The Endless Forest (34 page)

Balanced on the heel of one hand, she looked back over her shoulder to the tables where the others were busy eating and talking. Martha caught the sound of a male voice raised in protest and then an explosion of laughter that echoed off the cliff face and back again.

A feeling came over her, something familiar but hard to place in that first moment. Not happiness, not exactly, but a kind of contentment she hadn’t known in many weeks. She was among friends, safe among friends, and down in the village she had a small house to call her own, and work, if she wanted it. She could be useful. And if teaching did not suit, if she failed at it, why, it was only a matter of weeks. She could manage for that long. In the fall the new teacher would arrive and she would have to figure out what she wanted to do with her time. For now she didn’t need to answer that question. At this moment she simply needed to leverage the filled and very heavy jug out of the lake without falling in.

Martha was digging in with the heel of her free hand and her knees when she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye. A pale flickering in the dark water, like the flexing of a great fish.

She moved back instinctively, but too late. A hand punched up out of the depths and grabbed her wrist so that she let out a small scream and dropped the jug. She tugged, but her balance was a frail thing. Another scream, louder, but not loud enough to be heard over the waterfall.

She was going to fall in; she was going to be pulled in, pulled down and down into the cold and dark. Martha began to struggle in earnest but in that split second a head and shoulders broke the water.

“Daniel Bonner!” she roared his name in her surprise and outrage. “What—”

Another pull and she was tilted forward as though she were about to dive. In the flickering light of the bonfire the water in his curly dark hair glimmered, and she saw that he was laughing. Laughing.

“You—” The things she wanted to call him were unladylike. That was the last coherent thought Martha could summon, and then he was kissing her. He let go of her wrist and settled his wet palm against her throat, fingers spread, to hold her where he wanted her, and he kissed her full on the mouth. His skin was cold and his mouth shockingly hot. Martha felt it like a blow to the chest, a blow that traveled to the deepest part of her where something only vaguely imagined sparked into sudden life.

A kiss that lasted three seconds, no more, and then he was smiling at
her. She opened her mouth to say something but he pressed his fingers there, gently, and shook his head.

“I’m sorry I scared you,” he said, still smiling. “Go on back, I’ll be there shortly.”

She hesitated for the merest second, her thoughts were tumbling so; a mistake.

“Or if you want to wait—” He made to climb out and she stood abruptly. Daniel looked up at her like one of the selkies in Jennet’s stories, sleek and dark. In one movement she pivoted away and then remembered the jug, stopped her movement but too suddenly. One boot lost its purchase on the wet rocks and then she was falling, aware of the tangle of her skirts as she kicked, aware of the wave of cold air off the waterfalls and of Daniel, a quick view of his surprised expression and then she was in the water, the cold shutting out everything else.

A strong hand grabbed at her and missed, grabbed again. Martha would have reached up but her arms were suddenly so heavy she couldn’t lift them.

An arm closed around her waist and with a great upward thrust her face broke water.

“Easy,” Daniel said. “Easy.”

He wasn’t smiling anymore, at least there was that much. As Martha caught her breath she could see that he had been as scared as she was. And still her fist came up of its own accord with every intention of cuffing him over the ear. Daniel caught it easily, but he had to let go of her to do it and with that Martha realized a few startling things. First, he was standing on an outcropping of stone that served as a step beneath the waterline, so that he had footing, while she had none. Second, he had not a stitch of clothing on. Daniel Bonner was stark naked.

She stood pressed against a naked man in a mountain lake on a spring night and the only thought in her head was that he was going to kiss her again, and she wanted him to.

“We weren’t planning on swimming,” boomed a voice above them. “But you always were one for the unexpected, Daniel.”

Martha closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. When she looked she saw that they were all there. With the light to their backs she could not make out the faces, but she could name them every one, anyway. Hannah, Ben, Jennet, Luke, Annie and Gabriel, Ethan. Ethan, who had
been her teacher and should be outraged, but she was sure he was smiling. The others, the ones she had just met were definitely smiling, though they were trying not to.

All that took no more than a heartbeat and then Susanna was coming forward.

“Blue-Jay,” she said in a no-nonsense tone. “Help Martha out of there. Daniel is in no position.”

“Oh, I see his position all right,” Blue-Jay said. He leaned over and extended a hand, and Martha took it. He pulled her up onto dry land with a flick of his wrist, as if she weighed no more than a trout.

There were a dozen conversations going on, but Susanna had her by the shoulders and was propelling her toward the house. “Dry clothes, hot tea,” she said. “Quickly.”

Martha tried not to hear the teasing Daniel was taking. At least he was responding with an easy humor, something she herself could not have done. She wondered if he was going to climb out of the lake as he was, in front of everybody. If nobody would mind him walking across the glen naked.

Suddenly she stopped and turned.

“He did not pull me in!” she shouted. “He didn’t! I fell!”

There was a split second of silence, and then Jennet called back.

“Och, aye. I fell right here mysel, lass. Most Bonner women do.”

For the second time since her return to Paradise, Martha found herself being put to rights in front of a blazing fire, stripped of her own clothes. At least this time there was no mud and no LeBlanc daughters to come in and glare at her.

Susanna and Hannah wrapped her in blankets and put her in the good rocking chair, which was positioned as close to the hearth as they dared. Then Hannah took up toweling to rub her hair and head dry, and if she were honest, Martha would have to admit what a wonderful thing it was to be tended to this way. She had nothing to do but sip her tea and study her surroundings.

The house was well made, the walls thick enough to reduce the noise of the waterfalls to a hush, but oddest of all, it smelled pleasant. After a winter of scraping and curing pelts it should have been ripe, but there was only the faintest odor of bear grease and gun oil. It was true that
Susanna had hung bundles of dried flowers and herbs from the rafters along with the last of the stores of corn and squash and onions, but in Martha’s experience those things could hardly be enough.

“She airs every room out, twice a day,” Hannah said, “no matter the weather, and she leaves many of them open all night. It was one of her conditions.”

“For marrying Blue-Jay?”

Hannah laughed. “For living up here. I don’t think there’s any force in nature that could have changed her mind about Blue-Jay.”

From the chamber that opened off the main room Susanna called out to them.

“The skirts will be a little short, but the stockings are good wool.”

Martha’s voice creaked. “I’m glad of whatever you can lend me. Truly.”

Her own things were hanging in front of the hearth, dripping into the hissing fire.

Behind her Hannah said, “You could stay here and rest, if you like.”

It was a reasonable thing to offer and Hannah’s tone was unremarkable, but Martha tensed. Another decision to make, and she could hardly organize her thoughts enough to drink a cup of tea. Daniel Bonner had kissed her, and she had kissed him back, and somehow or another she had to make sense of that before she walked out of this house and had to look him—and everybody else—in the eye.

“Daniel swam in that lake every day, winter and summer, from the time he was old enough to walk until he built his own place,” Hannah went on in a conversational tone. “He still comes up to swim two or three times a week at first light. He’s hardened to the cold in a way you can’t be. I’m worried that you may come down sick.”

“Oh,” Martha said. “You think it would be wise for me to stay here by the fire, is that what you mean?”

“No,” Hannah said. “I hope you’ll come back to the party with us, but I don’t want you to feel as though you must.” And then she hesitated. It was odd to see such an expression on Hannah’s face. To Martha she seemed the most self-possessed and confident woman she had ever known. It was something of a relief to realize that others found the situation as awkward as Martha did herself.

Hannah said, “Daniel didn’t mean for it to go so far, I’m sure of that. He would never put you in danger.”

Martha tried to look interested but not overly so.

“You couldn’t know this,” Hannah said, “but it’s been a very long time since we’ve seen Daniel so playful. We have you to thank for that.”

“It wasn’t anything I did,” Martha said. “I just happened to—” her voice trailed away, because if she didn’t believe the things she was about to say, Hannah certainly would not.

Hannah was smiling now, a soft smile with a great deal of understanding in it. She said, “You haven’t asked me for advice, but I’m going to give you some anyway. As embarrassed as you are now, one day you’ll look back on this night—on this whole summer, is my guess—and the memory will warm you.”

“I forget sometimes that you’re old enough to be my—to have a daughter my age,” Martha said.

“Oh please.” Hannah laughed. “I’d rather you thought of me as a sister.”

Before Martha could think of a response to such a surprising statement, Susanna appeared with an armful of neatly folded clothing. Underskirts and skirts, sleeves and a fitted bodice and the stockings, as promised.

Susanna had a bright smile and the kindest of eyes. A friendly girl, people said of her, always attentive and sincere. And how her parents had grieved when she turned her back on the Friends and went her own way.

“Are you happy here?” Martha heard herself ask the question and wished she could take it back, but Susanna seemed to take no offense.

“Dost thou mean, do I miss my family and my home? Thou sees that John comes to call whenever he can, and that helps a great deal. But I am happy here, so happy that sometimes I fear that I might wake up and find it was all a dream.”

She glanced at Hannah, who smiled at her. “This is where I am meant to be,” Susanna said. “I want no other life.”

“Listen,” Hannah said, straightening.

“Who is that with the rattle?” Susanna said after a moment.

Martha thought it was a question for its own sake and expected no answer, but Hannah had one.

“Standing-Elk is come. Listen, the Round Dance is starting.”

Hannah looked so excited and pleased that Martha felt her own pulse leap.

“Then you should go ahead, both of you,” she said. “As soon as I’m warm through I’ll dress and come out, I promise.”

—

The bonfire had been built up so that the flames shot into the night sky and pulsed with the beat of the drum. It had a life force of its own, and as it danced it threw shadows around it like a many-layered skirt.

Daniel retrieved his pack from where he had left it on the other side of the lake, and standing there in the shadows, he dressed. First he exchanged the wet sling for a dry one, and then he pulled on breeches and a loose shirt, moving gingerly and praying that his shoulder would leave him in peace this evening. At the moment the pain was small and far away; cold water could do that, and the excitement. And most likely, he told himself, the kissing.

He cast one more glance at the cabin and saw his sister and Susanna closing the door behind themselves, without Martha. But she would come. He felt the truth of that deep in his gut. In those few seconds when he held her and her whole body softened, he understood that she wanted to be here, with him. She was frightened, but more than that she was curious and open, and that was enough, for now at least.

As he walked back to the fire he watched Gabriel strip down to loincloth and leggings and then join the circle of men moving into the dance. Runs-from-Bears and Standing-Elk sat with Sky-Wound-Round on benches, the big water drum between them. Standing-Elk had horn rattles in both hands, and all three of them were already caught up in the singing. At Good Pasture there were sometimes a dozen men gathered around two or three water drums and another three or four with horn rattles, but here at Lake in the Clouds they had their own ways, and they were good.

Daniel came into the heat and light and moved into the shuffle-kick-step of the dance behind Blue-Jay, just as the women came up to form another circle inside their own. Martha would join them, and the dancing would go on and on until they were all breathless with laughter. As this thought came to him, Daniel saw that Martha had come out on the porch and John Mayfair was walking toward her with purpose.

As soon as Martha stepped off the porch John Mayfair appeared—seemingly out of the shadows—and startled her so that she jumped. She
would have fallen—for the second time in one evening—if he had not caught her by the elbow and steadied her.

She had never seen a man so determined to apologize. He should not have let her go fill the water jug on her own, and he hoped she would forgive him for his thoughtlessness. Martha had forgot about the jug and about John Mayfair too, but she hoped her expression didn’t give that much away.

It was hard to talk over the crackle of the flames, the drums and the singing and the dancing, but she wanted to put his mind at ease.

“You are not to blame, and there was no real harm done. Won’t you join the—” She stopped herself, but not quite in time. “Pardon me, I forgot. Of course you’re not dancing.”

He shook off her apology. “While I have the opportunity, may I ask thee a question?”

Martha pulled up short. She gathered the borrowed shawl more closely around herself and gave a brief nod.