Hank’s small, freckled brow furrowed briefly. “What about you? Would you be sad? If I lit out, I mean?”
“Oh, yes,” she answered. “You see, we’re going to have some babies around here, and they’ll need an older brother to watch out for them. Oh, they’ll have their cousin Noah, of course, and eventually the others will be big enough to help out, too, but that won’t be the same as having a real brother, right there under the same roof and everything.”
Hank looked pensive and a bit torn. Eagerness sparked in his eyes, though she knew he was doing his best to suppress the emotion. Poor, sweet thing; heaven only knew what sort of tribulations he’d gone through before coming to Primrose Creek. No wonder he was such a stalwart and serious little man.
“Did you marry my pa so’s you could live in this fancy house?”
The question caught Skye off-guard and stung smartly. She hadn’t married Jake for any reason other than love, though she wasn’t about to explain her most intimate feelings to a seven-year-old. Jake, on the contrary, and despite his many protestations, had almost certainly married her for the timber on her land, though she didn’t doubt that he regarded her highly. A man as handsome, as capable, as downright good as Jake Vigil could have had his pick of women.
She decided to ignore the inquiry entirely, since she’d already left it dangling so long. “There isn’t much in the pantry,” she said, getting back to her feet with a sigh of resolution, “but I’ve managed to scrape up some oatmeal and molasses. Come have your breakfast. You mustn’t be late for school.”
“I hate school,” he said, dragging his feet as he approached the table.
Skye went to the stove, busied herself with stirring and scooping, as she’d seen Bridget do a thousand times. It was strange how such simple tasks as cooking oatmeal and looking after a child could give a person so much joy. “Well, you’ll need schooling,” she said, “if you hope to follow in your father’s footsteps. He’s a very intelligent man, you know. You’ve seen all his books on the shelves in the study? He must have hundreds, and it looks to me as if he’s read them all—”
Hank made a great deal of noise getting into a chair and situating himself just so at the table. “Noah says you’re all right,” he said. “So I reckon I’ll stay put awhile.”
She hid a smile.
“He’s about to go under, my pa,” the child confided. “That’s what they say at school. Then he won’t want me underfoot no more. He probably won’t want you, neither.”
Skye was careful not to meet Hank’s gaze for a few moments, for her own was glittering with a sheen of tears, quickly blinked away. “Your father will never give you away,” she said, and it was in that moment the one thing she was truly sure of. “Never.”
It was more than a rumor, though, the reference to Jake’s financial situation. He’d admitted that to her himself the day they were married. She hadn’t minded then, except for his sake, anyway, and she didn’t now. She had land, she had timber, she had the gold that sifted down out of the mountains, settling like silt in the creek bed. She had strength and love and competence, and if she couldn’t build a life from those things, she was just plain useless.
Skye set the bowl of steaming oatmeal, generously laced with molasses, before him. “Don’t you go worrying, now. Your father’s not beaten yet. And even if he was, why, we could start over, the three of us, just by pushing up our sleeves and getting down to work.”
He looked at her for a long, poignant moment. “Their pas work for my pa, mostly. The kids at school, I mean. Everybody’s real scared.”
Skye dared to stroke the boy’s hair, and, to her surprise, he did not pull away. For the first time, it came to her how high-handed she’d been in the beginning, flatly refusing to sell her timber to Jake or anyone else. She’d never once thought how many people would be affected by her rather blithe decision, and now she was ashamed.
Hank’s words echoed in her ears all morning. Everybody’s real scared.
Jake came home at around noon and found her in the study, with leather-bound volumes in teetering piles all around her. He looked harried and quite unsure of his welcome, but he smiled when he saw her, as though there were something amusing about a woman sorting books.
His clothes were covered with dirt, and his hair was full of sawdust, but Skye didn’t care. When he pulled her close, her senses arose as one and spun their way upward in a whirlwind of sparks, like ghost leaves rising from a garden fire. He brushed a smudge from her cheek with the pad of one thumb and kissed her forehead.
“My wife,” he said, as though he could not believe his good fortune.
Skye’s throat closed, so great was the swell of emotion that arose within her, and some moments had passed before she managed to speak. “About the timber—” she began.
He laid an index finger to her lips. It was a gentle gesture, intended to soothe, no doubt, but it had exactly the opposite effect on Skye. She was dancing with lightning; if Jake had carried her upstairs to their bedroom, she would have gone willingly, even though it was the middle of the day.
“Never mind the timber,” he said.
She blinked. “But it’s yours now, at least partly—”
He interrupted with a shake of his head. “No,” he said in a firm voice, and held her away from him. It was a minor distance—his hands were still cupping her elbows—but Skye felt it sorely. “The land, those trees—all of that’s yours. And I know how much those trees mean to you.”
Skye was speechless. Jubilance and confusion tussled within her.
“I’m the head of this household,” he went on solemnly, “and I’ll pay my debts and provide for my wife and child. Somehow.”
“You’re just being stubborn, Jake Vigil,” she accused when she found the breath to speak. “You need that timber.”
He withdrew further just then; she felt it, even though she would have sworn he hadn’t actually moved. “No,” he said. “What I need is to be able to look at my face in the mirror every morning when I shave without being tempted to turn away in disgust. If you want to back out—”
Skye’s eyes widened, and her mouth dropped open. She had to close it again consciously. When she spoke, she was trembling with controlled fury. “Are you suggesting that I back out of this marriage? Just go home to Primrose Creek and pretend nothing’s changed?”
He heaved a sigh. “Only if you want to,” he said.
She stared at him. “Well,” she told him, “I don’t. I’m not some throwaway woman, Jake Vigil. I’m a wife, and I mean to stay that way!”
He grinned, his white teeth making a startling contrast with his dirty, rascally face. “You lost that race on purpose.”
She stomped one foot. “I did not!”
He laughed. “Yes,” he pressed, frankly enjoying her high dudgeon. “I think maybe you did. You wanted to marry me.”
She had wanted to marry Jake, she was crazy about him, and she had been for a long time, but she would have won that race if she could have, would have left Jake Vigil and his second-rate stallion choking in the dust! With huffy little motions, she smoothed her hair, straightened her spine, dusted her hands together. “I’ve made cheese potatoes,” she said. “For your dinner.”
“Admit it,” he said. “You wanted to marry me.”
“All right,” she said. “It’s true.”
He grinned and folded his arms. “Why?”
“Because I wanted lumber for a house,” she lied.
He laughed. “Try again.”
She flushed. “Because—I wanted—babies.”
In a single motion, he swept her up into his arms.
“What about dinner?” she asked, her heart thrumming at the back of her throat.
He kissed her forehead, then bent to nip lightly at one of her breasts. “I’m not interested in dinner,” he said, and started up the stairs.
The man at the Western Union office read the telegram Skye had written out and peered at her through greasy spectacles. He wa
s a doddering old fellow, and his jaw shook with effort while he rallied his powers of speech. “This here is to the vice president of the railroad, Mrs. Vigil,” he said.
She leaned forward and spoke in a cheerful whisper. “I know that,” she said. “After all, I wrote it.”
He was still skeptical. “You talked this over with Jake, I reckon?”
“I do not recall asking for your counsel in this matter or any other, Mr. Abbot,” Skye pointed out. “That timber is mine, after all, and if I want to sell it to the railroad, I jolly well will. Furthermore, if you mention this to my husband, I will know you betrayed a confidence and report you to the Western Union people.” Maybe Jake was willing to let go of everything he’d worked for by turning his back on a lot of perfectly good timber, but she wasn’t about to let him. She’d sell the trees herself if he refused to do so, and the railroad would be forced to let Jake cut the ties for the tracks, since there wasn’t another mill within miles, thereby fulfilling his contract.
Mr. Abbot blinked. “That beats all,” he said, but he sounded subdued. Skye hadn’t expected him to be the least bit daunted by her threat, since it was largely an empty one, but apparently he had taken it to heart. “Don’t know what the world’s coming to, when a new bride’ll steal business from her own husband—”
“I’ll find out,” Skye warned ominously, probably overplaying her hand a little but emboldened by her success in buffaloing Mr. Abbot, “if you tell.” With that, she counted out the fee for sending the wire, slapping each coin down onto the counter with a little flourish, and waited obstinately while Mr. Abbot tapped out the words that would change everything—for better or for worse.
Megan came to call first thing the next morning and took in the wonders of Jake’s house with amazement. The last time Megan or any of them had been inside the mansion, Jake had been courting Christy. He’d ordered all sorts of fancy furnishings to please her back then, things it looked as though no one had touched since.
“This is even bigger than Granddaddy’s place,” Megan said when she and Skye were seated in the great, echoing parlor, sipping tea.
“Umm,” Skye replied. The house seemed cold and imposing, and she would have preferred to live on Primrose Creek, with Jake and young Hank, of course, in the simpler place she’d planned so carefully in her mind. “That was different,” she said at some length. “The farm, I mean. That house was always brimming with noise and music and—well— life . This place is like a museum.”
Megan looked impish. “Are you complaining, Skye McQuarry Vigil? If so, I must say that you lack conviction—your eyes sparkle, and your skin glows. You look like you’re going to start singing for joy at any moment.” She lowered her voice and leaned forward in her velvet chair. “Is it wonderful? Being married, I mean?”
“Married?” Skye echoed, a little stupidly.
“You know,” Megan persisted. “Married.”
Color throbbed in Skye’s face. “Oh,” she said.
Megan would not let the subject go. “Well?”
“Yes,” Skye admitted in an embarrassed rush, unable to keep herself from beaming. “And don’t ask me to tell you any more, because I positively will not, Megan McQuarry.”
Megan settled back, grinning. “I wouldn’t dream of prying,” she lied. Prying was her calling in life.
Just then, Hank burst through the front door and appeared in the parlor doorway. His eyes were enormous, and there was no color in his face at all. “There’s a fire comin’!” he yelled.
For Skye, everything stopped for a moment, the world, time itself, even her heartbeat. It was the thing they had most feared, all of them, and it had come upon them. “What?”
“Pa sent me to tell you Mr. Hicks is comin’ with a wagon. We’re supposed to pack up whatever we can and head for the low country—”
Skye and Megan were both on their feet in an instant, racing toward the front door. They reached it at the same time and stared in horror at the rim of black, roiling smoke surging along the western horizon. The blaze was big, and though it was still far away, it looked as if it was headed straight for Primrose Creek.
“I’ll be needed at home,” Megan cried, and dashed down the walk to mount Speckles, the mare she’d left tethered to the fence. She didn’t bother with decorum but planted one foot in the stirrup, swung the other leg over the saddle, and rode astride.
Skye thought anxiously of Bridget and Trace, of Noah and the twins and all the horses and cattle, but unlike Megan, she did not bolt for the homestead. She was a married woman now, responsible for a child, and if she’d gone flying off to help her sister and cousins, Bridget would have been the first to tell her to go home and look after her own.
She turned quickly and smoothed Hank’s hair back from his worried face. “Where is your pa? Over at the mill?”
Hank nodded vigorously. “We’d better get movin’,” he said. “Pa said he’d whup me good if I didn’t mind him, ’cause there’s no time to waste!”
The acrid scent of smoke reached Skye then, souring the spring breeze that had made the earlier part of the day so pleasant. Tears burned in her eyes. Perhaps it wouldn’t matter now, that she’d gone behind Jake’s back and offered to sell the timber on her land to the railroad. If that fire kept traveling in the same direction, there wouldn’t be any timber.
“You go into the parlor,” she said calmly, laying a hand on Hank’s skinny little shoulder, “and gather as many of the books together as you can. I’ll fetch blankets and food.”
Hank nodded and raced toward his father’s study. If he questioned the wisdom of saving books instead of other, more practical items, such as chairs and washtubs, pots and pans and butter churns, he didn’t say so.
Mr. Hicks appeared with the wagon only minutes later, and, as the air grew thicker and sootier and more difficult to breathe, Skye wondered with real despair if all of Nevada was on fire. Still, she raced back and forth, helping to load the wagon. When it was full, she urged Hank up into the box and turned toward the mill, searching through the billowing smoke for her husband.
Jake was striding across the road, and, reaching her, he took her by the shoulders and kept on going, shuffling her along with him, until they were beside the wagon. “Head down the mountain, Skye,” he rasped. “Go as far as you can tonight. I’ll look for you at Fort Grant first, and if I don’t find you there, I’ll come to Virginia City.”
Skye was horrified. It had not occurred to her that she and Hank would be leaving without Jake. It was unthinkable—they were a family, the three of them. They belonged together, no matter what.
He must have read her thoughts, for before she could speak, Jake put a finger under her chin and lifted, closing her mouth. “For once in your life,” he said, “don’t argue with me. This whole mountain could go up if we don’t stop that fire. All the men are staying to fight it, and, frankly, we don’t need anything else to worry about!”
She looked around, saw for the first time in her panic that the road was already thick with fleeing wagons and buckboards. Where, she wondered desperately, were Bridget and her children? What of Christy and the new baby, little Joseph? What would happen to the houses, the barns, the livestock?
Jake hoisted her into the wagon. “Go,” he said.
She gazed down at him for a long moment, loving him, but unable to say it, even then, for fear he would turn away. “I’ll be back,” she said. “Once Hank is safe at Fort Grant, I’m coming straight back.”
“Don’t you dare,” Jake warned. His jawline looked hard, and she knew he wasn’t fooling. “I mean it, Skye.”
She took up the reins. “So do I,” she answered, and guided the wagon around in a wide arc, joining the exodus from Primrose Creek.
Chapter
6
A s a McQuarry, Skye was possessed of many singular characteristics, but a propensity for blind obedience did not number among them. Her intentions were as firmly set as her jawline while she drove the team and wagon ever further,
ever faster, away from nearly everyone and everything she held dear. She would go back. As soon as she could, she would return to Primrose Creek and battle the fire herself, hand-to-hand. After all, she had as much to lose as anybody else.Smoke chased the noisy band of scrambling escapees, rolling over them like some dark, acrid tide, causing Skye’s eyes to burn, as dry as if she’d opened the door of a blast furnace and peeked inside. It was hard to see the road, harder still to breathe. Deer sprang alongside the track now and then, fleeing the flames, and small animals—squirrels, raccoons, and rabbits mostly—scampered in the ruts and in the ditches, their high-pitched squeals adding to the din.
Beside her in the wagon box, Hank crouched on the floor, with Mr. Hicks’s bandanna pressed to his face. His eyes were enormous with fright as he looked up at Skye, his knuckles white where he gripped the seat with one hand and the side of the box with the other.
Hurry, urged the voice of instinct, hurry. And Skye listened. She stood, reins in hand, feet set to hold her balance, and drove the already-lathered team harder, and then harder yet. Squinting through the smoke, when she dared to look away from the road ahead, Skye glimpsed Bridget and Christy in a shared wagon, comforting the smaller children in the back while Caney held the traces, traveling at a pace to rival Skye’s own. Megan rode alongside on her spirited mare, with Noah behind her, his little arms clenched tightly around her middle.
Noah had always been Skye’s special charge, and her heart went out to her nephew, finding its way through the smoke and soot and fear. He must have felt her regard, for he turned his head immediately, and their eyes connected.
She smiled at him, willing him to know that she thought he was being very, very brave.
Skye did not know how far they’d traveled, the McQuarry women and their various charges, the townswomen and theirs, when they were met by a large contingent of cavalrymen from Fort Grant. Uniforms already stained with soot, prepared for a fight that might well mean life or death to some of them, as to a great many secret and cherished dreams hiding in the hearts of all these terrified but determined women and children, Skye thought those soldiers were among the most splendid sights she’d ever seen.
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