Dorothy Garlock - [Annie Lash 03] (32 page)

Always cautious, Light squatted behind the now flaming-red sumac bushes that lined this section of the river and carefully scanned the area before he stepped out onto the sandbar. He looked upriver to see if a craft had come down near the bank. When he looked downriver, he noticed a canoe amid the reeds that grew close to the bank. The birch-bark craft, tied to the bank, bobbed on the gently moving water.

Skirting the bank, Light found a place where he could look down into the craft. It was Delaware and there were four paddles, which meant there might be up to four Indians roaming the area. The tracks led into the woods and turned west. They were easy to follow. Head up, his eyes checking from side to side, Light hurried along the path.

He knew where the Indians were headed.

*  *  *

The work on the cabin where Paul and Eli would stay was progressing to the point where longer poles were needed for the roof. Caleb led them to a stand of tall straight pines a good mile above the homestead. This day they would cut and trim the trees; tomorrow they would bring the oxen to drag the poles to the homestead.

It was a cool, damp day and the work was going well. Eli was beginning to have a greater appreciation of the forest and the bounty it provided. He had always enjoyed physical labor, especially when he worked with Paul, who was as strong as a bull and also liked to compete. They often challenged each other to everything from arm-wrestling to seeing who could spit the farthest.

A dozen trees were felled before noon and Paul teased Caleb unmercifully because he couldn’t keep up with trimming them. Aee had sent meat and bread for their noon meal. They sat down on a log to eat it. It was Paul’s and Caleb’s turn to tease Eli about the fine meal
they
were having because of him.

“It is good for us, is it not, Caleb, for a woman to be sweet on our friend?”

After they ate they took time out to sharpen their tools on a grindstone. Before starting back to work, Paul checked the loads in the rifles, and Eli checked the pistol he had stuck in his belt.

Caleb laughed. “Them Delaware ain’t goin’ to stand thar and let ya shoot ’em with that lit’le ole thin’, Mista Eli. Ya ain’t goin’ to know they’s here till ya start bleedin’.”

“Light has been watching the shore with his spyglass and hasn’t seen any more. He said the ones he saw could be a hunting party trailing that buffalo herd.” Paul leaned his rifle against the log they had been sitting on and picked up his axe.

“One Delaware can kill you just as quick as a hundred.” Eli patted the butt of the pistol in his belt. “That’s why I’m carryin’ this.”

Eli and Paul selected a tall straight pine and the ringing blow of the axes was the only sound until Caleb began one of his low moaning songs.

Donno where I goin’,

When I lay me down t’ die—

I be a poor soul a’rotten

In dis deep hole where I lie.

“Good grief, Caleb. Can’t you sing about something besides dying?” Eli straightened and looked over his shoulder at the man.

Swish.
The arrow seemed to come from nowhere. It passed close to Eli’s cheek and embedded in the trunk of the tree that he and Paul had been chopping. Eli jerked the pistol from his belt and whirled. A rifle barrel protruded from the bushes north of them. He lifted the pistol, aimed and fired. The shiny barrel jerked upward, then dropped.

Eli dropped the pistol and sprang for his rifle. Before he could reach it, Caleb’s arrow pierced the chest of an Indian who had stepped from behind a tree to fire. A yell came from the chokecherry bushes after the loud boom of Paul’s gun.

Caleb was across the clearing before Eli could collect his thoughts. There was a dull thud. Paul and Eli crouched behind the log, waiting.
Were there more than three? Did Caleb need help?

There was total silence.

Several agonizing minutes dragged by before Caleb returned. He dragged a Delaware by the hair on his bloody head and dropped his limp body beside the one with the arrow in his chest.

“Dat all dere is.”

“There were three of the devils. I got one with the pistol. He’s back there in the bushes.”

“
Mon Dieu,
that was fast,” Paul exclaimed.

“Dey quiet as a snake, dem Delaware.” Caleb’s foot nudged the one he had killed, then reached down and jerked the arrow free. “Dat damn good one. Ain’t goin’ to waste it.”

“Be careful, Paul, he may not be dead,” Eli called when Paul, holding his rifle in front of him, went toward the bush where Eli had shot the Indian. Keeping his eye on the bush, he stooped and picked up the rifle.

Eli had begun to reload his pistol when he heard Paul’s agonized cry.

“
Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!
Eli! You . . . killed . . . Light!”

You killed Light!

Eli could not believe what he’d heard. His throat swelled, his heart stopped, his feet stuck to the ground.

Caleb moved past him and somehow Eli followed. Paul was kneeling beside the still figure on the ground. Blood spread out over Light’s buckskin shirt. His head lolled to the side. He looked young and small as if he were something that was no longer useful and had been discarded. The leather hat he always wore lay on a bed of leaves behind him.

The pounding of his heart and the lump in his throat made it impossible for Eli to speak. His numbed mind slowly played over what had happened. He had straightened and looked at Caleb a second before the arrow meant for him had struck the tree trunk. He saw the rifle come up out of the thornbush. He pulled his pistol and fired.

He had killed Baptiste Lightbody.
In all his life he had never felt such crushing despair.
He can’t be dead! He can’t be dead! I’ll never get to tell him
—

“He ain’t dead.”

It took seconds for Caleb’s words to penetrate Eli’s mind. He felt himself being pushed aside as the big Negro dropped to his knees and took the knife from Light’s scabbard. Starting at the neck, he slit the scout’s doeskin shirt to the waist.

“I can’t find a heartbeat.” Paul’s fingers sought a pulse in Light’s neck.

Caleb placed his ear against Light’s chest. “He ain’t dead,” he insisted. “Dis hole not kill ’im dis soon.” He pointed to the place in Light’s chest where the bullet had entered. Caleb lifted Light’s head. The back was soaked with blood. “Hit his hed on dis rock. Dat might kill ’im.”

“He’s not dead?” Eli whispered hoarsely.

“Almost. He lose blood. May die soon.”

“Stop the blood!” Eli pulled his shirt off over his head and cut a hole in the sleeve with his knife. He ripped the sleeve from the shirt and handed it to Caleb, the rest of the shirt to Paul. “I swear I didn’t know—” Eli clasped his hands and rocked back and forth. “Christ a’mighty! What’ve I done?”

“We’ve got to get him back to
madame.
” After wrapping the sleeve about Light’s head, Paul and Caleb wrapped the shirt as tightly as they could around his chest.

Paul looked up at his friend’s ashen face. He had never seen him so shaken, not even when he had failed in an attempt to rescue three young children when a wharf collapsed at Evansville. He’d had nightmares for months after that.

“We can make a stretcher—”

“No time. I’ll carry him,” Caleb said firmly.

“Get the rifles, Eli. Eli,” Paul said again when his friend continued to stare at Light’s still face. He looked at Paul with dull eyes. “Get the rifles.”

“What will Maggie say?”

“I’ll get the tools. If Caleb can carry Light, we can carry everything else. Eli.” Paul shook his friend’s arm. “Move, Eli.”

*  *  *

It was the longest mile Eli ever walked. Three times he offered to take a turn carrying Light and three times Caleb shook his head. After the third refusal Eli was convinced that Light had died and, knowing the guilt he was feeling, Caleb didn’t want to add to it by having him carry the body of the man he had killed.

Before they reached the homestead, Paul went ahead to speak to MacMillan. The two men went to the house. When Caleb and Eli reached the yard, MacMillan and his wife were waiting beside the door to the sickroom. They stepped aside and Caleb carried Light inside.

“Where’s Maggie?” Eli’s face felt wooden.

“I saw her an’ Bee go to the root cellar, but—”

Eli placed the rifles on the bench beside the door and walked away. Maggie and Bee came out of the cellar before he reached it. Smiling, Maggie ran across the yard to meet him.

“Eli! Where’s yore shirt? It ain’t summer.”

She was wearing her buckskin britches and an old wool jacket. He had never seen her so beautiful. Her eyes were shining, and her cheeks rosy, her red mouth laughing.

“Maggie, come—”

“Yo’re goin’ t’ catch yore death a cold, is what ya’ll do. Why’er ya sweatin’, Eli?”

“Maggie, there’s been an . . . accident.”

“Did ya hurt yoreself?” When he didn’t answer, Maggie took hold of Eli’s arm. “Who’s hurt, Eli?” Her eyes, large and suddenly fearful, searched his face. “Who?” Her mouth formed the word.

“Light.”

“Bad?”

“I’m . . . afraid so. Miz Mac—”

“No.” She shook her head vigorously. “Light’s not . . . hurt.”

“He . . . he was . . . shot.”

“Light’s not hurt! Yo’re lyin’, Eli. Yo’re a liar! Yo’re a liar!” she screamed. “Light’s all right!” She darted around him and ran. She didn’t stop until Paul grabbed her at the door of the sickroom. “Let go.” Her clenched fist hit him on the side of the face.

“Don’t fight,
chérie. Madame
will help him.” Paul’s hand gripped her shoulders.

Maggie twisted away from his grasp and bolted into the room. Aee and her mother were bending over the still form on the bunk. Maggie saw the blood on the chest of her beloved and the bloody rag wrapped around his head. From the depths of her soul came a soft keening cry of grief. It was the most pitiful sound any of them had ever heard.

Outside the door, Eli clapped his hands over his ears.

“I swear to God, Paul, I didn’t know it was him.” Eli’s eyes begged his friend to believe him. “All I saw was the barrel of the gun come up. Now I know that he was going to shoot the Indian—the one you shot. But at the time it seemed that . . . he was one of them.”

Paul put his hand on Eli’s shoulder. “It was an accident. No one will blame you.”

“Maggie will.”

“We must wait and see,
mon ami.
Light may not die. He is not big, but he is wiry and strong.”

“You were right. I shouldn’t have come looking for him. I wanted to see him . . . to hate him. I never thought I’d
like
him.”

The soft sounds of Maggie’s grief continued to come from the room. The sound cut into Eli’s heart like a sharp knife. He walked away and stood in the cold damp air, facing the woods, feeling sick inside. After a while something warm slipped over his bare shoulders.

“Ya wantin’ to come down with a sickness?” Aee moved around in front of him.

“How is he?”

“I don’t know. Bullet went through him so Ma didn’t have to dig for it. She dug out pieces of cloth. Caleb said it was a pistol shot when Ma asked. If it’d been a rifle shot it’d torn him to pieces.”

“I didn’t mean to shoot him.”

“Ya did it?” Aee frowned. “Caleb didn’t say. Guess I never thought—”

“Will he die?”

“Ma won’t say. She says the crack on his head’s bad. She’s keepin’ a wet rag on it.”

“I didn’t mean to shoot him,” Eli said again.

“Ever’body’ll know that.”

“Paul don’t.”

“Why’er ya sayin’ that? It was plain ya didn’t cotton t’ him. If it was ’cause he had Maggie an’ ya wanted her, don’t mean ya’d shoot him.”

“Maggie loves him.”

“That’s plain enough,” Aee said with less sympathy in her voice. “She’s in there tearin’ herself to pieces a grievin’.”

“Do you think I shot him so I could have . . . her?”

She looked into his eyes for a few seconds before she spoke.

“I ain’t got much use for ya most of the time, Swede. But I ain’t think yo’re that low-down.”

Eli held her eyes with his. She tilted her chin and refused to look away or flinch when he ran a finger down her cheek.

“You’re something, Aee.”

“I know what I am. I’m a breed. Lived in the backwoods all my life. Don’t know diddly ’bout livin’ in a town.” Her chin came up a little higher.

“You’ve got more gumption than all the town-women I’ve known put together.”

Her brows lifted. “Even Maggie?”

“Maggie can’t be put in the same pocket as other women. She’s . . . different. Even you’ve got to see that.” When Aee’s lips began to curl in a sneer, he added, “She’s one kind of woman, you’re another. You’re solid, Aee. Solid and dependable and resourceful. You’d do to winter with. Maggie’s pretty to look at, like a . . . butterfly. Someone will always have to take care of Maggie.”

“She’s . . . pretty and I’m not.”

“Who told you that?”

“I don’t have t’ be told. I got eyes. Ya got ’em too. Ya put ’em on Maggie often enough.”

“Do you think a butterfly is pretty?”

“’Course I do. Maggie’s a butterfly. Ya said so. Then what am I? A horsefly?” Angry glints appeared in her eyes.