She couldn’t understand what the old chief was saying as he offered the pipe in all directions, for he spoke the words in his Chippewa tongue.
After the pipe was smoked and set aside, Chief Gray Feather left the wigwam. Flame took this time to scoot closer to White Fire.
“Where is he going?” she whispered.
“To tell the women to bring in some food,” White Fire said, reaching a soft hand to her cheek. “Are you all right about everything? You are able to relax?” His lips fluttered into a soft smile. “You have accepted how I look? The paint? The breechclout?”
“I would love you if you wore nothing and you ran around with your body painted black,” Flame said, giggling. She leaned closer and ran a finger slowly over his powerful chest. “I think you are so handsome.”
“I could paint your face, if you wish,” he teased, his eyes dancing into hers. “When we are alone, I could paint your body.”
“No, I wouldn’t go so far as that in my admiration of the body paint,” Flame said, laughing softly. Then she grew quiet and stared at the buckskin entrance flap. “I wish that I could totally relax while being here with you, but I can’t get Father off my mind.”
“Of course, and who would expect you to?” White Fire said, drawing her into his embrace. He cuddled her closer. “I am sure he will look for you tonight until he is exhausted. Then he will return to the fort. I hope that we can leave early enough in the morning to travel through the forest before he is up again and searching for you.”
“What are we going to do in the morning?” Flame asked, shivering at the thought of what her father might do if he found them together. “Where will we go?”
“It would be too risky to go back to my cabin,” White Fire said. “Not yet, anyhow. We will establish ourselves elsewhere for a while. We can go to the Indian agent in Pig’s Eye. We can seek refuge there until Colonel Edwards sees to your father’s dismissal from this area, or better yet, his arrest. Then I will proceed at getting my son, but only after you and I speak vows before a preacher.”
“I want nothing but to be with you and Michael,” Flame murmured. “I will do anything, go anywhere you say, to achieve it.”
“For tonight, let us just forget everything but being together,” White Fire said huskily.
He leaned her away from him. He placed both hands at her brow and swept her hair back from her face. “We will be given a wigwam for the night,” he said. “You will experience how it feels to live as the Chippewa live. You will experience how it feels to make love in a wigwam.”
A sensual shiver raced across Flame’s flesh at the thought of being alone in a wigwam
with White Fire, making love. It seemed so primitive.
Yes, she concluded. For tonight she would forget about her father. It served him right to have to worry about her welfare, for in truth, it was only himself that mattered to him.
Perhaps her father might even feel relieved if he never saw her again, she thought bitterly. She had become a nuisance, an obstacle to his peace of mind.
She knew him well, and knew that he needed a clear mind to plan his strategies. A man of no great intelligence, he could only concentrate on one thing at a time.
Gray Feather came back into the lodge. He held the entrance flap aside as several women stepped inside. They carried wooden trays heaping with food and sat them on the floor close to the fire.
Another woman brought in a large brass kettle filled with boiled venison and green corn.
Flame glanced over at Chief Gray Feather. It was as though the Chippewa chief had known there would be a reason to celebrate, that he had known that his scheme to bring White Fire there would work. Much food had been prepared over the cook fires in many lodges.
When the women left, and Gray Feather came and sat down close to White Fire and Flame, he offered them wooden spoons and bowls.
“Eat your fill tonight and then tomorrow there will be more to eat before your departure from my village,” the chief said, gesturing with one of his hands toward the food.
Hungry enough, having had only a few bites of food the entire day, White Fire did not have to be asked twice. But first he heaped Flame’s plate with different items from the large platters.
As they sat by the fire White Fire sampled all the dishes they were offered. There was bear meat, which Flame declined, and boiled venison and duck, which she ate daintily with her fingers. They both had bowls of the corn soup, then finished the meal with cups of pine needle tea.
When the platters were empty, Chief Gray Feather gazed over at White Fire; then at length at Flame. Then he touched White Fire gently on the shoulder. “I do understand now why your heart is lost to this white woman,” he said thickly. “She is a gracious woman. She is beautiful. And I see much love in her eyes as she looks at you.”
“Fate brought us together many years ago just before my departure from St. Louis, as it did again here upon Flame’s arrival to the Minnesota Territory,” White Fire said, reaching over to take one of Flame’s hands in his. “It was written in the stars that we should meet twice, then marry.”
“Dreams, my dreams, placed you in the arms of my daughter,” Gray Feather said sullenly, his attitude cooler. “But in the past, as dreams failed me, so do they fail me now.”
White Fire’s insides stiffened. “It is with much regret that I am to blame for your dreams proving wrong,” he said tightly. “But although I am not marrying your daughter, do you not see that we can still be friends? I still feel a oneness with you and your people. I feel as though I am brother to your warriors, and son to you, their chief.”
“A son in my heart is not the same as in truth,” Gray Feather said, sighing. “But I do wish for you to still be a part of my life . . . of my people’s. Come often. Have council. Smoke with me. Hunt with me.”