Chapter 6
“Yes, ma’am.”
The unfamiliar softness of the reply made her hand pause.
She bent back to the work.
The leather fought her. The knife slipped twice. Once the blade struck frozen rock and almost folded against her knuckles. Henrietta shifted closer until her shoulder pressed against Calvin’s chest, bracing herself so that she could saw through the thick boot without disturbing the leg.
She became aware of his breathing.
Shallow. Controlled.
Painfully controlled.
“You may make whatever sound you need,” she said.
“I don’t need to make one.”
“Men are remarkable creatures.”
“Are they?”
“Yes. They will howl over a splinter if there is an audience but attempt martyrdom when their bone is sticking sideways.”
“My bone is not sticking sideways.”
“Your boot certainly is.”
“That is the boot.”
“The boot lacks independent ambition.”
His fingers tightened on her arm as she cut through the last strip of leather.
“Ready?”
“No.”
“Neither am I.”
She spread the boot apart.
Calvin screamed.
The sound echoed from the ravine wall and vanished into the storm.
Henrietta shut her eyes for half a heartbeat but did not stop. The boot had been disguising how badly the lower leg was injured. Even through his sock and trousers she could see the wrongness of the line below his knee. Swelling had already begun.
She had seen a stable boy break an arm once in Chicago. That had seemed terrible enough.
This was worse.
Calvin’s forehead rested against her shoulder.
He was breathing through his teeth.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He lifted his head at once.
“Don’t.”
She thought he meant the leg.
Then he said, “Don’t apologize to me.”
Something in his face made her look away.
Henrietta cut the boot completely free and tossed the ruined leather onto the ledge. It slid toward the edge. Calvin stopped it with his good heel.
“You’ll want that,” he said.
“For what?”
“Proof.”
“Of what?”
“That a woman can ruin a good pair of boots faster than any horse.”
Henrietta gave him a look.
He managed a weak grin.
There was blood at the corner of his mouth where he had bitten his lip.
She tore a strip from the lining of the coat and bound the leg as firmly as she dared, using a narrow piece of fallen branch wedged in the rock as a splint. Calvin did not scream again. He did not speak at all.