The Texans by Brett Cogburn Page B

and stuffed them into a valise while the Tonkawa watched over her. She knew it was foolish, but she had a faint hope that some miracle would happen and keep her from having to go with the expedition. Such things only happened in the books she had read, and the only miracle she had ever known was the family she was about to be dragged away from.
    â€œThere’s no sense fighting us. Red Wing is a Comanche, and as a measure of our goodwill, Houston wants us to offer her back to them in hopes of having peace with all of the Comanches that we can get to come into Fort Bird and talk with us. He also hopes that they’ll be moved by such a gift and offer us white captives in exchange,” the commissioner said.
    â€œShe’s no more a Comanche now than you or I. Did you know that her father and mother were both dead long before Colonel Moore captured her? Did you know she can hardly even speak a word of Comanche anymore?” Mrs. Ida shook her finger under his nose. “You tell me, would you take a white woman and offer her to the Comanche even if it meant peace for all times? What if she was your daughter or sister?”
    â€œMrs. Wilson, you know that General Woll’s army sacked San Antonio again last year. The word is that the Mexicans are forming up again and sending ambassadors out to make agreements with the Comanche to aid them. President Houston believes that peace with the savages may be all that saves Texas from invasion.”
    â€œYou don’t need my daughter to bargain with the Comanche. It sounds like the Mexicans are doing fine without giving away their women,” Mrs. Ida snapped.
    â€œI’m truly sorry, but I have my orders and will follow them as they are.” Commissioner Anderson got up from his chair and put his hat back on.
    â€œLike hell you will.” Mrs. Ida produced a single-shot pistol from the folds of her dress in the wink of an eye. “I didn’t love and raise that girl all this time to lose her to the likes of you, Colonel, Commissioner, two-bit chicken thief, or whatever you call yourself.”
    The hammer on that pistol was eared back and she was ready to shoot. The commissioner made a move to jerk the gun from her hand, and it would have proven a fatal tactic if it had not been for Placido bounding from the door and knocking off her aim with his long arm. As it was, the pistol sent a ball through the bookkeeper’s hat. The little man pushed his glasses up on his freckled nose and then jerked off his lid to study the hole in the crown. He measured the distance between where the bullet had entered and the silk band, as if to gauge how close the woman had come to putting the bullet in his head.
    â€œI daresay, she almost killed me,” he said, and he had gone white around the gills.
    â€œAgent Torrey, you’d best get on your horse,” Colonel Moore said.
    The squeamish Indian agent looked at a loss for words but did as he was told. Nothing he had known in Baltimore had prepared him for what he’d seen in just a few years in Texas. There were no women where he came from to shoot hats off your head, or the need to trade civilized women to savages for goodwill. He found himself wishing he’d married that fat shoemaker’s daughter next door and stayed back in Maryland to raise fat little kids and sew on boot soles, happy in the ignorance of any place such as Texas even existing.
    The Indians with the party had mounted and ridden up to the porch. They were well-armed and looked determined. Mrs. Ida didn’t care if there had been fifty of them; she continued to wrestle with Placido over her gun. The Tonk finally let her have the gun back, as it was empty and he thought it harmless enough. As soon as he let go she reared back with it like it was a tomahawk and swung it viciously at him. He ducked easily, but she did manage to hit Torrey in the back of the head just as he was stepping off the porch to go to his horse. He