Читать книгу Wyoming Renegade - Susan Amarillas - Страница 12

The team had been hitched for the past thirty minutes. The remaining supplies had been loaded and all was ready. Alex was sleepy but excited as they pulled away from Frankel’s livery stable at daybreak.

The wagon creaked and groaned like the old-timer it was. The canvas covering was dirty white and looked a little thin where it curved over the front bow. It flapped and fluttered with the movement and with the early morning breeze.

Not a soul stirred as they rolled out of town. Too early even for the dogs, she thought, stifling a yawn with the back of her gloved hand.

She shifted on the seat, grateful that Eddie had put a folded blanket over the rough wood. She could tell, already, this seat was hard as granite and it was going to get a lot harder as the day wore on—and her behind wore down.

Eddie was engrossed in trying to get a little speed out of the team, moving about as fast as ice freezing.

“Git up!” Eddie ordered with another slap of the thick leather reins. If the horses were at all impressed or concerned, they gave no indication of it.

“This is war,” Eddie grumbled to the team, and Alex chuckled.

Well, war or not, for better or worse, they were off. As they rolled away from the town, she had a minute or two of second thoughts. After all, she’d put her whole future on this undertaking. Her father had called it a wager, and that was true, but there was more than just money on the line, there was her happiness. For all her bravado, she had her doubts. Oh, she knew she was a good artist, better than most, not as good as others— not yet anyway. But still, that didn’t mean she could win a national contest, this one specific contest. She was an unknown in America. And she painted in a style that many were only lukewarm about—impressionism.

It was all or nothing now. She was determined to have it all.

About a mile out of town, they rolled through a stream, the crystal clear water churning around their moving wheels.

The road turned north and so did they. The sky was brighter now, nearly white at the horizon, darker shades of gray the farther west she looked.

The persistent breeze fluttered the hair at Alex’s neck where it was tucked up under her battered old Stetson. Goose bumps skittered over her arms. Instinctively she tugged her coat closed in front, overlapping the edges without doing up the half-dozen black bone buttons. “Brr. It’s cold, isn’t it?” Not cold enough to frost her breath, but darned close, and she rubbed her hands together again to ward off the chill.

Eddie didn’t comment.

“What are you scowling about?” She nudged him in the ribs with her elbow.

“Jeez, Alex, it’s practically the middle of the night. How can you be so cheerful?” His youthful face was screwed up tighter than a mason jar.

She chuckled. “Mornings. I love mornings.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t, so give a guy a break, will ya? I need the sun to be up, I mean really up, for a couple of hours, then I can put words together.”

“Okay. Okay.” She held up her hands in surrender. “I get the idea. I promise not to talk to you for a while, how’s that?” Instead, she focused on the surrounding countryside.

The sunrise had turned into a glorious display of pink and red and lavender, the sun inching up like a golden ball rising from some sorcerer’s magic box. It was, in a word, breathtaking

Overhead, a pair of red-tailed hawks appeared in the sky, circling, gliding, hardly flapping their wings at all, just soaring effortlessly on the warming air.

Around them the world was quiet. As far as she could see, there was nothing but rolling hills and grass and sagebrush. Way in the west there was the shadowy blue shape of mountains, but between here and there, just prairie: no trees, no houses and no people.

Amazing. Having lived her whole life in one large city or another, it was startling. Just miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles. It might have been intimidating; instead, in a way that was unexpected, she felt not overwhelmed but calm, free. It was as though she’d come back to a place that was familiar, which was absurd, but she felt it all the same.

They rode along in companionable silence for the next hour or more. And though there wasn’t much to sketch, she felt as though something were missing if she didn’t have her sketch pad in her hand, so she climbed over the seat to retrieve it.

The back of the wagon was filled with boxes and crates and bags of supplies. She reflected that maybe she did overbuy on the supplies: canned food including milk and fruit, dried food, grain for the horses, just in case. Yes, the livery man had told her it wasn’t necessary, but suppose the horses didn’t like eating grass? She’d had a colt once who wouldn’t eat anything but hay from a certain farm. She wasn’t taking any chances.

There were two trunks of her clothes and a couple of carpetbags and the wicker traveling case, and then Eddie had a couple of carpetbags, though how in the world he’d manage with so little was beyond her.

Her sketch pad—actually there were a dozen of them—was tucked in the red wooden trunk with all her other art supplies: oils, palette, thinner, brushes and the rest. She pushed aside the several precut pieces of canvas already rolled up, and some precut pieces of wood for making frames to hold the canvas.

Pulling out one sketch pad, she let the lid slam shut. Feet braced, she staggered up to the front again.

In an unladylike flurry of petticoats and legs, she rejoined Eddie on the seat, grateful he was her cousin, whom she’d known all her life.

“Lunch in a couple of hours, okay?” Eddie muttered as she settled beside him.

“Okay.” Neither of them was much for breakfast.

The road, two ruts in the loamy brown soil, stretched straight in front of them, dipping like a dragon’s back as it disappeared over each small hill only to reappear again on the next rise.

The sun shone summer bright, warming her face and arms, drying her skin. She was fair, and prone to sun burn, so she rolled her sleeves down.

Thank goodness she’d had the good sense to bring her Stetson. Okay, it wasn’t her hat exactly, it was Davy’s. He’d worn it that summer they’d traveled to Santa Fe. Her father had bought Davy the hat at a shop in the square. Davy had been so proud. Wearing it made her feel close to her brother. Lord love him, Davy had always had an adventurous nature. She couldn’t wait to see him again.

With warm thoughts of her brother on her mind, she settled back, her sketch pad on her lap, a pencil in her hand, only to surge to her feet. “Look! There! It’s antelope.” Eyes wide, she pointed in another direction. “Look, Eddie! There. Aren’t they beautiful?” Spread out on the hillside, bold as you please, were antelope, hundreds of antelope. Their tan-and-white coloring had made them almost impossible to see until one of them had moved.

“Stop the wagon!” Heart racing, she didn’t wait, just started over the side. Antelope. Just look at them.

“Whoa!” Eddie pulled back on the reins and slammed the brake into place with a clunk. The horses neighed and shook their heads in objection to the sudden command. “Whoa!” The wagon rocked forward and back.

Alex managed to find footing somewhere. All she knew was there were antelope and she was going to sketch them. She plopped down right there, her skirt ballooning out around her.

Eddie slid across the seat and spoke to her from above. “Jeez, Alex, what’s the matter with you?”

“I can’t draw in a moving wagon.”

“Well, you can’t draw if you’re crushed under a wheel, either.”

“Yes, yes.” She gave a dismissive wave of her hand, already focused on the animals. “Look at them. Aren’t they beautiful?” She arched her hand and arm to a new angle. She was only half talking to him, mostly she was talking to herself.

Fast as she could, she made her sketch, squinting against the sunlight. “This is wonderful,” she muttered, her hand flying over the paper.

“Come on, Alex, between you and these lumbering excuses for horses, we’ll never get there if we have to keep stopping. Besides, I have the feeling we’re going to see a lot of antelope before this trip is finished.”

“Wait.”

Fifteen minutes later, Eddie prompted her again. “Come on.”

“Okay. Okay.” Putting the finishing touches on her sketch, she scrambled to her feet. She knew he was right, they probably would be seeing a lot of antelope and buffalo and elk and about a dozen other animals this trip; it was just that this was the first.

Brushing off her skirt, she handed her drawing pad up to Eddie then, unaided, climbed up.

From then on, she kept the pad on her lap, her hand lightly caressing the rough paper. Paper and pencil, canvas and paints depicted who she was as accurately as a sketch depicted what she saw. She’d been like this ever since that first visit to the Louvre, when she had been twelve and they had been on a family vacation to the Continent.

She could remember how her parents had coaxed and threatened to get her to go along. She’d wanted to visit a certain carousel that was near the cathedral. She wasn’t interested in paintings by dead men, for heaven’s sakes.

But her parents had won out, as parents had a way of doing. It would be good for her, they’d promised in a way that she’d known meant she was going to be bored silly. She’d given in and gone along so they’d get it over with, and she could visit the carousel.

The museum was large, a converted palace, with huge corridors stretching this way and that. She remembered how loud her footsteps had sounded on the marble floors and she’d had this tendency to want to tiptoe and whisper.

But from the first painting, she had been enthralled.

It had seemed so easy then. She’d learn to draw and paint and have her paintings hanging in museums. Ha! It was, without a doubt, the hardest thing she’d ever done. For all the hard work, for all the gnashing of teeth and pounding of fists, she’d stayed with it, because every time she walked away, she couldn’t escape. Scenes, paintings were everywhere she looked. Ideas seemed to haunt her, to materialize right in front of her. She had to paint, that’s all there was to it.

Mama had been her champion until she died. Alex missed her terribly. True to her mother’s faith in her, she’d continued, returning to Paris to finish her studies. Then, just when things were breaking for her, her father had wired for her to return home. He’d cited recent changes in certain European governments; a fear of trouble brewing was his cryptic comment. She had been shocked, disappointed. She had wired back, asked for extensions but she hadn’t been able to delay the inevitable.

That had been almost a year ago. She had asked to return to France. Her father always had excuses, reasons, most of which had something to do with her darling baby brother.

Yes, Davy was always in trouble, but it was always innocent. Who could stay angry at him when he smiled? He had a smile that would melt a witch’s heart.

Davy and Alex. Alex and Davy. Over the years, they’d been a team. When they’d been little, she’d been the brains and he’d been the brawn. In other words, she thought up the mischief and he carried it out.

Her ears were still ringing with the lecture. She was convinced Papa had it written down somewhere—either that or he’d memorized the darn thing because, every time, it was the same, word for word. They must conform. Good boys and girls didn’t behave in such a manner. They had a reputation to uphold. He had a reputation to uphold as San Francisco’s leading banker.

She and Davy had tried to take it seriously. They’d tried to conform. Mostly they’d tried not to recite the speech along with him.

Mama had encouraged them both to follow their dreams. Alex had pursued her art but Davy, being the only son, had been expected to come into the family business and so his dream of writing the great American novel was never realized. Perhaps that was why they were so close, why they’d always supported each other…until that day six months ago. The day of Davy’s banishment.

Those first few days she couldn’t have felt any more guilty if they’d sold their favorite puppy to wandering gypsies.

Yes, Davy had gotten out of hand. Yes, his gambling debts far exceeded any income he could earn, which he didn’t. Yes, he had been spending an inordinate amount of time at a certain saloon on the Barbary Coast and the rumor was there was a woman.

Her father had convinced her that they must send Davy away for his own good.

His own good. She’d said those words like a litany for days before and weeks after. Now, having seen Gunlock…

She shook her head. No wonder Davy had taken off. There were no stores, no theaters, nothing to occupy a young man’s idle time. It was a miracle he’d lasted as long as he had. Cowboying must have sounded very exciting to Davy.

Cowboys were the stuff of dime novels, of adventure, of romance, of men like Josh Colter—dark, powerful, dangerous with warm sable eyes that seemed to look right through her and into her soul. A delicious warmth curled in her stomach and moved out through bone and flesh. She swallowed hard.

Never mind him. Get your mind back on business.

Yes, business. She stiffened and snatched back any further thoughts of the tempting Mr. Colter. Up ahead, a dust devil whirled across their path and disappeared in the grassland. She dragged in a calming breath, the tangy scent of sage sharp and refreshing. The sun continued to warm her face, adding to the heat that had stirred inside her.

Spring, the time for things new and bright and fresh, and sometimes for infatuation. Ah, of course, that was probably why she was feeling all this… this attraction.