The Drifter

by Lisa Plumley

  Even worse were the more immediate consequences, Julia soon discovered, when Graham turned to her and raised an eyebrow.

  “Surprise?” he asked as the boy trotted off. “What surprise?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  ’Twas passing hard to walk when blindfolded and led by a person wearing high-heeled shoes, Graham discovered. Julia had produced a long silky scarf from her reticule—the thing was seemingly bottomless, so numerous were the items she’d pulled from it since their acquaintance—and had tied it securely around his head to cover his eyes. Then she’d caught hold of his hand and led him across the street.

  Their wobbly progress was slow. It felt as though, in her fancy shoes, Julia walked about as gracefully as a swan on a rutted road—when Graham knew that wasn’t true. He’d watched her ladylike movements long enough to appreciate the elegance she possessed. He’d also glimpsed the seductiveness that lay beneath her propriety, and it was that which drove him near wild as he tried to match his steps to hers.

  “Almost there,” she assured him, sounding breathless. “Remember, no peeking. I want this to be a true surprise for you.”

  “It already is.” This giddy side to her had been a revelation to him, more akin as it was to sheer pleasure-loving woman than rules-abiding etiquette instructress. “And I’ll not peek. Else you might take out an eye, with tying this thing even more tightly than you did.”

  Scoffing, she adjusted the length of red fabric. Another surprise. Who would have guessed demure Miss Julia held a hidden fondness for bordello-red silk?

  “Nonsense.” Several more steps, and they halted. “And I know you peeked, because I saw you step around those horse leavings in our path.”

  He grinned. “Well and truly caught. But I never claimed to be anything but a bounty hunter, rogue and drifter.”

  “Rogue, first and foremost,” she teased.

  Graham shrugged, surreptitiously trying to detect what was going on around them. She’d led him seventy-two steps to the west. Onto the boardwalk, judging by the hollow clank of his boots hitting gritty lumber. Gaslights were on nearby, because he heard their hiss and felt their warmth to his right. And Julia hadn’t needed a key to open the door to the building he felt with his outstretched hand. It had to be Bennett’s Apothecary and Soda Fountain Emporium, as the boy had mentioned.

  But why?

  “Stay here,” Julia said. Her gloved hands pressed on his shoulders, as though he were a sapling to be planted in a spring-thawed dirt mound. “I’ll be right back.”

  Graham nodded, stifling a grin. If she thought anything but his own desire kept him there, she was mistaken. But the seriousness in her tone as she sowed his place on the boardwalk kept him silent.

  Shuffling feet moved nearby. One pair, two. Several more. This felt like a trap. And he felt like a fool. He was dying to snatch the covering from his eyes. If any of the desperadoes he’d tracked discovered him like this—trussed up like a clerk on his wedding day, hair combed and whiskers gone, wearing a necktie and preparing to submit to a mysterious surprise—they would shoot first and laugh themselves silly later.

  Then suddenly, Julia was there.

  Her hands touched his jaw, lingered a bit more than necessary as she made her way up on tiptoes to relieve him of his blindfold. “Ready?” she whispered.

  Her body pressed against the length of him as she worked at the knot she’d made, leaving him aching for more. “More ready than you know.”

  “Good. And—” hesitating, she stilled her arms over his shoulders and brought her mouth near his ear “—please remember. I did this because I care for you.”

  Silk whisked over his face, fluttering before his vision in the gaslight until Julia swept it aside and hurried away. Graham registered the bright expanse of the Emporium before him, recognized that he was standing alone in the doorway facing the inside…and then all hell broke loose.

  “Surprise!” yelled dozens of voices. “Surprise!”

  Neighbors, friends, Julia’s family…they all filled the room. He spotted Asa and Aunt Geneva, Isabel Deevers, Lizzie with her rooster, Patrick the delivery boy, Abbie and Jonas Farmer. The men from the livery stable beamed from their places in front of the soda fountain counter, their arms wrapped around their smiling wives. Mayor Westley raised a palm in greeting, as did the sheriff. Everywhere he looked, Graham saw familiar faces.

  ’Twas festive. Friendly. And so unlike the life he’d led ’til now that it brought a lump to his throat. Awash in emotions he’d scarcely felt before, Graham stood fixed to the floor. He hardly knew what to do. Suddenly his smile felt strange, his posture uncertain.

  Julia took charge, and in the process, saved him.

  “Ahem!” she said.

  A distance to his right, she cleared her throat, quieting the hubbub. She stood straight and tall, a wide smile on her face, and raised the thing in her hands. ’Twas a tall frosted cake, Graham saw, and it held a single burning candle amidst the swirls of sugary icing.

  “Ready everyone?” she asked, nodding toward the cake.

  A roar of yeses filled the room.

  “All right, then…one, two, three. Happy birthday!”

  The combination of dozens of voices was deafening. And heartening. To his amazement, Graham found himself surrounded by friends wishing him well. Hands grasped his, palms slapped him jovially on the shoulders. He was buried in “happy birthdays” from all sides. From somewhere near the druggist’s counter, the members of Avalanche’s city band struck up a rollicking tune. And through it all, Julia kept advancing toward him, balancing a cake the likes of which he’d never seen.

  “I hope this day agrees with you,” she said when she reached him. “It’s too long now that you’ve gone without a birthday, and you deserve better. I thought this day might do.”

  Her face glowed in the light from the candle, burnished with affection and flushed with excitement. Her hopeful blue-eyed gaze captured his, and in her eyes he glimpsed a sort of caring he’d never dreamed of finding. She raised the cake on its stoneware platter.

  “Make a wish,” Julia urged. “Make a wish, and blow out the candle, and we’ll all hope that it comes true for you.”

  The lump in his throat rose all over again. Graham couldn’t quite clear it away.

  “I could not wish for anything more than this,” he said. The hoarseness in his voice would betray all he felt, he knew. But he could not help it. “I’ve never had so much. Nor known a night like this one.”

  Understanding softened Julia’s features. “Then wish for something for later,” she said softly. “Please. It’s your birthday, if you’ll have it. There must be something you want.”

  Hearing their exchange, neighbors pressed closer. Their encouragement was rowdy, often ribald, and always warm-hearted. It touched Graham to the core, and lent him a lightness he sorely needed…before he blubbered like a babe over this surprise of hers.

  He held up a palm. “There is something I want,” he announced to the crowd. His gaze met Julia’s, and held. “’Tis unlikely I’ll get it, but a man can hope.”

  “Hear, hear!” Aunt Geneva shouted, raising her glass.

  “Yes, go on!” Asa Bennett called. “Make your wish, and we’ll share a toast.”

  Graham tilted his head toward Julia. “A man can hope,” he repeated in a low voice. “However unlikely his wish may be.”

  She understood what he asked. The knowledge was there in her eyes, in the quaver that briefly tilted her smile.

  “Indeed,” she said, “I doubt there’s a soul here without a secret wish, or two. Even me.”

  Her admission heartened him. If her wish were anything near his own, his future looked bright. Graham closed his eyes.

  I wish for Julia, he thought, and blew out the candle in a single breath.

  Cheers rose to the rafters. Grinning, Graham opened his eyes and found a mug of ale being pushed in his hand. He drank as the women clustered around Julia to help serve the cake.

 
The birthday cake.

  For him.

  The notion made him fair giddy, like a boy with a new plaything, or a man recently visited by the bordello’s finest lady. He laughed aloud with every jest, made many of his own, raised his ale in toast more times than he cared count. ’Twas his birthday, thanks to Julia—the first he’d ever had.

  How had she known he’d want this? He hadn’t known himself, had done all he could to discourage even the smallest talk of it. That night at the Bennett’s house, when he’d revealed his past as a foundling child in Boston, Graham had never meant to arouse such an impulse in Julia. In truth, he’d hoped she would forget what she knew of his past…the same way he forgot what he’d left behind, when he struck the trail each time.

  But this…’twas far beyond hoped-for. And all the sweeter for it.

  “Are you having a good time?” Julia appeared beside him, flushed and eager and bearing a piece of white cake on a plate. She took the ale mug from his hand, set it aside, and replaced it with the sweet. “Were you surprised? You’re not angry, are you? Some people don’t like surprises, and a man like you—”

  “A man like me needs them twice as much, I think.”

  Her smile was gentle. “Oh, Graham. I’m so glad you don’t mind. After Papa remarked that we should simply choose a birthday for you, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I decided there was no earthly reason not to designate a day.”

  “’Tis the nicest thing anyone has done for me,” he admitted. “And by far the most surprising.”

  He speared a bite of cake with his fork. Julia squeezed his arm, gazing up at him with palpable hopefulness.

  “You look as though heaven depends on my tasting of this cake,” Graham told her, hiding a smile. “Did you make it yourself?”

  “Yes. Well, I had some help from Alice.” She went on watching his fork, pinning the morsel of cake with an anxious look. “Aunt Geneva is helpless, you know, at anything involving domestic skills, and naturally, Papa doesn’t know anything more about the kitchen except how to retrieve just-baked cookies from the sideboard.”

  He nodded, and slipped the bite into his mouth.

  She watched, wringing her gloved hands, as he chewed. “That’s part of what I was doing while paying all those calls with you,” she chattered. “Collecting recipes and hints from every lady I knew. I thought surely you’d guess what I was up to, with so many inquiries about frosting versus glaze, egg yolks and butter versus egg whites and sugar—”

  “Aaagh!” Graham clutched his throat and rocked backward. “The cake! It’s…it’s….”

  With a little cry, Julia grabbed him. “Mr. Corley! Graham! Are you all right?” She looked desperately around them. “Oh, dear—someone help! I’ve poisoned him with my cake!”

  “…it’s delicious.” Grinning broadly, Graham levered himself upward. He dragged her to him and kissed the surprise from her face. Their friends shouted their approval, even as the woman in his arms realized what he was about and surrendered to his kiss—but not before a muffled protest.

  He couldn’t help but laugh as he thumbed a smear of frosting from the corner of her lips, and tongued the sweetness into his mouth. “Thank you. I may never get enough.”

  “You rogue!” Julia pushed away and swatted his shoulder, red-faced and laughing as she recognized his ruse. “You were teasing me!”

  He shrugged. “I had to make you quit chattering somehow. You were drowning out the music.”

  “Ooooh!”

  Graham grinned and finished his cake. It was the best he’d ever eaten…maybe the only he’d ever eaten. The fact that it sucked moisture from his mouth like hardtack, sat in his stomach like a buttered brick, and made his teeth ache with sugary sweetness didn’t matter. Not so long as Julia watched him fondly, and stayed there by his side.

  She delivered two more pieces at his request, looking all the while as though the sight of a fully grown man cradling a plate of sweets was the most amusing she’d ever seen. And looking proud, very proud, of her part in this day.

  They exhausted themselves with dancing, the men in town having helped Asa move aside the store’s furnishings ’til they stood against the walls and revealed a small square of floor space. They ate and drank, Julia turning rosy-faced and tipsy with the quantity of wine her aunt Geneva pressed upon her.

  Graham reveled in the gathering, in the closeness, storing up memories of this day. If he could have, he’d have stowed them in his saddlebags beside his letters from Frankie, and taken them out later. He’d want them, when an empty sky pressed upon his shoulders and miles stretched long between him and a friendly face.

  Suddenly downhearted, Graham separated himself from the crowd of boisterous men around him. Across the room, Aunt Geneva waved. The delivery boy, Patrick, chased his sister and five of her rooster-toting friends. Abbie Farmer, clad in a dress Graham would have bet his last ten dollars came from the Blooming-dale Brothers’ catalog, danced with her husband to the music that continued to play.

  Julia stood speaking earnestly with her father, her hat discarded and one glove missing. He watched her for a minute, but did not go to her. If he were wise, he’d stay away while she felt the effects of the wine. Already she’d pressed against him much more freely than ever before, and he wanted nothing she would regret to happen between them.

  She spied him, all the same. Just as he turned his back, Graham heard her high-pitched exclamation. An instant later, she’d clasped his arm and was beaming up at him.

  “Graham Corley, you rascal.” Momentarily distracted, she slipped off her remaining glove and tossed it over her shoulder. She smiled. “A very happy birthday to you!”

  “Thank you.”

  Friends slipped past them, some offering renewed birthday greetings. As it turned out, Julia had not revealed to the townspeople that he’d had no birthday until now. Instead, she’d merely arranged the surprise celebration as though Graham had been having birthday parties all his life, thereby safeguarding his past—and his pride. He was grateful to her for that. For that, and more.

  “But you look as though you’re sneaking away!” Julia said. She puckered her lips in a crooked tsk-tsk. “We can’t have that. Not before you’ve had your gift.”

  “There can’t be more.”

  She nodded. “Oh, yes! There is more. Come with me.”

  Tugging at his arm, Julia weaved her way toward the Emporium’s front door. At the threshold, she snatched up a lighted lantern someone had left there and carried it, swinging cheerfully, in her free hand. They stepped together into the chilly, pine-scented night. As they passed beneath the show globe and walked through the squares of light spilling from the windows onto the boardwalk, Julia chattered about how she ought to consider bringing everyone outside to reveal his gift.

  “But I can’t do that,” she told him, lowering her voice conspiratorially. She leaned tipsily nearer, making the last of the gaslight shine on her dark hair. “Then I’d have to share you with them, and I don’t want to. At least for now, you’re mine to keep.”

  She nodded in emphasis, her tone firm. Graham grinned. ’Twas passing strange to be claimed by a woman who held every opinion tight as a nailed-on horseshoe. Strange, but wonderful.

  “In that case, I’ll not try to sneak away,” he said.

  “Oh, you can’t! What of your wish? I’m fairly certain that escaping your own birthday party invalidates your wish.”

  “And this doesn’t count?”

  “Seeing your gift is a part of the party,” Julia announced after a moment’s serious deliberation. “I’m certain this is fine.”

  They rounded the corner. Buildings loomed nearby, huddled shapes against a starry sky. In the distance, the sounds of the party could still be heard—music, laughter, conversation, feet stomping in rhythm to some new dance. The air held a hint of woodsmoke, and it mingled with Julia’s citrus perfume to create a homey scent that Graham deliberately lay aside in his memory. The lantern light swung ahead of them in jerky
ovals, illuminating plain dirt, patches of grass and the rutted path ’round the side of the Emporium.

  Avalanche was the same as a hundred western towns he’d seen, Graham mused. Made of the same buildings, the same necessities, the same kinds of people. How then, he wondered, could it feel so different, suddenly?

  So welcome?

  “Ahh, here we are.”

  With a satisfied air, Julia plunked the lantern down on a set of plank steps leading to a doorway. ’Twas the shed where they’d taken their reading lessons, Graham realized. Now that he looked, its narrow lumber sides, sloped roof and small chimney could be seen straight ahead. He turned to Julia.

  “My birthday gift is an extra reading lesson?” he asked, unable to resist teasing her. “Damnation, but you’re a strict teacher, Miss Bennett. Some might be tempted to indulge the guest of honor, but you—”

  She laughed, and gave him a nudge forward. “No! Look closer. In the lamplight.”

  Graham began at the steps and sent his gaze upward. Three steps, a scrap of windblown paper, the bottom edge of the shed’s door, the door’s lower surface. He made it all the way to the doorknob before he paused, giving Julia a sideways glance.

  “You’re jumping around fit to rival a pair of dice in a saloon drunk’s hand,” he said. She’d hugged herself, he saw, and was making little side-to-side skips as she waited for him to discover this new surprise. “Are you sure you don’t want to just tell me what my gift is?”

  “Look! Look!” she cried. “Keep going!”

  He grinned, and hesitated apurpose. “So, let me get this straight…I’m supposed to look higher?”

  Her muffled exclamation made him laugh. “Yes! Yes!”

  “All right.”

  She was beyond easy to rile up. ’Twas part of what made being with Miss Julia enjoyable, he decided. Obediently, though, Graham tilted his head. He focused on the doorknob, the middle section of the door, the top of the door. Skimmed to the roofline, past the…the hand-painted sign? That hadn’t been there before. Graham squinted.

  “The Graham Corley Public Lending Library!” Julia read aloud, obviously unable to remain silent a moment longer. She clutched his arm as she gestured wildly toward it with her other hand. “Surprise!”