Homecoming Girls (14 page)

She searched again, only higher this time, and then she spotted a rocky outcrop jutting out from the side of the mountain. ‘Yes,’ she said triumphantly. ‘I see it.’

In one movement she lowered the eyeglass and turned to find him gazing at her.

‘I beg your pardon.’ Swiftly he took a step back and turned to glance again out of the window. ‘My brothers are often in the forests above Dreumel’s Creek and every day I look for a sign from them.’

‘Are these your real brothers or members of your – your community?’

He laughed. ‘Tribe, do you mean, Miss Newmarch?’

‘I don’t know what I mean,’ she confessed. ‘I’m sure that in England we’re not given a true picture of the Indian situation.
I have heard a little of the Seven Years War, which is now part of history, and of various treaties which guaranteed land to your people, but learned more about the gold rush of 1849.’

‘Then I’m impressed,’ he said, ‘for you appear to know more than might be expected of you.’

She blushed. ‘I admit that I did some reading about the founding of America before I left home, but there’s little written about the Indians; and in the articles I have seen . . .’ She hesitated, not wanting to offend.

Looking down at her, he said softly, ‘We are described as wild savages?’

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Which is plainly untrue.’

Quite untrue, she thought. Of him at any rate. I can’t begin to consider the rest of his nation. I can only look at him and see someone who is trying to integrate, to make something of his life. But more than that, he is a most attractive man and it’s as well that we are leaving tomorrow because when he stands so close I can feel my senses pounding and I wouldn’t trust myself to remain in control if we stayed.

James Crawford turned again to the window. ‘Behind the escarpment is another trail, obscured and rarely used. Mr and Mrs Thompson must have got lost in the forest and come across it by accident. It was fortunate that they were found. They wouldn’t have easily come down the mountain by themselves. My brothers do not often venture so far above Dreumel, especially at night, but,’ he shrugged, ‘perhaps they sensed something; the older men have keen powers of perception.’

‘The fire, you mean?’

‘Yes. Fire is a forceful element; it affects us all.’

‘Do your brothers live near? Is there a settlement here?’

‘The nearest settlement is No Name, which is where I was born. My mother is mixed race, my father a true Iroquois.’ He gave a wry grimace. ‘They lost me for a while after I
came over
to the other side, especially when I went to Philadelphia; but since I’ve lived in Dreumel’s Creek they come regularly to check up on me in the hope that one day I’ll return to my rightful place.’

Clara was fascinated and couldn’t keep her eyes from his face. He’s from another world, she thought. An ancient community so much older than ours.

‘The Iroquois confederacy was formed many years ago and the different nations are disbanded, but there are still small groups of Mohawks, Senecas and Oneidas who try to live as
our ancestors did and strive to claim their land back.’ He was speaking quietly, almost as if to himself.

‘And will you?’ she asked softly. ‘Go back to them? You can perhaps be of use to them: a spokesperson, a bridge between two communities.’

He turned towards her and, as if on impulse, leaned forward and kissed her tenderly on the mouth. ‘If I cannot find what I want here,’ he murmured and transfixed her with his dark eyes, ‘then yes, I think I will.’

A flush suffused Clara’s cheeks. She was overwhelmed by his action, but rather than being angry or insulted she felt as if her bones had melted into water. She wanted more than anything to reciprocate, to put her arms round his neck and let him kiss her again.

They gazed at each other, Clara breathing as if she had run up a flight of stairs, not out of breath but exhilarated by the climb. He took hold of her hand and pressed it to his lips. ‘I know I am behaving irresponsibly,’ he whispered. ‘But I am totally intoxicated by you. By your beauty, your manner, your sensibility. Forgive me.’ He stepped away from her. ‘I don’t mean to offend you.’

She put her hand to her throat and felt a pulse throbbing. ‘What do you want of me?’

He shook his head. ‘Everything – and nothing. That you haven’t spurned me is enough.’

He closed his eyes for a second and then, opening them, said softly, ‘It is the first time I have kissed a woman.’

There was a silence between them. Clara didn’t know what to say or to do and neither did she want to break the spell. A sense of warmth enveloped her, light, protective, and yet at the same time releasing and liberating her. She had always thought of herself as emancipated because she had been brought up by sensible parents, yet she was still bound by convention and propriety. She suddenly thought of Thomas. Though they had been friends since childhood he had never so much as kissed her cheek or her hand, and she would have been astonished if he had.

And it would have been nice if he had done so, she thought, for then I might have been prepared for this. With that experience behind me I would have known that a simple kiss could take me into another place. One of sensuous anticipation of something more.

As they stood close and, though not touching, aware of each other’s nearness, a noise from outside brought them from their reverie. There was the sound of hooves and cheering. They both blinked, and it was as if they had awoken from a dreaming state; both stepped back, and had anyone come into the room it would have appeared that there was an insurmountable chasm between them.

‘The Thompsons,’ he murmured. ‘They’ve been brought down from the mountain. They’ve come into Dreumel, not Yeller.’

Clara wanted to ask him how he knew, but her tongue appeared to be locked. But then, she thought, why would I ask and what would he say? He just knew.

At the front of the hotel a crowd had gathered around the Thompsons and they seemed overcome by the welcome. As they haltingly told their story, it seemed that they had decided to ride up into the mountains from Yeller and take a look at the town from above, probably following the same track that Jewel and Clara had taken with Caitlin the day before, but then they had continued higher into the forest trail. On turning round to come back they realized that they had taken the wrong path and were quite lost.

It was as darkness was falling and they were still searching for the way out that they heard the crackle of fire and were at first terrified that the forest was alight, and again plunged deeper into the trees; they could smell burning pine and see the columns of smoke, and then they heard the shouts of men. It was a relief followed by dismay when they realized that it was not the forest that was on fire, but the town below them.

‘We followed the light of the flames to find our way back to the tree line,’ Bert said, ‘and saw the whole of Yeller ablaze, but we still couldn’t get down. The horses were as nervous
as we were; they were snickering and snorting and very restless, so we took them back into the forest and tied them up, and then we sat on the ridge and watched. We couldn’t have come down anyway because by then it was pitch dark and we couldn’t see the path at all.’

‘And then,’ his wife said, taking up the story, ‘the horses quite suddenly became quiet and when we went back towards them we saw—’

‘Indians!’ Bert said. ‘They were standing by the horses and talking to them and breathing into their nostrils.’ He glanced up the steps to the boardwalk and then to the porch, where James Crawford was standing with Clara and some of the hotel staff. ‘And,’ he continued, ‘they said they would bring us down this morning and let someone know that we were safe before a search party was sent out.’

‘They gave us food,’ Sarah said. ‘And water and a blanket to wrap round us. We’re very grateful,’ she added huskily. ‘We might have died.’

‘Don’t often see Indians in this neck o’ the woods.’ A man chewing tobacco spat out a stream of brown spittle. He too glanced up at James Crawford. ‘’Cept tame ones,’ he added in a low voice. ‘The wild ones mainly stay on their own land.’

James Crawford had heard. He lifted his head, showing his muscular neck, and without a word, though his lips were set in a tight line, he turned round and went inside.

‘Why’d ya say you want to meet the Chinaman?’ Caitlin asked as they walked down the main street. ‘Do you need some medicine? If it’s that time of the month I’ve got aspirin.’

‘No. No, it’s not that, thank you.’ Jewel flushed at Caitlin’s frankness. ‘I want to talk to him. About the Chinese and how they came to be in America.’

Caitlin frowned. ‘Well, I guess they were looking for gold, same as everybody else. Sun Wa came during the gold rush, so they say, but I don’t know why he settled in Dreumel’s Creek: most of them went to California.’ She shrugged. ‘He’s been here for as long as I can remember, anyway. Sun Sen runs the
laundry in Yeller. Well, he did; his middle daughter went to school with me.’

She glanced at Jewel and then, tucking her arm into hers, guided her round a large puddle of water from the previous evening’s downpour. ‘You don’t think of yourself as Chinese, do you, Jewel? Cos you’re just such a pure English lady.’

‘But I’m not!’Jewel protested. ‘I was born in America just as you were. But I had an English father and a Chinese mother, so what does that make me?’

Caitlin blew out her cheeks. ‘Well, I had an Irish grandmother and parents from Yorkshire, England,’ she said, adding: ‘That’s in the north of England.’

Jewel hid a wry smile. ‘Yes, I know,’ she said. ‘That’s where I live.’

‘We’re all a mixture,’ Caitlin persisted. ‘So you don’t really need to go searching. Anyway, we’re here. This is where Sun Wa lives.’

They stood outside the single-storeyed store. In the window were dusty boxes with Chinese writing on them and dishes filled with what looked like tea leaves. Yes, Jewel thought. I know we’re a mixture. Caitlin knows about her ancestry because her mother and father have told her. But I know nothing about my mother or how she came to be in America, because no one knew her. Perhaps my father did, but he’s no longer here to tell me.

She swallowed hard. ‘Shall we knock?’

‘Caitlin! Hello.’ A round-faced Chinese girl opened the door to them. She bowed her head in acknowledgement of Jewel and then tilted it as she said, ‘Grandfather is not available at the moment. Can I help you? Or my father’s here.’

‘This is my friend from England,’ Caitlin told her. ‘Jewel, this is Lucy. I told you we were at school together.’

The girl bowed her head again in Jewel’s direction and said hello and then said to Caitlin, ‘We were burnt out, did you hear? That’s why we’re staying with Grandfather.’ She had no trace of a Chinese accent.

‘Could I speak to your father?’ Jewel asked, disappointed that she couldn’t speak to the older man.

‘Of course.’ Lucy opened the door wider. ‘Welcome.’

They stepped inside the dark interior and needed a moment or two for their eyes to adjust to the dimness after the brightness of outdoors. There was a piquant tang of smoke in the air: not the kind from a wood fire, nor the charcoaled smell of burning which drifted over Dreumel from Yeller, but something more elusive, something sweet and yet potent.

Their eyes opened to reveal a small room; against one wall was a square table covered by an oiled cloth and two chairs beside it. They were invited to sit down. On the opposite wall was an alcove with a half-drawn cotton curtain and another table within it; next to it was an entrance which had no door but a beaded curtain obscuring the room beyond. The beads rattled as Lucy went through them, again delivering to Jewel a half-forgotten memory.

Jewel and Caitlin looked at each other and Caitlin wrinkled her nose; at the aroma, Jewel supposed. After a moment the beads rattled again and Lucy’s father, Sun Sen, came through. He wore a spherical cap, a short jacket with a mandarin collar and narrow black trousers.

He clasped his hands together and, bowing low from the waist, asked if he might do anything to assist them.

‘Miss Allen,’ he said to Caitlin, ‘I hope your family have not been inconvenienced by the fire.’ He then turned to Jewel. ‘I am a herbalist,’ he explained. ‘Like my father. But I have been making my living in the laundry for many years. Now it seems that I must go back to my original occupation.’

‘I’m very sorry to bother you,’ Jewel said. ‘It must be a difficult time for you and I’m not in need of a herbalist or a launderer, but tomorrow I am leaving for California and intend to search for my mother’s history. She was Chinese,’ she added, thinking that it was probably unnecessary to do so. ‘She died not long after I was born. In San Francisco.’

She gazed into his round face and black eyes, so like his
daughter’s. ‘I don’t know where to begin,’ she pleaded. ‘Can you help me?’

He surveyed her solemnly. Then he said, ‘Thousands of Chinese came to America in search of a better life. Most were men who worked the gold fields or on the railroads. There were few women. The men sent any money they earned back to China to feed their families, which is what my father did. Very few of the families were able to follow them, and many of the men intended to return to China when they had made enough money to afford to do so, but died in the attempt without ever seeing their wives or children again. Thanks to my father’s determination, my mother and older brother and sister were the lucky ones able to join him here. Perhaps your mother was from such a family.’