Frontier Engagement

by Regina Scott

  The sun was dipping toward home when he located the camp. He heard the voices first, whining, complaining. Then he caught the scent of cooking fish. Apparently the thieves didn’t feel the need to hide their presence. They had reason to believe they were alone out here. But they were wrong.

  Unslinging Pa’s rifle, he crept closer.

  They’d set up camp in a clearing just off the road where a stream ran down to the lake. Davy was crouched beside a fire, cooking a trout on a stick, while Nash brought back another armload of firewood. Their bedrolls were laid under the wagon for protection, guns propped in easy reach against the wheels.

  But what made James’s heart start beating faster was the sight of Lance and Percy. His horses were standing under a fir, their halters tied high on a branch so they couldn’t even lower their heads past their knees to graze on the greenery clustered below them. Their matted manes and tails told of their treatment. Had the thieves even bothered to feed them? Water them? He felt as if someone had shoved a burning coal down his throat.

  Suddenly, Percy raised his head, nostrils twitching and ears coming forward. He shifted, tugged on the halter as if testing its strength. The wind was blowing in from the lake, so James should have been upwind of them. Had the horse still managed to sense James’s presence?

  Now Lance stamped his feet, jerking against the halter, as if trying to turn his head and look in James’s direction. James wanted to reach out, soothe the horses, but he knew that would have to wait. First he had to take care of those thieves.

  He glanced back at the fire and frowned. Davy was still crouched by the fire, licking oil from his thick fingers. Where was Nash?

  He heard the double click of a rifle cocking behind him.

  “Put down the gun,” Nash said. “Now.”

  He’d never turn in time to shoot before he was shot. But to surrender Pa’s rifle on top of the horses and wagon?

  “Let me walk away,” James said, “and I won’t tell the sheriff.”

  “Now, why don’t I believe you?” Nash sneered. “Seems like those horses mean a lot to you. Haven’t found a fellow yet who’s willing to take them off our hands, and a few even tried to chase us down for them. Everyone knows they belong to a fellow named James Wallin.”

  “He sounds like an upstanding gentleman,” James said.

  The cold metal of the gun barrel touched his skin. “He sounds like a pain in the neck. Now, drop your gun and march. It’s time we figured out what to do about all of you.”

  James set down the rifle and rose, hands up. Nash bent just far enough to scoop up Pa’s gun, then walked James into camp and directed him toward the tree where Lance and Percy were tied. Percy nickered in greeting, straining at the halter.

  Davy scrambled to his feet at the sight of James. “Did he bring the law?”

  “Not that I can tell,” Nash replied, handing Davy Pa’s rifle. “Cover him while I do the honors.”

  Davy raised the gun and sighted down it at James’s chest. His partner crossed to James’s side and eyed him a moment.

  “Maybe we best make sure you don’t have any other weapons on you,” Nash said, eyes narrowed as if he didn’t trust James for a second. “Keep those arms up.”

  Fingers laced behind his head, James stood as the outlaw patted his arms, his chest.

  “I should warn you I’m ticklish,” he said.

  Nash didn’t respond to the joke. His poking and prodding had yielded a thunk, and he dipped into James’s pocket and drew out the miniature.

  James lunged for it. “Give me that!”

  Nash shoved him back.

  Immediately, Lance and Percy shifted, buffeting Nash on either side. He swatted them back with his free hand.

  “Stupid critters,” he complained, tucking the miniature away. “I’ll just keep this little trinket as a remembrance of our time together. I figure you owe me something for bothering with them. Now, sit!”

  James considered shoving past him for the lake, but if Davy was any kind of shot, the outlaw could pick him off before he reached the water. So he sat on the roots of the tree while Nash bound his arms back around it.

  Percy took a bite at the thief as he rose, but Nash twisted away before the horse could do more than snag his sleeve.

  “I’m sorry I ever laid eyes on you,” he told Percy.

  “I’m sure they feel the same way about you,” James said as Nash headed back for the fire. He tugged at the rope, but it held tight. Both horses lowered their heads to blow in his face.

  “I’m happy to see you, too, boys,” James murmured to them. “But we’re in a real fix now.”

  Davy seemed to think so, as well. “Maybe we should just shoot them all,” he said, face pale in the fading light. “Get rid of the evidence in the lake.”

  Nash nodded. “Might be a good idea. Looky what I found.” He pulled out the miniature and handed it to his partner before bending to retrieve the last of the fish.

  James felt ill. “Do what you want with me, but let them go.”

  Nash snorted, straightening. “They’re dead either way. They wouldn’t last a day out here alone. We already had to chase off a catamount that was drooling over them.”

  Davy had been studying the miniature. Now he slipped it into his pocket and raised his head. “Then let’s leave them all. I can’t take this no more.”

  As if Lance and Percy knew the robbers had reached their limit, both horses raised their heads and bugled, stomping at the ground, thrashing against their ties. James had to press himself back against the tree to keep from being trampled.

  Davy clapped his hands over his ears. “Make them stop!”

  Nash snapped up Pa’s rifle and aimed it at the horses.

  “Don’t!” James cried. Breath coming fast, he lowered his voice and tried to catch Lance’s eye.

  “Easy,” James called. “Easy, gents. There now. Quiet.”

  At the sound of his voice, they settled. Lance lowered his head and blew a breath against James’s hair. Percy snorted in annoyance at the thieves.

  Nash eyed James. “Well look at that, Davy. They listen to him well enough.”

  He turned to his partner. “I can see we’ve been trying to sell to the wrong folks. None of these farmers is ever going to take a chance on them horses. They all know the beasts belong to this fellow. We need to find men like us, who won’t care where the horses came from.”

  Davy nodded slowly. “All right, but what about him?”

  Nash glanced James’s way. “We’ll take him along to keep the horses biddable until we can find a buyer. He won’t risk us shooting them.”

  With a sinking feeling, James knew Nash was right.

  “And then what?” Davy pressed.

  “Then,” Nash said, fingers tightening on the gun, “we leave him in the deep woods for the catamounts to play with.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Rifles slung over their shoulders, Simon and John jumped out of the second dugout, their boots splashing in the clear waters of Lake Union as they hauled the boat ashore with Rina clutching the side. She hadn’t been sure of the craft when she’d first seen it, but it had borne them safely across the lake to the area where Simon was certain James had landed. As the men released it, she rose and stepped out, half boots crunching on the pebbles and dried moss that littered the area.

  She hadn’t been sure of her attire, either. Both the White River school and the Fosgraves would have been shocked by the outfit Beth had put together for her.

  “You can’t wander around in the woods in a dress,” the girl had said, rummaging around in various chests upstairs at the Wallin main cabin.

  “I did before,” Rina had pointed out.

  Beth had raised her head and her brows. “And look how well that turned out.”

&
nbsp; She had insisted on something more practical. So now Levi’s trousers were cinched at Rina’s waist with her leather belt and puddled over her half boots. James’s dress shirt was tucked into the trousers, sleeves rolled up at the wrist. With her cloak slung about her shoulders, she thought she looked more like the outlaws they hunted than the schoolteacher she had once dreamed of becoming.

  A dream that had come true because of James.

  She drew in a deep breath of the moist air. He had to be safe. Oh, he could be so bold, so rash, but this time, just this time, he had to have thought things through.

  Protect him, Lord! He’s trying to do what’s right. Surely You honor that!

  John left Simon to hide the boat from prying eyes and went to study the edge of the forest. Rina knew he was looking for any sign that James had passed this way. Simon stowed the boat under an overhanging bush, then returned to Rina’s side.

  “No sign of the other dugout,” he commented, eyes narrowing as he scanned the shoreline. “James must have hidden it.”

  Rina frowned at him. “You sound surprised.”

  “I am,” he said. “It’s not like him to think ahead.”

  He was always so hard on his brother. “He thought ahead,” Rina informed him, pulling her cloak a little closer in the cool air as she waited for John to give them the signal to move out. “He planned this so he wouldn’t endanger anyone else in the family. He likely reasoned that they were his horses, so it was his duty to find them.”

  John motioned to them, and Simon started out for the trees. “You assume he thinks about his duty,” he said.

  “No, Mr. Wallin,” Rina replied, pacing him. “I don’t assume. I know James thinks about his duty. Perhaps he would confide in you more if you stopped picking at him incessantly.”

  Simon stiffened, but John clapped a hand to his brother’s shoulder as Simon and Rina drew abreast.

  “It’s in Simon’s nature to pick,” he told Rina with a smile to soften his words. “He prefers that things progress in an orderly fashion. Nothing ever truly satisfies him unless it’s perfect.”

  “There actually isn’t such a thing as perfection,” Simon said, but John poked a finger in his chest.

  “See? You couldn’t even let my statement stand.”

  “Because it isn’t accurate,” Simon protested. “I don’t expect the world to be perfect.”

  “No,” Rina said. “Just James, it seems.”

  John chuckled at the look on Simon’s face, then hurried to lead them into the woods.

  Following James’s path was fairly easy. He had not been attempting to cover his trail, and he seemed to know where he was heading. The trail led unerringly through the woods, always toward the east. The sun was low on the horizon, lengthening their shadows and slanting through the woods with a reddish light that made it look as if a fire was chasing them forward. The trousers felt odd against her legs, and she had to stop herself from reaching for skirts that weren’t there every time she climbed over a log or ducked under a low-hanging branch.

  She was glad when, a short while later, they came out on a wagon road, winding its way north.

  “Hoofprints,” John said, pointing to the shapes in the muddy track. “Those have to belong to James’s horses.”

  “And that one to James,” Rina said, nodding at the outline of a boot.

  Simon glanced up at the sky. “We don’t have much light left. Keep moving.”

  “I’ll go ahead, scout the way,” John offered, breaking into a jog. He disappeared around a bend in the road.

  “You’re wrong, you know,” Simon told Rina as they followed at a brisk walk. “I do not expect James to be perfect. No one is perfect. Our father was the finest man I’ve ever known, and even he made mistakes.”

  Rina knew he must be thinking about the widow-maker. “How awful that you all had to see him die. I know you must feel his loss keenly, even as James does.”

  “Pa’s death hurt us all,” he said, voice hard and eyes once more narrowed. “James no more than the rest of us.”

  “And there you would be wrong,” Rina said, shaking mud off one of her boots. “James feels it more. He blames himself.”

  Simon jerked to a stop on the road. “Did he tell you that?”

  “Yes,” Rina said, raising her chin. “And I think you blame him, as well.”

  He shook his head, hands tightening on the gun strap about his chest. “I never said that.”

  “Not in so many words,” Rina allowed. “But John is right. You tell him by word and deed that you doubt his choices, his actions. Believing that, how could he not think you blame him for failing to see the branch?”

  Simon’s look went out into the trees, but she thought he saw another clearing from ten years ago.

  “None of us saw that branch,” he said, voice softening. “James’s job was to look out for danger, but he couldn’t have seen the widow-maker from where Pa had stationed him.”

  Rina kept her gaze on him. “So it wasn’t James’s fault.”

  “Not at all.” His look came back to meet hers, and sorrow darkened the green. “No one blames James.”

  “Except James himself,” Rina realized.

  “I don’t argue with him because of Pa,” Simon continued, starting forward once more. “I argue because I don’t understand some of his choices since Pa died. He makes everything into a joke.”

  “He makes light of the world because he cannot dwell on the dark,” Rina explained, lengthening her stride to keep up with him.

  Simon cast her a glance as if he wasn’t so sure of her interpretation. “He wastes money on fancy clothes no one but us will see, and he bought horses better suited to race than to pull a plow.”

  “When you think no one else believes in you, you have to take steps to believe in yourself,” Rina countered.

  Simon gave her a hand to help her over a particularly rough patch. “And then he appointed a schoolteacher who had no experience teaching.”

  “A terrible fault to be sure, believing in someone,” she said, landing on the other side. “I was certain it was the wrong choice, too, until I met James.”

  Simon sighed. “Perhaps I don’t know my brother as well as I thought. Thank you for telling me this. If we find James, I’ll talk to him.”

  “When we find James,” she corrected him, “I will hold you to your promise.”

  They came around the bend to find John waiting in the brush as little ways along. Finger to his lips, he motioned them forward with his free hand.

  “There’s a camp just into the woods,” he murmured when they reached him. “The horses are tied to a tree, and so is James.”

  Rina’s breath felt tight. “Can we set them all free?”

  “Not easily,” John assured her. “I only caught sight of two men, but their guns are close to hand. I doubt we could get the drop on them.”

  “Can we circle around?” Simon asked. “Free James at least?”

  “There isn’t a lot of brush between here and there,” John answered. “Too great a chance they’d see us.”

  “Unless someone distracted them,” Rina said. “People rarely see what they don’t expect.”

  It was something Mr. Fosgrave had said once, and she’d only realized the truth of it when he’d confessed. It was her choice whether she followed in his footsteps or embraced who she truly was, a woman who was not above a bit of whimsy, who no longer feared to reach for the future and the man she loved.

  Simon and John were staring at her as if they guessed what she was about to suggest.

  “No,” John started, but Simon put a hand on his arm to stop him.

  “A distraction might work,” he said, gaze on Rina. “What did you have in mind, Miss Fosgrave?”

  Rina swallowed, fear gathering around
her like her cloak. She knew she must put it aside for James’s sake. You’ve taught me so much the last few days, Father. Help me use it to good purpose now.

  “I intend to give them an engagement they would never expect on the frontier,” she said. “Find me a good-sized stick, and I’ll explain.”

  * * *

  James’s arms sagged. He’d been rubbing the rope along the rough bark for an hour if the dimming light was any indication, but still the rope stayed tight. All the while his mind had been turning over his predicament, seeking another way out. Nothing had seemed likely of success.

  He should have asked his brothers for help, but he’d wanted to prove that he could solve the problem he’d created. He owed them that, at least. Now he was likely to lose everything—the horses, the wagon, his life.

  And Rina.

  He rested his head against the bark and closed his eyes. That was the greatest loss—the chance to grow closer to her. She brought out the best in him, made him want to be the hero instead of the clown. She made him believe he could succeed, could make a difference, if only for her.

  And he loved her for it.

  He’d held her back from the first, fearing just this reaction. He hadn’t wanted to fall in love, to risk his heart, to risk a loss as great as when Ma had lost Pa. Yet what had Ma gained? Love and a family and memories to sustain her. Surely loving Rina could bring all that and more. Winning her was worth the risk.

  Lord, protect her. I knew I was falling in love, but I couldn’t find the courage to tell her. I thought I had to be more than I am. Now I know she is all I need save You. Forgive me for failing again, her and my family and You.

  From deep inside, a verse floated up, remembered from family worship years ago. He could hear his father’s deep voice, so like Drew’s, reading from the leather-bound tome.