Midnight Star (27 page)

Delaney well understood her awe. He felt it himself each time he journeyed to Downieville overland. He said, “Wear your hat. The sun is hot and you’re burning.”

She shot him a look from the corner of her eye. “Excuse me,” she said, and walked toward a clump of bushes.

When she emerged, Delaney handed her a thick slice of bread spread with a dubious mixture. All she recognized were beans. She ate, not wanting to know the ingredients.

“I smell like a horse,” she said.

“You’ll not notice how either of us smell by tomorrow.”

“It is so peaceful here.”

“Yes.”

“Will all the scenery be so beautiful, the land so wild?”

“No, not unless we go inland from the river. Even now, we’re but two or three miles from a mining camp.”

“Will we see Indians?”

“Most likely.”

“What are they like?”

“For the most part, they’re harmless, and helpless. It seems that for every one of us to come to California, one more of them dies. There are renegades, but to survive, they live deep in the forests. Are you finished eating?”

She handed him her plate, and he simply looked at it. “Rub it out with sand. I doubt there are any servants within hearing distance.”

“You have but to tell me what to do, Del,” she said, looking at him steadily.

“Rub it out with sand,” he repeated.

Together they repacked the supply bags. Chauncey felt her muscles beginning to tighten and looked askance at her mare, Dolores. But Delaney
had mounted gracefully and was giving her a silent, mocking glance.

She climbed into the saddle. At least she was riding astride. She couldn’t begin to imagine enduring in a sidesaddle.

They moved a good mile inland, and there were no trails. For the most part, their horses walked, avoiding the thick brambles. Chauncey no longer heard the birds singing. She was growing less enthralled with the grandeur of the hills and forest. Her bottom felt raw, her legs numb.

She said nothing. She had promised she wouldn’t slow him down, and she had no intention of complaining. She’d fall off her mare first.

Delaney saw her exhaustion and pushed another mile. He halted in a small clearing beside a glitteringly clear creek. “We’ll stop here for the night. Rub down the horses, Chauncey, and see that they’re well-tethered.”

He paid her no more attention.

She sent a scathing look toward his back, gritted her teeth, and dismounted. Her legs collapsed and she clung to the pommel. Muscles in her thighs that she’d never dreamed existed were screaming.

“See to it, Chauncey! And collect some firewood. I’m going hunting.”

She whirled around, her tortured muscles momentarily forgotten. “No,” she called after him in a panic. “Don’t leave me alone!”

Delaney turned and shifted his hat back on his forehead. “Even proper little English ladies have to pay for their supper. I’ll be back soon. Just stick close to the horses after you’ve done your chores.”

She stared after him as he disappeared into the trees, his rifle tucked under his arm.

“Sneering, unfeeling bastard,” she said under her breath. “All right, Dolores, off with your saddle! Hank,” she continued to Delaney’s bay stallion, “you’re next. Stop snorting at me and don’t be so impatient.”

An hour later, Chauncey was grinning to herself and warming her hands over the small fire she’d built. The bedrolls were laid out, the horses tethered close by, and at least her face and hands were clean. She sat cross-legged by the fire and leaned forward, cupping her chin against her fisted hands. The sun was near to setting. She tried to concentrate on the beauty of her surroundings, but failed miserably. The air grew chill, the silence deafening. She cried out at the sudden sharp report of a rifle.

“Talk to yourself, idiot. Yes, that’s it. Hello, Dolores, Hank. Is the grass good? I don’t think you need any more water.”

Dolores whinnied.

Chauncey rose quickly to her feet, and weaved where she stood. Her muscles had tightened and cramps ripped through her. She was rubbing her bottom when Delaney emerged into the small clearing, a dead rabbit held in his hand. It was all Chauncey could manage not to flinch away.

She gulped and took a step backward, her expression appalled.

“Don’t worry,” Delaney said, “I won’t ask you to soil your pretty hands. Nor do I want you to vomit on our dinner.”

She couldn’t help herself. She simply couldn’t bear to see him skin the rabbit. She walked around
the perimeter of their camp, trying to avoid looking at him and his revolting task, and easing her muscles.

“We’ll eat in about twenty minutes,” she heard him say. “Come here, and keep turning the rabbit on the spit. I’m going to bathe.”

When he returned, he was shrugging back into his shirt. The water was frigid. Had he stripped and jumped in?

“I built the fire,” she said, her voice a bit sharp. Damn him! She wasn’t about to admire the play of muscles across his chest.

“Yes, I see. Matches are a great invention, are they not? Next time, build it more loosely, so air can circulate beneath. Like this.”

She watched silently at he took several sticks and balanced them upright so they came together in a cone.

“The rabbit is done,” she said.

“Burned to a crisp, rather.”

“I set out the dishes and bedrolls.”

“And talked at great length to the horses.”

He’d heard her! “They are about the only amiable company I’ve found!”

He squatted in front of the fire and began to pull the burned meat from the bones. “Didn’t you open any beans?”

“No.” She stared at the rabbit meat, burned on the outside and quite rare on the inside.

“Watch me do it,” he said.

They ate in silence. Chauncey didn’t want to talk; she wanted to curl up, wrap herself in the bedroll, and groan her muscles to sleep. She eyed her bedroll laid out on the other side of the fire
and moaned at the thought of getting to it. Perhaps she could crawl, or maybe roll.

“Next time, keep turning the meat.”

“I thought it delicious,” Chauncey snapped, her fingers tightening around a bone.

“Are you finished?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll sand out the plates while you collect more firewood. There are all sorts of interesting beasts in the forest. I don’t want to share my bedroll with any of them.”

Collect more firewood! She pulled herself to her knees. There wasn’t a bush or anything to use as a support. Didn’t he feel any discomfort at all? He was striding about as if he’d just gotten out of bed after a wonderful night’s sleep. Get up, Chauncey!

She did, but found after leaning over to pick up some dead branches, that she couldn’t move. She tossed her small collection beside the fire and collapsed on her bedroll.

Delaney’s eyebrow shot up. He knew she was in agony. His muscles were a bit sore, and he was used to riding goodly distances. He strode to his valise and withdrew a small jar. He tossed it onto her lap. “It’s liniment. It smells like manure, but it works. Rub it on your thighs and your bottom.”

“Thank you,” she said.

He went to collect more firewood, leaving her alone. She managed to pull off her skirt, boots, and underthings. She opened the jar and was rocked back at the dreadful smell. Manure! More like three-day-old dead fish! Still, she dipped a glob on her fingers and resolutely began to rub the chilly cream into her screaming thigh muscles.

She finished her legs and sat feeling like an utter fool. How the devil was she to do her bottom?

“Turn over on your stomach.”

He was standing over her, legs spread, his hands on his hips. He looked like some kind of desperado, a word she’d heard Lucas use.

“More modesty? I’ve made a thorough study of your charms. Did you not promise that you wouldn’t delay me? You won’t be able to sit your mare tomorrow without my . . . assistance. Now, turn over.”

She tugged her shirt over her thighs and slowly eased onto her stomach. She reared up when she felt her hips bared.

“Just hold still.” He straddled her, his knees on either side of her thighs. She felt his fingers coated with the cream touch her buttocks.

Delaney stared down at his wife’s beautiful white hips and saw the beginnings of bruises. He didn’t gentle his touch, but kneaded her soft flesh deeply and firmly. She groaned, but he pressed his hand into the small of her back to keep her from moving. God, but he wanted her! He sucked in his breath and continued rubbing her, stroking her. His fingers slid between her thighs, and he felt the heat of her.

All he had to do was flip her onto her back and take her. He quickly wiped the liniment from his hand. His finger found her and slowly began to ease inside her.

She wanted to cry and yell at him at the same time. She heard his jerky breathing, felt his finger probing. “How much do you intend to pay me?”

His finger thrust deep within her.

“Stop it! Damn you, don’t!” She tried to jerk away from him, but his knees were on either side of her thighs, and she couldn’t move.

“You’re my wife, and I’ll take you when and where I want to.”

“You don’t want me, you just want to punish me and hurt me!”

His finger eased out of her and he pressed his hand under her to cup her. “Yes, I want you, wife, and if you would but touch yourself as I am doing, you’d see that you are as ready as a bitch in heat.”

He moved his palm to her belly and she felt her own wetness on her fingers. Why not? she thought blankly to herself. At least for a few moments he would forget his anger. For a few moments he would respond to her as he used to.

“Very well,” she said softly.

He went still. I am a civilized man, he thought, not some miserable savage.
But she wants you!

He shook his head. He didn’t know what she wanted. Slowly he eased his hand from under her and rose to his feet. He saw that her shoulders were shaking, and she’d buried her face in her crossed arms.

“You do smell like a horse,” he said, turning away from her to stand by the small fire. “Dress yourself. A lady shouldn’t lie about bare-assed.”

She wasn’t crying, she was too angry to shed more tears. His crude words hit her, and her fury grew. Slowly she turned onto her back and raised herself on her elbows. She was naked from the waist down and made no move to pull her shirt over her body.

“You don’t smell too sweet yourself,” she said furiously at his back. She willed him to turn around.

He did, and nearly stumbled at the sight of her. “Dress yourself,” he repeated.

“Why?” she asked, stretching slightly, arching her back a bit. “You are my husband. As you said, you’re thoroughly familiar with all my charms.”

She was trying to put the boot on the other foot, and succeeding. He felt a bolt of admiration for her slash through him, and said coldly, “If you don’t cover yourself now, madam, I will take you. Very quickly. You won’t enjoy it, I promise you that.”

She didn’t move, only stared at him, her eyes luminous and unreadable in the dim campfire.

He began to unfasten the buttons of his buckskins. “You are willing to risk a babe in your belly when you return to England?”

He was a stranger to her in that moment, and she sought desperately to find the man she loved. “Will you never forgive me? Will you never try to understand?”

His desire was gone, and he wanted to laugh at the irony of it. Even if he wanted to punish her, he doubted he could do it. “I am going to relieve myself,” he said, and strode into the darkness.

When he returned, she was covered with a blanket and lying on her side, her eyes closed.

His voice awoke her the next morning. She blinked awake and groaned. The ground, she thought inconsequentially, was not the same as a bed. She gritted her teeth and got to her feet. It was cold, the sun just breaking through the heavy foliage overhead.

“Collect firewood.”

She said nothing, and did as he bid. Her muscles eased somewhat with the task. She was beginning to feel human again. How, she wondered, could people live like this day after day?

Delaney watched her moving about, at first stiffly, then more easily. She was as strong-willed and stubborn as a mule. When she returned to the camp, her arms loaded with small branches and twigs, he gave his full attention to making the coffee.

He laughed aloud suddenly, startling Chauncey, the horses, and the birds overhead. He realized he was trying to break her, for whatever reason. He laughed more deeply. If she broke, what would it prove?

“May I share your jest?”

“No,” he said. “Build the fire as I showed you. I’m going to pack up the horses.”

The coffee was black, bitter, and tasted better than any Chauncey had ever drunk. She gulped it down, burning her tongue. She sighed, shook out her tin cup, and rose.

“I’m ready,” she said.

He grunted, not looking up at her.

She studied his averted face a moment, smiling unwillingly at the growth of beard on his cheeks. His hair was tousled, his white shirt no longer clean. She thought he had never looked so handsome.

“I’m going to the creek to wash my face,” she said.

He nodded. “We’re leaving in five minutes.”

“Do you know, Del,” she said thoughtfully, her hands on her hips, “if you don’t make up
your mind what you want, you will surely die of perversity.”

“Five minutes,” he repeated, for want of anything better to say. Damn her, but she was right, and he knew it.

Five minutes later, Chauncey eyed Dolores with misgiving. “Well, my dear,” she said as she stroked her mare’s silky nose, “there is no hope for it, is there? If you can keep going, so can I!”

The river wound away from them, snaking its way between narrow bluffs. Delany turned inland. The trees were so thick that the sun slashed through in narrow slivers of light. The silence would have been comforting had there been any conversation between them.

She wanted to ask him about the different kinds of trees she was seeing, but his face was closed. And the birds! So many of them, and she couldn’t identify a single one. She saw deer, rabbits, squirrels, even a fox. They seemed to regard her with some disdain. She was, she supposed, a trespasser in their kingdom.

The day dragged on. Chauncey could feel her muscles cramping and wished she could slip her blanket under her bottom. Tomorrow, she thought, no matter Delaney’s sarcastic, mocking comments, she would do it.

Delaney stopped in late afternoon, and Chauncey was momentarily surprised to see that there was another small creek near.

“You’ve come this way before, haven’t you?”

The sound of her own voice after so many hours of silence startled her.

“Yes,” he said.

He didn’t find fault with her fire and she
didn’t eye with too much revulsion the plump wild partridge he’d shot. She was careful to turn the partridge continually on the spit, and the result was mouth-watering.

“Either this is the best food in the entire world or I’m starving,” she said.

“You’re desperate,” he said. After a moment he added, “I’ve always found that food cooked outdoors tastes better. Maybe it’s the clean air or the added taste from the open fire.”

“Goodness!” she exclaimed, eyeing him in astonishment. “So many words! And all spoken at one time!”

“You know, dear wife,” he said, “I find my natural good humor disappearing in your charming company. May I suggest that you try keeping your sharp tongue behind your teeth?”

“Death by perversity,” she muttered, and stalked away to lie on her bedroll.

Chauncey had fallen into a light sleep, having made peace with the hard ground, when she felt a hand clamped over her mouth. She jerked upright, struggling.

“Don’t make a sound,” Delaney whispered, tightening his hold on her. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

She felt a cold lump of fear in her throat. Bears, she thought wildly. Weren’t there bears in forests? She pulled the blanket about her and stared toward the dark woods. Snakes? Could Delaney have heard a snake? Stop being a fool, she whispered behind her teeth. Snakes slither, they don’t walk and make noise.

She shot up at the sound of three rapid gunshots.

“Delaney!”

There was no answer, nothing! Only the deadening silence. Her derringer! She rushed forward on her hands and knees, grabbing for her valise. She threw her clothes about, and closed her fingers over the small pistol. A foot smashed down on her hand.

She screamed in pain and fright, and the derringer fell from her fingers. An arm closed over her throat and she was dragged back.

It was a man, and he smelled dreadful. She could hear his harsh breathing, hear him grunt in pain when her elbow lashed back into his stomach. He hissed something at her, but she couldn’t understand him. She was panting, struggling mindlessly. He jerked at her throat and she couldn’t breathe. Her screams became gurgles of sound, but she didn’t give up, even as her vision blurred. She kicked back, her boot connecting with the man’s shin.

He grunted in fury and jerked her about to face him. She saw him for only a moment before his fist smashed against her jaw. An Indian, she thought vaguely, and fell into darkness.

Her nose twitched. What was that awful smell? She moved restlessly, opened her eyes, and blinked. Her face was pressed against a man’s leg, and the filthy odor was from his buckskins. She tried to arch away from him, but a flash of pain went through her jaw, and she moaned softly.

She felt a hand press firmly against the small of her back, and her face fell again to his thigh. I’m going to vomit, she thought. She closed her eyes and swallowed.

The man was saying something to her. It was a string of low guttural sounds that had no meaning to her. She raised her chin, trying desperately to turn a bit so she could see him.

“Delaney,” she whispered, the sound of her own voice causing more waves of pain in her head. “My husband! Where is he?”

The man was talking again, turning slightly on his horse’s back, to speak to another man behind him.

Her nausea increased. She locked her teeth together. This is all a nightmare, she told herself over and over. This can’t be happening. It is a thing woven from rotten cloth. I am going to wake up now. Delaney will be here. He will be all right. Wake up, you fool! She did, with a vengeance. She reared up against the man’s hand, yelling a curse at the top of her lungs. For one instant she looked at him straight in the face.

Oh God! Even a nightmare couldn’t produce such a terrifying image. Matted black hair hung about his face. His eyes, flat black coals, were close-set, his nose nearly flat against his cheeks, and his lips were parted, showing wide-spaced yellowing teeth.

“No!” she shrieked, and scored her fingernails down his bare chest.

He struck her on the side of the head, and she slumped unconscious against his thigh.

“No, please . . . no! Make it stop. Please!”

Chauncey felt a cool wet cloth on her forehead. I am dead and in hell, she thought vaguely. I won’t open my eyes, not yet.

But she did. Kneeling above her was a young
woman. Then her vision cleared and she stared at the woman silently. Her features were flat and heavy, just as the man’s had been, but her jet-black eyes held a measure of feeling, compassion perhaps. Her face was perfectly round, her thick black hair braided into two thick plaits that fell over her shoulders. She exuded the same noxious odor, and Chauncey’s stomach lurched.

“Where am I?” she whispered, swallowing convulsively.

“You be still, lady,” the woman said. “I take care of you.”

“My husband,” Chauncey said, her voice breaking. “Where is he?”

“Don’t know. Chatca no say,” the woman said, her voice as flat as her facial features.

“Who are you?”

“Father Nesbitt call me Cricket, after a famous white man. Father Nesbitt let me keep his house and teach me good English.”

A priest with a bizarre sense of humor.

“Father Nesbitt dead because Chatca want me to go with him. You drink this, lady, make pain go away.”

Chauncey opened her mouth and tasted a thick vile liquid. She gagged and tried to spit it out, but Cricket held her head, forcing her to swallow.

“Chatca say you a demon.”

Chauncey fell back, her cheek touching a filthy matted fur. Some demon, she thought, hearing the admiration in the woman’s voice. Lying helplessly, unable to fight even another woman. Her mouth began to grow dry, and she stared up at Cricket. “Will I die? Did you poison me?”

“No, you sleep. When you wake up, you feel better. Chatca want you better.”

Chauncey slept dreamlessly. When she awoke, she was alone, and to her surprise, she did feel better. Her jaw still ached, but the ripping pain was only a dull throb in her temple. She pulled herself up on her elbows and looked about. She was lying on several filthy furs on a dirt floor. She was in a small lean-to of sorts, and it was dreadfully hot. The door wasn’t really a door, she saw, but rather a narrow opening covered with some kind of animal skin. There were several filthy blankets on the floor near her, some ancient tin plates stacked in one corner, and nothing else.

“Delaney,” she whispered. The enormity of her situation hit her hard, and she fell back, sobbing softly. He couldn’t be dead, he couldn’t! She heard again the three sharp gunshots. Had one of them robbed him of his life? She shook her head violently, as if her denial made it true and kept Delaney safe.

Get a hold on yourself!

She drew a deep breath. Indians. She wondered how many of them there were. Why had they taken her? What did this Chatca want with her? She remembered Delaney’s words that the Indians were a rather helpless lot. Well, Chatca didn’t act at all helpless! She felt a trickle of sweat curl down between her breasts. The cramped lean-to was like an oven. Slowly she pulled herself upright, then onto her knees. There was no surge of pain in her head. Gingerly she rubbed her fingers over her jaw. It was sore, but nothing she couldn’t bear.

Get up, Chauncey. You’ve got to see where you are and how many Indians are outside.

She placed her hands flat in front of her and eased herself upright.

“You better, lady. I tell you so.”

“Cricket,” Chauncey said, weaving dizzily where she stood.

“You hungry, I bet. I bring you food. You sit down, lady.”

“No, wait! I must know where I am! You’ve got to tell . . .”

But Cricket was gone. Chauncey walked slowly to the entrance and pulled back the animal skin. The sun was high in the sky. Oh God, she thought, how much time had passed since Chatca had taken her?

She forced herself to look about her. There were only three more crudely built lean-tos spaced in a small circle. In the middle of the circle was a good-size fire with a rusted iron pot hung from a hook. The odor of the food, whatever it was, made her stomach lurch. She saw Cricket emerge from the trees surrounding the camp and walk to the pot, slop some of the thick food into a wooden bowl, then straighten.