Prairie Rose by Catherine Palmer Page A

his voice more irritated than he liked. “Look, Rustemeyer, the fräulein works here. Understand? She works for me.”
    “ Ja . Not vife.”
    “No, she’s not my wife.”
    “Gut. Sehr gut.” The German grinned broadly. “Ich bin glücklich.” Seth gave a grunt. “Whatever that means.”
    “Hello, Mr. Rustemeyer,” Rosie said as she stepped up to the two men. When she looked at Seth, he could see a pair of pink spots on her cheeks. “Mr. Hunter, I’ve come to borrow your shirt for a moment. I need to make a pattern.”
    Seth glanced at Rustemeyer, who was scanning Rosie up and down. He wished she would get on back to the house. “Maybe tonight, Miss Mills. We’re busy right now.”
    “But I promised you a shirt by Sunday. If I wait to measure until tonight, I’ll never get it done. Tomorrow I’ll be baking bread, and the next day I’ll be making soap, and the day after that I mean to hunt for strawberries. With the gardening and cleaning and gathering chips and such, I barely have time to sit down for a moment. You need a new shirt so badly, Mr. Hunter, and this blue color I’ve found will make your eyes … your eyes …”
    The pink spots on her cheeks blossomed into red roses. Seth couldn’t hide the grin that tickled the corners of his mouth. So, Miss Mills wasn’t all housekeeping and chores. Her eyelashes fluttered down, and she cleared her throat.
    “This fabric is a very nice shade of blue,” she said, lifting her chin. “It will hide the dirt well, and that shirt you’re wearing is so dirty it could walk around on its own. Now take it off and let me measure it. As soon as you’re wearing the new one, I’ll give the other a wash and you can have it back—if it doesn’t fall to shreds at the first touch of soap and water.”
    “All right, you can have it. While I get out of it, see if you can explain a pontoon bridge to Rustemeyer.”
    “You’ll have to explain it to me first.”
    Briefly, Seth outlined his proposal for the bridge. He had two skiffs himself—one he’d bought off the farmer who went bust— and he suspected Rustemeyer had a third. They could braid regular rope into heavy cable, build piers out of stone and mortar, and add the plank walkway last. With hard work, the construction shouldn’t take too long.
    “Think you can get that through his head?” he concluded, jabbing a thumb in the direction of the curious German.
    “All you have to do is draw him a picture, Mr. Hunter.” Rosie turned away and knelt to the ground. She began to sketch. “Here’s the bridge. Brücke . Here’s the water. Wasser. Ja? ”
    “Sie sprechen Deutsch!”
    Rustemeyer squatted down next to Rosie and gazed at her with those big puppy-dog eyes of his. Seth had the urge to topple him straight into the creek.
    “You must learn better English,” Rosie said. “Now you and Mr. Hunter are going to build a pontoon bridge. Floating on the water, see? The small boats will float. The water can go up and down, but the wagons can still cross over the bridge.”
    With some gratification, Seth watched Rustemeyer shaking his shaggy blond head. Not even Rosie could make the big hound dog understand. Seth dropped his suspenders and pulled his shirt over his head. When his eyes emerged, he saw that Rosie was walking down to the creek. In one hand she held a stone. In the other, she carried a leaf.
    “The stone sinks,” she told the German. “You see? It goes under the water. But the leaf floats on top of the water. The bridge must float. Like the leaf. Float .”
    “ Float ? Nein. Ich verstehe nicht.”
    “Oh, he doesn’t understand, Mr. Hunt—” Rosie caught her breath as Seth tossed her his shirt. Her focus dropped to his bare chest, then darted quickly back to his eyes. The flush on her cheeks spread down her neck, and she hugged his shirt as though it were some kind of shield.
    “Excuse me,” she muttered. Turning away quickly, she hurried to the spot where she had laid the blue fabric.