One Thousand White Women (8 page)

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Authors: Jim Fergus

BOOK: One Thousand White Women
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“Horses?” I replied in a small voice.
“Perhaps they neglected to mention that the savages offered horses for their white brides,” the Captain said.
I recovered my composure quickly. “Perhaps we should be flattered,” I said. “I understand that the savages hold their horses in the very highest esteem. Furthermore, you must remember, my dear Captain, that no one forced us to participate in this program. We are volunteers. If there is shame in our mission, then some of it must rest with those of us who signed up of our own free will.”
The Captain looked at me searchingly, as if trying to ferret out some possible motive that might make such a thing comprehensible to him. His broad brow cast a shadow like a cloud over his eyes. “I watched you at table tonight, Miss Dodd,” he said in a low voice.
“Your regard did not escape my attention, Captain,” I said, the blood rising again in my cheeks … a certain tingling sensation.
“I was trying to understand what had possessed a lovely young woman like yourself to join such an unlikely enterprise with such a motley assortment of cohorts,” he continued. “Some of the others … well, quite frankly it is easier to speculate why some of the others had signed up. Your British friend, Miss Flight, for instance, clearly has a pressing professional need to visit the prairies. And the Irish sisters, the Kelly twins, why they have the look of rogues about them if ever I’ve seen it—I’ll wager that they were in trouble with the police back in Chicago. And the big German girl—well, surely her matrimonial prospects among men of her own race are somewhat limited …”
“That is most unkind, Captain,” I snapped. “You disappoint me. I took you for too much of a gentleman to make such a remark. The fact is that we are none of us any better than the next. We all entered into this for our own personal reasons, none of which is superior to that of the others. Or necessarily any of your concern.”
The Captain straightened his back and clicked his heels together with smart military precision. He inclined his head in a slight bow. “You’re quite right, madam,” he said. “Please accept my apology. My intention was not to insult your companions. I only meant that a pretty, intelligent, witty, and obviously well-brought-up young lady such as yourself hardly fits the description of the felons, lonely hearts, and mentally deranged women that we had been notified by the government to expect as volunteers in this bizarre experiment.”
“I see,” I said, and I laughed. “So this is how our little troupe was billed; no wonder that we have been treated with such disdain by all we encounter. Would it salve your conscience, Captain, to know that you were handing over only such misfits and riffraff to the savages?”
“Not in the least,” said the Captain. “That isn’t at all what I meant.” And then Captain Bourke did a peculiar thing. He took me by the elbow, grasped my arm lightly but firmly in his hand. The gesture was at once oddly proprietary and intimate, like the touch of a lover, and I felt again the pulse of my own desire. He stepped closer to me, still holding my arm, close enough that I could smell the aura of cigar smoke about him, could smell his own rich manly odor. “It would still be possible for you to refuse, madam,” he said.
I looked into his eyes, and stupidly, as if in a kind of trance, as if paralyzed by his touch, I took his words to mean that it would still be possible for me to refuse his amorous advances.
“And why would I do that, Captain?” I asked in a whisper. “How could I refuse you?”
And then it was the Captain’s turn to laugh, releasing my arm suddenly and pulling away, clearly embarrassed by this misunderstanding … or was it? “Forgive me, Miss Dodd,” he said. “I meant … I only meant that it would still be possible for you to refuse to participate in the Brides for Indians program.”
I must have turned very red in the face. I excused myself then and returned forthwith to my quarters.
 
Captain Bourke was noticeably absent at the dining table yesterday, as was his fiancée Miss Bradley … I suspect that they must have dined privately, perhaps in the Captain’s own quarters … Hah! It suddenly occurs to me that my journal entries—like my entirely inappropriate romantic longings of the past twenty-four hours—begin to sound like those of a lovesick schoolgirl. I seem quite unable to get the good Captain out of my mind. I must be insane! … betrothed to a man whom I have not met, infatuated with a man whom I cannot have. Good God! Perhaps my family was correct in committing me to the asylum for promiscuity …
 
Dear Hortense,
It is very late at night, and I write to you by the dim light of a single candle in our spartan Army barracks at Fort Laramie. I am unable to sleep. A very strange thing has happened tonight of which I can not breathe a word to any of my fellow brides. Yet I am bursting to confide in someone, and so I must write you, my sister … yes, it reminds me of when we were little girls and still close, you and I, and I would come into your room late at night and crawl into your bed and we would giggle and tell each other our deepest secrets … how I miss you, dear Hortense … miss the way we once were … do you remember?
Let me tell you my secret. At dinner this evening I was seated once again, and I think not by accident, at the table of one Captain John G. Bourke, who has been chosen to escort us to Indian territory. Indeed, we are scheduled to depart tomorrow for Camp Robinson, Nebraska Territory, where we are to meet our new Indian husbands.
Although he is only twenty-seven years of age, Captain Bourke is a very important officer, already a war hero, having won the Medal of Honor at the bloody battle of Stones River, Tennessee. He comes from a good middle-class family in Philadelphia, is well-educated and a complete gentleman. He is at once extremely witty, with a mischievous sense of humor, and truly one of the handsomest men I’ve ever set eyes on—dark with intelligent, piercing hazel eyes that seem able to gaze directly into my heart. It is most disconcerting.
Under the circumstances you might think that there is little opportunity for gaiety or flirtation among our group of lambs off to slaughter, but this is not so. Dinnertime especially offers us some diversion from the boredom and inactivity of fort life, and in the manner natural to any group of unmarried women, all have been vying for the Captain’s attentions. And all are green with envy that he only has eyes for me.
Our mutual, and perforce, perfectly innocent attraction and good-natured banter has not been lost on Miss Lydia Bradley, the post commander’s pretty, if vapid, daughter, to whom Captain Bourke is engaged to be married this summer. She watches her fiance like a hawk—as I would if he were mine—and misses no opportunity to divert him from his attentions toward me.
As a painfully obvious tactic toward this end, Miss Bradley goes to great lengths to cast me in an unfavorable light in the Captain’s eyes. Unfortunately she’s not a terribly clever girl, and her efforts so far have been distinctly unsuccessful. Tonight at table, for instance, she said: “Tell me, Miss Dodd, as a member of the church missionary society, I am curious to know with which denomination you are affiliated?” Ah, so her first gambit would be to expose me as a Protestant in front of the Captain who, is himself, as he had just informed us, Catholic, having been educated as a boy by the Jesuits.
“Actually, Miss Bradley, I am neither a member of the missionary society,” I said, “nor affiliated with any particular denomination. Truth be told, I’m a bit of an agnostic when it comes to organized religion.” I have found that the best, and certainly simplest defense of one’s faith, or lack thereof, is the truth. And while I hoped that this information did not prejudice the good Captain against me, it has also been my experience that the Roman Catholics often prefer those of no faith to those of the wrong faith.
“Oh?” said the girl, feigning confusion. “I would have thought that to go among the heathens as a missionary, membership in the church would be the very first requisite.”
It was again obvious where Miss Bradley was trying so clumsily to lead me. I’m certain that the Captain’s sense of duty and discretion would have prevented him from discussing professional matters with his fiancée, but clearly she had by now deduced the true nature of our enterprise.
“That would depend,” I answered lightly, “on what sort of mission one was fulfilling, Miss Bradley. Of course, I am not at liberty to discuss the details of our upcoming work among the savages, but suffice it to say that we are … shall we say … ambassadors of peace.”
“I see,” said the girl, visibly disappointed that she had elicited from me no hint of embarrassment for being a wanton woman off to couple with heathens. Having spent over a year in a lunatic asylum for roughly this same “sin,” I am scarcely intimidated by the transparent interrogations of a twit such as Miss Bradley. “Ambassadors of peace …” she added, trying for a trace of sarcasm in her voice.
“That’s right,” I said, and I quoted:
“‘A peace is of the nature of a conquest;
For then both parties nobly are subdu’d,
And neither party loser.’
 
So saith the great Shakespeare.”
“Henry VI
, Part Two, Act IV, Scene 2!” boomed the Captain, with a broad smile. And then he quoted himself:
“‘You did know
How much you were my conqueror, and that
My sword, made weak by my affection, would
Obey it on all cause.’”
 
“Antony and Cleopatra,
Act III, Scene 11,” I said, with equal pleasure.
“Wonderful!” the Captain said. “You’re a student of the Bard, Miss Dodd!”
I laughed heartily. “And you, too, sir!” And poor Miss Bradley, having inadvertently led us, like horses to water, toward yet another common interest, fell silent and brooding, as we embarked upon a lively discussion of the great Shakespeare, joined enthusiastically by Miss Flight. The Captain is bright and extremely well read—altogether a perfectly charming dinner companion, and the evening was very gay, without further mention of our rapidly approaching fate …
Yes, yes, I know, Hortense. I can hear your objections already. I am fully aware that this is hardly the time to be embarking upon romantic liaisons—especially as both Captain Bourke and I are, shall we say, “bespoke.” On the other hand, perhaps there is no better time for just such innocent flirtation—which is certainly all that it can be. After my ghastly ordeal in the asylum, where I fully expected to die lying in a dark, sunless room, you cannot imagine how wonderful it is to be in the company of a dashing Army officer who finds me … desirable. You would have no way of knowing this dear, but often forbidden love is the sweetest of all … ah yes, I can just hear you saying, “Good Lord, now she speaks of love!”
After dinner, poor Miss Bradley was “unwell”—the second time she has fallen ill since she’s dined with our group. The Captain maintains that she is simply too delicate for frontier life, but as we women well know, feigning illness is the last refuge of one who lacks imagination.
I was already on the porch waiting for him when, after escorting Miss Bradley home, Captain Bourke returned to smoke his evening cigar. It was a lovely spring evening, warm and mild. The days are lengthening and dusk was just beginning to settle over the land, so that the bare rocky buttes of this godforsaken country were softened in gentle outline against the horizon. There was still a bit of color in the sky where the sun had set over the western hills. I stood facing the day’s last fading light when the Captain approached.
“Would you care to take a stroll around the fort grounds, Miss Dodd?” he asked, stepping beside me so that his arm brushed lightly against mine. His touch was like that of flesh on flesh. It made my knees weak.
“I’d be delighted, Captain,” I said, but I did not move away from his touch … indeed, could not. “Are you certain that your fiancée would approve,” I added only half-jokingly, “of your keeping company with another woman?”
“Unquestionably she would not,” the Captain said. “I’m sure you must find her to be a silly thing, Miss Dodd.”
“No, not silly,” I said. “Quite charming actually. Perhaps only rather young for her years … a bit callow.”
“And yet she is not, I suspect, very much younger than you, madam,” he said.
“Ah, tread cautiously, Captain!” I said “—a delicate subject, a woman’s age. In any case, I am old for my years. As you are for yours.”
“In what way old, Miss Dodd?” he asked.
“In the way of experience, Captain Bourke,” I said. “Perhaps you and I can more fully appreciate the great Shakespeare because we have both lived enough of life to understand the truth and wisdom of his words.”
“In my case war was a stern teacher of truth, if not wisdom,” said the Captain. “But how is it that a young woman of your obvious breeding knows so much of life, madam?”
“Captain, it is quite likely that you and I will not know each other long enough for my personal history to matter,” I said.
“It matters to me already, Miss Dodd,” he said. “Surely, you are aware of that.”
I still stared at the horizon, but I could feel the Captain’s dark eyes on my face, the heat of his arm against mine. My breath came in shallow draughts as if I could not take sufficient air into my lungs. “It is late, Captain,” I managed to say. “Perhaps we should take our stroll another time.” Where our arms had touched and now parted it was like tearing my own flesh from the bone.
My candle burns down, dear Hortense, I must rest my pen …
I am,
Your loving sister, May

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