The Spoils of Sin (28 page)

‘Astoria, then,' shrugged Carola.

Fanny had no experience of Astoria, knowing it by reputation as a place of considerable trade and traffic, being on the coast where the Columbia disgorged into the ocean. Travellers thronged its streets, from strange and distant lands such as China. Astoria undeniably had a romance associated with it, from its long history. Fur trappers traded there; ships delivered every sort of goods; and the scenery was said to be quite fabulous.

‘You are not thinking clearly,' Fanny accused. ‘The money has addled your wits. Take a few days to accommodate yourself to the changed circumstances. Even closing our doors to the men will feel strange for a while.'

‘I wish to have everything settled before my confinement,' said Carola, still disturbingly cool. ‘That leaves me little time for reflection.'

Fanny suddenly saw the advantageous aspect of the coming birth. If she could slow the pace of her friend's plans, a few days here and there, she might buy time for herself. Carola would be weary and ungainly. She would be unable to travel. How, then, could she hope to transport herself to a new township, so far away? All Fanny had to do was obstruct, in a variety of subtle ways, and wait for enlightenment.

But she had reckoned without the new status conferred by wealth. ‘I shall send a reliable scout to find out what I need to know, and to purchase a plot of land. That might take a week at most. During that time, I shall assemble my chattels and prepare to travel in a comfortable coach that I shall hire. Then I shall find myself a good quality hotel, where I can stay until after the child is born and the new house is finished.'

I,I,I
echoed in Fanny's head. ‘Am I not to accompany you?' she asked, struggling to sound as if it hardly mattered.

Carola blinked. ‘You have just expressed an intention to enlarge this property and live here with your dog.'

‘And you replied that this house is to be sold.'

‘It is not an absolute necessity to sell it, if you prefer to remain here. I might even freely consign my share of it to you, in friendship.'

The moment had come. ‘Carrie – we have not properly discussed the apportioning of Marybelle's money. It has been my assumption that she intended it for us both, and we therefore each take a half.'

‘She left it all to me,' said Carola, looking away.

Fanny remembered once more the bump of acquisitiveness that the Hastings man had found on Carola's head. Was that another term for greed? Selfishness? ‘And you think she meant that I should be excluded completely? Why so? I never gave her any cause.' Even as she spoke, she knew the truth was rather different.

Carola had no hesitation in voicing it. ‘I was kind enough to visit her, when you were not. And I am carrying a child. She saw me as both deserving and needy. You, she believes to be capable of making your own way in life.'

There was a terrible logic to it that left Fanny speechless. But already, her position was becoming clear to her, with a few faint threads of promise. If Carola left her the house, and her dog, she would not starve. She had savings. She was not shunned by the townsfolk. She might even – and the thought brought nothing by way of dread or resistance – find another girl to join her in the same life as before. The prospect of continuing in a similar fashion was almost appealing. The vast changes proposed by Carola had alarmed her greatly. Now she glimpsed a chance that she might not have to make them after all.

‘I am capable of making my own way,' she asserted, with a firm nod. ‘If that is what it comes to.'

It was the exact right thing to say. Carola turned pale, then forced a laugh. ‘I did not say that was my opinion,' she said. ‘The situation is not of my making. Marybelle was perhaps not fully in her right mind. She made some remark about your hair and how it was similar to that of her father's second wife, who she never liked. Or it could be that her lawyer persuaded her that a single name was of greater clarity in her will. Besides, you are not yet twenty-one. That alone might render you ineligible to receive such a legacy.' She frowned. ‘I have no knowledge of the way the law operates in such matters.'

‘I am at your mercy,' said Fanny, pressing what felt like an advantage. ‘And that being so, I wish you to understand that I see no need to plead for a share. I can manage as things are. All the decisions are yours. You are senior. You are the person named in the bequest.'

‘I love you, Fanny. Do you doubt it?'

Fanny hesitated. She had detected precious little affection coming her way in the past few days. ‘What, then?' she demanded.

‘I do not wish the money to separate us. And yet – five hundred dollars seems so much less than a thousand.' She laughed again, a sound of self-reproach. ‘It would not ensure either of us a life of idle luxury.'

‘I do not seek such a life. To grow fat and lethargic, ordering servants back and forth, seeking increasingly desperate means by which to pass the days – that is not the life I see for myself.'

‘There is the child to consider,' said Carola.

‘The child of my brother,' Fanny flashed back.

‘In what way is that significant?'

‘I would wish to be witness to its …development. I would not like to think of us being forever separated.'

‘And yet you had no objection to my finding a woman from some distant town to adopt it.'

‘I believed at the time that you wished it to happen in that way. Now that I know you are resolved to raise the child yourself, I feel differently.'

‘I could claim to be a widow,' said Carola thoughtfully. ‘A wealthy widow with one small child might have decent prospects, might she not?'

‘Prospects regarding a handsome husband – is that what you mean?'

‘Fanny – I am merely reviewing the possibilities. You are taking every syllable I utter as the Gospel truth. The fact is, I have no firm plans.'

‘The fact is, you are dreaming grand dreams, believing in the impossible. Even the wealthiest woman alive has to find occupation for herself.' She sought urgently for the right words to convey her meaning. ‘Ahead of you lie thirty or forty years of life. The decisions you make now will ordain the nature of those years. Take care, Carrie. We have made a place for ourselves here. To move to Astoria or Portland or wherever would be the same as leaping blindly off a cliff. It carries a good deal more hazard than potential benefit.'

‘It would provide the opportunity to deny our sordid activities and begin afresh.'

‘Sordid activities?' Fanny thought of Charlie and Paul Merryman who had been so tender and considerate, and the several older men who were so grateful. Carola, she feared, thought of the man intent on sodomy and the difficulties of continuing with a child in the house. She frowned, then sighed. ‘I should be sorry if no such activities ever came my way again.'

Carola stared at her. ‘What are you saying?'

‘I am saying nothing definitive. But I find myself a good deal less happy than you are with these sudden changes. I have no wish to leave Chemeketa. It feels as if I am destined to remain here all my life. I like to imagine a circle of regular friends, accepting our place amongst them, and trusting us to behave with decorum. It is what I decided upon, three years ago, and I have no real reason to alter my mind.'

‘And yet you demand an equal share of the money.'

‘There is not a person alive who would refuse it,' Fanny shot back. ‘Who are you to withhold it?'

Carola shook her head. ‘We are back where we began. Enough, Fanny. We must allow ourselves a day or so to settle the confusions in both our minds. But with your permission, I shall go now to the butcher and request two prime steaks for our dinner. I suggest you stoke up the fire and get the fat sizzling. I shall be back before you can peel three potatoes.'

It was just as she had foretold, the steak and fried potatoes a grand feast, which saw Hugo slavering hungrily beside Fanny's chair. She pushed him away, still smarting from Carola's easy rejection of him. His noble head turned into her hand, nuzzling at her in a familiar gesture that she interpreted as fondness. ‘Dear boy,' she murmured.

‘What?' Carola looked up.

‘I am lavishing affection on my dog.'

‘Huh! Well, don't feed him from the table. Even my mother knew better than that, with her little monsters.'

Fanny elected to laugh, overriding the wariness that now coloured her feelings towards her friend.

There followed a few days of near paralysis. Carola spoke of plans, but less determinedly than before. There was no move to transfer any money to Fanny, and when she asked, the excuse was made that they should wait for the bank to compile a portfolio of investments. ‘But the two hundred dollars are readily available,' Fanny argued.

‘And earning interest,' Carola replied. ‘What are you wishing to do with it, pray?'

‘I wish to know where I stand.' But she quickly fell silent, knowing that each day in which nothing was decided or acted upon was a day in her favour. Carola's back was paining her, now and then, with the result that she fell into a habit of retiring to bed each afternoon for a few hours' rest. This suited Fanny very nicely and she made much of the benefits of this practice.

But nothing was as before. There was money, and yet they had purchased no new items. Fanny was in normal health, with time on her hands, and yet their doors remained closed to customers. The weather had turned unpleasant, with a prematurely autumnal feel to it. The month of September went out churlishly, leaving nostalgic thoughts of the fine summer months quite vanished now.

Chemeketa continued to expand. Out in the street, the air was filled with the sound of hammering and the scent of new-cut timber. One of many thriving businesses was that of the sign-painter. Each new store needed its name and business trumpeted on a large colourful board, and inevitably a specialist came forth, who would add curlicues and gold paint to the essential facts. Talk largely consisted of scandalised reports of the goings-on in San Francisco. Murders, rampages, immense sums lost at the gambling tables, and very much more – it all fuelled the stories that arrived in Chemeketa, where life remained almost absurdly civilised by comparison. Many wives refused to allow their men to go south, for any purpose. It was generally agreed, in any event, that it was already too late for the miraculous finds of gold that had now been occurring for over a year. Many of the stories featured starving prospectors who might glean an ounce or two, and then nothing more. Tales of sudden immense wealth were fading, overtaken by complaints at the greatly inflated prices of basic necessities.

Fanny missed hearing these tales firsthand from her visiting men. She gathered snippets in the stores, but nobody sat down with her for a good long gossip, as had happened throughout the year in their parlour, where men relaxed and smoked and enjoyed female company. She began to feel bored and frustrated. Hugo was evidently in a similar frame of mind. Finally, five days after the momentous visit she and Carola had made to the bank, she elected to take her dog out for a lengthy walk.

The weather had settled. The date was 6th October 1849. It was a Saturday, a week since Miriam Myers had paid her call. Carola was chafing against the lack of progress with her plans, but seemingly too distracted and indecisive for any real action to be taken. Fanny felt an urgent need to clear her head and have a concentrated think.

The death of Reuben had faded into a lesser concern, which Fanny knew was shameful and wrong. Her Catholic parents and grandparent would be saying prayers for his soul, keeping a candle burning for him, telling all the stories they could think of about his life. Her sister Charity would perhaps find other matters pushing away her grief. She lived half a day's ride away from the family, and had small children to occupy her.

For the first time, Fanny thought of her parents and sisters in relation to the new money. They would expect a part of it, however small, if they knew of it. It was a natural normal expectation, hardly worth debating. She understood, then, Carola's reluctance to divide the inheritance. Shared, it became so much less. Distributed amongst relatives, it would quickly dwindle to little more than a healthy boost to one's savings – far from the lifelong security and possibility that it had first seemed to confer.

Was it, then, more trouble than it was worth? The dissent and greed that arose from it had already almost split the girls apart. Squabbling sisters, reproachful parents, hard decisions and large changes would remove just about all the joy and hope that first came with news of the legacy. So, then, she resolved, standing on the bank of the Willamette river where new sectors of the town were rapidly developing, she would renounce any claim to the legacy. Carola could have it all. Carola had earned it, with her visits to Marybelle. Fanny had done nothing whatever to deserve it.

Hugo ran ahead of her sniffing, marking every tree and rock with his scent, a large animal that primitive people would find alarming, but whose softness was almost embarrassing. Except when his mistress was under threat, of course. She felt again the sharp pang that Carola's words had caused her, when she said so easily, ‘The dog must go.' That had been the point where everything changed. Simply identified now, looking back. Until then, Fanny had taken for granted that they were always united, come what may. But if Carola could even imagine sending Hugo out into the wilderness to fend for himself, growing thin and lame and red-eyed with grief and bewilderment, then she was not the close companion Fanny had believed her to be. The images before her eyes made her whistle him back for a caress. ‘Dear boy,' she murmured into his ear. ‘Dear good boy.' And Hugo made a sound like the purring of a cat, expressing his undiluted love.

And Carola would soon have her little one to receive all her devotion. Fanny and Hugo would both be pushed aside when that happened. Where they might have formed a strange little family, all with something to give, there was a dawning mistrust. Perhaps, as already faintly suspected, it would be best for Carola to move away to start a new life with her new wealth. Fanny and Hugo would seek another girl to take her place, and continue as before. No need for Marybelle's gold at all. The town was growing apace, with its increasingly complex networks of suppliers of necessaries and luxuries, bringing life in Oregon ever closer to that in Massachusetts or Rhode Island. The States of America were to become truly United, one vast country with a common language, common purpose and common values. Even the lawless California was said to be applying for formal Statehood, with an election of political leaders due within a few months. There would be a role for Fanny and a few more of the same.