Merline Lovelace (10 page)

Curling her arms above her head, she stretched like a cat. Satisfaction hummed through her as she let her thoughts drift. She’d experienced the most indescribable pleasure, the kind she’d always heard hinted at. She had the promise of the funds she needed. She would soon shake off the dust of the colonies, sail to Bermuda and free Harry.

For the first time in months, she felt lighthearted and eager to meet the day. The giddy feeling lasted
until she remembered she’d also be shaking off the dust of a certain lieutenant.

Uncurling her arms, she brought them down. Really, there was no need for this sudden drop in spirits. She’d enjoyed a brief dalliance. She couldn’t let the desire that seemed to grab at her throat whenever she was in the lieutenant’s company distract her or turn her from her purpose.

Despite the stern lecture, she couldn’t keep a sharp note from her voice when she addressed her maid. “Didn’t I instruct you to wait until I summoned you in the mornings?”

Hattie jumped a good three or four inches into the air. When she turned, her expression was as pettish as Barbara’s tone.

“Yes, you did.”

“Then perhaps you’ll explain why you woke me?”

“Mrs. Morgan sent me up,” she said sullenly. “She wanted me to tell you she’s wishing to speak with you at your convenience.”

“Very well. You’ve told me. You may leave the water and fetch my chocolate. Oh, and tell the lieutenant I should like to speak with him, too.”

Only to arrange transportation back to Fort Gibson. She was
not
contemplating another session in the grass, with her muscles straining and Zach Morgan’s body driving into hers. As extraordinary as those hours yesterday had been, Barbara couldn’t risk repeating them.

“The lieutenant’s not here.”

“What’s that?”

“He’s not here.”

Frowning, Barbara shoved aside the covers and pushed upright. “What do you mean? Where is he?”

“A rider came for him, saying he was needed back at Fort Gibson. He left more than three hours ago.”

“But… But he didn’t say goodbye.”

Barbara regretted the foolish words the moment they were out of her mouth. She regretted them even more when Hattie sent her a smug look.

“Yes, he did. To me.”

Zach’s abrupt departure left Barbara feeling disconcerted. Her interview with Louise Morgan later that morning added a simmering mix of frustration and anger.

They faced each other across Louise’s desk in the counting house. The stink of buffalo hides wrinkled Barbara’s nose as she struggled to make her feelings clear to her hostess.

“I cannot possibly stay here until your son returns from this expedition.”

“Why?”

“Every day my brother remains in prison saps his strength. I must initiate efforts to free him immediately.”

“Zach tells me it will take many months to push a petition through the courts for a new trial, and then
only if you can present new evidence. With his help, matters will go faster.”

Hell and botheration! Barbara had been caught in her own lie. She could hardly admit now she had no intention of petitioning the courts. Tipping up her chin, she answered in her most aristocratic manner.

“I appreciate the lieutenant’s offer of assistance, but—”

“I will hear no buts.”

Louise Morgan’s expression was every bit as cool as Barbara’s. She knew she had the upper hand and didn’t hesitate to use it.

“My son wishes you to remain at Morgan’s Falls until he returns. When he does, you will receive the funds you require.”

T
he tough crossbreeds Daniel supplied Zach and Private Bowles proved their strength and stamina. By midafternoon, the two riders had crossed the Arkansas River. They pushed on through early dusk. Night was dropping fast when they heard the distant call of a bugle sounding tattoo, the warning that all stragglers had to return to the post immediately. They made the ranger camp just minutes before lights out.

Zach asked Private Bowles to see to the mounts and reported directly to Captain Bean’s tent. Jesse Bean was one of the reasons Zach had traded his regular army uniform for buckskins and a floppy-brimmed felt hat. Past forty and a great bear of a man, Bean had spent most of his adult life on the frontier. He was a skilled woodsman, a keen hunter and a longtime proponent of mounted riflemen. The
last had made him the natural choice for commander of the first company of rangers.

“Sorry to drag you away from the English beauty,” he boomed in a voice that could shake the acorns from a pine branch a half mile away. “Nate Prescott is still muttering about what a sly dog you are, spiriting the lady off to Morgan’s Falls the way you did.”

“Yes, and I intend for her to stay there until we track down this Pawnee raiding party.”

“We’ll be doing more than tracking Pawnee,” Bean warned. “Colonel Arbuckle wants us to make a sweep from the Arkansas clear to the Red River. We leave in the morning at first light.”

Zach’s lips pursed in a soundless whistle. The Red River cut through the plains far to the west of Fort Gibson. He’d trekked to its headwaters with his father years ago, but as far as he knew, no military patrol had ventured so far across the open prairie. No wonder Captain Bean had specifically requested Zach for his second in command for this expedition.

“Our orders are to make contact with the western tribes,” the captain explained. “We’re to tell them about this Federal Indian Commission the president has appointed and secure their agreement to come in to Fort Gibson to powwow with the commissioners.”

“To what end?”

“The hope is the commissioners can convince them to stop preying on the tribes migrating from the East,” Bean said dryly.

Zach figured the chances of that happening were about the same as him sprouting wings and flying across the prairie. The Plains Indians were hunters not farmers. They scorned those who plodded along behind a plow and saw no reason
not
to swoop in and steal cattle, horses and captives from the “civilized” tribes now settling on their traditional hunting lands.

He supposed the commission had to make the attempt to negotiate with them, though. President Jackson would never convince Chief John Ross and the Cherokee still stubbornly clinging to their lands in Georgia and the Carolinas to resettle unless he could show them written promises that fierce tribes to the west wouldn’t make war on them.

Not that the treaties would mean anything. The Osage and Pawnee and Kiowa would continue to raid and the troops at Fort Gibson would try to maintain a shaky peace. With a tight feeling in his gut, Zach wondered how long this small, isolated outpost could act as a buffer between all those caught up in the turmoil of Indian Removal.

He’d best send a message to his mother—and to Barbara—advising he’d be gone longer than anticipated. His sense of duty ran too deep to take leave of his men or his responsibilities without giving adequate notice.

“I’ll go roust the quartermaster from his tent,” he told Bean. “If we’re to leave at first light, I’ll need to draw extra powder, shot and rations.”

Streaks of pink and gold were shooting through the dawn sky when the ranger company rode out the next morning. Led by Captain Bean, Zach and two less experienced lieutenants, the troop was a motley, colorful bunch. Most of the men wore deerskin trousers to protect their legs, but their shirts, footwear and headgear reflected their wildly divergent individual tastes. Bearskin or buffalo robes were rolled up and tied behind their saddles. A string of packhorses carried two-man tents and extra provisions.

The rangers’ route took them north through tangled forests, past scattered Indian villages and the occasional cleared fields being worked by slaves. Gradually, the settled areas fell behind. Soon the wild geese honking noisily as they headed south for the winter and the creatures scrambling through the underbrush were the company’s only companions.

With each slap of his powder horn and bullet pouch against his hips, Zach felt his thin veneer of sophistication peel back another layer. He could hold his own in eastern salons and enjoyed waltzing a pretty girl around a ballroom as much as any man, but this was the land he’d been born to, the wilderness that had bred him.

He’d slipped completely and comfortably into a different skin by the time the company made camp that night. The men tended to their horses before themselves, of course. With the mounts hobbled and
turned in to the forest to graze on the tough, thorny pea vines, Captain Bean set the sentinels. The rest of the troop lit campfires and cooked game they’d bagged during the day.

The private detailed to the officers’ mess filled a black kettle with a brace of fat quail, succulent wild onions, slices of bacon and dough balls formed from flour and water. With the hens and dumplings bubbling, he thrust a sharpened branch through a rack of ribs from a buck Zach had brought down. The ribs sizzled and spit and added to the general merriment of men released from the drudgery of garrison duty.

The rangers in particular were quick to shuck off any semblance of military order. Most were high-spirited youngsters who’d enlisted seeking adventure on the frontier. A few were veteran woodsmen who considered their officers more comrades than superiors. Coarse laughter and ribald jokes soon rose from the groups gathered at the various campfires. After dinner, the night was enlivened by the tinny wail of a harmonica and, later, a rousing chorus of hymns led by the tall, lanky lieutenant whose former occupations included schoolteacher, singing master and Methodist preacher.

The troop entered Osage country the next day and spent their second night with Colonel Auguste Chouteau, government agent to the Osage. His agency consisted of a cluster of log huts that included an of
fice of sorts, a powder magazine and a shed for storing the gifts and supplies provided to the tribe by the government in exchange for the lands they’d yielded to the eastern tribes.

Son of a French trapper and a longtime friend of Zach’s parents, Choteau provided information on the Pawnee raiders. They were from the Grand Pawnee band, now camped two days’ ride northwest.

The company pushed on the following morning. That afternoon, Captain Bean dispatched Zach and two troopers to forge ahead and scout out the camp. The small patrol found the raiding party before they found the main band. Almost rode right over them, in fact.

Damned if the raiders hadn’t stolen a keg of raw-grained whiskey along with their captives. The swill was being smuggled into Indian Country by the wagon-and keelboat-load in violation of every sanction the government tried to impose.

Alerted by the sounds of raucous laughter and foot-stomping ahead, Zach and his men dismounted and crawled forward on their bellies. The Pawnee were camped beside a creek lined with tangled underbrush and cottonwood. A single glance showed the keg wedged into the fork of a tree, the three Cherokee captives bound together and the Pawnee dancing and whooping around the glowing embers of their fire.

There were six of them. All young, all wearing war paint, and all dangerously drunk. Using hand signals, Zach sent one of his men left, another right. When they were in place, he’d make the raiders aware of his presence, convince them they were surrounded and demand their surrender. That was his plan, anyway.

Zach had answered to the colonel scant days ago for shooting a white squatter. He didn’t relish facing Arbuckle again to report he’d put a bullet into a Pawnee. Particularly with this Federal Indian Commission hoping to bring the plains tribes in for a palaver.

While he waited for his men to get into position, Zach checked the charge on his rifle and primed his pistol. He was ready when he heard the throaty twill of a wood finch. Seconds later, a turkey warbled off to the right. Rising, Zach called out in Pawnee.

“I am Lieutenant Morgan of the long rifles. My men and I have come for you.”

The raiders whirled. Some gaped stupidly at the thicket screening Zach from view. Others stumbled toward their spears.

“Stand where you are!”

Keeping his finger light on the trigger of his rifle, Zach showed himself.

“You have raided Cherokee land and taken captives. You must come with me to answer for these actions.”

Several of the warriors began to mutter. One with
wavy black stripes on his chin and forehead curled back his lips.

“We answer only to our headman.”

“Your headman can come to Fort Gibson and speak for you.”

Zach figured that was as good a way as any of getting the chief of the Grand Pawnee in to meet with the commissioners.

“My men encircle your camp. Move away from your spears and rifles and—”

With a snarl that came from whiskey or bravado, Black Stripes yanked at the hatchet in his belt, pulled it free and swung his arm back in a swift arc.

Cursing, Zach fired. The ax head flew off. What remained of the ax shaft splintered in Black Stripes’s hand. He dropped the shattered handle, grunted and stared at a bloody palm missing two fingers.

“Move away from your spears and rifles,” Zach repeated.

The small patrol retraced their steps with five disarmed and sullen Pawnee and the three freed captives in tow. The Cherokee had to be kept under as close a watch as the Pawnee to keep them from exacting retribution for the raid on the spot.

They found Jesse Bean and the rest of the company already bivouacked in a thinly wooded area beside a running stream. The men had pitched their tents, and several deer carcasses hung from branches.
Additional hides were pegged out for stretching and dressing, while strips of jerked venison smoked over the fires. Since the sun still rode high in the afternoon sky, Zach naturally questioned why the captain had called a halt to the march so early in the day.

“Colonel Arbuckle sent two Creek riders after us,” Bean explained. “Seems one of the commissioners has arrived at the fort and wants to join our little expedition. We’re to wait for him and his friends to catch up with us.”

“His friends?”

Bean’s mouth twisted. “Apparently Mr. Ellsworth made several acquaintances on the trip out to Fort Gibson. A Swiss count or some such and his entourage. Invited them along to see something of the West.”

Zach swallowed a groan. Traveling through Pawnee and Comanche country presented dangers enough without adding the responsibility of looking out for a group of easterners. Worse, the greenhorns would slow them down considerably. It was beginning to look as though this expedition would take far longer than anticipated.

He thought about sending another message to Morgan’s Falls with the squad Captain Bean dispatched to take the Pawnee prisoners and Cherokee captives back to the fort. After considerable debate, he decided to take his chances. Barbara would wait, or she would not.

With nothing to do but hunt and rattle the dice for the next few days, Zach’s thoughts returned with ever-increasing frequency to the lady whose cool smile and haughty airs both amused and delighted him. At night, the memory of her wild, panting cries and silken body moving urgently under his left him hard and aching beneath his buffalo robe.

He managed to hide his frustration at the delay, but greeted the arrival of the Ellsworth party with profound relief. Relief surged quickly into astonishment when the commissioner introduced his three traveling companions. One was a young Swiss count so eager to hunt buffalo that he’d traveled across an ocean for that express purpose. Another was a bluff Englishman by the name of Latrobe. The third was an American—and the very man Zach’s younger brother was named for.

Washington Irving’s eyes twinkled when Jesse Bean introduced his lieutenant. “So, Zachariah. Finally, we meet.”

Dumbfounded, Zach shook the hand of the author whose elegant prose and effusive recommendation had helped secure an appointment to West Point for the son of a sergeant and a woman of mixed French and Indian blood.

“Mr. Irving! What the devil are you doing in Indian Country?”

“Didn’t I promise your parents I would one day
visit the land they described in such glowing terms when we met in Richmond so many years ago?”

“That’s true, you did. But last we heard you were still junketing about Europe.”

“Seventeen years abroad were enough. I had decided to return home when I met with Mr. Latrobe and Count Portales. Since they, too, desired to come West, we immediately formed a company. You can imagine our delight when we chanced on Commissioner Ellsworth in St. Louis. He was en route to Fort Gibson and graciously offered us the sanction of his official government status. When we arrived at the post, we learned of the ranger patrol and immediately decided to join you. So here we are.”

“So here you are,” Zach echoed, grinning at the author turned adventurer. In his buckskin trousers, red flannel shirt and leather cap, Irving looked almost fit for the role. His jaunty image was somewhat diminished by the fact that he and his traveling companions had brought several servants to see to their needs and a long string of packhorses loaded with the necessary comforts.

The arrival of the commissioner’s party considerably enlivened the camp. While their tents were being set up, the newcomers went around to meet the rest of the rangers. Captain Bean sent their cook a side of venison and a couple of wild turkeys. Zach brought over a tin basin filled with honey dug from
a beehive nested in a hollow tree trunk. As their supper stewed, he and Irving downed cups of coffee sweetened with the thick honey.

“This is a remarkable coincidence,” he told the author. “I was speaking of you only a few days ago with a guest who’s staying at Morgan’s Falls. Lady Barbara Chamberlain. She says she met you once. Perhaps you recall her?”