushing, she began folding the fabric. "Oh, you know Aunt
Etta, Pa. Always putting such stock in dreams. If she'd had her way,
I would have stayed in Philadelphia and married a Redcoat:"

I was thinking of a Bluecoat, he said, setting his damp hat
on the hearthstones. "Maybe along the lines of Major McKie"

She felt herself stiffen but tried to school her features. "McKie,
Pa?"

"It's obvious he's set his sights on you. But at present he's a
bit too distracted for courting, given the Indian trouble:"

She hugged the fabric closer. "Why, I-I just got home and
there's so much to be done. I can't be thinking of courting and
leaving home. Not now ... not yet"

Saying no more, he sat and resumed whittling on a pipe while
she set the fabric aside. But later, after they'd eaten, she cleared
the table and sharpened her scissors, assembling all her sewing
supplies. Using an old dress as a pattern, she opened the sewing chest from Aunt Etta and hunted for her silver thimble and
some silk thread. Pa watched her as he whittled, as if wondering
if she had the nerve to cut the fine fabric.

She breathed a silent prayer as the sharp scissors bit into
the blueness, the lantern quick to catch the slightest mistake.
Each slice seemed to raise successive questions. Red Shirt and
his father had seen her sewing in years past, when she'd sought
to stay busy and avoid them. Was it mere coincidence that the
velvet matched her eyes? Should she wear it or save it? If she
saved it, it must be for her wedding day. If she wore it, Jemima
would swear she was putting on airs.

The bodice was nearly cut when Pa leaned back in his chair.
"I'd best read you the letter from Etta"

She looked up, glad to take a rest and let go of the shears.
He began slowly, his voice a bit husky from the cold he seemed
to keep. He was working too hard, she thought. Now that the
harvest was in, he needed to rest, but there always seemed to be
something left undone. Studying him, she thought again how he
needed a son to aid him-not a helpless daughter. As he turned
to the second page, she found her eyes drifting to the velvet.

"Morrow, did you hear?" Pa's gruffness broke the spell, and
she looked up. "My persistent sister has extended you an invitation again"

She withheld a grimace. "Perhaps Aunt Etta could come here
when things settle down"

His smile was wry. "Silk and buckskin rarely mix, Morrow.
I've invited her often enough, but she merely counters my offer
with her offer, which is to have you to herself again. I think life
as a spinster must be lonely. And with a war on. . "

"Perhaps I'll go back ... one day" One day. It had a lovely,
noncommittal sound, far-off and evasive as it was. But for now
she'd had her fill of Philadelphia.

He folded the letter, his eyes still on her. "She says the city
is calm now that the British have departed. You could attend
finishing school, enjoy the theater, do all the things you couldn't
do last time, and-"

"No, Pa, please:" She'd not tell him all that she didn't miss that the city was dirty and stank, that people threw the contents
of chamber pots out second-story windows, that she'd been
little more than a slave right along with Aunt Etta, catering to
the British elite.

Shoulders stooped, he took up his pipe again, a pile of shavings at his feet. "There's another reason Philadelphia appeals to
me. You'd be out of harm's way:"

She fought down her dismay. Not with chamber pots flying
out of windows and a war on.

In the still room, his voice seemed ominous. "There's a wilderness war coming, I'm afraid, the likes of which we've never seen.
Sending you back to the city would be dangerous but seems a
bit safer than keeping you here:"

She sat down on the bench, forgetting her sewing, grieved by
the deep lines of weariness in his once handsome face. Perhaps
we should both leave, she almost said. She thought it each time
she ventured into the east side of the cabin and stood among
the shattered remnants of their lives. She thought it now, beset
with worries about McKie and the British and Shawnee. Yet
they stayed on. Because of Jess.

She wasn't supposed to see the letter, Morrow realized. All
the Mondays of her life she'd spent dusting Pa's desk-save the
two years she'd spent in Philadelphia-never lifting the hinged
lid to trespass to the contents beneath. But life was full of firsts,
and so today she did. Night after night she'd seen him at work
composing on crisp foolscap and longed to ask who the letter
was for. She sensed it concerned her, and that is why she trespassed. That it was addressed to Aunt Etta nearly made her shut
the desk but for one telling line.

Morrow seems to have caught the eye of one too many men,
both savage and civilized.

The savage was Major McKie, surely. The lid came crashing
down, and she whirled about, certain Pa stood watching her. But
both doors were open, untouched by his shadow. The plaintive
call of a dove was the only sound that shattered the stillness, and
she started dusting again, the stain of guilt shading her features.
If he were to enter now, he'd know just by looking at her. She
might as well finish the deed.

Dropping the crude duster, which was little more than a flurry
of goose feathers attached to a stick, she went to the front door,
eyeing the barn and field and pasture before passing to the back
porch and returning to the desk. It took but a few minutes to
scan the long letter for the most important points, and when
she was done, dismay overlay her shame.

Morrow is a woman now and in need of further feminine
influence. Since she has returned from Philadelphia, I see things
more clearly. As you stated in your last letter, the frontier is no
place for a motherless daughter, and certainly not a fatherless
one. I am, as you know, not well. The settlement men, most
of whom are dishonorable, are paying her entirely too much
attention, though she seems not to notice. There is but one man
and only one to whom I would entrust her, but I shall save that
for another post.

She reread that final line two, three times. Which man?
Surely not McKie. Perhaps another soldier or settler? She favored none of them yet found the fact that he did intriguing.
And his solution? Leaning on the open lid, she pored over the
final paragraph.

I have decided to return Morrow to Philadelphia-to your
care-at the earliest convenience, barring further hostilities
between Indians and whites.

Your loving brother, Elias

Oh, Pa! She wished he would appear so she could spill out
her angst, confess her spying, change his mind. 'Twas only a
few months since she'd left the city. Now Philadelphia seemed
as far-flung as England and twice the enemy. Would he take her
there himself? No, he'd said he would send her at the earliest
possible convenience. Did that mean tomorrow? Next week?
With what escort? Captain Click?

The sound of boots scraping the porch steps made her nearly
panic. She didn't want him to see her so, tears spilling down like
a spoiled child. With furious haste, she disappeared through the
dogtrot door into the east side of the cabin. Dust motes swirled
like snow as a shaft of sunlight tried to penetrate the grimy panes
of glass on the landing above.

Sinking onto a three-legged stool just inside the door, she put
her head in her hands. Perhaps she could just pretend she'd never
read the letter and pray that it would get lost between here and
Pennsylvania. Or that the war-the wilderness one or otherwisewould move closer and the danger would prevent her from going
to the city. She couldn't possibly leave Pa, unwell as he was.

In time she heard him pass onto the porch and go outside.
Likely he thought she was upstairs in her room. The hum of
cicadas rose shrilly in the Indian summer heat. Inside the ravaged room came the age-old smells of stagnant air, dust, and
disuse. In her haste she'd left the door open, and a gust of wind
whipped through the dogtrot, rifling her muslin skirt and pulling strands of her hair free of its pins.

She was so lost in recollecting every line of the grievous letter that she neither sensed nor saw anyone at first. Silent as a
shadow, Red Shirt filled the dogtrot doorway, lowering his head
to see inside. His lithe outline was reflected in the looking glass
just across from her, and she went absolutely still. He was so
close she could have reached out and touched the fringe of one
beaded buckskin legging if she'd wanted to.

He looked down at her, and then his eyes roamed the room,
taking in every desolate detail. But as she'd often observed, no
emotion crossed his face. How, she wondered, was it possible to
look at all the mess and be unmoved? Her own heart hurt anew
each time she came here. His father's people had done this. The
Shawnee. Not the Wyandot. Not the Cherokee. The Shawnee.

Without a word she hunkered further down on the stool
and wrapped her arms about her knees, shutting her eyes. The
wind gusted again, dancing with a flurry of stray feathers. Just
like that final day. Thirteen years later she could still recall the
feeling-the awesome bewilderment and finality of it all.

Would it never leave her?

"Morrow, is that you?" Pa's voice seemed to echo down the
dogtrot.

She stood up slowly, knowing he'd stay well away from the
door lest he see the shattered remnants of his old life just inside.
Why did she feel like she was a hundred years old? She'd been
sitting far too long. Her knees seemed to creak as she got up
and shut the ugly sight away, joining him in the late afternoon
sunlight.

"I've been looking everywhere for you;' he told her, removing
his hat and running an agitated hand through his hair. "I never
figured you'd be over on this side"

For once she didn't hide it. He might as well know she came
here as often as she could, to think, to try to remember, even as
she ached to forget. She looked around, feeling a chill despite
the warm wind. "Red Shirt was just here. Did you see him?"

He looked at her like she was addled. "I've not seen him this
day, Daughter. Not since he came the last time and had words
with you on the porch."

On the porch ... when she'd all but begged him to stay away.
Her face burned at the memory. "He was right here-standing
in the dogtrot doorway. Looking inside"

"Did he speak with you?"

She shook her head, searching the orchard and the far meadow,
the pasture where the horses roamed, and every outbuilding as
if she could conjure him up and make Pa believe her. She felt
the need to resurrect Red Shirt, to prove she wasn't dreaming.
But it was just she and Pa, after all ... and the grievous letter
that stood between them.

"Perhaps he came by to see if we're all right, given the trouble;'
he said.

But she believed none of it. "I'm not feeling well, she said
softly. "I'd best go lay down"

He nodded and began coughing again, and her heart sank at
the sound. Before crossing over the threshold, she took a last
look over her shoulder, a sense of foreboding following her.

Where is he?

It troubled her that Red Shirt could see them yet stay hidden.
How many times had he come by and watched them while keeping himself a secret? The thought was so unnerving she felt woozy.
She climbed the stairs to her room, fighting for composure.

Did he stand and watch them from the woods ... perhaps
linger on her window? One moment he seemed like a friend,
another he felt like an enemy. Which was he? Though he'd said
he wouldn't hurt her-had even saved her life at the river-she
couldn't quite shake the fear that he might turn on her, on Pa.
She'd heard of whites befriending Indians to their everlasting
regret. A half blood wouldn't be any different.

She climbed atop her bed and felt the feather tick deflate
beneath her weight. At any moment Red Shirt could come up
here and do what the Shawnee had done years before-slash the
thick tick to ribbons and fill the room with feathers.

If it happened, she hoped he'd have the grace to tomahawk
her first.