Remembered

by Tamera Alexander

  Stewartson shrugged as if to say it wasn’t his fault.

  A thought crept up on Jack, one he hadn’t entertained in a long, long time. Did God take Aaron at such a young age because he knew Jack wouldn’t be a good enough father to the boy? Even as the punishing question tried to take root, Jack refused it. Again.

  For years he’d struggled to search out the why behind Mary’s and Aaron’s deaths. And gradually he’d been led to accept that he might never know. Odd, the older he got—though he thought he still had some good years left in him—the less of a hold this life had on him. Maybe age did that to a man. Or maybe it was God that did it, preparing him for all that waited on the other side.

  Death marked another beginning for him, not an end. He’d come to see it as part of his journey to God.

  “You know, Jack, if you’re ever—”

  The mare whinnied, and followed it with a low moan.

  Jack knelt for another look, then exhaled aloud. “Stewartson, looks like we’re in business.”

  CHAPTER | TWENTY - SIX

  ONE MORE HILL?” Lilly’s eyes danced.

  “I am willing if you are.” Véronique breathed deeply, relishing the scents of spring. “But I do not want you to strain yourself.”

  Lilly paused at the crest of the hill. “I’m okay. It doesn’t hurt too badly today.” She motioned off to the right. “Let’s take this way. It leads around the lower pasture and brings us up in front of Casaroja. There’s a whole bed of columbine blooming there. I saw it when we drove by. Which reminds me—you did very well on your first driving lesson, Mademoiselle Girard.”

  Véronique offered a brief curtsy. “Merci beaucoup, Mademoiselle Carlson. I had a very good teacher, non?” She was careful to watch where she stepped, as Lilly had warned earlier. She and Christophe had often walked through the pasture behind the Marchand stables in the evenings, so she was accustomed to this. But as fine as Lord Marchand’s stables and horses were, they could not compare to the boastings of Casaroja.

  “May I ask you a question, Mademoiselle Girard?”

  She glanced beside her to find Lilly watching. “Of course, ma chérie.”

  Lilly looked away. “It’s personal.”

  “It is good that it is personal, since you and I are friends of that nature.” Véronique wondered if this had anything to do with the boy Lilly had told her about earlier. That Jeremy, the racaille.

  Lilly looped her arm through Véronique’s. “How did you get Mr. Brennan to like you so quickly?”

  Véronique stopped short. “Pardonnez-moi?” Her face heated. She thought back to how they’d kidded together in Miss Maudie’s bedroom. “Mr. Brennan and I are friends, Lilly. If I have led you to believe there is more between us, I have misspoken. I admit again, as I did with you and Miss Maudie, that I like him . . . very much. But he has given me no indication of anything beyond friendship on his part.” Though there were moments when she’d questioned it.

  Lilly curled her tongue between her teeth, and slowly nodded. “He just asked you out to dinner. I saw the way he looked at you.”

  Véronique liked the way Jack Brennan looked at her, but that certainly wasn’t an indicator for a man’s true feelings. She’d seen many men—married gentlemen—take second and third looks at a woman, when a first glance should have more than sufficed. “Oui, he asked me to dinner, and I will enjoy Mr. Brennan’s company.”

  Lilly’s expression said she wasn’t convinced.

  Véronique took the girl’s arm and drew her forward toward the flowers. “Jack Brennan is the type of man who is kind to everyone, Lilly. I have observed this about him. It is his nature to be cordial and caring.” How did she explain their relationship when she wasn’t quite sure of it herself? “I have hired Mr. Brennan as my driver, and that affords us a . . . closer relationship of sorts because we spend more time together, but it is not what I believe you are thinking.”

  Lilly made the same tsking noise with her tongue as Miss Maudie had done earlier. “He stammered, for heaven’s sake. Didn’t you notice that?”

  She had noticed that. But she’d witnessed that kind of thing before when a lesser servant was addressing their superior. “Perhaps he was nervous because I am his employer. There is a . . . respect that runs between us.”

  “Well, there’s something running between you, but I don’t know that I’d call it respect.” They walked a few steps farther. “So you’re not going to tell me what you did to get him to like you?”

  “The young man meant for you, Lilly, will not require any tricks or ploys to be played upon him. He will see you, he will grow to know who you are—both the good and the bad—and he will realize he does not wish to live another day of his life without you.”

  Lilly sighed and rolled her eyes. “I knew you’d say something like that. I was looking for something more practical. Maybe something that happened between you and Mr. Brennan.”

  The trip Véronique had made with Jack to the Peerless came to mind, and she was reminded of what she’d done along the way. An accounting of that mortifying event would hardly help the girl in winning a boy’s heart, and Véronique dared not share that story. It was embarrassing enough that Jack harbored that memory of her.

  Lilly stopped and took hold of her arm. “Whatever you’re thinking right now, you have to share it. Your face is positively on fire.”

  Véronique put a hand over her mouth, and shook her head. “I cannot. It is too compromising.”

  Lilly’s shoulders fell. Her expression darkened. “Did Mr. Brennan . . . try to take advantage of—”

  “Non! It was nothing like that. Jack Brennan would never do such a thing. It was . . . something else that happened.” Suspicion lingered in Lilly’s eyes, and Véronique knew of only one way to dispel it. Though she regretted having to do so. “You remember, Lilly, that I am afraid of heights.”

  The girl’s expression clouded.

  “On one of my trips with Jack, the mountain gave way into a ravine. It was very steep, and frightening. I became nervous, and my stomach became . . .” She wanted to phrase this as delicately as possible.

  “Unsettled?”

  “Oui, unsettled. And then I . . .” She put a hand over her stomach at the memory.

  Lilly bit her lower lip but couldn’t hide her smile. “You didn’t.”

  Véronique closed her eyes. “I did.”

  “In the wagon?” Lilly waited. Then her dark brows shot up. “On him?”

  Véronique nodded as embarrassment swept through her. Hearing Lilly’s giggles didn’t help. “Please, Lilly, you must promise not to tell anyone. It was a very . . . humbling experience for me.”

  Lilly’s laughter eventually quieted. “You know what my father would say to that, don’t you? God had to humble you before He could raise you up. So get ready to be raised!” She rolled her pretty eyes again. “I’ve heard that all my life.”

  “I like your father’s way of thinking.”

  Lilly took a deep breath. “So, you’ve answered my question. I just need to find a boy that I like” —she ticked the items off on one hand—“get him to take me on a wagon ride, and then regurgitate all over him.”

  “Ah! What a rude thing to say!” Véronique gave her a shove.

  “Rude to say? What a rude thing to do!” They both dissolved into giggles, until Lilly suddenly went quiet. “Wait!” She held up a hand. “Listen.”

  Véronique heard it too. A strange cry, primal sounding.

  “Come on!” Lilly hurried toward the sound.

  Véronique followed, wondering if this was the wisest course of action. She rounded the copse of trees behind Lilly and skidded to a halt, breathless. Her eyes went wide.

  “The foal’s not coming out right, Jack. Either that, or he’s a really big one.”

  Concern hardened Thomas Stewartson’s voice as he knelt by a laboring mare, and Véronique saw the same concern reflected in Jack’s strained expression.

  She’d met Monsieur Stewartson upon a
rriving at Casaroja. Lilly had introduced them. He seemed quite amiable, and a capable foreman, though right now a scowl darkened his features.

  Jack shifted his weight from one knee to the other and examined the mare more closely. “I think the shoulders are caught.”

  Lilly was already beside the young mother, stroking her neck and speaking in hushed tones. She waved for Véronique to join her, but Véronique stayed right where she was. As young girls, she and Francette had once snuck into the stables to watch a birthing, curious as to the way of things. But when Monsieur Laurent spotted them, he had scolded them both, saying that proper young ladies should not witness such a thing.

  And yet Véronique could not look away.

  The horse suddenly writhed and tried to regain her footing, then fell back. Lilly immediately moved out of the way, then crept close again once the mare calmed.

  “Mademoiselle Girard.” Lilly gestured to her a second time. “Come here. It’s all right.”

  Véronique stepped closer, both curious and unsure. She knelt beside Lilly, careful to stay away from the mare’s mouthful of enormous teeth. She’d been bitten as a little girl, and her right shoulder still bore a tiny scar.

  Thomas peered up. “You think you gals can keep her down?”

  Lilly nodded. “We’ll try, Mr. Stewartson.”

  “Well, do more than try. If she manages to get up, we could lose both her and the foal.”

  As if accepting the challenge, the mare pushed with her forelegs and tried to roll, then struggled to rise a second time.

  Véronique immediately shrank back.

  But Lilly pushed against the mare, managing to slow her efforts.

  In an instant, Thomas was there. He settled his full weight against the horse and urged her back to the ground. Once she was lying on her side again, Thomas blew out a breath.

  Véronique stepped forward, but he stopped her with a look.

  “Ma’am, why don’t you just wait over yonder. I’ve got enough to handle without worrying about you too.”

  Unaccustomed to being spoken to in such a manner, and from a man of Stewartson’s position, Véronique backed away, her chest tightening. She glanced at Lilly, who offered a weak smile.

  “Véronique, you want to give me a hand down here?” Despite his grimace, Jack’s voice was surprisingly calm. “Can you grab me that rag?”

  Keeping her eyes down so as to avoid looking at Stewartson again, she did as Jack asked, and he wiped off his hands and arms before laying the rag aside.

  She bent down beside him and saw a head and a pair of legs protruding from the back end of the mare, wrapped in a kind of milky white sack. The foal wriggled, the mare writhed, and Véronique felt the air squeeze from her lungs.

  Jack glanced at her, then looked more closely. “You’ve never seen this before?”

  She shook her head. “But I promise, I will not get sick.”

  He gave her a brief smile, then returned his attention to the mare.

  “The shoulders are stuck in the birthing canal.” He pointed. “The foal’s still wrapped in the birth sack, but can you see how the forelegs are even with each other right now?”

  She leaned closer.

  “Typically one leg will advance before the other, letting the shoulders pass through one at a time. But this young mother needs some help. We only pull when she’s pushing. Otherwise she might stop, and we don’t want her to do that.”

  The mare whinnied. The muscles in her great underside rippled.

  Jack lifted his head. “You ready, Stewartson?”

  “Ready.”

  Jack gripped the foal just above the fetlocks and pulled downward.

  As Véronique watched, she couldn’t help but reflect back on all those times Lord Marchand and his famille had been presented with a showing of newborn foals. To think—all of this had occurred beforehand, a short distance from where she lived every day, and she’d never experienced it. She felt strangely cheated.

  Jack let up and caught his breath. “One more should do it, Stewartson.”

  The foal wriggled, and Véronique spotted a tiny slit beginning in the sack by the foal’s head. The foal must have sensed it too because he squirmed even more vigorously.

  Jack began pulling again, and the foal slid out a few more inches. Just as he started to pull a third time, the mare whinnied and pushed the foal out the rest of the way.

  Véronique knelt watching, wordless. Tears choked her throat.

  She’d never been so close to the beginning of a life before. She thought of her mother and wondered what Arianne Elizabeth Girard would say if heaven’s veil were lifted for the briefest second and she could see her only daughter kneeling in a stained silk gown, in a pasture in the middle of the Colorado Territory, witnessing the birth of a foal.

  Thomas and Lilly joined them, and at Thomas’s instruction, they all stood and moved back, watching as the newborn worked its way from the birth sack.

  After a moment, Thomas approached her. “Miss Girard, I’m sorry for how I spoke to you, ma’am. But when the life of one of my mares is on the line, I can get a mite worked up.”

  “You have no reason to apologize, Monsieur Stewartson. I was the novice in this situation and did not understand. I offer you my gratitude for letting me witness this.”

  His expression softened even more. “It’s something, isn’t it?”

  “Oui.” Her throat closed. “It certainly is.”

  After a while, Thomas and Jack moved the mare and her newborn to a stall in the barn. With admiration, Véronique observed Thomas, Jack, and Lilly as they worked together to get the new mother and baby situated. Then Thomas headed up to the main house to tell Claire and Miss Maudie the news.

  “Well, ladies,” Jack said as he grabbed a cloth from the workbench, “if you’ll excuse me for a few minutes, I’m going to go out back and wash up.”

  Véronique watched as he walked away.

  Lilly sighed and leaned closer. “You were absolutely right, Mademoiselle Girard. Nothing but respect between you two.”

  Véronique ignored the comment but couldn’t keep from smiling.

  She and Lilly watched the new mother and baby get acquainted and laughed at the way the foal tried to balance on its spindly legs.

  Finally, Lilly turned to go. “I’m going to run up and see if Miss Maudie is awake. You want to come? Or would you rather wait here.” Lilly’s tone said she already knew the answer.

  “I believe I will choose to wait here, merci.”

  Véronique was standing on tiptoe peering over the stall wall when she heard a sound behind her. She looked over her shoulder.

  Jack approached, wearing his undershirt and carrying the other soiled shirt in his hand. The hair at his temples was still damp, his hands and arms freshly scrubbed and clean. He took a place by the stall beside her and made no pretense of watching either the mare or the foal, as she did.

  He simply watched her.

  She tried hard not to act self-conscious, but the pressure got to be more than she could stand. She finally smiled. “What are you doing, Monsieur Brennan?”

  “I’m looking at you, Mademoiselle Girard. Is that within the accepted boundaries of our employee-employer relationship?”

  She shrugged, hearing the teasing in his voice and feeling as though there was a more serious question beneath his obvious one. And it was a question she was not ready to answer. “This is a free country, non?” She loved the sound of his laughter.

  “You did well out there, Vernie. I’m proud of you.”

  She chose to ignore his use of the dreadful nickname. “I did not do anything. It is you who was the hero. But I am thankful I was there to watch it all.”

  He gave her a slow smile, and his focus moved from her eyes, to her mouth. He slipped an arm around her waist, and Véronique angled herself toward him.

  “Hey, you two . . .” Thomas’s voice sounded from the front of the barn. “Claire’s cooking supper for everyone up at the main house. Mi
ss Maudie’s asked everyone to stay.”

  The pressure of Jack’s hand on her waist increased just before he moved away, and she got the unmistakable impression that he would have kissed her right then had Thomas not interrupted. Then Jack flashed that boyish grin as though having been caught, and she was certain of it.

  As they walked to the main house, he gave her a look that could best be described as one of promise. Véronique only hoped he was serious. Because regardless of rank or standing or expectations or otherwise, this was one promise she planned on making sure Jack Brennan kept.

  CHAPTER | TWENTY - SEVEN

  BACK SO SOON, Mr. Brennan? It’s not been a week yet since you were last here.” Miss Maudie waved at him from her perch on the oversized sofa in the front room. Or perhaps it was Miss Maudie’s petite size that made the sofa look overlarge.

  Her foot was propped up on a cushion on a low-standing table, and a blanket draped her lap, covering her injured leg. A book rested on the sofa beside her, and color laced her cheeks with a healthy glow.

  “Yes, ma’am, I’m back.” He held his hat in his hands, careful not to knock any of the road dust loose. “Seems Hochstetler can’t get his shipments to arrive in sequence from Denver, so I’m delivering the rest of that new stove you ordered.”

  She nodded. “You’ve had to make several runs to Casaroja of late.”

  “I never mind the extra trips, ma’am.”

  “Be givin’ you time to think, now doesn’t it? Bein’ on the road, I mean. You’ve a likin’ for it.”

  “I think I’m made for it, actually,” he agreed. “But not like I used to be. I’d like to be able to come home at night now, to a familiar place. I’m looking forward to settling down here, if things work out.”

  He nodded to the book. “What are you reading?”