Calico Palace (77 page)

“You do? Why?”

“There are thousands of people,” said Kendra, “who have adopted their children. Those children grow up safe and happy.”

“But those children,” he exclaimed, “were
wanted.
”

Hiram pushed back his chair and stood up.

“Kendra,” he went on, “maybe I’ve been making it important because all my life I’ve known nobody wanted me. My parents, whoever they were, certainly didn’t want me or they wouldn’t have thrown me away. My foster-parents didn’t want me—why should they? They had their own children. I was an extra burden they carried from a sense of duty. They never said so, they were always kind. That’s it. They were
kind.
”

Hiram drew a short breath.

“You wouldn’t understand that,” he said slowly, as he stood looking down at her. “You had real parents. You were wanted, you were loved, you were somebody’s child—”

At this Kendra stood up too, so abruptly that her chair fell over behind her. Hiram stared at her in amazement. She was staring at him too. For the first time she was realizing that Hiram did not know about her parents’ elopement and her years of being put away in boarding schools because nobody wanted her. She had never told him about her lonely sense of being nobody’s child.

She knew who her parents were; she had that much advantage over him. They had not thrown her into a garbage can. But her mother had grasped at the first chance she had to get rid of her, by handing her over to her grandmother and ignoring her as much as appearances would allow. Her grandmother had kept her out of the way as much as possible. If ever there was an unwanted child, it was herself.

Hiram did not know this. He did not know how much understanding she had to give him, any more than she had known how much he needed it. She used to think of Hiram as being utterly strong and confident. It was dawning upon her that nobody was utterly strong and confident. Everybody needed help from other people.

Hiram stood still, where he was, speechless. Her own silence and her own surprise had given him a shock. Kendra walked around the table and stood before him and held out her hands. He took them in his and looked down at her with love and a wondering awe.

“You do want me then, Kendra?” he asked.

Kendra’s throat had closed up. She could not answer. She nodded, dumbly, then all of a sudden she found that his arms were around her and she was crying, her head on his shoulder while his big hands soothed her as if she had been a child. After a little while she managed to look up, tears still on her cheeks.

“Hiram,” she said chokily, “you need me, but no more than I need you. You and I—oh Hiram, I have so much to tell you!”

T
HEY HAD DINNER AT
the Union Hotel, leaving the others to dine on whatever Lulu and Lolo saw fit to serve them. Before going out Hiram engaged this card room for the rest of the evening. When they came in they sat down to talk, and they talked for hours, and nothing they said seemed ordinary. Every line provoked laughter or tears, and sometimes both. Kendra had never laughed so much in one evening, nor cried so much either. But even the tears were delightful, for every time he saw her eyes grow misty Hiram kissed her and made her laugh again.

At last, when they heard Marny pass the door on her way to the kitchen for chocolate, they went to meet her, walking hand in hand like two children, and told her they were going to be married. Marny kissed them both and wished them all the joy in the world.

“Are you surprised?” asked Hiram.

Marny began to laugh. “Certainly not. Anybody could see you were in love with Kendra. But I thought you were never going to get around to saying so.”

“I suppose,” Hiram returned modestly, “I’m just a bashful swain.”

She laughed again and gave him an affectionate pat on the cheek. “I’ve observed,” she said, “that big tough men like you are often bashful when it comes to speaking tender lines. Don’t apologize.”

“I haven’t,” retorted Hiram, “and I won’t.”

When Marny came down the next morning Kendra told her letters had already come by messenger from both Pocket and Hiram. Pocket’s letter said he rejoiced at the news. Hiram’s letter said he would be over this evening to take her out to dinner again and then to a play, and would she please wear the blue silk dress with the flouncy sleeves because this was the one he liked best.

Marny smiled across her coffee cup. “He’s really in love with you, Kendra. I wish you so much happiness—” she sobered, and reached to take Kendra’s hand in hers. “And this time, dear, I think you’re going to have it.”

That evening Kendra put on the blue dress with the flouncy sleeves, and when Hiram came in he brought her a blue silk folding fan with ivory sticks. He also brought silk-and-ivory fans for Marny and Hortensia and Lulu and Lolo—all chosen, he said, from among the five hundred dozen that had been advertised in the
Alta.
The fans, of varied colors and designs, were beautiful, and the girls thanked him. Hiram and Kendra went off together.

Marny had an unexciting dinner of beef and potatoes, prepared by Lulu. After dinner she went up to her room for a breathing space before going back to work.

Marny’s bedroom was well furnished, with soft deep rugs on the floor and a satin quilt on the bed, a long mirror, heavy curtains to keep her from being waked up by the morning light, and on the table a whale oil lamp with a shade of frosted glass. She lit the lamp and looked at herself in the mirror.

She was wearing a black satin dress with a flourish of white cobweb lawn across the bosom. Around her waist was a gun belt—black leather tonight, so as not to be too obvious against her black dress—with her little gun tucked into the holster. Her only ornaments were her nugget necklace and a pair of plain gold earrings. When she dealt cards she never wore rings or bracelets. Marny smiled at her reflection. She was a striking person, no doubt about it, with her trim figure, her flamboyant red hair and green eyes. After all this time in the mists of San Francisco she had no freckles left but a few golden dots that made a butterfly pattern, hardly more than a shadow, across her nose and cheeks. That trace of freckles seemed to be there to remind onlookers that while she was not really beautiful, she was uniquely herself.

She wanted to see how the kittens were. The big whale oil lamp was too heavy to be easily carried about, so lighting a smaller lamp she went into the boudoir. She set the lamp on the side table and bent to look into the hut.

The kittens were now eight days old, and how they had grown! They were still tiny, but so much bigger than they had been at first. No wonder, for they seemed to be always nursing. Luckily Geraldine was putting away prodigious quantities of food and could give them all the milk they wanted. Right now the kittens were curled up beside her, on a soft old blanket folded and tucked into the hut to make a bed. Geraldine was purring, happy as a cat could be.

Marny went back to the bedroom. The air was growing chilly, and the rippling curtains reminded her that while there was not much wind yet, it might get stronger as the night went on. She set down the lamp and went to close the windows.

The windows looked over the roofs that sloped downhill toward the bay. San Francisco still had no street lights, but here between the plaza and the waterfront the town was never quite dark, and as this was a Saturday night there were even more lights than usual. In the bay were five hundred vessels, most of them with lights of their own. Marny saw an Isthmus steamer, and other coastwise craft, and tall-masted seagoing vessels from many ports, and the busy little steamers that chugged between San Francisco and the placer country. Farther out she could see the lost ships, rotting and falling to pieces in the water.

She closed the windows and drew the curtains. Making sure the outer doors of bedroom and boudoir were locked, and the door between the rooms closed so the kittens would have to stay where they belonged, she started downstairs.

Around her she heard laughter, music, all the merry sounds of the plaza on a Saturday night. She went down to the first floor and cracked open the door behind the bar of the public room.

What a racket!—but the men seemed to be having fun. In this room they now had two female dealers, French girls who had come to California to seek their fortunes. Marny could see them, smoking little black cigars and bestowing seductive smiles upon the players.

The bar was doing a rush of business. On the platform at one end of the room the orchestra was playing. At the end of the bar near the orchestra four men were warbling the words that went with the tune. Along the bar other men clinked glasses and made comments of their own. In front of the bar a boozy patriot was prancing up and down, waving a flag and announcing that he was prepared to carve the gizzard out of the first fool duck of a foreigner who questioned the right of a trueborn American to do exactly as he pleased in his own country.

“Things going all right, Marny?” asked a voice at her side.

She turned to see Troy Blackbeard. “Yes, Troy, so far. Except, that fellow with the flag—don’t you think we’d better get him out before he starts a war?”

Troy grinned. The Blackbeards liked Marny. Not only did she play fair and mind her own business, but she was one of the few people who went to the trouble of telling them apart and calling them by different names. After all, a man may like his twin but he also likes to be treated as a person in his own right instead of half a unit.

“We’ll keep an eye on him,” Troy promised.

“Good. I’ll go on up to the parlor.”

She went up to the parlor. As she crossed the room a score of men called greetings. Marny smiled at them and waved. She noticed that Pollock was here again tonight, as usual in the group around Hortensia. He was not one of those who greeted Marny as she passed.

Marny was not distressed. She told the Harvard man to go to dinner, and took his place at the card table.

She had an agreeable evening. Her table was crowded with as many players as she could take care of. Nobody made trouble. When she paused to stretch, she noted that play was brisk at all the tables, and while the bar was noisy the noise was good humored. The cards were kind to her, and she felt a glow of good luck.

At ten o’clock she left her game to the Harvard man and went out for a rest. In the kitchen a pot of chocolate was ready on the stove. Marny filled a cup and carried it upstairs to her own room.

She lit the whale oil lamp, took off the heavy nugget necklace and dropped it into the pocket of her skirt, took up the cup and tasted the chocolate. Evidently Lulu or Lolo had made it tonight. Marny could always tell when Kendra had not made the chocolate. As she drank, she reflected that she was going to miss Kendra.

Certainly she did not begrudge Kendra her present happiness. Kendra had had more than her share of trouble and she had met it with courage. She deserved to be happy now.

—But I do wish, Marny thought as she set down her empty cup, that Lulu and Lolo could learn to cook like her.

She heard a little call from the boudoir. Geraldine had heard her come in, and had caught her scent under the door. In cat language, Geraldine was calling, “Come and pay some attention to me.”

Marny lit the small lamp and carried it into the boudoir. Geraldine was standing by the door, but as Marny came in she sprang to the table top and rejoined her babies in the hut. Setting the lamp on the side table Marny bent to talk to them. The gun at her belt felt heavy. She should have taken it off, and given her waist a rest along with her neck.

No matter. The kittens were so adorable. Marny would never understand the way they liked to lie in a pile on top of each other. —You’d think, she reflected, that they would smother, or at least be mighty uncomfortable. But evidently not.

“You darlings,” she said to them. “Jupiter and Empy and Pandora and Calico. I love you all.”

As she stood up she was wondering—When Kendra leaves the Calico Palace, how shall we divide the kittens? I suppose we’ll each take a boy and a girl. But which of us will get Geraldine? She’s the one who came to the door at midnight. Oh well, we’ll decide somehow.

Marny said good night to the kittens and started to leave them.

“Stop!” ordered a voice as she turned around.

In the doorway between the boudoir and the bedroom stood Captain Pollock. He held a gun in his hand, and the gun was pointed at herself.

Almost by instinct Marny’s hand flashed to her belt. But at the same moment he barked,

“Stop!”

Marny stopped.

Pollock ordered, “Put your hands in front of you.”

Without thought or reason, Marny obeyed.

“Don’t move,” said Pollock, “and don’t scream.”

Marny did not move or scream. For that moment she was benumbed. She felt nothing but stark, absolute terror.

They faced each other. Marny stood still, her elbows bent, her hands in front of her as though she were carrying an invisible tray. Pollock too stood motionless, his gun ready to fire.

Now that she had passed that first instant of shock, Marny’s wits began to clear. She became aware of every detail, with such acuteness as she had seldom felt before. She saw the lamplight pouring through the doorway behind him, and the light from the smaller lamp on the table in front of him, making his features plain; she saw his neat chestnut hair and beard, the excellent quality of his clothes and his well-kept boots; and she saw his strong competent hand on the gun. The gun was a Colt Army Revolver. This was a favorite type of gun in San Francisco and Marny had seen it often. It weighed four pounds, it was a pistol of .44 caliber, and it could easily blow her—or anybody else—right out of the world.

She heard the sounds of the Calico Palace—music, voices, footsteps, opening and closing of doors, the muffled roar of the plaza and the streets beyond. The noise seemed loud, and it seemed to be all round her, like a wall enclosing the silence where she and Pollock stood.

She had thought she was well guarded. But Pollock was a clever man, and crafty. He was here on the fourth floor now. No doubt he had been here before, more than once. Leaving the parlor as if to go home, he must have found a way to elude the guards and slip up the stairs. Pollock had had a purpose in his mind and he had cleared the way.