by Rebecca Tope
It was some time before Fanny noticed how quiet Carola had been ever since they got back to Chemeketa. She worked strenuously at the domestic chores, seemingly contented enough. But she had very little to say. ‘Did the cat steal your tongue?’ Fanny asked, eventually.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You seldom speak. I have counted five words since breakfast – and now it is noon.’
‘What is there to say? We have made our plans, admired each other’s efforts, dreamed of gold in every form, discussed our holiday trip at considerable length. I can think of nothing more to speak of.’
‘We have scarcely mentioned my family,’ Fanny corrected her. ‘The usual thing would be to analyse their characters – Lizzie, my parents, the dogs. And Reuben, of course. If there be anything to say about poor Reuben.’ She sighed. ‘Whatever will become of him?’
‘He should consult a proper doctor. There could be something to be done for him.’
‘There!’ Fanny crowed in triumph. ‘You do have something to say. And it is true what you say - I doubt that a qualified medical man has ever looked him over. Even when it first happened, there was no real help available.’ She frowned. ‘But what could anyone do for him now? It is firmly set as it is, and only the most violent of treatment could make any difference.’
Carola shuddered. ‘The pain is unthinkable.’ She touched her own shoulder and worked it reflexively. ‘The joint must be a complex arrangement. It moves in a complete circle, see.’ She straightened her arm and drew a large circle in the air. ‘Once damaged, how could it ever be mended again?’
‘Indeed. As I said.’
‘It is a tragedy,’ said Carola, suddenly angry. ‘A silly accident that has ruined his life. I wish I had known him before it happened.’
Fanny cast her mind back three years. ‘He was a good brother, never teasing or domineering, like some. He took pleasure from the outdoor life – cutting wood for the fires, fixing wagon wheels and that sort of thing. A simple fellow. My mother was distraught when they took him for a soldier. We missed him sorely.’
‘He has no ambition now,’ said Carola. ‘He views his life as a vale of pain and despair. He is little better than one of your oxen.’
‘He was never one for thinking or book-reading. There is little depth to my brother, it must be said.’
‘And there we have it. Now perhaps you can understand why I have said nothing about him. And the others in your family – they are all simple people, unremarkable in any way. Except for your sister Charity, of course, and I believe we have said enough about her.’
‘Surely she is the most simple and unremarkable of them all?’
‘I think not. She has such an observant look to her. I fancy she explores everything that comes her way in a very thorough fashion. From what you have said, she chose her husband against all expectation, with a wisdom that has since become clear.’
‘Mr Fields was little more than a shadow to me,’ Fanny admitted. ‘My grandmother condemned him for some violence committed against his wife, and we shunned him for that reason. His children were poor pale things, so quiet and thin. One of them died,’ she remembered. ‘There was so little life in any of them, even him.’
The conversation lapsed, with Fanny reassured that there was no reason to be concerned for her friend. The reopening of the boudoir that evening sat on her own chest somewhat heavily. Whatever happened, she did not expect to find much pleasure in it.
Chapter Twelve
They lit the lamps, stoked the stove and threw the front door open, as soon as darkness fell. Hugo was told to stay by the fire and do nothing to alarm. Carola sat at the piano and picked out a tune she remembered from Charleston days. ‘Louder!’ Fanny encouraged. ‘They have to hear it out in the street.’ She threw a handful of lavender on top of the stove, hoping to create an enticing scent. The open door was an inconvenience, with the wind still blowing so strongly, but the inner curtain helped to reduce the draught.
Two hours later, nobody had crossed the threshold, but then the sound of boots on the steps was heard.
Two strangers came in slowly, their eyes full of questions.
‘Welcome, sirs,’ trilled Carola, standing up from her stool. ‘Come along in, do.’
The routine proceeded smoothly, mechanically. Fanny took the shorter man, who was a little older than her and quite acceptably clean, except for his boots. The four mounted the stairs, leaving Hugo to deal with any further visitations. Letting the doors to their rooms remain slightly ajar, as always, business commenced.
‘My name is Francesca,’ said Fanny.
‘Paul Merryman,’ he told her easily. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
Conversation was generally reserved for the downstairs room, but there had been less time given to preliminaries on this evening. It was not always that the men gave their names, but this one showed no sign of wishing to preserve his privacy. He went on, ‘We are recently come from Astoria. The intention was to sail down the coast to California, but the berths were all taken. So we take the road instead. In these gales, I fancy we made the better choice.’
‘Indeed,’ said Fanny, removing her skirts. ‘Do you wish me to unclothe myself completely, sir?’
‘Let me.’ He pressed up behind her, his hands on the fastenings of her bodice. As her breasts fell free, he reached around and cupped them gently, his thumbs circling her nipples. It was not a new experience, but uncommon enough for her to be surprised. The sensation was sharply thrilling. Darts of excitement flashed downwards, and she found herself throbbing with anticipation, in a way she had not known for months.
He proceeded to stroke and finger her entire body, kneeling over her with his shirt hanging open, and his breeches thrown onto the floor. She could see his member quite clearly, swinging above her belly in a fashion she thought both eager and friendly. The absence of hurry was in itself unusual. Now and then he made a low purring sound, which made her giggle. We are like lovers, she thought suddenly. Two people in love, understanding and valuing each other as equals. The strangeness of it caught at her throat, until she feared she might weep.
When he finally entered her, she was mad with impatience and bucked against him with her mind entirely empty. All that mattered was the crescendo building inside her as his rhythm increased. His eyes were open, watching her face. When something exploded through her entire body, he smiled in satisfaction, and followed with a deeper thrust and a choked cry of his own.
Only then was she aware of other sounds from Carola’s room. A shrill cry of ‘No. I say NO!’ was followed by howls that were part screams and part cries of rage.
‘Your friend is hurting her,’ Fanny gasped, pulling on a few garments at random. ‘We must stop him.’
‘He is no friend of mine. We met barely a minute before coming here, that’s all.’
‘Come,’ she urged, but Paul Merryman was in no rush to move. He lay back on the feather mattress, his head in the soft pillow and seemed half asleep. ‘Hugo!’ Fanny called next.
The dog was already at the top of the stairs, eyes wide and ears flat. ‘Here!’ she told him, pointing at Carola’s door. Together they ran across the passageway and burst through the door. Fanny had time to feel thankful that the assault – whatever it was – had not been sufficiently premeditated for the door to be closed and barricaded against rescue. Hugo leaped like a javelin at the naked man, who was kneeling on the bed, with Carola’s slim body face down between his legs. Her head was turned sideways and she was alternately shouting and crying.
The dog did not bite at first. He bowled the man over, the force of the impact sending him half onto the floor. His lower body remained in place, twisted and oddly linked to the girl’s. The noise increased, with Hugo’s snarls and the man’s wordless protests. It seemed he was in some degree of pain.
With a wrench, Carola detached herself, and rolled into a ball. ‘Filthy swine!’ she spat at the man, her lips twisted in an expression not unlike that of the protective
dog.
Fanny remained in the doorway, still trying to make sense of the scene. The man’s member was slowly shrinking, as he sat on the floor fingering it and whimpering. Hugo stood over him, great jaws open in a terrifying threat.
‘He is an animal! Worse than an animal,’ Carola went on, her rage overcoming any other emotion, and her spine straightening. ‘Get out, you disgusting beast!’ She reached for items of male clothing and threw them at him.
‘What did he do?’ asked Fanny faintly. Her own recent enjoyment hung around her, giving the world a pinkish hue and making it difficult to take anything seriously.
‘Unspeakable!’ Carola was still addressing the man.
He made a move towards her, with a balled fist, until a growl from Hugo stopped him. ‘You should go,’ Fanny advised him. ‘And consider yourself fortunate.’
Red-faced, he pulled on his clothes, wincing once or twice. ‘I be damaged,’ he complained.
‘How?’ Fanny remained mystified as to exactly what had gone wrong.
‘He pushed up my arse,’ Carola shouted. ‘If you persist in knowing. And got himself stuck there, filthy pig.’
A laugh came from just beyond the door. ‘Filthy indeed,’ came the voice of Paul Merryman. ‘Let that be a warning to you, my friend. Go against nature at your own risk.’
‘Never mind nature. I made it plain I was not having it, and he forced me.’ Carola had not left the security of the bed, her legs curled beneath her, and her arms waving eloquently. ‘The man is monstrous.’
Fanny gave it up. Such a practice was beyond her understanding. The pain involved would be intense, she was convinced. ‘Are you injured?’ she asked her friend. ‘Torn?’
‘I know not. Send them away and lock the door, and then ask me again.’
Apologetically, Fanny led her own customer down to the front door, behind the offender who saw no reason to loiter. ‘He is not with me,’ Paul Merryman repeated. ‘I never saw him until this evening.’
‘He spoiled it,’ Fanny whispered sadly. ‘He spoiled everything.’
‘Some men are spoilers by temperament. But you’ll never see him again. We both head south again in the morning.’ He took some notes from a pocket. ‘I neglected to leave payment.’
‘As did the despoiler,’ Fanny said angrily. ‘He ought to pay double.’
‘I will pay it, and extract it from him later. If I hurry, I can catch him up. If not, it will be an easy matter to find him in this small town.’
He pressed thirty dollars into her hand, and squeezed it shut. ‘It was a sweet time, spent with you,’ he murmured. ‘Very sweet.’
She forced a smile, and closed the door. Her heart felt large and soft inside her, swelling with a sense of warm affection that was new to her. The man’s face floated before her eyes, his skin and lips vivid in her memory. Was it possible to fall in love so quickly? To discover a person who fitted and reflected oneself so perfectly? She could so clearly imagine the two of them together for life, building a family and sharing the daily work, enjoying easy conversation and delightful night-time exploration.
She would never see him again. He was gone almost before she knew it. Besides, he would never marry a prostitute. No man would. Marriage and family were permanently barred to her now.
The realisation of this suddenly became a concrete thing. No longer a theoretical notion, lightly dismissed. It was a deep black hole in the ground before her. It was an iron chain around her neck. It was a shame and a sorrow that she thought she would never be able to bear.
It had taken two minutes at most for these thoughts to take hold. Paul Merryman was gone, and upstairs her friend required comfort.
Chapter Thirteen
Carola had wrapped herself in a woollen shawl she kept in her room, and was walking to and fro, as if to test her condition. Fanny watched for a moment, before saying, ‘You seem right enough.’
‘It feels dreadful. As if he is still there.’ She grimaced. ‘I must go to the privy and try to get clean.’ But she made no move to leave the room.
‘It was the act of a depraved monster. Have you ever heard of such a thing before?’
Carola shook her head. ‘Never. He said something about it being pleasingly tight, after the …other.’
‘Tight enough to trap him, it seems.’
Carola did not smile. ‘I shall never recover. I shall always fear some other swine will make the same attempt.’ Tears began to trickle. ‘No animal in God’s world would do such a thing. Is man so corrupt, so vile, as this?’
Fanny remembered the warnings from her customer on the very first night. Even he had not so much as hinted at something such as this. Or if he had, she had missed his meaning. ‘It would seem so,’ she sighed. ‘Oh, Carrie – what have we done?’ The words burst out before she could stop them. The sense of spoilation was overwhelming, and with it a conviction that they could not go on as they were. ‘We have been innocent fools, fortunate to have escaped harm until now.’
‘No, no. You go too far. We have been innocent, perhaps. But we must go on as before, with certain safeguards. There must be words we can use to make it plain that such things are not permitted.’ She grimaced again. ‘Though what those words might be, I cannot say.’
‘We could have asked Marybelle. She is sure to understand.’
‘She has gone – who knows where?’
‘We might make enquiries and try to find her. It was not so very long since she was here.’
‘Over two months. She might be in New York by this time.’
‘Why New York?’
‘Why not? Isn’t that where people go when they have money to spend?’
Fanny heaved a long sigh. ‘My man was the best I ever had.’ She laughed ruefully. ‘My best and your worst, all at the same time.’
Carola looked up interestedly. ‘Really? And yet they were companions.’
‘He says not. They only met outside our door, and came in together, perhaps from nervousness. His name is Paul Merryman. I shall never forget it.’
‘Good God, Fanny! You sound like a girl in love.’
‘He was like a lover. The word was in my mind when we were…together. It has never been like that before, not even with Abel. This man was there for me, not for himself. I had no notion such a thing was possible.’
Carola bit her lip. ‘It ought not to be like that, Fan. Your task is to please him and forget your own desires.’
‘He would not permit me. It was not my intention. I was helpless.’ She relived the swoony floaty feelings induced by the man. ‘And he was perfectly pleased, too. My pleasure gave him pleasure.’ She frowned. ‘How can that be?’
‘I envy you, since my pain was all my bastard wanted.’
‘The fact is, we are each of us different now. I am as spoiled as you, I fear. Whatever my mind might ordain, my body is like to crave the same delight hereafter. And when it is not forthcoming, I shall be sorry.’
Carola took a long breath. ‘Just the same, we keep on with it. We have no other choice. We cannot survive without it.’
Fanny was reminded of the banknotes stuffed into her hand. She spread it out on Carola’s bed. ‘Thirty dollars!’ she cried. ‘He gave me thirty dollars for us both.’
‘What?’
‘See for yourself.’
They both fingered the money wonderingly. ‘Who are these men, then?’ asked Carola. ‘Who go off to find gold, when they already have full pockets?’
‘They were well dressed and clean. Sons of gentlemen, eager for adventure. The goldfields, it seems, will see all of humanity flooding towards them.’ Fanny tried to visualise the many different characters all crowding together with their shovels and buckets and foolish hopes.
‘And, fortune being so blind and capricious, what would you wager that these rich men will be the luckiest of them all in what they find?’
‘I wager nothing,’ said Fanny. ‘I will put aside my twenty dollars and dream of a day when I can be free of this work.’
Both of them froze with shock at these words. Had she really meant it, Fanny wondered. In eight short months, had she come so far? Where was the fun and anticipation and feeling of inviolability? And now she felt trapped in a cage of her own making. Because she knew full well that nobody had forced them to choose this life.
‘There is really nothing so bad about it,’ Carola said quietly. ‘One difficult night, and you are ready to abandon it?’
Fanny closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, it was with a new determination. ‘I shall be better in the morning. We both will. Summer is coming, and so is the gold. We shall reap great rewards. Of course we shall.’ Fanny lifted her chin and gave herself a slap. ‘If you are not injured, then we proceed as before. All that took place today must be forgotten.’
‘I am not injured,’ said Carola softly.
They had taken little heed of their dog, who had, after all, saved the day. Now Fanny caressed and fondled him in an excess of gratitude. ‘Without you, my Hugo, much worse would have befallen us. You did your work magnificently, and must be well rewarded. Come with me, and we will open the parcel I got from the butcher.’
With a large marrow bone to gnaw, the dog was quickly in heaven. Fanny watched him and tried to order her thoughts. The money Paul had given her would justify a night or two without accepting further business – but an instinct told her that this might lead to a deepening reluctance to ever open again. And what would they do with themselves, without the preparations for each evening? Carola had perhaps known a childhood of idleness, with slaves and servants attending to her – but Fanny had grown up with a firm assumption that idle hands were sinful. As it was, the afternoons could hang heavily, with little to do but keep the little house clean and prepare meals. But a regular flow of money ensured that marketing could be conducted with frequency and what little variety the town could offer. While they paid their way, they could maintain civil relations with the local people. However much the wives might disapprove of them, they were tolerated so long as they kept to a few basic rules.
