Ghosts in the Gulch: An Evergreen Cemetery Mystery (Evergreen Cemetery Mysteries Book 1)

by S. L. Hawke

  “I’m starving.” The growl in my voice seemed to put an end to this secret conversation. Those are never good. Asking about them was futile. Somehow, it seemed important that I not let anyone know how much this bothered me.

  “I’ll bathe last,” Fergus offered. Andrew shook his head.

  “Old men are first and slowest,” he offered, none too politely.

  “Perhaps I should go on the transport ahead of you. Another set of servants are also going to this place, carrying with them bundles of tea and medicine.”

  “The price of the wagon ride.” Now it was my turn to make Fergus and Andrew feel outside the conversation. But I was wrong. They did, however, look wary.

  Lam smiled slightly understanding my thoughts. Medicine was another name for opium. This dark trade followed industry and war despite our country’s best efforts to control it. Whiskey was no substitute for opium’s dreams.

  We left the barracks and headed down towards the bath house. Images of its unkempt state worried me. So far the lice hadn’t found me.

  “I can offer my services to your sister’s boarding house,” Lam said, walking without sound down the well-set stone path. He opened the pink, fresh-cut redwood door.

  Recalling the faces of my sisters was becoming harder with each passing year. Would they remember me? Hell, would they even recognize me? Worse yet, would I know them? A chill brushed the back of my neck. Would they accept Hiru?

  “I figure I could travel the passes in the next two days, then make my way into Santa Cruz.” I began to disrobe. “Are you suggesting we go with this transport instead?”

  “You must go on your own. Find this Confederate thief.” Lam handed me a cake of soap scented with lavender and a rough sea sponge. “A servant can go on ahead and prepare for his master’s arrival.” The statement made me uncomfortable. If anything, Lam was my Master, and I the student. Chasing a fugitive in an unknown wilderness could last weeks, months even.

  He poured steaming water into the seat-shaped bathtub. I dipped the sponge in the scalding water and made a froth with the soap cake. From there I scrubbed, watching the foam go from cream white to reddish brown in a few wipes of my face and chest. The cake of soap dwindled down into nothing as I lathered my hair, then taking a water pitcher, I gestured for the hot water from Lam who filled it half way with boiling water from a large kettle; then with careful ladles of cold water, the contents were shaken, and the scalding temperature became bearable as I poured it over my soapy head.

  Several pitchers later, I managed to free myself of the soap residue and began the process of drying myself. Lam assisted in helping me dress, as if he had been my valet all of his life.

  “Two men from the Ranchos are in town. One is quick and observant but hides beneath fine clothes and ladylike ways. The other is simply bored and angry at all English.” Lam buttoned the back of my suspenders to my pants. “They claim to have stolen horses, gold, and clothing out of the ranches of white men who are ‘squatting’ on their land. It is most interesting that these vaqueros claim to be warlords. The hot headed one claims one day to be governor over all the mountains of Santa Cruz.”

  “What are their names?” I asked as Lam handed me a boar brush and a special tin of shaving soap. I lathered the brush while Lam held a small square mirror up for me to see my face. “One is called Tiburcio Vasquez. He will do whatever the finely dressed, effeminate Faustino Lorenzana will tell him to do.”

  That’s when I stopped for a moment. That name had been in all the Marshals’ drafts I had read about “banditos.” Each time, both men would escape and disappear into the landscape like rabbits. A thought occurred to me. Perhaps they sold their scouting skills to the rebels? Why else would they masquerade as ‘guards’ to the sister of a supervisor of Santa Cruz County? Did they then take Sally’s information back to the Rebels, then come here for a poker game? What was it they were really trying to do?

  I began to lather my chin, then stopped cold. The man looking back at me in the mirror was old. I took a breath. This old man had deep set eyes from lack of sleep. Brown to most, but the sun glinted through the porthole window along with fresh air, and one of my eyes turned forest green. My cheeks looked like leather left out in the weather, but my nose, broken once, had been reset by a Japanese surgeon, so only a small bump interrupted the length of it. My jaw was too broad, lips too thin, and ears, well too big. My hair lingered along past the collar. I’d cut it at the barbershop when I got to Santa Cruz. It also was dark brown, but the grey was spreading. Whatever trace of red hair I had disappeared with my youth.

  I opened my mouth and checked my teeth. Lam handed me a boar-bristle tooth brush and I took some bicarbonate powder and scrubbed them, fearful of tooth rot. Then I brushed the soap across my face.

  Lam was also skilled with a razor. His prowess in battle with it, I could only imagine. My face was clear and smooth from his handiwork, unlike my own that often left my collars stained with blood drops.

  A starched white and clean collar greeted me as I clipped it in place. Lam then, again, expertly tied the blue silk cravat. I reached up to stop his hand but his skill simply allowed him to move his own hands out of the way before I even could reach the cravat. It was new, clean, and resembled Miles’. No, as I studied the cravat around my neck. This was Miles’ cravat. The difficulty of swallowing did not go unnoticed.

  “I found this in your saddle bags, wrapped in paper and tied with a black ribbon.” Lam studied my face. He knew what I was thinking and yet I could not articulate at that moment the pain and loss I felt for a woman I’d only shared myself with a few times.

  “In time, you will smile at her memory,” Lam whispered. I closed my eyes once then buttoned my cuffs and allowed my jacket to be settled on my now much thinner shoulders.

  “You are coming with us, Andrew and me?” Lam carefully brushed the jacket down.

  “I am your servant. To not do so would look strange. But you must go on horseback, not stage or train.” I visibly relaxed. Having Lam with me meant we could tackle whatever fate threw at us. “You should find time to train. Or that sword will be only a piece of metal.”

  He was right of course.

  “This evening. In lieu of a formal dinner,” I said, getting only a nod from Lam. Someone banged on the bathhouse door. Fergus, by the sound of the urgent voice behind it. Nodding at Lam, I half smiled, then left.

  If I were famished, the young men must have doubly been so. The dry heat, the constant riding, the ups and downs of the landscape at every turn, made a simple walk into a roundabout affair. Lam showed me the direction to the kitchen. Again the familiar French flowed out from it. Smiling, I stepped inside the busy, bustling, and incredibly clean workplace.

  “You call this Spanish roja, wine? You will have swill for sauce.” The joke was old, my French rusty, but I still was unprepared for Pierre’s response. He whirled around, knocking off his ridiculous white sock hat, waving his cleaver about, ready to deliver a fatal blow to anyone who challenged his authority or skill. He followed with a very large wooden spoon. The cleaver lunge I missed, but the wooden spoon tapped me on the side of the hat, sending it into the bread dough.

  “Mon Dieu!!” Pierre put down his cleaver and spoon. He stared at me. Gingerly I reached for my hat and dusted off the flour. With the hat still in my hand, I pointed to his boiling pot.

  “Better see to that first.” I held my hat in one hand and waited as he swore, pushing the saucier off the heat. Chinese servants around him looked at us as if we were about to explode.

  “Mon Ami!” Pierre held out his arms. “Incroyable!” Pierre’s curly, light brown hair was now frosted up with grey, just like mine. He’d also packed an extra flour sack of pounds around his middle.

  “Hello, Pete.” Pierre hugged me hard then ordered his sous chef, a Hispanic boy of 20 to bring us food, wine, and water. I tried to explain that I was invited by the Missus to dine with them at luncheon.

  Pierre made a sound like clearing
his throat for a spit. “That cow.” He waved a dismissive hand through the air. “She wouldn’t know good food if it sat on her! Mon dieu, she only wants to eat chocolat,et chocolat et chocolat, every day, every meal. And beouf, vraiment! Boiled and parched until it isn’t fit for a sow.” A table appeared suddenly, brought by two kitchen helpers, followed by a table cloth, and plates, utensils, wine glasses, all in a magical swoop of hands. “I will send word,” Pierre snapped his fingers, “that you are otherwise preoccupied. Bratton owes me more than this pathetic job. I and my cooking brought him a very large fish.”

  “Really?” I said with some skepticism. But it would not have been beyond belief. Pierre saved us in much more dire circumstances. I would expect no less from Emperor Napoleon’s former chef.

  “Non, c’est vrai. Moi, I cooked for the Bank Manager from San Francisco, and this gendarme…Big man, very large mustache. They save the mine — and here I am with enough money to begin my own restaurant. But that is not the fish I speak of.”

  My surprise was complete. Pierre smiled like a cat full of canary. “Moi et Bratton son beaux-frères.”

  “Non.” Pierre had married into the Bratton family. I answered in French and kept talking in it. “When did that happen?”

  “Ah! Well, when I first arrived here Bratton had brought his entire family to this hellhole, including his widowed elder sister.”

  He didn’t have to finish the story. But he did. I took a sip of the red wine, a bit more robust than last night’s, full of fruit. I held the glass to the light. The color was deep purple, thick, and smooth. The oak in it tasted plain as spice.

  “You like?”

  “Vraiment. But, it’s local. I’ve had something like it before.” Again I held up the glass. Pierre chuckled and blessed me.

  “It comes from a winery up there in those mountains, by God in Heaven.” He pointed to the Santa Cruz Mountains behind us. “AND they call it a very curious name.”

  Frowning at him, I swallowed the remainder of my wine then took a knife tip of chevre into my mouth. I gestured for him to continue while I took another mouthful of a peculiar green fruit, sharp and citrus-like whose peel was brown and furry.

  “The winery,” here Pierre leaned forward, “claims that the grapes were blessed by a great flying cigar.”

  My laughing made me choke on my food.

  “It’s in those mountains, with a Scottish name. Boony Don — or some other barbaric-sounding town, but the point is, this is truly a French wine. And even if it may not have been blessed by a heavenly cigar! Eh?” He raised up his glass and gulped.

  We spoke about the events that brought us to this point in time, but I was sticking to my story of needing to return to see my mother one last time. Pierre inquired after Hiru’s health.

  “You should give serious thought to sending him back to the Sandwich Islands,” Pierre said in English.

  What could I say to that?

  9

  “It would be friendlier to him. More accepting and his royal blood would not be disregarded.” I nodded in slight agreement. Pierre leaned forward and poured more wine.

  “I have heard that there is a very rich widowed princess in Santa Cruz. Her father is cousin to the CZAR! Sa mère, a princesse Japonnaise. She is so rich that they send her great aunt to fend the men off. Perhaps you should inquire if she needs a body guard?”

  “Right.” I ate more, drank again, and shook my head. “Is this place really as rich as they claim?” My question was a bit fast, but Pierre knew I wasn’t here to renew old ties…well, that was not entirely true.

  “Rich and getting richer, IF they can sort out who really holds the claim.” Pierre dished out some chicken in a rich butter sauce with capers and currants.

  “I thought the mining company holds it.” A mouthful of tender succulent meat melted in my mouth surprising me with a fiery chili. The garlic was a given, but this was an excellent dish. Pierre took a bite and then spat it out.

  “Idiot!” he roared at the sous chef. “Qu’est-ce que c’est ça?” The poor sot stood at attention, sweat breaking across his temple. He squeezed his eyes closed. Pierre then picked at the dish and took another bite. Nodding his head back and forth he tasted the chicken again. Then he gestured towards the sous. The young man timidly approached Pierre.

  “Should I move back a pace?” I added, watching with some amusement at this dance I myself once did with Pierre. Pierre shushed me.

  “More wine. The blanc gris. Then it is heaven.” As Pierre said this to the young man, the sous chef lit up as if he’d been given all the gold under the mountain.

  “You troll,” I said, taking another swig of the glorious wine. There was no label, but I could imagine the wine would be called “Volant” or some such thing. You could never call a wine “Le Cigare Volant.” Something about that name just could not be taken seriously.

  “You were saying that the mining company didn’t hold the rights?”

  “Three different ranchos claim rights, in addition to a white man who claims he owns both the land and the claim. The lawyers are making money from the legalities while Bratton simply fills orders, runs his own company business and buys up the land surrounding the mine. My brother-in-law is one thing, visionary.”

  “Why is that?”

  “This place has greatness written all over it. Mark my words, this valley will grow past its orchards, past its cattle, because it is the only place you can have both industry and people, living and working near a major port that flows, truly, all the way towards the mountains.” Pierre looked off into the distance. “They call it the Delta of Sacramento. There is where you will have true agriculture. Water, hills, and vines, maybe even olives. Anything will grow there.”

  “Here too. This is delta. I just came from a farm that grows peaches, almonds, apricots.”

  “Ah oui, and that is already successful, but we also know that the war is making things more difficult for trade with Europe, so the East becomes our gateway. Europeans and Americans alike would gladly trade cotton for silk and they would embrace these new workers from Asia without any thought of law. Slavery, my friend, comes in all forms and the black man is not alone. They will find another race to exploit.”

  “You’re an optimist.” Another bite, another swig. “Ever hear any talk about the Confederacy out here?”

  Pierre snorted so loudly I thought he was blowing his nose. “They are a JOKE. But they have people who support them. Especially in the mountains. There is talk of creating a gunpowder factory in Santa Cruz, a second one that can ship even faster to Los Angeles, to San Francisco, to where? I ask you!”

  “But you have heard talk. Joke or otherwise?”

  “Every two weeks, someone comes from the eastern side of these mountains. They buy supplies, blasting powder, ammunition, much of it looks like mining supplies, tents, all that.”

  “Have they come in yet?”

  “Those two Rancho boys are waiting for them. The men come, they play poker, and they leave with them, then come back again.”

  “So which is it? Did they leave and come back or are they waiting?”

  “GRENNIE!” a woman’s voice bellowed. Pierre’s hand stopped midway to his mouth with a glass of wine.

  “Ah. Ma Chere.” Pierre stood, looking quite unruffled. I stood wondering if a willow switch was on its way. A statuesque well-coifed woman with greying blonde hair, a generous bosom, and a jaw as square as my own strode into the kitchen as if she owned it.

  “Grennie?” I whispered leaning towards him. The woman saw me and strode forward until she stood even with me. Crossing her arms she jutted that magnificent chin of hers outward.

  “Well, so you’re the one that has my corpulent sister-in-law’s petticoats in a fluff!” she announced rather than inquired.

  “Ma Chere, this is my bon ami, Andre—”

  “Ah!”She held up a scolding long finger. I did notice, however, that unlike her sister-in-law, Mrs. Croix, as I assumed she was, shined from
cleanliness. I liked her already. “The man has a voice — I’d like him to introduce himself to me!”

  “Andrew Jackson Sloan, Madame Le Grenoie,” I said softly, trying not to laugh at the nickname of ‘frog’ in French. She flatly and sarcastically smiled but there was a twinkle in her eye.

  “Smart too. No wonder. Well, Mr. Sloan. Rachel Bratton Williams Croix.” She said the French last name perfectly. “Your valet has been inquiring as to your health and apparently you have an urgent matter to attend to?”

  Quickly I checked my pocket watch and saw that the hour had turned into two and yes, I did need to attend to my practice of sword. “Thank you Madame. It was very nice to meet you.”

  “Likewise.” She dismissed me, but turned to Pierre. “We need to have food ready for that lot that comes from the Pajaro side. They paid in gold, Grennie, GOLD.” She grinned at me. “Unmarried men pay premium for a home cooked meal. So—” She made shooing gestures to Pierre. “—my turn to dazzle the unclean, uneducated palates of the lonely and unmarried.”

  “Ahhhh, my lovely wife. Merci.” Pierre grabbed his wife and kissed her sloppily. Though she feigned tolerance, I could see she was as full of life as Pierre had always been. I looked away to give them their moment. Pierre took off his apron and carefully hung it up on the pegs that held assorted aprons. We left the kitchen, me reseating my hat, Pierre grabbing his jacket, to go into the waning afternoon of the streets of New Almaden. We parted at the barracks with a promise to keep in touch when I settled into Santa Cruz. I got there just in time to meet the suppliers of the Confederate Rebel Camp.

  As far as we could tell, no one could see us in the field. Lam had put two young Chinese boys near the pathway to the shaded glade, his practice place of choice. The mountain rose straight up behind us, unable to hold spies on its sides.

  My hakama, my kimono, my scrolls, Tomiko’s kimonos, were burned when we fled Japan. The only thing I had was her grandfather’s sword and her father’s sword, which I presented to him personally when I made landfall in Hawai’i. Ikebara-san promptly pulled another on me. Then when I evaded his steel, he bowed very slightly, strode forward and took the sword from me. Later that evening, Ikebara-san demanded we train together and beat me up with a bokkan, a wooden practice sword, until I could no longer stand. While I eased my aches in the oforo or bath house, Tomiko’s father would play with Hiru, as if he were a boy himself. That evening, the assassins came.