He laughed softly, looking down at her. “Thank you, Miss Brandonberg.” She wished no one else were in the room, that she could kiss more than his cheek, in more than gratitude. She wondered what was inside the brown package, and if he’d miss her after all while she was gone. But she couldn’t stand here all night, riveting her attention solely on him. There were other guests.
“Don’t mention it, Mr. Claus,” she returned quietly, then reluctantly moved off to visit with someone else.
In the cloakroom Kristian and Ray were secreted in a corner, rehashing the Santa Claus scene and Miss Brandonberg’s part in it when a feminine voice intruded, “Excuse me.”
They both swung around to find Patricia Lommen behind them.
The two boys glanced at each other, then stared at her. She wore her auburn hair caught up at the top of her head in a wide red bow. Her dress was gray and red plaid with a high round collar, and for the play she had rouged her cheeks and darkened her eyebrows slightly.
“Could I talk to you alone for a minute, Kristian?”
Raymond said, “Well, I’ll just go in and have some hot chocolate,” and left the two of them alone.
Kristian stuffed his hands into his pockets and watched Patricia as she made sure the door was closed then crossed to his corner of the cloakroom. “I have a Christmas gift for you, Kristian.” She brought it from behind her back — a balsam-green package with a dotted-swiss bow.
“F... for me?”
“Yes.” She looked up brightly.
“B... but why?”
She shrugged. “Does there have to be a reason?”
“Well... gosh, I... gee... for me?” He accepted the gift, gawking at it self-consciously. As he took the delicate box he became aware of how ridiculously big his hands seemed to have grown this last year, with knuckles the size of baseballs.
He looked up to find her staring into his eyes, and his heart lurched into a queer, dancing beat. He’d been noticing things about her lately — how good she was with the younger children while directing the Thanksgiving play; what a perfect madonna she made, standing on the other side of the cradle in the manger scene; how her pretty brown eyes tilted up at the corners and had thick, black lashes; how her hair was always washed and curled and her nails neatly trimmed. And she’d developed breasts the size of wild plums.
“I don’t... ” He tried to speak, but his voice croaked like a bullfrog at mating time. He tried again and managed in a soft, throaty voice, “I don’t have anything for you, though.”
“That’s all right. Mine isn’t much. Just something I made.”
“You made it?” He touched the bow, gulped, men looked up again and whispered reverently, “Gosh, thanks.”
“You can’t open it now. You have to wait till Christmas Eve.”
Her mouth seemed to be smiling even though it wasn’t really. A gush of rapture sluiced down his body. Oh, jiminy, were her lips ever pretty. The tip of her tongue came out to wet them and his heart slammed into doubletime. She stood before him straight and expectant, her chin tilted up slightly, her hands crossed behind her back. There was a look in her eyes he’d never seen in any girl’s eyes before. It sent his heart knocking. His eyes dropped to her lips. He gulped, drew a deep breath for courage, and bent toward her an inch. Her eyelids fluttered and she held her breath. Kristian felt as if he were choking. They tipped closer... closer...
“Patricia, Ma wants you!”
The pair in the cloakroom leaped apart guiltily. Her brother stood in the open doorway, grinning. “Hey, what’re you guys doin’ out here?”
“None of your business, Paul Lommen, just go back and tell Ma I’ll be there in a minute.”
With a knowing leer, he disappeared inside.
Patricia stamped one foot. “Oh, that dumb Paul! Why can’t he mind his own business!”
“Maybe you’d better go in. It’s awful chilly out here and you might catch a cold.” He wondered how it would feel to reach out and rub her arms lightly, but the mood was shattered and he’d lost his courage. She hugged herself and he observed the lift of her breasts above her crossed arms. He looked into her eyes, thinking about braving it again. But before he could she answered.
“I guess so. Well, I’ll see you at church, okay?”
“Yeah, sure.” She turned away with ill-disguised reluctance.
“Patricia?” he called just before she opened the door.
“What?” She faced him eagerly.
He gulped and said the manly thing that had been on his mind ever since Christmas play rehearsals had started. “You made the prettiest madonna we ever had.”
Her face broke into a radiant smile, then she opened the door and slipped inside.
When the schoolhouse lanterns had been doused and the door closed behind them, they all rode home together. Theodore and John sat up front on the cold, wooden seat; Nissa, Linnea, and Kristian in the back with a motley assortment of sheets, dishtowels, Nissa’s soup kettle, tins of leftover sanbakkels and krumkaka, coffee cups, a bag of Christmas gifts Linnea had received from her students, and one Santa suit buried under the hay. Theodore had brought the buckboard tonight, its summer wheels replaced by wooden skids that squeaked upon the snow. The sleigh bells he’d worn on his legs were now strung around Cub’s and Toots’s necks and jangled rhythmically through the clear, star-studded night. The air was stingingly cold, cold enough to freeze the nostrils shut, but the group in the sled was in a spirited mood. Linnea had to endure a description of her blushing face while she was sitting on Santa’s knee, and plenty of teasing about the entire charade. Theodore took his share of good-natured jest, too, and they all laughed about the fact that his beard smelted like mothballs. They rehashed Roseanne’s remark about “thoop.” They were still laughing when they dropped John at his house.
“We’ll be by in the morning to pick you up on our way to town,” Theodore reminded John as his brother stepped down from the wagon.
“Sure enough,” John agreed as they said their good nights.
Linnea’s heart fell. She’d hoped to be alone with Theodore on their ride into town, but it appeared he wasn’t risking it. He could set her on his knee, squeeze her waist, and even let her kiss his cheek in front of the entire school population, but he took great care to keep her at arm’s length when nobody was around. She realized the importance of traveling by twos out here in the winter and knew she shouldn’t resent John’s coming along to keep Theodore company on his way back, but when would she get a minute alone with Theodore before she left? It was really the only thing she wanted for Christmas.
At home, Theodore pulled up close to the back door and they all helped unload the wagon. She rehearsed the things she wanted to say to him if only she’d get the chance. But it was late, and when morning came there’d be chores, then breakfast with the entire family, then John beside them every minute.
Theodore came into the kitchen with a last armload and turned back toward the door to see to the horses. If she didn’t act now, her chance would be lost.
“You two go on to bed,” she advised Nissa and Kristian. “I want to talk to Theodore for a minute.” And she followed him back outside.
He was already climbing onto the sleigh when she called, “Theodore, wait!”
He dropped his foot, turned, and asked, “What’re you doing out here?” The way he was feeling, the last thing he needed was to be alone with her — tonight of all nights, when a two-week separation loomed like two years.
“I just wanted to talk to you for a minute.”
He glanced surreptitiously toward the kitchen windows. “It’s a little cold out here for talkin’, isn’t it?”
“This is nothing compared to pumping water at school in the morning.” In Nissa’s bedroom a lantern came on. “Let me come down to the barn with you.”
Forever seemed to pass before he made his decision. “All right. Get in.” He handed her up, followed, and sent the team plodding slowly along. In the milky moonlight the windmill s
tood tall and dark, casting a long, trellised shadow across the face of the snow. The outbuildings were black shadows with glistening white caps. The skids squealed softly, the sleigh bells jingled, the horses’ heads nodded to the rhythm.
“You made a wonderful Santa Claus.”
“Thank you.”
“I wanted to choke you.”
He laughed. “I know.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“And spoil the surprise?”
“Do you do it every year?”
“We pass it around. But it’s got to be somebody without little ones, else they’d recognize their pa.”
“And you did very well reading all those names off the sacks. How did you learn them all so fast?”
“Kristian helped me.”
“When?” she asked, surprised.
“We did it in the tack room.”
“Oh.” She felt a little cheated, but insisted, “Promise me you’ll keep on practicing hard while I’m gone?”
His only reply was a quick smile. He guided the sleigh beneath a lean-to roof behind a granary. It was suddenly very dark with the moonlight cut off, but the horses pulled through the blackness and stood again with the white rays falling on their backs. Theodore hopped over his side, and Linnea followed suit. He moved around the horses, disconnecting them from the whiffletree, and she helped him spread a crackling canvas tarp over the sleigh.
“I’m surprised Roseanne didn’t say you sounded just like her Uncle Teddy.”
He chuckled. “So am I. She’s a smart little cookie, that one.”
“I know. And one of my favorite pupils.”
“Teachers aren’t supposed to play favorites.”
She let the silence hang poignantly for several seconds before replying softly, “I know. But we’re only human, after all.”
He straightened. All movement ceased. They stood on either side of the team, staring at each other in the thick shadows of the lean-to.
Think of something, Theodore warned himself, anything, or you’ll end up kissing her again.
“So John brought you the Christmas tree.”
“Yes. He’s so thoughtful.”
He moved to the horses and she followed at his shoulder as he drove them toward the barn. Even in the sharp, fresh air she smelled like almonds. He was getting to like the smell altogether too much.
“He’s smitten with you, you know.”
“John! Oh, for heaven’s sake, where did you get that preposterous idea?”
“John never took a Christmas tree to any of our men teachers.”
“Maybe they didn’t send out a plea for one.”
Theodore chuckled sardonically and ordered, “Open the doors.”
She folded back the big double doors, then closed them when he’d driven the team inside. Just as the latch clicked, a lantern flared and Theodore hung it overhead, then concentrated on removing the harnesses from Cub and Toots and turning them into their stalls. She was right on his heels.
“Theodore, I don’t know where you get these ideas, but they’re just not true.”
“Then there was Rusty Bonner and Bill. Yup, you sure do collect ‘em, Miss Brandonberg, don’t you?” Nonchalantly he reached overhead for the lantern and took it away.
“Rusty Bonner!” she yelped. “He was a... a... Theodore, come back here! Where are you going?”
The lanternlight disappeared into the tack room, leaving her in near darkness. She stalked after him, with her fists on her hips. Did the infernal man always have to pick a fight with her when she wanted just the opposite?
“I don’t collect them, as you put it, and I resent your implying that I do!”
He hung up the collars, looped the lines in neat circles, then turned with a leather bell strap in his hands. “And what about in Fargo? You got some more you’re collectin’ over there?” He stood with feet spread wide, knees locked, the string of sleigh bells doubled over his palm.
“There is nobody in Fargo. Nobody!” she declared vehemently.
With a sideward toss he threw the bells onto the workbench. They made a muffled ching before the room fell silent. Theodore rammed his fists into his pockets.
“Then who is Lawrence?” he demanded.
Linnea’s belligerence abruptly disappeared.
“L... Lawrence?”
“Yes, Lawrence.”
Her cheeks grew blotchy pink, then deepened to an all-over heliotrope. Her eyes rounded and her lips parted uncertainly.
“How do you know about Lawrence?” she finally managed in a choked whisper.
“I heard you talking to him one day.”
She absolutely wished she could die. How long had it been since she’d fantasized about Lawrence? Why, she’d practically forgotten he’d ever existed. Now when she kissed windows and blackboards and her pillow, it was Theodore she kissed, not Lawrence! But how could she explain such childishness to a man who already considered her far too much of a child?
“Lawrence is none of your business.”
“Fine,” he snapped and turned away, taking a rag to a bell strap and rubbing it punishingly.
“Unless, of course, you’re jealous.”
He reared back and barked at the ceiling, “Hah!”
She stomped to within a foot of his back, wishing she could whap him a good one and knock some sense into his head. Lord, but he was such a chicken!
“All right, if you’re not jealous, then why did you bring him up... and Rusty... and Bill?”
He flung down the bells and swung on her. “What would a man of my age be doing getting jealous over a... a whelp like you?”
“Whelp?” she shrieked. “Whelp!”
“Exactly!” His hand lashed out and turned down one of her ears. “Why lookit there, just like I thought, still wet back there!”
She twisted free, hauled off, and kicked him a doozy in the shin.
“I hate you, Theodore Westgaard! You big lily-livered chicken! I never saw a man so scared of a girl in my life.” She was so angry tears stung her eyes and her breath lost control. “And furthermore, I c... came out here to thank you f... for the Christmas present and you... you... sp... spoil it all by p... picking a fight!” To Linnea’s horror, she burst into tears.
Theodore cursed and grabbed his bruised leg as she whirled and ran from the barn.
Utterly miserable, he breathed a sigh of relief. What else was he supposed to do except pick a fight when she came following him with those big blue eyes all wide and pretty and tempting him to do things no honorable man would think of doing with a girl barely out of normal school?
He sank to his chair, dropping his face into his hands. Lord God, he loved her. What a fine mess. Old enough to be her father, and here he sat, trembling in a tack room like some boy whose voice was just changing. He hadn’t meant to make her cry — God no, not cry. The sight of those tears had made him want to grab her close and apologize and tell her he hadn’t meant a word of it.
But what about Lawrence? Who was he? What was he to her? Most certainly someone she’d left behind, judging from her reaction when his name was mentioned. Someone who made her blush like summer sunset and argue hotly that he was nobody. But no girl got that upset about a man unless he was somebody.
Theodore puttered around the tack room until he was certain she was safely in bed. Wretched, he wiped off the harnesses and the strands of bells.
He thought of her returning to her gay life in the city with all its conveniences and old friendships, comparing some young buck eighteen or twenty years old to an old cuss like himself. At length he stretched and sighed, feeling each and every one of his thirty-four years in the heaviness of his heart and the stiffness of his bones.
Let her go and make comparisons, he decided sadly. It’s best for all concerned.
In the morning neither of them spoke during breakfast. Nor on the ride to John’s house. Nor on the long ride to town. The sun beat down blindingly upon the glittering snow. The sleigh bells had been
left in the tack room, and the horses seemed less spirited without them. As if he sensed the strain, John, too, remained silent.
At the train depot, both men accompanied Linnea inside, and when she made a move toward the barred window, Theodore unexpectedly clasped her elbow.
“I’ll get it. Wait here with John.”
She went into the ladies’ room and replaced her scarf with her bird-wing hat, and upon returning to the waiting room, studied Theodore’s broad shoulders and the upturned collar of his heavy wool jacket. Within her was a hollow space where her holiday spirit had been the night before. A single word from him would revive that spirit and take away this terrible urge to cry again. But he turned and handed her the ticket without so much as meeting her glance. John picked up her suitcase and they moved toward the long wooden waiting bench with its thirteen matched armrests. She sat, flanked by the two men. Her elbow bumped Theodore’s and he quickly pulled away.
Somewhere in the station a pendulum clock ticked, but other than that it was dreadfully silent.
“Something wrong, Miss Linnea?” John asked.
She felt as if she’d swallowed a popcorn ball. The tears were very close to showing.
“No, John, nothing. I’m just a little tired, that’s all. It was a big week at school, and we got home late last night.”
Again they sat in silence. Askance, she saw Theodore’s jaw working, the muscles clenched so tightly they protruded. His fingers were clasped over his stomach, the thumbs circling each other nervously.
“She’ll be in any minute,” the station agent announced, and they went outside to wait on the platform.
Theodore scowled up the tracks. The train bleated in the distance — once, twice.
Linnea reached to take her suitcase from John’s hand and saw that his eyes were very troubled in his long, sad face. The tears were glistening in her eyes now — she couldn’t help it. Impulsively she flung an arm around John and pressed her cold cheek to his. “Everything’s okay, John, honest. I’m just going to miss you all so much. Thank you for the present. I’ll open yours first.” His arm tightened around her for a moment, and she kissed his cheek. “Merry Christmas, John.”