Reckoning of Boston Jim

by Claire Mulligan

  “Hops, yes. Oh, it makes me laugh each time I see them. And there are men so black they seem made of night.”

  “Oh, and so many marvels, endless marvels.”

  “But no fine seamstresses, very few!”

  “Oh, and such a scarcity of good lace.”

  Dora can hardly tell which is speaking. She fears that if she continues to look from one to the other her neck might snap. Their sentences stack upon one another and build, eventually, their story—twin orphan girls sent off to the Antipodes by the parish priest. In their possession are letters of betrothals to two stalwart brothers, not twins, but close enough in age and temperament and happy to live close to each other for all their days. The Placterton Brothers are brewers with a thriving business. Famous in Melbourne, truly. They are not convicts, nor bolters, nor descended of either, the sisters make this clear, turning sombre ever so briefly.

  “There’s some here who look down on us.”

  “Oh, but we hardly care, hah.”

  “Not a whit, no. Let them rot here in soggy old England.”

  “Are you married then?”

  “Yes, are you?”

  “No,” says Dora, not looking at Mr. Haberdale who is grimacing and fidgeting.

  The plumper sister’s gaze passes over him, expresses sympathy. “We have heard that Miss Burdett-Coutts is once again planning to send good women off to the colonies.”

  “Oh, yes, sister. It is one of her great causes. To the Americas this time!”

  “No, it is the Canadas.”

  “Yes, sister, you are right. That was the island. Fabulous riches there. The streams are full of gold. The men are all handsome and rich as can be imagined and not a woman amongst them.”

  “Oh, they are lamenting for wives! They care not a whit for position or dowries. Not like here in soggy old England.”

  “The female immigration society, dear. They arrange everything. It is all very safe.”

  “All very honourable.”

  “It is time we left, Miss Timmons,” Mr. Haberdale says.

  “My goodness! I do believe I’ve heard of this Miss Burdett-Coutts,” Dora says to the sisters.

  “Of course, you have,” Mr. Haberdale says. “She is that worst of the bourgeois, that is, of the philanthropists. She gives money away as if it belonged wholly to her in the first place, that is, I mean, as if she should be applauded for it. It should be taken. Yes. Taken! All of it, not given out in dribs and drabs . . .”

  “But your friend, that Mr. Marx and his family. Don’t they live in one of her charity buildings?”

  “We must go now,” he says as if he has not heard this question at all.

  “Yes,” Dora echoes, “we must indeed.”

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  The outings continue, but no longer to factories or to the meetings of radicals in cramped coffee rooms. Mr. Haberdale the Younger now seems determined to please her. They view the enormous panoramas at Burfords in Cranbourn Street, the waxworks of Madame Tussuad. They attend the Oxford Music Hall where Dora catches Mr. Haberdale tapping his toe. “Only out of impatience,” he insists, and gives his usual frown. On a common green they clamber into the coach of a whirligig and are soon being heaved into the sky. From this vantage Dora sees, for the first time, her city in all its vastness and muted chaos and wonders if it is indeed a monstrous place, a devourer of the innocent, as Mr. Haberdale insists. How she desires to continue rising higher and higher, to leave the city entirely.

  Ah, but then a month or two passes and she has nearly forgotten this desire, nearly forgotten the Antipodean women. Indeed, she has nearly resigned herself to Mr. Haberdale, though he has not proposed marriage, though he has said marriage is a custom that will soon be abolished. And yet, and yet, something rankles. It is as if she is inhabiting a life for which she is not meant. She has felt so ever since the fire took her beloved parents and their beloved store.

  Then one evening her life finds its true course. She is walking alone near Newcut Market, seeking medicine for Miss Grower who has fallen sick. A yellow fog shrouds the buildings and street carts; it turns the street lamps a sulphurous yellow; seems to muffle the sounds of hooves and wheels and the calling out of wares. People appear out of this fog, stream past her, then disappear, like apparitions at a magic lantern show, all but a group of students, reeling with laugher and drink. They halt before her and their leader (he must be their leader for he is the most handsome) drops to his knees. “I am leaving soon for the colonies,” he cries. “For the goldfields of the British Columbias. I will pluck gold from the ground and so adorn your golden hair. Ah, my beauty, come with me. I adore you. I love you with all my heart. At least give me a kiss before I journey to my fate, to death perhaps!” The young man’s face. Oh, how it beseeches! How full of longing it is! She kisses his cheek. He leaps up and tries to pull her along. His friends haul him back. They are laughing as if they own the world and then the fog takes them.

  “It were Mr. Hume, you see. I knew it as soon as I saw him at the Avalon Hotel. I didn’t dare tell him straight away. I waited till that evening we danced aboard the Grappler. I told him that he’d been thinner then and that his hair were lighter, but that it were him for certain. And he said that for certain it must have been. It were a sign, you see, back in that London street. I knew it straight away. And so straight away I sought out the wife of that Mr. Marx to see if she could help with the wheres and hows of finding the Miss Burdett-Coutts and her societies. Mrs. Marx was glad to help me, and I’m thinking it were because she didn’t like Mr. Haberdale. Those Marxes were terrible poor, see, and never once had he helped them, thinking, I suppose, that books are alike to food and ideas can pay the rent. As for Miss Burdett-Coutts I met her in person I did, and she were lovely and grave and not at all like Mr. Haberdale said, not a philanthropist at all. And she was happy to send me on a ship to this island. Said such a lively person as myself would be useful there. And true enough in no time at all I felt that this was my place and home and that London was long ago. And it’s strange, Mr. Jim, isn’t it? How you can live all your life in one place and still feel as if you’re not belonging.”

  Ten

  A train trundles through green countryside. Heat waves ripple over farms and church spires. The woman Eugene sees is Dora, but not Dora. She is alone in her seat though the carriage is packed with men. They are hidden behind their periodicals. Dozing over their canes. They are oblivious to the woman, but for him, but for him. Her head leans against the window; her hat brim is crushed against it. Her eyes are closed as if she is sleeping—dreaming of him, perhaps, as he is of her. Leisurely she twists the pearl buttons of her bodice and they ping to the floor. Overskirt, petticoats, chemise. They are falling from her, are lifting themselves out the window to fly alongside the starlings, blindfold the amazed cows. She rolls her stockings down her thighs, eyes still closed, as if under a mesmerist’s spell. Next her corset pings open, is a silver carapace at her feet. Now she is naked but for her hat. And this, too, she unpins, the feather of cobalt blue brushing her cheek as she does so. Now lets fall her hair. It is wheat-coloured, shot with copper. Ah, she is dimpled. Luminous-skinned. Her hands caress her throat, her breasts, the round of her stomach, her sanctuary. The men are no longer oblivious. The breathless gold of the moment is gone. They are shouting in a tangle of tongues. Pointing. Cheering. Jeering. Mules lope down the aisle. Oxen smash the windows with their horns. A whistle blasts. The train shatters into black shards.

  “Quite so. Shit,” Eugene says blearily and watches a square of morning light fold over the rafters. He hopes to fall back into his dream, but it is impossible, what with the mossy film on his tongue, the thudding in his skull, the cymbal crash of plates, what with the birds carrying on like mad heralds, the general din of hundreds of men on the move.

  He rises stiffly from the bed. Culky? Is that the proprietor? Why not Procrustes, the nefarious innkeeper who stretched or chopped unwary travellers to make good his boast that his bed would
fit any man? For that is how Eugene feels this morning, as if someone has been hacking away at his limbs.

  The water in the washing jug is brown and afloat with flies. Already he has a thick stubble on his chin. He will grow a beard. And why not? If he is to be a miner, an adventurer, then it is best to look the part. Next he slicks down his hair with Macassar oil, scrubs his teeth with tooth powder, and adjusts his clothes, having forgotten to discard them last night. A wine stain adorns his topcoat lapel like a tattered rose. How did it get there? He is no dribbler. The Judge will have the wrong idea entirely. The Judge? Bloody hell.

  The front room of Captain Powers’s establishment is empty but for a tabby cat arranged artfully on a chair. The fire is a pile of ash. Eugene catches his breath. Curses.

  “The Judge and his party left at first light,” Powers says, as if this should be obvious.

  “Ah, quite so, did he leave a message for Mr. Eugene Hume? We arranged to meet.”

  “To meet? Here? This morning?”

  “This morning. Yes. I believe it was this morning. However . . .” Eugene presses his brow. Damn Culky and his rotgut whiskey.

  “Perhaps you would care for some breakfast, sir, to sop up your evening.”

  Eugene cradles a mug of gritty coffee, eats bacon, flapjacks and eggs in the near-empty saloon. Steps outside. Pale sky ringed with clouds. A ruffle of wind. Two men pass by him with a trundle barrow that haws from side to side. Culky’s Indian boy stands in the midst of the road and stares after them like the one child left by the piper.

  No matter that he missed the Judge. In the goldfields, that is where they promised they would meet, he is nearly certain. He checks his pocket watch. Near to noon. Let the others run off like hares. He will catch them up soon enough.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  The stove hisses pleasantly, puffs out green-smelling smoke. Two men—Yale-ites, Eugene assumes, for they are in no hurry to depart—sit about it with their boots on the rails, hats low on their heads, their cheeks abulge with chewing tobacco.

  The man busy at the counter looks gravely at Eugene from over the rim of his spectacles. He bids Eugene good morning and felicitations and introduces himself as Isaac Oppenheimer, provider of all supplies. Soon enough Eugene has bought a sack of dried beans, dried apples, lard, a filch of bacon, coffee, and four jars of medicinal brandy. “Best that you purchase as much as possible now, good sir,” Oppenheimer says, and speaks of the prices further up the road in a tone of awe and fear that is best reserved for minor demons. “And how is your shot? Because you shall need much shot. To shoot your dinner and the waking bears. They are most fierce at this time.”

  “As would I be, Mr. Oppenheimer, if I were rousted from a winter’s sleep with no victuals and no woman bear to warm me.” Eugene says. He glances at the Yale-ites. They give no sign of having heard this witticism. The one is scratching his armpit. The other spits a brown steam into the spittoon.

  “You shall also need mosquito netting. Mosquitoes on further miles are worse than the plague of locusts that the Lord sent against the blasphemous Pharaohs.”

  Eugene nods in appreciation of this colourful embellishment, decides he is enjoying all around this purchasing from Mr. Oppenheimer, he with his impeccable, ornate English that was most likely learned entirely from antique books. “Three boxes of shot then, and two lengths of your mosquito netting.”

  “And this? I shall assure you, it is the finest.”

  Eugene declines the plug tobacco, though he cannot help but smile. Chewing the finest plug tobacco is like chewing the finest dried leather boot. He debates telling Mr. Oppenheimer this, and then decides, no, it would damage their game. For Dora is correct; it is a game, the machinations of a deal. Not that there is room for bargaining here. A large-lettered sign over the counter warns against it.

  Mr. Oppenheimer rests his elbow on the counter, lowers his voice so that Eugene must lean toward him, so that the others cannot hear. “You seem a gentleman who shall appreciate this.” He pulls a rolled parchment from a leather casing.

  “Ah, and what is this? My fortune?”

  “Of a manner, sir. It is a map.”

  “A map?”

  “It is the latest map of the wagon road. Drawn by a surveyor of the noble Royal Engineers, one of the very men who did forge a path through the great canyon.”

  “Is it so easy to become lost? Do I not merely trudge along?”

  Mr. Oppenheimer tsk tsks as if Eugene asked if he should merely fly. He unrolls the parchment with reverence. “They say of this road that it is the eighth engineering wonder of the world.”

  Eugene peers closer. “Do they indeed?”

  The map is beautifully drawn, the coastlines detailed as lacework, the place names in a precise hand. There is the great rough oblong of the colony of Vancouver Island. There, the colony of British Columbia through which the Fraser River meanders—spliced in places like torn fabric just above the 49th parallel, past New Westminster, past Fort Hope and Yale and then upward into the heart of the colony. As for the wagon road, it begins at Yale and follows the Fraser until, at Lytton, it joins a River called the Thompson. The road now follows this river until 47 Mile House, now heads on riverless past 70 Mile House, 100 Mile House, 150 Mile House and so on. Such dull names wherever they are marked from. Ah, but what poetry can be expected from engineers? The road ends near Soda Creek. Near where it joins again with the Fraser.

  “From there you shall take another steamer, until here.” Oppenheimer points to Quesnel. From Quesnel a fine line turns at ninety degrees into the stream-veined palm of the goldfields. “No more road. The way is hard here. A hundred miles yet on forest paths.”

  “Look here, your map is wrong. How can this possibly be called 47 Mile House? It is a quarter way along a near 500 mile route. That means that is wrong by . . . by a great deal.”

  “These are the mileages calculated from the Lake of Harrison route, from this outpost.” Oppenheimer points to Lilloet. “It is not popular now. There is too much portaging, and too many high mountains.”

  “Ah, quite so. The confusion should be sorted out. Do you not agree?”

  Oppenheimer does indeed.

  “Well, what else? Lady Franklin’s rock? How charming. Did you meet the grand lady when she visited the colony?”

  “I did, yes, I did. She is like a queen. She tells me: ‘Mr. Oppenheimer, I shall remember always your help and good store.’ ”

  What is an adventure without a map? Even looking at it is somehow comforting. The distance from Yale to Barkerville seems short enough when it is laid out here before him on Mr. Oppenheimer’s counter. The “forest paths” from Quesnel to the goldfields suggest a country stroll. Never mind the gaps where the road is not yet finished and the blank spaces that might be gigantic whirlpools or crevasses or barbarian kingdoms or whatever else the imagination cares to colour in. This only adds to its appeal. And he is one for maps. He recalls that now.

  Eugene points to the goldfields: Lightning Creek, Williams Creek, Van Winkle. The string of towns: Camerontown, Barkerville, Richfield.

  “Can you mark, my good man, where the treasure lies?”

  Mr. Oppenheimer smiles. “If I knew such a thing I should be a rich, rich man.”

  “Hah, quite so, and now that I am quite supplied, I need a conveyance. A good horse would suffice.”

  Mr. Oppenheimer straightens his spectacles. One of the Yale-ites laughs, says: “Won’t find a horse, good or otherwise. You’d best go see the blacksmith. He’s got a molly, I hear.”

  The blacksmith brings her out blinking and bewildered into the sun, like someone long imprisoned. She is fat-bellied, the grey of a felt hat. The blacksmith pats her withers with his speckled hand, tells Eugene that she is a pack mule, owned previously by Cataline himself and didn’t he care for her as if she were his own sister? She could get to the goldfields with her eyes closed and is alike to a mule the blacksmith had back in Toronto—affectionate, dependable, sweet-natured. He would keep he
r himself except that he does not have the space, nor the feed.

  Eugene pretends a practiced eye. What does he know of mules? They are hybrid creatures, like griffins and chimeras. They cannot breed, poor sods.

  “Is she sturdy?”

  The blacksmith says she is indeed, leans his considerable bulk against her. The mule flicks her ears in seeming disdain and does not move.

  “Quite so, and her hooves. Are they strong?”

  “Strong and newly shod,” the blacksmith says, lifting one of the mule’s hooves to show him.

  Eugene glances down. “And her name? Am I to merely call her Miss Mule?”

  “Miss Mule. Hah! Call her that if you want. Her name, though, is Zuri. I think it means good in Cataline’s lingo.”

  The blacksmith asks for forty dollars and when Eugene theatrically waffles he throws in an oiled canvas and an aparejo, which looks to Eugene to be nothing more than a leather sack stuffed with straw.

  “Bring your supplies, I’ll rig her for you. It’s an easy business.”

  But it is not an easy business. Eugene has to make three trips back to Culky’s, has to enlist the help of Culky’s boy to carry the three trunks and several sacks. The blacksmith stares aghast at Eugene’s pile of supplies. No amount of cajoling will convince the blacksmith that it is not too much for both man and mule to carry. Reluctantly Eugene returns to Oppenheimer’s. Sells him the so-called unnecessary articles—the folding table, the games board, the tome on alchemy that he has not yet read, the top hat and box, even the third trunk itself.

  “And what of the tent?” Oppenheimer asks.

  “Won’t I be needing it?’

  “I would advise to sleep in the air if the weather is fine, to stay at the roadhouses when it is not. Such is best.” Oppenheimer says, though for all his concern the price he sticks by is far below what Eugene asked.

  Only now will the blacksmith show Eugene how to saddle the mule with the aparejo and then how to lash on the trunks and how to secure it all with a diamond hitch. The mule makes no protest except for a slight sinking, as if she were standing on soggy ground.