The Lawman's Oklahoma Sweetheart

Leave it to Lije to paint Clint’s actions with the brush of faith. He’d extended the invitation because Clint knew Lars was fond of the young woman. Lars also confessed to a soft spot for Dakota, the half-white boy who had been abandoned by his white father. Lars had talked in admiring terms of how Winona had stepped up to take the boy in, how it took courage to do so.

Well, it would take courage to step into this dangerous circle he’d drawn around himself, Lars and Katrine. Clint nodded at his brother. “I was thinking she’d be good company for Katrine. She’s started to attend services regularly, and Katrine will need someone to sit with her with Lars gone.”

“There is no doubt I see her drawn to our faith, and she’s taken to English like lightning—even though I have to say I credit Lars for that much more than myself.” Lije eyed his brother with one eyebrow raised. “Still, I can’t help saying how much I think you are good company for Katrine.”

Clint frowned. “I think not.”

“Why?”

“You know why.” Lije never did understand Clint’s reluctance to take a wife, forever pushing him in the direction of relationships that weren’t to be. Despite his endless compassion, Lije seemed blind to how the subject felt to Clint like God’s cruelest burden. Lije could start a family whenever he wanted, had even been engaged once, but had lately insisted on being single until Alice stole his heart back in Boomer Town. In contrast, Clint wanted nothing more than a big, noisy houseful of young’uns but could never sire children. The childhood disease hadn’t taken Clint’s life—he knew he should be grateful for that when so many in Pennsylvania died that winter—but it had taken almost more than Clint could bear. Lije couldn’t see how a wife but no children could never be enough for Clint, how it was less painful never to marry at all.

“She needs a friend,” Lije replied. “That’s all I’m saying.”

Clint could not be a friend to Katrine. The tiny part of him that had come to think of her in ways that went beyond friendship had taken firm root the night he pulled her from the burning cabin. His mind strayed to the beautiful statuesque blonde too much lately.

“Which is exactly why I brought up the subject of Winona.”

Lije shot him an older brother “you’re not fooling me” look and began stacking hymnals as if they were discussing something ordinary rather than the long-painful subject it was. The church was nearly complete, with some walls up all the way and others still sporting bits of tent tarping to keep out the blazing June sunshine. The fact that Lije had enough hymnals to stack was a minor wonder in itself. “Katrine looks at you the same way you look at her—when you aren’t looking of course, or when you think I don’t see. But I saw it. Alice did, too.”

Clint began stacking hymnals just to give his hands something to do. “So you and Alice are in on this together, are you?” Sometimes Lije could be too much the elder brother, all full of “sage” advice when Clint would prefer he kept to his own on some matters.

Lije offered him one of those “I know better than you” smiles just then. “Actually, Alice brought it up first. Once I was looking for it, it wasn’t that hard to see.” Thumping the last stack down on the church’s back bench—still without a laid floor, the church sported rows of benches where pews would one day sit—Lije planted his hands on his hips. “You mind telling me what’s so awful about the prospect of you and Katrine Brinkerhoff?”

He was going to make him say it, wasn’t he? “Stop.”

Lije’s sigh was long and weary. “Not every woman pines for a family, Clint.”

As if he didn’t know that. As if he hadn’t considered the foolish notion that somewhere out there might be a woman who would welcome a man with his particular set of shortcomings. The war had filled the world with pretty young widows, already-made families in need of fathers, but he wasn’t the sort of man who could take that on.

“This one does. I’ve heard Lars speak of it, and her, too. Besides, a body can’t hardly make it out here without a big family, even you know that.” He let out a sigh ten times wearier than his brother’s. “It ain’t to be, Lije. Leave it alone.”

“God crafts families in many ways.”

He’d heard that line before, too. He’d heard every single platitude on that subject. “I said leave it, Lije.” He walked out of the church, needing to put some wide open space between himself and his brother’s meddling.

Of course, Lije followed him. “Well, then, let’s talk about Katrine. She’s alone now, and missing a heap of provisions besides. You just said how hard it is to make do out here with a few hands, let alone all by herself. So how do we help her? If what you say about how her place burned down is true, how do we keep her safe?”

Hadn’t he done nothing but worry about that very thing for days now? “You do your job, I’ll do mine. Seems you got half of Brave Rock corralled to get her settled with provisions. I’ll get the homestead built back up as fast as I can while I see to her safety.” It would be so much easier to tell Lije this was just a temporary solitude for Katrine, but that wasn’t smart. Not until he knew more. Maybe he could keep her in safe company until this was all over. “Can’t you keep putting her up in the back of the clinic for a while yet?” Alice ran the Healing Hearts medical clinic right next door.

“Of course we can. But even if you do get her cabin built back up, I’m not much for the thought of her living there all alone.”

He’d thought of that. He’d spent too much time thinking on that, actually. He gave Lije the same argument he gave himself: “She spent plenty of time on her own while Lars was out tracking or on the reservation. She’s made of stern enough stuff. She’ll do all right once the grief clears a bit. But that might be where Winona can help, too.”

In that moment, he caught a glimpse of Katrine standing off to the side of all the folks gathered remembering Lars. She stood tall and strong in the sunlight, the hem of her borrowed Sunday best dress whipping in the wind, the band of black fabric standing out like a gash against the sky-blue of her sleeve. Even her bonnet couldn’t hide the strained and lonesome look he could see in her eyes.

“Winona might be good company for her, but you need to watch out for Katrine, as well.”

Clint was never the kind of man to shirk his duties—most especially in a matter like this—but Lije didn’t realize what he was asking.

His reluctance must have shown on his face, for Lije put a pastorlike arm on Clint’s shoulder and said, “It’s the least you can do for Lars. He’d have wanted you to take care of her, don’t you think?”

Was the whole world conspiring to keep Katrine Brinkerhoff at his side? “You know I’ll protect her. She’ll come to no harm, I promise.” He cast his eye back to the woman. She was wiping one eye with a handkerchief—one he knew to be one of the pale blue ones Lars always carried. Around her neck, on a black ribbon, she wore the pocket watch they’d found yesterday amongst the homestead ashes. Even now, her hand came up to finger the old timepiece—their father’s, she’d told Clint—as she gazed off in the direction of the reservation.

Did she guess that Lars was hidden out over that ridge? Could she feel him the way Clint could sometimes sense the presence of his brothers? Families were strong like that—it’s what held the world together out here where there was so much to overcome. He stared at the set of her chin and told himself again that she’d come through this okay. She’d push on through to build a fine homestead, find some good man with as much faith as Lije, and raise up a passel of children to listen to the harrowing tale of “when Uncle Lars had to disappear for a while.”

He’d stay close enough to see her through. He’d bring Winona in on this dangerous game because that was the only safe thing to do. Then, when Lars could come home, he’d return to his place in the background of her life—doing a disappearing act of his own.

* * *

Katrine sat down on the rocking chair outside Elijah and Alice’s home after all the congregation had gone, weary inside and out. She stared off into the horizon, wondering where Lars was and if somehow he could hear all the lovely things that had been said about him today.

“I wished I had a jar.”

She looked up to see Gideon’s wife, Evelyn, sitting next to her. She hadn’t even noticed that the woman had sat down in the adjacent rocking chair. “Pardon?”

Evelyn offered a sad, knowing smile. “When my grandpappy died, I wished I had a special jar that I could catch all the fine things said about him at his funeral. I was so tired and sad I was sure I’d forget most of it. The stories, the compliments, that sort of thing.”

“Lars was a fine man.” Oh, how she hated using was. Her mind would shout “He still is!” every time she had to refer to Lars as if he were truly gone. Today seemed stuffed full of “was.”

“Of course, I had no such jar,” Evelyn continued. “But I didn’t forget them, you know. Oh, maybe one or two—and there were a few stories grandmammy would have groaned to hear—but I remember all the fine words as if it were yesterday.”

Katrine let her head fall against the tall back of the rocking chair. It was so soothing, to sit here and rock. I will want one of these in my new house, she thought, bemused to remember she had no such house at the moment, much less a chair or a porch on which to rock. “I am glad to know. I feel too weary to remember my own name right now.”

“Grief is tiresome business. It wears on a soul to lose ones we love. And you’ve lost much more than that.” She placed a brown paper package on the arm of Katrine’s rocking chair. “I wanted to give you a little bit back.”

“Me?” Evelyn was becoming one of her closest friends here in Brave Rock. She loved to look at Evelyn’s talented sketches, and Katrine had often enjoyed telling stories to Walt, Evelyn’s charming young son.

“Walt is fond of you. Now that he talks again, he has tried several times to tell me stories like Miss B’s.” Back when Katrine first met Walt, the trauma of his father’s death had rendered him mute. Now, finding a new father in Clint’s brother Gideon, Walt was an endless stream of chatter and generous affection. He loved Katrine’s stories, but they’d had to resort to Miss B when Walt couldn’t possibly get his five-year-old mouth around Brinkerhoff.

“I am fond of Walt.” She fingered the twine on the package. It was too soft to be a book, too small to be yet another must-be-altered item of clothing. She undid the knot to pull a beautiful linen pillowcase from the wrapping. Delicate and soft as a cloud, it was embroidered along the side with familiar yellow flowers with six long thin petals. “Star of Bethlehem!” she exclaimed.

“I asked around town to see if someone had a book that would show me a flower that comes from Denmark. I thought you needed an extra touch of home. Did I get it right?”

Katrine brushed away a new wave of tears. “It is perfect.” She had never felt so welcomed, so part of a community in all her years in America. If she had ever had doubts that Brave Rock was her new home, today had erased them. “Thank you so much.”

“I thought you might like something that is all yours. A soft pillow is one of life’s great luxuries. And a good night’s sleep makes everything better.” Her eyes took on a shadow of memory that spoke of experience. Evelyn had lost her first husband on the day they staked their claim here in the territories, and the land been at the center of a long argument between herself, her three contentious brothers and Gideon Thornton. The worst fights sprung from contested claims out here, where two settlers claimed rights to the same land. It had been a heated battle—one which became as much about the decades-old feud between the Thornton and Chaucer families as it was about good land. Katrine only knew the bits and pieces Evelyn chose to reveal—something about land and the war—and what her brothers and those who listened to them muttered or whispered. Despite Evelyn’s loving relationship with Gideon, that rift had yet to heal. So, when Evelyn spoke of needing softness at the end of a trying day, Katrine could believe she spoke from experience.

How many sleepless nights would pass before Lars could come home? “I miss him terribly,” she admitted, running her hands across the sweet yellow flowers. It had become the safest thing to say; she did truly miss him.

Evelyn only nodded. While it was clear to everyone who saw them together how much she loved Gideon, something in Evelyn’s eyes told Katrine her first husband had not won her affections so deeply. When she married, Katrine wanted to miss her husband desperately whenever he was gone, even hunting. Lars was fine company, but a brother was not a husband. And a sister was not a wife. They had come to the Oklahoma territories to build whole new lives for themselves, not just to acquire land. For Katrine, that new life had always meant a happy family.

“I think you will tell your children wonderful stories about their uncle Lars one day. He was a good man, and you are a wonderful storyteller. Until then, you may tell Walt as many stories of Lars as makes you happy.” She leaned toward Katrine. “In fact, I will be grateful if you steal his attention now and then. Five-year-old boys can be such a handful.”

Katrine felt just enough of a laugh bubble up to let her know the day’s tensions were indeed slipping from her shoulders. “I will tell him endless tales of how Lars Brinkerhoff always minded his mama.” That made Evelyn laugh, as well. “I’m afraid not all of them will be true, however,” Katrine went on, “for I must say Lars was not at all good about minding his mama.”

“So I’ve heard.” The deep voice startled Katrine, bursting the small bubble of happiness she’d formed with Evelyn. “Lars was fond of boasting how he was no end of trouble as a child,” Clint added.

“It is true,” Katrine said. “He was...” it took her a minute to choose the right English word “...precocious as a boy. What you would call a rascal, I believe.”

“Now now, Katrine.” Evelyn’s voice was warm even though her words were chiding. “Let us not speak ill of the dead.”

Evelyn’s words stole the smile from Katrine’s face. This was how it went every day; for seconds—when Clint was around, especially—she could allow herself to remember that Lars lived and would return. Then, like a splash of cold water, someone or something would remind her Lars needed to appear dead. The contrast was difficult to endure, exhausting at times. It made her crave time alone with Clint where she could talk about her brother in terms of life, of safety and of his return. To think just seconds ago she was giving thanks for what a supportive home Brave Rock had become. Just this moment, she would have given anything to ride out of town and hide with Lars wherever he was, away from all the compassionate, suffocating mourners.

Clint picked up on her distress and turned to Evelyn. “Could you give us a moment? I have some delicate matters to discuss with Miss Brinkerhoff. I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course.” She turned to Katrine. “Please forgive my earlier remark. I wasn’t thinking. Lars was a rascal, I’m sure, and knowing what I know of young boys, I can hardly count it speaking ill in any case.” She laid a hand on Katrine’s arm. “Anything. Anything at all, you call on me. I want to help.”

“I know,” Katrine said, holding the soft, beautiful pillowcase tight against her chest. “I know.”

The second Evelyn left, Katrine slumped back into the rocker, feeling twice as weary as she had before. She propped her elbow on the chair arm and let her forehead fall into her upturned hand. “This is too hard.”

Clint sat on the porch at her feet, looking up at her with an expression of regret that caused a lump in Katrine’s throat. “I know.” She kept forgetting that this necessary charade was as difficult for him as it was for her. Still, he seemed so strong, so in control, where she felt like a weed tumbling across the prairie in hapless gusts of wind. “You need someone to help you.”

She couldn’t help it. “I need Lars.” She tried not to whine the words, but the weariness had stolen all her good behavior. Evelyn was right, she hadn’t slept well since the fire. She looked straight at Clint until he looked right back into her eyes and then she whispered, “Tell me he lives. I need to hear the words out loud.”

“Katrine.” His eyes darted around them, careful for nearby ears. “We’ll go out to the cabin again tomorrow.”

“I can’t wait until tomorrow.” She stood up, pacing the porch. She needed to hear someone else speak the words, to know she was not so fogged up in thought and pretended mourning that it was still true. To know she could call her dear brother a rascal and not be speaking ill of the dead. She turned and simply demanded it of Clint. “I cannot.”

He took one look around, and for that moment she resented his role as protector. She did not want his cautionary nature. Then, to her surprise, he walked toward her. He took one of her hands and pulled her close to him. One strong hand wrapped around her shoulder, the other held her elbow. Not the full, protective embrace he’d offered her after the fire, although she could feel his desire to do so, but a careful, much-as-could-be-allowed gesture. His face hovered just above her head, close and startlingly tender. “He is alive.” His words were as filled with emotion as any she’d ever heard from the sheriff. “Lars will come home.”

Chapter Six

Not half an hour later, Clint found Winona Eaglefeather standing quietly on the edge of the Gilberts’ property where she kept a tepee with Dakota. The Gilberts had become good friends with Winona, as they had watched over Dakota when he first arrived in Boomer Town before Winona had arrived, looking for the boy.

She still had on the plainclothes dress she had worn to the service. When she came from the reservation, she wore Cheyenne dress, but many times in town she dressed in the manner of other Brave Rock women. It was late in the day, but after talking with Katrine he knew the news he carried could not wait until tomorrow.

“I’m glad you came to the service.” It didn’t feel like the right greeting, but Clint couldn’t find other words. “Lars spoke highly of you.”

“Your fun-e-ral—” she worked the new word carefully on her tongue “—is so strange to me.” When Winona had first come to Brave Rock, she could only communicate in English on the most basic level. Now, only three months later, the language came much more easily. That had a lot to do with the amount of time Lars had devoted to teaching her. Lars was an excellent instructor—already Clint had learned a great deal about the area and tracking from the Dane—but Clint knew their motivation to communicate went deeper than a grasp of English.

“Strange?” he inquired. A funeral for a living man was oddity enough, but since Winona could hardly have known that, Clint was curious about her reaction.

“Yes.” She circled one hand in the air, as if reaching for the right word. “So...quiet.”

He’d never had cause to see a Cheyenne funeral, but Lars had told him of the tribe’s colorful spiritual ceremonies. Solemn rows of folk in black couldn’t be further from costumes and fires and sacred dances. “I suppose it must look that way to you.”

“When the Cheyenne mourn their dead, we place a body up high to speed them to the Great Beyond. There is much wailing and crying. Singing and telling stories.”

“We tell stories—you heard Reverend Thornton tell a few about Lars as part of his message—but mostly to each other more than part of the ceremony.” Lije had indeed told several heartwarming tales of the help and support Lars had given people in Brave Rock. Clint had felt his soul warm to the fact that in three short months, this prairie settlement had become a true community. He and Lars were fighting to keep that community safe, and Lars’s own memorial bore truth as to why that was worth the current cost. “Lots of people stopped me in town or after the service and told me stories of Lars. People see it as a way to remember.”

“And headstones.” Her eyes squinted up in consideration of this unfamiliar custom. Brave Rock had no graveyard yet, but even Lije had mentioned they’d need one soon. “Reverend Thornton tells me your people put the bodies down in the ground.”

“That’s true, usually. Only there is no body to bury in this case.” He found his words ironic, given what he had come to say. Still, it wasn’t the kind of thing he could just blurt out.

“You wear black,” she went on, then motioned to her own dark clothes. “We wear red.” He noticed that the elaborate beaded decorations she always wore in her long black braids were a bright red today. Even in American garb, she managed to retain her Cheyenne identity. Maybe that was why Lars felt such a connection to the woman—she had a gift for moving between the two worlds of her life. Lars was little different; he seemed to slide with ease between his Danish heritage, his American future and his time spent learning hunting and tracking on the Cheyenne reservation. It’s what made him such a good role model for young Dakota. Half white, half Cheyenne, the boy was struggling with who he was and where he belonged since his mother had died and his father, prior to his death, had never even acknowledged the boy’s existence. The more Clint thought about it, the more Lars had in common with this aunt and her nephew. Clint would be glad to put an end to their mourning.

“We are so different,” she went on. “And yet death is sadness everywhere.” He did not need to see her wipe a tear from her eyes to know she mourned Lars deeply; it was clear in the tone of her simple words.

“Can we take a walk, Miss Winona? I need to talk to you about something important. Private. To do with Lars.”

She looked at him with curiosity, but turned as he gestured away from where Dakota sat working with some leather outside the tepee. “I have told you all I know. I do not know how I can help you, Sheriff Thornton.”

Clint made sure they were a safe distance before he turned to her. “I have not told you all I know.” He took a breath, fully aware he was bringing danger to Winona’s door but also aware that Katrine could not go on without more support. “Lars is not dead.”

Winona’s eyes, already dark and large, popped wide open. “I do not understand.”

“Lars is alive, but in hiding. He did not die in the fire, but we thought it best to make it look as if he had died. The men who set that fire were looking to kill him for something he had seen, and we didn’t want them trying again.”

“He lives?” she whispered. Her hand went to her chest, confirming Clint’s suspicions that Lars had come to mean much more to her than an English tutor.

“Yes. Only Katrine and I know this, but I fear it’s too much for her to bear alone.”

Winona’s eyes glanced over Clint’s shoulder back in the direction of the church where so many people had mourned just hours ago. “A great lie.”

“Yes, but a necessary one. And only for now. Lars’s life is worth saving at any cost.” After a moment he added, “I know you feel that way.” Lars had known the reasons Clint could pull her into this; she understood the cost, and her heart would make her willing to pay it.

She paused a telling moment before saying, “You speak the truth.”

“He needs supplies brought to him where he hides. And messages. I’ve told Katrine she can write to him but for her to visit is too dangerous. I suspect certain folks are watching her—folks who might aim to finish what they started.”

“Katrine is still in danger?”

“As I said, I believe her cabin was set on fire on purpose. To kill Lars. By the same people who have been setting other fires and doing other damage.” He paused a moment before adding, “Lars and I both believe we know who the Black Four are. I am trying to catch them even now, so that Lars can come home and everyone can be safe.”

“A heavy task.”

“One that is my job as sheriff. Only it makes it hard for me to help Lars. You, though, you slip in and out of town every day. And he is not far from the reservation.” Clint was used to telling folks what to do, to giving orders and planning strategies. It felt odd to be asking, pleading even, for assistance. “Will you help?”