A puzzling dream

Charlotte's eyes closed easily and her breathing slowed. Outside she could hear the familiar sounds of the nighttime at her family home. An owl hooting soulfully in the distance cut through the sound of crickets chirping and the constant peeping of the small green frogs from the water garden. She could also hear the coarse laughter from some of the suitors drift up from the open windows in the gaming room on the first floor.

She considered closing her window to shut out the sound of the partiers she had abandoned, but Charlotte enjoyed the night time symphony of nature's creatures and refused to shut out the peaceful sounds of the estate she loved because of her uneasy guilt at leaving the revelers to their own devises. The men didn't mind, she was sure, in fact they probably were having a much better time now that the ladies had retired to their chambers. A great yawn stretched her mouth wide in a most unladylike fashion giving testament to how tired she really was.

She thought over her conversation with the dour Lieutenant Easton as she felt herself drift into sleep. The earnest young officer was not much fun at a party, but he certainly seemed more reliable than most men she had met. Certainly more trustworthy than the outlaw Randolph Fuller…

Charlotte is running barefoot through the endless virgin forests of the Americas wearing nothing but a nightgown that flaps immodestly on her thighs. Ahead she sees a musket fire into the woods with a flash of flame and smoke but - as is common for many of her dreams - there is no sound. An arrow strikes the soldier in the throat as he tries to reload his firearm and he slumps to the ground clutching futilely at his bleeding neck.

Her arms are grabbed from both sides and she is pulled away from the scene of the ambush. To her left is Lieutenant Easton, his scarlet uniform is torn and bloodstained but he appears to be unharmed, to her right is Randy Fuller - as tall and handsome as she remembered but dressed in the fringed buckskins of a colonial frontiersman. The three survivors of the slaughter run through the forest until the narrow path reaches a fork, Mr. Fuller pulls her to the right while Lieutenant Easton is arguing silently for the path to the left.

Charlotte is frozen in indecision as each man pulls her by the sleeve and as can only happen in a dream her nightgown rips in two leaving Charlotte standing alone at the fork wearing only a tiny scrap of silk around her hips. From behind her a bunch of red skinned warriors led by Jason Worthington and John Basingford are closing rapidly and yet she still cannot move as like a pack of hounds the savages encircle her reaching for her lustfully.

Charlotte awoke with a start. Her heart was racing and in her clenched fists were handfuls of bedding.

She recognized the scene from a yellow paged romance she had found hidden in her old nanny’s room. The author of the book (borrowing liberally from James F Cooper’s novel of the colonial life) had written a tale about the capture of several young women including the teenaged daughters of an infantry colonel by raiding Algonquin. Unlike Cooper’s more proper although suggestive narrative, this writer dwelled at length on the treatment of the innocent teens at the hands of the lustful savages.

Multiple lurid passages detailed the young women’s humiliation at the hands of the vengeful natives; first the captives had been stripped of nearly all their clothing, and as they trekked through the woods the warriors had groped and fondled the soft white flesh of their captives. Charlotte had read and reread these titillating descriptions with a mixture of arousal and horror imagining that it was she who had been taken.

Only the presence of a French liaison officer had kept the two untouched daughters of the British officer from suffering the fate of the colonial girl and the girl's maid who had been passed from one warrior to the next at each resting point. The French officer however was not the hero of the book; once they reached the summer camp of the Algonquin he showed his true colors. The Frenchman attempted to charm first the older of the two and then her younger sister into his bed. When his attempts at seduction were rebuffed by both the young Englishwomen, the determined officer used the crude threat of turning the sisters over to the natives to weaken their resolve. The young heroines were placed in the position of having to choose between the suave but dishonorable French officer and the honest savagery of the native warriors.

The real heroes of this romance had been the unlikely combination of a noble British officer and the colonial woodsman of her dream. Despite the differences between the proper English officer and the easy-going woodsman who's determination and spirit made up for his lack of respect, the two men finally managed to rescue the young women just in time.

It was easy to interpret the meaning of the faces of her would be suitors on the greased and painted bodies of the Algonquin raiders. Even during her waking moments Charlotte often felt like the quarry of a fox hunt and the pack of gentlemen seeking her hand and her father's approval behaved no better than red savages. Much more disturbing in Charlotte’s opinion was the presence of Mr. Fuller in her dream as a hero, a man on equal footing as the worthy Lt. Easton. She would have been far less surprised to have seen him in the dream playing the role of a ravaging warrior or the duplicitous French officer who tried to take advantage of the **** sisters. How had Randolf Fuller slipped into her subconscious in the part of a savior?

The sounds of partying from downstairs had finally subsided, but Charlotte lay awake on her bed for nearly an hour unable to quiet her mind enough to fall asleep.