Merline Lovelace (21 page)

“Yes, she is.”

With a
thump
of his fist, Daniel sent the door banging back against the wall. The batman jumped away and looked to Louise for guidance.

She sat as stiff as a pine plank in a chair tucked into the alcove beside the fireplace, wearing a lilac gown frilled with blonde lace, and an expression of pure anguish.

“Get out,” Daniel ordered the batman, not taking his eyes off her.

“But the lieutenant—”

“Now!”

He slammed the door shut behind the man. Louise didn’t so much as blink at the
thud.

“You must leave, Daniel. I promise James I will not see or speak with you again.”

“James sent me up here.”

Surprise blanked her face. “Why would he do such a thing?”

“He had little choice in the matter.”

“Why do you come?”

“To take you away,” he said bluntly.

She closed her eyes for a moment, drew in a ragged breath. “I struck a bargain. I will hold to it.”

“The bargain is invalid.”

“What is this, ‘invalid’?”

“It has no teeth.”

“I do not understand. What do you say?”

“As Bernard explained it, you agreed to give yourself to James if he stayed my court-martial and pleaded with his father to make sure I didn’t hang. Do I have the right of it?”

“Yes.”

“The problem is, you weren’t free to give yourself. I paid your uncle a bride price. You belong to me.”

She sprang up, shock chasing the torment from her face.

“But you could not— You did not—”

“Take you to my bed?”

“Take me to wife. You were already wed to Elizabeth.”

“You told me yourself it didn’t matter. That many trappers kept both white and Indian wives.”

“Yes, but—”

“We spoke no formal words of marriage, such as you did with Henri, but you belong to me as surely as you did to him.”

“Why do you do this! You can’t want me. Not after all that has happened. There is too much hurt between us, Daniel. Too much hate.”

“I told you at the
cabildo.
I don’t hate you.”

The whip had laid more than his back open. The raw, blistering pain had stripped away guilt, remorse, even grief. All that remained was the need to tell her what was in his heart.

“Elizabeth was my first love, Louise. God willing, you’ll be my last.”

He had to touch her. Lifting a hand, he brushed the edges of a puffy, bite-shaped sore on her lip. The effort cost him more strength than he wanted to admit, but the thought that Wilkinson had put that mark on her sent fury and absolute determination surging through his veins.

“Pack what things you want to bring with you. You’re coming with me.”

Hope leaped into her eyes. “James agrees with this?”

“Yes.”

As quickly as it had come, the hope died. Hugging her arms to her chest, she turned away from him.

“I cannot go away with you. You choose to ignore the curse I was born with. I cannot. Me, I bring you nothing but heartache and grief.”

“You’ve brought neither.”

“But think how you have suffered since that day we met. Think of what Elizabeth suffered.”

He didn’t try to argue, as he had so many times before. He’d learned by now that her fears and beliefs went too deep to be shrugged aside.

“I’ve had time aplenty to think these past weeks. Perhaps it was your destiny to come into my life that day, just as it was mine to find you. It doesn’t matter whether the meeting was the work of the Almighty or the spirits you believe in or happened by mere chance. What’s done can’t be undone. But I do know this. If you deny your heart now, you’ll only cause more suffering to us both.”

She pressed her lips together. She couldn’t refute his last argument. But the legend that had followed her all her life still haunted her.

Daniel settled the matter by curling a knuckle under her chin and tipping her face to his.

“I’m not leaving this place without you.”

T
orn between joy, relief and the nagging worry that she and Daniel tempted fate, Louise let her heart overrule her head. She would go with him. Wherever their paths led, they would walk them together. Whatever storms arose, they would brave them together.

Her blood singing, she rushed into the bedchamber to gather her things. She’d acquired a considerable wardrobe of gowns and fripperies since her arrival in New Orleans. They were carefully packed in the leather-bound trunk Bernard had delivered to the Royal Arms.

She had no thought for silks and cashmere now. Frantic to be away from the two rooms that had become her prison, she pawed through the neatly folded shawls, pantaloons and chemises to the bottom of the trunk. There she found the buckskin leggings and tunic she’d cleaned and packed away soon after her first shopping expedition with the Thibodeaux women. Those, a change of underlinens and the lace-
trimmed lilac dress she was now wearing were all she’d take with her. The rest James could dump in the river for all she cared.

Clutching the few items against her chest, she searched the bedchamber for something to carry them in. An army-issue haversack hung from a peg in the clothespress that held James’s extra uniforms, but it was too large and too heavy for her needs. She decided instead on the leather pouch that contained his writing desk.

Snatching the pouch from the shelf, she dumped the wooden writing box on the bed. Quills, papers and a stoppered horn spilled out. The plug came off the horn and a stain of black ink spread across the coverlet. Louise paid no attention to it as she crammed her few things into the leather bag. Grabbing up a bonnet and shawl at random, she thrust her hand through the strings of her reticule. The reassuring weight of her skinning knife bumped against her thigh as she hurried into the sitting room.

“I’m ready.”

Daniel turned at the sound of her voice, but not before Louise saw the red spotting the back of his shirt. Her glance flew to his face. Deep grooves were carved into his cheeks. Sweat beaded his temple.

The joy singing through her veins stuttered and died. She could only imagine the pain he still suffered. Slinging the pouch over her shoulder, she crossed the room and slid her arm around his waist.

“Come. Let’s leave this place.”

Daniel leaned on her going down the stairs, but when they turned into the taproom, he squared to his full height. His arm stayed across her shoulders, pro
tective and possessive. Louise huddled close to his side, made wary by the sight of so many blue coats and gold epaulets. She searched for James and found him standing tight-lipped beside Bernard Thibodeaux.

The lieutenant didn’t notice the leather pouch, hidden as it was behind her back, but the fact that she wore her bonnet and shawl was enough to put twin spots of red in his cheeks.

“So, you’re leaving.”

“Yes.”

“I suppose I was foolish to think a slut such as you would hold to her promise.”

Daniel started for him. Louise clung to his waist to hold him back and rushed into speech.

“I said I would marry you, James, and so I would if you really wanted me.”

“The hell you would,” Daniel countered savagely.

Ignoring the furious outburst, Louise hurried on. “What you want—what your father wants—are Henri’s name and his fortune. I cannot give you his name, but I give you his fortune. It is yours. All of it. Bernard, you will sign the papers?”

The merchant looked ill at the thought of turning the funds he’d worked so hard to secure for Louise over to the lieutenant.

“Is that what you really desire?”

“It is.”

He looked to Daniel and found no support.

“Those monies are hers to do with as she pleases.”

With a long sigh, Bernard came to join them.
“Well, we have enough witnesses here to swear that’s your wish. I’ll take care of the matter.”

James opened his mouth, and for a fleeting moment Louise wondered whether he would throw her gift back in her face. He snapped it shut again, swallowing whatever he’d intended to say, and turned his back to her.

She didn’t spare him another glance. Digging her fingers into Daniel’s side, she all but pushed him out the door of the Royal Arms and into the warm June dusk.

Daniel handed Louise into Bernard’s carriage, climbed in behind her and dropped his head back against the squabs. She sat on the edge of her seat, but couldn’t draw in a full breath until the vehicle had rolled away from the inn. When it rounded a corner and she saw the last of the Royal Arms, she felt as though a great weight had been lifted from her chest.

“Where do we go?”

“To Doumaine Street,” Bernard answered. “While Daniel’s wounds heal, I’ll speak with the lawyers and arrange for—”

“Not Doumaine Street.” With a grunt, Daniel raised his head. “I don’t trust Wilkinson.”

“Where do wish me to take you? Another inn? I know a quiet place on Canal Street where you could hide away for a few days or weeks.”

“I want you to take me to the cemetery where you buried Elizabeth. I want to see where she lies. Then—” He groped for Louise’s hand and threaded his fingers through hers. “If you will, take us to a
church. That business about the bride price carried us through tonight, but the lieutenant—or his father—may decide to challenge my claim. It’s best to make it legal in every way.”

“You want to be married?” Bernard exclaimed. “Tonight?”

“Yes.”

“But your back bleeds!” Louise protested. “Your knees wobble and shake like those of a babe. You need to be abed, not rattling about in a coach.”

“And so I will be. After we’re married.”

The joy that had gripped her earlier returned, fierce and hot. They’d traveled so many miles together, she and Daniel. Faced so many dangers. Shared so many sorrows. He was in her heart, in her every thought. Now she would take him to husband and stand with him against the world if it came to that.

“All right, we will marry this night. But me, I will not be surprised if you fall on your face at the church.”

“It’s all well and good to talk about being married,” Bernard protested, “but you cannot decide one minute and wed the next. The bans must be cried and the proper documents drawn up.”

“Pah!” Louise said with a shake of her head. “A gold coin took care of the bans when I married Henri. And we need no documents but the marriage lines. Find us a priest.”

“If you think I’ll take you to a church without stopping first at Doumaine Street, you much mistake the matter! Helene would have my head on her best china platter if she did not stand witness with me to your marriage.”

When apprised of the plans, Helene promptly bundled herself into a bonnet and shawl. Bertrice and Marie begged to be allowed to come, as well. Rather than crowd everyone in one carriage, Bernard suggested he take Louise and his family to the Church of the Immaculate Conception and make the necessary arrangements for the marriage ceremony, while his servant drove Daniel to the cemetery.

“I go with Daniel,” Louise said, keeping her hand threaded through his. “We meet you in thirty minutes, yes?”

When the carriage drew up to the cemetery entrance, Louise climbed out first and offered her shoulder to Daniel.

He’d regained some of his strength during the short ride, and walked without leaning on her, but the spreading stain on his back worried her. Frowning, she took her lower lip between her teeth. Pain arrowed through her and she loosed the still healing flesh instantly.

“This way,” she murmured, tasting blood.

Their footsteps crunched on the crushed-shell walk and echoed through the quiet. Although the spreading oaks cast much of the burial ground in shadow and made the hanging moss look like long fingers reaching from the graves, a summer moon shed enough light for Louise to find her way among the marble crypts and statues. Kneeling figures with arms lifted to the stars in supplication and prayer guided her. An angel with widespread wings beckoned.

“The gate is locked,” she told Daniel when they approached the tomb where Elizabeth lay. “You
cannot go inside, but I will show you which shelf holds her coffin.”

Nodding, he let her lead him to the iron grate. Barely enough light filtered through the bars for her to make out the dim shapes inside.

A glint of gold caught her eye. The trophy she’d given Elizabeth to take with her into the spirit world lay where she’d left it, but the soft sigh of a breeze through the moss whispered its own message.

Yes,
Louise answered silently.
I’ve kept my promise. I’ve brought Daniel to mourn you properly.

Easing to one side, she made room for him at the bars.

“There. Do you see? The moon shines on the oak boards you cut and nailed.”

“I see.”

“I’ll leave you, then, to say what prayers you will for her.”

Retracing her steps, she stopped in the shadow of a weeping mother bent over a cross and a lamb. Face lifted to the stars, Louise offered her own prayers.

Give him peace, Elizabeth.

He loved you greatly and with honor. Any pain that comes because of what we do tonight, give to me. Any guilt that must be born, let me bear it.

Please, give him peace.

D
aniel and Louise were married in a side chapel of the Church of the Immaculate Conception. Votive candles flickered in red glass containers. The faint perfume of incense drifted on the dank air. Bernard stood with Daniel, Helene with Louise. Bertrice took everything in with wide eyes and Marie cried softly into her handkerchief.

A donation of five gold louis to the orphans’ fund ended the priest’s objections to performing the ceremony without having the bans read. Since Daniel was not Catholic, no mass was sung, but he was required to pledge that any children born of the union would be baptized and raised in the One True Faith.

That formality taken care of, the black-robed priest recited the Latin phrases that held no meaning for either Louise or Daniel. His soft chants echoed through the stillness of the church and, oddly, their very strangeness brought Louise a slow, spreading comfort.

She would not have thought all those months ago,
when she looked up from the bloody beaver pelts and watched Daniel stride into Henri’s camp, that she would one day stand beside him and take him to husband. She couldn’t have imagined the twists and turns their journey together would take before it led them to this place, this time.

Perhaps Daniel was right. Perhaps he was her destiny and she was his. Perhaps God or the spirits or mere chance had brought them together. Perhaps they’d each had to suffer greatly before they could bind their hearts as the priest now bound their bodies and souls.

The simple ceremony took its toll on Daniel’s strength, so much so that Louise grasped his arm when they walked into the deserted square outside the church. The two carriages were where they’d left them to enter the church, their coach lanterns flickering like beacons in the still, warm night.

“I ordered a wedding supper to be laid out and waiting for us when we return,” Helene told the small party. “It won’t be as lavish as I would have liked, but…”

“Monsieur Thibodeaux!”

Startled by the shout, Daniel grabbed Louise and was about to thrust her behind the carriage when the Thibodeauxs’ manservant, Thomas, pounded out of a side street. His broad chest heaving, he skidded to a halt before the small group.

“Lieutenant Wilkinson’s at the house,” he panted. “He done brought a whole squad of soldiers with
him. They’s after Miz Louise. I slipped out through the back and come running to tell you.”

Bernard blew out a slow, hissing breath. “You were right to insist on a wedding this night, Daniel.”

“They’s wanting to search the house,” Thomas said, getting his wind back. “The lieutenant is sayin’ Miz Louise is a thief who done stole from him.”

“I stole nothing! All I take away with me is a change of linens and the leggings and tunic I arrived in.”

“He’s fussed ’bout some bag. A leather pouch, I think he said.”

“But I leave my trunk! All my gowns and hats and shoes. They are worth more than an old, scratched pouch.”

“The man is pulling at the hairs of a mange-ridden dog,” Bernard said, his mouth tight with anger. “He didn’t have the grit to face Daniel down at the Royal Arms. Instead he brings this trumped-up charge of thievery against Louise!”

“Trumped up or not, it could land her in the
cabildo
prison,” Helene put in worriedly.

“Not while I still breathe,” Daniel said in a flat tone that left no doubt in the matter. “Where is this pouch?”

“It is there,” Louise told him, “in the carriage.”

“Get it out. We’ll empty it of your things and send it back with Bernard and Helene. In the meantime, you and I will take to the road. I’m not giving him or anyone else a chance at you.”

“Daniel! You cannot travel tonight. Your back—”

“Get the pouch.”

She scrambled into the coach and retrieved the bag from the corner of the seat. The carriage lanterns threw enough light for Daniel to recognize the engraved initials on the flap.

“It’s the same one Wilkinson carried on the expedition. He used it to tote his writing box with his journal and circumferentor.”

“I empty everything in the bag onto the bed! I do not take his journal or any surveying tools.”

His jaw locked, Daniel dumped Louise’s few belongings onto the floor of the carriage, then ran a hand inside the pocket of the flap to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. The pocket was empty, but his probing fingers discovered a slight bulge behind the lining. Scowling, he carried the pouch closer to the flickering light and felt inside again.

“What is it? What do you find?”

“I don’t know. Feels like folded paper. It’s down behind the lining.”

“I’ll wager it’s a wad of banknotes,” Bernard guessed. “Louise probably made off with his private stash, all unknowing. No wonder he’s after her.”

“I give him Henri’s money,” she exclaimed indignantly. “Me, I take no banknotes!”

Thoroughly incensed, she let loose with a spate of epithets concerning James Biddle Wilkinson’s person that widened the eyes of Bernard’s womenfolk. Daniel interrupted her in mid-curse.

“They’re not banknotes.” Drawing a sheaf of folded papers through a thin slit in the lining, he unfolded the top sheet. “They’re letters.”

“Pah! Throw them back in the bag and let us be away.”

“Hold on a moment. Look at this, Bernard.”

The merchant peered around his arm. “I can’t read it. Hold it up to the light.”

Daniel obliged, his face set in tight lines.

“I still cannot make out the words. Or these strange symbols.”

“Looks like a special cipher, wouldn’t you say?”

“I believe—” His glance shot from the paper to Daniel’s face. He swallowed hard. “I believe you may be right,” he finished on a faint note.

“What is this, ‘cipher’?” Louise wanted to know.

“It’s a special kind of writing,” Daniel answered, flipping open another sheet to find it filled with the same code. “Secret symbols. Aaron Burr used them in the letter he wrote to General Wilkinson.”

“The letter the general turns over to President Jefferson? The one everyone speaks of?”

“Yes.”

Frowning, she studied the strange symbols. “Do you think this traitor Burr writes to James?”

“Could be. Or the letters could be from the lieutenant’s father. For all we know, the general was the one who devised the code he and Burr used to communicate with.”

Louise shook her head in disgust. “It is all anyone talks of, this business with Burr. The day of your
beating, a man comes to see James. This man, he worries that the general will betray him as he betrayed this Burr. James says he will not, but he sweats like a pig when the man leaves and again when I ask him about his father’s schemes.”

Daniel spun around, his eyes narrowed. “You asked Wilkinson about his father’s schemes?”

Taken aback by his tone, Louise tried to recall the brief conversation. “I ask James why he wants to marry me. He says his father now makes a new plan. One that uses my name to bind the French, my blood to bind the Osage and my monies to buy the arms he needs.”

“Dear God above!” Bernard gasped. He threw a look around the quiet, moon-washed square. “This is not the place to speak of such things!”

Daniel heartily concurred. The hair on the back of his neck was standing straight up. Thinking hard and fast, he whirled to Bernard.

“Go back to your home. If Wilkinson is there, tell him that you and Helene and the girls came with us to the church and you parted with us here.”

The merchant nodded. He, like Daniel, recognized the dark waters rising about them all.

“If he asks about the pouch?”

“You can say Louise had it with her but—” Grasping the bag by the strap, Daniel spun it over his head and let fly. It sailed through the night and landed in the shadows across the square. “But she threw it away outside the church. If he searches for
the damned thing, he might just give us time to get out of the city.”

“And the letters?”

He looked Thibodeaux square in the eye. “What letters?”

“What letters, indeed? You’d best take the carriage.”

Reaching into his frock coat, the merchant pulled out his purse. He pressed it into Daniel’s hands, refusing to listen to his protest. “I’ll deduct the monies from Louise’s inheritance. You’ll have to send word what you want done about that, by the by.”

Confused by the swift exchange, she frowned. “I already tell you what to do with it. You must give it to James.”

The two men exchanged looks. “Send me word,” Bernard said again.

Nodding, Daniel wrenched open the carriage door and all but tossed Louise inside. She landed on the velvet seat in a flurry of petticoats and had barely righted herself before he instructed the driver to take the old Spanish post road north and climbed in beside her.

“Now,” he said grimly as the carriage began to roll, “tell me about the conversation between Wilkinson and this visitor of his.”

By the time the carriage had passed through the outskirts of the city, Daniel felt much like a man sitting on a powder keg. The coded letters he’d found
in the pouch just might be the fuse. Louise was most definitely the tinderbox.

His gut twisted into a tight knot as he assessed the significance of what she’d overheard in James Wilkinson’s quarters. An unknown person had stated flatly that the lieutenant’s father was the mastermind behind the traitorous scheme Burr was about to stand trial for. This same person claimed to have evidence in the form of a letter from Wilkinson. Moreover, the general’s son had as much as admitted that his father had planned to use Louise’s heritage and her inheritance to further a new scheme after his other plans
came to naught.

Daniel’s one, driving instinct was to get Louise as far from the general’s intrigues as he could, as fast as he could, but the damned letters burned like a brand inside his shirt. Wilkinson had incriminated Burr by sending his letter to President Jefferson. Had he incriminated himself in one of these letters to his son?

The imbroglio weighed more heavily on Daniel’s mind with each mile the carriage traveled along the rough, rutted road that had once stretched from the Spanish possessions in Florida to their capital in Mexico. Finally, he leaned forward and called to the driver through the front opening.

“Pull up.”

“Here, sir?”

“Here.”

The empty darkness outside the open window
drew a puzzled glance from Louise. “Why do we stop?”

“We need to talk about which road to take. If we follow the Old Spanish highway west, it will carry us to New Iberia and Lafayette and on into Texas.”

“Is that not where you wish to go?”

“I’m thinking,” Daniel said slowly, “that maybe we should leave the carriage, buy a couple of horses and head east until we pick up the Federal Road.”

“Where does this Federal Road lead?”

“It cuts through Mississippi Territory and Creek Country in Alabama, then goes north to Richmond.”

“Richmond? It is the place where they hold the trial of this Aaron Burr. Why do you wish to go there?”

“So I can deliver the letters tucked inside my shirt and you can tell the barristers conducting the trial what you heard.”

She stared at him in surprise, her face a pale blur in the wash of moonlight coming through the side window.

“If General Wilkinson
was
the mastermind behind Burr’s scheme,” Daniel said, “he needs to answer for it.”

“Do you think to take vengeance on him for ordering you to be whipped?”

“No, I would have ordered the same given the circumstances.”

“I do not understand. If you seek no vengeance, why do you care about the general’s schemes? He
can spin whatever webs he wants. They mean nothing to me.”

“They mean something to me. I wore an army uniform for fourteen years. I can’t close my eyes to a plot to destroy the frontiers so many of my friends and comrades shed blood to defend.”

“Pah! The army strips you of your uniform. It almost strips the flesh from your back. You owe nothing to the soldiers who stand by and watch it happen.”

She was right. He owed nothing to the army that had drummed him out of its ranks, nothing to the country he’d served for fourteen years. He had no reason to involve himself in the doings of men like Wilkinson and Burr—except one. He still called himself an American.

“If I go with you and speak to these barristers,” Louise said determinedly, breaking into his thoughts, “I do so only because you ask it of me. It will be my bride gift to you.”

Wondering how many other men had received testimony at a traitor’s trial as a wedding gift, Daniel could only grin.

“You’d best change into your buckskins and moccasins. We’ve a long road ahead of us.”

They sent the carriage back to the city and spent their first night as husband and wife alone together under the stars.

Daniel insisted on getting well away from the road. He carried the carriage blanket the driver had
offered up along with one of the coach pistols. Louise rolled her few possessions up in her gown and tucked them under her arm. Leaving the rutted road, they went deep into a stand of eucalyptus. The branches, with their peeling bark, gleamed like old bones in the moonlight. The scent was strong, wrinkling Louise’s nose, but she didn’t complain. She knew the camphor odor would help keep the mosquitoes at bay.

Daniel spread the blanket close against one massive trunk. “Tomorrow we’ll find a hostelry where we can buy horses and supplies.”

“First,” she said firmly, “we will collect spiderwebs with the dew still wet on them so I may make a poultice for your back.”

He didn’t argue. He hurt from his neck to his knees. Gingerly, he eased down onto the blanket, but Louise stopped him before he could plant his shoulders against the trunk.

“You must lie flat, on your stomach.”

His mouth curved in a wry grimace. “I’m not going to spend our wedding night with my nose in the dirt.”

“Lie on your side, then, and I will lie with you.”

When she stretched out beside him, Daniel pillowed his head on one arm and hooked the other around her waist to draw her bottom against his belly. Her scent came to him over the stink of the eucalyptus. Incense from the church still clung to her hair, mixing with the faint tang of lye soap and the earthy sweat raised by the June night.