Merline Lovelace (16 page)

“You’d better rest while I present my credentials at the office of the secretary of war and arrange a meeting with him and the president. I’ll return in time to take you to dinner, if you’re up to it.”

“I’m sure I will be. And while you’re gone, I’ll wash away all these days of travel.” She spoke rapidly, too rapidly, trying to cover her embarrassment and dismay. “Would you ask Hattie to go down to the kitchens and fetch some hot water?”

“Of course.”

Zach’s face was thoughtful as he crossed the elegantly appointed bedchamber. He had a good idea what had sent Barbara running for the chamber pot and it wasn’t rancid grease.

He was the oldest of eight children. He’d seen his mother doubled over often enough, retching up her breakfast or dinner. Unless he missed his guess, Barbara’s belly would soon swell with his child. He’d tried to protect her. Done his damnedest to prevent this from happening. But every soldier knew such precautions were precarious at best. If she was with child…

A fierce, primal satisfaction raced through him at
the thought. He’d claimed her body these past weeks. Now it was time to make that claim official.

He didn’t deceive himself. He knew she hadn’t yet trusted him with the truth about herself or this brother of hers. But she would. She was inching closer to it each day. Each night. She didn’t realize that she revealed a little more of herself each time Zach took her in his arms or tumbled her to his bed. There, she held nothing back.

His thoughts filled with Barbara, he strode into the sitting room where Hattie stood amid the pile of their luggage.

“Is she all right?”

“Right enough,” Zach answered.

“That’s three times now she’s lost her dinner.”

She darted a glance at the open door to the bedroom. Her tight, pinched expression told Zach she’d hit on the same explanation for Barbara’s temperamental stomach.

She would know, he thought. She tended to Barbara’s most intimate female needs. He was tempted to ask when her mistress had bled last, if only to confirm his own suspicion, but curbed the impulse. The possibility Barbara might be pregnant was something she and Zach should discuss privately, if and when it proved to be true.

“Barbara wishes to wash and rest before dinner. I’ll carry in the luggage if you’ll go down to the kitchens and fetch some water.”

Hattie stumbled out of the suite, almost blind with rage.

The bitch was breeding. She’d swell up like a mangy barn dog, drop her whelp and keep the lieutenant tied to her forever.

Hattie should have stuffed a pillow over her face when she’d had the chance. Or found some excuse to lure the whore onto the deck of the
Star
or the
John Hawley
. Now she would pay the price for wasting all these days and nights.

Fury pumping through her veins, she stumbled down the hotel’s narrow back stairs. Sounds of hearty laughter and the clink of pewter on pewter came from the taproom at the front of the establishment. She followed the hiss and sizzle of roasting meat to the kitchen at the rear.

After the cold outside and the narrow, drafty stairs, the heat from the roaring fireplace hit her like a blow. She was gasping for breath, when a cook’s helper hefted a tray heaped with platters on his shoulder and hurried her way.

“What do you need, missus?”

“Hot water for…” She almost choked. “For my mistress.”

“Darcy!” He shouted to the girl basting a spitted haunch of mutton. “Help this woman.”

Hattie’s lip curled. The girl was a slattern. Her hair hung in greasy tangles. Food stained her apron, and
mud crusted the ragged hem of her homespun skirt. Hattie waited in tight-lipped silence while the slut ladled water from the black kettle hanging on the hock.

“There you be, missus.”

Hattie took the pitcher without so much as a word. She had one foot on the stairs when she realized she needed more than hot water. She needed a way to rid Zach of the woman who could never love him the way she did.

A kitchen slut like this one would surely know the direction of an apothecary or a midwife. Or, she thought, a rat-catcher.

Slowly, she turned back.

“I
asked the kitchen maid to make you some chamomile tea. It’ll settle your stomach.”

Barbara propped herself up on one elbow as her maid entered the bedroom carrying a silver tray.

“Thank you. I’ll take the tea and gladly, although my stomach seems to have ceased its acrobatics.”

Hattie poured the fragrant brew into a china cup decorated in a delicate Blue Willow pattern. Familiar now with Barbara’s tastes, she added milk and two spoons of sugar.

“The heaves will come back,” she predicted as she handed her mistress the tea. “They most always do during these early months.”

The china cup rattled on its saucer. Barbara’s gaze flew up to lock with the brunette’s.

“You know?”

“That you’re increasing? How could I not? You’ve not bled since I started to tend to your underlinens. I didn’t think to count the weeks until you tossed up your dinner a few times, though.”

“Nor did I,” Barbara admitted.

She still couldn’t bring herself to accept the possibility. She was a few weeks late, that’s all. Hardly surprising given the worry that had dogged her since Harry’s arrest, not to mention all the plotting and scheming.

“I went to the apothecary while you were resting,” the maid said after a moment. Digging a hand into her skirt pocket, she withdrew a twist of oiled paper. “My mam tossed up her breakfast every time she took pregnant. The only thing that helped her was a touch of cowbane in her tea.”

Barbara eyed the twist with some misgiving. Cowbane was a common remedy for cramps and other women’s illnesses. It was also a deadly poison. Rat-catchers spread it in sewers and garbage-strewn gutters to kill off the ever-present swarms of rodents.

“Don’t take more than a pinch,” Hattie warned, confirming the herb’s lethal power.

“Thank you, but I don’t need it now. I’m feeling much better.”

“It’s best to take precautions. Especially since you’re sitting down to dinner with the president tonight.”

“What’s that?”

“Zach…” Flushing, Hattie caught herself. “Lieutenant Morgan sent a note. The sergeant who delivered it said he was to wait and escort you to the White House for dinner. He’s downstairs now, in the taproom.”

“Where is this note?”

Hattie retrieved a folded piece of parchment from the silver tray. The lines inside were penned with a bold, slashing stroke.

The very thought of a red, bleeding slab of beef made Barbara’s stomach lurch.

She was in no mood to meet with anyone, much less this homespun president. All she wanted to do was lie back down, draw the covers over her head and cower until she knew how to handle the possibility she might be breeding. Stubborn pride wouldn’t allow it. She had her faults—any number of them—but she wasn’t a coward.

“Set the tea on the dressing table,” she told Hattie. “I’ll put in a pinch of cowbane, as you suggest, and sip it while you brush out my hair. First I must decide what to wear.”

Almost dancing with glee, Hattie took the tea to the dressing table as instructed. This was better than she’d hoped for. With her back to Lady Barbara, she opened the paper twist. A tap of a finger dumped half the contents into the porcelain cup. Quickly, she screwed the paper tight again and laid it beside the saucer.

That ought to be enough to kill the stupid cow
and
her unborn calf. If it didn’t, Hattie wouldn’t take the blame. The Englishwoman would add another pinch and suffer the consequences wrought by her own hand.

The first cramp struck Barbara just after her marine escort had handed her cloak to an attendant at the presidential palace. She placed her hand lightly
on the arm the sergeant offered and took only a step or two before she faltered.

Pain sliced into her. Gasping, she dug her fingers into the marine’s sleeve.

“Ma’am?”

As quickly as it had come, the agony eased. With a shaky smile, she loosened her clawlike grip.

“Forgive me. I feared I’d caught my heel on my skirts for a moment.”

He accepted the ready explanation and continued his measured tread down a marble hallway that might have been magnificent if not for the muddy boot prints dirtying its floors.

Despite the advancing evening hour, people of all descriptions lingered in the hall and crowded an antechamber hung with red twill satin. Frontiersmen in buckskin rubbed shoulders with gentlemen in frock coats and snowy cravats. A beefy, red-faced farmer shared an alcove with a barrister in black robes and a powdered wig. Merchants were scattered throughout the rooms, many with cases containing their goods tucked under their arms.

They were petitioners, Barbara supposed, come to see their president just as British subjects did their king.

“The general keeps late hours since his wife died,” her escort explained when she commented on the crowd. “Often as not, he’ll take appointments until midnight or later.”

Her curiosity about the president she’d soon meet grew. She knew little about him, only the bits and pieces of gossip she’d picked up since arriving in America. Like Zach, Jackson was both lawyer and soldier. He’d served as congressman and judge and had commanded the Cotton Balers at the Battle of New Orleans. As president he fought to enhance the power of his office. He was also fiercely determined to remove the eastern tribes to lands west of the Mississippi…despite being an avowed friend of the Cherokee and father to an adopted Creek son.

Rumor had it that he’d fought any number of duels to protect the honor of his late wife, whom he’d married and lived with for several years in the mistaken belief the Virginia legislature had granted her first husband a divorce.

In person, Andrew Jackson proved every bit as intimidating as his reputation. He was a tall man, well over six feet, and whipcord lean. His piercing blue eyes looked out from under bushy white eyebrows as Barbara approached on the arm of her escort. She was unsure whether she should curtsy. American customs were so odd. The president resolved her dilemma by thrusting out his hand.

“So Lady Barbara.” He gave her hand a hearty shake. “What’s this about you dragging one of my most promising young officers away from his duties to accompany you to London?”

She could hardly admit she had no intention of
traveling to London. “Lieutenant Morgan made the decision to take a leave of absence without consulting me, sir. You must speak to him about it.”

“I have. Blistered his ears about it, as a matter of fact.”

He leveled his quelling stare on the young officer under discussion, at that moment making his way across the room in their direction.

“Just make sure you send him back to us. Zach has all the heart of his father. Sergeant Major Morgan served under me at New Orleans, you know.”

“So I’ve been informed, sir.”

“I need men like Daniel Morgan and his sons. I’m depending on them to keep Indian Country from flaming up like a tinderbox.”

“That grows more difficult with each new wave of immigrants,” Zach said, joining them. “Both white
and
red.”

His glance roamed Barbara’s face, as if to verify that she’d thrown off her indisposition. She smiled and accepted the glass of wine a steward offered her. Reassured, Zach gave his attention once again to the president.

“Settlers with false quit-claim deeds are causing almost as much trouble as the Osage and Pawnee.”

“I know it,” the president grumbled. “As fast as my treasury agents nose out one illegal printing press, another starts turning out counterfeit banknotes and deeds.”

“If we don’t stem this tide of white immigrants,” Zach warned, “none of the tribes will believe we intend to honor the boundaries your commissioners negotiate.”

“I’m well aware of that,” Jackson snapped. “I appointed the commission, after all, and drafted their charter with my own hand.”

He drew in a breath and turned to Barbara with a rueful smile.

“People think me ruthless for being so determined to enforce the provisions of the Indian Removal Act.”

They thought him more than ruthless. In her short weeks in America, she’d heard him described as everything from a self-serving politician desiring only to appease his white voters to a cruel despot out to destroy the peoples his government had negotiated countless treaties with.

“Moving the eastern tribes is the only way I can guarantee them freedom to live according to their customs,” he explained. “The state legislatures—Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina—are determined to exercise jurisdiction over their populations. Once they do, their indigenous tribes will lose all power and identity. Chief Justice Marshall, damn him, has buried his head too deep in the law books to recognize that bitter inevitability.”

Others drifted over to join the conversation.

“The Cherokee might have made the Supreme Court decision stick if gold hadn’t been discovered
on their land in north Georgia,” a rotund general with bushy side-whiskers put in. “Now there are lynchings and burnings every night, and the governor refuses to use the militia to stop the mayhem.”

“It’ll bode ill for the Union if we’re forced to send in federal troops,” another murmured. “We’ll find ourselves at war with the State of Georgia.”

“With the rest of the southern states, as well,” Jackson predicted grimly. “They’re already threatening to secede if the abolitionists push legislation through Congress outlawing slavery.”

Obviously burdened by the responsibilities of his office, the president thrust a hand into his thick white mane.

“Damned if I’m not at point nonplus. To save this cobbled-together Union of ours, I must support slavery, which I abhor, and evict our native peoples from their homes and lands. If anyone knows a better path to tread, I wish they would tell me!”

None of the powerful men present offered an alternative course, and Barbara sensed the destiny of the native peoples Jackson referred to had already been written in stone. Or blood.

It would be left to men like Daniel and Zach Morgan to determine which. The president had indicated as much, and Zach used the moment to push a cause Barbara knew was dear to his heart.

“Honoring the boundaries your commissioners negotiate is the only way to maintain peace in Indian
Country, and we must use all means necessary to keep white settlers from encroaching on those boundaries. That will require more troops. Mounted troops.”

“Yes, yes, you rangers have proved your worth out there on the prairies.”

Jackson paused and hooked his thumbs in his waistcoat. Rocking back on his heels, he nodded to a bushy-bearded gentleman in a rusty black frock coat.

“I’ve instructed the secretary of war here to prepare a request for establishment of a regiment of dragoons. We’ll submit the request to Congress when it reconvenes in January. That news should please you, Lieutenant Morgan.”

Zach gave a whoop of joy. “It does indeed!”

The president’s grim expression eased. Even the solemn secretary of war smiled.

“Colonel Arbuckle recommends you be given a captaincy in the new regiment,” Jackson said. “I concur. I want you back from your leave of absence in time to help recruit and train these dragoons.”

“Yes, sir!”

The confidence the president placed in Zach both amazed and delighted Barbara. She couldn’t imagine anyone better suited to the task they’d just given him. As Jackson had pointed out, Zach knew Indian Country. He also understood better than most the challenges the dragoons would face when they de
ployed to the frontier. More importantly, he brought intelligence and compassion to his duties.

If she
had
to be pregnant, Barbara decided as her gaze slid over his tanned, handsome face and broad shoulders, she could have picked a worse father for her babe. Far worse.

With the thought, some of her worry over the possibility she might be increasing disappeared. In its place came a different emotion, something perilously akin to hope. A babe might bridge the chasm when Zach finally learned the truth about her intentions.

Assuming he believed the child his, that was.

She couldn’t discount the distinct possibility he might not. After the stories he’d heard about her—and those disgusting innuendos about her relationship with Harry—how could he not think the worst? Barbara was swinging from hope to despair yet again when another cramp seized her.

The pain sliced into her bowels like a saber. It was all she could do not to gasp or double over. Clenching her teeth, she stared blindly at the portrait hanging on the far wall until the agony lessened.

“Lady Barbara?”

She let out a shaky breath and blinked to clear her vision. “I beg your pardon, sir?”

“I was inquiring whether I may escort you to the table. I believe the cooks are ready to serve.”

Lord, yes! All she wanted now was to conclude this evening as swiftly as possible. Forcing a gra
cious nod, she allowed the president to seat her on his right.

She soon saw Zach had characterized the general’s tastes accurately. Servants presented platters of rare sirloin, stewed potatoes and something they called fritters. She choked down two bites of the beef, but the fried corn stuck in her throat.

When had it grown so uncomfortably warm? And why had the president chosen to seat her so close to flames dancing behind the richly embroidered fire screen? Discreetly, she daubed at the perspiration dewing her upper lip and tried to follow the quicksilver changes in conversation.

She thought she’d succeeded in hiding her distress until she met Zach’s eyes. A small frown creased his forehead. When he cocked his head in silent inquiry, Barbara couldn’t disguise her discomfort any longer. She pressed her napkin to her lips again and sent him a pleading look. Instantly, he pushed back his chair and addressed President Jackson.