Come Spring (9 page)

He looked past Alice when they rounded a bend and saw the cabin nestled safe in the valley. Blue Creek was not frozen yet; it curved and twisted along the valley floor like a shimmering silver snake as it reflected the leaden sky.

Smoke spiraled up from the chimney. The welcome sight of it set his mind at ease. Old Ted seemed to have been able to manage. He smiled to himself with relief, the problem of Alice and her reluctance suddenly insignificant when he thought of what he stood to lose if Ted had been slack about his responsibilities.

A
NNIKA
realized that they had stopped and groggily fought to wake up. When she was rally conscious she became all too aware of the fact that Buck Scott was mounted behind her, holding her gently in his arms. She was warmer than she’d been for two days.

She looked around. They were standing before a small cabin, so small that she thought of it as a shack. The entire dwelling would fit in the reception room at home. Thick white smoke escaped from the chimney, and she found herself looking forward to warming herself by the fire. The windows were shuttered on the outside, so she had no idea how many others of Buck’s ilk might be waiting inside. How many more barbarians might be waiting to pounce on her?

She forced herself to think of the fire burning inside, of being warm, of having something to eat.

He drew away from her, and when he did she missed his warmth. Buck dismounted and paused long enough to stare up at her with a threat in his eye. “Don’t think about going anywhere,” he warned.

“Why should I, now that we’ve arrived at such elegant accommodations?”

Oddly enough, her comment hurt him. She could see it in the tensing of his jaw and the way he glanced at the ramshackle cabin and then back at her before he stared at the ground. She never thought that he might be concerned about her opinion of the place. Was this his home? Was this all he had to offer Alice Soams? With sudden clarity Annika knew why the woman had duped him. The real Alice Soams probably took one look at him and changed her mind.

Wordlessly, he turned away and began to pull the trappings off the mules and pile them in the snow-covered yard. He slapped each animal in turn on the rump and watched as they moseyed over to a trough full of grain that was partially covered by a crude lean-to.

He walked back to the mare and reached up for Annika. Before she could protest that she could dismount alone, he grabbed her around the waist, pulled her down, and stood her on the ground.

Her knees buckled and she nearly fell over.

Buck caught her around the waist and held her until she steadied herself. Weakly she attempted to brush his hands away.

“Let me go,” she demanded.

“You going to fall over?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Let me go or I’ll scream.”

He cocked his head to the side. “What for?”

“For help, that’s what for. Is everyone around here as insane as you are?”

The change in him was immediate. His face flamed crimson and then went white. He stared at her, his eyes cutting blue shards of ice as forbidding as the glacier-topped peaks that surrounded them. For a moment she thought he was going to reach out and backhand her. Instead, he turned away and stalked off toward the cabin. He did not look back to see if she was following him or not.

After what he had put her through for the past thirty-six hours, she did not think anything else could surprise her. She was convinced the door of the cabin would swing wide to reveal a scene out of hell.

As Annika stepped over the unpacked snow, as she felt the cold white stuff spill over into the tops of her once-shining boots and melt around her ankles, she thought of Esmeralda again. She was about to enter the bell tower. Her imagination ran wild. And for the first time ever, she wished she hadn’t been such a voracious reader.

Buck Scott had disappeared inside with her valise and writing box. The door was standing wide open. She could just glimpse the edge of a crude table beyond it The floor appeared to be hard-packed dirt. She heard low voices inside and didn’t know whether to be thankful or not that she wouldn’t be alone with Buck Scott.

Curious and frightened, she folded back the bright blanket, now soaked from the falling snow. It weighed as heavily on her shoulders as her fate. Annika uncovered her head and drew the blanket around her shoulders. Beneath it her beautiful satin cape was ruined. It was limp—water stained and wrinkled as a steamed spinach leaf. Trying not to dwell on her loss, she made herself move forward, trepidation more than exhaustion slowing her steps. When she reached the threshold she could not force herself to step inside. Instead, she stood gazing in disbelief as one might study a painting in a museum. She had envisioned myriad scenes being played out inside the log cabin, but none could compare to reality itself.

Buck was speaking to an old bearded man who lounged in a straight-back chair pulled up before the fire. The men were oblivious of her as they exchanged greetings. The old man’s face was covered by more than a few days’ growth of stubble—a few years’ growth would be a more accurate description. The beard was gray and long, trailing halfway down his chest. It came to rest just above his protruding abdomen. Above the beard, his cheeks were ruddy, but from heat, cold, or too much liquor, she could not guess.

The old man was dressed much the same as Buck Scott. His clothing was made of hand-sewn leather and wool. He wore worn brown boots instead of moccasins.

“How did everything go, Ted?” Buck asked.

“I don’t know how you do it.” The old man sighed. “Ain’t no wonder you had to get yourself a wife. No way could I dothis night and day. I ain’t had a good stretch of sleep since you rode off.”

“Things were quiet when I left,” Buck said.

“That didn’t last long,” Ted informed him with a grunt.

Annika followed their gaze and nearly gasped aloud when she saw the object of their quiet discussion.

A little girl, a child who looked no older than three and dressed in a creation fashioned from gunnysacks, sat tied to a chair, happily ignoring the men as she proceeded to smash boiled beans on the surface of the table. Her face was covered with beans and her hair, which Annika assumed was blond, was matted with the same substance. Food was everywhere: on the child, the tabletop, the chair, the dirt floor beneath her. Oblivious of the grown-ups, the child played happily, occasionally stuffing a handful of beans into her mouth.

It was the most disgusting thing Annika had ever seen.

Before Annika could react, Buck looked up and noticed her in the doorway.

“Come in and shut the door. You’re letting out the heat.”

At the sound of his voice, Annika started. At the same time, the child looked up from the enamel plate before her. She swept the plate aside and it thudded to the floor. “Buck! Buck!” She started to squeal as she waved her hands about, wildly seeking his attention.

Annika turned to see what Buck would do and found him studying her intently.

“Mama! Mama!” The little girl turned her wide blue eyes on Annika.

Annika glanced around the room waiting for the child’s mother to materialize but no one appeared. Then she noticed the baby was still staring at her with eyes exactly like Buck Scott’s.

“Why is she calling me mama?” Annika whispered to Buck.

“Why
is
she doing that?” Buck asked Old Ted.

Unconcerned, Ted shrugged. “Baby’s been pesterin’ me since she woke up and found you gone. I had to tell her where you went, so I told her you went to fetch her a mama.”

“Oh my god,” Annika whispered. “So that’s why youasked Alice Soams to marry you? So you could bring her here to raise your child? When were you planning to tell me—her—about this?”

“That’s
not
my child,” Buck said.

“Ain’t this Alice Soams?” Ted asked, indicating Annika with a wave of his hand.

Buck shook his head. “She says not, but that’s just because she doesn’t want to keep her end of the bargain.”

Annika glared at Buck and then at Ted. “I’m not Alice Soams. This man abducted me from the train and dragged me here against my will—” Her blanket had slipped down around her shoulders. She hiked it up again.

“You agreed to marry me,” Buck interrupted, but he suddenly sounded as tired as Annika felt.

Ignoring him, Annika appealed to Old Ted. “If you’ll take me back to Cheyenne I’ll see that you get paid anything you want. My family has money. Lots of it. They won’t care how much you ask.”

“Would you please come in and shut the door?” Buck’s impatience was evident as he issued the sharp command. He walked over to the table and carefully untied the messy child and miraculously, without getting beans on his hands, set her on the ground. The baby then scuttled under the table where she sat contentedly collecting stray beans and piling them in her lap.

Annika ignored them both and concentrated on Ted. “Will you do it?” She hiked the blanket up from where it had slipped down past her shoulders. Her once-festive hat sat askew, barely clinging to the side of her head.

He shook his head. “No, ma’am. I’m gonna leave you two to argue it out. I ain’t one to take sides in marital disputes.” He dismissed her as he began to gather up his things, a jacket much like Buck’s, a rifle he’d laid on the wide wooden mantel, a hat made of a small, furry animal.

Annika felt hope drain away as exhaustion returned to replace it. She leaned against the doorjamb. Taking a deep, resigned breath, she stepped over the threshold. No sooner did she do so than a small, half-balding rodent ran out from behind a barrel near the hearth. Before she could react with more than a scream, it began hopping toward her on spindlylegs and shaking uncontrollably. She thought she was losing her mind when she heard it bark. She didn’t think rats could bark, but then, she’d never been attacked by a rat before.

Its protruding eyes bulged as it sank its teeth into the toe of her boot. Fortunately for Annika, the animal did little damage before she shook her foot and sent it scuttling away. Annika ran across the room and stopped only when she bumped into the bed, the most substantial piece of furniture in the room. “That thing just bit my boot!” she protested.

Old Ted stomped across the room and scooped the yapping dog up in his arms, kissed it on the lips, let it kiss him, and then tucked it into the front of his buckskin jacket. “What do you expect after you attacked poor little Mouse like that?”

“It attacked me! Besides, that not a mouse, it’s a rat.” Annika shook with anger as she pointed at the offending animal.

Ted looked grievously offended. “Come on, Mouse. We know when we’re not wanted.”

Annika turned to Buck. Her appeal fell on deaf ears. “It bit me,” she whined.

“You set on leaving, Ted?” Buck chose not to deal with either the attack or Annika’s discomfort.

“I’m not staying here. If I get snowed in, no telling how long I’ll be stuck with all of you.’

“Thanks for taking care of Baby for me,” Buck called out as Ted slammed the door behind him.

Buck and Annika stared at each other in uneasy silence until the little girl crawled out from under the table. She toddled over to Annika and stopped a foot away. One sniff told Annika that there was more that needed to be cleaned off the child than beans.

The baby stared at her, one finger in her mouth. With the other hand she patted the mashed beans clinging to her hair.

“Mama?”

Annika sighed, dropped to the edge of the bed, and covered her face with her hands.

“How about making us something to eat?” Buck said.

At the sound of his voice, Annika slowly lowered herhands. She stared down at the dirt floor. Here and there, small bits of grass and pine needles were imbedded in the well-packed earth. She knew he was waiting for her to answer, that he was standing there staring at her as he had done since the moment she stepped inside. Dragging her across the country at a breakneck pace had not been enough. Now, when she was so tired that she thought she might close her eyes and sleep sitting up, he wanted her to make them something to eat.

When she finally looked over at Buck, Annika was glaring. “Are you talking to me?”

“Who do you think I’m talking to?”

Annika glared at the messy baby who had just taken another step toward her. She made no gesture that might encourage the child to come any closer.

Buck glanced at the baby and then at Annika. “You can cook, can’t you? I’m hungry enough to eat a bear.”

When he turned away, dismissing her as he lifted one of the packs that he had just carried in, Annika stood up. The blanket fell away from her and dropped to the bed. She reached out and grabbed the first object she could lay her hands on—a brass candle holder that rested on a rough crate upended beside the bed.

Taking careful aim, Annika drew her arm back and let the candle holder fly.

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