Two-Gun & Sun (5 page)

My eyelids were swelling shut. I'd been stung by those accursed creatures on that mountain.

I felt my throat swell. But I wouldn't cry, not now, not if the miners couldn't make me.

Soon, my eyes would close completely and I'd be left with the vacant stare of that grasshopper. Ugly. Well, so I would be. So what. I'd be goddamned if I was going to ask him to help me home. Pay him to run the press, yes, but a favour? No. I burst from the doorway, stumbling, half-blind, determined to find my own way back.

Wheels clicking along a track. Coins rattling in a jar. A set of keys, jangling.

The printing press—running at last?

I jackknifed up and out of bed and the floor swam beneath me. I was blind, too, my eyes stuck shut, a weight bearing down on them. I groped for the bed and sat. The weight fell clumsily from each lid, two damp wads landing one after the other into my lap until I pushed them off. My eyes still strained under heavy lids, the bedding painfully white. Then I recalled: I hadn't unpacked my sheets. I hadn't yet slept in my new bed.

Stupid with sleep I decided I was dreaming and forced myself to look again at the bed, at the two clumps I'd pushed onto it. Dirt.

Startled awake now, I jerked my head around. Dark space and rough boards above, around. A shack. Not my bed not my bedding not my printing press running itself downstairs.

Where was I?

Despite the weight of my eyelids, they lifted high when I spotted the dead man in white laid out on a table beside this bed. Flesh crept along my scalp. Nipples and navel contracted in one wave of nerves as the corpse twitched, then groped with a hand for something on the other side of the table. Not dead at all.

Two odd clumps had been placed on his eyes, too. What strange medicine was this? I'd heard of coins placed on the eyes of the dead but not lumps of dirt on the living.

His hand emerged with a bowl and he planted it onto his big belly. A roasted popping corn smell of what must be rice, and a whiff of chicken broth. Next, a pair of wooden chopsticks that fluttered and clicked against the insides of the ceramic bowl, bringing food to his mouth. The source of the sound.

Sightless, on his back, he snapped his wooden sticks adeptly, like they were extensions of his fingers, the limbs of a grasshopper, clicking closed. A telegraph, tapping. Yes, this unusual man was news.

I clawed at my pocket for a notebook and pencil. I was here to run a newspaper. I should be able to tell false from true. What had made me think the man was dead?

My rustling caused the large head to swivel toward me. The black clumps fell from his eyes, black strips of hair fell forward, his face bloated and bruised, deep purple against pale white, lips swollen and bearing a cut, nose ballooned to twice the normal size of a nose.

Well, well, he said. A woman! I'd kiss you if I wasn't so battered and bruised.

I nodded as I flipped over the cover, thoughts racing: Not Chinese, either.

There's bloody few of you in this place, he said. That's what I get for moving to the Wild West of North America.

That, too? I asked, pointing my pencil at his face.

They gave me quite a thumping, he said. And I'm not some one-gun bum what can be easily surprised.

A growl of a voice, I noted.

He stopped to rub his broad chin and claim, A two-gun bum, that's me.

And he laughed heartily.

I scribbled as I asked, You have guns?

Did. They stole 'em. I was outnumbered is why. Fortunately my friends came to the rescue.

Friends. I wondered. Those men who shouldered him like a cadaver?

He twisted around, his belt straining at the waist of his white trousers, and shouted into the air, Would've appreciated a softer spot, but don't mind now that I see you've given the bed to the lady.

He pronounced it ly-dee, a cowboy twang leavened by a Cockney accent.

Who are you shouting to?

Oh, he must be gone. Doctor. Healer of our wounds. Maker of this fine meal.

His flipped the dark hair back from his forehead, exposing a widow's peak. He was older than I first thought, and larger. Then he eased back, contemplating me and the discarded clumps on my bed.

And who got you? he asked.

I never thought. I must have looked a sight. Well, so did he.

He blurted a possible answer to his own question,
Monsieur
Mosquito? Wasps?

Before I could answer a figure stepped into the room, that cocky printer who had threatened me. Vincent Cruz. I slipped my notebook back into my pocket and dropped my eyes.

I see you've met Morris, he said.

She has, Vincenzo!

Despite myself, I smiled at the new version of his name.

I shifted and pinpricks stitched across my belly. It had been hours since I'd left my shop and its lavatory upstairs. I was ready to burst.

The big man swung his thick legs around to sit on the edge of his wooden table.

But, he added, we haven't been formally introduced.

The printer then told this Morris character who I was, and what I did.

Morris Cohen at your service, he said, rolling his R's. A ly-dee newspaper publisher. I wondered. I saw you writing in that book.

I shot a quick glance at him. His swollen face scanned the room.

Vincenzo, my friend, he said, and then something that sounded like, Chay fang. And you, my dear?

His question had me flummoxed. I spoke no Chinese.

He leaned over to one side to look me in the face, questioningly. No French at all? In Montreal we couldn't buy a loaf of bread without a
s'il vous plait.

French. I had a smattering of it from my schooling, but none of it had come with a Cockney accent. I understood at last:
J'ai faim.

Not hungry, I said. Thank you.

Though I was. All I'd had today was that pickle. But my guts were full enough, and I crossed my legs at the ankle to hold back the floodwaters.

One of these little bowls is not sustenance enough for a man my size, he said.

Morris, Vincent said. Why don't I fix you another?

He rattled dishes in the far corner, and brought out a brimming bowl.

I'm a Jew, Morris said, so these are strange enough.

He tapped the sticks together.

I'd been staring at his carrot-thick fingers, and yanked my head up. Then down again as soon as I realized what I'd done. Pain shot across my skull. I wanted to run. Scrub myself clean. Find an outhouse, something.

Eating pork, Morris continued, took a whole other sort of getting used to. The fact is I've developed a fondness for bacon. But my friends here eat pork with a frequency that would stop any Jew in his tracks. Even me, and I'm not like any other Jew.

And then he did something with his face. I stole another glance and I think he winked at me. For God's sake. With his face in that condition—and my eyes in theirs.

He said to me, I suppose you want to know why I'm here.

I hadn't until he mentioned it.

Ask me anything you like, he said, and began talking without waiting for my reply. Ever since Saskatchewan I've been hearing about the national leader.

Saskatchewan. The name threw me for a moment. I knew others who'd come from that province. John's people.

He's the top item at every tong meeting from here to Moose Jaw, Morris said. I'm here to see him.

Tong? What is that?

Secret society. I've been made a member myself with the explicit understanding that I not reveal the ins and outs and other particulars.

I saw him give a speech, Vincent said. I ever tell you that? Before the revolution.

Still looking down I asked, Revolution?

That would explain the rifle.

It was clear the two had discussed the subject before, but for my benefit they explained.

We dumped the Manchu dynasty to make a modern China, a republic.

Morris' rough voice added, The uprising started in 1911. Everyone was chopping off their pigtails.

Queues, the printer said.

Precisely. To show rejection of the old ways. Even here. Not everyone, of course, my friend.

I did this for my pop. He had to cut his. Too Chinese, the bosses said.

Ahhh, Morris said, politics of another sort.

I lifted my head carefully to study Vincent, but his head was turned.

When did the revolution end? I asked.

A revolution, Morris said, does not begin on one day and end on the next. Our leader's struggles continue. The warlords in the north still support the dynasty.

Warlords! I said.

And the foreigners. Those bosses don't want things to change, either.

He
has been in exile many times over the years as the balance of power shifts, Vincent said.
He
needs a unified army to fight those warlords.

And a rail system connecting all corners of China, Morris said. I plan to discuss this with him when our leader comes here to raise support.

Here? I blurted. Incredible. Does the famous man have a name?

He is a man of many names, Morris said, as is the Chinese custom. He waved his chopsticks as he recited, Sun Deming. Sun Wen. Rixin. Nakayama Sho. Well, that's what the Japanese call him. Sun Zhongshan. But to you he would be known as Sun Yat-sen. Last name first, their custom as well.

He paused then, perhaps waiting for me to acknowledge the name. I'd never heard of it. Instead, I told them, I'd like to meet him, too, arrange an interview—

Vincent made a sound like a snort or a curse, cutting me off with a snap of his hand. Then he checked himself and half-smiled, his bottom lip deepening into a frown, adding, He's important. He's our president.

I said that was exactly why I wanted the interview.

My fingers twitched against the pocketed notebook. As soon as I got home I would write all this down.

And if the President of the United States were here you'd ask to interview him, too?

The cheek of the man. Yes, I said, I think I would!

In my heated reply I had forgotten about my swollen eyes and had kept my face lifted. Quickly now, I dropped it.

Morris bellowed appreciatively, My dear! You make a fine newspaperwoman. Doctor! Join us! We are having a fine debate.

The door had opened without my noticing, and a man shuffled over. Shoes, red, the toes coming to a point and curled back, embedded with mirrored sequins stitched in place with bright yellow thread. I thought of Parker's words: Chinese, Hindu, whatnot. Hindu, I decided.

I lifted my chin and forced my eyelids up again. Why not? They've seen me, now.

Jesus. He had spectacles thick as headlamps on a truck, making his eyeballs underneath bulge like a toad's. The lenses flashed with each movement of his head.

Black flies, he said to me, aiming a gnarled fingertip at my own bulging eyes. They blinded you. And with the heat, too, he said, you fainted. Right in the street.

He scooped up the clumps from my bed, then turned to scoop up the other two from the table.

Come, my darlings, he said. You've had your fill, I see.

He dropped the two black creatures into a jar he tucked into a pocket.

Leeches, he said to me, to take the blood from the gentleman's blackened eyes. Then he added in a reassuring tone, Yours are just tea bags, miss. A tiny poultice for each swollen eye.

May I see? I asked, and reached out to take up one saturated silk pouch by its dangling string. I'd never seen tea in bags, not up close. An American invention. I was disappointed all the same that my bug bites didn't warrant more exotic treatment. What a story for a letter to the boys, leeches on eyes. But something for the newspaper, at least. I handed it back.

I don't faint, I assured this doctor.

Well, then, miss, with the swelling from the bites you couldn't see where you were going. I suppose you hit the post. Just two feet from my door, down you went.

That explained the pounding in my head as well as my eyes. I looked down, at my lavender front ground in dirt. I must have staggered and then fallen forward.

Exactly. That's being knocked unconscious, I said, not fainting.

All right, but let me have another look.

He poured water from a jug into a pan. The sound was excruciating.

Up, he said. More.

I'd been hugging my knees. I lowered them, squeezed my thighs together and sat up.

He lifted one eyelid, then the other, dabbing with a cloth. His brown hands smelled like soup.

Not a concussion, he said, dropping the cloth into the pan and taking it to the far corner. You'll be fine. You went down like a boxer.

I smiled until I considered the look of my eyes. He had almost reached the door again when I called out, What about my eyelids?

He adjusted his spectacles and smiled. They look normal to me, he said.

Well, they would to him.

Then Morris was on his feet and heading for the door, too.

He said, I need to rustle up something that'll stick to my ribs. My friend here has the appetite of a sparrow.

And he slapped his big stomach with a flat palm.

And I need clean clothes, he added, holding his jacket open.

So did I, though I didn't want to draw further attention to my appearance.

Walk her back, huh Morris? You're safe, now.

I leapt to my feet.

True, my friend. There's nothing more to take. They have my guns. Come with us, Vincenzo. You can lead the way.

First, I said, I need to use—then I faltered, wondering what to call it, convenience, contrivance?

There's the yard right behind you, Vincent's voice said. Or the latrines. Up this alley, then over two more.

I shook my head. I'd never make it, and, with no other choice left me, hurried for the door to the yard.

Outside, I peered into the darkness, wondering who might be watching. Too bad. Too late. The cool air hit me at once and I wrestled out of my leggings. This was a time when a dress would have been better. Just lift the hem. I barely got my linens pulled down. Heard and felt the rush of water. And relief, such incredible relief. Elbows on knees, lavender hem gripped in my fists, I considered where I was, this foreign patch of dirt backed by a shack and surrounded by a leaning fence, on the other side of it more rows of shacks and fences. Kitchen noises. Banging pots. Sizzling of food. Scrape of spoons. Sounds of home. I would have cried but for the plain ridiculousness of my present situation.