ONE

            “Tell me again what you will do at this fort.”

            John glanced up.  Rachel was sitting across the fire from him wrapped in a woolen cloak the color of a rich burgundy wine.  Its hood framed her face, emphasizing her pale perfect skin and all but obscuring the wavy brown hair that ringed it.  The night was cold for late September and he had just returned from gathering wood to feed the blaze he had kindled in the center of their camp.  Rachel looked tired.  But then most likely so did he.  Neither of them had slept well the night before, having awakened often to the cries of wolves in the distance.  Something more than two-thirds of the way through the near three-month journey to Fort Wayne, they had both begun to feel it might never end.  For the first few weeks the newness of being near to one another and totally dependent on each other night and day had sustained them in a way food and drink never could.  In the beginning they had actually chosen routes to avoid the settlements and towns that littered the lands east and west of the Pennsylvania line.  Now, deep into the Northwest Territory and well beyond the edge of the civilized world, they found they had both begun to hunger for a familiar face or a safe habitation.

            John glanced at his rifle where it lay close by, primed and ready.  He had almost forgotten what it was to live moment by moment with nothing but your wits and intuition to guard and keep you alive.  In the years he had resided at the Robinsons’ and worked for the War Department, he had put such skills aside.  Unless one frequented the gaming halls and twisted back alleyways of Philadelphia, there was really little need for them there.  But here, in the wilderness, death was all about them.  Hiding in the trees.  Lurking around the next bend.  Falling with the rain and running with the rivers.  All it would take was one misstep.  A chill.  A broken bone.  A musket ball or knife-thrust.  John glanced at the trees with their whispering, rustling leaves.  Or an arrow through the heart.

            Dear God, how could he have ever contemplated bringing her here?

            “John?”

            John blinked and returned to the present.  Rachel had asked him a question.  “What will I do at the fort?  Just what I have said.  I am to handle the trade with the Indians at the Factory the government has established in Fort Wayne.  I will stock, inventory and manage the goods in order to provide the native peoples with the things they need.  In return they will bring furs to the Factory for trade, which I will send on to auction in New York or Philadelphia.”  John shifted and leaned back.  “Much the same as I have done before in Pennsylvania and Kentucky, only then it was with settlers.”

            Rachel’s brown eyes had grown round.  “I have never met an Indian,” she said quietly.

            “No?  I thought you said you had seen one.”

            “Seen not met.  In the city from time to time Indian chiefs would come to meet with the men in the Congress.  I saw one once when I was a little girl.  I remember the man had a ring in his nose and he was dressed like the king of some faraway land.”  Rachel shivered.  “I found him frightening.”

            “You said you were young.”

            Her eyes swept across the cloistered glade they occupied.  It was a patchwork of shadow and moonlight. “So you think I would not find him frightening now?  If he should come whooping out of the trees?”

            John rose to his feet and crossed to where she sat.  He settled in beside her and pulled her close.  “During the years that I traveled with General Wayne’s army, I met many Indians.  Miami.  Shawanese.  Lenape, or what the British call Delaware.  Many were, as you say, strong and commanding.  Powerful figures.  But others were sad and to be pitied.  They were more often hungry than violent, and greedy unscrupulous men fed off of that hunger by robbing them of the necessities of life.  Even worse they supplied them with liquor, knowing it alone could dull the edge of their pain.”  John shook his head.  “We do them wrong.”

            “How?”  Rachel laid her cheek against the warm brown fabric of his jacket and took his hand in her own.

            John was silent a moment.  When he spoke, his voice trembled with passion.  “Among the Indians are some of the most honorable men I have ever known.  More honorable than many of their conquerors.  They deserve more than to be unfairly driven off the lands that have been theirs for more years than a man can count.”  He turned her hand over and stared at it.  “I wish I could do something more.”

            “You will.”

            John looked at her and laughed.  “Have you become a seer now?”

            “I do not need to be one.  I know you.  Whatever you do, you will do it well.”  He watched as Rachel shifted and lifted her head so she could gaze up at the stars.  They had journeyed now for some seventy-odd days.  During that time the constellation known as the Great Bear had tipped toward the earth, spilling its contents, causing the leaves and the land about them to grow brown and gold.  “There will be many Indians at this fort?” she asked at last.

            “Yes.”

            “Friendly?”

            “Some.  Some will be friends.  Others will come for what they want and go without a word.  Still others will not come, but will lurk in the woods like wolves, planning mischief.”  John’s hand tightened on her shoulder.  “We must be very careful, Rachel.  Fort Wayne is not Philadelphia.”

            She laughed.  “Are you implying there are no wolves in Philadelphia?  Surely not.”

            “But they are civilized.  They might wish you harm, but if they do their chosen weapon will be a word or a whisper.  Here it will be an arrow.”  John hesitated.  “Or a musket-ball.”

            “Clean and swift then.  Honest.”  Rachel nodded once.  “I think I prefer the wolves of the wilderness.”

            “My dearest heart, what did I do to deserve you?” John asked as he laid his hand along her cheek.

            Rachel looked straight at him.  “You respected me, and never once let my being a woman matter.”

            He frowned.  “What?  Of course, it matters.”

            Rachel smiled and took his chin in both hands.  “Not in that way.  Do you remember when you first came to board with us?”

            “Of course.”  He had been a young man then, barely more than twenty.  He had just returned to Pennsylvania after several years of serving in the Quartermaster’s core, driving supply wagons to and from the forts in the Northwest Territory that dotted the road laid out by Mad Anthony Wayne.  The Robinsons had taken him in and treated him like a son.  He had come and gone daily, broken fasts and supped with them, sat in their parlor and played games with their children.  And now, he had stolen their young and beautiful daughter away.  “How could I forget?”

            “I was just a child.  A female child.  But you spoke to me as an equal, sharing your heart and what was in your mind.  And when I answered, you took what I said seriously.  I have never met a man who was not of the Circle of Friends who did so.  And even there, in this, many men fail.”  She paused.  “I think I have loved you since that first night.”

        “Rachel?”
        She looked up at him.  “Yes?”

        “You were very....  Are very young.  I know this may seem foolish to ask now, here, in the middle of the wilderness, but are you certain?  This life I have been called to is not an easy one.  You were made for finer things.”

            “I was made to labor and to love.  And to be with you.  I want nothing else.”

            “But....”

            Rachel placed her finger on his lips.  “Hush,” she whispered as she slipped her arm about his waist.  “I want to be with you.  Now.”

            John reached inside her cloak and pulled her small soft form close to his and kissed her, and the two of them melted into one.

            “John?”

            Rachel threw off the woolen blanket that covered her and sat up.  Puzzled, she glanced around the camp.  She was alone.  The fire had been extinguished.  She could see dirt heaped on the ashes and knew that meant John had put it out on purpose.  Something must have happened to wake him and draw him away.  She straightened her disheveled garments and rose to her feet.  A cold wind had begun to blow and it whipped her dark hair about her pallid face.  She caught one of the stray locks and wrapped it behind her ear and went in search of their horses only to find they too had disappeared.

            Glancing at the sky, she realized it was still several hours until morning.  The moon was riding high, not yet ready to surrender control.  Rachel held very still, shivering as a few renegade raindrops fell to the ground.  It would do her no good to panic.  Most likely John would return shortly with the horses and an explanation.  She walked to the edge of their camp and listened, uncertain of whether or not she should call out.  John had warned her that the land they traveled was under dispute.  Not only did the Indians claim it, but also both the French and English still plied their trade here, seeking to work their influence among them.  Feeling anxious, Rachel closed her eyes and sought communion with her God, knowing he cared for her young husband even more than she.  ‘What must I do?  I would ask Thee to tell me,’ she prayed, falling back into the plain language of her Quaker youth.  ‘Should I leave this place to seek him?  Or stay?’

            The wind rose and whipped about her, lifting her cloak so it flapped against her heavy woolen leggings almost as if in answer to her prayer.  So strong was its hand that it made her stumble forward.  Rachel’s eyes flew open and she looked up.  Through what had now become a steady cascade of silvery rain, she saw movement in the woods.  “John?” she called quietly.  “John, is that you?”

            There was no answer.  The forested world about her remained silent.  Then something shifted and a tawny form dashed across an opening between the trees.  Rachel watched the direction the deer took and then turned back to the camp.  Moving with conviction, she scoured the area for her husband’s belongings and sighed with relief when she spotted his kit.  Not only did it mean John had not planned to go far, but it contained something she needed.  Kneeling, Rachel rummaged through his things until her fingers locked on an object of warm polished wood and cold steel.  Almost as if it was a snake she had taken hold of, Rachel gingerly pulled the pistol free of the leather bag.  Then she sat staring at it.  If she took it with her, she would be obligated to use it should the need arise.  This was part of what her mother had feared.  The dearest belief she held as a Quakeress was that all life was sacred, that every creature—no matter what or who—had ‘that of God’ within them.  Both her parents had instilled that belief in her as well.  She had hoped when they had started into the wilderness that it would never come to this, but she had known better.  That was why within the first week she had asked John to show her how to load and prime the weapon.  With a frown Rachel returned her hand to John’s kit and sought the small bag that contained a short ramrod and his extra powder, lead balls, and bits of leather.  Several minutes later, with a curious prayer on her lips that she had done it right, she rose to her feet and started into the woods, following the path God’s creature had taken.

            Rachel had not gone very far when she heard a strange muffled sound.  Under her cloak she gripped the pistol tightly and continued forward.  Above her the moon shone steadily, lighting her way through the trees.  She glanced continually from one side to the other, fearful of missing a sign.  Then, suddenly, the leaves before her shuddered as if with a violent wind and from out of them the deer burst forth, darting across her path.  It startled her so she cried out.  Horrified, Rachel clamped her hand over her mouth and froze.

            Then she heard it again.  This time not a sound, but a low moan.

            “John?  John, is that you?”

            It came again quickly, directing her to the right.  Rachel left the path and stepped into the underbrush only to freeze in horror.  A man’s body lay concealed in the tall rustling grasses.  She closed her eyes instantly, terrified.  Then, knowing that she must, Rachel opened them and looked down.

            The man’s figure was clothed in dirty buckskins and thigh-high leggings, and his hair was coal-black.  The bone handle of a knife protruded from his side.

        It wasn’t John.