Song of the Spirits (In the Land of the Long White Cloud saga)

by Lark, Sarah

  “Naturally, anything could still happen,” the pessimistic doctor informed him. “He’ll be in bed for quite a while, which promotes lung infections. Nevertheless, he’s a strong young man.”

  When he arrived at the Lamberts’ home, the pastor did not bother with lengthy explanations, and instead simply attempted to placate Nellie Lambert with the news that her son was doing well under the circumstances. The message did not get through to her, however, and Marvin Lambert likewise proved unreasonable.

  “Let’s await the results of the investigative committee first,” he grumbled. “I’m not going to promise anyone money before that. That would be an admission of guilt. We can consider a donation fund later.”

  The pastor sighed and hoped to be able take care of the most urgent expenses with the collection. The ladies of the parish were already fervently planning the first bazaars and picnics to raise funds in addition to taking up their own collections.

  The mining authority didn’t take long to appear—in fact, the inspectors arrived at the very moment that Matt Gawain, after working for two days straight without a break, was about to finally go home to bed. Instead, he led the men through the mine and he did not mince words. Though the final report chastised the mine operator for a lack of safety precautions, it found that he had not flagrantly violated the standard regulations. The new air shaft that he had so reluctantly granted Timothy—and to which he owed his son’s life—had saved him in that respect as well. Only a small monetary fine was levied, because the mining teams were insufficiently equipped.

  Marvin Lambert went into a rage when he read that, as the inspectors could not have known that from their tour of the mine. Someone had talked—he suspected Matt Gawain—and naturally, Marvin was indignant. He threatened to let Matt go several times, not seeming to recognize how much the prospect of losing Matt frightened his remaining workers.

  “Many of them are already asking about work in the other mines,” Matt complained. He had finally gotten some sleep and was visiting Timothy before returning to work. “Until now, I never really noticed, but your father lives in another world.”

  Timothy nodded. His father had blamed everyone and everything for the accident except his own apathy toward safety measures in the mine. He did not recognize that any of the fault was his and refused to consider changing his approach for the expansion of new tunnels.

  “But this time he won’t be able to get his way,” Matt declared with conviction. “We’ll need to hire at least sixty new people. That will be hard enough in itself now that we have the reputation for being the ‘Death Mine.’ If we keep on this way, Mr. Lambert will have to dig his coal himself.”

  Timothy remained quiet. He had enough to do in his own encumbered condition. To fight with his father on top of that was more than he could bear. Besides, Marvin rarely visited him. He seemed to want to ignore the misfortune that had struck his son as much as his responsibility for his remaining workers.

  Matt Gawain wondered bitterly whether Marvin Lambert believed that Timothy would someday return fit as a fiddle or if he had simply written his son off. Though he did not discuss these thoughts with Timothy, he brought it up one night at the pub when he was getting drunk with Ernie and Jay. Shaken by Timothy’s condition, they ordered one whiskey after another.

  The Lucky Horse had reopened the day after the accident, as had the Wild Rover. Business was quieter, and neither Elaine nor Kura played the piano. The men chatted in lowered voices and drank more whiskey than beer, as though hoping to numb their own anxieties.

  Over the next few days, the miners returned to their routines. They did not celebrate Christmas that year. Nor did they mark New Year’s Day. No one felt festive.

  Matt began looking for new workers and complained that he could hardly find any experienced miners. The few applications he did receive came from men who had done just about everything short of having seen the inside of a mine, from whaling to digging for gold. These men would have to be trained first—an arduous and tedious business.

  The pastor held the memorial for the victims of the catastrophe on the following Sunday so that everyone could take part.

  “The mines should have given the men a day off—Lambert’s at least,” he declared to Elaine. “But at this point, I’d rather just give in than have to get into it again with him about it.”

  Elaine nodded. “What should I play?” she inquired, looking for her music. She had come to the church to give the pastor the money that Madame Clarisse had gathered for those left behind. That had sparked another dispute.

  The women’s association normally had a monopoly on donations, and the ladies had discussed heatedly whether they could accept the brothel’s “sinful money.” The pastor and the more practical Mrs. Carey had been for accepting it, particularly as it represented a considerable sum. Madame Clarisse had collected nearly three times as much as the respectable ladies.

  “Let’s just look at it this way,” Mrs. Carey had finally declared to general acceptance. “Madame Clarisse has merely made restitution for the money that the dearly departed previously left in the pub. That should also absolve the men of a few sins before they stand before their creator.”

  Elaine flipped through the liturgy for funerals. “‘Amazing Grace’ is always a good choice,” she suggested.

  The pastor bit his lip. “Don’t strain yourself, Miss Keefer. I hope you do not take offense, but I have already planned the ceremony with Miss Martyn.”

  Elaine glared at him. “With Miss Martyn? Well, thank you for telling me.”

  The pastor turned away. “We did not want to pass you over, Miss Keefer. Certainly not. But Miss Martyn plays Mozart’s Requiem so exceedingly movingly. I haven’t heard anything like that since I left England. And I thought that since you’ve already done so much, and continue to do so…”

  Elaine stood up. She was so angry that she wanted to leave before she screamed at the pastor or, if nothing else, revealed her cousin’s true marital status.

  “And what exactly am I doing that’s so much?” she asked angrily. “I didn’t raise the money, and I’m not cooking for the ceremony like the ladies on the church council. But of course I will acknowledge that I cannot hold a candle to ‘Miss Martyn’ on the organ, whenever she condescends to let the lesser folk take part in her angelic playing. Just take care that Mrs. Tanner does not sing out of key again. ‘Miss Martyn’ can become rather difficult when that happens.”

  With that, Elaine stormed out. She felt more than a little inclined to have a talk with Kura, but decided against it. Kura would only derive pleasure from her outburst and probably make a few pointed remarks about her rival’s organ playing. Elaine knew, after all, that she did not play perfectly. Kura would lend the funeral ceremony a much more solemn air since she displayed no emotion except in her eyes.

  So Elaine rode to the Leroys instead and visited Timothy, as she did every afternoon. She knew that the people in town talked about it. Though some were of the opinion that she was merely doing her Christian duty, others whispered that Miss Keefer no doubt wanted to hook the rich mine owner’s son. Even as a cripple, he was a good catch.

  The miners took it the most calmly. They had often seen Timothy standing next to the piano, and a few of them even knew about his tenacious but thus far unsuccessful courtship. Now they asked Elaine every day how he was feeling.

  Elaine encouraged the men to visit Timothy themselves, which many of them then did. Berta Leroy’s plan was working out exactly as she’d hoped. Timothy was not cut off from the world in this little hospital, and his friends’ visits cheered him up. That was proving to be of the utmost importance. He was still awaiting the expert from Christchurch. Although the doctor kept delaying his arrival, Timothy had nevertheless set his hopes on him.

  He’d learned of Dr. Leroy’s provisional diagnosis, despite the fact that Elaine and Berta had expressed themselves only vaguely on the subject and that even Dr. Leroy had held back his worst prognosis. Timothy’s mo
ther, however, knew no such scruples. Nellie Lambert visited her son every day and seemed to view it as her duty to cry unceasingly for an hour. When the sixty minutes were up, she took her leave in haste, often bumping clumsily into Timothy’s bed. Timothy tried to view this with a sense of humor, but that was not always easy considering the great pain he suffered whenever he moved even the smallest bit. It took hours for the sensation of knives cutting through his body to abate. Berta was well aware of that, as she too inevitably caused him pain during his daily care. But when she offered him morphine, Timothy categorically refused to take it.

  “I may have shattered legs, but that’s no reason for me to cloud up my brain. I know that there comes a time when you can no longer do without it, Mrs. Leroy, and I don’t want that for myself.”

  Sometimes, however, the pain was so unbearable that it took all his strength not to scream. Berta gave him a dose of laudanum whenever that happened, while Elaine sat still beside him, simply waiting or tentatively taking his hand. Timothy bore her tender, trembling touch better than anyone else’s. She never gripped him hard. Even when she gave him something to drink or dried his forehead after he had broken out in a sweat, her gestures were featherlight.

  One day, Timothy was in especially good spirits; the specialist from Christchurch had finally agreed to come the day after the funeral service. Timothy was looking forward to the doctor’s visit and smiled at Elaine’s anger at Kura and the pastor.

  “You’ll have to tell me someday what it is you have against that Maori girl who plays for Paddy Holloway,” he teased. But he stopped immediately when Elaine’s expression turned stonelike. She reacted that way whenever he asked her anything about her past. “Look at it positively, Lainie, you don’t have to go cry at the funeral service; you can keep me company instead. It would make Mrs. Leroy happy. She’s always worrying that I’ll fall into a depression if she leaves me here alone. And as the doctor’s wife, she can’t miss the service. She was on the verge of asking my mother if she wouldn’t stay with me. But my mother would never pass up the opportunity to show off her new black lace dress as she bows her head in sorrow. She already wore it yesterday when she paid me a visit. I hope she doesn’t make a habit of it.”

  Elaine did stay with Timothy during the service, which the town’s gossip-craving matrons didn’t fail to remark upon. Berta caught two ladies in the act of discussing the matter and took them angrily to task.

  “That man can barely move! You should be ashamed of yourselves to even consider the possibility of any untoward happenings.”

  Mrs. Tanner smiled knowingly. “Mrs. Leroy, there are certain things men can always do,” she maintained. “And that girl was already a little suspect to me when she showed up here in her ragged state.”

  Kura came out ahead this time with respect to who had the best reputation. Both Mrs. Miller and Paddy Holloway basked in the glory of her presence. The young singer endowed the funeral service with such a poignant air that even the most hard-bitten fellows had tears in their eyes. Kura herself also cried, thus winning every heart to her side. No one wasted an uncharitable word when Caleb Biller congratulated her on her wonderful performance and offered to accompany her to the interment that followed. Kura made an appealing picture at his side. Even his mother, Mrs. Biller, looked more intrigued than hostile.

  Elaine, meanwhile, sat beside Timothy, who was in a terrific mood, seeming to expect miracles from the specialist from Christchurch, who was supposed to straighten the fractures and make casts. It would probably take the doctor several hours, but Timothy was firmly convinced that he would heal quickly afterward.

  “I’ve always been healthy, Lainie. And I’ve broken my arm before, when I was a boy. That was back in working order again just a few weeks later.”

  Elaine knew that Dr. Leroy expected Timothy to be in casts for a few months, but she kept it to herself. As she put away the newspaper that she had been reading to Timothy and closed the curtains, he protested. “I can’t possibly sleep now, Lainie. It’s the middle of the day, and I’m not an infant. Come, read me some more or tell me a story.”

  Elaine shook her head. “You need your rest, Tim. Dr. Leroy said that tomorrow will be difficult for you.” She brushed a lock of hair out of his face. Timothy could move his arms, but his broken ribs made any other movement of his upper body painful. Elaine assisted as much as she could, though Timothy hated it when she helped him eat or drink. He only let Berta Leroy perform the unavoidable hygienic functions, and that was mortifying enough.

  Elaine straightened his sheets carefully. She was so anxious that she could have cried. She could not share Timothy’s optimism. Dr. Leroy had not actually said tomorrow would be “difficult” but “painful.” Straightening the fractures would be excruciating, and there was no way Timothy would want her to be present for that. Elaine hoped that Berta Leroy would succeed in keeping Nellie Lambert away too.

  Timothy smiled at her, as irresistibly as ever. The image of a healthy Timothy at the horse race flitted across her mind. She stroked his forehead soothingly.

  He winked at her. “I get my best rest when you hold my hand,” he claimed. Suddenly Elaine saw a spark in his eyes, the very one that she had so often seen—and learned to fear—in Thomas Sideblossom’s expression. “It’s more exciting when you stroke my forehead that way. I’m still a man, after all, in spite of everything.”

  He felt for her hand, but then he saw her face and could have slapped himself. The soft, trusting expression in Elaine’s eyes had turned to suspicion and fear. She drew her hand back as though she had burned it. Naturally, she would stay with him; after all, she had made a promise to Berta. But she would certainly not be resting her hand in his that day.

  The next day, however, she asked herself ruefully how she could feel such fear toward Timothy and why, moreover, she had not succeeded in masking it. She had treated him coolly the rest of the day, and he had been visibly deflated when she left him—this despite the fact that he could have used all the hope and optimism he could get. Elaine sensed the calamity before she even saw him. She ran into Nellie Lambert, who was sitting next to Berta Leroy and crying into her teacup.

  “He’ll never be healthy again,” she whimpered to Elaine. Over the last few days, the two women had run into each other several times in the doctor’s office, but Timothy’s mother evidently had no idea what Elaine’s relationship to Timothy was. Nor did she seem to really notice Elaine, who might just as well have been a piece of furniture in the little hospital.

  “The doctor from Christchurch has the same fears as my husband,” Berta said. “He put casts on the broken bones, but they’re splintered and compressed. And of course we can’t look inside—at least not yet, although some man named Röntgen is supposed to have recently invented a machine in Germany that can do just that. Dr. Porter was very excited about it, but alas, it won’t help anytime soon. So righting the broken bones comes down to a matter of luck, and the likelihood that everything will hold together perfectly is practically zero. He hopes he got the hip in place right at least, which should enable him to sit again. But we’ll just have to wait and see. Tim was very brave though. Go on in to him, Lainie. He’ll be happy to see you.”

  “But don’t upset him,” Nellie Lambert demanded. “I don’t actually think he should receive any more visitors today.”

  The first thing Elaine did upon entering the darkened room was pull the curtains open. It was not late, and it was summer—why the devil did Timothy’s mother always feel the need to block out the sunlight?

  Timothy looked at Elaine gratefully but did not manage a smile. His eyes were glassy. Though he had taken morphine that day, it did not look like it had been sufficient to mask the pain, for he appeared drained and sick. Even immediately after the accident, he had not looked so haggard.

  Elaine sat next to him but did not touch him, since she sensed that he was the one who would shrink from any contact that day.

  “What did the doctor say?” Elaine f
inally asked. The new plaster casts around Timothy’s legs were covered with a blanket, but they seemed much bulkier than Dr. Leroy’s splints. She knew that Timothy would refuse to show them to her, so she did not even ask.

  “A load of nonsense,” Timothy said gravely. The morphine made him seem sleepy and subdued. “Just another pessimist like our good doctor. But what do we care about that, Lainie? I’ll be able to walk again someday. We can’t have me being wheeled through the church. I want to dance at our wedding, after all.”

  Elaine did not answer. She did not even look at him. But Timothy almost found that comforting. It was much better than the indulgent and empathetic looks that his other visitors gave him whenever he contradicted the doctor’s prognosis. Elaine seemed, rather, to be fighting with her own demons.

  “Lainie,” Timothy whispered. “About yesterday… I’m sorry.”

  She shook her head. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. I was being ridiculous.” She raised her hand as though she wanted to stroke his forehead but then could not bring herself to do it.

  Timothy waited until he could no longer bear it.

  “Lainie, today was a… rather hard day. Could we maybe… try it again? With the hands and going to sleep, I mean?”

  Without a word, she took his hand.

  5

  Kura-maro-tini was vexed. She could give several reasons why. For one, she had hardly earned a cent the previous week. There was no business during the mourning period after the mining accident, but she’d heard that Madame Clarisse’s girls continued to get paid. Paddy Holloway’s did not; if Kura did not play, there was no money to be had. The problem was that Mrs. Miller still wanted her rent, as did the stable owner. Kura had considered selling the horse, but she had grown fond of the animal.