Soldier at the Door(33)

Zenos looked over at her again, this time a little alarmed at her intensity. “Ma’am, um, I really don’t know . . . yet. But I’m working on it.”

“Well, you better be!” she said firmly. She looked over at him and noticed he was grinning again. “What?”

“You . . . you’re just not anything like I imagined you would be. Ma’am,” he remembered to add.

Mahrree furrowed her brows. “And what did you imagine me to be?”

He blushed. “Uh, I guess like all the other women around here.”

“Hmm.” Mahrree thought about his evaluation. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

He chuckled. “That’s what it was meant to be!”

Mahrree gestured to turn at the next road. “My house is the second one on the left there. The one without a proper garden.”

Zenos nodded. “Now who decides what’s a ‘proper’ garden?”

“It’s about time you gave a good response, soldier—my thoughts exactly! I’ll forgive you that you phrased it as a question again, though. But you’re right—it’s proper to me. But it’s not proper to my mother,” she added.

They walked across the road and Mahrree opened the low gate for the private.

“I thank you for your help,” she smiled as he pulled the wagon into the front yard. “And I’m sure my neighbors and everyone else at the market who’ve heard enough of my wailing babies also thank you.”

She expected him to tip his cap and leave her, but he didn’t. Instead he lifted Jaytsy carefully out of the wagon and set her down.

“I can stay and watch your daughter while you feed your son, ma’am. I’m off duty right now, and you have enough rocks in your ‘proper’ garden that I can teach her how to ‘properly’ throw them,” he suggested.

Mahrree bit her lip. Another tempting offer. Usually Jaytsy emptied the lower levels of the bookshelves while Mahrree put Peto to sleep.

But she felt odd about letting a soldier watch her little girl.

Then again, Perrin did say he was impressed with him. That’s why he was so pleased when Zenos signed a two-year commitment. Maybe she could trust this sweet-faced young man who was now watching her little girl pick up small stones.

Jaytsy started to put one in her mouth, and the private quickly stopped her and showed her how to throw it instead. She giggled when it bounced on the ground.

There had never been another soldier who had ever offered to help. In fact, every other soldier she’d encountered took one look at the children and sidled away; even Yip, who ran the fastest and was appointed to be Perrin’s messenger to the family. The soldiers were probably worried someone small would drool on their uniforms.

Private Zenos crouched and handed pebble after pebble to Jaytsy, grinning at her in genuine pleasure. Mahrree couldn’t remember the last time she had ever seen a young man enjoy a baby.

Mahrree shrugged. “All right, Private Zenos. I think I’ll take you up on your offer. Her name’s Jaytsy, although she responds more frequently to ‘Puppy Dog.’ I should only be a few minutes—”

“Take all the time you need,” Zenos said, not shifting his gaze from Jaytsy as she picked up another rock, considered if she should taste it or toss it, then gave it a worthy heave. “There’s plenty of rock to keep us occupied for hours.”

Mahrree nodded and brought Peto into the house. In his bedroom she positioned the rocking chair so that she had a view out the window. She could see the image of the private through the thick wavy glass, and the smaller smudge that was her daughter. She never took her eyes off the window while she fed Peto.

It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the soldier, but . . . well, all right—she didn’t trust the soldier. Why was he so willing to be helpful?

Mahrree pondered that while she nursed Peto who, within ten minutes, was sound asleep. She laid him in his cradle then went back outside.

From the front porch she watched as the private tried to show Jaytsy how to throw the rocks into a ring he drew in the dirt. It was a little too complex for Jaytsy to understand. Apparently she saw rings everywhere and was redistributing rocks throughout the garden.

The private looked up at Mahrree. “Ma’am! You’re finished sooner than I expected.”

As she walked down the stairs Mahrree wondered what he expected. “Peto was exhausted.”

“That’s his name? Peto? Rather unusual.”

Mahrree cringed inside, wondering if she should have revealed her son’s name. She already told him her daughter’s, but she had no reason to not trust the private.

“Yes. Peto’s my maiden name. My father never had a son to carry on his legacy, but we thought this could be a way to honor his name. It was actually the captain’s idea.”