A Bride for Noah Page 14

  At a moan from behind, she turned to find Sarah resting in the shade of a bushy fir tree. Correction. She had collapsed on the ground, her arms thrown wide and her head obscured by the tall, thick grass. The girl had removed her shoes, and her bare feet showed beneath her skirt.

  Evie crossed the glade to stand over her. A hot red flush stained her normally pale skin. Dirt smeared one cheek and her hair clung limply to her damp forehead.

  Concerned, Evie knelt beside her. “Are you hurt?”

  Sarah’s eyes remained shut. “Yes.”

  She scanned the girl’s body for signs of blood. “Where?”

  “Everywhere.” The word came out on a moan. “My shoulders, my arms, my legs, my feet. It all hurts.” Her eyes fluttered open. “I can’t cut down one more tree. I can’t.”

  Lucy approached with a cup and the skin of water that Miles had refilled for them from a nearby stream. “Here. A drink will refresh you.” She opened the cap and, filling the mug, held it out toward her sister.

  Sarah did not move to take it but closed her eyes again. “The only way that will refresh me is if I can swim in it.”

  “All right, if you say so.”

  With a shrug and a wink at Evie, Lucy held the cup over her sister’s supine figure and tilted it. Cool water splashed into Sarah’s face and she shot off the ground, sputtering.

  “Why did you do that?” she demanded, wiping water from her eyes.

  Lucy smiled sweetly. “Because you looked so warm, dear, I thought it might cool you down.” She thrust the skin and empty cup into Sarah’s hands and flounced away, chuckling.

  Her mouth dangling, Sarah stared after her sister. “I can’t believe she did that.”

  Evie tried to control her mirth and failed. She slipped an arm around Sarah’s waist and gave her a hug. “You do look cooler,” she said, laughing.

  Though she looked like she might voice a heated reply, Sarah held her tongue. Then she gave a reluctant smile. “Actually, I feel cooler.” Then she turned a stern countenance on Evie. “But I can’t use that saw anymore today. My hands are blistered.”

  She held one up for Evie’s inspection. The tender skin between her thumb and forefinger was fiery red and a row of angry blisters had risen. They had realized early on that they needed to wear gloves and had sent Miles to scrounge some from the camp. He’d returned with several pairs of gloves that swallowed the ladies’ dainty hands. Huge gloves were better than no gloves at all, but they did chafe. Evie’s hands bore similar injuries.

  “Maybe it is time to stop for the day.”

  She looked toward the sky. The sun had passed directly above the clearing several hours past, and was now nearly obscured by the tall fir trees that lined the western edge. She judged the time at around four o’clock, which meant they’d been working more than six hours. No wonder they were exhausted.

  “But look what we’ve accomplished!”

  The area where she envisioned her building was almost clear of trees. True, they had all been small, but that was one reason she selected this area. Stumps still protruded knee-high from the ground, shorn of their tops and looking like spikes planted around a battleground. On the far side of the glade, Louisa and Ethel were plying their saw to the last tree that stood in the way. Lucy was dragging a felled cedar from the center of the clearing.

  When they’d begun that morning, Evie would never have dreamed they could accomplish so much in a single day. The achievement was in large part due to Ethel, who had given up her loud cries of “Whoop! Whoop!” hours past. She’d labored tirelessly and with an unending good cheer, and even seemed to enjoy the work. Evie had to admit that her sturdy build was more suited to this sort of industry than Sarah’s stick-thin frame.

  Tree limbs rustled and Miles’s call preceded him into the clearing. “We’ve brought the last of it.”

  The man had proven absolutely worthless when it came to anything resembling physical labor. After a halfhearted attempt to fell a bush with a stalk no bigger around than Sarah’s bony wrist, his feet became tangled in the tall grass and he fell. Claiming that he had injured his shoulder in the fall, he’d insisted on “resting” in the shade for an hour while the ladies worked. At that point Evie had realized he had no intention of actually doing any real work and began assigning him a series of tasks, such as fetching gloves and filling water skins. At least he accomplished those cheerfully enough.

  Miles emerged from the trees, followed by a pair of Duwamish braves carrying crates of earthenware dishes. The natives had showed up shortly after lunch. For a while Evie hoped they would pitch in and help, but they seemed content to stand off to one side and watch the work with amused stares. She’d finally given Miles the task of engaging them to carry the restaurant supplies from the beach. Here the provisions would be far less visible, and therefore safer. At least that was her hope.

  “There you go, my good fellows. Right over there.” Miles, whose empty hands swung freely at his sides, nodded toward the pile of crates and bundles at the far end of the clearing, and the Indians good-naturedly followed his directions. Miles approached Evie. “The only thing left at the beach is the stove, which is far too heavy for two people to carry. We’ll need to borrow the Dennys’ mule before we attempt to move that.”

  “Here it goes,” called Louisa.

  Evie turned in time to see Ethel cup her hands around her mouth and shout, “Timber!” in an enthusiastic voice that filled the glade and rose into the sky. Grinning like a child, she said, “I just love doing that.”

  The tree stood around eight feet tall. Small by lumberjack standards, but it was one of the biggest the ladies had felled. They’d learned early in the day, by trial and error, to cut the smaller branches from the bottom of the trunk to save their faces being scratched, and to give them room to work around the trunk. Now Ethel jumped up and grabbed one of the remaining branches to tug it toward the ground while Louisa plied her saw to the last bit of wood attaching the tree to its stump. With a crack the trunk gave, and Ethel leaped out of the way as the tree fell to the grass. Evie let out a cheer that was echoed by the other ladies. Even the two Duwamish natives joined in with high-pitched victory cries.

  “Good work, ladies.” Miles pulled out his handkerchief and mopped at his forehead. “I think we’ve done enough for one day.”

  Evie turned a sour look his way, but chose to ignore the comment. “I have one more thing I want to do before we head back.”

  Sarah groaned aloud as Evie retrieved the lunch bag. From it she pulled a folded paper and a coil of thin, stiff rope—clothesline that she had borrowed from Mary that morning.

  “I want to mark the boundaries of the building,” she announced.

  “Excellent idea.” Miles smiled broadly. “I shall help.”

  From nearby she retrieved her ax and four straight branches she had cut earlier for this purpose. All day she’d been eyeing the exact spot she wanted, and now she marched across the grass to the first corner. Turning, she peered through the trees where sunlight shimmered off the clear waters of the bay. One day soon, she would see this same sight through the front window of her restaurant. With a satisfying sense of accomplishment, she placed the end of the first branch on the soil and, using the back of her ax, pounded it into the ground.

  Louisa, Ethel, Sarah, and Lucy stood in a row nearby, watching. Evie looked at Miles. He might be untrustworthy when it came to money and supplies, and worthless when it came to work, but he was her business partner in the restaurant venture. And besides, without him she would be working as a housemaid back in Chattanooga, living in her rented room and waiting for James to determine when it was time to get married. She handed him the coil and smiled. “Tie it around that stake and follow me.”

  She made a show of unfolding the paper and examining her sketch, though she knew the dimensions by heart. With measured steps, she counted off five paces to the rear corner, where she drove the second stake. Then she turned to her left and counted ten paces for the th
ird, and another five back to the fourth corner. Miles followed behind, securing the clothesline to each stake. He tied the last knot with a flourish and straightened.

  A sense of triumph bloomed in her chest. With a grin she could not contain, she made a show of stepping across the line to stand in the exact center of the rectangle, accompanied by the cheers of her friends and the victory calls of the natives.

  She had not nearly finished basking in the enjoyment of the moment when a man stepped between the fir branches and into the clearing. Startled, she turned to find Noah standing still, staring around the glade with a countenance of pure bemusement. Through most of the morning she had started at every noise, certain that he would show up and try to force them to stop working, but in the past hours she’d forgotten to be anxious. How perfect that he appeared now, when she finally had something worthwhile to show him.

  “There you are, my boy,” Miles said. “You’re just in time to join in the celebration.”

  Noah spread his arms wide, his head shaking slowly back and forth. “What is this?”

  Lifting her head high, Evie folded her arms across her chest with a contented grin. “This is the future site of my restaurant. We’ve worked all day and cleared it.” She raised her eyebrows and added, “Without disturbing your lumberjacks.”

  “But…” Head still shaking, Noah walked slowly around the roped-off rectangle, examining the jagged stumps, the pile of brush in the far corner, and the mound of supplies with the two Indian braves standing in front of it. “Who did all the work?”

  “We did.” Louisa winked in Evie’s direction and adopted a mock-simpering tone. “All by our sweet little selves.”

  “And we have the blisters to prove it,” added Sarah, extending her hand for his examination.

  He continued the circuit and came to a halt in front of Evie, just outside the boundary line. “So this is the place you’ve chosen for your restaurant?”

  Irritation sparked in her. Did he have nothing else to say? No words of congratulations, or even acknowledgment of their accomplishment? How like him.

  She raised her nose high. “This is the place.”

  “Really?” He made a show of looking around the clearing. “And have you filed a claim with the land management office in Portland?”

  The words doused her irritation. She lowered her nose. “What?”

  His lips formed a tight smile. “You didn’t know you had to file a claim with the authorities? Have you bothered to check to see that no one else has claimed this particular plot of land?”

  The blood drained from her face, leaving her cheeks cold and her head light. She cast a frantic look toward Miles, who stared at Noah with his hand covering his mouth. Eyes wide, he caught her eye and gave a slight shrug.

  Her temper threatened to flare, but she held it in check. This was her fault as much as Miles’s. After the fiasco with the financing, she should have known better than to rely on him to handle business details. What was she thinking to blithely assume the land she desired would be available for nothing? She looked back at Noah.

  “Has—” Her voice wavered. She swallowed and tried again. “Do you know if this plot of land has been claimed?”

  “Yes, it has.”

  She tried to read his expression, but could not look past the mockery in those steely eyes. “Wh—who owns it?”

  He folded his arms across his chest in an imitation of her arrogant posture and planted his booted feet firmly in the grass. “Actually, I do.”

  Eleven

  A few days before, Noah would have enjoyed this conversation immensely. But sitting across from Evie now, her features fluid as she struggled to control her emotions, he couldn’t take pleasure in her discomfiture.

  He’d refused to discuss the difficult situation of the land this afternoon. Not only did he have to inspect the former cutting site and report back to Arthur, but he also saw tears spring to Evie’s eyes several times. If those tears had erupted into full-blown crying, he would be lost. He might as well have signed the land over to her on the spot. No, they both needed time to gather their thoughts and their composure before a sensible discussion could take place. So he’d promised to come to the Denny home when the day’s work was completed, and the ladies had left. It had been hard to watch their drooping shoulders as they disappeared down the path. They really had done an amazing job.

  Now Noah and Evie faced each other in the twilight, sitting near the stream where they could have some privacy for their discussion. At first they’d had a difficult time convincing the children to stay inside and Mary had been forced to speak sternly to the girls. Even now, two little faces peered over the half-door, staring intently in their direction.

  Evie sat still, her hands clasped in her lap and her gaze fixed on the stream. “I thought Miles would come with you.”

  “He wanted to,” Noah told her. “But after he followed me around all afternoon, reminding me that he is my mother’s only brother and attempting to lecture me on the responsibilities of family bonds, I refused to let him. I needed the quiet of the trail.”

  That brought a faint smile which faded as quickly as it appeared.

  The area’s birds began to settle in the treetops before darkness overtook them, calling loudly to one another above their heads. Noah searched for something to say, something that would soothe the awkwardness between them. He would even welcome Evie’s infuriating taunts over this gloomy silence.

  “I’m sorry I disturbed your land.” Her head ducked and she stared at her hands. “It was foolish of me not to realize I needed to inquire about ownership before we began the work.”

  Noah could have agreed, but he didn’t have the heart to beat her down further. Instead, he shrugged. “Everyone makes mistakes. And at least now I have a head start on clearing that plot.”

  Her lips twisted, and she gave a silent nod.

  “I’m curious about something. Why did you choose that place? Why not the landing area?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t want to be on the beach. I want a higher vantage point.”

  “But it seems to me that being near the dock, and hopefully soon the mill, would be an advantageous place for a restaurant. As this settlement grows, that will be the port of entry. When a ship docks, your restaurant would be one of the first buildings they see. You’d have sailors and visitors alike clamoring to eat there.”

  “I thought of that, but those aren’t the customers I hope to have.”

  Noah furrowed his brow. “Seems to me that any customers are good. You don’t agree?”

  “I do, but sailors will eat there once or twice every few months, whenever they are in port. Visitors probably even less often.” Finally, she met his gaze with a quick sideways flicker of her eyes. “What I want are regular customers. The men and women who will live here, and who will come back often. Eventually a town will grow here, and families will come to do their shopping and their banking and other business. And while they’re in town, my restaurant will only be a few steps away.”

  Her logic began to make sense. “But why wouldn’t the town be centered around the dock and the mill?”

  “You know what sailors are. They get off the ship with their minds set on guzzling as much whiskey as they can hold, and finding”—she looked demurely away—“companionship.”

  Noah had to concede her point. He’d been on enough ships and known enough sailors to verify that.

  She looked at him, a curious expression on her face. “Did you look at the area around the port in San Francisco?”

  “Yes, of course. I’ve been there many…oh.” His mind took him for a quick stroll down the port-side streets of San Francisco. The area was littered with dingy hotels, saloons, and houses of ill repute. The same was true of Portland. It was true, in fact, of every port town he’d ever visited. A new respect for Evie dawned. She’d spent time thinking of this, evaluating her future and planning for it.

  Now she smiled. “You see? I have no doubt that this
new town will be wholesome and upstanding, thanks to the Dennys’ influence, but if growth is to come, so will those businesses. And I think they’ll spring up around the docks.”

  “But why my land? What made you select that clearing?”

  “It’s close enough to the bay that supplies can be easily transported, and that’s what most businesses will need. The trail is already well-defined and looked to me like it could become a main thoroughfare. The land all around that clearing slopes, but there’s a long flat ridge right there that I thought would be the perfect place for a town to start. And besides.” She lowered her eyes again and seemed almost embarrassed. “I loved it from the moment I saw it. When I stepped into it, I felt…”

  Though she didn’t finish the sentence, Noah knew what she was going to say. “It felt right.”

  The muscles in her throat moved as she swallowed, and she nodded without looking up.

  He spoke in the softest whisper. “Me too. That’s why I staked my claim there.”

  They shared a smile, and some of the strain seeped away. The air around them became lighter, easier to breathe, and somehow warmer even though the sun had disappeared from view and night’s chill had begun to creep over the forest.

  Evie broke the companionable feeling by straightening her spine and standing. “I suppose I’ll have to start looking for a new place to build my restaurant.” Her smile held a spark of her usual spunk. “Surely not all the land around here has been claimed.”

  “Now, wait a minute. We’re not through here.” Noah gestured toward the ground. Hesitantly, she lowered herself, but sat stiffly instead of settling back.

  He could hardly believe what he was about to say. “What if we worked out some sort of business arrangement?”

  Delicate eyebrows rose high on her forehead. “Like a lease for the land?”

  “That’s an option,” he agreed.