Gypsy (40 page)

‘Nor did I.’ Sam smirked. ‘That was one of the best discoveries.’

They both laughed and went on to talk about how good it was to be away from the restrictions they’d grown up with, and that they were friends, as well as brother and sister.

‘Has there ever been a woman you didn’t want to say goodbye to?’ Beth asked.

‘It would be quicker to list those I was glad to,’ Sam joked. ‘I always seem to meet someone there’s a real spark with just as we’re moving on. Take that small redhead who helps her mother make pies down on Main Street!’

‘Sarah?’ Beth had spoken to the girl many times. She was very proper, never went into the saloon or encouraged any of the men’s advances. But she had a feisty air about her and she was very pretty.

‘Yes, Sarah from Idaho. I really like her, she’s got that kind of—’ He broke off suddenly at the sound of gunfire. ‘That’s close by,’ he exclaimed, shrugging off the quilt and getting to his feet.

Gunfire was commonplace, just as brawls in the streets and saloons were. But it wasn’t usual to hear it in this part of town.

‘Don’t go out, Sam,’ Beth begged him. ‘You know what it’s like when a few of them are drunk and riled up. You could end up among them and get hurt.’

He hesitated. ‘I’ll just look out the door and see what’s going on. No harm in that.’

As he pulled the door open an icy blast came in. Sam reached for his fur-lined coat and hat and quickly stepped outside, shutting the door behind him. Beth got up to look out of the tiny window, but all she could see was Sam’s shoulder and the snow-covered ground. But as she heard people shouting, her curiosity was aroused, and she reached for her coat and hat too.

Sam grinned as she came out. ‘Didn’t think you could resist! Dare we walk down there? It sounds like it’s in State Street. Let’s just take a peek. We won’t get involved.’

They hurried, Beth taking Sam’s arm for security on the slippery ground. As they turned the corner into State Street they came upon a crowd of people huddled around a man lying on the ground. Even in the poorly lit street they could see blood staining the snow.

‘Who did it?’ Sam asked a man walking past.

‘Dunno his name, just a guy who’d been fleeced, I guess.’

‘Do you know the man that’s been shot?’ Beth asked.

‘That guy they call the Earl.’

Chapter Twenty-seven

Sam tried to restrain her, but Beth wriggled away from him and pushed through the people crowding around Theo. Her heart was thumping with fear, but all memories of her last angry words to him were wiped from her mind.

‘Theo!’ she cried as she sank down on her knees beside him.

‘He ain’t gonna make it, mam,’ a man in the crowd called out.

It didn’t look good. Theo was unconscious and Beth could see a hole where the bullet had gone through his coat into his shoulder. Blood was pumping out of it. Catching hold of his wrist, she felt for a pulse. It was there, but weak. ‘He certainly won’t make it if we leave him here to freeze,’ she said sharply. ‘Someone help me get him to the doctor.’

Theo stirred and opened his eyes. ‘Beth!’

His voice was so quiet, Beth leaned closer to his face. ‘Yes, it’s me. But don’t talk or move, it will only weaken you.’

As Sam came forward to help, one of the other men suggested they got something firm to lay Theo on, and almost immediately a woman came running out of the nearest saloon with a narrow table-top in her arms. ‘They busted the legs off in a brawl,’ she said by way of explanation and rushed back inside out of the cold.

Sliding the table-top under Theo, Sam took his head end and two others took his feet.

Dr Chase’s cabin was close by, and someone rushed ahead to knock him up. Beth had never met the doctor as she’d never needed any medical help, but she knew him to be a good man because he and Reverend Dickey were responsible for funding the building of a cabin as a hospital, due to open very soon, and the doctor was also well known for treating very poor people without charge.

Dr Chase, a small, slender man with glasses and thinning hair, was already in his apron and rolling up his sleeves as they arrived at his door.

‘Put him on the table,’ he said, moving the lamp closer. ‘Are any of you relatives?’

Sam explained that he and Beth were Theo’s friends and travelling companions and gave him their names. The doctor asked them to stay to help, and for the others who had followed on to leave.

‘I hope you aren’t squeamish,’ he said to Beth as he began peeling Theo’s clothes away at his shoulder. ‘Because I’ll need you as a nurse. Go and wash your hands thoroughly.’

As Beth washed her hands in the basin the doctor had pointed to, she glanced back at Theo. He had no colour in his face, his lips were blue and he was unconscious. She felt sick with fright, for as the wound was exposed it looked terrible, a mass of dark red tissue and blood.

She put on an apron and rolled up her sleeves, and the doctor asked Sam to stand firm behind Theo to restrain him if he struggled.

‘It’s fortunate he is unconscious,’ he said quite cheerfully. ‘But the chances are he’ll come round when I begin probing, so be ready.’

Beth wanted to ask why the doctor couldn’t give him chloroform, but she didn’t quite dare, and stood by to follow his instructions.

‘If one has to take a bullet, it’s a pretty good place for it,’ Dr Chase said, indicating Beth was to hold his tray of instruments and pass whichever one he needed. ‘Why was he shot anyway?’

‘We don’t know because we weren’t with him when it happened,’ Sam said. ‘We only ran to see when we heard the shot.’

‘His name?’

‘Theodore Cadogan,’ Beth said.

‘Ah, the English Earl,’ the doctor said. ‘From what I’ve heard it was only a matter of time before someone shot him. And you then,’ he said, looking over his glasses at Beth, ‘must be the much acclaimed Miss Bolton, the Gypsy Queen?’

Beth felt a wave of shame wash over her, for the implication in his words that she was no better than she should be for consorting with a man like Theo. But the doctor said nothing more, and cleaned the wound with swabs, then began probing into it. Theo regained consciousness once and struggled to get up, but fortunately passed out again.

‘There we are!’ said Dr Chase, jubilantly holding up the bullet in the jaws of his pincers. ‘It hadn’t gone in too far, luckily for him. But he’s going to need good nursing to recover. Bullets are easy enough to extract; the real problem comes when infections move in. Are you up to that nursing, Miss Bolton?’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said without any hesitation.

‘I shall stitch him up, and he can stay here tonight. Tomorrow I’ll get someone with a cart to bring him to your cabin. I’ll give you instructions then as to his diet. He has lost a lot of blood and it will take him a while to recover his strength.’

‘Why did you help me?’ Theo asked the following evening.

The doctor had brought him round to the cabin that morning, and the two men with him had lifted him on to the bed. Theo had been given something for the pain, and that made him sleep most of the day. Beth had made a pot of beef tea as the doctor ordered, and she was stirring it on the stove when Theo spoke.

‘Because I didn’t see Dolly the whore rushing to your aid,’ she said waspishly. ‘But if you would rather go there and lie in her flea-ridden bed, you only have to ask.’

‘I would much rather be with you,’ he said, his voice very weak. ‘You are the only woman I’ve ever really loved.’

Beth felt tears welling up in her eyes, but she bit them back. ‘I’ll take care of you for old times’ sake, but don’t count on me long-term, Theo.’

Theo was in a great deal of pain for the first few days. Dr Chase came by to change the dressings daily and said he was pleased to see no sign of any infection, but showed no sympathy for Theo.

‘You’re lucky you aren’t dead,’ he said bluntly. ‘I’ve got patients who have become sick through no fault of their own, and they are my priority.’

It appeared that the man who fired the shot had left town, perhaps because he thought he’d killed Theo, and feared he would be charged with murder. All Theo would say on the subject was that he deserved what he got. Beth took that to mean he had swindled the man.

She passed the days by reading to him and passing on any gossip, and in truth she was glad to be inside in the warm with him. Jack or Sam took over on nights when she had to play.

It was ten days after the shooting before Jefferson spoke to her about it. He hadn’t come into Clancy’s saloon in all that time, and she hadn’t seen him around the town either. But suddenly there he was in the crowd watching her play, smiling that lazy, seductive smile that made her pulse speed up.

‘Have a drink with me?’ he said as she got down from the little stage.

‘I’ve got to get back,’ she said, dying to ask him where he’d been all this time, but knowing that wasn’t a smart thing to do.

‘Nursing duties?’ he said, lifting one eyebrow. ‘What does the Earl do for you that warrants such tender care? I heard you slung him out after our night together?’

‘We go back a long way,’ she said. ‘I don’t turn friends away when they need help.’

He put a glass of rum in her hand. ‘And when he’s recovered?’

Beth shrugged. ‘I don’t know. That’s up to him.’

‘By that I take it you will fit into his plans? If he goes back to Dolly, you’ll be free; if not, you’ll be tied to him?’

‘Look, I don’t know, Jefferson,’ she said in irritation. ‘When I took him in to nurse him it was because of our past, just as I would take care of Jack if something happened to him. I can’t think beyond that right now and I don’t understand why you are questioning me about it. You didn’t even drop by to see how I was when you heard I’d chucked him out, so why should you care now?’

‘Because I like you and he’ll bring you down.’

‘He’s not that different from you,’ she said indignantly.

‘That’s why I know how it will end.’

Beth sighed, drank down her rum and picked up her fiddle case ready to leave. ‘Then I hope you’ll have someone who will take care of you if you get shot,’ she said crisply. ‘Goodnight, Jefferson. It was nice while it lasted.’

She thought he would come after her; after all, on their night together he had said he wanted her as his girl. But perhaps that was just part of his patter and all he’d really been looking for was another conquest.

‘I’ve been a blithering idiot,’ Theo said a few days later. He was up and about now, though he couldn’t do anything strenuous; even dressing himself had to be done carefully and slowly.

‘What brought you round to that startling conclusion?’ she asked.

‘Don’t be sarcastic,’ he said reproachfully. ‘I’m trying to make you see I do value you. I always did, but the thing that makes me saddest is the distance between us now, when we were once so close. I know it was me who caused it. But I don’t know how to get you back where you used to be.’

‘I don’t know either,’ she said sadly. ‘Sometimes I think it’s this town full of people with only gold on their minds. It’s affected us all. Even Jack, who spends all his spare time helping people, can’t wait to take off on the trail. It’s like a disease.’

‘Maybe the only cure for it is to take that trail then,’ Theo said.

‘You won’t be strong enough for that for some time.’

‘A month should do it. But the real question is whether you want me with you.’

‘Of course I do, Theo! Maybe I don’t adore you blindly the way I used to, but I still love you. If you would just be more honest!’

‘Honesty didn’t bother you with Soapy,’ he said. ‘He’s far more dishonest than me, he’s a liar, a thief, a swindler, and no doubt he’s had people killed too, though I doubt he dirtied his own hands with that.’

‘At least he was there when I needed someone,’ Beth snapped. ‘I didn’t see Dog-faced Dolly rushing to your aid.’

‘That’s it then, sis,’ Sam said as he took the last sack of their supplies out of the cabin and loaded it on to the hired cart that would take it the three miles to Dyea and on to the start of the Chilkoot Trail. ‘Say goodbye to the cabin. I doubt we’ll come back this way.’

Theo was sitting up on the cart. His shoulder had healed well, but the weeks of inactivity and good food had made him gain weight, giving him a flabby look. Jack, in contrast, was very lean, for he’d been working six days a week building houses, shops and cabins. This was to ensure they had enough money to pay the Indian packers to carry their goods to the top of the Pass.

Along with the compulsory ton of provisions to be allowed into Canada, carpentry tools were needed to build a boat at Lake Bennett, a shovel, sledge, stove, tent, bedding and many other essential items. As most men could only carry fifty pounds on their backs up the trail, this meant that if they didn’t hire Indian packers they would have to make dozens of trips up and down, which could in effect take three months to complete.

The vast majority of their fellow gold seekers had no choice but to do that, for the packer’s price per load was exorbitant. But Theo wasn’t strong enough to carry more than a few pounds, and neither Sam nor Jack wanted Beth to take heavy loads. With their combined funds they had enough, and they reckoned that what they lost in money would be made up for in time, and being able to take some items that they could sell for a big profit in Dawson City.

‘I have to post this letter home before we leave,’ Beth said, waving an envelope. Just a couple of days earlier they had finally received a letter from England with a photograph of Molly taken on her fourth birthday just before Christmas. Beth had hastily penned a letter back enclosing a picture she and Sam had had taken here in Skagway, and telling Molly and the Langworthys that they were about to leave for the goldfields.

She had wondered as she wrote it whether people back in England had any idea of what this trip entailed. Beth had a fairly clear idea that it was going to be no picnic, as foresighted Jack had been out to the start of the trail and talked to people who had given up half-way, and what he learned was almost enough to make them abandon the idea.

‘We’ll go on, you catch us up when you’ve posted it,’ Theo called out. ‘But don’t get waylaid!’