“Could I speak to you, Eleanora?” he said as he approached.
“Certainly, but first let me present my friends.”
His bow was perfunctory, his face did not relax into the slightest vestige of a smile as he acknowledged the introductions. Taking Eleanora’s elbow he said, “I’m sure you will excuse my sister?”
“By all means,” Mazie replied, her eyes bright. “Don’t let us keep you from what is obviously a grave matter.”
Color stained Jean-Paul’s cheeks but he inclined his head. Without another word he led Eleanora away, moving so swiftly that she had to lengthen her stride to prevent it appearing that she was being dragged.
The long length of the dining saloon held only a pair of domino players and a man reading one of the pile of newspapers before him. The smell of cooking wafted from the galley, though the dinner bell was not due to ring for some time. In a deserted corner of the dining saloon, Jean-Paul pulled out a chair for her. Holding her full skirts with both hands so she could slip into it, Eleanora demanded, “What is it? What is wrong?”
Her brother seated himself across from her. “Have you any idea what kind of woman you were chortling with out there as if you were bosom companions?”
Eleanora, smoothing her hair, went still. “I feel sure you are going to tell me.”
“She is not a suitable acquaintance for you.”
“No? I found her amusing.”
“Did you indeed,” he said grimly. “Mon Dieu, Eleanora. I gave you credit for more discernment. She is little better than a streetwalker. Let me tell you—”
“No! Let me tell you, younger brother. I am well aware of who and what Mazie Brentwood is; she told me herself. But at this particular juncture I scarcely see that it matters. Moreover, no one, Jean-Paul, gave you the right to choose my friends or to embarrass me in front of them.”
“It is my responsibility as the man of the family.”
“It has taken you long enough to come to it, then.”
It was dim in the dining saloon. The only illumination came from skylights set into the deckhouse above. Even so, she could see the blood receding from her brother’s face. It was a moment before he could speak, then his voice was quieter, more reasonable.
“Don’t you realize where friends like that woman can lead? Right or wrong, we are judged by the company we keep. Nicaragua may not be New Orleans, but it is a civilized country and the conventions still stand.”
“I am more than a little weary of the conventions.”
“Nevertheless—”
“Besides, who am I to talk to? The few other women on this ship are preoccupied with their husbands, their fears, and with how they will live when they get to California — those who are not too seasick already to care. I’m sure you wouldn’t approve of me talking to strange men—”
“You can talk to me.”
“Yes. Where have you been for the last hours? In the deckhouse having a drink and a game of cards with the officers in their quarters, and spying out the windows! You see, I am not quite as ignorant as you imagine!”
Quarreling. Again. It seemed that was all they had done since that afternoon at Bank’s Arcade. When Jean-Paul had been convinced, after bitter disagreement, that she intended to come he had argued that she ought to wait at least a month until he had looked over the situation and made arrangements for her. A month with the condescension of Cousin Bernard was not to be borne. Too, she was afraid there would be excuse after excuse to delay her until she gave up her determination to go. They had quarreled over the necessity of asking their lodgers to move. Jean-Paul was for the clean-cut, she for a more gradual transition after she had found other places for them where she knew they would be comfortable. Since all the trouble would be hers, she had won that set-to. She had not fared so well over the baggage they would carry. Two trunks plus a Gladstone bag for Jean-Paul contained all their belongings. Many small things, heirlooms, mementos, had to be left behind in the dubious care of Uncle Narciso and Cousin Bernard and the supercilious creature who was his wife.
On the table before her was a much-thumbed copy of El Nicarguense. Several weeks old, the lead story told of the death by firing squad of one Mateo Mayorga on the orders of William Walker. An elderly man, his only crime seemed to have been that he was an aristocrat. Looking away, Eleanora felt the vibration of tension along her nerves. What were they getting into? What were they doing? It was this uncertainty which caused her temper to flare. Perhaps it was the same with Jean-Paul.
Her brother reached out, touching her hand where it lay on the table. “I don’t think you are ignorant, only inexperienced, which is as it should be, ordinarily. It’s just that I worry about you. If anything unpleasant — happens to you it will be my fault.”
“I would never blame you,” she answered, touched by the concern in his soft brown eyes.
“But I would blame myself.”
They reached the dark green coastline that curved into the Bay of San Juan de Nicaragua in a streaming rain. The group of transit company buildings huddled beneath thrashing palm trees at Point Arenas looked far from prepossessing in the gloomy light. Across the bay the rubble of what had been Greytown before the bombardment in July of the year before had a forsaken look, as if at any moment it would melt into the brown sand of the beachfront or the dark green vegetation of the encroaching jungle would reclaim it. Some rebuilding was in progress, a two-story frame structure labeling itself a hotel and what looked like a docking pier. A sign proclaimed it to be the site of a new city to be known henceforth as San Juan del Norte.
The destruction of Greytown by the United States sloop-of-war Cyane, though instigated by the transit company after a dispute over port dues, had had nothing to do with William Walker. It was, however, an indication of the temper of the times, the political importance of the transit route across Nicaragua, and the license claimed by some representatives of the United States.
The riverboat Colorado waited with steam up to take the passengers aboard. There seemed no reason to linger in that drenched port at the mouth of the San Juan River. The transfer was made, the gangplank pulled in, and churning the cocoa-brown water into a froth, they proceeded upstream on the ninety twisting miles to the head of the Rio San Juan.
The river ran high in its banks joined by a thousand trickling runnels pouring out of the steaming jungle. There was the musty reek of decaying vegetation, overladen by the pervasive perfume of flowers. Trees made a bower over the river, their branches festooned with hanging creepers flowering orange and yellow, white and red. Thick-leaved vines, their juicy stems as large as a man’s wrist, strangled the trunks of mahogany and avocado trees. Thick clusters of plants with hanging aerial roots nestled in the crotches of their limbs. Palm trees waved split fronds and tree ferns pushed their lush greenery toward the wet gray sky.
Here and there they saw the brilliant flash of color as parrots and macaws took wing. Once, as the boat passed under an overhanging branch, a snake colored a bright yellow-green thudded to the deck. It was dealt with swiftly, unemotionally, by the Indian deckhands, as if it were an everyday occurrence.
The stone bastion of Castillo Viejo, rising high on its steep, cliff-like hill, was nearly obscured by rain as they passed it in the afternoon. Gray, deserted, it had an air of ancient, crumbling mystery. The pole-and-thatch houses hunched head to head at the foot of the hill had a mildewed look after the long rainy season. The Castillo Rapides were crossed without slowing. A few miles further upstream, however, the Colorado developed a steering problem. The boat sidled into the port of San Carlos at half speed.
There were supplies to be unloaded for the dingy little town on the shore of Lake Nicaragua. With the repairs there would be a delay of several hours.
For the convenience of the passengers who wanted to go ashore, dinner was served early. The rain stopped halfway through the first sitting and the clouds cleared in the west. Resting low on the horizon, the sun burned orange, sending long wavering shafts thro
ugh the white streamers of lake mists. Its light touched the waves of the “Gran Lago” with gold, and on the opposite shore, tipped the distant blue cones of the volcanoes Orosi, Madeira, and Ometepe with copper.
The mist lent a spurious enchantment to the scabrous thatch-roofed houses of the town, reaching as high as the gates of Fort San Carlos, which guarded the meeting of the river with the lake. The streets, however, ran with water in which refuse floated. There was nothing to be seen but mud and squalor. Returning to the ship from a short exploration, Eleanora and Mazie, escorted by Jean-Paul and the major, were halted by the sound of gunfire. It came from down the lake. Major Crawford dropped his air of relaxed companionship like the devil shedding a cassock. Bearing alert, he herded the women back to the steamer. Wading back through the cluster of vendors at the foot of the gangplank, the major set off in the direction of the sound.
The alarm was unnecessary. The shots had been fired by a group of men from the steamer who had taken advantage of the halt and the lull in the rain to practice their marksmanship on some of the alligators they had been seeing off and on all day. To make amends to the ladies for rushing them, Major Crawford bought small, red finger bananas, coconuts and pineapples from the Indian vendors in their costumes dyed in deep primary colors, and presented them. They were welcome tokens of their first day in the tropics.
After being cooped up so long, Eleanora would have liked to stay on deck. Despite the effluvia of the jungle and primitive sanitation, there was a heady quality in the air, the exotic essence of a strange and new country. She was denied the pleasure by the cloud of mosquitoes, enormous and black, which descended as night fell. As she went below, the deck vibrated into life once more beneath her feet. They were under way again.
In their stateroom, designed on this smaller river steamer to hold four women, Eleanora found Mazie stripped to stays and petticoat. She was brushing her hair with a furious impatience, her face shining with the goose grease she had applied against wrinkles.
As Eleanora came through the door, she tossed the silver-back brush onto the berth she had chosen and put her hands on her hips. “Bad news, honey. The best I can tell, your trunks are missing.” She nodded at the baggage that littered the floor, her own trunks, bags and boxes plus those of the two other women who must share with them while their husbands repaired to the one large men’s cabin. “I’ve been through these things a dozen times but I can’t find hide nor hair of them — nor of the hat box with my three best hats in it I bought from Madame Helene in New Orleans for ten dollars apiece!”
“You must be mistaken,” Eleanora said, starting forward.
Mazie gave a shake of her head, her mouth grim. “Gone.”
“But — how?”
“Stolen during the transfer from the Daniel Webster to the Colorado, most likely. What official in this God-forsaken country is going to stand around in the rain to watch that every piece is put aboard? It’s an old story on this run. I’ve heard in the early days, when there were so many transfers plus the mule trip, it was a lucky group that got through in either direction with more than half the luggage they had when they started out.”
“Can’t it be recovered?”
“I’ve already lodged a complaint with the captain for both of us, but there’s not much chance. It’s probably well on its way into the jungle by now, and back in there are still places no white man has ever seen. No, before long some Indian’s wife is going to be picking beans in a hat worth more than her whole village!”
Eleanora sank down on the edge of a berth. “They won’t have much when they open my trunks, but everything I had to wear was in there. All I carried off the ocean steamer with me was an extra chemise, a handkerchief, and a few toiletries. What am I to do?”
“Granada isn’t the end of the world. It does have seamstresses.”
“Even if I make it myself I can’t afford a new wardrobe.”
“You still have what you have on. Surely you can afford just one or two more gowns, something cooler.”
Doubtfully Eleanora surveyed the gown of brown velvet she had donned that morning. She had made it over from a riding habit worn by her mother. It was rather masculine in appearance with long, tight-fitting sleeves and a high neck. The day had been cool due to the rain, but already she had regretted her choice. What would it be like when the sun came out? Moreover, after their excursion about San Carlos the hem was caked with mud. Knowing it was unlikely that she would ever be able to wear it again in this tropical climate, she had been careless about soiling. It was doubtful the skirt could ever be cleaned.
Eleanora raised bleak eyes to the other woman. Mazie chewed on her full lower lip. “Well, I don’t like that gown on you anyway. It’s too drab, too old-womanish. And the rest of your clothes were the same. I think it’s just as well you have to start over.”
“But I tell you I can’t.”
“Nonsense. There are always ways and means. Let me see, something light and airy, something in green — or pink—”
“I’ve always tried to wear subdued colors. My hair—”
“Your hair is glorious!”
“My grandmother—”
“Your grandmother may have been a lady, but she sounds like a jealous old witch to me, jealous of your mother, jealous of you. You are a beautiful woman, face a perfect oval, fascinating green eyes, those dark lashes and brows and ivory skin inherited from the Creole French side — all crowned by that flaming Irish head. I call it a terrible waste to see you try to deny the way you look, subdue yourself into invisibility.”
“I don’t want to attract unwelcome attention,” Eleanora tried to explain.
“Something else your grandmother warned you against, I don’t doubt. Oh, I know you don’t want to dress quite like me, and I don’t mean that you should, but there’s nothing wrong with making the most of what you have. You’ll never find a man otherwise.”
Eleanora tilted her head, a militant look rising in her eyes. “It may surprise you to learn I don’t want a man.”
“You may think you don’t, but unfortunately a man is a woman’s only security.”
“I had a fiancé once. I seemed to lose my attractiveness for him when I lost my dowry.”
“He was a fool. You are better off without him.”
“That may be, but I prefer to place my trust in Jean-Paul — and myself — from now on.”
“Wonderful! Except that brothers have a way of marrying and putting their wives first. Then where will you be? You need husband, a life of your own.”
“You seem to have done well enough without one.”
Mazie stiffened, then relaxed slowly. “I had a husband once, and a child — a son.”
“I’m sorry—”
“No, let me tell you. We had a place in the hills of Georgia. One winter night the house caught fire, a spark from the chimney on the wooden shingles. I was out in the separate kitchen-cabin setting bread, my husband was dozing before the fireplace. Half the roof was ablaze before it was discovered. I ran into the smoke-filled bedroom where my son slept. He was small, not quite two years old. Since it was cold I rolled him in the bedclothes and picked him up. My husband told me to carry him outside and stay out while he tried to save a few things. I did as he said, though I couldn’t help looking back, thinking of everything I was losing. And then I began to unwrap the bundle in my arms. I had picked up not my son, but a stuffed toy I had made for him. I screamed to my husband and he went back after him. A moment later, the roof-tree fell in.”
Her voice died away in a husky whisper. “Mazie...” Eleanora stretched out her hand to the other woman, unable to find the words to express her sympathy.
“I am thirty-three,” Mazie went on. “I’ve spent over ten years trying to forget, trying to find some way of relieving the torment of self-blame. Nothing ever works — quite. And yet I’ve learned a few things. I’ve learned that men and women need each other. That the closeness of men and women, the fusing of their bodies in a passion of
caring, is one of the few things that makes life bearable.”
“And yet,” Eleanora said, looking away, “you speak of — what you do as your profession.”
“So it is, except that I am more selective.” She smiled. “A conceit, I expect, but I prefer to call myself a courtesan. The difference is, I restrict myself to one man at the time. But come, I have shocked you enough for one night. We were speaking of clothes. I have one or two things cluttering my trunks you can take off my hands. I let a dressmaker in Saratoga last summer convince me that a pretense to delicacy would be beneficial. I’ve decided since that it just isn’t my style. I’m a bit rounder in places than you, but I still have a sewing kit somewhere among my things, and that can be remedied.”
“I appreciate the gesture, but I couldn’t take them, you know,” Eleanora said.
“Why not? You are one of the most sensible young women I’ve seen in some time. Surely you can see the necessity. I think you can understand, too, that I will be hurt, and insulted, if you refuse.”
“You make it impossible to hold out against you,” Eleanora said wryly.
“Good,” Mazie answered, turning to her trunks. “That was exactly what I intended.
The dock at Granada swarmed with people. Men with handcarts pushed and shoved, raising a cloud of dust in their efforts to secure a place near where the gangplank would be let down. “Carreton de mano! Carreton de mano!” they cried, using sign language to show their willingness to carry baggage. Women with dark curling hair hanging down their backs adjusted trays of fruit and pork, older women and boys gathered up their offerings of conch shells and woven palm-fiber hats, leather goods and curiosities made of cow horns.
Soldiers, Falangistas in red shirts, their wide-brimmed, red-banded hats pulled low against the bright afternoon sun, leaned against the deckside buildings. Most were American or European in appearance, a few were Spanish. All shared a lean, hard-bitten look that contrasted sharply with the men crowding the rail of the steamer.
It had been an uneventful trip across the lake. They had gone first to Virgin Bay, where the passengers for California had disembarked. The carriages to take them to San Juan del Sur had been waiting, their side panels painted with scenes of California and Nicaragua, their wide blue-and-white and red-and-white stripes glistening in the sun. At the sight of them a cheer had been raised, a spontaneous reaction to reaching this next-to-last stage in the long transit crossing.
Love and Adventure Collection - Part 2 Page 49
