“May I help ye gentleman find something?”
Both men turned from her to face him. They were big, not as tall as him but the older man was broad and worn strong like the drawing of a berserker he’d seen once. He wouldn’t want to take on the two of them at once. The younger one took a short step closer, blue eyes fierce. Lips cracked an unfriendly smile. Zeke eased when Miss Sigridsdatter turned right and drifted out of sight without these two seeing which way she went.
Copper nuzzled his shoulder. Zeke turned to find Mose standing behind him with both horses.
“Why don’t ye mind ye own business, friend.” The softspoken threat didn’t sound English.
Alarm bells shrieked in his mind, and a fierce protectiveness surged forward. It didn’t matter what these men wanted with her. Zeke would see to it they wouldn’t get it.
“Well now. I wouldn’t want visitors to our town to get lost. Would we Mose?” Zeke turned to include his friend.
Moses’ usual friendly smile didn’t appear. “Nossir. We certainly wouldn’t want anyone to be lost in our town.”
“We are not lost,” the young man snapped.
“I saw ye come out of the tavern and head this way, I assumed ye were lost, there are no boarding houses or taverns down this way. Yep. Far as I could tell, ye had no reason to be headed to this part of town, friend.” He looked the speaker in the eye and calmly waited.
The younger man glanced at his companion.
The older man shrugged. “Just out for a stroll after a fine meal in yer tavern. Just a friendly stroll is all.” He drew the s’s out like a snake.
The two men stepped around Zeke and Mose and headed back toward the tavern. Zeke took Copper’s reins from Mose as they watched the men retreating into the thinning crowd.
“Who was that?”
“Ye know as much as me.”
“Were they following her?”
Mose said “her” like only one woman could be referred to by that pronoun. Zeke needed to go home before he thought Mose was right.
Five
His sister, Tirzah, must have been waiting by the door for it swung open just as he reached the knob. “Were there a lot of people, Zeke?” She asked before he could hang his hat on the peg. The twinkle in her hazel eyes reminded him of their childhood.
“Let him come in and tell us all, Tirzah,” their mother called from the adjacent room. “He doesn’t want to tell it twice.”
“A fair amount.” He winked, and the two of them entered the parlor.
“How much is a fair amount?” His mother, ensconced in a winged chair across from his uncle in front of the fire, lay her knitting aside. Uncle Eleazar perched his book on a knee.
Golden light from the fire, and a few well-placed candles danced across the patterns of the wallpaper. A hint of bayberry mixed with the earthy smells of the fire welcomed him. Restlessness stopped him from joining his family around the fire. He wondered if he’d ever cease feeling the urgency of the next battle. Each task he’d taken on since the end of the war felt empty and temporary. Like he was filling time waiting for orders that would march him miles away. Visits with those he loved felt hollow and meaningless next to the call to action he’d become accustomed to during his time with the Continental Army.
Zeke forced himself down on a spot next to his sister on a settee across from his mother and uncle. “The tavern yard was near filled with families.”
“Did ye decide when we shall leave?” Tirzah’s excitement kept her on the edge of the cushion.
Zeke felt his mother’s disapproval without glancing in her direction.
“Not yet,” he said. “We wanted to get a feel for the numbers before we settled on a date.”
“Thank the merciful God for that.” His mother slapped her hands together. Tirzah rolled her eyes and picked up her needlework.
“That’s enough of that, child,” her mother corrected. “Ye brother has no business haring off into the wilderness in his condition.”
“Mama—” Zeke started.
“Do not ye ‘mama’ me. No one wants to tell ye the truth. Ye’ve been progressing so well and ye being a hero of Yorktown.” She took deep and audible breath. After a quick glance at her clasped hands, she looked him in the eye. The pity she felt for her boy and more were reflected in the depths of her brown eyes. “But ye are a cripple. Ye are lame. There I said it. Ye will never be able to walk normally again.”
Zeke stood to push the anger from his chest rather than blast it to his mother. His mind was made up, and it was time for his mother to decide. She could come with him or stay here in Kemp’s Landing. Kentucky was his destiny.
“The way I see it, Hezekiah, yer injury has made the odds equal. A Smith with a bum leg is worth one and a half other men,” his uncle said. He didn’t cotton to shortening the glorious names of the Smiths.
This time Mama faced his uncle. “Ye have heard the reports of Indian attacks on Boonesborough. It is dangerous, Eleazar. And ye do not help matters by jesting about them.”
“Stop yer fussing, Mama,” his uncle’s voice gentled, “A man’s gotta be a man. Hezekiah knows his limitations. Leave him be.”
Zeke thanked heavens for his uncle’s support. “I am going to Kentucky, Mama. Ye can stay here with Uncle, or ye may come with me. I will respect ye choice.”
“I wish to accompany ye to Kentucky, Zeke,” his sister interjected.
Zeke grinned at Tirzah. “That decision I must leave to Mama. If she goes ye can go, if she stays here, ye shall have to stay here with her.” Tirzah nearly bounced in her frustration. “Mama is right. It will be a hard road.”
“I am not afraid of hard work. I am tired of this place.”
Zeke looked closer at his sister and a desperation he’d not seen before lay in the shadows of her eyes. War was a weary business. He hadn’t forgotten that the years at home while supplies dwindled and neighbors became patchy friends and sometimes enemies left so many holes. His sister had not been in the frontlines, but she’d fought with every pair of stockings she’d knit him and every soldier she’d fed alongside their mother. He took her small strong hand in his own. “I will bring ye to Kentucky. Whether ye come now or later after I have built a home.”
