Dorothy Garlock (2 page)

Annie Lash looked back toward the river where yet another caravan of settlers had just crossed on the ferry. The lead wagon headed for the wagon grounds, the two span of oxen moving ponderously. On and on they came; wagons, carts, dogs and cows, the children shouting and running alongside while trail-worn men popped the whips tiredly.

This was Saint Louis where, three short years ago in 1804, Captains Meriwether Lewis and William Clark passed to ascend the Missouri River for twenty-six hundred miles, becoming the first white men to cross the American continent north of Mexico. Here, hundreds of settlers had camped briefly before going on west. They had left farms, blacksmith shops, mercantile stores, and families to pursue their dreams of finding richer, more beautiful country across the wide Mississippi.

“They’ll manage,” Annie Lash said aloud, and the sound of her voice startled her. Tonight, they’ll unhitch and picket the oxen, she thought. The children will stake out the cows; the women will get out pots and spoons, and there will be a cookfire. They’ll make a home for the night. Later, each woman will snuggle in her man’s arms to whisper the intimate things a man and a woman say to each other in the dark of the night.

Reluctantly, Annie Lash moved along the path again. She wanted to remain to smell the evening. There’s no supper smoke like April smoke, she thought. The dry leaves and twigs still have the winter dampness. In no time at all spring will be gone and summer will take its place. She walked swiftly now, not wanting darkness to catch her outside the safety of the sturdy cabin Charles Jester had built when they arrived in this place five years ago. She looked at the western sky. The sun had gone down and she hadn’t noticed. Overhead, the clouds were thickening, and to the south, brief flashes of lightning signaled the approach of yet another spring rain storm. Before the night was over the loud clashes of thunder would shake the rain from the clouds, and by morning the streets of Saint Louis would be a sea of mud.

Annie Lash reached the village and slowed her steps.

“Evenin’, Miss Annie Lash.” The man’s voice was respectful, and Annie Lash glanced up, nodded to the man lounging in front of the mercantile store, and hurried past.

She knew good and well that he was wondering, just as nearly everyone in this village of almost a thousand permanent residents was,
What’s Annie Lash Jester going to do now that her pa is dead?
She could almost hear the murmur of voices that trailed her.
Foolish old maid tied herself to the old man and let her good years slip past her. She must be all of twenty-two. Never been to a party. Never owned a pretty dress. Never had a man. Almost too old, now, for a man to want her, except one whose woman had gone and left him with a parcel of younguns to take care of.

Annie Lash was a tall, lithe, strong woman with capable, slender hands which she used with pleasure. She had to be strong to cope with caring for her invalid father and to help Zan Thatcher handle the furs they bought and sold in order to make enough money to put food on the table for the three of them.

She had no fancy opinion of herself or her looks, no vanity about the rich brown hair with its deep waves nor her delicate white skin that she kept shaded from the sun with a calico sunbonnet so her nose wouldn’t peel. Her eyes were what one noticed first. They were large and clear, the kind of blue that was so light it looked faded, yet they shone bright between the layers of dark brown lashes. She had always thought her mouth was too large, so when she smiled she held her lips in such a way that the corners turned up and her teeth only showed partially. This way of smiling put two small holes in her cheeks, but Annie Lash didn’t know that because she had never smiled at herself in a mirror.

Her feet hit the walk fronting the shops. She liked the sound her heels made on the boardwalk. Here, Osage men padded, their moccasined feet soundless; shiny-shoed gamblers strolled; women trod lightly in soft slippers, trailed by barefoot children; heavy-booted workmen clumped along. The moccasined feet of French
voyageurs
walked here, as did the feet of the bragging, fighting boatmen who freighted the furs down the river from the rich country in the north.

Annie Lash turned into a shop at the end of the block and paused until her eyes became accustomed to the dimness before she moved toward the rear of the store. She inhaled the fragrance of the tobacco, the spices, and the kegs of dried fruit, and decided to do something impulsive and foolish. She was going to buy a nickel’s worth of sugar, go home, and make it into maple sugar squares to indulge her sweet tooth.

“Evenin’, Miss Annie Lash. Ain’t this late for you to be afoot?” Old Seth Harthan moved away from the two Osage men he was dickering with and hurried toward her. The Indians and two rivermen were the only customers in the store.

“I suppose so.” She placed a coin on the counter. “I’d like this much sugar, Seth.” When she spoke there was a taste of the faraway South on her lips. “If you’ll trust me with the container, I’ll see that you get it back.”

Seth snorted. “Fiddle! Tomorry? Next week? Makes no matter.” He worked fast, scooped the sugar from a barrel into a small tin bucket, and clamped down the lid. “Ain’t no nickel’s worth here so I’ll throw in this dab a raisins if’n ya got a pocket to put ’em in.” He reached into a keg and came out with a handful of plump raisins. Annie Lash held open the pocket on her apron and he dropped the fruit inside.

“Thank you, Seth.” She knew the raisins were a gift and smiled at the old man so he knew that she knew they were a gift.

Seth followed her to the door of the store. “It’s almost dark, Miss Annie Lash. You ain’t ought to be awanderin’ about this late. You ought to wait and I’ll shut up the store and walk you home.”

“I’ll be all right. In no more than five minutes I’ll be inside the cabin.” She looked away from him, allowing her eyes to adapt to the gloom up and down the street. “Bye, Seth.”

The old man nodded and watched her walk rapidly across the street and head down the road toward the river. He had seen the two boatmen eyeing her while he was scooping out the sugar. He hurried back inside to engage their interest in case they had a notion to follow her.

Annie Lash knew well the risk of being caught away from her home at night. Once, two rowdy rivermen had captured her and held her pinned to the side of the cabin until Zan and his long gun persuaded them to let her go. She and Zan had backed into the cabin as the drunken men advanced threateningly. They had returned later that night to pound on the door and make insulting offers.

She walked swiftly, her long stride eating up the distance. Zan would be worried about her. She had depended on her father’s old friend for so much these last few years. Now it was time to set him free to ride the river he loved. She had to make a decision soon, choose one from among the three men who wanted to marry her. The offers had come in scarcely before her pa was cold. A strong, capable woman, well able to handle a parcel of motherless younguns, tend a garden, wash and cook was what those men wanted. The fact that she was sightly didn’t really enter into it at all. A single woman, people said, needed a man to take care of her. It was unheard of for a decent woman to make her way alone. If she was unmarried she lived with a relative and worked for the family, that was, if she didn’t want to be a whore and live in one of the bawdy houses farther down the river.

Annie Lash hastened her steps and thought of her choices. Harm Fletcher; short, skinny, almost bald. He had five children, the oldest eight years old, the youngest two. She felt sorry for the children. They were nice, well-behaved little ones. But . . . oh, she wanted more out of life than tending someone else’s younguns. Aside from that, the thought of being in bed with Harm sent cold chills all through her.

There was Mr. Greer, who owned several flatboats and freighted furs down to New Orleans. He didn’t make the trips himself. He was too old. He was probably no more than fifty, but he looked older. His shoulders were bent and he suffered from a chronic pain in his joints. Annie Lash knew he was looking ahead to the time when he would be an invalid and need a woman to take care of him. In the meanwhile, he would take what pleasure he could from her young body. She had seen his eyes on her breast, and the thought of those talonlike hands on her naked body brought the saliva to her mouth and caused her stomach to tighten.

The other offer had come from Walt Ransom, a big, brawny, rough-talking man with seven children. He had bragged that he had a youngun for every year he’d had his wife. He drank, brawled, worked as little as possible, and had been on her doorstep before she realized the word was out that her pa was dead.

Annie Lash heard the scuff of boots behind her and quickened her steps. Hoarse laughter followed her and she began to feel panic until she saw Zan coming toward her, the long gun in his hand. She didn’t slow down until she reached him.

“What’er ya tryin’ to do, gal? Ya know ya ain’t got no call to be out when night comes.” Zan’s voice sounded angry, but she knew it was because he’d been worried.

“I’m sorry. The time passed quickly and darkness came before I knew it.” It felt good to slow down and walk beside big, comfortable Zan. This is what my pa would have been like, she thought, if he’d not been involved in the argument with the
voyageur.

They stopped at the door to the log cabin. Lightning creased the sky and thunder rolled nearer. Annie Lash felt a drop of rain.

“Light the lamp,” Zan said. He stood in the open door while she moved into the room, walking with sure steps because she knew every inch of it.

In the soft glow made by the lamp she looked at him. Grizzled and gray, he still stood straight and tall, his buckskins clean, his flat, straight-brimmed hat sitting squarely on his head. She knew he loved her like a daughter and that accounted for the impatient scowl on his face.

Darkness had brought a lively wind that whistled in the door. The light flickered and Zan turned to go.

“Bar the door, lass.” His voice still held gruffness.

“I will. Zan . . . thank you.”

“I’ll be back come mornin’.”

“Zan . . .” She went to him. “I’ll make up my mind soon. Don’t worry about me. If you get the chance to take a boat upriver, take it. I’ll make out.”

“Annie Lash, ya ain’t got to take no man ya don’t want. Ain’t I tol’ ya that?” His weathered, roughened face softened. “We’ll make out like we done a’fore yore pa died.”

“I can’t do that, Zan. It’s time I made a place for myself and freed you to spend your time on the river. I don’t know what Pa and I would have done without you, but now that he’s gone I want you to live your dream of following the river up to its beginning and beyond if the notion strikes you.” She kept her voice steady by sheer willpower, because . . . Oh, Lordy, how she hated the thought of his leaving her alone in this place.

“I ain’t got no use fer none of ’em what ask ya, Annie Lash. If’n I was a leavin’ ya with a good man, one what I knowed ya wanted, I’d go. Till then, I ain’t.” His voice was determined, as forceful as it was sometimes when he was selling furs.

Annie Lash held his arm and squeezed it—as much demonstration of feelings as Zan would allow. Even that embarrassed him.

“Annie . . . Annie Lash.” The slurred voice came from the rutted path that served as a road. “Are ya waitin’ fer me, darlin’?” The brief lightning flash outlined Walt Ransom’s brawny frame. “I brung someone ta see ya,” he called, and came lumbering toward the door. “What ya a doin’ here with my woman?” he demanded belligerently when Zan blocked the doorway.

“Annie Lash ain’t receivin’ no callers.”

“Ain’t . . . receivin’ no callers?” Walt repeated Zan’s words in a disbelieving tone, then roared with anger. “Ya want me ta wring yore head off that scrawny neck, ya old river rat?” The man with Walt reeled drunkenly and snickered. “What ya doing here, anyways? Ya stay way from my intended. Hear?”

“I’m not your intended, Walt Ransom! Get yourself and your drunken friend off my doorstep.” Annie Lash squeezed into the doorway beside Zan.

“Ya shut yore mouth up, woman! This here’s twixt me ’n the ol’ man.”

“You lay a hand on Zan and I’ll blow a hole in you big enough to drive a team of mules through.” Annie Lash drew her pa’s musket out from behind her and pointed it at Walt’s bloated stomach.

“Jesuz Christ!” Walt swore. “Ya ain’t got no hankerin’ fer this ol’ man, has ya?”

“I’ve got a powerful lot of love for this man, but you wouldn’t understand that.” The sneer in her voice enraged Walt more than her words.

“What ya need is a whip on yore back! An’ I got me a notion ta let ya have it.”

“That ain’t what her needs, Walt.” The man’s voice was so raspy it sounded like it hurt him to talk.

“She’ll get
that,
too!” Walt hitched up his trousers. “I’ll be back tomorry with that preacher man, gal. An’ I ain’t better hear no back talk outta’ ya.”

“You come around here tomorrow or any other time, Walt Ransom, an’ I’ll fill your hide with buckshot.”

His laughter was loud and full of bravado. “Hear that, Samuel? I’m goin’ ta have me a fightin’ squaw, but I kin take the fight outta’ her.”

“Get!” Annie Lash snapped. “Get on away from here and don’t come back!”

“If’n it ain’t me, t’will be them river rats. Ya know ya can’t live here without no man, ’n I’ll treat ya square. I was just a funnin’ ’bout the whip. Ya know I’d not mark up a purty thing like ya be.” His black, hairy face split in a grin and he moved closer to the door.

Zan had stood quietly, but now he lifted his rifle and the muzzle touched Walt’s chest.

“Don’t ya come anosin’ ’round here no more, ya no good hunk a fish bait. That’s all ya be . . . fish bait. Ain’t no decent man on this here Bank’ll stand ’n let Annie Lash take no slack from the likes of ya. Now back off, or ya’ll be a long way downriver come mornin’.”

Walt stepped back. His pride had suffered a blow. Samuel would spread the news at the tavern that he had been rejected by the gal he’d been bragging about. He shook his fist at Zan.

“Ya ain’t got no chance a’gin me, ol’ man. I be back tomorry, ’n I’m a havin’ that woman! Me little ones needs a ma, and she’s gonna be it.” His voice dropped to a whine and he turned away. “C’mon, Samuel. That ol’ man ain’t gonna walk easy fer the rest a his days. Ain’t I tol’ ya the gal was sightly? An’ ya ort to see her with her hair down. I seed her a washin’ it in a bucket a rainwater once . . . purtiest sight I ever did see. Now, oncet I git ’er, ya fellers what’s . . .” His booming voice trailed away in the darkness.