Jubilee Trail (72 page)

Florinda was less patriotic. Florinda had heard of the Declaration of Independence, but she was not sure what it was. As they drank the chocolate Garnet told her something about it. Florinda said it sounded very fine, but she still did not see why they had to get up at the bust of dawn to celebrate. She thought the middle of the day would do just as well. But of course she didn’t know much about such things, and in the meantime where was the ink? Now that she was up this would be a good chance to check the accounts for the past week, before Silky squeezed himself a new coat out of her share of the profits.

Silky was already opening the bar. He told the girls to get ready for a busy day, for cheers made thirsty throats. At the new fort, the Declaration was to be read in both English and Spanish, in the presence of the troops and anybody else who cared to climb the hill and hear it. The structure was to be formally named Fort Moore, in honor of Captain Moore who had lost his life at the battle of San Pascual, when Kearny’s men met the Californios last December. Later there were to be more ceremonies, more guns, and more cheering. Everybody would be in a gay mood and would want plenty to drink.

He was right. The day was blazing hot and the saloon was packed. By midnight Garnet and Florinda were so tired that their eyes were hazy. But they were aware that Captain Brown had been standing for some time at Garnet’s end of the bar. He had stood quietly, always with a drink in front of him but taking his time about swallowing it. He said very little. But as long as he stayed there, the boys did not get too rowdy. When Silky and José were finally helping the last customers down the front step, Garnet gathered up the remnant of her strength and went over to him.

“Thank you for being here,” she said.

“Don’t try to talk,” Captain Brown said smiling. “Get some rest.”

He said good night then, and went out. Florinda, who was standing at the bar with her head sunk upon her hands, murmured appreciatively, “That’s a real gent you’ve got there, Garnet.”

Garnet agreed with her. She had grown very fond of Captain Brown. In the bluster of Los Angeles his quiet friendliness was as bracing as a breeze on a sultry day. His father, he told her, had for some years been doing business with the bank where Mr. Cameron worked. Mr. Brown was an importer of laces and other luxury goods from Europe. There had been two sons in the family, and the plan had been that the older son should go into business with his father, while the younger went into the army. Captain Brown, the younger son, had gone to West Point. But his brother had died, and Captain Brown had asked to be put on the army’s inactive list so he could carry on the family business. He had been called back to duty at the outbreak of the war, but he expected to return to civilian life when the country no longer needed him.

He had arranged for Garnet to send a letter home, in a bag with some military dispatches being sent by way of Mexico. She could use only one sheet of paper, and the commanding officer had to read what she wrote. But at least it was a way of letting her parents know that Stephen had been safely born and she was in good health.

Later in July the Mormon battalion was mustered out. Some of the men re-enlisted, and the army sent them to San Diego. Here, with their customary energy, the Mormons went to work. They whitewashed houses, shod horses, made carts, and set up a bakery; and altogether they made themselves so useful that the people of San Diego sent a petition to Governor Mason asking him to use his influence to get the Mormons to stay in California for good. Most of the Mormons, however, shook their heads. They had been sent West to be ready for the new Mormon colony that Brigham Young was starting, and this was where they wanted to go.

The Mormons who did not re-enlist set out for the new colony at once. They filled their pockets with seeds of crops that grew in California and so were already adapted to conditions this side of the Great Divide. They came by the saloon to say goodby, and Garnet and Florinda wished them luck, though Florinda added admiringly that she didn’t think they would need it.

Now and then Captain Brown came into the saloon when Texas was there. But Captain Brown always managed to look the other way, and Texas gave no sign of recognizing him. Texas was in good spirits these days. His main interest seemed to be Stephen. When Stephen had his first birthday Texas brought him a marvelous confection that his landlady Señora Vargas had made out of beaten egg-whites, sweetened with panocha and crisped in the oven; and now that Stephen was old enough to play with toys, Texas spent a lot of time making playthings for him—a rattle, a set of straw animals, a soft woolly ball that would not hurt him if he dropped it.

Texas was a great help to Garnet, telling her how to take care of Stephen and what to give him to eat. Isabel was a comfort, for Isabel had brought up three children of her own; but Texas was a doctor, and an American. He could understand—as Isabel could not—Garnet’s tremors about feeding a baby in a land where she could not get milk for him to drink. Like most California mothers, Isabel thought of cow’s milk merely as food for calves. She made Stephen a gruel of cornmeal and beans and squash and any other vegetables that happened to be available, all cooked together and strained. In a little while she was flavoring the gruel with beef-juice. Garnet was frightened, but Texas soothed her. California babies thrived on this fare, he said. To her relief and surprise, Stephen thrived on it too.

In September a wave of hot air blew in from the desert and they had the hottest weather Garnet and Florinda had felt since they came through Cajón Pass. The nights still had a harsh dusty coolness, but from sunrise to sunset the town trembled in a tawny glare. The heat felt heavy, and lay like a weight on their necks. But even so, such weather had its good points. As the men had come in during the fogs to drink something to warm them up, now they came in to drink something to cool them off, and the cash-box tinkled sweetly under Florinda’s caressing hands.

During the heat wave Garnet caught sight of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Hale one morning, riding past the saloon in their usual splendor. She remarked that she thought anybody who had a chance to stay in the country during weather like this would have been glad to do so, but Silky set her right. Charles’ rancho was east of Los Angeles, he reminded her. With every mile eastward you got farther from the sea and nearer the desert, and consequently the heat increased. So no wonder Charles had taken refuge in town.

It was also during this breathless September that Garnet had her first glimpse of Estelle, the woman who conducted the bawdyhouse six doors down from Silky’s. Though Estelle’s place of business was so near, Garnet had never seen her. She herself almost never left the saloon except in the morning, and at that time of day Estelle’s house stood silent with the shutters closed. She had never seen Estelle in the saloon. The men who came to the bar sometimes had girls with them, but not often. As for Silky, though he frequently went a-courting he had never had any feminine visitors. Silky was careful to keep his business and personal interests apart. Garnet was astonished, therefore, one afternoon when she came down after the siesta, to find Silky talking to a woman who sat with him at the kitchen table.

Garnet had come down the stairs with Stephen in her arms. His gruel was keeping warm on the hearth-stove, ready for her to feed him before going to the bar for the afternoon. As she opened the door to the kitchen, she heard a woman speaking.

“… it’s a shame, Silky, I tell you it is, bad for business and everything. But I swear to God, it’s so pitiful.”

She had a jangly tin-spoon sort of voice, and her accent was like that of some of the bullwhackers on the Santa Fe Trail. There were so few women in Los Angeles who spoke English that Garnet gave a start of perplexity. If she had not had to feed the baby she would have gone away without interrupting them. But Stephen was hungry, and since she had already opened the door she thought if they were talking about private matters she would stay only long enough to get his pot of gruel and leave them. As she took a step across the threshold she heard Silky say,

“And you’re sure you can’t get him out?”

“I ain’t got the heart, Silky!” the visitor pled. “I swear to God I ain’t got the heart.”

Then Silky caught sight of Garnet, coming into the room with her baby in her arms. He sprang to his feet and bowed to her, so low that his forehead nearly touched his knees. Garnet did not know what to make of him. Since he had grown used to seeing her every day Silky no longer thought it necessary to show off his high-flown manners for her sake. But now he was twirling his mustache and speaking his absurd stagey lines, and while he said his piece Garnet got a good look at the stranger who sat by the table.

The woman did not look old. But she had the look of an object that had been roughly used, so that it had lost its freshness long before it had begun to wear out. And while no part of her was obviously dirty, she gave a general impression that she could have been improved by soap and water.

She had sagging bright pink cheeks, the same color as the big pink velvet rose that she wore tilted at one side of her head. Her hair was the color of a brass door-knob except where it was darker along the parting, and over her ears she wore bunches of curls that were a still brighter shade of brass. Her dress was silk, printed with large pink flowers. The heat of the day had put big rings of sweat in the armholes. The hem was dusty, and her slippers—black with pink rosettes—were dusty too. She wore a lot of ornaments: swinging gold earrings, a gold necklace, rings and bracelets on both hands, besides a leather gun-belt that was dingy from lack of polishing. The look of her made Garnet conscious of her own smooth hair and her crisp dress of green and white gingham, and she felt a twinge of distaste. But as Silky sprang to his feet the strange woman turned her head, smiling at Garnet and Stephen with a friendly curiosity. She had large brown eyes and a good-natured smile, and Garnet noticed with surprise that though she did look cheap and common and second-hand, she was in her own way an attractive person. As the two of them observed each other, Silky was speaking his lines.

“Ah, Mrs. Hale, what a pleasure it is to see you looking so well, like a rose sparkling with dew on a spring day! And the little one, so fine and strong, such a joy to his doting mother—”

“Glubble glubble,” said Stephen. “Glubble bam.” Stephen had smelt a whiff of his gruel on the hearth-stove, and he wanted it, and he wanted it now, and he wanted no nonsense beforehand. Screwing up his face he began to cry. At the same time he dug his hand into his mother’s hair and drew out a lock, thereby destroying the neatness of the whole. The woman at the table said, “Ah, poor little fellow!” She smiled at him and waved cheerily. “He’s all right,” Garnet said, still not sure who the visitor was. “Just hungry, and cross because of it.” At that instant she heard footsteps on the stairs. Florinda was coming down, intending to have a cup of chocolate in the kitchen as usual before opening the barroom for the afternoon trade.

Just over the threshold she stopped, her hand still on the door. Her eyes moved swiftly in surprise as she saw who was there. Florinda was wearing a clean calico dress printed in a design of tiny blue flowers on a gray background, with a little white collar at the neck. She had brushed her hair till it shone like eggshell satin, and her skin was glowing from having just been scrubbed with cold water. Even the leather holster at her belt had a well-rubbed sheen. Altogether she looked so fastidious that she made the hot room seem cooler the minute she came in. Garnet knew how much work it cost to keep clean in Los Angeles, because she had to make the same effort herself. She knew also that while Florinda’s efforts were caused partly by self-respect, they were also prompted by the reward of good business. On these blistering days, when the men saw the fresh unwilted look of the girls at the bar they went out and told their friends that Silky’s saloon was the coolest place in town. But all the same, Florinda did look exquisite and the other woman did not, and the thought flashed through Garnet’s mind, That’s the difference between a courtesan and a streetwalker. As she thought this, it dawned upon her that this caller must have come from that place nearby.

All this had gone through her head in an instant of time. Stephen was fussing tearfully for want of his afternoon meal; Florinda stood holding the door-latch with a hand in a neat fingerless mitt, gray to match the gray background of her dress. She was exclaiming in a voice of reproach,

“Silky, you promised!”

Estelle glanced down, turning one of her rings around her finger. But she gave a shrug and glanced up again at Florinda, a faint touch of humor on her lips. She was not embarrassed, but Silky was. Having nothing to say, Silky took refuge in words.

“Indeed, Florinda, I regret profoundly that you or Mrs. Hale should be discommoded in any fashion! But this, I assure you with all my heart, this is an exigency, a most distressing imbroglio—”

“Is that so?” said Florinda. “Well, bless my soul.”

Garnet bit back a wild impulse to giggle. Stephen was pulling at her hair again and she could not stop him, for she had to hold his feet lest he squirm down and kick the gun she was wearing. Florinda let go of the door-latch and put her hand on Garnet’s elbow.

“Come outside with me, Garnet,” she said. “Please.”

Garnet was glad to comply, for Stephen had begun to feel very heavy. She went with Florinda back into the dark little hall where the staircase was. Florinda shut the door. Garnet sat down on a step, putting Stephen beside her and sighing with relief as she got the weight of him off her arms. Trying to make some order out of the wreckage of her hair, she asked, “Is that woman the Estelle I’ve heard about?”

“Yes,” Florinda said shortly.

“What is she doing here?” asked Garnet. “I suppose I shouldn’t be angry, or shocked either, but—”

“Maybe you aren’t, but I am. He told me he wouldn’t.” Stephen was still fussing, so Florinda added, “Wait here and I’ll bring his porridge. Also I’ll find out what’s going on. Silky’s not going to speak plain English if you’re in sight.” She started to open the door, but paused and looked over her shoulder. “Garnet, what’s an exi—exige—what is it?”