Jubilee Trail (68 page)

“Oh yes, I forgot, you told me you were going to Russia. That will be fine. You don’t know when you’ll start, do you?”

“Do you want me to go?”

“Well, you do get on my nerves,” she returned with a sigh.

The Brute smiled complacently and returned to his bottle. Florinda said, “You look very cheerful too.” He burst out laughing, so abruptly that he spilt some wine on the floor. She was referring to a remark he had made before they left Kerridge’s. Mr. Kerridge had told Florinda he was going to miss her, one reason being that she had such a cheerful disposition and smiled so brightly at everybody. The Brute heard him, and after Mr. Kerridge had gone out of earshot the Brute turned to Florinda with a wicked grin, asking, “Are all civilized men as easy to fool as that?” When she demanded to know what nonsense he was talking now, the Brute replied, “You do not smile because you are cheerful. You smile because you have such beautiful teeth. If your teeth were crooked you would be much more solemn than you are.”

Now, as he laughed and spilt his wine, she laughed too, but she ordered, “Wipe that up. We have spiders enough without putting out bait for them.”

The Brute drew out one of his beautiful embroidered handkerchiefs and obeyed. Florinda stood up, taking her workbasket, and started toward the door leading to the stairs.

“Look, Brute, I can’t sit here gabbling forever. I’m going back to work tending bar tomorrow, and I’ve got a lot to do today.”

“Are you mad with me?” he asked with a grin.

“Oh, go to St. Petersburg,” said Florinda.

Silky’s Place was prospering vastly. It was the only saloon in town that was well supplied with whiskey. Few of the native wineshops had any whiskey, for the Californios did not care for it. But before the war Silky and Florinda had bought all they could get from the smugglers, and thanks to Mr. Abbott, they still had their stock. With it, they had most of the Yankee trade.

Now that the girls were back at work the saloon was open twelve hours a day: from eight in the morning till noon, and again from four o’clock till midnight. Both Silky and Florinda regretted having to close in the afternoons, for it cut down the profits. But the army, having had one revolt, wanted to get the Californios into a friendly mood. Yankees who owned places of business were told to keep in tune with the local customs.

Since business was so good they decided to improve the saloon. They put wall-benches along both sides of the barroom, and a table in front of each bench. They also added some extra space at one side of the building. This meant they would have another storeroom, and also another bedroom upstairs, so Garnet and Florinda could have two rooms instead of one. They joyfully set Isabel to work making new bedspreads and wall-curtains. For though they had not much leisure, it was refreshing to have pleasant rooms of their own to spend it in.

As John had told them, Los Angeles was teeming with Yankees. There were men of the regular army; Frémont was still here with the men who had marched with him from the north; and there was also the Mormon battalion under Colonel Philip St. George Cooke.

The Mormons were very well-behaved. This was partly because their religion enjoined a strict code of morals, and partly because Colonel Cooke kept them so busy that they had little time for mischief. He first set them to work getting rid of the wild dogs that swarmed over Los Angeles. He told them to catch and kill every dog that did not have an owner who would be responsible for it. This took several weeks, and when it was done the town was so much more agreeable that everybody asked why it had not been done long ago.

Having got rid of the dogs, Colonel Cooke told his men to clean up the town. They cleared the streets of garbage, whitewashed the houses, and cut down the weeds. Garnet and Florinda wished they would stay forever. Not all the Mormons were as good as their elders wanted them to be, but they were a very decent lot, and to the astonishment of both Garnet and Florinda, most of them actually did not drink. They gathered on the saloon porch, or they even came inside for the chance to talk to two real American girls, but they had been taught that liquor was an invention of Satan and they would not touch it.

Like most converts to a new religion they were devout to the point of fanaticism, but except when someone questioned their tenets they were very polite. Whenever Garnet or Florinda came out on the porch, bound on an errand, two or three Mormons would spring up from somewhere, bowing and asking for the honor of being escorts, “since you never can tell when some lowdown fellow might forget his raising, ma’am.” The girls always accepted the bodyguard. The town now had so many more men than women that it was hardly safe to go out alone. Garnet thanked heaven for the Mormons, and Florinda, though she regretted the money they did not spend at the bar, had to agree that it was mighty nice to have all these sober men around.

The upper-class families of Los Angeles had made friends with the army officers soon after their arrival. The Yankees gave balls and dinners, and added a new gaiety to the life of the village. But the general run of the people did not like the Yankee soldiers.

To begin with, there were simply too many of them. They overran everything, they crowded the stores and saloons; and though Estelle’s establishment was larger than it used to be and now had several rivals, still nice girls had to be carefully guarded. Besides, the Yankees had no respect for the native ways and were not tactful about saying so. The Yankees had been taught every day of their lives that there was no sin greater than laziness. In the United States the most scornful remark you could make about a man was to say, “He won’t work.” But the Angelenos had the old Spanish idea that work was a curse.

The Angelenos lived in mud shacks. Their streets were choked with weeds and rubbish. They had no schoolhouse. They had no wish to learn anything or to change anything. All day long they sat in the sun and talked and dozed and sipped red wine. The Yankees, fresh from the bustle of their own country, watched the Angelenos with a mystified contempt. Why, they demanded, why didn’t the lazy fools
do
something?

The Angelenos, who saw no reason why they should do anything they did not have to, gazed with equal bafflement upon these men who could not keep still. The Yankees were always moving something or scrubbing something or trying to make something different from the way it was. The Angelenos thought they were a public nuisance.

Though Pico and Castro had long since fled the country, there was a legend going around that they would come back and chase out the foreigners. The children had a song about it, which they shouted at the Americans in the street. Garnet heard it for what seemed like the thousandth time, one April morning as she was coming back to the saloon from Mr. Abbott’s, where she had been to buy flannel to make nightgowns for Stephen. She was walking between two escorts, a big red-headed Mormon named McConnell and a small dark Mormon named Dorkins. McConnell carried her parcel, while he and Dorkins each held one of her elbows, guiding her with earnest care.

“Here’s a puddle, ma’am, now be just a wee mite careful,” McConnell was saying, when a group of three or four youngsters in a doorway they had just passed, began to sing vehemently.

Poco tiempo

Viene Castro

Con mucho gente—

¡Vamos Americanos!

Grinning, the Mormons glanced back at the children. “I get the idea in a general way,” McConnell said to Garnet, “but what does it mean?”

“Why, it means that pretty soon Castro is coming back with a big force, and when he does—scat, Americans!”

Dorkins wanted to know who Castro was. Garnet had begun to explain that he had formerly been the military commandant, when McConnell said,

“Why, it wasn’t us they were singing at. It was them rich folks down the road on horseback. Say, they’re grand, ain’t they?”

Garnet glanced over her shoulder. Down the road, she saw a procession approaching. The riders were Charles Hale and a dozen retainers, mounted in their usual splendor. Garnet drew the soldiers to a standstill and felt her bosom get hot with a curious anger as she caught sight of the woman riding at his side. So this was the former Mrs. Lydia Radney, now Mrs. Hale. As the train came nearer Garnet watched her with a wrathful interest.

Lydia Hale was about thirty years old. At least as tall as her husband, perhaps a trifle taller, firm of shoulder and straight of spine, she sat her horse (thought Garnet, remembering the young ladies’ academy) like a governess who had to set an example to her pupils. She was as colorless as a pencil sketch. Her clear pale skin had hardly a touch of pink even at the cheekbones; her hair was the grayish-brown that is neither dark nor light but the shade of a dead leaf; and her eyes were merely eyes, with no particular shade of their own. Even her riding-dress had no color: it was dark gray, with a line of white about the throat. But nevertheless, in a cold granite way, Lydia Hale was a handsome woman. Her features were finely cut, she had a good figure, and her dress was made of good material and well fitted. Her whole appearance was austere, and nothing about her suggested warmth or friendliness, but she was by no means ugly. And while she was certainly not a woman with a talent for gracious trifles, still in matters of importance she looked as if she would be quite capable of holding her own.

As they drew near and passed, Charles saw Garnet. He made no gesture of greeting. His eyes paused for an instant, and then he looked away, like a man carefully not seeing a poor relation. Mrs. Hale saw Garnet too. Charles must have told her who this stranger was, for though they had never seen each other before, Lydia’s eyes swept her over with a cool, speculative curiosity (as though I were a savage with a ring in my nose, Garnet thought). Then the other woman’s nostrils quivered and her lips curled faintly in contemptuous dismissal, and she too looked away.

Garnet felt anger rising and wrapping around her like a flame. At the moment she would have enjoyed using the Colt revolver at her belt. Her eyes narrowed as she watched the procession go by.

I should like to kill them, she thought fiercely. Taking Oliver’s property from me and then sneering at me because I have to make a living tending bar. Damn that woman and her curling lip. Does she think I
like
having my child grow up in a saloon?

The brilliant line of riders turned around the corner of a building and went out of sight. Probably they were on their way to the home of Señor Escobar.

“Say, Miss Garnet,” exclaimed McConnell’s voice beside her, “don’t you feel good? You look kind of feverish.”

Garnet was not surprised. She certainly felt feverish. She said she had a raging headache, which she did. McConnell and Dorkins walked back to the saloon with her, and said goodby on the porch. Garnet went into the kitchen and told Mickey to make a pot of strong coffee. Sitting by the table she covered her face with her hands. “Please, God, let me go home,” she whispered. “Please, please, get me out of this place!”

B
UT IN THE DAYS
that followed, Garnet grew calmer. She did not like Charles any better than before. But her common sense told her that after the war American courts would be set up in California. When this happened, as the widow of a man who had owned property she could demand an accounting for her son.

How soon this would be she could not tell, as the war was not yet over. For the present she would have to stay at the bar. But with what she could earn, together with what Oliver had left, she could pay her passage home after the war. There would no doubt be something over, which her father could invest for her. She would have again the safe and pleasant life she used to have, and this time she would never, never let it go.

Down in a corner of her mind a little demon whispered, And John?

Be still, Garnet retorted. I’m going home.

She strapped on her gun-belt and went back to work.

Working at the bar was harder now than it had been last fall, for there were more customers and the hours were longer. Garnet did not like the airless room, full of the fumes of liquor and the smell of sweaty bodies; she did not like having men stroke her and pinch her and make indecent suggestions. Not all the men were like this, but sometimes she thought the respectful ones were even more exasperating. For they had a way of saying, “You ought not to be in a place like this, Miss Garnet.” They said it reproachfully, as if they thought she was tending bar because she wanted to. Sometimes, late at night when she was short-tempered from weariness, she let a snappish reply escape her lips. But not often. One terse line from her, and instantly Florinda’s eyes were sending a warning. As soon as the bar was closed and they were alone Florinda urged, “Garnet, please remember, they come in here to have fun. You and I are part of the fun. Any peevish old crone can pour liquor out of a bottle.”

Garnet smiled ruefully. “I know. I’m sorry. If only my back didn’t ache so at the end of the day I’d have a sweeter disposition.”

“Yes, dearie,” said Florinda. She was not impressed by backaches. She had laughed and flirted above too many of her own. “How much money have you got on deposit at Mr. Abbott’s?” she asked.

“About two hundred dollars.”

“Mighty good to have, isn’t it? So smile at them, Garnet, and any time you feel like something that fell out of a garbage can, remember they’re paying you for every smile.”

During bar-hours Florinda was enchanting to the boys, and when closing time came she brushed them off like mosquitoes. If there had been one among them who had superlative charm, or one who could have offered her something like a really valuable bit of jewelry, she might not have been so cool. As it was, she was too busy to be interested. So she continued to occupy her pretty blue-curtained room all by herself.

But little by little, Garnet got used to the bar. She learned to say no in a quiet voice that clearly meant what it said, and she was no longer embarrassed by having to say it. She never did learn Florinda’s skill at bright answers, and she never acquired Florinda’s ability to listen with a look of fascination to yarns she had already heard forty times. But she did learn to stand up twelve hours a day without complaining about it, and talk cheerfully to the customers when she was so tired she thought her legs were going to buckle under her. She learned what a dollar meant in terms of time and aching muscles and screaming nerves, and this was one of the greatest surprises of her life.