Courting Carrie in Wonderland

by Carla Kelly

  He decided not to worry about her, not with Carrie already at the campfire. He walked to the fire and sat beside her.

  “What are you going to sing?” he asked, when he really wanted to ask Carrie what she thought of Jake Trost, and how her life was going, and if he was wasting his time. Ram, you’re an idiot, he thought, mildly disgusted with himself.

  “I’ll sing your song, and then probably ‘Old Folks at Home,’ because I like it.”

  “Have you planned an encore with Mrs. LaMonster?” he teased.

  “No, indeed,” Carrie said with a shake of her head. “She made it clear to me that she had no intention of singing tonight.”

  “Give me a winter patrol any day, with a blizzard thrown in,” he said.

  He meant it as a joke, but Ramsay saw worry in her eyes. “Don’t even tease about that,” she said and touched his sleeve for a far-too-brief moment. “I’ll worry about you this winter.”

  “No need. I know what I’m doing,” he said, which was, at that moment seated beside a lovely woman, about as far from the truth as he had ever wandered in his life. He nudged her shoulder. “Here comes our magician.”

  She nudged back and whispered, “Bonnie Boone says he’s calling himself The Great Trostini now. I haven’t seen his show in several days so who knows?”

  Trust Jake to be more clever than Ramsay would have supposed. He did his same talent-thin tricks, except that he made a great show of flubbing even those until his audience was laughing and demanding more nonsense. Be advised that this man is no fool, he thought.

  “Smart fellow,” he whispered in Carrie’s ear. My goodness, but she smelled so sweetly of almonds. “He’s turned his deficits into assets.”

  For his finale, Jake called a little girl from the audience and performed one last trick. Without a single flub, he tugged a nosegay of paper roses from what looked like a hollow log and presented it to her with a deep bow. The laughter turned into oohs and ahhs, followed by applause.

  “My turn,” Carrie said when the clapping died down. “Wish me luck.”

  He wished her all kinds of things, up to and including a lingering kiss. “Good luck,” was the cleverest thing that came out of his mouth.

  There she stood in front of the campfire, hands clasped in front of her, her lovely hair in its single braid. Always the observer, Ramsay noticed something different about her before she said a word. As she beamed on her audience, she seemed more confident. Something about her was different.

  “I’d like to sing two songs for you,” she began. “We may be called Yellowstone Park savages, but we love being here, and we want you to enjoy Wonderland as much as we do.”

  Her comments drew a round of applause she obviously hadn’t expected, because he saw her surprise and then the pleasure on her lovely face. She has no idea how charming she is, he thought. A glance at Jake Trost told him the University of Washington student was thinking the same thing.

  She put up her hands. “I’d like to sing a favorite song for Sergeant Major Stiles, sitting here on the front row. I could tell you more about him that would impress you, but he’d be embarrassed if I did. Let me just say he’s one of the many troopers in our park who keep order and look out for bears.”

  Audience members chuckled. Ramsay had to smile. The woman did love her bears, even if they queued up at a privy. He privately applauded her wisdom in not sharing medals and Moro insurrectionists with campers out to have fun in Wonderland.

  After a pitch pipe note from Jake, she sang “Why No One to Love?” and she sang it to Ramsay this time, not the couple to his right who were holding hands and mooning over each other, and not even to the older lady and gentleman he had noticed as he came to the campfire. Just to him.

  She curtsied gracefully when she finished and didn’t seem embarrassed by the enthusiastic reception her song received. Who was this Carrie? Ramsay had to admit he liked her even more.

  “And now, a song for me. You all know it, and you’re welcome to sing along on the chorus.” She hesitated and he tensed, simply because he was so tuned to help anyone in trouble, especially Carrie. “Here it is,” she said. “I’m an orphan. I earn money here in the summer so I can attend Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman.” She flashed a smile in Jake Trost’s direction. “We’re not as well-known as the universities of Oregon or Washington, which some of my fellow savages attend, but we’ll grow.”

  She stepped toward her audience, not away, as a less confident Carrie from only a few days ago might have done. “I don’t have a home, really, unless it’s right here in Yellowstone Park. Join me on the chorus, if you’d like.”

  She looked to Jake, who gave her another note. “ ‘’Mid pleasures and palaces, though we may roam, be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.’ ”

  She sang the verse so pure and lovely and gestured for her audience to join her on the chorus. Ramsay joined in too, thinking of Iowa farms and hard times, and parents who loved him. “ ‘Home! Home! Sweet, sweet home! There’s no place like home, There’s no place like home!’ ”

  Carrie sang the next verse, then gestured again. As her rapt audience joined in, Ramsay noticed a figure leave the back row and join Carrie on her impromptu stage.

  Well, Hades froze, Ramsay thought, amazed, as Louise LaMarque put her arm around Carrie’s waist and harmonized. To his further amazement, Carrie kissed her quickly on the cheek, which made Mrs. LaMarque stop and visibly gather herself together before she could finish the chorus.

  Thunderous applause followed. Ramsay suspected that many of the campers knew exactly who this dignified lady was, even though she had not graced a Broadway stage in years. Carrie turned and applauded her fellow singer, who bowed gracefully to her and then to the little audience, likely a far cry from legions of devoted fans she had once commanded.

  When the applause faded, Carrie held up her hand. “You obviously know who this charming lady is,” she said and waited a moment for more applause to end. “Louise LaMarque is touring Yellowstone, the same as you. Can we prevail upon her to sing another song?”

  More applause. As he watched the grand old dame, Ramsay knew she was being nourished by her little audience’s acclaim. The fact was written all over her face. His heart did a little dive when he saw how tightly she had clasped her hands together, to stop any tremors. You’re a tough old warhorse, he thought with admiration. Gallant to the last.

  Everyone looked at Louise LaMarque with evident anticipation. She did not disappoint. “While it is true I have not graced the stage in recent years, I have a favorite too. It’s also a song you have heard of, although some of you might not admit it if Grandma were here.”

  What is this rascal up to? Ramsay asked himself, concerned. She had better not be bamboozling Carrie. I’ll stop her before she does that.

  She made an elaborate show of putting her hand above her eyebrows and looking through the group of campers. “Let’s see: No one younger than fifteen in this unruly mob? Perfect. I’ll sing Lottie Collins’s version. If you want the laundered version, go somewhere else!”

  Some of the older men in the audience applauded. Ramsay laughed inside to see one wife shake her finger in her husband’s face in a silent scold that did nothing but amuse the others. To everyone’s continuing delight, she tugged at his arm. The old boy wouldn’t budge.

  Mrs. LaMarque turned to Carrie. “You, my dear, will join me on the chorus, and I expect to see some ankle. At the very least.”

  The savages and younger men in the campfire circle whooped and applauded and Carrie blushed. She whispered in Mrs. LaMarque’s ear, and the old songstress-turned-socialite just laughed. With all the aplomb of a duchess, she looked around, gave herself a note, and Ramsay knew why Carrie’s cheeks had rosied up.

  Mrs. LaMarque raised her skirt just far enough to show off a well-turned ankle. She swished her skirt and sang, “ ‘A sweet Tuxedo girl you see, A queen of swell society, fond of fun as fun can be, When it’s on the strict QT.’ ”

&n
bsp; She paused and gave a most knowing leer in Ramsay’s direction. “Right, Sarge?” she asked, and her audience whistled and hooted.

  The skirt went higher. “ ‘I’m not too young, I’m not too old, Not too timid, not too bold, just the kind you’d like to hold, Just the kind for sport I’m told.’ ”

  Predictably, the more straitlaced among the women gasped at that line. Carrie’s eyes were huge in her face, but he knew she was also a tough little fighter. He couldn’t help smiling as she lifted her own skirt up to her ankle, and a very fine ankle it was.

  “Ready everyone?” Mrs. LaMarque asked. “Ready, Carrie?”

  “As I’ll ever be,” Carrie said. She gulped visibly, which made Jake Trost laugh out loud, and raised her skirt to her knee. Ramsay smiled to see that the very fine ankle was connected to an equally excellent knee. His agile brain reminded him to store this bit of information for future reference.

  “Everyone? We’ll start slow. ‘Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay, ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay.’ ”

  If a can-can performed in a Wylie Camp by a woman on the shady side of sixty could be called sedate, Mrs. LaMarque swished her skirt and waggled one leg and then the other. Her eyes full of fun, Carrie joined in, singing and dancing as Ramsay sang along. Watching Carrie and clapping along to the rhythm with the others, Stiles realized those Moro insurrectionists in the cave had finally given up. He sang, clapped, and couldn’t remember his last nightmare.

  Each verse was a little more naughty, but even that irritated wife whooped on the line, “ ‘Though not too bad I’m not too good.’ ”

  He knew precisely how good Carrie was, how kind, how hard-working, and how determined. Watching her sing and dance with a twinkle in her eye, Ramsay realized that after two years, some of it spent in a bad place, he didn’t feel old and ready to gum his bread and warm milk at night. He wanted to sit with Carrie McKay in a quiet parlor and see where things went, not that he could find such a venue in a place dedicated to geysers and bears.

  He looked at Mrs. LaMarque, who happened to be watching him, and gave her a thumbs up. She threw back her head in silent laughter, and he knew he had an ally instead of an enemy.

  The applause went on forever, which meant one more chorus, this one involving a kick or two, instead of just a waggle. Ramsay watched gleefully as the little tip jar filled to overflowing. Some of the campers walked away singing “Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay,” while those younger among them capered about, practicing their own high kicks.

  “Well, Sergeant Major Stiles, did we set back respectability in Wonderland a few years?” Mrs. LaMarque asked him. She tucked escaping pins into her pompadour and fanned herself with her hand.

  “A generation at least. What would President Roosevelt say?” Ramsay teased in turn.

  “He would be applauding, I am certain,” she told him. “Carrie, come East with me. I can see a life on the wicked stage for you.”

  “No thanks,” Carrie said. As he watched in simple appreciation, she undid her tangled braid, shook out her hair, then started braiding it again. Impulsively, he put up his hand and stopped her.

  “Leave it this way,” he said. “That’s not an order, but pretty near to one.”

  Too shy to look at him, she did as he said. She ran her fingers though her hair to attempt some order, then pulled it over her shoulders.

  She patted the log beside her and Mrs. LaMarque sat down. “Come now, I don’t think that song has been around more than ten years,” she said. “You never sang it on the stage.”

  Mrs. LaMarque gave one of her full-bodied laughs. “No, my dear, but I wanted to!” She patted Carrie’s knee. “Ten years ago when everyone from Lottie Collins to organ grinders were singing it, I was holding sedate social evenings in my husband’s house on Fifth Avenue. What a bore!”

  Ramsay smiled as the two entertainers leaned toward each other and giggled. He heard Mrs. LaMarque sigh and saw her place her hands on her skirt, one hand trembling, the other at rest. She looked down at her hands. “But time moves on, my dears.” She leaned out and looked around Carrie, Ramsay her target now. She spoke quietly to him as if no one else were present. “Don’t waste it,” she said and then sat back, her attention on Carrie again. She held out her hand. “Help me up, my dear. Time for these old bones to find a mattress!”

  Carrie helped her to her feet. Mrs. LaMarque gestured toward the first row of tents. “I can point myself in the right direction. Don’t you loiter out here too long, Carrie. A girl can get a bad reputation doing that.”

  With a laugh and a wave of her hand over her shoulder, she walked to Tent One, humming “Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay.”

  Jake Trost must have wandered off too. Ramsay stood up, wired but pleasantly tired at the same time. “I will walk you home, milady, then head to Number Twenty,” he told her. “Miss McKay, you are a wonder.”

  “I decided today that since I am a lady of comparative leisure for a few days, I might as well have fun,” she said, as he escorted her toward Tent One. She turned back and picked up the tip jar. “I’ll divvy this up right now. Sit down. You can take Jake his share.”

  Delighted with her scrupulous, no-nonsense attitude, he helped the lady of comparative leisure divide the coins and even dollar bills, to Carrie’s wide-eyed amazement.

  She caught him in silent laughter. “See here, Ram, you don’t appreciate the finer points of show business,” she teased in turn. “My goodness, five dollars each!”

  She stuck her share in her pocket, put the rest back in the tip jar, and handed it to Ramsay. He took it in one hand, considered Mrs. LaMarque’s admonition not to waste time, and put his other hand around Carrie’s waist. She touched his heart by blending into his side.

  “Feeling safe?” he asked.

  She nodded. They walked in silence to Tent One, up the single step and onto the porch. “What a day this has been,” she said. “I almost don’t know what to say.”

  “Don’t say anything,” he told her and kissed her.

  He could have done the endeavor more justice, but he had a tip jar in one hand. He found it simple enough to haul her close with one hand and then kiss her. It might have been the easiest thing he ever did.

  She kissed him back, which he found entirely gratifying. Too soon to suit him, she let go and opened the door. “You’re just the best man, Ramsay,” she said.

  He knew he wasn’t, but suddenly he wanted to be.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Mrs. LaMarque had managed to get into her nightgown and robe, but she held out her brush to Carrie. “It’s a bit tangled from that dancing. Would you?”

  They both sat on the edge of the bed as Carrie brushed Mrs. LaMarque’s white hair until it snapped and popped. Sitting so close to her employer, Carrie couldn’t overlook the grayish tinge to her face and her heavy eyelids, as though it took supreme effort to keep them open. She put down the brush.

  “Mrs. LaMarque, this trip is too much for you, isn’t it?”

  The lady sat up straighter and opened her mouth, probably to object. Carrie put her arm around her and Mrs. LaMarque leaned into her. She nodded.

  “And there you were, kicking up your heels for us!” Carrie joked. She wanted to take a light tone, because she could tell something far heavier was weighing on this complex woman.

  “I’m an old warhorse,” Mrs. LaMarque said finally, even though it seemed to take more energy out of her with every syllable. “Give me something that approximates footlights and even a tiny audience, and I am ready to go.” She squeezed Carrie’s hand. “If I must be honest, my life has been rather dull lately.”

  “We don’t have to continue this journey,” Carrie said, even though her heart told her otherwise. When would she have another chance to spend time with such a splendid man as Ramsay Stiles, but for this trip?

  Mrs. LaMarque said nothing. She closed her eyes. What else? Carrie thought. There was something at stake; she could almost reach out and touch it.

  “Why are you here, Mrs. LaMarque? I could tell you were
n’t impressed with today’s walk to Mammoth Terraces. Some visitors tell me that’s their favorite view in the park. You didn’t seem interested.”

  “I wasn’t,” she replied. “Hot springs, geysers, even bears—oh, I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do,” Carrie said firmly. “Why are you here?”

  Mrs. LaMarque sighed. She put the hairbrush on the end table and gestured for Carrie to help her to her feet. “Pull back the coverlets. I need to lie down.”

  I want you to tell me, Carrie thought, but she did as Mrs. LaMarque ordered. Carrie helped her from her robe and took her hand to assist her into bed. She propped both pillows behind the lady’s head and then pulled up the chair close to the bed.

  “I need to hear what you should be telling me,” she said. “We can stop this trip right now. I’ll return that fifty dollars and—”

  “No, you will not!” Mrs. LaMarque declared in a voice surprisingly strong, even though Carrie could see it cost her. “No,” she repeated. “You have college plans and you need every cent.”

  “I can’t argue that,” Carrie said with a shake of her head. “Still …”

  Mrs. LaMarque reached for Carrie’s hand. “I suppose you won’t leave until I tell you what you want … need … to hear.”

  “Pretty much.”

  To Carrie’s dismay, Mrs. La Marque closed her eyes. “I’m just regrouping,” the lady declared. “I swear you sigh loud enough for two people and a hamster.”

  Carrie laughed. “Especially that hamster! Why are you here?” she repeated, in what she hoped was her kindest voice.

  “I want to see the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone,” Mrs. LaMarque said suddenly, almost as though she was blurting out the words against her will. But now that they were said, she seemed to relax.

  “I hear it’s amazing,” Carrie said, at a loss. “We can be there tomorrow.”

  It was Mrs. LaMarque’s turn to sigh. “Just one hamster sigh. I’m tired.” She tried another tack. “You’ll think I’m silly.”