Tamera Alexander - [Timber Ridge Reflections 01] (12 page)

He picked up his meat cleaver. “My answer stands.”

Elizabeth tightened her grip on the jerky, and the paper crinkled. “May I ask why you’re so averse to my proposition?”

He grasped his cleaver, brought it down hard, twice, and laid aside the two cuts of meat. “Maybe ‘no thank you’ means somethin’ different back east, ma’am.” Another clean cut, but this time with the crunch of bone. “But out here when someone says it, it’s considered rude to keep pushin’. ”

“I don’t mean to push, I just—”

“Morning, Lolly. I just got the meat from the icehouse and left those two guns in the back.”

Elizabeth startled at the voice behind her and turned, hearing the butcher’s deep grunt in response.

Ranslett’s tone was all friendliness and welcome, but disapproval shaded his expression. And she noticed something else. His beard was gone. His jaw was smooth and clean-shaven; his hair looked freshly washed. A still-damp hank of hair curled at his temple and he’d traded the worn buckskin for a well-fitted shirt, vest, and dungarees.

The change was astonishing, and the question was out of her mouth before she’d thought it through. “Going courting this morning, Ranslett?”

He smiled and rubbed his jaw, his dimples even more pronounced without the beard. “Not that I know of, Miss Westbrook. But the day’s young yet.” He winked. “How ’bout I get back with you on that?” He glanced over her shoulder toward the butcher, his demeanor sobering. “Is there a problem here?” he whispered.

“No. No problem. I was just asking Mr.—” What had Ranslett called him? “Mr. Lolly a question.” She shot a glance at the burly man, who seemed absorbed again in his work.

“And I believe Mr.
Lolliford
”—Ranslett gave the name added emphasis—“gave you his answer.”

She hesitated, not caring for the tone of his correction. “So it would seem. By the way . . . you’re late.”

“My apologies.” He dipped his head. “I had a letter to post for Monday’s stage.” He gestured toward the door. “Shall we?”

She grabbed her pack and preceded him outside. The tan mare he’d had with him in the mountains was now hitched to a loaded wagon, and his beagle sat perched on the wagon seat. Josiah stood in the street, clutching the mule’s reins.

She stopped short on the boardwalk. “Are we taking a trip?”

Though she couldn’t see his face, she heard his chuckle.

“I need to deliver some meat to a family outside of town. It shouldn’t take us long. Then we’ll see if we can find something worthy of that camera of yours. Something that will . . . impress.”

She ignored the teasing in his tone. “Josiah has my equipment packed on the mule. Can we tie on to your wagon?”

“Fine by me.”

She noticed Josiah didn’t move but watched Ranslett instead. Not until Ranslett gave a nod did Josiah do as she had suggested.

“Mind if I ride in the back there, Mr. Ranslett, sir?”

Saying nothing, Ranslett unpinned the back hinge, lowered the railing, and made room enough for a person to sit.

“Thank you, sir.” Josiah climbed in and situated himself.

Ranslett started around to her side of the wagon, presumably to help her up, but Elizabeth placed her camera on the floor beneath the bench seat and climbed up on her own accord. He smiled up at her, offering her a curious look, and moved to check the harnesses.

The beagle snuggled up, and Elizabeth held her hand outstretched for him to sniff it. He licked it, and she rubbed him behind the ears.

“Remember, Ranslett, you promised me a day of hunting and I want the full experience. Exactly what you’d do during a normal day of scouting out an animal to cut down in the prime of its life.” She waited for his reaction and could tell he had one but hid it, because he purposefully wouldn’t look at her.

“It’s called tracking, ma’am.” He leaned down to peer beneath the wagon. “And I told you before, I’ll do my best.”

She pulled the pad and pencil from her pack and made note of his phrasing, then slipped it back inside again. She’d already noticed what was beneath a blanket in the back. “Is the rack spoken for?”

He put his foot on the wheel to climb up. “Beau, to the back!” The beagle vaulted over the seat and climbed to where Josiah was seated. The dog began licking Josiah, which didn’t seem to bother Josiah at all.

Ranslett climbed up beside her and sat down. The bench seat shrank by two thirds. Holding her camera, Elizabeth tried to scoot over so that they weren’t touching so much, but her right hip met with the edge of the box seat. It wasn’t as if she were some prim young schoolgirl who had never rubbed thighs with a man when riding in a carriage, but this seemed different. This seemed so much . . . closer.

She looked at where their bodies met, then lifted her gaze to find him smiling.

“There a problem, ma’am?”

She lifted a shoulder as nonchalantly as possible. “No, everything is fine. And you?”

“I couldn’t be better.”

“I am, however, still awaiting an answer to my question. . . . Is the rack spoken for?”

“Yes, ma’am, it is.” He gave the reins a snap and the mare responded.

She gripped the bench seat. She didn’t know how she would manage to ship something like that back to Washington but knew it could be done. And she also knew Goldberg would prize the gift. He’d be the envy of the other board members, and her thoughtfulness wouldn’t hurt her chances at the job either. “What if I were to say that I’d like to buy it from you?”

“Then I’d have to tell you that I’m sorry, that it’s already spoken for, again.”

She weighed his answer. Her funds were by no means unlimited but the accommodations and food here were far less expensive than what she’d budgeted for, so she had some leverage room. “What if I offered you more than your current buyer?”

“I’m pretty sure you can’t match his offer, Miss Westbrook.”

“Try me.”

He maneuvered a path around a freight wagon whose owner was unloading supplies at Ben Mullins’s store, then pulled back on the reins and waved another wagon through the intersection. “I appreciate your interest, but . . . no thank you.”

Elizabeth realized then that he’d been behind her in the butchery for longer than she’d thought. She sighed and stared off to her right. He probably thought himself comical at repeating what Lolliford had said to her. He snapped the reins again, urging the mare forward, and they rode in silence.

They were nearly out of town when she heard her name being called. She turned on the seat. Ranslett must have heard it too because he slowed the wagon.

Sheriff McPherson waved to them from the boardwalk and held up a hand, indicating for them to wait. He shook the hand of the man he was speaking with, then strode toward them. “I’m glad I spotted you, Miss Westbrook. My sister reminded me this morning to set a time to bring you out to the homestead for that photograph. Once she gets something in her mind, it’s hard to budge it.”

Elizabeth smiled at him. “I’m much the same way, so I understand.”

McPherson’s focus drifted. “Ranslett . . .” He nodded once. “How’ve you been?”

Ranslett shifted on the narrow bench beside her. “Fine, Sheriff. Keeping busy.”

Sheriff McPherson acted as if he might say something else, but he didn’t. A moment passed.

Elizabeth would’ve had to have been completely unobservant to miss the tension traveling between the two men. And she was fairly certain Ranslett hadn’t been gripping the reins so tightly a moment ago.

“Rachel’s eager to learn more about what brought you out here, Miss Westbrook, and about Washington. She asked for you to bring whatever pictures you may have of back east.”

“I’ll happily do that. I only hope my stories won’t disappoint her. Washington isn’t as exciting as people often imagine.”

“Don’t forget where you are, ma’am. Timber Ridge is a beautiful place, but it hardly matches the happenings in a big city. Rachel always dreamed of visiting places like Washington when we were growing up.”

“And where did you grow up?”

“Little town south of Nashville, ma’am, called Franklin.” Sheriff McPherson shot Ranslett a quick look. “You’ve probably not heard of it . . .” A shadow crept over his face. “Unless you knew somebody who fought there in the war.”

It took a moment for the name of the town to register. And when it did, Elizabeth swallowed. “Yes . . . I—” She took a quick breath, wondering if she sounded as breathless as she felt. “I remember . . . reading about that particular battle.” And hearing numerous officers recount what a great victory it had been for the North, and for her father in particular. He had been scheduled to be on the battlefield that day but was called back to Washington. His longtime military friend and colleague, and her “Uncle” Henry, took his place. And before the battle had even begun, Colonel Henry Jackson had been killed by a sharpshooter. After telling her the news, her father had never spoken of it again, but she knew he carried the burden of that day inside him. Just as she did the guilty gratitude that he hadn’t been there.

Mindful of the heritage of the two men present, she suddenly grew conscious of her own heritage and stance in the war. “Sheriff, please tell your sister”—she pushed away thoughts resurfacing about the war and the number of soldiers killed in that battle—“that I look forward to seeing her again. I’m free to come out late tomorrow afternoon if that’s convenient for her.”

“Actually, tomorrow might not be the best day. How about . . . next Saturday? A week from today?”

As they settled the details, Elizabeth stole a glance beside her. Ranslett hadn’t even attempted to join the conversation.

“Ranslett, you’re welcome to join us too.” The sheriff was studying the ground, but his invitation seemed sincere. “Might be good for you and—”

“I can’t. But thanks.”

Elizabeth sensed McPherson wanting to press the issue, and waited for him to do so. But he didn’t. He simply gave a slow nod, tipped his hat to her, and walked on. As Ranslett drove the wagon from town, she thought again of what Lolly had said to her about not pushing a person. Especially when they turned the corner and Ranslett stole a backward glance in the direction the sheriff had walked.

10

T
hey’d traveled nearly a mile before Elizabeth dared test the silence. Josiah hummed a tune from the back, one she remembered hearing at a rally she’d attended where the speaker had been a former slave. Somehow Josiah managed to weave the melody into the slow plod of hooves and the squeak of wagon wheels.

She moved her head slowly to the left, a fraction at a time, as though she were watching the rise and fall of the passing mountain peaks instead of sneaking a look at Ranslett beside her.

He seemed lost in another world, one in which she was not a part. He was an impressive-looking man, in a rugged, unconventional way, and vastly different from the polished, well-bred Southern boys she’d known who had attended Georgetown University before the war. His jaw was more square than her memory had assigned and his hair thicker, with a curl to it. His eyes turned down at the corners, giving him an almost boyish appearance, and a melancholy one. But the boyish look ended abruptly at his muscular neck and shoulders—at that point,
powerful
was the overwhelming descriptor she would choose to assign him. He and Josiah were very similar in that regard.

“Beautiful country, isn’t it?” He looked her way.

She quickly focused on the mountains beyond him. “Yes, it is.”

“You’ve never been out west before.” It wasn’t a question.

“No, I haven’t.” She smiled. “Why, does it show?”

“Not to a blind man.”

She held back a laugh, still a bit peeved at his earlier behavior. A cool breeze, not too chilling, rustled the sparse grasses growing between boulders strewn along the path.

“What brings you out here, ma’am?”

She felt Ranslett’s attention but didn’t look at him. “I’ve always loved photography, and when I read about the Colorado Territory, I decided I wanted to see it for myself.” Which was wholly true—it just wasn’t the whole truth.

“Where’d you read about it?”

“Books, newspapers.”

He grunted softly.

“What does that mean?” She imitated his grunt.

“Just strikes me as odd . . . a woman like you just up and deciding to leave Washington and travel all the way out here—to take photographs.”

“Firstly, I don’t care for your phrasing of ‘a woman like me,’ and secondly, perhaps it does sound odd if you don’t have a love for nature and an appreciation for wildlife.” Granted, her love for both of those things had been recently acquired, but nevertheless it was true.

His amused expression said he wasn’t the least bothered by her comments. Nor fully convinced.

He slowed the wagon and negotiated a tight turn onto a washboard road. It smoothed out after a hundred yards or so, but not before Elizabeth wondered if her teeth would ever stop rattling. She took a deep breath of cool air and felt a tingle in her lungs. Not one that frightened her this time.

“Tastes good, doesn’t it?”

She knew what he meant. “Yes, it does. The air here is much fresher than what I’m accustomed to.”

“I don’t doubt it.” He sat up straighter and stretched his back and shoulders, then rolled his head from side to side. “You ever been married?”

“I beg your pardon?” Elizabeth was certain she heard a soft chuckle behind her.

“Just asking a question, ma’am. Making it blunt, the way you like it. And saving us both some time.”

His attempt to copy her accent failed miserably. “No, I’ve never been married. If I had I wouldn’t go by
Miss
anymore, now, would I?”

He shrugged. “Can’t always tell by that these days.”

She debated whether to counter the question and decided to match his boldness. “What about you, Ranslett? Have you ever been married?”

He huffed. “No, ma’am.”

“Such a reaction might lead me to think that you don’t esteem the institution of marriage.”

“Then you would’ve made a hasty judgment, Miss Westbrook, and would have arrived at the wrong conclusion.”

She stared at him as they rounded the bend. A cabin came into view, a modest dwelling set in a cleft of the mountain and bordered by evergreens. To the left sat a barn sagging with neglect and the weight of time. An empty corral adjoined it, its fence in need of repair—but it didn’t really matter since there were no livestock present. A leaning structure squatted nearby, between the barn and the cabin, and Elizabeth assumed it was an outhouse.