The Chisholm Trail Page 6

  “I’d count it a miracle from God if I could. But nobody in Texas has a plugged peso. I don’t even own a horse, and got no hope of ever ownin’ one. I joined the Confederate army when I was eighteen. Ma tried to talk me out of it. She said they’d never see me again, and she was right. While I was gone, the Comanches killed her and Pa, and burned our place to the ground. I hitched rides when I could, but mostly I walked from Virginia. I got home to find only the chimney standing, young cottonwoods growin’ where the house used to be. Down by the creek, where me and Pa fished, there was a pair of graves. No horses, no cows, nothin’. Took me ’most a week just to find out what happened to my folks. I had nothin’ to hold me, so I come back to New Orleans. God knows why. I was so down and out, I didn’t have any shells for my Colt, or them four lobos that jumped me would of been left dead in the street.”

  Ten recalled the words of Jesse Chisholm.

  “…when you ride into those Comanche-infested brakes, take some fighting men with you. Texas men. You’ll know them when you meet them. They’ll be the survivors of four years of war. They’ve already been to Hell and back.”

  “Suppose,” said Ten, “you had a chance to be part of an outfit trailing Texas cows to Indian Territory, and later to the railroad? Could you fancy ridin’ for and with an Injun like me?”

  “Pardner, I’d fight the devil with a single tree for the chance to set a Texas saddle, on a good hoss, and ride with an honest-to-God cow outfit. Why, I’d paint my face, put feathers in my hair, and ride for your grandma.”

  “We’ll be goin’ into the brakes after the cattle,” said Ten. “There’ll be Comanches, maybe outlaws, and then the long trail north.”

  “Injun, you got yourself a Texas cowboy. When do we ride?”

  5

  On Friday, Ten visited different stores and shops, until he found Levi’s, shirts, and boots for Marty Brand.

  “You had to have these before you could go out,” he told Brand, “but a man ought to choose his own hat and six-shooter. When you’re up to it, we’ll see to that.”

  Ten had taken a room for Marty at the Magnolia Hotel, and Marty left the rooming house on Saturday morning. Before going to the hotel, they made the rounds, until Brand found a black Stetson he liked. He completed his outfit with a new Colt, belt, and tie-down holster.

  “I never reckoned I’d live long enough to be dressed as fine as this,” he said.

  Ten found it necessary to take Brand into his confidence regarding his visit to the LeBeau house.

  “Pardner,” said Marty, “I don’t know whether to call you a brave man or cuss you for a fool. Takin’ on them smugglers and black market gents might be interestin’. Even goin’ after Comanches I can understand. But cozyin’ up to a lonesome gal without any friends? Whooee!”

  Ten grinned, pretending a calmness he didn’t feel. The butterflies in his stomach felt as big as turkey buzzards and seemed to be having a violent disagreement among themselves. Just after four o’clock he knocked on Marty’s door and was told to enter.

  “Marty, I’m going to leave most of my money with you.”

  “You expectin’ her to pick your pockets?”

  “I don’t know what to expect,” said Ten. “Wolves around here seem to run in packs.”

  “Want me to tag along? Between the two of us, we could gut-shoot a pile of the varmints.”

  “I reckon not. I’ll likely have enough trouble explaining why I’m there. Gettin’ shot might not be as tough as what I’m about to do.”

  He returned to his room and dressed in the clothes Mathewson had sent. There was a white shirt with ruffled front and cuffs, a black string tie, and a fancy black suit with a square-tailed coat. The shoes were matching black, highly polished, and they cramped his feet. He wore them only because his boots were pretty well used up.

  Marty grinned. “My God, you look like somethin’ between a circuit-ridin’ preacher and a hundred and eighty pound buzzard. I never seen so much black all at once. If you get in trouble, just hide out till dark and you’ll disappear. Wanta wear my black hat?”

  “No thanks,” said Ten. “This is about all the finery I can stand.”

  The clock in the lobby said 4:25, and when he stepped out the door, the carriage was waiting. He got in, the liveryman clucked to the team, and they were off. The carriage was black, the horses were a team of matched blacks, and the liveryman wore black. Ten felt like he was on his way to a funeral. Perhaps his own.

  The Logan house, built in the mid-nineteenth century, could only be described as elegant. It was two stories, white, with a porch across the entire front. Huge white columns supported a second-floor balcony encircled with white wrought iron. A white wrought-iron gate opened to a stone walk, while an iron picket fence set the house apart from the street. The fence extended as far as he could see, and appeared to surround the property. To the left, palms hung their graceful heads over the second-floor balcony, while on the right, the granddaddy of all magnolias shaded the lower porch, the east end of the balcony, and brushed waxy green leaves against the second-story windows.

  “Your name, sir?”

  Ten told him, and the butler finally found it on the second page of the guest list. He expected the man to lead him—or at least point him—where he was expected to go, but he was left on his own. He felt as out of place as a range bull in a sheep pen. He started down the hall. The first door he came to was wide enough and high enough to accommodate a Conestoga wagon and a six-mule team. He walked into what obviously was a parlor. The deep wine floral carpet looked as though nobody had ever set foot on it. The love seat and many chairs were richly upholstered in a plush velvet that matched the carpet. Paintings hung at perfect intervals along the walls, and magnificent burgundy drapes graced the windows from floor to ceiling. Strangely enough, on the far side of the room another door led to a second parlor as elaborate as the first. Except for the butler, he hadn’t seen a soul.

  Ten was in the second parlor when he heard a door close. He started toward the sound of it. The door on the far side of the second parlor was closed. He had his hand on the knob when it suddenly opened and a dark-haired, dark-eyed girl ran headlong into him. What he did next, he never fully understood the why of it. He kissed her full on the lips, and for just a heart-stopping second she responded. Then she backed away, took a deep breath, and slapped him so hard his ears rang.

  Off balance, he stumbled into a spindly-legged glass-top table, and it toppled with a tinkling crash. He lay there amid the wreckage, afraid to open his eyes.

  “Oh, you’re hurt!” she cried.

  He opened his eyes. The oval top of the table had been a frame for the glass, and some shards remained. On one of these he had gashed the top of his left hand, and if appearance meant anything, the wound was mortal. His entire hand was bloody, and it dripped grotesquely off the tips of his fingers.

  “What on earth…?”

  The woman was an older twin of the girl. It had to be Emily LeBeau.

  “Come on!” cried the girl, taking his uninjured right hand. “We have to stop the bleeding!”

  She led him into an enormous kitchen, filled a pan with cold water, and he put his bleeding hand into it. She left on the run, returning with a towel and a medicine kit. By the time she had the bleeding stopped and the cut bandaged, they had a considerable audience, including Emily LeBeau.

  “Ma’am,” he said, “I’m sorry about your table. I’m as clumsy as a cow on loco weed.”

  “Do I know you?”

  “I doubt it,” said Ten, “but I’m sure you know of me. I’m Tenatse Chisholm. My father is a frontiersman and scout. Jesse Chisholm is quite well-known in Washington. I’m sure you’ve heard Mr. LeBeau speak of him.”

  “I…ah, I’m sure that I have,” she stammered.

  “Mother,” said the girl, “why don’t you take our guests back to the summer house? Tenatse and I need to talk.”

  “Very well,” said Emily, obviously relieved. “But don’t neglect
your other guests. Dinner is at six.”

  Ten viewed the “guests” with a critical eye. He doubted a one of them was under twenty-five, and every last one was female. John Mathewson pretty well had his facts straight. The girl pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. He straddled another, folding his arms across its back, and resting his chin on them. He simply stared at her. She had big gray eyes and hair as raven-black as his own. She had a pert nose, even teeth, and skin without blemish. When he didn’t speak, she did.

  “Why didn’t you tell her the truth? You wouldn’t have fallen if I hadn’t slapped you.”

  “It would have served no good purpose,” he said. “It would only have embarrassed you, and made me look like the fool I likely am. Besides, I had no right to do…what I did.”

  “Then why did you do it?”

  “Because you’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen in my life, and I wanted to,” he said. “If I had it to do over, I’d do it again, even if you pulled out a pistol and shot me between the eyes.”

  There was no doubting the truth of his words. She leaned forward, kissed him on his left cheek and again on the right. There was just a hint of moisture in the big gray eyes.

  “Once for your honesty,” she said, “and once more, because I wanted to.”

  It was suddenly unbearably hot. He stood and took off his coat, forgetting the Colt against his belly, under the waist of his trousers.

  “A pistol!” she gasped. “Is it…loaded?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Isn’t that dangerous? You might shoot off some…”

  “Parts I’d purely hate to lose,” he finished.

  He laughed, and she covered her crimson face with her hands. She spread her fingers and peeked at him with one big gray eye.

  “You must think me a terrible, forward woman.”

  “I told you what I thought of you,” he said. “That, hasn’t changed, and it never will.”

  “You totally flustered Mother. She never heard of you.”

  “But your daddy has.”

  “They never—They…oh, damn it,” she cried, “I’m so tired of covering up for them! They each lead separate lives, and I…I’m alone. I don’t have either of them. Mother flutters about, trying to impress people I simply can’t stand. He—Father—goes off for days at a time, to horse races, card games, and…and God only knows what else. I have no friends. You saw my guests! Dear God, some of them are so old they—their female parts have—have grown up in weeds!”

  He laughed, and again she blushed, hiding her face with her hands.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I wasn’t laughing at what you said, but the way you said it. You talk honest, without put-on, like a western woman.”

  “Why haven’t I seen you before, if you’re a friend of…my father?”

  “I’ve never been here before. This is my first time in New Orleans.”

  “You have an Indian name, but you speak English as well as I do.”

  “Jesse Chisholm, my father, is one-half Cherokee. My mother was a full-blooded Cherokee. Whatever that makes me, that’s what I am. Jess sent me to school in St. Louis, and I stayed there three and a half years.”

  “Then you can’t be much older than me.”

  “I won’t be eighteen until the fourth of next April.”

  “I thought you were older. You seem…so mature, so sure of yourself.”

  “On the frontier, it’s shoot or be shot. It ages a man. I never knew my mother. Sometimes, I think an Indian is born old, with a Bowie knife in his hand and raising hell his only option.”

  “What a profound thing to say.” She giggled. “If Mother finds out you’re Indian, she’ll simply die. If Father were here, if he knew—”

  “Then I’d die,” said Ten.

  “So would I, when he was through beating me.”

  The light had gone out of her eyes. She bowed her head, and a single tear slipped down her cheek.

  “Priscilla.”

  When she finally looked at him, she tried to speak, but could not. She swallowed hard, and when the words came, they were almost a whisper. Ten leaned closer to hear.

  “I have so enjoyed this little while with you. I’m not used to being treated like I…I’m a person with feelings of my own. When I think of how it’s been, how it is, and how it’s going to be, it’s…it’s the contrast that’s hurting me.”

  He took both her hands in his, and she didn’t resist.

  “Priscilla, in another year you’ll be eighteen. Your life will be your own, to live as you please. You can choose your own friends.”

  “No,” she said, and her voice broke. “I’m to marry old Jason Brawn.”

  “What?” He gripped her hands so tightly she winced.

  “He’s…dear God, he’s older than my father. But he’s got money. He’s the wealthiest man in New Orleans. He controls gambling in nearly all the saloons, and on some of the riverboats. Daddy says it’s—it’s in my best interests.”

  Like hell it was! Ten made a silent vow that he’d gutshoot this pair of conniving old bastards, if that’s what it took. He turned his attention back to Priscilla.

  “If you don’t want him, then I swear he’ll never have you!”

  “I’ll kill myself first,” she exclaimed. “God help me, I will!”

  “It won’t come to that,” he said. “You’re not alone anymore.”

  She smiled, and chills broke into a fast gallop up his spine.

  “Thank you,” she said. “It’s wonderful of you to want to help me, but what can you do?”

  “I can take you so far into Indian Territory they’ll never find you,” he said grimly, “and I can kill anybody that tries to stop me.”

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “Dead serious.”

  He still held both her hands, and she was looking at him in frank amazement, when the butler appeared in the doorway.

  “Dinner is about to be served,” he said.

  Ten waited until he had gone before speaking to her again.

  “Think of some excuse to get away from these people, and we’ll talk again before I have to leave.”

  To his dismay, there were place cards at the dining tables, and the card with his name was far from Priscilla’s. With her on his mind, he ate almost nothing. Finished, they retired to the parlors. There was an hour of foolish conversation, of which he later remembered nothing. He caught Priscilla’s eye once, and she shrugged helplessly. There simply was no way they could escape together, without the reason being obvious. When the grandfather clock struck nine, the others began excusing themselves and leaving. Each of them paused for a parting word with Emily LeBeau and then with Priscilla. Ten waited until last. He mumbled something to Emily. Priscilla waited at the door, disappointment in her eyes. He spoke as softly to her as he could.

  “Where’s your room?”

  “Upstairs,” she said.

  “Near the balcony?”

  “Yes,” she said. “At the end where the magnolia tree is.”

  “When the house is dark, I’ll meet you on the balcony in the shadow of the tree.”

  She started to say something, but he was already in the hall, on his way to the front door. He was relieved to find that Mathewson didn’t have the carriage waiting. He walked far enough from the house that he could see without being seen, and waited in the shadow of a tall hedge. He froze, thinking he’d heard a stealthy footstep, but it wasn’t repeated. The wait was making him jumpy, he decided. First, it had been the endless socializing in the parlor, and now the wait until Priscilla reached her room. His heart leaped when a lamp was lighted in the room she’d said was hers, but every downstairs window was still ablaze with light. The big magnolia tree on which he depended stood between two of those lighted windows. The upstairs lamp went out after a few minutes, and he waited impatiently for those downstairs to be extinguished. Finally, one by one, they were. By the stars, it was no later than ten o’clock, but it seemed he had
waited half the night. He delayed a little longer after the last lamp went out, then returned to the house. The gate creaked like something out of a bad dream, and he held his breath. But there was no sound except the crickets, and he went on.

  Once he was in the massive shadow of the magnolia tree, he felt safe. The tree was old and gnarled. Its lower branches were within easy reach, and worthy of ten times his weight. Two-thirds of the way up, he came to an enormous branch that reached out over the balcony. Directly above it was a lesser limb to which he could cling for balance. Once over the balcony, he let himself down as quietly as he could. She had changed her pale blue gown for a thin, white dressing gown. She came to him with a sob, clung to him, and he could feel her slender body trembling. She had spread a quilt up against the wall, and although the balcony was roofless, the friendly big magnolia concealed them with its shadow.

  “I was so afraid you wouldn’t come,” she whispered. “Mother would never have left us alone as long as she did if she hadn’t had all those people in the house.”

  “Can’t you talk to her, tell her how you feel?”

  “No,” she said. “Do you think she asked me if I wanted this so-called birthday party, with a bunch of silly females simpering over me? She just used me, like my father intends to use me, buying favor at Brawn’s gambling tables. I’m so sorry I’m burdening you with all this, but I have nobody else. I’m ashamed of myself for being so selfish. It’s not your problem.”

  He drew her close to him, so that he could speak into her ear.

  “I’m making it my problem. I want you, Priscilla LeBeau, if you’ll have me. Say that you want me, and I’ll take you west, to the frontier. I’ll swear by the stars that nobody—your daddy or anyone else—will ever use you or abuse you again.”

  He felt her tears on his cheek, and it was a moment before she found her voice. Even then, it trembled with emotion.

  “Tenatse Chisholm, I’ve known you just five hours, but I trust you. I believe in you. If you really and truly want me, I’ll go with you.”

  “Not just because there’s nobody else?”