So Wide the Sky Page 6

  "A dream," Cassandra nodded. "When Kiowa—" She bit her lip, searching for the words. "—took me."

  Sally set the candle aside and came to kneel on the pallet Cassandra had made for herself on the floor.

  "...you doing down here?" she asked, drawing Cassandra into her arms. "Oh... doesn't... matter, does it?"

  Cassie resisted Sally's embrace at first, uncomfortable with her closeness, the sense of being confined. But there was warmth in Sally McGarrity, warmth and comfort, compassion and tenderness.

  My mother held me like this, Cassie found herself thinking. She stiffened in Sally's arms. It wasn't good for her to remember things like that. It wasn't safe. If she thought about what her life used to be like, she'd want to go back, and there was no going back. No family, no friends, no home in Kentucky.

  "There, there," she heard Sally McGarrity whisper.

  Cassie knew there was no family left. It would do no good to ask Drew about the massacre. Drew's survival was miraculous enough. She dared not hope that Ma and Pa had lived to start the trading post in Santa Fe they'd dreamed about. She knew in her heart that Susannah, Lucy, Faith, and Janey were dead, not flirting with beaus or happily married and having children of their own.

  She fought down the wave of grief she'd held inside for nine long years. There was no time for grieving now, just as there had been no time for it when she and Julia had been fighting to stay alive.

  Julia.

  Cassandra closed her eyes. Julia weighed heavily on her conscience, a burden of truth she had to share with Drew. But how could she explain what had befallen Drew's treasured younger sister? She could not tell him through Alain Jalbert, not in Hunter's words, not with Hunter there to hear her. They must speak of it alone. She must somehow find the words to tell Drew about Julia herself.

  Sally McGarrity gradually loosened her hold on Cassandra and smoothed back her hair. "Better now?" she asked.

  Cassie nodded.

  "You want... bed... there?" she inquired, indicating the narrow iron bedstead.

  "Pokes me," Cassandra answered, jabbing with her finger.

  Sally McGarrity laughed and came to her feet. "Straw ticks do that. You want,"—she gestured as if she were pouring from a pot—"coffee? It's getting light."

  Without waiting for an answer, Sally went into the kitchen. Cass heard the rumble of the coffee grinder and smelled the thick, dark essence of the beans. Taking a moment to search out her blanket and moccasins, Cassandra joined her.

  She was surprisingly comfortable sitting across the table from this woman she had known less than a day. But then, Sally McGarrity seemed content with Cassie's silence, content to wait for the coffee to boil.

  Taking care not to stare, Cass studied the older woman, seeing kindness and warmth in her deep blue eyes; the soft, sweet line to her mouth, waving strands of silver in her auburn hair. She seemed possessed of an abiding serenity, an infinite calm. It must have made her the perfect foil for the major's energy.

  He rumbled into the room a short time later as the two women sat over steaming cups of coffee. "...three... after six," he grumbled, glaring at his pocket watch, "...that bugler... blown... yet!"

  His words were cut short by the sound of the trumpet.

  "There!" he said, closing his watch with a snap. "Finally."

  "Coffee, Ben?" Sally asked, already reaching for the pot.

  He sat forcefully, gruffly, the way he did everything, and reached for one of last night's biscuits.

  Sally passed him a cup of coffee and the jam. The smile he gave her was only one step short of adoration.

  "I want you... Cassandra... office," he said around bites of his breakfast. "There... questions... answered. Want... about... Cheyenne... I'll see Jalbert... there, too..."

  "Can... you... time... Cassandra... talk... Captain Reynolds?" Sally inquired, and Cass looked up. "They have things... after so many years."

  Ben McGarrity nodded, downed the rest of his coffee in a single draft, and surged to his feet. "Bring Cassandra... after guard..." he instructed, and dutifully bussed his wife's cheek.

  Sally smiled and watched him go.

  Cassie saw the softness in the older woman's eyes, the abiding tenderness in the curve of her lips. Sally loved her big, bluff husband. She had found her special place in the world. And what Cassandra wanted more than anything was to find a place of her own.

  Chapter 6

  Drew sat braced in the corner of Major McGarrity's office, awaiting Cassie Morgan's arrival. He thought he had prepared himself for this morning's meeting. He thought he could look at Cassie, hear her voice, and not feel the terrible clutch of shock, revulsion, and pity he had the day before.

  In a way he had succeeded. What Drew felt as the major ushered Cassie and Mrs. McGarrity to chairs in the cramped office at the rear of the headquarters building was none of those things. It was stunned surprise.

  There was nothing in this young woman to revile or pity. She was dressed in a rich, blue bodice and matching skirt, with a furl of ecru lace cresting at the base of her throat. Her taffy-colored hair draped low on her cheeks and fell in glossy ringlets from beneath the back of her deep-brimmed bonnet. With a soft half smile and discreetly lowered lashes, Cassie was alluring, coquettish, and astonishingly beautiful.

  The promise of that beauty must have been evident in the girl Drew had known—in the sculpted bones of her face, in the ivory glow of her complexion, in the clear, arresting eyes. As a young man he had seen all that, but he had never understood that one day Cassie would possess a loveliness that could turn a man inside out.

  Yet he knew the Indian tattoo was lurking like the serpent in the Garden of Eden, hidden in the shadow of the bonnet, disguised by the drape of her hair. It would always be there, evidence of the years Cassie had spent with the savages, marking her in a way she could never erase.

  Certainly Drew could never forget it. He couldn't allow himself that luxury.

  The ladies were just getting settled when Alain Jalbert shouldered his way into the room.

  McGarrity waited only long enough for Jalbert to lower himself into the empty chair.

  "Well then, let's get started," McGarrity began. "I want to know about the Indians. I want to know how many Cheyenne were in the band where she was living. I want to know what alliances they've made with the Sioux. I want to know how many warriors Red Cloud and his lieutenants can muster against us come spring."

  Jalbert sent the major a long, assessing glance. "And what makes you think she'll tell you any of that?"

  "Of course she'll tell us," Drew spoke up. "Why wouldn't Cassie tell us?"

  Jalbert's eyebrows rose, and Drew felt the sting of the half-breed's contempt. "Because she's been living with the Indians all this time. Because she probably considers herself as much Cheyenne as white."

  Drew's outrage was caustic and hot. "But the savages killed her family!"

  "You said it was the Kiowa," Jalbert put in softly, "who attacked your families' wagons."

  "Yes," Drew acknowledged. "The Kiowa."

  "And she's been living with the Cheyenne."

  Drew scowled with distaste. Redskins were redskins. He didn't care to make such fine distinctions. He didn't like the friendly camp of Sioux clustered at the western perimeter of the fort. He didn't trust the mixed-blood Jalbert, and his spontaneous translations. He wasn't pleased that the girl he remembered had returned from the dead, forcing him to change his thinking about who and what she was.

  Still, how could there be any question of where her loyalty lay?

  "Why don't we let Cass tell her story in her own way?" Jalbert suggested, shifting his gaze to McGarrity. "If you've got questions when she's finished, you can ask them then."

  McGarrity glanced across at his wife before he nodded. Jalbert relayed the request to Cassandra then translated as she began to speak. "I will start with the day the Kiowa came. The day they attacked our wagons. The day they made me their captive."

  McGarrity nodded a
gain. "Go on."

  "Drew,"—she glanced hesitantly in his direction—"and I were riding together a short distance behind the wagons when the Indians began to fire down from the walls of the canyon. They trapped our families in a narrow place where there was no way to escape. They fought bravely, but there were many more Kiowa than there were of us."

  The fear Drew had felt nine years ago clawed at his throat as she spoke. He remembered the blind, raw panic of being pinned down, of being outgunned. Of being helpless.

  "Only when they were sure that everyone in the wagon train was wounded or dead," Jalbert translated as Cassie went on, "did the Kiowa show themselves. Some climbed down the cliff. Some rode into the canyon from the ends. That is how they found me—hidden among the rocks where Drew had left me when he went down to the wagons to fight."

  Cassie sliced another glance in his direction, acknowledging that the worst of the telling still lay ahead.

  Drew swallowed hard, fighting for breath.

  "Only Drew's sister Julia and I were not hurt in the attack. One warrior bound our hands and guarded us while the other Indians killed and scalped our families."

  That day came back to Drew in horrific detail. He smelled the coppery corruption of blood and violence and sudden death. He tasted the rime of dust on the back of his tongue. He heard the wracking of Julia's ceaseless sobs. He'd lain in the rough, sparse grass a few yards away from Cassie and his sister. But he was broken, immobile. Too badly hurt to lift a hand, too weak to hold a pistol and grant them release.

  Sweat crawled down Drew's ribs and beaded in the fringe of his mustache. His hands were shaking when he wiped it away.

  "Tell us the rest," McGarrity prompted her.

  Cassandra nodded, a shudder moving through her. "The Indians looted all the wagons and set them on fire. They tied ropes around our necks and marched us west. They pulled Julia and me along behind their horses and beat us if we stumbled or couldn't keep up.

  "We had been marching for three days when we reached the Kiowa village. There were other prisoners there, and they herded all of us together. The Kiowa women and children poked us with sticks and tore at our hair and clothes. They tortured some of the men."

  Cassie's voice wavered, and Jalbert paused in his translation. Drew saw the half-breed's concern for her in his eyes.

  She drew a long breath and then continued. "Once—once all that was over, they began to divide us up. Some of the children were given to Kiowa mothers who'd lost a child. Most of us were taken as slaves. One of the warriors from the canyon claimed Julia, and another claimed me."

  "Then you don't know what happened to my sister?" Drew burst out, unable to bite the question back. "Did Julia kill herself rather than submit?"

  Cassie looked deep into his eyes. She seemed reluctant to speak of Julia's fate, yet he sensed that when she did, he would finally learn the truth.

  "I think we should let Cass explain what happened in her own way," Jalbert said, and rose to get a dipper of water from the bucket that stood outside the major's door. Cassie drank gratefully and handed it back.

  "For the first months we stayed at the same encampment," she went on once Jalbert had resumed his place, "and I saw Julia every day. We would meet when we went to the creek for water or were sent to gather roots or wood. Though it was forbidden, we would whisper to each other in English so we wouldn't forget the sound of it.

  "Then late in the fall, the warrior who owned Julia went to winter farther south. I did not see her again until the bands came together for the summer hunt," Jalbert continued translating.

  "Julia had changed while we were apart. She had grown pale and thin. I tried to spend as much time with her as I could, but the brave who owned her caught us speaking English, and both of us were beaten. After the gathering, Julia's Kiowa family returned to the south."

  "Dear God," Sally McGarrity said. "Was there no chance to escape? Didn't you try to run away?"

  Cassie bit her lip as if she were not sure how to answer. "Where would I run to if I had?"

  Cassie's resignation made Drew angry. She should have at least tried to escape. She should have died trying.

  McGarrity leaned forward from his perch on the corner of the desk. "But how did you come to be with the Cheyenne?"

  Cassie drew a shaky breath and raised her head. "I was wagered in a horse race. Gray Falcon won me for his wife."

  Sally McGarrity gasped.

  The major cursed low in his throat.

  Drew shuddered with the chill that ran the length of his back. Visions of what being wife to a warrior meant swam through his mind: some red bastard tearing at her clothes, dark hands mauling her, a savage grunting and panting between her thighs.

  Gooseflesh rippled along Drew's arms. How had Cassie stood the degradation? How had she survived the shame? Good women killed themselves before submitting to an Indian. Why hadn't she?

  He lifted his hand to rub the gooseflesh away and saw the half-breed watching him. Jalbert had known all along what had happened to Cassie. He had known how repulsed Drew would be by it, and he was arrogant enough to sit in judgment.

  Drew was quivering inside when he reached across to take Cassandra's hand. "It doesn't matter," he told her, responding to the challenge in the Indian's hooded eyes. "What matters is that you survived, that you have been returned to us."

  Drew hadn't noticed how pale Cassie had become until her color came flooding back. "Do you mean that, Drew?" she whispered, her face suddenly shining with hope.

  "Of—of course he means it," Sally McGarrity answered. "We're all glad you're here at the fort, aren't we, Ben?"

  The major scowled. "Of course we're glad. Now, missy, just how long were you with the Cheyenne?"

  "I lived with the Cheyenne for six years," Cassie answered.

  "Did you always live with the same band?"

  "Most of the time," Jalbert translated for her.

  "And where was that?"

  "We lived with Black Kettle's band until the attack on the Sand Creek encampment. We were fortunate to escape from Colonel Chivington's troops with our lives."

  Cassandra's quiet revelation sent shock ricocheting around the room.

  "Oh, my Lord!" Sally gasped.

  The major scowled.

  Even Jalbert's calm seemed ruffled by Cassie's answer.

  Only Drew maintained his composure. He had read early accounts of Colonel Chivington's victory over the Indians in the newspapers back East, and it seemed an infinitely well-planned and well-considered action. Chivington had come upon the encampment in the early morning while the Cheyenne were still abed and had his men ride down any hostiles who tried to escape. Only later did it come out that Colonel Chivington had attacked a company of Cheyenne that was under the army's protection, and that his men had slaughtered Indians who hadn't even tried to resist.

  Still, considering that the redskins had been raiding in the Colorado territory for months, considering what Drew himself knew of savages, he'd had no trouble defending Chivington's actions to his fellow officers. That had given him a reputation as an Indian hater, but it had also gotten him assigned to Fort Carr when many of his classmates from West Point were fighting bureaucracy back in Washington.

  Cassie ducked her head before continuing. "It was after Sand Creek that we took what we could salvage and made our way north toward the Republican River."

  That single fact defined the stance Cassandra's Indian husband had taken. He had allied himself with the raiders. Under Red Cloud, the Cheyenne and the Sioux had wreaked havoc most of the previous year. They had attacked travelers on the Bozeman Trail, harassed Forts Phil Kearney and C.F. Smith, and massacred poor Captain Fetterman and his men just before Christmas. Now they were holed up in their winter camps, but come spring...

  "But why did the Cheyenne agree to trade you back?" McGarrity asked after a moment, and waited for Jalbert to repeat the words.

  Cassie's chin came up. Her eyes were hard, her mouth drawn tight at the corners, as
if his question had touched her on the raw.

  "My husband no longer wanted me," she answered. "And no other warrior would take me to wife. I am childless, barren. Of no use to a husband. Of no use to the tribe. That is why they gave me back."

  Drew could barely believe what he was hearing. White women never spoke of such private things. While they might whisper among themselves, no lady would make such a declaration. What shook him even more was that Cassie almost seemed willing to bear some warrior's child. But how could she consider that after what the savages had done to both their families?

  McGarrity pressed on, still determined to get his answers. "Ask her if she knew Standing Pine meant to use her to lure Captain Reynolds's patrol into that ambush?"

  Jalbert did not even bother to translate. "She didn't know," he said.

  "You're sure of that?" McGarrity asked with a frown.

  "Absolutely, sir."

  "You aren't even going to ask her?"

  The half-breed shook his head. "I saw her face when the hostiles came over the rise."

  McGarrity scowled in disbelief. "How can you be certain that after a few days here at the fort, she won't steal a horse and hightail it back to report our strength?"

  "The Indians don't want her," Jalbert answered steadily.

  "So she says." The major studied the half-breed seated before him. "Can you guarantee she hasn't been sent to spy on us?"

  Drew wanted Jalbert to be right in this. Though Cassandra might be marked, violated, soiled by her years with the savages, there was still enough of the girl he'd known in her to make Drew long to believe in her.

  Jalbert looked across at Cassie and back at the major. "I'd stake my life on her loyalty. Now, Major, if there isn't anything more you want me to ask her, it seems to me..."

  The way Jalbert had appointed himself Cassandra's guardian offended Drew. The half-breed had no rights where Cassie was concerned.

  "I've nothing more now," the major conceded. "I still want more specifics about the Indians she's been living with, though that can wait."