Gold (15 page)

Pamela, though charmed by his youthful earn
estness, was puzzled. “And how might I help
you?” she asked, smiling.

“
As you know,” Danny went on, “some sand
bars—they’re called placers—are rich with gold while others lie barren. And the men mining the rich placers won’t let on they’re doing that out of
fear thousands more will flock to the site.”

“
Yes, I’ve heard that.”

Danny reached into his shirt pocket, took out
a much-folded paper and spread it on the desk.

“
This is a map of the diggings,” he said. He
tapped his finger on her open ledger. “And in
here are the accounts of most of the miners . . .”

“
And,” she interrupted, “my records of who
pays in gold and who asks for credit.”

“
Right. If I knew who paid in gold I could find
out where their mines are. Then I could go to the rich diggings to make my claim, not to the poor
ones.”

Pamela p
laced the ledger on top of the map.
Should I help him? she asked herself, then
shrugged. What would be the harm? She began
leafing back through the pages. “Danny O’Lee,”
she told him, “you were right to use your brain
and not your brawn. Here I’ve been keeping these
accounts all these weeks and an idea like yours
never occurred to me.”

“
You’ll be helping me then?”

She nodded.

“Miss Pamela,” he began. He leaned over as though to kiss her on the cheek, then drew back,
his face reddening, “I just want to say that you are
a very grand lady.”

On a night two weeks later Pamela was in her cabin writing by candlelight.

“My dear Mr. Gowdy,” she wrote, “I believe that I closed my last letter by informing you that
I was safely ensconced under the magnificent roof of my own cabin in the quaintly-named settlement
of Hangtown. The central attraction of the cabin, which is shared by Selena and myself, is a fireplace built of stones and mud, the chimney fin
ished off with alternate layers of rough sticks and
this same rude mortar ...”

There was a rapping. Pamela put down her
pen and crossed to the door.

“
Who is it?’ she asked.

“
Danny O’Lee, ma’am.”

She unlatched and opened the door. Danny
stood smiling at her, his hat in one hand, his
other hand behind him.

Pamela
’s eyes softened. “I’d ask you inside,”
she said, “but I’m alone.”

“
I wasn’t expecting to visit long in any case.
I’m fresh in town and heading for the Empire
where I’ll seek lodgings and then celebrate my
good fortune.”

“
Your plan worked then. Oh, Danny, I’m so
glad.”

“
In ten days time”—he lowered his voice to a
whisper—”I’ve taken two thousand dollars and
more of the dust from a placer on the creek not
far from here. And there’s more to be had in the
same spot.”

“
You do have the luck of the Irish after all.”

“
Thanks be to my secret partner.” He grinned
at her. “So I brought you a gift from the dig
gings.”

“
Danny, I didn’t expect anything for helping.
I don’t want anything.”

“
A gift to match the gold of your hair,” he
added, smiling broadly. From behind his back he
brought forth a bouquet of yellow flowers.

“
Oh, Danny.” She took the flowers in her arms.
“They’re so lovely. They’re like daisies, yet not
exactly like any I’ve ever seen.”

“
I don’t know their proper name myself.”

“
But what do the miners call them?”

Danny said gravely,
“With sorrow I have to tell
you they’re known in the diggings as Mule Ears.”

Pamela laughed.
“Oh, Danny O’Lee, I love them, Mule Ears or not.”

Af
ter Danny left, Pamela put the flowers in a
vase and returned to her letter. She found she had
to force herself to go on, sighing with relief when
she came to the last few sentences. “By mes
senger,” she wrote, “I am sending a portion of the
profits from our venture here in the mountains. I
will be deeply indebted to you, even more than I
already am, if you will buy land for me in the
town as close to Portsmouth Square as possible.
Use your best judgment. I do not wish to specu
late or to have you trade in my behalf. My desire
is to add to my landholdings as I did years ago
in England, the country which will someday, God
willing, once more be the home of
“Pamela Buttle-Jones.”

Putting one of the flowers in the buttonhole of
her brown taffeta dress, Pamela went to stand in
the doorway of the cabin. The night was warm, the stars bright and close overhead, the moon a
thin sliver above the hill to the west. The bitter
sweet scents of spring were all around her, in the
pines, the burgeoning earth, the lilac
fragrance
she herself wore.

She crossed her arms under her breasts, draw
ing in a breath and letting it out with a tremulous
sigh. A yearning filled her, vague and undirected,
yet strong and persistent. She remembered run
ning through fields of flowers when she was a girl
with the wind in her hair while in the sky above
a great red kite dipped and soared.

And she remembered Danny
’s smile—so like
Barry Fitzpatrick’s. Would she ever see Barry
again? Pamela shook her head and went back across the cabin to remove her bag from its peg
on the wall. Pausing to take some of her medi
cine, she walked slowly up the path toward the hotel. I should check our supplies, she told her
self. Tom Horobin was due in a few days and
he’d expect her to have their order ready. She heard the night sounds of the distant woods but
as she walked they were replaced by the hubbub
coming from the Empire.

She hesitated at the foot of the porch steps, finally deciding to call on Selena to see if she
wanted to add anything to their order. She crossed
the darkened hallway of the hotel and eased open
the door to the gambling saloon until she was
able to see through the crack without being seen
herself.

Selena sat on a high stool on the stage Rhynne
had built for her, her feet on a rung, her hands clasping her scarlet skirts to her knees, her face
aglow as she sang. The men joined in on the
chorus, clapping, calling out for more. Pamela
studied the faces in the crowd, looking at each
in turn, then shook her head and frowned.

When the song ended, Selena stepped down
from the stage, pushing aside the hands of the
men. She stopped beside a gaming table, stand
ing with hands on hips, talking to a man Pamela
couldn’t see.

“
And what was your name before that?” Pamela heard her daughter ask. And then Selena was
back on the stage, whispering to Ned. As she
started singing she pointed to the man at the
table and he stood up, trying to retreat but
hemmed in by the crowd. Pamela saw it was
Danny O’Lee.

Selena sang:

“
Oh what was your name in the States?

Was it Thompson or Johnson or Bates?

Did you murder your wife,

And fly for your life?

Say, what was your name in the States?

Danny O’Lee broke from the crowd, the laughs
and hoots of the men following him from the
room. Pamela eased the door closed and walked
out onto the porch. There was no one about.

Going down the steps, she looked along the
street. No one. She walked past the store and,
off to her right, saw a figure outlined in the dark
ness.

“
Danny?” she called softly.

“
Miss Pamela?” His voice echoed his surprise.
“Ah, you see the luck of the Irish isn’t as good
as you thought,” he said.

“
Take my hand, Danny,” she told him. His
palm was warm in hers and she led him back to
the Empire, across the porch, through the hall
way and up the stairs.

“
Which room is yours?” she asked.

“
The last.”

She led him there, standing aside while he un
locked the door. Once inside, she slid home the
bolt. “Wait,” she said, her fingertips touching his
chest. She went to the bed, and, as quickly as
she could, removed her clothes. Naked, she slid
between the rough blankets.

“
Come here to me, Danny O’Lee,” she said. When he was beside the bed she reached out for
his hand. “Take off your clothes, Danny,” she
said.

“
Miss Pamela,” he began, “never in my
life . . .”

“
Hush,” she said. “Not a word.”

Then he was in the bed beside her. She felt him
trembling so she took his head in her arms, nes
tling him against her, letting him lie next to her
for a long time until his trembling quieted. When
she felt him stir, seeking her, she guided his head
down to her breasts, trembling herself when his
lips closed on her nipple. Her hand slid down his
body and found his sex.
Afterwards, she lay holding him in her arms.
She was fulfilled, fearful and happy, ashamed yet
defiant. Joyful.

“
Danny O’Lee,” she said, “when I was a young woman in England I once saw a great star trailing
a train of fire. For days on end it was there in the sky and then Halley’s Comet was gone. It won’t
return in my lifetime, perhaps not in yours. Some
things come only once, Danny. Do you understand?”

She felt his head nod against her bare breast.

Outside in the hall, W.W. Rhynne turned and
went quietly to his room. His face was as expres
sionless as ever, but his eyes glinted like the eyes
of a man who has just filled an inside straight.

CHAPTER
ELEVEN

“Can I help you, Mr. Rhynne?” Putting down
his hammer, John Griswold looked up from the
bed of a wagon.

“
I need some lumber. About forty board feet
should do it.”

“
Think I’ve got what you need,” Griswold said,
climbing down from the wagon. “Have to be pine,
if that’s all right with you.”

Rhynne shrugged.

Griswold pulled the corner of a tarpaulin from a pile of lumber stacked next to the shed he used as his carpentry shop. He stacked four boards at
Rhynne’s feet.

“
Could you deliver them to Abe at the Em
pire?” Rhynne asked.

“
Guess I could. It’s a dollar-twenty a foot.”

Rhynne raised his eyebrows.
“Heard you
charged Callahan a dollar.”

“
That was two weeks ago. Prices go up every
day. But seeing how it’s you, Mr. Rhynne, I’ll
make it a dollar.”

“
Abe will pay you.
”

“
Planning on building some shelving for the
hotel?” Griswold asked.

“
No, thought I’d put together a bookcase.”

Griswold nodded.
“Need nails?”

“
I have plenty left from when the Empire was
built. Reminds me, though, I do have need for
some hinges. Four of them.”

“
Can’t help you there. You’ll have to use can
vas strips. There’s nary a hinge to be had in
Hangtown.”