Elizabeth Lane - Navajo Sunrise

Lifting her skirts above the frozen mud, Miranda strode across the empty square of land that passed for a parade ground toward what she remembered to be the mess hall. The few soldiers who were loitering outside the door straightened to a semblance of attention, tipping their hats as she passed. One of them, a quiet young man who’d been part of her escort from Santa Fe, smiled shyly and held open the door. With a nod of thanks she stepped over the threshold.

Her heart sank as she surveyed the long mess hall with its sea of empty tables and benches and the more genteel officers’ section at the far end. Where was her father? Couldn’t he at least have waited for her to join him for breakfast? Did he think she’d traveled all this distance to wander around this desolate place alone?

“So here you are, my dear.”

Startled by the sound of a feminine voice, Miranda turned to see a plump, birdlike woman hurrying toward her from the direction of the kitchen. She was well into middle age, her badly dyed brown hair sculpted into rigidly upswept curls. Her wine-colored gown was elaborately ruffled at the neck, sleeves and hem, giving her the look of a drooping garden peony.

At closer range Miranda saw that the woman’s childlike face was webbed with lines, but traces of faded beauty lingered in her molasses-brown eyes. Those eyes sparkled as she seized Miranda’s fingers in her small, lace-mitted hand. “Your father had pressing duties this morning and couldn’t be here. I offered to wait and show you around—after you’ve had breakfast, of course. My name is Violet Marsden. My husband is quartermaster here at the fort, and I…” She caught her breath, as if the very effort of speaking had strained her. “I can’t tell you how very pleased I am to welcome you here!”

Still a bit dazed, Miranda allowed the woman to lead her to a table in a corner of the deserted officers’ mess. It was cheerlessly set with a threadbare linen cloth, chipped but serviceable white porcelain and heavy silver plate that bore a patina of long use. But someone had placed a sprig of tiny yellow spring wildflowers in a spare cup. Who had it been? Her father? This woman, perhaps?

“I’ve just been to the kitchen to make sure the cook saved you some porridge.” Violet Marsden settled herself across the table, adjusting her gown like a preening sparrow. An undertone in her fragile voice spoke of cotton fields and magnolias and the gracious manners of a time forever gone. What was she doing here in this barren place that seemed to have had every trace of gentility parched, burned, starved and frozen out of it?

“Did you have a difficult journey?” she asked, lifting the china teapot and pouring a cup for Miranda, then one for herself. There was no sugar or cream on the table, but the tea was fresh, its warmth curling pleasantly in Miranda’s stomach.

“The trip wasn’t bad,” she replied, dismissing what she remembered of last night’s arrival. “But I do have a question. Am I just imagining things, or is my father avoiding me?”

“Avoiding you?” Violet glanced up, her eyes wide with surprise. “How on earth could you imagine such a thing? Of course Major Howell isn’t avoiding you!”

“Then where is he? We’ve barely exchanged a dozen words since I arrived last night!”

“But, my dear, there’s a perfectly logical explanation for that,” Violet protested. “Last night you were exhausted and needed your rest.”

“And this morning?”

“Why, it’s simply the usual Saturday. He needed to be at the issue house early to make certain there’s no trouble with the Navajos!”

“Trouble with the Navajos?” Miranda asked, dimly aware that she sounded like a trained parrot.

“Why, bless you, this is the day they come in to get their rations. Thousands of them! The line goes all the way from the issue house to the road and beyond. With so many Indians about the place, a strong military presence is needed.”

Miranda glanced down at the bowl of gluey oatmeal laced with canned milk that had appeared on the table before her. “And my father couldn’t be spared for a single morning?” she asked, stirring the grayish mess with her spoon.

“The commanding officer of the fort is required to be in attendance.” Violet dabbed at her little rouged mouth with her napkin. “With the care of the Navajos passing from the army to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, this fort has come under a good deal of public scrutiny, my dear. If there’s trouble and some impulsive young soldier fires at unarmed Indians, it could make the army look very bad. Do you understand?”

“I do.” Miranda remembered the rifle butt crunching into Ahkeah’s skull. Evidently it was all right to hit Navajos but not to shoot them.

“It’s the major’s responsibility to make sure nothing happens that would open the army to criticism,” Violet said, brushing away an imaginary crumb from the lace edging on her bodice. “That’s why your father couldn’t delegate the job to anyone else, not even to be with you.”

“I see.” Miranda forced herself to eat, knowing she would be hungry later. Questions about the Navajos—and the disturbing man she had held in her arms last night—milled in her mind, clamoring for answers, but she cautioned herself to hold her tongue. The last thing she wanted was to trigger unpleasant gossip by showing too much interest in a man she had no business knowing.

“Will I be allowed to go to the issue house and watch?” she asked casually.

“I suppose so.” Violet’s patrician nose crinkled with distaste. “But don’t expect to like what you see. The Navajos are a filthy, treacherous lot, far worse than the slaves on my daddy’s plantation ever were. Their young girls hang around the fort and offer themselves to the soldiers for a few crusts of bread! Some of our boys have caught the most dreadful diseases from them! A gentlewoman isn’t supposed to know about such things, but one can’t help hearing talk!”

She frowned, then brightened as her eyes fell on Miranda’s empty teacup. “Would you like me to read your fortune, dear? My old mammy back in Louisiana taught me how, and I’m really quite good at it! I read for all the officers’ wives before they left.”

“Then, by all means, go ahead.” Miranda set little store by fortune-telling, but she had no wish to be rude. She watched skeptically as the small woman took the cup and stared intently into it, studying the pattern of the tea leaves in the bottom.

“Please don’t tell me I’m going to fall in love with a tall, dark stranger,” Miranda said, striving to keep things in the spirit of fun. “I’m getting married in June, and my fiancé is neither dark nor particularly—”

“Hush!” Violet whispered urgently. “Something’s coming to me!” She lifted the cup closer to her face, knitting her brows and pursing her small mouth. “It’s not terribly clear,” she said, “but I see a great change coming into your life.”

“Of course,” Miranda said with a little smile. “As I told you, I’m getting married, and after that Phillip and I will be living in London.”

“No.” Violet’s fragile voice rasped with conviction. “The change I see is one you’re not expecting and can’t prepare for. This change will shake your very soul. It will challenge all the things you’ve ever believed in!”

Miranda forced a good-natured laugh. This was all nonsense, she reminded herself. No one could look into a scattering of soggy tea leaves and read the future.

“And how will I deal with such a change?” she asked, humoring the woman. “Do the leaves tell you that?”

Violet’s eyes seemed to darken. Then she sighed and shook her head. “No. But be careful, my dear. I see danger in the leaves…and death—the death of someone close to you, perhaps, or even your own!”