Frontier Engagement

by Regina Scott

  She shook her head. “I hope you know by now that I am immune to such things, Mr. Wallin.”

  “And I’d think you’d realize by now that some gentlemen around Seattle are desperate,” he countered. “What if they besiege you at the White River? Who’s going to guard your door?”

  She smiled. “You forget. I can shoot.”

  He sighed again. “Oh, but I pity the poor fellows.”

  Rina chuckled. “I don’t.”

  “You’re a hardhearted woman, Miss Alexandrina Eugenia Fosgrave,” he said. “But you sure can drive a team.”

  Somehow, that praise warmed her more than any of his other compliments.

  She drove all the way to their stop for the night. The rain had just begun to fall when he directed her off the main road into a clearing. A large well-tended log cabin sat along one side, with a smaller log shack opposite it near a wide barn. She could see smoke drifting from the chimney of the main house, and at least one horse shifted in the shadows of the barn.

  As she brought the horses to a stop, she caught a good look inside the shack, where more smoke poured from open windows. Inside, a beefy fellow with the singed leather apron of a blacksmith straightened from his forge to eye her.

  “Now, there’s a sight you don’t see every day,” he declared, plunging the iron he had been working into the nearby vat of water. He exited through the steam and approached the wagon. He had a rough face, as if each feature had been carved with a blunt chisel, and silver like smoke drifted through his curly black hair and beard.

  “How might I help you, pretty lady?” he asked.

  Rina looked at James, unsure of protocol.

  “This is Miss Fosgrave, destined for the White River school,” James supplied. “I’m James Wallin, and I have the privilege of escorting her as her husband to be. We were hoping for a couple of beds for the night and shelter for the horses.”

  Their host wiped his soot-darkened hands on his apron. “Robert McKenzie. You’re welcome to stay, two bits for bed and board, another bit for each horse. You’ll need to bunk in the hayloft with my other guests, Mr. Wallin. I’ll give the lady my room for the night so she can have a separate space.”

  So she’d be alone in a house, with James in the barn? She wasn’t sure she liked the sound of that. As Mr. McKenzie moved toward the house, she leaned closer to James on the bench. “Are you certain there isn’t another hostelry nearby?”

  “Not for ten miles or more,” James assured her, hopping down. “You take what you can get in the wilderness.”

  So it would seem.

  Either their blacksmith host had sharp ears or he guessed her concern, for he nodded to her as James helped her down and she started for the house. “You’ll be safe here, ma’am,” he told her, holding the thick door open for her. “No harm ever befell a lady at my establishment.”

  His dark brown eyes gazed down at her with seeming sincerity under his thatch of tangled hair. She wished she could believe him. “How many ladies have visited your establishment in the last year?” she asked, pausing on the narrow stoop.

  His brushy brows gathered as if he were remembering each face that had passed through his door. “Three, near as I recall. You’ll be the fourth. And just so you know, I treat every guest in my home like family. We may be cantankerous or sweet natured, but we all rub together nicely. I’m sure you’ll fit right in, Sister.”

  She could only hope he was right.

  * * *

  James couldn’t be more pleased with the way things were going. He’d managed to make several points against the White River on the way here. Her pensive questions told him he’d given her food for thought. Now McKenzie’s Corner was making his case for him. Rina had looked none too happy with the place, and he’d felt her stiffen at the description of the sleeping arrangements. Of course, he wasn’t too keen on them himself. The barn seemed a far piece to run if she was in trouble.

  So, he’d better make sure there was no trouble.

  He settled Lance and Percy in stalls for the night, then hurried inside. With the windows shuttered, the main room of the cabin was a cozy place, furs hanging to dry from the well-chinked walls, hams smoking near the blazing fire. A counter ran along one wall, behind which were crowded anything a traveler might want, from wooden casks for fresh water to steel traps for catching vermin. Strings of dried peppers, red, yellow and green, draped bolts of calico and wool.

  McKenzie presided over it all like a king in his castle, his tall frame squeezed behind the counter. And Rina was the queen. She’d perched on a stool across the worn wood planks from him, skirts draped about her, head cocked as if listening to a request to grant a boon. A small, older man with dark hair hanging to his shoulders and his lanky blond-haired friend were already bellied up to the counter beside her. By the skins they wore, James was fairly certain they were trappers.

  “John Deerlund and Francis the Rock or some such,” McKenzie introduced them, most likely mangling a French name. “Cousin Francis don’t talk much, but Brother John’s always up for a yarn. This here’s Brother James Wallin.”

  Deerlund smiled, displaying crooked front teeth. “A pleasure, sir. And it’s an even greater pleasure to meet your lovely wife.”

  Rina glanced at James as if waiting for his reply.

  “Miss Fosgrave and I aren’t married yet,” he explained.

  The smaller man straightened and said something to his partner, who frowned.

  Rina, however, beamed. “Ah, vous êtes Français, monsieur!”

  The Frenchman beamed. “Mais oui!” He launched into a long story that had Rina exclaiming and James scratching his head.

  “Do you speak the lingo?” he murmured to Deerlund.

  The man shrugged. “Enough to follow along. He seems to be telling her about all the places we visited on our last trip. Either that, or he’s proposing marriage.”

  That’s what James feared.

  Rina put her hand on James’s arm. Turning to look at her, he found that her eyes were shining. “Monsieur LaRocque has invited us to dine with him. Shall we?”

  He’d have much rather eaten dinner alone with her, but by the look of the cabin, that would be impossible. “I’d be delighted,” he told her. “So long as you translate.”

  “Avec plaisir,” she said, and he got the gist.

  He had a feeling he’d be sitting by the fire and listening to a one-sided conversation all night, but as it turned out, dinner was a merry affair. They gathered on overturned bushels and piles of furs around the fire, wooden platters in their laps. Their host produced a brace of ducks roasted over the fire, plus fresh greens, tart blackberry preserves, and corn fritters that seemed to melt in James’s mouth. The way Rina dug in, using a silver fork McKenzie had located for her, told James she was enjoying the simple food, too.

  As for their host, McKenzie and Deerlund kept up a steady stream of stories, from the first time McKenzie had tried to catch a salmon and ended up floating downriver, to the day Deerlund had surprised a bear eating the last of his supplies and chased it off with a branch. Even the Frenchman contributed a story or two, with Rina translating. James had never seen her so animated, unless she’d been talking about his horses.

  “So what about you, ma’am?” Deerlund asked, setting aside his empty platter at last. “Surely you have a story or two to share.”

  James perked up. She hadn’t said a lot about her life before arriving in Seattle. From the way she’d been educated and the skills she’d acquired, he expected she’d been raised by a wealthy family. Even if she had been orphaned, why come West? Surely she’d had friends and other family who had wanted her by their sides.

  “Oh, nothing as exciting as yours,” she assured him, rising. James and LaRocque rose as well, but she waved everyone back to their seats as she went to carry her platter and tin
cup that had held apple cider to the counter.

  Deerlund watched her go, then jerked his head. “So, you tell us, Brother James. What do you know of her?”

  James was watching her, as well. She set the platter down and carefully arranged the tin cup on top, but she didn’t fool him. It wasn’t organization but delay she was practicing.

  “Not enough,” James admitted. “But if she doesn’t want to share her past, I wouldn’t press her.”

  Deerlund seemed to accept that, for he turned to their host. “I don’t suppose I could convince you to play a song on that squeezebox of yours, McKenzie.”

  The blacksmith stood, his shadow climbing the wall. “I might be so inclined, if I had willing hands to clean up.”

  Deerlund and LaRocque volunteered. As they gathered the remaining dishes, Rina returned to James’s side. Her eyes looked dark in the firelight, heavy, and he didn’t think it was the day that had worn her down.

  “I should probably retire,” she told him, smoothing out the wrinkles in her black skirt.

  “And miss a good concert?” James teased. “It might be your last chance for music in a long while.”

  She shook her head. “They must have music out on the White River.”

  “Not like this, they won’t,” James promised.

  He’d heard the tales in town about how Robert McKenzie entertained his guests with his concertina. Sure enough, as soon as the room had been set to rights, their host brought out a small box with buttons on either side and a hinge in the middle.

  “What’ll it be, gents?” he asked, opening the hinge to reveal thick leather folds between the two halves of the box that sighed as they opened. “Something sweet or something with a little kick to it?”

  Deerlund, who had been leaning against the wall, straightened. “Something to make us tap our toes. I’m in the mood to dance.” He turned and offered his hand to Rina. “What do you say, Miss Fosgrave? Will you be my partner?”

  Rina dropped her gaze. “How kind of you to ask, Mr. Deerlund, but I fear my employer would frown on such frivolity.”

  Deerlund was the one to frown, but James wasn’t sure whether he disliked the strict rules she lived under or whether, like Levi, he had no idea what frivolity meant.

  James stood and offered Deerlund a bow. “Allow me to be your partner, good sir.”

  “Mais oui,” LaRocque said. “This we did long ago.” He slipped into French, and Rina translated.

  “Apparently gentlemen danced with gentlemen back in the early days of the fur trade,” she explained. “They had no other choice.”

  Deerlund chuckled. “Even fewer females back then, I warrant. All right, Wallin. I’ll dance with you. But I lead.”

  James slipped into falsetto. “Why, certainly, kind sir. Just don’t step on the toes of my dainty shoes.” He clunked his solid boots against the floor.

  McKenzie’s box let out a squawk, and they all laughed.

  Then he lit into a sprightly tune that set the dried peppers to rattling on their strings. LaRocque overturned the wash tub on which he’d been seated and beat along in time. James clasped hands with Deerlund, and they stomped around the floor, bumping into the counter, a pile of furs, each other. It was more fun than he’d had in ages.

  “À présent moi,” LaRocque declared, rising to push James aside. He and Deerlund spun around while James clapped in time. He glanced at Rina with a grin, then nearly faltered.

  Her eyes were drawn down, her fingers pressed tightly together in her lap, her lower lip caught between her teeth. He’d never seen anyone yearn so hard.

  “That tears it,” he said, reaching down and pulling her to her feet. “You’re dancing.”

  “But what if the school board hears of it?” she cried, resisting.

  “Then you can come back and teach at Wallin Landing,” he said. “We don’t hold against having fun once in a while.” And he pulled her out onto the floor with the dancing trappers.

  Chapter Eleven

  What was he doing? Was he determined to cost her her position? Rina nearly pulled away again as James spun her out onto the floor. Then Monsieur LaRocque flew past with a salute, and Mr. Deerlund patted her shoulder. Even if she could have stopped without interrupting them, the call of the music set her feet to skipping. Before she knew it, she was dancing along in time.

  She had learned the waltz and the polka from a dance master, but she’d only performed them at balls and always with partners who kept the proper distance, sedate, accomplished. James and the trappers had a different way of dancing. It seemed to involve nothing more than the touch of hands and a great deal of stomping. She could feel the beat echoing up from the floor into her heart as they swirled around each other. Their movements weren’t hard to follow, and she certainly didn’t see any harm in the effort.

  That is, until James put his hands on her waist.

  “Mr. Wallin,” she started, but anything else was lost in the shriek of delight as he tossed her in the air and caught her again.

  “My word, but that was fun!” She knew she must be grinning, and as widely as him for once. As if he appreciated it, he winked at her, took one of her hands and spun her around. The cabin became a blur of color, his touch her only anchor. But she couldn’t care. She was a bird, soaring over valleys, a deer bounding up a mountain. For once in her life, she was free.

  “Hand over hand!” Deerlund called, turning with her.

  They all began passing back and forth among the group, left hands to left, right hands to right, around in a circle. She knew a few country dances that included such moves, but none went to this tune. Indeed, she suddenly had three partners instead of one, and they seemed to be making things up as they went along.

  “Now promenade your partner,” James called as his hand met hers, and she found herself marching along beside him down the room as LaRocque and Deerlund followed behind.

  “Circle right,” McKenzie shouted over the music.

  Everyone joined hands, and around they went, moving with the notes. James’s gaze carried her along, encouraged her, told her she was amazing. She didn’t want to look anywhere else.

  “Now left,” McKenzie ordered, and her body bumped James’s as they changed direction.

  “Sorry,” she murmured, but he just gave her hand a squeeze.

  “Now thank your partner kindly,” McKenzie finished, lowering his arms at last.

  The concertina deflated with a mournful wail, and Rina felt as if she might crumple as well without the music’s support. LaRocque bowed to Deerlund, who clapped him on the shoulder, nearly oversetting him. James took Rina’s hand and bowed over it. She didn’t think the dance was the only reason she found herself breathless.

  “Another,” Deerlund demanded, rubbing his hands together gleefully.

  “Fine by me,” James said, giving Rina’s hand a swing. “I have the only partner I need.”

  LaRocque stepped forward. “Mais non,” he said. “Such a flower belongs to no man.”

  Rina started to demur, but the trapper took up her other hand and switched to French. “Many years ago, I danced another way, a more courtly way. Dare I hope you know it as well, Mademoiselle Fosgrave? The minuet?”

  Oddly enough, she did know the dance, though it had fallen out of favor years ago according to the dance master who had taught her. It was now only performed in court circles in Europe, favored by royalty for its impressive, controlled movements.

  “I would be honored, Monsieur LaRocque,” she said before turning to James and explaining the Frenchman’s request in English. She wasn’t sure how James would take the matter, but he released her into the trapper’s grip.

  The Frenchman requested a particular song from their host, who nodded and raised his concertina once more. Out came the strains of a slow, stately melody. Rina
and LaRocque moved to the center of the room. One of his arms went about her waist as they stood side by side. Step-together-step, step-together-step. She followed the trapper through the elegant forms. It was so prescriptive, so precise. She could not find the joy she’d felt earlier.

  James tapped the trapper on the shoulder and said, “À présent moi.”

  She didn’t think he knew the words meant “now me.” He’d was merely copying what the Frenchman had done earlier. LaRocque obligingly released her with a bow, and James stepped into his place. At once, the room felt warmer, the music softer.

  “Do you know the minuet?” she marveled.

  “I never had the benefit of an education like yours,” he admitted. “But I learn fast.”

  He proved to be right. In unison, they traipsed down the room. He performed the steps languidly, effortlessly, allowing her merely to react, to feel. He was the finest courtier at the king’s command, and she was the princess he’d come to convince. Every defense she had was falling to the sweetness of his look.

  The music stopped, and so did James. For a moment, they stood, gaze to gaze, breath coming as one. She didn’t remember there was another person on the planet until Mr. Deerlund began applauding.

  “Mighty fine dancing, ma’am,” he said, coming forward from his place along the wall.

  Rina curtsied. “Thank you, Mr. Deerlund.”

  “No,” James murmured, bending closer to her ear. “Thank you.”

  She tucked a hair behind her ear as an excuse to step away from his warmth.

  “That’s enough for one night,” McKenzie declared. “Best you gents finish the night with a nice game of checkers.”

  Deerlund grumbled, but LaRocque nodded toward the fire, and the two settled next to the glow.

  James didn’t seem disposed to release Rina’s hand. “Care for a game?” he asked.

  He was already playing a game she could not win. Her heart would only end up further bruised. “No. Now I really must retire if I’m to be ready to leave with you in the morning.”