The Spoils of Sin (16 page)

Fanny took from this exchange a reassurance that her friend was at least not planning the seduction that she had feared. Indeed, she began to see her alarm as ludicrous. Carola, as much as Fanny herself, had relished a break from the demands of the bedchamber. The wholesome activities of the homestead had come as a welcome change to them both. Hugo ran delightedly across the wide open acres, digging for rabbits and groundhogs, chasing exuberantly after squirrels. Their horse, too, was enjoying its idleness. Fanny's panicked urge to return prematurely to Chemeketa, had evaporated as Carola had predicted, once Charity took her leave.

And then the snow came. Patrick Collins stood out in his beaver coat and stared at the swirling flakes. At first, Fanny had assumed he was either angry or alarmed at its implications, but it soon became apparent that he was neither. ‘'Twill not stick for long,' he predicted. ‘And see how pretty it makes everything.'

His wife was less sanguine. ‘Ye'll never make a farmer,' she told him. ‘As I recall, it was every man's dread, for the sake of the beasts and the impossibility of moving far.'

Even Granny insisted on being brought downstairs to share in the excitement caused by the unseasonable weather. ‘Did they not tell us it never snowed in Oregon?' she demanded.

‘They told us it was like the western coast of Ireland,' Patrick said. ‘More liable to rain than to snow. But the weather makes no promises. Think of those poor souls in '46, with twenty feet of the stuff on their heads.'

‘That was in the mountains, a long way from here.' Grandma had taken a keen interest in the unfolding drama of the lost Donner Party comprised of people she had met on their wagon train. News-sheets had made much of it once the facts had become known, embellishing the details with flourishes that caught the imagination of Americans everywhere. ‘But if it's like this down in California, 'twill annoy all those gold prospectors, sure enough.'

‘And what might you know about that?' Patrick asked.

‘More than you, that's for sure.'

In truth, she had learned a good deal from Fanny, who had taken to spending an hour or more upstairs with her grandmother each evening, describing the life of Chemeketa and the recent mass movement down to the California goldfields. More than any others in the family, the old woman thrilled to the implications of untold wealth in the pockets of ordinary uneducated men. ‘A clever gambler could relieve them of much of it,' she said. ‘And a clever girl, likewise.'

‘That is the intention, Grandma,' Fanny had whispered. ‘But you're not to say a word of it to my parents, mark you.'

‘All the greater their surprise, when you return here later in the year, with your bags full of gold, then,' the old woman teased. ‘Your father has a treat in store, and no mistake.'

Fanny permitted the dreams to blossom, thinking it was all too likely that her grandmother would not live to see another visit from her, whether carrying gold or not.

The snow kept them huddled inside the house for much of each day. The livestock gathered close to the homestead, calling for victuals and water. Reuben and Carola undertook to throw hay to them, while Patrick took a pick and a spade and made a drinking place from a small streamlet that ran close by. Lizzie's dogs went crazy in the unfamiliar white world, joined by Hugo, who bowled them over until their shaggy coats were covered in icy balls of gathered snow.

It lasted three days, the novelty fading even for Patrick, who yet persisted in finding it both nostalgic and aesthetically pleasing, while admittedly inconvenient. ‘I should be off to Oregon City by this time,' he chafed. ‘The works will not run themselves, and there's likely to be many more settlers here this year, with the lure of the gold. All wanting new saddles and harness, for sure.'

‘Will they not be heading for territory south of here?' asked Fanny. ‘Will they not be building a better road over the desert, on the Mormon Trail? Why would anyone come to Oregon when the wealth is to be had in California?'

‘California will not offer them the land and the good life we have here. Those with better sense will maybe spend a time in the goldfields, while sending their women and little'uns here to claim their acres.'

‘And soon the whole country will be filled with riff-raff,' said Mrs Collins with a sniff. ‘Rushing westwards with no proper preparation and no notion of what to do when they get here.'

It was true, Fanny realised. Assuming there were continuing discoveries in the goldfields, the word spreading all around the world, the western coast of America would soon be as populous as the east – and with no better quality of person.

Nobody came by with fresher news, even after the snow was gone. And yet somehow the very air seemed full of the growing excitement of the presence of gold not so far away. Fanny discovered her father one day, shovelling grit and mud from the bed of the stream where he'd made a watering hole. He was shaking it carefully onto a growing heap between two trees. ‘Dadda? What is it you're doing?'

He laughed self-consciously. ‘Naught but a little prospecting,' he said. ‘Who's to say we haven't some deposits of our own, here in Oregon?'

‘Have you found anything?'

‘Silt, dead leaves and a leather bucket I fancy belonged to an Indian fifty years ago or more. The bottom is long gone.'

By the twenty-fifth of the month, Fanny was again hankering to leave. Her clothes were stale and much marked with the mud of the tracks and yards. Washing them was a lengthy process, which her mother bore with ill-concealed impatience, having so much to do for the others. Hanging space for drying was insufficient, with damp garments slapping into everyone's faces whenever they moved.

Carola was quiet. Reuben was absent – doing his best to create new ditches to take water away from the pastures, but finding it slow and difficult with one arm. The snow had delayed the necessary ploughing, and in any case, only one ox was fit for the task. The other had a swollen knee and could scarcely set his foot down for the pain of it. Lizzie made poultices and pleaded with her father to be patient with him.

Naomi – or Nam as she was always called – was as quiet as Carola, which was highly unusual. Eleven and a half years old, she continued to be treated like a baby. When it became evident, in the small crowded house, that her courses had begun at a painfully young age, Fanny felt a strange sense of regret for the end of that innocent childhood that seemed so additionally precious in a girl.

Mrs Collins was increasingly distracted by the imminent birth of Charity's new baby. ‘By rights, I should be with her,' she worried. ‘It isn't right that she should manage it alone.'

‘She has Ellie,' said Fanny. ‘The girl is old enough to provide all the necessary help.'

‘You might go yourself,' snapped her mother. ‘Instead of idling your time away here.'

It was the last straw. ‘I cannot do that, Mam. I have to return to the business in a few days' time. It cannot remain closed for much longer.'

‘You and your precious business,' was all the reply she got to that.

‘We leave in two days,' Fanny announced to Carola that evening. ‘Just a little sooner than we planned. I am sick for my real home.'

Carola laughed, but made no objection. ‘It is perhaps for the best,' she agreed. ‘A visit ought not to outlast its welcome.'

‘You agree?' Fanny was surprised.

‘I am neutral on the matter. It is your project, in essence, with me a mere accompaniment to it. I have enjoyed making the acquaintance of your family, but I confess to a curiosity and impatience to know how things stand in town. Out here, one feels starved of connection and information.'

‘I fear we might miss the benefits of the returning gold-diggers, if we tarry much longer.'

‘No need,' Carola assured her. ‘They will not return for some time yet, if I know men. Those who make a find will be greedy for more, and those who fail will keep on trying in new spots. As the numbers increase, the pickings will dwindle, and then we will know how such as we might benefit.'

Fanny looked at her. ‘Are we foolish to remain in Chemeketa, then? Ought we to travel south, where the men and their money are?'

‘We would then become downgraded, as camp followers, with no finer touches. We might relieve them of their gold, but we would find ourselves coarsened and useless in no time. For myself, I prefer to maintain my dignity and to live in a degree of comfort.'

Fanny was impressed. ‘You are perfectly correct,' she said. ‘Of course.'

‘Or perhaps I am simply too timid to make such an uncertain change,' shrugged Carola. ‘I have my little luxuries about me, and I am hopeful of sustained business in the years to come.'

Years to come
rang uncomfortably in Fanny's ears. Even with due attention to cleanliness and the requisites for robust health, she shied away from any considerations regarding the future. The work was relentless, the responses already automatic for the most part. Always, the words of the man on that first night returned to her – the certainty that one day she would be attacked and damaged by a man of unsound mind lurked just below the surface. Hugo, her stalwart protector, might not always have the speed or the strength to protect her.

They left at sunrise on the twenty-seventh of March, with warm hugs and promises to return in the fall, when there would be apples to gather and beef to be salted and a new niece or nephew to be welcomed. The horse was reluctant to have the traces put on again, after so long a respite, but resignation soon overcame him and he drew the cart away towards the Chemeketa road with a fair grace.

Hugo loped alongside, tongue lolling from his mouth and tail describing circles in the air.

Carola was hopeful that they might make the entire journey by nightfall, obviating the need for a strange bed. ‘Fifty miles!' Fanny objected. ‘The horse cannot do it.'

‘He might. The road is easy, and he is well rested. And we have the moon to guide us, God willing, if the clouds stay away. We might continue an hour or two in darkness, in that case.'

Fanny shivered. Travelling by night would be a frightening experience. Who knew what miscreants might lurk in wait for them? ‘Fifty miles,' she said again. ‘On the Trail we never managed half so much in a single day.'

‘You had plodding oxen and well-loaded wagons on rough-hewn tracks. It does not bear comparison.'

But there were stretches of Oregon road where the mud was deep and the horse soon mired to his knees. The girls climbed down, and with skirts bunched up, did their best to hasten the cart along. By noon they had covered perhaps a dozen miles at most. ‘If we achieve thirty miles, I shall be surprised,' said Fanny. ‘We must make the best of it.'

The weather was clear, with a winter sun casting deep shadows beneath the trees they passed. The horse was given a half-hour for grazing and taking a brief drink from a puddle of water. Hugo chased a raccoon and came within a whisker of catching it. Fanny walked a short distance amongst the trees and found green spears of new growth under her feet. Fiddleheads, unfamiliar buds and shoots, small white blooms all took her fancy and sent her dreaming. What matter if they reached town one day or the next – it was a beautiful world and the exploration of it was a pleasure.

Carola, however, had a darker attitude. ‘We shall be within fifteen miles or so of Chemeketa by nightfall. That leads to a difficulty, which you do not appear to have considered. We are
known
, Fan. There will be ideas about us that we might not like. Remember the head reading man and what we believed him to be intending? We were wrong, I admit, but not so
very
wrong at that. They were five-and-twenty miles from our boudoir and still they knew of us. I cannot contemplate it. Forgive me, but there it is. We will be judged, abused, condemned – the generality do not like what we do. Why did we sustain the secrecy with your family otherwise?'

‘Then what? Whip up the horse until he drops down dead? Or sleep in the open air, with a frost as likely as not?'

‘The horse won't drop dead. If we keep a steady pace, I believe we might still accomplish the whole distance. I estimate we have covered over a quarter, and there should be no more stretches of quagmire.'

Fanny looked around her. To the right were hills, but ahead and to the left the land swept smoothly towards the Willamette Valley and lower ground. Traffic passed in sufficient quantity to have formed a well-packed road, with none of the bumps and ruts she recalled from the Trail. Homesteaders living alongside the road took it upon themselves to maintain it, both for their own benefit and that of passing travellers. It was not so very different from the thoroughfares back in Rhode Island. Commerce was established already between Oregon City, Chemeketa and Portland, necessitating the reliable transport of goods and passengers by road. New and adventurous as it has seemed when they set out on their journey, she had to admit that it was in fact quite normal to travel from place to place for a whole host of purposes.

As she chewed her lip and mulled over Carola's words, she observed a group of men of horseback, approaching from the north. Her instinctive reaction was that this added weight to her side of the argument. If there were riders like this abroad, did this not render two unescorted females entirely too vulnerable to contemplate spending a night on the open? Even if the horse could be persuaded to keep plodding onwards, they could easily be caught and molested by a group of two or three men.

‘I don't like it,' she said. ‘We have mismanaged ourselves. You were perfectly right.'

But Carola had somehow revised her opinion and was clearly much less concerned. ‘See those men,' she tilted her chin at the horsemen. ‘And look – there are more following.' She pointed at a second group, appearing over a gentle rise in the road. ‘Something is afoot.'