Chapter 4

Emma thought carefully about her answer. Knowing that her answer would only sound trite and naïve to River, she nonetheless answered in the only way she knew how to answer such questions.

“Well of course love doesn’t require you to marry. You love your parents for example. Or your children. But marriage is a special commitment. It’s a promise to God that you will share a life with another person, and to raise a family. And it’s not just about love. It’s also an adventure. A beautiful adventure that you get to share with someone else.”

“And to have someone you can count on for sex.”

Emma blushed again. “Yes, I suppose that’s true. If that is your requirement. Anyways, this conversation is bit much for me, even with strong alcohol. What time is it? Is it midnight yet?”

River reached into her pant pocket and pulled out a pocket watch. She shook it a bit and said, “I reckon its midnight right about now.”

Emma smiled. “Then I’ll be meeting Percy’s family for the first time today.”

“Merry Christmas by the way,” River said.

“And Merry Christmas to you.” Emma bowed her head. “I’m sorry I don’t have a gift for you.”

“That money to take you to Bozeman works jus’ fine for a Christmas present.”

Having run out of conversation, Emma joined River in watching the fire. The whiskey made the fire cozier. She sank into her chair and leaned her head against the cool log wall as she watched the flames lick the firewood. It was not a hotel in Bozeman, but there was a sense of real safety and security of the sight and smell of a roaring fire in a cabin in the middle of a snowstorm. And River gave her a sense of safety.

River broke the short, pensive silence with another question. “So, what did you study at Oxford?”

“Well, law, I suppose.”

Emma nodded. “Yes, like Percy.”

“that’s incredible. So you’re going to practice law too?”

Emma looked on her with amusement. “Don’t be silly. Oxford does not confer degrees on women.”

“Why do you need an Oxford degree to practice law in Tacoma?”

Emma laughed. “Because I lack the credentials to do it.”

“But is it what you wanna do?”

“… but you wanna practice law.”

Emma sighed and looked on River half-flustered and half-sympathetic at the honest naivety.

“What I want to do does not matter!” she said with an impatient slur.

River frowned. “Well, why the hell not?”

“What I mean… What I mean to say is that, ugh, it’s not that important. It’s not my place to do that sort of thing… Where’s that whiskey?”

She motioned clumsily for the whiskey bottle from River and took a sip. “Oh this is better with every sip. But now where’s the water. The water will go well with it.”

River pointed up at the wall behind her. Emma spotted the flask hanging by the strap from a nail and tried to reach for it while leaning back in her chair. She yelped as she fell backwards onto the floor and laughed with her legs hanging up in the air and her skirt over her head. River jumped out of her chair and lifted Emma up to her feet with a hand.

“I reckon the chair has had a bit too much to drink,” Emma quipped.

They heaved in drunken laughter together for a long while, and when the laughter died down, they stood there with their eyes gazing into the others’, looking from one to the other. Their smiles disappeared from their faces. The storm howled and whispered between the dark pines outside and sounded much like the roaring fire inside. Emma couldn’t help but think once again of River’s beauty, and she saw that River’s eyes contained similar thoughts.

“Oof, my head is spinning,” Emma breathed.

River swallowed and responded, “yeah, mine too.”

Emma looked down and found River’s hand still holding her’s. Her hands were not at all like a man’s, as she might have thought. They were smooth and fit delicately into hers.

“You’re still holding my hand,” Emma said.

River released her clutch and shook herself out of her trance and grabbed the flask from the wall and handed it to Emma.

“Here’s your water,” River said. Emma took a sip. River went back to sit at the table.

When Emma was done with the water, she hung the flask back up on the wall and sat back down. After a momentary hesitation, she said to River, “I would love it if you joined us for Christmas dinner.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“No, I really mean it. Join us for Christmas dinner. It would make me happy if you did. And Percy’s family is very generous. They would love to have you too.”

“I’m not looking for anyone’s generosity. Besides, I enjoy my own company.”

Emma smiled pitifully. She swayed as she sat in her chair and hiccupped.

“So, what’s next for you in life, River?”

“Head back to Livingston.”

Emma frowned at her. “I mean what do you want to do for the rest of your life, silly woman. Surely a free spirit like you mustn’t be doing this for the rest of her life.”

“What’s wrong with doing this for the rest of my life?”

“Oh nothing, if it makes you happy.”

“It makes me pretty happy.”

“That’s good. But what is your dream? If money was no issue. If you could go anywhere. Anywhere in the world.”

Without hesitation, River responded, “Hong Kong.”

After finishing a sip of whiskey, River elaborated, “I’d travel to Hong Kong if I had the wherewithal to do it.”

“That is an exciting ambition. Why would you not have the wherewithal? You should do it.”

“Hah. I wouldn’t know where to start. Now, how in the hell do you get to Hong Kong from Montana?”

“Well. You start by taking the train to the west coast. To a port city like Tacoma. Or Seattle. Or San Francisco. Then you take a steamship from there to Hong Kong.”

“That’s all I got to do?”

“That is, in a nutshell.”

“Shoot. That ain’t hard. I can do that tomorrow.”

“But then who’s gonna look after my horses? And Annabelle?”

“I’ll look after your horses. And Annabelle.”

“You’d do that for me?”

“I ventured to invite you for Christmas dinner with a family I haven’t met yet. Of course, I would look after your animals. But perhaps I’d join you on your trip to Hong Kong. Then… we’d have to find someone else to look after your animal.”

River perked up in her chair and a smile grew on her face. “Wouldn’t that just be swell,” she said. “I mean, truth be told, I didn’t hold you in the highest regard when I first met you. But you’re growing on me Miss Finch… Em. Can you imagine? Me and you going to Hong Kong.”

“Sure. I’ll just tell Percy to skip the Christmas dinner. And the wedding – that would have to wait as well. I wonder if we’d make it to Hong Kong by the new year.”

“So besides seeing Hong Kong, what other dreams?” Emma asked.

River’s face furled in thought.

“Maybe write a book.”

Emma, halfway through drinking from the half-empty whiskey bottle, snorted into the bottle. Embarrassed, she responded, “I am dreadfully sorry.”

River did not seem to mind or notice. She continued on, “I’m partial to reading books, as you already know. My aunt was a book lover and she would read to me when I was little. I still have all her books. Anyway, there’s this fella by the name of Mark Twain who’s got a way of writing about his travels that make me envious. And he’s got a good, funny way in tellin’ these stories. It gets me excited. I figure I’d live like that man does. Maybe I’d travel. Maybe I’d go to Hong Kong and write a book about it.”

That warmed Emma’s heart. She replied softly, “I think you ought to do just that.”

Emma spoke up, “I think you should go to Hong Kong. And write about your travels.”

“I ain’t any good at writing though. Not like that Mark Twain fella anyways.”

“Nonsense. I’ll help you write your book.”

“Is that a promise?”

River laughed again deeply. “Look at us. A couple of drunk women talking about going to Hong Kong and writing books. What do I know about Hong Kong, or writing books?”

Their eyes met again in a moment of quiet. But the moment was interrupted by a sudden cracking of wood and crashing shattering of glass and a violent din of winter that was like a thousand hungry wolves right in the cabin.

“Aw hell, I knew that would happen someday!” River shouted.

A torrent of snow filled the room in a whipping whirlwind. The fire turned frenzied and threatened to go out. A tree branch had shattered through the window and let in the cold chaos.

Emma scrunched up onto the chair against the violent unleashed wilderness in their small haven.

River jumped to her feet and ran to push the pine tree back out the window to no avail.

“Come on Em, help me here with this branch! We gotta get this window all sealed up.”

Emma ran to River, and, as hard as she could, she pushed against the tree branch and the bristling wet needles.

“It won’t budge!” Emma shouted above the howling din.

“Ok you push here, I’ll go to the other side and pull,” River shouted back.

She ran out the cabin door, then Emma felt a tugging against the gnarled branch.

“Push!” she heard River shout from outside.

“I’m pushing!” she yelled back and pushed with all her heaving heart.

It took all her strength, but the branch moved and she as she felt it slide out the window, an invigorating strength moved her to push harder until it was fully disappeared from the window.

But with the tree branch gone, the blizzard only came through more fiercely, coating the room in cold, wet slurry.

“What do we do now!” Emma shouted.

River did not answer, but came back in a few moments later, hoisting with both hands’ boards and a hammer, and nails in her mouth.

She spit the nails onto the floor and dropped the boards and said, “come on, let’s get that window done.”

Emma stood frozen as River went to put a board up against the broken window.

“Hold this board up for me while I hammer it in.”

Emma nodded and hopped over to the window and did as she was told, holding the board up precariously, while River grabbed a couple nails, and swiftly pounded them through the board into the window frame.

“Ok, grab the next board.”

Emma put up the next board and River pounded nails into that one. When that one was secure, they worked on the next. Snow blew in ceaselessly. Emma felt her clothes soak through, and her hair dampen with the onslaught. She held her eyes closed as she held the board up while River hammered. Despite the sobering cold, her head was numb with whiskey, and her stomach and lungs burned with a slow whiskey burn and this made her excited. The blizzard invigorated her soul like a jump into an ice-cold lake.

“Last board!” River demanded. Emma wiped the slurry of melted snow from her face to clear her vision and grabbed another board and posted it up against the window, holding it as assertively as she could against the buffeting wind.

When River hammered in the last nail into the last board, they collapsed into the slush that had collected below the shattered window, both soaked to the skin.

The biting cold air that had blown in from the bitter storm still lingered in the sealed cabin, but the adrenaline and intense physical exertion kept them panting and sweating hard.

The wind continued to howl and buffet the cabin walls, but they were safe from the elements.

Emma brushed her water-matted and frizzled hair from her eyes to look at River. River squeezed the water that weighed her hair down. Emma clapped and laughed with the feeling of triumph course through her as she sat in the slush pile, which had started to numb her butt. River’s face twisted into dismay when she noticed a growing crimson splotch in the side of Emma’s chemisette.

“You’re bleeding!” River exclaimed.

Emma looked down in surprised amusement. “Indeed.”

River crawled over to her. “Let me take a quick look,” she said.

She lifted Emma’s left arm up and inspected the red gash in the linen.

“It really doesn’t feel awful.”

“take your top off.”

“I need to check the wound.”

Emma did as she was instructed. She unclasped her chemisette quietly, revealing her loose white undergarment. River tossed the chemisette aside, then lowered the straps from Emma’s shoulder, causing the cotton garment to fall to around her waist. River found a piece of loose cloth, wadded it into a ball and pressed it against the wound to soak the blood. Inspecting it, River said, “yeah, it’s not bad.”

Emma watched as River pressed the blouse harder against the wound. “Just need to stop the bleeding and it’ll be fine,” River said calmly.

“You’ve a lot of experience with this sort of thing?” asked Emma.

River shrugged. “Might have a scar or two. Hey, let’s go sit over by the fire and warm you up,” she said and guided Emma over to the fireplace where the log fire roared and filled the room with orange light.

They sat cross-legged, opposite each other in front of the fire, River with her hand still applying pressure against Emma’s naked ribcage. Emma looked up and noticed the light playing with the shadow against River’s sharp face. Flames glinted in her eyes. Her face was streaked with dirt. Emma raised a hand to wipe the dirt streak away. River flinched.

“You have some dirt on your face,” Emma explained

River smiled at her and let her wipe away. She closed her eyes and leaned her cheek into the hand and sighed.

“Your hand is warm,” she said.

Emma pulled her hand back.

River looked to the floor timidly. Emma’s chest fluttered with energy and all at once an instinct contrary to every moral fiber within her welled up as a pounding heartbeat. As with a snowstorm, she lacked power to subdue it. River dared to turn her eyes back up to meet Emma’s and they sat in silent realization of a shared desire.

River uncovered the wound. The bleeding had stopped, and what remained was a gash an inch across, but shallow.

“I’ll get some dressing” she said and went over to her saddlebag.

Emma sat with her arms tightly wrapped across her naked breasts. She gazed secretly at River’s body. The jeans curved with her hips and with the taut muscles of her thighs and her calves.