Hunton’s stage station was as noisy as Mary remembered it from her trip to Fort Laramie. With few travelers in late October, she had a curtained-off partition to herself, which was all the luxury anyone could expect. His eyes on some barely sober cowboys, Sergeant Blade posted a guard outside her curtain, which turned out to be him and then the corporal halfway through the night. Mary slept better than she thought she would.
They left at dawn, making a steady push that saw them to Cheyenne at dusk, just as the eastbound train pulled in to the Union Pacific depot. Sergeant Blade retrieved the calico money from the military strongbox and sent the paymaster on his way rejoicing.
Earlier that afternoon, another Indian scare meant the major heard the whole story of the calico ball when Mary joined him in the ambulance again.
At his request, she told the paymaster some favorite longhouse stories and answered his questions about life on the still-shrinking Seneca reservation. In turn he assured her that her relatives had almost nothing in common with western hostiles. She could have told him that earlier, when he chose not to share his ambulance. She decided the paymaster was better informed now, and she could be charitable.
Mary also arrived at an unexpected personal judgment. The only daughter with three older brothers, she had been raised by doting parents. Perhaps, just perhaps, she had been spoiled as much as Victoria Masterson. Perhaps it was time to grow up and face the fact that while she did not live in a perfect world, she could whine less about her own lot in life.
And so Major Pettigrew had given her a courtly bow at the depot and told Sergeant Blade to take care of “this charming little lady.”
“You made a friend, charming lady,” Rowan teased as they watched the train leave. He glanced at Mary. “I feared you would hop the train and head East yourself, and how could I ever explain that to my superiors?”
“I thought about it,” she told him as they walked back to the troopers holding their horses. “I promised Mama I would weather out six months.” She had to smile. “I find it singularly amusing that during a short jaunt to Cheyenne I became a ‘charming little lady.’”
Sergeant Blade laughed at that as they rode along together. He sent the rest of the troop through to Fort Russell with the corporal. His face changed to the more serious expression she also knew. “I wish that all of us out here, white and Indian alike, had the luxury of such a discovery. Until that happens . . . Follow my lead here, if you will, and trust me not to be a scoundrel.”
Mary mulled over his words as he dismounted in front of the Plainsmen Hotel and helped her down. Sergeant Blade escorted her into the lobby, calmly signed the register as Sergeant and Mrs. Rowan Blade, then handed her the single room key after the clerk finished and before her blushing confusion subsided.
“I didn’t want to chance the clerk getting all huffy about Blue Eye and denying you a room,” he said quietly. “It’s a serviceable falsehood, and after all, unlike our major, he hasn’t had the benefit of your company, has he? I’ll meet you in the dining room over there at eight tomorrow morning, and we will scavenge the dry goods stores in town.”
“I must pay you for the room,” Mary said, and opened her purse.
“Captain Hayes already did,” Rowan said. “He told me to make certain you had safe accommodations in Cheyenne. It was his contribution to this bit of female silliness, I believe was how he put it.” He leaned toward her, a surprising conspirator. “Captain Hayes is, unlike his wife, not a foolish person.” He put a forefinger to his forage cap. “Until tomorrow, Miss Blue Eye.”
Sergeant Blade wasn’t a man to argue with, so she didn’t try. Maybe he was right in camouflaging her and protecting her behind his own name. The clerk appeared none the wiser, and must have thought they were married. She could think about Rowan’s Gordian Knot way of solving a problem later, perhaps when she was riding home to New York on that eastbound train.
If that was still her plan. During a solitary dinner and then a peaceful evening in a pleasant room, Mary thought about Major Pettigrew. He hadn’t apologized for his bigotry, but the major had changed. So had she. How much, she wasn’t certain. As she drifted off to sleep, Mary Blue Eye considered that the answer to her question wouldn’t be discovered if she ran back home when times were tough.