Montana Bride

by Joan Johnston

“I do, too! Because of what Karl said. It’s a bitterroot leaf, isn’t it, Karl?” Griffin said triumphantly.

  Karl held out the dried-out, one-inch leaf, which had once been fleshy, but which had withered away and fallen off the plant in early June when the bitterroot flower appeared. “Yes, it is.”

  Griffin smirked at Grace and said, “Told you so!”

  “What’s the prize, Karl?” Grace asked.

  “You’ll have to ask Dennis,” Karl replied.

  “I didn’t think I’d have to provide a prize,” Dennis said, chagrined. “Let me think a minute. Oh, by the way, who won?”

  “I did,” Hetty said, smiling broadly. She turned to Karl and said, “It’s incredible how knowledgeable you are, Karl. How on earth did you learn all this? It seems you know every plant, flower, bush, and tree in the Montana Territory.”

  Karl felt himself flushing at the compliment. “It’s simple, really. I studied.”

  “But it’s not simple,” Hetty replied. “More than once I’ve brought you a leaf that looked nothing like anything I’d seen before, but it turned out to be something you’d already identified.”

  “Leaves of the same plant can come in a lot of shapes and sizes,” Karl said.

  “I can’t imagine how you remember it all,” Hetty said, admiration plain in her voice.

  “It seems to me like a pretty big waste of a perfectly good brain,” Dennis interjected. “Why bother remembering so much useless information?”

  “It’s not useless,” Karl said, stung by his friend’s surprising criticism.

  Dennis made a disparaging face. “It’s not? Give me one good way you can use it.”

  Karl opened his mouth to defend himself, but Hetty beat him to it.

  “You must not have been listening very closely, Dennis. Karl could feed us with his knowledge if we were hungry. He could treat us with his knowledge if we were sick. He knows which trees are best for building or burning. He knows which bushes will bear sweet fruit and which will bring forth the most beautiful flowers. And he knows which plants are harmful and should be avoided.”

  Karl was astonished to hear Hetty make the same argument he’d made so many times to his elder brother, who’d disdained the time Karl had spent learning about plants.

  Unfortunately, Dennis had been present for too many of those arguments, and he responded exactly as Jonas so often had.

  “Only a savage still uses leaves and roots for medicine. We don’t need those native remedies,” Dennis said snidely. “We have better, more effective ones. And we can grow wheat and corn to feed ourselves. We don’t need to eat the damned bitter root of some flower.”

  Karl hadn’t realized until this moment that Dennis shared Jonas’s feelings about his work. It was shocking to hear him speak so rudely and crudely about Karl’s study of plants and to dismiss his life’s work so completely. He knew better than to argue. He’d never changed Jonas’s mind. He wasn’t likely to change Dennis’s, either.

  But it seemed Hetty wasn’t done. “Maybe back East this sort of information isn’t important,” she said heatedly. “But you seem to forget we’re heading into a wilderness where we have to expect the unexpected. Those savages you’re condemning have managed to survive in this wilderness a very long time. So I don’t see how anyone could call Karl’s amazing knowledge about the plants that grow in the Montana Territory useless.”

  Dennis clapped, grinned at Karl, and said, “Bravo! I haven’t heard such an impassioned defense of your work since the last time you argued with Jonas.”

  “I mean it!” Hetty said.

  “I’m sure you do, sweetheart, but—”

  “I’m not your sweetheart!” Hetty snapped, cutting him off. “And I’ll thank you not to make fun of my husband.”

  Dennis looked thunderstruck by the attack. He shot a look at Karl that said, What’s going on? Where’s that sweet, shy bride you married?

  Karl wasn’t quite sure himself. But he felt his heart skip a beat when he looked into Hetty’s admiring blue eyes.

  She turned to Dennis and said, “When you’re considering what to give me for a prize, Dennis, be sure it’s something I can split three ways.” She put an arm around Grace’s waist, then tousled Griffin’s eternally shaggy hair. “We all three deserve to share in the reward.”

  Griffin’s chin dropped, and he murmured, “I don’t.”

  “Of course you do!” Hetty said.

  Griffin shook his head. “I didn’t play, so I don’t deserve to win. And I ain’t taking charity.”

  “I’m not taking charity,” Hetty corrected softly. “And it isn’t charity when you earn it.”

  Karl could see the boy was only a moment from bolting. He put a hand on Griffin’s shoulder to keep him in place. “Tell me, Griffin, what is Populus balsamifera?”

  For a moment, the boy didn’t answer, and Karl wondered if he’d made a mistake about how closely Griffin had been listening for the past two weeks. Then the boy’s head came up, and he said almost defiantly, “That’s the Latin name for cottonwood.”

  “How do the Indians use it?” Karl asked.

  “They make a poultice of the leaves for bruises and sores and boils.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yeah. They make tea from the bark for whooping cough.”

  “Anything else?”

  Griffin’s eyes brightened. “They mix the buds in springtime with blood to make black paint that won’t wear off.”

  “Anything else?” Karl repeated.

  Griffin glanced at Dennis, then said, “Yeah. Cottonwood sap is sweet to eat, and so is the inner bark. And you can feed cottonwood twigs and bark to horses, ’cause they like it.”

  “Is that all?” Karl asked.

  Griffin shot Dennis a cheeky look. “Cottonwood makes a good fire. It doesn’t crackle, and it gives off a clean smoke.”

  “You were playing, Griffin, whether you knew it or not,” Karl said. “You absolutely deserve a share of the prize.”

  Griffin jerked himself free and mumbled, “If you say so.”

  “I’m convinced,” Dennis said. He turned to his saddlebags, reached inside, and came out with a leather pouch. He opened it and handed a long, thin strip of black licorice to Hetty and then to Grace. Finally, he offered one to Griffin, whose hands were stuck in his pockets. “Take it, kid. You earned it.”

  Griffin glanced toward Hetty, who nodded, then to Karl, who nodded and smiled encouragement. Finally, he looked at Grace and said, “You can have my share.”

  “I couldn’t remember half what you did about cottonwoods,” Grace said. “Take it, Griffin.”

  Karl could tell the boy didn’t trust Dennis not to snatch the prize back at the last moment. He finally reached out, grabbed the licorice strip, and ran pell-mell toward the front of the wagon. Grace shot an anxious look at Hetty and hurried after him.

  “What the hell’s wrong with that boy?” Dennis asked.

  “Watch your language,” Karl said.

  “What the hell’s wrong with you?” Dennis replied irritably. “You never minded my language before.”

  “It’s not just you and me anymore. I have a wife and kids to think about.”

  Dennis snorted and muttered, “Son of a bitch.” Then he held up his hands in surrender. “You win. I’ll watch my language.”

  Karl met Hetty’s gaze and saw approval there. His throat constricted with emotion. He shouldn’t care what she thought. Henrietta Wentworth Templeton Norwood was a liar.

  Over the past two weeks he’d begun to speculate that she must not have been much older than Grace when she’d gotten pregnant for the first time. Had she even been married when Griffin was born? If she’d had a child out of wedlock, it would explain her willingness to move West.

  Maybe she’d never been married. Or maybe she’d been married twice before. If so, what had happened to those two previous husbands? And who the hell was Clive?

  Whatever Hetty’s past, he didn’t want to know any more tha
n he already did. The only thing that mattered was her behavior from now on. And it had felt awfully good to have his wife take his side.

  “If you’re through playing games,” Dennis said, mounting up, “you might want to help find us a place to camp tonight.” He kicked his horse and headed off toward the sunset.

  Karl flushed at the censure. He’d stayed close to the wagon the past two weeks to play the game, letting Dennis do most of the scouting. Apparently, Dennis was more than ready to hand that duty back to him.

  He mounted up without another word. Before he could ride away, he felt Hetty’s hand on his thigh. He looked down, startled by her touch.

  “Karl?”

  “What?” His voice was harsh with the need to restrain his sudden desire. It took all his willpower to resist the urge to pull her up onto the horse with him, to hold her tight and kiss her silly.

  He wanted to make love to his wife.

  Hetty looked taken aback for a moment, but she smiled up at him and said, “Thank you for the game.”

  “It was Bao’s idea.”

  “You were the one who ended up doing all the work. The children loved it. So did I. You were wonderful.”

  Karl thought, To hell with it. He looped the reins around the saddle horn, leaned down and caught Hetty under the arms, and lifted her up onto his lap. He looked into her eyes and saw that she was stunned at what he’d done. He couldn’t have explained the impulse that had made him act. But as long as he’d gone this far, he followed his instincts and kissed his wife.

  He was expecting resistance, but there was none. Her mouth opened at the press of his tongue, and he felt his heart pound as her hand caressed his neck. Karl pulled her tight against him, but there was no way to feel her body beneath the bulk of their coats, so he sought the connection to her that he wanted and needed through their kiss.

  He’d barely begun tasting her sweetness when he heard a shout from Bao.

  “Boss! Come quick!”

  Karl broke the kiss, slid Hetty off his lap to the ground, and spurred his horse, all in the same instant. In the wilderness, moments could make the difference between life and death. As he galloped to catch up to the wagon, regretting the abrupt end to their kiss, he thought, This had damned well better be one hell of an emergency!

  Hetty stood stunned for a moment, unsteady on her feet, her fingertips pressed against her lips. She couldn’t believe what had just happened. First, that Karl had pulled her up onto his lap and kissed her in broad daylight, his tongue intruding into her mouth so she could actually taste him, and second, that he’d abandoned her so suddenly.

  Her body was still discombobulated from the kiss, her breathing erratic, her heart thumping hard in her chest, but she forced her legs to work as she stumbled after him.

  She heard Grace screaming. And Dennis yelling. And Bao’s shrill, broken English. And finally, Karl’s furious bellow above them all.

  Hetty broke into a run.

  What she saw when she reached the front of the wagon made her gasp and halt in her tracks. Karl and Dennis were engaged in a bout of fisticuffs! The fight between Clive Hamm and Joe Barnett passed before her eyes, along with its devastating conclusion.

  “Stop!” she cried. “Oh, please, stop!”

  The two men ignored her. It quickly became clear that Karl was outmatched by his larger, stronger friend. The skin around his puffed-up left eye was red and raw.

  Karl ducked under Dennis’s swing and punched him in the gut. Dennis grunted and caught Karl in a crushing bear hug. Karl slipped a foot behind Dennis’s ankle and shoved, and Dennis tumbled to the ground with Karl on top of him. The two men began pummeling each other again.

  Hetty was desperate to stop the fight, but she had no idea how. Maybe if she knew what had caused it, she would be able to end it. She turned to Grace and demanded, “What happened? Why are they fighting?”

  Between sobs, Grace said, “Mr. Campbell hit Griffin.”

  Hetty’s mouth fell open. “Why on earth would he do such a thing?” When Grace didn’t answer, she turned to Griffin and asked, “What happened, Griffin?”

  “It was an accident!” Griffin protested.

  “What was?” Hetty demanded.

  Griffin snarled, “What happened!”

  Frustrated that she didn’t know any more than she had before she’d started questioning Griffin, Hetty turned to Grace and asked, “Did you see what happened?”

  “A stone from Griffin’s slingshot hit Mr. Campbell’s horse and made him buck and Mr. Campbell fell off and his horse ran away,” Grace said all in one breath.

  “Oh, Griffin, no!” Hetty cried. “Where did you get a slingshot?”

  “I made it.”

  “Give it to me,” Hetty said.

  Griffin pulled the wooden slingshot out of his belt and smacked it into her waiting hand, but his chin took on a brash tilt as he said, “Nobody slaps me. Not for nothin’!”

  Hetty’s breath caught in her throat. “Dennis must have been sorely provoked. What else did you do?”

  Griffin shot her a look of betrayal. “I should have known you’d take his side.”

  Grace interceded to say, “Mr. Campbell grabbed a handful of Griffin’s coat—”

  “So I kicked the son of a bitch in the shin!” Griffin finished.

  “Karl arrived in the nick of time,” Grace sobbed. “That son of a bitch would have choked Griffin senseless for sure!”

  Hetty opened her mouth to complain about the children’s use of that ugly term to describe Dennis Campbell and shut it again. Dennis was a grown man. He should know better than to attack a child, no matter what the provocation.

  She turned back to the two snarling and grunting men wrestling on the ground, wondering how she could break up the furious fight without coming to serious harm herself.

  Suddenly, Bao doused the two men with an entire bucket of icy water. They broke apart and came up spluttering and swearing.

  Both men rose like shaggy, lumbering bears, turning to threaten Bao, who dropped the bucket, crossed his arms inside his wide sleeves, and said, “Confucius say: ‘Without feelings of respect, what is there to distinguish men from beasts’?”

  The two men stared at the Chinaman with jaws agape.

  Hetty seized the opportunity to step between them. Since Karl was on top when the water got dumped, he’d gotten soaked. Water dripped from his hair and spiked his eyelashes. She put her hands on his wet coat, her back to Dennis, and said, “Enough. That’s enough, Karl. Dennis is your best friend. You’ve done enough to punish him for a slap.” She didn’t mention the apparent attempt to choke Griffin, since that was likely to enrage Karl all over again.

  Then she turned around, keeping herself between the two men, and said, “Enough, Dennis. This is no way for best friends to treat each other. Griffin is sorry. It was an accident.”

  “Like hell it was! That brat spooked my horse on purpose.”

  “Did not!” Griffin retorted.

  Hetty turned to Griffin and said, “You’d better get moving if you’re going to find Mr. Campbell’s horse before dark.”

  “Me?” Griffin glanced at the surrounding wilderness with a look of trepidation, and Hetty almost changed her mind about sending him out to recover the horse. But she knew if there were no consequences for Griffin’s behavior, it would only get worse.

  She pointed west and said, “Get moving.”

  “I’ll go with him,” Grace offered.

  Hetty almost stopped her, but it would be safer for the two children to be together. “Fine. We’ll camp right here. Be sure you’re both back before dark, whether you find Mr. Campbell’s horse or not.”

  “You’d damn well better find him,” Dennis said.

  “I told you to watch your language,” Karl warned, swiping at a cut on his cheek with the back of his hand and smearing blood across his face.

  “Get moving!” Hetty ordered sharply. The sooner Griffin was out of Dennis’s sight, the better. As the children tro
tted away, Hetty turned back to the two men.

  She gave her attention first to Dennis, hoping to calm him down. “Let me see your face.”

  Dennis stood still as Hetty grasped his chin and gently turned his face back and forth so she could survey the damage. Dennis had a nasty bruise on his right cheekbone and a bleeding cut on his chin. She turned to Bao and said, “Mr. Lin, I’ll need your medicine kit.”

  “What about me?” Karl demanded, hands on hips.

  Hetty glanced over her shoulder and said, “Get out of those wet clothes before you catch pneumonia. I don’t want to find myself a widow before I’ve had a chance to be a wife.”

  Karl looked disgruntled.

  “Bao can take care of you while I doctor Dennis,” she told him. Hetty wished there was a way she could explain to Karl that she was nursing Dennis because she wanted a chance to question him further about his behavior toward Griffin. She tried meeting Karl’s gaze and sending a message with her eyes, but he turned and stomped away toward the back of the wagon.

  “Come over here and sit down, Dennis,” Hetty said, leading him by the hand to a tree split by lightning that had fallen beside the trail. There was an awkward moment when she tried to free her hand and Dennis held on.

  “I appreciate you taking the time to doctor me,” he said, caressing her palm with his thumb.

  Hetty wished Dennis had been the one with his eye nearly swollen shut, because there was nothing to protect her from the look of admiration in his incredible blue eyes. She knew she shouldn’t feel flattered, but she couldn’t help it.

  Oh, she was a horrible, fickle girl. Hetty would forever regret flirting with one man to make another jealous. She would never, for the rest of her life, do anything so foolish again. So she didn’t understand how she could be feeling like this with Dennis, when Karl’s recent kiss had almost caused her to swoon. What was wrong with her? How she wished for her twin! Hannah would have known how to put this rascally charmer in his place.

  Luckily, Bao arrived at that moment with his medicines and a wet cloth. He set down the box and handed Hetty the rag. He took one look at Dennis and said to Hetty, “No need stitches. You remember which salve for bruises?”