LEGEND of the DAWN: The Complete Trilogy: LEGEND of the DAWN; AFTER the DAWN; BEFORE SUNDOWN. by J.R. WRIGHT

Author:J.R. WRIGHT [WRIGHT, J.R.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: J.R. Wright / DKW BOOKS
Published: 2013-07-11T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Now that he had proven she lived, where had she gone? He would find her, he vowed, if it took the remainder of his life… If Breanne were alive, he would find her! If not? If not, he would discover what had become of her.

It took four days to locate the Sauk village on the Maple River. It was near where it joined up with the Red, just as Beaver Charlie had said all those years ago. What kept them here, with so many whites crowding in, he wondered? He’d passed a dozen squatter farms on the way from the cabin.

Maybe it was because the Sauk had been mixing with Europeans for hundreds of years, or more. So Beaver Charlie had said once. Even their language was sprinkled now and then with a French or an English word.

“I’m looking for Beaver Charlie!” Luke shouted as he led the calico mule through the swarming village. It was late September, always a busy time for anyone this far north. Winter was coming on. Meat needed to be laid in, and mountains of firewood gathered, sometimes from miles away.

Most in the camp moved about with little concern over his presence, except for one old man who shuffled forward. “No,” he said, then signed as he spoke their garbled tongue. “Red Beard died. Go to happy place many years ago.” He pointed to the overcast sky, without looking up as he did it.

“Died from what?” Luke was anxious to know. As he remembered, even though he looked it, Beaver Charlie wasn’t that old.

“Of sickness. Many people in village die then.” The old man pointed to his heavily pockmarked face.

“Smallpox?”

“Pox,” the old man said, nodding his head in agreement.

“Does his woman live?” Luke asked.

“Yes,” the old man shuffled to a place where he could see between the lodges. When Luke caught up to him, the old man pointed.

Across the river from the village were two log cabins, very near each other. “She still lives in the cabin?” Luke asked.

“Yes. She lives with man who speaks of God.”

“A missionary?” Luke asked.

The old man nodded. Charlie had told often of the missionaries that came here. It was from one of them back then, freshly arrived from Fort Union, that word had come of the planned rendezvous at Woodhole, near the Mississippi that year. He also knew from Charlie that the small cabin next to his served as a temporary residence for these young men of God.

“How do I get over there?” Luke asked, not wanting to get wet on such a chilly day.

“Beaver dam,” the old man said and pointed up river.

Luke properly thanked the old Sauk and headed for the nearby river to find the crossing. Soon he was on the other side and walking up on the largest of the weathered cabins, both made of enormous cottonwood logs.

He should have asked the woman’s name, he thought, just as the plank door opened and a middle aged white man, dressed in buckskins, stepped to the porch.

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