Gold Dust Read Online Free Page B

dress
     and speak like a lady. Olivia had taken great pains and exercised great patience to teach her. She slipped into bloomers,
     chemise, a voluminous skirt that would allow her to ride astride into town, a simple shirtwaist, and a tailored jacket. Examining
     herself in the mirror with a critical eye, she wondered how Jonah Armstrong would react when he saw her. Twelve years old
     indeed! She was a woman grown, and a passable looking one at that when she took thetrouble to get gussied up. Green eyes, the Irish green she’d inherited from her father, twinkled back at her from the mirror.
     Smooth olive skin and high cheekbones were the gift of her Blackfoot mother. Thick black hair tumbled to her narrow waist
     in tangled waves.
    She threw back her shoulders and admired the bosom that had finally come in when she was fifteen. It was small, but it was
     definitely there. When she was younger, Katy had thought she was going to be flat as a boy for the rest of her life. Up until
     today, she had almost regretted that her womanly assets had bloomed, but now she wondered if the greenhorn would think she
     was attractive. Men had been ogling her twin sister Ellen for the past six years, and supposedly she and Ellen looked very
     much alike. Of course, no man in his right mind would ogle Katy. If one had, she would have decked him.
    Thinking of the greenhorn made Katy smile. Lucky for the poor fellow that he’d bumped into her. He had no notion what he was
     about going to the Klondike with his city-bred ignorance. There would be more like him on the trail, she guessed, and the
     tenderfeet would only make it more dangerous for the rest of them. Mr. Armstrong would get through to the goldfields, though,
     because he had Katy O’Connell helping him. Lucky for him he wasn’t the sort of man who refused to accept help from a woman.
    When Katy doused the lamp, took the small valise she had packed, and stumbled her way from her bedroom into the kitchen, Hunter
     followed. He sat beside her when she propped the note for her parents against the flower arrangement on the dining room table.
     He pressed against her legs when she cut herself slabs of bread and cheese in the dark kitchen and headed out the door toward
     the corral and barn. Her gelding, Little Brown, whuffed loudly when Katy opened the corral gate and Hunter followed her in.
    “Ssssh!” Katy hissed at the gelding. “You want old Jenkins to know we’re taking off?”
    The gelding rolled an eye at her as she lifted the saddle to his back.
    “Don’t worry, you old plowhorse. You’re only going as far as Willow Bend. I left a note for Jenkins to pick you up at the
     livery.”
    Hunter joined in the conversation with an unwolflike whine. Katy hunkered down and put her arms around the furry body.
    “I’ll miss you, you old wolf!”
    Hunter had been her best friend for eight years, ever since her pa and Olivia had rescued him from a cave where the rest of
     his litter had been killed by a grizzly bear. Raised with the doting attention of Katy, Ellen, and Olivia, the gray wolf had
     developed an unstinting devotion toward his adopted pack. Never once had he cast a longing eye into the wild. He was more
     like a devoted dog than a wolf.
    Hunter raised a paw and placed it on Katy’s knee.
    “Don’t do that!” Katy cried. “You’re just making this harder!”
    The wolf gazed at her from woebegone yellow eyes.
    “What would you do in the Klondike—a soft and pudgy old wolf like you?”
    Probably the same thing that he’d always done—play with the wind, pounce on rabbits and rodents, play tag with her in the
     high grass, be her faithful friend.
    Katy expelled a huge sigh. “All right. You win, stupid wolf. You can come. We’ll manage it somehow.”
    So Hunter was still beside Katy when she tied the valise onto the back of her saddle, mounted Little Brown, and rode off toward
     the dawn. A few hundred yards from the barn, she stopped to let her gaze sweep a