She gaped at it, then at him, her brown eyes wide.“M-merci, monsieur!”
Nicholas felt an absurd momentary impulse to apologize or explain himself. There’d been a time in his life when he would have asked her what had happened to make her sell her body, when he might even have tried to help her find a better life. But those days had long since passed. The truth was he no longer cared.“De rien.”It was nothing.
And as she hurried out of the room, wolf pelt clutched to her breast, that’s what Nicholas felt.
Nothing.
***
Elspeth Stewart woke with a start, heart racing.
The geese!
She rose as quickly as she could, grabbed the rifle, which sat next to the bed, primed and ready.
If it was the same vixen that had harried them yesterday, she would shoot, and this time she wouldn’t miss.
And if it were Indians or renegade soldiers?
Her mouth went dry.
Quickly, quietly she crossed the wooden floor of the cabin that was her home, lifted the heavy bar from the door and slowly opened it, dread like ice in her veins. Outside it was still dark, the first light of dawn only a hint in the eastern sky. She peered past the door toward the poultry pens and saw a small honey-colored fox dart into the underbrush.
In a warm rush of relief, Elspeth stepped quickly onto the porch, raised the rifle, cocked it, fired. A yelp, followed by silence, told her she had hit her mark.
She stepped back inside long enough to put down the rifle, put on her cloak, and slip into her boots—she had taken to sleeping fully clothed since Andrew’s death, but that didn’t include boots—before going outside to see what damage had been done.
The vixen lay dead in the bushes. Its teats were swollen with milk, and Elspeth felt an unexpected pang of empathy for the dead animal. It had only been trying to eat so that it could feed its new litter of kits.
She pressed a hand protectively to her rounded belly. In a few weeks, a month at most, she would be doing the same. Which is why she needed to protect the geese and chickens, she thought, brushing aside her sentimental response.
She squatted down, picked the vixen up by its tail, and carried it away. She didn’t want the smell to attract bears or wolves.
When she returned, the geese were still honking and flapping angrily about, but there were no bloody wings, no broken feathers that she could see. Andrew’s fence had held.
“Quit your flaffin’!” she scolded. She wasn’t truly angry with them. Geese were better than dogs when it came to alerting their masters to danger. Her life—and that of her unborn baby—might well depend on them one day.
As it was so close to dawn and she’d be getting up soon anyway, Elspeth decided to start her morning chores. She fed the geese and chickens, gathered the few eggs that had been laid, and set off to the cowshed for the morning milking. By the time the animals had been fed and Rona and Rosa, her two mares, had been led out into the paddock, the sun had risen behind a heavy blanket of clouds.
She drew water from the well and carried it inside to heat for washing and for her morning porridge. She had just stepped through the door, when she saw the fire had died down to embers and needed wood. But there was no firewood stacked in the corner. And then she remembered.
She hadn’t had time to split more wood for the fire yesterday and had been so tired after supper that she had fallen asleep at the table, leaving the chore undone.
Her stomach growled.
“Well, Bethie, you cannae be expectin’ the wood to chop itself.” She lifted the heavy water bucket onto the table, took the ax from its resting place beside the fire, went back out into the chilly morning.
The woodpile stood on the west side of the house, and it was dwindling. She hadn’t worked out how she was going to fell trees by herself; that was a problem for another day. She awkwardly lifted a large piece of wood onto an old stump, hoisted the ax, and swung. The ax cut halfway through the wood, stuck. She pried it loose, swung again. The wood flew into two pieces.
In the two months since Andrew’s passing, she had gotten better at chopping firewood. She no longer missed and sometimes even managed to split the wood with one blow as Andrew had done. Still, it was an exhausting chore, one she did not enjoy.
How long could she last out here alone? The question leapt, unbidden and unwelcome, to her mind. It was followed by another.
Where could she go?
She lifted another piece of wood onto the stump, stepped back, swung, and soon found herself in a rhythm.
Perhaps after the baby was born she could go to Fort Pitt or one of the other forts and find work there. At least she and the baby would be safe from Indians and wild animals. But would there be other women? Would they be safe from the soldiers?
