Snowfire

by French, Colleen

  "To bed we go Mr. Jefferson Alexander the fourth," she declared. "But what about your drawers?"

  Alex's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, then he followed the line of her finger as she pointed into the darkness. By the light of the moon, he spotted one of the hound pups dragging his new trousers across the lawn.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The following morning Gabrielle took Alexis out to the dog pens to see the new litter of hound puppies. The little girl squealed with delight as the pups surrounded her, licking and jumping.

  Alexis put out her chubby hands to pet them, laughing when a dark speckled pup sucked at her finger. "Puppies!" she cried. "I never played with puppies before." She plopped herself on the ground without a thought to her lacy blue and white frock.

  "Never played with puppies? Where have you been living, girl? The moon?" Gabrielle caught a pup by the scruff of the neck and lifted him, letting the sweet smelling ball of fur lick at her face.

  "I've seen 'em, but I never petted one before."

  "Wait. Let me guess." Gabrielle dropped the pup into Alexis's lap. "Aunt Clarice wouldn't let you because they would muss your frock," she said in disbelief.

  Alexis gave a nod. "I used to watch them from the window when we came to visit Grandmother Margaret, but we don't come very often."

  Gabrielle tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. "Well, from now on, you can play with them whenever you want. Because I like a little girl with a rumpled dress."

  "Can I have one? Can I take one to bed with me?" Alexis rolled onto her back, letting the puppies climb over her and tumble to the ground in a wiggling heap.

  Gabrielle frowned. "I'm afraid not. Your papa got very angry with me the other day when I brought that old mama hound into the parlor. He's given me strict orders. No dogs in his mother's house." She unbuttoned the two top buttons of her white shirt waist so she could breathe more freely. She didn't mind wearing the skirts so much—at least they weren't suffocating like the slim fitting shirt waists—but oh, what she wouldn't have given for a pair of men's Levis and a flannel shirt.

  Alexis rolled onto her stomach, pushing her face into the fat belly of a rolling puppy. "Well, pooh on Papa, that's what I say!"

  "Alexis Alexander!" came a sharp voice from behind. "Get to your feet immediately, child!"

  Gabrielle spun around to see Clarice standing behind them. Alexis scrambled to her feet and ducked behind Gabrielle's skirts, slipping her hand into her new friend's.

  "You could have said good morning, Clarice," Gabrielle said tartly, tightening her grip on Alexis's trembling hand.

  "Good morning indeed! First you kidnap Alexis, and now you've got her rolling in the dirt like a pickaninny!"

  "Kidnap her!" Gabrielle chuckled. "You handed her to me."

  "I gave you permission to take her into town to purchase a new hat!" Clarice's face swelled with engorged blood. "I understand you had her swimming in the river," she said with disgust. "She could have been drowned!"

  "Not with me hanging on to her she couldn't have!" Swinging around, Gabrielle took Alexis's hand, kneeling in front of her. "You run up to the house, sweet. Go into the kitchen and tell Cook to give you an apple cookie, all right?"

  Alexis bobbed her head and turned to go, but Clarice's voice made her stop. "Alexis Alexander, you get in my carriage this minute!"

  Tears of fright welled in Alexis's eyes as she looked to Gabrielle in confusion.

  "Do as I say," Gabrielle said in a hushed voice, giving her bottom a pat. "Now."

  With a squeak, Alexis bounded off, running across the rutted lawn as fast as her little legs could carry her. Seeing her safe, Gabrielle stood up, swinging around to face her incensed sister-in-law. "She's Alex's child and she's staying here, Clarice," Gabrielle said through clenched teeth.

  "Who do you think you are?" Clarice's face was turnip-purple with rage.

  "Your brother's wife and the step-mother of his child!" Gabrielle didn't care what Alex had to say about patience, she'd taken enough from this rude, meddlesome biddy!

  Clarice shook her head in disgust. "You're nothing but trash, you little tramp. I've held my tongue for my dear brother's sake, but no longer."

  "How dare you," Gabrielle murmured, taken aback.

  "You don't belong here, so why don't you just go back from where you came? Jefferson will never be anything as long as he's got you hanging around his neck. You think Alexis will be able to get into a decent school with a step-mother with the kind of reputation you have? You think we don't know you spent the whole winter in bed with my brother? Jefferson told me you didn't get married until just before you left Seattle!"

  "Since when is it any of your damned business?" Gabrielle was trying to block out the woman's words; she was trying to ignore her, but she couldn't. Clarice just kept going on and on, ranting and raving in that high, shrill voice.

  ". . . Jefferson doesn't need you. He doesn't want you; everyone knows it. He's just too much of a gentleman to say so. The only reason he married you was because he thought it was the honorable thing to do after you threw yourself at him."

  Gabrielle took a step back, her mind reeling. "That's not true. Alex loves me."

  "Loves you? The only thing he loved was your gold, and now he's got it, doesn't he? How can you be so stupid, girl? How can you be the only one that doesn't see it?"

  "Stop it!" Gabrielle shouted. "Just stop it!" She covered her ears with her hands. "I don't want to hear anymore." Against her will, tears began to slip down her flushed cheeks.

  Clarice pointed an accusing finger, following her. "Well, you're going to hear it. You're ruining Jefferson's life, and you're going to ruin Alexis's too if you stay here!"

  A sob wracked Gabrielle's body as she turned away. She knew it wasn't true, none of it. She knew Alex loved her, but Clarice's wicked words combined with her own insecurities gnawed at her sense of reason.

  "Now I suggest you pack a bag and be on the next train out of here. There's one leaving at eight in the morning, bound for the West Coast." Turning, Clarice left Gabrielle and stalked across the lawn.

  Gabrielle sank to the ground, lifting a brown puppy into her lap. The little dog licked at her tear-stained cheek as she dashed at her eyes with the back of her hand. "I've got to get out of here." She sniffed. "Got to think . . ." Getting to her feet, she brushed the grass off her skirts and headed for the carriage house.

  When Gabrielle set out in the two-seated carriage, she didn't know where she was headed. Her tears clouded her vision as she made her way down the dusty road, urging the matched chestnut mares faster. The wind tore at her face, whipping her straw bonnet from her head to blow down the road, but she gave it no mind. Taking the road along the river, she grew calmer, letting the mares fall into an easy trot.

  What right did that woman have to say those things to her? Images of Alice LeBeau and her words of warning echoed in her head. Her mother had said the same, hadn't she? She'd called her own daughter a whore! Am I that stupid that I don't see it? Gabrielle wondered. Am I so in love with Alex that I don't realize he really was only interested in the gold? She moaned aloud, reining the horses to a halt near the river. Leaping out of the carriage, she tied the reins haphazardly to a hitching post and started down the path that ran along the river.

  She was so confused! Nothing seemed right, and she didn't know what to do about it. Gabrielle lowered her head as a middle-aged couple, arm in arm, passed her.

  "Good morning," they said, nodding pleasantly.

  "Morning," Gabrielle muttered, passing them by. A little farther down the river, out of sight of the other people that sat fishing or just enjoying the fall morning, she sank into the grass.

  "God sakes, Papa! What am I going to do?" she moaned aloud. Picking up a small stick, she tossed it into the water.

  Three quarters of a mile down the river, Mickey Jordan and Goliath Baron eased their ancient rowboat into the water and jumped in. Mickey, a dirty blond, pushed aside the fishing poles and took th
e oars, beginning to row. Goliath, the black man, sat in the bow of the boat, his cap pulled low over his face.

  "You sure you seen her?" Mickey asked, rowing steadily.

  "Yes, I'm sure." Goliath smiled, tipping his hat in the direction of an old couple fishing on the bank. "I told you she'd be back. It's where she come yesterday and the day before, ain't it?'

  "I don't know about this murderin' stuff, Goliath. I don't like it. Not one bit. 'Specially if we got to wait for the pay money to come from Seattle."

  "I told you, Mickey, it's going to be well worth our while. This Mr. Taylor's offerin' a high price on her head."

  "What'd she do? Pretty enough little thing. Hard to believe she could do somethin' to make a man so mad he'd have her kilt. 'Specially with him livin' out there and her here."

  "It's not our business, Mickey, so just keep rowin'."

  "I'm rowin', I'm rowin'!"

  The rickety rowboat moved downstream slowly as Mickey continued to row steadily. "Here, Mickey, here's where we leave it." Goliath pointed into the reeds, pushing his cap back off his face. "You think you're gonna sneak up on her in this dinghy?" The bow hit the shore and Goliath jumped out. "You gonna come sneakin' up on her and say 'Hey, little girlie, hold still while I get out of this boat so's I can hit you over the head and kill ya!'"

  Mickey shook his head. "I didn't say that, Goliath, and you know it! Don't be puttin' words in my mouth." He waded through the water, caught the bow of the wooden boat and tugged on it, pulling it onto the shore.

  "You ready now?" Goliath tapped his booted foot impatiently.

  Mickey wiped his runny nose on his sleeve. "Ready to go with ya, but I ain't ready to be hittin' the little lady over the noggin' with that there axe handle you got."

  Goliath turned around. "What do you mean? You said you'd do it." He shook the long axe handle he'd retrieved from the bottom of the boat.

  "I didn't say it; I never said it." He shook his head emphatically. "I didn't never say I was gonna do the whackin'. You said I was." Mickey pressed his dirty finger into Goliath's potbelly.

  Goliath raised the axe handle threateningly. "You do as you're told Mickey, or you'll get it, too," the black man said. "Now take this and let's get going before she up and moves."

  Mickey accepted the axe handle with shaking hands. "I don't like it," he murmured beneath his breath as he followed Goliath through a patch of cattails. "Don't like it at all. What if I don't hit her hard enough the first time?"

  "Hush now, before I hush you myself," Goliath ordered.

  Gabrielle rested her chin in the palm of her hand, tossing another stick into the water. She'd been there nearly an hour, muttering to herself, and still she hadn't come to any conclusions. She wished desperately that she had someone to talk to: Jack or Mya or even one of her sled dogs. Anything would be better than sitting here alone in this strange place mulling over her dilemma. She loved Alex so much, and now his daughter had found a place in her heart. But was Clarice right? Was she really doing more harm than good staying here in Virginia?

  The snap and crackle of moving brush behind her made Gabrielle turn just in time to see the shadow of a monstrous man swing a large stick over her head. She screamed, tensing her muscles to roll out of the way, but her voice was lost in the sound of the rushing water as swirling darkness overtook her.

  The first sound Gabrielle heard as she slowly drifted toward consciousness again was the sound of water lapping beneath her. Her face was pressed against something hard and rough as she lay crumpled in a heap. Forcing herself to lay perfectly still, she waited to gather her wits. A boat! That's where I am . . . someone has put me in a boat! Recalling every survival rule she had learned on the Tanana, she fought back the paralyzing fear that crept up her spine. Where were they taking her? Was it the men who had followed her yesterday? Why? What did they want with her? Was she being kidnapped, or was that blow meant to kill?

  "Come on, Mickey, let's get into the boat," she heard a deep male voice say.

  "I'm a'comin'," answered another man, distress obvious in his voice. "I just wanted to get rid of the stick. It's got blood all over it, Goliath!"

  Gabrielle took a deep breath, realizing it must be her own blood that covered the weapon the man had just disposed of. Then she felt it, the warm, damp sensation that oozed down over her ear and trickled to pool in the crook of her neck. She wondered faintly how injured she was, but she knew she couldn't be too bad off if her mind was functioning. Feeling the rock of the boat, she forced herself to remain relaxed to keep her abductors from realizing she was no longer unconscious.

  The boat tipped again; and then there was the sound of wood scraping wood, and Gabrielle felt the boat begin to move backward through the water. What am I going to do? she thought frantically. How am I going to get away? It was difficult to suppress the desire to jump up and dive overboard, but she realized she wouldn't have a chance against these two men. If one of them followed her overboard, he could drown her as easily as a kitten.

  "Golly, Goliath, look at all that blood," Gabrielle heard the man rowing say.

  "People bleed when you kill 'em, Mickey, old boy."

  Kill? They meant to kill me, Gabrielle thought. Dear God, help me, she prayed silently. What am I going to do? Panic rose in her throat until she thought she would choke, but then her father's words came to mind: "Panic is another word for corpse," Rouge LeBeau had told her time and time again. Swallowing against the lump in her throat, she tried to continue her shallow breathing.

  "How're we ever gonna get our money, Goliath, that's what I wanna know?" the man rowing said. "How's that Mr. Taylor gonna know we done our job right?"

  Taylor? Gabrielle shuddered inwardly. She couldn't believe that after all of this time, with this distance between them, he was still pursuing her. Only this time he wanted her dead. Why dead? And how did he find her? How could he possibly have known she was in Richmond?

  "'Cause it'll be in the newspapers when they find the body. Haven't you got any sense, Mickey?"

  Gabrielle heard the man, Mickey, cease rowing, and for a moment the boat just drifted. "How 'bout here, Goliath? This where we should dump her?"

  "Yup. Looks good to me. You go ahead while I watch to be sure nobody's comin'."

  "Me? I'm not doin' it. How come you're gettin' paid more than me, and I'm doin' all the dirty stuff, Goliath?" The big man stood up, rocking the boat, his feet so close to Gabrielle's face that she could smell the leather of his wet boots. "I just kilt this little girlie, and there you are sittin' pretty as can be with your arms folded across your lap!"

  "Mickey, this ain't the time to be discussin' this. You'll get your money, all right? Now just throw the body overboard before somebody sees us."

  The boat rocked again as Mickey took a step forward, the corner of his boot catching Gabrielle's hair. She grimaced at the pain but remained silent, wishing the man would just shut up and throw her overboard.

  "Nope. I ain't gonna do it, Goliath."

  "What do you mean you ain't gonna do it?" Goliath raised his voice then lowered it.

  "I mean I ain't throwin' her over. You do it."

  "Look at her! She's dead. I ain't touchin' her!" Goliath stood up in the bow of the boat, and it rocked again.

  "Look here, Goliath. The way I sees it is if we get caught, I'm the one who knocked her, and I'm the one that threw her in the drink. What'd you do? You tole me to kill her, and you're gettin' most of the money." Mickey shifted his weight, and the boat rocked violently.

  "Hey! Watch it, dumb ass, you're gonna tip the boat!"

  "Tip it? What do I care if I tip it?" Mickey shifted his weight purposely, and the boat rocked so hard that it rolled Gabrielle on her side. It took all of her willpower to remain relaxed, like a ragdoll, like her Laura, and let her body flop over. "If'n it tips," Mickey went on angrily, "she'll roll out, and I won't have to dump her." He continued to rock his body and water splashed into the boat.

  Goliath sat back in the bow, c
lutching the side of the boat. "But you'll dump us, too," he shouted above the sound of the pitching boat.

  "I don't care," Mickey answered. "You're the one that can't swim!" And with that, the man stomped his booted foot, and the boat tipped over.

  As the cool water splashed Gabrielle's face and she took a deep breath, she heard Mickey throw himself into the water. Goliath cried out and fell with a bigger splash as Gabrielle felt herself roll from the boat to the water.

  Gabrielle allowed her body to sink beneath the surface, letting the cold water of the James River revive her. Then, cautiously she moved her arms, then her legs, praying her limbs would obey her. Feeling lightheaded by now, she knew she had to resurface. Turning away from the sound of splashing water, she raised her head above the surface just long enough to catch a breath of air and dove again.

  She didn't know if one of the men had seen her; she prayed they hadn't, but she kept swimming. Her instincts told her to get as far away from the danger as possible. Gabrielle resurfaced three times before she felt the slope of the bank beneath her and decided to have a look behind her. Her heart pounding, she brought her head above the surface. Pushing her wet hair off her face, she found her would-be murderers nowhere to be seen. But as she pulled herself exhausted toward the reed-covered bank, she heard them just around the corner of the bend in the river.

  Gabrielle could hear loud splashing and shouting, and she couldn't help wondering if the man Mickey was going to leave his partner to drown.

  "Kick your feet," she heard Mickey calling. "Good a time as any to learn how to swim, Goliath."

  "Help me!" the black man cried out, his voice garbled. "I'm drownin'!"

  "You're not drownin', you're swimmin', now come on, just a little farther."

  Panting, Gabrielle shook her head, pulling herself into the shallow water where reeds grew. I'm safe enough from them now, she thought as she pulled herself onto solid ground.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  For a long time Gabrielle lay on the bank of the river, her head cradled in her arms. The voices of her captors had faded until she was certain they were gone. Mickey had waded out and rescued Goliath after they had agreed that they'd split the payment for killing her fifty-fifty. Gabrielle couldn't help laughing at the irony of the situation. The two of them had been so busy arguing over the money that neither had checked to be certain her body had sunk in the river. If Taylor had hired two men with a little more sense, she knew she would be dead at this moment.