Mountain Rose (2 page)

Thank goodness their racket was far enough away not to bother Mama, Raegan thought, coming to her shack and stepping inside. She stood in the room that served as kitchen and living room, her eyes skimming over the walls, frowning at

the wide cracks where the sun shone through.

The two-room house had been made from unseasoned green lumber, and as the hot Idaho sun dried it, the boards had warped and pulled apart from each other. Raegan shivered, remembering how the cold winter wind had whistled through the boards, bringing drifting snow in with it. Papa had nailed tarpaulin over the worst parts, but a person was never completely warm until summer came.

And summer was almost as bad. The place heated up like an oven, and bugs and flies entered at will—even snakes occasionally. Raegan's gaze drifted to the old woman dropping a handful of potatoes into a pot of simmering stew.

"How is she?" she queried softly.

"She finish letter. Now wait for you to take to store," Mahalla answered as she stirred a long-handled spoon through the meat and potatoes. "It tire her, the writing. She rest now."

Raegan moved quietly across the bare floor and peaked into her mother's room. The sun shone through the small window over the bed, bathing Anne O'Keefe's thin, ravaged face with its light. The fever-bright eyes were open. When they fell on Raegan, the pale lips parted in a smile. She lifted a wasted hand and beckoned Raegan forward.

Raegan hurried to sit on the edge of the bed and take the bony hand into hers. As she gently rubbed it, trying to impart some of her own warmth into the icy one, Anne spoke carefully, in order not to start coughing again.

"Your walk has put roses into your cheeks, honey." Raegan smiled at her and gently smoothed the white-streaked hair from Anne's forehead. "I was lying here wondering if the wildflowers are blooming yet."

Tears threatened to choke Raegan. Mama so loved the wildflowers of Idaho, their brightness and beauty in a wild, harsh land. She gulped back a sob. There had been so little beauty in Mama's life. One did not find such in rough mining towns.

Over the constriction in her throat, Raegan managed to say, "There are no blossoms yet, but I saw quite a few buds ready to burst into bloom any day now. I'll pick you a bouquet then."

Anne did not express her regret aloud that she would never again see a flower bloom, but for a flickering second her eyes spoke the thought. She said instead, "I've finished my letter to brother Chase. Maybe before supper you will take it to the store. I pray someone will soon come through on their way to Oregon."

"Uncle Chase is not really your brother, is he, Mama?" Raegan asked.

Anne smiled fondly as she recalled the gangly youth who had challenged William that day twenty years ago, arguing hotly that a shiftless drifter wasn't good enough for his sister.

"By blood, no, he is not," she answered. "But

in my heart he has always been my true brother.

"Do you feel like talking about him?" Raegan smiled down at the pale face animated with memories of a very young Chase Donlin.

"Yes,
I think I would," Anne answered, then was silent a moment, gathering her thoughts of long ago. She began speaking finally, in sad fondness. "Three months before my tenth birthday my father died of scarlet fever. He was a wonderful husband and father, and Mama and I missed him terribly. As I look back, I realize that he spoiled Mama a bit, for she was quite helpless without him. When, six months later, Chase's father began courting her, she was ready to be looked after again."

Anne paused, staring thoughtfully at the ceiling. "I don't think Mama loved John Donlin when she married him, but in a short time I'm sure she did. She had to have, to stay with him in an environment entirely new to her. You see, your grandmother had always been a town person, leading a pampered life somewhere in Utah. I forget the name of the town."

She smiled ruefully. "That way of life came to a stop when her new husband moved us from our townhouse to his cabin in the wilderness of Oregon. Other than Indians, I don't believe there were any other inhabitants within ten miles of us. My stepfather was, and still is, I guess, a trapper. He made his living that way, and a good one it was, although you'd never know it from his sparsely furnished home. Of course Mama soon took care of that," she added with a little laugh.

"Papa Donlin adored her, and when she let it be known that she wasn't happy with the sturdy, hand-crafted furniture in the large cabin, he took her to San Francisco and let her buy whatever she wanted. The chosen pieces were shipped up the coast to Oregon, then delivered to us by mule-drawn wagons."

Anne paused again, a gentleness coming into her eyes. "I'll never forget the first time I saw Chase. He was six years old—a shy, wild little boy with a dirty face and unbrushed hair hanging to his shoulders. His mother had died at his birth, and he had been mostly raised by an old Indian woman who kept house for him and his father.

"My, how he stared at Mama and me. In all probability, we were the first white women he'd ever seen. At any rate, Mama's sweet smile and soft, coaxing voice soon brought him from behind the old woman's skirt and to her side. I remember him sitting on her lap, peering across at me with his big dark eyes. I was a bit jealous of him at first, but before I knew it he had crept into my heart and I had acknowledged him as my little brother."

Anne closed her eyes, and after a minute, thinking that her mother had fallen asleep, Raegan started to rise. She sat back down when Anne spoke again.

"I've often wondered over the years what kind of man Chase grew into. I'm sure he's handsome. He was a handsome little boy and teenager. I fear, though, that like all the men who trap for a living, he may be hard and rough-like. It can hardly be helped, living in such harsh country."

She gave Raegan's hand a weak squeeze. "He'd be gentle with you because you're my daughter, if for no other reason. And your grandparents will love you dearly."

With a tired sigh, the ill woman drifted off to sleep and missed the tears that sprang into her daughter's eyes. She didn't realize how her last remark had unintentionally stated clearly that before long that daughter would be with the family she had left so many years ago.

Spring had also arrived in Oregon, and the trees were beginning to sprout pale green leaves that shimmered in the bright March sun. As Chase Donlin rode along a winding, rocky trail, a warm-scented wind swept down from the surrounding hills, making him breathe deeply. He shrugged out of his buckskin jacket and folded it over the pommel of the saddle. It was good to feel the heat of the sun on his body again. The past winter had been a long, cold one.

And lonesome too, he added to himself, swaying easily to the stallion's gait. He'd only seen Liza three times in all those snow-filled months.

His hard, handsome face stirred with an amused grin. The Widow Jenkins hadn't liked that at all. That lady did like her loving.

Chase leaned over and patted the black stallion's proud arching neck. "I hope she's well rested up, Sampson," he said, "for I can give her all the time she wants today."

He rode on, tall in the saddle, wide-shouldered and narrow-hipped. He was a man who was a law unto himself, seeking no fights, but avoiding none. He was much like the wilderness he laid his traps in. Calm, ruthless when need be, terrible when his anger was roused, he was fast with his fists, a good shot, and deadly with the

Bowie knife shoved into the top of his knee-length moccasins.

In short, he was a man not to fool with, as some had found out. Trappers in the region said of him that though he was an honest man, he was the meanest cuss in the woods. When Chase Donlin was in a rage, they said, a sane man would walk a wide circle around him.

Unaware of all that was thought and said about him, Chase had gone his own way, helping his neighbors in need, but otherwise having little to do with them. His one friend, who lived with him off and on, was a half-breed named Jamie Hart. He, too, was adept with the knife, and they made a formidable pair to come up against in a fight. Consequently, they were seldom bothered.

Chase glanced up at the sun approaching its zenith and lifted his mount into a gallop. "We're never gonna get to Liza's if we keep lazin' along like this, Sampson."

An hour later, the rocky trail brought him out of the forest of pine and into a grassy swale where a small cabin sat in its center. Liza's small dog began a shrill barking as Chase approached the building, making the stallion shake his head and snort in annoyance.

"Is your mistress still in bed?" He spoke to the yipping dog. "Usually she's half way across the yard by now."

He wondered suddenly if the widow was all right. She had to hear this damn dog carrying on.

The cabin door burst open then, and a curvaceous dark-haired woman bolted from the cabin, running toward him. He pulled Sampson to a plunging halt.

"There you are, Liza." Chase smiled down at the attractive face lifted to him. "I was beginning to think something had happened to you." He was ready to dismount and grab the widow into his arms, then paused. For the first time he saw the man leaning indolently in the doorway.

Calvin Long. Chase's lips curled slightly. Liza must be in a hard way to take this one in her bed. Knowing the woman's randy nature, he had suspected for some time that she took her pleasure from other men when he wasn't available, but to wallow around with lazy, no account Calvin Long?

The man lived in a run-down shack way back in the hills, along with an Indian and a half-dozen undernourished half-breed children. Not only was the man shiftless, he was a thief as well. He stole the animals caught in other men's traplines, and anything else he could lay his hands on.

Chase remained in the saddle. Although he didn't care how many men Liza slept with, he had no intention of climbing between blankets that still held another man's warmth and scent.

"Since you have company, Liza," he said coolly, keeping his seat, "I'll visit you another time."

"Oh, Chase, honey." Liza caressed a palm up and down his buckskin-clad thigh, afraid there was some tell-tale evidence that she had just spent two lusty hours in bed with the man lounging in the shadows. "Calvin was just leaving. He was

kind enough to deliver my monthly supplies."

I'll just bet he was,
Chase thought as Liza lowered her lids to hide the anxiety in her eyes.

She had been widowed for three years and desperately wanted a new husband, not only to appease her physical needs, but to support her as well. What money her dead husband had left her was fast dwindling away. She had, a long time ago, decided that Chase Donlin would be that man.

When she saw Chase run his eyes over Calvin, she, too, ran a fast searching glance over the man's stocky body. A small frown creased her forehead. The two top buttons of his fly were undone. Had Chase noticed also?

Chase had, as well as the look of spent passion in the man's slitted eyes. Giving Liza's visitor a pointed look, he said as he lifted the reins, "I'll be on my way, Liza. I just stopped by to see how you were doin'."

As the stunned woman stared at him open-mouthed, he wheeled Sampson and galloped back in the direction he had come.

Chase chuckled as he rode out of sight and slowed his mount to a comfortable lope. He knew Liza had marriage on her mind. She had hinted at it often enough. But it was a hint he chose to ignore. Marriage was not for him—especially not to a woman like the widow. Hell, every day that he was out running his trap line, he'd have to worry that she was entertaining some man in his absence.

Be that as it may, Chase thought ruefully, his present condition still exisited. He badly needed a woman. He toyed with two thoughts. There was Rosie and her three whores upstairs in the only saloon in the small village of Big Pine.

Then there was the long-standing offer of choosing himself an Indian maid from a neighboring village, an offer made by Chief Wise Man, leader of a Paiute tribe, for saving his life once. He had never taken the old man up on his proffered generosity.

One morning three years ago, he had come upon the aging Paiute chief cornered by a hungry bear. A couple of shots into the air had frightened the animal, and the shaken old man who had looked death in the face had, from that moment, been Chase's firm friend. Whenever Chase came across him, he was urged to visit his village and choose himself a woman.

When Chase came to a forking of the trail he drew rein, still not having made up his mind between the whores and an Indian girl. The path on the right would take him to Chief Wise Man's camp. He wondered if they were still there or had moved to a different location now that it had warmed up. The Northern Paiutes moved often to hunt, setting up their camp around lakes and marshes, for they were fishermen as well.

I'll never know sitting here, he thought, and lifting the reins, he urged the mount onto the Indian trail. A pretty little redskin might be just what he needed to wile away the summer months.

Although many of the trappers had moved Indian women into their cabins, Chase never had. He didn't want any woman, red or white, underfoot all the time.

In a short time his destination appeared around a bend in the trail. He pulled the stallion up beneath the screen of a low-sweeping spruce and ran his glance over the camp. They were still there. There was a cookfire in front of each cone-shaped house constructed of brush. Children ran and played while women and young girls busied themselves with a variety of work. He grinned when his eyes fell on the old men sitting around a large separate fire, smoking their clay pipes, no doubt boasting of past glories. He saw no evidence of younger braves, nor had he expected to. They were out hunting.

Chase let his gaze drift over the young women and teenage girls. There were a couple of real beauties among them. A throbbing set up in his loins. Either of them could be his for the asking.

Still, he hesitated. What if neither one wanted to go away with a white stranger? They might not want to leave their people, might have an Indian sweetheart. It was not his nature to impose his will on another person, especially a woman. She came to him willingly or not at all.

Chase sat a while longer, still debating. Then, with some regret, he turned Sampson around and headed back toward the trail that would take him to Big Pine. It looked like it would be one of Rosie's girls. He needed to replenish a few supplies anyway. He would wait awhile, then go visit Liza again. He felt sure that the next time he came riding in, he would find her alone. The widow wouldn't take a chance on displeasing him again.