Bride School: Mary (The Brides of Diamond Springs Ranch 4) (4 page)

“No, sir. Forgive me for interrupting your story.
You were explaining why you didn’t want me dancing with Mr. Sparks…”

The man in question glanced their way like he’d
overheard his name. John smiled innocently, but all amusement fell away when
the candlelight bounced off the man’s smooth head currently covered with four
thin locks of long hair.

“Where was I?”

“You ran away from home,” she prodded.

“Ah, yes. The summer of my fifteenth year. I left a
note for my mother telling her I’d come back as soon as the stains were gone. I
packed a ruck sack with the things I foolishly considered necessary, then I
high-tailed it up the mountain to the north. A mountain called Snowy Range…”

Mary was surprised she was able to sit calmly when
deep inside her a ten-year-old girl jumped and screamed to be let out.

John Hermann
had
to be Rebel, the boy who’d
come to her mountain and won her heart! The boy who haunted nearly every dream
she remembered dreaming. The boy with the brown hands.

The world had spun away from her when he’d
mentioned his stained skin. Who, other than the tanner’s son would have had
those hands? She’d never considered it. When Rebel had stumbled onto their little
fishing hole, she’d never asked what made his hands and forearms a different
color than the rest of him. She’d assumed that God had changed his mind halfway
through making him a white boy and decided at the last minute he should be
something else.

She was ten, for heaven’s sake. And with no mother
around to ask such questions, she’d settled for her own answers.

The memory of Rebel’s face had faded for the most
part—
all but his cornflower blue eyes.
But she remembered his hands like
they’d been her own. She’d stared at them for hours as he’d whittled away at
one stick after another. She knew, if she looked closely, the nails on John
Hermann’s pointing fingers would be rounded on the inside corner. That his
thumbnails were pink and as smooth and flat as a frozen pond.

As soon as she’d seen those blue of his eyes, she
should have looked at his hands.

She’d stopped breathing. He’d stopped talking. She
blamed it on the fire, and they were headed outside to face Fontaine before
she’d gotten a hold of herself. But what had brought her back, finally, to the
present was his nervous check of those hands. She remembered that too. She’d
remembered him being ashamed, and she couldn’t bear to see him ashamed again.

His hands had been beautiful. Smooth and soft as
chewed leather. Dark and magical while they turned a piece of kindling into a
bird.

Though she never expected it to happen, a living,
breathing Rebel had stepped back into her life. But she’d embarrassed him.
While others danced by, she’d taken those hands in hers and embarrassed him.
And she would never be able to explain why—because, for the rest of that
evening at least, she couldn’t be Jeb Radley’s daughter.

She had to remain
Alexandra Campbell from
Pennsylvania.

She’d promised to do her best not to be caught.
But even though she had no right confessing her real name, there was nothing
stopping her from listening to his story and hearing what Rebel remembered of
that dreamlike summer. Would he remember a toe-headed mountain girl who’d lied
to him about how old she was? Would he even remember kissing her? Did
boys—men—care about such things?

“I ran out of food after three days,” he said. “So
I had to start hunting. I set a few traps and went looking for water, prepared
to head back down the mountain if I couldn’t at least catch a fish. I finally
found a creek, but there was already someone fishing in it. A boy named Fritz—about
my age, actually. His two little brothers, and a sister. At first, I thought
they were going to run me off. They looked even hungrier than I felt, which was
saying something. At fifteen, a boy’ll start chewing down trees if you don’t
feed him every few hours, you see.”

Mary laughed, knowing just how right he was. One
would think her brothers were a pack of wolves the way they’d devoured whatever
was set on the table in front of them. And the young’uns had only been eleven
and twelve when she’d left the mountain. It was just on the tip of her tongue
to say so when she remembered her place and bit her lips so nothing dangerous
might fly out.

“But they didn’t run me off. Fritz pointed to a
dark spot ten feet down the creek and told me there were fish in that hole, or
he was a flea-bitten hound dog. And if I came up with nothing, they had plenty
to share.” He smiled and looked away like he was watching the past happen all
over again.

Mary remembered that day too. It had been the
second-best day of her life. The first-best, and the worst, had been the day he
kissed her.

“They invited me back to their house to share
their supper and meet their pa. I told them I had run away and that their pa
would only force me to go home if he knew. I made them promise to keep my
secret. They made me promise to come back the next day when their pa went
hunting.” He grinned. “And I did. Every day for nearly a month. My parents were
worried sick, but my own father refused to come looking for me. I’ll never be
able to make it up to my mother.” He shook his head. “Boys aren’t born with
brains, did you know?”

Mary smiled and nodded, agreeing more than he
could possibly guess.

“I thought it was strange for a man to leave every
morning to go hunting, so I followed their pa once. Turns out the man was a
moonshiner. But I had to give him credit for coming home to his children every
night. And every few days, he’d bring home fresh meat.”

“Moonshiner?” She could barely say the word. Her
mined reeled to the rhythm of the music while she tried to reconcile a dozen
strange memories. It would explain so much.

John nodded. “No need to go hunting every day just
to feed a family of five.”

Mary felt like the world around her was tipping
sideways, showing her clearly something she’d been unable to see all her life.
Of course her pa had cried when they’d said their good-byes. Without Mary to
look after the boys and cook the meals, he wouldn’t be able to stay away all
day.

Now that she was gone, would Pa end up teaching
the boys to make moonshine too?

She was suddenly anxious to go home, to check on
her brothers and get a promise from her pa that he’d take good care of them.
But Jens and Max were clever, enough. One day, they’d realize, as she had, that
there might be a better life for them away from Snowy Range. She had no call to
sway them. Their lives were their own to make.

Just as hers was.

Oblivious to the chaos he’d unleashed in her head,
John continued with his tale while watching the couples stomp and skip in
patterns across the room and back again.

He chuckled quietly. “I wore so many blisters on
my fingers, I cringe thinking about it. Fritz’s sister was always watching my
hands, see, so I figured I should do something interesting with them. I started
whittling things. Silly, unrecognizable things, but she pretended to see them
clearly. Fritz whittled too. And when we weren’t whittling, we were chopping
and building rafts and forts, and whatever we could think of.”

“It sounds like the perfect summer for boys.”

John’s eyes lit up. “And not bad for girls,
either.” Then he sighed sadly. “
Mary.
”

Her heart wept at the sound of her name spoken
with that deep voice. “I beg your pardon?”

“Fritz’s sister. Her name was Mary. Pale hair.
Freckles. Sun-browned skin.” He grinned. “I thought she was beautiful.”

Mary tried to keep from blushing, but he was
watching his hands, not her, and turning beet-red himself.

“I also thought she was thirteen. She looked
awfully thirteen.” He rolled his eyes. “But she lied. She was only ten. Heaven
help me, I fell in love with a ten year old!”

She forced herself to inhale, then had to force
the air out again. “In love?”

“Hopelessly. Which brings me to you and Charlie
Sparks.” He nodded in Charlie’s direction. “And the rest of them too, while
we’re at it.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“Well, it’s like this. My Mary would be seventeen
now, just like you. And the thought of her father sending her to a place like
Diamond Springs, to marry her off, gets me pretty riled, especially if she
married an older man.”

“Older? These men can’t be much over thirty, can
they?”

He’d called her
My
Mary. Of course, she’d
like nothing more than relish the endearment, but she had to pay strict
attention if she was going to keep up with the conversation. She found it hard
to think clearly with her heart jumping around in her chest, demanding she
confess. But she simply couldn’t do something so selfish as break her promise
to Alexandra—not when the consequences for the other woman might be dire.

He gave a snort. “I admit they’re honorable
enough. But they’re also
established.
Set in their ways. Looking for a
woman to fit into their lives, fill a space on their buckboard,” he waved his
hand, “like a sack of flour pressed into the gap between the coffee and the
beans. Like a few sundries missing from the chuck box.”

She stifled a smile. “The chuck box? They’re
looking for a mighty small wife, then.”

He laughed. “I’m sure you know what I mean.”

“Do I? Are you saying a younger man won’t try to
stuff his wife into the chuck box?” She couldn’t help giggling. Maybe it was
the ten-year-old Mary inside her, finding a way out.

He reached up and tapped the end of her nose as
she remembered him doing a dozen precious times that long gone summer. “A
younger man wouldn’t look for a woman to
add
to his life. He’d look for
a woman to make a life
with
. Someone to build his life around, not
tether her to a life he’s already built.

She was tempted to tease him further by telling
him he’d better marry soon or he’d fall into the same category as those dancing
by. But she couldn’t let the evening end before hearing the rest of his story.
She only knew how the summer had ended for
her
.

“So, tell me, John. Whatever happened to your
Mary?”

He sobered and watched the dancers for a bit, but
she could tell he was gathering his thoughts. After a few minutes, she wondered
if he remembered where he was, let alone the fact that someone waited for him
to speak.

Finally, she laid a hand on his arm. “Never mind.
You don’t have to tell me. Some things are just too private, aren’t they?”

He sighed and shook his head like he was shaking
off sleep. “It was a kiss, actually, that ruined it all.”

Her heart sank. He regretted what was the most
memorable, sweetest moment of her life! And it was the sweetness that had made
the rest bearable.

She had to turn aside to dab her handkerchief to
the corners of her eyes before enough moisture gathered to rain down her face.

“I’d made her something special,” he went on, “in
the evenings, in my own pitiful little shelter. It was little better than a
nest made in the burned-out ruins of a cabin.” His expression turned wistful. “In
a piece of knotted pine, I’d carved a rose, copying the shape of a little pink
rosebush I’d found growing in the floor of that cabin. There was no roof, you
see. Plenty of sunshine and rain there.” He smirked. “Which made it such a
pitiful shelter.”

Mary couldn’t speak. She’d had no idea his carving
had been of her own special rosebush.

“A pink rose, like the color of your gown.”

Staring at the ruffles along her knee, she could
see the roses as clearly as if they’d been sewn to the gown itself.

“I saw Fritz and the boys washing in the creek and
jumped on the chance to speak with Mary alone. I hurried back to my hideout,
grabbed the gift, and ran to her house where I knew she’d be hanging out the
laundry.
Mary, I made this for you,
I said. She got all teared-up
because she had nothing to give me in return. So I suggested a kiss, like it
had just come to me. But of course, I’d practiced saying it a hundred times.”

He looked away again and Mary could almost feel
his lips on hers, wondering if he was reliving the moment too.

She forced herself back into Alexandra’s skin. “So?”
she asked lightly. “How was it, kissing a ten-year-old?”

John looked back at her and grinned. “Just as good
as kissing a thirteen year old I suppose. It wasn’t my first, but it was my
last kiss for a good long while.”

Mary couldn’t imagine being more flattered. At
least he didn’t seem to regret the kiss itself, and that was something.

A pained smile twisted his mouth. “Fritz caught
us. He was angry with me, but he was furious with Mary. I was supposed to be
his
friend, not hers. I doubt he had anyone in his life who wasn’t family, and
he believed she’d stolen me. I feared he might hurt her, so I refused to leave.
He said it didn’t matter, that she’d taken something of his, so he’d take away
what was hers. Then he ran.”

Mary’s stomach turned at the memory. She’d known
exactly what Fritz had been talking about. And she’d known where he was headed.
There was no stopping her tears now. The wound was old, seven years come
summer, and still the pain was as raw as the day it happened.

Tears. For a silly rose.

She was grateful John wasn’t looking in her
direction while she mopped her face.

He gave a heavy sigh. “We chased after Fritz. You
have no idea how fast an angry kid can move.”

Oh, but she did.

“I ran my heart out and I couldn’t even keep up
with Mary. By the time I reached the burned-out cabin, Fritz had been and gone.
Mary was on her knees clutching the remnants of the little rosebush. There were
deep boot marks where her brother had stomped the plant into the ground. I
remember the tiny drops of blood and scratches on her hands from the thorns.
Hundreds of little pink petals covered the ground.”

The music stopped. Mary wiped her eyes one last
time and looked up to face the dancers. She forced a smile and Alice started
toward her, but she shook her head and thankfully, the girl turned and walked
toward the refreshment table instead. Mary was careful not to look anyone else
in the eye.

John reached over and squeezed her hand, then
didn’t let go. And there they sat, holding hands and watching the floor.
Eventually, the musicians started up again and the dancers forgot them.

“It’s a waltz,” he said. “I’ll tell you the rest
while we dance. All right?”