Merline Lovelace (16 page)

Clearly agitated, she plucked at the blanket swaddling her thin body. In an agony of fear that she would use up her pitiful store of strength, Julia tried to soothe her.

“Be still,
chèrie.
Please.”

Her daughter pushed at her restraining hands with weak fists, working herself into an agitation.

“I don’t like this place! I want to go home!”

“We will, darling. We’ll go back to Suds Row as soon as you get well.”

“No! I want to go back to Mobile, to our own house!”

She thrashed disconsolately on the cot, forcing Andrew to rap out a command.

“Be still, Suzanne!”

Startled by the brusque order, she quieted for a moment. But only for a moment. Her lower lip trembling, she fixed sunken, resentful eyes on the major.

“I don’t like you. You mashed Daisy. You’re a bad man.” Her small chest heaved. “I want my papa.”

The pitiful cry closed Julia’s throat. Swallowing the coppery taste of fear, she dropped to her knees beside the cot.

“Papa’s gone, darling. Remember, Mama told you?”

“I want to go home.” Sobs racked her daughter’s thin frame. “Back to Mobile. To papa’s house.”

“Dear God!” Smoothing the lank brown hair from her daughter’s forehead, she fought to calm the agitated girl. “Shhh, sweetheart. Shhh.”

“Please, Mama. Promise me we’ll go home.”

The hoarse cry ripped Julia’s heart out of her chest and shredded it into small pieces.

“I promise,” she whispered, blinking fiercely to hold back hot, desperate tears. “Just get well, my little one, and we’ll go home.”

T
he spectre of death hovered above Fort Laramie throughout the rest of August.

Julia followed the funeral cortege too many times to count as people she now considered friends were laid to rest. Private Rafferty, who had succumbed during the first week. Sergeant Major Sean Donovan, buried with full military honors. Private Lowenstahl of the flowing blond mustaches and innate grace. He’d waltz no more, except with angels.

And the children. Julia’s heart grieved with each small, freshly dug grave. Six died in addition to Patrick Donovan. Mary Donovan had taken her loss with dry-eyed stoicism, but Victoria McKinney had thrown herself atop her baby’s coffin, sobbing hysterically, and had to be dragged away by her friends. Julia stayed with her whenever she could snatch an hour or two away from Suzanne’s bedside.

The patients who survived recovered their strength, some quickly, others more slowly. Bit by painful bit,
Suzanne’s thin frame fleshed out, but her sunken eyes and pallid skin haunted Julia. Little Hen’s return to Fort Laramie helped spur her daughter’s recovery. So did Andrew’s reminder that her pony waited for her.

Julia made a point to avoid all appearance of partiality or friendship with Andrew during his visits to the invalid. The memory of that awful night when Suzanne had almost sobbed away the last of her strength would remain forever seared in her heart…along with the grim expression on Andrew’s face after she’d promised the sobbing daughter that she’d take her home to Mobile.

Andrew didn’t bring up the subject of their departure while Suzanne remained in the sick tent, for which Julia was profoundly grateful. Her own strength had stretched almost to the breaking point. She couldn’t deal with anything but her daughter’s day-to-day condition.

Nor did Andrew reopen the subject of moving them into his quarters. When Suzanne recovered enough to move her back to their apartment on Suds Row, he carried her down from the hospital himself. But Julia knew it was only a matter of time until they would have to discuss her promise to Suzanne. Sick at heart, she dreaded the moment Andrew would force her to defend her choice of her daughter over him.

Mary Donovan got the story from Julia one evening when the laundress came bearing a gooseberry pie for the invalid. While Mary’s six remaining children crowded around Suzanne’s bed and helped her devour
the tart treat, the two women sat side by side on the bench outside.

They talked first of the still sick and the dead. Julia could only admire the way Mary had buried her grief along with her son and her husband.

“It does a body little good to mourn,” the older woman said simply.

“Will you stay here?”

“Here, or at some other post. The Army’s me home, don’t y’know?”

Hands folded loosely in her aproned lap, the laundress lifted her gaze to the spectacular sunset painting the sky with pinks and golds.

“I’ll marry again,” she said after a moment, her eyes fixed on the swirl of colors. “I’ve already had three offers.”

The old Julia, the Julia who’d grown up in a culture that expected women to don unrelieved black and retire from society for a full year after the death of a close family member, would have been shocked. The woman who’d emerged from the sick tents merely nodded.

“’Tis a matter of choosin’ which o’the three will make the best father to me children,” Mary mused. “And to the babe I’m carrying.”

A strangled sound of joy and sadness escaped Julia. A new baby could in no way compensate for the loss of a son and a husband, but she could only thank God He’d seen fit to give Mary this bit of happiness to see her through the bleak days and weeks ahead.

“What about you?” the laundress asked. “Will you and the major be marryin’ again?”

“No.”

“Whyever not?”

A flight of geese swooped over the rooftops. Long black necks extended, wings flapping, they splashed into the river to break their journey south for the night. Their raucous honking gave Julia the time she needed to frame a quiet response.

“As soon as Suzanne regains enough strength to travel, I’m taking her back to Mobile.”

“Why? What’s waitin’ for you there?”

Nothing but empty yesterdays, she admitted silently, and the promise of Suzanne’s tomorrows.

The laundress wagged a finger under her nose. “Now you listen to me, missus. The major’s daft about you, don’t y’know? You and that little girl, both.”

“You don’t understand. I promised Suzanne I’d take her home.”

“Well glory be,
un
-promise her!”

“It’s not that simple. I bargained with God, too.” The pledge she’d offered over and over again in the darkest hours echoed in her mind. “If he spared my daughter’s life, I swore I’d—I’d—”

“Give up anything that smacked o’sin or worldly pleasure and live a pure, repentant life,” Mary finished dryly.

“More or less.”

“The major, o’course, being your greatest temptation to sin?”

She didn’t bother with a denial. Mary wouldn’t believe it, in any case. The mere thought of those stolen hours in Andrew’s arms before the epidemic struck raised telltale heat in Julia’s cheeks.

They’d coupled like wild, jungle beasts. Without love, without trust, with no thought to marriage or the moral obligation to procreate. Driven by a hunger their joining hadn’t begun to satisfy. If anything, that taste had only made her crave him more. Now, it seemed, she’d pay a heavy penance for her all too brief descent into insanity.

The ever-pragmatic Mary dismissed such philosophical considerations with an impatient wave of her hand. “What man or woman doesn’t make dire promises in times o’stress? Didn’t I swear I’d be a meek, humble wife to the sergeant major if only the Lord would leave him on this earth a bit longer? It wasn’t meant to be.”

Julia picked at the threads of her skirt. “Maybe Andrew and I aren’t meant to be, either. We made a mockery of the sacrament of marriage the first time we tried it. This time, my first consideration has to be my daughter.”

“Well, Suzanne will be some time yet gettin’ her full strength back. And winter blows in early out here on the plains, don’t y’know? Come spring, I’m thinkin’ you and Suzanne might both have changed
your minds about leavin’…if the blizzards and snow blindness don’t drive you mad first.”

On that cheerful note, she called to her noisy brood and went home.

In her own, far more reserved way, Walks In Moonlight echoed Mary sentiments when she, Little Hen and Lone Eagle came bearing a buffalo calf’s liver wrapped in oiled cloth. Lone Eagle stood behind her with arms crossed, saying little while his daughter clambered up to sit cross-legged on Suzanne’s bed. His wife shared her recipe for liver stew with the patient’s mother.

“Boil the meat long with wild onions. The broth will help to thicken Suz-anne’s blood.”

Assuming Julia could get it down her daughter’s throat. The girl’s weak, fretful state hadn’t diminished her fussiness.

“Thank you.”

Placing the dripping bundle in a bowl, she wiped her hands and offered her guests a glass of the gooseberry wine. Walks In Moonlight glanced to her husband for guidance before declining gracefully. The barriers were coming back up, Julia thought with a stab of regret.

They talked for a few moments more, then Lone Eagle called to his daughter. Affection softened his granite features when the girl came skittering across the room. Reaching out a big hand, he tugged one of
her braids. Giggling, she wrapped her arms around his naked thigh.

When Lone Eagle looked up, a smile passed between husband and wife, so fleeting and so intimate that envy dug sharp fangs into Julia’s breast. She had to fight to keep it from her face when Walks In Moonlight turned back to her.

“Is it true you will leave Fort Laramie when the little one recovers?”

“Yes.”

“Does your heart take you away?”

“I—I must go. I promised Suzanne.”

The Sioux cocked her head to one side. Her dark eyes searched Julia’s.

“Each woman must find her own path,” she said softly. “I will pray to the Great Spirit that you find yours.”

To Julia’s relief, Suzanne accepted that it might be some weeks before she was strong enough to travel. The mere prospect of returning to her familiar world seemed to satisfy the still lethargic girl, although she reminded her mother of her promise whenever the opportunity arose. In the meantime, she had Little Hen to keep her company and the books her mother borrowed from the classroom to help her learn her letters.

September swept in on a rush of cooling days and momentous events. The residents of Fort Laramie were goggle-eyed with the news that Colonel George
Armstrong Custer, flamboyant hero of the War of the Rebellion and commander of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, had been recalled to Fort Leavenworth to face a court-martial board. The rumor was he’d ordered his officers to shoot deserters in cold blood. Not only that, he’d left his troops in the field without authority. Like so many other men, he’d feared for his wife Libby’s safety during the cholera outbreak and had rushed home to move her out of harm’s way. Unlike so many others, he’d abandoned his troops to do so. A military tribunal sentenced him to one year’s suspension from the Army without pay.

The officers and men at Fort Laramie either rejoiced in or cursed Custer’s dismissal. Colonel Cavanaugh saw it as one more victory for the Sioux and Cheyenne, who hated “Yellow Hair” for his savage attacks on their encampments. Others, Andrew among them, viewed Custer’s court-martial as one more strand in the complex tapestry of the plains. Like Red Cloud’s attack on the woodcutting party at Fort Phil Kearny last month—now known as the Wagon Box Fight for the way the woodcutters had circled the wood wagons to fight off the attack—Custer’s dismissal held political undertones.

Andrew suspected the real reason Congress was more interested in peace than in continuing the war against the Plains Indians had to do with cold, hard cash. Quite simply, it cost more than they wanted to pay to maintain the posts along the Bozeman Trail,
particularly with alternate routes to the Montana gold fields now available.

His suspicion hardened into certainty when General Sherman confirmed that the Army would not retaliate for the Wagon Box affair. Nor would the army brass allow Captain Powell’s success in repulsing the attack be touted in the eastern press as a major victory.

Instead, Colonel Cavanaugh received word that the newly appointed peace commission would gather in St. Louis prior to setting out for Fort Laramie in early November, weather permitting. Andrew dispatched messengers to all the major bands, apprising their chiefs of the commission’s expected arrival. Spotted Tail sent word that he would meet with them, as did Sitting Bull. Red Cloud and Crazy Horse didn’t reply.

Julia absorbed all of these events only peripherally. Her main focus remained on happenings closer to home. The second week in September, Mary Shaunessy O’Dell Donovan married Private Robert Mulvaney in a quiet ceremony attended only by her family and a few friends. The brawny, bull-necked private was five years Mary’s junior and as much in awe of his new wife as he was amazed by his incredible good fortune in winning her. He didn’t have the rank or the presence of her late husband, Mary confided frankly to Julia, but Sean Donovan had considered Mulvaney the hardest working and most sober of all his troops. That, she declared roundly, was sufficient recommendation for her.

Her own affairs somewhat in order, Mary decided
Julia needed a break from nursing and urged her to resume classes. With a tart reminder to the other laundresses that it was their children who benefited from Julia’s school teaching, she marshaled them into shifts to care for Suzanne during the day. And it was Mary, Julia discovered, who sternly advised Andrew that the mother was looking as peaked as the daughter. She needed to put some of the late September sunshine into her cheeks.

Obedient to Mary’s crisp order, Andrew appeared at the schoolroom just after Julia dismissed her students for the afternoon. She glanced up, her hands stilling in their task of scrubbing the slate board.

“You didn’t keep any pupils after school to do that?” he asked with a smile.

“No, not today.”

“Good.”

The uneven floorboards creaked under his boots as he strolled down the aisle between the desks. Removing his hat, he held it in one gloved hand. Sunbeams slanting through the window picked out the russet tints in his hair.

“Can you leave for a while, Julia? I’ve got a gig outside. We could take a short ride.”

“Yes, of course.”

Her calm reply disguised a sudden nervousness. They hadn’t talked, really talked, since that night in the tent. Andrew’s visits to check on Suzanne and convey Daisy’s wishes for her speedy recovery had,
of necessity, been conducted under the child’s watchful eyes.

He’d known better than to press Julia when her daughter’s health still weighed heavily on her mind. From the way his hands lingered on her waist when he lifted her into the high-seated buggy, it was evident that time had now passed.

She gathered her shawl about her shoulders, more to hide her fluttering pulse than for protection against the playful breeze that snapped the flag against its wooden pole. The same breeze tugged at the hair she’d caught back in a loose bun at the nape of her neck. Wishing she’d brought a bonnet to keep the wayward strands from flying about her face, Julia slanted Andrew a curious glance.

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

He handled the reins of the buggy with the same ease he did his chargers. Neatly maneuvering around the troops walking guard, he tooled the gig along the dirt track circling the parade ground. Old Bedlam’s two-story bulk swept by, as did the surgeon’s quarters and the sutler’s store.

At first Julia thought their destination might be the cavalry stables at the north end of the post. Perhaps he wanted her to see for herself how Suzanne’s pony fared, or discuss its disposition when she and her daughter returned East. The mere thought of leaving put a lump in her throat.

To her secret relief, they swept past the stables and
followed the curve of the Laramie River. Once clear of the outbuildings, the breeze chased away the earthy odor of horse manure and the clang of farriers’ hammers against iron anvils. Another bend of the river cut off all echoes from the fort completely.