A Wanted Man (15 page)

Lark raised her eyes to Rowdy’s face, and something passed between them, though neither of them spoke right away.

“Lydia,” Lark asked presently, “where is your father?”

“Papa’s way out to the Bennington ranch,” Lydia answered. “He went yesterday, in his buggy. They’re having a baby out there.” Her small face brightened.

“It’s the first one, so they wanted a doctor to come. Papa helped them pull a stuck calf out of a cow last spring, and they gave him a whole bag of sweet potatoes.”

Lark blushed, probably because of the stuck-calf image. “Let’s sit a little closer to the fire,” she told Lydia, “now that Marshal Rhodes has been so kind as to start it.”

Lydia allowed herself to be steered to another seat, but her eyes were wide and suddenly pensive as she looked up at Rowdy. “Marshal, do you suppose my papa will be able to get home, with all this snow?”

“Tell you what,” Rowdy said. “If he’s not back in the next little while, I’ll go out looking for him.”

Lark spared him a grateful look, unwrapped Lydia from his coat and replaced it with her cloak. “We’ll stay here for a little while,” she said. “But I think Marshal Rhodes has things to do.”

Rowdy didn’t want to leave them, but Lark was right. He
did
have things to do, and searching the road between Stone Creek and the Bennington ranch, wherever that was, would be one of them, if the doc didn’t show up pretty soon.

“Lock the door when I’m gone,” he said, resigned, as he put the coat back on. He checked the wood supply and found it adequate.

“We never lock the schoolhouse,” Lydia said, earnestly helpful. “Not when there’s somebody inside.”

“Just this once,” Lark told her softly. “Later, when you’re warm, we’ll go to Mrs. Porter’s and sit in her kitchen by the stove and drink tea.”

Lydia’s small, thin face went luminous at the prospect.

Rowdy headed for the door, and Lark followed.

“Perhaps you ought to stay,” she whispered. “I know I said you had work to do, but the weather—”

“I’ll be fine,” Rowdy answered, wanting to touch her. Maybe brush her cheek lightly with the backs of his fingers. He didn’t, of course, because they were in a schoolhouse, and Lydia was there, and both those things made it more than improper. “You’ve got plenty of firewood, and I could send Gideon to get you in a wagon from the livery stable. I’ll come myself, if I don’t have to leave town to look for the doctor.”

Lark moved a little closer to him, lowered her voice another notch, until it was barely more than a breath. “You might stop at Dr. Fairmont’s house and see about Mabel,” she suggested.

Rowdy’s jaw tightened. “Oh, I’ll speak to Mabel, all right,” he promised.

Lark nodded. “If she answers the door, and she might not, tell her I will keep Lydia with me overnight.”

“I’ll tell her,” Rowdy confirmed. Then he cleared his throat and said quietly, “Lock this door, Lark. Franks is probably home, sitting close by the fire, but if he’s not—”

“I’ll lock the door,” Lark promised. She touched his face, her fingertips light and smooth and still cold from outside. Then she pulled them back, as though she’d done something inexcusably bold.

He wanted to kiss her. Wanted to but didn’t, for the same reasons he hadn’t caressed her cheek moments before.

“About Gideon and the wagon—”

“We’ll be fine on our own, Rowdy. Really.”

He nodded, opened the door, careful not to let the bitter wind sweep inside the schoolhouse, and went outside.

Waited until he heard her key turn in the lock.

Then, not wanting to leave, he did anyway.

L
YDIA, STILL SNUGGLED
in Lark’s cloak, yawned, lay down on the long bench closest to the stove and went to sleep. Lark straightened all the books and dusted all the shelves and desks, and watched through the windows as the snow spun against the glass.

The big clock behind her desk ticked ponderously.

Lark checked the level of water in the drinking pail and found it nearly empty. She had tea leaves and a kettle on hand, but Lydia was swaddled in her cloak, and she knew the cold air would bite into her flesh if she went out without it to the well.

She was hungry, too, and she’d left her lunch in Roland’s wagon, along with her lesson books. Remembering the morning’s incident, she cringed.

Then she felt ashamed.

She was making too much of this.

Roland would probably show up for school tomorrow and bring back the things she’d left behind in his wagon. He would surely apologize, and Lark, keeping in mind that she had contributed to the misunderstanding by accepting a ride to school in his buckboard, would accept graciously.

Franks didn’t come to school so he could learn the three
R
s
, she heard Rowdy say.

A momentary disquiet rose up in Lark, and she frowned.

Rowdy didn’t understand, that was all. He couldn’t put himself in Roland’s place, imagine what it would be like to be full grown and still unable to read. It was a dreadful hardship, and Roland, instead of pretending to be literate, as other people did, had had the courage to come to school and ask for help.

No, Rowdy simply didn’t understand.

Feeling much better now that she’d reasoned things through, Lark decided to brew a pot of tea. There was still a little water in the pail, after all, and she could put on her cloak and go outside for more after Lydia woke up.

Lydia did not wake up when the tea was ready.

Lark added wood to the fire, sat down at her desk and sipped from the cup she’d found on a shelf in the storeroom the day she’d undertaken her duties as Stone Creek’s one and only schoolteacher.

Darkness began to gather at the windows.

Lark bent over Lydia, frowning, and touched a hand to the child’s forehead. Her flesh was so hot that Lark actually flinched.

“Lydia?” she said softly, not wanting to frighten the little girl.

Lydia moaned, opened her eyes halfway. The whites glittered eerily in the dimness.

Hastily Lark found the lanterns she kept on hand for dark winter afternoons and lit one.

“Lydia?” she repeated, drawing closer to the child.

“Sweetheart, wake up. I’ve made you some tea.”

Lydia’s eyelids fluttered, and she made a slight whimpering sound, but she didn’t respond in any other way.

Lark set the lantern aside and cupped Lydia’s face in the palms of both hands. Dear God, the child was ablaze with fever.

Lark took her gently by the shoulders. “Lydia!” she whispered hoarsely, “Lydia,
please
—”

“Water,” Lydia pleaded, her voice so small and raw and dry that Lark’s panic deepened with a lurch.

She’d used the last of the water to prepare her tea.

“Just a minute,” she told Lydia, as calmly as she could. “I’ll get you some water right away.”

Lydia began to shiver violently, even though her flesh was hot to the touch. Lark wrapped the cloak more closely around the child, who flailed weakly against it, then rushed to fetch the bucket. She’d never drawn water from a well—she’d always sent one of the bigger boys out to do that.

What if she couldn’t make the mechanism work?

What if the well was already frozen over?

She paused on the schoolhouse threshold, braced by the rush of wind that slammed into her the instant she opened the door.

Rowdy. Where was Rowdy?

Why hadn’t he come back, or sent Gideon?

Because she’d told him she and Lydia would be all right, and he’d believed her. By now he was probably out in this awful storm himself, looking for Dr. Fairmont.

Lark pulled the door closed against the heavy force of the wind, and dashed to the well. Dropped the bucket and grabbed the handle attached to the crank.

It wouldn’t turn.

She struggled.

The handle wouldn’t budge.

Panic seized her again—she wanted to scream, but who would hear her? The storm muffled all sound, and she could barely see the schoolhouse, near as it was. The town beyond was cloaked in darkness and snow.

Snow.

Desperately exultant, Lark began gathering up handfuls of the stuff, plopping them into the bucket she’d brought from inside. When she had it half-full, she hoisted it—it was heavy in her numb hands—and hurried back toward the door.

Collided with a huge form on the steps.

Roland.

For all her high-minded attitude earlier, when she’d decided to accept Roland’s apology, should he offer one, and go on with his education as if nothing had happened, fear scalded through her like venom.

“Miss Morgan?”

But it
wasn’t
Roland.

It was Gideon, looming there, barely discernible.

A sob escaped Lark, tore itself painfully from her throat. “Gideon,” she wept. “Oh, Gideon—”

He took the bucket from her hand, opened the door and steered her inside, much as his older brother had done, when they’d come to the schoolhouse together and found Lydia sitting on the step.

“Lydia—she’s one of my students. She’s sick.”

Gideon looked into the bucket. “What do you want snow for?”

“Water. Lydia needs water, and I couldn’t make the well handle turn. When it melts…”

“I’ll get the water,” Gideon said. “You go stand by the stove. You shouldn’t have been out there without a coat or anything.”

Lark nodded. Sat down and gathered Lydia in her arms, cloak and all.

Gideon returned quickly with the water.

“There’s a ladle on the bench,” Lark told him, rocking the child. Lydia’s clothes were drenched in perspiration. Even if Gideon had a wagon, they wouldn’t be able to take her out in this cold.

He fetched the ladle.

Her hand shaking, Lark dunked it into the bucket, lifted it to Lydia’s mouth so she could take a sip. She lay immobile in Lark’s arms, though, her eyes still partially open, beyond the ability to drink.

Frantic, Lark dipped her index finger into the ladle, and placed it on Lydia’s tongue. The child stirred. Lark dunked her finger again. If she had to give Lydia that whole bucket of water, drop by drop, she’d do it.

“I’d fetch Rowdy, but he’s gone,” Gideon said uncertainly. “I was just passing by, on my way to Flagstaff, and I saw the lantern light and wondered what you were doing here so late—”

“I’m thankful that you came, Gideon,” Lark said, trying the ladle again, because Lydia seemed to be rallying, though only slightly. “Do you happen to know if Dr. Fairmont has returned to town?”

“I think that’s who Rowdy went looking for,” Gideon answered, after shaking his head once. His eyes widened as he watched Lydia struggle to take even a sip of the water she needed so desperately. “That’s why I—”

“That’s why you were traveling to Flagstaff in this terrible weather,” Lark observed. “Gideon, I can’t tell you how foolish I think that is. What if you got lost along the way, or your horse went lame? You would die of exposure, that’s what.”

“Tell me what I ought to do,” he said, visibly shouldering her gentle rebuke. He was Rowdy’s brother. Likely he was stubborn. He was also brave, and he’d stopped by the schoolhouse to look in on her when he might have gone on. “Snow’s deep. I could get a wagon down the hill all right, but back up, that would be another matter.”

Lark was trying hard not to imagine the very same perils she’d described to Gideon happening to Rowdy—perhaps at that moment he was lost, or simply so paralyzed by the cold that he couldn’t sit his horse any longer. “Go to Mrs. Porter’s, Gideon. Tell her what the situation is, and bring back as many blankets as she has to spare. We’ll wrap Lydia up warm and you can take her back to the rooming house on your horse.”

“What about you, Miss Morgan? You can’t stay here by yourself.”

“I’ll be perfectly fine until you’ve gotten Lydia safely to Mrs. Porter’s. You can come back for me then, if you’re not too cold to ride.” She paused, looking up at this sturdy young man, little more than a boy, really.

“You can find your way to the rooming house, can’t you, Gideon?”

He pushed back his shoulders. “Of course I can,” he said.

“Go, then. And Gideon—be careful.”

Gideon hesitated, touched Lydia’s fevered head with a curiously gentle gesture. “Don’t you die, little girl,” he murmured, his eyes haunted. “Don’t you die.”

And then he was gone.

He returned twenty long minutes later, his arms full of folded quilts.

Lydia had taken more water during his absence, but she was half-delirious and followed his movements with large, frightened eyes. Lark stripped the child to the skin while Gideon stood with his back turned, then wrapped Lydia in several of Mrs. Porter’s quilts, swaddling her like an infant.

“Gideon is Marshal Rhodes’s brother,” Lark explained, when Lydia shrank from him. “He’s going to take you to Mrs. Porter’s house.”

“I’m Pardner’s friend, too,” Gideon said, taking Lydia from Lark’s arms. “You know Pardner, don’t you?”