Courting Morrow Little: A Novel Page 3

  "Trapper Joe."

  Surprise seemed to seep into her very bones at the mention of their nearest neighbor. Half savage himself, the wily woodsman spoke a dozen different Indian dialects and knew the way of the woods as well as any Shawnee. Why, she'd nearly forgotten all about him. Or that Pa had entrusted him with the memory of Jess. Trapper Joe was faithful to bring back any news of white captives, though not once had he led them to believe that what they'd lost might one day be returned to them.

  She looked toward the woods, the sun warm upon her back. Unbidden, the image of the two Shawnee hovered and refused to budge. The old fear she'd felt at last seeing them resurfaced. She recalled with crystal clarity the day they'd come to the cabin that stifling afternoon shortly before she left for Philadelphia. She'd been busy packing her trunk and Pa was cleaning his rifle when their sturdy shadows filled the open doorway.

  They'd entered the cabin like they owned it, and she'd backed into a corner, the rough wood of the wall digging into her back. The tall Indian was turning toward Pa, and as he did so, his hand fell to the tomahawk at his waist. Before he could pull it free, she let out a high, girlish scream, and Pa swung round and faced her.

  "Morrow!" His stern voice seemed sharp as an ax.

  The sound died in her throat, and the Shawnee laid their weapons on the table. Pa was motioning her forward, and soon, despite her trembling hands, she was serving fried grouse, new potatoes, green beans, gravy, and corn bread. The Indians ate by the fire with their fingers, shunning utensils and the trestle table, their eyes on her as she moved to serve them. The younger man-the son-upended her completely, his painted physique a rainbow of red and black.

  Afterward, she listened to their lilting voices on the porch, finding their tongue strangely melodic, coming as it was from the mouths of men painted for war. She'd carried the bitter memory clear to Philadelphia, and it had increased the fervency of her prayers for her vulnerable father left alone on the Red River.

  Pa coughed again, the persistent sound startling her out of her reverie. "I've not seen the two Shawnee since winter. It's a dangerous time to be about, whether Indian or white. There's been some raiding-horse stealing and such. A family was burned out over on Drowning Creek. And Captain Click just told me the colony of Virginia is sending soldiers to Kentucke to try to quell the trouble"

  Pondering his worrisome words, she fell silent and tried to take in all the loveliness that had so long been denied her. A cardinal flew by with a flash of red as they moved into the shade and took a westward turn. Home. This was her home, no matter what, no matter the memories. She lifted her chin and smiled at the sky.

  Thank You, Lord, for bringing me back.

  There was no place on earth more like Eden than their home on the Red River, Morrow thought. In certain seasons, the stately two-story cabin couldn't be seen, smothered as it was by trees. But it was a peculiar place, the house only half lived in. She and Pa occupied the west side while the east side was kept shuttered and shadowed. A dogtrot divided the two, joining twin porches at front and back. Two fine chimneys of river rock adorned each end, one nearly continually puffing smoke, the other banked for a decade or better. To her knowledge, Pa had never entered the east side since that tragic summer's day all those years before, though her own footprints had mingled with those of the mice, marring the dusty floor.

  All was chaos within, just as the Shawnee had left it. The spinning wheel where Ma had slumped sat untouched, the wool she'd been working mere spiderwebbing. Splintered furniture was strewn about-a chair leg here, a hatchet-marked cradle there. All the prized glass from the broken front window had been swept up by someone, sometime, and replaced with oiled paper. But a few stray feathers from the shredded tick remained, having escaped a brisk broom, and startled her anew each time she entered. With the door ajar, they danced in the draft, and she felt she was five years old again, fresh grief spilling into her heart.

  Their side of the cabin was feather-free and tidy as could be. Bright rag rugs lay like pressed flowers on the clean pine planks, and a huge hutch bore plates of pewter and what remained of the fine English china. From spring to fall, fresh flowers graced the trestle table, and winter boasted bittersweet. A staircase hugged the west wall, its hickory steps and handrail worn smooth with time.

  Today she hurried to her room at the top of the stairs, standing in the doorway and surveying the plate-glass windows she'd just cleaned that bubbled and streaked in the sun. Her eyes were drawn to her bed, bigger than a girl's had any right to be, its counterpane immaculate, the pillows fluffed, the chamber pot out of sight beneath. Her old dolls sat primly on a shelf, and her fine Philadelphia clothes were hidden in a corner wardrobe painted with a fleur-de-lis. When she'd left for Aunt Etta's, the room had seemed just right. Now, two years later, why did it have a childish feel?

  Although she'd been home less than a week, it seemed longer somehow, and she'd resumed her old routine with nary a blink. Still weary from the trip, she sank down atop the soft bed, her thoughts far upriver. To Fort Pitt and beyond to the bustle of Philadelphia. She missed it a bit. She'd forgotten how quiet the cabin was ... how lonesome she felt. Pa was mending fences in the far pasture and likely wouldn't be home till supper.

  She looked through the shiny windows, suddenly aware of a door groaning open below. The ensuing silence sent an icy finger of alarm down her spine. Pa always called to her when he entered, as if he knew it would ease her. She tried to swallow down her fear, but it had followed her for so long she felt nearly suffocated by it.

  If it wasn't Pa ... who?

  Isolated as they were, company rarely came. A reassuring rumble of voices sent her scurrying to the landing, where she leaned over the stair rail. As she peered down, surprise lit her face. Standing below was an Indian girl scarcely older than she herself, clutching a bundle. Good Robe? She'd nearly forgotten the wife of Trapper Joe, who lived downriver. A stocky shadow appeared in the open doorway behind the tawny figure, voice booming.

  "Miz Morrow, where are you?"

  "Right here, Joe, she answered, hurrying down the steps.

  He took her in head to toe with a surprised grin, as if making up for the time they'd been apart. "Well, I doubt I'd know you if you hadn't answered to your name. The fort's all abuzzel with news that you've come back. But I had to come over here and see for myself."

  "I've not been home long," she said with a smile, hovering on the last step.

  He pulled on his unkempt beard, eyes alight. "Well, it's high time I showed you my son;' he told her. "We're calling him Elias, or Little Eli, after your pa"

  She came forward, eyeing the bundle. "Pa told me the happy news. He's hardly a month old, is that right?"

  Even before Morrow asked, Good Robe was offering her treasure. "You like?"

  Touched, Morrow took the baby, thinking him no heavier than a feather pillow. The sight of his tiny face, eyes shuttered in sleep, wee fists curled tightly beneath his chin, filled her with wonder. "He's ... beautiful:"

  "Good Robe was a mite skittish about comin' over here, seein' as how Aunt Sally turned her away," Joe said. "But I told her you ain't nothin' like them other settlement women:'

  Morrow flushed. Just yesterday Pa had related in the most genteel terms how Good Robe had walked miles to the fort while laboring only to have the settlement midwife shun her. She'd given birth on the trail going home, and after a frantic hunt Joe had found her, alone but having safely delivered their son. Morrow's heart twisted at the telling, yet she could hardly blame Aunt Sally either. The woman had lost a child in an Indian raid and had worn her unforgiveness like a badge of bitterness ever since.

  "Please sit down and I'll make you some coffee;' she told them, passing the baby back to Good Robe and showing her to a rocking chair. As she filled a small kettle with water and measured coffee at the hearth, she heard the scrape of boots on the porch.

  Pa came in, mouth curving warmly at the sight of them. "Glad to see you, Joe, Good Robe. Is that my
namesake there?"

  "Sure is," Joe answered. "I was just showin' him off to Miz Morrow. But I got other business to discuss with you once we've had some coffee:'

  Hearing the somber edge to his voice, Morrow felt a touch of dread. Often, fresh from his forays into the woods, Joe would bring back news of what was truly happening on the western fringe of the frontier-not the slanted, tainted tales often told by British and American officers and the local militia, but the honest-to-goodness truth.

  She served Good Robe first, then took the men their coffee on the back porch, where they sat with their pipes, enjoying a rare rain. Even the birdsong had stilled, giving way to the gentle slurring sound as the midsummer dust was dampened down. Standing in the dogtrot and looking toward the river, Morrow fancied she could smell honeysuckle, its sweet scent banishing the lingering supper smells.

  She felt a bit awkward left alone with Good Robe. The Indian girl spoke little English that she knew of, though Joe spoke her tongue like he was born to it. They'd wed right before she'd left for Philadelphia, Morrow remembered. Joe had supposedly swapped five horses for her in some Indian town across the Ohio River. As the story circulated through the settlement, its baseness hurt her somehow. The Almighty had created man and woman and called it good, Pa said, and a woman's worth wasn't measured in horses. But to his credit, Joe did seem to care for her.

  The sight of Good Robe rocking her baby was a welcome distraction, given the intense if hushed tones of the men outside. A sudden lull in their voices made her turn and look beyond the back door. Fireflies winged about with tiny lanterns on their backs, resurrecting a memory she'd rather forget. She sighed and tried to put it down, but it came on anyway.

  When she and Jess were small, they'd catch a dozen or so fireflies and imprison them in glass jars, but he'd cry after mere minutes and beg to release them. Did he, wherever he was, remember her calling him lily-livered and stomping upstairs to the room they shared? It seemed he'd always given in to her whims, letting her use the fireflies like a night-light by their bed. But by morning they were mere bugs in a jar, hardly the ethereal creatures they'd been the night before.

  Joe's voice seemed to saw into the silence, ending her reverie. "There's been some talk of a prisoner exchange, he was saying, pausing at intervals to puff on his pipe. "Some chiefs and soldiers at Fort Pitt are hammerin' out the details:"

  Listening, Morrow felt the same bewilderment she always did when they discussed her long-lost brother, torn between covering her ears and eavesdropping. She finally succumbed to the latter. Returning to the hearth, she sat down opposite Good Robe, nearly drowning out the men's voices by the creak of Ma's old chair as it pitched to and fro. But her foot came down at Joe's next question, and her rocking ceased. "Seen them two Shawanoe lately?"

  Pa seemed to take his time with the answer, but already Morrow was straining for it, a deep dread knotting her insides.

  "Not since last winter," Pa said.

  "They been comin' for years now and I still ain't seen 'em'

  "You're always away hunting or on some other business, Joe, otherwise I'd send for you"

  "Well, somethin' tells me they ain't no ordinary Indians'

  Pa leaned back in his chair-she could tell by the squeak and the grunt of it. His voice was thoughtful. "What makes you think so?"

  "Them fancy gifts they bring. That horse they give you last fall's the finest I've seen this side of the Cumberland"

  "I nearly refused it," Pa admitted. "With all the horse stealing between here and the Ohio, I'm still a bit befuddled as to whose horse I have"

  Joe chuckled. "Only a fool would refuse such a prize. Besides, the Shawnee don't take kindly to bein' told no'

  Pa paused a moment. "I've often wondered who they are myself, why they keep coming back. I didn't see the son for a long while and feared he might be dead given all the trouble. But then last winter he was with his father again. I don't think they mean us any harm, though they rattle poor Morrow considerably"

  Joe chuckled. "She's rattlin' age, I reckon. One thing I can say for the Shawanoe, once you've done 'em a good turn, they ain't likely to repay it with evil. You've likely befriended the whole Shawnee nation and don't know it:'

  "Humph." Pa's doubt could be felt clear into the cabin.

  "I ain't just speculatin' either. I got reason to believe the Shawnee whose son you saved years ago is a chief of the Kispokos. That's the warrior sect of the tribe' He paused as if to give Pa ample time to take it all in. "The past couple of years I've been hearin' about one of their headmen crossing into Kentucke to rendezvous with a white man. I believe that white man is you.

  "Have any idea what his name is, Joe?"

  "Matter of fact, I do."

  Morrow leaned forward in her chair as Joe mumbled some thing unintelligible and commandeered the conversation once more. "But just so you don't think he's payin' a social call, I hear he's keepin' an eye on the settlements. Either way, you've earned his respect, and that means a lot in these troubled times'

  Joe's reassuring words did little to ease her. Morrow glanced at Good Robe, whose dark head was tilted toward her chest, eyes closed, the baby tucked to her breast. Was she still weary from the birth? Morrow hoped Joe had sense enough to canoe her downriver today and not make her walk all the way.

  As the conversation on the porch wound down, Joe came in and roused his wife. Morrow gathered up the coffee cups and banked the fire for breakfast while Pa stood at the door and saw the couple off.

  "The rain's a welcome change, he said. "I think I'll leave the doors open for a spell:"

  At his words, the flicker of fear in her heart seemed to flame. Holding back a sigh, she wandered to the front porch and looked at the dense wall of woods, then crossed to the back and did the same. The rain had eased, and everything was green and lush and wet. Almost peaceful.

  How, she wondered, would it feel to be free? Free of fear? Free of the past? Free from all the hurt hidden in her heart?

  Lord, are You there? she wondered.

  Fear not, for I am with thee ...

  Morrow had nearly forgotten her birthday, but Pa reminded her of its coming. 'Twas a fine time to celebrate, he said, with summer humming all around, the days long and sultry. Since coming home, she'd yet to see her friends, and so she'd sent two invitations to Red River Station by Joe, asking them to join her for a little party. Several miles upriver, the sprawling station was fortified with blockhouses and stuffed with settlers fearful of wild animals and Indians. Sometimes it seemed to Morrow that she and Pa were the only ones not in residence, save the Sabbaths when Pa preached there. Would Lizzy and Jemima even leave its secure confines to come?

  Her thoughts wandered back to Philadelphia where she and Aunt Etta had celebrated by taking a post chaise to a tea shop, where they'd eaten one too many scones, and then gone to the theater to see The Prince ofParthia. Despite all this civility, she'd been homesick and dreamed of having a tea party all her own under the giant elm near the orchard.

  The last of July dawned bright, with red roses crowding the cabin steps and phlox and cockscomb blooming along the porch rail. Coming down from her attic room at dawn, Morrow noticed that both front and back doors were open again. Likely Pa was trying to air out the bitter odor of bacon she'd burned the night before, as well as woo any willing breeze.

  Hastening to the trestle table, she surveyed the platter of queen's cakes she'd made, each confection dusted with sugar and looking far too tempting. Just recently she'd found the faded receipt written in her mother's flowing hand and had nearly gasped at the two dozen eggs called for. Forging ahead, she'd hung about the henhouse and coaxed the birds to lay, then gathered and cracked every one. Her mouth watered as she added a heaping helping of flour and sugar and two pounds of butter. Perhaps this was why she'd once been so round and Jess had teased her.

  Taking a bite of cake, she looked down at the gown pinching her waist. The blueberry chintz was shot through with silver thread, the faux-pearl bu
ttons down the bodice framed with exquisite ivory lace. The same lace formed a fichu about her shoulders before peeking out again from the hem. Her birthday dress, compliments of some officer's lady. She took a slow turn, liking how the glossy skirt rustled and swirled around her. Eighteen seemed a momentous age. Ma had married Pa at eighteen and birthed Jess the year after.

  She passed to the porch, pleased to see Pa had placed a small table and three chairs in the shade of the elm near the orchard. Snatching up a tablecloth, she fairly danced across the yard in anticipation of her party. The breeze teased the damask cloth, threatening to whisk it off the table, so she anchored it with a pitcher of roses. In the distance she heard the rumble of a wagon. Lizzy and Jemima already?

  Turning, she ran back into the cabin and returned with a tray of cups and saucers and the coveted queen's cakes. It was too hot for tea, truly, but she was anxious to air the porcelain teapot and fancy cups and saucers Aunt Etta had packed in her trunk before leaving the city.

  By the time Pa had deposited the young women near the porch, Morrow had everything in order. Jemima was the first out of the wagon, her rotund figure wrapped in her best Irish linen dress, her bonnet festooned with a clump of wilted daisies. No plain homespun today, Morrow mused. This was a tea party, after all, betwixt friends who'd been apart far too long. Next came Lizzy, as lean as Jemima was generous. Her dress was just as fine, if wrinkled from riding, the airy muslin sprigged with tiny periwinkle flowers. She wore a simple bonnet, her fair face flushed from coming all the way from the fort.

  Morrow hid behind the elm, watching them wander toward the porch. Pa spied her and chuckled as he unhitched the team by the barn. When the girls reached the cabin steps, she sat down at the table as gracefully as she'd seen the ladies do in Philadelphia, spreading her skirts over her slippers and tucking in a tendril of hair that had come free of her chignon. Taking hold of a silver sugar spoon, she clinked it gently against a china cup to get their attention. Both turned at once, but it was Lizzy who ran pell-mell toward her, nearly overturning the table in her glee.