"Not everybody wants people looking inside them," Tyler said.
"I wouldn"t like to have a beard," Zac said, "but it"s n.o.body"s business what I"m thinking."
"They wouldn"t have to wonder long," Daisy said. "You"d tell them soon enough." Daisy was startled by her own words, but neither Zac nor Tyler seemed to take offense.
"Your wound is healing nicely," Tyler said. "I doubt you"ll have much of a scar."
He covered it with salve and began bandaging it again.
"Now all I have to do is hide in a closet for three years until my hair grows out." She didn"t mean to keep harping on the same complaint, but after suffering with freckles and being six feet tall, a scar and a singed head added stinging insult to grievous injury.
"What you need is a wig," Zac said. "You"d be amazed what they can do nowadays. I had a marvelous one for a play we did at school a couple of years ago. I wonder if I still have it? You"re welcome to borrow it if I do."
"I"m sure Daisy"s friends will be happy to have her safe and sound no matter the length of her hair," Tyler said.
"It"s not my friends I"m worried about," Daisy said.
"It should be. No one else matters."
Daisy didn"t replay. Only a man could be so right and so completely wrong at the same time. And never understand why.
Daisy was even more bored the next day. Rain had been falling since dawn. The sky was a dull grey, and the clouds showed no sign of breaking up. The steady drip from the roof was getting on her nerves, but Tyler said it was still impossible to start for Albuquerque.
"It"ll freeze tonight and turn into a sheet of ice. That"ll make it even more dangerous."
"I"ve never been cooped up so long. I need to do something. Let me fix dinner tonight."
Zac lifted his gaze from the cards.
"Thanks," Tyler said. "It"s no trouble."
"I want to," Daisy said. "It"s about the only thing I can do for you. I feel utterly useless."
"I"d get over that soon if I were you," Zac advised.
"Get over what?" Daisy asked.
"Needing to feel useful. People will take advantage of it. Before you know it, they"ll be expecting you to do things for them all the time."
Daisy smiled. "I gather you"ve managed to control the impulse."
"Never had it."
Daisy looked back at Tyler. "I mean it," she said.
"I"d rather do it myself."
"I promise to put everything back in its place." She couldn"t disguise the annoyance in her voice.
"Tyler doesn"t like anybody cooking for him," Zac said.
"I"m a good cook," Daisy said.
"Tyler"s better."
"I"ll have to spend the rest of my life cooking, so why don"t you teach me some of your tricks?" she asked.
"I"m not very patient," Tyler confessed. "Besides, I make up a lot of things as I go."
Daisy didn"t have to be hit over the head to figure out Tyler was trying to tell her to leave him alone. "Okay, suppose I wash your clothes?"
One look at Zac"s expression told her she"d stumbled into another forbidden area.
"I don"t know how you can stand living in a place without curtains on the windows," she said, frustration making her petulant. "Do you mind if I make some?"
"What are you going to use?" Zac asked. "Your petticoat?"
"It would be better than bare walls," Daisy said.
She was frustrated, hurt, and thoroughly miffed. Tyler was the most self-contained man she had ever met. He could do everything better than she could. What he couldn"t do, he didn"t want done. He didn"t need a woman. He didn"t even want one. She was just in the way.
She didn"t understand why she should care about Tyler when she didn"t care what Zac felt. It must be because Tyler was the one who took care of her, who seemed to be genuinely concerned about her.
"You ought to buy some curtains next time you"re in Albuquerque," she said. "It would make the place look nicer and give you some privacy."
"There"s n.o.body to be private from," Tyler pointed out.
"You could use some pictures, too," she said, persevering. "This place looks like a cabin in the woods."
"It is a cabin in the woods."
"I know, but it shouldn"t look like it."
She didn"t know why she bothered. He clearly wasn"t going to take her suggestions. Maybe he had lived by himself so long he didn"t know how to include other people in his life, even let them know he wanted to include them. Feeling excluded annoyed her.
She guessed she liked him.
That didn"t really surprise her. She had thought for some time he was rather nice even though he was domineering and uncommunicative to the point of rudeness. What did surprise her was discovering it was important he like her back.
Frustrated and confused, she started pulling books off the shelf and dusting them. The cabin was very neat, but this was one area Tyler had forgotten. She found herself imagining what she would do if she lived here, how she would rearrange the furniture, decorate the walls, the things she would buy if she had the money. It was really a remarkable cabin. Most homes in Albuquerque weren"t built half so well.
The feel of a hand closing around her wrist caused her heart to leap into her throat. She looked up into Tyler"s deep, brown eyes about the time he took the book from her hand.
"Don"t sneak up behind me," she said. "You scared me nearly half to death."
Tyler replaced the book on the shelf and pulled her away from the bookshelves. "You don"t have to work for your keep."
"I don"t mind."
"I"d rather you didn"t."
"All right," she snapped, throwing the dust cloth on the table. "I"m sorry I touched your books, your dust, or anything else that"s yours. I promise I won"t do it again." She started toward her corner.
"I didn"t mean for you--"
"I know, you didn"t mean to hurt my feelings, but you don"t want anybody to do anything for you, to thank you, even to talk to you most of the time. I don"t know why you bother to go on living. You"re already dead inside."
She retreated to her corner and drew the curtains behind her.
"I see you haven"t lost your charm," Zac remarked dryly.
"Go to h.e.l.l!" Tyler said and slammed out the door.
Daisy couldn"t decide whether her tears were from anger or disappointment. Her wrist still burned where Tyler had touched her. It seemed incredible that such a gentle touch should be a rejection. It made her furious.
It also hurt. She"d had a lot of rejection in her life. It never got easier, but this was harder than all the rest.
Tyler turned back toward the cabin. It was getting dark. The rain had stopped and the temperature had plummeted, but he was hardly aware of the cold. He couldn"t stop thinking about what Daisy had said.
He had closed her out just as effectively as if he"d slammed a door in her face. He hadn"t meant to. He hadn"t even wanted to, but when she"d started to mess with his things, he"d experienced a moment of panic. He knew she was trying to help, but she was stirring up new feelings. He couldn"t handle the ones he had.
He stepped across the stream that ran near his cabin. The snow melt gurgled noisily around the rocks, but a lacy network of ice trimmed the banks. If it got cold enough, the spray would freeze into a kind of ice foam.
He"d been self-contained for so long he didn"t think about it. Until today. Until he realized he didn"t want to close Daisy out. He had spent so many years keeping to himself, denying any emotion, he didn"t know how to express feelings, to let anybody into his life. He certainly didn"t know what to do once they were there. He didn"t know how he wanted Daisy to fit, how long he wanted her to stay, how much he wanted her to mean. None of his feelings toward her were familiar or comfortable.
He did know he was not going to forget her easily, if at all.
He found himself wishing he could talk to George, but he knew n.o.body could figure this out for him. He would have to do it himself. But how should he begin?
Begin with what you want. If you know that, all the rest will follow.
He decided to check on the animals before he went inside. There was something peaceful about being around the mules, and right now he was experiencing more than his share of turmoil.
Next morning Tyler was taking boiling water to melt the ice in the water troughs when he caught sight of Willie Mozel stumbling along the ridge. The temperature had dropped below freezing overnight, turning everything to ice. Six inches of sleet and snow had fallen on top of that. The day was overcast, bitterly cold. Nothing would melt today.
Tyler intended to send the crusty old prospector on his way the minute he made it to the cabin, but by the time Willie staggered into the yard, Tyler knew something was wrong. Willie looked half dead.
"What happened to you?" Tyler asked.
"d.a.m.ned thieving b.a.s.t.a.r.ds!" Willie managed to say before he sagged against the shed.
"What are you talking about?" Tyler asked. He took Willie by the arm and started toward the cabin.
"Three men came to my cabin yesterday. They wanted to know about all the prospectors in these mountains."
Tyler stopped in his tracks. "Why?"
"They wouldn"t say." Willie was clearly anxious to get inside the cabin, but Tyler didn"t move.
"What did they say?"
"Just wanted to know who lived in the cabins and where they were. They kept asking about their ages. Seemed a d.a.m.ned fool thing to do to me. Ain"t n.o.body under fifty except you."
"True," Tyler said, half to himself.
"Seemed to think there was a pair of young fools up here. I couldn"t make them understand a prospector don"t want n.o.body else hanging around, especially if he"s got a claim worth having. Never know when a partner might conk you over the head and drop your body into some ravine."
"What are you doing here?"
"They tied me up with some gra.s.s ropes, left me in the shed," Willie said, still angry at the abuse of his hospitality. "I"d still be there now if my burro hadn"t chewed through the ropes. The fools didn"t know that crazy burro will eat anything that ain"t rawhide."
"Did you walk here through that storm last night?"
"Couldn"t have got here any other way," Willie said. "Now stop making me talk until I"m blue in the face and help me inside. I could use some of that fancy chow you"re always cooking up."
"I don"t want you to say anything about those men when we get inside," Tyler said.
"Why?"
"My brother"s here."
Willie"s brow cleared. "So you"re the two young men. Why should they be after you?"
"You"ll see in a minute."
Chapter Ten.
"What happened to him?" Zac demanded the minute Willie stepped into the cabin.
"He got caught in the storm last night."
"Why did you leave your cabin?"
"He was trying to get back from Albuquerque," Tyler said, filling in with his own invention before Willie could speak.