Lyn Cote (2 page)

“We—the men—we build the school...more on Saturday,” he said haltingly.

This pleased her. She wanted to get her life here started, get busy so she could put the past in the past. “How much longer do you think it will take?”

“Depends. Some men harvest corn. If rain comes...” He shrugged again, seeming unable to express the uncertainty.

“I see. Well, I’ll just have faith that it will all come together in the next few weeks. Besides, the delay gives me more time to prepare lessons.”

At that moment, Mr. Lang turned the wagon down a track and ahead lay the Steward cabin. Ellen’s heart leaped when she saw her cousin, carrying her baby, hurry out to greet her.

“Ophelia!” she called.

Mr. Lang drew up his team. “Wait,” he insisted. “Please, I help.” He secured the brake.

But Ellen couldn’t wait. She jumped down and ran to Ophelia, the emotions she’d been working so hard to keep at bay finally overtaking her. She buried her face in Ophelia’s shoulder and burst into tears. Her feelings strangled her voice.

Chapter Two

“W
hy weren’t you at the river to meet me?”

Ellen grasped her cousin’s hand desperately as Mr. Lang drove down the track away from them. She had managed to pull herself together enough to bid Mr. Lang goodbye and thank him for the ride, but she was glad to see him leave—his presence had pushed her over the edge emotionally. The man had only been kind to her, but being alone with him had nearly been more than she could bear.

“Why weren’t you at the river to meet me?” Ellen repeated.

Ophelia pulled a well-worn letter from her pocket. “You said your boat would dock tomorrow. ‘I will arrive on the sixteenth of August,’” she read.

“But that’s today.”

“No, dear, that’s tomorrow. It’s easy to lose track of days when traveling. I know I did.”

Ellen thought her own mental state must be the explanation. As Ophelia guided her to a chair just outside the log cabin and disappeared inside, Ellen tried to appear merely homesick and travel-weary, not heartsick. She must master herself or this thing would defeat her. She stiffened her spine.

Soon Ophelia bustled into the daylight again and offered her a cup of tea. “This will help. I know when I arrived I...” Her cousin paused, frowning. “I cried a lot. It’s a shock leaving family, leaving home.” She sat down beside Ellen and began nursing her little boy.

Ophelia had thoughtfully offered her an excuse for her tears and she would not contradict her. Yet the invisible band around her heart squeezed tighter. Ellen took a sip of the tea, which tasted like peppermint. “I’ll adjust.”

“Of course you will. You’ve done right coming here. Pepin has the nicest people, and those with children are so happy to have a teacher. They can’t wait to meet you.”

A weight like a stone pressed down on Ellen’s lungs. She’d never taught before. Would she be good at it? “I’m glad to hear that.”

“The schoolhouse with your quarters isn’t finished yet, but Martin and I will love having you spend a few weeks with us.”

That long? How could she keep her misery hidden that long, and from Ophelia, who knew her so well? “I’m sorry for arriving early and putting you out—”

“You’re not putting me out,” Ophelia said emphatically. “Having family here—” the young mother paused as if fighting tears “—means a great deal to me.”

Touched, Ellen reached out and pressed her hand to Ophelia’s shoulder. “I’m glad to have family here, too.”
Family that loves me,
she thought.

Her cousin rested her cheek on Ellen’s hand for a moment. “I’m sorry I missed Cissy’s wedding.”

The image of Holton kissing her sister, Cissy, in their parlor, sealing their life vows, was a knife piercing Ellen’s heart. What had happened had not been her naive younger sister’s fault, she reminded herself. “Cissy was a beautiful bride,” she said bravely.

“Oh, I wish I could have been there, but we couldn’t justify the expense of the riverboat fare and the time away from our crops. It seems every varmint in Wisconsin wants to eat our garden and corn.” Ophelia sounded indignant. “You’d think our farm was surrounded by a desolate desert without a green shoot, the way everything tries to gobble up our food.”

Ellen couldn’t help herself; a chuckle escaped her. Oh, it felt good to laugh again.

“It’s not funny.”

“I know, but
you
are. Oh, Ophelia, I’ve missed you.”

And it was the truth. Ophelia had been a friend from childhood, slipping through the back fence to Ellen’s house, escaping her own overbearing, scene-making mother.

“I miss your parents. They were always so good to me,” Ophelia said in a voice rich with emotion, rich with love and sympathy.

The cousins linked hands in a silent moment of remembrance.

“They were good to me, too,” Ellen murmured. Strengthened, she released Ophelia’s hand. “But they are with God and I am here with you. To start a new life, just like you have.”

“Ellen, about Holton.” Her cousin paused, biting her lower lip.

Ellen froze, her cup in midair. What about Holton? What could Ophelia possibly know? And
how?

“I wondered... My mother wrote me that when he first came to town, he was making up to you...”

Ellen suffered the words as a blow. She should have foreseen this. Ophelia’s mother, Prudence, completely misnamed, was also one of the worst gossips in Galena. Of course Aunt Prudence would have told Ophelia how, when he first came to town, Holton had buzzed around Ellen, only to switch his attentions when her prettier, younger and easier-to-manage sister came home from boarding school in Chicago.

Ellen tried to keep breathing through the pain of remembering.

At that moment, Ophelia’s husband, Martin, walked out of the woods, a hoe over his shoulder and a dog at his side, saving her from having to speak about Holton and his deception of her. She had gotten through mention of the awful day of Cissy’s wedding without revealing anything. No doubt it would come up again, but perhaps every day that passed would distance the pain.

This move would work out. It had to.

As she thought of her future in Pepin, the handsome but troubled face of Kurt Lang popped into her mind. What was wrong with her? Did she have no defense at all against a handsome face? A handsome face belonging to a man that might mislead and lie just as Holton did?

She vowed she would never again make the mistake she’d made with Holton. Never.

* * *

Kurt found Gunther sitting beside the creek, fishing. The lanky boy was too thin and his blond hair needed cutting. A pang of sympathy swept through Kurt. His brother was so young to carry their family shame.

Gunther looked up, already spoiling for an argument. “I did my chores and Johann did his.”

And just like that, Kurt’s sympathy turned to frustration. He knew why Gunther simmered all the time, ready to boil over. But the lad was old enough to learn to carry what had happened to them like a man.

Upstream, Johann, who had been wading in the cooling water, looked up at the sound of Gunther’s voice. He waved. “Hello,
Onkel
Kurt!” The barefoot boy splashed over the rocks and ran up the grassy bank to Kurt.

Kurt pulled down the brim of the boy’s hat, teasing. Johann favored his late father’s coloring with black hair and brown eyes. “You keep cool in the water?” Kurt asked in careful English.

Johann pushed up the brim, grinning. “Yes, I did.” Then the boy looked uncomfortable and glanced toward Gunther.

In return, Gunther sent their nephew a pointed, forbidding look.

Kurt’s instincts went on alert. What were these two hiding?

His guess was that Gunther had done something he knew Kurt wouldn’t like and had sworn Johann to secrecy. Kurt let out a breath. Another argument wouldn’t help. He’d just wait. Everything came out in the wash, his grandmother used to say and was said here, too.

“You bring me candy? Please?” Johann asked, eyeing Kurt’s pockets.

“Candy? Why should I bring you candy?” If he wasn’t careful, he’d spoil this one.

“I did my chores this week.”

After feigning deep thought for a few moments, Kurt drew out a small brown bag. “You did do your chores well, Johann.” Kurt lapsed into German as he tossed the boy a chunk of peppermint. Then he offered another chunk to his brother.

Gunther glared at him. “I’m almost a man.”

Irritation sparked in Kurt’s stomach. “Then act like one.”

Gunther turned his back to Kurt, hunching up one shoulder.

Kurt regretted his brusque tone, but he couldn’t baby Gunther. Everyone said that had been the root cause of their father’s downfall. Their father had been a very spoiled only child who had never grown up. Kurt would not let Gunther follow in their father’s disastrous footsteps.

“Your schoolteacher arrived today.”

Kurt stopped there, realizing that the unexpected meeting had upset him. Miss Ellen Thurston was a striking woman with a great deal of countenance, but so emotional. He’d heard all the gossip in town about her. She was a well-educated woman and a wealthy man’s daughter, and her family was even in government in Illinois. Far above his touch. His brow furrowed; he recalled the scene at the Stewards’, her brown eyes overflowing with tears. Why had she burst into tears like that? He shook his head again. Women were so emotional, not like men.

But wondering about the new schoolteacher was just wasting time. His life now was raising Johann and guiding Gunther. Brigitte’s betrayal tried to intrude on his thoughts, but he shook it off—he did not want to spare one more thought for his former fiancée.

“I’m not going to school,” Gunther insisted.

Kurt stiffened.

“Nicht wahr?”
Johann asked and went on in German. “I think it will be fun. At least we will get to meet some others here. I want to make friends. Don’t you want to make friends, Gunther?”

A fish took Gunther’s bait, saving them from another angry retort.

The deep pool of Kurt’s own sorrow and shame bubbled up. He inhaled deeply, forcing it down. Would the weight he carried never lift? Kurt watched his brother deftly play and then pull in a nice bass. Kurt tried encouragement. “A fine fish for supper. Well done.”

Gunther refused the compliment with a toss of his head.

Kurt’s patience began slipping. Better to leave before he traded more barbed words with the lad. He relaxed and spoke in German, “Catch a few more if you can. Johann, help me put away what I bought at the store. Then we will look over the garden to see what needs picking.”

Johann fell into step with him. Kurt rested a hand on the boy’s shoulder. Again he thought of the schoolteacher, so stylish and with soft brown curls around her aristocratic face. He’d anticipated a plain woman, much older, with hair sprouting from her chin. What was Miss Ellen Thurston doing here, teaching school? It was a mystery.

Then, in spite of the sorrow that never quite eased, Kurt began teasing Johann about how much peppermint he thought he could eat at one time.

Things would get better. They had to.

* * *

Riding on the wagon bench, Ellen dreaded being put on display for all of Pepin today, nearly a week after arriving. But the men had decided to hold a community-wide workday on the school and attached living quarters, and she must attend and show a cheerful face to all. In light of the wound she carried and concealed day by day, it would be one long, precarious ordeal. She had to portray confidence above all.

When the Stewards’ wagon broke free of the forest into the open river flat, she welcomed the broad view of the blue, rippling Mississippi ahead. She took a deep breath. The normally empty town now appeared crowded and her heart sank another notch—until an impertinent question popped up: Would Mr. Lang come today? Ellen willed this thought away.

Ophelia touched her hand. “Don’t worry. You’ll get to know everyone in no time and then this will feel more like home.”

Ellen fashioned a smile for Ophelia. If only shyness were her worry. “I’m sure you’re right.”

“You met my friends Sunny and Nan last year. They are eager to make you welcome.”

Ellen tried to take comfort from her cousin’s words.

Ellen and Ophelia joined the ladies who were storing the cold lunch in the spring house behind the store. Then they gathered in the shade of the trees with a good view of the unfinished log schoolhouse and claimed places on a rectangle of benches. Small children rolled or crawled in the grass in the midst of the benches, while older children played tag nearby.

Though scolding herself silently, Ellen scanned the men, seeking Kurt Lang. He had made an impression on her and she couldn’t deny it. She also couldn’t deny that she resented it.

“Miss Thurston,” Mrs. Ashford called. “This is my daughter Amanda.” Mrs. Ashford motioned for a girl in a navy blue plaid dress, who appeared to be around fourteen, to come to her. “Make your curtsy to the schoolteacher, Amanda.”

The thin, dark-haired girl obeyed, blushing. With a start, Ellen recognized her as the girl she’d seen slipping downstairs to meet a boy on the day Ellen had arrived.

Ellen took pity on the girl, obviously enduring that awkward stage between girlhood and womanhood, and offered her hand. “I’m pleased to meet you, Amanda. Your dress is very pretty.”

Mrs. Ashford preened. “Amanda cut and sewed it all by herself. She is the age where she should be finishing up her learning of the household arts. But Ned and I decided that we’d let her go to school one more year, though she’s had enough schooling for a girl.”

Ellen swallowed her response to this common sentiment, quelling the irritation it sparked.
Enough schooling for a girl.
Her older brother’s wife, Alice, had the gall to tell her once that the reason Ellen had never “snared” a man was she had had too much schooling for a woman.
I couldn’t stand my sister-in-law’s sly rudeness and innuendo a day longer.
What would this storekeeper’s wife say if she announced that she intended to earn a bachelor’s degree and perhaps teach at a preparatory school someday?

Ellen limited herself to saying, “I will be happy to have Amanda in my class.”

The men began shouting words of instruction and encouragement, drawing the women’s attention to the schoolhouse. They were coordinating the positioning of four ladders against the log walls, two on each side. With a start, Ellen spotted Kurt Lang as he nimbly mounted a ladder and climbed toward the peak of the joists.

Ellen felt a little dizzy as she watched Mr. Lang so high up in the air, leaning perilously away from the ladder. An imposing figure, he appeared intent on what he was doing, evidently not the kind to shy away from hard work.

As she watched, a barefoot boy with black hair and a tanned face ran up, startling her. “You are teacher?” he asked with an accent. “The girls say you are teacher.”

“
Yes, I am going to be the teacher. Will you be one of my students?” Was this Mr. Lang’s nephew?

He nodded vigorously. “I want school. I like to read.”

“Good. What’s your name?”

“Johann Mueller.” He pointed toward the school. “My
onkel
Kurt.” Then he pointed to a teenager standing by the ladders. “My
onkel
Gunther.” The
boy said the name so it sounded like “Goon-ter.”