It was bad enough hearing Jimmy cry. Even worse was when his crying grew weaker and it was clear he was failing. In desperation Robert walked all over town, as well as through the nearby miners’ camps, looking for women and asking them what to do. Wherever he went, he got amused looks, for it was unusual to see a man carrying a baby around, especially a newborn. The women he met had plenty of advice. The one who had helped with the birth tore a towel into triangles and showed Robert how to pin it around Jimmy for a diaper. Another showed him how to properly swaddle a baby; when she got through wrapping Jimmy in Martha’s shawl he could move nothing but his mouth, and seemed stunned by this fact.
The most sensible woman was the one Robert had watched mining with her family a few days before. Now she was sitting alongside the creek, resting while her husband and sons worked. She had a smear of dirt across her nose and cheek, and she rubbed at it while contemplating Jimmy. “He’s spitting up cow’s milk? You gotta find you some goat’s milk, then, or sheep. And if you can’t find that? Go find a woman with a baby. Go farther away to the other camps, or better yet, down to Stockton. More women there, more babies maybe.”
Robert frowned. Stockton was sixty miles away. Even if he could find a way to tie Jimmy on so they could ride the gray that far, it would take another day to get there. His nephew might be dead by then. And there was no guarantee that there were babies in Stockton.
“Course, you could always try the Indians,” the woman added. “There’s Miwoks camped up near Cally Grove.”
Robert recalled that there were definitely babies there—he’d seen them recently in their slings on their mothers’ backs, so natural there it was easy to forget them. He frowned. “Think they’d do it?”
The woman shrugged. “Everybody’s got a price.”
Robert wasn’t so sure. Most Indians he’d seen maintained a distance from white people, as if taking a step back and watching to see what would happen. Why would an Indian woman agree to feed a white child who might grow up to push her family off the land?
By the next day, though, he had no choice. He could not find any goats or sheep nearby. Jimmy continued to spit up the cow’s milk, and the sugar water Robert managed to get down him was not sustaining him. When he stopped crying altogether, Robert went to saddle the gray. He would have to go back up to Calaveras Grove.
Jimmy was too small and floppy to be tied in a sling to Robert’s chest or back. Instead he swaddled him extra tight—already he was getting better at that—and had Billie Lapham hand the baby up to him once he was astride the gray. His arm ached from carrying the baby almost nonstop for two days, but he couldn’t see a better way.
“Goodenough, I never thought I’d see you ridin’ round with your saddlebags stuffed with diapers and sugar water,” Billie Lapham said as he stood at the gray’s side. “You want me to water the seedlings while you’re gone?”
“Oh—yes.” Robert had forgotten about the sequoias he’d collected. These last few days he had thought of little other than keeping Jimmy alive.
“It’s good to see you lookin’ after your nephew. Your sister would have been glad.” Billie Lapham’s eyes grew watery. “Poor gal.” He took out a handkerchief and wiped his face and blew his nose. It occurred to Robert then that Lapham’s grief for Martha was a dress rehearsal for his wife’s death. Molly was right: the world was full of sorrows.
Robert wanted to gallop up the mountain but didn’t dare; holding Jimmy in the crook of his arm, he had to ride one-handed, trying not to think about the gray rearing up at a snake or stumbling over a rut in the track. But the horse seemed to understand that Robert was riding differently, that there was a new, demanding passenger, and adjusted his gait to a gentler trot than usual.
He had been so swamped with the practicalities of looking after a baby that he’d not had time to consider anything else. Now that Jimmy was quiet, and Robert had a plan and was moving, he was able to think about Martha. And then he was not thinking, but crying, sobbing so hard that the gray actually stopped and swung his head around to look at the sight, and Robert had to kick him to get him started again.
At last, empty of tears, he grew as calm as his listless nephew, and they rode up the mountain towards the big trees.
When he caught sight of the red and yellow parasol in the distance once again, this time coming down towards them, Robert was so relieved he almost began to cry again. Only now did he realize that these last few days he had been waiting for Molly to come and make things right.
She was lying flat in the wagon bed as the same old man drove, spinning her parasol above her and singing:
I came to the river
And I couldn’t get across
So I paid five dollars
For a big bay hoss.
Well, he wouldn’t go ahead
And he wouldn’t stand still
So he went up and down
Like an old saw mill.
Turkey in the straw
Turkey in the hay
Turkey in the straw
Turkey in the hay
Roll ’em up and twist ’em up
A high tuck a-haw
And hit ’em up a tune called
Turkey in the Straw!
The old man accompanied her by whistling the tune. Because of the singing and the whistling, she didn’t hear the first time Robert called her. “Molly!” he cried again. This time she rolled herself up and squinted towards him as the wagon came to a halt.
“Robert Goodenough, here you are again!” she cried, waving the parasol at him. “You come out to find me?” Then she caught sight of the baby and went silent. Perhaps because hers was one of the few female voices around, Jimmy roused himself from his semiconscious state in Robert’s arm and let out a thin, piercing wail.
“Good Lord.” Molly clutched her substantial breasts and laughed. “Don’t that hit me right here. Makes ’em feel tingly. Watch out, little baby, you’ll get me started too soon! That your nephew? What’d you bring him up with you for?”
“Martha …” Robert couldn’t finish, but one look at his red eyes and crumpled face told Molly all she needed to know. Getting to her knees on the wagon bed, she held out her arms. “Come down here, both of you.”
Robert handed her the baby, and by the time he’d dismounted she’d already pressed Jimmy to her chest. She reached out and put her arm around Robert and hugged him hard, the baby squashed between them. For a moment Robert tensed, fearing for Jimmy. But he was fast discovering the resilience of newborns, and after a moment he relaxed, even allowing himself to rest his head on Molly’s shoulder. For the first time since Nancy put Jimmy into his arms, Robert did not feel like the only one responsible for him.
When they pulled apart, Molly gazed down at Jimmy, who was now nuzzling at her bosom, his mouth seeking something he sensed was close by.
“What are you feeding him?”
“Sugar water is all. He won’t take cow’s milk and there’s no women back at Murphys could feed him. I thought …” Robert trailed off, for Molly was unbuttoning the top of her dress to reveal a huge, dark nipple. Cupping her breast in one hand, she lifted and held out the nipple to the baby, who lunged at it like a drowning man come up for air. Latching on, he began to suck as hard as his weak mouth could.
Molly chuckled. “Tickles. Ow!” Desperation was making him suck harder, for he seemed to know he was where he was meant to be, doing what he was meant to do.
“Is that gonna work?” Robert asked.
“Dunno. I’ve heard of it happening, but never seen it myself.” Molly winced. “He’ll jest have to keep sucking, see if that brings on the milk.”
Half an hour later Molly’s milk came in.
Robert could not get used to living in a hotel. He shared a big bed with Molly that gave him a backache because it was softer than he was used to. Sometimes when she was asleep he moved to the floor. But that didn’t really help, for he also sensed others close by, hearing murmurs and laughter and moans from adjacent
rooms, and music and shouts from downstairs, and people walking up and down the street outside. Jimmy lay in the drawer near the bed, waking every two hours to feed since his tiny stomach held little and emptied quickly. Robert was woken by plenty of sounds when he was sleeping in the woods—bears crashing through the bushes, wolves howling, other animals snuffling nearby. Yet somehow these noises disturbed him less than Jimmy’s insistent cry—for it was demanding something of him in a way the animals never did.
Molly loved Murphys. She settled into her preferred room, with its mahogany bed and its balconies overlooking the street, like a miner laying claim to a choice piece of river. Within an hour her dresses and petticoats hung from the bedposts, her bonnets dangled by their ribbons from hooks by the door, her shoes were piled in a corner and her hairbrush and hand mirror and powder and tin of rouge and hairpins littered the top of the bureau. The room smelled distantly of cooking from the restaurant below, and up close of warm flesh and talcum powder and souring milk and baby shit. Robert did not complain. He was grateful just to see Jimmy sleeping in Molly’s arms, cheeks fat and rosy after two days of being wan and gray. Grateful too that she patted the bed next to her and made it easy for him to join them.
Molly asked the hotel owner to find a cradle for Jimmy, or have one made right away. “A baby needs to rock,” she said when Robert pointed out that his newfound trick of the bottom drawer bed seemed to work. Soon a rough cradle made of elm appeared in the room, and that was when Robert began to understand that she was settling in. He had assumed they would stay at Murphys a day or two and then … but what would they do? He had cones and seedlings to bring back to William Lobb in San Francisco, but it was hard to imagine Molly and Jimmy living at Mrs. Bienenstock’s. He was pretty sure no woman had ever entered the boardinghouse apart from Mrs. B. herself, and a baby there would be like a yellow dress at a funeral. San Francisco itself was too rough and dirty for a child. On the other hand, he needed to go there more regularly than anywhere else, and Molly and Jimmy couldn’t follow him around while he was collecting plants and seeds. It would slow him down, and anyway a baby was better off in one place.
What Robert did not question was that he and Molly were now linked—by his nephew more than the child he had fathered, admittedly, but Jimmy was a real, demanding baby whereas his own was still just a mound under Molly’s dress.
Molly quickly got to know the hotel staff—the owner, the cook, the barman, the maid. Being pregnant seemed to give her even more of an appetite for food and company. She would often take Jimmy down to the saloon and nurse him while she sat with the customers, laughing and singing. Her size did not stop her in bed either, and she was loud with it, crying out whenever they coupled so that passersby on the street could hear.
She did not become friends with Nancy Lapham, however, the way you might think two women would who were surrounded by men. Robert kept expecting them to seek the other out, but apart from courteous nods and Nancy’s inquiries after Jimmy, they kept out of each other’s way. Robert mentioned this first to Billie Lapham while they were checking on their horses in the hotel stables one evening. Lapham was dazzled by Molly, her sensual solidity combined with her matter-of-fact manner. “Well, now,” he said, wiping his forehead with his palm—he seemed to be missing his handkerchief—“Nance is funny that way. She likes women her own size—like your sister. She knows where she is with a woman like Martha. Whereas Molly—she’s so—well, so full of life, she makes Nance feel even sicker. Course she didn’t say that,” he hastily added. “And she admires how Molly’s taken up Jimmy so natural. We both do. She’s really somethin’ else, your woman.” Billie Lapham spoke the last two words in an incredulous tone, as if he couldn’t believe Robert’s luck at landing such a catch.
Molly was blunter about Nancy. “She’s sickly,” she said when Robert asked her. “I don’t need to get friendly with someone who’s dyin’. Maybe that’s heartless, but I’d jest lose her, and who wants to get set up to be sad?”
After two weeks at Murphys, Robert began to feel as if he were wallowing in mud, unable to escape. His daily life had slowed down. He slept later and later, sunk deep in the feather bed and Molly’s flesh. He no longer hunted for his own food, but ate greasy steaks at the restaurant. Someone else looked after the gray and washed his clothes and lit his fires with wood they had chopped. He had never had such an easy life, and he hated it. Only Jimmy’s cheeks filling out, his eyes beginning to focus, his clear contentedness made Robert feel it was worthwhile.
To break out of the feather bed comfort, one day he rode up to Calaveras Grove with Billie Lapham, who did business with Haynes while Robert collected more sequoia cones. He had thought it would be a relief to be among the giant trees, but they only reminded him of Martha’s death and the last time he was here, and he worked with little pleasure, a sadness gnawing at him that even the trees could not assuage.
He had planned to stay overnight, camping out as he used to. But when he came back to the Big Trees Hotel towards the end of the afternoon to wash, there was a letter from William Lobb waiting for him that had followed him up the mountain.
Lobb was as brief as ever.
Bienenstock’s
California & Montgomery
San Francisco
August 20, 1856
Goodenough—
A man on the Welsh border wants to plant the biggest redwood grove in Britain on his estate. He is keen to get a head start on his wealthy friends, so wants seedlings rather than seeds. Bring back 50 as quick as you can, and a few sequoia seedlings to impress his neighbours.
William Lobb
He rode straight back to Murphys, relieved to have a purpose but uncertain what to say to Molly. When he got to their room, she was walking around with Jimmy on her shoulder like a sack of flour, patting his back to burp him. She brightened. “Robert Goodenough! I guess you couldn’t stay away even for a night. Did you miss your little family?”
“Molly, I—”
“Rub my feet, won’t you, honey? Carryin’ two babies around is swellin’ ’em right up.” She sank onto the bed and stuck out her feet.
As he took one in his hands, Robert looked around the room at the new cradle by the bed, the bucket full of soaking diapers, a line strung across the room where clean diapers were pegged to dry. On a small table were the remains of a steak Molly’d had sent up. The place had an air of permanence that made him uneasy. “Molly, we got to talk about what to do next,” he said.
“Well, first thing to do is to take Jimmy and put him in his cradle.”
Once he was settled back rubbing her feet, he started again. “Willam Lobb wrote to me. I’ve got to go back to San Francisco, and collect redwoods on the way.”
He was expecting arguments and complaints. But Molly surprised him. “How long we got to pack?” she said.
“Oh. I wasn’t expecting you to—”
“’Cause I’ve been wantin’ to see that city for a long time now. You know I’ve been in California three years and not been to San Francisco yet? I ain’t even seen the ocean! Now’s as good a time as any. Easier to do it now than when the other baby comes.”
“But you don’t have to come with me. I can come back to Murphys after. Aren’t you settled here?”
Molly snorted and gestured at the room. “You call this settled? You got a funny idea of settled. Settled is when I have a range to cook on and my own front door and a garden full of beans and tomatoes. Anyway, we’d better come with you. Otherwise who’s to say if you’ll come back to us? This William Lobb I hear so much about will jest give you somethin’ else to collect, then somethin’ after that, and we’ll never see you.”
Robert stopped rubbing her feet, stung by her words. He wasn’t sure he could argue with her, though. “I’m going to have to leave tomorrow,” he said instead.
“I can be ready tomorrow.”
“Are you sure?”
“Watch me.” Molly got up and began pulling clothes down from hooks and foldin
g them. As she moved around the room, Jimmy’s dark eyes followed her as he lay quiet in the cradle.
“What about Jimmy?”
“What about him? You think babies ain’t traveled all over this country? He’ll be fine as long as he’s fed and swaddled to feel secure. Little ones don’t need more than that. It’s when they start to walk that it gets harder.”
“And you won’t have—the other one—on the way?” They had not talked about the baby Molly was carrying. Until it cried and needed feeding, it did not take their attention. Robert no longer questioned whether or not it was his. There would never be a satisfying answer to that question.
Molly shook her head. “It ain’t due for a while yet. Git my trunk out from under the bed for me, will you, honey?”
Faster than he’d expected, she dismantled the room, then went to arrange for the rest of her things to be brought back from the stables, leaving Robert alone with his nephew. Jimmy did not cry when she was gone, but regarded Robert at the foot of the bed, his long lashes making a fringe on his cheeks.
“Well, now, Jimmy, looks like we’re going on the road again.”
Maybe it was hearing his uncle’s voice, soft and wistful, but it seemed to Robert that Jimmy smiled a little.
They left Murphys amid something like a fanfare. Robert had met many people when he was struggling to get Jimmy fed and was memorable as the desperate man with the hungry baby. Molly was equally memorable for her laughter that filled the hotel saloon, her waves and halloos from the front balconies and her strolls through town, Jimmy in one arm, her other arm cupping her ballooning belly to support it, her yellow dress let out to its fullest and sweeping the dust behind her. Robert had hired a wagon to take them to Stockton, where they would get the steamboat to San Francisco. There he would get Molly and Jimmy settled, then go back out to dig up redwood seedlings, for he didn’t see how he could do that with them in tow.