The Frontiersman’s Daughter (30 page)

He smiled despite his cracked lip, and she fervently hoped he’d not broken his fine nose or the cheekbones that made his handsome face so noble. Would the cuts heal or scar? The one over his eye was deep, while the rest were more like scratches.

Ma Horn’s salve was pleasant-smelling, made from crushed rosemary and comfrey and mixed with the ooze of white oak. Lael applied it with a clean cloth as gently as she could. He did not so much as wince, but she sensed some inner struggle within him. Anger? Fear? Exhaustion? He looked as though he’d just come from battle though he bore no musket wounds.

She left the salve on the table then started to go, but he blocked her exit. His eyes were as earnest as she’d ever seen them. “Will you forgive me for the things I said tae you when we last met? Before I went oot and slammed the door?”

She looked up at him. “I came here to ask you that very thing.”

Only when I saw you, I forgot.

“Forgiven, then?”

She softened. “You were only trying to warn me, as a friend.”

“Aye, as a friend.”

“I shouldn’t have sassed you so.”

He smiled, or tried to. “But you are so good at it.”

She almost smiled as well, then looked again at his face and went solemn. “Is there nothing more I can do for you?”

“Aye,” he answered. “You can pray.”

Her eyes filled again. “I’m not very good at that.”

“You dinna have tae be. Just honest before the Almighty.”

She was suddenly struck by a curious thought. “Do you ever . . . pray for me?”

His eyes fastened on her face. “Aye, I do.”

Her heart turned over. If he prayed for her . . . what did he pray about? She quickly shut away the question lest her heart grow too soft toward him.

“I still think you should have been a preacher,” she said softly, then turned her back and departed.

52

Two days later, on a raw November morning, one of Simon’s nearest neighbors arrived on a mule even more ornery than Lael’s own. It stopped just short of the cabin, nearly sending the boy sailing off its bare back and onto the slippery porch.

“Lael Click! Piper Hayes is bad sick, and Simon wants you sent for!”

She finished adding wood to the fire and poked at her cornmeal mush with a spoon, scarcely believing her ears. But when the call came again she opened the door a crack. “Come in and thaw out.”

She poured mush into two bowls and passed him some sweetening. He said gleefully, “I reckon she ain’t so sick I can’t eat a bite.”

Having lost her appetite, Lael began packing her bags, speculating on what might await her. Piper had recently given birth to a stillborn girl. Was this the trouble?

All the way to the Hayes’ homestead she chafed at the wind and the slow plodding of the mule. Her stomach gnawed in empty complaint, and her feet began to ache in her worn stockings and boots. Mile after bitter mile fueled her fury that Simon Hayes had the gall to call upon her after all that had transpired between them, when the doctor could have been had for half the trouble at half the distance.

As Simon’s land unfolded around her, signs of prosperity and abundance were everywhere—in the numerous fences and grazing livestock, in the fallow fields that lay like a drab quilt, in the solid cabin, twice as big as her own, with real glass windows that bubbled and streaked in the noon light. Like salt in a wound, it was, coming here like this for the very first time.

A pack of dogs rushed to meet her, then Simon’s aging mother appeared on the porch to call them off. Lael had last seen Matilda Hayes at Pa’s court-martial years ago. Before that, through the years of forting up in her childhood, Mrs. Hayes had treated her like a daughter. Today though, with hardly a greeting, Lael was ushered into the spacious cabin.

“She ain’t been well since the birth,” Mrs. Hayes said. “But here lately she seems different somehow. She’s got a misery in her stomach and is all a-tremble.”

“How long?”

“Oh, a good week or more. She’s weak as water and can’t do her chores, so I come over from McAfee’s to pitch in.”

Shirking her chores? Complaining of weakness? Prejudice rose up in Lael hard and strong. Piper had ever been one to slack, to her memory, even in the schoolroom with Miss Mayella.

At the back of the cabin, hidden away in the luxury of a second room, lay Piper, prostrate on the bed she shared with Simon. At the sight of her Lael felt a queer revulsion. She wanted nothing so much as to run out of the cabin and flee on her mule. But sheer stubbornness of spirit won out.

“Hello, Piper.”

The closed eyes fluttered open. Somehow, Piper Cane Hayes managed to look sullen even in sickness. She’d changed little over the years, and her hazel eyes narrowed at the sight and sound of Lael.

“Lael . . . Lael Click? You get on away from here! I ain’t lettin’ no Indian lover lay a hand on me!”

Lael looked down at her.
I am just what you say I am, in more ways than you know.
Still, the slur stung, though she’d been saying such things since settlement school.

Strangely, Piper’s eyes closed again and her face resumed its gray pallor. Lael spent the rest of the afternoon blending tea and tincture and asking questions of Simon’s mother. Nay, she did not think it was a mortal illness, she told Matilda Hayes. A weakness of the blood, perhaps.
Nothing that a little backbone and a day’s work wouldn’t cure
, she wanted to add. Pausing, she took in Piper for the last time—in the bed that should have been hers.

A stray thought, black as smoke, curled through her brain. What if . . .

She swallowed, stunned at such evil. What if she were to leave not willow bark and feverfew but mayapple? Simon’s mother could give her the fatal dose and still her hateful words forever. None would be the wiser. None but God. She bit her lip and packed her bags, wondering if she could make it home before dark.

There was no offer of payment, though Mrs. Hayes fixed her a cup of coffee with cream. The cream was payment enough, Lael decided, its sweet richness lingering on her tongue. She’d sorely missed her milk cow since the barn burning.

Simon was curiously absent, but she’d given it little thought. As she crossed the hard ground in search of the mule, she saw a flicker of movement. The barn door that had been ajar moments before was now closed. She paused, awash with a queer sensation.

Without reason or understanding she bypassed the smokehouse and walked uphill to the barn, dodging frozen puddles and muddy ruts, her saddlebag heavy in her arms. A bitter breath of wind pressed against her skirts.

She pushed at the heavy door, and it opened noisily. Inside, Simon stood, his back to her, working on a harness. He did not turn. Did he not hear?

“Piper’s weak but she’ll live,” she announced across the haystrewn expanse of barn.

He did not turn around but said, “I reckon you’ll be wantin’ payment.”

“Nay, seeing to Neddy like you did is payment enough. We’ll call it even.”

He worked the harness in his hands as if she’d never come in at all and said nothing in response. No turning around. No mumbled good-bye. The shadows in the barn were lengthening and the winter darkness would soon overtake her. She should have been well on her way home by now. But something held her fast.

Slowly—did he think she’d gone?—Simon turned.

When she saw him face to face, a shocking fury filled her. Something new and queer twisted his features. Fear? Shame? His face was badly battered, even more so than the doctor’s own. If not for his shock of red hair and powerful height, she would have been hard pressed to recognize him.

Her voice, when it finally came, was as harsh as the winter wind. “Is that why you didn’t send for the doctor, Simon? Were you afraid he’d refuse to come after you ambushed him in the woods?”

Silence.

In that moment something broke within her—some hard and binding chain—freeing her from him forever. She saw him as he truly was: hardly a man at all, but someone weak and enfeebled by his own passions.

Without another word she turned and fled down the hill.

53

She arrived at the fort at dusk. Snow had begun to fall, and the bitter cold and darkness forbade her to go farther. Dispirited, she got off the mule just inside the gate. She had a passing fear that the doctor, given this recent trouble, might leave. Was this what Simon hoped? She had a terrible suspicion that Simon might have killed him had he not fought back . . . and fought back well.

There again was a puzzle. Simon, a veritable bull of a man, had clearly taken the brunt of the beating. There was clearly more to Ian Justus than met the eye. Surgeon . . . fiddler . . . fighter?

But would he stay on? The settlement could no longer do without him. She was hearing reports of his treating all kinds of ailments, most of them successfully. Numbly, her near-frozen legs walked the length of the common. If God had called him here, would God not also call him away at the appointed time? And when might that time be?

There were no lights on in the doctor’s cabin. By the time she reached the sanctuary of Ma Horn’s, her soul felt as numb as her feet.

Ma Horn sat alone at the table. No second place was set. No fiddle case or wool coat was in sight. A wild, irrational fear seized her. “Oh, please—tell me—where is he?”

“He went away, child. To Lexington. He’ll likely not be back before mornin’.”

But just as Lael had removed her wet coat and boots, there came a commotion outside. She reached the cabin door first and opened it wide. In the swirling snow, she saw him, boots frozen to the stirrups of his saddle, his blue coat layered with a mantle of white. He looked as surprised to see her as she was to see him. Inside, door shut to the wind, Ma Horn set about warming the doctor’s supper, while Lael moved their coats and boots nearer the fire. But she couldn’t eat. The knowledge of Simon lay too heavy on her heart. The green-eyed monster, Shakespeare had called it. Jealousy. Was this why Simon had attacked him in the woods?

As was her custom, Ma Horn soon fell asleep in her chair. The doctor got up and moved closer to the fire, leaning against the hearth. His face was healing nicely, she noted. He looked down at her, his eyes the same merry blue as always, despite everything.

“I’ve been tae Lexington and back and brought you this.” He passed her a leather pouch. Curious, she untied the closure and carefully emptied the contents into her lap.

A ring spilled out, glittering and golden, and she saw a flash of diamonds as well. Before she could right the bag a string of pearls followed, filling her open hand like so many drops of cream. But what came next truly astonished her. It was a miniature, its gold casing bearing the face of a lovely russet-haired woman with emerald eyes. Stunned, Lael could think of but one thing.
Olivia.

There was an awkward silence as he realized his mistake. She’d never before seen him flustered. A sudden flush turned his rugged features swarthy, and he looked confused and apologetic. She felt deeply wounded herself, and all thumbs, as she tried to return the lovely jewels to the bag. Mortified, she felt the ring slip from her fingers and fall to the floor, rolling beneath the trestle table.

All at once they were kneeling, hands touching as they searched.

“Lael, I—”

“Please,” she whispered. “There’s no need to explain. Perhaps . . . is there another bag?”

There was. An identical leather pouch was produced, but its contents weren’t nearly so magnificent or thought-provoking. They were her spectacles, wire-rimmed and small and round, the glass clear and thin as creek ice.

“Thank you, truly,” she said though it fell a trifle flat after all the excitement. Though he still looked vexed, the bag of jewels was nowhere to be seen. Safe in his pocket once again, she guessed.

“Try them on before you thank me. And read this, tae be sure.” He handed her Ma Horn’s Bible. She opened it at random to the Song of Solomon.
Hardly the book to be reading aloud to the doctor.
Deuteronomy, the book of laws, was far safer, she decided.

She began a bit hesitantly, unsure of the strange device perched on the end of her nose. But the longer she read, the greater her confidence grew. The words no longer blurred but stayed in their proper place.

She looked up, elated. “I must pay you.”

He smiled. “’Tis payment enough tae hear your voice. Keep reading.”

She finished one chapter, then two. It dawned on her that she was no longer reading to ascertain the veracity of her new spectacles. She was so often quiet in his presence . . . could it be he truly liked to hear the sound of her voice?

She stopped abruptly and removed the spectacles. “I must look a sight—”

“You look . . . lovely.”

In the still room his words, though softly spoken, had tremendous force.

Lovely.

No one had ever called her that. He was looking at her again— she could feel it—though she dared not look at him. The flush that stained her neck and face made her feel feverish.

He moved to put another log on the fire.

She kept her eyes on the book in her lap. “I am truly grateful, Doctor.”

“Doctor?” He turned back to her and leaned against the hearth. “I meant tae talk tae you aboot that some time ago.”

“Talk about what?”

“My Christian name. You canna say it?”

She swallowed, nervous as a schoolgirl. “But of course . . .”

“Then say it.”

“Ian . . . Justus. But I should call you Doctor Justus.”

“Why?”

“’Tis only proper.”

He grinned and rolled his eyes. “I dinna notice you Kentuckians observe such social niceties.”

She fingered her spectacles. “What does everyone else here call you?”

“Doc Justus.”

“And you want me to call you . . . Ian.”

“Only if you want tae.”

He was teasing her again. She couldn’t help but wonder what Olivia called him. All at once she was overcome with a dreadful certainty that she shouldn’t be sitting here at all. This was Olivia’s place, not hers. And yet she was struck by the fact that, unlike Olivia, she would never have remained in Boston. She would have followed Ian Justus clear to Kentucke, come what may.

Simply put, she, Lael Catherine Click, knew a good catch when she saw one.

But he was as forbidden as Captain Jack.

She stood up. “You must be tired from your long ride. I don’t mean to keep you.”

He studied her for a long moment, and then he put on his boots and coat. When he was almost to the door, she said very quietly, “Ian . . . I know . . . about Simon.”

He turned and his blue eyes seemed to bore a hole in her. She rushed on, “He fetched me to see Piper, who’s been ill. He never meant for me to see him, but I did.” She continued, fresh anguish filling her at the possibilities. “He might have killed you. It’s a wonder he did not.”

His face was grave. “Perhaps he would have, but for one thing. I was a boxer in college—in Scotlain. Like my faither before me.”

In college, in Scotland, years before. Before he’d dreamed of or possibly even heard of Kentucke. Before God called him here. Even then he was being prepared . . . for this.

Whom God calls, He equips
. Where had she heard that?

They stood an arm’s length apart, and the silence was expectant, filled with heartfelt things they could not say. Feeling near tears again, Lael stuttered out the question that seemed ready to rend her in two. “Are you going b-back to Boston?”

His expression softened, so poignant she felt breathless. What could he possibly be thinking? Feeling?

His voice was low, measured. “Nae . . . no’ now. No’ yet.”

Without another word, he let himself out. She sagged against the door frame, suddenly weary. The blast of icy air that struck her in his wake was nothing like the blow to her heart. Truly, Ian Justus was forbidden, and not because of Olivia or Captain Jack. Ian Justus belonged to God.

And Lael Click did not.