Chapter Six
"Good morning, Father." Mackenzie walked into the officer's dining room. Her father was alone drinking a cup of tea and eating a thick slice of Mary's cornbread.
Outside, she could hear Harry shouting commands and the soldiers responding. She could hear their boots as they marched in six inches of mud, drilling as they did most mornings. Harry said it wasn't that they needed the practice, only that it was a way to diminish their boredom.
Mackenzie dropped her arm around her father's shoulder and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. She slid into Harry's vacant chair at the end of the table.
"Morning, daughter. You are just the one I wanted to see."
"Uh oh, that means I'm in trouble, right?" Another chipped china cup rested on the table, probably meant for Harry. She poured herself some tea, using his cup. "When I was a little girl you always used that phrase when I was in trouble."
"You're not a little girl anymore, Mackenzie," he answered seriously. "But that doesn't mean I've given up my responsibility to keep you safe. You'll be mine to care for until, God willing, I place you in the safety of your husband's care. Even then, you'll still be my daughter."
She dropped a lump of brown sugar into her tea and stirred it with her father's spoon. She had known this was coming. "I think I already know what you're going to say."
"Good. Then this won't take long."
She tasted her tea. It was so bitter that she added more sugar. At home they always had sweet, thick cream for their tea, but of course there were no cows here in the middle of the wilderness. She took another sip of the tea, and satisfied, reached for a slice of cornbread. She glanced up at her father. "Well? Go ahead. I'm ready for my berating."
"There'll be no berating. We're not talking about a county fair horse race you entered under a boy's name, or giggling during services, Mackenzie. We're talking about your life."
She sighed. "It was stupid to go to the stream alone the other day. I know that now. It won't happen again. I'll get an escort next time."
"That wasn't what I wanted to discuss. I know you have enough wits about you not to go to the stream alone again. I'm talking about last night."
Last night? She was afraid to make eye-contact with her father. Did he know Fire Dancer had come to her room? Sweet heavens, a redman could be hanged for such an offense. She concentrated on crumbling her bread, and tried to sound casual. "Last night?"
"Dancing with that heathen!" He slapped his hand on the table and the sugar tin jumped. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself !"
She took a bite of the bread, relieved her father didn't know just how far she'd gone against propriety with the Indian. "The dance? It was all in fun, Papa. The man with the pipe was playing, so I danced. I've done the same a hundred times in your tavern. I've danced with men I didn't know while you played your fiddle."
"It's not the same thing and you damned well know it." Her father's eyes reflected fear more than anger.
"No?" she said softly.
"No! You danced with colonists in my tavern!"
She licked her index finger and used it to pick crumbs off the table. She licked the crumbs off her finger, taking her time to answer. Fire Dancer was like that. He took much longer to respond than was customary.
Franklin slurped his tea. "I take your silence as agreement that you erred in judgment."
She glanced at him over the rim of his tea cup. "It was completely innocent. He meant me no harm or disrespect."
"You may think so, but . . ." His tone softened. "But, Mackenzie, you don't know men as I do. Men can be crude creatures of urges rather than wits. And neither of us knows what goes on in minds of their kind."
"Fire Dancer has never been anything but respectful to me. For heaven's sake, Father, he saved my life! I can at least dance with the man."
"I am forever grateful for what he did and I told him so, but I still want you to stay away from him. And I want someone else with you when you work on his portrait. Me or Josh, or Harry. You shouldn't be alone with a man like him. He's dangerous. Unpredictable. Even Harry says so."
Suddenly depressed, she brushed the crumbs off her skirt. She'd come to Fort Belvadere with such high hopes. Nothing was working out as she thought it would. "He won't sit for the portrait, so there's no need to worry on that."
"Good. That's even better. I want you to finish up Harry's as quickly as you can. Hopefully, DuBois will be here within the fortnight, but if he isn't—"
She felt a sudden sense of panic. "We're going home?"
"I think it's best. Harry doesn't know what's going on with DuBois. He sends word he's been delayed again, but he could be preparing to attack us, for all we know."
Her chair scraped against the plank floor as she stood up. "But he's part of the peace negotiations. A man of honor wouldn't do such a thing."
"You're right. It's all probably perfectly innocent. I'm certain he was held up in one of his forts in New York, just as he says. But Harry is uncomfortable, so I'm uncomfortable. That Huron who tried to attack you wasn't alone. There have to be others out there."
Mackenzie lifted her cup to her lips and took a sip of tea. She knew what her father said made sense. It probably would be best if she avoided Fire Dancer altogether since he wouldn't sit for his portrait. Period. The job would be over. Period. Her first job would be a failure. Period.
"Mackenzie," her father said softly.
She slowly lifted her gaze to meet his. She knew he knew how important this commission had been to her.
He held out his hand to her. "I want to protect you. You're all I have in the world. You do understand, don't you?"
She took his hand and squeezed it. She did understand. Even though she wanted to do these portraits more than anything in the world, she knew that her father loved her and wanted what was best for her.
"All right, Papa." She kissed his rough hand. "I'll stay away from him."
"That's my girl." He rose from his chair and scooped up his leather cocked hat from the table. "I'm going to the stream to try my hand at fishing. Want to come?" He dropped the old hat onto his balding head. "Josh said he'd meet me there after he fed the oxen."
She rolled her eyes. "Josh."
"Mackenzie, I don't think you've really given him a chance. He's mad in love with you and he could take over the tavern and trading post when I get too old. He could care for you when I'm gone."
She groaned. "Please don't say that. I don't want to talk about it."
He turned toward the door. "Whether we talk about it or not, it's the truth. I'm nearly fifty-five, daughter, and I'm feeling my age in my bones. This trip made me realize that. I won't be here with you forever and these colonies are no place for a woman alone, especially with all the fighting. I'd feel better knowing Josh would be with you to care for you."
Mackenzie didn't answer. What was the point? As far as her father was concerned, a woman chose her husband by what he could provide. In her father's eyes, the fact that she could never love Joshua Watkins was inconsequential.
A few days later, late in the afternoon, Mackenzie wandered into the compound to find her father. She'd been working on Harry's portrait for hours. Past the point of actually needing him to sit, the portrait was coming together nicely. It was even better than she'd hoped, which, instead of encouraging her, frustrated her even more. A portrait of only one of the peace delegates was useless. Even if DuBois did arrive soon and she did finish his portrait, she still wouldn't have Fire Dancer's. Harry's superiors had specifically requested that the Indian Prince be included. Without it, she doubted they'd even pay her for the other two portraits.
Mackenzie rubbed her neck to relieve the tension as she made her way across the muddy yard toward the lean-to shed where her father locked up his supplies. Outside the door were stacks of wooden crates, some empty, some still containing goods he'd brought with him to sell. She spotted Tall Moccasin. He had taken to Franklin and could often be found nearby. Josh was there, too.
"Afternoon, Mackenzie." Josh swiped his hat off his head and nodded, trying to keep a bag of feed balanced on his shoulder at the same time. The Indian boy held a bag of equal size.
"Afternoon, Josh." She smiled and his face turned red with embarrassed delight. That was one of things she didn't like about him. He was like a puppy. She gave him the slightest encouragement and he was all excited. It was a smile, for bloody Mary's sake. She wasn't agreeing to wed or bed him.
"Well . . . I . . . . I'm off to feed the oxen. Your father's inside."
She nodded as he passed by with Tall Moccasin behind him, both headed toward the paddock. Tall Moccasin nodded his head in greeting and grinned.
"What are you doing, Father?" She peered into the lean-to.
"Taking inventory," he said from the shadows of the building. "We've done well. Damned well. I've sold all the sugar and salt. Most of the tobacco, whiskey and ale, too."
Mackenzie leaned her back against the rough wall and tipped her face up to the bright sun, closing her eyes. She knew she shouldn't be out without her bonnet. She freckled so easily. But, despite its heat, she always found something revitalizing about the sun.
She opened her eyes at the sound of someone approaching through the mud, half-hoping it was him . She'd wondered when Fire Dancer would show his face, after pulling that trick the other night. For three nights she had waited at her window to see if he would come—so she could turn him away, of course. So far, she'd not seen him.
She frowned as the ugly, strutting one, Okonsa, came into view. Even when Mackenzie found out that he was Mary's brother, she didn't like him any better. He had mean eyes. He was crude and disrespectful to women, not just to her, but to Mary as well.
"Greetings, woman of beauty."
Still resting her back against the log lean-to, Mackenzie crossed her arms over her chest. "Can I help you?"
"This man thinks yes." His tone was suggestive as he crudely grabbed his man-parts.
This time, she didn't turn away. He did it to shock her and she knew it. What did she care if he liked to play with himself?
He chuckled at her lack of a reaction. "But this man come to barter with the father of the fire-haired woman. Later, you and Okonsa will talk of how you can help this man." He reached out to grasp a lock of her hair.
She jerked out of his way. It was different when Fire Dancer had touched her. He had never meant her any harm. She wasn't sure she could say the same about Okonsa.
"Father! You've got a customer." To busy herself while Okonsa was there, she lifted a quarter keg of ale onto her shoulder to carry it back into the lean-to. It wasn't heavy. She was used to hard work in her father's tavern.
Franklin Daniels appeared in the doorway, wearing a leather apron. He wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. "What can I do for you?"
The Indian lowered his voice. "This man comes for colonist manake firewater. Whis-key."
Franklin frowned. "Sorry. Can't help you."
Mackenzie walked back out of the lean-to and lifted another quarter keg onto her shoulder.
"Can't or will not?" the Indian with the nose ring demanded.
"I won't sell you any more whiskey."
"You have the whiskey and you will not sell it to this man?" The Indian took a threatening step toward Mackenzie's father.
Franklin didn't back down. "Not after that incident the other night. Redmen don't take well to liquor. You know it. I know it. One of these soldiers could have been killed in that brawl. One of your men could have been killed as well. It was a mistake for me to sell the whiskey to you in the first place."
"I have coin—English coin." Okonsa yanked a small red leather purse from the waist of his loinskin.
Mackenzie lowered the ale keg back to the ground. How curious it was that Okonsa carried a white woman's purse. It was dirty and stained, but very similar to the green one her father had bought for her last Christmas.
"I don't want your coin. I'll sell you tobacco. I have needles and cloth you can take back to your woman, but no whiskey." Franklin blocked the doorway, his legs spread wide. "I won't be responsible for any more fighting or injuries."
The Indian stared at her father with hatred in his eyes. "Do not make this mistake, white man." He shook his fist at him. "You do not want this man as enemy."
"You'll not threaten or bully me into changing my mind. I won't sell any more liquor to Indians. Not to your bunch, not to any others."
Okonsa's mouth twitched. He turned to Mackenzie. "Tell your father that he should sell whis-key to this man. There could come a time very soon when he might want this man for friend. To turn Okonsa away would be a great mistake."
Mackenzie lifted a brow. "He makes no mistake. He shouldn't sell you the whiskey. If it was mine, I wouldn't sell it to you, either. As for needing you as a friend, I think not."
He chuckled, speaking so softly that only she heard him. "Ah , you have fire in your heart. This man can see why a man would be attracted to you."
Mackenzie leaned over and lifted the keg onto her shoulder again. Was he referring to Fire Dancer or himself? Just the thought of this man touching her made her skin crawl. "Come on, Father," she said hurriedly. "Let's get this stuff inside and locked up before it grows dark. You never know what thieves lurk about."
Okonsa only laughed and walked away.
She turned her back on him as he strode away, not wanting to look at him another second. Inside the lean-to, she heaved a sigh of relief. "Good job, Papa." She patted her father on the shoulder. "You stood up to him. You were right not to sell him whiskey again. Fire Dancer says it's bad medicine for his people. Okonsa never should have bought the first bottle from you. It's against the law in his village."
"You talked to Fire Dancer after I asked you to stay away from him?"
"Oh." She waved her hand. "That was what he said that night. You know, when he got me inside the fort safely after the fighting started."
Her father moved a crate of tobacco over to make room. "That Indian with the nose ring is bad medicine, if you ask me. The man scares me. I hope the hell DuBois makes it here soon, because I'm ready to go home."
Mackenzie felt a chill. Her father's words had a foreboding tone about them. Okonsa scared her, too. She considered speaking to Fire Dancer about him, but what would she say? He looked at her? He grabbed his groin? And Mackenzie knew that Fire Dancer considered him his own brother. She wouldn't feel right saying anything against his brother when she had no concrete evidence.
She glanced at her father. "Okonsa's bad medicine? I've never heard you talk that way before."
"I've got a bad feeling in my stomach, Mackenzie," He brushed the top of his balding head with his hand. "I just want to keep my scalp, that's all."
That night, when Mackenzie heard a tap, tap, tap on her shutter, she leaped out of bed, barefooted, in her thin, white sleeping gown. It had been so hot this week that she'd carefully pulled out the stitches on the sleeves and removed them.
She stood in the darkness and stared at the closed shutter, a sense of excitement making her heart flutter. She knew who it was, of course. A part of her wanted him to come. She lifted her hand to open the shutter, then drew back in indecision.
Fire Dancer excited her, but he made her feel vulnerable as well. When she was with him, she didn't seem to be completely in control of her thoughts and feelings, or even her own actions. And her father had told her to stay away from him.
She dropped to her knees on the bed, unlocked the shutter, and opened it a crack. "Go away."
"I must see you, Mack-en-zie. Let this man in."
"Go away. My father says I can't talk to you."
"What do you say, Mack-en-zie with hair of magic and a mind that speaks for itself?"
She ignored his enticement. "You won't sit for my portrait; why should I do anything for you?"
"Mack-en-zie, this man asks that you let him in. I will not harm you. You know that this man would never harm you. This man only wants to see you. To talk. It is lonely here so far from home."
She knew she should slam the shutter closed and lock it. Instead, she opened it a little farther so that she could see his face. His admission of loneliness struck a cord in her heart, and endeared him to her more. She was lonely, too. And only this man seemed to fill that loneliness.
"Give this man permission to enter," he pressed in a whisper. "It is what you want. It is what this man wants."
Her face was only inches from his "If I don't give you permission, will you come anyway?"
"This man will not." He stared into her eyes, the lamplight in her room casting light and shadows across his serious face.
Sweet heavens, but he was a handsome man, his face seemingly carved from a master's hand.
"This man wants . . . needs you."
"Need me?"
"Need . . . need to talk."
Mackenzie could feel herself trembling inside. He wanted to talk to her; he wanted to be with her. He wanted her. Other men had wanted her, but no one had ever made her feel like this.
Mackenzie rested her hand on the lock of the shutter and attempted to appear nonchalant. So did she let him in or not? She debated silently.
Mackenzie thought of the idea she'd been toying with all day. If I'm going to go through with it , she mused, I need to see him, to study him. So why not let him in? He could talk and she could make the necessary observations .
She knew she was making weak excuses, but she couldn't help herself. "All right," she whispered as she swung open the shutter. "But you leave when I tell you to leave. I swear by all that's holy, if you don't, I'll call for the guard that waits at the bottom of the stairs."
Fire Dancer climbed through the window.
Mackenzie took several steps back.
He sat on the edge of her bed and stared at her.
"Well," she said after a minute or two of silence. "You said you wanted to talk. Talk of what?"
He drew his thin, sensual lips back in a half-smile. "It does not matter what we speak of, really, does it, Mack-en-zie? It only matters that we speak. That we share the words that tumble in our heads." He crossed his arms over his bare chest. "This man wonders what thoughts are in your head. This man wonders of things about you."
"Things?" She took a seat on the camp stool an arm's length from him. They sat at eye-level. A good way to study his face , she told herself. "What things? I've never known a man to be interested in what a woman thought about anything."
"This man is not any man."
He stared at her with those black eyes of his and she was unable to break the eye-contact. "No, you are not any man, are you?" she whispered.
Again that smile.
Mackenzie felt herself relax. He truly was interested in her, wasn't he? She laced her fingers and looped her hands over one knee. Her father was wrong. He wasn't dangerous. Only lonely. "So what would you like to know? My favorite food? The color of my last new gown?" She cut her eyes at him, an amused tone in her voice. "Why I won't marry Joshua Watkins, perhaps?"
He chuckled. "This man already knows why you will not marry the boy. You are not well suited. No, this man wants to know other things. Important things. Things that will tell this man what kind of woman you truly are."
Now she was intrigued. "Like what? Ask me a question. Any question."
He glanced away in thought. Then he looked back. "Name the men you have loved in your life, Mack-en-zie."
She rose off the stool and began to pace. "The men I have loved. What a strange question." She stroked her chin. "Hmmm. I love my father. I loved my grandfather very much." Her draped easel caught her attention. "He taught me to paint. He was schooled in Paris, you know." She pressed her lips together. "And I guess I love Harry—Major Albertson—because he's been so good to me all these years. And . . ."
Fire Dancer still sat on the edge of her cot, attentive as always. "And?"
She fiddled with a jar of paint that rested on the easel's shelf. "And Jack. He wasn't a man, just a boy. He was the cook's son." She smiled at his memory and felt a familiar ache. "I called him Jackie. He loved to fish. I used to take him fishing. The summer I was fourteen and he was seven he drowned in the river." The last word caught in her throat
"This man is sorry you lost one you loved."
"Thank you." She smiled up at him. "Now my turn. If you can ask questions, so can—" She spotted a black snake slithering across the floor board in front of her and halted in mid-sentence.
Fire Dancer rose off the cot and made a hand sign in the motion of a slithering snake. "Muneto."
Mackenzie stood perfectly still as the snake, as long as she was tall, glided by. "Muneto," she repeated.
Fire Dancer walked behind the snake, encouraging it to cross the floor and escape through a hole between two logs along the floor. "You fear muneto , Mack-en-zie who fights Huron with a bucket?"
She couldn't resist a smile at his teasing. She knew he was trying to ease her apprehension.
The snake disappeared through the wall.
"I . . . I'm not afraid of—" she imitated his hand-sign—"muneto . I just don't like them. Once when I was a child, four or five, I went out to the barn to feed the oxen. I put my hand into a feed crate to grab a handful of grain and the feed was alive with snakes." She couldn't repress a shudder. "I had nightmares for years."
He walked toward her. "This man will make a con-fess-i-ion."
"Oh?" Again she was intrigued. She had never met a man so honest and open about himself.
"When this man was a boy, I feared snakes." He chuckled. "Think of it, Mack-en-zie. Boy who is a prince. Boy who will grow to be great warrior and leader of his people. Shawnee boy who runs to his mother when he sees a snake."
She grinned.
"My brother-cousin Okonsa would tease me. Snakes on my sleeping mat. Snakes in my moccasins. Baby snake in my drinking cup."
"How cruel."
"He thought it was funny."
"Are . . ." she found herself lost in his gaze again. "Are you afraid of snakes now?"
He shook his head. "This man does not care for snakes in his cup, but no, I am not afraid. A wise man taught me not to be afraid. A man I wish you could meet." He caught her hand in his, and their fingers entwined.
Mackenzie felt light-headed. She was supposed to be study ing the angles of Fire Dancer's face, the color of his skin, the shape of his ears. Instead, all she could do was stare at his lips and wish they would touch hers.
"Will you let me come again?"
"My father must not know." The warmth of his hand spread a warmth to her entire body. "He would take me away."
"This man will take care. I would not see you sent away."
"I know. I know, but if he even suspects . . ."
"We will not give him reason to suspect." He let go of her hand and walked to the cot where he stretched out on his side. "It is early, Mack-en-zie. And it is your turn to ask another question."
After that night, an odd, new relationship developed between Mackenzie and Fire Dancer.
During the day, she made a point to ignore him when she passed him in the fort yard. When they attended one of Major Albertson's suppers, she avoided him, remaining beside Josh and her father or their host.
Perhaps she avoided Fire Dancer out of a sense of guilt that she was disobeying her father, or perhaps she did it because she didn't trust herself. It was easier for her to ignore Fire Dancer in public than to talk to him without anyone suspecting the truth of her feelings for him, especially since she really didn't know what those feelings were.
Mackenzie told herself that she allowed Fire Dancer to come to her room at night so that she could study him. Night after night she let him in her window. He talked. She listened. Sometimes she talked and he listened. Sometimes they argued. Fire Dancer saw the British and French as nothing but a blight on his people. Mackenzie tried to convince him that they could all live in harmony, that the Shawnee and Lenape and the other tribes could learn from the white man. Fire Dancer only laughed and stretched out on her bed, his hands tucked behind his head, his half naked body gleaming in the lamplight. They talked until the middle of the early morning. Sometimes until the stars began to disappear and the sun began to show its first rays.
Then he left and she began painting.