The words, though kindly said, seemed rote. How many times had the commandant had to deliver this same message?
On their way out, Clay was delayed by McKee, the Indian agent. A half blood, he was a curious mix of two worlds, both red and white, his respect for Clay obvious. Unlike his commander, he didn’t indulge in pleasantries and protocol and spoke Lenape with Clay as if wanting to maintain some sort of privacy. A third man joined them, his attire and manner as Indian as McKee’s. His stony eyes took her in so intently she nearly flinched.
He spoke in Lenape too, gesturing to her in a manner that returned her gaze to him, if only briefly. Standing aside as the trio talked, she watched an Indian woman with a baby on her back walk past, her step light, her doeskin garments colored with beads. Tessa’s thoughts, always so full of Ross, left room for Keturah too. How did her old friend fare? Was she happy with the Moravians, glad to return to the territory she’d lived in for so long with the Lenape?
Clay was speaking as emphatically as she’d ever heard him, McKee and the third man listening closely, occasionally asking an unintelligible question. Occasionally even McKee’s gaze would stray to her, then back to Clay again. Though their words were lost to her, she sensed the matter being discussed was more personal than passing. After several intense minutes, the other two men walked in the direction of the fort.
“Who was that with McKee?” she asked, looking back over her shoulder at them.
“Simon Girty.”
Her brows peaked. Hester seemed to hover and hiss. Dirty Girty. All her life she’d heard of him, but never had she thought to encounter him. Taken by Indians as a child, he’d never forsaken his feral ways, even turning on his own white kin. “He’s not soon forgotten.”
“You never know from which corner help will come,” was all Clay said. Did he mean the matter with Ross?
She mastered the shudder in her spirit, the sense that Girty and even McKee were not lightly dealt with, nor men you could turn your back on. But Clay had shown no unease in their presence and had from all appearances known them for a very long time.
“Needs be we head east straightaway. Once we have our fill of Philadelphia we’ll return here to see what’s transpired in our absence.” Clay took her by the arm, turning in the direction of the inn.
His decisive words kindled new courage. “If you think that best, aye.”
36
Clay settled accounts with their hostess and bade the officials farewell, and then they started east. Soon Fort Pitt was a speck of brick on the far horizon. Three hundred miles spread out before them, the distance daunting. Though Tessa set her sights forward, she couldn’t quiet the notion that by leaving Pitt she was somehow leaving Ross. Turning her back on the border, the far-flung west, was somehow akin to turning her back on her brother, or so the knife’s edge of pain said. But waiting along the Buckhannon seemed unendurable too.
When they came upon a boundary marker along a particularly alluring stretch of the Monongahela River, Clay said, “Here marks Tygart land.”
“Whatever would we call it?” she wondered, spying a treed rise that begged for a fine house. “Surely not Tygart Station. These woods seem peaceable in a way the Buckhannon’s never been.”
“Plenty of oaks. Oak Run. Oak Grove. Oak Hill.” With a shrug, he turned in the direction of Fort Pitt. “A home of solid stone, not logs. Furnishings from overmountain. Enough fancies to make you feel you’ve one foot in town.”
She smiled, envisioning it. “But first, Philadelphia.”
They set a brisk pace, their hard riding through the foothills of the mountains eclipsing conversation, though in time a companionable silence ensued. Since leaving town, Clay had become quieter, as if his conversations with McKee and Girty weighted him in ways he couldn’t share. To counter it, she forced a gladness she didn’t own, if only to lighten his load. No need to burden him with cares he couldn’t control. As for herself, she tried to outrun her sorrow with every league they traveled. Yet no matter where she went, flashes of Ross followed. And Jasper.
Daylight trickled to dark, turning their thoughts to bedding down. They slowed, searching for a suitable spot to overnight, their horses spent. Together they removed saddles and bedrolls and what was needed to keep them till first light. The weariness of the trail had taken hold again, that sun-lined, sunburnt look born of the heat and dust and miles.
“You look deep in thought,” he said, settling beside her on a saddle blanket.
She smiled, fingers seeking her locket again, afraid she might lose it in the rigors of travel. “I’m remembering that blessed bath and bed. What followed . . .”
“We’re making good time,” he told her with a wink. “Should see the spires of Philadelphia by week’s end.”
Lately at close of day they’d been joining hands and murmuring cumbersome if heartfelt prayers. For those at home on the Buckhannon and at Fort Tygart. For those far away like Keturah and Ross. For themselves as they pushed into the unknown. They partook of Semple’s beaten biscuits and some jerked meat as the wind awoke, a touch of autumn in its grip.
Clay draped an arm about her, pulling her closer, the both of them a knot of warmth in the chill, blackening woods. He kissed her softly, an invitation. She returned the kiss, burrowing nearer, forgetting the insects and sideways slash of the wind. But ’twas impossible to ignore the howling wolves or the distant thunder of approaching hooves. At once, Clay pulled away from her and got to his feet, rifle in hand.
A man’s voice grated in the near dark. “Tygart, that you?”
A split second’s surprise.
“Aye, Girty,” Clay answered as the buckskin-clad man appeared in their makeshift camp. “What brings you?”
Long minutes passed. The men were speaking Indian again. Did it give them greater expression than the white tongue? She sat completely still and waited for the intrusion to come to an end. The moon rose, white and full as a melon from the field.
In time Clay turned toward her, his expression unreadable, the shadow of Girty in back of him. “Prepare to return to Fort Pitt at first light.”
She got little sleep. How could she rest with the snoring, volatile Girty but a few feet away? There was little time for questions. She would trust Clay that returning west was what was called for. Secretly, she rejoiced. Maybe the Lord was answering their persistent prayers. She just hadn’t expected help to come in the form of the renegade Girty. Or a return to Fort Pitt.
