Prairie Rose by Catherine Palmer Page B

“I’ll just measure this now.”
    “You do that,” Seth said.
    He rubbed a hand across his bare chest and gave Rustemeyer a victorious smirk. See if you can make her blush , he wanted to crow. Go ahead and kneel at her feet. Kiss her on the hand. Tell her she’s pretty. Trail her around the house. I don’t notice her turning pink when you look at her, you ol’ shaggy dog .
    “The bridge is going to float, Rustemeyer,” he shouted. He had the feeling if he could just talk loud and slow enough, the German would understand. “A … pontoon … bridge. Like … like boats.”
    “ Boat ? Das Boot! Ah, die Schiffbrücke! Ja, ja!” Rustemeyer splashed out into the creek, spread his long arms wide, and indicated with his hands how the pontoons would float.
    “Ja,” Seth said. “That’s right. You got the idea.”
    Excited now, Rustemeyer began a long discourse in German. He pointed at his farm, gestured toward the creek, and formed his hands into circles and parallel lines. As he talked, he strode back and forth in the water. He drew marks on the bank and set stones in little piles. After a while, Seth gave up trying to make sense of it and wandered over to where Rosie was working on the new shirt.
    “I think Rustemeyer understands about the bridge,” he said, hunkering down beside her. “It could be tricky getting the cables across the stream. It would be nice to have O’Toole’s help. Even so, I don’t reckon it’ll take us long to build it, once we gather enough lumber.”
    “I haven’t seen many trees around here.” Rosie was laying out his shirt as a pattern on the blue cloth. She kept her attention squarely on the fabric. “You may have quite a time getting boards.”
    “I bought a big load of lumber off that fellow who went bust. It’s stacked out behind the barn. There’s enough for the bridge and a good start on the house I plan to build after I’ve proved up my claim. I built my barn from that wood. Most folks around here don’t have frame barns, you know.”
    “It’s a very nice barn.”
    “You been sleeping okay out there?” He wished he could entice her to look at him. He liked the way it flustered her to see him without his shirt. “That blacksnake hasn’t bothered you, has he?”
    “Not a bit.”
    “You reckon I ought to invite the O’Tooles over after we get the bridge built?”
    “That would be nice. Chipper’s been lonely.”
    “Maybe we could have a dance in the barn.” He paused and leaned toward her. “Like this morning.”
    Rosie bit her lip but kept her attention on her work. “I’ve never been to a real dance,” she said softly as she began to cut the fabric. “I wouldn’t know how to fix things up right.”
    Seth sat, stretched out his legs, and plucked a stem of grass. He hadn’t enjoyed talking with a woman this much since … well, he didn’t know when. Mary had always been the one causing him to stumble over his words. The way she had batted her eyes and flounced around him had left him all but dumbfounded. Truth to tell, he had felt like a puppet around her—always ready at her beck and call, always subject to her whims. And Mary Cornwall had had a lot of whims.
    But with skinny little Rosie—this brown-eyed twister—he was the boss. He could make her laugh. Make her blush. Make her mad. Look at her now, furiously cutting away on that shirt. All day long he had been thinking about the way Rosie had flung her arms around him. He had liked that. Liked it a lot.
    “I reckon a barn dance might be fun, Miss Mills,” he said, chewing on the grass stem. “Come late spring everybody’s working so hard that a break would be good. Maybe you and Sheena could plan the party. What do you think about that?”
    Rosie nodded and kept cutting. “Who would come? Everybody’s so spread out.”
    “The O’Tooles, of course. Casimir Laski’s a nice fellow. His family could visit. They’d have to stay the night. And then there’s LeBlanc. He’s the French