She knew her people were gone, raided and taken, just as she had been. Yet something about recognizing where she was, seeing the familiar, lifted her spirits like a hawk's wings, just above the mourning of her loss.
She smiled at this gift given in a groaning time: that this eltee-wintoo—white man—who meant to take her far away and sell her to another was heading north, through a place Oltipa knew as home!
Suzanne and Lura's wagon rattled up the lane to Ruth's place. Suzanne beamed with her newfound sense of direction. She could hardly wait to tell Mazy, Seth, all the rest. As the wagon stopped she heard Mariah whoop.
“Well, I'll be,” Lura said. “It's my Mattie.”
Suzanne imagined hugs and hellos, heard expressions of joy. Made out Elizabeths voice, children, and a baby. In a lull, Suzanne accepted Matt's hello, then asked “Isn't Mazy here?”
“She and Seth headed out a week or so ago,” Ruth told her. There was something different in Ruths voice. A quietness. Defeat? “I expect they'll be back next week. Matthew's milking for her.”
“And me too,” Jason reminded Ruth.
“Yes. And doing a fine job,” Elizabeth said. “From what Ruth tells me.” She turned to Suzanne. “We do have some things to talk about, Suzanne.”
Ruth sighed. “And it isn't happy news.”
“What?”
Elizabeth was the one who spoke of Jessie's disappearance, of Zane Randolph's involvement. Finally she said, “Your Wesley Marks is one and the same as Ruth's husband. Zane Randolph, and the snake grabbed Jessie and is gone.”
Suzanne felt struck by a split rail.
“You saying that Suzanne's suitor was already taken?” Lura asked.
“That isn't what the worry is,” Ruth said.
“I…don't know what to say. He took Jessie? His own kin?”
“Our sister's gone?” Ned said, his voice quivering.
“Its my fault,” Ruth said. “He followed me. I should have stayed in Ohio and faced him.” Her voice broke.
“Come on, Ruth,” Matthew said. “Lets let Elizabeth fill in details. Tell it without us. We'll get the milk cows up. The fresh air'll do you some good.”
Suzanne heard Matt and Ruth walk away.
“Oh, that young man you sent my way went after them. He don't know that JeSsie's likely with them. Least we're making that guess. And the baby you hear? That's his boy. Said you sent him to me. Ruth's a wreck. You can see that.”
“She can't see anything, remember?” Lura interjected.
“I can see the man trusted my advice about Elizabeth,” Suzanne said. “Baby's pretty quiet.”
“Good as gold ‘til you try to set him down or take him out of his basket. Then he wails like a stuck pig. Something happened to him awful when Zane took his mama.”
Suzanne swallowed. “Wesley…I mean Zane…wanted things to happen in a certain way. He came in once when I wasn't there. I felt him there, though. And I asked him not to do it again. I should have trusted myself more, that it didn't feel right.”
“He came looking for you first. Maybe when he couldn't find you, he—”
Suzanne gasped, her fingers to her throat. “This is my fault,” she said, her newfound focus blurred by the errors of her past. “I had to do things on my own, didn't let you all help me as I might have. We would have found out. We could have warned Ruth. Instead, for a man like…him, a blind woman alone was…an invitation to invade.”
“Don't be blaming yourself, now,” Elizabeth said.
“I just…I need to go away. To Sacramento, and take my children with me.”
They'd ridden into the city, easily locating the boardinghouse where Sister Esther stayed on J Street. The woman bent over tomato plants growing up along a picket fence, newly painted, the green against white and the woman's dark skirt a contrast fit for a painting to even Mazy's unpracticed eye. Seeing her gave Mazy's heart a lift. They shared a love of words and a living faith, both things Mazy had neglected of late. Esther turned at the sound of their call, her little black cap still tied tightly beneath her chin. The woman smiled, revealing that missing tooth.
“Mazy. A fine sight, that's certain,” Esther said as Mazy released her from an embrace. Esther brushed at her apron, clasped her hands before her in that way she had. A Mexican man led Seth's horse and Mazy's mule to the stable around in back. Esther lifted her long skirt with her gnarled fingers and guided them toward the porch.
“Come have cake and iced tea,” she said stepping straight-backed up on the steps. “Margaret makes the best there is. She's got fresh eggs daily and cows.” She turned, one hand on the porch post, her index finger pointed to Mazy now. “Milk costs two dollars a gallon in Sacramento, but she lets her guests have all they can drink for free.”
“Bet they pay dearly for the food,” Seth said. He removed his tall hat and held it in his hands, his blond hair matted by the heat against his head.
Esther nodded. “Yes, but they'd pay dearly at any hotel and still not have the satisfaction of milk foamed against their mustaches. Milk is essential. But I'll serve you tea.”
Esther brought a tray out, and they sat on chairs of pine stumps cut out with tall backs. Small cushions softened the seats, and Mazy wondered if Esther had made them. She gazed out at a street busy with wagons and freighters and women walking in newly dyed dresses. She took off her own hat, a bonnet tied with wide strings at the throat, and fanned herself with it. “I thought the city would be cooler, so close to the river,” she said.
“Tell us what you know about Naomi,” Seth asked.
Sister Esthers eyes pooled, her chin lifted. “So little. Only that she's gone back to her husband. Again. I don't know what to do. Marriage is a scared trust, not to be broken, but no woman deserves poorer treatment than stock.” She pulled a hanky from the sleeve of her dress, wiped at her eyes, then dabbed at her neck above the white collar.
Mazy reached across and patted the woman's hands. “My only prayer is that Naomi knows she always has a home with me,” Esther said. “And that she knows she has not been forgotten. Perhaps he will change. People do,” she said.
Mazy cast a quick glance at Seth, then said, “And the other contracts?”
“Are being repaid,” Esther said. “My night work at the Jenny Lind Theater permits me to pay a little extra, and my day work at the academy allows me a way to live. Mei-Ling is happy. I am well blessed, despite the losses. And you?”
“At long last, I'm here to face whatever I'll discover about Jeremy. And myself. Sometimes I think I've been blinder than Suzanne, waiting so long.”
“I'd hoped that one would come visit and bring those boys,” Esther said. “I held this secret wish after Zilah died, that Suzanne would find a refuge with me. The dreaming of an old woman.”
“Did you ask her? Say something to her?” Mazy asked Esther.
Esther shook her head. “I didn't want to intrude. And then, I didn't think I deserved such a gift, not after my poor showing with bringing the Celestials to safe harbor.”
“It's funny how we deprive ourselves of things we might enjoy,” Mazy said. She considered her own words as she stirred her tea. Maybe her avoidance of language and Scripture these months were just one more way she had of getting “busy” so that she had no time for the things that gave her nurture. Perhaps, like Esther, she believed she just didn't deserve them.
David's only hope was that someone might have seen them, a man and a woman and maybe another, he didn't know who. But they'd be resisting. None of the packers he met heading south held any hope for him. Instead, they warned him about riding out alone with the Pit Rivers restlessness. “I haven't much for them,” he said. “A little grub's all, and I doubt they'd kill me for that.” One packer had shaken his head, mumbled words about David being blind to the facts, then moved on down the trail.
David knew it was crazy to even think that the dog could follow their scent. Chance was probably just chasing a rabbit or squirrel. Still, he'd camped out beneath an oak, and i
n the morning the dog had acted as though he knew what he was being asked to do. David had no other plan, nothing else that looked like the next step.
But on the third day, Chance stopped, stood in the middle of the main trail, dozens of hoofprints in the dirt. David watched the dog whining and panting, stopping, looking up and back, scurrying back and forth across the wagon tracks, horse droppings, barefoot markings. David swallowed. He knew they'd lost the trail.
“You did better than I could've.” He sat with his hands crossed over the saddle horn, staring ahead at the twist of dirt winding through the timber, rocks, and streams beyond a few orange poppies huddled in the shade. Should he just keep on, believing he could make Oltipa appear before his eyes? He turned the horse and looked back in the direction they'd come. He got off and picked up the dog, leading the horse over to an oak. He leaned against the tree, scratching his back on the bark. “We're at the end of the line, Chance,” he said. “Only a fool would keep going on into Oregon Territory with no more evidence than a dog sniffing.” He set Chance down.
David eased himself down the tree then, hung onto the reins and let his horse graze. He'd have to live with the emptiness either way—that he should have headed south first, had wasted time coming north. Or if he turned back and never found her, he'd live with the thought that he should have kept going, that she might have been just around the bend. No good answer, no sure thing waited at the other end. He guessed that was all of life, no sure thing.
“Your faith need not be large enough to finish,” his mother always said. “Only adequate to embark.” He guessed it was adequate back at the cabin. Just not now.
What to do next?
He closed his eyes. “Help-me, help-me, help-me,” he said.
Back south, he had Ben waiting. That was the surest thing. That was where his embarking should head now instead of on this wild chase into Oregon. Accept defeat. Head home. That decided, he fell asleep.
20
Mazy watched the buggy pull up in front of Margaret Franks boarding-house, saw Seth speak with the driver, adjusting his tall silk hat as he did. The men looked toward the house, and she knew they were speaking of her, probably saying something about waiting after women and then moving on to the weather, both looking up now, to a cloudless blue sky.
She tied the ribbon of her bonnet, spreading it out at her throat as she watched, then turned to the oval mirror. She'd always liked green, a color her mother said brought the chestnut out in her hair. At least her hair had shine to it now, the spring water of California restoring what the alkali had once taken out. She turned sideways, noted the burgundy sash that circled the back of the poke, stepped back, then stood full face. She wore the best dress she'd been able to have shipped up to Shasta. Before their appointment, Seth suggested they go shopping in Sacramento, but she was content with what the packers delivered. The whale bones of the busk held her stomach flat, and as she swirled, the skirt kept moving over the five petticoats, even after she stopped. She covered the green taffeta with a paisley shawl, straightening the fringe with her lace-gloved fingers.
Last evening, Seth had shined her shoes—he'd asked if he might— and she accepted. They were the last thing he handed her before he leaned just slightly and kissed her more than good-night.
“It isn't a good time, Seth,” she said when he stepped back. “If you press me…”
“I'm not,” he said, both hands up in protest. “That was just a kiss that says ‘I love you,’ in friendship now; more if you allow. I thought you might like to hear it before you face whatever you will tomorrow.”
“Thank you,” she said. “It is nice to hear those words, especially with no intent to…bundle me.” He smiled, tipped his fingers in salute, clicked his heels, and backed away to the door. After she latched the knob, she wondered whether he was headed out to the gambling halls.
That was last evening; this was the new day. Mazy inhaled. Head to toe, she was ready. She picked up her reticule and the thick envelope she'd made sure was never far from her sight. This was it, the day she'd anticipated and put off for over a year. This was the day she would find out what kind of man she'd married those three years ago, what kind of man could woo her, win her, fool her parents and herself, then lift her from the familiar and set her feet on a westward course. She'd discover his story and, in it, hope to find herself.
She couldn't concentrate on the sights the driver pointed out to them, the buildings going up after Sacramento's own fire the year before. This history of the West could have been written by its embers. She noticed brick buildings, a few iron doors, and several buildings with metal roofs and a foot and a half of dirt on top for extra fire protection. Just like at home, she thought and shook her head. Home. So Shasta was becoming home. Seth reached over to pat her hand.
“I'm sorry,” she said, turning to him. “Did you say something?”
“No,” he said. He removed his hand. “I saw you shake your head. Thought you might be biting at your lip that way you do. Just offering comfort, is all I'm doing.”
“Oh,” she said and turned away, watched the brick buildings fade into wood-framed ones, then to houses with a rose climbing here and there and pies setting in windows. More than one yard had a goat bleating from the back, chickens scratching in the gardens. The clop-clop of the horse along the hard earth formed a soothing rhythm.
Seth reached to hold her hand again and she allowed it. She wondered if she should have let him come along. Perhaps these requests provided him a level of intimacy and assumption she didn't intend. It was too late now, but she decided she'd have him remain in the waiting area when she went in to meet the solicitor and Jeremy's brother.
“Sometimes two people can hear better than one, when the words are hard to hear,” he said when she told him.
“I know. But I don't want the lawyer or Jeremy's brother to make any assumptions as men can do, about whether I make my own decisions. He might easily start talking to you, not to me.”
Seth nodded agreement. “Maybe he'll have more sympathy for you if I'm not there. Tell you more than he otherwise would, about the child and all.”
“I'm not looking for sympathy,” she said and wrinkled her forehead. Then the driver stopped.
“Here's the place,” he said. “Josh McCracken, Attorney at Law.” He twisted in his seat, said, “If you don't mind my saying so, you two seem pretty happy together to be coming to a land and divorce lawyer.”
“Divorce?” Mazy said.
“One of the best in the state,” the driver said. Then, considering another option he might have missed, added, “ less of course you're getting one from others, so you two can be together.”
Mazy opened her mouth to protest but told Seth instead, “Why don't you stay out here? Set the driver straight while I'm gone.”
“About our not needing a divorce or that we intend to be together?”
Her set jaw was her only answer as he helped her from the buggy.
The waiting area in McCracken's home had black horsehair couches with wide walnut arms curved around the ends. Ferns draped from huge porcelain pots below photographs colored with pastels of mountains and valleys. A chandelier hung from the high ceiling—and that was only the outer office. Mazy turned slowly around, feeling smaller than she wished, and decided there must be wealth in the dissolution of marriages, another of the Wests hidden treasures.
“You must be Mrs…. Bacon,” a man said from behind her. The voice was high pitched, from a small man.
“Yes. Jeremy Bacons wife.”
“Yes,” he said, adjusting his glasses on his narrow nose. “Follow me, please. Mr. McCracken will see you now.”
The man across the desk from her matched her in height. His hand felt warm as he took hers, gently pressed her fingers with both hands then directed her to a seat, thanking her for coming, asking after her comfort, ordering his secretary to return with tea. She sank into the cushion of a leather chair, sitting much lower than the lawyer now enthroned be
hind his desk. Her chair had appeared equal to his before she sat. Now her chest caved in on itself from the chairs softness. Light from the window behind him masked features that faded into a cleanshaven face. Dark hair curled at the ivory shirt collar. She looked around, noted the absence of any other people in the room.
She took in a deep breath, took control. “I understood my husbands brother and his wife were to be here,” she said, forcing herself to sit up straight, hands at her purse on her lap.
“Your husbands brother asked that I press their case for them,” McCracken said, taking control back. “Its quite usual, I assure you.”
“I hoped to meet the relatives of my husband.”
“In due time,” he said. “I'm sure he'll want contact with you, but for now, things are somewhat…awkward, to say the least. They're feeling a little remorseful that they've not made a greater effort to stay in touch with your husband's offspring. And they were uncertain how you might receive all this news.”
Mazy's hands felt damp, and she thought perhaps the room was too warm, though the window behind him stood partway open and the lace curtains moved easily in a light morning breeze. The secretary returned, bringing cool tea and sugar cookies, both of which Mazy now declined, her mind spinning without knowing why.
“Your letter informing us of your husbands death came as a shock to them,” McCracken told her, “as you might imagine. They'd had no word from him since just before you started out.”
“As my learning he had a wife and child came as a shock to me.”
“Children,” he corrected. “He had two. A daughter and a son.”
A hawk in flight carried a snake in its talons. Oltipa raised her eyes at the bird's cry of triumph, doing what it needed to stay alive, risking all for food, perhaps to feed its young. She watched as it made its way to a tree and disappeared. Staying alive. That was what she must do, not get caught up with her outrage at this man. And save this child if she could not save her own. She must return, for even the slightest chance that her son lived, for even the chance that David Taylor might come searching, be confronted by this Randolph man and lose the challenge with his life.