Frontier Courtship by Valerie Hansen Page A

benediction.
    In her heart she knew she’d done the right thing for Connell McClain. Sending him away was her wordless blessing on his quest.
    She only wished there was some way of letting him know the underlying reasons for what she’d done and how much she truly cared about his welfare.

     
    Following parallel, the sun at his back, Connell managed to easily keep the Tucker train in sight. If anyone noticed him, he figured they’d probably think he was just one of the extra drovers, rounding up loose stock, or maybe a lone Indian on a scouting mission. There were sure plenty of those around since the emigrant trains had cut such a wide swath through the plains.
    Two days out, he came upon a Cheyenne and Arapaho hunting party in search of buffalo. Seeing members of the two tribes together had become a common sight, especially after the summer council of 1840 had drawn them, plus the Kiowa and the Comanche, to the Arkansas River to make peace amongst themselves.
    Ascertaining that he and the hunting party were moving in the same general direction as the Tucker train, Connell spent the next three days riding with the Indians and communicating by means of rudimentary language and sign. To his relief, the hunters treated him like a long-lost relative.
    The young men in the party were upset about the presence of so many wagons crossing their hunting grounds, and rightly so, Connell thought. Westward migration of Eastern settlers as well as the influx of Mexicans from the south was unstoppable, and the tribes were only now beginning to realize what all that meant to them.
    In the course of the evening meal on the third day, he’d shown them Irene’s picture. To his great surprise, Lone Buffalo had nodded solemnly.
    “You’ve seen her?” Connell asked.
    Another nod.
    “Where?” He had trouble feigning calm in the face of such news, but he knew if he demonstrated much excitement, his cautious companions might choose to tell him no more.
    Lone Buffalo pointed north. “Black Kettle camp.”
    “In the Big Horn Mountains?”
    The young Indian recoiled at the use of the settlers’ name for such a sacred place, but he nevertheless nodded affirmatively.
    None of the others in the hunting party could confirm the sighting. Still, the lead provided the first glimmer of hope Connell had had in months. Could the woman with Black Kettle really be his Irene? Maybe. And if not, he still had the God-given responsibility to visit the camp and try to rescue whoever was being held captive there. He might not be a Bible-quoting zealot or a churchgoing man, but he was a believer just the same.
    Although he’d prayed fervently and long that he’d find Irene in a white man’s settlement, he knew she could have done worse than to wind up with the Cheyenne. Of all the Plains tribes, they were the least likely to force her into a quick marriage, since their normal courting rituals took from one year to as long as five. Then again, if she was considered a slave instead of having been adopted into the tribe, those customs wouldn’t apply to her.
    Connell’s jaw clenched. He forced himself to consider various options. If, by tribal custom, she now belonged to one of the Cheyenne families, that relationship could pose a worse problem. It was far easier to purchase a slave than it was to convince a bride’s father, adoptive or not, that he’d make a worthy husband.
    It would be better to make a formal appeal than to simply grab her and make a run for it, he reasoned. Black Kettle would definitely not take kindly to having one of his band spirited away, no matter what the reason.
    What he needed, Connell decided, were twenty good, fast horses as a show of his wealth and importance. Trouble was, he had so little money that, unless he intended to adopt the age-old Indian custom of stealing them, that particular option was out of the question. It was times like these that he wished he hadn’t been raised with Christian values. To the Indian,