“Bountiful dinner,” Heckewelder said at last with an appreciative nod aimed at Hester and Tessa.
“Always is, this time of year,” Hester told him, passing him another helping of green beans and potatoes. “Soon we’ll have plenty of roasting ears.”
“Thankfully, crops are plentiful at Bethlehem. We have common gardens of several acres, a church, and a schoolhouse.”
Tessa voiced a secret hope. “We’ve need of such here. A preacher and a teacher both.”
“In time, mayhap,” he replied with a reassuring smile. “Once the western border settles down.”
“Peace might be had sooner if such things were in place.” Hester rose to replenish pewter tankards. “I’d sure like to witness both before I go to glory.”
Clay seemed lost in thought, saying little, his steady presence adding to the swelling pleasure Tessa felt to be gathered around this bountiful table. At meal’s end, as she anticipated coffee and pie, he scrambled her composure when he set down his fork and said, “A word with you, Miss Swan.”
A word? Hester all but crowed when Clay rose from the table and escorted Tessa to the blockhouse. She went in ahead of him, sure every settlement wag in the fort had their eye on the blockhouse door, if not privy to the conversation within.
Standing by the fireless hearth, he rested an arm along the mantel while she sat in the Windsor chair facing the andirons. The air was still cloudy with smoke, the seats arranged as they’d been for their meeting with Keturah.
“You need to be made aware of some things.” His voice lowered to that measured tone he used when he didn’t want to be overheard. “And since you’re one of the few women here who has the gift of discretion, I’ll say it plain.”
She folded her hands atop her aproned lap. “Speak plainly then.”
“Miss Braam is wed. To a leading Lenape war chief.”
Her mouth went slack. Keturah wed? To a . . . war chief? If he’d struck her with the fire tongs she’d have been less upended.
“She had a métis child, a son, who died of what sounds like smallpox.”
Wonderment engulfed her. For a moment she sat mute, trying to make this stunning piece of Keturah’s past fit into the puzzle of her Indianness.
“Her safety is in question, given her Lenape tie to a war chief. I have reason to believe he and the Lenape may know or will learn of her whereabouts, which puts your family at risk in the event he tries to retake her.”
Her thoughts spun back through the time Keturah had been with them, sifting through the days, hours. “She’s often alone in the woods gathering her medicines. Seems like there’s been ample opportunity to reclaim her. Or for her to run if she had a mind to.”
“She’s made no effort to do so? Given you any reason to believe she wants to be elsewhere?”
That faraway part of Keturah she sensed so strongly at times—was this because a large part of her was with her husband, who was still living, or with her child, forever gone? “Betimes she seems distant. Like she’s just bodily present. But never has she given us reason to believe she wants to be somewhere else.”
“Heckewelder has offered her asylum at Bethlehem in eastern Pennsylvania or the mission the Moravians hope to establish in the Tuscarawas Valley further west.”
“Sounds sensible. If you heard from her Braam kin, you’d send word to her there, aye?”
“Aye, but the hard truth is, some don’t want redeemed captives back. They’re considered befouled, especially once they learn they had an Indian family. Reunions can be agonizing for both sides.”
Did he speak from experience? Her gaze held his. “You know it by heart. I can tell you do.”
“Aye.”
How would Keturah’s family react once they learned of her return, if they ever did? Did an Indian husband carry more clout than her own white kin? “Would it not be wise to ask Keturah where she wants to be? With her Lenape husband or here?”
“So, you would recognize a marriage between a savage and a settler.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
He looked more pleased than surprised by her vehemence, as if she’d passed some test most failed. Did he think her like Jasper, blinded by mean-spiritedness?
Lord, nay.
“Is that any different than marriages made hereabouts without benefit of a preacher?” she asked. “Those settlers who come together and wait to make it legal?”
