Memories of Gold (17 page)

Maria looked to her friend’s open wardrobe and recognized the truth in the words. “Your dresses are gone,” she stated, dumbfounded.

Josie shrugged. “Yep. I sold them to the tailor yesterday. That’s why I was there when the earthquake hit.”

Maria turned to Josie, whose face was drawn and tired. “Why? What’s going on, Josie?”

Josie shook her head. “Let’s discuss it another time. You have too many worries now as it is.”

Maria knew it was true, but she also saw the desperation in Josie. Something was very wrong. “Tell me.”

Josie looked down, shaking her head. “I’m sick, Mary.”

“But when you get better—“

“I won’t get better,” Josie said, cutting off Maria’s words. “The doctor told me yesterday morning.”

Maria sat on the bed, her head swimming. There was too much for her to absorb. She couldn’t lose someone else so soon.

After a long while, she turned to Josie. “How long…”

“I have a couple months yet, but the doc said I’ll get much worse right at the end.”

Maria was astonished. Josie seemed so collected, so calm about the whole thing. “Why aren’t you more upset, Josie?”

Josie shrugged. “I’m tired, I guess. Tired of fighting, tired of pretending. I’ve been here for years, you know? Ever since I was sixteen and left alone with nobody to help me. I made a decent go of it, but now I want time to relax and see my daughter a little before I’m finished.”

Maria didn’t know she had more tears to shed, but they streamed down her face. “You can’t die, Josie. Not you, too.”

Josie seemed surprised. “What do you mean? Who else died?”

The thought of repeating the words aloud tore at her, but Maria said them anyway. “Jimmy. He was shot yesterday.”

Josie jumped up, a cough racking her skinny frame. “No! When you said he was gone, I thought you meant … oh, Maria, I am so sorry. I should never have said anything.”

The two women wrapped their arms around one another and hugged for a long time.

When the two women finally separated, Maria took her friend’s shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Come with me,” she said.

Josie shook her head. “That’s ridiculous, Mary. You have enough to do taking care of yourself. I can’t have you take care of me as well. And I need to be someplace with Alice.”

Maria recognized the merit in her friend’s statement, and Josie didn’t even know about Emma yet, but that didn’t change what Maria knew to be right. “Josie, you are my dear friend. Is there someone you plan to spend these months with, except for Alice?”

Josie’s expression told Maria all she needed to know.

“Then please come with me, and bring Alice. I could use the company.”

Josie nodded reluctantly. “Fine, I will. But please, Mary, don’t let me be a burden on you. I can give you the money I have for my care, and for Alice’s when I’m gone. I received a fair amount for my dresses and things.”

Maria nodded, not wanting to argue. She just prayed nothing else would go wrong.

She stood, feeling the weight of exhaustion in her bones. “I need to find Daisy.”

“What are you going to tell her?”

Maria shrugged. “I’m just going to say that I’m leaving for Redding. She can make of it what she wants. I can’t—“

Maria stopped, not sure what she wanted to say; Josie nodded. There was no need to say anything more.

Jimmy awoke, his shoulder itching terribly. He bit the inside of his lip in frustration. He couldn’t leave, couldn’t move much on his own, and now he couldn’t even sleep, all because of a little hole in his shoulder. He knew of plenty of men who had gotten shot and continued on with their lives without a problem, but the pain was still excruciating if he shifted his weight around much and he felt helpless against it.

And now this itch, his new irritation that he could do nothing about. He pressed his head back and groaned as quietly as he could, trying not to wake Guadalupe. The smallest strip of light could just be seen on the edges of the mountains outside the window, and he knew that the sun would not rise for an hour or more.

His thoughts turned, as they did so often, back to Maria. He had asked Guadalupe to help him get a message to her, but she said that the post would only stop in this area in a week. He realized that Maria likely believed he was dead, but for the time being, he had no way of informing her of the truth. His promise to her, when he had said he would never disappear again, had been broken and there was nothing he could do to fix it.

He thought about her sad and alone, and wanted to reach across the miles to hold her, but it would take at least a few days for him to be well enough to get back to her. What would she do during that time? He knew she was certainly not the type to wallow in bed, crying for hours, but would she go back to work?

He still felt a small ache at the thought of her being with other men, but it was now mostly a pain of sympathy. She would always do what she needed to survive, which was one thing he loved about her, but it also meant that she would hide her hurt and go on as she always had.

He could not stand the thought of her in pain because of him and was absolutely determined to make it back as quickly as possible to her so he could set things right. He wanted to explain how much he loved her and show her that he would be there for her regardless of what she did for a living. What did that matter, after all?

In fact, what did any of it matter? His position with the bank, San Francisco, the big house of his dreams? All of it paled in comparison with Maria. When he had fallen into the water, thinking he was going to die, it was her face he pictured. She was what he wanted, and nothing else mattered.

Jimmy closed his eyes and balled up his fists in frustration, causing a small lightning bolt of pain through his hurt shoulder. He ignored it. This was all so stupid. The nearest town was fifteen miles away, according to Guadalupe, and any attempt at traversing that distance in his condition would likely end in disaster. She had no horse to lend him, so he was effectively stranded.

He would need to wait until the post came through. Then he could get a ride to the nearest town and make his way back to Shasta. He would need to wait patiently until
then
.
Jimmy sighed and adjusted himself slightly, ignoring the itch of his wound and trying unsuccessfully to doze.

After what felt like days, he could hear Guadalupe moving around in the room behind him. He tried once again to shift himself on the couch, his makeshift bed, until he was sitting up. He found to his pleasure that, despite the barbs of pain in his shoulder and the necessity of moving his leg very gingerly to keep it from throbbing, he was able to make it to a sitting position with little trouble. He felt encouraged by the experiment, hoping that the worst was over.

Jimmy took a quick inventory of his body. The terrible ache in his head, which was probably from hitting it during his fall, seemed to be mostly gone. His leg wasn’t overwhelmingly painful, though he could do little with it in the splint Guadalupe must have constructed before he regained consciousness. His shoulder, of course, was still a problem and sent sparks of pain through him whenever he moved too much. The itching had died down enough at the moment to not be what he would consider torture, though it was difficult to ignore.

Overall, he was doing rather well considering the circumstances, and Jimmy felt some of his anxiety leave him. At the very least, he was sure he would be able to leave in a week with the mail coach and get back to Shasta, no matter how painful the trip would be.

As he thought about the days left before he could go back to his life, Guadalupe came into the room and began working at the stove, lighting the chips of wood and putting water on to heat. As she began the work, he considered her, the woman who saved his life, and what he could possibly do to repay her. She had been so generous, and yet all he had really thought of since he awoke was how to get away as quickly as possible.

Guadalupe looked over, and he nodded to her and wished her a good morning. She smiled and reciprocated, then asked, “How are you feeling today? Getting better?”

“Yes, thank you, Guadalupe. Much better than I expected I would. You are a wonderful nurse.”

She chuckled quietly. “I have a lot of practice.”

He knitted his brows. “On whom? You’re too far from town to go around fixing people all the time.”

“Not people. Animals. I have always had a soft spot for injured things, and I help them whenever I come across them.”

“Well, it seems to work on humans, too. You’ve helped me a good deal, and I would like to repay you, if I can. Is there any way I can help you around here?”

She laughed good-naturedly. “I do not think you are that strong yet. It will be difficult to stand with your leg hurt.”

“Well,” he considered, “Is there anything I can do to help with the cooking without moving much? I don’t know how to do anything but fry eggs, boil water, and cook meat over a campfire, but I would like to do something.”

She paused for a moment, thinking. Then she nodded and began gathering items. After a few minutes, she set a floured wooden board across his lap and dropped a ball of dough on it. “You can make the bread. If it hurts too much, you tell me and stop. And only use your one good hand. Do not hurt yourself more,” she finished, wagging her finger at him to show how serious she was.

He smiled. “Right you are. I’ll make the bread,” he announced, happy to be doing something useful. It amused him that his grand task was something as silly as making bread.

When he looked down at the dough, though, he realized that he had no idea how to accomplish this. He knew his mother had made bread all the time, but he’d never actually paid attention to the process. “Um, what exactly do I do?”

She looked at him, shaking her head and smirking, and he tried to give her an endearing smile that let her know he honestly did want to help. “Like this,” she said as she leaned over him slightly, grabbed the ball of dough, and began kneading it with her hands. “You do this, and then we will let it sit so it can rise.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He began to knead the dough, struggling a little to find an effective way to do it with only one hand. After a few moments of difficulty, he found that pressing it flat with his knuckles and then folding it in on itself worked well, and he continued to work until Guadalupe finished putting eggs in the water on the stove and started hot cakes for breakfast.

She came over to inspect his progress. “Very good, Jimmy. Now we let it sit.”

She took the board off his lap and put it on the table. After putting a square of cloth over the ball of dough, she turned back to the stove.

“What next?”

“Now, you wait. I will finish the food, and then we can eat.”

Jimmy felt restless and wanted to contribute more, if only to occupy his agitated mind, but he knew there was nothing helpful he could do at the moment as she worked above the small stove. With one nearly-useless arm and a leg in a splint, there was little he would be able to do for a while, he realized. It was a frustrating thought.

She took the hotcakes and eggs off the stove and began bringing a plate to where he was half-sitting. He held up his good arm to stop her. “If you don’t mind, I would like to try to eat with you at the table.”

She looked at him for a moment, giving him a half-smile. “Men need to be strong and healthy even after bullets and rivers, is that it?”

He laughed. “That pretty much sums it up. I can’t lie here any longer and have you serve me.”

She submitted to his request and placed the food on the table. Slowly, Jimmy sat himself up completely, ignoring the pains that the movements caused, and moved his good leg off the edge of his makeshift bed. With his good hand, he carefully lowered his splinted leg to the floor as well.

He paused, happy to finally be upright again. Guadalupe walked over and leaned close, allowing him to wrap his right arm around her shoulders, and in one heave of pain, he was standing, his weight on his good leg. He smiled at her, though there was an edge of a grimace to it as the ache ran through him before it began to die down.

When he tried to put his weight onto his splinted leg, however, he realized for the first time how badly it was hurt. While he was prone on the makeshift bed, the pain in his shoulder had dominated his thoughts and he had spent very little time thinking about the injury to his leg. Now, however, he could tell that it was seriously damaged. It would be a very long time before it healed completely and he had full use of it again.

Leaning on Guadalupe, Jimmy was able to hop and shuffle his way to the table, where he sat down gingerly, careful to move his injured leg as little as possible. He gritted his teeth against the pain, but was glad to know that it was manageable. He took a deep breath and let his body rest.

Once he was sitting in the chair and she was sure he was steady, Guadalupe moved over to her seat and they both began to eat. The food had cooled somewhat in the time it took for Jimmy to get settled, but he was happy to no longer feel completely helpless.

They looked across the table and smiled at each other.

Chapter 10

Maria wiped away the tears that had sprung into her eyes once again. She told herself for the hundredth time that she could not sit and bemoan her losses, and she continued her circuit of the general store. The candy jars had brought back thoughts of her childhood, how she and Jimmy would both scrounge and beg their parents for pennies, and every one was spent on licorice and other treats.