Comes a Time for Burning (13 page)

“I…”

“Indeed,” Hardy snapped. “The room must be absolutely clean before anyone else may use it. And that brings us to a further issue.” He unhooked the coal oil lantern from the ceiling hook and stepped back out into the landing. “I see three other rooms,” he said. “They must all be evacuated and quarantined. We must examine each person thoroughly. The more we can isolate this incident, the better off we will all be.”

His jaw clamped shut, Fred Jules looked from door to door, as if an answer would pop out from one of them.

“What is the disease?” he asked. “You have not said.”

“Cholera.”

“My God!” He stepped back as if punched.

“It can be managed with intelligence and due diligence,” Thomas added, not sure that he believed what he was saying. “First, while we are aggressively treating the stricken patients, every effort must be made to render these rooms as sterile as possible. And the rooms around it. If the entire hotel must be quarantined until that is completed, then so be it.”

“That is
not
possible,” Jules said.

“Well, it is,” Aldrich spoke up. “If it must be done, if these two men order that it must be done, then it must be done, yes?”

“You have no authority.” The hotel manager’s voice hardened.

“Oh, I do,” Aldrich said easily. “You know, Fred, I have never looked to put my nose in your business, but we both know it
is
a business, and we both know what the statutes say about that, eh? Heaven knows I do. Pastor Patterson reminds me often enough.”

Fred Jules glared at the constable for a moment, then turned to Thomas.

“Just what do you want of us?”

“We shall begin with absolute cleanliness,” Thomas said. “At this point, we have but the two cases, but the character of the disease makes that most unusual. As this room is cleaned, along with the others on this floor, we must also determine who was in intimate contact with Miss Levine.”

“If the town hears of this,” Jules said softly.

“The town
will
hear of this,” Thomas said quickly. “Of that, I’m certain. We will make sure that the town hears of it. If we don’t act with accord to stop this thing, Port McKinney will be decimated.” He surveyed the landing. “When the residents of this floor must use the toilet, and don’t want to use the chamber pot, where do they go?”

“The privy is on the north side of the building,” Jules offered.

“And who is charged with emptying the chamber pots from the rooms?”

“The guests are not expected,” Jules said. “But you said that Mrs. Snyder…are you sure? She is ill?”

“She is. She cleaned for you?”

“Well, in addition to many other things,” Jules said.

“I would guess that Lucy Levine was not considered a
guest
, however. Am I correct in that?” Hardy asked. “She would have emptied her own, were she up to the task?”

“Yes.”

“And for the other rooms? For the guests on the second floor?”

“One of the maids.”

“Would Lucy have done that, perhaps? Both she and Mrs. Snyder?”

“She works thus from time to time. We have many rooms that must be attended to.”

“When she is not otherwise engaged,” the constable said dryly.

“The girl who rooms with Lucy?” Thomas asked.

“She has traveled to Seattle. She has family there.”

“When did she leave?”

“It has been a week. She…how does my good wife say it…Missy found her man. One of the loggers took her from us.”

“We will want to speak with her. She must be found.”

“She was well when she left,” Jules said.

“When was the last moment that you saw Lucy, by the way?”

Jules frowned, taking his time. “She was having dinner with a favorite of hers, and that would have been just a day or so ago.”

“A gentleman named Ben Sitzberger?”

Jules nodded. “Is he…“

“We must know for certain when you saw her last.”

The manager watched the sputtering flame in the lantern for a moment. “It would have been Wednesday at supper.”

“And she was well?”

“She appeared to be so. She was enjoying herself and her company. She’s showing favor toward him, you know,” Jules said. “And we like to see that. When the girls can leave here and find contentment and build a home of their own, then my wife and I feel a sense of accomplishment.”

“I’m sure you do,” Hardy said.

“Sitzberger. Ben Sitzberger,” Jules said, confirming. “A promising young man who works for Mr. Schmidt.”

“Sitzberger spent the night?”

“I would think so,” Jules said, then quickly added, with an uneasy glance toward Lucy’s pathetic room, “but not here, of course.”

“Of course not,” Hardy said with considerable acid. “Where, man?”

“I would have to ask my wife, but certainly it would be one of the guest rooms on the second floor.” He scratched his scalp. “The girls do not host in their private quarters.” He said it as if that was a policy of enormous distinction, Thomas thought.

Thomas drew Hardy to one side. “The disease struck in just hours, Lucius. Just hours. One moment, Lucy was enjoying the company of her beau, and the next, the cholera had laid her low.”

“That’s the way of it. Who works for you that you trust?” Hardy asked Fred Jules. “I mean trust with your life, sir? Because that’s to whom you must entrust this task at hand. You must make sure that your employees do your bidding in the most meticulous, thorough fashion. This room must be cleaned, as must all the others. As we said, all the bedding and soft things burned. Everything else be washed down thoroughly with strong disinfectant. The best is the corrosive sublimate that you can purchase by the bagful at Lindeman’s. And then,” and he reached out a hand to grasp the hotel manager’s shoulder to make sure he was listening, “once clean, everything must remain clean, sir. Fully aired and clean. Fully disinfected. Make sure every employee scrubs her hands to perfection. And scrubs often.
Every
time something from one of the rooms is handled.”

“Do you know what you ask, sir?” Jules bleated.

Hardy barked out one of his short, hard laughs. “Well, then, think of it this way. This is Friday, is it not? Do you wish to see the sunrise on Monday? You and your wife? Every one of your hotel staff? Your guests? Because
that
, good sir, is the choice the cholera gives you. You are a marked man, Mr. Jules. We who have come into contact with this contagion…we are
all
marked.”

“I’ll tend to it,” Jules said, and sounded as if he meant it.

“Today,” Hardy added, and Jules nodded. “The hotel will be under strict quarantine until we are satisfied that all is well. Constable Aldrich will enforce the quarantine. No one must leave until either Dr. Parks or myself can confirm that the risk has been abated. Only when we’re sure that you are doing all that we ask can we attend to other matters more difficult.”

“My God, man,” Jules exclaimed, looking quickly at Aldrich as if he held the answers. The constable remained silent. “What matters do you refer to?”

“Staying alive, for one,” Hardy said. “When a cholera epidemic breaks out, the dead are counted in thousands, sir. How many live in Port McKinney? Five hundred?” He squeezed Jules’ shoulder once again as he turned toward the other rooms. “Now, show us these rooms.”

Chapter Sixteen

Thomas’ hopes rose as they visited first one room and then another on the third floor. All save one were empty, and showed no tell-tale signs of illness. All reeked of various amounts of perfumes and incense, but not the wretched, putrid miasma from the cholera.

Aldrich’s knock on the door farthest from Lucy’s and the stairway was answered by Letitia Moore, a large young woman no doubt capable of smothering the fittest lumberjack in a close hug. She opened her door despite being attired in the thinnest of undergarments.

“Three at once?” she announced cheerfully, then turned as Aldrich stepped into view. “Well, make it four, then.” She held a towel under her chin as a drape, looping a finger through one of the golden ringlets that cascaded down beside her face. She could have been Flora Jules’ daughter.

“Miss Moore,” Jules said, and he couldn’t seem to bring himself to look at her face, “Miss Levine has been taken ill.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” the woman said with what sounded like genuine sympathy and affection. “But I’m otherwise engaged, Freddy. I have a gentleman downstairs.”

Fred Jules colored at the familiarity. “No, these gentlemen…”

“The
handsome
good doctor,” Letitia said, beaming with perfect white teeth. “I’ve told Alvina on several occasions that we all need stars as lucky as hers.” She reached out a hand to Lucius Hardy. “And who are you, kind sir?” She even curtsied slightly.

“Dr. Lucius Hardy,” the physician replied, and bowed stiffly without taking the proffered hand.

“Well, my.” She rolled her eyes. “Two doctors in one visit. I wish I were ill.”

“Did you speak with Lucy at all during the day yesterday?” Thomas asked. “Did you see her?”

“I confess not. We have been unusually busy, and I’m sure I don’t know why. Perhaps some phase of the moon. Is she desperate?”

Thomas ignored the question. “Did you happen to encounter Mrs. Snyder at any time in the past few days?”

“Encounter? What
ever
do you mean by that?”

“Did you see her? Speak with her? She is ill as well, and we need to know with whom she associated.”

“She’s ill? Heavens. And she is
such
a jewel, you know. But, one gets sick now and again, don’t we. You know,” Miss Moore said, and she pursed her lips judiciously. “I just don’t recall things like that. Some of the older employees of the hotel…” She swept a hand around to include the walls as if that’s where the older employees resided. “I’m certainly aggrieved to learn she is unwell.”

Remarkable
, Thomas thought. “Listen, these are your closest friends, your associates we’re talking about. Discretion is one thing, but this is absurd. A woman a doorway removed is ill to death, and no one notices? My God.”

Before the girl could answer, Hardy turned to Thomas and Jules. “We’ll want to talk with everyone. It will only take a few moments to ascertain the state of things.” He lowered his voice and said to Thomas, “There is yet a chance, my friend. If the contagion can be limited to this floor, to the one room…”

“There is that chance.” Thomas looked critically at Letitia Moore, who appeared to be, in all ways, in the prime of health. “You have been well, Miss? You have any complaints, however trivial?”

“Only that you’re happily married,” she laughed, and touched Thomas’ cheek with two fingers, bubbling a laugh as he recoiled back.

“Should you feel any distress in the bowels, any sudden vomiting, you must come to the clinic immediately,” Hardy said. “You will not leave the Clarissa until you are told you may do so.”

“My.” The girl was obviously not entirely used to taking orders. “We are to be quarantined?”

“Indeed you are. Just so we understand each other.” Both beds in the room were empty, and Thomas surveyed the tiny confines as he stepped past Letitia. With the toe of his boot, he touched the chamber pot, and it rocked easily.

“My, you are a curious one.” Letitia’s expression of amused affection was replaced by concern. “Will Lucy recover? You have not said what the malady is.”

“She may, she may not. Who shares this room with you?”

“That would be Constance,” Jules offered quickly. “A young woman from Portland. She was so taken with the village that she decided to stay.”

“
So
taken,” Letitia said sarcastically. “Had she the money for fare farther up the coast, away she would go.”

“Where is she?”

“Now? I believe she is with a gentleman who prefers to awaken in the company of a pretty girl,” Letitia replied. “The first mate of the
Willis Head
, so she may yet find her ticket up the coast. She has been in his company since Thursday.” Letitia suddenly reached out a hand, again making contact with Thomas’ arm. “Now
she
said Lucy was taken ill with the grippe. She was making some broth for her. I was busy and didn’t really pay attention. Constance seemed not to worry.”

Thomas glanced at Jules, then said to the young woman, “It is not the grippe, Miss Moore. Would that it were so. Miss Levine suffers from cholera.”

Letitia Moore’s face lost the rosy hue of playful banter, and her eyes went cold and watchful. “The cholera?”

“Yes.”

“However…”

“We don’t know,” Hardy said abruptly. “Now if you’ll excuse us.”

It took an hour to prowl every remaining room of the Clarissa, and Thomas let his nose guide his suspicions. The victims didn’t mope about for days, feeling off their feed. The avalanche of symptoms crashed down, destroying any will, laying waste to any inclination for self-defense. As untidy, dark and dank as the Clarissa might be, once they were clear of the third floor, the potpourri of other odors—odors less lethal—greeted them whenever a door was opened.

No one professed to be ill, although the first mate of the
Willis Head
greeted the four men with less than good cheer. As Thomas held up the oil lantern, he saw the man recoil away from the light as if someone had thrust a dagger in his eyes.

“Jesus and all the saints.” The man held up his hand. “What are you about? What do you want?” He held a straight razor in his hand, but the lather soaking under his full, red beard indicated he’d been razoring his own neck at the moment of the knock, not someone else’s.

Jules touched Thomas’ elbow. “That’s Constance,” he whispered. “She shares the room with Miss Moore. Constance DeJohn.”

“Sir, may I speak with your companion?” Thomas asked.

The man stood rooted, looking from one face to another. “And just who the hell are you?” he asked Thomas. Had he wanted to bar the door, he certainly would have had no trouble, Thomas thought. With his cordage-like muscles graced with enough tattoos for ten men, the man’s decorations also included a fair selection of scars inflicted with something more dangerous than an artist’s needle.

“Dr. Thomas Parks. I need to speak with Miss DeJohn on a matter of the greatest urgency.”

The figure still occupying the bed sat up, holding the sheet to her chin.

“Miss DeJohn?” Fred Jules called, and the sailor glared at him and then saw the constable for the first time, the small brass badge on his vest now visible as was the revolver at his waist. “These men need to talk with you.”

“I ain’t decent,” she replied. “Is that the doctor?”

“Dr. Parks,” Thomas announced. “Excuse me,” he said to the sailor, and stepped past into the room. “Miss DeJohn, we are concerned about Lucy Levine.”

“All I done was make her some chicken stock broth. She had an upset tummy.”

“When was this?”

The girl pulled the sheet up so that the lower half of her face was covered. The bedding fell away enough to reveal one shapely shoulder. “I guess it was yesterday morning. Something like that. I brought her the soup for lunch. I don’t think she liked it.”

“Thursday noon.”

“She was in a bad way. She said that Benny was not feeling so good either.”

“Benny? This would be the Sitzberger boy?”

Constance nodded, and smiled broadly, ducking her face into the sheet once again. “Almost every night, he comes down from the camp. Sometimes he don’t spend the whole night. Sometimes he does.”

“Did you manage Miss Levine’s bedding? Anything like that?”

“I helped her change it.” The girl made a face. “She had an accident, she said. But I did that and then she said she was feeling better, and I had things to do. The other girl said she’d help some before she had to leave.”

Thomas sighed. “The
other
girl?”

“Eleanor. The mean guy’s daughter. Or step-daughter, I guess she is.”

For a moment, Thomas could not find the words. “
Eleanor
was here? Eleanor Stephens?” Constance DeJohn seemed puzzled at the physician’s stupefaction.

“She ain’t no stranger to the Clarissa, Doctor Parks. I woulda thought you knew that.”

“My God,” he whispered, and looked at Hardy. “And this Sitzberger…we must find him.” He paused, looking at the sailor. “Where’s your captain, sir?”

“I’m the first mate. I ain’t in charge of him,” the sailor replied.

“He’s not here at the hotel?”

“Nope. He’s got his own roost.” He flicked the razor closed then open again. “You boys found out what you needed to know?”

“I’ll need to speak with him,” Thomas said.

“Then you’ll find him out at Schmidt’s mill. The
Head’s
carrying Schmidt’s tonnage, mostly. It’ll be unloaded today, if there’s room at the wharf down the way. We’re waitin’ on that. He’s got three square-riggers in at the same time, and there ain’t room for us. We’re to make headway for Bellingham, so he’d best find a spot for us soon.”

“How many remain on board now?”

The first mate looked at Thomas with curiosity. He wiped the drying soap off his neck with the small towel, and passed it across the razor. “Two remain,” he said. “Why does that concern you?”

“The rest are here?”

“No. There’s only three others, and they got their own digs.”

“Here in town?”

“One of ’em has a brother working the timber. Where there’s a good card game, that’s where Luke is sure to be. He took Cy and the Murray kid with him.”

Once entertaining hopes that this outbreak might be easily contained, Thomas felt a wave of hopelessness. Somewhere off in one of the other rooms, he heard a whoop of delight, and for a moment he imagined that the cholera was laughing at him.

It took them just moments to find Bessie Mae Winston in one of the second floor’s front rooms. Miss Winston’s paying companion had already left, apparently paying her sufficiently to allow her some moments of peaceful slumber by herself. Groggy and sleepy-eyed, Miss Winston’s tale was grim. She’d wanted to borrow an article of clothing from Lucy, and had found the girl comatose. A girl with great common sense, Bessie Mae had not wished to awaken the Jules, both of whom had terrible tempers. Knowing that a nurse could always be found at the clinic, she had hurried there. Self-reliant, quick thinking—
I should hire this girl
, Thomas thought.

“Did Miss Levine tell you when she first experienced symptoms?” Thomas asked, and Bessie Mae frowned. She was a tiny thing, the pillow she clutched as she sat in bed more than adequate for her modesty.

“It’s been a couple of days,” Bessie Mae said. “She was havin’ dinner with Benny a couple days ago, and I know she didn’t feel up to snuff then. I remember her sayin’, ‘sometimes you gotta just paint on a good face.’” Bessie Mae managed a brave smile. “Can I come up and see her?”

“Indeed,” Thomas replied. “That would be important.”

“She’s like to die?”

Thomas hesitated. “Come see her today.” Bessie Mae understood his meaning, and pressed her face into her pillow.