Tennessee Waltz

by Simmons, Trana Mae

  His Uncle Cal had loved these mountains, as had his Aunt Selene. It had broken both their hearts to leave, but their hardscrabble piece of land had quit producing even the bare necessities. Cal had been unyielding in his determination to never get involved in one of the other ways some of the mountain men made a living. Cal wouldn't even drink the corn liquor the stills hidden deep in the mountains produced.

  The mists covering the mountain peaks blurred in Wyn's vision, and he backhanded his eyes. He couldn't afford to let go right now. The chill was deepening, and he should get his pa inside.

  As he turned, Sarah rose to her feet. "I'll go on to the boardinghouse," she said quietly. "May I come back over here later this afternoon and see Mairi again?"

  "We'd be proud if you'd come to supper," Dan spoke up. "You can meet the rest of my family then. We'll all be wantin' to thank you for takin' care of our Mairi. We eat at six, but you come on over early. You can visit with Mairi a'fore supper."

  "Thank you," Sarah said in a heartfelt voice. "May I please make one other request of you, Mr. MacIntyre?"

  "Wishin' you'd call me Dan," he said. "And yeah, you can ask. I can't promise I'll say yes, but you can ask."

  "Thank you," Sarah repeated. "And I'm Sarah. What I want to ask is this. I didn't ask Jeeter to leave Mairi's bag, because . . . well, because I realized after what you said about the grave markers that I might be overstepping again. But I did buy her a new wardrobe and she picked out presents for each of her cousins. I paid for them, but I really wish you'd let Mairi give them to her cousins. She put a lot of thought into the choices she made."

  "I'll send Wyn over to Mandy Tuttle's to get the bag after while," Dan conceded, and Sarah released a sigh Wyn took to be relief.

  "Thank you, Dan," Sarah said once again.

  She nodded at Wyn, then picked up her skirts and descended the steps in that royal walk she had. He thought about offering to escort her to the boardinghouse, but it was only a few hundred yards away. The mountain women walked miles each day at times. But then, Sarah Channing was a far cry from a mountain women.

  "You know," Dan mused. "I think I sorta like her."

  "You're just grateful to her for taking care of Mairi," Wyn replied. "You haven't known her long enough to make a decision about whether or not you like her."

  "Nope, I do believe you're wrong this time, son. She's right, you know. She could've just kept Mairi for her own. Mebbe even used all that there money she 'pears to have to fight us when we tried to get her back after we found her. Lots of women would've figgered Mairi was better off in a rich household than livin' here in the mountains. Lots of women would've looked down their noses at the thought of even comin' here to Sawback Mountain. That there Sarah just asked our little Mairi what she wanted to do, then packed her bags and came on soon as she could. Yep, I do like her."

  "Well, you can bet your bottom dollar she'll be raring to get out of here in a couple days," Wyn sneered.

  "You know, son, you can't judge all city slicker women by the one you got tied up with. I mean . . ."

  "I don't want to talk about Rose, Pa. I've told you that before. Now, you want to come on in? It's starting to cool off."

  "Think I'd rather you just bring my jacket out here for me," Dan replied. "I'd sorta like to sit here and remember Cal for a while. Look." He nodded toward the small cabin behind the schoolhouse on their right. "There comes Sissy. You mind a'tellin' her, Wyn? I promise I'll help you tell the rest of 'em when they get in from school. I oughta be up to repeatin' the story by then."

  "I'll do that, Pa." He patted Dan on his shoulder, then stepped inside the store and grabbed his pa's jacket from a peg. After handing the jacket to Dan, he went to meet Sissy, who had her two-year-old, Bobbie, toddling after her. Despite her advanced pregnancy, Sissy carried a bucket with her cleaning supplies in it, and Wyn reached to take it from her as soon as they met.

  A moment later, Sissy sobbed in his arms, and Wyn glanced over at Widow Tuttle's. Sarah stood on the porch watching him, and somehow he could sense her concerned gaze. Telling himself he was only remembering her unusual, expressive eyes, he lifted a courteous hand to her, then led Sissy toward the store.

  His pa could like her all he wanted, and he admitted that he really didn't dislike the woman. She was as different from the mountain women as night from day, though. She stood out like a Christmas tree in July in these surroundings, where he was used to women with tired eyes and weary shoulders.

  He'd always enjoyed snowstorms in the mountains. For one thing, they gave him an opportunity to relax and catch up on his reading, when he could keep his brothers and sisters out of his hair. But right now he wished this storm Jeeter was predicting over with, since it would keep Sarah Channing from leaving for possibly a week. He didn't exactly understand why he felt threatened by her, especially since there were qualities about her that he admired. He'd just keep his distance until he saw that straight back and perfectly styled hair riding down the mountains in Jeeter's wagon.

  Too, he couldn't forget the hunger in Sarah's eyes when she gazed at Mairi. Despite her assurance that she only wanted to delay her good-bye to Mairi for a day or two, he would cautiously keep an eye on her. He knew pretty much what Sarah could offer Mairi, and he could only hope that the child's deeply instilled mountain pride would mean more to her than the material things at Sarah's disposal to give her.

  His pa had a huge dose of mountain pride himself, and a loyalty to family unsurpassed by any other man Wyn knew. His pa would wrap Mairi in his love and loyalty, and it would wound his spirit mightily if his niece turned her back on her family and opted for the life of a rich girl.

  Chapter 2

  Sarah immediately liked Widow Tuttle, who said to call her Mandy. Round, chubby and talkative, Mandy made no bones about being extremely happy for Sarah's company. Within a very few minutes, she had Sarah settled in a large, airy room with a cherry wood bed and armoire, and beautiful hand-woven rag rugs on the polished pine floor. Over cups of tea, she avidly listened to Sarah's story of finding Mairi and filled Sarah in on the MacIntyre family history. However, Sarah noticed Mandy avoided explaining how Dan had ended up in the wheelchair. She would have followed up with the history of every mountain family in the area if Sarah hadn't suggested they leave some points of conversation for future tea times, since she intended to stay for a few days.

  "Good thing that's your intention anyway," Mandy responded. "Jeeter said there's a storm on the way, so there won't be any travel in or out of here for a few days."

  "Jeeter told the same thing to the MacIntyres. Is Jeeter always right about his weather predictions?"

  "Never known him to be wrong," Mandy said. "They say the male children don't usually inherit the power, but Leery never had any girl children, so maybe some of her sight got passed on to Jeeter. Jeeter's her son, you know."

  "Well, no, I didn't know," Sarah reminded Mandy. "Um . . . who is Leery?"

  "Leery?" Mandy frowned briefly, appearing to concentrate on her words. "Well, Leery's a lot of things," she said at last. "She's a healer, and she was all we had before Doc MacKenzie came around. She's still the only midwife most mountain women will have, though' Leery seems to know when she needs to bring the doc in with her for a bad case. Like maybe the babe's gonna have the cord wrapped around its neck or start out breech and be hard to turn or something. She's got the sight, just like her mother and grandmother and great-grandmother had before her. Leery can't call it up at will, but when she has a vision, she passes it on to whoever needs to know."

  "I don't much believe in stuff like predicting the future," Sarah admitted. "But I do know that a lot of the remedies that have come down through time do work. I had a nanny once who gave me sage tea with lemon for a sore throat, and mullein tea for a cough and stuffy nose. Of course, my father would have had an apoplectic fit if he'd known about that."

  "Some believe, some don't," Mandy said with a tolerant shrug. "Oh, sounds like someone's knocking."

&nb
sp; Curious, Sarah followed Mandy. They found Wyn at the door.

  "Come in," Mandy offered.

  "No, I'll only be a minute." He turned to Sarah. "Mairi woke. And she would rather wait until you come over to pass out her presents to her cousins. Thought I'd better let you know, so you didn't think I'd forgotten about picking them up. I'll come over at five and carry them for you."

  His tone was totally polite, but for some reason Sarah bristled just a tad. He hadn't asked her if five would be agreeable to her — only told her of a decision already made.

  "Pa said for you to come on over, too, Mandy," Wyn continued. "And he'd plan on you bringing the cornbread, if you'd leave the onions out this time."

  "Very well," Mandy agreed. "Need I bring enough for Prudence?"

  "I imagine. She finds out we got a visitor, she'll probably invite herself to supper instead of cooking on her own."

  He started to leave, but Mandy touched his arm. "Have you made any plans for the wake?" she asked in a quiet voice.

  Sarah watched the pain fill Wyn's deep blue, expressive eyes — the same pain she'd noticed when he approached the wagon even before he had known the sad message she brought. As tall as she was, Sarah only had to tilt her head back a little to see his gaze. His broad shoulders slumped inside the worn, though neatly-patched, tan work shirt he wore.

  "I guess soon as we can get word out after this storm is over," he said, his voice roughened. He swiped at a blond curl of hair that had fallen across his forehead. "Say, a couple days after the storm."

  Mandy nodded, and Wyn bobbed his head briefly at both of them, then turned and left. His rangy stride ate up the distance between the boarding house and general store, covering the area in a third of the time it had taken Sarah to walk over here. She'd barely had time to become chilled before he turned for one last glance at them and then entered the store.

  "He looks so much like Dan at that age," Mandy murmured. "Maria would have been very proud of him."

  When Sarah glanced quizzically at her, Mandy motioned her back inside and closed the door. "Maria was my best friend," Mandy explained as they walked back to the kitchen. "Dan's wife. She and Dan were coming back from Razor Gully one day with a load of supplies for the store. They used to go themselves when the supplies arrived, rather than paying Jeeter to deliver them."

  Mandy chuckled tolerantly. "Sometimes I teased Maria about using the trips to get away from that brood of children she and Dan had. She always winked and gave me this look that said I was totally right, but she never once let on to her children that she needed a little time away from them."

  Motioning Sarah to a chair, Mandy began gathering up cornbread makings as she spoke. "Something spooked Dan's horses. Jeeter always uses mules on his freight wagon, because he says they don't spook as easy as horses, but Dan's never owned a mule that I know of. Anyway, Dan heard a mountain cat howl a few minutes earlier, and he thinks it might have crept up on the wagon. He didn't see it, but the horses smelled it."

  "The wagon must have wrecked," Sarah said, her heart filling with sympathy.

  "Yes. Maria . . . Maria was killed — her neck broken. Dan hurt his back and hasn't walked since the accident two years ago. Wyn came home to take care of everyone."

  Not wanting Mandy to think she was inappropriately interested in the handsome man across the way, Sarah changed the subject. "I do appreciate being asked over to the MacIntyres for dinner . . ."

  "Supper," Mandy corrected. "I know you call the evening meal 'dinner' back where you come from, but here we call it 'supper.'"

  "Uh . . . supper then. What I was getting at, though, was that this is one of the strangest invitations I've ever heard, especially when Mr. MacIntyre actually told you what to bring with you."

  Mandy laughed gaily. "Oh, I already knew what Dan would want me to bring. He just mentioned leaving out the onions — even though that's the way he likes my cornbread — because Sissy gets an upset stomach from onions, her being with child and all. And you'll find out, if you stay around long enough, mountain men don't ask womenfolk. They tell them what's expected and presume that's the way it will be. And in the mountains, sometimes there's a reason for it."

  Sarah thinned her lips in displeasure, thinking it was just as well she wouldn't be staying around very long. For twenty-five years she had kowtowed to men — first, her father and then her fiancé. She'd had a taste of defiance in her relationship with Stephen the past couple months, due entirely to her deep affection for Mairi and her desire to see the little girl safe and cared for again. Surprising her, Stephen had backed down in his insistence she turn Mairi over to the authorities and get on with their wedding plans. Even knowing that Stephen didn't want to take a chance on losing her money if she broke their engagement didn't lessen her enjoyment of having the upper hand with him.

  To pacify him, she had at least set their wedding date for the coming June. Then her father had passed away, and the restraints and chains had dropped from her like fall leaves as she discussed her future with her father's attorney. Despite her deep, abiding desire for children, she wasn't in one bit of a hurry to marry Stephen and return to the stricture of having a man in control of her life again.

  Wyn MacIntyre's attitude of assuming that Mandy would follow his and his father's dictates without question chafed her. And, to be truthful, she had another, larger problem with Wyn, which bothered her even more. She'd felt those same feelings around him as when she would become infatuated with one of the more handsome, eligible men during the Season in New York City. Her wallflower status, except when she was courted by one of the men trying to gain control of her future fortune, left her yearning for just one man to become truly sappy over her. But it had never happened.

  Mandy's voice broke into her thoughts. "Would you hand me the sugar, please?"

  ~~~~

  According to Mandy's parlor clock, Wyn arrived on the dot of five. Sarah glanced at the clock the moment she heard a knock, then set aside the embroidery she'd brought with her to while away the time on the train. She debated for a few seconds whether or not to keep him waiting, but decided Mandy would come after her if she tried that. By the time she got to the front door, he already had the satchel containing Mairi's things on his shoulder. Still, he somehow managed to help her into her cloak after assisting Mandy into hers. As soon as Mandy retrieved the black iron kettle of cornbread she'd set on the small table in the entrance way, he motioned them out the door.

  Already the sun had dropped behind the mountain tops, and a sliver of moon shone, though faded in the lingering twilight. Here and there stars winked into sight, their light visible, then not, as the clouds scuttled across the sky. A few snowflakes wafted lazily to earth on feathery flights while the three of them walked toward the store.

  "No wind yet tonight," Mandy observed. "At least we'll probably get back home before it starts drifting."

  "I'll make sure you get home all right, Mandy," Wyn promised.

  He ushered them up the steps and held the door for them. Mandy led the way through the store, with Sarah glancing overhead at the sounds pounding down on them. Wyn didn't appear to notice, since he followed them through the dim interior with sure-footed steps, carrying the satchel on his shoulder.

  Mandy paused at a stairwell in the rear of the store, turning slightly toward Wyn.

  "Go on up," Wyn said without her even having to speak. "I took Pa up an hour ago."

  Nodding, Mandy picked up her skirts and climbed the stairs. The noise grew louder with every step. On a wide landing at the top of the stairwell, Mandy reached for the doorknob, then murmured to Sarah before she turned it, "Better prepare yourself."

  She opened the door on pandemonium. A huge, sprawling room lay on the other side of the door. Two red-haired whirlwinds immediately caught sight of them and headed toward them at full speed, small legs churning and whoops of welcoming joy rising above the clatter of their booted footsteps. Somewhere another child began to cry, probably scared witless at the incre
ased clamor.

  A woman who looked on the imminent verge of giving birth smiled at them from the stove, then pulled the spoon out of a large pot she was stirring and laid it aside. Placing a fist in the small of her back, she wobbled toward the crying little boy, who was curled up in a child-size rocking chair by a huge stone fireplace. Sarah gasped in disbelief when the woman actually bent down and picked up the child to cuddle him close, but at least the child's shrieks quieted somewhat.

  A blond girl in her teens sat on a stool in one corner of the room, strumming some sort of instrument that looked like a small, flat harp. The song she was playing had a minor melody, and her out-of-tune voice singing the words loud enough so at least she could hear them didn't help one bit.

  On the other side of the fireplace, Dan sat in his wheelchair, talking to a girl who seemed to be about Mairi's age. Mairi sat on his lap, and Gray Boy curled under the wheelchair. Dan and the girls appeared oblivious to the noise around them, as did Wyn when he dropped the satchel and grabbed the two red-headed terrors by the backs of their shirts to prevent them from crawling up Mandy's skirts. Pulling them off Mandy, he held them at arm's length, legs wind milling as they shouted their displeasure.

  "Mr. MacIntyre!" another voice demanded, and Sarah swept around in a swirl of cloak and skirts to see yet another woman approaching, this one about her own age. The dangerous glint in the woman's eyes foreboded more bedlam in an already overburdened atmosphere.

  Wyn dropped the twins, who took their revenge on him by each tackling one of his muscular thighs, and the woman's strident voice matched the whine of her spoken words.

  "Mr. MacIntyre," she said. "I warned you the last time." She stopped in front of Wyn, and the twins ducked behind his legs, still pummeling him and chanting jibes at each other. The woman propped one fist on one hip, then raised her other hand and shook a finger at Wyn.