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“How will you explain your attack on Chief Gray Elk and his people to Colonel Snelling?” she blurted. “Don’t you know how hard he is trying to keep peace among the Indians and settlers?”
“He ain’t trying hard enough,” Victor said, smiling crookedly. “All I’ll have to tell him is that some of Gray Elk’s murderin’ redskins came to my trading post and stole from me and came close to killing you in the process. I’ll just say I was defendin’ you from such an assault.”
“And you expect him to believe that?” Mariah said, her voice rising in pitch, daring another face slap. But her father had not even heard her. He was staring intensely out the window. Mariah was hearing the arrival of many horses outside, and went to look out the window also. When she saw the lead rider, she froze inside and turned quick eyes to her father.
“And so the cheating, vile Tanner McCloud is going to assist you in this raid?” she accused. “That’s why he’s come with so many men?”
“Dammit, no,” Victor said, kneading his brow. “We’ve enough men of our own workin’ for me here at the post without bein’ bothered by anyone else.” His face became flushed again with anger. “That sonofabitch. He’s come again to speak in your behalf. He told me the last time he was here that he was goin’ to bring a great bride price.” He wheeled angrily around and began working his way toward the door, his cane, as it came in contact with the wooden floor, sounding ominous. “You see? He’s lived in the wilderness so long he thinks he’s bargaining for an Injun squaw! Well, I’m goin’ to set him straight once and for all. In fact, I’ll tell him that I don’t want to see his lousy yellow eyes around here again. He’s pestered me one time too many.”
Mariah didn’t have time to say anything else. With the aid of the cane, her father moved quickly, and was soon gone from the room, slamming the door behind him.
Mariah stifled a sob behind a hand as she gazed with a deep longing down at her hair on the bed.
Then she went to a drawer in her nightstand and pulled out a mirror. Her fingers trembled as she lifted it. When she saw her reflection, and how her hair now lay flat and lifeless against her head, only just past her ears, she turned her eyes away and threw the mirror across the room.
As it shattered into dozens of pieces, it was not enough to silence the loud shouting going on below her in the main store of her father’s trading post. Never had she heard her father so mad.
Never had Tanner McCloud cursed so loudly, so violently.
And then it was all quiet. She went to the window again and watched Tanner and his men ride away in a cloud of dust, her father standing outside with his rifle aimed at Tanner’s back. She wished she could go back to bed and then get up again to find that everything was as it had been those many years ago when she had had a mother to confide in.
Never had she felt as alone as now.
Chapter 3
We should often be ashamed of our very best actions, if the world only saw the motives which caused them.
—La Rochefoucauld
A vicious storm had delayed the attack on the Chippewa, leaving the rivers and creeks rumbling with swollen, rushing water, their banks being eaten away with the churnings.
But it had not delayed the ambush indefinitely. Soon the sun had replaced the dark clouds in the sky. And as though living a nightmare, Mariah rode her mouse-gray mustang into the Indian village beside her father, her face smeared with ash, the same as the others under her father’s command—a disguise against possible recognition.
She witnessed the carnage as her father and his men swarmed through the Indian village in a senseless frenzy, spraying the Chippewa with volleys of gunfire and tossing torches, which soon had the bark dwellings wrapped in sheets of flames, the smoke and fire belching out with a sound like thunder.
The crash of Indian pottery split the air like a shriek. Pistols flamed and bullets spattered, the reports from the guns deafening. Horses reared and plunged, trampling fallen Indian women who tried to flee from their outdoor cooking fires, into the protection of the forest.
A few of the aged were saved at the expense of the younger women who so very bravely interposed their slim bodies between the elderly and the firing weapons. Old men and young boys alike were running around, frantically snatching up whatever weapons they could find, but too soon falling among the bloodied figures strewn across the ground.
The village was a chaos of screaming confusion and the pall of smoke. The air was thick with the acrid stench of black powder, of burning hides, and of blood.
“Be sure not to leave anything of value!” Victor shouted to his men. “And get some of that corn yonder for roasting!”
Mariah, having not fired a shot, thanked God she had at least been spared that. She hung back and looked pityingly at the women and wailing children who huddled in the center of a circle of braves. The men fought valiantly, keeping the foe off by firing into the attackers.
Then her heart sank as several of her father’s men began charging and firing point-blank into those braves. The Indians soon became a ring of bodies, those surviving reaching for the attackers to pull them from their horses. The horses reared, hooves flailing, trying to get away.
Outraged by the horror of it, Mariah had a strong urge to switch sides and fight alongside those Indians, who were dying like wolves, fighting to the last gasp without noise or complaint.
Instead she pulled at her horse’s reins and swung her around, desperate to get away from the massacre. She didn’t get far. Too soon she found herself face-to-face with an Indian brave standing in her horse’s way, who if he had chosen to, could have killed her instantly.
But she was still dressed in the clothes of a boy, the jacket loose over her shirt, her breeches large and slouchy, hiding beneath them the curves that she could now boast at the age of eighteen.
And the ploy seemed to have worked well. The Indian must have taken her for an innocent lad forced into battle, for the handsome brave did not raise his firearm against her, nor did he grab for his knife, which was so handy in a sheath at his waist.
For what seemed an eternity, but was in truth only a few moments, Mariah and Echohawk stared at each other, long enough for Mariah to be struck by his extraordinary presence. A young man of obvious physical power, he wore no shirt, his copper body reflecting the sun like fire. His legs were sheathed in fringed leggings that were so tight she could see their muscled contours. He was tall, with raven-black hair framing his noble shoulders. His eyes were the darkest of all midnights, large and flashing. He had high cheekbones and a mouth that was hard and proud.
As quickly as he had appeared, the brave was gone, leaving Mariah shaken by how intensely he had affected her. Shivers ran up and down her spine as she realized that soon he could lie dead among the already fallen braves.
