Linda Castle - Temple's Prize

A rustle of stiff fabric telegraphed Connie’s intent to swivel around on the hard wagon seat. It took a few minutes for her to manage to move all the material surrounding her body.

“Yes—he is,” she said.

He could not see her face behind the netting, but her voice held a tone of undisguised amazement.

“It was so long ago when you left, I am surprised that you would remember such an insignificant thing as the exact location of his office.”

He shouldn’t remember. But every small incident and minute detail was as clear as if it had been yesterday instead of ten years ago when he lived with C.H. and Connie.

“I have a good memory.” Temple bent his head lower to′concentrate on the hunk of wood, wishing he had kept his mouth shut. His brows pinched together in annoyance and he promised himself that he would not allow his curiosity to get the better of him again.

“Yes, you certainly do.” Constance turned back to face the front of the wagon. The team was trudging slowly and Peter slapped the reins against the rumps of the horses as if he were anxious to reach the canyon. The wagon lurched forward and Temple neatly sliced the tip of his thumb with the razor-sharp blade.

“Damnation, Hughes. You’ve made me nick myself.” Temple stuck his thumb against his tongue to stanch the flow of blood. The faint taste of iron filled his mouth as blood oozed from the stinging gash. The wagon jerked again as it came to a halt.

“What is it?” Constance demanded. She had somehow managed to climb over the iron railing at the back of the seat—quite a feat considering the amount of cloth that surrounded her. She was kneeling, or he believed she was kneeling, beside him. One thing he was sure was that her huge skirt was ballooned near his thigh and she was pressing him tighter against one trunk. Her fingertips grazed over the flesh on his exposed forearm. “What has happened? Let me see.”

As if she could see anything through the netting, he thought sourly. He took his thumb from his mouth in order to speak. “It’s nothing.”

She grabbed his hand with both of her smaller ones. “You have cut yourself.” A thick glob of blood welled from the wound. The cut was not deep enough to be serious but wide enough to bleed freely.

“It’s nothing to worry over,” he grumbled. She ignored him and turned his hand this way and that, examining his thumb while he dodged the brim of her outrageous hat.

“I’m not going to bleed to death, Connie, now let me go.” Temple felt awkward, sprawled on his back among the canvas with Connie hovering over him like some sort of apparition from a child’s dream.

“It could become septic, Temple. Allow me to tend it now.” Authority rang in her voice and it only served to make Temple more annoyed.

“While you see to Mr. Parish, I am going to take a little walk.” Peter climbed down from the wagon seat and ambled off toward a scanty grove of squat pine trees, leaving Temple to fend for himself.

“It is a tiny scratch.” He managed to wrench his hand from Connie’s determined grasp. The fact that she was now calling him Temple and not Mr. Parish did not escape his notice during their tug-of-war.

“I don’t want to win Montague’s endowment because you were too injured to give it your best,” her smooth voice pronounced from behind the barrier of her netting.

Renewed fury sluiced over Temple. He wanted tò deliver a suitable retort, but her thorny declaration had left him momentarily speechless. A hot tide crept up his face to his hairline.

“Very well, Miss Cadwallender, do your worst,” Temple grated out. He shoved his hand toward her, offering the injured thumb for her to inspect.

“I am pleased to see you are at last being sensible,” she muttered while she searched through a small carpetbag. He had the uncomfortable suspicion she was smiling behind the barrier of cloth. In fact, he could practically hear laughter in her voice. When she had found what she was looking for, the massive hat once again turned in his direction. “Now kindly hold still so I can put some antiseptic on this cut.”

A gust of icy wind blew over them and he actually heard a muffled giggle. But surely it was a trick of the wind; little Connie would not laugh at an injured man.

Would she?

Temple used his free hand to close his knife and slip it inside his trousers. Constance put something related to liquid fire on his thumb.

“Holy blue blazes, Connie!” The stinging liquid made his eyes water. He glanced around for the piece of wood he had been carving when she had descended upon him, but between her ministrations and the antiseptic he had no luck in finding it.

“There now—that should keep your thumb clean and dry.” Constance gathered her skirts and stood up. Temple was stunned to see his hand swathed in white gauze. His thumb was bound to three times its normal size. Now he looked almost as ridiculous in his bandage as Constance looked in her hat.

“If this bandage is meant to stanch moisture you must be expecting a flood.” Temple climbed to his feet and leaped from the back of the wagon before she had a chance to object and bind him further.

Constance couldn’t imagine why Temple was so annoyed. After all, she had done him a good turn by cleaning the cut. She watched him enter the copse of low shrubs near the pine trees. The sun was high overhead and she was a little warm in her traveling ensemble.

Her eyes swept over the countryside while she gathered the gauze and mechanically popped the cork back in the bottle of antiseptic. Short mossy-green tufts of grass sprouted here and there, but in the deepest ravines and beneath the squat pines, there were actually small patches of snow on the ground. Constance replaced the items in the small box and returned it to her carpetbag. She had climbed halfway over the wagon seat when something caught her eye.

It was a piece of pale pine wood wedged in a flap of canvas on one of her crates. She picked it up and turned it around in her fingers while she looked at it. A most peculiar tightness manifested itself in her middle while she studied the tiny figure in her hand.

It was a young girl with thick plaits trailing down her back. She was dressed in full skirts and a pinafore.

“It’s me,” Constance whispered to herself. It was the very image of the way she had looked when Temple stomped out of her father’s house ten years ago.

The sound of masculine voices drew her head up. Temple and Mr. Hughes appeared at the edge of the bushes. Impulsively, and not really sure why, she thrust the little carving into her pocket and scrambled back over the seat before they reached the wagon. She was grateful she was wearing her insect bonnet, because she was quite certain that a most unbecoming flush had stained her cheeks.

When the sun had climbed to the center of the sky, and Constance’s stomach had growled noisily several times, Mr. Hughes stopped the wagon in the middle of a small meadow. A sprinkling of hardy wildflowers were blooming near the tough sprigs of grass.

For a moment Constance was struck by a sharp pang of homesickness. She excused herself and went off for a few moments of privacy. She stuck her hand inside her pocket and felt the carving again. She had never taken another person’s belongings before and she wasn’t sure why she had done so now, but when she wrapped her fingers around the small object she felt less homesick.

After relieving herself, Constance made her way toward the wagon. Temple was unloading the large wicker basket Mr. Hughes had brought along. Sunshine caught the pale strands of Temple’s hair and turned it to liquid silver. A hard knot formed in Constance’s stomach while she watched him. The pale collarless shirt strained across the width of his neck and the shoulder seams stretched with each movement.