PART SIX:

He heard her go out, obviously gathering in more wood for the fire from her pile outside, for soon she was back and there was the sound of branches being laid gently on the floor. He slid

his right arm off to the side, cracking open one eye half way to watch her. What was she doing? She'd picked up his hat and carried it to the basin, was wetting the brim in that spot where the kink had set in, and working at smoothing it with her thumbs. Almost as if she knew that such

a thing would bother him. But she couldn't know that.

He saw her glance over at him and he quickly shut the eye, keeping it closed for a while. Felt good just lying there. He was starting to drift off but a small scrape of a chair roused him and

he peered one-eyed across the room again. She'd gotten the wine-colored shawl, had put it over her hair, and was kneeling, facing the wall, murmuring something. He wished he could see more than her back. Why would she be kneeling like that? Very strange woman. He blinked several times, intending to see what she did next, but she stayed on her knees too long. His lids grew heavy and sleep came.

Some time later she got to her feet, letting the shawl slip down around her shoulders. Adding more wood to the fire, she stood awhile next to the pallet, watching him sleep. He was on his back, making just the softest male buzzing sound with his breathing. He'd put his shirt and his jacket back on as they'd talked earlier, but lay there now with the blankets down around his feet. The one foot was still bare and she pulled the two blankets up to his chest, carefully tucking their bottoms in around his feet.

Her eyes strayed around the room as she considered where to rest. Perhaps she might just sit

in the chair all night? But a wide yawn saw her spreading her shawl on the dirt floor near the fire and she simply lay down atop it. It wasn't long enough, so she pulled her knees up, lying on her side, her back to the fire, and rested her head on the crook of her left elbow.

He woke in the wee hours at the crumble of a large ember, lying there for a moment, trying to remember just where he was. He looked toward the fire, feeling chilly despite the two blankets and saw her curled nearby on her side. With the fire so low, the light in the room was very dim, and because she was lying on the floor, he thought for a second that she had fallen while he slept and so he sat up. He determined, though, that she was just asleep, was using her arm as a
pillow. It wasn't until that moment it came to him why she would be doing that. He was in her bed.

He snorted slightly. Damn fool woman had no idea at all how to take care of herself. Let some stranger come in like this, eat her food, use her blankets while she lay uncovered on the dirt. He'd been cold with two and she had none. He peered at her closely. Damn ugliest clothes he'd ever seen on a female body. That had to be a man's jacket, too, that shapeless charcoal grey thing she was wearing. Lighter grey skirt. Grey. Not a color a young woman should be thinking of wearing at all. One fat tendril of her brunette hair hung down over her face. He wondered if he could move it off and not wake her. Might as well try. He leaned out and lifted it carefully, settling it back further on her head. She hadn't stirred.

Awake now, he studied her face in the dim light. Where was his saddlebag? Oh, yeah, there just beyond her head. He lifted it, grimacing once at the strain it took to do so without getting up

off the pallet, set it in his lap and unbuckled a flap. In a moment he had his small pad in hand and was sketching her face. He liked the deep shadows, the contrasting few highlights from the embers, on the planes of her brow, her cheek, the side of her nose. Using a fingertip, he smeared the shading a bit, trying for the effect he wanted.  She moved in her sleep, not much, just enough to send that tendril back down over her face. He smiled, letting it be. He had pretty much what he wanted. He signed it 'Wade' in the lower right corner and lay back down, trying to drum
up a sufficient level of guilt in himself to get up and let her have the bed. But he was comfortable there and fell back asleep before any such level of guilt had even barely reared its head.

She shivered and woke. It was nearly dawn she figured as she rolled onto her back. Fire was almost out. She'd best get up and tend to that. Thank goodness she'd brought in enough wood already that she wouldn't have to go outside. She was chilled nearly to the bone without facing

a snowy morning. Her arm hurt from the way she'd slept on it and, once standing, she stretched it out and pulled it back a few times until it loosened up. He'd moved his saddlebag. She hadn't heard him in the night, so she turned and looked down at him. His right hand was resting on the dirt floor, a pad and pencil obviously having fallen out of it as he slept. Was he writing something? She wasn't going to look but then it was plain he'd been drawing. Intrigued, she walked around so she could see it better without touching it. What...? It was her. He was good enough that she could tell it was her. He'd awakened sometime in the night and had watched

her sleeping. She bit at her lip, not quite sure how that made her feel. She'd watched him sleep several times, but that was, well, different. Since she'd been grown, no man had ever watched her as she slept. But Benjamin had last night and not only had watched, but had recorded it.

The sketch was good, though. He'd spent some time on it. Why would he have wanted to draw her? After she'd built the fire back up, she went to sit at the table, folded her arms and buried her face in them. She wanted to think. She wanted to think about why he had come. Did his presence change anything and, if it did, in which direction? She didn't know, not yet. And
it was very possible he'd be gone and she'd never know.

"Mornin', LizzieBess. You got anythin' that passes for coffee round this place somewhere?"

She lifted her head. He was propped on his right elbow, looking at her. "I'm sorry. There's nothing like that."

"Let me guess," he continued. "You drink snowmelt for breakfast. Would that be right?"

She nodded, rising from her chair and rummaging through the shelves again. "Flat bread. No yeast."

His left cheek crooked into a smile. "Best for avoidin' the Angel of Death anyway."

Her eyes widened a bit. Passover? He knew how they hadn't had time for the bread to rise

before they had to leave? "You expecting one to come knocking at my door, Benjamin?" 

She was busily mixing a few things in a clay bowl.

"Could be," he said. "He's been trackin' me for years."

"That how you got shot?"

"Naw. He's got a sight better aim than the feller who did that."

"Did you shoot him? The man who shot your arm?"

He shook his head. "Would have. Didn't happen to have my gun at the moment."

"Why did he shoot you, Benjamin? Had you done something he didn't like?"

"Never met him. Still ain't. He didn't want me to go where I needed to be."

"Doesn't sound like all that much of a reason to go and shoot somebody."

"He was lookin' to be paid for the shootin'. Seemed to find that a damn good reason."

"Where did he not want you to go?"

"You ask a damn sight lot of questions, LizzieBess." His eyes locked on hers. "Depot. I had a train to catch."

"Did you catch it?"

"I did."

"Then how come you're way out here afoot?"

"Didn't much want to go where the train was headin'.

"Why would he get paid if he shot you?"

He looked down at his hands a moment. "Wasn't supposed to shoot me. Was supposed to shoot the man I was with."

"This sounds very confusing, Benjamin."

"I know." He raised his eyes to hers again. "It was."

"The man you were with? Did he get away, too?"

"No, he didn't make it."

"So, someone got paid, then, for shooting him?"

"No one left to pay anybody." His eyes moved to the fire.

She saw that something rather heavy had settled over him and decided to leave her questioning alone for a while. "Be ready in a minute." She got a very tiny jar off the shelf, doing something with it before she handed him the pan again.

"No plates," he said, accepting it from her hand with a small smile. Cutting off a bite with the side of a fork, he looked from the flat bread to her. "Honey? Where'd you go and get honey?"

She held up the jar. He frowned. "That all you got? And you went and wasted it on me?"

"That's a matter of opinion." She raised her chin somewhat.

"Stubborn woman," he mumbled, stuffing the large bite into his mouth.

"Stubbornness isn't all that bad."

He narrowed one eye, fixing her with it. "To obey is better than sacrifice and stubbornness is

as iniquity and idolatry." He licked the honey off his lips. "First Samuel 15:23."

She watched his mouth, entranced by the movement of his tongue, by the unexpected words he said. Seeing where her gaze lay, he continued, "...He went the way to her house, in the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark of night; and, behold, there met him a woman, stubborn, and her feet abide not in her house. Now is she without, now in the streets, and lieth in wait at every corner. So she caught him and kissed him and said unto him, I have peace offerings with me. " He swallowed another bite. "This day have I paid my vows. Therefore, came I forth to meet thee, diligently to seek thy face, and I have found thee."  He set the pan down and deliberately, slowly, pushed the blankets. "I have decked my bed with coverings of tapestry,

with carved works, with fine linen of Egypt. I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning; let us solace ourselves with

loves."

His lips curved more as her eyes widened. "Proverbs 7: 8 through 18. Scripture can be almighty interestin' from time to time."

He'd quoted in this deep voice, so deep it flowed with more richness than the honey she'd poured him. How in the name of all that was holy had he managed to come up with a scripture right on the spot like that, something with not only stubbornness in it but a man passing by a woman's
house, a woman who offered him things, a woman who put coverings on  her bed and invited him to recline? She'd never been confronted with anything remotely similar to this. His eyes were going right inside hers, so she turned her head away.

"So you see, LizzieBess, how right my warnin's are about you lettin' strange men into your place? You see how dangerous it is?"

"I see," she murmured, still not looking at him.

"I don't think you do," he smiled. "I don't think you have any idea at all."

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