Summers, True

by Poppy

  "You are too innocent and trusting," Jack said heavily. "This has been a terrible voyage, but once we're ashore, you won't ever need to see her again. I'll be happy when we're all ashore in San Francisco and safe."

  Part Four

  San Francisco

  Spring 1852

  Chapter Twenty-two

  JACK and Andy had been gone for hours. They had walked off the wharf, leaving her alone, and simply disappeared. That was terrifying, but everything here felt wrong, silent and menacing. This was the waterfront. Waterfronts were always abustle with life and movement. Yet now the gray afternoon light was beginning to darken, only a few yellow beams showed behind iron-barred windows, and only an occasional furtive figure hurried along the sandy street. Even the stray dogs had stopped their prowling and sniffing.

  Poppy perched on her trunks stacked between the prow of a stranded ship and the wall of a closed shop. She could hear, faint as echoes, the voices, shouts, music, and rumble from San Francisco spreading out beyond the wharf. But around her was only silence, except for the faint lapping of water against the pilings at the end of the wharf.

  Jack and Andy had hurried up the street from the wharf to find a place to stay and a wagon to carry her trunks. Even if they could not find a wagon, surely in all this time they should have been able to hire a couple of porters with wheelbarrows.

  She slipped to her feet and ventured out on the wharf, standing on tiptoe so she could look up the street and still keep her trunks in sight. Now she could see a glowing halo of lights from the town. Out in the bay, she could see the heavy gray fog hanging like a canvas curtain over the derelict ships, stranded there when their crews deserted years before to run for the gold fields. Nothing moved in the ghost fleet, but around its edges the dozen ships that had sailed in that day swung at their anchors. As she watched, the chill breeze that had been sweeping down over the inland hills sharpened and moistened. The cold cut through the heavy, padded basque and wool coat she was wearing. Streamers of fog floated away from the solid curtain and began to drift toward her.

  She took an impetuous step forward and then shrank back. This strange, dead waterfront street, oddly composed of stranded ships with shops and warehouses crowded in between, was intimidating, but nobody had bothered her. If she went stumbling around, in this heavy basque and coat with an those weighty skirts underneath, and stepped off into deep water, she would drown before she could even call for help.

  She went back and perched on the trunks again, settling her reticule and knitting bag in her lap but not loosing the strings from her wrist. She was going to ask the next person who passed to get her a sheriff. Yes, that was what they were caned here. She wanted a sheriff urgently. Because something was terribly wrong. The fog was worsening, not as dark as a London pea-souper but as thick, wrapping her in gray tendrils until she could see nothing,

  "Ashore and safe in San Francisco," Jack had said. He could not foresee all the little mischances of the landing and this day.

  The week before had been bad enough, when her very fingers and toes were tingling with longing to get ashore, to feel solid land under her feet, to see the town some people said had streets paved with gold and others said with drowning-deep mud. She wanted to be in San Francisco.

  The ship had sailed far and long in search of the trade winds. Jack had tried to explain the long distances of this coast and that they would be lucky if they found the hidden entrance to the bay at the first pass. That brought impatient shrugs. They were in sight of land and other ships. There was the goal. There was California.

  All the passengers were sure each day would be their last on board. They plunged into a scramble of packing. Jack and some of the other sailors produced their gold-mining equipment. The tin pans, the pickaxes and shovels, the belts and bags to hold gold, some hastily fashioned out of the tops of worn boots, were put in carryalls. The chemical retorts and crucibles for gold tests, the goods for trade, the city clothes, were already in trunks, many with false bottoms and special locks. Guns and pistols, knives and powder flasks, were stowed in pockets and holsters. The women put away their bright, worn gowns and appeared in severe street costumes. Friends, bosom-close for months, parting cabin mates, inseparable companions, barely smiled and nodded to each other as they hung on the rail, peering' shoreward. The voyage was past. Eyes strained toward the future.

  They jostled at the rail as the ship sailed along the shore, past uninviting stretches of wasteland with straw-colored hills, austere and forbidding. They muttered in dismay over the stunted shrubs and few trees, wondered at the sight of the hundreds of horses and cattle feeding on those brown hills, and were reassured when they glimpsed deep green valleys with tall oaks. The rains came only in winter, knowing passengers reported, and then for a brief time the hills were green and bright with wild flowers. But even though the hills were brown and sterile-looking, the livestock could live on them. Beyond, in the faraway Sierra, the talk ran, spring warmth was melting the snow and ice on the mountainsides. The streams and rivers were surging into life, watering the fertile inland valleys, brightening the land. And most important, the rushing water was unearthing the wealth of gold from rocks and ledges, and carrying it down from the heights.

  If the Captain did not find the trade winds, if he missed the bay entrance, they would be too late, too late, and others would have scooped up that wealth glinting in the water, dazzling in the sunlight. Knuckles were white on the railing as eyes searched for the break in the brown hills, the magic entrance to the golden land.

  The greed in those eyes, so naked and all-consuming, shook Poppy. Repeatedly she fled from it to the disorder of the cabin only to look around her in baffled despondency. She could not get everything back in those trunks. She could only roll and stuff, cram and pound, and still the trunks brimmed. Her bunk was covered with Andy's dirty clothes and her own crumpled petticoats and sleeping robes. Dirty clothes must be larger than clean clothes. At least they did not fold as neatly. In desperation, she pulled out a heavy padded basque, cut like a skating jacket, and crowded Andy's clothes into its place. She grabbed all the books from the tin box, tied them in netting, crammed her things in, and managed to close it. Now if Jack sat on the trunks, she could wear the basque ashore, though it would be a struggle to pull her heavy coat over it.

  The ship tacked sharply, and she reeled against the bunk.

  "Land! Land!"

  Poppy sniffed. They had been in sight of land and of other ships also sailing parallel to it for days, and much good that did them.

  "The bay! The bay!"

  That was different. She ran out on deck.

  They were sailing up a narrow channel, running among floating streamers of fog, beating against strong currents. Ahead of them she glimpsed another ship and, turning, saw still another behind them. After months of seeing only an endless horizon, distant ships, and land miles away, this boxed-in closeness was terrifying. Even as she shivered, they broke through into a spacious landlocked bay, broken here and there by small islands. Ahead she saw a bluff with two or three small cannons and a tall flagstaff. That was San Francisco.

  In the middle of the bay, she saw a solid thicket of ships, a forest of ships with broken masts, moored so close together she was sure anyone could step from one to another almost as easily as walking across a creek-broken moor. Those were the abandoned ships, left in the early gold rush days when the crews broke and ran for the gold fields without waiting to unload.

  As they drew in closer, she saw other ships stranded on land with shops built around them. Or perhaps the land had grown out around the ships, it almost looked like that. Extending past them were great wharves, one shaped like a T at which three ships were unloading at once. None of the wharves was vacant.

  Talk rippled along the rail again. "Wait our turn." "Going to land us over there." "Cheaper fees at that one if I know our Captain." "No, not any more. That was last year, when the Vigilantes were meeting the ships and turning people back."


  "Afternoon before we get ashore."

  Poppy almost jigged with impatience. Jack, closing the trunks, was reassuring. The crew had been paid off, and everybody was packed. The Captain, the First Mate, and a few seamen who were being paid double would stay on board to take the ship back to her anchorage. Once the passengers had landed, everybody else was free. So Poppy was to let the other passengers go ahead until he and Yankee Bill could unload the trunks between them, They would be only minutes behind the others. They would be ashore and settled in time for dinner.

  They drew in to the wharf, and the Captain gave the ceremonial order to drop anchor. The crew jumped briefly to the riggings and cheered, then they tied up. The gangplank went down. All order vanished in a struggling, Shouting melee. The cabin passengers went first, pouring like milk from a broken pitcher, kicking, elbowing, shoving. The men headed up the wharf and to the street at a dead run. The women, kicking and pushing their trunks ahead of them-for none of the crew would help-were only a little behind. Then the steerage passengers flooded up over the deck. Poppy moved back. Their faces were pale from long confinement, for they had been allowed up on the afterdeck only for brief periods. The stench from their unaired, unwashed clothes and bodies was almost palpable.

  Silence fell on the Ship, and Poppy realized she was the last passenger and alone, waiting there by the cabin. Even Andy had vanished.

  Then he ran up to her. "Jack and I have to carry everything down to the wharf."

  "What happened to Bill?"

  "Some old steerage passenger claims Bill stole those pans and that shovel from him, but Bill says he's got a list from where he bought them in his duffle bag. The Captain says he's got to produce it or pay up."

  "Not many of those steerage people had mining gear. They were brought straight here out of jail."

  "Of course it's a crook game," Jack said, coming and bending to hoist a trunk on his shoulder. "That man knows the crew's been paid off and thought he could collect some cash to take him ashore. He just picked on the wrong person. Lend a hand here, Andy. The Captain wants to cast off before these wharf charges mount up."

  "Bill will fix it in time to help us get these things to town," Andy said.

  Poppy had no sooner carried the last of the tin boxes ashore than the gangplank was drawn up behind her, and the lines were cast off. The ship began to move away from the wharf. They all stared incredulously.

  "Bill must have had trouble finding that paper," Jack said uneasily. "He'll have to row ashore and find us later."

  "What do we do with all this?" Poppy cried with a gesture to the trunks and boxes stacked all around her.

  "I'll find a porter with a wheelbarrow or a wagon or something," Andy offered. "There were plenty here when we landed."

  Jack and Poppy looked at each other uneasily, The afternoon was wearing away, and they were in a strange and foreign city. They had depended on Bill because he had been here before and at least knew the names of a few streets and hotels.

  Andy came running back. "One man told me everybody was his own porter here, and it looked like I was a strong boy. Another man said all 'the wagons are over at the big wharf where two ships are still unloading. A man with a big wagon full of whiskey barrels asked where we were going and told me we'd better find out because nobody's going to tie up his wagon and horses and lose three other fares while we drive around trying to make up our minds."

  "He's right," Jack said. ''We'd better move all this off the wharf and find a quiet spot where Poppy can stay with it and wait. And we'd better find rooms and engage them before we come back with our wagon."

  So they moved everything into a spot between a store and a stranded ship, in the shadow of the curving hull, and went off together, leaving her to guard all their possessions. Now hours had passed, and the fog had closed in around her.

  She dared not move from her perch, Yet she knew Jack and Andy would not willingly have left her here alone in this isolated spot for so long. What could have happened to a grown man and a strong boy? She must find help, give an alarm, and start a search for them.

  Then she sensed movement, saw darker shadows in the fog.

  "Jack, Andy," she cried with a sob of relief. "Here. Here I am." She put out her hands, groping.

  A slender beam of light from a partially covered lantern struck the knitting bag and reticule dangling from her wrist, A knife flashed, slashing the strings, cutting her wrist as the two 'bags were snatched away. The light vanished. She stumbled back, but a heavy body followed, 'towering over her, pressing her against the trunks while the knife slashed again and again. tearing the thick wool of her coat and the padding of the basque beneath.

  Poppy threw back her head and screamed. Above her, in the hull under which she was sheltering, an unseen door opened, and a broad beam of yellow light flooded down on Poppy staggering back against the trunks, her wrist streaming blood, and on a dark figure ducking to scoop up something from the ground and then turning and disappearing, feet pounding away, into the all-encompassing grayness.

  "Help," Poppy screamed. "Help. I'm murdered."

  "You sound pretty lively to me," a man's voice grunted.

  A tangle of wood and ropes rattled through the door, unwinding into a rope ladder with wooden steps. A tall man slipped down the ladder, lantern in hand, and flashed it full on Poppy, studying her,and then circled the light around the trunks.

  He decided, "Doesn't look like he got away with anything."

  "Just my knitting bag and reticule."

  "I saw you sitting down here. Why'd those men of yours go off and leave you?"

  "To find a place to stay and a wagon for the trunks."

  "No sense," the man growled. "No plain common horse sense. All right. You're hurt but not killed. Get yourself up the ladder,and I'll fix that cut."

  "But Jack, Andy-something's happened to them. We've got to find them."

  "First things first. You're dripping like a stuck steer. Now these trunks. Usual story, I suppose. Everything you've got in the world?"

  "Yes, but Jack, Andy-something's happened to them."

  "Probably has." He drew in a deep breath and yelled, "Efram. Efram. Open the shop door and haul these trunks inside and lock up again. I'm taking the lady upstairs. Efram, get out here."

  Another unseen door in the hull cracked open, level with the street, and a tall, lanky, tow-headed boy with long, powerful arms loped out. He bent and gathered a box under each arm.

  "I'm getting them, Father, I'm getting them. You mind the Iady."

  Chapter Twenty-three

  POPPY stood in the center of the bright bare room, if keeping her dripping wrist over an enamel basin on the scrubbed board table. With her other hand, she held her chemise up around her breasts while the man bent to examine the cuts across her ribs. He grunted, straightened, then went over to the steaming teakettle on the iron stove, and poured water into an enamel pitcher. He put that, a bar of yellow soap, and a cotton towel on the table.

  "You've got lively blood, but except for that wrist, you're no worse'n if a cat scratched you. Lucky you were dressed so heavy, or I'd be trying to explain how we got a deader here. Wash,and I'll get you some brandy to put on those cuts so they won't go putrid on you, and we'll tie up that wrist. You'll be as good as new in a week."

  "Don't you think we should get a doctor?"

  "Miss, if there's any doctors in this town, they ain't doctoring. If they're doctoring, they probably ain't doctors. Wash like I told you, and I'll find that brandy bottle."

  Poppy watched, fascinated, While he went to the neat plank shelves beyond the stove. This room, walled in from space between decks, was as scrubbed and sparse as any place she had ever seen, and yet it lacked nothing. The shelves, stove, and a wide ledge holding wash basins and water buckets were arranged along the wall beside the door. The table with four straight wooden chairs set around it was placed squarely in the center.

  At the back, two bunks were neatly made up with bright blankets. A trunk
was set at the foot of each, and clothes hung from pegs over them.

  The man returned with a large brown bottle and a thin cotton towel he tore into strips. Before she could take them, she jumped at the sound of a thudding and bellowing from down below.

  "Stop, thief. Stop, thief. Where are you taking those trunks?"

  She knew that voice. Poppy rushed to the door, flung it open, and looked down. Beside the few small trunks still outside, Efram and a smaller figure were wrapped together, swaying back and forth, panting and grunting.

  "Bill," Poppy called. "Bill, stop that."

  "I know Jack's gear when I see it. Where is he? This man's stashing it in his place."

  "I know. I know. He's putting it inside for me."

  Bill pulled back, looked up and let out a yell. Rapidly he started climbing up the ladder. Poppy glanced down at herself, bare shoulders shining in 'the bright light, chemise crumpled and ripped. She whirled and tossed the padded basque around herself as Bill burst into the room. She threw herself at him.