A Log Cabin Christmas (16 page)

A
peculiar girl, this ward of mine. Sam scrutinized her, struck again by the truth Stearns spoke so readily. Not a girl. A pretty woman. And one whom
I know nothing about
.

“I’ve been remiss. You already know I’m Samuel Carver. Miss Montrose identified herself and called you Mrs. Banks.” A nod confirmed this, enabling him to continue. “Now that we’ve performed basic introductions, I’d like to hear the particulars of how you came to Kentucky.”
And, for pity’s sake
, why. He managed to leave the final query unspoken, though it hung heavily in the cedar-scented air between them.

“Your father was to have been my guardian, but he expired suddenly. When my father fell ill, he amended his will and named you to the position. Subsequently …” Miss Montrose paused, apparently finding the words difficult to say. “He passed on.”

“The man’s mind works well enough to understand that much.” Mrs. Banks prodded her charge to get on with the tale, prompting Sam to forgive her for dubbing him a
bufflehead
earlier.

“Quite so,” Sam said. “What I’ve not worked out is why he chose me.” He didn’t bother trying to hide his astonishment. “Why not a relative of your own, or, if it came to that, even my older brother? How is it he chose a guardian on another continent?”

“If you lend one of my relatives an apple, they’ll repay you a withered core. As for your brother …” Miss Montrose hesitated. “Although Father bore your family in high esteem, I received the impression he considered your brother to be an …”

“Arrogant fool who’d tuck you in a country corner and forget your existence?” Sam supplied when she trailed off.

“Extremely busy gentleman whose time was much taken up with the running of his newly inherited estates,” she confirmed.

“You grant my brother more leniency than you extend to your own relations, Miss Montrose. Perhaps you don’t know him well.”

“Or perhaps I know my own relations too well,” she riposted. “My father feared I’d be beneath your mighty brother’s notice. Though I would say there are worse fates than being ignored.”

Sam rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. “Unscrupulous relatives prompted what you termed
escape?”

He retained some faint hope the young miss had lost her temper over some imagined slight and took to the seas in high dudgeon.

If she ran away in a fit of temper, imposing herself upon her unsuspecting guardian, Sam would not shrink from sending her back. Foolish chits, mulish misses, fanciful flights overseas … he wanted no part in the sort of poorly scripted melodrama his ward seemed determined to enact before his eyes.

Rather than answer his question, she asked one of her own. “You knew of your father’s death?”

“In truth, your father’s condolences reached me before the notification from our family’s solicitor.” The memory jostled loose, sending Sam to his feet. He strode to the opposite wall, retrieved a box from the shelf set into one of the logs, and withdrew a faded, torn letter. “When missives reach me, they’re frequently the worse for wear. I could only make out the first third or so….” He unfolded it, suspicions mounting.

Faded script raced across the page as though written by a frantic hand. Blotted in some places, the ink smeared and dribbled by water in others, much of the message ghosted into the parchment. The pertinent portion—at least, what Sam assumed to be the pertinent portion—remained legible along the top.

Here the lines crawled back into a mist of ink and intention, indecipherable to Sam’s eye. At the time, he’d not given it another thought; his father’s death preoccupied him. Now, that last word struck him as something along the lines of a warning shot.
Nevertheless …
the world might shatter.

Sam passed the note to the women, waiting while they read. He was not above watching the wary brown eyes of his ward soften at the sight of her father’s hand upon the page. She devoured the words as though hungry for explanation, and Sam marked the instant she could go no further. Fresh sorrow darkened her brown gaze to sable. Her lids closed, as though losing part of a letter echoed the loss of its author.

His fists clenched at the sudden depth of her grief and his inability to lessen it.
Why should it matter? I only just met the woman! It shouldn’t be my place to comfort her—I’m not equipped for this. She’s not mine—she’s just visiting
. Somehow, the reminder that he’d be sending her away made him feel worse.

“Nevertheless …” The word emerged from low in his chest as Sam offered the only thing he could: a conclusion to the sentence. “The world goes on, and so must we.”

“And so she would have,” Mrs. Banks burst out, “if her father’s solicitor hadn’t passed on just after him, leaving that gormless Mr. Gorvin to plant his paws on Mina’s money. Or if her nodcock of a cousin hadn’t conspired to force her into marriage or an asylum—not that one would’ve been much different than the other, mind you. Or if you’d been in England to see—”

“That will do.” Miss Montrose—Mina, apparently—patted her companion’s arm. “Certainly Mr. Carver gets the gist of it.”

“Indeed. I surmise that your cousin and greedy sudden-solicitor conspired to withhold your inheritance until they could find a convenient, immoral way to usurp it legally.” He caught himself pacing the cabin like a caged creature.

The courtesy title of baron, along with its lands, would have been passed to Montrose’s heir. How simple it should be, with his cousin trapped beneath his roof, to seize her fortune. The realization chilled him more thoroughly than any winter frost
.

Given enough time, he would have forced Miss Montrose to wed him. Or, should her will prove stronger than his wallet, he’d find an official willing to pronounce her deranged. A locked-away relative is a relative whose finances must be managed by someone competent, after all. By the time he’d reasoned it through, the chill boiled away beneath the heat of Sam’s rage. All because her guardian conveniently resided far away in America and couldn’t protect her
.

How terrible for a man to fail at his most important duty, when he hadn’t any inkling she’d been entrusted into his care. Sam looked at his ward in a new light, feeling his former ire at her intrusion melt away. “You’ll be protected now. Whether you wish to remain in America or travel back to England when the weather permits, I’ll arrange for your finances and your personal safety. This Gorvin fellow will be tossed out.”

“Thank you.”

No prolonged stories of abuse or wailing over the trails of her long journey to America issued forth. A simple thanks for his promised assistance, and his ward fell quiet.

Which left him with one large, unanswered question: “Without access toyour inheritance, how did you find me, elude your cousin, and finance your passage to the Americas?”

“Oh.” She circled her hand in a dismissive gesture. “We borrowed the heirloom engagement ring and paid a visit to Mr. Gorvin, all aflutter over my upcoming wedding to my cousin.” Her finely drawn face scrunched up in distaste. “A waterfall of fribble over the need for a rushed trousseau drowned his suspicions easily enough. He all but leaped at the idea of drawing a check.”

Sam scrutinized the pair of women perched before his fire. “Strategists, are you?” Wide, unblinking gazes met his in an attempt to appear guileless. “I’ll be sure to remember that.”

When she awoke the next morning, Mina had forgotten where she’d slept—another rented room? Worse, one of the infrequent haylofts? Her surroundings, strange and dark, offered little aid and less solace. She might have taken a fright, if it weren’t for Belinda’s steady snurgling. No matter that her nurse maintained that only men snored and gurgling belonged to infants, Mina believed only Belinda produced this odd combination of sounds.

As an infant she’d found it comforting. Now, as a grown woman wresting the reins of her future from the clutches of her cousin—Mina winced at how dramatic that sounded—she still found her old nurse’s snurgling somewhat soothing.

If nothing else, the sound said Mina wasn’t alone. Even better, it meant Belinda stayed safe. The older woman need never know it was Cousin Elton’s threats against her that prompted Mina’s mad scheme to visit the solicitor. If they’d failed, Mina’s own actions would trap her into the marriage or brand her as unbalanced. But if she’d not made the attempt, Belinda would have suffered her cousin’s next attempt to force Mina’s cooperation….

She shook the thoughts away, replacing the memories with a deep breath. Then another …
Cedar
. The previous day rushed back in a wave of frustration and relief.
We made it. This is home
.

Sinking back, Mina’s recollection melded with what her senses could and couldn’t tell her. The stiff bed beneath her was really a slightly raised frame of poles, covered in springy fir branches and blankets—a larger sibling to the one down the ladder. The mysterious Mr. Carver, by turns callous and gallant, had constructed it as soon as their conversation had ended.

Leaving them with instructions to ignore the skin but make a stew of the raccoon on the table. Mina groaned at that remembrance. She’d learned to cook basic meals in preparation of the plan, stew certainly among them. Yet she’d practiced with chicken, beef, venison, and any sort of fowl. Somehow, the prospect of
raccoon
as her first feast seemed an unfair challenge. Particularly considering they’d had to clean and dress it before beginning the actual cooking….

A snurgle-snort interrupted her reluctant reminiscence. Mina held her breath, listening to see if Belinda would awaken.
Not yet
. The snurgles resumed, and she relaxed in near-complete darkness. The brighter light of day barging around the edges of the makeshift blanket they’d tacked over the loft opening to the floor below signaled morning. Otherwise, the floor extended across the cabin, kissing the ceiling in a sharp angle atop the walls. She could stand in the very center—otherwise, the low ceiling rewarded any such ambition with a knock upside the head.

No sounds from below rose above Belinda’s sleeping symphony. Easing from the pallet, Mina crept toward the blanket, twitching the corner aside to peer below. The bed empty, fire blazing, no boots in sight … it seemed as though Mr. Carver had stepped out. He might be sitting at the table, out of sight, but somehow Mina doubted it. In a cabin so small, surely she’d sense if a man as forceful as her guardian were about.

“What’re you about, Missy?” Belinda awoke in a fine mood. In comparatively little time—considering the cramped space and lack of light—they managed to dress. It took some creative contortions and a lot of ducking, but they made it down the ladder without any major mishaps.

Mr. Carver’s idea of breakfast left much to be desired, and more to clean up after. A skillet of shriveled bacon, congealing in its own grease, crouched atop the table. The contracted strips looked threatening, as though poised to fling themselves down the throat of any unwary passersby. Alongside it stood a tin pitcher of water, covered with a crisp of ice, and a small plate of dough lumps likely meant to serve as biscuits.

A bowl smeared with the floury remnants of the failed biscuits tilted atop a shelf beside the tin used to bake them. A dirty dish wobbled on top. Mina registered the mess then glanced at Belinda.

A smile scratched deep lines around her friend’s lips. “Well, Mina. First we clean, and then we unpack. It should keep us busy for a good long while, by the looks of things.”

They knew a brook ran nearby; Mr. Carver had showed them yesterday. With much searching, Belinda unearthed a scrub brush while Mina hunted in vain for something to serve as towels. She ran her hands lightly along the walls, searching for shelves she’d not spotted, when she found a long grove running down to the floor. No logs were cut out for shelving, but …

“Here.” Mina took Belinda’s hand and ran it along the line. “It seems like a door, only there’s no latch.”

They stared at the wall for a long moment. “I wonder …”

W
hat have you done?” Sam roared with shock and fury. Less than a day, and they’d destroyed months of painstaking work.

“Isn’t it lovely?” Miss Montrose spread her arms wide, pale moonbeams of hair springing from their moorings as though taking part in her enthusiasm. “Would you believe I
found
them? And now Belinda will be more than warm enough through the winter!”

A lesser man than Samuel Carver would bow to the appeal of her exuberance. But a lesser man wouldn’t have spent months hunting, trapping, skinning, scraping, packing, preserving, and storing the skins now hanging in every nook and crevice of the cabin. Obviously, Miss Montrose had uncovered the secret door to the old dugout he used as his hideaway store room.

The conniving wench had made a thorough inventory of his goods before pirating them. An orderly row of water-resistant beaver pelts dammed any drafts along the floorline. Directly above, rows of deerskin pranced around the cabin, decoratively topped by the march of fluffier hares. But the true masterwork had to be the fanciful strip of alternating pelts adorning the highest level of the walls.

Here, she’d artistically strung a series of black-and-white-striped skunk skins, plumed tails horizontal, skittering about as though chased by the few precious red fox furs he’d gathered. Whimsical décor didn’t raise Sam’s spirits, but the destruction of his livelihood sent his better nature plummeting.

Because Miss Montrose showed impressive creativity in displaying the furs without aid of nails. Sam assumed she’d searched for some but had found none on hand. Ruinously expensive, necessitating handwork by a blacksmith, nails had to be special ordered in these parts. So instead she’d diabolically destroyed half the value of the pelts in a plethora of methods.

Ropes stretched across the cabin, bearing larger skins she’d
cut holes in
so they’d string up along the wall. By the looks of it, the smaller pieces remained aloft by means of wedging between the logs, snagging bits of fur along rough patches of bark, and—Sam felt the muscles in his jaws jumping—thick daubing of what looked like mud securing them in place.

“Found
them,” he thundered. “As though all these animals left themselves in neat piles upon my doorstep? This isn’t a fairy tale, Miss Montrose, and these pelts don’t belong to you.”

Her arms lowered to her sides, her smile fading from her face. “They lay underground, behind a concealed doorway. No one made use of them; it seemed as though there’d been no fresh air in the musty place in years. I assumed they’d been abandoned, that the previous owner passed on and you didn’t know the hidden treasure of the house when you bought it.”

“The owner of the dugout sold me the land with a hole in the hillside, but I built this cabin. Every tree felled, every joist carved, every notch matched and peg hammered were done by my hand. Including,” he gritted out, “the spring-touch hidden door to
my
storeroom.”

“Oh, dear.” Mrs. Banks didn’t sound overly concerned. “We debated waiting to make sure, but in the end this idea won out.”

“This idea?” Sam waved an arm to encompass the mockery surrounding him. “How, pray tell, did you justify ‘this idea’?”

“We wanted,” his ward informed him in a very small and stiff voice, “to clean up a bit. You’ll notice we put a good bit of our luggage in that back room, and it frees up the cabin a good deal. But mostly we wanted to surprise you as a way to thank you. You were very kind.” A pointed pause. “Once you gave us the opportunity to explain our situation, of course.”

“Until then, you acted like a
bufflehead
.” Mrs. Banks gave voice to the unspoken portion of the statement then fixed him with a glower. “I do hope, Mr. Carver, that despite your current mood, these bouts of buffleheadedness won’t prove frequent?”

“Neither of you understands the gravity of your actions. You descend upon my home, commandeer my property, and show the unmitigated gall to insult me? Chide me for
my
conduct?”

Sam stepped toward the nearest wall, reaching for the nearest mutilated deer hide. His fingers curled around the edge, giving a small shake to illustrate his point. The thing flapped on what used to be a wash line, threaded across in a parody of stitches. “In one unthinking stroke, you’ve sullied months of work.” His hand spasmed before releasing its hold. “
Months
.”

“We didn’t realize.” Miss Montrose, at least, seemed remorseful. “But surely it can be made right, Mr. Carver.”

“No, Miss Montrose,” he ground out. “Your little decorating whim will cost me. Holes in hides cannot be unmade. I’ll never be able to sell these massacred pelts. I’d be a laughingstock if I tried, and I can’t advance in the company with nothing to show and no profit made for the better part of a year.”

“Oh, but that can be fixed!” She lifted her chin. “As soon as I receive my inheritance, I’ll gladly pay you the highest price for your fine work, Mr. Carver. At worst, my error presents a brief delay to your plans, but surely that’s negligible.”

“A check can’t cover the damage you’ve done!” Sam drew a breath. “I gave my word to my partners, and you’ve made a liar of me. The brief delay you speak of means months. In business, time is the one asset that can never be recouped. It’s never negligible when a man bears responsibilities to repay.”

“Responsibilities?” Her very stillness spoke of a woman riled, her poise a mask to hide the fury she held in check. “You speak of repaying responsibilities to men who’ve invested with you, Mr. Carver. And who might have been foremost on that list?”

Your father
. Her meaning slammed into him with the force of a sledgehammer. With Old Montrose gone, Sam’s responsibility transferred to the daughter his friend had left in his care.

The long fingers of loss clutched at his chest, gnarled with knots of guilty sorrow and tipped with angry claws. Sam fought the tightening fist of emotion, focusing on the anger and turning it against the woman who’d brought it all to the fore.

“Don’t dismiss your thievery by claiming you’re owed anything from my dealings with your father,” Sam snapped. “I took you into my house, but it’s not yours to do with as you please. The back room was not yours to explore or pillage. My work, my furs, were never yours to use or destroy. No excuses.”

“You heard me offer to pay for those goods. You will apologize, Mr. Carver.” She spluttered, “Thievery! I never!”

“You did. This afternoon.” He sprung the hidden door to gesture at the ravaged storage dugout. “Once full, this now lies empty—” Sam swallowed the word when he caught sight of the stack of trunks, crates, and satchels crowded into his dugout.

His jaw clenched. “You even steal
space?”

“Bufflehead,” came Mrs. Banks’ ill-timed pronouncement. “Space isn’t something one can take nor steal. It simply is.”

“Oh? We’ll see if you still feel that way tonight.” And Sam stopped listening as Miss Montrose kept a steady stream of protestations and demands for his own apologies.

Fueled by rage, he hauled out now-empty luggage from the soon-to-be empty back room. Uncounted trips up the loft ladder later, the eaves themselves burst with trunks, bandboxes, and crates stacked within each other. By the time Sam finished, the only thing uncovered was the ladies’ pallet, with luggage stacked along the cabin walls.

By then Miss Montrose had either lost her voice or showed prudentsilence—Sam didn’t know which. She edged around the fire, giving him a view of the pièce de résistance of their efforts; his bench.

At least Sam assumed the garish thing squatting alongside his table used to be his bench. Now swathed in a heap of what looked to be every kind of fur, the thing boasted a swaying skirt of raccoon tails. He sank onto it, ignoring the women, and ignoring the traitorous thought that the bench had never felt half so comfortable before.

Some things a man can’t approve
.

Some things a woman couldn’t ignore. That night Mina stared at the ceiling, desperately hoping for sleep. But time stretched on, measured by Belinda’s peculiar breathing, until Mina felt forced to face the unvarnished, unsavory truth.

She needed the necessary. Unfortunately, no conceivable contortion produced the chamber pot from beneath the pallet.

When her guardian had hauled their luggage out of the old dugout and banished as many pieces as he possibly could to wedge within the already-small loft, Mina had kept quiet. Stewing over his unreasonable rage and ludicrous accusations that she’d stolen—stolen!—both furs and space did no good. But arguments and recriminations would make things worse. Silence did no harm.

Until now
. After prolonged discomfort, Mina wriggled out of the bedclothes and slipped into one of Belinda’s dresses. Her own wouldn’t fit without proper undergarments to cinch her in, but her nurse’s more generously cut items wouldn’t require any assistance. That done, Mina swiftly laced her boots and crept down the ladder.

Stealth never numbered amongst her strong suits, but she fancied she’d mastered some level of proficiency since her father’s death. Mina’s cousin kept a gimlet eye on her fortune, and thus her every move. Anything she accomplished, she managed by balancing secrecy, smiles, and soundless steps. The practice should serve her well this night, since Mina was still bent on proving to Mr. Carver that space couldn’t be stolen; and that meant she’d never admit his moving the luggage into the loft presented a problem. A rearrangement would serve to correct the issue in the morning.

Moving slowly, remaining silent, and disturbing as little as possible reigned as Mina’s chief goals. Mina refused to even consider the ensuing conversation should she awaken her already-irked guardian while sneaking out in the dead of night.

Some things, she fervently believed, ought never be explained. Of course, this situation shouldn’t even exist. Casting blame—no matter how rightfully aimed—brought no comfort or solution beyond her decided course. Sidling past Mr. Carver’s sleeping area toward the door, Mina kept her eyes averted
.

Her ears, however, readily informed her that her guardian slept soundly and well upon the warm cushion of furs she’d laid atop his bed earlier that day. Snug and silent now, those furs were the one thing he’d not protested earlier. Mina allowed a smug smile, knowing her additions made him more comfortable.
I wonder whether he didn’t notice them at first, and then was too tired after hauling all the baggage? For that matter, I wonder whether all men will prove as stubborn, or if his disagreeable tendencies are his alone
.

She couldn’t really speculate and wouldn’t waste the time to do so. Her cloak provided welcome warmth, a tangible reassurance. Sliding back the bolt proved challenging; it scraped loudly enough to make Mina fear discovery. When no one roused, she eased open the door and darted through, shutting it again quickly.

Cold air knifed through her clothing, stabbing with icy blades where her flesh was exposed to the elements. She halted, senses shivering with something more than the chill of the night. An awareness of something … strange.

No sounds layered the darkness as she might have expected. It was eerily windless, and branches didn’t sway. No hoots called from their recesses above. As hard as she focused—and Mina focused with absolute determination that no creature should catch her unawares in the dead of night—she made out no skittering nearby. Not so much as a rustle among the trees.

By the time Mina began heading back from the outhouse—thank heaven there was one!—needles of cold pricked about her nose and ears, alternating stings with numbness. Soon she’d be inside, warmed by the fire and protected from any creatures lurking in the darkness.

Though it wasn’t, she puzzled, as dark as one would expect. The moon held back its guidance; the stars’ glow, shielded by fog, looked as muted as back in London, where a dense miasma of coal dust and fog obscured them. Yet Mina found no difficulty picking her way through the unfamiliar territory. The realization made her clutch her cloak more tightly around herself and seek the dawn on the horizon.

No warm glows in umber or russet. Golden rays didn’t peak aloft to light her way. She fought the fanciful notion that the earth somehow swallowed the moon, and its pearly polish worked forth from below. How else to explain this luminous sheen blanketed across the earth? The ghostly glow, coupled with the night’s still silence, struck her as alarmingly unnatural.

Mina picked up her pace, eager for the security of the loft and Belinda’s snurgles. All about, the glow grew brighter until everything even up to the sky seemed illuminated. Then a great, roaring rumble swept toward her from all sides, freezing her in her place as the earth convulsed.