Riding the Flume (16 page)

St. Joseph's Main Street was, as usual, teaming with people. Francie's stomach was growling and she was beginning to feel weak from hunger. She'd had nothing to eat since before dawn this morning.

Mouth watering, she stopped to look in the window of
a baker's shop, but she had no money to buy food. For the first time in what seemed like hours, she thought about her parents. They were probably frantic with worry, even if they'd heard she'd been seen riding the flume. Especially if they heard that. She sighed and moved on.

The offices of the
St. Joseph Herald
were not on Main—Francie found that out by walking the whole length of the street and halfway back again. Finally she stopped into the hardware store.

She made her way through stacks of crates and barrels of nails to the counter, smoothing her damp hair back with her fingers and trying to ignore the curious look the clerk gave her. “Can you tell me where the office of the
St. Joseph Herald
is?”

His eyes widened. He was young, almost as young as she was herself. “Were you in an accident?” he asked her.

She looked down at her skirt, streaked with dirt and torn at the hem. “Sort of,” she answered. “If you could tell me where the newspaper office is?”

“I'll show you,” he said, his eyes narrowing with concern. He led her back out onto the wooden sidewalk in front of the store. “Go to the next side street and turn left—it's two blocks on the right.”

The newspaper offices were on the second floor. Francie could hear the clacking of the big press and voices calling to one another as she climbed the stairs. She felt as if she had lead weights tied to her feet—she could barely
make the effort to lift her foot to the next step. She wondered suddenly what she would do if Mr. Court wasn't in, or if he wouldn't see her. “If he won't talk to me about the sequoias,” she said, “maybe he'll want a story about riding the flume.” She knew that some day she might be proud of what she'd done, but right now all she felt was numb and discouraged. She pushed open the door—it had one frosted glass window and “St. Joseph Herald Offices” in black letters on the front—and went in.

She was immediately swallowed up in the noise. On her left was the pressroom. The floor vibrated with the clatter of the long press—its cylinders were turning and seemingly endless sheets of paper were whipping under them. Through the half-opened door she could see men in ink-smudged aprons pacing around the machine. They were shouting at each other, and Francie couldn't tell if they were angry or excited. A linotype machine nearly filled the small middle room—another man in an even dirtier apron was studying a piece of paper pinned to a board on his right, and he was tapping on the keyboard without looking at it. On the right was a closed door with a frosted window like the one through which she'd already passed. “Franklin Court—Editor” was printed there in thick black letters. Francie knocked softly, and when she heard no answer, turned the handle and pushed the door open.

“Can I help you?” The woman at the desk spoke before she looked up. She had dark brown hair caught up in long
braids that wrapped around her head so many times she looked as if she were wearing a crown.

“May I see Mr. Court, please?” asked Francie, shutting the door on the noisy rooms behind her. Hunger was beginning to make her feel weak. If she could only hold up until she saw Mr. Court.

“Whom shall I say . . .” The woman's voice faded into silence as she looked up and took in Francie's dirty face and torn skirt. “What happened?” she asked, springing to her feet. “Are you all right?”

Francie grabbed the corner of the desk to keep herself from falling. “I need to speak with Mr. Court,” she said, but the words came out in a whisper. “I'm Frances Cavanaugh.”

The woman had come around the front of the desk. She took Francie by the elbow and half led, half carried her to the nearest chair. “Sit here,” she said. “You look awful.”

“I . . .” Francie's head was spinning. How could she explain the last few hours? “What time is it?”

The woman glanced at the grandfather clock standing by the door. “Not quite two o'clock,” she said.

“I think I'm just hungry,” Francie said. She tried to speak in her normal voice, but it came out just above a whisper. “I haven't eaten since dawn, and I've . . .”

“You've been in some kind of accident.” The woman smoothed Francie's tangled hair. “Wait there.”

She disappeared into the next room but came back
almost immediately with a glass of milk and a small brown bun. “Here,” she said, putting the food down on a small table in front of Francie's chair. “You eat. Mr. Court has been called out to cover a story, but he'll be back soon. I'm sure he'll want to talk to you. Whatever has happened to you, it certainly looks like news!”

Francie ate the bun in silence—it was made of coarse flour and had raisins scattered through it. The woman had gone back to her desk and was typing something on a shiny new typewriter. The noise from the other rooms reached here only faintly; Francie rested her head on the paneled wall behind her and closed her eyes.

The slam of the door jerked her awake. Mr. Court came bursting into the room like a tornado. “Damn and blast,” he shouted, throwing his coat in the direction of the coat-rack in the corner. “That girl didn't show up! Hurst, the last flume herder, telephoned when she passed his station, but the boat came in empty. After half an hour the sheriff sent out a party on horseback to search.” He dug in his trouser pockets and came up with a handful of paper scraps, which he dumped onto his secretary's desk. “We can't hold up the evening edition much longer, but I don't want to go to press without this story! Miss Jordan, we'll give Sheriff Bennett half an hour. If we haven't heard anything by then, I'll walk over to the jail to see what's up.”

Miss Jordan had risen when he came through the door. Now she put a hand on his arm, stopping him as he was
heading to a closed door behind her desk. This door did not have a window and was marked “F. Court—Private.” Miss Jordan nodded toward Francie. “This young woman has been waiting for you, Mr. Court.”

He swung around and stared at Francie, taking in her torn and dirty clothes and her tangled hair.

Francie jumped up. “I'm Francie Cavanaugh,” she said. “I need to talk to you about—”

“You're the young woman who rode the flume this morning.” His eyes seemed to bore into her as if he were testing her strength. Then his lip quirked up into what might have been a smile. “I'm glad to find you safe. How did you get here?” He motioned her to sit and pulled up another chair to sit beside her. She half expected him to pull out a tablet of paper and begin taking notes. He didn't, but she got the feeling he was remembering every word she said.

“I was afraid the sheriff would be waiting for me. I couldn't let him arrest me, not before I'd talked to you. So I left the flume before the boat came to town.”

Mr. Court raised his eyebrows and sat back in his chair. “Usually it's the newspaperman who goes looking for the story. Not the story that comes to the newspaperman. Surely you knew I'd be waiting to interview you when you came into the lumberyard. How could I resist? A woman riding the flume—that's news!”

Francie clasped her hands together so tightly her fingers
turned white. “It's not riding the flume I want to talk to you about—it's about cutting down Carrie's sequoia. Did you get my letter? Can you help?”

Mr. Court hit his forehead with the palm of his hand, and then laughed out loud. “Frances Cavanaugh! I knew you seemed familiar. You're the girl who was going to count the rings of that old sequoia stump for me. I did get your letter, but I was in San Francisco until yesterday afternoon. I only saw it last night when I stopped in the office on my way home.” He crossed one ankle over the other knee, brushing invisible lint off his immaculate trousers. “You'd better begin at the beginning.”

So Francie told him everything, from finding Carrie's note in the knothole of the stump to her wild ride down the flume to St. Joseph. “It was the only way I could get here fast enough,” she said.

“You did bring the will with you, didn't you?” Mr. Court asked, looking around.

Francie felt herself blush, but she reached inside the bodice of her shirtwaist and pulled out the oilskin pouch. She took out the will and handed it to Mr. Court.

He unfolded it in silence. He looked at it for a long moment, and Francie could see his eyes following the lines of print across the page. He turned it over and then held it up to the light. “It certainly looks genuine,” he admitted. “But I'll take it over to the land office. They'll have the deed on record.” He looked up, not at Francie, but past
her, as if he could see something on the wall behind her. She had to fight the temptation to turn her head to see what he was looking at.

“What I don't understand,” he murmured, “is how the lumber company could have a deed to this land if it belongs to Robert Granger.” Then he came to his feet as suddenly as if he were a jack-in-the-box on a spring. “That question can be answered quickly enough.” He grabbed his coat and shrugged his arms into the sleeves. “Never mind the sheriff, Miss Jordan. Just take down Miss Cavanaugh's story for the evening edition.” He turned to Francie. “Repeat what you told me,” he said. “I'm going to the land office and the courthouse.” He put his hand on the door and then turned back. “I'll telegraph to your parents, too, and let them know you're safe.” He pointed at Miss Jordan. “And see if you can find Miss Cavanaugh some clean clothes.” And he was gone.

Telling her story to Miss Jordan was easier than telling it to Mr. Court—Miss Jordan nodded and smiled, making her feel as if everything she said made perfect sense.

“Now you'll want those clean clothes,” Miss Jordan said when she'd finished. “If you'll wait here, I think I can find some for you.”

Too tired now for more conversation, Francie only nodded. Miss Jordan patted her shoulder and left the room.

She was back in less than fifteen minutes with some clothes draped over her arm. “These belong to my niece—she's
not quite as tall as you are, but she lives just two blocks away,” she said, handing Francie a soft skirt of a dark green wool and a crisp white shirtwaist, along with lace-trimmed drawers, a camisole, and a white petticoat decorated with little pink ribbons. She looked down at Francie's feet doubtfully. “But I don't think I can find shoes in your size.”

Francie lifted up one foot. “My boots are almost dry,” she said. “And so are my stockings.”

Miss Jordan smiled, and led her into Mr. Court's private office. “Do you need any help dressing?”

Francie shook her head. “No, thank you,” she said. And Miss Jordan left, closing the door behind her.

Francie stood in the middle of the room, clutching the clothes. The office was paneled in a dark wood, and the library table that Mr. Court must use for a desk matched it. On the table was a huge dictionary and some other books, flanked with brass bookends in the shape of books. A pile of blank sheets of paper, a number of pens, a big bottle of ink and a blotter were all neatly arranged in the center. This must be where Mr. Court wrote his articles. A stone fireplace took up most of one wall, and on another wall there was one window overlooking the street.

Francie stood as far from the window as she could get. She took off her sweater and unbuttoned her shirtwaist and skirt. It felt wonderful to step out of her dirty clothes, still damp from the flume ride. She slipped on the drawers
and camisole and adjusted the petticoat. She pulled the white shirtwaist over her head without unbuttoning it, and slipped into the wool skirt. It was a bit too short, but it fit in the waist. She ran her fingers through her tangled hair, wondering what her mother would think if she knew her daughter was changing clothes in the newspaper office. She didn't have to wonder what her father would think—she shuddered and hoped he would never learn of it. She smoothed her skirt and went back to the waiting area.

“Could I borrow some pins for my hair?” she asked Miss Jordan.

“Certainly,” she said. She opened a drawer in her desk and picked out a comb and some pins, handing them to Francie with a smile.

“Thank you,” Francie said. She sat down and quickly twisted her hair up the way Carrie had worn hers. Nobody in St. Joseph would mind—they didn't even know Carrie here.

• • •

It must not have been very difficult to find out what Mr. Court wanted to know—he was back shortly after Francie settled herself in her chair. This time he came in quietly. He nodded to Francie but, without a word, he went into his office and shut the door. Francie looked at Miss Jordan, who shrugged. “He's often like that,” she said. “He's figuring something out.”

Soon he called through the door. “Send Miss Cavanaugh in here.”

Francie went in. Mr. Court was sitting in the big wooden armchair by the table, staring at the will, which he'd smoothed out flat on the table. But he rose when Francie entered the room. He motioned for her to sit down in one of the large stuffed chairs by the fireplace. He picked up the will and sat down across from her.

“Well, I found the answer,” Mr. Court said. “Or part of it, anyway.” He nodded. “The deed is genuine. Though most of the land around Connorsville wasn't put up for sale until it was surveyed, a few people, like Robert Granger, staked out claims before that. So this land apparently does belong to Robert Granger and not the Sierra Lumber Company.” He raised his eyebrows and tapped at the paper with his finger. “Quite an error on their part,” he said, “though if the man's dead, and the documents hadn't come to light, who would have known the difference?” He shook his head.

Francie rubbed her fingers back and forth on the thick velvet pile of the chair. “Is the will . . . could you check?”