Page 47 of I Do, I Do, I Do
The trail bent sharply upward from Sheep Camp toward an area known as the scales. Clara made the three-mile ascent in a thick snowfall that didn’t thin out until she reached the scales, where she had agreed to meet Juliette and Zoe.
Once she caught her breath, she raised her eyes to Chilkoot Pass and her heart sank. A single file of men struggled up one thousand feet at a forty-five-degree angle. The barren treeless snow-covered slope looked a straight perpendicular from Clara’s vantage point.
Here and there a spent form dropped out of the line, and the man giving up came tumbling down the snowy incline in a dangerous uncontrolled fall. The controlled descent lay on the far right of the climbing men. A trough called the grease trail had been worn into the snow by those who had reached the summit and were now sliding down on the seat of their pants to fetch another load of goods before they made the nearly impossible climb again.
“It takes from three to six hours to reach the top,” a growly voice said at her side. “Unfortunately, the pace is set by the slowest climber.”
Clara pulled a heavy scarf away from her mouth and nose and refused to notice that her pulse accelerated when she heard his voice. “How do the men keep their footing?” she asked, holding her gaze on the climbers. They made her think of a line of dark ants steadily advancing up a steep and snowy anthill.
“See those sourdoughs standing at the bottom? They cut steps in the ice. Fifteen hundred steps. If you want to use their staircase—and everyone does—you have to pay a toll.”
She nodded. Opportunists abounded in this wild inhospitable land, most of them seeking to profit from the prospectors’ desperate push to reach the gold fields. Governments profited, too. At the top of Chilkoot, Canadian Mounties would collect customs duty on all supplies before the cheechakos were permitted to enter Canada. One needed a fat purse to survive this journey.
The ragged mountain peaks that surrounded them were as craggy and intimidating as Bear Barrett’s face, Clara decided without looking up at him. She edged away, but he stepped forward, moving closer this time.
“All right,” he said after a minute. A long breath expelled vapor from his lips. “I apologize for saying aloud that it would be easier if you were a woman of loose virtue, or whatever it was I said. I didn’t intend to offend you, and that’s the truth.”
She stood in unmoving silence so long that her feet started to chill despite thick stockings and heavy boots. “I accept your apology,” she said finally, as they had both known she would.
“Just once I would like to get through a single damned conversation without one of us getting mad.”
She shifted to look at him through the diminishing fall of snowflakes and sucked in a breath. “What in heaven’s name have you rubbed all over your face?”
“Bacon grease and wood ash. I recommend it to you and your companions to protect against wind and cold.”
Immediately Clara felt the raw fire in her cheeks raised by altitude-frigid temperatures and the steady wind blowing off the glaciers. But she couldn’t quite imagine herself smearing that mess on her own face.
A twinkle appeared in the brown-bear eyes peering out of ashy gray holes, and she noticed the defined contours of his lips since they, too, were outlined in grease and ash. Feeling her own mouth go dry, she swung her gaze back to the line of men struggling up the ice steps.
“Have you thought about our rematch?”
“I don’t recall agreeing to any rematch,” she said, feeling the bulk of him immediately behind her.
“I think we should go for the best two out of three.”
The vapor from his breath puffed above and to the side of her hat, trailing away while she watched. “Maybe,” she said, smiling. “I’ll consider it.”
“Excellent!” His pleasure made her wonder if he’d been in more fights, defending himself from snickers or snide comments. “So. Are you ready to make the ascent? I’ll follow behind you.”
If he did, she would feel his gaze on her bottom for the next three to six hours and agitate herself wondering what he was thinking—and thinking unseemly thoughts herself. Now a stream of vapor sighed from her lips. This huge shaggy man was driving her crazy. An example of her craziness was her embarrassing desire to shove him down in the snow and then jump on top of him. And it was shameful how Bear’s presence obliterated all remembrance of Jean Jacques, her thieving no-good stinkbug of a husband.
Suddenly her gaze sharpened, and she peered hard through the diminishing snow. “Is that Juliette standing in the ascent line?”
Bear narrowed his eyes and nodded. “It looks like her.”
“We agreed to meet at the scales and make the climb together.”
She and Bear reached Juliette in fifteen minutes, ignoring shouts of “get in line,” and “wait your turn.”
“What are you doing?” Clara demanded. “You were supposed to wait for Zoe and me.” Juliette continued to astonish her. Clara would have wagered all she owned that she and Zoe would have to drag Juliette up Chilkoot Pass. But here she was. The first among them to join the climb line.
Juliette raised liquid eyes and an ashen face. She tugged at a frost-white scarf wrapped around her throat and mouth. “If I stop to think about this, I’ll never do it. I need to keep going.” She gripped her gloved hands together. “Oh, Lord. I’m just…I’m so…Oh, Lord. This is going to be…”
The line inched forward, pushing Juliette closer to the men collecting the toll. Clara considered Juliette’s petite form and delicately boned face. Already her hem was caked with heavy ice, and her cheeks burned red with cold. The shoulder pack containing a bite to eat and a canteen of hot tea looked too big, like the pack would topple Juliette at the next step. It seemed inconceivable that such a small fragile creature could make a climb that was defeating men twice her size.
As if to underscore Clara’s thoughts, a yell caught her attention, and she turned just as one of the men who had stepped out of line hurtled down the slope, bouncing from snow-covered rock to snow-covered rock. He landed at the bottom near the line waiting to ascend. When someone rushed to help, it became apparent that his fall had broken several bones.
There was nothing to say except good luck. And, “I’ll meet you at the summit.” She gazed up at Bear. “That goes for you, too,” she said, before leaving to search for Zoe.
