Into the Breach With You (The Ladies Alpine Society #3)

Chapter Five

It was cloudy, but at least it was warm. There would be a melt that would reconfigure some of the snow, and then next month would come another freeze. It would be dangerous to do any big mountain climbing until the weather conditions stabilized. Karl would keep an eye on the snow to make sure he kept his clients safe.

Tante Greta had the right idea of having a day of rest. He slept in for the first time in a week, waking only as he heard her come down to the kitchen to begin the breakfast service. It was pleasant to have a coffee while staring out at the mountains. He rarely drank coffee, but with the guests here, they were well supplied for the coming months with the luxury beverage.

Instead of sitting with guests this morning, he ate in the kitchen and helped with the food service. There wasn’t much room, and he could see the irritation on Greta’s face when he’d step in her way. She had a routine in the mornings, and he was clearly making her life more difficult. He apologized and took himself out to check on the goats.

The goat pen was holding up well. Four of their herd were about to give birth. He would tell Tante Greta that someone needed to be out with them on the days he hiked. At least to check in and make sure the kidding progressed well.

He left his empty coffee cup on the post and went on to the barn where the cattle were. The cattle were in the same state as the goats. A few ready to calve, but here they had their neighbor, Herr Frohlich, to check on them. Herr Frolich helped Onkel Peter and Tante Greta with their herd and took them up in the mountains with his, and they bartered with milk and cheese the rest of the year to keep him happy.

After the tour of the animals and a pat on the head for Gunther, the dog who watched over all of them, he didn’t need to go check on the goats again, but he might, in case Fr?ulein Brewer came to see babies.

Not that it was his duty to check on the livestock, really. When the summer came, that would be handed off to one of the seasonal hires, as most of their hired hands were currently prepping their own flocks, trade, and building projects. Most didn’t even live in Zermatt year-round and had promised to return in another month, when the foreign tourists typically arrived in Zermatt.

But Karl’s English clients were definitely not like others. Then again, these English were women, which made them unusual on the surface, but it was more than their gender. Most mountaineers were men, or if there were women, they were married or related to one of the other men. He’d seen those women. Hale and hardy, unjudged, for they were already married. Or they were strange women, under the influence of their strange fathers or uncles.

But this group of alpinist women, beautiful and wealthy, some married, some not, was unlike anything he’d ever encountered in his mountaineering career. There were always rumors of women-only Alpine trips, and rarely people asked if he knew any women Alpine guides; he did not.

Footsteps came up behind him, and after a week of hearing her tread, he knew who it was before turning.

“Any baby goats this morning?”

she asked, tucking her hands inside the woolen shawl she’d draped over herself. Her hair was half-down, the way he’d first seen her that first night.

“The beginnings, yes,”

Karl said, brushing crusted snow off of a rock with his boot. He was a fool in front of her, and he hated that. Much better when they were moving, and he didn’t have to sound smart in another language. He shook his head. “I mean that yes, we have babies. They are in a separate pen. There are other goats that still have not kidded.”

Her eyes lit up. “May I see them?”

He nodded, and as he guided them closer to the pens, he noticed that she was distracted by the view. She seemed to love the mountains. And she had yet to complain about any of the walks he’d taken her on. Because of snow and time and not wanting to carry equipment, he hadn’t taken her up any big peaks yet. Perhaps he could teach her how to read the snow, make her more capable.

She might not be good at reading snow, but she could at least help guide the others with her steady pace. It was a thought. And then perhaps they might have to spend their time after dinner going over maps and making plans.

Typically, this was the work of the expedition leader, which was Fr?ulein Bridewell, but the cool-tempered blonde had told him that all the preliminary mountain guiding should be planned with Fr?ulein Brewer. She’d been very clear about that when they’d followed him up to mend the fence.

“I have spent so much time preparing for the Matterhorn, that I can’t even imagine an after,”

Justine said. “It’s like an event that can never happen, because what will I do when it’s over?”

Karl shrugged. He remembered that feeling from long ago, but it had since faded, under the weight of so many subsequent experiences. “You’ll find another mountain to climb. There are many.”

Justine laughed, and he swore it sounded like a bell. A beautiful, clear, unexpected laugh, unlike her many other kinds that were tinged with other emotions. This one was pure. His chest puffed up, happy that he was the one who had made her laugh.

“Do you have a favorite?”

she asked.

His mind blanked, unsure of what she was asking.

“Mountain, I mean. Do you have a favorite mountain?”

She looked down, away from him. Was she suddenly shy?

It made him stammer. He didn’t want her to be uncomfortable, but he also didn’t know how to answer her question. “Favorite in what way? To look at? To climb? A favorite experience?”

“Are those different?”

she asked, meeting his gaze again.

He nodded. “Wildly different! To climb is an accomplishment. Sometimes a hardship. You may freeze a toe, or lose a toenail. You maybe might get very hurt or have to stay up all night to finish a descent. You are hungry and tired and sore, but it is exhilarating because you did it! But then, some climbs are fun because you may need ropes and a partner, and it is less about the top than the journey up the side. Those are very fun. And then others, I know them so well, I look at their beauty from afar, and sigh. It brings me pleasure knowing they exist, even if they do not know I am there.”

“You make it sound like the mountains are women you are courting.”

Fr?ulein Brewer’s cheeks flushed pink. She looked like the dolls he saw in shop windows in Munich and Zurich. The pretty ones with porcelain heads and shiny curled hair.

I would court you , he thought, but didn’t say it. There was no point. She was here for a few months only. Instead, he shrugged. “It is my life. It is what I do.”

She was silent for a moment. “I could help you.”

Karl’s mind flipped through possibilities, but none of them could be correct. “With what?”

“With the baby goats, you ninny.”

“Nin-ny,”

he repeated. This was another new word to him. “Is this like nan-ny?”

She shook her head with exaggerated exasperation. He liked making her react to him, and it felt very much like pulling a girl’s hair when he was younger.

“Your English is excellent in many places, but how are you so bad at insults?”

“I am not often insulted,”

Karl said. Well, not in English, anyway. Any group of mountain guides who spoke the same language were merciless in their teasing, but none of them spoke English either. French, German, Swiss, Tyrolian, yes. All of those. But English? What for?

She huffed out a laugh, and sunlight crept far enough over the trees and the roofline of the inn to catch the reddish glint of her hair. “I find that hard to believe. I could insult you all day.”

“I believe you could,”

he said, mildly. He did not want to be insulted, but he was beginning to understand that she spoke many words, but rarely did she intend anything mean-spirited. Her insults were a flirtation, which he would gladly accept. “But I don’t know how you could help a goat give birth.”

“Not the birthing, the babies.”

“Fr?ulein Brewer,”

Karl started, not wanting to exclude her in any way, but also not wanting her to take on a responsibility that she could not possibly upkeep. “I think—”

“I enjoy the way you say Fr?ulein to me, but it seems cumbersome, all those syllables.”

She pushed her lips into a pout that made his hands twitch and his thighs flex in unwilling response. “Perhaps, when we are alone, you might call me Justine.”

Karl swallowed hard. His thoughtful, prepared mind screamed that this was not appropriate. Why was anyone allowing her to be alone with him? Why had they let him be alone with her? He would have looked around for a chaperone if he could have torn his gaze from her playful brown eyes.

But the rest of him nodded dumbly in agreement and tried out her name on his tongue. “Justine, then. And I am Karl.”

She smiled and repeated his name, and he could have been happy to go deaf after hearing his name on her lips.

**

She knew it was a terrible idea to give him leave to use her first name. Of course it was a terrible idea—she’d thought it up, hadn’t she? If ever she had a reliable trait, it was bad ideas. But he pronounced her name with a soft j , like the French, and it made her weak in the knees. In his mouth, her name was beautiful, not at all mannish and workmanlike.

Standing in that morning half-sun, the cold threatening to creep into her hands despite her gloves, she was in paradise. He looked at her with interest, engaged when she teased him, and never lost his temper, no matter what she said.

The situation was almost perverse. They stood in the most gorgeous valley she’d ever seen, the sky gray and cloudy, but still she found it to be more cheerful than any of the innumerable gray days she’d spent in England. And there was this man. After the ballroom legions of men tried to flirt with her, engage her, dance with her, take liberties with her, none had made her feel like this.

It was enough to turn a girl’s head.

“Justine, there you are!”

Ophelia called, gathering her woolen shawl around her shoulders.

Justine wanted to sigh. Because if ever there was a person who knew when the worst time to show up was, it was Ophelia. There had been an occasion at finishing school when she’d walked in on Justine and Annabelle Rivers, which had been a short-lived—but educational—romp that year. There was nothing as embarrassing as them both throwing down their skirts as the door opened, and Ophelia walking in, her nose wrinkled.

She loved her best friend, she did. But her timing was shit, if she could be so bold.

“Since we will not be taking our exercise today, I thought it a perfect day to go over routes and sort the gear.”

Ophelia looked beautiful, her long gold-blonde hair shining in the low light of the gray day. Justine could be jealous of her friend, whose blue eyes and fair complexion were almost comically the picture of the English ideal. Instead, Justine understood Ophelia’s aloofness, which was actually dreaminess wrapped in aristocratic manners.

And Ophelia had a point. Maps. Routes. Gear. Ugh. The worst. Justine wanted to put one foot in front of the other. She wanted to be pointed in the correct direction and let loose, like a hunting dog, crashing through streams and underbrush. Perhaps not the most flattering of comparisons for herself, but accurate.

If that was unavailable, cuddling a baby goat would be an excellent consolation prize.

“You’re right, Ophelia,”

Justine said with a groan. “I suppose we will set up in the dining room, if it is available?”

It would be so much more fun to stand out here with Karl, watching his expression as he mentally translated her teasing words. Plus, he didn’t wear a waistcoat or formal English clothing, and she enjoyed seeing his broad shoulders move and flex in his woolen shirt, kept tight against him by his braces.

In fact, men’s fashion here embraced tighter trousers as well, and combined with the boots Karl wore, Justine found herself admiring more than just his shoulders. But Ophelia. Maps. Routes. Gear. Yes. She needed to get Karl Vogel out of her brain and the practicalities of this expedition in.

“If I may, I can outline the routes I myself have climbed,”

Karl offered.

“I thought you had chores to do,”

Justine teased, even though she did hope he would spend the day with them.

“I do,”

he admitted. “But this afternoon, during the coffee time, I could come.”

“Tea time,”

Justine corrected.

Karl rolled his eyes dramatically, but he had the underpinnings of a smile on his face as he did so. “Coffee. Tea. Hot beverage time with a piece of cake.”

“Very well put, Mr. Vogel.”

Ophelia gave him a short, competent nod. Then she looked to Justine, and there was almost a visible realization in her expression as Ophelia finally caught up to the relationship between Justine and Karl. “I will meet you inside, Justine.”

It put a smile on Justine’s face to watch Ophelia go, her steps as uncertain as Ophelia’s ever were, knowing that she had blundered into a flirtation and completely ruined it.

“I should go,”

Justine said. “I’ll see you this afternoon, though, when you can correct everything we’ve done and I can throw cake at you for it.”

Karl’s brow furrowed. “Why would you waste good cake?”

Justine smiled. “Throwing a hot beverage at you would be much worse.”

Karl nodded thoughtfully. “Perhaps no throwing, then?”

“Don’t be an arse, and I won’t.”

Justine turned and flounced away, her heart absolutely light and singing, as if she were meant to be right here, in this place, doing this very thing. She’d never in her life felt so free and at home. If only this expedition could last forever.

**

The weather turned much sooner than Karl anticipated. They only had a few days of the temperate melt before the hard frost slammed into the mountains, capturing all the moisture in the air and freezing it.

They put the goats and the cows in the same pens to keep them warm, and the birthing goats came into the storage closets on the ground floor, the farthest away from the dining hall as they could get. Karl worked hard every day, making sure the cows and the goats were warm and watered, cleaning up the new interior goat shed so that the smells didn’t disturb the guests.

They hadn’t gone on any hikes once the cold snap hit only because Karl was too busy. He’d hoped the Englishwomen would go out of their own accord—perhaps they did—but he had other work to hold his attention. He often missed dinner, which was a shame, because he enjoyed seeing Fr?ulein Brewer in her evening dress. He knew it was nothing compared to the beautiful silk and lace confections she must have at home, but he loved seeing her in the bright colors and gowns dotted with small flowers.

She was unlike anyone he’d ever met before, and he could admit he was infatuated. But it was nothing he couldn’t push under the surface so that when she left, he wouldn't be useless. He was still a mountain guide, and if there was anything mountaineers knew, it was discomfort.

Onkel Peter pulled him aside. “Karl. You are working too hard. I go to change the hay for the goats, it is already done. I go to check on the cows, they are toasty and warm from the lit brazier. You must let me earn my keep, or your Tante Greta will turn me out before she lets go of Elke.”

Karl shook his head. “Onkel, this is why you asked me here. To be of use. I am of use, what is wrong with that?”

His Onkel gave him a pitying look. “You are young, Karl. And you have clients here. Spend time with them. With the pretty one who watches you when she thinks no one will notice.”

Karl shrugged to feign indifference. “They are all pretty.”

His Onkel did not seem convinced of his apathy. “Your shadow, Karl. She is a pretty one, and very capable. Like your Tante.”

He winked, patted Karl on the arm and took the water pail he was carrying to the goats.

He could only blink as he watched his Onkel take over his chores. What should he be doing if he was not buried under the heavy workload of running an inn? His immediate urge was the same as always: outside.

The small windows let in the cold, but he could see the gray crispness outside. At least that would be warmer than when the skies were clear and clean. He went through the dining room where the guests were strewn about the tables, lingering over coffee and tea. The married couples were playing some kind of card game that he didn’t recognize. The women were teamed up against the men, and the teasing seemed merciless.

It reminded him of Justine, and he wondered if that was something that he had missed out on in his younger years, since he’d started coming up to Zermatt when he was only seventeen to climb and then later, to guide. He’d not gone to churches and dances, learning how young people were meant to flirt and to court one another. But he’d supposed that Justine’s gentle teasing was akin to pulling his braids in school. Not that Karl had braids. He frowned.

“Don’t tell me that frown is for me,”

Justine said, looking up from where she and Lord and Lady Rascomb and Fr?ulein Bridewell had maps spread all over the longest dining table. “You only just got here. How can I have already earned your disapproval?”

He tried not to smile, because he was beginning to understand that she did like him as much as he liked her. While he'd had relations with women before, it had been easily won barmaids, and neither of them believed in a longer-term attachment. This was different. It felt different, anyhow. “No disapproval. But I have been relieved of my afternoon chores. I can take you outside.”

Why did the English language not have a collective word for you ? So inconvenient. He meant to invite everyone in the room, but how did one say that?

Justine’s dark brows rose in surprise and delight. “Me, you say?”

Karl nodded, and then looked at each of the rest gathered. “And you, and you, and you.”

“And me?”

squealed Herr Bridewell in a falsetto. His fellow card players laughed, and his wife tossed a crust of bread at him.

Glancing back at Justine, he noticed her cheeks had reddened. She had thought he’d meant only her. Which he did, but thought was inappropriate. Was it not inappropriate? He didn’t know any more. All he could hope was that his language blunder was not ill-received.

“Anyone who would like to go outside today. I will warn you that it is colder than it was when you arrived, and you will need more layers than you typically wear.”

“Mr. Vogel,”

a gentleman said, and Karl swung his gaze over to the thin man who accompanied their afternoon hikes well enough, but was not listed on the expedition. The husband of the Mrs. Prudence Moon, a woman who was on the expedition list, which confused Karl, but he was learning not to question these English ladies. “Is this cold spell typical for this time of year? In England, we usually have a springtime.”

Karl nodded. “This is what happens here. We have a thaw, and then another frost. This will not last long. Then another thaw. Then summer.”

Herr Bridewell let out a low chuckle. “Sounds delightful.”

Karl nodded. “It is very muddy for a time.”

“Even better,”

Herr Bridewell added. The man glanced at his bride, and then his sister, and announced, “I am having a jolly time where I am. My wife and I decline your generous offer, Mr. Vogel, and I do hope that Mr. and Mrs. Moon do likewise.”

Herr Moon nodded. “Of course. Card playing is not a terrible way to spend a day.”

“Very well.”

Karl nodded and turned back to the long dining table.

“My old joints are not too keen on the cold, I admit. I’ll sit this one out,”

said Lord Rascomb, looking pointedly at Lady Rascomb, who raised her eyebrow.

Fr?ulein Bridewell frowned back at her mother. She whispered something to her mother that Karl could not hear, and Justine shot her a look. The three of them debated in hushed tones, and all Karl could get from it was inappropriate , which was what he’d been worried about in the first place.

Justine glanced at him, her big brown eyes full of some kind of emotion he didn’t understand. All he could do was stand there like some big cow and wait for a decision. He would go outside no matter what was decided, for the cold didn’t bother him. The key was to be in it, accept it, be a part of it. To suffer against weather was the greatest folly. A person would never win against nature.

Finally, the conference broke apart and Justine stood. She was very pretty; Onkel Peter was correct. And he did think she was the prettiest of all the women here, petite and fierce, quick and full of blazing health.

“I’ll go,”

Justine said, her eyes downcast, as if she were embarrassed. That was strange.

“I need to get my warm things, as do you.”

Karl said.

Fr?ulein Bridewell sat back down at the table, her brow furrowed. She did not meet his eyes either. That did not seem to be a good sign.

“I can be back down in ten minutes,”

Justine said, skirting the table to run upstairs.

Karl nodded, watching her go. “I’ll meet you at the front desk.”

She did not bother to turn around to acknowledge that she’d heard him, not that it was terribly important. They always met at the front desk, why should this time be any different?

Glancing around, he found that none of the other clients looked at him. They were all absorbed in their own business, not wanting to speak to him. How strange. English people were strange. Unease pricked at him as he went to the pegs behind the bar where he kept his few outdoor options. His thick coats with fur lining, his woolen scarves and gloves and mittens. His extra thick socks and the underlayers that protected him from the wind that could slice right through the wool.

He waited at the desk, sweating as minutes ticked by. Finally, she appeared, and he pushed himself off the desk and propelled himself out the door. How relieving to finally be rid of the sweating.

She hurried after him, her steps coming one-two, one-two. Leaving the front of the inn, the wind screamed down through the valley and cooled him at once. He loved this feeling, this change, of keeping warm, knowing it was so cold out.

“Come,”

he said to her, wanting to get away from the inn and all of the strange whispered words that sat in the air. He led her over towards T?sch, not wanting to take on too much today, but also not wanting to go far in case her clothes did not keep her warm enough or if the weather suddenly changed for the worst.

By the river, however, he found exactly what he was looking for: different types of snow.

“Look,”

he said pointing at where the new, brittle, dusty snow met with the hard-packed crusty white bank.

She came and stood beside him, looking, but not saying anything. Her silence was odd. He didn’t like it. But he also didn’t understand it. From what he’d been told by the Frenchman he’d guided, the English would rather sweep problems away, as if they never existed, than discuss the trouble.

Karl understood the trouble with discomfort, but he also felt that it was like when there was something about your boot that troubled you. If you didn’t stop to take off your boot and examine and rectify the trouble, then it would cause a blister. If the blister continued to be bothered, it would bleed and become infected. It was best to deal with the problem before a blister occurred in the first place.

Since she hadn’t said anything about the snow, he had to take charge of this. They were in Zermatt, not London. He was the guide and she was the client, so he would do this his way, not hers. “What was the trouble?”

“Trouble with what?”

she asked, mildly. There was no tease, no double-entendre. It made him uneasy.

“Trouble that made you whisper with Fr?ulein Bridewell and Lady Rascomb.”

His jaw clenched, flexing against the woolen scarf that he had wound around his chin.

She fiddled with her own scarf, unwinding it from around her neck and then adjusting it to leave enough length to cover her mouth. “It was merely addressing concerns.”

She finished her adjustments and with that, her mouth was covered.

His jaw clench even harder. Perhaps it had been better when they walked, rather than talked. “I would like very much to know these concerns. That way I can help with them. That is my job.”

She steadied her chocolate gaze on him. “You cannot help with them. Because I am the problem. Not you.”

He pulled back, viscerally shocked by her comment. How could she be the problem? She was the only one who came on these excursions with him, and therefore the most prepared for what faced them on the Matterhorn in a few short months.

She walked further down the stream, making her way towards the trail that meandered next to it, her back to him. What could possibly be wrong with her?

He caught up to her. “Are you ill?”

“No,”

she said, not bothering to explain anymore.

Karl shook his head. If she didn’t want to tell him, then that was her choice, he supposed, and he had tried his best. Fine. He hated that he bristled at her coldness, that it made him feel like he had done something wrong, when he knew very well that he hadn’t. “If you do not wish to be here, then you can return to the inn any time.”

“If I have to stay inside one more minute, I’m going to scream.”

Justine turned away from him.

Karl frowned. This was how his older sister had been—never wanting Karl to see her upset. But then, she would turn away and attempt to cry silently, which she was terrible at. He always knew when she was crying. But it started this way. “Then let me teach you about snow. That was the purpose of today’s walk. To read the snow.”

“Read the snow?”

she asked in a mocking tone. But she turned to face him, and that was something. The tip of her nose was red, but that could just as easily be from the cold weather and not tears. “As in, the frozen water that surrounds us.”

“Yes,”

Karl said, nodding, hoping he would be able to reel her in with this knowledge. “It is vital for anyone doing big mountain climbing to understand the conditions in which they find themselves. So I want to show you the snow, and how to tell the different kinds.”

“How can there be different kinds of snow? It’s all water, isn’t it?”

“Ja, but how that water freezes changes the way it behaves when a foot is placed upon it. When you live in these conditions, you learn by error. You do not, and we will find snow on the mountain even in July. You must learn.”

Justine’s posture relaxed and she crossed her arms. “Fine. Teach me the snow.”

Karl smiled, not that she could tell under his scarf. “It has to do with the amount of moisture in the air, the temperature, and the wind. This snow?”

He brought his heel down hard on the packed, crusty snow. “Old and hardpacked. It is more like rock, and will last late into the thaw.”

He pulled off his mitten, bent and scraped what he could from the surface of it. “Look at it closely.” He dropped it in her hand.

She brought the clump of dirty snow up to her face. “Looks like snow to me.”

Fine. She wanted to be a difficult pupil, this was her prerogative. “Keep that in your hand.”

He walked over to the stream and broke off the overhanging crust that had formed in the last day or two. The clump was clear, not white, and had space between each crystal. He dumped it into her hand next to the other clump. “And this one?”

A line formed between her eyebrows. “They are different.”

“Tell me how,”

he said, hoping he sounded patient, like a good teacher.

“The second one looks more like crystals than a solid lump, like the first one.”

“Good, yes, yes.”

He nodded, hoping she would continue her thought, but she didn’t. Well, there was no need to go into detail if she wasn’t interested. “Which would you rather walk on?”

“The first one. It looks like a solid rock, not like a piece of jewelry.”

“Good. Lesson one complete.”

“That’s it? Don’t walk on snow that looks like you shouldn’t walk on it?”

She dropped the snow on the ground and put her hands on her hips.

“You told me very clearly that snow is just snow. There were no types of snow. Now you’ve seen two different types, and you know which is safe to walk on and which isn’t. That is progress.”

Karl turned around to head back to the inn, gambling that she would stop him. He hoped she would stop him and ask more questions. This was important, but he didn’t want to force the knowledge on her.

“That’s it? We’re going back inside?”

Justine said behind him.

“Do you wish to learn about more snow?”

This was his hope, but she was clearly uneasy, and he didn’t understand why.

“Yes,”

she said impatiently.

“Will you tell me what is wrong? You do not seem yourself.”

She bent backwards and looked at the sky and groaned. “Why are you like this?”

“Why are you like that?”

he shot back. Instead of answering, she glared daggers at him, which he didn’t mind at all, because at least she was looking at him.

“I really don’t like you,”

she said, folding her arms again.

He took a step closer to her. “I think you do like me. At least a little.”

She sighed. “Lady Rascomb is worried about how appropriate it is that I go on these outdoor excursions that are not exercise-focused without a chaperone of some kind. It is not how a young lady is supposed to behave in England.”

“But Fr?ulein Bridewell disagrees?”

Karl asked, thinking back to the whispering trio before Justine agreed to go with him this afternoon.

Justine wobbled her head. “In a way. She has realized that I . . . that I . . .”

she trailed off.

Karl could have taken pity on her and changed the subject, but he was far too curious about what she would say.

“I do not admire many men. But I do admire you.”

He had been ready to stamp his feet from the cold, but he suddenly felt quite warm. “Admire? Is that a strong word in English?”

As far as he understood, in English, one could admire a horse. Or a nice cake. Or a sunset. Did this mean she liked how he looked?

She scoffed. “Don’t let it go to your head. What’s the next lesson about snow?”

***