Triumph of the Mountain Man Read Online Free PDF Page B

First call for dinner is at five. Or is that too early for your liking?”
    â€œYes, it is, a bit,” Smoke allowed.
    â€œWould seven be better?” Without conscious intent, Winnefred appeared coy.
    â€œPerfect. I’ll present myself to you then,” Smoke replied, working out of himself a gallantry he rarely had cause to display.
    â€œThen, I shall leave you to your cigar. And again, my sincerest thanks.”
    * * *
    When Smoke Jensen entered the dining car with Winnefred Larkin on his arm, it turned heads all up and down both sides of the aisle. They made a striking couple. Smoke led her to a vacant table and seated her, then drew up his own chair opposite. A rather recent addition, these rolling restaurants had been designed, like the sleeping cars, by George Mortimer Pullman. They had proven quite successful, much to the chagrin of the Harvey House chain of depot-based eating establishments. Smoke examined the menu, printed in flamboyant style, bold black on snowy white.
    â€œWhat sounds good to you?” Winnefred asked after a few silent moments of study. “Everything seems so strange to me.”
    Smoke nodded understanding. “I gather you are from the East, Miss Larkin? When one gets this far west, the larder on these dining cars is stocked from locally available food for the most part. See? There’s rainbow trout listed, though I don’t know what amandine means. Bison tongue, elk steak, and beef stew.”
    â€œPlease, make it Winnie. And, amandine means the fish is done with an almond and lemon sauce. Quite the rage in Philadelphia. Perhaps you would choose for the both of us, Smoke?”
    Never a fancy eater, Smoke Jensen concentrated to select something that he believed would please Winnie and yet not be too out of his ordinary fare. He selected cold, sliced bison tongue in a mildly hot sauce for an appetizer, then followed with elk steak, new potatoes and peas, cold pickled lettuce and hot bread. Winnie Larkin seemed enchanted with the choices. Their waiter, a large, smiling, colored man in a short, white jacket and black trousers, suggested a bottle of wine. At Smoke’s insistence, Winnie made the selection.
    For once it all turned out right, and even Smoke enjoyed the meal. Cut from the rib eye, the elk steak was juicy and tender. The California claret went well with it. Fortuitously, Smoke had asked that the cook withhold the green peppercorn sauce from the meat. It was rich and thick, and to the way Smoke thought, if a piece of meat was poor in quality, one could dump all the sauce in the world on it and not make it the least bit better. This time it was decidedly not needed.
    While they ate, Winnie kept up a light, fanciful banter about her travels in the West. She found New Orleans charming, Texas rough and exhilarating, Denver a cultural oasis in the midst of near-barbarism. Now she looked forward to Santa Fe. She had heard somewhere that the territorial governor had written a most popular book.
    â€œYes,” Smoke informed her. “It’s called Ben Hur. Surely you have read it?”
    â€œOh! Then General Lew Wallace is Governor Wallace? And, yes, I have read that book. It is so . . . uplifting.”
    When she learned Smoke was involved in breeding blooded horses, she waxed ecstatic over her childhood desire to have a papered horse. All her parents had, Winnie lamented, were a pair of plodding dray horses. She spoke of riding lessons as a girl in her teens and how she still longed to own a Thoroughbred of her own.
    Smoke quickly disabused her of that ambition. “I don’t raise Thoroughbreds. They are for racing and fancy shows back east. Mine are Palouse and Morgans and Arabians. Those of lower quality I sell to the army as remounts. Arabians are show horses, but a lot of military officers want, and can afford, them for parade horses. The Morgans are great for carriages as well as saddle stock. Since the Nez Perce have been forced onto