Native Gold (13 page)

He had this strange overpowering desire to care for her. He wanted to hunt for her, to bring her deer meat and acorn bread and rabbit fur blankets, to do something for her that would return the shimmer of joy to her eyes. It was foolishness, he knew, but as he followed her in silence, it felt as real as the earth beneath his feet.

All Mattie wanted to do, traipsing home after her grueling day of fruitless gold panning, was collapse in a pathetic heap, tell her growling belly to be quiet, and cry herself to sleep.

What was she going to do? How would she live? She couldn’t even blame her bad fortune on lack of skill. Jasper and Red, up to their thighs downstream from her, had been only too delighted to tell her that Doc Jim hadn’t found a nugget in weeks on his claim.

If that were so, if there was no gold left, how would she survive here? She scarcely had two pennies to rub together. She couldn’t even afford the trip home.

Not that she wanted to go home. Not that she even
had
a home. No, she was stuck in this God-forsaken hellhole until...

That finally made her smile, if only halfheartedly. God had most certainly not forsaken Paradise Bar. It was the most beautiful place she’d ever been.

She stopped and peered up at the pine tops swaying majestically in the last golden rays of the sun, and beyond them, the apricot-pink rosettes of cloud scudding across the wide sky. A red-tailed hawk winged up from one of the lofty spires and soared over the dense stand of trees, its high-pitched cry the only sound against the soft soughing of the breeze.

No, Mattie thought, this truly was Paradise, and God would find her a difficult Eve to cast out. She would dig in her heels and find something, anything, to earn her own way here—take in laundry, raise chickens, even learn to cook—anything short of giving up and relying on some hapless man to take her in.

Unfortunately, the young miner standing on her porch as she emerged from the wood didn’t appear to concur. She watched him in silence as, unaware of her presence, he shifted restlessly from one foot to the other before the closed door, clutching a wad of wildflowers. He was one of the Cooper boys, either Billy or Bobby—she couldn’t remember which. He finally cleared his throat and knocked softly on the door frame.

"I’m here," Mattie called from behind him, startling the poor boy so badly that he dropped the blossoms, scattering them across the pine planks.

"Oh! Oh...hello, m-ma’am," he stuttered. "I was, uh, well, I was in the, in the neighborhood and, uh..." His eyes trailed slowly down her dress, not so much in appreciation as in surprise.

"I’ve been panning," she explained.

One side of his mouth rose in an uneasy smile. "Find anything?"

"Only some muscles I’d forgotten I had," she said sheepishly, swinging the pick down from her shoulder.

He frowned, not quite understanding.

"Won’t you come in?" she asked, frankly hoping he wouldn’t.

But misfortune seemed her lot.

"I’d be much obliged, ma’am," he replied, glancing bleakly down at the flowers and deciding it was perhaps better to salvage his dignity and let them lie.

She resisted the urge to sigh and instead graciously invited him in.

The hairs along Sakote’s neck bristled like a wolf’s mane as he spied on the couple from the trees.

What was that boy doing at the white woman’s house?

Sakote watched while they held a brief conversation on her porch and then entered the cabin and closed the door.

Of course, Sakote knew what the boy was doing, even though he pretended he didn’t. He’d brought flowers for the woman. In the world of the
willa
, that meant one thing. He was courting her.

Sakote didn’t know why, but this angered him. The boy was just that, a boy. He couldn’t have lived more than fifteen leaf-falls. He’d probably never even hunted a deer or speared a fish. He couldn’t provide properly for the white woman. She should have laughed at him and thrown him off of her doorstep.

But she hadn’t. The clumsy boy had dropped his gift to her, littered her porch with the blossoms, and still she invited him into her home. It was...irresponsible.

Did she think a beardless, butter-fingered boy would make a suitable husband?

He spit derisively. She obviously didn’t understand what made a good mate. This
willa
boy was so thin, he’d starve before the first frost of
se-meni
. He possessed neither the strength of the bear nor the cunning of the coyote. In fact, Sakote wondered scornfully if he was even of an age to father offspring.

The woman needed a man, someone to fill her drying racks with salmon and deer, a man who could build her a
hubo
to withstand the winds of
ko-meni,
a man who would keep her fat with child, a man like...

Sakote kicked at the dirt and glared at the cabin before he could finish the thought. Trickster Coyote must be playing with him to make him think such a foolish thing. No matter how the woman intrigued him, no matter how his heart leaped at the sight of her, they were from two different worlds. He was Konkow, and she was
willa
. He was the son of a headman, and she was the woman of a defiler. Better that she find a husband—any husband, even a bad one—among her own people.

Sakote knocked the back of his fist once against the trunk of an oak, and then turned to go. He had to get back home before he began thinking about silly things like picking bunches of blue flowers for the white woman.

The silence stretched awkwardly as the door closed behind Mattie and her guest. She stacked her tools in the corner and washed her hands in the bucket of water by the stove.

"Well..." Billy or Bobby, she wondered. "Can I offer you..." She perused her meager stores and forlornly settled on the last two gaily painted tins. "Peaches?"

His eyes lit up. "Oh, yes, ma’am."

She was afraid of that. Now she would be just one tin closer to starvation. She dried her hands, pulled up the stool for him, and, summoning up a brave smile, served them each a bowl of the precious fruit.

He polished off the lot of it with a happy grin.

"More?" she reluctantly asked from her perch at the edge of the bed.

"Oh, no, ma’am. My mama told me...well..." He blushed all the way to his ears. "It just ain’t right to make a pig of myself."

Mattie didn’t know what to say to that. She speared one of the sweet slices and chewed it slowly, pretending it was a three-course meal.

"Well, ma’am, what I...what I came for was to, well, to let you know that..." His gaze caught on something behind her, and he gladly changed the subject. "Hey, are those yours?"

She followed his stare to the mattress, where her sketches were scattered across the coverlet. She frowned. Hadn’t she put them away?

"Uh, yes...yes, they’re mine."

"Could I take a gander at them?"

"Mm-hmm." She was sure she’d tucked them back into her portfolio. But then she’d been in such a hurry to get to her claim this morning.

"These are...well, ma’am, these are just about the best pitchers I ever saw."

"They’re only sketches," she said with a shrug.

"Well, they’re damn good...I mean..." He blushed furiously. "Pardon me, ma’am."

Something about the drawings bothered her. She was almost positive she’d replaced them this morning. She recalled thinking that perhaps the wind had carried off her quail picture and that she didn’t want to lose any more.

"They’re awful good," he amended. "Why, I’ll bet some of the boys’d be real happy to have their pitcher done so they could send it home."

Mattie was only half-listening. She was tired and baffled by the scattered sketches.

"Please, you’ll have to forgive me, Billy..."

"I’m Bobby."

"Bobby. I’m really rather exhausted and—“

"Say no more, ma’am," he said, straightening. "I just wanted to stop by and let you know that if you need anything, why, I’d be plum happy to...you know...help or...do just..." His voice trailed off along with his nerve.

"I understand," she assured him. "Thank you."

"Thank
you
, ma’am, uh, for the peaches."

She was happier than was courteous to watch him depart. He couldn’t be more than fourteen, bless his heart, barely out from under his mother’s wing. The last thing she needed was a lovesick boy courting her.

Fetching a stick of jerky from the can, she sat on the bed to munch it and put her sketches back in order. To her astonishment, another drawing was missing, the one of the monkey in the tree along the Chagres River.

What was going on? Could Bobby have sneaked in her house and taken it before she arrived?

No, he’d been surprised by her drawings. He’d even said...what was it he’d said? That some of the boys might like to have their "pitchers" done.

She stopped chewing and swallowed the unwieldy lump of jerky. Was it possible? Would the miners pay to have their portraits drawn? Could she make a living with her pencil?

A pleasant thrill of hope coursed up her spine. Perhaps she wouldn’t have to stand thigh-deep in the stream another day, swirling pans of dull sediment. Perhaps she wouldn’t have to wash miners’ shirts till her hands grew red and raw. Maybe she wouldn’t need to bake pies all day long or scrub dishes all night. Maybe she could use her God-given talent to eke out some kind of existence here.

Of course, first she’d have to thwart the thief. If her art was going to be her livelihood, she couldn’t give it away. Tomorrow she’d set a trap for the culprit. With any luck, she’d catch the villain red-handed.

By the time Mattie slipped between the bedlinens, she didn’t care that her stomach still growled for food, that she’d hung her dress up filthy, or that the empty tin of peaches would be crawling with black ants by morning. She dreamed of the bright future before her and the sketches—her sketches—that would soon travel by mule and wagon and ship to destinations all over the world.

UMBRELLA.

It was a tree, Hintsuli guessed, but he’d never seen such a tree. Its huge leaves sprang up like a headdress of condor feathers, so long they drooped back toward the earth. Rain dripped in fat drops from the underside of the leaves. The trunk looked like it was painted in a Konkow basket design. But the tree wasn’t as interesting as what was clinging to it, protected from the rain by the great leaves. Hintsuli was not sure what the creature was. It appeared to be a tiny, dark baby with a round face and big eyes. But it had a tail, and its arms and legs were long and thin. Hintsuli didn’t know what it was, but now it belonged to him.

He held the skin out before him, so the animal seemed to dance in the flicker of the dying fire. He’d stolen the second hide this morning after Coh-ah-nuya had gone. All afternoon, he’d spoken to Wonomi, praying for a vision, pleading with The Great Spirit to reveal to him the magic of Coh-ah-nuya’s hide. But still he couldn’t free the animals.

He must go back to her
hubo
again tomorrow. It wasn’t that difficult. He’d crept as easily as a mouse into the cabin twice already. Coh-ah-nuya, like the other
willa
, went to hunt for gold when the sun was up. As long as he was cautious, there was no danger.

Next time, he would take
all
the hides. Maybe they were powerless by themselves. Or maybe the charm was in the strange little sticks he’d seen beside the hides. He would take them, too. He must find the source of Coh-ah-nuya’s power.