Stony River (38 page)

She nodded a bit uncertainly. “In that case…could you use Fenn’s name instead of mine?”

He was in a hurry, and yet he must be sure of the facts—if one was not careful to be accurate, it resulted in more time wasted in the long run. “Fenn said you were the one who found it,” he said patiently.

“Yes, but he was the one who identified it and made the call. And—I’d like Fenn to get the money.”

“Well, yes…I can arrange that.” He appeared to think it an odd request, but he wasn’t the type to pry into personal matters. He jotted a note in his book lest he forget the item with so many other details to attend to.

Sevana drove home euphoric because the very thing she’d wished for had come about: she had helped Fenn a step closer to paying off his debt.

But Fenn wasn’t there to learn of his good fortune—nor had he returned when a week had gone by. Sevana found it very hard to wait and wonder without any word from him. Her only consolation was that she could ride Trapper when and wherever she liked—and that she did, pursuing a lively course, for there was much she wanted to see. At any time she could be found resident in the high pasture, or galloping along the river road, or dreaming by the slow-moving river. Wherever she went she found beauty—beauty that often startled her with its intensity. Minute by minute she discovered new pictures, if only it could have been possible to paint so many and so fleeting the scenes that met her eyes. And in her heart was a feeling so deep and sharp it cut like pain—as if she’d been asleep all her seventeen years, and only now was life breaking in on her with all its color and light, dazzling her with it.

The more time she spent outdoors, the more at ease she felt there—at ease, and something else. In the absolute serenity of the cedar grove, she was convinced she was not merely imagining an invisible energy behind those mighty monoliths. Ancient forces were present that were bigger than her, stronger than her. Within that solemn shrine, she could believe more definitely in a power greater than anything else—whether it was God or the primeval spirits of the giant trees or some other force,
something
mystical stood back of that timeless quiet.

The only time the solitude was still her enemy was after dark. Due to the friendly nature of the timid elk she startled occasionally on the trail, the less timid deer who wandered frequently through the yard, and the coyote she’d caught standing at the edge of the homestead looking so much like a lost little dog that she set out pancakes for it (to the delight of the ravens who promptly made off with them), she had stopped packing the gun she’d paid such a price to earn. That, and because toting the unwieldy piece detracted so much from her enjoyment of walking. Maybe most of all, it was just that she had grown so used to the place, it no longer seemed a strange and frightening environment. But alone in the house at night, she kept the gun by her bedside.

But even then, she was no longer afraid as she once had been, when she’d lain awake far into the night waiting for something to break the silence. The silence now seemed too strong, too hypnotic, to be broken by anything. She came to count on it—even to need it. The peaceful land, the constantly flowing river, the sun and moon taking their set turns in the sky—there was nothing to disturb her. So when someone knocked on the door one evening just before dark, her only joyous thought was that Fenn was safely home, and she ran down to unlock the door, throwing it open. It was someone she didn’t know.

In her nightshirt she stared at the man, unable to think what to do. Right off he started talking. Said Fenn owed him some money and he wanted it now. Said he was supposed to be paid in town last week and Fenn hadn’t shown up.

She felt relieved. It was a simple thing. She told him Fenn had been gone for almost two weeks fighting fire.

The man said he didn’t care where he was, he wanted the two hundred—now—tonight.

She frowned, uneasy because he hadn’t gone away. She asked what the money was for.

For whatever she wanted to think. Now where was it?

Sevana knew where Fenn kept his money. If Fenn really did owe the man, that was one thing. But what if she gave his money to someone who turned out to be a robber?

She made a quick decision. “I’ll get it for you. Wait here.” She went upstairs and got her own money from her father. At least Fenn couldn’t yell for giving away his. She also put on her jeans and a work coat of Fenn’s hanging there, and into the baggy pocket she slipped the revolver. Then she went down to face the stranger again. He had come into the house and was eyeing the muzzleloader on the wall. He was stocky for his diminutive height, his thin hair pulled back in such a tight ponytail that it gave a slant to his close-set eyes. She handed him the bills and he counted them.

“All here.” He put it in his wallet. Now that he had his cash, his attention shifted to her. “You his sister?”

She nodded, hoping he would say he was a friend of Fenn’s. He didn’t.

“I heard about you. Loggers at the Whiskyjack talking about the prettiest little girl to ever come up the river. I hear they didn’t have much luck with you though. Maybe with big brother gone, it’d be easier.”

“You’ve got the money, now please go.” Her voice came out clearer and sharper than she expected.

“I think Fenn owes me a little back-interest on this money, don’t you?” He was coming toward her.

“Get out.” She took out the gun and cocked it a little blindly—but as it clicked obligingly into position, she pointed it at him with both hands.

The man looked at her seriously. “I’m leaving. You don’t have to get so riled up.”

“If you come around again I’ll shoot you on the spot.” The words sounded so foreign to her ears she couldn’t believe she was saying them.

He vanished into the night. Afraid he would come back unless she proved she wasn’t bluffing, she fired once, carefully, toward the treetops. The man took off in his truck like he believed her.

After he was gone, she put the gun on the table and wrapped her arms around her quivering middle. She, who hated violence of any kind—who had once walked out of a crime drama a group of her friends had gone to with some boys from the other school—she had pulled a gun on a man. She hadn’t known what fear could make her capable of.

The weather turned cooler, there was some rain. And one night coming back from the chores at the barn, she thought she heard the low rumble of a motor and the faraway slam of a car door. She stopped still, listening hard. The motor died away. Instead of going inside, she continued to stand peering into the twilight—thinking of Fenn, but also the man who’d come for the money. Nothing stirred. Then out of the shadows came trudging a husky figure she instantly recognized, his cumbersome gear slung over his back. With a glad cry she ran and threw herself against his bulky form. “Oh Fenn, you’re home!”

“Gad, Sevana, what’s the meaning of this?” he demanded roughly. He cast her aside and strode on to the house, leaving her to catch up on her own.

In the house she was amazed at his appearance. His face was so dirty that the whites of his eyes stood out in freakish contrast, and his clothes were the same brown color. His hair was matted close to his head, and he smelled overpoweringly of smoke. He dropped the pack by the door and collapsed on the nearest chair.

“How was it? Why were you gone so long?” she asked, hurrying to get him some food.

“Fire kept getting away from us,” he said, unlacing his bootstrings mechanically. “On the line three days before they brought in a crew to help us. Don’t know what we would have done if it hadn’t rained.” He pulled off a boot and let it drop to the floor with a thud. “How’s my truck?”

“What do you mean?”

“Trick told me you blew out a tire on the Billy Goat Mile.”

Sevana’s heart plummeted to the abysmal regions of dismay. “Yes,” she all but whispered. “But I got it fixed in town.” She was utterly crestfallen. “Trick promised he wouldn’t tell!” she couldn’t help exclaiming, even though it did nothing to enhance her cause.

“Well—” Fenn drawled as the other boot hit the floor, “if it wasn’t supposed to be a secret, he could have kept it just fine. But it was eating him that he knew something I didn’t; and first time we were together at camp, a few too many nips out of the whisky bottle—which in itself was supposed to be a secret, you might say—and out came the whole story.” He leaned back in his chair and gingerly felt his stiff, stuck-together hair. “I’d say this gets you off the hook with him, though. ’Course he was real broken up about it, begged me not to tell.”

“Why did you?”

“I don’t owe Trick anything,” he said blandly, as if he saw nothing deficient in the creed he lived by.

Sevana tugged at a strand of her hair. “I’ll go anyway,” she decided. “I owe him a favor, even if he did break his word. And I’m sorry about your truck.”

“Look, no harm done,” Fenn said uncomfortably. “You did it for me.”

After he’d eaten her hot dinner, she brought up the subject of the two hundred dollars. He looked openly disconcerted at first, but by the time she got to the shooting part, he was grinning. “By gad, Sevana, I didn’t know you had it in you.”

He said he did owe the money, but hadn’t been able to pay it because of the fire. He got out his money and paid her back on the spot.

“What was it for?” Sevana asked.

“Horse feed,” said Fenn promptly. “Winter hay for Trapper.”

Somehow the story was in circulation when Fenn went back to work. Word was to watch out for that pistol-packing sister of his. He related this to Sevana with something near approval. “They say you shot out Rory’s tire and he had to ride all the way back to town on three wheels.”

“I did not!” Sevana denied it vigorously. “I shot high over the trees, just to scare him.”

“You scared him, all right.”

“Who is this Rory fellow?” she demanded. “I didn’t like the look of him. Is he a farmer? Where’s your horse feed?”

“I’ll pick it up closer to winter. I just had to pay for it while it was still available.” Fenn’s face was closed, so she knew she would get no more information.

She tried again with Trick when he took her to Nelson. But Trick said flat-out he didn’t know who Rory was or anything about him. They ate at a nice steakhouse and sat through an outdoor adventure movie of Trick’s choice.

Driving the winding road home again, Trick confessed to a craving for a good long straight stretch where he could put his foot to the accelerator and just
go
—instead of crawling forever through those cramped passages where everything was measured by inches, not miles.

“I felt boxed in by the mountains when I first came, too,” Sevana commiserated. “And you know better than anyone what I think of the roads. But the longer I stay here, the more I find to like.”

“You’re still in the glamour stage,” Trick informed her. “The mountains are showy, there’s no doubt. But wait till you’ve put in some six-month winters in the shadow of the river canyon…battled snowslides and mudslides and windfalls and washouts…spent a whole afternoon driving some pot-holed road and realize you’ve only gone ten miles—and see if you don’t get as tired of it as I do. Not that I’m such an old man. Which brings me to another point.” Unabashedly, he told her he had visions of him and her in a little house in Cragmont over the coming winter. He asked her out again.

But Sevana quickly quelled whatever notions he was entertaining by telling him she was about to leave for Lethbridge, so this would have to be their last time.

“Well, you think it over,” he said mildly, rolling down the window to let fly a spat of tobacco juice. “I figure you must like me some, if you came even after I broke my promise to you.”

“You knew Fenn told me?”

“I know Fenn. He’d never cover for me. In fact, he looks for ways to do me in. Why’d you come, if you didn’t have to?”

“I wanted to, Trick. And I had a very nice time.”

A balmy grin spread across his whiskered face. “So did I. Well, maybe when you come back next summer—”

She promised to see him again if she did—not enlightening him of the unlikelihood of such an event. She was more affected by his suggestion than she’d let on. Why, he had practically asked her to marry him! She had only gone on a few dates at her regimented school, and not with anyone who had inspired her genuine interest. And now here was someone suggesting a future together…and while he, too, did not interest her, he was still the first man to consider her in his life plans. Her first almost-proposal—unless she counted the foolery of the man at fire camp—and it was from a stout, red-bearded logger named Trick!

“Trick,” she said, remembering something she’d wondered about, “what did Fenn tell the crew about seeing me again, after you all took me out the first time?”

“He said you hated our guts and didn’t want to see any of our ugly mugs again.”

Sevana sucked in a harsh breath, her hand flying to her throat. It was worse than she’d suspected. “I suppose everybody despises me now,” she said dismally.

“Not at all,” he said calmly. “We just figured
Fenn
hated our ugly mugs, and we didn’t want to get shot at. ’Course that was before we knew you could shoot, too.” Like Fenn, he seemed proud of her, as though she had proven herself to belong there with the other rough-and-tumble inhabitants of that not-quite-civilized land.