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Wolf Hawk glanced over at the woman’s father again, seeing that he seemed to be getting worse by the minute. His shoulders were slumped and his breathing had become painfully shallow.
He wanted to believe this woman and offer to help her father, but how could he now trust anything she said?
How could he have any feelings for this elderly man when two of his own people, young braves who had had a lifetime ahead of them, were dead, and surely because of these white people!
Suddenly the warriors who had been sent inside the cabin came out, forcing Tiny ahead of them with hard shoves.
“There was only this one man in the cabin. We have found no others in the fort,” Blue Sky reported.
“And he is who I said he was,” Mia tried to explain. “He is only with me and my father because he helped row our scow.”
Tiny said nothing, only cowered in the Indian’s grip, his eyes pleading silently with her to make the Indians understand who he was…most definitely not a trapper!
“You still lie to me after we found proof of your dishonesty?” Wolf Hawk growled out. “Tell the whole truth now, white woman. If this tiny man is who you say he is, then where are the others? I know that there were two more because I found two horses abandoned in the forest. Surely the men came back here and are hiding even now as we speak. Are there other trapdoors where they might be hiding?”
“Oh, what can I say now to make you believe me?” Mia said, tears filling her eyes. “We were traveling on our scow down the Rush River on our way back home, to St. Louis. We stopped for the night. While we were sleeping, someone stole our scow. Surely it was those men you are speaking about.”
“That could not be so,” Wolf Hawk objected. “Trappers would not leave behind a prime catch like these pelts that we found.” He took one step closer to Mia and her father. “It is time to stop this game you are playing…”
At that moment Mia’s father gasped, grabbed at his chest, then fell to her feet.
“Papa!” she cried as she dropped to her knees beside him.
She checked his pulse and could feel none. He was dead!
He had suffered a massive heart attack this time. And there was only one person to blame: that vicious, heartless Indian chief who wouldn’t listen to reason!
She glared up at him through her tears. “You caused this,” she cried. “You frightened my father to death! Do you hear me? He is dead! His heart has failed him!”
Wolf Hawk was stunned by what had just happened.
The white man had died right before his eyes, and it did seem that fright had killed him.
Yet Wolf Hawk refused to feel guilt over the death of someone who was a part of the scheme that had led to two of his young braves’ deaths.
If this woman had told him the truth from the beginning, perhaps her father would still be alive.
“Please leave,” Mia said, sobbing. “Don’t you see that you have done enough here? I have lost my father. What more could you want from me? I have nothing, nothing now. My mother is already dead, shot down by an Indian’s deadly arrow. And now my father? Oh, please leave. Please, please leave. The men you are searching for are surely long gone…on my family’s scow. I have told you more than once that it was stolen during the night. When you find the scow, you will surely find your trappers.”
“And you think I should believe that?” Wolf Hawk said stiffly. He nodded toward her father. “I will give you time with your father, but then you and the tiny man must come with me and my warriors to my village. That will dr
aw the other two men there to rescue you. It will be their second mistake, for I will not allow myself to be fooled by a mere woman.”
He looked her slowly up and down, then gazed into her eyes. “What man could leave not only the pelts behind, but also you?” he said thickly. “You are beautiful, and though you are so small, you have the spirit of a wolf.
“We will take not only you to the village, but also the pelts. That will be enough to eventually lure them there. When they do come, they will get far more than they expect.”
Mia saw the uselessness in begging him any more. She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to block out the terrible picture of her father lying there, dead, then looked at him again.
“Papa, oh, Papa, what am I to do?” she whispered.
Chapter Twelve
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
