Lady Lavender (17 page)

The headman clapped his hands like a boy presented with a new horse. “Okay, boss. Now I finish fan tan game.”

Back on the rim of the valley Sam slipped off the horse and scurried to the shelter of the bunkhouse where a comforting stream of gray smoke drifted from one of the metal chimneys. Rooney slapped his hat against his thigh, and the rainwater that had collected around the brim splooshed onto the muddy ground. He cocked his head, shielded his eyes with his hands and studied the sky.

“Let's make tracks, Wash. This ain't no summer shower.”

Without another word, the two men turned their mounts toward town and spurred them to a gallop. The wind through the treetops sounded like a woman screaming, and the rain came at them sideways. Wash could scarcely see through the thickening mist. Rooney's strawberry roan was just a shadowy blur on his left.

He pulled his hat down low to protect his cheeks and chin from the slashing rain. Water blew in under the brim. He kept his head down and watched what he could see of the terrain ahead. Rooney must have done likewise, because the man's mount never wavered or
slackened its pace. Good man, Rooney. Sometimes his friend seemed more than half Comanche. He prayed neither of their horses would stumble or step in a prairie-dog hole.

It took an extra hour to reach the outskirts of Smoke River. “I want a shot of Red Eye,” Rooney yelled over the wind. Wash wanted a shot of Red Eye, a hot bath and a warm fire at his feet, in that order.

The honeysuckle vine on Mrs. Rose's boardinghouse fence was getting beat all to hell by the downpour. The fence itself was half tipped over from the blasts of wind that ripped across it. Wash would not ask Mrs. Rose's grandson—what was the blue-eyed kid's name, Mark?—to take General on down to the livery stable. No sense getting the youngster soaked and his grandmama upset.

Getting from the stable back up the street to the boardinghouse turned out to be a struggle. The wind buffeted them from the front, the rain hissed into their ears and up their noses.

“Gonna forget the Red Eye,” Rooney yelled over to Wash. “Don't wanna swim to the saloon.”

On the wide boardinghouse porch, they stomped around to dislodge the mud caked on their boots, then shucked them, stuffed the toes with pages from the
Oregonian,
and set them just inside the front hallway to dry.

A rush of warm, cinnamon-scented air met them. “Sarah,” Rooney crooned at the dining-room entrance. “You makin' cookies for a weary man?”

“Gingerbread,” a female voice answered.

“Gingerbread,” he said in a dreamy voice. “I'll just bet Little Miss likes gingerbread. That ain't French, is it?”

“Nope.” Wash took one look around the empty dining table.

“Is Jeanne upstairs?”

“No, Colonel. She's still out at MacAllister's place, working on her lavender wreaths.”

An icy fist slammed into Wash's chest.

Mrs. Rose appeared in the kitchen doorway, wiping her hands on a towel stuck in her apron waistband. “Jeanne left early this morning…took Manette and rode out before breakfast.”

“You mean she's been out there all this time, during the storm?”

“Sure has. I must say, that girl is no stranger to hard work.”

Wash exchanged a look with Rooney. “Want me to go with you?” the older man asked.

“No. Like you said, she's my responsibility.”

Mrs. Rose fluttered her hands in Wash's direction. “You're not going out in this wild storm again, are you?”

Wash didn't answer. Rooney nodded. The woman bit her lip but said nothing.

Rooney pounded up the stairs and returned with both his own black rain poncho and Wash's olive-green one. “Yer gonna need these.”

Wash sought the man's eyes. “Thanks, Rooney. You're a good friend. And,” he added, “you deserve a double helping of gingerbread.”

The last thing Wash heard before he closed the front door behind him was Rooney's gravelly voice and Sarah Rose's laughter.

W
ash slogged his way down the street to the livery stable, an inexplicable feeling of dread burrowing into his stomach. Even with his rain poncho covering him from head to hip, water blew at him sideways until he could feel the cold drops sliding down the back of his neck. He pulled the poncho tighter.

Tom Roper met him at the stable, banged the door shut after him and faced him with hands propped on his hips. “You crazy, Colonel? Yer horse just got settled down and now you wanna take him out again in this muck?”

“Have to, Tom. Mrs. Nicolet and her daughter went out to MacAllister's early this morning. They're not back yet.”

“You know Swine Creek's rising? A fella rode in 'bout an hour ago and said he had a devil of a time swimmin' his horse across.”

“I know a shallow spot to cross.”

He would never forget the winter the Platte had flooded—all those dead horses. He shook his head to dispel the memory and threw a dry saddle blanket onto General's back, hefted his saddle into place, and tightened the cinch. Jamming his wet boots into the stirrups, he signaled Tom to swing the door open just wide enough to let him through.

Rain hit his hat so hard it felt like he was standing under a waterfall. The livery yard was now a sea of mud. He spurred General into a canter until he had squished through it and was on the road leading west out of town.

“Okay, boy, let's go!” The animal lurched into a hard gallop. Wash hoped the horse could see through the sheets of rain, because he sure as hell couldn't.

Sure enough, the creek bordering MacAllister's property was raging over its banks. Wash reined up and stared at the raging water. Small trees carried by the yellow-brown torrent swept past like ghostly many-armed figures. He urged General into what looked like a shallows, laid his head alongside the animal's neck and tried to pray.

MacAllister's bunkhouse was faintly lit, but Wash noted that no smoke came from the stone chimney. That meant there was no heat inside; Jeanne and Manette must be freezing.

Jeanne's gray mare was sandwiched between the wagon and the bunkhouse wall for protection. He maneuvered General as close as he could get to the
single step at the bunkhouse doorway and yelled to warn her he was here.

“Jeanne!” Probably couldn't hear him over the storm. He shouted her name again, then dismounted, grabbed the extra poncho, and burst through the door without stopping to knock.

Jeanne looked up from the chair by the hissing potbellied stove, her face pale, her nose red from the cold. Manette huddled on her lap, bundled up in a quilt.

“Wash! What are you doing here?”

“Came to take you into town. To the boardinghouse.”

“But why?”

A gust of wind shook the bunkhouse walls and Manette squirmed deeper into Jeanne's blanketed lap.

“The creek's rising. You're going to be flooded out.”

Her face turned white.

“Water's already so deep you can't wade across it. Come on, we're going into town.” He lifted Manette off her lap and set the girl on her feet.

“Got any extra blankets?”

Jeanne rose unsteadily. “Y-yes. On my bed.”

“Get your wraps on,” he ordered. He stripped another quilt off the lower bunk and bundled it under his arm.

“Jeanne, General is strong and steady. I want you to ride him, and I'll take your gray. I'll seat Manette in front of you. Ready?”

He was herding them toward the door when Manette let out a squeal of protest. “My coat! My new coat. She
pointed to a red garment draped over the back of the other chair.

Jeanne rolled her eyes. Wash grabbed the coat and jostled Manette's thin arms into the sleeves.

“You have a coat, Jeanne?”

“
Non.
I wear my shawl.”

“Not enough,” he snapped. He shrugged off his dripping poncho, then the deerskin jacket he wore underneath and hung it around her shoulders. With shaking fingers, she buttoned it up to her neck, then pulled the wool shawl over her hair.

“We are ready,” she announced.

Wash dropped the extra poncho over her head and slipped into his own. Before he opened the door, he snagged a rope and bridle from the hook on the wall.

He took Jeanne out first. Sloshing through a sheet of muddy water, he lifted her into General's saddle, then went back for Manette. When the girl was securely settled in front of her mother, he guided her small hands to the pommel. “Hold on to this, honey. Hold very tight so you won't fall off.”

Jeanne lifted the front of her poncho to cover her daughter and wrapped one arm over Manette's body to keep her in place. Wash watched her bend forward to speak to her daughter.

“Do not be frightened,
chou-chou.
We have been wet and cold before, remember?”

A little mewing sound came from under the layers of garments.

Wash led the gray mare out, slipped the bridle on her and folded the extra quilt onto her broad back. Then he
mounted, clicked his tongue and the two horses began to slog over the watersoaked ground. Wash took the lead on the gray. He couldn't set too fast a pace because of the pummeling rain and because he worried Manette could lose her grip and tumble off.

By now it was growing dark. The only sounds were the squishy clopping of horses' hooves and the endless drumming of the rain. When they reached the creek, Wash groaned. The water was even higher than before and he followed it for a good mile before he found a place still shallow enough to ford.

He reined in and waited for Jeanne. “We'll go across side by side.”

Jeanne bit her lip and nodded.

“I'll be on your downstream side, so if anything happens—” He couldn't finish the thought.
Nothing
would happen. He would not
let
anything happen.

“Stay close. Ready?”

Again she nodded and they urged their mounts into the tumbling water. He heard no moans of fright, no weeping, not even from little Manette. Sure had to admire their grit under pressure.

The two horses struggled on through the raging creek, dodging the small logs and upended shrubs that rushed past. The water rose to Wash's thighs. He kept his eyes on Jeanne's skirts; the fabric was sodden with dirty flood water and the weight of her petticoats dragged at her. Still he heard not one word of complaint.

In fact, he heard no word at all. For a split-second his heart stopped.

“Jeanne? Are you all right?”

“I am all right, yes. And Manette, too.”

A warm glow spread through him. They were going to make it just fine. They were over halfway to town and the worst—fording the creek—was almost over.

General struggled up the oozy bank on the opposite side of the creek while Wash hung back on the gray until he knew they were safe. Then he dug in his spurs. The mare jolted up the muddy incline to the top, where Jeanne quietly waited with General. Again, admiration filled him.

They plodded on, Wash leading, Jeanne and Manette behind him. The road widened when they neared town and Wash slowed to let her catch up. Side by side, they walked their mounts against a wind so blustery Jeanne's heavy, wet skirts were tossed up around her knees. All three of them would be waterlogged before they reached the boardinghouse.

They moved forward, their heads down against the wind, hands aching from the stinging rain. For the second time that day Wash began thinking about some whiskey, a hot bath and a warm fire.

And Jeanne.

Suddenly he was happier than he could ever remember. Here, out in the middle of the worst storm he'd seen in years, so wet his underdrawers squished against his skin with every motion the horse made, cold and hungry… But hell, he felt like singing!

Just then Jeanne's voice floated to him, crooning some kind of lullaby in French. His throat tightened.

It took another hour until he could see the blurry lights of the town through the rain; it felt like yet
another hour of carefully picking their way around street-wide brown mud puddles before they rode up to the boardinghouse.

Wash leaned sideways so Jeanne could hear him. “I'll bring the horses back to the stable later.”

She turned toward him, but it was too dark to see her face.

“Wash?”

“Don't argue, honey. Ask Mrs. Rose to start some bathwater heating.”

Her horse swerved into his and both animals halted. Jeanne reached her hand out, grasped his and squeezed. Tears burned under his eyelids.

The two-story yellow clapboard boardinghouse loomed ahead. Wash dismounted outside the picket fence, now flattened by the wind, and lifted Manette from her mother's lap. He had to pry the child's stiff fingers off the saddle horn.

Rooney appeared in the open doorway. Manette darted up the steps and he swung her up into his arms. “Why, yer soakin' wet, Little Miss. What you been doin', swimmin' in the creek?”

The girl giggled and threw her arms about his neck.

“Jehoshaphat, yer nose is colder'n a snowball!”

Jeanne could not dismount she was so exhausted; could not swing her leg over the horse's rump with the weight of her sodden skirts pulling against her ankles. She watched numbly as Wash strode toward her, his tall form slick with mud and rainwater. He reached up,
pressed both hands against the poncho that covered her and grasped her around the waist.

He lifted her out of the saddle, steadied her feet on the ground and unexpectedly folded her into his arms. Their wet ponchos brushed together with a whispery sound and all at once he was chuckling near her ear.

“Wh-what is s-so funny?” Her body shook from the bite of the freezing wind on her wet legs. She could not stop her teeth from chattering.

“Nothing is funny,” he said, sucking in a gulp of air. “I'm just happy that we got here.”

“You—” she tried to keep her voice steady “—are easily p-pleased.” It was just a jest, but she heard his voice change with his reply.

“The hell I am.”

She had said exactly the wrong thing. But it did not seem to matter because he scooped her up, poncho and all, and tramped up the porch steps with her in his arms.

Rooney, with Manette hanging about his neck, ushered them through the front door with a shout. “Sarah, they're here!”

Wash set Jeanne down and lifted off the poncho and her rain-soaked shawl, then wrestled Manette's arms out of her red coat.

He rolled all the wet garments together in one bundle and looked at Jeanne. “You want to add your wet skirt and petti—?”

“Certainly not!” A bubble of laughter escaped, and the next thing she knew he was down on one knee, un lacing her boots.

Opening the door briefly, he tossed her shoes and his own boots and the pile of wet garments out of the front door onto the lawn swing.

Mrs. Rose had the dining table set with flowered china bowls of warm bread and milk at each place. One bowl had what looked like gingerbread floating in it; Rooney plunked Manette down in front of it. “You like gingerbread, don'tcha, Little Miss?”

Manette did not answer because her mouth was already full.

“Well,” Rooney said. “Turned out to be a nice day for a ride, huh?”

Wash snorted. Hiding her smile, Jeanne dropped her head to concentrate on the bowl in front of her. Wash clanked his spoon back into his bowl and eyed Rooney. “Worst damn picnic I've ever been on.”

“Yeah?” Rooney eyed him with a perfectly straight face. “What was wrong with it?”

“Ants,” Wash said.

At that, Jeanne laughed aloud. She felt giddy, as if the last few hours had been just a bad dream. But it was over now. She and Manette were safe and dry. While Mrs. Rose fluttered in and out of the kitchen, replenishing their supper bowls, and Wash got the horses warm and dry in the livery, Jeanne's spirits rose until she felt like dancing. Heaven help her, she could not live without this man!

Oh, yes, she could. She would soon have her own farm, her own house. Her heart might shrivel up, but she could go on and make a new life for herself.
Vraiment,
she had
no choice. Even if she wanted it to be different, she could not rope and tie the man down; it would kill him.

Rooney stood up suddenly, scrabbled at the sideboard and produced a bottle of amber liquor and two shot glasses. “Sarah musta forgot this when she dusted this mornin'.”

He poured both glasses full. Before Jeanne could stop herself, she reached over and claimed one.

Rooney's thick eyebrows shot up. “Didn't know you was a drinkin' woman, Jeanne.”

“But I am not,” she confessed. “It is an American custom I am just learning.”

Both men chuckled.

“But it is true,” she insisted. “I have never tasted spirits or whiskey or whatever it is called.”

Rooney poured a third glass and shoved it in front of Wash. “Down the hatch.” His head tipped back and he downed the liquid in one gulp.

Wash raised his brimming glass. “Down the hatch,” he echoed. He gulped it all down, then sat back in his chair waiting to see what she would do.

“Oh, very well,” she said. “I will do it just to prove that I can.” She lifted the liquid to her lips. “Damn the match,” she announced. She held her breath, poured the whiskey into her mouth and swallowed.

Sacre bleu!
Her throat burned as if she had eaten a red-hot coal! She couldn't take a breath, couldn't talk. Her eyes watered. And both Wash and Rooney were guffawing!

Manette stared at her with widening blue eyes.

She waved her hands in front of her, trying to draw
in some air, but nothing helped. Finally Wash stopped laughing, leaned close and pounded her back with the flat of his hand.

She coughed, then choked. At last she could speak.

“Gentlemen,” she announced in a raspy voice. “I have now damned the match.” Both men stopped laughing.

“Is that not what one says?” she asked.

That set them off again. Jeanne ignored them, finished her bowl of bread and milk and waited for Wash and Rooney to stop chortling. Rooney exchanged a look with Wash, then solemnly poured another shot of liquor for each of them.