Free Scarlet Plume, Second Edition by Frederick Manfred

speakin’.”
    Reverend Codman’s lips turned quivering white. Somehow he managed to keep from speaking. Reaching down, carefully, even meticulously, he selected a single blade of grass from between his feet. He began to pick his teeth with the pale green end of it.
    Judith gave Silvers a withering look. The rank rutting odor of the man reminded her of an old boar she and her four brothers had once caught in the woods near their Davenport farm. She also recalled a remark Vince had once made, that many of the pioneers were not the best of people, that there were bounty jumpers, deserters, and thieves among them. Her eyes fell on Silvers’ grease-spotted buckskin shirt front. “Hardly better than animals, eh?” She glanced around at Tinkling. “Who’s this you married, then?”
    Theodosia breathed quick short breaths. She took off her slat bonnet. “My, but it’s close out.” Sweat beaded Theodosia’s pale forehead. The large freckles on her cheeks stood out like dark warts.
    Silvers pushed back his fur cap, and a black forelock slid across his brow. “Yeh, and I say the gov’ment made a mistake when it gave you Christian willies permission to come out here. This is no place fer women.”
    Theodosia put her bonnet back on. “You don’t seem to understand, Mr. Silvers, that my husband and I were called by the Lord to bring the gospel message to the heathen. We had to come.”
    “So you really think you can make a Christian out of a Indian, ha?” Silvers exploded. “Woman, it can’t be done, any more than you can’t make a house cat out of a weasel.”
    “Then you have no compassion for even the least of these? Even when they hunger for truth?”
    “I wouldn’t give them a stone to gnaw on.”
    “Not even your pretty little Christian wife?”
    Silvers stomped his heavy boots. “Her, maybe yes. Because she’s never said no to me in bed. But the rest of them red devils, naw. Let them eat grass. Or their own dung.”
    Tinkling jerked as if someone had cut her across the thin shoulders with a whip. She shied around to hide herself.
    Joe Utterback had a word. “And if you want my honest thought on it, Mrs. Codman, this is what I say. It hain’t right fer an ignorant savage to own so much land, unplowed, while the better white man is forced to live in want. The Indian never did use the land for what the Lord intended it fer—raisin’ wheat. That’s what I say.”
    Reverend Codman shook his head sadly. “Yes. How beautiful the Ordinance of 1787 reads. ‘The utmost good shall always be observed toward the Indians. Their lands and property shall never be taken from them without their consent.’”
    Angela tugged at Judith’s sleeve. “When do we eat, Mama? I’m hungry.”
    Judith glanced up at the warm sun. “Stars alive,” she said. “It’s going on afternoon already. I completely forgot about dinner.”
    Maggie Utterback said, “Who wants to eat now? ’Ceptin’ maybe that pig of a husband of mine.”
    The boy Ted gave his mother, Theodosia, a tug on the arm. “Make me some cornbread, Mama. I’m hungry. I surely like that new molasses you made.”
    “Shh,” Theodosia said. “You’ll have to wait awhile. Until we decide what to do.”
    Mrs. Christians covered her eyes with her hands. “Here I am, far in Indian country, cut off, and my husband dead.” She cried bitterly.
    Mavis put an arm around Mrs. Christians. “There, there. Now, now.”
    Mrs. Christians lashed out, eyes wild, throwing Mavis’ arm aside. “Get your dirty hands off me, you whore, after what you done with some of our men.”
    Mavis turned white.
    Billy Vikes and Jed Crydenwise gave each other wondering looks.
    “Let us pray,” Reverend Codman said. He bowed his head and folded his hands. His voice boomed loud and strong. “Our Father which art in heaven, we come to thee in the noon hour of this day, sorely troubled at heart and beset round about by—”
    “Here they come!” Maggie Utterback cried. “Men, cock