by Poppy
She wept to the native market and found a fleecy white shawl for her head and a pair of leather sandals. Tiring of the town, she found a beach deserted enough that she dared to take off her dress and petticoats and swim while the sailor stood guard. For dinners on the ship, the cook produced strange, delicious fish doused in fresh lime juice, and crisp, fiat cakes of a coarse com meal.
The serenity and beauty of the place entranced her. The blue water, the silver beaches, the exotic flowering trees, the sound of singing and laughter drifting through the night air, all seemed perfection. More than ever she was sure this place was her destiny.
She did not count the days. Dex had urgent business, and he must ride far on it. He had said he would return, and whatever else Dex did, he did not lie. Three weeks passed before he returned.
He climbed aboard, looking brown and haggard, thinned down to bone and sinew. Pausing only to brush Poppy's lips with a kiss, he went straight to the Captain's cabin and stayed there, behind a closed door, for two hours.
By the time she was alone with Dex, she had already guessed. "The news was not good?"
"No. Alaman is taking over from the generals. I know what he advocates. A dictator, Santa Anna again probably, until a European prince can be found to accept a crown."
''That is everything you don't want."
"Everything." Dex dropped heavily into the chair by the desk and rested his head on his hand and stretched out his legs. "I can't do much, but I must stay and watch until this crisis at least settles for the moment. The great game is yet to come. That may take years."
Poppy bent her head to hide the happy smile on her lips. "When do we leave for Mexico City?"
"I start back within the hour. You sail with the Captain on the morning tide."
Poppy jumped to her feet. "No."
"This is a dangerous country, Poppy."
"Dangerous? These people? They are like sweet, gentle children."
"They are savages, Indians."
"You do lie," Poppy burst out. "You do lie! The one thing I always said you did not do. I have seen them, watched them. They are no more dangerous than a pet puppy dog."
"They can kill and tear and torture like mad dogs."
"You're lying," Poppy cried. "You don't want me. You're just looking for an excuse to send me back."
"I'm refusing to risk your life."
"You promised. You promised me Mexico City."
"A promise I must break."
"I won't let you. I'm coming ashore. I can ride. I can get there. I'll see you in Mexico City."
Dex stood up and pushed her into the upholstered chair. "Sit there and be quiet and listen to me. If I must, I'll lock you in this cabin and tell the Captain to keep it locked until he's at sea. You're sailing with the ship. So listen to me."
"You can make me listen, but you can't make me do it."
"Then listen. I must send you back with the ship. The Dolphin's home port is San Francisco. Don't scream. Keep quiet. Listen. I'm not sending you back to the husband who arouses such dangerous impulses in your reticule."
"Then where are you sending me?" Poppy spat.
"Anywhere in the world you wish to go. You told me you wanted to make a fresh start. During the trip back, decide what you want. The Captain knows most of the ships that are in and out of port. He will arrange accommodations any place you want to go." Then hastily, "But not back to Mexico, of course."
"Are there any other places I'm forbidden to go?"
"I'd suggest you avoid the Continent," Dex said calmly. "Your unfortunate accident in the Vendee was unimportant, involving only minor figures in this network of intrigue. But the intrigue is still alive. In another year or two, it should be quite forgotten, but for the moment you might enjoy a more equable climate."
"You have suggestions?"
"The United States is a large country. Ships sail the Pacific to many interesting ports."
Out of sheer perversity, Poppy said, "Yes, I've heard many interesting things about Australia."
"Australia?" Dex grimaced slightly. "My sources of information do not reach that far. The choice is yours."
He was quite willing for her to sail away to a place where he would never see or hear of her again. Poppy stared at him, paling. Until then she had not really believed this conversation was taking place. The whole thing had seemed a grotesque joke, an unreal fantasy, a tease that only delayed the moment when Dex would take her in his arms and love her violently, fiercely, to make up for all the empty nights they had slept apart. Then there would be the weeks and months to follow, the dinners together in the small apartment, the carriage promenades, the balls, all the glitter of Mexico City spread out at their feet-their pleasure ground, their private festival of happiness. She had lived with that thought and dream for weeks, and now in minutes Dex was smashing it as casually as his hand might fall on a butterfly and crush it.
"I have been much impressed by the Australian men I have met," she choked.
"Indeed? The Captain will arrange your passage. I have also left money with him to give you for your needs while you are getting settled."
Poppy jumped up, standing tall. "He needn't arrange anything. I won't take your money. You gave me money once, and it nearly got us all killed, Andy and Jack and me. You won't send me on another voyage that's an invitation to murder."
Dex's eyes narrowed. "You complained once before about the gold, but you did not tell me you had trouble."
"Ask the Wigginses sometime. They saved us. And none of it need have happened if you had not been so ashamed of me or so careful of your reputation with sweet little Felicite that you wouldn't risk giving me a note of credit to the bank."
"I wouldn't risk it," Dex admitted blandly. "But not for the reasons you are giving. The Pannets are closely tied to the Austrians, and that matter in the Vendee was still rather widely remembered then. Besides, I sent a man to guard you. That went awry, and I had no way of knowing."
"Knowing what?"
"He suffered a fall before you were out a week, and was killed."
Poppy remembered Andy breaking into the cabin and asking if she wanted to go to a funeral. "That was your man?"
"One of my best. A tragic accident. For everybody apparently."
"Just the same, I want nothing from you," Poppy said stormily. "Except what you promised, Mexico City."
"And I only wish to see you settled and safe," Dex said. "The life I lead is neither. So you sail back with the Dolphin. You have only to let the Captain know your wishes, and he will do his best to provide all you need." He turned and walked out of the cabin.
Poppy took one impetuous step after him and then froze, realizing something. She tugged out the drawers of the chest and the desk. Then she was sure. Everything belonging to Dex was gone, had been removed probably while she was ashore this morning. Only her things were left. Dex must have sent a message to the Captain. Dex had known he was leaving her. The Captain had known it. She was the only one who had not.
He was gone. She heard the soft splash of oars as the ship's boat pulled away for the shore of Mexico.
Part Eight
San Francisco
Early Spring 1853
Chapter Forty-five
THE Golden Dolphin sailed into the bay that afternoon under a light, steady breeze and a brilliant sun. The rains must have been heavy because the hills and island glowed a rich green, lightened here and there by great drifts of golden poppies. As they sailed through the clear blue water, so unlike the gray English sea, Poppy saw San Francisco was still spreading up the hills from the valleys. The aspect was beautiful, but she could have wept with helpless rage that the long arms of land were closing around her like the bars of a cage, a dreadful jail to which she must commit herself for life, from which there could be no pardon.
She was not landing here only to find another ship, on which she could sail away forever from all the old ties and memories to a new and free life she could make for herself. She was going ashore h
ere, aground forever, in this strange, beautiful, violent city. She must go straight to Jeremiah and beg to be allowed to resume her position as his wife.
When she first suspected she was pregnant, she had gone to the Captain's cabin on the pretext of asking for a calculation of their arrival date, and had feverishly consulted his calendar. Back at the desk, she had jotted down dates and confronted the inexorable facts. By the time they landed she would be two months pregnant, nothing noticeable, but she had not seen Jeremiah for over three months. She could leave San Francisco again, without seeing him, and go anywhere she liked and announce she was a widow, left with ample funds. She could have Dex's baby in comfort and security. Except she knew too well the smirks and whispers that would follow them all their lives. A beautiful young widow?
No sign of any family, paternal or maternal? The usual pathetic story. Everybody would be polite to their faces and whisper "illegitimate" behind their backs. She would not bear a child and have it labeled. She knew too well the price Andy had paid and would always pay, the opportunities for education and work denied, the social stigma. She would not have her child an illegit.
Better to return to Jeremiah and beg. He might throw her out, call her a harlot and. whore, and then she would have to find another place. But she did not think be would do that. His vanity, pride, and standing were all involved. If he cast her off and named her unfaithful, he was that pitiful figure, a man who could not hold his wife, and he knew better than any what his weakness was there. He would 'hardly risk that she might be brazen enough to whisper in turn "impotent."
If he took her back, his beautiful young wife was a 'social and political asset. He would be delighted to have a child as proof of his virility and proof to his public that he was a solid family man. He might pretend, even to her, that the child was his and accept it as premature. Once she was back with him, Poppy knew he would never let her go. This would be ignoble bondage for life. But she would fight to see that her child gained everything possible from it.
She did not want Dex to have any hint of this. He had cast her off, brutally, left her to find her own future. And she would. She would never let him know this child existed, that he had a child.
Because she knew he would report to Dex,she carefully measured her words to the Captain. "I have friends ashore I wish to consult before I make any decision about my future. Possibly one of them will have a suggestion I wish to accept. If that is so, I will have no need of your kind offices."
The Captain looked troubled. "You will let me know?"
"You will be in port a while?"
''The new mainmast, repairs, yes."
Once she was publicly reconciled with Jeremiah, nobody could do or say anything. "You will know," Poppy promised.
They were drawing close to the wharf. She must force herself to smile at the sailors and the Captain and speak a few words of thanks. They had done all they could to make the slow, halting trip pleasant. She could not tell them she had been grateful for every delay while they worked to plug once more the great break in the hull. They knew she had been languid and distressed, but she hoped they had put it down to grief at her parting from Dex. They could not know her sick dread of facing Jeremiah.
She could not bring a sparkle to her eyes or a lilt to her voice, but she kissed the Captain impulsively as she thanked him. She saw the concerned look on the face of the sailor who handed her down the gangplank and told her to wait on the wharf while he ran to fetch a carriage.
Waiting, her courage failed her. She felt too weak and shaken to walk up the steps of the boardinghouse and face first Mrs. Stander and then Jeremiah in those rooms with all their degrading memories. She was not ready, even now.
Even as she smiled and thanked the sailor when he handed her into the carriage, she heard herself, without knowing what she was going to say, blurting out the address of Phillipa's hotel. Then she knew sheer instinct was guiding her, and it was good. Phillipa must have married weeks ago, but the hotel was respectable. She could stay there and inquire if Mr. and Mrs. Wilton were in town. They were her friends. They could tell her what had been happening, what story had been told to account for her absence. With that information, she could face Jeremiah forearmed.
Thinking only that her suit was sadly wrinkled and her luggage makeshift, she got out in front of the hotel. To her surprise, the carriage dispatcher there recognized her and remembered Her friends, he assured her before she could inquire, were within, taking tea in the blue room off the lobby. With a gasp of relief, Poppy motioned him to take her luggage and almost ran inside.
Across the red carpet, beyond a shield of potted palms, she saw Phillipa sitting in a small side parlor demurely pouring tea for Mr. Wilton. She sprang up when she saw Poppy, gave a soft cry, ran to meet her, and threw her arms around her.
"Glory be to God, you're home and safe."
"Glory be, you're here," Poppy breathed.
Mr. Wilton, hand extended, came to draw them back into the small parlor. "Welcome home. You've come for the dinner?"
"What dinner?"
"Ring for another cup, Phillipa," Mr. Wilton said. "Our guest has just arrived in town. She must be tired and in need of refreshment."
Poppy sank into a gilt chair beside the table holding the elaborate tea service on a silver tray. "Refreshment in many senses. I have been out of touch."
"Completely?"
"Completely." She knew Mr. Wilton to be an astute man, and she trusted him. "A long sea voyage."
"Some three months or more, I think?"
"Yes." Head high, Poppy looked straight into his eyes. "What was said about my absence'?"
"That your health was poor, and you were staying in the country. A touch of lung trouble, in consequence of that old wound, I believe."
"Anything else'?"
"Your husband was reported prostrate with grief and worry for a few days."
"Where in the country'?"
"Would it be inconvenient if people checked the lists of ships arriving and departing on certain dates'?" Mr. Wilton hinted.
Poppy went white. Shipping men knew who owned the Golden Dolphin and would recall her unscheduled departure and limping return.
Mr. Wilton needed no answer. "I believe then you have been at the hot springs for your health. I have a widowed sister-in-law who is sure to recall seeing you there." He wrote neatly on a small card and held it out. "This is her name and address."
"Now I am forever indebted to you," Poppy said unsteadily as she took it.
"Just as long as you're back to see me through my wedding," Phillipa cried. "Oh, Poppy, darling, I have been in a frenzy, but with you I won't have an anxious moment."
"I have been in fear I might never get her to the altar without your support," Mr. Wilton admitted drily. "Our house is sufficiently completed and partially furnished. We could move in, but I have not been able to persuade my bride."
"Once when he tried to press me, I went into a deep swoon," Phillipa admitted and leaned forward tensely. "I can't do it alone, Poppy. There's so much I don't know. Is it a dozen sheets for each bed or a dozen for all the beds? And the initials?"
Mr. Wilton patted her hand. "Poppy will help you with all that later. Meanwhile, there is this great dinner tonight, three hundred guests, I understand."
"Won't you be there?"
Mr. Wilton's lips thinned. ''When you married Mr. Dunbar, I was willing to reconsider the opinion I formed of him in 1851 when the city was bankrupt. Then after the bond Issue-but all this is beside the point. Since your departure and since he acquired the backing of the Pannets-no, I will not be attending this dinner in his honor. A fund raising, among other things, to promote his candidacy later this year."
To Poppy, one thing was of first importance. "You deal with Dexter Roack?"
"We do business together, yes." Mr. Wilton spoke so curtly Poppy realized he knew the ownership of the Golden Dolphin and who had been aboard at the last sailing but did not wish to discuss that. "Our relationshi
p has always been highly satisfactory."
"The Pannets are another banking house entirely?"
"Rivals, in fact. As I understand their European connections, Mr. Roack's house deals mainly with the British government and the old regime in France. Mr. Pannet's bank is reputed to be closer to the present Emperor and the Austrian royal family."
"Of course there are mergers by marriage."
