A relieved, albeit sad, smile tipped up the corners of Vivian’s lips. She offered a nod. “That’s wise, Clay. After all, He’s the one who brought you here to minister.” She rose and left the hut.
Allowing his eyes to slip closed, Clay rasped a heartfelt prayer: “You brought me here, God. Please tell me how far this ministry is intended to reach.” He fell asleep before he received an answer.
Lizzie sat in a slice of shade behind her cabin and stitched a blue bead into place, completing another delicate forget-me-not. She held the coat at arm’s length and admired the row of blossoms dancing from shoulder to shoulder. Perfect. She showed the coat to Martha, who lay on the grass nearby. “What do you think?”
Martha raised one ear, tipping her head as if forming an opinion. She gave a yip, and Lizzie smiled. Then her smile faded, her gaze drifting in the direction of Gwichyaa Saa. Had Clay recovered? Did Vivian need salve? She wished someone would come and let her know how they were doing.
As much as she appreciated Martha’s faithful presence, talking to the dog wasn’t the same as talking to Vivian. The past days had been lonelier than those prior to Vivian and Clay Selby’s arrival. Having experienced human companionship, she felt a keener absence now that it was gone.
“I don’t know why I’m completing the coat,” Lizzie told Martha as she reached into the little hide pouch at her hip for a green bead. She held the little bead to the light, envisioning an entire leafy vine trailing down the coat’s front. “My grandmother will surely never accept it now that I’ve done Clay such harm.” Her chest ached with the remembrance. If only one could turn back time. If given a second chance, she wouldn’t squeeze the trigger. The picture of him crumpling, then lying white and still on the fern-strewn pathway would haunt her forever. “But I need something to do—to keep myself busy until my garden is ready to harvest.”
By the time Lizzie had returned to her cabin after leaving the food bags near the village, she’d decided she would leave for California at the end of the growing season. Clay and Vivian could make use of the extra food stores, and allowing her plants to wither and die, unattended, went against her conscience. Two more months. She could stay here, alone, two more months if it meant the opportunity to make restitution to the missionary pair. But then she would have to leave and never look back. The feelings for Clay rising to life deep inside her couldn’t be allowed to blossom. Leaving was her only option.
Lizzie rubbed Martha’s stomach with her bare foot as she continued stitching. “I’ll do as much on the coat as I can with the time I have. It won’t be as nice as the one I’d planned to give to Vitse, but it will still fetch a good price in White Horse.” One of the traders in the town especially liked native clothing—he sold the pieces to a man who ran a Wild West show in America. Lizzie didn’t know what he meant by a Wild West show, but she would gladly allow him to fill her pocket with coins. She’d need all the travel money she could get.
Her hands fell idle as she tried to envision California. Pa had been gone for so long, she’d nearly forgotten his stories of living in the city. She knew he’d had a big house, because he often complained about the small size of their cabin, and she knew his family was wealthy because he frequently bragged to Mama about his fortune in furs being equal to his father’s success in the ’49 gold rush. Lizzie recalled asking him why he didn’t search for gold in Alaska like so many others were doing, and he’d laughed and said, “Why should I get my hands dirty? Furs are cleaner.” Lizzie hadn’t understood his meaning—preparing furs was stinky work. But when Papa laughed, she laughed too, and the meaning hadn’t mattered nearly so much as his joyfulness.
Martha whined, reminding Lizzie she wanted more scratching. Lizzie bobbed her foot and carefully applied another bead to the coat. Green beads, like Vivian’s eyes. And blue beads, like Pa’s eyes. Her eyes, too. She let her eyelids slip closed as an image of her father appeared in her memory. Voss Dawson—tall, slender, with thick hair that stood on end and a beard so full and soft she could lose her fingers in it. A learned man who taught her to read, write, and cipher before her seventh year. A rugged man who trained her to be self-sufficient. A man who claimed to love her, and then left her behind.
In her memory, she heard her father’s voice—“Never forget, Lizzie, you have a father in San Francisco who loves you.” She’d never forgotten. And soon she’d see him face-to-face. Would he be proud of the woman she’d become?
Tears stung behind Lizzie’s eyelids. Before she could go, she had work to complete. She sniffed, opened her eyes, and determinedly returned to stitching. Martha fell asleep, stretched out in the grass. The breeze teased Lizzie’s hair as she stitched, weaving the vine that would eventually reach from the coat’s neckline to the hem. The vine was the length of her hand from longest fingertip to wrist when Martha suddenly growled and jumped to her feet. Fur bristling, she stared into the brush.
Lizzie set the coat aside and grabbed for her ready rifle. Whoever neared, it was a stranger—Martha wouldn’t respond so suspiciously to someone with a familiar scent. The dogs in the pen came to attention, their pointed snouts aimed in the same direction Martha looked. Martha growled again, crouching into a position of attack. Her lips curled back to reveal white, pointed teeth.
Lizzie soothed, “Easy, girl, easy. Stay . . .” She would reverse her words if the visitor proved to be a threat.
Suddenly, two little heads popped up above the pin cherry bushes. Two pairs of dark eyes met Lizzie’s. Lizzie relaxed her tense shoulders. “Down, Martha.”
Martha sank down, releasing a low-toned growl of complaint. The other dogs added their whines and growls to Martha’s. Lizzie leaned her rifle against the cabin wall and strode across the yard to greet the two little visitors. Naibi ran straight to Lizzie, but Etu headed toward the dog pen.
“Etu, no! They bite!” Lizzie called in Athabascan.
The boy slowed his pace momentarily, but then he dashed to the pen and curled his fingers in the wire. The dogs went wild. Lizzie, fear making her clumsy, ran over. To her surprise, rather than snarling with fur on end, the dogs wagged their tails and lolled their tongues in a happy welcome while leaping against the fence.
Etu grinned up at her. “They like me.”
Naibi skipped over to join Etu. She poked her hand into the pen, and Martin, Dolly, and Thomas all competed to lick it. Martha loped across the yard and sniffed the back of Naibi’s head. Naibi giggled wildly, hunching her shoulders. Then she turned around and wrapped her arms around Martha’s broad neck. Martha swiped the child’s cheek with her tongue.
Lizzie watched in amazement as the dogs made friends with the two children. A wishful idea formed: If only Etu and Naibi had a father who might be interested in purchasing her team. Then she could leave, assured the dogs would at least be loved by the children. Or maybe she could gift the children with the dogs. Their grandmother would surely benefit from having the animals to pull the travois or sled. She discounted the thought. The grandmother didn’t have enough food for the children—the dogs would starve if left with Etu, Naibi, and their vitse. Leaving them with strangers would be hard for her, but she had to consider their welfare.
Lizzie allowed the children and the dogs several minutes of play, and then she tugged the children away from the pen. Although a part of her thrilled to have the unexpected company, she knew she couldn’t encourage the children to seek her out. She put her hands on her hips. “Does your grandmother know you’re this far away from the village?”
The pair exchanged guilty looks.
“You didn’t ask her permission?”
They shook their heads in unison, hands linked behind their backs. They looked so innocent, Lizzie had a difficult time not smiling. But she couldn’t encourage them to run all over the woods, unattended. Her pulse raced when she thought about the various dangers that could befall two small children.
“It isn’t safe to venture so far through the woods by yourself.” She turned a stern gaze on Etu, the
older and—supposedly—more responsible of the pair. “What would you do if you came upon a bear?”
Etu puffed his chest. “I have a knife.” He patted a tiny, scarred sheath hanging on a length of rawhide around his waist. “I would protect Naibi.”
Lizzie snorted. She hated to dash the boy’s pride, but his knife wouldn’t intimidate a gopher. “A knife like that would only tickle a bear and make him mad.” She shook her head. “Etu, you need to use good judgment. Naibi depends on you.”
Naibi pulled on her lower lip with one finger and rocked from side to side. The little flowered dress, its hem now torn and muddied, swayed above her dirty bare feet. “Etu takes good care of me. That is why he brought me here.”
Etu nudged her, his brows forming a V.
Naibi shifted away from him, her expression guileless. “He remembered you said you had lots of food. And we are hungry.”
Compassion filled Lizzie, followed by a rush of concern. “Did you tell Vivian about the food I left in the bushes?”
Etu nodded his head hard. “We showed her where you put it. And we helped her carry it into the log house Mister Clay builds.” Then he shrugged. “But she gave us none of it.”
Lizzie wondered why Vivian would be so thoughtless. Didn’t she realize the children were hungry? Or was she too busy taking care of Clay to think about anyone else? “I do have food, and I will feed you today. But”—she forced a firm tone—“you may not come here whenever you choose for something to eat. It is unsafe for you to be in the woods on your own, and members of the tribe are not supposed to visit me. So do not come again, do you hear me?”
Both children nodded. Etu said, “We will not come here on our own again.”
Naibi skipped forward and clasped Lizzie’s hand, beaming up with her gap-toothed grin. She swung Lizzie’s hand. “Can we go eat now?”
Lizzie curled her fingers tightly around the little girl’s hand. The contact felt good. Her lips lifted into a smile. “Do you like baked acorn squash? And smoked salmon?” She didn’t mention the sugar cookies that filled a crock on her shelf. She’d surprise them with the treat.
Naibi licked her lips, and Etu’s eyebrows rose in anticipation.
“Then come.” As Lizzie led the skipping children across the yard to her cabin, she told herself she mustn’t grow attached to them. She wasn’t staying, and they were members of a village in which she wasn’t welcome. But even as she composed the inner warnings, she feared it was too late. Naibi and Etu had already captured a portion of her heart.
Chapter Eighteen
Vivian deliberately stayed away from Clay’s hut and allowed him the day to rest. And to think. She wanted to advise him on how to respond to Shruh’s demand for them to reject Lizzie the way the rest of the village had done, but harping at him would only lead to resentment. Clay was stubborn—maybe even more stubborn than she. So she busied herself using the flour the Mission Committee had sent to bake several loaves of bread, cleaning and roasting the grouse that had been foolish enough to get its foot caught in her snare, and carting all of her nonpersonal items from her hut to the mission building to give herself a little more space in her tiny dwelling.
By midafternoon, she’d given away most of the bread. Although she hated to lose so much of the food she’d prepared, she could hardly blame the natives for requesting a portion—the aroma was enticing and so different from the usual scents surrounding the village. But she wrapped the last two loaves in burlap and hid them in the bottom of a crate so she and Clay would at least get to enjoy some of her bounty.
She’d just sent two natives away empty-handed when a rough-looking trapper leading a gray-muzzled pack mule ambled through the middle of the village and approached the mission. Vivian stifled a groan. Had the scent of baking bread brought him from the woods?
“Good afternoon,” Vivian said when the man stopped outside the mission doors. “Is there something I can do for you?”
The man swept his battered hat from his head, revealing salt-and-pepper hair badly in need of a cut. “I be huntin’ a white woman name o’ Vivian Selby. I got a package for her—mercantile owner in Fort Yukon sent it out with me yesterday.” He turned his head and coughed.
Vivian waited for the coughing spell to pass, and then she moved a few inches closer to the man. “I’m Vivian Selby.”
His grin broadened, exposing shreds of chewing tobacco caught in crooked, yellowed teeth. “Well, then, right nice to make your acquaintance, Miz Selby. Here now . . .” He unbuckled one of the straps securing an odd assortment of items onto the poor mule’s bowed back. “Feller in town told me the writin’ on the box says it came all the way from Massy-chusetts, Yoo-nited States of America.”
He paused to touch his hand to his chest and look skyward, his expression reverent. Then he jerked a good-sized wooden crate free and plunked it on the ground at Vivian’s feet. It took great self-control to resist diving on the crate immediately. If it came from Massachusetts, it held gifts from Aunt Vesta and Uncle Matthew. Anticipation made her giddy.
But she coiled her fingers together and waited while the man adjusted the remaining straps, gave the mule’s rump a whack, and aimed another smile at Vivian. “Yes, ma’am, I told that mercantile feller I didn’t mind a bit makin’ a delivery—wouldn’t even charge him, seein’ as how the box was comin’ to a white woman.”
He laughed, but the laugh turned into another coughing spell. He stomped the ground, bringing the cough under control, then offered a sly grin. “An’ you don’t need to be payin’ me nothin’, neither. It’s enough of a treat just to take a gander at you, purdy lady.” He waggled his wiry brows. Tipping sideways, he let loose a stream of tobacco-colored spittle that landed very near the crate.
Vivian scuttled forward and pulled the box away from the man. She wished Clay were with her. The way the trapper looked her up and down made her uncomfortable. “Thank you for delivering my crate. If you’ll excuse me, I’d like to examine the contents.”
The man cackled as if she’d made a joke. “’Course you do, ’course you do.” He jerked on the mule’s reins, and the big animal stumbled forward a step. The man plopped his hat in place. “I’ll be moseyin’ on now. You have a good day, ma’am.”
Vivian waited until he rounded the bend at the far side of the village before retrieving Clay’s claw hammer and prying the top off the crate. She pawed past a layer of straw, then gasped in delight. A beautiful teapot and a pair of matching cups and saucers painted with pink rosebuds nestled within the folds of a mint green gown lovely enough to grace the high society luncheons in Boston.
Vivian lifted out the teapot and ran her fingers over the delicate blooms, her eyes misting as she remembered sweet tea parties with Aunt Vesta in her fine parlor. She scanned the beautiful but rugged landscape surrounding the mission. The tea set certainly didn’t fit the surroundings, but holding it gave her such a feeling of home. She hugged the little pot to her chest and sighed. “Thank you, Aunt Vesta.”
She set the pot aside and reached into the box again. A second gown, daffodil yellow with yards of snow-white lace, unfolded in her hands. “Oh my . . .” She’d thought the green gown lovely, but this one must be the loveliest ever sewn. Holding it brought another rush of remembrances, ending with a strong desire to return to the years she’d spent with her aunt and uncle. Away from the untamed prairie lands, she’d felt secure and safe.
Guilt fell over her so abruptly she drew in a strangled gasp. She didn’t deserve to hide away, secure and safe—she had restitution to make. And she would make it here, on a frontier even more rugged than the one of her childhood homestead. She started to shove the dress back into the box, but desire stilled her movement. Instead, she held the gown against her front and looked down its length. Her gaze drifted past lovely yellow flounces to a double row of creamy lace . . . to the toes of her scuffed brown shoes. A laugh trickled from her throat—such an incongruous pairing!
Sighing, Vivian crushed the dress to her aching h
eart. She would never wear this gown, or the mint one—they were far too fine for a missionary teacher on the Alaskan frontier. She gave a little jolt. But what about . . . ? She examined the gown again, her heart pounding in happy speculation. This was exactly the kind of gown that would fit well in the upper social classes of San Francisco.
She’d had Clay post a letter to her mother, requesting dresses, but nothing Vivian left behind in Oklahoma compared to the daffodil gown. Lizzie would have no need to hide in shame if she entered the city attired in the delightful, regal gown, with her hair pinned up. This evening, Vivian would pen an exuberantly worded letter of thanks to her dear aunt, try each dress on one time for the sheer enjoyment of it, and then find a way to present them to Lizzie.
“I shall keep the teapot and teacups, however,” she vowed aloud. Perhaps they’d improve the flavor of the herb teas she and Clay drank in lieu of imported black pekoe.
She folded the pair of dresses and began to place them back in the crate, but she spotted an envelope lying in the bottom of the wood-slatted box. Black, scrolled script formed a single line on its front: For my dear Vivian. The sight of Aunt Vesta’s familiar handwriting sent a coil of homesickness through Vivian’s breast. Even though she’d been sent to her aunt and uncle in disgrace, they’d never treated her unkindly. Returning to Mother when she’d finished school had been difficult, and when she thought of home, Aunt Vesta and Uncle Matt’s charming, gingerbread-bedecked bungalow on the edge of Huntington’s town square always came to mind.
Squatting beside the box, she ripped open the envelope and eagerly unfolded the pages. As she read, her hands began to shake. By the time she’d finished, the pages rustled as if caught in a stiff breeze, and tears coursed down her face. She crushed the pages to her heart, her head low. “What should I do? Oh, what should I do?”
A Whisper of Peace Page 15
