Shaman Part 110

Hopelessly, Auguste stood up and bent over to pick up the iron ball chained to his leg. Perhaps, he thought, Lynch's law would be better. At least it would not prolong his suffering, make him relive moment by moment everything he and those he loved had suffered over the past year.

And sooner or later he was bound to end up in the same place--a grave.

The following day Nicole was sitting in the witness chair, answering Ford's questions in a soft, melodious voice.

Ford asked, "Do you agree, Mrs. Hopkins, with your brother's charge that Auguste is a renegade and murderer?"

Nicole's full face reddened with anger. "My G.o.d, no! Auguste never turned against us. He left Smith County because Raoul would have had him murdered if he'd stayed. Auguste has never harmed anyone."

Ford's next witness was Mrs. Pamela Russell. Hearing the spectators murmuring questions to one another after Ford called her name, Auguste wondered anxiously what a woman whose husband had been killed by Wolf Paw's raid on Victor could possibly say that would help him. Her black dress and bonnet made her face look even paler. She clutched a black leather bag in her lap.

Ford said, "Mrs. Russell, did your late husband entrust any papers to you concerning Auguste de Marion?"

"Not exactly, but he kept such papers in our house and told me about them. I kept them safe after he died."

"What were they?"

"A certificate of adoption and a will."

"Why did he keep them in your home instead of in the village hall?"

Pamela Russell's dark eyes flashed as she searched the courtroom, looking, Auguste suspected, for Raoul.

"Raoul de Marion, who never let my husband forget that he owed his job to him, ordered Burke to destroy both papers."

"That's a lie!" came Raoul's shout from the back of the hall.

Justus Bennett looked toward Raoul and said, "Colonel de Marion, please.

What this woman is saying might even help our case."

"All right," Raoul called. "But you watch what you're doing."

"Now, Mrs. Russell--" Ford began again.

"Burke knew that what he told him to do was wrong. So, instead of destroying the adoption certificate and the will, he brought them home and kept them in his strongbox in our cellar. When the Indians burned our house, the papers survived." She paused, gazing over Ford's head.

"The papers survived."

"Do you have them now, Mrs. Russell?"

She unbuckled the strap that closed the leather bag in her lap and drew out two folded pieces of paper. She handed them to Ford, who unfolded them with a flourish and turned to the judge.

Ford asked, "Your Honor, may I read these doc.u.ments to the court?"

"Go right ahead," said Judge Cooper.

"First, the certificate of adoption," said Ford.

Auguste felt a hard lump rise to block his throat as Ford read the statement that Pierre de Marion, on the sixteenth day of August, 1825, did declare his natural son, hereafter to be known as Auguste de Marion, to be his lawful son, granting him all rights and privileges to which that status might ent.i.tle him.

Auguste covered his burning eyes with his hand.

_I meant so much to him._

"Now," said Ford, "the will: 'I, Pierre de Marion, residing on the estate called Victoire, in the County of Smith and State of Illinois, make this my will and revoke all prior wills and codicils.'"

It was the will Auguste had fought against until Pierre had finally persuaded him to smoke the calumet; the will giving the chateau and the land to Auguste. There were also monetary gifts to a number of servants, including one of two hundred dollars to Armand and Marchette Perrault.

Auguste heard an angry-bee buzzing among the spectators. By seizing the estate, and concealing the will, Raoul had wiped out these gifts. He'd have to face some angry servants today, Auguste thought with satisfaction. Including that swine Perrault.

"The prosecution will want to see those papers," said Bennett when Ford had finished reading.

"Of course," said Cooper. "You may have a look any time. In my presence."

After Ford had given the jurors the two papers to look at and had returned them to Cooper's table, he turned to Bennett.

"Your witness."

Bennett slouched into the open area before the judge's table. "No questions. Mrs. Russell, widowed by those savages, has surely suffered enough."

Pamela Russell stayed sitting in the chair beside the judge's table, clutching her leather bag. Her bosom, Auguste saw, was rising and falling with some powerful emotion.

"That's all, Pamela," David Cooper said softly. "You can go now."

She stood up, looking like a woman in a trance, and moved slowly toward the door in the rear of the courtroom. Auguste turned in his seat to watch her. She stopped before Raoul, who was sitting near the back. He stared up at her as she pointed at him.

"How dare you call me a liar, Raoul de Marion! When it's you that lied about what you told my husband. My husband never fired a gun before in his life, and he had to stand up and be killed, because you took all the men who could shoot away with you. I hope those papers ruin you."

Spots of red stood out on her cheeks. She covered her face with her hand and rushed out of the courtroom.

"How come you didn't shut her up, Judge?" Raoul shouted after she was gone.

"I figured she deserved to have her say," said Cooper calmly.

Ford said, "The defense calls Miss Nancy Hale."

Auguste's heart started to beat harder as he watched Nancy, tall and straight in a pale violet dress, walk to the witness's chair. Just what he had feared a year ago, when Nancy first asked him to make love to her, had happened. He felt a love for her--an impossible love, now--that was as strong in its way as the love he felt for Redbird.

In answer to Ford's soft-spoken questions, Nancy told how she had been captured and how Auguste had intervened to protect her, and later to protect Woodrow. She told how he had risked his life to escort her and Woodrow to safety, and had ended up being captured.

Bennett got up to cross-question.

"Miss Hale, this may be a hard question for you to answer in open court.

But it is important to this trial. It's well-known that Indians are no respecters of the virtue of white women. So, what I'm asking you is ..."

He paused and leaned over her. "Were you subjected to anything of a shameful nature while you were a prisoner of the Sauk?"

"Objection," called Ford. "The question itself is shameful. It has no possible bearing on this case."

Judge Cooper glared at Bennett. "What call do you have to ask her that?"

"Defense counsel has taken us down a lot of winding roads, Your Honor.

I'm attempting to determine facts about the defendant's character."