She laughed. “I obey when the orders are worth obeying.”
He gave her a little smile. “When your brothers are captaining their ships and the sailors disobey because they don’t think the orders are worth obeying, what do your brothers do?”
She gave him a look of mock innocence. “You don’t expect me to know what goes on on a man’s ship, do you? I think I might be shocked to the very depths of my soul if I were to be told something like that.”
When Josh grinned at her, a lovely, warm grin that showed his fine white teeth, Carrie thought she might swoon at the sight of him. She was sure that there was no better-looking man on earth than Mr. Joshua Greene. She lifted herself onto her elbows. “Josh,” she began, “do you think—”
He put his fingertips to her lips to silence her, then drew back as though he’d been burned. “Wait here and keep Tem warm.”
She nodded at him, and he was gone.
When Carrie got up to dress, she saw that before he’d left, while she and Tem were still asleep, Josh had raked the fire and put more wood on it. He had filled the coffeepot with water and tea and set it to boil. As Carrie poured herself a mug of tea, she smiled. He may not be a great farmer, but he knew how to take care of people and he knew how to climb up and down ropes in the middle of a storm and he knew how to ride—and he knew how to love.
“I could stand a little of that love,” she said out loud, as she stood up and went to the mouth of the cave to look out at the dawning of the day.
By the time Josh, Carrie, and both children, as well as Choo-choo, were once again assembled in their pretty little house, it was almost noon. Mrs. Emmerling had come and gone, the house was clean, and there were ham sandwiches made, as well as a pot of bean soup simmering on the stove and two fat apple pies in the oven.
“I’m hungry,” Tem said.
All the way down the mountain, Josh had held his son tightly in front of him, as though he couldn’t believe the boy was well and safe, but now Josh turned a stern face to his son. “You and I are going to have a little talk,” Josh said, and Tem looked at his father in disbelief.
Carrie took Dallas outside while Tem and his father “discussed” what Tem had done.
While Carrie and Dallas sat under a tree with Choo-choo, the child’s doll, and a stack of buttered bread and mugs of fresh milk, Carrie kept glancing back at the house. “You don’t think that your father will…you know, do you?” she asked Dallas.
“Beat the stuffin’ out of Tem?” Dallas asked without much concern in her voice.
“Where did you hear such an expression?”
“Uncle Hiram says that’s what’s wrong with us. He says that Papa should beat us now and then, and it would do us a world of good.”
“Does he?” There was a tone of challenge in Carrie’s voice. “And what does your father say to that?”
“Papa doesn’t talk to Uncle Hiram much. He just sits and listens.” Dallas’s voice lowered. “I think Papa hates Uncle Hiram.”
Carrie opened her mouth to tell Dallas that she was sure that Josh didn’t hate his own brother, but she couldn’t make herself say the platitude. From what she’d heard about Josh’s brother, she already hated him. “Will your father strike Tem?”
Dallas gave Carrie a smile that was as sly as any adult’s. “Naw. Papa couldn’t hit us. He’ll just talk a lot.”
Carrie laughed. Her own father would have died before he hit one of his children. Of course most of the townspeople were in agreement with Hiram and thought that she and her brothers and sister would have benefited by a good, sound beating, but it never happened.
When, at long last, Josh came out of the house, Tem behind him, Tem looked fine, but Josh looked miserable. Carrie knew that Josh fully realized how close Tem had come to death, but Tem was already beginning to look on last night as an adventure.
Slipping her arm through Josh’s and holding tight when he tried to pull away from her, Carrie said, “I declare today a holiday. No corn bugs today and no anything that we must do.”
Josh gave her a look of irony. “You look on every day as a holiday.”
“Thank you,” Carrie said. “I think that may be the nicest compliment I have ever received.”
The snide look melted from Josh’s face and he smiled. “All right, you win. No bugs today. No weeds.” When he looked down at Carrie, his eyes were teasing. “And for you, no dishes to wash, no floors to scrub, no laundry to scour. For once you can do just as you please. You can be as lazy as you want.”
She didn’t like the implication that she led a life of constant frivolity. “I don’t think I’m lazy,” she said in a hurt voice, then saw that he was teasing her. When she raised her hand to strike him on the chest, he agilely danced away from her, so Carrie ran toward him and tried to hit him, but she couldn’t catch him. A minute later, the two of them were chasing each other like children, while Tem was standing by and smili
ng and Dallas was laughing and clapping her hands, with Choo-choo barking excitedly.
Carrie couldn’t catch Josh, but when she struck at him once and he sidestepped her, he caught her in his arms, her back to his front, and wrestled her arms to her side.
“I am not lazy,” Carrie said, trying to wiggle away from his grasp.