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Jolena swallowed hard as she gazed back at him. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "My mind wandered. It won't again."
"It will, unless you free your mind of what is worrying you," Spotted Eagle said, leaning a soft kiss to her brow. "Tell me what is in your heart. I shall help you put it behind you."
"When you mentioned marriage to me, my thoughts went to my father in Saint Louis," she murmured, casting her eyes downward. "I know that when we speak vows, it will be done in the Blackfoot tradition. My white father will be left out."
Jolena moved her eyes slowly up again. "That saddens me, Spotted Eagle," she murmured. "I feel that I owe him loyalty for how he has so devotedly raised me as his."
"I did not have to live with you to know that you were a dutiful daughter to this father," Spotted Eagle said, his eyes filled with a quiet understanding. "So you see, you have repaid him time and again for his kindness. You owe him nothing else."
Spotted Eagle ran his hands along the soft flesh of her skin, then cupped her breasts. "Would he not want you to do what makes you happy?" he said huskily.
"Yes," Jolena whispered, closing her eyes to the ecstasy as he once again began moving within her, filling her with his manly strength, awakening her to renewed heights of bliss. "And, darling, somehow he must be made to understand that you are what makes me happy."
"He will question it and then accept it," Spotted Eagle said. He placed a finger over her lips. "Shh. Let us not talk anymore. Let us make sunshine fill this tepee."
"I already feel its warmth," Jolena said, her pulse racing as warm surges of pleasure flooded her body. She closed her eyes. "It is such a delicious placeyour arms. Hold me, darling, and never let me go."
Her whole universe seemed to start spinning as she felt herself going over the edge into ecstasy…
The purple shadows seemed to have a life of their own as something moved midst them beneath the thick umbrella of trees. A throaty cough and then a groan broke the silence of the night. The lone figure stumbled blind from tree to tree, the man only half coherent after being alone in the forest for too many hours with nothing to eat but berries. Without a weapon, Kirk had not been able to make a good kill for a meal. His gun had been thrown aside as he had been thrown from the wagon and knocked unconscious just before it had tumbled over the cliff, joining those below, where death had come to so many.
"Jolena," Kirk whispered, swatting mosquitoes away from his face as a swarm began buzz- ing around him. "Where are you, Jolena?"
When Kirk had awakened behind a cover of bushes, he had seen no one except those who lay broken and bloody at the bottom of the cliff. He thought that he had succeeded at grabbing Jolena from the wagon. But it was hard now for him to sort through his scrambled memory as to what was real and what was imagined, perhaps during hallucinations as he clung somewhere between a conscious and unconscious state right after his fall.
He remembered very vividly how he had run desperately down the steep hillside, blinded with tears, fearing recognizing Jolena among those who had died from the fall. When he found nothing that even vaguely resembled his sister, he had searched high and low for her, finding no signs of her except for her strewn journals and destroyed butterfly collection.
After giving up on her, he had searched for his pistol. When he did not find it, he felt naked traveling through the Montana wilderness. He had lost count now of how many days and nights he had been wandering aimlessly about.
But he did know for certain that he had not come upon any civilization. He had even prayed to find the Blackfoot village. There he would have found food and lodging and perhaps those who sympathized with his plight and would go and search for his sister.
As Kirk stumbled out of the forest and into a moon-drenched meadow, he sighed and moved relentlessly onward. Brief dizzy spells caused him to weave, then he would snap out of it and be lucid again for a while.
Then he stopped with a start when he saw movement ahead of him, only a short distance away. He blinked his eyes and wiped them with the back of his hands, wondering if it were possible to see a mirage at night.
"Is it real?" he whispered, his knees wobbling as he tried to stand steady enough to gaze again into the distance.
"It is," he whispered, the discovery causing his heart to begin pounding. There were several riders approaching.
He squinted his eyes, trying to see if they were Indians or soldiers. His insides seemed to curl up into a tight knot when he recognized the riders as Indians, but he had no way of knowing which tribe! The Blackfoot were known to be friendly in these parts.
There were also known to be several Cree renegades who terrorized everyone that had two legs, no matter the color of their skin.
Kirk gazed up at the star-speckled heavens. "Lord, oh, please, Lord, let it be the Blackfoot," he whispered.
Then, knowing that he had no choice, he stood his ground and waited. When the Indians spotted him, they came riding harder, their shrieks piercing the air. This was enough for Kirk to know that they were not friendly Indians. He turned and tried to run from them, but his legs were too weak to carry him any farther. They gave way, and he crumpled to the ground.
As he lay helpless on his stomach, Kirk covered his ears with his hands to keep from hearing the pounding of the horses' hooves as they came closer and closer. He closed his eyes and held his breath as the horses made a wide circle around him, then stopped.
Kirk's heart pounded wildly as he waited for arrows to pierce his back.
When this did not happen, he slowly opened his eyes and turned over onto his back, then screamed when he found one of the gaudily painted Indians leaning over him, a knife in his hand.
When the Indian placed the knife at his throat, so close that the tip pierced his flesh and caused blood to curl from the wound, Kirk almost fainted from fright.
The Indian began speaking in a language unfamiliar to Kirk, and when Kirk talked back to him, he could tell that these Indians were unlike Spotted Eagle, who knew the art of speaking English quite well.
''You… are… Cree?" Kirk managed to say, saying the word Cree slowly.
