Captured by Love (Michigan Brides #3)(5)
Red Fox watched him with his steady, serious eyes.
“What do you think?” Pierre rubbed his hand across his chin, the smooth skin strange under his callused fingers. “I’ll bet you’ve never seen anyone quite as handsome, have you?”
“I think you want to make a feast for black flies and mosquitoes.”
Pierre knew the young brave thought he was foolish for shaving the heavy beard and washing away the bear grease that kept them from being eaten to the bones by vicious swarms of insects that came to life every spring.
“It’s a small price to pay to get the attention of the pretty ladies.” Pierre bent toward the pool of recent rainwater, cupped his hands, and splashed his face. “Where I come from, the smell and sight of bear grease isn’t exactly going to endear me to anyone.”
“You do not need those ladies.” Red Fox’s ever-watchful eyes scanned the lakeshore, where the rest of the voyageurs were washing and making themselves presentable before they forayed into civilized society. “Not when you could have a good woman from among my tribe.”
Pierre rinsed his razor. Many coureur de bois like himself took Indian women as their wives. The native women knew how to paddle and patch a canoe and make bearskin robes, and they could ice fish in the harshest of winter temperatures. As the headman of a fur brigade, an Indian wife could be a great asset. Many of his fellow traders married Indian women, not only for their knowledge of the land and ability to survive in the wilderness but because the unions helped solidify trading relationships within tribes.
Maybe marriage to an Indian woman was his best option. Even so, he wanted to put it off for as long as possible. “I’m not ready to get married.”
“Then you do not need the attention of ladies.”
Pierre tossed Red Fox a grin. “There are some of us who get attention no matter what we do.”
He dried the razor blade on the grass and then returned it to the leather case he only used in the spring and summer when he returned to civilization.
The wide open shoreline that made up the south side of the Straits spread before him. It had been cleared of all its timber in bygone years. In fact, the treeless terrain stretched back for at least three miles from the shore, evidence of the old fort and community that had once thrived there.
Now all that remained were a few charred picket walls buried in drifting sand. Long before he’d been born, the old buildings had been dragged across the ice of the Straits and reconstructed on Michilimackinac Island, which was a more strategic location for a fort than the wide, exposed mainland.
Too bad the Americans hadn’t been able to make use of that strategy and hold the fort at the beginning of the war.
He peered across the choppy water. In the distance he could see the rising hump of the island, the Great Turtle, as the Ottawa called it—the place where the waters of both Lake Michigan and Lake Huron flowed together around the island’s shoreline.
Home.
He dragged in a breath of the damp, cool air, letting the familiar lakeshore breeze caress his bare skin. His predawn trip onto the island yesterday morning had made him realize how much he’d missed his childhood home in the years he’d been gone.
He’d never thought he would miss it, had always expected that once he left he’d never want to return.
But thankfully God had whacked him hard across the head and brought him to his knees.
And as much as he loved the wilderness and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, an urgent need to return to the island had haunted him these past months, ever since he’d learned that Michilimackinac had fallen to the British.
“We must go. The Great Spirit Git-chi Man-i-tou is waiting.” Red Fox rose from the rock where he’d perched. His necklace of beads and metal disks clinked together and bumped against his shirtless chest. He’d already painted his face, one half blue and the other half red with the vermillion Pierre had provided the Chippewa in preparation for their return to the island.
Red Fox’s tribe would be paddling to the island today too, arriving to receive their yearly gifts from the British, a system that provided provisions to the Indians in exchange for their friendship.
“We have waited too many sleeps to go to the Great Turtle,” Red Fox said, his young face thin with worry. “We must not anger the Great Spirit by waiting any longer.”
Pierre crossed his arms and assessed his crew among the throngs. “We’ll leave soon. When the men are ready.” His men were laughing and singing and excited about the stop on Michilimackinac.
Even though he was anxious to return, he was nervous too. His parting with his family hadn’t exactly been a happy occasion.
His foolishness weighed heavily upon him whenever he thought about the final heated argument he’d had with his papa. He may have made peace with God, but he’d never be able to make peace with Papa. Now he’d have to live the rest of his life with the regret of not being able to look Papa in the eyes, shake his hand, and ask for his forgiveness.
At least soon he’d be able to stand before his maman, hug her, and tell her he was sorry.
Of course, during his early morning mission to the island the previous day, he hadn’t been able to resist swinging by his home and peeking in on her. He’d had to wrench himself away, even though his heart had swelled with longing to feel her gentle fingers comb his hair as she’d always done. He knew speaking with her would have put his entire mission in jeopardy. As it was, he’d stayed too long.