The Guardian Read Free

could see the red linings of their flared nostrils and the whites of their eyes. She could see Rueben flashing among the wagons on his spotted Indian pony.
    The one thing she could not see was Indians.
    Boiling with anxiety, she righted herself and began crawling forward amid the jouncing boxes and barrels. Silas would scold her if she violated his orders to stay put. But never mind. She had to find out what was happening.
    As leader of the little party, Silas drove the first wagon. The other wagons carried missionaries, a mason, a carpenter and a pale, consumptive young man with enough medical training to call himself a doctor. The two missionaries were married to sisters—plain, humorless women in their forties with little use for Silas Bennett’s pretty young bride. Other women might have fussed over Charity and her condition, but these two, who’d evidently been friends with Silas’s first wife, treated her with undisguised spite.
    There were no children along. Charity’s baby, as far as she knew, would be the only white child in hundreds of miles.
    As she moved ahead, steadying herself against the big trunk, the cold weight of Rueben Potter’s pistol pressed against her leg. What if she were forced to use the tiny weapon with its single shot? If she fired the lead ball into her own brain, how long would the baby live? Long enough to be torn from her body and ripped apart? Would she have the courage to shoot into her bulging belly, killing the child before it could know terror or pain? Even the thought was too awful to bear.
    Gasping with effort, she reached the front of thewagon. Silas was driving the team hard, his long musket balanced across his knees. Reaching forward, Charity laid her hand on Silas’s bony shoulder.
    â€œGet back, Charity,” he snapped without turning around. “Stay out of sight.”
    â€œI’m not a child, Silas,” she said. “I need to know what’s happening. Where are the Indians?”
    His head jerked slightly to the left. “Trees,” he muttered, too busy driving the team to rebuke her impertinence. “They’re staying even with us. We can see them moving, but as long as they stay back, we can’t get a clear shot at them.”
    Charity stretched, trying to see the Indians, but her eyes were dazzled by the afternoon sunlight. She could make out nothing. “You’d think, if they were going to attack us, they would have done it by now,” she said. “Maybe they’re only curious.”
    â€œD’you want to wager your life on that, woman?” Silas’s metallic voice quivered with a nervous undertone. “According to Rueben, the Blackfoot are the devil’s own spawn. I’m willing to take his word for that.”
    â€œLook!” Charity pointed. Her vision had cleared and she could now see the Blackfoot warriors riding out of the trees. Their sharp young faces were unpainted, their bows and quivers slung over their backs. They sat their horses proudly, their bare chests gleaming like copper. The thought flashed through Charity’s mind that these youthful warriors were the most beautiful people she had ever seen.
    The leader raised his right hand in an unmistakable sign of peace, but Silas appeared not to notice. “Spawn of the devil!” he muttered, raising his musket.
    â€œNo!” Charity’s scream was lost in the shattering explosion of powder and lead. She saw the young Blackfoot’s body jerk backward with the impact of the shot. Then the plunge of the startled horses threw her back into the wagon, into the shifting chaos of boxes, bins and barrels. She heard the blood-chilling screams of the Indians and the whistle of objects flying through the air. Only when Silas moaned and fell to one side, with a feathered shaft protruding from his chest, did she realize they were arrows.
    â€œSilas!” She fought her way toward him, but his glazing eyes and the