The American Conquest: Christian Western Historical (Window to the Heart Saga Trilogy Book 3) Read online

  Pastor Nathan Thompson and his wife asked to join their traveling party, as they felt led by God to travel to Boulder to start their new church. Including them, their party consisted of two dozen people.

  Pressing her lips together as anxiety threatened to take over, Margaret glanced over her shoulder into the back of the wagon at her sleeping son. He was growing so fast and reminded her so much of her beloved Henry. She missed him terribly, and even though nearly four years had passed since he was killed, the pain from the past and how everything happened still bothered her.

  Suddenly, Margaret was jolted out of the past by a loud screech in the distance. Putting her hand above her eyes, she scanned the terrain. In the distance, she saw a few vultures flying in circles. They must have found a carrion and were taking their turns eating.

  The land was so different from her England. It was rough and dry, not like the moist, forestry home she grew up in. It was also completely opposite the cityscape of Paris. Yet, this new land held a certain appeal she could not quite understand or explain. It was as if something was pulling her forward.

  The group had been traveling along the Oregon Trail for over five months. Their time on the trail had been lengthened considerably by a run of bad luck, to include losing several wheels, supplies being eaten by wild animals, and two hired men dying due to sickness. In addition, they had to wait out several rounds of unusual inclement weather conditions before proceeding. After all of their misfortunes along the journey, it was finally time for them to split off to the Overland Trail that would take them into the Colorado Territory.

  Fall was fast approaching, and it was paramount that they reached Boulder before first snow. If they continued to make good time, they could be there within the next month.

  Trotting up next to Margaret on his horse, Mister Goodrich shouted at her, “It’s ’bout time to round up fer the ev’nin’, miss. Why don’t ya bring the wagon ’round an’ we’ll get dinner goin’.”

  “As you wish, Mister Goodrich.”

  He stared at her openly for a moment, leering at her curves and wagging his eyes, driving home his desire.

  “I told you before, a good-lookin’ gal like ya self needs a man out here. It ain’t proper fer a single gal to be on the trail without one.”

  Margaret was uncomfortably aware how vulnerable she was being one of the only two single women in their group. The hired men were beginning to look at Sarah and her in ways she did not like. Neither of them wanted any part of the flirtations, which seemed to make their interest even greater, Mister Goodrich being at the front of the licentiousness pack.

  Randall did his best to look out for her and Sarah, but he was only one man, and she worried what would happen if any of them got it into their heads to try to force their attention upon one of them.

  Bringing the wagon to a stop, Margaret stated, “I am fine, Mister Goodrich, and I would appreciate it if you would not broach the subject again.”

  He started to turn away but decided against it. Angrily, he barked out at her, “Ya think yer too good for us, Miss High-and-mighty. I’ll have ya know that I could humble ya real quick now. An’ b’sides what ya might think, ya ain’t no better than us. If ya were, ya wouldn’t be needin’ us to lead ya an’ ya never would’ve been here in the first place.”

  Ruffled because his accusation stung, Margaret squirmed in her seat on the driving bench of the wagon. She realized that he was partially correct. She no longer was a part of the society in which she had been raised. She could not use her title for fear that someone would end up telling the wrong person. She had even gone to the lengths of changing the family’s last name to their maternal grandmother’s maiden name to avoid any connection to their past. Yet, her title and name were what set her apart from these dirty Yanks. Without it, she was just like them.

  She did not want to put herself in the same class as them, but if she alienated them, she could end up without a guide and be left to fend for herself in the merciless frontier land. If that happened, none of them would survive.

  Hopefully, an apology would suffice Mister Goodrich. “I meant nothing by it but—”

  Without any warning, the lecher leaned over and forced his mouth on hers. His putrid breath was revolting, and Margaret immediately felt bile rise in her throat in reaction. Quickly, she yanked away as her hand automatically flew out and slapped him soundly across the cheek.

  Out of breath, she whispered in a hoarse voice, “Mister Goodrich, I would advise you to never touch me again.”

  He glared at her several seconds before turning and riding away, shouting over his shoulder, “This is far from o’er. Ya’ll pay fer what ya just did.”

  As she watched him head toward the river, she felt an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. Margaret began to shake uncontrollably. The forced affection brought back painful memories from her past that she had been trying to escape.

  Margaret looked up to see Jackie and Sarah walking towards her. They came to a stop next to the wagon, as Jackie asked, “What just happened between you and our guide?”

  Pulling a handkerchief from the pocket of her riding skirt, Margaret indignantly wiped Johnny’s saliva from her mouth. She hopped down from the wagon and proceeded to walk around to the back, without answering her sister-in-law. But Jackie was persistent and followed her, saying, “You are not answering me, chéri. Perhaps you do not trust me as much as you say?”

  “Nothing happened. It was just a misunderstanding,” Margaret asserted.

  “So you say, but I did not know one received a slap over ‘nothing.’ But then I am not used to your silly English customs. Hardly anything you do makes sense to we French. You are so backward in almost every way, perchance you would slap him over a misunderstanding.” Jackie gave Margaret a sly smile and said flippantly, “I think I will go ask Randy about it. Maybe he can explain what happened. After all, he is English, and perhaps he can explain it to a confused Frenchwoman.”

  Jackie turned around and grabbed the reins of one of the horses tied to the wagon. Margaret moved over and stood between Jackie and the horse, blocking Jackie from leaving.

  “Please, do not mention this to Rand. It is unimportant, and he would only get mad and cause a scene. Then we would lose our guide, and it is not worth it. It is over and it will not happen again. I assure you.”

  “What will not happen again?”

  Sighing, Margaret finally told Jackie what happened. “Mister Goodrich mistook my attempt at apologizing for offending him as a sign that I might be interested in his attention. I politely told him that I was not, and he did not receive it well. He overstepped his boundaries as our guide, and I put him in his place. He will not make that mistake again.”

  “How did he overstep?”

  Margaret was irritated that Jackie was insisting on details she did not wish to discuss. With a clipped tone, she answered the question. “He forced a kiss on me, and I slapped him for his audacity, then warned him to never touch me again.”

  Jackie raised her eyebrows in surprise and laughed. “I guess that means our Mister Goodrich will not be bothering you again. Never mind him. He is just a leering old man who does not know his place.” Jackie narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips together in frustration. “I have a good mind to tell Randy, just so he will put a stop to it. Do you know that he was boorish enough to voice his sordid attentions for me the day we met, even though he knew I was married to Randy? He deserves to be punished for his lack of respect. He needs to be reminded of his station.”

  Margaret nodded, pushing away her recently acknowledged fact that there was no difference between them and Mister Goodrich any longer. “You have a point, but I do not want to involve my brother. I think we should just forget the whole incident and put it behind us. Unfortunately, we need him to get to Boulder. Besides, I took care of it myself.”

  “It is too late not to involve me, Maggie.” Jackie and Margaret jerked around to find Randall leaning against the corner of the wagon. “I
have seen the way Mister Goodrich looks at you, and I have been meaning to… talk to him about it. But it seems this time he has crossed a line that cannot be overlooked. It needs to be addressed, and with what I just overheard my wife say, he has had it coming a long time.”

  “We didn’t know you were here at camp. We thought you had gone to get water with the rest of the men.”

  “I was going to, but I came back because I forgot my knife. I got back just in time to catch the exchange between you and Mister Goodrich.” Gripping his knife resolutely in his hand, Randall stated determinedly, “I am going to take care of this right now.”

  With that, he turned and headed toward the river to find their guide.

  “I cannot believe that Rand punched Mister Goodrich,” Margaret stated in disbelief. She had been shocked when Mister Goodrich walked back from the river with his hand on his face and a welt forming over his left eye.

  “I cannot believe that Mister Goodrich decided to stay on after it happened.”

  “He is probably staying so he can get his money. That is the only thing that motivates his kind. He will not give up until he gets his share of our money in Boulder.”

  Jackie sniffed. “Yes, it is disappointing, but the men here are all the same. These Yanks are nothing but disgusting mongrels that would never know how to treat a woman, let alone a lady.”

  Margaret gave Jackie a crestfallen look. She was going to have no luck finding a good husband out here in the frontier. She told herself it was not a priority after all she had been through, but the idea of living without a partner for the rest of her life made her sad.

  “I am sorry, mon chéri. I know you are without a husband and it must be difficult to think of the lack of potential out here.”

  “You are right, Jackie. The prospects are dismal, which means I need to learn to be self-reliant. Pinning all my hopes on marriage has never gotten me anywhere positive before. The last man I married died because of it. I do not think I want to go down that road again.”

  Margaret heard a commotion behind her and then felt a tap on her shoulder. She stood up and turned around to see her oldest friend and servant, Sarah, standing behind her, body full of tension.

  “What is it Sarah?”

  “My lady, Henry is calling for you. He has had another nightmare.”

  Jumping up from around the campfire, Margaret lifted her dirty skirts, and ran toward the wagon. Henry’s nightmares were getting worse and more frequent. She had no idea why he was having them or what she could do to stop them.

  She jumped into the back of the wagon and knelt beside her son. He was awake now and crying. Brushing his hair back from his sweaty forehead, Margaret whispered, “It is all right, Henry. Your mummy’s here, and I am not leaving.”

  Sitting on the edge of his cot, she pulled her son into her arms.

  “You are safe, and I will not let anything happen to you.”

  Margaret rocked him for several minutes as he slowly quieted. It scared her every time he woke up like this, and she continued to pray for the nightmares to stop. Lord, please help Henry with these bad dreams he keeps having. I do not know where they come from, but you do. I ask you to free him from them and give him peaceful sleep.

  Sarah insisted that it was a natural thing and all children had bad dreams, but Margaret never remembered her or Rand ever having nightmares frequently. Deep down she worried the nightmares stemmed from him sensing the fear in her, which she tried desperately to keep hidden.

  Often in the beginning, and even now on occasion, she would dream that her first husband was still alive and that they were together. In her dreams, she could still feel his touch and his love. And when he did not fill her dreams, Michel would visit her and they would be dancing at their wedding. He would whisper in her ear how much he loved her as he held her in his embrace. But when she would wake up, swearing she smelled one of their scents, she would reach out to touch them and only find emptiness. Feeling like she lost them all over again, she would curl into a ball and silently cry until morning came.

  Other nights, her pleasant dreams were replaced by nightmares filled with the horror of the duke hunting her. She could feel his cold, angry grasp on her body, with his leering face near her as she screamed. She would try to free herself but be unable to escape. She would wake up in a thick sweat, panting with terror-filled tears.

  In her worst gut-wrenching moments, it was her faith in God that sustained and helped her. Her faith allowed her to keep going and live for her son after the men she loved died. Her faith helped her find her brother, even when everyone else thought he was dead. Her faith brought her to this new world and continued to push her forward.

  Looking down, Margaret smiled at her slumbering son. She cherished him more than anything in this world. God had blessed her with the perfect gift, a gift that gave her a reason to live every day, and a piece of her husband lived on through their child.

  As she was quietly backing out of her wagon, a hand landed on her shoulder, causing her to jump. Then a voice said, “It is only me, Maggie.”

  Margaret relaxed. “What do you need, Rand?”

  “I needed to let you know that a scout found Indian tracks just a little way off.” When he frowned, Margaret knew he was worried. “And they are fresh. Hopefully, we will not run into them. But we have been hearing that the Cheyenne are on the warpath and in this area. If they do attack us, we need to be prepared. We are going to have a meeting right away. Be at the campfire in five minutes.”

  Margaret nodded and silently said a prayer that they would not have to carry out any plans they made that night. She shivered at the thought of what would happen to her family if they encountered Indians in such an isolated place.

  Chapter 3

  When the Indians attacked, it was just as the first rays of the sun burst forth across the meadow where the traveling party had made camp and prepared for battle. The small bands of settlers were tired from their long journey and lack of adequate sleep and food. The Indians had the superiority and took advantage.

  The pandemonium of the situation overcame anything else. Margaret knew they were outnumbered, outgunned, and outsmarted. They were going to be slaughtered, and there was nothing they could do to stop it.

  She crouched underneath the wagon, which had been turned upside down to protect the women and children, and watched in horror as, one by one, each of their men were killed. Margaret, along with Jackie and Henry, hid beneath one wagon, silently praying for the safety of their men, while Laura, Sarah and Albert were hidden beneath the other.

  Clutching a gun, Margaret tried to help by firing through small holes in the wood of the wagon. She had little success, missing several times and only grazing one Indian warrior in the shoulder. The Indians were being methodical, slowly killing one man at a time. She was terrified of what would happen when they got to them.

  Jackie was a wreck, witnessing her husband fend off attack after attack. Both women peeked through the small holes in the wood of the wagon. There were only two hired men left, as well as Mister Goodrich, Randall, and Pastor Thompson. Margaret bit her lip as she anxiously focused on the battle outside.

  Randall was about to fire off another round at one of the Cheyenne warriors when his gun was knocked out of his hands by a tomahawk. Blood squirted from where the weapon had hit him, and Randall grabbed his hand in pain.

  Margaret winced as she too felt the intense pain that was coursing through her twin. She wanted to shoot the Indian who relentlessly bore down on her brother, but she did not want to take the chance that she would hit Randall.

  Glancing over at Jackie, Margaret noted how white her friend appeared. As long as she had known her, she had never seen such a stricken look on Jackie’s face. Henry was curled in a ball with his eyes clenched shut and his hands over his ears. He hated all the screams and shouting going on outside the wagon.

  Randall and the Indian were locked together in hand-to-hand combat, and Margaret knew her brother was at a di
sadvantage. It had been his right hand that had been wounded, so instead, he held his knife a bit awkwardly in his left.

  He lunged and the light-footed Indian ducked away from the thrust. In return, the warrior distracted Randall by striking with one hand and knocking Randall’s knife away with the other.

  Randall dove for his knife, but the Indian kicked it away and then stepped on Randall’s wounded hand to keep him from moving. When the Indian raised his tomahawk to strike, Margaret could stay hidden no longer.

  Stumbling from underneath the wagon, she screamed like a madwoman. She could not lose her brother again. She raised the shotgun, supporting it under her other arm, and fired. The shot was dead-on and hit the Indian directly in the chest. The impact sent him sprawling on his back. He lay there unmoving, and when the rage that had enveloped Margaret began to fade, she realized that she had just taken another life. She had killed two men in her life, both in defense of her brother.

  Numbed from her sudden insight, she had temporarily forgotten that she was standing in the middle of an Indian raid. It was not until she heard Randall yell, “Maggie, watch out behind you,” that she remembered there was a battle going on around her.

  She staggered around just in time to see an Indian rushing at her but not in time to raise her shotgun. He knocked the weapon from her hands and grabbed her by the hair. When she struggled to get free, he pulled her hair so tight that she began to see spots. She clinched her eyes shut as she screamed out in pain. Tears rushed down her cheeks, not only from the pain but her fear as well. She opened her eyes to see the gleam of the Indian’s tomahawk as he raised it into the air. In horror, she watched as the blade descended toward her.

  Then from out of nowhere, she heard gunfire and saw the tomahawk fall from her enemy’s hand. Reflexively, he let her go as he grabbed his wounded hand. A second shot followed and the Indian fell to the ground dead.