Chapter 11
"We'll stop fer a rest."
Adam didn't argue. He would have liked to have said that it wasn't necessary, but he was pretty sure that he couldn't make it convincing. It would be a relief to get down for a minute.
"Now, don't get down. Wait fer me."
That one he thought about disobeying, then thought better of it. Mounting, to his complete surprise and displeasure, had almost caused him to pass out. He wasn't willing to risk it on an ill-advised dismount.
"Why don't ye pull 'im alongside that fallen tree - we'll use it as a mounting block."
Meekly, he obeyed. For a man who had always mounted effortlessly while his horse was already in motion, it was a humiliating turn of events.
He allowed Bridie to steady him as he eased his way out of the saddle, clinging to the pommel with his good hand. He stepped down from the log and seated himself on it, spent. Sport nudged at his ear and he reached up to pat his cheek. "Not quite the pace you're used to, eh, boy?"
Bridie was eyeing him intently. "Couldn't go any faster in this mud anyway - not on these slopes. Are ye holdin' up there?"
He nodded mutely.
"Time fer some lunch anyway." She pulled down her saddlebags and seated herself next to him. "Lovely day. Hard to believe it's the same country as two weeks ago, isn't it?"
"I'm finding it even harder to believe I'm the same man I was two weeks ago. I feel about 100."
She handed him some chicken and patted his knee. "Yer doin' fine. It is premature, like, but all things considered I don't think we dared wait."
"No." They ate in silence, Adam trying to find the words for what he wanted to say, if she would only let him. They had almost finished when he finally ventured, "Bridie, I want to - "
She must have read his expression, because she said quickly, "What is it now? Are ye lookin' fer a story, then? Well, all right, one last time, I suppose…let's see…once upon a time…"
He smiled despite his exasperation.
"Once upon a time, there was a princess who went ta live on a high mountain o' stone." She shot him a sideways glance. "Not a very fair princess, ye understand, but she had high ideals and thought she could do some good there alone on the mountain. And maybe she did, fer a time, in her way. But, anyway. This princess lived all alone on the mountain, with her books an' her music and her fine ideals until one day she noticed a strange discontent was growin' in her heart. Until finally, ta her surprise an horror, she realized that she was turnin' ta stone, just like the mountain."
Adam was watching her very intently now, but she avoided his gaze.
"So she said ta herself, she said, 'I must leave the mountain, then, before I turn all ta stone. Maybe then I can turn back into a real live girl.'
So she made up her mind ta take her books an her music an leave her fine ideals high on the mountain and seek a new place and a new mission. But before she could leave, a strange thing happened."
Here she glanced up at him for a moment, then away again. "One day, when she was haulin' wood ta have against an early storm, what should she find in the snow but a handsome prince, injured and unconscious."
He started to say something then, but she hurried on. "O' course, she couldn't just leave him there. So she put him on the sledge instead o' the wood and took him home to nurse him back ta health. An' ta her surprise, even while he was still outta his head, he spoke ta her in a secret language - one she hadn't heard since she'd come ta the mountain. An then she knew there was a miracle in play.
Oh, there's more - " she stopped his interruption. "Fer ye see, he was a very responsible young prince. So, lest he leave and take his poet's heart away too soon, the angels sent snow, fer days an days…so there was nothin' for it fer a time but ta read poetry an' make music an talk about high ideals fer hours on end…"
She still avoided looking at him, but to his surprise, reached out and slipped her hand into his. "Have ye ever heard o' sech a miracle, really? Imagine two people in all o' Nevada Territory loving literature and music somehow findin' each other at just the right moment…and then.
As the snow began ta melt away and they knew their time was at an end the princess looked at herself an found ta her amazement that she was no longer turnin' ta stone. She was indeed again a real live girl."
They sat quietly with hands clasped until Adam tried again. "Bridie, I - "
"Is it the lesson yer wantin'? O' course, there is one, as with all the best stories." She looked directly at him now, her intent blue gaze more penetrating than ever. "The princess learned that when yer where ye need ta be, doin' what ye should be doin', things have a way o' takin' care o' themselves. Ye may not always get what ye want just when ye want it, but ye'll always get what ye need just when ye need it. Don't ye think that's an important lesson?"
Adam met her gaze with a glowing dark one. "Yes," he said quietly. "It is." He cleared his throat. "You're staying, then."
She nodded. "It's where I belong. Fer now. And yerself?"
"Still not sure."
She threw him off guard by suddenly pressing her face into his sound shoulder. "Ye'll come back?"
He had to strain to make out the words. "Count on it."
"Even if ye decide ta go east. Ye'll come back one more time ta tell me?"
He reached up to touch her hair. "I promise."
She sat up suddenly and made a dash at her eyes with the back of her hand. "Well. I expect we should see about gettin' ye back on yer horse. Daylight won't last ferever and ye've still a long ways ta go."
He rose cautiously, surprised. "You're not coming?"
She shook her head. "I should make rounds. See how me clientele weathered the storm. The Pass is only about a mile down thataway. Won't take ye but a bit ta reach it, even at a walk." She gave him a look. "An don't ye even think about canterin'."
"Yes, ma'am. No, ma'am." He grinned despite the pain as he gingerly remounted. "Something must have changed. I'm surprised you're letting me go off on my own."
"From all you've told me, I don't expect ye'll be on yer own fer long."
He looked puzzled, then shook his head. "Surely, not this soon…"
"We'll see. I'd be bettin' on it meself. If I were a bettin' kinda girl." She opened his saddlebag and slipped something inside.
He protested. "What now? You've already given me enough food for five days."
"It's that poem I promised ye. Read it when yer alone." She stood on tip-toe on the log and kissed him on the cleft in his chin. "Ye take care o' yerself. An' I'll expect ye come spring. No excuses."
"No excuses." He lifted the small hand still resting on the saddlebag and kissed her fingers gently. "Thank you, Bridie."
She gave his hand a squeeze. "Get on with ye now. Daylight's wastin'."
He urged Sport into a walk, following the direction she had indicated, thinking of how funny and wise she was, how she had been just what he'd needed.
She was right. It was nothing short of a miracle, and feeling that feeling again that she had to be an other-worldly being in disguise, he turned carefully in the saddle to look back and see if she had indeed dissolved or disappeared.
She was standing on the log, grinning at him, knowing exactly what he was up to. "Now ye see, what did I tell ye?" she called "Still here! Nothin' magical about me!"
He grinned back companionably and touched his hat to her, but as he rode away he thought, Not magical, hm? For once in your life, Bridie Halloran, you couldn't be more wrong.
000
Adam had gone over half a mile before curiosity got the better of him and he reached in his saddlebag to pull out the slim volume. A faded satin ribbon marked the page and he brought Sport to a halt to open it. No reading and riding today - everything felt just a little too precarious.
The first thing he noticed were the words 'THIS is the Adam Cartwright I know' penned there in Bridie's spidery handwriting. He smiled to himself. She must really want him to pay attention if she'd actually defaced a book for it. The next thing he noticed was the title, "Invictus".
He knew the piece, had even committed it to memory once, but now he wanted to read it afresh, through her eyes. Sport stood patiently while he read:
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as a pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced or cried aloud
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.
It matters not how straight the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
He closed the book carefully and slid it tenderly back into his saddlebag, then sat gazing for a minute, unseeing, at the landscape before him.
Master of my fate and captain of my soul, hey? He coaxed Sport back into motion.
I hope you're right, Bridie. I surely do.
TBC
Actually, drmweaver, being able to post without a name is fairly new. I agree about Bridie and Adam - I always thought of them as kindred spirits.
