15
Maddie looks a mite green.” Though said beneath his breath at a distance from the fort’s worst wags, Clay sensed it didn’t matter. That Maddie was poorly was plain to see. “What’s ailing her?”
“A misery in her stomach.” Jude’s frown made him years older as he watched his wife lean over the washtub, scrubbing half-heartedly. “Been plaguing her ever since Fort Pitt. And no doctor to be had.”
“Take her to Keturah.” Though he pondered the healing herbs to be had, Clay’s mind leapt toward Tessa instead. Here lately she colored his every thought, making him balk at Jude’s inevitable request.
“Sounds wise. But we’ll need you to go along to Swan Station. Interpret.”
Turning away from the sun-soaked common, Clay entered the cooler shade of the blockhouse. He hated to see Maddie suffer. All manner of maladies paraded through his head. Though he didn’t pry for decency’s sake, he suspected dysentery, given her frequent trips to the privy.
“I could have Keturah brought here,” Clay told him, pouring them both cider. “Spare Maddie the distance to Swan Station.” But even as he said it, difficulties arose. Jasper would likely be her escort, but with his frame of mind, Keturah deserved better company. “Let Maddie decide.”
Clay drained his cider and sat down while Jude went out. He surveyed the growing papers atop his desk with stoic dismay. He was a fighter and borderman, not a scrivener, but as commander of a military garrison he was to document anything and everything that happened during his tenure, including supervising the fort’s overall affairs—living conditions, disputes, the preservation and use of equipment and supplies, and the enforcement of military and frontier law, loose as it was in the backcountry. An onerous amount of scribbling that made his hand cramp more than his wounded leg.
In minutes Jude was back, no less grim than before. “Maddie’s partial to riding to Swan Station to seek a remedy once she’s done with the laundry.”
“Aye.” Clay’s quill dangled precariously over the paper, a drop of ink threatening to fall and mar the document as he dredged up details unrelated to the Spinster Swan.
The report prior to his arrival here was grim. Along the westernmost border of Virginia and Pennsylvania was an uncurbed trail of destruction that necessitated Fort Tygart and other, smaller stations being built. More than two hundred settlers dead. Fifty-some homesteads burned. Countless captives taken. Entire back settlements deserted, easing the way for enemy encroachment. And now, other than Indians combing the country, an inexplicable lull in any outrages.
“Musta heard you were coming,” Cutright had quipped that morn, his belly with its gaping weskit shaking in mirth. He reached into a jar on a shelf and handed Clay a twist of celebratory tobacco.
Clay dismissed the jest. “My sense is that they’re amassing. Strategizing. Preparing to strike collectively.”
The big belly ceased shaking. “We’ve enough powder and bullet lead to withstand a prolonged siege, aye?”
“There’s no such thing as enough,” Clay answered, leaving the storekeeper to tend his depleted wares. Few pack trains ventured over the mountains in these uncertain times.
Pressing the ink to paper, Clay wrote today’s date—6th June, 1770. More men were needed. Cannons, not just bullet lead and gunpowder. Wilderness warfare was fought by a different, ever-changing, endlessly taxing absence of rules. Such demanded all his focus, all his faculties. And yet an uncommon woman with a promise of new stockings danced at the corners of his conscience.
If Maddie weren’t so miserable, if Jude didn’t have a glint of desperation in his eye, if the woods weren’t so mysteriously still . . . Combined, they forced his hand to revisit the Swans on a mission for Maddie. Hard on the heels of his desire swelled stiff resistance. He had no time to indulge any heart-related whims. With any luck, Miss Swan would be at the ferry and he’d miss her altogether.
“Ready, Clay?” Maddie stood in the blockhouse doorway, her dress hanging with alarming slackness around her already spare frame.
“Aye.” He took up his rifle, shot pouch, tomahawk, and other accoutrements.
“Mighty big of you to act as escort, busy as you be.” Maddie looked askance at his injured leg, unbandaged now and hidden beneath buckskin breeches. “Reckon you’ll get shot at again?”
His grin was half grimace. She hadn’t lost her humor at least.
They walked toward the front gate, where Jude had readied their horses. Clay tried to quell his rising anticipation. Though few knew, he’d patrolled the perimeter of Swan land so often he could find his way blindfolded.
The first mile passed in silence, his senses tuned to the slightest infringement on the peaceful summer’s day. How he longed to enable the back settlements to farm and hunt and live in freedom, as unconcerned about danger as any city dweller.
A noisy splash through a creek and a slight climb over a rise brought them to the border of Swan land. Their cur, Snuff, began to bark the closer they came. Smoke hung in the humid air about the cabin, as did the reek of boiled turnips. The slant of the sun bespoke two o’clock. Clay pushed back his hat to cool his brow as Rosemary Swan stood up amid the kitchen garden. Keturah was nearby at the creek, rinsing out piggins.
Nary a trace of Miss Swan.
Disappointment pummeled him, and then relief reined him in. He dismounted as Jude helped Maddie down then led the horses to a water trough.
“Well, Colonel Tygart, honored by your coming,” Rosemary said, walking over to meet them and glancing quickly at his wounded leg.
“A fine day, aye?” Clay removed his hat. “We need to speak to Keturah in private. Maddie’s ailing.”
Concern crumpled the older woman’s features. “Of course.” She gestured to a wide stump beneath the shade of a rustling elm. “It’s a mite close in the cabin, but out here’s a breeze. Care for something cold to drink from the springhouse?”
At their combined ayes, Maddie sat down with relief. Jude left the horses to forage while he talked to Zadock and Cyrus near the barn. ’Twas just Clay, Keturah, and Maddie now.
