Chasing Secrets (2 page)

J
ing drives us to the ferry. In the sky, plumes of yellow smoke shoot up from Chinatown. The air is yellow and smells of rotten eggs and burning trash. I'm glad we aren't going that way.

We've just pulled up to the dock when I spot Billy. Billy looks like Mama in Papa's extra large size. He has her dark hair, and eyes so blue, they're almost violet. He doesn't have huge feet the way I do, but he has big hands—each the size of a loaf of bread. Aunt Hortense has to send to New York to get gloves that fit. Apparently New York is full of people with big hands.

Billy has his jacket off and his shirtsleeves rolled up. He's headed toward a crowd of young men watching a street fight. I raise my arm to wave, then yank it back. Our father
won't be happy Billy is down here. If I say hello, Billy will accuse me of telling Papa on him.

I watch Papa out of the corner of my eye; he hasn't spotted Billy. But the way Jing's eyebrows move, I'm pretty sure
he
has.

After the ferry ride across the choppy green water, Papa and I rent a horse and buggy from the livery. Just as we climb up, the rain begins to come down. By the time we dig our slickers out, we're soaked. The wind howls; water and mud splash up from the road. Steam rises from the warm horses. Even with a hat on, my hair is dripping wet by the time we tie the horse outside the Jessens' little house and tramp inside.

Luckily, Papa knows Mrs. Jessen. Some ladies would rather die than have a strange doctor examine them.

In the small cabin, Mrs. Jessen's five-year-old daughter, Caroline, stands holding her swollen misshapen arm. Her mother is screaming like her hair is caught in the hooves of a galloping horse.

Papa has an established order of who to help first—triage, he calls it. Children, then women, then old men, then young men. But who comes first in this case? The baby inside Mrs. Jessen, or Caroline? There are no grandmothers hovering, no hired men in the yard, no neighbors offering a helping hand. Nobody but Caroline Jessen, her mother, my father, and me.

Papa carefully inspects Caroline's arm. “It's a fracture. How'd you hurt it, little one?”

“Fell,” Caroline whispers.

“My daughter, Lizzie, will take good care of you,” he tells her gently, then turns his attention to Mrs. Jessen as he talks me through setting Caroline's arm.

“Get some chloroform and the gauze mask. Come show me when you have it,” he calls.

This is more than he's asked of me before. Did he forget I'm only thirteen?

“Move, Lizzie!” he shouts.

Mrs. Jessen's screams are gaining on us like the whistle of an oncoming train.

Papa has two doctor bags: the black satchel full of medicine, the brown one packed with instruments wrapped in soft cloth. The chloroform is in the black one, along with mustard poultices, camphor, ammonia, liniment, and rubbing alcohol. I dig through the brown bag, looking for the gauze mask under the bandages—old sheets cut and rolled by Jing.

When I don't find the mask, I plow through again, making a mess of things. Papa isn't going to like this. But then I feel the cool smooth edge of metal…the mask.

Papa sees I have it. “Is there a piece of wood around? Three inches by seven?”

“Seven inches. Do we have a ruler?” I ask.

“Just guess. You'll use it as a brace.” His voice is calm and encouraging, but I know he won't be happy if I make a mistake.

I head outside. The rain has let up. It's misting now, the water hanging in the air. My boots stick in the mud, making a sucking sound as I pull them out.

I run to the boathouse and then cut around the back. The boat's paddles are on one side, firmly attached to the boat hut. They're too large. Besides, I can't get them off.

The terror in Caroline's eyes makes my mind spin like a bicycle wheel with no chain attached.

In the reeds stands an egret, slender and elegant. I watch it and try to calm myself. Where am I going to find something to use as a brace?

No trees; it's all marsh here. Monterey pines grow in the back, behind the house, but they are full of gnarly branches. We need something flat.

The egret lifts its pterodactyl wings and takes off, its thin legs dangling behind. And there—just beyond the bird—I see a broken oar in the reeds. I trudge through the muck, tug the paddle pieces from the mud. There is one about the right size! I wash it in the bay, the water sloping into my boots. Then I run up to the house to boil water. Papa makes me boil everything.

On the porch, I notice a spittoon, along with small cages of animals. Mice, squirrels, a raccoon.

In the back room, Papa has clean sheets and towels around Mrs. Jessen. He's talking to her in that comforting way he has.

Caroline is huddled in the corner of the front room, her brown hair matted with snarls and snot, her eyes wide. A pulse beats in her small forehead. My father says a patient must have faith in you. But how do you earn trust? If Caroline is anything like the girls at school, I'm in big trouble.

“You're going to be fine,” I say.

“Get away,” she spits.

Papa has his hands full with Mrs. Jessen. If Caroline runs from me, there's no way I can get the metal form with the gauze mask over her nose so that I can pour the chloroform one drop at a time. Papa instructed me precisely how to use it—chloroform can be deadly.

I move closer. Her arm hangs like a Z. How can an arm look like that?

“You ain't a doctor.” Her whole body caves around her arm, protecting it from me.

“I can do this. I've done it before,” I lie.

“Leave me alone. My father's a policeman,” Caroline kicks out at me, her foot catching air.

“Calm her down,” Papa calls from the back room. “Then give her the chloroform,
carefully
!”

Caroline cowers behind an old loom. “Stay away.”

My eyes search the house for clues about her. Then I remember the animals on the porch. “What is your raccoon's name?”

She won't answer.

“Is your papa a policeman in Larkspur?” I ask.

“San Francisco.” I can barely hear her over her mother's moans. Tears flood Caroline's eyes.

Then I understand. Caroline is more afraid for her mother than she is for herself. I know how that feels. For a split second I feel a sting, because Caroline's mother is here with her and mine is dead. Then I whisper, “He won't hurt her.”

Caroline quivers. “He's hurtin' her now!”

“She's having a baby. It hurts a lot. But he'll help her. He knows how.” I work at making my voice comforting.

The tears spill down Caroline's cheeks, making pink lines in her dirty face. “No,” she hiccups, her shoulders convulsing, but her eyes are watching me.

“Yes,” I say. “It's always this way. It's painful when the baby comes.” I try to sound calm. I've never attended a childbirth before, but I know this much.

Caroline eyes me. “God's doing this to her?”

“No. God's taking care of her. Some things in life just hurt. But your mama's in good hands now.”

I sense her agreeing with me more than I see it.

“My papa is a good doctor. He'll bring her through this.”

Her eyes absorb this.

“He will. He's delivered hundreds of babies. He knows what he's doing,” I say as I pray for a normal birth.

She nods. The hand of her good arm creeps forward, finger by finger to touch me.

I take the last step to her, wiping the hair gently from her face.

W
e're up half the night, pulling a small person out of Mrs. Jessen, which is like getting a boulder out of a pickle jar. Impossible…but somehow it happens.

After my father finishes cleaning the afterbirth, the creature looks more like a baby and less like a gnome. Papa says they don't cry much the first day, but this baby's cries pierce holes in my eardrums. My father isn't right about everything.

Mr. Jessen is home now, out back chopping wood in the morning light. Mrs. Jessen and the new baby, Thomas, are sound asleep. I was asleep, too, curled up in a chair, when Papa woke me. “We have to get going, or we'll owe another day's charge for the buggy.”

Mr. Jessen is a big man with a hearty handshake. “Much
obliged, Lizzie,” he tells me when he comes through the door, bringing in the smell of chopped wood.

“Looks like you got yourself some help there,” Papa says, and nods toward the back bedroom.

Mr. Jessen grins. “Gonna be a while before I can get much work out of him.”

“True enough, but he's got a fine set of lungs. I can vouch for that.”

“That he does. Thanks, Jules. I know it's a slog for you to come all the way out here. But given what's been going on in the city, the farther away the better.”

“Something I should know about?”

“Restaurant down on Sutter stinks to high heaven. Got incense burning to mask the smell. Finally opened up the wall. Eighty-seven dead rats in there.”

Papa rocks back on his heels. “Any explanation?”

“Rats dying in a wall…happens. It's the quantity that bothers me.”

Papa sighs. “Could be anything.”

“I know it. Keep your eyes open. That's all I'm saying.”

“I sleep with them open.”

“I'll bet you do.”

Before I leave, I check on my patient, Caroline. She's sleeping peacefully, her hair fanning out over the pillow, her arm set on the broken paddle piece. Jing's bandages are rolled neatly around her arm, anchored by her thumb. Not bad for my first broken arm. I only wish Caroline went to
Miss Barstow's. I imagine her telling the other girls. This would impress them, wouldn't it?

I climb into the buggy, badgering Papa with questions. “How was I supposed to know how to set a broken arm and calm a terrified little girl?”

Papa's long legs search for a comfortable spot in the cramped buggy. He has to duck when going through doorways and punch extra holes in the stirrup leathers to make them long enough for his legs. I hope I don't get that tall.

“You figured it out, though, didn't you?”

I can't help smiling. I like being good at this. “Why are you teaching me? Billy was supposed to be the doctor.”

“Why are you learning?”

“There are no girls in medical school.”

“There are a few.” He smiles tenderly, taking a lock of my hair and putting it on the right side of my part. “You did well.”

I soak this up.

“Just don't forget that everybody reacts to chloroform differently. Always pay close attention to the small things.”

“Are there charts that tell you
exactly
how much by age and by weight?”

“Yes, but don't be a slave to charts. You don't want to be one of those physicians who operate with an open atlas before them.”

“I'm to operate now?”

He flashes a boyish smile. “Not this week.”

I know what he's saying, but what if I make a mistake? Too much chloroform can kill a person.

“Does Dr. Roumalade have charts?”

Dr. Roumalade is the doctor for people who live on Nob Hill. He makes house calls, like Papa does, but he also has an office, with a room just for people to wait. You have to be a high-muck-a-muck to see Dr. Roumalade. If you're a railroad king and get sick, he'll move in with you until you get well.

“Yes, but I'm certain he uses his eyes and ears more than his charts.”

I bet he doesn't get paid in blackberry jam and hand-woven blankets, the way Papa does. It's easier to get your fee if the outcome is good. For his healthy baby boy, Mr. Jessen probably gave Papa a few dollars besides the jam and the blanket, but I don't know for sure. Grown-ups don't give straight answers about money.

“Why is Dr. Roumalade Aunt Hortense's doctor, not you?”

“It would be awkward,” Papa says.

“And what was Mr. Jessen talking about, anyway? Eighty-seven rats dying.”

“Hygiene is not what it could be in some of our eating establishments.”

“But so many!”

“I've got my hands full worrying about human diseases. I can't keep track of rat ailments, too, Lizzie.”

After the boat ride through thick wet fog, Jing appears in front of the Ferry Building.

I scurry ahead of Papa and climb up into the buggy behind Jing. “How'd you know what ferry we'd be on?”

“Magic,” Jing says, and smiles. His eyebrows move an awful lot. They tell you more than his lips.

The buggy rocks as Papa climbs in. He slides his bags under the seat.

“Does Dr. Roumalade travel as much as you do?” I ask.

“Nope.” Papa gives me a dry smile. “He sends inconvenient patients to me.”

Jing slaps the lines, and Juliet leaps forward.

“Everything okay at home?” Papa asks as we pass a mule and wagon.
Hee-haw,
the mule warns; we've come too close.

“At home, yes, sir. But Chinatown is under quarantine.”

“Chinatown.” Papa shakes his head.

I watch up ahead, where a policeman on horseback manages the overflowing line of people waiting for the cable car. “What's the quarantine for?”

“The plague,” Papa says.

“The plague? Right, Papa.” I laugh.

“It's true. The fact that nobody's seen hide nor hair of it is apparently beside the point. A lot of Sturm und Drang for nothing.”

Jing nods, but I don't. What is Sturm und Drang?

“Why is the quarantine happening, then?” I ask.

“Just the word shakes everybody up. Plague victims die a hard death.”

“Do they all die?”

“Death rate is fifty percent. Nearly wiped out Europe during the Middle Ages.”

“Is it because of the rats?”

“Don't jump to conclusions, Lizzie. You know better than that.”

“There must be some reason they think we have the plague.”

“There was an outbreak in Hawaii. But there hasn't been a single confirmed case here.”

“Why did they quarantine Chinatown?”

“Well…they're not going to quarantine Nob Hill, now, are they?” Papa winks at Jing.

Jing smiles.

Aunt Hortense hurries out the second she sees us, like she's been watching through the window. Sometimes she looks so much like Mama, it feels like a twist of the forceps on my heart. But when she opens her mouth, she's Aunt Hortense again. “Thank goodness you're safe,” she says.

“Do you think I'd let anything happen to my Lizzie?” Papa asks.

“Promise me you won't take her with you for a while,” Aunt Hortense pleads.

“What are you concerned about, Hortense?” My father's voice is patient, as always.

“When was the last time they quarantined a part of the city?”

“I can't recall.” Papa climbs down from the buggy after me.

Aunt Hortense fans her face. “My point exactly.”

“Is Karl worried?”

“Not a bit. Look, humor me, Jules. I don't want to take chances with our Elizabeth.”

Papa nods. “Of course. She'll stay home until this dies down.”

“Thanks.” Aunt Hortense kisses Papa lightly on the cheek.

“Wait….Papa!” I whisper when we are out of earshot of Aunt Hortense. “We didn't go near the quarantine today, and we're not going tomorrow, either, are we?”

“Nope.”

“Then there's no reason for her to be worried. Come on, Papa. What am I going to do at home?”

Papa slips his spectacles off and cleans them with a cloth he keeps in his breast pocket. “Your aunt does a lot for us. If a small thing like this can make her happy…”

“But you're the doctor, and you're not worried. Why do we have to listen to her?”

“Because she's your aunt and she loves you.”

One word from Aunt Hortense and my whole weekend is ruined. I kick the cobblestones so hard it hurts my toe.