Janet Quin-Harkin (20 page)

Libby laughed and took them.

“Were you about to tell me I was incorrigible or insufferable?”

Libby shook her head. “No,” she said.

“Then I’d better be on my way,” Gabe said. He held out his hand. “Goodbye, Mrs. Hugh Grenville. It was really nice knowing you.”

Libby took his hand, although her own was trembling. “Goodbye, Mr. Foster. I wish you every happiness.”

“And I you, Mrs. Grenville,” Gabe said. He walked over to his horse and lifted down the children, kissing each in turn as he set them down. “Bye, princesses. Be good to your mommie. Take care of her, won’t you?”

Eden tugged at his coat. “Do you have to go?” she asked, her lip quivering.

“I’m afraid so. You’ll soon have your daddy here to take care of you. You don’t need me.”

He swung into the saddle, dug in his spurs, and set off at a brisk trot down the street. Libby watched until the cloud of dust behind him had settled. Then she took the children and went into the hotel.

“I’d like a room for a few days,” she said as a huge man in a leather apron appeared.

“Passing through, are ya?” he asked

“I’ve just arrived from Boston. I’m coming out to join my husband,” Libby said.

“That wasn’t your husband I saw arrive with ya?” he asked, a spark of interest flickering in his eyes.

“He was just a kindly fellow traveller who rescued me and my daughters after an accident along the trail.”

“You crossed the plains all alone?” The man looked impressed.

“We came on ahead of the main party,” Libby said. “They were travelling slower with oxen. They’ll be coming down the pass.”

“I expect you could do with a good meal then,” the hotel keeper said. “Pretty poor food out on the trail, right?”

“We’d love a meal,” Libby said, “and a hot bath.”

“I’ll have hot water sent up to your room,” the man said. “What would you like for your meal?”

“There’s a choice?” Libby asked, amazed.

“Lady, you can get anything here you want,” the man said. “Oysters, ham and eggs, steaks, peaches. You name it, we’ve got it.”

“I don’t believe it,” Libby exclaimed in wonder. “You’ve really got oysters?”

“Real favorite of the miners, they are,” the man said. “They like them fried up with ham and eggs.”

“That sounds really good,” Libby exclaimed. “I’ll try it. And maybe a boiled egg each for the little girls?”

Soon they were sitting on a real bed in a room that had a wooden floor but canvas walls and roof. Red calico draped across the window frame gave the room a pleasant pink glow and made it feel like an exotic tent. A Chinese servant appeared with a hip bath and hot water, adding to the exotic atmosphere. Libby looked at him with interest. She didn’t ever remember seeing a real Chinese person before and was fascinated by his loose pants and jacket and the long black pigtail down his back. He, on the other hand, displayed no interest at all in pouring water for a strange woman. When he was done he gave the slightest of bows and left. Libby looked at all that hot water.

“Come on, you lucky ladies, time for a bath,” she said, starting to undo Bliss’s dress.

“I don’t want a bath. I like being dirty,” Bliss protested.

“If you don’t have a bath your papa will not recognize you,” Libby said sternly and pulled the dress over her head.

With her daughters clean and wrapped in towels, Libby allowed herself the luxury of sitting without her clothes in warm, clean water. Then, of course, she wished she had clean clothes to change into.

“We’ll have to go shopping tomorrow, children,” she said.

“I need a new dolly. You promised,” Bliss complained.

“And we need new dresses, Mama,” Eden added. “Mine’s too small and it’s all dirty.”

“We’ll see what we can do,” Libby said. “I hope there’s a store in town that sells clothing. We’ll have to be careful with our money. We don’t know how long until we find Papa.”

“Mr. Foster offered to give you some money, but you wouldn’t take it,” Eden said accusingly.

“We couldn’t take Mr. Foster’s money. We don’t accept money from strangers,” Libby said.

“Mr. Foster wasn’t a stranger. He was nice,” Eden said firmly.

“He was very nice, but it still wouldn’t have been right to take his money. He’ll need it himself and we’ll be fine,” Libby said.

She shook as much dust and dirt as she could out of their clothing and went down to the dining room. The hotelier, who told her his name was Big George, waited on her personally, making her feel that she had stepped back into Boston for a second. Libby could not remember when anything had tasted quite so delicious; the moist oysters with their salty taste of ocean and the juicy ham and fresh eggs, together with real bread to mop it up with. Although it was a man-sized plate, Libby cleared every morsel. So did the two girls. As she finished eating and washed it down with a big mug of coffee, men began to return up the street, talking loudly, reminding her that she had been bathing and eating while a hanging had been taking place.

Have I already become so callous, so insensitive? she wondered. Survival had been such a primary concern for so many months, she decided it had truly been a case of everyone for himself with no time or energy to think too much about others. If I had wept for every grave along the way, I should have no more tears left, she thought. This is a harsh world and I have to live in it for a while.

She finished the last of her coffee, then looked around the room. The interior walls were also calico draped and there was a potted fern in the corner to try and convey some elegance to the primitive wooden trestle table and the mismatched chairs. On the doorframe a slate was tacked. It read: Oisters 1 doller apeese. Eggs 75 sents. shampayne ten dollers a bottel.

“I don’t believe it,” Libby said, getting up hurriedly from the table. “It must be some sort of joke.”

She walked through to the reception area where Big George was now talking to three other men, listening to their vivid descriptions of how the hanging had gone. They all fell silent and looked at Libby as she approached.

“Good meal, missus?” the hotelier asked.

“Very good,” Libby said. “Would you like me to pay for it right now or with my room bill?”

“Suit yourself,” the hotelier said. “You’d have trouble skipping town without paying. Women are as rare as hen’s teeth out here. Everyone would know exactly where you were.”

“I’d rather pay as I go,” Libby said. “What do I owe you?”

The man sucked at his teeth. “By my reckoning it comes to ten dollars and fifty cents.”

“For one meal?” Libby asked, unable to keep her composure any longer.

“That’s the prices around these parts,” George said, still smiling pleasantly. “Most folks is surprised at first, but the miners are willing to pay anything to get luxuries from home. Supplies are real short, see. If I can bring peaches up from Chile and oysters in tins around the Horn, then I can charge what I like for them, for you’ll not find them anywhere else.”

“I see,” Libby said. She managed a gracious nod. “You may add the meal to my bill.”

The sound of scuffling outside the open door made her look around to see the doorway crowded with staring faces. “See,” she heard a loud whisper. “I told ya there was a real live woman in town.”

“Who does she belong to?” another whisper asked.

“Ask her if she’s a widder.”

“No you, I don’t know how to talk to women anymore.”

Libby realized that this was a good chance. She smiled at them. “Good day to you,” she said. “My name is Mrs. Hugh Grenville. I’ve just arrived from the States and I’ve come to join my husband. I wonder if any of you know where I might find him. His name’s Hugh Grenville. . . .”

She saw a big grin spread over all the ugly faces.

“What’s so amusing?” she asked.

“Pardon me, ma’am, but none of us goes by his proper name here. We’re all Frenchy Joe and Pious Pete and Little Jim. We don’t know a thing about each other and we don’t want to know.”

“They sing a song here, ma’am,” another man said. “Go on, sing it, Willie!”

A young boy blushed but sang in a good voice:

“Oh, what was your name in the States,

Was it Thompson or Johnson or Bates,

Did you flee for your life or murder your wife?

Say what was your name in the States?”

“But my husband should be easy to find, even if he has no name,” Libby said. “He’s an Englishman. An English gentleman, very proper. He talks very correctly and likes to dress well. . . .”

“You know anyone like that, Frenchie?” one of the men asked.

Several of them guffawed so that Libby couldn’t hear the muttered answer.

“We’ll keep our eyes open, ma’am. If we find him, we’ll tell him you’re staying here, will we?”

“Thank you, I’d appreciate that,” Libby said.

The men ambled away. Libby turned to the hotelier. “Once they spread the word, it shouldn’t take too long, should it?”

Big George shook his head kindly. “I wouldn’t hope for too much,” he said. “Chances are, even if they know where he is, they wouldn’t tell you.”

“Why on earth not?”

Big George shrugged. “Plenty of men come to the mines to get away from their wives. They’ll probably think you’re a no-good, interfering woman out to spoil a man’s fun, if you’ll pardon my saying so.”

“Then I’ll have to start searching myself,” Libby said. “I’ve come this far. I’m not going to give up now.”

I
T WAS ONLY
after a week of exhaustive searching that Libby finally realized how hopeless a quest she had taken on. On the way to California she had imagined the mines as one little area, like a coal mine, but not as deep, with all the men crowded together digging. Now as she enquired, she found there were hundreds of little settlements stretched up and down a hundred miles of rugged country and new settlements being formed with every new gold strike. Some of them were not even named yet. And as for Hugh standing out because of his English accent—every stretch of river had as many Germans and Swedes and Frenchmen and Englishmen and Mexicans and Chinese digging on it as it did Americans. There were hundreds of men who seemed to be called English Joe or London Louie or Frenchie or Sauerkraut. Libby tried to fight off the feeling of despair that threatened to overcome her by poring over the map in the hotel lobby and trying to put herself into Hugh’s head. If he’d started from Independence, it was likely he had come into Hangtown. If so, he would have gone to the first big strike he heard about. She tried asking George when the various discoveries were made, but he was vague and unhelpful, claiming that men were finding new places to dig every day.

It was with a feeling of grim determination that she marched the children down to the livery stable and rented a horse for herself. She chose a big, steady bay and set the children up in front of her, not wanting to leave them alone in the hotel room. Although Hangtown was almost deserted by day, excitement or violence could flare up at any moment and the evenings were always rowdy. A man would run through town yelling that he’d struck it rich and suddenly it would be rifles fired into the air and free drinks all round. Or a quarrel would flare up over a claim or even over a small insult and men would go for their guns. Libby could not believe the matter-of-fact way that dead men were dragged out of the road, as if they were pieces of litter. In the evening she would hear the talk floating up from the barroom downstairs that “poor old so-and-so had copped it today.” Then someone would comment that he shouldn’t have claim jumped and the matter would be forgotten. It seemed that life was as impermanent as the tent cities that were springing up.

Each day of her first week in Hangtown Libby headed the horse out in a different direction, trying to talk to as many people as possible. It was hard going up and down mountainsides on trails only just wide enough for a single horse. Luckily, she had chosen a good horse and he was very sure-footed as they slithered down sandy slopes and had to ford rushing streams. She soon found that all settlements were deserted during daylight. Every able-bodied man was out working on his claim. Only the sick lay in their tents or cabins and Libby was not too anxious to get close enough to question them.

The miners who were working did not welcome her either. Gold was the number-one priority and they wanted to get as much as they could before the winter rains came in earnest. They stopped work just long enough to look at her curiously, but when she asked about her husband they all shrugged or shook their heads and excused themselves to get back to their work, so that she began to believe what George had said was true. They had a code not to ask questions about anyone and certainly not to betray him to his wife.

After six days of journeying around under a hot September sun, Libby sat on the hotel bed and stared at the wall, trying to decide what she should do next. The little girls lay asleep, relaxed as only children can be whatever their surroundings. She took the last of her money from her pouch and spread it out on the bed. By the time she had paid the hotel and food bills there would be precious little left; enough for a couple of weeks of board at the hotel.

“I can’t go back,” Libby muttered to herself. “I’ve no money to pay the fare and I couldn’t subject the children to that trip again. I can’t afford a boat either, so I have to assume I’m stuck here.” She looked down at the sleeping faces. “And somehow we’ve got to survive, even if we have to take up gold digging ourselves.”

In the morning she sought out George.

“Any news about your husband yet?” he asked before she could say anything.

“Not yet,” she said. “This is taking longer than I planned. Can you suggest somewhere cheaper to live, where I could maybe do my own cooking?”

George looked down at her and shrugged his big shoulders expressively. “There are a couple of boarding houses, but they board ten men to a room or to a tent, as the case may be, in bunks,” he said. “The men don’t care where they sleep right now—a barrel, a tent, a few branches over them. That will all change when they see what the rains are like.” He grinned, then looked at her with pity. “There’s no place for a woman here yet, or for little children. My advice to you would be to take the stage down to Sacramento and then get a ship down to San Francisco. I hear they’re getting quite citified there. You’d feel more at home.”