The Colonel's Lady (24 page)

Straddling a chair, he took the sheaf of papers from her and said nothing. It was the closest he’d been to her in two weeks, and she breathed in the scent of the stone house—and him—for the two had become inseparable in her mind. Since she’d fled to Smitty’s Fort, he seemed to be so careful, so formal with her, never being alone with her for even a few moments, always having others present.

If he’d ever been even slightly infatuated with her, she knew he wasn’t any longer. His interest had dissolved like the pearly mist that hung over the river most mornings, and its leaving had stolen something from her. She should have been glad. Friendship was all she could offer—or receive. Because of Cecily, first and foremost. Because he was a man in an intense season of doubt. About himself. His position. Providence. Yet despite everything, she felt blasphemously discontent, and so full of yearning she ached.

“Fine work,” he said in low tones, “considering you’d rather be in your garden.”

Reaching the bottom of the page, she sprinkled the wet ink with pounce. “There’s still time yet.”

He leaned closer. “I caught you smiling to yourself earlier, and since it couldn’t be anything you overheard me saying . . .”

“I was thinking of my peas.” Carefully, she funneled the pounce back into the jar, his nearness making a stew of her insides. “And I meant to thank you for having that fence built to keep the animals out. Those Kentucke rabbits especially seem to have a penchant for all things green.”

“So do my men. Best keep an eye on them.”

She almost smiled—and then a rush of hot tears surprised her a second time. Panicked, she dropped a piece of paper. As they bent over, their hands and heads collided, and she felt she was swimming in leather and Indian tobacco. He was wearing the buckskin jacket instead of his usual uniform coat, and it made him look more rugged frontiersman than gentleman soldier. ’Twas a wonder she could keep her head on her shoulders and do a smidgen of work . . .

He retrieved the paper, and she murmured her thanks, determined not to look at him. And then, giving sway to his poignant request for her support at Smitty’s Fort, she did look, alarmed by the shadows she saw beneath his eyes. “Are you . . . all right?”

He hesitated. “Aye, and you?”

Nay.
She couldn’t answer—at least honestly—so she said nothing.

A commotion at the door made them both turn to see Joram Herkimer enter again. “The scouting patrols are back, sir, and ready to give a full report.”

With a nod, Cass stood. “Bring them in.”

Taking the scrap of paper she’d dropped, she retrieved her quill and dipped it in ink. Still tearful, she scribbled the only encouragement she could muster before pressing the note into his hand as she went out.

Praying for you.

23

On her knees that night, Roxanna felt the hard, cold, hickory planks through her linen nightgown as she knelt by her bed. Since childhood she’d prayed thus, like her mother and father before her, and it provided a warm if sometimes bittersweet tie to her past. No other position felt quite right, though she knew all that mattered was the posture of one’s heart. Try as she might, she couldn’t imagine Cass on his knees. It seemed as far-fetched as her lying abed in the stone house, in that wondrous dream, about to bear a child.

Her first petition was unceasingly the same.
Lord, deliver me from Fort Endeavor.
Being penned within its walls day in and day out was deepening her melancholy over her father’s death, her fatal attraction for Cass. Still, she’d promised to pray for him. The hastily scrawled note that said she’d do so was uppermost in her mind, though he might not appreciate her petitions.

Lord, soften his arrogance and temper and intemperate habits. Make him a man after Your own heart . . . because somehow, against my will and surely Yours, he’s stolen mine.

Early the next morning, Abby came and shook Roxanna awake. Rolling over on the thin mattress, she took in Abby’s tearstained face and sat bolt upright. “Abby, have you had another bad dream?”

The little girl nodded and crawled into bed beside her, which did little to ease Roxanna’s anxiety.
Oh, Abby, won’t you speak?
Lying back down, Roxanna wrapped her arms about the child’s slight form, gratified when her even breathing assured her she was slumbering again. Lately Abby had been coming to her cabin more often, and Olympia didn’t seem to miss her. In the mornings before work, Roxanna continued to school Abby in her sums and letters without interference. But she worried unceasingly about the child wandering around in the dark when no one else was about save the sentries.

Before Roxanna could fall back asleep, Bella appeared, kerchief askew, eyes bright in the dawn light as she pushed the door open. “Law, but I been worried to death ’bout that child. Between her sleepwalkin’ like a ghost and McLinn sick . . .”

Roxanna pushed herself up on an elbow. “The colonel—sick?”

“Aye, been up all night, Hank says. Can’t keep nothin’ down and is in an agony wi’ his stomach.”

“Is it the ague?”

Bella shot her a chilling glance. “Not this time.”

“Maybe the dysentery, then.”

“Naw . . . worse.” Bella slumped in a chair. “Somethin’ ain’t right here lately. Somebody’s been goin’ through the kitchen disturbin’ things.”

“What?”

“I know it sounds foolish, but somebody’s out to make mischief and now the colonel ain’t well. Somethin’ smells.”

A coldness crept into Roxanna’s spirit. Bella didn’t know about the spy. No one did except Cass and herself. He hadn’t even confided in his own officers. “Are you saying someone means the colonel harm?”

“I think somebody’s set to hurt him, all right. Mebbe poison him. The cinchona I keep in the kitchen in that little tin looks different somehow. I give him some after supper last night as he didn’t look right to me, like he might be gettin’ the ague again. And now . . .”

“Perhaps he’s simply exhausted,” Roxanna said, trying to fit all the pieces of this strange puzzle together. “Do you truly believe he’s been poisoned?”

Tears glittered in Bella’s eyes, and she raised her apron to dash them away. “I know it’s so. And I’m sore afraid I’ll be blamed for it.”

“Bella, I know you wouldn’t do such a thing.”

“Naw, I wouldn’t. But somebody would, and they’re right here in these walls. And that scares me to death.” She heaved a sigh, damp eyes hardening. “I ’spect it might be one o’ them doxies, in and out o’ the kitchen like they is. That Olympia bemoans the colonel so.”

Roxanna’s mind spun with all the possibilities. Perhaps this spy—this man or woman, whoever they were—was no longer content simply rummaging through papers. Perhaps it had become a different sort of game. A dangerous, even murderous one.

Slipping free of Abby’s sleeping form, Roxanna began to dress with unsteady hands. Bella sat with surprising lethargy, and Roxanna sensed her fear. Without saying a word, she slipped out and crossed the empty parade ground at a near run. Knowing reveille would soon sound, she wanted to be well out of the way.

The spring dawn was arriving in a red fury, the sky so strangely fiery Roxanna nearly winced.
Red sky at night, sailor’s delight
. . .
Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.
The little rhyme only intensified the fear now crawling all over her, raising gooseflesh as she entered the dim kitchen.

The cinchona tin rested above the hearth on the mantel. Taking it down, she noticed the kettle was already steaming over the hearth’s fire, as Bella had been here since first light. Uncapping the tin, she sniffed the contents. The cinchona, unpleasant in any form, seemed no different now. Reaching for a pewter cup, she measured out the amount she’d seen Bella use previously and then added hot water. Bitter tendrils of steam stung her nostrils. She waited for a few minutes, weighing the wisdom of what she was about to do, senses taut.

A spy, she thought, was nothing but a poltroon, slinking around doing damage in the dark. Taking the cup, she took one sip, then two. Never having tasted the medicinal tea, it was all she could do not to sputter as she swallowed.

The back door creaked open and Bella stood there, wild-eyed with worry. “Law, Miz Roxanna, what on earth you doin’ with that cup?”

“Praying it’s not poisonous, Bella.”

Bella rushed forward, hands outstretched, looking like she would dash it to the floor. Quickly Roxanna downed the hot liquid and set the empty cup on the table.

Bella looked stricken. “Lord have mercy! If it made McLinn sick, strappin’ man that he is, it might well kill you!”

“So be it,” Roxanna said. “’Tis better to know one way or another. Poison or not.”

She was indeed sick. Horribly so. Within half an hour, she was retching into the chamber pot beneath her bed. With Abby safely ensconced in the kitchen with Bella, Roxanna drew the latchstring in and wanted to die. Surely Cass felt the same. The malignant brew, tainted with whatever caused such misery, lingered on her tongue and seemed it would never leave her. Bella came by and maneuvered the door open, trying to get her to sip water and take an antidote for her roiling stomach, but Roxanna couldn’t keep the remedy down either.

“I’m goin’ to send Hank downriver for Dr. Clary,” Bella whispered, nearly wringing her hands. “The colonel forbade it for hisself, but he’s liable to court-martial me if I don’t fetch him for you.”

But Roxanna shook her head weakly. “No one need know.”

With Cass ill as well, she would hardly be missed. There would be no working at headquarters, anyway. A heavy rain was now pounding on the shingled roof with such fury it rivaled the smithy’s hammering. Few were about on such a day, as the parade ground was now a seething pool of dark, ankle-deep mud. She lay on her bed, stripped to her shift, the quilt half covering her between bouts of retching, her mind rife with dark thoughts.

Oh, Lord, let me die in this place, then I’ll be free. No more worries about spies or Abby or a bleak future. No more fighting my attraction for a man who loves another . . .

Toward twilight she slept. But it was a nauseous, dreamless sleep punctuated with stomach pain. She came awake to shadows—of someone replenishing the fire that had almost burned out. Bella? And then someone was lifting her head, stroking the tangled hair back from her face, and murmuring whispered words in Gaelic.

She shot upright, pushing against the hard shoulders that loomed over her, fear spiking as she grappled with the shadows.

“Roxie—Roxie, ’tis only me.”

Cass?
She grabbed his coat sleeve with frantic hands, a bit out of her head. He sat down on the bed and gathered her up in his arms as if she were a child. Like Abby, she thought woozily. Like Papa had with her so long ago. Weak, she succumbed to the heady scent of him, gave in to the unfamiliar feel of his arms and solidness of his chest as he cradled her.

“You need water,” he said, but he didn’t reach for the cup Bella had close by. He simply stroked her hair and kept murmuring soothing words till she was still.

Ashamed to be seen so, she tried to turn away, face to the wall, but he wouldn’t relinquish her. He held her tighter, his breath warm against her ear.

“Roxie, what have you done?” His voice held an uncanny tenderness, so poignant her heart ached. “Why, love, why? If anything should happen to you . . .” He broke off as if aware he’d tread too far. Fumbling with the cup, he brought her head around so she could drink. She managed a few swallows, chest sore from heaving, skin all ashiver.

He bent his head, murmuring Gaelic words that made no sense yet left an unmistakable impression. He was praying for her. Pleading for her. Petitioning the Providence he disdained on her behalf. Though he wasn’t on his knees, she sensed his soul was.

Tears slid down her cheeks, but she was too weary to push them away. Finding her embroidered hankie lost in the bedding, he dried her face, and she succumbed to the warmth of him and slept. In time Bella came, but Cass didn’t leave her. Nor did he go when Dr. Clary examined her, poking and prodding and shaking his head.

“I’d issue a statement—an order—saying there’s an enemy within fort walls. Every man is suspect,” he said vehemently. “Every man is to watch every man. Anything even slightly suspicious is to be reported at once.”

Roxanna listened as through a foggy curtain. Across the room, Bella was regarding Cass with a look akin to horror as the implications dawned. “We’d best keep locks on every tub and barrel we got,” she moaned, moving toward the door. “And the kitchen is wide open right now, just ripe for more mischief.”

She shut the door with a thud that was hardly heard above the pounding rain. Dr. Clary tried to leave, but his horse couldn’t manage the muck of the common, so he sought refuge in the kitchen, saying he’d drink coffee till the weather cleared.

When Roxanna awoke, she found everything altered. Cass had hold of Abby, dwarfing the rocking chair alongside her bed. Pushing up on one elbow, she surveyed them in the firelit shadows. Abby was, in repose, so sweetly innocent with her coppery head upon his chest. His eyes remained closed, long lashes dark against his tanned skin. Roxanna traced the strong planes of his face with her loving gaze as her fingers could never do, and bit her lip to stem the desire.