Free The Mirror by Marlys Millhiser Page A

hand and cover the spring.
    Timbers to repair the shoring of the adit near the breast of the mine . . . more for cribbing new shafts . . . the pump must be on its way up the canyon by now . . . the old storage shed was falling to pieces, he'd build a new one . . . most of the timbering was sound . . . cables for a tramway in the depths . . . the rails were intact and three ore cars in the adit would need repairs . . . much to do . . . he'd have to get Tim Pemberthy in to help and they could train for the double hand in the Brandy Wine . . . kill two birds with one stone . . .
    The old chamber pot sat smack in the middle of the clearing for all to see.
    Smoke seeped through the wire mesh of the screen.
    "Brandy!" Corbin shook loose thoughts of the Brandy Wine and raced to save the girl for which it was named. "Brandy?"
    More smoke met him as he entered the house but he could see her through it, trying to whisk dark clouds out the front door with a dish towel.
    Feather wisps of hair fell about her face, a smudge blackened one cheek, reddening streaks crossed her forehead. Her dress was dirty and her eyes round. "The stove," she said between seizures of coughing. "I didn't know how to work it." Brandy tried one of those false smiles on him as she had that morning. "Sophie, I mean Mother and Nora always did the stove thing." A tear wandered through the black smudge and Corbin had to turn away.
    The smoke cleared rapidly and hadn't been as bad as he'd thought. In the stove, the fire was out but the mystery was how she'd lit one at all. The damper was shut tight. "Are you burned, Brandy?"
    "Just from the sun." Her smile was real now, if trembly. "I forgot my bonnet at first."
    Corbin showed her the handle to jiggle the ashes down, how to scrape them into the bucket with the scoop, how to adjust the vent, and then he built a fire for her. He wondered at the McCabes, working so hard to find their daughter a husband but not teaching her to use a cookstove.
    He found some late lunch in the icebox, knowing pride at the fact he didn't have to walk to the cave for it and neither would the ladies. Corbin watched his wife sniff a tin can of grease and ladle some into a kettle. She put small hunks of meat to sizzle. Peeled potatoes, turnips, carrots and onions were set in rows on the table.
    It appeared he'd have a fine supper at least. "Brandy, do you have an apron? Your dress is getting soiled."
    "Apron. Oh . . ." She rushed to her trunk and returned tying one about her waist.
    Corbin marveled at a woman forgetting her apron. This woman seemed to forget many things. The uneasiness stirred within him, and something else as well. Even when mussed and dirty, Brandy was a pretty little
    thing.
    He left her sweeping the floor to walk into town and order supplies for the Brandy Wine. But she called him back from the porch. "Corbin, you haven't forgotten about the mirror?"
    "I'll telegraph the McCabes before I see to anything else." He had forgotten the mirror and the relief that lit her face now made him feel guilty. The fact that her every little expression could move him so was perplexing.
    Corbin started down the slope and tried to shrug off his thoughts. There was always May Bell....

    10

    Thora K. bristled into the cabin, a tiny hat of black straw hiding her ball of hair. "Hoed up 'alf me onions, she did. Do 'ee come out and see it." She dragged Corbin to the garden without a glance for Shay or the table laid for dinner.
    Shay slumped to a bench and stared at the gay bouquet of wildflowers set in a broken bottle from the garbage heap. That small gesture brightened the room so. But Thora K. noticed only the onions.
    The stove overheated the cabin to stifling, but a spicy fragrance seeped from under the kettle's lid. She'd added herbs from Thora K.'s jar.
    "I'm 'ungry," Corbin's mother announced when they sat to the table. Then she added pointedly, "'Ope there's henough."
    Thora K. cut her food into minute pieces and chewed it with her front