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Burning Tree was the one man who would listen with an open heart and tell him what needed to be done. As Sam entered the lodge, he took in the old man with braids that had gone silver, the dark piercing eyes that still looked young and vital as he stared into them. Though Burning Tree was stooped to some extent, he had the heart of a young warrior, and everyone in camp listened to him.
“You have been through much, my son,” Burning Tree said as he stared straight ahead and admitted him into his lodge.
“Yeah, I guess you could say that.”
“You have seen love, temptation, and lust. Yet, you continually picked love over the three. A wise choice. You have experienced danger, evils, and crime. Yet, you remained strong. You have suffered sorrows, loss and confusion. You have not yet found your way out of the confusion. Your heart is heavy. You love this white woman? This Riley.”
“God, how did you know?” Sam was startled at his ability to see so much.
“I had visions of your adventure with Riley. She is part of your future unless you reject her. There is only one question to ask. Do you love her with all your heart and mind?”
“Very much…yes!” Sam answered. “I thought I could walk away from her and not look back, but that isn’t so. I think about her all the time. I worry for her. I feel I did not succeed in taking care of her.”
“Then what is there to decide, your heart has spoken to you,” Burning Tree insisted.
“My heart yes, but my head tells me this won’t work. That black and white cannot mix,” Sam explained.
“Yet, you have a sister who married a white man and lives very happily. Sometimes a man must walk with his heart, not his mind. Your sister mixed. She is happy. Is she not?”
“But…Hattie and Lee…are different. They were in love for years. Riley, well, Riley and I haven’t known each other that long.”
“Time does not measure love. Nor does time make the love any more powerful.”
“No,” Sam admitted. “It sure don’t. Because when I think about Riley I think of Hattie and Lee and how much they loved each other, how much they were willing to sacrifice to be together. That’s how I feel about Riley. I tried to fight it. Tried to hide it from her, but she was always so honest with me.”
Burning Tree frowned and nodded. “You are not the first to love so. You will not be the last. Long ago, our chief took a young white captive, he didn’t want to admit it then, but he was taken with her at first glance. He took her into his own teepee. Although she was a captive, he could not treat her as such. He called her White Feather. He gave her an Indian name, for he was sure she would be his,” Burning Tree was saying as he cooked himself a meal.
“He was so in love with her, he took her to his lodge. He had no other wife and after she came, he wanted no other. She resisted our ways at first, and would have nothing to do with him. But he slowly won her heart and respect and after a while he married her, I married them. They were so in love. Deeply and truly in love. They
lived together here for years. They are still here. Many times she had the means and ways to escape, but she did not. She did not even try. When her husband asked why she did not escape, she told him she loved him too much to leave him.
“She chose her Indian husband over living with her own people. He even offered to let her go and take the child with her, which is not a custom for a chief. But he loved her. She loved him that much too. They have been very happy, and he has led our people to peace with the white man. Then their son grew up and he fell in love with a girl that had been raised as a white. Katherine did not know she was part Indian until Chase Rivers told her. She loved Chase, and they have made many children and lived happily here in our village.
“Then Chase’s friend, Lee, wrote a letter and asked to come with his black bride. Chase welcomed him into our village and they have been happy many years and had many children too. So you ask if a white and a black can live together in peace…I tell you, yes, here they can. But one must truly love the other and sacrifice to make this happy life. You must decide just how much you care for this girl and if she feels the same.”
“Would she be accepted here?” Sam asked. “I mean if I brought her.”
“As your wife…yes. I would marry you. Only as your wife,” Burning Tree said as he stirred his food over the fire. “In the eyes of our people, you would be married.”
“You would marry us?” Sam asked as though thunderstruck.
“Yes my son, it is the only way you could live here with us. As joined together.”
Sam smiled at the old man. “You are a wise man, Burning Tree, a very wise man.”
“You bring your young bride here and I will marry you.”
Sam nodded and left.
He had some serious thinking to do. Not once had he considered living here with the Indians again, but the chance to be with Riley every day made him see the village with new eyes. Would she be happy here though? It would be a different world for her.
Sam decided he would stay there a while and think on it and see how his heart felt later. He spent days examining the couples of which Burning Tree spoke. The longer he stayed, the more his eyes were open to the possibilities. His one question rested on Riley; would she come here to be his wife?
***
The lawyer seemed taken aback that Ethan Morgan was even considering turning a ranch into a bordello, but as legal counsel he merely cautioned him.
“It’s highly irregular, and once the law moves that direction things could change for you in a hurry, but right now, I see nothing stopping you from doing it. Is this what Riley Morgan wants?”
