Cinderella in Overalls

by Carol Grace

  After the door closed behind him, Catherine squeezed her eyes shut. How could he walk out on her now when she felt so close to him? When they shared so much? She told herself it was best that he had. What would she do if he were here on the mattress next to her, warm and vital and tempting her to forget what she’d said about going in different directions? But if it was for the best, why did she feel so awful?

  Chapter Nine

  Catherine thought she’d never sleep, but she must have because the next thing she knew she felt his hand on her shoulder.

  “The Island of the Sun, remember?” he whispered.

  Her eyes flew open and she swung her legs over the edge of the straw mattress. She gazed into his blue eyes, which contrasted with his tanned face. Running her hand through her tangled hair, she managed to smile in the semidarkness.

  “I hope you remember how to paddle that boat,” he said, returning her smile as if they’d never had that conversation last night.

  She nodded reassuringly and pulled on her long pants and sweatshirt over her nightshirt. Silently, as the gulls swooped overhead, they walked across the reed-lined path once again. They pushed off in the balsa boat they’d borrowed from Miguel under stars that shone in the thin mountain air, much brighter than in La Luz, brighter even than in Catherine’s backyard.

  Seated single file, they quietly dipped their paddles in the water and headed out of the lagoon toward the Isla del Sol. She didn’t ask him where he’d slept or if he’d slept. She wanted to forget about last night. And it was easy, as they paddled in perfect harmony, to believe their hearts and souls were also traveling on the same wavelength.

  She couldn’t see Josh, who was sitting behind her, but she imagined his muscles flexing as he pulled his paddle through the water. And she pictured his body bending forward and back in time with hers. When the moon set, it was a ball of gold in the dark sky. Catherine gasped at the sight and dragged her paddle for a moment.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” Josh said, his voice so close and so deep she could only nod in agreement.

  She reached over her shoulder, and he took her hand and held it tightly for a moment. She felt tears prick her eyelids at the sheer beauty of the sky and sea. She would never forget they had shared this moment together. Then they turned the boat in the direction of the island.

  In a half hour they reached their destination and climbed a steep slope to the first of the ancient terraces that rose like huge steps to the top of the island. In the darkness Catherine stumbled and slipped backward into Josh’s arms. Leaning against a large rock, he held her while she caught her breath. She closed her eyes and let him support her, feeling the muscles in his chest through his jacket.

  “Take it easy,” he murmured in her ear.

  “I don’t want to miss it,” she said breathlessly. “This is our only chance.” She reached for the rocky ledge above her, and with a boost from Josh she pulled herself up. In a moment he was beside her. “Thanks for being there to catch me,” she said.

  “I’ll always be there,” he said, his warm breath on her cheek. And he hoisted her to the next level.

  Always. Forever. Those were just words. If anything was forever, it was her farmland, as close to a sure thing as there was in this world, and yet it was gone forever.

  Near the top of the slope the outline of a rectangular pile of stone stood against the sky, the remnants of the House of Inca. One doorway was left. Out of breath and caked with dirt, Josh pulled Catherine up to stand there. Framed in the doorway, their shoulders touching, they stood waiting silently.

  Suddenly the sky in the southeast lightened and the sun burst forth in golden splendor just as it had for the Incas. Just as it had for centuries. Catherine breathed a sigh of pure delight. She looked at Josh, and he tightened his arm around her shoulders.

  “So Old Pedro changed his mind,” he said. “I wonder why.”

  Catherine stared straight ahead, watching the sun and the sky, not daring to believe that Josh, too, might change his mind. “He had a dream,” she explained, “where the padrón told him not to be afraid anymore.”

  Josh shielded his eyes from the dazzling sun. “If I go, will you come along?”

  “Of course.”

  Without another word they climbed down over rough stones from terrace to terrace until they reached the shore below and their boat. This time the sun and the wind were at their backs as they paddled to the village. The boat seemed to fly effortlessly over the waves.

  The wind ferry took them to the mainland. They carried their bags to the train station, over the cobbled streets, still feeling the motion of the boat beneath their feet.

  “When would we go to the mine?” she asked cautiously when they settled into the lounge car for the return to Castillo. She was afraid to ask, but more afraid not to.

  “As soon as I can get away,” he said.

  The words came easily, but Catherine noticed creases in his forehead. She imagined that his decision to pursue his father’s dream wasn’t an easy one. She wondered how and when he had changed his mind. Maybe during the night when he went out for a walk.

  Josh changed the subject and it occurred to Catherine as they ate their lunch in the dining car that Josh could talk about other things besides banking, like farming or lost civilizations, and he was always interesting. She’d always assumed that bankers’ wives must be bored out of their minds talking to their husbands about the prime rate and variable interest mortgages. But being married to Josh would never be boring.

  She felt the color rise in her face. How could she even think such a thing? What would the people in Tranquility say if they knew what she was thinking? That she must be lonely or depressed or homesick. But she wasn’t any of those.

  But when they got off the train and drove back to the valley she felt something that bordered on loneliness. Maybe it began when she saw her small house sitting there in the rain, looking as sad and neglected as a person who’d been deserted. Maybe it was when she said goodbye to Josh and watched him drive away. That was when she faced the emptiness of the house and the void in the pit of her stomach.

  She’d lived alone in this house for eighteen months and never felt it before. But she’d never spent every minute of two days with someone before. She made a fire in the cook stove and Jacinda, seeing the smoke from her chimney, came by to tell her it had been raining since she’d left. She put on her jacket and they went out to inspect the soggy fields. They unplugged drainage ditches, but it was too wet to plant. The tomato plants were sitting in pools of water.

  For two days she watched the rain come down from inside her house, feeling more and more restless. The only reason she ventured out was to make arrangements with Old Pedro for the trip to the mine. When they settled on a date, she sent a message to Josh and he came by the market to tell her Tuesday was fine.

  Catherine was ready at dawn. She had packed her boots and her down vest, her binoculars and her oldest jeans the night before. Then she had rolled up her sleeping bag and put it by the front door. Now she paced back and forth, wondering what else to take. She’d never been prospecting before, but she felt the excitement rise as she pressed her face against the rain-spattered window. Where was he? Would he never come?

  At midmorning a Jeep with rain flaps and a spare fuel can on the back pulled up in front of her house. Josh got out and came to the front door. “All set?” he asked, his eyes gleaming with anticipation.

  She nodded and her heart skipped a beat. Was it the idea of discovering a lost silver mine, or the thought of going there with Josh? Whatever it was there was electricity in the air, and she knew he felt it, too. She grinned idiotically, unable to contain her excitement. He smiled back and she peered over his shoulder. “Where’s Pedro?”

  “In the back. He wanted to bring his burro, but I told him we didn’t need one. We have four-wheel drive.”

  “Where did you get it?” she asked, impressed by its rugged exterior.

  “I borrowed it from a cu
stomer who has a ranch in Callajita.”

  He picked up her duffel bag and sleeping bag. She looked around the room. “I hope I haven’t forgotten anything. I have warm clothes. I found someone to drive the women to market....”

  Impatiently he beckoned to her, and she closed the door behind them. In the Jeep she stowed her basket in back next to Pedro. She said hello, but he only gave her a brief nod. She hoped he hadn’t changed his mind. Still, he was there, and she felt a sudden surge of confidence that they would find the mine.

  After they left the valley, the rain tapered off. An hour later Pedro leaned forward to speak to them.

  “He says you should leave this monster behind and pick up some burros to carry the equipment,” Catherine said.

  “How long would it take by burro?” Josh inquired.

  “Longer than the Jeep, but he knows they’re surefooted.”

  “Tell him this monster will take us farther faster. Like this.” Josh turned abruptly off the road and onto a rocky riverbed. Catherine braced her feet against the floor and Pedro’s eyes widened in surprise. “That’s four-wheel drive,” he explained, heading toward a mahogany tree where he parked under its gigantic branches.

  As they got out of the Jeep and stretched, dozens of brightly colored birds emerged from the branches of the tree and took flight above them. Catherine tilted her head back as they flew in a pattern against the morning sky.

  Pedro exclaimed and Catherine translated. “He says it’s a good sign. Parrots and toucans bring good luck.”

  “I hope he’s right.” Josh shielded his eyes from the sun. “We’ll need all the luck we can get.”

  Catherine opened her basket and spread a cloth on the ground. “We also need lunch.”

  “You brought lunch? I thought we’d drive straight through. I want to get to Santa Cruz tonight and pick up our supplies.”

  “Josh. You’ve waited all these years. Can’t we take a half hour for lunch?” She looked around at the mountains in the distance. “This is a beautiful spot for a picnic, and I made empanadas from Jacinda’s recipe.”

  He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “Fine,” he said. “Just so we get to the site tomorrow. If Pedro remembers where it is.”

  She handed him a meat-filled pastry. “And if he doesn’t?”

  He shrugged as if it didn’t matter. “We’ll come back and forget the whole thing.”

  Relieved at his change in attitude, she poured lemonade into metal cups for all of them. It didn’t matter if he was acting casually for her benefit. She could see he was more relaxed lounging on the ground with an empanada in his hand than he’d been a few minutes ago.

  As it turned out, they got to Santa Cruz with plenty of time to buy supplies—oil for their lantern, fuel for their camp stove and some food. Encouraged by their progress, Josh pressed on to the road to Tochabamba with night falling around them. He seemed driven by an inner force to get to the mine that night instead of the next day.

  With her nose pressed to the window Catherine heard Josh ask Pedro if he remembered the route, but there was so little daylight that he said no. The road twisted upward, narrower and narrower until it was only one lane and dropped off steeply to one side. Catherine closed her eyes and pressed her lips together to keep from protesting.

  Suddenly Josh swerved and stopped abruptly. Catherine’s eyes flew open. In the dusk she made out the words on a wooden sign: Lookout Point. They were in a clearing shaped like a semicircle and rimmed with rocks to prevent vehicles from driving off into the valley below.

  One glance at his white knuckles and clenched jaw told her he’d been almost as worried as she was and that they weren’t going any farther that night. Slowly she got out of the Jeep.

  Pedro followed cautiously. The older man obviously would have preferred his slower, safer burro ride.

  “Great view,” she said with all the enthusiasm she could muster. She tried to ignore the twinge of vertigo that hit her when she looked down at the white ribbon of road they’d just taken. “We’ve come a long way,” she remarked.

  “But we’ve still got a long way to go,” he said with a worried frown.

  Impulsively she wrapped her arms around him as if she could somehow ease his worries that way. “Maybe not that long,” she murmured, her cheek against his soft flannel shirt. “Tomorrow, when it’s light, things will look different. More familiar.”

  She felt the muscles in his chest relax as he leaned over and buried his face in her hair. “Did I tell you I’m glad you came with me?” he asked in a deep, muffled voice.

  She looked up at him, her arms linked around his waist. “I’m glad, too. This is the adventure of a lifetime. Your adventure. Thanks for sharing it with me.”

  He gave her a quick, fierce kiss. He wanted to share everything with her. Adventures, disasters, whatever came. But she’d made it clear that wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted to share her adventures with farmers in South America, helping them have better yields and better lives. As for him, he had to put his dream to rest, once and for all, so he could get on with his life. A life that didn’t include Catherine Logan. Suddenly that prospect seemed so bleak that he kissed her again, harder and with more intensity as if he could change things that way.

  Catherine stood very still, absorbing the pressure of his kiss, wanting it to go on forever. But she straightened and turned so that her back was to the steep drop-off. “Looks like a good campsite,” she said, still breathless from the kiss.

  “As long as no one else decides to camp here, too,” he remarked with a smile. Her relentless good humor cheered him up, gave him hope.

  “We haven’t passed a single car for miles. I think we’ll have the place to ourselves.”

  He looked around. “No place to attach a tarpaulin.”

  She shrugged. “We’ll sleep under the stars.”

  Josh nodded. He opened the door to the Jeep and folded the front seats down so that Pedro could sleep inside. Catherine lifted her wicker basket from the rear, glad she’d brought plenty of food and wine, glad that the worry lines between Josh’s eyebrows had disappeared.

  They all sat cross-legged around the tablecloth. This time there were no trees, no birds, only the stars overhead and, if one looked, the lights of the houses in the valley twinkling below. Catherine didn’t look. Instead she looked at Josh eating a sandwich of bread and cheese by starlight. He leaned back on one elbow and looked at her.

  “Do you remember the Fourth of July?” he asked.

  “We had hot dogs and champagne.” She looked up at the stars.

  “You wore a short skirt and a T-shirt,” he recalled. “It was the first time I saw your legs.”

  She smiled in the dark. “You wore a blue shirt. It was the first time I saw you without a suit.’’ It was the first time she’d thought of him as anything but a banker. Maybe it was the first time he’d thought of her as anything but a farmer. There was a long silence. With a friendly good-night Pedro retired to the Jeep.

  “You missed the fireworks,” he said. “I owe you a sparkler and some rockets. I owe you a whole night of fireworks.”

  Her hands shook as she folded the tablecloth and put it in the basket. In the stillness of the night his words hung in the air. He went to the Jeep, took out their sleeping bags and placed them on the ground next to each other. She pictured their bodies locked together under a starry sky, making fireworks together, but she knew she couldn’t let that happen. Not tonight. Not any night.

  She brushed her teeth behind the Jeep with mineral water. Then she removed her shoes and slid into her down bag. He was lying next to her with his arms crossed under his head. A shooting star sped across the sky.

  “There you are. Natural fireworks,” she said.

  “That’s not what I meant,” he growled.

  She sighed and turned her back to him. If she looked into his eyes, she’d be lost. She didn’t want to hear him breathe or imagine his arms around her. This was a discovery trip, an expedition with no
room for runaway emotions. No time for indulging in passions they’d later regret.

  Despite the hard ground, despite the nearness of Josh, she slept. She slept so well that only the sun shining in her eyes and the smell of coffee woke her up. Surprised, she blinked her eyes and sat up, the sleeping bag at her waist. Josh smiled down at her from behind a cup of steaming coffee.

  “Wait a minute. Where did you get that? I thought you couldn’t cook.”

  He tilted his head in the direction of Pedro bent over the camp stove, stirring fried potatoes. “I can’t, but Pedro can. Good thing. If we’d waited for you, we’d starve.”

  She got up and tied her sleeping bag into a tight roll. After breakfast they stood next to the Jeep. The deep crease was back between Josh’s eyebrows.

  “Would you ask Pedro,” he said, “if anything looks familiar today.” Pedro shook his head. Josh nodded curtly. “We’ll go on a little farther.’’

  Back in the Jeep Catherine closed her eyes so that she couldn’t see the sharp drop-off to the right. Around the next bend Pedro leaned forward and squinted into the distant hills that undulated under a bright blue sky.

  “The sleeping maiden,” he said slowly in Spanish.

  Josh met Pedro’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “Is that where it is?” He’d never heard of the sleeping maiden. Still, it was possible.

  “The mine is to the east.” Pedro pointed to a barren, rocky mountain. “That’s Tochabamba.”

  Josh slowed to a crawl as Catherine translated for him. “Fine. We know where it is. We just don’t know how to get there.”

  Pedro put his hand on Josh’s shoulder and spoke.

  “He says you can get burros from the ranch ahead, then follow the trail to the mine.”

  Josh’s eyes widened. “Is it possible that the ranch is still here after all these years?”

  Another twenty miles up the road was an arrow pointing west. The sign had fallen onto its side, but the letters were still legible: Rancho del Cielo. They drove down a rutted road and followed tracks made by the wheels of a cart until a ramshackle house came into view. It looked deserted, but when they cut the engine, the silence of the mountain air was broken by the braying of burros and the clucking of chickens. Catherine gave Josh a look of surprise.