Across A Thousand Miles. Nadia Nichols

time to get out of the dog-food business. The markup was so small, just fifty cents a bag. For the privilege of selling Bill MacKenzie forty bags, she had earned the tidy sum of twenty dollars, not even enough for one bag of food for her own huskies. And that was assuming he ever paid her.

      It simply wasn’t worth the aggravation.

      And where was he, anyway? He had her four-wheeler, a Honda that Bruce had spent a small fortune on four years ago. If he hurt that machine… “Okay,” she said to Tuffy. “He left here around four o’clock. It’s five miles to Sam and Ellin’s. He has to go out back and remove the parts he needs from the junkers Sam collects and that’s going to take some time. One, two, three hours? Even if Ellin feeds him—and she surely will— he should have been back at least three hours ago. The snow is too deep now for the four-wheeler, which means he’s stuck out there somewhere and freezing to death.”

      Rebecca paced the small confines of the kitchen with mug of tea in hand. Tuffy raised her head and watched intently. “I can’t call Ellin,” Rebecca told the dog. “I thought he’d be back by nine so I didn’t phone before and now it’s too late, Sam goes to bed early and if I bother them now…” She took a sip of tea. “I have to! If he’s lost out there we’ll have to find him. It’s ten degrees standing temperature, but way below zero with the wind chill.”

      She set her mug down with a thump on the kitchen table and plugged the radio phone into the battery. “Ellin? Ellin, it’s Rebecca! Where on earth is Bill MacKenzie!”

      Ellin’s voice was drowsy with sleep. “Why, he’s right here! He’s spending the night. It was late and the weather was far too nasty for him to head back after he and Sam had gotten the parts, so we made him bed down in the boys’ bedroom.” Ellin’s voice lowered to a naughty whisper. “My dear girl, wherever did you find him! He’s a treasure!”

      “Ellin, for your information I did not find him! He bought a load of dog food from me, and his truck just happened to break down on my road! Do you mean to say that all this time he’s been sleeping?”

      “Like a baby. We tried to call, but as usual your phone was unplugged. Don’t be mad, my dear. I must tell you that we’ve enjoyed his company immensely. He even helped Sam fix that old Bombardier of ours, he’s that good a mechanic! I must say, you’ve got yourself quite a man there, Rebecca.”

      “Ellin, he’s not my man! I’m sorry to have woken you but I thought… I just didn’t know…” She glanced at Callie, who was curled on a blanket behind the stove, sound asleep. “I mean, it’s a bad storm and he—”

      “You were worried. I understand completely.” Ellin’s grandmotherly voice soothed and reassured. “But worry no more, my dear. We’re taking good care of him and we’ll get him back to you safely first thing in the morning. Now go to bed and get some sleep.”

      Rebecca couldn’t be angry with Ellin, and as she climbed the steep stairs to the cabin’s sleeping loft, she surprised herself by laughing for the second time that day.

      BY MORNING the storm had blown itself out, and at 8 a.m. Sam and Ellin arrived, riding double on the wide-track Bombardier snowmobile and towing a sled. Bill MacKenzie was driving Rebecca’s Honda behind them. Rebecca had finished watering and feeding the dogs, and she invited the elderly couple into the cabin for a cup of coffee. Mac came inside briefly to check on Callie and then went out to rummage in the sled behind the Bombardier. She could see several mysterious tools protruding from the canvas wrappings he pulled out.

      “Mac’s a darn good mechanic,” Sam said, as he settled himself into a chair at the kitchen table. Sam was in his seventies, lean and trim and bursting with the health and vitality of a man who had lived most of his life in the outdoors. Ellin’s hair was as white as her husband’s, and she was also in shape. They had lived in the Yukon all of their lives, had raised four boys in their cabin, home-schooling them with such success that all four had gone on to successful careers.

      “He’s Brian’s older brother, and I remember Brian telling us he was in the military. I don’t recall which branch,” Rebecca said, pouring the coffee. “He’s taking care of Brian’s team for the winter.”

      “Well, he certainly knows his stuff. He knows airplanes, too,” Sam said. “You should’ve seen his eyes light up when he saw my old Stearman! Said he’d help me get her back in the air this spring if I wanted. I guess I wouldn’t mind having some help.”

      “I’ve never known you to refuse help,” Ellin said to her husband. “Now,” she turned to Rebecca. “Let me give you a bit of advice—”

      “Ellin, before you start, let me just say this,” Rebecca interrupted firmly. “I’m not the least bit interested in Bill MacKenzie. I hardly know him.”

      Ellin sat up straighter. “It’s been a long time since—”

      “I wouldn’t go there if I were you, Ellin,” Sam advised his wife. “Rebecca knows her own mind.”

      “Thank you, Sam,” Rebecca said.

      “She can’t spend the rest of her life grieving.”

      “When it’s time to move on, she’ll know it,” Sam replied.

      “I doubt it. Rebecca’s one of the stubbornnest people I know,” Ellin said.

      “Now, just a minute!” Rebecca nudged the sugar bowl in Sam’s direction. “I wouldn’t call myself—”

      “Well, you are, my dear, and you might as well admit it. Trying to make a go of it alone here, running Bruce’s business—”

      “My business now, Ellin, and I’m doing just fine with it. Better than Bruce did, if the truth be known.”

      “It’s too much! You need help. Especially with the dogs and the tour business. What if you were out on a training run with a team of dogs and something went wrong? What if you never made it back home? Who would know you were missing? Who would know to come looking for you?” Ellin leaned over the table, her blue eyes earnest. “My dear girl, the lowest possible denominator in this part of the world is two. You simply can’t go it alone!”

      Rebecca sighed and lifted her coffee cup. “Ellin, just what are you getting at? You want me to marry this man? This stranger?”

      “He’s not a stranger. He’s Brian’s brother!”

      “This conversation is getting a little too weird for me,” Sam said, pushing out of his chair. “I think I’ll go see if I can give Mac a hand.”

      “Yes, you do that,” Ellin said, waving him away as if he were an annoying fly and turning her attention to Rebecca. “Not marriage, my dear. At least, not until you know each other a little better.”

      “Thank you for that much, at least,” Rebecca said.

      “I think you should hire him.”

      “What?”

      “Think about it. He owes you money. He told us the story about the dog food and also that he couldn’t pay Sam for the truck parts. So to work off the parts, he’s going to help Sam with some odd jobs. Maybe he could work off what he owes you for the dog food. You need a man’s help around here. He could get in your firewood, help with the tours, pick up the food in Whitehorse, help take care of the dogs—”

      “No!” Rebecca said.

      “Oh, I know what you’re thinking. Where will he live? He can’t stay in your guest cabin because most of the time it’ll be occupied with paying clients. Well, don’t you worry, I’ve thought it all out. He can stay with us. We have that log cabin the boys built. It needs some fixing here and there, but he’s perfectly capable of making it livable, and it has a good roof. He can move the junk that’s stored there into the hangar, and in his spare time he can help Sam with mechanical things, like keeping the snow machines up and running, and working on that old wreck of an airplane.” Ellin sat back in her chair with a self-satisfied smile. “Don’t you