Stone Dreaming Woman (9 page)

He was not sure he was in much better shape now than he had been that terrible afternoon. Weak and aching, he gathered his reins. It took him three tries to make it into the saddle. Numbly he turned the horse back the way they had come and prepared for another endurance ordeal that would test his determination for the second time in a month.

By the time he made it to the North Village road, he was chilled to the bone and shaking inside his furs. On the way into Elk Gap, he rode past the entrance to Richard’s lane and found himself sorely tempted to stop, but doggedly he kept on, from one breath to the next, until he passed the outskirts of the town.

The sight of a blanketed Brandy tethered outside Mrs. Hammill’s told Shane that Paul had finished short patrol around town and gone inside. He said a prayer of thanks in every language he knew as he reined Midnight to a stop next to the mare. He set himself to dismount, but pain tore through his shoulder, and he barely managed to get his left foot out of the stirrup before falling backward against Brandy. She could be cranky when she chose, but this time she sidestepped into him and kept him on his feet. Then out of nowhere Paul materialized next to him and put an aiding arm around his partner’s shoulders.

“Shane, what on earth happened to you?” he asked.

“Up on the trail. I was attacked. Bart Hankins had a knife. I shot him. You’ll have to ride up and get the body. I couldn’t… Midnight fell with us…”

“Let’s get you inside. You can tell me the rest then,” Paul interrupted, guiding him up the steps and into the warmth of the small room they used as their constabulary. He let Paul help him out of his furs and press a mug of tea into his chilled hands. He gasped out the rest of the story while the welcome warmth suffused back through his bones. This time he managed to make sense.

“I knew you shouldn’t have tried that ride in this cold. You’ve been pushing yourself much too hard over the last couple weeks. You should have let me go. I know enough French to get by with those people,” Paul said impatiently. “But I guess it doesn’t matter now. Are you all right?”

“I…I think so. My shoulder hurts, and Midnight fell on my leg, but I can tell nothing’s broken. It just has to wear off.”

“All right, Shane. You haul your backside upstairs and get yourself into bed. I’ll go up there and investigate things and write it up. Let me have Midnight so I can bring the body back.”

“Go ahead. But…it’s bad, Paul. I shot him point blank in the head.”

“I’ll take a tarp with me. Don’t worry. I’m a big boy. You get up to your room, or do I need to haul you up there by the seat of your pants?”

“I’ll go. I promise.” He put his empty cup down on the desk and left the room, feeling at least a hundred years old. Suddenly the stairs to the third floor looked as tall as the Matterhorn. He managed them one step at a time, and when he arrived in his room he shucked out of his tunic, pried his boots off, and lay down heavily on the bed. He pulled the top blanket around himself and fell asleep in a heartbeat.

When he awoke, dark had fallen and he had missed supper. Even though he had not eaten since breakfast, he was not hungry. Moodily he consulted his pocket watch. At barely six-thirty, it was too early to go to bed, especially after his long nap, and for once he had completed all his paperwork. He stood up, flexed his shoulder, and found it much less sore than he had feared. Listlessly he went to the table where his portable easel held the study of three wolves he had started a month ago. Picking up a pencil, he made a few strokes, grew bored, and took a fresh piece of paper and started to doodle. As he sat thinking, his mind drifted back to the previous Friday when he had been stranded at Richard’s farmhouse, and he realized he was trying to sketch Jenny’s face. But his artist’s eye was not satisfied with his memory. While he knew he had reproduced her features with reasonable accuracy, the crackling, vibrant intensity of her personality had escaped him. With a sigh he rose, took his hockey skates out of his foot locker, snagged his heavily beaded white wolf parka from the armoire, took up his hat and cavalry gauntlets, and left the room for the short walk to the church.

The Calvary Presbyterian Church choir always rehearsed on Wednesday night. Those who did not sing gathered next door at the old millpond to skate. Once an early sawmill had occupied the site, but it had burned down years ago. The smoke-blackened stone foundations remained as the only evidence the mill had ever existed. The pond eventually became the main recreation site for the Elk Gap children: a swimming hole in summer and a safe place to skate in winter.

Though he had walked slowly, he found himself one of the first to arrive. He sat down on a log next to Will Tillman and let his skates slump to the ground. That night he felt ambivalent about skating, and doubly so if the local boys started their usual sandlot hockey game.

He and Will traded pleasantries, and then the conversation lay momentarily dormant while Will filled his pipe. Shane took the opportunity to look around. A few more people had arrived, among them Ruth Grayson. He still could not think of her without a twinge of regret. He knew now that he actually had not loved her. However, the abrupt way she had broken off their relationship had left a raw spot. He understood her reasons, though. Too soft and sensitive to deal with the dangers of his work, she worried herself to distraction the moment he left her sight. The incident with Red Hankins had proved that, fortunately sooner rather than too late. In the end he had assured her they would remain friends, but his November-born personality, tending to see things in black and white rather than shades of grey, decided then and there that he would not go out of his way where she was concerned.

Ruth started toward the frozen pond, then apparently changed her mind and came up to the bonfire. Tactfully Will excused himself, though Shane wished he had not.

“Hello, Shane,” she began. He had never liked the hesitant timidity in her tone.

“Hello, Ruth.” He heard his own voice flat, the only remnant of his Iroquois accent. It came back in times of emotional stress.

“May I sit down?” By way of reply he slid over, pulling his skates after him. She gave him an intense look, her eyes yielding when his did not. “I just want to say that I’m…I’m very sorry…”

“Don’t apologize. If whatever was between us was wrong for either of us it was wrong for both. It’s best aired at the outset. You couldn’t live with my occupation and I can’t live without it. It’s as simple as that.” She had been looking at her hands. Finally she lifted soft eyes to his.

“I tried, believe me. I tried very hard.”

“I know you did. I shall always be grateful to you for that. Still in all, how do you think it made me feel to know that I made you unhappy?”

“It’s not that at all. It was never your fault. I’m sorry for the way things turned out between us, but it was inevitable. I only regret telling you when and how I did. I should have waited until you were better. I was just…overwhelmed by what had happened.”

“It was no extra hardship, not really. I’m grateful for your honesty. It’s one of those situations where getting the truth out into the open was better done sooner than later.”

“I thought you’d feel that way. You’re that sort. How is your shoulder?”

“Healing well. It’s a little sore yet, though I’m drawing again. I’m not up to rounds or hockey, but it’s only a matter of time.”

“I’m glad. Well…” She sighed and looked away.

“Yes?” he prompted.

“I really do wish you all the best. I’m very fond of you, you know. I suspect I always shall be.”

For an instant he felt a familiar rush of affection. Ruth was a dear person. “I know you’ll find happiness,” he said. In the dancing light of the bonfire he saw the sparkle of incipient tears in her eyes.

“Thank you,” she whispered, then she fairly ran from him, stopping at one of the logs around the pond to put her skates on. He looked past her and happened to see Richard’s wagon pulling up in the snowy field next to the pond. The figure next to him did not look tall enough to be Mavis. It had to be Jenny.
Wonderful,
he thought wryly.
I looked forward to not seeing her for at least another month.
However, his mind sized her up against Ruth. In contrast to Ruth’s softness, Jenny had courage enough for an army. It showed in the way she had run after Midnight with a total disregard for her own safety. And he had to admit he respected her horsemanship and her quick mind. Curiously, he found she held some mysterious attraction for him, but whether it would prove to be simply the fascination of a puzzle or something deeper he did not yet know. He watched Richard give her a hand down from the wagon. Remarkably graceful and delicate in all she did, she managed to look slender despite her heavy clothing and the bulky fur coat. Her hand was still through Richard’s arm when they came to the edge of the pond.

Shane watched as they laced their skates and chatted with several of the new arrivals. Practically everyone at Calvary had arrived by now. The Tillman tribe had already taken to the ice, along with the equally numerous Redfields. Jenny and Richard glided sedately side by side, and as Jenny limbered up she did a fluid turn, skated backward in front of him for a while, then resumed her position at his side. It appeared she skated as well as she rode. Shane sat moodily on the log, bundled in his silver-white wolf parka bright with bands of brilliantly colored beadwork, and watched the skaters. Warren Redfield flew up to the edge of the pond and executed a violent spray stop that came within half an inch of the bank.

“Sergeant Adair, come on! You’re missing a good game,” he called.

“Sorry. My shoulder’s not up to hockey yet,” he replied with a halfhearted wave.

“Well, next week, then.” The boy dug his skates in and flew back to the game that was heating up at the far end of the pond.

Shane was not the type to sit on his hands. He quickly had enough of being the Little Match Girl watching everyone else have fun. He was good enough on skates that he would not fall unless he was showing off, and at any rate, Angus would not be there to give him a public bawling out. He stood up slowly, keeping the pain off his face only with effort. Why he had come skating after such a horrendous day was beyond him. There was always next week, after all. Deep inside he knew, against all logic and despite his mixed feelings, that it had to do with the possibility of seeing Jenny Weston again.

He picked up his skates and went to one of the logs at the edge of the pond. He levered off his Strathcona boots, familiarly called “high browns,” pulled on his skates, and then tied them carefully before stepping onto the ice.

Like the rest of the local boys, he had skated since he could walk. However, he rarely skated simply for its own sake. In his mind, skating and hockey were inseparable. In college he had thrown himself into the sport, since it bridged the great cultural gap between him and the rest of the students at Royal Dominion. He played Right Forward and captained his team for two years, the last of which ended in an undefeated season. At times he missed the excitement, but, he reflected, he would not trade places with anyone. He loved his home and his work, and he had a wide circle of friends. What more could a person want? But hard on the heels of that thought the answer welled up inside his heart: acceptance for what he was, and more importantly, love.

He was deep in reflection, his feet moving automatically, when he joined the procession of people skating counterclockwise around the pond. Little Alice Redfield, still wearing two-bladed training skates, waddled around against the traffic, bumped into his leg, and abruptly sat down, giggling. Alice, an angel child, barely four, blue-eyed, golden-haired, apple-cheeked, and still baby plump, had long ago wormed her way into his heart. He went down on his unbruised knee and set her back on her feet.

“Alice, you’re going the wrong way. You have to skate the same direction everyone else does. See your sister over there?” He pointed to Belinda and her inseparable friend Julia Tillman.

“Yes,” Alice said, favoring him with a pixie grin.

“Well, go skate with her. That way you won’t run into people. Now give me a hug, then go on.” Alice threw her arms around his neck.

“Your coat tickles,” she giggled, giving him a squeeze. “Can I skate with you?” Skating “with” someone, by Alice’s definition, consisted of hanging on for dear life and being pulled around the ice at a frantic pace. He indulged her as often as he could, but his shoulder felt so painful that he did not want to bend down.

“Maybe later, Alice. I’ll tell you what. I’ll take you to Belinda. How’s that?” Fortunately she stood tall enough that he did not have to stoop to reach her. Holding his fingers in a red-mittened hand, she duck-paddled along beside him, then finally gave up and let him tow her. He turned around in front of her and she gleefully grabbed his thumb with her opposite hand. Then she pulled his gauntlet off and plunked down on her backside again. He had sunk half way into a brown study, but Alice proved irresistible. Her laughter went to the center of his heart like summer sunshine. This time he picked her up, settling her carefully on his right forearm.

Shane liked children, and it was reciprocated. They flocked around him wherever he went. Even though he had no living siblings, he had long ago become very used to babies. By Iroquois custom, North Village children were raised Indian fashion: all adults parented all children, the older children watched the younger ones, and the children themselves formed one big group of brothers and sisters.

Still carrying Alice, he took a shortcut across the center of the pond and arrived in front of Belinda and Julia.

“Good evening, ladies. I have a delivery for you,” he said, relinquishing Alice to her older sister.

“Thank you very much, Sergeant Adair,” Belinda said, corralling Alice, who still wanted to follow him.

Soon the notes of Ben Redfield’s harmonica floated over the lake, carrying well in the cold, still air. He was playing
Shenandoah
, a tune that even Shane, with his completely tin ear, could feel.