Journey Home Chapter Sixteen

            The little boy paused in the bushes, panting hard.  He felt sore all over, like someone had hung him up for a rug and beaten everything out of him.  He was soaked to the skin.  His shirt and pants were in tatters.  But he was alive.

            And free.

            Robinson shuddered as he remembered the Indian warrior grabbing for him.  He hadn’t meant to fall, but in the end the river had proved his way out.  He had landed in the water and been nearly drowned.  Then, catching hold of a piece of driftwood, he had floated for he didn’t know how long until finally he had hitched on a tree uprooted at the edge of the stream.  Climbing up it he had fallen on the shore and lost consciousness, only to wake some time later to Indian voices.  For a moment, he had feared it was the men who hunted him, but then he realized the Indians were female.  Some women hunting berries near the river had found him.  When he woke up, he had been buried under skins, nice and warm.  It was all he could do not to stay there.  But he knew from his pa’s stories that Indians sometimes took white boys and made them part of their tribes, and he wanted to get home.  So the first chance he had, he ran away to the place where he was now.

            Wherever that was.

            Robinson turned and looked at the river.  It had been moving fast and he had floated for some time.  He had to be pretty far away from where he had last seen Stephen.  He hoped his brother was all right.  What with him being wounded and the Indians being there and all….

             He swallowed hard.  Pa had always told them not to borrow trouble.  Let the days worries be sufficient for the day, was the way his ma put it. 

            In other words, stop whining and get moving!

            As he started to walk, the chill morning air struck him and he shivered.  It had been foolish to run off from the Indian women, but he had no way of knowing whether they were friendly or not.  Still, if he’d been smart, he would have grabbed one of those skins and thrown it around his shoulders.  If he got sick, it would only make things worse.

            Halting, Robinson looked around and then looked up.  His father had taught him how to navigate by the stars but they had almost disappeared, though a trace of them still glittered in the sky.  The Indians had taken them south of Boonesborough.  The river flowed northeast, so he should have floated near the town or past it.  Getting his bearings, he continued to travel north.  If nothing else – if he was past Boonesborough – he just might end up at the Wild Wood Inn.

            He sure did miss his ma.  Seeing her would be like seeing Heaven.

            As he continued to walk, Robinson began to shake.  Fatigue and exhaustion slowed his pace.  Just as he was about to fall in his tracks, he remembered what Stephen had told him about General Harrison’s soldiers.  When the way got tough, they got tougher.  Drawing up to his full height, the little boy stiffened his spine and saluted his unseen commanding officer. 

“Sir!  Yes, sir!” he declared.

Then, putting one foot in front of the other, he continued on.

 ~

           Adam paused to take a drink.  He didn’t want to admit it, but he was still a bit lightheaded from the blow he had taken to his head.  He knew if he said anything, even made the slightest intimation that there was something wrong, it would all be over.  He was, after all, traveling with a half-dozen women.  Even if he didn’t die from the concussion, it would all be over. 

They would mother him to death!

            Being with Rachel Moray made him miss his own mother.  The two women could have been twins.  He hadn’t seen his mother in over a decade, or his father.  While they understood his choice of a career, his parent didn’t think he understood how futile the legal fight for the Cherokee was.  Even though his father had done everything right – he had cut his hair and worn white men’s clothes and farmed the land – still he had been rejected by the white man.  His reward for trying to fit had been a beating that had nearly cost him his life.  Adam had been beaten too and cursed with words that still had the power to sting.  He had been spit on and rejected, told he didn’t belong and lied about.  But he refused – he couldn’t, no, wouldn’t give in.  There had to be a way.  It was the law, damn it!  White or red, it was the law.

            Adam capped the water skin and placed it back in the wagon.

            “It’s the law,” he repeated out loud, as if to reassure himself.

            “Adam, are you all right?” a light voice that he recognized as Rachel Johnston’s asked.  Worry and weariness crinkled the edges of her eyes as they met his.

            He turned and smiled at her.  “Fine.  I’m fine.  We should get moving.  Is everyone ready?”

            They had traveled for hours, exchanging the moon for a peach-pink sun that rode low on the horizon heralding a new day.  Nature had finally forced them to take a break.  While discretion compelled him to remain at a discreet distance as the women entered the woods, he had been nervous awaiting their return.  His only male companion, Stephen, was non compos mentis.  The Johnston’s eldest son had lapsed into unconsciousness and lay in the wagon’s bed unaware of anything around him.

            “All accounted for and ready to continue on,” John Johnston’s wife answered as she swept a wisp of deep brown hair back from her eyes.  “How far do you think we have to go?”

            “Curious Dent said Sunalei would be at the waterfall.  That’s not that far from the town.  We should be there shortly.”

            “Will you stay with us once we arrive?”

            Adam took her hand and helped her to board the wagon.  “Once I know Sunalei is all right, and you ladies are safe, I must return.  Israel’s name needs to be cleared.  And mine,” he admitted with chagrin, “since I am wanted now for breaking out of jail.”

            “You are wanted for more than that, son of the Cherokee,” a deep voice intoned. 

            Adam stiffened.  His hand shoved his heavy coat aside, heading for the pistol he carried, but even as his fingers brushed the warm wooden handle, he knew it was too late.  He was one man, alone with six women – suddenly surrounded by a pack of wolves.  The natives had materialized as if from thin air to form a circle around them.  As Adam watched they raised their weapons.  A moment later a tall native whose white hair bore only a single predatory hawk’s feather stepped into the clearing.  The man waited unmoving until he took his hand from his coat and held it up to show that it was empty.

            “Son of my Cherokee enemies, you are wise.”  The man gestured broadly, taking in the wagon and the women it carried.  “I have no quarrel with these females.  If they come to harm, it will be on your head.”

            Adam knew him instantly, even though they had never met.  “You must be Hawk,”  he said.

            “Yes.  And you?  When you are with white men, you are Adam Fox.  But among the Cherokee, your name is Adohi.”

            “How do you know me?”

            “My men have been watching the town.  They saw you enter.  And leave.”

            Adam knew Indian runners could cover nearly one hundred miles in a day.  It would have been nothing for a messenger to bring Hawk this information.  But the renegade Wyandot’s words stirred a deeper fear within him. 

Had he been watching all along? 

“What do you want with me?” Adam demanded as Hawk began to circle like his namesake.

The renegade smiled.  It was not a pleasant sight.  “Your expertise,” he answered.

Adam bit back his anger.  “While I have no doubt you and your…men might be in need of legal counsel, what would make you think that I would consider –  ”

Hawk’s eyes flicked to the women and back.  He said nothing.

“Let them go.  I will do whatever it is you want.”

“Adam, no!”  It was Rachel Johnston.  She was up and on her feet.  “I have dealt with this man before, he is evil.” 

Beside her, Rachel Moray had grown pale.  Adam knew she shared her husband’s confidences.  No doubt she knew what Hawk was capable of.  Reaching up and catching the other woman’s hand, she pulled her back.  “Think of your children,” she warned quietly.  “And of the one yet to come.”

Hawk opened his arms wide, as if to say there was nothing to fear.  “Such words, ladies, and of one you do not know.  My men will think you less than Christian for such thoughts.”  The renegade’s eyes lingered on Rachel Johnston, then he turned and walked to Adam’s side.  There he added quietly, “If you will agree to be bound, I will let them go.  I have no desire to play nursemaid to six women.  There are more important matters to be attended to.”

Adam had no idea if he could trust him.  From what he had heard, Hawk was not capable of speaking the truth.  Still, it made sense.  With a war approaching, keeping watch on six excitable – and perhaps volatile females, would take more time and energy than the renegade had to expend.  Fortunately, he didn’t seem inclined to kill them outright.

“What promise can you give me?”

Hawk’s black agate eyes narrowed.  “A bold man I can admire.  But not a stupid one.”

“My father told me of you,” Adam said softly.  “Little Bear was known in Chota, as was his story.  Once, you were a great warrior.  Once your word meant something.  Once you would have died before breaking it.  I ask you, as that man, to give me your word that the women will be allowed to go on their way unmolested.”  Adam could only hope that deep down within the renegade there was the shadow of the man he had once been.  “Then I will do as you ask.”

Hawk remained still for more heartbeats than Adam was comfortable.  Then, just as he decided he had offended the Wyandot, the old man stirred and nodded.  Hawk untied the beaded sash he wore and placed his hand upon it.  “This was my son’s,” he said.  “On it I swear.”

That was as good as it was going to get.  Adam swallowed hard and nodded.  “Let me tell them.”

Hawk replaced the belt and then inclined his head.

The two Rachels were furious.

“You’re going to what?”

“You’re telling me you trust that man?”

Added to their consternation was the constant wail of three very frightened girls and one middle-aged women seeking to comfort them.  Verity Moray met his determined gaze; her own filled with pity and with pride.

“It’s for the best.  I’ll be free to act on my own.”  Adam’s eyes traveled over the dozen warriors arrayed about them.  Escape was unlikely, but not impossible.  “If I had to worry about all of you, my hands would be tied.”

That quieted them a little.

“Adam, be careful,” Rachel Moray whispered as she kissed him on the cheek.  “You’re still not fully recovered yourself.”

“What do you think they want?” Rachel Johnston asked, her dark eyes fixed on Hawk.

“My services, he says.”  Adam shrugged.  “Perhaps he means it.”

She shook her head.  “If only it were that simple.  But you know it is not.”

“I told them to take you back to the inn.  Hawk’s men won’t go near Boonesborough.  Stay there until I return, or until….”  His voice trailed off.  For once, the barrister was at a loss for words.

“God protect you,” John Johnston’s wife whispered.

As the wagon jolted away, Adam turned back to Hawk.  “Now, what is it you want me to do?”

“Why, what you are good at.  Prosecute a case.”

Adam frowned.  “You want to hold a trial?”

“Is justice only for the white man?”

“No.  No.  I have pledged my life to making it count for the red man as well.”  There was something Hawk was holding back, something that lifted his upper lip in a slight but definitely triumphant sneer.  “Who is the plaintiff?”

Hawk turned to watch the wagon roll out of sight.  Then he lifted his hand and gestured to the men who stood closest to the trees.  They disappeared for a moment and then reemerged, dragging a bound and gagged white man between them.  The man was taller than Hawk, which put him at well over six feet.  His dark blond hair was disheveled, and he looked as if he had been roughly handled, though he was obviously unharmed – as of yet.

Adam had a sinking feeling he knew who he was.  While in Daniel Boone’s company, the frontiersman had spoken of an Indian agent from Ohio; one who worked with the Shawnee and Wyandot.

John Johnston.

The warriors halted just behind Hawk.  Adam met Johnston’s eyes as they did.  The agent was unbent but wisely afraid.

“Of what does he stand accused?”

Unexpectedly, Hawk exploded in anger.  “Of what?  Of destroying the Indian – the Shawanoese, the Wendat, the Seneca and Lenape!  Of feeding and clothing and making him weak!  Of taking his warrior’s heart and crushing it, turning him into a woman who farms and sits by her fire waiting to grow old and die!”  The renegade turned and with a blow to the stomach, drove the white man to his knees.  Pivoting back, Hawk pointed a shaking hand at Adam.  “You will charge this man!  You will show the red men gathered here that John Johnston is false.  That his words are poison.  You, Adam Fox, will find him guilty!  And by the hand of the white man’s law – for the red man – he will die!”

Adam actually stepped back.  Hawk’s words struck like a blow.  “I would never pervert the trust placed in my hands in such a way.  Never!,” he declared.  “There can be no trial here.  You have already decided his guilt.  You are both judge and juror.  I will have no part in this.”

For a moment Hawk said nothing.  Then the sneer reappeared.  “I did not tell you what your reward would be if you did.”

“It doesn’t matter.  Nothing could – ”

Adam faltered.  Another of Hawk’s lieutenants had emerged from the woods.  He was not alone.  Beside him walked a slender dark-haired woman.

It was Sunalei.

 ~

 The sun had risen and clouds occupied the sky.  Robinson paused to gaze up at a flock of birds winging across it.  As he did, the birds suddenly disappeared.  At first he was confused, but he understood all too well what had happened several minutes later when he awoke lying on the ground. 

He had passed out.

He had sat by the fire at the house in Ohio on cold wintry evenings, listening to his Pa and the visiting soldiers and trappers talk.  They told harrowing tales of men wandering in the woods until they stumbled and fell and lay where they had fallen, leaving nothing more than bleached white bones for their families to find.  That was, if the animals had not found them and scattered them over miles of land.  He knew all about the carrion birds whose job it was to clean up the mess, about rotting eyes and bloated flesh….

Robinson shuddered, both with the cold and fear.

With a mighty effort of will, he rose and stood wavering like a sapling in a strong breeze.  Feeling sorry for himself would do no good.  No good at all!  Ma always told him to look on the sunny side.  If he concentrated he was sure he could….

Well, pretty sure he could.

Overhead the sun was painting a pretty day, full of the rose-gold pink color his mother loved.  There was a spit of rain in the air, and as the drops landed they glistened like jewels.  Unexpectedly, Robinson grinned.  If his sister Rosanna had been here, she would have tried to pick them and place them in her crown.  Sometimes they pretended she was a princess under an enchantment, just like in the Brothers’ Grimm fairy tales.

Maybe that was it.  Maybe he was under a spell and when it was broken, he would wake up and they would all be safe and sound at home. 

A snapped branch and the sound of masculine voices woke him quickly from that dream.

For a heartbeat or two, fear pinned him to the spot.  But Stephen had taken him hunting deer often enough to know that inaction was a sentence of death, and so he began to move.  Unsteady and uncertain of his footing, Robinson moved to the edge of the path and, taking a deep breath, plunged into the underbrush even though he was uncertain of what lay beyond – solid ground or a swift descent.  When he found he had not fallen, he turned and began to move forward and then halted as he spotted a flash of white through the trees.

“Retreat!” he told himself and pivoted to do so – only to be confronted by a pair of legs clothed in what looked to him like regulation army blues.  But when he looked up, the old dark- skinned man with long silver-white hair looked like anything but a soldier.  Ducking, he tried to escape the man’s grasp, but failed as powerful fingers gripped his collar and drew him back.  He was just about to start kicking and fighting when someone unexpectedly called him by name.

“Robinson, don’t be afraid.”  As he pivoted toward the sound, a second man appeared.  As the man knelt, a weary but relieved smile broke across his face.  “Robinson.  It’s me.  Danny.”

A moment later Robinson was in Daniel Moray’s arms.

~

 Adam sat on a boulder beside the waterfall he had known as a child, holding his sister’s hand.  Nearby one of Hawk’s men lingered, giving them barely any privacy.  Sunalei was to be taken to some unknown destination, there to be held until his cooperation with the renegade Wyandot’s plans resulted in John Johnston’s death.

‘I’m sorry,’ were the first words his sister had spoken as he took her in his arms, before they had been forced to walk the rest of the way to the place she had once called home.  Now he asked her why.

“I did not do as you asked,” she admitted with chagrin.  “I did not remain when Dent told me to.  I was on my way to the town, to my husband, when Hawk’s men took me.”

Adam turned her hand over in his.  He was angry, but he understood.  If it had been someone he loved – someone he was committed to – he could have done no less.  “We’ll find a way,” he answered.  He knew there were many men seeking the renegade Wyandot.  Men who would be there soon.  Daniel Boone.  Mingo.  Israel and Rebekah.  And, unfortunately, the mob from Boonesborough.  Adam drew a breath as he released his sister’s hand.  He was far from a praying man, but he was not above invoking Providence in asking that the one group arrive before the other.

“Adohi?”

She always called him by his Indian name and it always brought images of their childhood back to him – of their mother and father and their younger siblings.  For no reason other than to make small talk to turn her mind from her troubles, he asked her, “Have you seen Tobias lately?”

She shook her head.  “What made you think of him?”

“I don’t know.  I guess, in a way, I think of him all the time – and of you and Talia.  It has not been our lot to grow old together.”

“Where is Talia?”

“In New York, married to a merchant and living as a white woman.”

Sunalei nodded.  Their younger sister had lived her entire life in the white man’s world, it was not a surprising choice.  “I saw Tobias several years ago.  He was very angry.  He walked with men like these.”

“No.”

“I spoke to him.  I told him hate and war were not the way.”

“Did he listen?”

She shrugged.  “I do not know.”

A shadow fell across them and a harsh voice announced.  “Whitehair’s woman.  It is time.”

They looked up to find Hawk and two of his men.  Adam rose and helped his sister from the boulder and then stood, holding her hand.  He did not want to let go for fear he would never see her again.  He would not condemn John Johnston – not even if it meant his own death – but he hoped he could remain true to himself and still save her.

Sunalei must have sensed something.  She squeezed his fingers and then enveloped him in her arms.  “Adohi, my beloved brother,” she said, her words clear and loud enough for all to hear.  “May He who created us both keep you in His care.”  Then she added quietly, close to his ear.  “Help is on the way.”

A moment later she was torn from his arms.

Adam stared at her, wondering if he had heard what he thought he had.  Help?  From what quarter?

“Adam Fox, son of my enemies,” Hawk pronounced, drawing his attention.

“Yes?” Adam asked as he turned toward him.

            “We go to the meeting place.  It is time.”