The Colonel's Lady (40 page)

Sorrow darkened her gaze. “For your pension, you mean.”

“Aye. ’Tis yours for the taking.”

Their eyes locked in the little beam of light escaping the shutter crack. She’d never looked more frightened or confused. With a little sob, she covered her face with her hands, and he felt his own chest convulse. Hopelessness hung in the air, poisoning the peace they both craved, the future they were powerless to do anything about. He took a tentative step toward her, unsure of how to comfort her, afraid she might turn away. But when his arms went round her, she didn’t resist. The warmth of her, the sweetness of her scent, took his breath away. He held her as tightly as he dared, the inky knot of her chignon just beneath his chin, her tears wetting his coat. He rested his bristled cheek against the silk of her hair and waited. Long minutes ticked by. He could feel them as if they were his pulse, his lifeblood, instead.

Her voice was hardly audible, laced as it was with pain. “I can’t marry you, Cass, but I can forgive you.”

He bent his head nearer. “How can you forgive such a thing?”

“If God forgave me all my sins, how can I not forgive you?”

He let the gentle words take root, assuaging the rough edges of his regret, and then his thoughts took a sharp turn. Though she forgave him, perhaps even loved him, ’twas not enough to reverse the terrible path he must take. Or secure her own uncertain future.

She drew back from him, her voice resigned. “When are you leaving?”

Spent, he sat down and folded his arms across his chest, if only to keep from reaching out to her again. “Reinforcements should arrive soon, and the day after that we march.” He felt bone weary even uttering the words. He longed to say instead, “Let’s pledge ourselves each to the other and sail for Ireland and leave this war-torn land.” But he was dealing in delusions. Ireland had long ceased to be a safe haven . . . home. The colonies—Virginia—were naught but a shadowy dream. His own mortality met him at every turn.

How vulnerable she looked standing there in the shadows. Tears shone in her eyes, but she managed to say with far more composure and grace than he deserved, “I’ll pray for you every time I think of you. I’ll keep the prayer you taught Abby alive in her heart till you come back.”

He opened his mouth to contradict her, but the words lodged so tight in his throat he couldn’t speak. He was days away from death. ’Twas a waste of words to argue otherwise. Rising from the stool, he opened the cabin door and went out.

For several long minutes she looked at the door once he’d shut it and fought the urge to run after him. The locket now seemed heavy in her pocket.
Do you have my locket, Roxie?
He’d gotten it from her father as he lay dying, she guessed, or found it among his belongings afterward. She wanted to know the details—yet didn’t. Whatever had happened that ill-fated day, Cass had found the locket and held on to it. Perhaps . . . She groped about for answers. Perhaps he’d kept it close as a reminder of his promise to take care of her.

Not because he truly loved her.

At noon the next day, official marching orders for the army were posted, and the parade ground rang with huzzahs and hurrahs as the expected regiments from Virginia poured through the gates. A strangely festive feeling permeated everything, which only fueled Roxanna’s uneasiness. How could men about to make war be so jubilant? Even Cass seemed unusually lighthearted, perhaps for the benefit of his men, yet as the day wore on she sensed his mood shifting. Inside his simmering headquarters as the June heat swelled, he and his officers went over weaponry, supplies, subordinate command, and the latest intelligence from across the Ohio River.

“Even with reinforcements, our numbers are woefully weak,” he admitted, looking up from a detailed map. “’Tis why I’ve had you report abroad that we have three times the number of the enemy. A phantom force, if you will.”

“That may be why they’ve not crossed the river,” Micajah speculated.

“But there’s enemy sign everywhere,” Joram Herkimer said, eyes on Cass.

“We may well have to revise our strategy,” Cass told them. “Instead of a major battle, it seems wiser to stage surprise raids and simply harass their troops to death, Shawnee style.”

“There are a number of weak spots in the British defense,” Jehu acknowledged, thrusting a finger at a particular point on the map. “Beginning here . . .”

Roxanna was no longer listening. Returning her quill to its inkpot, she tried to ignore the blinding pain in her head. Abby had thrown up her supper in the night, and neither of them had gotten much sleep afterward. Though she seemed fine this morning, Roxanna wondered if all the turmoil and excitement were to blame. Her own stomach rebelled at the thought of the coming meal. Its unsavory odor seemed to cling to the warm, windless air like rancid perfume. Venison stew again, she guessed, and burned cornbread.

“Are you well, Miss Rowan?”

She looked up from the final dictation she was copying to find the officers huddled in a corner and only Cass behind his desk.
Miss Rowan.
Oh, but she preferred Roxie by far. His voice was flat. Weary. Was it her imagination, or had he succumbed to the resignation she sensed weighting him?

“I’m well, Colonel McLinn.”

“Bella told me Abby was sick in the night.”

“Yes, but she seems quite recovered this morning.”

He nodded. “You’re at liberty to go.” With that, he sat down at his desk and shuffled through a stack of papers without looking at her. “There’s no more to be done.”

No more . . . ever.

She tried to breathe past the crushing burden in her chest. She willed her eyes to stay dry. ’Twas goodbye. Come morning he would march. There was nothing left to say. He’d confessed and she’d extended forgiveness. Their complicated relationship was at a tumultuous end. Setting her jaw, she gathered up her writing implements and left him as resolutely as he’d left her the night before.

36

The next morning, Roxanna took Abby gently by the shoulders. “I’m going with the army to help Bella and the soldiers. Dovie will look after you while I’m away.”

Abby nodded, tears welling, and Roxanna hugged her hard, feeling a rush of emotion threatening her own resolve. It was then she saw the purple medal strung with black silk ribbon around Abby’s neck.

“Papa gave me his heart,” Abby said, holding it out for closer inspection.

His heart indeed. Roxanna’s own heart squeezed tight. The coveted cloth badge, edged in silver braid and earned on some far-flung battlefield, was now faded and fraying.

She knelt down, tears spotting her cheeks. “Keep smiling and talking and praying, Abby. I’ll be back soon.”

But would she? Everything seemed so uncertain, the cheerful words a lie. As Dovie led Abby away, Roxanna lifted her haversack and canteen, the rattle of departing drums in her ears. Stepping outside, she walked toward the kitchen just as she’d done countless times before slipping through the sally port. No one, save Dovie and Abby, knew she was going. Not Graham Greer. Not Bella. Not Cass. And if she didn’t hurry, she’d never catch up with them. With her pistol tucked into her waistband, she hurried across the sun-warmed grass, feeling as sneaky as a deserter. Only her mission was to join the army, not abandon them.

They were a good mile ahead of her, but their tracks were easy to follow, the supply wagons leaving deep, dusty grooves in the summer ground as they hauled their too-heavy loads. The plan to go with them had come to her in the night in feverish fashion, like a bad dream. She didn’t want to leave the relative safety of the fort, yet a strong compulsion pushed her forward.

Was it the Lord’s leading or her own?

She trudged past the fort’s ripening cornfields before plunging into deep green woods. Within their stifling embrace she felt disoriented, hardly able to hear the tat-a-tat of the drums. But she must stay out of sight, well to the rear of the column, unbeknownst to Cass. He’d be in a blistering fury if he suspected she followed.

Astride his black Shawnee stallion, he’d led his men out the front gates an hour before. Standing by the flagpole as he left, she had trouble keeping her eyes to herself. He stood straight as an Indian, a whole head taller than any man present, in full dress uniform like he was going to a fancy ball and not battle. Not once had he glanced her way.
I’ve no more need of you
, he’d sometimes said after a day’s transcribing. And he was proving it now. But he did lift Abby off the ground at the last, accepting the pink posy she offered to tuck in a buttonhole.

Now, after a mere two miles trailing them, she was spent. ’Twas the heat and the constant racket of insects that set her teeth on edge. The very woods seemed suicidal, dappled a dazzling array of greens and golds in the sunlight and wind, capable of hiding untold enemies. Once she thought the army’s rear guard spotted her, but she darted behind a giant elm till they were lost from view.

All day she did this before remembering they must cross the Ohio River, and she could hide no longer. Deep and muddy and a mile wide, it might have been the Atlantic. The angst-filled memory of nearly losing her life, of the keelboat captain with an arrow shot through him, almost made her turn back.

She waited till dusk, when low fires flickered like fireflies along the river’s south bank and the hum of men’s voices and Bella’s cooking encroached on her hiding place, before she stepped forward.

“Miz Rowan, that you?” one of the regulars barked, pulling his pipe from his mouth.

“’Tis me, Private Tucker.”

“You been followin’ us all day?”

She nodded, picking briars from her skirt, sensing his approval.

“I’m mighty glad to see you . . . but I fear the colonel might be of a different mind.”

Different indeed.
She peered into the darkness, thinking how the men were nearly indistinguishable from each other. Was this how it had been the eve of her father’s death?

“Where
is
Colonel McLinn?” she ventured.

“Eating with his officers,” he answered, gesturing to a far tent.

“Well, I’ll not ruin his supper,” she replied, a note of lament in her voice.

He slapped at a mosquito. “I doubt his day can get much worse. We’ve had anything but an easy time of it since we left Endeavor. Two horses lame and three men sick.”

She almost faltered. A fierce longing for her cabin and Abby and the fort’s familiar routine came rushing over her. As if sensing her disquiet, he held up his pewter plate. “Care for some victuals?”

Beans and molasses and bread were the offering. Though famished, she shook her head. “Thank you kindly, but I’ve some things in my pack.”

She smelled rum in the air and guessed a gill for each man was in order, if only to cope with the heat and the insects. Bidding him good night, she made her way amidst myriad greetings along the riverbank to where a pale canvas tent loomed like a ghost in dense brush. Bella was in back of it, banging pans and kettles in a fit of temper, her makeshift kitchen sorely lacking. She wielded an iron skillet like she wanted to hit someone with it.

“Bella,” Roxanna whispered.

Turning, Bella threw up a free hand in mock fright. “Law, but you’re a sight for sore eyes. Can you help me move this here table?”

They spent several minutes rearranging things till Joram Herkimer’s voice broke in behind them. “Good evening, Miss Rowan. Colonel McLinn would like to see you inside.”

Inside.
The canvas tent glowed golden with lantern light and was empty of officers now, save Cass. She could see his shadowed profile against the canvas wall. Word of her coming had flown through the camp like a noisy jaybird, she guessed. She could hide no longer.

Cass lay his quill down and pushed away from his camp desk when Roxanna entered. Stripped of his uniform coat, his dark stock undone, he was still perspiring, and he felt another freshet of sweat at the sight of her. Despite the heat, he saw that she was pale, the pulse in the hollow of her throat apparent. She stood just inside the entrance, hands clasped and face stoic as if awaiting his tirade.

His voice was low and grieved. “Roxie, why in heaven’s name have you come?”

Her chin came up. “Why? Because I can’t possibly sit at the fort wondering what’s befallen all of you.” Tears made her eyes shine as she forged on. “There’s going to be death, wounds—”

“Aye, and a great deal more. This is no place for a lady. Not even Bella should be here.”

“But we are here and can be of use—”

“You’re not a help but a hindrance.”

Her wounded expression should have checked him, but he was naturally irritable on a campaign, not given to mincing words, and this was no exception. “You confound the best-laid plans by coming here. I asked Graham Greer to remain behind expressly for your future—yours and Abby’s.”

Her gaze wavered. “Why?”

“I heard of his proposal—and your consideration of it.” His tone was a bit too sharp, but he was sick to death of playing this infernal game of not caring when in truth, she was all he thought about. “There’s another reason you shouldn’t be here. How can I possibly keep my mind on battle when the woman I love is in harm’s way?”

At this, she wilted further, though her voice—and her gaze—held firm. “You would think the woman you love would be a support to you by her very nearness—”

“Aye, but only if she loves me back. Unrequited love is not what I’m after.”

He’d gentled his tone, but she still looked grieved. In truth, he wanted nothing more than to touch her, to drink in her scent and softness, if only for the time left to them. But they couldn’t draw comfort from each other. The boundary lines were firmly drawn, and they seemed as far apart as the enemy.

“You’re dismissed,” he said without thinking, seeming to wound her further. But he was suddenly beyond caring, riled that his rear guard hadn’t detected her in the ten-mile march they’d made that day. Breaking their gaze, he returned to penning a final letter to be given to the Continental Congress upon his demise.

Life on the trail as a soldier, Roxanna decided, was beyond difficult. At dawn, after crossing the river atop enormous rafts beneath a sheen of gunmetal sky, their trek north into enemy territory soon became a blur of dust and heat and tension. Cass insisted she ride at the middle of the procession on a mare flanked by his officers. Seated in the unfamiliar saddle, she thanked the Lord anew she’d had the sense to bring her straw hat. The sun seemed to fry the silk pansies and ribbon atop it but spared her face at least. Up ahead, Bella wore her own battered bonnet and walked.

Danger seemed to pulsate everywhere—in the wall of woods on either side of them, among the shrill racket of cicadas and other insects, in the constant creak of leather and clink of canteens. They were being watched, she sensed, by unseen Indians. Cass rode at the front of the throng—a perfect target for an arrow or musket ball. She kept her eye on him as if she had the power to cover and protect him with her loving gaze—and prayed.

For peace. For protection. For a miracle.

She could see why the land had become a battleground. Birds of every hue and song brought splashes of color to the lush landscape, and the scent of honeysuckle was so strong it seemed a vial of it had been broken open atop the greening ground.

Oh, Lord, will peace ever come to this beautiful place?

At dusk they camped on a high, timbered ridge where the view stretched for miles. She stood beneath the leafy canopy of an old, gnarled oak, soothed by its rustling as a breeze cooled her brow, well away from the heart of camp. She wanted to stay out of Cass’s sight. If she was a distraction, she didn’t mean to be. Her worry that she was a burden worsened in the twilight. Saddle-sore and sunburned despite her hat, she leaned into the tree’s rough trunk and wondered if she might be the first white woman to set foot in Shawnee territory.

“’Tis better appreciated with this.”

She turned to find Cass behind her, extending a spyglass. Taking it, she was only too glad to look elsewhere. The pounding of tent stakes back at camp rivaled the sudden pounding of her heart, yet the delicious sensation of his standing so near almost made up for his stinging dismissal the night before.