Rocky Mountain Redemption

by Lisa J. Flickinger

  “I was hoping to see Lou.”

  Isabelle smiled, and once again her full lips brought to mind others—soft, pliant. His heart did a little jig.

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Bailey. But Aunt Lou is indisposed.”

  “Where is she?” His voice sounded harsher than he’d meant it to. Why did the girl stir up such feelings in him?

  “As I said, she’s indisposed.”

  Enough of the time wasting, Preach. Keep your wits about you. “Tell her I need to speak to her, now.”

  Isabelle flinched at his raised voice.

  Preach’s belly knotted at her reaction. It was no way to treat a girl you intended to woo. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell. Would you find Lou for me?”

  “She left just after you and the men did. She and Joe went down the mountain to Stony Creek. They were doing the mail run and picking up kitchen supplies.” Isabelle jutted out one hip and folded her arms. “I was under strict orders not to open this door for any reason.”

  He lowered his lashes to half mast, taking in her pretty face once more—flour and all. “And yet you did,” he said softly.

  Isabelle cast her gaze past his shoulder.

  Preach stuck his boot against the base of the door to prevent its closure. “I need your help.”

  “My help? Aunt Lou said—”

  “One of the boys, Mack, is near delirious with fever. I think he might have come down with hand, foot, and mouth. If I’m right, it won’t be long before the whole bunkhouse will be down with it. I was hoping Lou might stock some fever tablets.”

  “If you let me close the door, I’ll check the medical supply box in Aunt Lou’s room. What else will you need?”

  Preach pulled his boot back to the packed dirt. “Probably a couple of pails of fresh water, to keep the men hydrated. I’ll send Will down to the creek. Other than that, not much we can do. It’s not fatal, but the men will be uncomfortable for close to a week. We had an outbreak eight years ago when I was working over at Svedberg’s. Every one of us was down with the disease.”

  Isabelle closed the door.

  It would have been warmer to wait inside, but it was best not to get her into further trouble with Lou. The evening’s chill had long since seeped through his sweaty clothes and was threatening to freeze up his bones. Preach rubbed his hands together to bring the heat back into them.

  Rustling and rattling emanated from inside the cook shack for several minutes before the door opened and Isabelle passed through two buckets. Each held several soft cloths and a couple of cups. One held the clear bottle of tablets he’d requested.

  Preach slid his hand over Isabelle’s to take the pails.

  Jerking back, she gasped and the pails almost fell from both their grip. “I’m sorry,” she said, whisking her long braid from behind her shoulder and worrying the frayed end.

  Snoop had been exaggerating. The thick braid would only reach to Isabelle’s waist—her tiny waist.

  “It’s all right,” he said in a soothing tone. “It looks like you’ve gathered everything I need. I’ll head back to the bunkhouse.”

  “Do you think the men will want their supper? It’s warming in the oven. Aunt Lou should be back soon to put it on.”

  “Hard to say how many of the men will have taken sick. I’ll check the bunkhouse and let you know.”

  “All right, then.” Isabelle nodded and closed the door.

  Preach turned with the pails to head to the bunkhouse. The girl was skittish, more skittish than any he’d ever met. But it wasn’t as if she could read his mind. She had no idea what the sight of her did to his insides. Or did she? Preach’s cheeks burned at the thought.

  She was scared. That’s why she’d jumped the way she had. Preach frightened her. Her hands had been shaking when he’d surprised her in the woods, too. Maybe it was his size. He couldn’t blame her. He was a giant next to her slight form. He’d have to be gentler. Isabelle didn’t need any more grief than he’d already brought her.

  Lord, help Isabelle not fear me.

  Perhaps she’d like a token. A bit more defining of the feathers, and the sparrow in the nest would make a perfect gift. Preach increased his pace. If there weren’t too many down in the bunkhouse, he could finish the sparrow and sneak back to the kitchen without Lou’s knowledge.

  He slung the pails to one arm and opened the door. Four of the bunks were occupied with men wrapped up in blankets. Horace and Alvin sat hunched near the stove.

  Sweet Isabelle wouldn’t be getting any gift tonight.

  Chapter 3

  Isabelle bent and scooped two pails of water from the creek. Her frequent visits down the trail no longer held any joy. The trips had lost their appeal about halfway through the third day of the outbreak. Preach had been correct—the men had come down with hand, foot, and mouth disease, owing to the poor hygiene of a handful of the lumberjacks and the close quarters in the bunkhouse.

  The night the men had taken ill, Aunt Lou had arrived shortly after Preach had left the kitchen door with the very buckets Isabelle was now filling. A good thing too. Aunt Lou had given several explicit warnings about not opening the door to anyone while she and Joe Pollitt, went for the supply run. She’d singled out Preach in her warning, claiming she hadn’t liked the look in the man’s eye when she’d come upon him and Isabelle at the creek earlier in the day.

  If Isabelle’s heart hadn’t almost thumped out of her chest when she’d realized she wasn’t alone at the creek, perhaps she might have noticed the yearning look Aunt Lou spoke of. Other than brushing by her sleeve, most likely by accident, Preach had been the perfect gentleman when she’d met him in the woods. Nor had he done anything untoward since. And why would he? The man knew the Lord.

  Isabelle would check the wood pile by the back door of the cookhouse when she returned. Preach had hidden a letter for her under a log each day since the start of the outbreak and Isabelle had replied to every one. He was an engaging writer, and shared tales about life in the woods and life on the farm. His love for the Lord, his fellow loggers, and the people of Stony Creek shone through in his words. He’d also asked after Isabelle and she’d been surprised by how easy the stories of her happy childhood, work with poor in Seattle, and service at her home church had fallen from her lips in spite of the secrets which had brought her to the camp.

  At the end of every letter he had enclosed a brief prayer for her, and she’d hidden the notes in her room under the mattress.

  Isabelle stared at the rocks lining the creek bed, all loggers were not as coarse or desperate as Aunt Lou made them out to be.

  As Isabelle trudged with the buckets over the dank soil of the path toward the cook shack, birds flitted overhead from the needled boughs of one pine to another, oblivious to the chaos within the camp. Every few steps, water sloshed over the bucket rims, adding to the dampness of Isabelle’s skirt and petticoat.

  Better wet skirts than a mouthful of blisters and an itchy rash on her hands and feet. Some of the men were suffering terribly from the same rash on their nether regions as well. No one was certain why delirium had taken a hold of Mack. The others suffered only mild fevers.

  According to Aunt Lou, no cure existed for the ailment. Preach and a man named Snoop, the only two still healthy by the morning after the outbreak, were keeping the ailing men hydrated with Isabelle’s buckets of water, which Aunt Lou delivered to the bunkhouse door. They also swabbed the men’s mouths with honey to help with the blisters.

  Other than hauling water, tasks in the kitchen had almost come to a standstill, as the ailing men had no appetite. Aunt Lou also delivered meals to Preach and Snoop three times a day mumbling that she could feed five people in her sleep.

  Isabelle plunked the buckets on the ground outside the kitchen door and checked the wood pile—no letter yet. “Aunt Lou,” she called, stepping over the plank threshold. “Two more for you. Are you sure you don’t want me to run them over?”

  Aunt Lou looked up from the she
af of notepaper on the counter next to a Zephyr Cream Sodas tin and laid the fountain pen down before smoothing the gray braid wrapped in a tight tower on the top of her head.

  Writing again? Aunt Lou wasn’t known as an avid correspondent. Isabelle’s family only ever received an obligatory Christmas note saying little more than “hoping all is well” and “best wishes for the New Year.”

  “No more than I did an hour ago, young lady,” she said, wiping her hands down the starched muslin apron around her waist, a gesture she used whether they were soiled or not.

  “Preach already knows I’m here, and the rest, except for Snoop, are bedridden. It’ll save you some steps on your ‘old feet.’”

  “It’s Snoop I’m worried about. The boy couldn’t keep a secret if he was paid to.”

  “Why do you continue to keep me hidden? I’ve met Preach,” and gotten to know and admire him, “he doesn’t seem like a bad sort. Perhaps the others—”

  “You don’t know what I know, and furthermore, the boss said no unmarried women at the camp, let alone one as young as you.”

  “You’re unmarried.”

  “Something else I haven’t been advertising, but the boss knows. I’ve been cooking in his camp for eight years, and I’ve never been any trouble.” She glared over the top of her wire-rimmed reading spectacles. “I expect you to behave as well.”

  After collecting the papers and returning them to the tin, Aunt Lou tucked the tin under a sack of oatmeal on the supply shelf. “There’s not much to do. We’ll make a couple of mincemeat pies later this afternoon—Preach’s favorite.” Tipping her chin up, Aunt Lou observed Isabelle from the corner of one eye as though judging her reaction.

  Isabelle settled her features into a smooth veneer. Preach’s favorite pie was mincemeat, a good thing to know. Thanks to Aunt Lou, Isabelle could now make a pie in less than ten minutes. “Until then?” Isabelle asked.

  “You can do some reading, if you like. I noticed you brought a fair bit of material with you.”

  Why was Aunt Lou going through Isabelle’s personal belongings? Was her room not private? What if she found the letters?

  “Did your father give you the impression you would have a lot of free time while you stayed with me?”

  “He gave me no impression at all,” Isabelle said. “In fact, he didn’t say a word for the entire trip until he told me which shack I was to find you in.”

  “Humph.”

  “I heard he and Mother arguing shortly after supper the day Archie and he drove me up here. I couldn’t hear what it was about, though. About half an hour later, my mother came to my room and cried as she packed my belongings. I’d taken to my bed with a headache that afternoon and missed my supper.” Something that had occurred more often than not. “Mother wouldn’t tell me what was happening. I suppose my father didn’t know what to do with me.” Worrying the end of her braid she lifted her gaze to her Aunt’s. “It’s understandable. For the most part, I don’t know what to do with myself.”

  “Perhaps staying here will help you figure it out. Don’t jeopardize the opportunity by being foolish.”

  A word used to describe Isabelle’s behavior so many times in the last months, she’d stopped caring. “I’ll be in my room when you need me.”

  Isabelle unlatched the door to her sleeping quarters as Aunt Lou bustled past to deliver the water. The tiny room, tucked by the back door, was opposite Aunt Lou’s matching quarters. The room held a single bed, fashioned from rough lumber, with a straw mattress covered in striped ticking. On the bed lay a thick feather quilt Aunt Lou had sown from bits of gray and brown wool, most likely fragments of worn women’s dresses and men’s slacks. Below a three-paned window high in the wall, a narrow desk served as a catchall for her wash basin, toiletries, and books. Pegs driven into the exterior log walls held her skirts, blouses, and petticoats. Although the pegs were convenient, sap from the oozing logs had left patches of amber crust on several pieces of her clothing.

  Closing the door, Isabelle glanced out the window toward the green of the forest. Aunt Lou couldn’t keep her hidden in the cook shack forever. Although, the fact that Isabelle had been at the camp close to two weeks and Preach was still the only one to find out was owed to Aunt Lou’s vigilance in supervising Isabelle’s every movement—other than the trips to the creek.

  A smile played at the corners of Isabelle’s mouth as she remembered Aunt Lou’s tumble into the water the afternoon Isabelle had met Preach. Aunt Lou would be horrified to discover the white of her bloomers had peeked from the folds of her skirt as she’d rolled down the bank. Most likely, Preach’s bulged eyes as Aunt Lou landed with a splash indicated he’d been subjected to the same spectacle as Isabelle. It was a marvel and a blessing Aunt Lou hadn’t been hurt.

  Isabelle rested a finger atop the three stacked novels she was reading simultaneously and traced a circle on the rough buckram cover of The Prisoner of Zenda, the lighthearted read she’d brought to boost her mood when she became maudlin. Cooper’s Pathfinder never disappointed in lulling her to sleep, and Studies in the History of the Renaissance kept her faculties from turning to mush.

  At Mother’s insistence, Isabelle had also packed her Bible. The beautifully tooled brown leather King James Version, a gift for her sixteenth birthday, remained unread, as it had since the spring.

  Isabelle snatched up the top novel in the stack. Today’s welcome respite from kitchen chores called for more of King Rudolf’s adventures. After climbing on the bed and tucking the soft quilt around her knees, Isabelle flipped to the fourth chapter.

  Several pages into her reading, she heard a light tap on the bedroom window. Glancing up, Isabelle could see nothing but blue sky and the tops of the trees at the edge of the clearing. Most likely one of the squirrels was up to its tricks again. They threw pine cones from the roof of the cook shack onto the stack of cut firewood. Occasionally, one of the pinecones bounced and struck one of the window panes.

  Isabelle looked down at the page but had only read a line when two more taps, in quick succession, sounded on the window. It wasn’t squirrels. She crossed the room and peered out.

  Preach? Why was he being so bold?

  Hands behind his back, a day’s worth of growth on his cheeks, Preach stared back at her. His eyebrows arched as though hopeful.

  Isabelle was in enough trouble with Aunt Lou already. If she discovered Isabelle had continued to communicate with Preach, Aunt Lou would demand Isabelle leave. She couldn’t jeopardize the blossoming relationship with Preach. Isabelle shook her head, “No.”

  Preach pointed to the door.

  Aunt Lou might be back any moment. Isabelle shook her head again.

  Preach smiled and shifted from one foot to the other.

  Why was he being so—“Oh.”

  Preach had brought one hand from behind his back. In his palm rested the carving of a small bird sitting in a nest. Although without color, the flawless shape and tilt of the bird’s head made it look as though it were watching her.

  Isabelle pointed at her chest. “For me?” she mouthed.

  Preach jerked his chin in agreement.

  Isabelle sprinted to the back door. “Where’s Aunt Lou?” she whispered through the narrow opening.

  “She’s in the bunkhouse helping Snoop. I didn’t get any sleep last night. She said I looked like death warmed over and sent me over to the boss’s quarters early. I wanted to give you this first.”

  Isabelle opened the door and took the figure from him. The delicate nest followed the curves of her palm. Although all in one piece, it looked like interwoven twigs. She ran her finger across the bird’s head and down its back. The fine marks on the body gave the feathers a realistic texture. The carving was exquisite. “You carved this? It’s such fine work.”

  Preach rubbed the back of his neck. “For a big oaf like me, you mean.”

  Isabelle glanced up. “That’s not what I meant.” She dropped her gaze to the tiny bird. “It’s so detailed, it looks
real.”

  “It’s a sparrow.”

  “I can tell.”

  Preach cleared his throat. “I’ve been working on it since we came out to the bush. It helps me…”

  Isabelle looked back up to search his expression. “It helps you what?”

  “Uh.” He shrugged. “It helps me to avoid thinking about things.”

  Like reading kept Isabelle from replaying the night of the May dance over and over in her mind. “I know what you mean.”

  He cocked his head in question.

  “You’re not the only one with thoughts you want to avoid.” Isabelle looked at the bird in her palm. She couldn’t resist and petted its tiny head once more. “Thank you, but I don’t think I should keep it. You’ve put so much work into it. It’s beautiful.” The precious bird should be given to someone important in his life. As she extended the nest toward Preach, she glanced up and saw that his brows were pulled into a tight furrow. “There’s no one else you’d like to give it too?”

  He shook his head.

  No woman in his life who would appreciate such a lovely gift? The knowledge caused her stomach to warm.

  “I want you to have it. Please.” His large palm, fingers spread, stretched toward her. “I didn’t know when I was carving it who it was meant for, but when I met you, I knew. It reminds me of you.”

  “The sparrow reminds you of me?”

  Preach’s cheeks colored a deep red as his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Well, the verse in the Bible. Do you know the one?”

  “Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows?”

  Preach nodded as Aunt Lou’s screech cut through the air from the path around the cabin.

  Isabelle yanked the door shut. It was as if Aunt Lou had a sixth sense when it came to Isabelle and Preach.

  “Open that door!”

  Isabelle stepped outside, balancing the nest in her palm.

  Aunt Lou approached Preach and Isabelle, arms pumping like a soldier’s, fury twisting her features. “Why am I not surprised? I figured I should come and see what the two of you might be up to.”