The Pride of Hannah Wade (29 page)

This was not the way she’d envisioned her homecoming. Now she could see how foolish she had been to think she could return with no questions asked, no recriminations. Her ordeal with the Apaches had been harsh and abhorrent, and the repercussions of it were only beginning.

“Hannah.” His fingers stroked her cheek in a delicate caress, his face so very near hers. She could hear the desire in his voice, and the reluctance that was ground into it.

Once his touch might have thrilled her, but tonight she was oddly unresponsive. The bloom of the evening
had faded; the moment when she could have gone freely into his arms had pasted. He wanted her, but it was still in his mind that she’d lain with Lutero. Her own memories were too strong. When Stephen touched her, she wanted no thought of Lutero in her mind.

“It’s been a long day, Stephen,” Hannah said quietly, and felt his slow withdrawal before he straightened away from her. “I think I shall retire.”

That hard-driving energy, so tightly leashed, turned him away and carried him to the whiskey decanter on the side table. “I’ll be along . . . directly.”

A quilt covered the straw-tick mattress, creating a cushiony soft bed. It formed to her body as she lay on it, surrounded by inky darkness. Occasionally she could hear the chink of a glass from the parlor or footsteps impatiently pacing. Everything was so familiar, yet the sensations had been forgotten and had to be discovered all over again. She wished Stephen was beside her so she could tell him all these things, share the wonder of returning to all the things she’d taken for granted in the past, but that was denied, and the pleasure of these discoveries was lessened.

The agitated tempo of Stephen’s footsteps changed to a decisive sound as he entered the narrow hallway and approached the bedroom. Hannah tensed, without being sure why. He came into the room and stopped, a dark shape blending into the black shadows, indistinct.

“Hannah, are you asleep?”

She hesitated a moment, debating whether to feign sleep, then replied, “No.”

“I’ve decided. You will tell no one the details of your capture.”

“Stephen.” She raised herself up on an elbow, protesting his words.

“Did you tell Griswald?”

She was confused by this compulsion to defend her
actions, to justify her behavior. “He asked. He’s a doctor. I wanted to be sure—“

“I’ll speak to him,” Stephen cut in, almost as if he was thinking aloud. “He’ll keep his mouth shut.”

All her feelings flattened out and she lay back on the mattress to stare blankly at the ceiling. “What do you want me to tell them, Stephen?”

“The truth. That you were a slave, a handmaid to that Apache squaw.”

“If I say it often enough, will they believe it? Will you believe it?” Hannah asked in a sad voice.

“It isn’t that, Hannah.” He came to the bed and sat on the edge, leaning over her and stroking her auburn hair. “I don’t want them to be looking at you and wondering things that are none of their business. You’ve been through enough. If I can, I want to protect you from any more unpleasantness. Do you understand?”

“Yes. Yes, I see,” she murmured.

Out on the parade ground, the trumpeter blew taps. The long, sad notes made a lonely call across the night, the song rising, reaching, and fading into a final sigh. Its silent echo lingered, holding them motionless for several seconds. Then Stephen leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead, the thick broom of his mustache again sweeping her skin.

“Good night, my love.” It was a husky whisper of longing and regret.

Hannah shut her eyes against the churn of emotions, the hurt and the want, the warmth and the cold, the bitterness and the sweet. He straightened, then moved away from the bed.

The strangeness of her surroundings, the half-forgotten sounds and smells and sensations, made it impossible for Hannah to sleep soundly. Much later she heard Stephen come to bed. For a long time, he lay beside her, not touching her, an arm flung above his
head. She wondered if he knew she was awake, but said nothing.

The adobe house in which the commanding officer and his wife resided was considerably larger and better appointed than the rest of the quarters along Officers’Row. A large four-poster bed with an elaborately carved headboard, dominated the bedroom, crowding a tall armoire into a comer. Mrs. Bettendorf sat on a cloth-draped steamer trunk disguised as a bench, which was positioned near the window where the morning light was good.

She held a mirror in order to watch and approve every curl and wave Cimmy Lou’s long, deft fingers made in her hair. Such a contrast they made—the staid, large-bosomed matron with her silver hair and powdered face, and the earthy, high-breasted woman with her coffee-colored skin and black, shining eyes holding all of night’s mysteries in their depths.

“You do have fine healthy hair, Miz Bettendorf.” Cimmy Lou combed the blue-gray strands, already curled by the hot iron, around her finger and fashioned them into position in a nest of long rolls.

“I believe this side is too full. Smooth more of it away from my face.” Mrs. Bettendorf critically examined her reflection, not responding to the compliment from one who was of the servant class, yet preening slightly.

Cimmy Lou skinned back more of the gray hair, accomplishing the feat that made her hairdressing skill in such demand, that of firming the age-slackened facial skin. “Yep, you have good hair, Miz Bettendorf. This hot, dry sun ain’t damaged it a Mt. You should see what it’s done to Miz Wade’s hair.”

“Oh?”

“I went an’ did her hair yestiday. I looked close, but she didn’t have no nits in her hair. It worried me some,
her livin’ all that time with the Apaches an’ all.” Deftly she pushed at the rolled curb on top, giving height to the crown. “My husband was there when they found her hidin’ under that pile of wood. You know my husband, Sergeant Hooker?”

“Why was she hiding?” The mirror shifted, its angle changing to include the reflection of Cimmy’s face.

“Scared, I guess.” She lifted a shoulder in a careless shrug. “I s’pose there was a lot of shootin’ goin’ on.”

“There is always the risk of a stray bullet,” Mrs. Bettendorf reasoned aloud.

“I ‘spect yore right. It’s jest natural that she wouldn’t want anythin’ to happen to that baby.”

“What baby?” The mirror was tilted sharply back to reflect Cimmy’s image.

“My husband said it was a shore ‘nuff Apache baby. ‘Scuse me while I get some mo’ pins for yore hair.” She crossed the room to the vanity table and picked up a squat glass dish with an enameled lid.

“Whose baby?” came the impatient demand.

A shell-adorned box sat open on the table, filled with fine lawn kerchiefs edged with lace. “I don’t rightly know whose baby it was.” Cimmy Lou touched the tip of her finger to the delicate lace edging. “You have such purty things, Miz Bettendorf. I always did admire these fancy hankies of yores.”

“Yes, yes. What about this baby?” Ophelia Bettendorf insisted.

“I don’t know nothin’ ‘cept what my husband tote me. Didn’t you think Miz Wade looted like an Indian when she came ridin’ in?” With calculated avoidance of a more informative answer, Cimmy Lou remained preoccupied with the exquisitely fashioned linen squares. “Ain’t you so lucky to have so many of these purty things?”

Mrs. Bettendorf released a long breath. “Why don’t you take one for yourself, Cimmy Lou.”

“Why, thank yon, Miz Bettendorf. Yore so generous.” She quickly picked out the one she’d had her eye on and tucked it deep inside her Mouse. Gathering up the wire pins for the woman’s hair, she turned back to the window. “Ya know that baby must not of belonged to Miz Wade ‘cause she shore didn’t keep it. Cap’n Cutter tole her to give that baby to my husband and she did. ‘Course he gave it to them Apaches to take care of theirselves.” She went back to work on the gray hair.

“How old was that baby?” Ophelia Bettendorf frowned thoughtfully, mentally doing some calculating of her own.

“John T. never said exackly. It was a little tyke, though, tied on one of them boards like they do with the small ones.”

“What else did your husband tell you about Mrs. Wade?”

Half an hour later, Cimmy Lou came to the rear door of Captain Goodson’s quarters. Maude Goodson was in the kitchen, supervising the meal preparations. A bundle of soiled table linens and other laundry sat just inside the doorway.

“Sorry I’m so late, Miz Goodson. Miz Bettendorf kept me a-fixin’ her hair.” Cimmy Lou sniffed the air, a sleek, feline gesture. “My, my, somethin’ shore smells good.”

“I will need these washed and ironed by the weekend,” Mrs. Goodson reminded her. “You will have them done for me, won’t you, Cimmy Lou?” She pressed her hands onto the laundry bundle, as if to keep the dirty linens should the laundress reply in the negative.

“Never you fear, I’ll have ’em done by Friday. You have lovely hands, Miz Goodson, so smooth and white. Miz Wade’s skin used to be like that, but it ain’t no more. The majuh fetched me when she came back yestiday, so’s I could help her bathe an’ all.” Her
wide-eyed look said there was more she could tell, but she turned away, “Mmm, that’s peaches I smell.” She walked toward the open jar sitting on a kitchen worktable, and breathed in the fruity scent. “It’s been a month of Sundays since I had any peaches.”

“How is Mrs, Wade?” Maude Goodson followed after her.

“As well as can be expected, considerin’.” Cimmy Lou lowered her voice. “You know how brown her skin looked? Well, it’s that way all over.” Only a few peaches remained in the bottom of the jar. “Whatcha makin’ with these peaches?”

“A torte.” It was an offhand, uninterested response as Maude pushed the nearly empty jar of peaches toward the colored girl. “Have the rest. We don’t need them.” She strove to sound very casual. “You didn’t really say that Mrs. Wade was dark
all
over, did you?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am.” Cimmy Lou used a knife to stab the peach halves from the jar. “She tole me the Apaches took all her clothes. She had to go ‘round without a stitch.”

Maude Goodson drew back. “I don’t believe that.”

“S’truth,” Cimmy Lou swore, her mouth full of peaches and the juice oozing out the sides.

“Why do you suppose they did that?” Maude wondered with an avid kind of horror and fearful curiosity.

When Cimmy Lou left Officers’ Row, she made a side trip by the parade ground, where dust boiled under the cantering hooves of cavalry horses, which were more familiar with the shouted commands than their riders. She was aware of the heads turning in her direction.

The air was pungent with the smell of horses and manure as she approached the stables. The rasp of a blacksmith’s file came from a shed nearby, and Cimmy Lou altered her course to walk toward the sound. She slowed at the sight of her husband, John T., stripped to
the waist, the hind foot of a hay horse between his legs. A sheen of perspiration made his muscled torso glisten a chocolate black, the hard flesh rippling as he rhythmically bulled the file across the hoof of the newly shod horse. His slouch hat was pushed to the back of his head, showing the mat of thick black curb.

Finished with his task, he set the horse’s foot on the ground and straightened, giving the horse’s rump a slap. His suspenders drooped in two loops from the waistband of his trousers, falling loosely against his small, tight flanks. He walked to the horse’s head, untied its lead rope from the snubbing post, and turned to lead the horse away before he noticed Cimmy Lou. The leap of pleasure that lit up his expression was satisfying. He reached for his blouse, a small bundle on the ground, and led the horse over to her, waiting until he had reached her to put on the gray uniform blouse.

“What are you doin’ here?” He stood close, looking down at her with warm, half-closed eyes.

“Haven’t seen you since reveille.” Her upward glance reminded him of how difficult she had made it for him to leave the bed that morning.

Hooker chirruped to the horse and headed toward the stable, a half-smile showing on his face when she walked with him. It was at times like these that John T. felt he had everything the world could offer him. He was top sergeant, the best damned soldier in the regiment, and married to a beauty, the envy of every man in the regiment. . . and she was here with him by choice, and he didn’t have to wonder whether she was making time with someone else.

“Whatcha got there?” He looked at the large laundry bundle she carried.

“Miz Goodson’s table linens. She’s havin’ a big party this weekend, a fancy welcome for Miz Wade. She’s havin’ oysters, John T. Can you remember what they
taste like?” A ring of longing was in her voice, wistful and seeking. “Must be five years back that the regiment was in Brownsville. They was good, I remember that.”

From the brightness of the day they went into the shadowed interior of the stable, the cloppity-clop of the horse directly behind them. A myriad of smells assailed them, horse and saddle leather mingling with grain and excrement. Cimmy Lou left her laundry bundle atop a wooden barrel just inside the stable doors and followed John T. to the empty stalls.

“Maybe we should get us some oysters.” John T. led the horse into the stall and tied its lead rope to the manger ring. As he walked back to Cimmy Lou, he ran a hand along the animal’s curving neck and withers. “Oysters make a man strong in bed, you know.”

“Is that right?” She slid her fingers over his chest, running them under his shirt to feel the muscled flesh.

“Being married to you, I could use that,” he declared in mock seriousness as his hands settled on the curve of her bottom. He fitted himself into the cradle of her hips and pushed against her in the intimate way husbands and wives have of expressing their desire.

“Maybe you could,” Cimmy Lou agreed in order to provoke him as she moved suggestively against him, feeling the beginnings of his arousal.

Bending his head, he blazed a kiss across her full, coral-tinted lips, and his hands moved around to the front and cupped the undersides of her breasts, holding the weight of them. He felt something else, too.

“What’s this?” His Angers probed inside and came up with the lacy kerchief.

“Miz Bettendorf gave that to me,” she said, taking it and tucking it back inside her bodice.