RECONCILING herself to hours of solitude, Blaze had settled into the armchair with a month-old newspaper from Virginia City when the door opened. Looking up, she saw a young boy standing in the rush of sunshine streaming in the opening. His shock of pale hair was disheveled, his eyes were grey and serious, and his sturdy arms were holding two string-tied parcels. "I brought some milk and meat," he gravely explained. "Ferguson butchered a steer yesterday."
Blaze had dropped the paper in her lap when she first saw him and, smoothing the pages lightly with her fingers, asked, "Are you the boy who picked the berries?"
"Yes, ma'am," he politely replied.
"Come in," Blaze invited, getting up. "Here, I'll take the packages." She carried them over to the counter by the dry sink. "Would you like something to eat?" she inquired, ignoring the measure of her culinary skills.
"No, thank you, ma'am," he courteously refused. Hazard had told him she couldn't cook when he'd stopped at the mine to get his orders for the day. He began stacking the plates from last night's supper.
"You don't have to do that…" Blaze paused, uncertain how to address him.
"Jimmy, ma'am, Jimmy Pernell," he acknowledged, setting the salt and pepper neatly in the center of the table.
"It isn't necessary," Blaze began again, watching the young boy's swift, sure movements. He'd gathered all the used dishes on one end of the pine table.
"He told me to, ma'am," Jimmy answered, reaching for the dishpan hanging on a nail by the stove. "And he told me to help you with lunch too."
"Is he paying you?" Blaze was amazed at the assurance of his actions. He was stoking the stove now after testing the water in the reservoir.
"Oh, sure, ma'am," he replied, looking up from his task, "Hazard always pays real good. Mom washes and irons his shirts. He pays her five dollars apiece. And my sister Abby copies some of the new laws for him for a dime a word. And the baby can't earn no money yet, but Hazard says anyone that cute deserves an allowance just for smiling and cheering him up. He gives Joey money each week and Ma buys extra food with it. You don't have to worry none, ma'am. Hazard's the best."
Now there, thought Blaze, with an inner smile, is a very fine version of hero worship—and a sizable outlay for Hazard each month.
"What does he pay you, ma'am, for taking care of things?"
"Er—we haven't talked about it yet."
Glancing around at the unusual disarray, Jimmy kindly observed, "When you get the hang of things better, I'm sure he'll pay you fine, just like he does everyone else. He's fair as a prince, Ma says. That's a fact. And cleaner than any man she's ever knowed."
"I understand," Blaze said to the boy busily rolling up the sleeves of his homemade shirt, "his tribe has some custom about bathing."
"Don't know about that, ma'am, but Ma says God took away the mold after he made Hazard. He's one of a kind."
It sounded, Blaze decided with a twinge of resentment, as though Jimmy's mother might have a touch of hero worship herself. "How old is your mother?" she asked as casually as possible.
"Old," Jimmy declared in the way of children viewing anyone over twelve. Looking up from his arrangement of dishpan and rinse pan, he added, "She's probably got a couple years on you, ma'am. Do you want me to show you how to wash dishes? Hazard says you can't do nothin'. I can show you." The offer was sincerely made, without a trace of intolerance.
"Thank you," Blaze replied with a smile, "That would be very kind of you."
"No offense, ma'am," he said, surveying the littered cabin, "but what can you do?"
"I'm afraid my schooling overlooked… this sort of thing."
"Well, don't worry none," he reassured her again, "I'll help you out."
"Thank you, Jimmy, I'd like that." His childish frankness charmed her and she smiled at him again. "Now tell me, what do I do first?"
"Put hot water from the stove reservoir halfway up both these pans here. I'll get the cool water and then I'll show you how to wash dishes."
He washed and she dried—with beautifully embroidered towels stitched by Jimmy's mother and sister. For a rare moment, staring at the intricate flower designs, Blaze wished she'd learned how to embroider. She felt curiously out of place in the midst of what was obviously a warm group of friends.
After the dishes were finished, Jimmy swept up all the remaining bits of broken crockery with admirable restraint. He'd seen his ma throw a plate against the wall once and then burst into tears soon after his pa died a year ago. And he knew when grownups broke this many dishes, something wasn't right. So without a word, the piles were all picked up, put into an old box, and carried outside. "I think now," he said, returning and giving an approving smile to Blaze's effort at bedmaking, "we'd better start lunch cuz Hazard said he'd be in at twelve sharp."
He was a much better teacher than Hazard because he was a much better cook. "Learned from my ma," he said when Blaze complimented him. He was stirring up a batch of biscuits and making it look like an effortless exercise. "Put some flour on the table there, and I'll show you how to roll these out. Is the fire goin' good?"
He'd taught Blaze where to look now, and she reported back that it was indeed "goin' good." So in what seemed an incredibly short time, to someone who viewed bags of flour, sugar, and potatoes with as much familiarity as a foreign language, lunch was prepared. The biscuits had just been taken from the oven, while steaks simmered in butter-drenched onions in a large skillet and small new potatoes steamed in a milk sauce laced with wild chives.
"You're an absolute marvel," Blaze conceded, awed by the young boy's expertise. "How did you possibly manage to get everything done at the same time?"
"Just have to know how to count, ma'am. It ain't hard. The stuff that takes the longest, well, you start with that first."
"It seems so easy when you do it." Blaze sighed.
"You helped too, ma'am," he politely acceded, avoiding mention of all the near-disasters Blaze's attempts at helping had occasioned.
When Hazard walked in five minutes later, Jimmy gave directions and the food was arranged on the table. Hazard was lavish with his praise, and sincerely so. His own cooking was of the most rudimentary sort, so Jimmy's meal was deeply appreciated.
"He's really wonderful," Blaze agreed, and was warmed by a smiling glance from Hazard. "Although I'm afraid I was more trouble than help. Who'd ever think cutting an onion would be so difficult?"
"It weren't your fault it rolled on the floor, Miss." (Hazard had corrected his "ma'am.") "Should have told you to cut off one end flat first. And it won't take you long to catch on to rolling dough."
Blaze thought otherwise; the sticky dough had been as recalcitrant as Hazard of late, she reflected with a smile.
"You rolled dough?" Hazard asked, a pleasant smile curving his fine mouth.
"Mashed it ruinously, I'm afraid. First it stuck to the glass, then to the table, then to my hands." She brushed a distracted hand through her hair in a sweetly winsome way that made Hazard think suddenly she should have something to wear besides the black slacks and linen shirt. As if the men's clothes seemed out of place with the feminine gesture. If he'd thought much about it then, it was the very first provision he'd made to accommodate her. Making a mental note to see to her wardrobe, he gallantly said, "I'm sure Jimmy couldn't have done it without you."
Blaze's long-lashed eyes swept a flashing look at Hazard, the gallant remark reminding her of the exquisite man in evening dress at the Territorial Ball. It always disconcerted her—the civilized behavior, the cultured voice, the occasional lapses in chivalry. His image was so adamantly Indian here on the mountain, half clothed, dressed in beaded leather, all bronzed flesh and long black hair. But when she saw there was no mockery in the starkly handsome face, she responded in kind. "I'm sure he very well could, but thank you all the same. It never hurts to try some new accomplishment."
"Do you suppose, then, in a week or so, we can add biscuits to our hot chocolate and strawberry menu?" His grin was pure sunshine.
"Perhaps with much prayer and dedication," Blaze replied, her own mouth lifting in an answering smile.
Her blithe emotional openness charmed him. Their eyes met over Jimmy's towhead and a buoyant conviviality traversed the short distance.
"Would a prayer ceremony in the kitchen help?" he teased.
"Bite your tongue. My mother's forebears would roll over in their Methodist graves." Her blue eyes were alight with laughter.
"I'd take my chances with distraught specters if my meals all tasted like this."
Jimmy didn't understand all that was going on over his head, but he understood the smiles and reckoned that dishes mightn't be smashed so much anymore. "I'll help whenever I can get away from McTaggert's and Ma," he offered.
He was rewarded with smiling thanks from both adults.
"See, you needn't waste any time with rites and rituals. Jimmy will see to my education."
"So amenable? What have I been doing wrong?"
"Just about everything," Blaze quipped, and added with decorum, "except for one thing, which you do very well."
The look passing between them this time could have scorched a prairie landscape in need of rain.
"Mind your manners," Hazard said very softly, after he'd recaptured the breath in his lungs.
"I've never minded manners much. So tedious," Blaze cheerfully replied, pleased by his reaction.
"And I don't suppose this is the time or place to change your mind."
"Oh, I don't know," she airily said, her smile lushly captivating. "I might be willing to change my mind about something if you wanted to change your mind about some things." The last word was a low murmur.
Resolutely steeling himself to resist the rich sensuality, Hazard blandly observed, "Not likely, with what's at stake. Although," he went on, all gentlemanly courtesy, "I assure you, it's not from lack of wanting."
"How reassuring."
"My pleasure. And now," Hazard said, rising, "back to work. Thank you both." He bowed in a slow, relaxed motion, the muscles across his chest flexing with the movement. Pausing halfway to the door, he addressed Jimmy. "Stop at the mine before you leave. I'll send some gold back with you for supplies."
"Sure thing, Hazard. Soon as Miss and me does the dishes."
"Again?" Blaze blurted out, astonished that everything seemed to be beginning all over again.
"Maybe Papa will arrive soon," Hazard suggested, his eyes amused, "and save you from the drudgery."
Blaze grimaced slightly. "Either that, or may a full complement of staff appear while my hands are still lily-white."
She amazed him quite regularly. No timid woman here. She was sure of herself, devoid of fear. And splendid. A pity he couldn't enjoy her without all the restrictions. In different circumstances… But then, he reminded himself harshly, two more different people, and circumstances, and cultures couldn't possibly be imagined.
Blaze would have liked to walk over to him, standing there in the middle of the room, and kiss him lightly on the cheek. He could make her smile so easily, could warm her with his own smile; he made her feel curiously content for the first time in her life when he turned the full power of his dark glance on her. And the tall, lean, broad-shouldered body was beautiful, too. A pity, she thought, he felt so strongly about duty. Having been raised in an utterly selfish world, she found the virtue in duty intellectually valid, but emotionally unsatisfying.
"I'll see what I can do about it," Hazard said, interrupting her musing.