Judith E French (26 page)

 

R
ed-haired Fiona O’Neal held her breath against the stench of the unwashed fur-clad trappers as she pushed aside the ragged deerskin curtain between the store and the public room of Jacob Clough’s Indian trading post. Fear curled in the pit of her stomach and stretched cold fingers up her spine, but she pulled her homespun shawl up over her hair and entered the low-ceilinged room with a face as expressionless as that of the drunken Huron brave slumped against the fireplace wall.

Jacob Clough banged his battered tin cup against the sagging trencher table. “Damn you, Fiona!” he roared. “What took you so long? My customers are thirsty.” On the far side of the table two filthy, bearded white men leered at her and held out their mugs as she poured the rotgut whiskey with unwavering hands.

You’d be proud of me, Grandsire, she thought. She could almost hear his gravelly voice in her mind.
Steady. Steady hands,
he’d growled at her a thousand times.
A woman with trembling hands is as useless as a horse with three legs.

The nearest man, his scarred features almost hidden by yellow, tobacco-stained whiskers, caught hold of Fiona’s arm below the elbow. “Pretty little thing, ain’t ye, girlie?” He laughed, exposing broken, green-scummed teeth.

She twisted, trying to free her arm from his iron grip, but his long, dirty fingernails dug into her flesh with the tenacity of a bulldog. His companion snickered.

“Feisty, too, ain’t she?” Fiona’s captor gloated. He yanked her closer, bringing his bearded face so near that she gagged at the smell of his foul breath.

Fiona slammed the jug of whiskey down on his other hand, smashing his fingers against the oak table. Yellow Beard yelped with pain and let go of her arm. In a heartbeat, she was halfway across the room.

“What the hell—” Jacob shouted.

“I’ll not be handled by filth such as that!” she shot back. She was trembling now—not with fear but with anger—and her green eyes were as hard as Sligo flint. “Bondwoman I may be,” she spat in fiery English, heavily accented with the lilting pipes of Ireland. “I’ll cook, and scrub, and tote your stinking slop buckets, but I’ll whore for no man.”

A movement by the blazing hearth caught Fiona’s attention, and her head snapped around. The Indian brave’s sloe eyes were open wide, and for an instant their gazes met, and the green of the Irish sea washed against gleaming obsidian. In the savage blackness of dark eyes that were more like a wolf’s than a human’s, she read compassion. The shock was so great that it rocked her back a step, but when she looked again, the painted Huron’s eyes were expressionless, and his face showed the slacken waste of a drunkard.

“What did I tell you, Karl?” Jacob demanded of the blond trapper. “She’s cherry. There’s none so pure as an Irish virgin. Papist, she is, and certain she’ll burn in hell does she lift her skirts for an honest romp.”

Fiona felt the heat rise in her cheeks. Damn Jacob Clough to the deepest pit in hell! Who was he to shame her before these animals just because he’d bought her indenture in Philadelphia? This was supposed to be a land of opportunity! What kind of government would permit such injustice? Even in Ireland, she’d been treated with more respect by the occupying British troops. “You’ll not do this to me, Jacob,” she swore. “Not if I have to cut your black heart out to stop it.”

“We’ll take ’er,” Karl said.

His partner, a hulking bear of a man with a patch over one eye, leaped to his feet and drove a hunting knife into the table between Jacob’s thumb and index finger. “Not so fast. He said the one he sold us two years ago was cherry too, but she was worn as an old shoe—red-haired slut. Jacob’s partial to redheaded women. Ain’t no chance of nothin’ old enough to breed being virgin.”

Jacob drew back his hand and blinked. His face had taken on a pasty shade of white. “No need to carry grudges agin’ old friends, Nigel,” he sputtered. “This one’s different. I got me a squaw to look to m’ needs. She cooks what I tell her to, and she spreads her legs when I say so—without givin’ me any backtalk. I got no need of such fine-bone spirit as Fiona’s. ’Course . . .” He grinned. “I ain’t spendin’ the winter in the mountains with only Karl to keep my backside warm.”

“How much?” Nigel demanded.

Jacob stepped away from the table. “Dear. Fiona’ll come dear. I gave you a bargain on Gerty ’cause you promised to sell her back to me come spring. Who cheated who on that deal?”

“Wolves et her,” Karl said.

“Not what I heard.” Jacob shook his head. “Word was that Frenchman Roquette bought a scalp off you, Nigel—a white woman’s scalp with hair like a blazin’ sunset.”

“Karl tole ye wolves et her. Didn’t say they et her hair.” Nigel grinned. “No sense wasting a good scalp, was there? Not with Roquette paying hard silver for hair.”

“Gerty sure didn’t need it no more,” Karl added.

A wave of back terror washed over Fiona, squeezing her chest so tight that she could hardly breathe. Abequa, Jacob’s plump Ojibwa wife, had warned her that he had sold another bond girl to these two fur trappers. Abequa had advised her to be nice to Jacob, to let him feel her breasts and buttocks—even to bed him if he wanted her.

She’d refused. The last time Jacob had tried to touch her, she’d spilled hot bacon grease on him. Nothing would make her submit to being mauled by a man. She might be a bond servant now, but she didn’t intend to remain one. And being a servant didn’t make her a trollop.

Unconsciously, Fiona’s hand went to the amulet at her throat. It was her last tie with home . . . her only friend. Her necklace had been a source of strength when her grandfather had died in Dublin, leaving her destitute. And the familiar charm had helped when Jason Bryant, the kindly Philadelphia apothecary she’d been apprenticed to, had succumbed to typhoid and her indenture had been auctioned off along with the contents of the shop. Now the amulet offered nothing. It hung around her neck like a lump of coal.

“You can’t do this,” she protested desperately. “I’m no whore! I’m a trained apothecary. I’m a healer. If you have no need of me, then sell my indenture to someone who does—not to such men as these be.”

“Fifty pounds,” Jacob said.

“You’re mad as Roquette’s horse,” Nigel said.

“Look at her.” Jacob’s voice became as silky as oil running over a cast-iron skillet. “Look at those hips. Turn around, Fiona, so the gentlemen can see your hips.”

“Twenty,” Nigel offered.

“Show us her tits,” Karl said. “I like a woman with big tits.”

Fiona’s knees went weak. She tasted the metallic dryness of fear on her tongue. He’s going to do it—the bastard’s going to sell me. He’ll make the devil’s profit, she thought with black Irish humor. Jacob paid twelve pounds for my indenture, and he’s asking fifty.

“She’ll fight you like a cornered badger,” Jacob said, “and when you get in the saddle, she’ll be as tight as wadding down a musket barrel.”

Tears gathered in the corners of Fiona’s eyes. Every instinct bade her to run—but where could she go? The trading post stood alone in hundreds of miles of trackless wilderness. There wasn’t a road or a white settlement for days.

Beg Jacob to keep you,
a voice in Fiona’s head cried.
He’s a coarse pig, but he’s better than these two. If you go with them, you’ll die. Tell Jacob you’ll do anything he wants.

Another mocking voice chimed in.
What did you expect? Are you any better than your mother? You can make a purse from a sow’s ear easier than you can make a lady of a whore’s bastard.

Jacob lifted the hem of Fiona’s skirt, exposing her black-wool stockinged legs to the knee. “Look at these legs,” he coaxed. “A lonely man would kill his own grandmother for legs like these to wrap around him on a snowy night.”

Karl’s hot eyes and whispered oath of admiration yanked Fiona from her trance. She spun away from Jacob, leaping not for the doorway as he expected, but instead running to the fireplace and seizing a flaming brand.

“By Mary’s robe,” she swore, “you’ll not sell me for a bawd and live to tell of it!” She whirled the flaming log around her head and bashed him across the shoulders with it. He screamed and fell back against the doorway, beating at a spark clinging to his shirtfront.

Karl howled with glee and plowed over the bench to grab her, but Fiona saw him coming out of the corner of her eye. She twisted around and struck him across the side of the face. His laughter turned to cries of pain. With his beard on fire in two places, Karl plunged through the outside door to bury his head in the knee-deep snow.

Panting for breath, Fiona backed against the far wall, nearly tripping over the drunken Indian. Jacob barred the way to the store and living quarters; Nigel stood between her and the door through which Karl had escaped. “Don’t come near me,” she warned Nigel. “I’ll kill you if you come near me!” She was too frightened to realize that she’d lapsed into Gaelic, or that she was standing inches from a wild savage.

“Put it down, woman,” Nigel said, taking a step toward her. “Put it down, unless ye want to feel the weight of my fist.”

Sweat ran down Fiona’s face and dripped into her eyes. She wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Her skirts were very close to the flames; she could feel the intense heat through her stout leather shoes. “I mean it,” she said. “I’ll kill you.”

Karl appeared in the doorway. “You bitch,” he said. “You bloody bitch. I get her first, Nigel. She’s mine.”

Nigel lunged at her, and she flung the brand with all her might. The log hit his chin and right shoulder, but he kept coming. Fiona feinted left, then ducked right under his arm and ran toward Jacob. He staggered up and spread his arms to catch her, and Fiona balled her fist and punched him square in the nose. Blood flowed.

When Jacob grabbed his nose, Fiona turned sideways and tried to squeeze through the opening, which led to the storeroom. She knew Jacob kept a loaded musket under the counter. I may not get them all, she thought, but I’ll shoot the first one.

She was three-quarters of the way past when Nigel grabbed her thick braid and yanked her head back. She screamed and struggled to get free. Her teeth closed around his hand, and she bit down hard. With a cry of rage, Nigel drew his fist and slammed it into her jaw. She went down in a crumpled heap.

Jacob sniffed loudly and wiped his nose. “Thirty pounds,” he offered. “I told you she was a wild one.”

Nigel didn’t answer. He stepped over Fiona’s still form and went into the store, returning with an Indian trade blanket of red wool. He spread it on the floor, picked up Fiona and laid her on it, then rolled the blanket around her. From a bag at his waist, he drew four silver crowns. “Twenty,” he said. “Take it or leave it.” He slung Fiona over one shoulder and glanced at Jacob.

“Twenty-five,” Jacob bargained. “When will the likes of you find a woman like her?”

Nigel started for the door.

“Done,” Jacob cried. “Wait, I’ll fetch her papers for you.”

Nigel tossed the coins to the floor. “Don’t need no damned papers where I’m takin’ her,” he said. He glared at Karl. “Bring them mules around and fetch me some rope.”

Jacob followed Nigel out into the snowy twilight. “No need to leave tonight,” he said. “Sleep here until morning. Me and my woman won’t be no bother to you.”

The Indian opened his eyes partway and watched through the open door as Nigel tied the unconscious woman across a dun-colored mule. The trappers mounted their animals and rode off into the forest, leading another mule. Wolf Shadow remained motionless as Jacob Clough came back inside and stomped the snow off his boots.

“Ungrateful bitch,” Jacob muttered. “Serves her right.” He scowled and looked around the room. “Abequa! Abequa!” Jacob’s voice rose to a shout as he called to his Indian wife. There was no answer. “Now, where in hell’s that lazy squaw?” Jacob glanced at Wolf Shadow, then pushed aside the deerskin and stalked into the next room.

Wolf Shadow opened his eyes again and stared at the outside door. The red-haired woman had the heart of
meshepeshe,
the panther. She had put up a brave fight—she deserved better treatment than she would receive from the two white men who had carried her off.

He took a deep breath and flexed his cramped muscles. White women were none of his concern. He’d come here to Jacob Clough’s trading post for a much more important reason than interfering in the sale of a woman. He should be thinking about Jacob and the two white men who worked for him—the bondman Harrison and the squint-eyed one called Zeke. Wolf Shadow hadn’t seen Zeke for several hours. Zeke carried a knife, and he threw it with the skill of an Iroquois. Wolf Shadow knew that if he wasn’t cautious, he could pay for his recklessness with his life.

Nevertheless, the woman’s pale freckled face with its green cat eyes haunted him. Troubled, Wolf Shadow leaned back against the logs and went over the scene again in his mind’s eye.

He remembered with shame that once—for a flash of time—he had looked into the white woman’s eyes, and she had looked into his. She had gazed at him in a way that made him wonder if she knew he was not a Huron as he pretended to be. As if she knew that he had not drunk the firewater, but only poured it over himself and pretended to be imprisoned by the liquor’s evil spell. But if she had read the truth in his eyes, she would have exposed him as an impostor . . . wouldn’t she?

The green-eyed woman was a great puzzle to him, and it was just as well that she was gone from this place, he decided. Still, the scent of her seemed to linger in the air, and he could not help but wonder what her thick red-gold hair would feel like sliding over his fingertips.

 

An hour later Harrison, the bond servant, entered the public room. The fire had burned to a single glowing log, giving little light. Wolf Shadow didn’t need much light. Harrison didn’t notice him until he clamped an arm around his neck and pressed the point of his steel knife against the bondman’s spine. “Make noise—you die quick,” Wolf Shadow threatened, deliberately using broken English.