by Win Blevins
That whole week she never stopped shaking.
Now she’d heard from Lei that Kanaka Boy couldn’t do it—that explained one thing. But at the time Esperanza believed every other word Kanaka Boy said. She knew that for the rest of her life she would be looking over one shoulder, scared of seeing the mocking face of a new version of the mad Hawaiian.
She sneaked a look at Sam. What was she to do with this man who was her papa, sort of? She realized he loved her. He had ridden across the worst deserts anyone knew about to save her. He had nearly thrown his life away to help her—she’d seen what a hair’s-breadth call that was. Even now he didn’t seem to want anything for her, just to help her.
She wanted her mother. But Esperanza understood that Papa Sam was a good man. Sometimes she wanted to crawl into his arms and bawl. Maybe she would.
ESPERANZA LAUGHED FOR the first time as they approached the Humboldt sink. “I’m sorry to say good-bye to the river,” said Hannibal.
They looked at the pitiful stream and waited.
“It’s so convenient. I can walk down it with a foot on each side, and when I’m thirsty bend down and drink it dry.”
She said more than one syllable for the first time that evening they got to the Humboldt. As they stopped the horses for the night, a sandhill crane lifted up a few paces out in the marsh. Esperanza exclaimed several words of amazement and then looked at Sam sheepishly, realizing.
The sink was a huge mishmash of lake, dry lake bed, and marsh. Sam and Hannibal knew it from when they brought a herd of horses from California to the mountains in 1836. “Last water for about forty miles to the Truckee River,” the men told the women.
“Does the river really disappear here?” said Esperanza.
“Sinks into the sands, end of river,” said Sam.
“Then?”
“We walk dry to the next river, the Truckee, about forty miles.”
“Can we rest a day?”
They rested three. Esperanza was still listless, but she began to talk to Sam. She said nothing about Kanaka Boy but only spoke of small matters of these first dozen years of her life, when she was still a child. She talked about happy memories, many of them about Vermilion and some of them, Sam was glad to hear, about rendezvous.
Lei was thrilled by the plentiful birdlife of marsh. She led Hannibal on hours and hours of treks around its ledge, spying every kind of bird in his field glass. “In the desert,” she said over and over. “Incredible.”
In the evenings she drew mosaics of birds, or sometimes just wings, in the sand.
After they got over to the Truckee River—dry crossings seemed hardly to matter anymore—they followed it up to the crest of the Sierra Nevada and looked out on the huge valley of the Sacramento.
Sam looked out at what he could see, the foothills of these great mountains, and what his mind’s eye pictured beyond. The huge, sluggish river, which watered one of the continent’s great tall-grass prairies. San Francisco Bay, where the river came to the sea. The road along the east side of the Bay, running south to the most beautiful land he’d ever seen and the capital of California, Monterey.
Since he thought the word, he said it. “Home.” He hadn’t used it in that meaning in two decades.
“Do you suppose they’ll make us become Catholics?” he asked.
“Only if we want to get married or die,” said Hannibal.
Sam looked at Hannibal and Lei speculatively.
Forty-nine
GRUMBLE GAVE SAM a bear hug that would squeeze sap out of a tree. Then he gave Hannibal an abrazo and bowed politely over the hands of Lei and Esperanza.
For sure they were the only ladies in the place. Having no idea where Grumble and Abby might live, and even less where Flat Dog and Julia might have put their lodge, Sam and Hannibal rode downtown to Abby’s tavern, casino, and dance hall, The Sailor’s Berth. Or maybe she and Grumble still owned it together, or maybe . . .
“Just me,” said Grumble. “It’s just me now. I have chameleoned myself from con man to respectable businessman. Sometimes I regret it. However, the capital I earned at Yerba Buena bought this establishment for me.”
“Yerba Buena” meant the mission on San Francisco Bay, which Grumble had turned into a whorehouse and sold for a nice profit.
“Not that this brothel is so respectable. Excuse my bluntness, ladies,” he added.
He expanded a proud arm to show off his premises. He had turned a low dive into a palace. The walls were life-sized paintings of naked ladies (not mere women). The back bar was splendid enough to attract the most highfalutin ship’s captain. The liquors on display were imported and expensive, though rotgut was on every table. This place was fancy enough to condone any sin a man wanted to commit.
The cherub had aged well. Grumble was still a rotund, graying man of indeterminate age with an angelic smile and a demonic gleam in his eye. Raised as an orphan by the Bishop of Baltimore, Grumble had learned to live by his extraordinary wits—he’d been the cleverest of con men and had turned the deck of cards (actually, several very special decks) into King Solomon’s mines.
“Papa,” said Esperanza.
Sam knew. “Sorry, Grumble, but we’re in a hurry. Where are Flat Dog and Julia?”
“Look up the hill to the grandest place you can see. That’s the hacienda of Don and Señora Strong. Well, their town hacienda. They have another place, an entire estate, in the Salinas River Valley. The former rancho of Don Montalban.”
Grumble winked at Sam and Hannibal. In 1828 they’d gotten into a fight with the don while springing Flat Dog from jail. The dustup had left the rancho without owner or heir.
Grumble turned his attention to Esperanza. “Young lady, you don’t remember me, but I know you very well. It was I who rescued you and your mother from—”
“Grumble,” said Sam. “Later.”
“Very well. Go up to the hacienda. Everyone is eager to see you, and Abby will make you very much at home. I will join you for a drink late this afternoon.
“But you may not take a single step away from this establishment without hearing my great news.”
They looked at him quizzically.
“You have arrived just in time. Two weeks from Saturday I am getting married.”
“To who?” Sam almost shouted.
“I will introduce the lady,” said Grumble, “over our afternoon drink.”
ABBY AND HER husband were in town doing errands, but a servant showed the new visitors to the guest quarters of the Flat Dog family.
Esperanza threw herself into her mother’s arms. Sam was relieved. When they first rescued Esperanza from Kanaka Boy, she seemed to want to crawl onto Sam’s lap and suck her thumb, but she never asked to be held and never talked about her abduction. Now the young woman, recently terrified into a girl, found solace.
Julia had hot water brought and gave Esperanza and Lei their first experiences of a bathtub.
Then everybody traded stories. Long journeys afford plenty of them. Julia and Flat Dog were horrified by the episode of Kanaka Boy’s trap and how it came out. Azul and Rojo were excited. Sam left out a lot of the blood, danger, and Kanaka Boy’s nasty threats. He didn’t want to remind Esperanza or give Julia’s sons nightmares.
The servant brought them a delicious drink Sam had never seen before, crystals of lemon dissolved in water, and showed Sam, Hannibal, and Lei to their separate rooms so they could rest. Sam loved the lemon drink and thought stretching out on a bed was delicious.
They didn’t see Abby until the servant brought everyone onto a wide, lovely tiled terrace for late-afternoon drinks, which was apparently a daily custom. She served watered wine and bowls of the fruits that grew so well in California, avocados and oranges, plus almonds, and a dish entirely new to Sam, artichoke hearts marinated in olive oil.
Azul bit into an artichoke and spat it out. Julia caught the wad in midair and gave her son a talking-to.
Rojo complained that he and his brother were bored and didn’t w
ant to be nice and talk to a bunch of adults—they wanted to play.
Flat Dog said he’d get them out of this duty as soon as he could.
“When I say so,” said Julia. She hadn’t had an opportunity like this for more than a dozen years and no opportunity at all to teach her sons how to behave in a nice social setting.
Hannibal asked Esperanza for her marionette horse, and he and Lei showed the boys more tricks about making it walk and run.
Sam didn’t give a damn about any of it. He just got impatient for Abby to appear.
She came alone, wearing a mint green dress, a wide-brimmed hat of canary yellow, and an emerald necklace fit for a duchess. She let a touch of gray show in her hennaed hair. She came straight to Sam, gave him a long hug, a quick kiss on the cheek, and said, “If I wasn’t so damned dignified, I’d jump up and make you catch me in your arms.”
When Grumble came, he walked down the broad steps holding hands with . . .
At first Sam didn’t recognize her, because she’d gotten huge and was crowned with a spectacular blond wig. Though he knew her to be Sicilian, in her embroidered white summer dress with a flaring skirt, plus enough bracelets and necklaces for a Gypsy, and with her olive skin, she could have been a Gypsy. Her hair was pushed high with combs in the Californio style. Her getup said she was the grandest of Californio ladies. Somehow, over the several five years, she had gotten as wide as Grumble and half again more. Her smile said that getting there, and everything else, had been a lot of fun.
“Siciliana,” he stammered.
“You knew her by the appellation she worked under,” said Grumble smoothly. That had been at The Sailor’s Berth, where Sam knew her intimately. “Now she prefers to be called by her true name. We will start afresh with correct introductions.
“Carlotta, I believe you know my friend Sam Morgan. Sam, Carlotta Casale, who is my madam and soon to be my wife.”
The lady turned her smile wicked and did a teasing curtsey.
“And may I introduce further”—Grumble gestured to the sixtyish man and young woman behind him on the steps—“Isabella Grazia, my fiancée’s sister, and Don Anthony Strong, your host.”
Isabella curtseyed to Sam and gave him her hand. She was wearing a pale aquamarine dress that fit tight enough for Carlotta to wear in her former profession. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Isabella just borrowed that dress from . . . my friend. She’s a respectable widow.” Carlotta gave a nice curlicue to “respectable.”
Sam pulled his eyes away from Isabella to shake hands with Strong, a Brit with an amiable face and a nose that suggested he enjoyed his liquor.
Sam had to force himself not to stare at Isabella. He tried to gauge which of the sisters was older but couldn’t tell—both in their midthirties, he supposed, Carlotta round as a walrus, Isabella slender as a the stem of a flower. From their eyes, both of them were endowed with an over-abundance of sass.
“Sam,” said Carlotta, “don’t look at my sister like that. Her husband died, her son got shot mortally robbing a house, and her daughter married a Greek and went to Olympus or somewhere dumb. She’s mad at God, and she’s feisty enough to take the Old Man on.”
Sam decided to try to be gracious. “She’s also lovely.” When Carlotta whispered a translation into Isabella’s ear, she gave Sam a merry glance.
“Watch out. We Casale sisters don’t stand on ceremony around men. You might say our experience, different as it is, has taught us not to.” Carlotta’s speech still bore an aroma of her native isle.
Grumble pitched in to rescue everyone. “Sam,” Grumble interrupted pleasantly, “I formally ask you to be my best man at the great event.”
“I don’t have any clothes,” said Sam.
“That’s grand. We shall expect you in your finest buckskins. At our wedding the common shall dance with the aristocratic.”
“Long as I’m the bride,” said Carlotta, “the common will be conspicuous.”
“And Carlotta was about to tell you that Isabella will be her maid of honor—”
“Not that either one of us is maids,” said Carlotta, “though only one of us was a bawd.”
“When I bought The Sailor’s Berth,” Grumble said, “I put Carlotta in charge of the ladies of the evening. Now she will be in charge of me.”
Carlotta gave him a look that said, You better believe it.
Hannibal and Lei brought the boys up and all were introduced.
“So,” Grumble rumbled on, “let us all have a grand luncheon at Murphy’s tomorrow, that’s a fine new eatery in town, and make plans. You two have some work to do. Hannibal and Lei, too.”
Sam couldn’t bring himself to look straight at Isabella. She seemed to be trying not to laugh at his self-consciousness.
“That’s a deal,” Sam said, turning away.
“Not so fast,” said Carlotta. “You’ll have one obstacle putting wedding plans together with Isabella. She doesn’t speak English.”
Sam gave Carlotta a look that said, Wha . . . ?
“I been speaking it since I got here on a boat ten years ago. She just arrived, so I have to translate for her.”
“She has about two weeks’ worth of Spanish,” put in Grumble.
“Let me finish my story, mio caro. My family hasn’t had anything to do with me since I took up the whoring trade. Only after Isabella took up arms against the Almighty and I sent money for the passage to California did she decide her sister might be worth a visit.
“So if she doesn’t say much, don’t think she’s demure. She’s just as brassy as I am. But only in Italian.”
Sam found his tongue enough to say, “So what is it you want us to do?”
“Now you’re getting into it,” said Carlotta. “We have invitations. The printer has them ready now. The engraving is beautiful, I designed it myself. We want the four of you, Sam and Isabella, Hannibal and Lei, to deliver them to everyone who is anybody in town.”
“Us?”
“It’s a service. Sam, you and Hannibal are acquainted with the people who count—the highfalutin people are the same as when you were here last. Hannibal and Lei can deliver invitations to the couples, Sam and Isabella to the single men. That will give you a chance to introduce my sister to them.”
“Enough,” Grumble said.
Carlotta didn’t even pause for breath. “Isabella needs a new husband. I want her to meet the comandante of the presidio, also Mr. Larkin, Captain Cooper, the owners of the French Hotel, everyone who matters. Especially the single gentlemen.”
Grumble interrupted louder. “Tomorrow. Now, Sam, I want to talk to Azul. Remember, I aided at his birth.”
Sam would never forget that terrible afternoon. Stormy with weather and with violence of man against man, it still produced a new human being.
OUTSIDE MURPHY’S, AFTER the luncheon, which was just an excuse for wine and conviviality, Carlotta handed Sam and Hannibal a carton each of formal invitations. “We’ll be on our way,” said Sam.
“We will, too,” said Julia. “Can you tell us where the shop of the saddle maker is? Flat Dog wants to see it.”
Grumble gave directions—Flat Dog and Julia walked that way.
Sam took Isabella first to a shop that bore the sign GIDEON POORBOY, GOLDSMITH in a fancy script.
A teenage boy met them at the front counter. “May I help you?” he asked in Spanish. Sam supposed he was one of Gideon’s Mexican nephews, helping out. He could see his friend the artist bent over and hammering metal against an asphalt block in the back shop. The metal looked like a gold plate.
“Tell Mr. Poorboy,” Sam said loudly, “that a Rocky Mountain beaver trapper has come to give him his leg back.”
Gideon peg-legged out of the back room as fast as he could, raced around the counter, and embraced Sam. They held on to each other. If you cut and saw off another man’s leg, if you take his blood and his life in your hands, you are forever joined. Not to mention riding from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean with him.
>
Sam handed Gideon the invitation, and the goldsmith exclaimed that he would be glad to see all his old friends.
While they traded news she couldn’t understand, Isabella looked around at the fine things. In the display cases were many beautiful things made in silver—drinking bowls, spoons, frames for mirrors, and pictures, candlesticks, and plates, some of them with a design raised by embossing. Her family had never been able to dream of such luxuries, although her friend Abby now could and perhaps one day Carlotta could. . . .
In a corner Isabella found liturgical objects. She reached out and touched a silver chalice. She had once been devout, but she thought that the church’s money should be given to the poor, not spent on fancy implements for communion or statues for the poor to bend their knees to.
“Señora,” said Gideon, “I see you like ze beauty. May I show you some things?”
Isabella spread her hands helplessly.
“She speaks only Italian,” said Sam.
“The plate that holds ze wafers,” said Gideon, picking it up, “inlaid in niello.”
“The black lines against the silver,” said Sam, “are really beautiful.”
Gideon gave an extravagant Gallic shrug. “I have these church things,” he said, “because I had orders from three different missions for them when the government seized all their lands. What a farce. All the mission lands, meant for the Indians but in possession of the ricos. Half the Indians are field hands, almost like slaves, and other half, zey went back to their tribes.
“So, I now have these wonderful objects I cannot sell. Neverzeless, my friend, I do very well. The ricos, their ladies, sometime a sailor who want a bauble for a woman . . . Very well.”
He noticed how Sam and Isabella stood close to each other.
“I t’ink you like zis woman you cannot even talk to. Sometimes it is good, a man can no understand what his woman say. If you decide you like her, or if ze wedding of Grumble, it make you feel sentimental, come back and I give you a small necklace or bracelet as a gift for her. Now I see her coloring, I can pick somet’ing most beautiful.”
