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“He is not well,” Dancing Cloud said solemnly. “For some time now I have seen his health failing.”
“Then you must return to him,” Boyd said, reaching a hand to Dancing Cloud, patting him on the arm. “Go. I will understand.”
“It was my father’s wish and advice that I come to you,” Dancing Cloud said softly. “I will escort Lauralee to Illinois, then return to my people.”
Boyd looked from Dancing Cloud, to Lauralee. Tears streamed from his eyes. “Come to me,” he said softly. “Both of you at once. Let me hug you.”
Lauralee and Dancing Cloud’s eyes met again, then they both leaned down and eased into Boyd’s embrace, their shoulders touching.
“My two favorite people in the world,” Boyd said, a sob lodging in his throat. “Now when I have everything to live for, I’m not going to be able to stay around to enjoy it.”
His sobs finally broke through, silencing everything else around him.
Chapter 5
I love her for her smile . . .
her looks . . . her way.
—ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING
The state of Missouri and the Mississippi River were now behind Lauralee and Dancing Cloud. Dancing Cloud riding beside her on his magnificent steed, Lauralee rode comfortably, yet sullenly, in a covered buggy. She had purchased this with the inheritance money that Boyd had willed over to her during his last moments of life. She snapped the reins, urging the beautiful black mare that she had also purchased into a soft trot along the narrow dirt road in Illinois.
Tears sprang into her eyes as she thought of how hard it had been to give up her father to the ground after having only found him a few short weeks ago. It had been almost unbearable for her as she watched the casket being lowered into the grave.
He had been given a military funeral at Jefferson Barracks, which was located a few miles south of St. Louis. It had torn Lauralee apart inside when the guns fired off a salute to her father, followed by the mournful sound of taps being played in his honor.
It caused a shiver to race across her flesh even now at the thought of the taps and how hauntingly solemn the trumpet had sounded.
She glanced down at her lap upon which lay a wilted rose. The priest who had spoken at her father’s funeral had given this to her. He had taken it from the spray of roses from the top of her father’s casket, on which had been placed a red ribbon with the word daughter written in gold across it.
Wiping the tears from her face with her black-gloved hand, Lauralee peered through the black veil once again and watched the direction of the road. Up ahead was a huge mound in the ground. As she rode past it and stared at it she was reminded of Joe Dancing Cloud and that he was riding at the left side of her buggy, for this mound was the burial ground of another tribe of Indians, the Cahokia.
Lauralee turned her eyes to Dancing Cloud. She had argued briefly with him after the funeral when she had once again reminded him that she did not need an escort while traveling to Mattoon, Illinois.
He had reminded her that she had promised her father that she would accept him as her escort.
“He has just begun his long walk on the spirit path of life,” Dancing Cloud had said. “He is with us now, as will he be with us always, in spirit. Do not disappoint him by disobeying his final wish.”
Dancing Cloud felt her eyes on him. He turned and smiled at her. Thus far the journey had been one of silence. He with his sad thoughts of Boyd. She with hers of her father.
They were both mourning a valiant, courageous man, a man who had brought them together.
Obviously Boyd had willed himself to stay alive long enough, not only to see that Dancing Cloud was there to look after Lauralee, but also to make sure that they met so that a bond could be formed between them.
The bond was there, Dancing Cloud thought to himself. Now to nurture it into something more . . . into something everlasting.
He knew for certain now that he did not only want to escort Lauralee to Mattoon, he wanted to look after her for the rest of her life. Although she tried to put on a bold front of being independent and able to take care of herself, he could see the vulnerable side of her. He had enough love within his heart to make up for all of that which she had not known since she had been wrenched from the loving care of her parents at such a young age.
No. She was no longer just a means to repay someone special to him. She was now way more than that to him.
L
auralee blushed beneath his steady, warm stare. She turned her eyes away, the rapid beat of her heart dizzying her.
She fought the feelings for Dancing Cloud that were nagging away at her consciousness.
She fought the strange, hungry need she felt for him.
