“What can you tell us about him?”
Clara briefly dropped her gaze. There wasn’t much to tell. She swallowed and met her mother’s eyes. “He’s thirty-four years old and lived in Oregon. He owns thirteen hundred acres of land south of Skagway.”
“A no account muckman?” Father demanded. “Dropping everything to scour the territory for bits of gold?”
“No Father!” Clara hastened to clarify. “He’s a trapper with property. The Klondike is thirty-some miles north along the Chilkoot and White passes. I’ve been reading the newspaper accounts.”
“A trapper?” Relief and distaste fought for dominance on Father’s face.
Clara empathized with him. “I assure you, Father, I’m not the least bit interested in throwing my future into the hands of a man chasing fleeting fortune. Should Jasper decide he wishes to pursue such foolishness, I’ll be on the first transport home.”
Though mollified, Father shook his head. “And if he decides to stop you from leaving?”
Frowning, Clara considered his question. “How would he do that?”
Father snorted exasperated laughter. “Clara, pumpkin, you’ve had a sheltered childhood, and we’ve used a gentle hand with you despite your youthful infractions. There are men in the world who will not take no for an answer.”
Clara puzzled over his words, unable to recall a single instance where she’d been overridden by anyone but people in authority and the occasional disagreement with Emma.
“Your father is right, sweetheart. We’ve done our best to protect you from the…baser elements of society. Without meeting Mr. Glass in person, you have no way of knowing if he can be trusted.” Mamma patted Clara’s forearm again. “What if he misrepresented himself to you? You are our most precious treasure. We want you to be safe.”
Though the sentiment warmed Clara, years of experience had taught her this was a prelude to their denying her what she wanted. Her parents always brought up her safety as the primary reason to follow their rules. “While I do appreciate your concern, I am a woman grown. I simply cannot live under your roof for the rest of my days!” She pulled away from her mother’s touch. “I’m not seeking permission. I have enough money saved for the train and to book passage to Skagway. The decision is mine to make. Alone.”
Her father growled. “Then why tell us? Why not leave a note and run away to a life of strife and misery?”
Clara studied the thunderclouds on her father’s face. “Because I love you.” She watched the clouds break, and the bleak anger at her apparent desertion collapse. “Because you’ve raised me to be strong. Because I want your blessing.” She left her chair to kneel by his, taking a brandy-stained hand in hers. “You’ve always told me that happiness is a choice, and I choose to seek it in Alaska. Jasper is a kind, well-worded man. He’s not a barely literate cretin digging into creek beds for a hint of riches. He’s a landowner, runs a trapping business and lives in the wilds of Alaska. I want to see if I’ll be happy there.” She sighed. “And if I’m not, I’ll return home. I promise. But I have to try.”
Several minutes passed as her father considered her words. “You’ll book round-trip passage from Seattle. If you require it, you can wire me for the return train fare,” he said at last.
Exuberance swept through Clara’s body, the strength of it almost causing her to reel and fall over. She clutched her father’s hand and heard her mother’s soft gasp of surprise. “Thank you!”
Father held up a finger of admonishment. “Don’t thank me yet.” He clasped both hands over hers, and leaned forward. “You’ll write at least once a month to keep us posted on your life. Should you fail to do so, I’ll be on the first train out of Boston.”
“We both will.” Mamma rose, coming round the other side of the table to place a hand on Father’s shoulder.
Mamma received a stern wink from Father as he continued. “You’ll need arctic weather clothing for the winters there, and I’ll cover the cost of both that and a year’s provisions. I’ll not have you reach Skagway and discover a shortage of food.” He glared at Clara. “Those are the terms of this contract. Do you accept them?”
Clara stared at her parents, astonished at their generous offer. The most she’d hoped for was to leave without fully destroying their relationship. Now she would have a year’s provisions to offer as dowry upon her arrival in Skagway. “Yes! Yes, I accept.” Unable to stop herself, she burst into tears. “Thank you.”
She was urged into her father’s lap where she cried into his jacket, an experience she hadn’t had since the loss of the family dog when she was eight. Her mother’s hands stroked her hair as her father cuddled her. “I don’t love the idea of you haring off to parts unknown with a stranger, but you’re welcome, pumpkin.”
Chapter Four
Callie cradled the tin cup in her hands. Her bared forearms rested against the rough grain of the dining table. Jasper had built it from the wood of a yellow cedar she’d discovered her first year in Alaska. She caressed the familiar grooves with one hand, exploring the warp and weave of tree fibers slowly growing dark with age. The burnt ring where Jasper had set a hot fry pan down without a cloth, the scratches from that time he’d cut strips of leather to repair snow shoes, the gouge when he’d dropped the hammer while fixing the roof last year. Though its existence as a table was mighty short in tree years, it had certainly seen its fair share of excitement. The smooth surface felt cool beneath her fingers, as cool as the tin cup she still held. She frowned at the cup, and inspected her dented and scarred reflection. Why was the coffee cold? She’d just poured it, hadn’t she? She tipped it, and the cool liquid slopped over the rim to splash her thumb, confirming that she hadn’t unwittingly drained its contents. Her reflection shifted into sepia tones for an instant before coffee puddled on the tabletop.
She straightened, surprised by the sharp ache in her neck and shoulders as she looked at the stove. From this distance she should have felt the heat of it, but it seemed the fire had gone out. How long had she sat here? It had still been dark when she’d put the coffee on and now light tumbled through the cracks in the shutters and door. A jolt of fear brought her to her feet, the stool crashing to the floor. She needed to rebuild the fire! Jasper needed the warmth. Jasper needed—
Memory sliced through the fear. The iron smell of blood blending with a growing putrid scent, the doctor’s sorrowful gaze at his last visit, Jasper’s last rattled breath as it passed through his lips. Jasper only needed burying now.
As wooden as the table, Callie picked up the stool and sat back down. Her eyes were drawn to the large bed in the corner, the mound of blankets that hid her older brother from view.
There’d been no warning that day, no indication of danger as they’d checked the traplines. Callie had pointlessly gone over and over her recollections, searching for anything that she could point to and say, “Yes, this! I should have seen this! I could have stopped it!”
But even Jasper had said as she hauled him home on the sledge that he’d been as shocked as her when the grizzly bore down upon them. The ursine had been poaching their trapline from the opposite direction and upwind. The only notification they’d had was the sudden roar of challenge as a thousand pounds of grizzly charged them. Jasper had been on point, unable to bring his Winchester up quick enough. He’d suffered the full brunt of the attack. It had been Callie who’d put the bear down, firing multiple rounds into its fat-layered hide as her brother screamed beneath it. Jasper had insisted later that it had been bad luck alone that had put him in the bear’s path.
She’d gotten Jasper home and patched up as best she could. By nightfall he’d developed wound fever. She’d wanted to leave immediately for Skagway to get the doctor, but Jasper had talked her into waiting until morning. She’d be stumbling in the dark, rousing nocturnal predators in her wake. No sense in both of them getting seriously injured when a few hours wouldn’t make a difference. Maybe he’d still be alive if I hadn’t listened to him, if I’d gone to
get the doc that night.
It was early afternoon of the next day when she’d finally returned from town with the doctor. The scraggly man had assured her that Jasper had been right. Mr. Bear had done a fine job on her brother’s internal organs and broken several of Jasper’s bones. There was nothing the doctor could do except ease Jasper’s passing. He’d left her a bottle of laudanum with instructions on its use—just a few drops in a cup of sugar water to be administered four times a day. If Jasper was given a full day’s dose at one go…well, he’d sleep with the angels.
Callie reached for the cup again. It was Jasper’s cup, identified by the crudely etched “J” on the handle. Hers still dangled from a hook under the shelves that held their cooking kit. She pulled Jasper’s cup close, and peered inside. Though the coffee was cold, she imagined the bitterness of the laudanum mixing with the bitterness of the blackjack. Normally she didn’t drink her coffee with sugar, but she’d made an exception this time. She didn’t want to gag from the taste. Just a few swallows and she could climb into Jasper’s bed and fall into blissful sleep, never to awaken.
Jasper needs burying.
She frowned. Though she didn’t particularly give a damn what happened to her mortal remains, the thought of leaving Jasper to the vagaries of Mother Nature didn’t appeal much. While the location of the Glass homestead wasn’t a complete secret, most folks didn’t travel south from Skagway. Months would pass before someone would recall that fella Jasper Glass and his odd sister. Callie had to admit that it only seemed right; a rather fitting end that she and Jasper become food for the animals from which they’d earned their livelihood. Several minutes passed as she wrestled with her desire to yield immediately to Death’s whisper or do the proper Christian thing. Jasper might not see the black humor in being left to the elements. Eventually she pushed Jasper’s cup away. I’ll drink it later. Maybe tonight.
She stood with effort. She’d only been bruised in the bear attack as the monster had brushed her aside to focus on Jasper, its tiny brain associating the pain of multiple gunshot wounds with the screaming man at its feet. Several days of inactivity as she cared for Jasper had taken its toll. Her joints creaked with disuse as she stomped into her boots. She couldn’t remember when she’d last changed her clothes or eaten.
At the door, she turned to look back at her brother’s bed. If she unfocused her vision she could almost see the blankets rise and fall with his breath, hear his familiar snore—the one he’d always denied—as he napped. But his was the slumber of eternity. There’d be no more mornings of his waking with corkscrewed hair and squinted, sleep-encrusted eyes. The back of Callie’s throat burned along with her eyes. She fought to control her sorrow as she threw open the door. Jasper needed burying and no amount of sniveling could keep her from the task.
* * *
Dirt and dried tears streaked Callie’s face, and exhaustion leeched the energy from her body. Time had no meaning. It had been hours, minutes, days since she’d left the cabin that morning intent on Jasper’s grave. Hours, minutes, days of selecting his final resting place, of digging a deep enough hole that overlooked the Taiya Inlet, of carefully bundling his body, still wrapped in blankets, and hauling him to his burial. Spent, she sat in the dirt at the foot of Jasper’s grave, enveloped in darkness as she listened to distant water splash the shore, the rustle of nocturnal rodents and the flurry and flap of wings as birds of prey hunted.
She lay back onto the soft dirt that separated her from Jasper, ignoring the chill as the cool night breeze caressed her sweat-soaked body. Jasper had picked a beautiful night for a trip to heaven. She studied the cloud of the Milky Way stretched across the sky. The entire thing looked like a river or canyon seen from above. Was Jasper somewhere up there, his spirit riding the ethereal rapids like a leaf tossed into a fast-moving stream? Did he shoot forward, pausing as the celestial currents veered past obstacles and eddies before rushing onward to Heaven? Callie had no doubt that Jasper would arrive at St. Peter’s gates, hair blown out of place by the brisk journey as he brushed self-consciously at his bushy mustache. Her brother was too kind and generous a man to ever fall prey to the Devil’s temptations. Hell would never hold him.
She wasn’t too sure about her own chances at the Pearly Gates. Church people saw the taking of one’s own life as a sin. Surely God didn’t think that, did He? All Callie wanted was to be by her brother’s side. That was a worthy goal, not something of which to be ashamed. Desperately missing a part of her life, unable to find cause to continue this painful existence, that seemed a valid reason to follow the choice she’d made. She didn’t think God would deny her entry to Heaven for such a sacrifice. Her parents had taught her that He was a loving God. He wouldn’t want to see her suffer. To stay here would be agony.
“What do I do, Jasper?” she whispered. “I don’t think I can do this without you.”
Jasper’s coffee cup beckoned in the silence. She began to make a list of chores—tidy the cabin, make Jasper’s bed, start a fire, change into her nightshirt. The coffee would be very cold by now. Perhaps it wouldn’t taste as bitter this way. The fire would warm her after she drank it. Then she’d crawl into bed and sleep forever.
Just as Callie made up her mind, just as she began to push away from the gelidity of Jasper’s grave soil, a flash of movement caught her eye. She paused, leaning on her elbows as she stared into the sky. A tiny point of brilliant orange flame traversed across the Milky Way. A stream of light trailed behind it until it faded from sight. She stared, mouth open in awe. “Did you see that, Jas?” At the moment she registered that her brother would never see anything as magnificent as what she’d just witnessed, two more streaks crossed her vision, following the first’s trajectory. They too disappeared as they burnt out.
Callie studied the star field above for more, mind working furiously for the first time since Jasper had succumbed. She’d asked him what to do and he’d sent her a meteor. Then he’d sent two more. A distant part of her, the one that had never fallen sway to portents and omens, scowled at the idea of Jasper responding from beyond the veil. She mentally shushed it. The doubting voice didn’t matter. What mattered was that Callie searched beyond the sorrow that had gripped her for several days.
With Jasper gone, the Glass line would end. There were no other siblings, no cousins that could carry on their family name. Jasper had wanted to have a family, to have children. He’d already begun to clear ground for the future cabin he’d planned to build for his wife. The wife that had no idea her groom was gone.
Callie imagined the poor woman arriving at the homestead, finding Callie’s body in the cabin and having no idea where Jasper had gone. No doubt it would appear that he’d done Callie in and run from the law. His name would be ruined, his future wife bereft. The thought occurred to her that Skagway’s doctor would know the reality, but rumor had a way of ignoring truth. In any case, Jasper wouldn’t want that city woman to make the trip seeing as how he wasn’t available any more.
Callie had to write a letter. She mentally clutched at the task, uncertain why it had become all-important to complete when her opinion of the brazen hussy had always been low. The survivor in her—the girl who’d watched her parents die in the house fire, who learned to hunt and trap and fish at her brother’s side, to clean and skin her kills, to live the life that her brother had given her—that survivor felt an odd sense of relief at having something to do which didn’t entail death in one form or another. The survivor wasn’t ready to lie down, to give up. Callie stared at her hands. Jasper wasn’t ready for her to give up either. He’d sent those meteors to wake her up from her stupor.
“I’ll write her,” she promised Jasper. “And I’ll keep up the homestead. I promise.” She turned onto her knees, facing the soft ground upon which she’d reclined, facing the crude cross she’d lashed together. “I don’t know how long I can do this, but I’ll try.” Her voice cracked and tears burned the back of her throat. “I’ll try, I swear.”
Chapte
r Five
Clara stood on the deck of the steamer ship S.S. Queen, head held high. The coastal city of Seattle, Washington was blanketed in gray skies and surrounded by emerald green forests. It slid by, picking up pace as the steamer got under way. Clara clutched the souvenir passenger manifest, a list of four hundred men and women taking the same leap of faith as she, daring to brave the unknown and uncertainty of the far north. How many of her fellow travelers would stay the course, stick to their guns and every other verbal cliché of which she could conjure?
She smothered a giggle, and scanned those that had remained on deck to watch the wet greenery of the Puget Sound islands glide along, pleased to note she wasn’t the only woman to have dared this journey. That had been what had made her most nervous as she traversed Seattle, to set up passage to and from the Alaskan District and purchase the requisite one thousand pounds of supplies. Her tenuous hope had been that she wasn’t the only woman on board a ship of hundreds.
In retrospect, her fears had been absurd. Female passengers were as plentiful as their male counterparts. Many were relations following husbands and brothers and fathers into the wilderness, bringing much-needed supplies and feminine stability to a new homestead. But there were also a handful of hard-looking women that Clara had noticed smoking cheroots in front of the shipping office as everyone waited to board. New Women, they were called. She’d secretly read books about them with Emma, illicit novels of romance and tragedy where women eschewed men and strove to build lives for themselves. These women that shared the ship with Clara evinced such a masculine aura that she was both appalled and intrigued, unable to keep from staring at their obvious confidence and wise-cracking laughter. She didn’t know whether to be scandalized by or to emulate their outrageous behavior. She wished Emma had come with her. No doubt her friend would say something shocking about the rough women, and cause Clara to laugh.
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