Snow Angel Part 3

The idea of hiring her as a prospector had already occurred to him, but the notion had its problems. For one thing, he didn't know if she was telling the truth about being a gold miner. He really needed an expert since he knew next to nothing about it. He wasn't sure he trusted her, either. It would be foolish to hire someone he didn't trust, and yet a something about the idea appealed to him.

Trying not to show his excitement, he said, "We'd have to start in spring when the streams thaw out."

Elizabeth shook her head. "I can't wait that long. All the good claims will be gone if I stay here. I need to leave for Dawson by first thaw."

"Elizabeth, I hate to be the one to tell you, but all the good claims are already gone. They were gone a year ago."

She bristled as he knew she would. "Then why are all those millionaires still getting off the s.h.i.+ps in Seattle?"

"Those men panned that gold a year ago. In August, last year, three men discovered gold on Rabbit Creek. They renamed it Bonanza Creek and staked their claim. Word spread up here about the findings, but winter was just around the corner. When the Yukon River froze, it trapped the prospectors up there near Dawson. That's why it took so long for word to reach the outside. By the time Alaska began to be flooded with gold seekers, most of the good claims were gone."

Elizabeth stood abruptly and walked away from the table. With her back to him she said, "I'll find a way. I always do."

Noah sighed. He knew he was hurting her, but the thought of this fragile-looking woman taking on the man-eating northern trails and the Yukon River made his stomach lurch. Softly he said, "Elizabeth, you may know a lot about panning gold, but this is Alaska. The ground up there is frozena"not in inches but in feet. Maybe even miles. I heard the men in Dawson are building fires every night to thaw out a few feet of earth at a time. They have to dig it, haul it up with buckets, and then build another fire in the hole and do it all over again. In the spring they'll have a ton of earth to wash. A ton. They have nothing better to do with their winter, stranded as they are, but I do. If we wait until spring thaw, we can check out all the streams on my land. It may take awhile, but who knows? We might find gold."

She turned, eyes blazing. "Yes, your land. What kind of future am I supposed to make for myself prospecting for someone else? I need to strike it rich on my own."

Noah motioned for the chair. "Elizabeth, please sit down and listen to me. You would be a partner, not just working for me."

She ignored the chair, "What exactly would being your partner mean?"

Words and plans that he hadn't even let himself think through started pouring out of his mouth. "Come spring, we decide on a spot and you help me mine the land. I'll split any gold we find, say 40/60."

"40/60? Why not 50/50?"

"I'll be providing the food and shelter. That should count for ten percent. It's a gamble, you see. You could end up paying a lot for food and board or next to nothing, depending on how much we find. What do you think?" Noah smiled broadly, knowing it was sound reasoning.

"What do I do until spring? You seem to have my future sewed up tight."

She sounded so resentful, Noah had to suppress his smile. It was killing her to accept his offer. "Actually, I did have a thought on that, but only if you're agreeable to it."

"Well?"

"In another week or so, when you're ready to travel, I'll take you down to Juneau to the trading post. With all the added business of the miners, I know Will and his wife would welcome the help this winter. Then, when spring thaw breaks, we'll pick our ground, set up camp, and if all goes well, maybe hire a man or two to help."

Elizabeth closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them Noah could read the resignation, but she didn't like it. "Since I'm not in a position to bargain with you, Mr. Wesley, I will accept your offer, but I'd like to make one thing perfectly clear. This is a business partners.h.i.+p, nothing else." She turned away from him and spoke toward the stove, "I'll have my own shelter."

Noah's fist came down on the table, making the plates jump. "Confound it, woman! Ia"I wouldn't offer anything like that. You'd have your own, well, you know, shelter. You didn't really think I was a I mean, I might, but not unless we were married a that is a well, you know what I mean." He broke off in frustration. "And don't call me *Mr. Wesley.' It's just plain Noah."

Elizabeth had turned in shock when he began his tirade. Clamping her open jaw shut, she said, "OK. I just wanted to be clear on that." Looking down at his empty plate she ventured, "I'll be glad to wash these dishes and do any other ch.o.r.es to help out while I am here."

Noah was still fl.u.s.tered and it took him a moment to grasp the turn of topics. Too gruffly he asked, "Are you sure you're ready to be on your feet? I nearly froze my feet a couple of times and I know it takes some time to heal."

"Oh, and I'm sure you just laid around the cabin for days while you were waiting for your feet to thaw, right?" she asked, her head c.o.c.ked to one side and a curtain of dark hair falling over one shoulder.

Noah answered with a shrug, "I guess not, but you're a woman."

Elizabeth's lips pursed together. "And hardier than you think, which I will prove soon enough. But for now, I'll start with the dishes. At least let me help you while I'm here."

Suddenly Noah understood. Her pride was at stake, and he couldn't say that in the same position he would feel any differently. Looking around the orderly cabin, he spied a basket under the bed and smiled. There was one household ch.o.r.e he could never get his hands adept at. "I'm not much at mending. Can you sew?"

Elizabeth nodded. "Yes, I can sew. What do you want made?"

Noah stood and walked to the bed. Bending down, he reached under the frame and pulled out a willow basket overflowing with all kinds of garments. He talked as he sorted through the pile. "Just some mending. I can't seem to fix holes, and they've kind of piled up over the last few years." Glancing over his shoulder at her he added, his voice quieting a degree or two, not wanting to hurt her feelings, "You'll be needing some warmer clothes yourself, to see you through till spring." He looked back down at the bed. "I have some nice furs you could use. You'll need them for the journey back to Juneau."

He held his breath in the ensuing silence and then was relieved to hear, "That's very kind of you, thank you." When he turned around, she had busied herself by pouring water from a porcelain pitcher into a pot to heat for dishwater.

Noah put one of his piles, the one with long underwear and other more personal items, back into the basket and stuffed it under the bed, leaving the other pile on top. "Well, just take your time on these things. I need to scout out some dinner, so I'll be gone for about an hour, going around the perimeter of the cabin checking for prints. I'll probably spend most of tomorrow further out, if the weather holds." He smiled at her, trying to put her back at ease. He found he would rather see her spitting mad any day than see her humbled like this. It would be good to leave for a while and give her some breathing room. Shrugging into his coat, Noah had to check the sudden urge to kiss her on the forehead before he left. He shook his head slightly as he bent down to tie on his snowshoes. "I'll be back soon." With a wave, he was out the door and shutting it tight behind him.

Walking to the barn to feed the animals, Noah smiled as he thought of Elizabeth. For such a little woman she sure had a lot of courage. She was really something. It hit him suddenly how much he would miss her when she left. He didn't want her to leave. He didn't want his life to go back to what would now seem lonely, almost desolate. Glancing up at the beamed roof of the barn Noah whispered, "I never thought I'd ask it, but a could You send another blizzard?"

January 14, 1882 Dear Mrs. Rhodes, I regret to inform you that the woman with whom I have been corresponding was no longer employed at the orphanage when I arrived. The other teachers claimed not to have ever known her. I believe they are being dishonest and that Elizabeth was here, but someone has learned of our inquiries and they have moved her to another location. No one will speak to me except to claim they've never seen or heard of an Elizabeth Greyson with your child's age and description. I have carefully searched the area for both the teacher and Elizabeth but have not been able to locate any knowledge of them. I must tell you, ma'am, this is too coincidental to be accidental. Do you have any enemies I should know of?

Sincerely yours, Jeremiah Hoglesby.

Private Detective for Hire.

Five.

When Noah returned he was surprised to find Elizabeth in the kitchen again.

She turned toward him as he walked in, wiped tendrils of curls from her forehead with the back of her hand, which held a long-handled wooden spoon, and said, "I'm glad you're back. I was beginning to worry."

With that announcement, she turned back toward the stove, as though she said such things to him every day. Stirring vigorously, she shot him a smile over her shouldera"the kind of smile that held him fastened to the floor.

"I'm boiling rice. I didn't think I could mess it up too badly, do you?"

Noah was entranced, despite himself. To think that just a few short days ago she was a pale and lifeless girl to him. Now she was a vivacious, warm woman. He liked the way she moved about his kitchen, with feminine gestures and graceful tilts and lifts to her arms. She was so different. He decided he had been away from women too long. He could only shake his head and slowly pull off his gear as he watched her move, light-footed, around the kitchen. Finally, he walked over and stood behind her to peer over her shoulder into the pot. She sure did smell better than the rice.

"It looks good," he said. "How long has it been boiling?"

Elizabeth shrugged, her shoulders brus.h.i.+ng up against his chest. "Only a few minutes," she said softly.

She had stiffened a little, at his nearness he supposed, but he wasn't willing to step back just yet. Above and in front of her sat a shaker with salt in it. He reached for it, saying, "You'll need a little of this." His voice was huskier than he meant it to be, and he cleared his throat. It had been a long time since he had felt this awkward around a woman. He had been sixteen when he'd had his first crush on a neighbor's daughter. She had been the fickle sort, only interested in him as long as he ignored her. The moment he'd noticed her that summer she suddenly filled out her dress and looked at him with subtle challenge in her eyes, when she knew she'd snared his attention, she'd suddenly turned uppity and unreachable. He was left with hot dreams and thin air. It had been a good lesson, though, and he'd been more careful of appearing too eager after that. There had been a few others since that time. A woman in Montana had caught his eye. Now older and wiser, he'd courted her with some finesse. But in the end, she just hadn't seemed the right fit. She would have been a practical choice, but he could only see himself living the daytime hours with her. He'd broken it off, feeling wretched in the face of her tears. In Alaska he'd been "set up" a few times by well-meaning friends. He'd gone along with it, but none had captured his heart or, truthfully, any other part of him.

He looked down at the woman in his cabin and inhaled as quietly as he could. Now, this woman. This woman captured his imagination. He could not get enough of looking at her or listening to the outlandish things she said. At night, hearing her soft breathing just steps away, he lay awake wanting to go to her. Sleep only made him dream of her, even dreaming of how she smelled with her clothes drying beside his bed. He lay there wanting, dreaming of touching her again, touching her in ways that would bring her to life a again a but in another way. She was all he could think about.

Elizabeth stood there, stiffly enduring, slowly stirring the swirling bits of rice. Finally, with quiet force she stated, "You may think you want me, Noah, but believe me, you don't."

Her tone shocked him more than her words, so much so that he took a step back and then another. "What do you mean?"

She turned and looked at him with eyes as old as the earth. "You don't know me."

It took courage, in the face of those eyes, but he stepped back toward her and took her hands into his. "I want to know you."

She laughed. It was brittle and made his heart sink. What had made this young woman so fierce? So unreachable?

She laughed again, this time making light of it. With a shrug of one shoulder she turned back to her rice and asked, "What do you want to know?"

Noah felt his throat constrict. How could she change like that, from one moment to the next, into someone else? He grappled with a hundred questions, half wanting to run out into the familiar territory of his frozen land. But he couldn't give up. There must be some key, some way to unlock her barriers. "What kind of family did you have?"

She stiffened, almost imperceptibly. Had he not been focusing on every nuance of her stance he would have missed it.

"Oh, you know. Just the normal kind."

Noah pressed on. "How old were you when you lost your parents?"

Her head was bent over the pot in apparent concentration. She had knotted up her dark hair and some curls had fallen, making the back of her neck look vulnerable in its graceful beauty. He wanted to kiss her there more than anything he could ever remember wanting. His body ached to take her into his arms and kiss her.

"I don't remember. My grandparents raised me. We lived on a farm in Illinois."

"I thought you were from Seattle?" he managed from a tight throat.

Elizabeth turned from the pan, brus.h.i.+ng past him and busying herself setting dishes on the table. "I am from Seattle. I moved out west after my grandparents died."

"All alone?"

"Yes, well, I had friends. And I made a decent living for myself."

"Panning gold?" he asked with more heat than he meant to express aloud.

"Yes, and doing other odd jobs. I was a seamstress at a dress shop in Seattle."

"At least that was a respectable job."

Elizabeth snapped, "I am sorry to offend your high moral standards, but I did what was necessary. I couldn't pay the boarding house and feed myself on what they paid me to work fourteen-hour days, sewing until my eyes were so blurred I could hardly see to get home at night. When I heard about this gold rush, I jumped at the chance to make a real future for myself."

"And risk your life in the process!" He was nearly shouting, shouting at the unfairness of it all. That she had to be so strong all the time. That she didn't want him. That he might never be able to scale the walls she'd constructed around her heart. But she didn't know that.

"Because I'd have to risk my life in the process," she said low and fierce and whisper-thin. "I had nothing else left to lose."

He shoved away from the table, not knowing how to answer that except to say, "Dead people don't have futures, Elizabeth."

What did it matter to him what she did with her life, anyway? It wasn't as if he could do anything about it. Stalking over to the hook on the wall, he pulled his coat down and shrugged into it.

"I'm going to feed the dogs."

ELIZABETH WATCHED HIM go with an angry glare. How dare he try to tell her about her life. If he knew about the things she'd done, he would be finished with her. She imagined the shock and even disgust on his face had she told him of the agreement she'd struck with Ross. She shook her head slowly. She couldn't think of that.

There were many other, lesser transgressions to shock him with that she knew by heart, like a creed, the mantra of her existence: the subtle lies, the petty thefts, the calculating maneuvers to get what she wanted, what she needed to survive to the next day, the men on the goldfields a lonely men, who were so easy to take advantage of. She'd grown overly confident, thinking she could play the game without paying a price. And she'd been very successful, until Ross.

No, Noah could not possibly understand hera"he was from a different world. He certainly wouldn't want her as his business partner, and she needed him to believe she had agreed to his plan. She needed the help of his friends to get through the winter. Never mind that for the first time she felt the emotional upheaval of a dull pain in her chest and enormous guilt when she looked into his clear blue eyes as he, hopeful and excited, spoke of their partners.h.i.+p come spring. She squashed the emotions. A conscience was something only the rich could afford.

Throwing elk steaks onto the hot skillet, she attempted to cook the meat. The steam and sizzle coming from the blackened pan sounded like she felt. Why must he probe and poke at her? He knew nothing about the black, empty hole that gaped inside her where his questions lurked. What had happened to her parents? As if she hadn't wondered that a thousand times and then determined to wonder about it no more. Why did he have to make her think of it again? But she couldn't seem to help it. The one memory locked deep in the recesses of her mind, a place she hadn't visited in years, mercilessly surfaced. A woman a soft, warm, comforting, motherly embrace. A smile that had beamed at her. Eyes that had glowed with love. Had she imagined it? She was afraid to dwell on it, that it might disappear into nothing but a wishful daydream. No, it must have been her mother. Her real mother.

Then the memory of alonenessa"feeling so utterly alone and frightened, with no one to come when she called. Dark rooms and loud voices and children crying, all blurred together for the first years. She'd learned the value of disappearing into silence those years.

The memories were clearer around age five when, she had since concluded, she must have been moved to a different orphanage. She'd received a good education and plenty of food, simple and repet.i.tive though it was. The girls were like girls anywhere, she supposed, some kind and loyal, some spiteful and mean. It hadn't been bad, really, but it would take more humility than she possessed to tell Noah about it. She didn't want or need his piteous stare.

The real trouble had started later when she was adopted. She ground her teeth, turning the meat over in the pan, stabbing at it with a sharp fork, as she thought back on pinch-faced, evil-eyed Margaret Dunning and her s.h.i.+ftless husband, Henry. She repressed a shudder, remembering how they had inspected her, making her stand and turn around, examining her teeth and then her body before taking her home with them. It didn't take long to figure out what the Dunnings had really wanted. With them, she'd learned all the colors of dirt, how hard clay was and full of rock, how little by little even a skinny girl could move mountains. She learned to hide food in her pockets and then, when they'd found that, in underclothes and broken-down boots. She learned the sting of a switch, the sound it made as it slashed through the air depending on its thickness, and the haphazard aim of blind anger.

It had taken six long years before the Dunnings had finally realized that, even with her, they still couldn't make a living off the dirt. Henry came home one day, drunker than usual with more than whiskey. He'd been struck by gold fever. He'd heard of a strike in San Juan, Utah. The next instant, it seemed, they were moving west. It had been her first ray of hope. Out west she could run away. There would be opportunities and, like the prairie schooners she watched sail by, she intended to float away on the first one that came along. But the unexpected happened: Elizabeth caught the fever. Gold was all she thought about. The next big strike was always just around the corner, hope a heavy aphrodisiac. And it was contagious. All three worked doggedly to find the mother lode. Elizabeth had been sure that gold was the answer to all her problems.

One day Henry had shown up in camp after a long absence with a toothless, ear-splitting grin, as excited as she'd ever seen him.

"Where you been? What you been up to?" Margaret had asked suspiciously, eyes narrowed. "You're hidin' somethin', I know you."

Henry shook his head, grinning, something he rarely allowed himself to do because of his blackened, rotten teeth. He dug into the pocket of a pair of faded tan pants. What he pulled out left them both speechless. It was the biggest chunk of gold they had ever seen, laying right in the center of his dirty palm.

The air whooshed out of Margaret as she s.n.a.t.c.hed it out of his hand. "Where'd you get that?" she demanded, looking at it with amazed glee in her eyes.

Henry's chin rose up and his chest puffed out with pride. "I found me a new claim, woman. Gold showing on the surface, thick as my wrist."

Elizabeth was aghast. Henry never spoke to Margaret like that, as if he demanded her to respect him. Margaret quickly burst his bubble.

"You? A new claim?" she shrieked. "Why you no-good, lying thief. You stole that or did somethin' evil to get it."

Henry shook his head but didn't look her in the eyes. "N-no," he stammered. "I didn't do nothin' wrong. Now you two pack up. We got to get back to that claim afore' someone else takes it. I covered the gold, so's I could come back for the both of y'uns. Didn't have to do that, ya know. I could'a left you, woman. Gone off and got rich on my own. But I didn't. I came back for you." He turned suddenly toward Elizabeth, eyes mean and hard. "And you, girlie. We got plenty of work for you to do, so be quick about it and get this camp broke up."

Elizabeth turned away before he could see the flare of rebellion in her eyes and began gathering supplies. Had Henry really struck the mother lode? It seemed impossible that he'd had such luck. Like Margaret said, he had probably done something bad, terrible even, to gain possession of that nugget. But maybe, just maybe, something had finally gone their way.

They packed up that morning and started west, Henry muttering about a dirt trail head that he had marked with a large rock. Three long, exhausting days later they came to the new claim. Elizabeth could not believe what her sight told her. Under an overhanging cliff, there was a vein of gold showing on the surface of the rock that trailed in a glittering path from their feet to higher than Henry's head with no end in sight. It promised to be a fortune.

She hadn't been fooled though. A person didn't stake a claim on a spot that had already been mined as this one had, especially if gold was showing on the surface. Only an idiot would part with a claim like thata"or a dead man.

Margaret must have thought the same, for she accused Henry of murdering a man to jump the claim. Henry had at first denied it, for days stuck to his story and then, in a sobbing, drunk fit, admitted to the deed. What Elizabeth overheard later that night had sent the first real, chilling fear for her life coursing through her entire body. Husband and wife had talked at length of how they would blame the murder on Elizabeth and concocted an elaborate story to support their claim. She'd known then that she had to escape. They would never share the wealth with her anyway. She forced herself to see the trutha"that they would use her, use what little strength she had to help dig out the gold, and then horde it for themselves and blame the murder on her.

In the end, she heard that a man's body was found downstream from the claim. The body had a bullet hole in it, and some men had recognized the miner. They were looking for the killer. All she knew at the time was that Henry had suddenly become nervous. The end had finally come. Elizabeth had to get away from the Dunnings and whatever law would eventually catch up to them. That's when she'd escaped. The man and woman had been so distracted by the gold that it had been easy.

At seventeen years old she had crept away in the middle of the night and joined a family going to Northern California, telling them her parents had been taken by typhoid. It was a common enough occurrence and they hadn't questioned her.

Reaching California, Elizabeth had finally broken out on her own. She'd mined here and there for as long as the gold lasted, alternately panning and sewing for a living. Then she'd gradually worked her way to Seattle and the edge of the continent. After settling into a meager existence as a seamstress, she'd met Ross and learned that the Dunnings were looking for her. The knowledge terrified her, wearing grooves of fear into her mind. What if they were still trying to convince the law that she was responsible for the murder? Miners hung men for stealing, much less killing. It wouldn't matter that she was a woman, either. Both Henry and Margaret were experts at lying and swindling. If they had made it look like she'd done it, then her only chance was to get as far away as possible. And she could never see Ross again. What he had done to her a no, she couldn't think of that.

Then, in the middle of July, just before her twentieth birthday, her salvation came. Word of gold in the Yukon Territory of Canada reached Seattle. Gold was waiting, hidden in the streambeds of a place so vast, so treacherous, so forbidding that she could lose herself. Something told her, in the pit of her stomach, that she would find what she was looking for here, in this icy wilderness laden with streams of gold.

January 5, 1884.