Corbin's Fancy (11 page)

Phineas was alone at his campfire when Fancy approached it. She was careful to hold her chin high, though there was little she could do about the high blush that pounded in her cheeks.

He extended a cup of coffee and a gentle smile.
“Good morning, Mrs. Corbin,” he greeted her, rising from his seat on the tree stump in a mannerly way and then sitting back down again.

Fancy allowed herself a moment of preening happiness at his use of her new title, but there were doubts gnawing at the edges of her mind as she sat down on the wagon tongue to enjoy her coffee. One casual, sweeping glance around the camp revealed that Jeff was nowhere in sight.

“He’s gone into town,” Phineas explained, obviously having looked beyond her attempt at subtlety and seen the fear. “Asked me to tell you that he’ll be back before sunset.”

Before sunset! Fancy was wounded. Was it customary for a groom to desert his bride so soon? For that matter, did Jeff intend to come back at all? It was entirely possible that he’d had second thoughts.

Phineas suddenly thrust a bowl of oatmeal into Fancy’s hands, making her start. “Don’t be borrowing trouble now,” he urged softly. “Jeff loves you, Fancy. He’ll be back because he’s got no other choice.”

There was no point in clearing up Phineas’s misconception by telling him that Jeff didn’t love her—he’d want to know why she had married him then and Fancy would have been too embarrassed to admit to the answer. Furthermore, annulling a marriage performed by a snake-man would probably be an easy matter for someone with Jeff’s money and influence. “I knew a singer in Port Angeles who married a sailor,” she reflected, after a while. “He went off to find a rooming house where they could live and never came back.”

Phineas stirred the small morning fire and sat down again. That gray pallor she’d seen the day before was
back in his face, and his lips had the same vaguely blue tint. “I don’t think we’re dealing with a man of that sort,” he comforted quietly.

Fancy had forgotten all her own problems in her concern for her friend. “Phineas, you look wretched. You’re ill, aren’t you?”

“Just tired,” he sighed. “To tell you the truth, Fancy, a few weeks of rest at my sister’s house is sounding better and better.”

Fancy took another sip from her metal cup, watching Phineas over the rim, then began to eat the oatmeal. “Does she live nearby?”

“Near enough,” shrugged Phineas. “She teaches at a school for young ladies in Spokane.”

Fancy looked down at her oatmeal and her coffee and was reminded of the debt she owed Phineas T. Pryor. If not for him, she might still be wandering the road. “I mean to reimburse you for all you’ve given me as soon as Mr. Stroble pays me.”

“Nonsense,” sputtered Phineas, and there was a flush under the grayness of his skin. “If one traveler can’t help another, the world’s in a sorry state.”

“Some people say it is anyway,” observed Fancy. “A preacher told me once that God was going to smite us all dead, except for the holy, of course. He said it would happen before this generation passed away.”

Phineas chortled. “Every generation since the time of Christ has believed itself to be the last one ever. I think it’s a sort of vanity—there are always people, you see, who can’t imagine the world going on without them. There are others who’d like to see the judgment come because they’re too lazy or too scared to live—they’re afraid to fail, mostly.”

Fancy pondered all the failures in her life and frowned. “I’m an expert at that,” she reflected, without wryness or self-pity.

Phineas chuckled. “Better one grand, magnificent failure, I always say, than a lifetime of piddling successes.”

Fancy was completely bemused by this remark. In any case, she had to feed Hershel, clean his cage, and get ready for another day of performing magic. After cleaning up the dishes—it was the least she could do, since Phineas was providing the food—she went about her tasks and tried not to watch the arriving crowds of carnival-goers for any sign of Jeff.

The morning went well, with no more rebellions on Hershel’s part, and, at midday, Mr. Stroble came through the gathered spectators to pay Fancy her two dollars. His eyes kept dodging hers as he handed the money over, but she didn’t give much thought to his curious manner for there were already people gathering to watch her next performance.

Late in the afternoon, a massive, thick-shouldered young man pointed to the signboard resting in front of Fancy’s table. “That says you sing and dance, too. How come you don’t sing and dance?”

Fancy’s stomach tightened; if there was one thing she’d learned to recognize in her travels around the territory, it was trouble. She smiled broadly and went on with her act.

The young farmer meant to be persistent. “I want to hear you sing,” he called out over the sea of calico bonnets and straw hats.

“Leave the lady alone, Rafe,” put in a man’s voice, from near the front. “She’s doin’ just fine.”

“This here’s fraud, that’s what it is,” argued Rafe
with a scowl, muscling his way closer to the canopied table. The pinkness of his round, plain-featured face testified that he’d been drinking.

Fancy took up the tiny, sulfur-filled vial that was easily hidden in her hand and made flames leap from her fingertips. The crowd in general was delighted, but Rafe was not appeased.

“I say she sings and does a jig or two!” he growled.

At that moment, Phineas came from out of nowhere, looking affable and guileless in his plaid suit and bowler hat. He approached the mountainous farmer without the slightest hesitation, his hands in his pockets, his smile broad. “What seems to be the trouble?” he asked.

Rafe turned toward him with a lumbering motion that chilled Fancy to the marrow of her bones. “I say it’s a lie, that there sign. I paid good money to see this show and this lady ain’t sung a note!”

Phineas was unruffled, his gaze shifting to a nervous Fancy. “Do you wish to sing, my dear?” he asked politely.

Fancy was terrified, but she shook her head.

“There you have it,” shrugged Phineas, still smiling. “The little lady prefers not to sing today.”

Rafe flung a dangerous, petulant look in Fancy’s direction. “She’ll sing,” he said.

Fancy was just opening her mouth to comply when Rafe suddenly raised his meaty hands and gave Phineas a hard shove, sending him sprawling into the rocky dirt and trampled grass. Phineas winced and grasped at his chest with one hand.

“Phineas!” Fancy wailed, rounding the table to rush to her friend. “Phineas, are you all right?”

Phineas was not all right; his grimace of pain told her
that much, along with the absence of color in his face. “I’ll be—just fine—”

Fancy looked up at Rafe, whose overall-clad frame loomed against the sky, blocking out the sun. “How dare you?” she hissed, furious beyond all good sense. She rose to her feet and advanced, and Rafe actually retreated a step. “Apologize this minute, you hulking beast!”

Rafe stopped. The realization that he was being backed down by a tiny woman, and in front of all his friends, to boot, dawned ominously in his face. He reddened and his bright little eyes narrowed. “No goddamned tramp travelin’ with a freak show tells me what to do!” he spat.

“Rafe—” ventured some tentative peacemaker, from the gaping crowd.

Fancy had never been more frightened in her life, but she was prepared to fight if she had to. She crossed her arms over her bosom and waited.

Rafe bent toward her and she felt his fetid breath in her face, smelled it, even tasted it. Her stomach turned within her, but she stood her ground.

“What else do you do for a penny?” drawled the brute, smirking now. “Whatever it is, maybe you’ll do it for me—in them bushes over there.”

Fancy drew back her foot to kick him—the distance between them allowed her a target other than his thick shins—but before she could make contact at all, Rafe was spinning around, a surprised expression on his face. Peering around him, Fancy saw Jeff, and the look of white-hot rage in his eyes scared her more than Rafe ever could have.

“Would you mind repeating that?” Jeff drawled, in a
cold voice. A muscle leaped in the line of his jaw and was still again.

Rafe had had a moment to recover, and he squared his mule-strong shoulders in preparation for battle. Still, there was a tremor in his voice when he answered. “I just wanted her to sing.”

Phineas had gotten back to his feet, and he caught Fancy’s upper arms in both hands and pulled her backward, out of range. The crowd, silent now, drew back, too, making a thick circle around the two men.

Blood pounded in Fancy’s ears and her heart nestled into her throat, fat and almost impossible to breathe around. God in heaven, did Jeff actually mean to fight with that monster of a man? That giant?

He did. Tired of waiting, he drew back one fist and then lodged it squarely in Rafe’s fleshy middle. It made a thudding sound and the farmer’s breath left his lungs in an angry whoosh.

With the hulking movements of a trained bear, Rafe swung one huge hand toward Jeff’s head. Despite his own impressive size, Jeff was smaller than his adversary and Fancy closed her eyes, unable to watch.

The terrible sounds went on for an eternity, it seemed to Fancy, and she flinched at each grunt of pain, each muttered swearword, each thud of fist against flesh.

“Sweet Lord in heaven,” marveled Phineas in an undertone, his hands still holding Fancy fast.

She opened her eyes at this and was surprised to see Rafe kneeling on the ground, blood trickling from his nostrils and making crimson patches in the dirt. His shoulders heaved with the effort to breathe and Jeff stood over him like an avenging angel, magnificent in
his fury, unscathed except for a slight cut above his right eye.

Almost idly, he lifted one booted foot and placed it in the middle of Rafe’s chest. With a desultory motion of his leg, he sent the farmer toppling backward to lie curled up on the ground.

Looking shame-faced and apologetic, several of Rafe’s friends came to gather him up and lead him, stumbling, away. Jeff’s furious indigo eyes sliced to Fancy and held, and the ferocity in their depths stunned her so profoundly that she couldn’t move or speak. Why was he angry with her, she wondered wildly.

Phineas stepped around her rigid little frame to offer a congratulatory hand to Jeff. Some of the fury faded from Jeff’s eyes as he hesitated and then accepted Phineas’s handshake.

Throughout this brief exchange, Fancy stood still, hurting and defiant and wildly confused. She had done nothing wrong, nothing but try to defend her friend, and yet Jeff was clearly outraged. The look he flung in her direction as he listened to Phineas’s raving skewered her with the piercing impact of a lance.

When Phineas wandered away to attend his balloon, Jeff approached her. Fancy averted her eyes, gnawing at her lower lip.

“What was that all about?” Jeff demanded coldly, standing so close that she could feel the power and strength of him in every fiber of her being.

Fancy lifted defiant eyes to his white, taut-jawed face. “The farmer started it all,” she said.

“You could have been hurt!” Jeff retorted in a tight voice, and it was then that Fancy realized that he wasn’t angry at all. He was frightened.

“I wasn’t, thanks to you,” she said lightly.

“Does that happen often?”

Fancy nodded reluctantly. “I’m afraid so,” she admitted. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it? It’s all over.”

His hands closed over her shoulders and he drew her close in a swift, almost desperate movement. She could feel just the hint of a tremor in his muscular frame. “Suppose I hadn’t gotten here in time—”

Fancy laughed nervously, surprised that there were tears brimming in her eyes. “I would have started singing,” she answered. She had never been rescued before, and it was a nice feeling, a touching feeling.

Jeff chuckled and caught her chin on the curve of his fingers, lifting. He kissed the tip of her nose and then held her close again, as though he feared to let her go. “What have I done?” he mourned, in an almost inaudible voice.

The magic of the moment was broken, as far as Fancy was concerned. The brutal fact was that, married to this man or not, she was still essentially on her own. Already he was regretting his association with her; the words he’d just uttered made that clear. “I told you that you shouldn’t have married me,” she said, hiding the sorrow she felt behind a thin wall of defiance.

His strong hands slid down from her waist to her round bottom, pressing her close. “Did you, now?” he teased, arching one golden eyebrow.

“Stop it—people will see!”

“I don’t care,” he replied, mischief dancing a weary jig in the depths of his navy blue eyes.

“Well, I do!” muttered Fancy, blushing. Though she’d thought otherwise, the things Rafe had implied about her morals smarted terribly in retrospect. She ached to be respectable.

Jeff gave her one more impudent squeeze and then let her go. “Shall I tell you what I plan to do to you when we’re alone?” he drawled.

“No!” shouted Fancy, folding her arms across her breasts in an unconscious effort to keep him at bay.

He reached out and traced the outline of her jaw with one finger. “First,” he said, as though she hadn’t spoken at all, “I’m going to—”

Fancy whirled and stormed back to her table, Jeff’s laughter ringing in her ears. When she looked back, though, he was gone and her moral outrage was all for naught. Considering some of the things he might be planning for when they were alone, she blushed hotly.

Mercifully, a new crowd was gathering in front of her table. She began her performance and only occasionally looked in the direction of Phineas’s balloon.

Telling herself that it was stupid to be jealous of an inanimate object, Fancy wished devoutly that the damned thing would pop.

When nightfall finally came, Fancy was exhausted and petulant. She flounced and muttered as she tended to Hershel and repaid Jeff’s amused perusal with a scowl.

He was sitting cross-legged in the grass, talking quietly with Phineas. Occasionally the two men laughed at some joke that Fancy couldn’t quite catch, and that made her even angrier.