by Janine McCaw
“And Frank?” William asked.
“Frank’s fine. I have no idea why McMichael hasn’t fired him, but he hasn’t. I guess he really is good at his job.”
“How are the two of you getting along through all this?”
“We’re not, I’m afraid.”
“Then Olivia,” William pleaded, “why don’t you just pack you bags and come home?”
“But the store,” Olivia protested, “all the money you and Aaron have put into this...”
“Olivia, it’s a drop in the bucket for both of us, not to worry. Come home.”
“I want to stay here Father,” she said. “I can’t explain it, but I like it here. I hated it when I first came here, but I’ve come to love the people in this town. The store was a good idea. The first morning’s sales were fantastic. It was so promising. If only that blasted man had stayed away a little longer, to really give the store a chance.”
“He was bound to come back sooner or later.”
He saw the look of disappointment on his daughter’s face.
“Olivia, are you upset about the failing of the store or upset about having to tell me about it?” he asked.
“The store,” she replied. “I’ve had to tell you a few times I’ve failed. I was hoping this time would be different. It’s embarrassing to tell you, of course, but you’ve always forgiven me before and I suspect you will now.”
“We can always get you set up in a store of your own in Seattle,” he assured her “if shop keeping is in your blood.”
“I’m not ready to leave Britannia yet Father. I’m not ready to leave Frank yet.”
“Olivia,” her father pleaded.
“No, don’t say it. I know what you’re thinking. It’s what you’ve been thinking from day one. I made my bed, now I have to lie in it. I don’t want to put the family through the scandal of a divorce.”
“It would hardly be the first Bower scandal,” her father replied.
Although he tried to change her mind for over an hour, William conceded that for reasons entirely her own, his daughter wanted to stay in this community. But what she had been through with the store had hardly been fair play.
“The thing about we Bowers,” he told Olivia, “is that we always have another card tucked high up our sleeve while our poker faces play the game. I can see McMichael out on the street, waiting for someone. He’s asking Frenchie where that person went, and Frenchie, God love him, is pointing at the store. The man McMichael is waiting for is the man who could talk the bankers for the Canadian Pacific Railway into providing a north-south line to move his precious ore into the United States cheaper and faster. He’s prayed for that more than he ever prayed for the war to end. That man he is looking for, my darling, is me.”
Olivia tried as best she could to stifle the laugh that was within her.
“William!” McMichael exclaimed with genuine warmth as he entered the store, ignoring Olivia completely. There was no sense dragging a stranger into this mess, McMichael thought. He offered his hand out to the American, but it was declined.
“Is there a problem?” McMichael asked, noting the grave expression on William’s face.”
“There is indeed,” William declared. “I’d like you to meet my daughter Olivia, the middle girl.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Why don’t we use the new tea?” Jimmy asked old Mr. Li. “This one smells mouldy.”
“Jimmy,” the man explained, speaking slowly, but speaking very good English, “there is a terrible sickness in town. They call it the influenza. Thousands of people are dying all over Canada. But not just here, all over the world. Look at me, I am an old man. I should be sick, but I am not. Look at my family. My wife started to get the cough. I gave her the tea. She got better. Now, I cannot say that all people will get better by drinking the tea. But maybe it can’t hurt. There are things called anti-oxidants in green tea, remember, we read that together in the Chinese medicine book. The new tea is fresh, but it is black tea. It does not have as many anti-oxidants. The green tea smells a little musky, yes. It is a little mouldy as it got a bit damp when I forgot to put the lid back on this tin. But it is my last tin. It is a big tin. I will give you some. I want you to promise me you will take the old tea, and make some for your family. I want you and your mother and father to be safe. Please do the honour of obeying an old man.” He handed the lad a tin of the tea.
“Okay,” Jimmy sighed. “But they’re not going to like it.”
Jimmy plugged his nose and drank the old tea that Mr. Li had poured for him.
“That is a good boy,” Mr. Li nodded. “You may go now, little Dr. Yada.”
Jimmy left Mr. Li’s home and stopped off at the Beachcomber market, leaving his wagon outside as he always did. He took his teapot from it. Since the day after the avalanche years ago, he had continued to earn pocket change after school going back and forth to the mine, selling tea, pop and potato chips to the workers and passers-by on the street.
Things had definitely changed at the Beachcomber’s market since Olivia’s father paid that fateful visit. As suddenly as the customers went away, they now mysteriously re-appeared. Jimmy came in at the same time most days, and the re-instated Lucy was more than happy to have boiled water ready for him. Olivia felt it was the least she could do, as his mother was still without a job. McMichael had found another cleaner who would work cheaper than Akiko, so she was still without work.
Olivia glanced at the calendar on the wall. It was hard to believe it was now 1918, and she had been at Britannia for three years.
“Mrs. Lucy, Mrs. Olivia,” Jimmy began, “I need you to drink some of this tea.”
He poured a couple of small Chinese cupfuls for them. They obliged and drank the small amount. Its odd taste had Lucy making a face.
“I know,” Jimmy admitted. “It doesn’t taste too good.”
“Tell you what Jimmy, why don’t I give you some fresh tea to take around, hmm?”
“No,” Jimmy explained. “Anti-oxidants. Mr. Li says I must use this green tea.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“This tea has magic powers; it will keep us from being sick.”
“Well,” Olivia offered, “why don’t you blend it with some fresh tea, maybe just to dilute it a bit?”
“Hmm, that would make it weaker. I would have to sell more of it to work. I could make more money I guess, but people would have to buy extra.”
“Don’t let McMichael hear you say that,” Lucy laughed.
“He would think that it is a wise business decision,” Jimmy said.
“He would at that,” Olivia admitted.
“Maybe I will take some sweet cookies and offer a two-for-one deal,” the lad said. “More to offer my customers and help the bad taste.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Lucy agreed. “Only I wouldn’t tell them it was bad. Tell them it’s exotic.”
Jimmy paid for the cookies and a bag of fresh green tea and diluted the mixture he had made from Mr. Li’s leaves, but only just a bit. Outside in the street, he could see his friend Lara coming across the road, and he went out side to see her.
“Lara, come have some tea.”
She had been meeting Jimmy for tea whenever she could escape the hawk-eyes of Mrs. Schwindt, who since the war, carried even more prejudices with her than she had before.
“Take a sip of the tea, a bite of the cookie, like that,” Jimmy explained.
“Did you hear the news?” she asked Jimmy, not waiting for an answer. “I heard the doctor say two more people have died because of the influenza since the weekend.”
“I know,” Jimmy said. “That is why you must meet me every day, and have some of this tea, okay Lara? Mr. Li and I think it is magic. It will keep us well. And I will make sure I go by the mine office and give some to your father everyday. I will put it on sale for him because it kind of tastes yucky. He always buys a cup of tea from me, so he should be okay too.”
“Why is everyone ge
tting sick Jimmy?” Lara asked.
“Mr. Li says it is a thing called a virus. Something like a cold germ. He says that this is a very bad one, a lot like one many centuries ago called the Black Death.”
“Black Death,” Lara repeated, her eyes growing wider and her voice quivering as she said it aloud.
Mrs. Schwindt came from around the corner and screamed bloody murder at the two children, knocking the cup from Jimmy’s hand.
“What are you doing, you heathen?” she screeched.
Olivia came out from the store.
“What are you doing, Mrs. Schwindt?”
“Are you not aware the influenza is spreading through the town, Mrs. Fitzpatrick?”
“Of course Mrs. Schwindt, but...”
“Germs. The monkey is spreading germs. That’s how it’s getting around. Going from house to house.”
“I hardly think so, Mrs. Schwindt. Jimmy sterilizes the cups in boiling water and never uses them twice without washing them, do you Jimmy?”
Jimmy shook his head.
“I never use a dirty cup. Influenza is caused by a virus Mrs. Schwindt. I am very careful. This tea is special. Mr Li, he told me his family drinks it when they are sick and soon they start to feel better.”
“See,” Olivia said, “there you go.” Olivia poured another cup and drank it, just to side with the boy. Its flavour had improved only slightly having been blended.
Jimmy poured a cup and offered it to Mrs. Schwindt. She swatted this one to the ground as well, breaking the cup.
“You keep that concoction away from me and away from our house, do you hear me?”
As it happened, McMichael was coming down the road and saw the incident occur.
“Mrs. Schwindt,” he yelled, “have you completely lost your mind?”
“It’s filth, Mr. McMichael. I am trying to protect your daughter from the influenza.”
“Mrs. Schwindt, I have had quite enough of your ranting these past few months. We had this conversation some time ago as I recall. Jimmy is Lara’s friend. Lara and Jimmy meet every day and have tea while you are taking your afternoon nap. I know all about it.”
“This tea is special,” Jimmy said. “Would you like some Mr. McMichael?”
“Of course Jimmy,” he said, “and here’s another nickel for the cup Mrs. Schwindt broke. I will take it out of her pay.”
“But Mr. McMichael...” Mrs. Schwindt began.
“Not a word, Mrs. Schwindt. Not one word.”
Over the next few months, many people in Britannia fell ill with the flu, many never recovering. It eventually hit the McMichael household, Lara coming down with the flu symptoms first.
Every morning and afternoon, Jimmy, wearing a cloth mask over his nose and mouth, came and gave Lara some tea and some home made soup. McMichael had noticed that for whatever reason, Jimmy’s clientele had a remarkable recovery rate, or didn’t get the influenza at all. No one in the Yada household had come down with the flu, despite the fact it was passing from miner to miner. At the first sign of his own symptoms, McMichael joined the breakfast, lunch and dinner tea plan along with his daughter. He was quite ill for a week and a half, but in the end it passed. Lara also recovered in a remarkably short time, her body building the antibodies to fight the illness.
There was sadness in the McMichael household when Mrs. Schwindt, who steadfastly refused to have anything at all to do with Jimmy, took ill and died. The nanny had been hospitalized, but did not make it. All in all, seventy-five percent of young Jimmy Yada’s customers survived the killer disease. His record was better than Dr. Van Den Broek’s was by far. No one ever knew what was in the magic potion Jimmy and Mr. Li had conjured up. It would be into the next decade before spores, similar to those in the mouldy tea would be identified by Dr. Alexander Flemming officially as pencillium mould. What would become the wonder drug of the twentieth century, penicillin, may have been hiding in Mr. Li’s smelly old tea.
One night, on his way home from his route, Jimmy was startled by Les Ferguson. Les had been trying for days to get Jimmy to give him some tea, the word of its magical powers having spread. Jimmy, not liking Les, had always conveniently run out. This time though, Les caught him before his last stop.
“Give me some of that tea, kid.”
“No.” Jimmy replied.
“If you don’t give me some of that tea now,” Les coughed, “I’ll knock you senseless and take it myself.” He coughed again, the hacking taking the wind from his lungs.
“With your respiratory problems,” Jimmy said matter of factly, “I hardly think so. Go away Mr. Ferguson, I have no tea for you.”
Les raised his fist to the child.
“Go away Mr. Ferguson,” a voice said. “There is no tea for you.”
Les turned around to see McMichael behind him.
“I think it’s best you head off now.”
Les slunk back into the darkness of the night, doing as his master said.
“I’m sure glad you came along when you did,” Jimmy said.
“I’m glad I did too.”
There was a silence between them for a moment.
“He’s sick,” McMichael offered.
“Oh, I understand that,” Jimmy began, “but I only have a little bit of the dried tea left. I am saving some for Christina, in case she gets sick. I could send some down to her. Lara misses her. I don’t have a big brother or sister, but I think I would miss them too if they had to go away. Lara would miss her more if anything really bad happened.”
McMichael was touched by Jimmy’s generosity towards his eldest daughter.
“That’s a very kind thing to do Jimmy. But Christina is just away at school. Lara will see her again soon.”
“That’s the part I don’t understand.”
“What do you mean Jimmy?”
“The influenza is in Vancouver too. The tea is here. You sent Christina away.
You kept the bad man here. How can we protect her when she is all alone? Soon may not be soon enough.”
McMichael took a step backward. The musings of a young boy had just profoundly affected him. Again.
The next morning, McMichael walked over to Sarah’s house and caught her on her way to work.
“Sarah, there are three things I’d like you to do today, in this order.”
“Yes, Mr. McMichael?” she answered. He had never come to meet her before.
“Get Les Ferguson’s papers in order. He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s going to be leaving town. Then call Christina’s school in Vancouver and get my daughter back up here. Frenchie’s already on his way down to get her.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” Sarah sighed. “And the third thing?”
“Don’t you dare say a word, to anyone, do you understand?”
“Yes Mr. McMichael?”
“I want you to go into Olivia’s store, and order a new red wagon for Jimmy from that blasted Eaton's catalogue.”
“Oh, Mr. McMichael!” Sarah said, hugging her boss for the first time in all the years she had known him.
“Not a word Sarah. Not a word.”
A fortnight later, on a warm night, McMichael sat on the porch with a cigar and some fine cognac. He could hear the laughing voices of the re-united sisters in the background. He had relented and given Mrs. Schwindt’s old room so that Christina could have some privacy. She didn’t have to share a room with Lara anymore. She was a young woman now, and was going to be a handful, he admitted to himself. How he was going to handle her without Mrs. Schwindt he didn’t know. Joe from the general store was coming over later that night give the room a fresh coat of paint. Christina had picked some yellow paint and some floral paper. Quite a contrast from Mrs. Schwindt’s stark white room, he thought. Much more like her mother would have chosen.
Les was gone and Frank was going to have to step up to the plate if he wanted to keep his job. He wasn’t sure Frank had the muscle he needed, but Frank had slowly but surely become his yes man over the past few months,
which is why he didn’t fire him when he landed in jail and the business of his wife’s store first came up. How fortunate that had turned out to be. McMichael had not had any idea that Frank was William Bower’s son-in-law.
He turned his eyes to the Vancouver paper that had arrived by boat earlier in the morning but he had not yet had a chance to read. The headline sent a bone-chilling shiver through him.
Influenza Claims Twelve At Private School
Chapter Twenty-Six
The night air that evening in 1921 was thick with smoke, the air echoing of the wail of sirens as Frank and Rudy made their way across the main roof of the mine plant, testing each beam gingerly before taking a step. The flames were already scorching several of the timbers, their fiery tongues licking through the cracks of the beams.
“I’m going to try to get to the far turret nozzle,” Frank said, pointing towards one of the two rotating water pumpers mounted as a fire precaution on the roof.
“Let’s get this one going first,” Rudy indicated to the closer water fire extinguisher. “Let’s try to get some of that wood dampened before you try to cross.”
On the ground, all available men were aiding the fire department as they battled a fierce blaze burning through the mine’s concentrator building. Starting in the crusher, the flames quickly caught a draft blowing through the building. In no time the building was engulfed in flames. It was the first time since Rudy threw Frank in jail that the men were talking to each other.
Olivia and Lucy stood on the porch of the Beachcomber store, shocked by what they saw before them.
“Not again,” Lucy whispered, her hand covering her mouth. “Not another disaster.”
