Aunt Dimity Goes West

by Nancy Atherton

  That would be me, I’m afraid.

  I glanced down at the journal, did a double take that nearly sent Reginald flying, and lowered my arm very slowly.

  The last sentence hadn’t been written by Aunt Dimity. The handwriting was more flowery than hers, and the ink was bottle green instead of royal blue. I closed my eyes, hoping that fatigue had produced a fleeting hallucination, but when I opened them again, the sentence was still there.

  “Who…who are you?” I managed.

  An excellent question. Who are you and what are you doing in my journal?

  Cyril Pennyfeather, at your service. I’m frightfully sorry to intrude on your private conversation, but there’s something I simply must tell you!

  Eighteen

  As I gaped, dumbfounded, at the page, Amanda’s words came back to me with stunning clarity.

  “Light hair?” I said unsteadily. “A slight build? Pince-nez on a chain?”

  Again, that would be me. I fit your excellent description in life, and under the right set of circumstances it applies to me still.

  “Are you the…the male spirit who accompanies me?” I asked, my voice cracking like a teenaged boy’s.

  Only when decency allows, I assure you. I may have many faults, but I am not a voyeur, Mrs. Shepherd.

  I giggled weakly and fastened on the one thing my shocked brain could handle.

  “Please, call me Lori,” I said. “May I, er, introduce Miss Dimity Westwood?”

  I’m delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Westwood. And may I tender my compliments on the wonderful means of communication you have devised? It’s so much more civilized than disembodied voices.

  “Disembodied voices?” I said faintly and looked around the room, half expecting an invisible army to start whispering on cue. My befuddlement was such that the reappearance of Aunt Dimity’s old-fashioned copperplate seemed like a welcome return to normalcy.

  Cyril Pennyfeather? The name seems familiar. Are you the schoolmaster who led the miners to safety after the Lord Stuart mining disaster?

  Indeed, madam, I am he.

  Forgive me if my next question is an indelicate one, Mr. Pennyfeather, but would I be correct in saying that you died in 1896?

  You would be entirely correct, my dear lady. I have been dead for well over a century.

  “Reginald,” I muttered, “forget what I said about no shocks to the system.”

  Aunt Dimity carried on as if I hadn’t spoken. Are you by any chance English, Mr. Pennyfeather?

  I am. I was born and raised in Bibury, in the county of Gloucestershire, the third son of a vicar who could scarcely afford to send his first two to university. Without a university degree, I had little hope of advancement in England, so I made my way to America and eventually to the American frontier, where the educational standards were less rigid. I was twenty-five years old when I opened my school in the boomtown of Bluebird, Colorado, and I taught there until my untimely death ten years later. They were the happiest ten years of my life.

  It must have been a fascinating experience to live in an American boomtown, Mr. Pennyfeather.

  It was, Miss Westwood. To witness firsthand a young, dynamic country growing by leaps and bounds, unfettered by outmoded social constraints

  The handwriting stopped when I cleared my throat, and I had the eerie sensation that Cyril Pennyfeather was standing mutely beside the hearth, regarding me attentively through his gleaming pince-nez.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, Mr. Pennyfeather,” I said, “but how long have you been, er, accompanying me?”

  I’ve looked in on you from time to time since the first night you arrived at the Aerie, though I assure you that your privacy

  “Yes, yes, I understand about my privacy,” I cut in. “What I want to know is, was Amanda Barrow telling the truth this afternoon? Did she see you with me when I walked into her shop?”

  I’m afraid so. Her cat saw me as well. I don’t know why the cat made such a fuss. I was quite fond of cats when I was alive, and they were fond of me. Be that as it may, when I became aware of the commotion I’d created, I immediately made myself as inconspicuous as possible. I’m a shy soul, really. I dislike being the center of attention.

  “If Amanda Barrow and her cat can see you, why can’t I?” I demanded, feeling distinctly shortchanged.

  It does seem unfair, doesn’t it? I can, alas, offer you no conclusive answer, although I suspect it may have something to do with genetics. I’m sure you have gifts Miss Barrow lacks.

  “I certainly have better dress sense, but that’s beside the point,” I said. “You’ve been hanging out with me for nearly a week, Mr. Pennyfeather. Why haven’t I been able to sense your presence?”

  More to the point, Mr. Pennyfeather, why haven’t I sensed your presence?

  You have both sensed my presence, dear ladies. You simply didn’t recognize what you were sensing.

  “Sorry?” I said uncomprehendingly.

  I’m afraid you’re going to have offer a more detailed explanation, Mr. Pennyfeather.

  I will do so gladly. When you arrived at the Aerie, Lori, your nerves were standing on end, and you, Miss Westwood, were too anxious about Lori to be conscious of anything else. Your mutual distress touched my heart, so to speak. I decided, therefore, to exert a…calming influence…on Lori. I’m rather good at that sort of thing, you know. Virtually unflappable, in fact. I was always able to calm a frantic pupil.

  “Good grief,” I said softly. “You made my nightmare go away.”

  It would be more accurate to say that I created an atmosphere of tranquility and security in which you found it easier to sleep, and sleep, saith the Bard, is the balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course, chief nourisher in life’s feast. Macbeth, Act two, Scene two. But I digress.

  I’m afraid you do, Mr. Pennyfeather.

  I beg your pardon. To sum up: Once Lori found respite in rest, you, too, relaxed, Miss Westwood, but by then you’d grown so accustomed to my presence that it failed to catch your attention.

  In other words, Mr. Pennyfeather, you flew in under my radar.

  Radar, Miss Westwood? What is radar?

  Forgive me, Mr. Pennyfeather. The word wasn’t coined until 1941, but never mind. Suffice it to say that you’ve taken me quite by surprise.

  “Me, too,” I put in. “Although I did see your obelisk in the cemetery.”

  My obelisk is rather handsome, isn’t it?

  “It’s lovely,” I said and since I’d only mentioned it in passing to Aunt Dimity, I went on to describe it in more detail. “It’s at least ten feet tall, made of polished white marble, with a beautiful inscription carved into it, a quotation from the Bible, something about a living sacrifice—”

  Holy, acceptable unto God. They chose Romans Chapter twelve, Verse one., Miss Westwood.

  How very humbling, Mr. Pennyfeather.

  Indeed.. More humbling still was the second inscription.

  “It’s below the Bible verse,” I explained to Dimity. “It says that the obelisk was erected by the families of the men Mr. Pennyfeather saved, to honor his memory. Mrs. Blanding told Toby and me that the families took up a collection to pay for it.”

  They must have gone without bread to raise such a sum. I’m more deeply touched than I can say. I had no idea that they’d gone to so much trouble on my behalf.

  “You didn’t?” I said, frowning in confusion. “Haven’t you seen the obelisk before?”

  I’d never seen it until today. No one from the Aerie has ever gone to the cemetery. Therefore, I could not go.

  “Why would you need someone to take you there?” I asked. “I hate to state the obvious, Mr. Pennyfeather, but it’s your grave.”

  You are under a slight misapprehension, Lori. The obelisk does not mark my grave.

  “It doesn’t?” I said, feeling more perplexed than ever.

  I’m afraid not. I wasn’t interred in the cemetery after my death because there was nothing to inter. My body, y
ou see, was never recovered from the mine.

  I instinctively lifted my feet and glanced uneasily at the floor. “We’re living on top of your grave?”

  Not directly, no, but we’re not far from it. After the dust had settled, they managed to retrieve every corpse but mine. Mine was in a rather tricky location, you see. To remove it would have caused another cave-in, so they left it where it was.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said.

  As am I, Mr. Pennyfeather. Truly sorry. I’m perfectly content to remain as I am, but I sense that you are not.

  It’s true. I wish to move on. If I’d received a proper burial, I might have proceeded to the next stop in my journey. Instead, I’m stranded in a way station between this world and the next. I cannot leave the mine site on my own, and I can accompany only those people who, like you, Lori, have a sympathetic and tolerant nature.

  “I know a few people who would be surprised to hear me described as sympathetic and tolerant,” I commented dryly.

  You didn’t shriek when you saw my handwriting. You didn’t slam the book down and run from the room. Your acquaintance with Miss Westwood has broadened your mind in a very special way.

  “I guess I do have gifts Amanda Barrow lacks,” I said, lifting my chin proudly.

  If you didn’t, I would not have been able to visit the cemetery with you. I’m grateful to you for allowing me to go there, Lori. I’ve long wished to pay my respects to Hannah.

  “Hannah Lavery?” The name hadn’t come up in my conversation with Aunt Dimity, so I continued, “Hannah Lavery was the daughter of a rich mine owner. She became a social activist, a reformer who worked to improve the lives of miners and their families. Toby and I saw her grave at the cemetery. Rose Blanding called her a rabble-rouser.”

  Were you referring to Hannah Lavery, Mr. Pennyfeather, or to another Hannah?

  In my eyes, there was no other Hannah. Hannah Lavery made my work possible, Miss Westwood. I taught grown men and women as well as children, you see. The mine owners frowned on educated workers—it’s harder to cheat a man who can read—but Hannah defied them. She supported my school with her own funds. My doors would not have stayed open if not for Hannah.

  “You were both rabble-rousers,” I observed, smiling.

  We were also engaged to be married. But the call went out that the mine had collapsed, and I went up to lend a hand. I had to, you understand. My pupils needed me. I helped extricate a handful of men, but too many died. I wish I could have done more, before the second cave-in caught me.

  I’m sure you did everything you could, Mr. Pennyfeather.

  I pictured the angel weeping over Hannah Lavery’s grave and remembered Rose Blanding’s comments about Victorian men preferring passive women, and how difficult it was for a crusader to give her heart to a man as well as a cause. I knew now that in one particular case, Rose had gotten it wrong. Cyril had loved his crusader, and she’d given her heart to him. Only a tragic twist of fate had kept them apart.

  “I don’t know if you noticed,” I said quietly, “but Hannah Lavery never married.”

  I noticed. Foolish girl.

  The flames in the fireplace quivered, as though Cyril had released a melancholy sigh. I sighed, too, at the thought of what might have been, but Aunt Dimity was more interested in history than in heartache.

  Why did the Lord Stuart Mine close so soon after the disaster, Mr. Pennyfeather? Was it because the miners believed the mine to be unlucky? Or was it because the owners were afraid of the scandal that would ensue if their use of inferior wood was discovered?

  I sincerely doubt that fear of any kind influenced the decision to close the Lord Stuart, Miss Westwood. In those days, scandals didn’t matter to investors as long as there was money to be made. And although the miners were a superstitious lot, they also had families to feed. They couldn’t afford to leave their jobs simply because the mine they worked in happened to be accident-prone. The only reason a mine ever closed was that there was no more gold to be had from it.

  “So the mine was played out,” I said happily. “James Blackwell couldn’t have been a thief because there’s no gold left to steal. He must have been investigating the curse.”

  At last, we come to the curse.

  What can you tell us about the curse, Mr. Pennyfeather?

  Quite a lot, actually, but I’m not sure where to begin.

  “From the beginning,” I said, to save Dimity the bother of writing it.

  Very well. I will begin, then, by telling you that prospectors came from all walks of life, but very few came from well-to-do families. It was not uncommon, therefore, for a rich vein of gold to be discovered by a man who could not afford to exploit it properly. If he could, he found investors to provide him with capital. If he couldn’t find investors, he had little choice but to sell his claim to the highest bidder. Just such a situation arose in the Vulgamore Valley in the year 1864. The prospector was a poor Polish immigrant named Ludovic Magerowski, and the highest bidder was a prosperous businessman called Emerson Auerbach.

  “I saw Emerson Auerbach’s photograph in the library,” I said. “He looked like a high bidder.”

  Emerson Auerbach was extremely wealthy. He bought Ludovic’s claim to the Lord Stuart Mine for five thousand dollars. It must have seemed like a vast sum to Ludovic, but it was a pittance compared to the mine’s actual worth. By 1890, the Lord Stuart had yielded two hundred million dollars in gold.

  “Wow,” I said, impressed. “That’s a spanking return on an investment.”

  Did Mr. Magerowski realize what he’d done, Mr. Pennyfeather?

  Eventually. He returned to Bluebird some twenty years later, with a wife and young child, having tried unsuccessfully to strike it rich elsewhere.

  I gave a low whistle. “It must have killed him to see someone else reaping such outrageous profits from a mine he’d sold for chump change.”

  It angered him, certainly. He initiated a lawsuit, claiming that Emerson Auerbach had swindled him, but the lawsuit was dismissed for lack of evidence. He took his complaint to the newspapers, but they ignored him, as did everyone else in Bluebird. They’d grown accustomed to hearing a prospector cry foul after a claim he’d sold fairly and squarely had yielded a fortune. No one but Ludovic believed that Emerson Auerbach had done anything wrong. Apart from that, no one liked Ludovic.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  He was a blustery, self-aggrandizing fellow. He claimed to have an English benefactor—the famous Lord Stuart, in whose honor he’d named the mine—but when I asked him why an English nobleman would deign to sponsor an impoverished Polish immigrant in a venture as risky as prospecting, he had no answer. Since he had no money, either, I concluded that the famous Lord Stuart was a figment of his imagination.

  What happened to Mr. Magerowski after the lawsuit failed?

  Strangely enough, he went to work in the Lord Stuart Mine. I can only assume that the mine manager felt sorry for his wife and child, because Ludovic had gone quite mad by then. I remember seeing him just before I died.

  I gasped. “He was there?”

  Yes, Lori, Ludovic was there on the day of the disaster. When I saw him, he had a look of insane triumph in his eyes.

  “His eyes,” I whispered, as the hairs on the back of my neck rose. More loudly, I asked, “Did he have dark curly hair? And a beard? And intense dark eyes?”

  Yes. He grew the beard after he came to work in the mine.

  “I think I’ve seen his photograph, too,” I said. “He reminded me of someone, a homicidal maniac I, um, ran into once.”

  I don’t know if Ludovic was a homicidal maniac, Lori, but I do know that he put a curse on the mine. He raised his lamp, looked directly at me, pointed to the bloodstained rocks, and growled, “No accident. I did it. I damned it all to hell. If I can’t have it, let the devil take it.” He gave an unearthly howl of laughter, then sprinted to freedom. A moment later, the shaft’s roof collapsed, and I was buried inextricably beneath a ton of debris
.

  “What an evil-minded little man he must have been,” I said heatedly. “Your final moments of life were stressful enough, Mr. Pennyfeather. Ludovic had no right to make them worse with his ranting.”

  You said earlier that you had something to tell us, Mr. Pennyfeather. Did you wish to warn us about the curse?

  Why should I wish to warn you about something so trivial?

  Do you believe it to be trivial?

  Naturally. I know that Ludovic cursed the mine—I heard him do it—but I do not believe that a lunatic’s ravings can affect affairs in the tangible world. No mere mortal has such power.

  “Then why was the Lord Stuart so prone to accidents?” I asked. “And why were so many people hurt at the site after the mine was shut down?”

  One needn’t turn to the metaphysical realm to explain mining accidents, Lori. Mining is a hazardous occupation in and of itself, an occupation rendered even more hazardous by managers who cut corners when purchasing building materials, which the Lord Stuart’s manager most certainly did.

  If you knew the mine was unsafe, Mr. Pennyfeather, why didn’t you bring it to someone’s attention?

  I did. Hannah and I wrote to congressmen, senators, and newspapers, decrying the perilous state of the Lord Stuart Mine, but no one listened. Profits, as I mentioned earlier, were worth more than men’s lives.

  “Hannah Lavery kept fighting the good fight right up to the day she died,” I said.

  Of course she did. She was indefatigable. There was a pause, as though Cyril was taking a moment to collect himself, then the flowery handwriting continued. As for the accidents that occurred after the mine closed, they, too, happened for entirely mundane reasons. Indeed, when I remember the foolhardy risks taken by those who explored the site, it seems incredible to me that so few were killed or injured. I would also point out that no accidents have occurred since the site was cleared.