Page 64 of I Do, I Do, I Do
The snow had thickened while Zoe let her thoughts drift, and now their tracks were obliterated. Snow had collected along Tom’s hat brim and atop the goods stacked on the sled.
Her chest constricted and suddenly she felt the cold stinging her cheeks and chilling her feet. But she kept her voice level, not wanting to betray anxiety when Tom didn’t. “What will we do?”
The sourdoughs loved to tell grisly tales of men lost in snowstorms, their bodies not found until the spring melt. Equally terrifying were the stories of frostbite and amputated limbs. She knew it could happen, because three days ago she’d seen a man whose nose had been lost to frostbite. His disfigurement had horrified her.
Tom stepped forward and clasped her shoulders, his expression reassuring. “I won’t tell you the situation isn’t serious. But I will tell you we should survive with no ill effects. It’s just one night.”
One night in the open. Fear dried her throat. She gripped the lapels of his coat and willed her heart to stop pounding so she could speak. “We’ll freeze. They’ll never find us.” Lord, she sounded like Juliette.
Tom patted her back, his touch a caress. “We’ll be fine, darlin’. Don’t you worry.”
His confidence assured and irritated her. Then she pulled her thoughts together and reminded herself that this was not Tom’s first trek through the wilderness. He would know what to do. When she raised her head, her mouth almost met his, and she drew a quick tingling breath, then stepped away and dusted her gloves together.
“All right,” she said, aware that he was looking at her as if he, too, remembered a kiss that had seared her. She hoped her voice sounded steadier to him than it did to her own ears. “What should we do? And how can I help?” It would be a cold and miserable night, the worst night of her life, but she would be with Tom, and she trusted him to get them through it.
“Let’s see what we have to work with,” he said, untying the ropes securing the boxes and crates on the sled. “It’s one of my sleds. If we’re lucky…excellent!” He hefted an ax in his hand, then found a hatchet and gave it to Zoe. “I’ll build a lean-to while you cut some pine boughs. Don’t wander too far.”
First he located a relatively dry and protected site beneath two large pines, then began chopping smaller trees. Working in the light of the lantern he built a teepee-shaped structure and overlaid it with branches stripped from the poles. By the time Zoe had collected enough pine boughs to cushion the floor of his shelter, Tom had scraped back the snow, hacked a pit out of the frozen earth, and had a fire blazing.
“Warm yourself while I set up the stove.”
“We have a stove?” Thank heaven they had the sled.
“And food. Once the stove is hot, I’ll fry some caribou steaks.” He handed her an armload of blankets and asked her to spread them over the pine boughs while he positioned the camp stove near the narrow opening of the lean-to.
“The others will be worried.” Zoe hung one of the blankets across the lean-to’s opening. “Will they search for us?”
“Not until daylight,” Tom rummaged for a skillet and plates, brandishing them with a smile when the items were found. “Are you still worrying about spending the night in the open?”
She smiled uneasily. “A little. But it seems we have all the comforts of home.” Home reminded her of earlier thoughts. “Do you remember what we talked about that day at the glaciers?” she asked softly, sitting on a log he had rolled near the fire.
“I remember every word and every moment of that day.” Glancing up from the stove, his green eyes traveled from her mouth to her throat and back to her eyes. For a long moment their gazes locked, and Zoe almost forgot what she wanted to tell him.
“I’ve been wrong about so many things,” she began. While Tom waited for the skillet to heat, she told him exactly how she had felt about Newcastle and its residents, not sparing herself.
“I’m sorry you feel that way,” he said finally, dropping strips of meat into the skillet.
“I don’t. Not anymore.” She couldn’t identify the moment when she had begun to align with the carriage people instead of with her own. But she would never forget the instant of revelation. She told Tom what Juliette had said and her shock of recognition.
“I’m devastated that I didn’t see it myself.” Anger and regret twisted her stomach. “If I could, I’d rush home right now and beg Ma’s forgiveness.” She blinked hard. “I’ve said and done so many hurtful things over the years. I’d watch the grabbing and big portions at supper and think, ‘This isn’t how refined people eat. This is Newcastle.’ Pa teased me about putting on airs, but he and the others must have known that I was ashamed of them.” It was hard to say these things. “All of us living in such a small house, and wearing mended shirts and petticoats. Never being rid of the damned coal dust.” She lowered her head. “I judged everyone by their fingernails. If there was a line of coal dust, I didn’t want anything to do with them. But if their nails were clean, the person could be a liar, a thief, and a seducer, and I thought he was gentry, finer and better than the people in Newcastle,” she finished bitterly.
“Don’t be too hard on yourself, darlin’.” Tom sat back on his heels and studied her through the falling snow. “I guess everyone in Newcastle has had similar thoughts. Maybe it didn’t take them as long as it’s taken you to come around,” he added with a smile, “but everyone hates the Owner’s Day Parade. You have to ignore the swells and just enjoy the free beer and music and the candy for the kids. Rich people live in a different universe. We don’t understand them, and they sure as hell don’t understand us. They can’t grasp that we don’t want charity.”
“I wanted to be one of them,” she said in a low voice.
“Who wouldn’t want to ride in a fancy carriage, wear fine clothes, and be attended by servants?” A shrug scattered snow off his wide shoulders. “There’s no harm in dreaming. As long as we don’t lose sight of the good things we already have.”
“I wanted it so badly that I did something very stupid and foolish.” She longed to tell him about Jean Jacques, and now was the time. The confession hovered on her tongue but died there. Pride stopped her from telling him that she had married a man because he had clean fingernails and was not from Newcastle. She didn’t think Tom would be as forgiving if he knew how far her blindness had carried her.
She watched him flip the steaks. Caribou was a tender meat, best when turned often over a hot fire and eaten before the red was cooked out. Tom placed the steaks on plates and poured the cooking juices over the meat.
“I think I understand what you’re saying,” he said after handing her a knife and fork, “and why you’re telling me this.”
“You do?” She wasn’t sure she understood herself.
“You’re telling me that you’ve changed your mind about our courtship and you’ve accepted my suit.”
She stared. And then laughed. “You’re a persistent man.”
