Northern Lights Trilogy (105 page)

“You are shivering,” James said, still studying her.

“I am all right.” She had to speak loudly to be heard over the waterfall, but the cavern gave each word a slight echo.

He gestured to the wall beyond the ledge, and for the first time Kaatje saw the petroglyphs. “What is it?” she asked.

“Kadachan showed me this place once. It’s ancient. But the story still is passed along from generation to generation, among several of the tribes in Alaska.”

She accepted his hand and smiled as he easily lifted her to the ledge. “Another story?”

“Yes,” he said, staring at her. “A love story.”

He didn’t wait for her response. He simply turned and began narrating the story to her, pointing to each picture. “There was once an Indian brave who was destined to be chief. He didn’t speak much, but everyone knew he had a big heart by the way he tended to his ponies. One day he decided it was time he should marry. There were several winsome maidens in the tribe—Gray Wolf’s daughter, known to be the smartest; Sunlight, the most beautiful of them all; and Tiny Feathers, a girl who could find the best berries and roots. But it was Forget-Me-Not that caught his attention.” James waved toward a rudimentary picture of several Indian maidens and then went on.

“He watched her closely. Although plain, it was she who touched him. She cooed to the babies and had a laugh that made him laugh too. It was she who was meant to be his bride. He knew it. So one afternoon, he approached her father, in the way of The People. He said, ‘I would like to take your daughter as my wife. What will her bride-price be?’

“ ‘This one is not beautiful or smart. I think one pony will be enough.’

“The brave and the father agreed, and the young man arranged to come back the next week to claim his bride.” James pointed to a picture where two men clasped hands.

“That night, the other maidens talked of the day. ‘One pony isn’t much,’ the beautiful one said. ‘My father would ask for at least five. But, of course, Forget-Me-Not is not valuable as a bride.’ ‘It’s true,’ agreed Tiny Feathers. ‘My love promised three horses for me!’ Only one noticed Forget-Me-Not as she crept away from the edge of the fire, ashamed.” James showed her an image of a great campfire, as well as the shadow of a woman.

He moved on to a group of men sitting in a circle. “The brave closed his door-flap to think and to sleep. The next morning he visited the old ones. ‘What is the largest dowry a brave has ever paid for a bride?’ The old ones talked and argued for a few minutes. Finally, one spoke out, ‘It is said that twenty ponies were paid for Prairie Thorn.’ The brave thanked them, then went to work. That week, he rounded up seventeen horses, all but his favorite. He walked through the village, trading for three more with all the possessions he had. Finally, he walked out to his horses, twenty in all. He stood and looked them over, great love filling his heart.”

There were twenty-one ponies in a long, horizontal image across the wall. James pointed to the last, a white stallion. “The brave’s favorite was a white horse he loved more than anything in the world. It was more valuable to him than all his things and other horses combined. After kissing the stallion’s nose, he led him with the others to the tent of his new father-in-law.

“The entire village gathered around, wondering what occasion demanded such a spectacle. ‘Here I am,’ the brave announced, ‘to bring my wife home.’

“Forget-Me-Not’s father emerged at the tent’s opening. ‘What is this?’ he cried. ‘We agreed that one pony was enough.’

“ ‘No,’ said the brave, ‘she is the bride beyond any price. She is my beloved.’ He looked at her and smiled. And for the rest of her life Forget-Me-Not smiled, joyful because her husband prized her enough to give up all he had for her, not for what she had to offer, but because he loved her.”

James looked at Kaatje meaningfully, and she sensed his care for her, his sudden intense feelings. It shocked her since there had never been anyone but Soren who had looked at her in such a fashion. “You deserve a love like that, Kaatje. You
have
a love like that.”

He was professing love? To her? She did not miss the way he tenderly said her given name for the first time. It was like a song on his tongue.

“God loves you like that—you are the bride beyond price, Kaatje. He loves you with a sacrificial, no-disappointment-ahead kind of love. You know that, right?”

“Yes.” So he wasn’t talking about himself—he was talking of God! An arrow of sadness shot through her heart. And she realized that she wished it were James who loved her like that. What was wrong with her? She was a married woman; she shouldn’t be thinking such thoughts! She was getting so cold her head was obviously growing numb.

His hand under her chin surprised her. She looked up at him with concern, but his face was calm. Her heart stopped for a moment. “You deserve a man to love you like that too, Kaatje. Soren has abused his rights as your husband. No one should ever treat a wife like that. One they call beloved.”

Kaatje wrenched her chin away. She shook her head, wondering at the heat beneath her skin even as she shivered. “I am cold,” she mumbled. “I had better get back to shore and get dressed.” She dived under the icy waterfall without pausing and emerged on the other side. Kadachan gave her a knowing glance. She looked away from him, concentrating on getting to the bank and her pack and dry clothes.

As she changed into a clean pair of bloomers and a semiclean dress, grunting and wrenching cries from the pool made her anxiously peek out. They were wrestling. Kadachan ducked and sent James flying into the water again, the splash covering ten feet. James emerged, his muscles flexed in anticipation and dripping rivulets of water as he went after his friend again. Kadachan lost that time, and when James offered him a hand, Kadachan pulled him back in.

Kaatje bit back a laugh as James fell for the oldest trick in the book. It mattered not where men were. The world over, they were but small boys in men’s bodies. What she had just seen she had witnessed a hundred times in Bergen, when Karl and Peder would do the same in a glacial pool where they all gathered as children. But the boys had been boys then.

James was all man. Kaatje ducked back behind the boulder and leaned against its rough surface. She drew a deep breath, thinking. He was kind and thoughtful. Kaatje sensed he had been watching out for her a hundred times in the last two months when she had not been watching out for herself. Even on the trail that afternoon, when she thought she was forgotten, James was pushing ahead, knowing this sacred, spectacular spot was within reach. Soren had never been so caring.

Soren also had never been paid to do so, she reminded herself. Why, Trent had practically threatened a public hanging if James did not deliver her home safely at summer’s end! She had witnessed the deal herself. She made a low sound of disgust in her throat and shook her head.

James was her guide. Nothing more.

But why had his eyes told her differently in the waterfall cavern?

Days later, they arrived in Forty Mile but soon learned that the self-appointed sheriff Kaatje sought had been gone for two years and that no one had taken his place. At the trading post—little more than a log cabin of eighty square feet—the ancient, grizzled proprietor told her that “the miner’s law rules in this country, and there ain’t no need for a formal sheriff.” Kaatje knew there was no legal jurisdiction for a “sheriff” in an ungoverned country anyway, so it didn’t surprise her that “Sheriff” Jefferson Young had disappeared.

“We teach the injuns to keep to themselves,” the old man told her while looking meaningfully at Kadachan. “Yes ma’am, when a miner gets out of line, we take care of our own. It ain’t just redskins we hang from the trees,” he said proudly, “We strung up Hard Luck Joe just last month for stealing Swift Water Bill’s flour from his cabin. We can’t be abidin’ any stealing. Not when winters’ll bring a man to eating bark rather than starving.”

If she found Soren here, would he be as backward as this trader? He had been gone for seven years—perhaps she wouldn’t even recognize him.

“Don’t get many white women this way,” the trader said with a smile that exposed several missing teeth and several more in the process of decomposing.

James took a protective step closer to her. His gesture sent a shiver up the side of her neck. “There is nobody else around that would know about miners in the area?”

“Nobody but me,” the man said, hooking a thumb in each filthy suspender on his chest. “Know just about every man, least every white man, within a couple weeks’ hike. They need me. I’m their flour and salt.”

Kaatje nodded. “And you never met a man named Soren Janssen?”

“Now, I didn’t say that, did I? We was talkin’ about Sheriff Young and never got back to Soren Janssen.”

“Get back to it,” James said.

“Hmm. Now what was that we were gettin’ back to?”

Kaatje sighed. “How much?”

“A dollar’d do it.”

“A dollar!” James exploded. He leaned over the counter and took the man by the neck of his dirty undershirt. “Tell her what you know! For free! It’s the decent thing, man!”

“All right, all right. Let go o’ me!”

Reluctantly, James did so. The trader looked from him to Kaatje and back to James again. “Soren Janssen came this way’bout two years back.”

Kaatje sucked in her breath. “You saw him? He was here?” “Yeah, with his squaw. They were headin’ downriver toward Kokrine’s.”

Kaatje glanced at James. “I got a letter from the trader there. He said the last he had heard of Soren, he was heading this way about three years ago, to what I assume became his claim. He promised he’d write again if he saw Soren.”

“Who was that? Malcolm Heffner?” the old trader gave her a
wheezy chuckle, as if privy to an inside joke. “Malcolm died of influenza three years back.”

“So Soren could have passed through.” Kaatje began.

“Without anyone ever sending you word,” James finished.

L
ora Anders eventually decided that Decker, if it had been Decker, was probably just like almost every other man in Juneau, stopping in town only to stock up, rest, and find directions to Fortune’s Smile. After several weeks of never seeing him again, she just knew he was gone for good. If it had been him at all.

“C’mon, Miss Anders,” Charlie complained as she knotted a tie at his neck. They were in the general store across the street from the Storm Roadhouse. Tora was getting him new clothes suitable for church. Nearing thirteen, he was all long limbs and clumsy big feet, constantly outgrowing his clothes. Last week, he had started to get a few pimples. When she discovered the girls teasing him about it, Tora decided he needed some sprucing up. It would do his heart good.

“You stay still, Charles, while I get this right. Then I want you to look in the mirror and see the young man you’re turning out to be.”

“Young man?”

“Young man.” She finished the tie and turned him by the shoulders to the full-length, oval mirror. He was already as tall as she. Tora guessed that he would eventually reach six feet, at the rate he was growing. “Look at you. Aren’t you a treat? Pretty Cindy O’Malley will give you a second look this Sunday at church.”

“You think?”

“I think,” she said, peeking over his shoulder and flashing him a grin. “Now if we don’t get back to the roadhouse and get ready for the supper crowd, we’ll be behind all evening. I’ve picked out a new pair of Levi Strauss jeans for you and a couple of suitable shirts. That’ll take care of you for work and school.”

He turned to her with pure pleasure in his eyes. “Thank you, Miss Anders. For doing this for me.”

“Well, you earn it, doing dishes and watching out for the girls and all. I know they can be pesky at times,” she added in a whisper. “And I’m glad you’ve come to be with us for a while.”

He nodded eagerly. “You think I’m learning enough that when Cap’n Martensen comes around again, he’ll take me with him?”

Tora turned away and pretended to be interested in a cast-iron stove model, checking the price tag. Karl would take him to sea again someday, just not as soon as Charlie hoped. “I think Captain Martensen wants you to get a decent education as well as some manners. Didn’t you two speak of graduation as the time you could sail with him again?”

Charlie groaned and picked at the end of a bolt of muslin. “Graduation? That’s years away!”

Tora raised one eyebrow and looked him in the eye. “Could be four. Could be three. You’re smart as a whip, Charlie. If you apply yourself to your studies, you could graduate at sixteen. Depends on what’s important to you.”

He met her gaze, understanding her challenge, and nodded once. “Three years I can take. Especially with Cindy O’Malley in town.”

“Glad you can suffer us that long for a pretty girl,” she said, chucking him under the chin. “You’ll be a sailor yet!”

They bantered back and forth until they left the store, whereupon Charles offered her his elbow. Arm in arm they walked across the muddy thoroughfare, pausing to let two wagons and then several men on horses pass before them. Juneau became busier with each passing day, alive
with the bustle and shouts of men on a mission of fortune. Tora had thought Montana was a land of opportunity; it was nothing compared to the raw wealth just beneath Alaska’s surface. It surprised her when she thought about it. Once, she would’ve died for just such an opportunity. Now she was content to keep everything as it was—she wished she could freeze her life at this particular moment, like a photograph from one of the new Kodak snapshot cameras. It was perfect like this. Work was brisk and plentiful, and life with Trent, Kaatje, Charlie, and the girls had fulfilled her in a way she never thought possible.