Fitzerald and Mary Henry
Mary Henry, sister of Captain Andrew Henry, worked as a maid and cook for the officers at Ft. Kiowa. It was not an easy place for the young, attractive woman to live. The fort was full of lonely soldiers, fur traders and various riff-raff, pretty rough characters, most of them.
Why the Captain believed that this fort in the far west was a fine place for his sister to live was something Mary could not figure out. He certainly did not think the fort was suitable for his wife. But, as their parents were both dead and Mary, at eighteen, was still unmarried, it was the Captain's wish that she accompany him to Fort Kiowa. He explained to her that it was only for a year, and then she would be returning to civilization where she would surely find a husband. She certainly wouldn't find a man to marry at Fort Kiowa, that was for certain.
Usually Mary would avoid the long stares and verbal exchanges with any of the soldiers or traders, her eyes would focus either on the ground or far off into the distance rather than risk eye contact. But, there was one man at Ft. Henry that she could not take her eyes off of, and that was Fitzgerald.
What a mystery this man was! He interested Mary for some reason, perhaps it was his gloomy moods, his edginess, or the fact that he would avoid eye contact or conversation of any kind. He never hassled her like the other men did. In fact, he was completely pre-occupied with something else. What was it that occupied his mind so totally? She couldn't tell, but it made him very mysterious and fascinating to her. He was the one person that Mary actually wanted to talk to at this God-forsaken outpost.
She saw him one morning, washing his face and head in a bucket of water in the fort yard and she watched, riveted as he put water over his scalped head. She couldn't take her eyes away. Here was a man who had been scalped and lived? What was his story? His marred head made him even more attractive in her eyes. Now she understood why he always wore the most exotic head-gear she had ever seen. Head-gear that was often the faces of actual animals that he had killed, somehow it added to his own animal magnetism.
One morning she got up the nerve to ask her brother about him.
"Andrew, why is Fitzgerald here?"
"Don't go anywhere near John Fitzgerald do you hear me? I don't trust that man. You keep clear of him."
"I just -"
"That's enough."
Mary shrugged and dropped the subject. But she was determined to talk with John (so that was his name!) at the first opportunity. She'd find a way.