Gray Hawk's Lady: Blackfoot Warriors, Book 1 (15 page)

“Humph!” she said. “A likely story.”

“But true.”

“What difference could it possibly make? After all, walking with the toes pointed out is quite fashionable. It is the way all proper English ladies are taught to move. I’m afraid my governess would quite faint if she were to hear you speak like this.”

“I do not know what this governess is, but I can tell you that walking with the toes pointed out puts strain on the back. The weight of the body is not balanced over the feet where it should be. But if you point the toes in and bend the knees, the weight of the body falls forward, allowing one to walk a great distance.”

“Humph!”

“I will show you.”

He rose and made to turn around, though he didn’t look over toward her.

“Not now,” came her rapid reply as she quickly submerged herself in the water. “I am bathing.”

He chuckled. “Should that make a difference to me?”

“Yes,” she said. “No gentleman would—”

“I am Indian.”

“Yes,
but…you promised me privacy this morning so that I might bathe and wash my clothes in peace. Do you not, remember?”

He sighed. “
Aa
,
yes, I do remember, but I also recall that you promised to cease your complaining.”

“I have.”

“You have not.”

“Gray Hawk—”

“
Annisa
,
all right now. I will keep my promise, though you have failed to keep yours.”

She drew in a breath of relief. “Thank you. I will try to do better.”

He laughed. “I hope that you do,” he said. “I certainly hope that you do.”

She settled down again to do her washing. Thank goodness he hadn’t turned around. She had just removed her chemise and drawers, and had been in the process of washing the stains from them. She now stood in the water in nothing more than her stockings.

“By the way,” she said as she removed the remaining articles of clothing and began to scrub them, “how is it that you know English? I thought that there were no white people in your country.”

“From a Black Robe,” he replied.

“A black robe?”

“A priest, a medicine man of your people.”

“Oh. There was a priest who came to your village?”

“
Saa
,
no,” said Gray Hawk. “It is a long story.”

She looked around her, at the endless stretch of prairie. “I seem to have the time to listen.”

“You will not like it.”

“That could be, but just the same, I would like to hear it.”

He paused. “Very well,” he said at last and seemed to settle back against the ground. “It happened many years ago, when I was a child. I accompanied my father to the north and east on a trading mission to a place called Fort William. There, the white soldiers took away my father’s weapons. They said it was to help him, to protect him.”

“Yes,”
Genevieve said. “This is done at the post. I saw it done while I was at Fort Union. And it
is
for the good of the Indian. Many of the warriors, if they met an enemy in the fort, would be tempted to commit murder. It is the only way the post can ensure peace.”

Gray Hawk grunted. “So they say. But did you observe that the white traders are allowed their guns and their weapons when inside the fort?”

“Well, naturally.”

“What is so natural about this?”

“The white traders have no vengeance against the Indian tribes. They would not be tempted to kill anyone.”

“Do you think so?”

“Yes.”

He bridled. “Well, it is not so. I will have to teach you better how to observe.”

“What do you mean? I take offense to that, I think.”

Gray Hawk shrugged, but she didn’t see.

“So?” she asked, when he didn’t seem inclined to continue. “What happened? I don’t understand. Other Indians have come into the trading post, but none of them speak English as well as you do.”

When he still didn’t reply, Genevieve prompted, “Gray Hawk?”

“I am thinking that you may not want to hear the rest of the story. You possibly might not believe it.”

“I will try, Gray Hawk; I will try. Won’t you please continue?”

Still he hesitated, though after a while, he said, “The white traders, whom you claim bear the Indian no grudge, began to poke fun at my father, there at the fort. They called him bad names, making obscene gestures at him. But my father, because he had no way to defend himself, ignored them. But then they began to make him dance.”

“Oh, how terrible. They made him dance when he didn’t want to…and in public?”

“No, Captive, you do not understand. They did not make him step to music or to the beat of a drum; they made him dance by shooting bullets at his feet. You must have seen this a few times. It was done while you were aboard the medicine canoe.”

“No, I didn’t know that—”

“An Indian, a Crow, died on the boat because of it. This man, this Crow, was, along with several other Indians, a guest of a white man who was taking them to a post in the South. These Indians were free to roam the boat at will. One of the Indians came across a trader who had drunk too much of the spirits of the fire water. The trader’s aim was bad when he made the Indian dance. He killed the Crow. And so it was with my father too.”

“The traders killed your father?”

“
Aa
,
yes, it is so.”

“Oh, that’s terrible. I’m so sorry.”

Gray Hawk lifted his shoulders in a dismissive gesture. “I was left alone,” he continued, “for no one else from our tribe had come with us to that post. It was almost winter. And so I stayed at the white man’s post, under the care of a Black Robe, until others from my tribe came to rescue me. It was over a year before I was returned to my people.

“I learned much about the white trader at that time,” he said. “I learned that the white man will say anything to protect himself. He will lie and he will cheat in order to get that thing he calls money. He will do most anything, even kill a friend, if it means he will obtain this money from doing it.

“I learned, as all of our people have learned, to leave the white man alone. All of our dealings with him have brought harm to our people. But I learned something else: no amount of reasoning, no amount of talk, will change the white man in his attitude toward the Indian. He kills all that he encounters, animal and Indian alike. It is a terrible sickness with him, and my people have not yet learned how to deal with this person, the white trader.”

Silence. Deadly, terrible silence followed Gray Hawk’s speech.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Why should you be? It had nothing to do with you, and you did not know my father.”

“Yes,”
she said, “I know, but I can still feel compassion for an injustice committed against you. And the killing of your father was truly an inexcusable injustice.”

“
Aa
,
yes, that it was. And it is one of the reasons why, when the white man comes into our territory, we kill him.”

Genevieve had been gently washing her hair as he’d been speaking and, having just dipped her head into the water, she raised it again abruptly.

“You would do that?” she asked. “You would kill a white man just like that, for no other reason than that he is in your territory?”

“We must protect ourselves.”

“But—”

“The white man, when he comes to us, brings us death and misery. Many times we have asked the white man to refrain from bringing whiskey to our camp. Our people go crazy with the whiskey and sometimes kill each other if they drink too much.

“The white man doesn’t listen. He brings it with him anyway.”

“But—”

“We ask the trapper not to kill the sacred beaver, the animal who brings to us the presence of the underwater people. But the white man doesn’t listen. He comes. He destroys.

“We met the white man in peace many years ago, when he came through our land for the first time. You know these men, Lewis and Clark. But the white man who called himself Lewis tricked us with talks of peace and killed two of us without reason. The white man brought us trickery and death. Is it any wonder, then, that we protect ourselves from him? No. When we see him in our territory, we kill him.”

Silence.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?” she addressed him after a while. “If I am not rescued by my own people, will you be taking me into Blackfoot territory?”

“
Aa
,
yes. That is my intent.”

“Will your people kill me, then, too?”

“
Saa
, no. What makes you ask such a thing?”

“I am white. I am going into your people’s territory—”

“You are also a woman.”

“Does that make any difference?”

He shook his head. “But being under my guardianship does.”

She gulped. “Will I have your protection?”

“If white woman stops asking so many questions, yes,” he snapped. “Now, come, it is time to finish your bath.”

“No, that is, I…can’t…” She stopped speaking and gulped, suddenly panicked. What had she done? Had she been so involved in listening to Gray Hawk that she had lost all sense? She had just washed
all
of her clothes. She now sat in the stream,, completely naked, with no dry clothes to wear.

“Captive, it is time for you to come out.”

“I…can’t. All my clothes are wet. I…I haven’t anything to put on. I…” Her voice dropped to no more than a whisper. “I guess I will have to stay here until they are dry. Either that, or…” she shivered, “…I suppose I will have to put on a wet dress.”

“
Saa
, no,” came his reply. He had heard her every word. “Wait.”

She sank back down in the water. “What is it, Mr. Gray Hawk?”

No response.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?”

“The deerskin. I have not yet made clothing from it,” he said, and she gasped. He spoke from no more than a few yards away from her. “It is as big as a robe, and you can put it on while your clothes dry. Here, I will hold it for you while you stand up.”

She blinked. “No, Mr. Gray Hawk. I cannot allow that. You would see me in my altogether.”

“In your what?”

She heard the humor in his voice. She didn’t like it.

“Mr. Gray Hawk, I have on no clothes.”

“I understand that.”

“No, you don’t. I washed my chemise and even my stockings. I sit here with not a single stitch of clothing upon my person. And I will certainly not rise while you are here.”

“Then,” he said, a chuckle in his voice, “you will be very cold when this day is through.”

“Just leave the deerskin. I can pick it up as soon as I emerge.”

No response, no answer, not even the rustle of grass to note his presence.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?”

“I am here.”

She bristled. “Would you leave the skin and go away?”

“
Saa
,” he said simply. “No.”

She looked back over her shoulder. He stood just a few feet away from her, the skin held up in front of him, his gaze on her unwavering.

“Mr. Gray Hawk,” she began, “did you not promise me privacy while I bathed?”

“
Aa
,
yes,” said Gray Hawk. “And I gave it to you, too, until I discovered that you needed my help. I have decided now to help you, much as your slave, Robert, ‘helped’ me.”

“Robert is no slave.”

“Is he not?”

“No.”

Gray Hawk shrugged. “As you say. Come, Little Captive, I will help you stay warm while your clothes dry.”

“Mr. Gray Hawk, are you suggesting…?”

“You are safe from me, white woman. I do not make love to my enemy. I am only suggesting that you warm yourself in this robe.”

She raised her chin. “I will not get out until you leave.”

“You will be cold, then. For I will not leave until you get out.”

She hit her hands against the water in frustration, spraying droplets all around her, hoping that some of the water would hit him.

“If you do that again,” he said, “I will come into the water and pick you up where you are.”

She bridled. “Turn your head.”

Silence.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?”

“Yes?”

“Oh! You are dreadful!” She sprang up all at once, and, splashing to the shore as quickly as she could, she practically clawed her way up the bank until she reached his level. Running forward, she flopped herself into the deerskin robe.

He closed the flaps of the skin around her, surrounding her in the warmth of the robe, though there was one other problem: his arms remained around her.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?”

“Hmm?” His voice came too close to her ear.

“You may let me go now.”

He nuzzled that ear.

“Mr. Gray Hawk?”

He nestled himself at her neck, and all at once a delicious sort of sensation tore over her body, making her more than aware that she wore nothing beneath the robe. The junction between her legs felt suddenly warm.