Chapter 19: Adjusting
Logan spent the entire afternoon with the horses after he made a lock for the gate into his property, and Remy and Jubilee wisely left him alone. It was, after all, a lot for Logan to take in all in one afternoon.
Logan ran Storm around in circles in the corral on the lunge line, thinking about what Remy had said. It rankled. He'd never owned a slave; he didn't even like the idea now. He hated the idea. But he hated the thought even more of Jubilee with Walbrook, thought about how she would have survived the amputation of both her legs right below the knees. He thought about what she'd be doing right now, if Walbrook had won his suit for ownership; probably in shock, unconscious, bleeding from the stumps of her legs. He saw her pass the corral fence, her bare feet flashing under the hem of her skirt, and shuddered. He turned his thoughts resolutely from Walbrook. The man had lost his suit; he was out of Jubilee's life forever. Logan had no intention of ever selling her.
He snapped the whip at Storm a little harder than he intended, and cursed himself under his breath as the horse started a canter instead of a trot. He steadied the horse, slowed him down, then returned to his musings.
Freedom. Every slave wanted it; he'd seen hunger for it in her eyes, when he first brought her here and talked about freeing her. Now she'd come to love him, but was she telling the truth about loving him more than her freedom? Was the Cajun telling the truth about Canada being a free country? Would Jubilee be free there? Would her freedom be worth giving her up, losing her, never seeing her again? Would he be willing to pay the price of never seeing her again if it meant her freedom? He could still hear her voice in his ear, stubbornly insisting to Remy that she'd rather stay here with Logan than be free in Canada. She might feel that now, but what about later, when the Cajun left? Would she regret that she hadn't taken the freedom he'd offered her? Logan didn't want to look into her eyes and see regret and unhappiness there because she had given up her chance at freedom to stay with him. What did he have to offer her anyway? Fifteen hours of work a day, sleeping in the barn (though Logan was determined to bring her into the house as soon as the weather turned, which would be any day now). He could feel the beginnings of fall frost in the air. And, not to mention, being watched like a hawk for any signs that their relationship was not a proper Master/slave one. He checked the treeline as he turned Storm again. Yep, those three men were still there. He was going to get a real sturdy lock for the front gate the next time he went to Jackson, and then he'd get one for the barn door so no one would hop the fence and try to enter the barn at night to make Jubilee do…whatever. The lock would be on the inside.
The Cajun had more to offer her. Freedom was a precious gift all on its own; but Logan had also seen the quality of the Cajun's clothes, the value of the cloth it was made from, for all that they were dusty and travel-stained. And yet, Logan had reservations about him. He couldn't deny that the man had helped them; he might have saved Jubilee's life by forcing Hunt to tell the truth in the courthouse. Logan himself liked something about the man. But he didn't know if the man was telling the truth about himself. Jubilee, however, did; Logan and Red Doe were the only ones she'd ever hugged. Running Wolf was even kept at a distance. Yet she'd hugged Remy LeBeau. Logan couldn't figure out what it was about the bold, brash young Cajun that had caught her attention.
The Cajun was handsome, and had his own kind of rugged charm. He'd seen the girls at the inn yesterday giving the Cajun appreciative, coy looks as they went through the inn to their room. Remy had seemed unconscious of it, although Logan was willing to bet a silver dollar that the Cajun had known about the looks he was getting. The man didn't miss much. Being a former slave, he'd have had to learn to pay attention to what was going on around him.
And that was another thing that bugged Logan. He urged Storm into a canter as his thoughts sped through his head like the ground under the horse's hooves. The lash scars proved that he had been a slave; but the way Remy refused to talk about his brand, and the fact that he traveled with a packet of pain-numbing, sleep producing herbs, made Logan wonder.
Logan stopped Storm when he thought the horse had enough, and rubbed the horse and walked him to cool him as he eyed Remy's horse. You could tell a lot about the man from the horse he rode.
Remy's horse was a chestnut stallion with a black mane and tail. It stood placidly cropping the lush grass of Thunder's pasture, its flicking ears the only sign of its alertness. But Logan saw the muscles tense in the horse's shoulder when Logan got near him, and then a quick sideways shimmy and laid-back ears told Logan that this horse had been allowed to sire a few foals; the horse was almost as temperamental as Storm. It said a lot for the horsemanship of the man who rode him, and about the quality of any other horses he might have.
Jubilee went to the back door and called, "Supper!" She punctuated her cheerful shout by banging on the back of a pot with a wooden spoon. Logan winced at the noise, and Remy's horse laid its ears back as it crow-hopped away from Logan.
"Careful, mon ami. He don' like strangers." Remy stepped past Logan and laid a hand on the glossy neck. "Easy dere, Rogue. Ain't not'ing goin' to hurt you here."
"His name is Rogue?" Logan raised an eyebrow. Any horse with an outlaw name had to be trouble.
"Eh, he's trouble all right, but only to people don' know how to handle him," Remy said when Logan voiced his concern. "He's ordinarily very well behaved." Then he whistled, long and low, and grabbed a handful of Rogue's mane as a lean, silent white shadow slid under the pasture fence and headed for the cabin at a run. "What was dat?"
Logan grinned at the other man's discomfiture. "That was Snow, her wolf," he said, jerking a thumb toward the cabin. "She said a bitch in the indentured servants' railroad camp had puppies, an' she had ta help this one survive when it's ma died. She lost track of it fer a while, the wolf stayed outta the railmaster's territory, but one day Jubilee an' I went huntin' a mad wolf who killed her favorite pony. It attacked us in the middle of the night, an' she'd probably have died if it wasn't for Snow bustin' in an' distractin' the other wolf until I could shoot it. 'Course, I also went and shot him too, when I seen him, and she looked so pitiful I couldn't ignore Snow. We brought him here ta help him recover. She lets him come an' go as she pleases; he'll disappear sometimes fer days at a time, but she never worries. Says he can take care o' himself jus' fine."
Remy looked thoughtful. "Will this wolf stay with her if she wants him to?"
Logan narrowed his eyes. "Sometimes. Why?"
Remy sighed. "Tie him in the barn with her when she go to sleep at night. If anybody sneak over your fence and try to get wit' her when you asleep, dat wolf goin' to made de bastard t'ink twice. An' if he do get in, de wolf will raise enough fuss dat you goin' to wake up."
Logan raised an eyebrow. "I was gonna buy a lock fer the barn door."
Remy shook his head. "Not practical. You keep straw an' hay in de barn. If it catches fire, she might not be able to get out in time. Not to mention, people 'round here do burn barns of people dey don' like. You don' want her to get burned in de barn." His eyes looked haunted for a moment. "Takes a while to untie a rope aroun' an ankle, and den she got to fiddle wit' a lock. Hay go up faster den dat.'
"A rope? Why would she have a rope…" Logan stared at the Cajun, and cursed. "No. NO!"
Remy said softly, "De law say a slave in an outdoor structure at night got to be restrained from running away. Chain and shackle de usual method, but rope do de same t'ing." He bent down, pulled the end of one trouser leg up. "See dat?"
Logan looked. Remy's leg was white with scar tissue from a horrible burn. "Remy's Master an Mistress tie him up in a barn one night as punishment, and de barn caught fire from a stable boy's careless cigarette." He gritted his teeth. "Take me long time to get de rope untied, wit' all de smoke an' chaos, an' horses screamin'. Nobody care bout a slave boy tied in de barn; dey was too busy gettin' de horses out. I finally got de rope off an' outside just before de barn collapse." Remy dropped his trouser leg.
Logan's heart dropped at the thought of Jubilee burning in his barn. "But…do I have to…tie her up…"
Remy sighed. "Yes, mon ami, you do. She know dat too. Dey," he jerked his head in the direction of the three men camping in the trees, still watching the cabin through the gathering darkness. "know dat too. Dey goin' to wait to go home tonight to see if you do it."
Logan looked sick. He turned and headed for the cabin without another word.
Remy took a moment to pat Rogue. "He goin' to be okay," he said, more to himself than the horse. "He jus' don' want to tie de petite up at night. But he goin' to have to unless he want to lose her." He headed for the cabin himself.
Logan ate supper with as few words as possible. Jubilee sat on the floor in front of the hearth, eating quickly and talking softly to the wolf, who listened as she fed him chunks of meat from the roasted haunch of deer she'd cooked. Remy watched them both.
Jubilee knew about the half-hour rule. She finished her portion quickly, and sat sewing a button onto Logan's shirt as she waited for the men to finish. Logan pushed his plate away and stared at the fire moodily, trying to put off the moment as long as he could, but finally got up. His steps were heavy as he went to the chest he kept rope in and selected two long lengths. "I'm sorry, kid," he said, his voice cracking. "Remy says ya gotta be tied in the barn."
"I know," she said to him gently. "It doesn't bother me, Papa. Really."
Logan cleared his throat. "Remy says if I tie Snow in there with ya the wolf'll protect ya from any bad skunks who might try ta sneak in there an' hurt ya," he said. "I don't wanna, Jubilee. I really don't."
"You have to," Jubilee said, slightly alarmed. "Papa, if you don't they'll take me away from you and give me back to the Railmaster, and he'll chain me worse. When I was in the slaves' boxcar the chain was just long enough to let me sit up. I couldn't move from where he put me. Sometimes he'd put chains on my wrists too, and when he did I couldn't protect myself from…from the other slaves. I'd rather have you tie me with rope."
Logan scrubbed his sleeve across his face to blot away the tears in his eyes. "Well, come on. Tell yer wolf ta come too." He opened the cabin door and led her out.
He tied one end of one rope to a ring in the wall, and the other end around Snow's neck. Then he tied the end of the other rope to the same ring, and waited as Jubilee made herself comfortable. Finally, cursing under his breath, he crouched and ran a loop of rope around her slim ankle. He tied a knot, stepped back, and looked at it.
"It's too tight," he said, bending to loosen it, but Jubilee prevented him.
"Papa, it's fine. Please. Don't torture yourself. I'll be fine." She took the blanket he'd given her and pulled it over herself. "Good night, Papa." She closed her eyes as he picked up the lantern and left, closing the barn door behind him.
He could barely see across the space from the barn to the cabin. It hurt to have to leave his little girl in the barn, tied like an animal. He decided, then and there, that privacy be damned, tomorrow she was sleeping in the cabin. He'd put blankets on the floor for her; he just couldn't do this every night, tying her up. It was going to tear his heart out. It didn't seem to bother her; she was used to being tied up, but he couldn't stand it. He wanted her back in the cabin, in her bed on the other side of the wall, sleeping peacefully on a comfortable straw tick.
How in hell was he going to do this for the rest of her damn life? More importantly, what if something happened to him, and she was left alone? What would happen? Would she be seized and resold? Would she go to someone who cared about her, or would she go to someone like the Railmaster, who would whip her during the day for the tiniest misstep, and rape her at night? The thought made him sick.
Would letting her go with Remy really be so bad? He'd done fine without her, he'd be okay without her again. Would her freedom be worth his loneliness?
He wasn't sure he wanted to find out.
