Sweet Mountain Magic

by Rosanne Bittner

  Her eyes twinkled with desire. “Mister, the way you’re built, I don’t give a damn who you’ll be thinking of, long as it’s me you take it out on.”

  He nodded, angry with himself for actually feeling as though he was betraying Mary. Was he to go the rest of his life without a woman just because he couldn’t be with Mary? It had been a whole year since he had left her in Austin, a whole year without a woman. And he didn’t really want this one, except that he hoped if he lay with her it would be just one more step toward forgetting Mary. He had to do anything he could to face the fact that he could not have the woman he really loved. Maybe this woman would help.

  He paid the bartender, then limped outside and took their two horses around to the livery. When he came back inside, Henny was waiting with a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. She kindly climbed the stairs slowly with him, giving him time because of his limp. He followed her swaying hips into a room then, remembering Mary’s questions about “painted women” after Red Dog had teased her about them. Mary had been so jealous. But now she had Rafe, and this kind of woman was all that was left for Sage.

  He thought how fitting it was for Mary Cousteau, the lady, to be living her proper life with her proper husband. She had not been made for the likes of Sage MacKenzie. He had never amounted to anything and probably never would. He was leading the only kind of life he deserved—wandering, pointless, sleeping with whores.

  “I’m surprised you haven’t headed north,” Henny was telling him as he closed the door.

  “North?”

  She set down the bottle and glasses, and went to a side door, opening it and ordering someone to bring some hot water. She turned back to Sage. “Yes. Haven’t you heard? They’ve discovered gold up at Sutter’s Mill—around Sonoma, in the Sacramento Valley.”

  “Gold?”

  She smiled. “Lots of it, they say. Hell, half the men in California are already up there. The ones you see here are just stopping off on their way. I expect before long I’ll have a hard time finding customers.”

  She unhooked the front of her strapless dress, opening it and letting it fall. She stood before him in lacy bloomers, her breasts bare, then she stepped closer, beginning to remove his clothes.

  A young Chinese woman carried in two buckets of warm water, but Henny paid no heed. Sage guessed the Chinese woman was used to it, knew her job. He let Henny undress him, and she pressed her bare breasts against his broad, hairy chest.

  “You’re a handsome man, Sage MacKenzie, even when you need a bath and a shave and you walk with a limp.” She ran her hands over his powerful arms, kissing his nipples. “We’d better make good use of the night. I expect you’ll be off tomorrow, looking for gold like the rest of them.”

  He let her finish undressing him. Then she stepped back and took his hand, leading him over to the big tin tub the Chinese woman was still working at filling. “They say that next spring they expect half the people back East to come flooding into California,” she continued. “They claim there’s enough gold up there for everybody. Maybe I’ll head that way myself. There will be lots of lonely, woman-starved men up there. A woman like me could get richer off those men than most of them will get from gold.”

  “I expect you’re right there,” he answered. He stepped into the tub, thinking how fast the country was changing. All those people coming to California…they would need guides. There would be plenty of work for a scout. He had to start thinking about what he would do with himself or go crazy. Maybe he would find work scouting for the newcomers.

  He sank into the warm water and Henny proceeded to remove her bloomers. She stood stark naked before him, then reached over and picked up the soap, wetting her hands and soaping them up. He leaned back and closed his eyes. He would think about gold and scouting tomorrow.

  The sun had not risen yet when Henny awoke to an odd choking sound. She turned to see Sage MacKenzie turned away from her, his shoulders shaking, his arms wrapped around his pillow. She sat up slightly. “Sage?”

  He did not answer, but he sucked in his breath and began breathing deeply then, grasping the corners of the pillow tightly in his fists. She leaned farther over to see tears on his cheeks, and she touched his shoulder. “It’s all right, Sage. You don’t have to be embarrassed in front of a woman like me. I’ve seen it all.”

  “My God,” he groaned.

  She sighed deeply, caressing his hair. “I didn’t much help you forget her, did I?” She moved her hand down to the huge pink scar on his hip. “At least you found out you can still make love to a woman,” she told him softly. “You were damned good, Sage.” She leaned down and kissed his back. “You got that out of your system. Now you go ahead and cry it out and get that part of it out of you, too. I’m going to get dressed and order up some breakfast.”

  Sage heard her dress and go out. He wasn’t sure how much longer he wept. He felt like a fool, but he couldn’t stop. He needed this. It was as though the tears were helping him clean his mind and heart of a memory that had tortured him for too long. Common sense told him a man couldn’t carry a torch forever. Life went on. A year had gone by. Mary was with Rafe and had a son. Maybe she was even pregnant again by now.

  He sat up, finding one of Henny’s handkerchiefs on a little table nearby and using it to blow his nose and wipe his eyes. He sat on the edge of the bed, thinking of the wild night he had spent with Henny. He had taken out all his frustrations and anger on her, using her to get back at Rafe Cousteau, taking her at first almost savagely. But he had been kinder to her the second time, and completely gentle the third. At least he knew he could still make love to a woman.

  He wiped his eyes again. It really made little difference. He had gotten it out of his system and that was that. But when he awoke, memories of Mary had flooded over him, all the sweet moments of bedding her, the taste of her, the feel of her, the violet eyes looking at him so trustingly. He could not help feeling she still needed him, that he surely loved her and understood her in a way Rafe never could. He couldn’t help being sure she wasn’t really happy at all, and yet the last thing she would want would be for him to go to her. She would do what was right and proper. He had no business messing it up. He had left her that day at the graveyard back in Texas, her beautiful violet eyes full of tears and sorrow. She had made her choice, and he could not blame her for it. How fitting that he had left her in a graveyard, for she was as good as dead to him.

  “Sage!” Sage heard his name shouted in the outer hall. It was Randy. “Sage! What the hell room are you in?”

  Sage smiled sadly and rose, wrapping a blanket around himself. He went to the door and opened it. “Quit your damn yelling,” he said, poking out his head to see Randy parading up and down the landing wearing only his underwear. “There are probably people still asleep in these other rooms.”

  “Sage, guess what?” Randy hurried to the door and came inside, glancing at the tumbled bed. He grinned more widely then. “Hey, you devil, you! You finally got somethin’ out of your system, didn’t you? I seen that pretty gal downstairs. She’s the one who told me you was up here.” His smile faded a little when he noticed Sage’s red eyes. “Did it help a little, Sage?”

  Sage smiled sadly and turned away, walking to a table where a tin cup sat with cigars in it. He took one out and bit off the end. “What the hell are you running around all excited about?”

  “Gold! Sage, they’ve discovered gold up north of here!”

  “I already know that. Henny told me.”

  Randy walked closer as Sage lit the cigar. “That’s where we’ll go next, Sage. I’m gonna dig for gold! Hell, we might strike it rich! Who knows!”

  Sage grinned and shook his head. “I don’t give a damn about being rich, Randy. There was a time when it would have mattered, but it doesn’t anymore. I’m thinking of going back over the Sierras and the Rockies and on out to Wyoming. Henny says lots of people will be coming out next spring to California to hunt for gold. I could get some good scouting jobs. I’ve
got to do something to keep busy, Randy, but climbing around the hills looking for gold doesn’t strike my fancy.”

  “Come on, Sage, just for a while!” The boy sobered. “Were you thinkin’ of splittin’ up, Sage? I thought we were friends.”

  Sage read the worry in the boy’s eyes. Randy didn’t want to admit it, but he needed Sage MacKenzie’s friendship and companionship. “We are friends, Randy. I wasn’t thinking of splitting. I would want you to come with me.”

  Randy threw up his hands. “Okay. We’ll compromise. You come hunt for gold with me for a while, and then I’ll go over the mountains with you. Hell, you can’t go over them mountains any more this year anyway. Winter’s comin’ on. And we’ll have an early start on all those comin’ out next spring. They have to wait till they can cross them mountains. We’re already here! That gold is out there waitin’ for us to come pick it up! How about it, Sage?”

  Sage chuckled at the eagerness in the boy’s eyes. “You ever gonna settle, Randy Lucas?”

  “Sure! Someday I will. I’ll find me a pretty little woman and set up house and have me a brood of kids. And we’ll live a grand life, because first I’m gonna find me some gold and be rich. And you’ll be rich, too, ’cause we’ll find it together.”

  Sage puffed the cigar and nodded. “Okay, kid, we’ll go north and see about this gold. Can’t hurt to find out what’s goin’ on, and at least we’ll be goin’ into country I know like the back of my hand.”

  Randy nodded. “Things are gonna be good now, Sage. I’ll find gold and make us rich—make up for you gettin’ wounded down in Mexico.”

  Sage shook his head. “You don’t have to make up for that. I told you it was my decision to go along. Nobody forced me.”

  “Well, just the same…” Randy sighed, turning for the door. “I’ll meet you later downstairs, Sage. We’ll leave today. That okay with you?”

  Sage nodded. “Soon as we stock up on a few supplies. The horses are in a livery out back.”

  Randy grinned again and went out. Sage limped to a window and looked into the street below. Gold. He didn’t doubt thousands of men would soon be swarming over the hills of northern California. The smell of gold did a lot of things to a man, made him kind of crazy. He might as well join them. His life had been rambling out of control ever since he had had to leave Mary in Texas. He had fought in the Mexican war, fought Apache and Comanche Indians. Now he would go look for gold. He smiled sadly, wondering what Mary would think of all of it, wondering now if she still thought of him at all. Surely she did. They had promised to love each other forever.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Mary took a small glass of wine from a silver tray carried by a servant. It was spring, 1849, and Harold VanCouver was holding a party for the elite of St. Louis, celebrating a full and very successful year in the shipping business. Rafe had befriended VanCouver the moment the man set up his warehouse near Rafe’s, seeing an opportunity to make deals with VanCouver that would benefit Rafe’s furniture store, as well as two new supply stores he had opened. After all, the race was on to California. St. Louis was bursting at the seams, and those in the business of shipping and supplies were having enormous success. Rafe’s wealth was beginning to surpass his own father’s, and his relationship with VanCouver reminded Mary of her own father’s relationship with Rafe’s father down in New Orleans.

  She watched her handsome, well-dressed husband with a heavy heart. She could have been happier about his success if his extremely busy schedule had not kept him away so much. These past months should have been so meaningful in their relationship—should have been a time of nurturing and rebuilding that relationship. They had moved to St. Louis to start over, but all she could see was that something was dying, not growing.

  Now she knew why her marriage was failing. Tonight it was all so clear. Their marriage had been faltering all along, because she had loved Sage MacKenzie, and because her spotless reputation had been tarnished in Rafe’s eyes. But something had come along that had swung Rafe Cousteau more deeply into doubt, something that had increased his resentment toward his wife, had made him look at her even more critically. That something was really a someone—Roslyn VanCouver, Harold VanCouver’s daughter.

  Rafe had not made love to Mary in months. All along he had feigned being too busy. Some nights he had not come home at all. She wondered how she could have been so stupid as to think it was just the problems they had had over Sage and little James and her rapes. The real problem had been another woman. It was so obvious to her now, as she watched Rafe talking to Roslyn. Any woman could read the look that was in Roslyn VanCouver’s eyes at that moment. The young woman was sick in love with Rafe Cousteau, and Rafe was in love with Roslyn. No one could mistake the way they looked at each other.

  Mary tried to control the hurt and jealousy. Yes, she had also loved another. But at the time she did not even remember Rafe, and when she did, she was certain he had been killed. When she found out otherwise, she had given up Sage MacKenzie, sent the poor, devastated man on his way, because she had wanted to do what was right and proper. What was Rafe’s excuse?

  She sipped some wine and turned to share some aimless words with a woman who had come up beside her to chat. But her mind was not on the conversation. She was struggling with her emotions. She must not hate Rafe. He had tried, very honestly tried. But something had been destroyed between them, and it was really neither her fault nor his. She struggled against tears as she spoke with the woman beside her, putting on a smile and playing the role of the elegant wife of Rafe Cousteau.

  She humbly realized she was still beautiful. She wore an orchid lace dress that nearly matched her violet eyes. Her hair was swept up in the latest fashion, and she knew all the right moves, manners, words. After all, Mary St. Claire Cousteau had been raised in wealth. And she was only twenty-one years old. It was not as though Rafe had an old woman on his hands. Still, perhaps what he had was worse than an old woman. She was a used woman, somehow tainted in Rafe’s eyes, much as he fought that attitude. The man was by nature kind at heart, a loving man. But Mary realized now he was an extremely unhappy man, living with a woman he no longer loved, wanting another.

  How ironic, she thought. For she had been doing the same thing. What she resented most was that Rafe had waited so long. If her marriage failed now, how would she ever find Sage MacKenzie? How would she be able to be with the only man she would ever want other than her own husband?

  Now Harold VanCouver was asking her to dance. She graciously obliged. The man had a small ballroom in his mansion of a home, and that was where his guests had congregated. A four-piece orchestra, made up of two violins, a double bass, and a piano, struck up a sweet waltz. Mary picked up the hem of her dress and moved across the dance floor with VanCouver, again playing the role of the beautiful, elegant wife of Rafe Cousteau.

  “How is your little boy?” VanCouver was asking.

  “James is fine,” she answered. “Getting very big, I might add. He’s very bright—walking and talking and causing me a lot of worrisome chasing about. He gets into everything.”

  VanCouver laughed. “Yes, children that tiny tend to give their mothers headaches.”

  Mary thought about Sage, wild and free. His son took after him, a free spirit, full of adventure.

  They swirled past Rafe and Roslyn. Rafe looked at VanCouver and nodded, and Mary wondered if Rafe had asked VanCouver to dance with her just to keep her occupied a little longer. Mary stared at them both as they whirled past, then moved questioning eyes to VanCouver, who quickly read her look.

  “I do hope you don’t resent my daughter’s occupying so much of your husband’s time,” the man told her almost apologetically. “The girl is much taken with him, I’m afraid. But she’s only eighteen, and has a parade of young men after her, you know. She’ll be swooning after one of them tomorrow. Eighteen is such a fickle age.”

  Mary watched his eyes, saw his struggle to correct what he feared was really happening. She thought
how at eighteen she had been fighting off Comanche Indians, watching her baby daughter being murdered. How would these people understand that? But Sage had. How she longed for the comfort of his understanding arms, the smell of his buckskins, the soothing gentleness of his words, the peace of being fully accepted and respected in spite of what had happened to her.

  “I have a feeling your daughter is more than a little infatuated with my husband, Mr. VanCouver,” she replied. “I think perhaps it is time to face the truth. Rafe has been seeing her, hasn’t he?”

  The man’s face reddened slightly and he cleared his throat nervously. “Only by circumstance,” the man answered. “My daughter is quite involved in my business, you see. Since her mother died, we have become quite close, and my sorrow is helped by having Roslyn around me. And since we have been working so closely with Rafe…well, we’ve all been together a good deal.”

  Mary’s eyes teared. “Yes, I can understand that. But I have a feeling Rafe and Roslyn have been together other times—without your presence, Mr. VanCouver.” She stopped dancing. “Please excuse me. I’m going to get my cape. Please tell Rafe I would like to go home.”

  She quickly left, noting that a few people stared at her brisk walk. She was sick of people looking at her like some kind of freak. She had thought she could get away from her past here, but many of them knew. She wondered then how many of them realized what was happening with Rafe and Roslyn, and how many of them actually sympathized with “poor Rafe”? She had to get away—away from their staring eyes. She was tired of putting on shows, pretending, being the proper wife. She just wanted to go home to James. James loved her just as she was—and so would Sage, if only he were here to hold her.