by Zina Abbott
“I will definitely stay in contact with your attorney, and through him, you.”
“Thank you. That will be all for now. On your way out, ask my housekeeper to send my nurse up. I will appreciate it.”
Caroline turned away to signal her dismissal.
~o0o~
As he slowly rose from his chair, Kit Halsey’s gaze never left Caroline Arnold. He agreed to accept this short-term job, hoping it would prove interesting and as financially lucrative as Mrs. Arnold indicated it would.
Kit realized one of the keys to his success as a railroad detective had been he possessed good instincts. He hoped those same instincts would serve him well once he passed the bar and practiced law.
Right now, his instincts screamed to him the old woman had not told him everything there was to know about this case.
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Kerr’s Ferry, California – April, 1882
Chapter 2
~o0o~
E liza Wells raced down the dirt drive to the road leading away from her uncle’s mill and the house that went with it. She stepped to the side and waited for her aunt to slow the buggy so she could join her. The entire conveyance tilted to the side as Eliza climbed up and then dropped into the vacant seat.
Her face bright with anticipation, Eliza turned to her aunt. “Was there any mail for me at the post office, Aunt Phoebe?”
Phoebe faced forward and pressed her lips together. After several seconds, she reluctantly answered. “There was some mail for your uncle, but nothing for you.”
Eliza’s shoulders slumped with disappointment and she turned to face forward. “I wonder why I haven’t heard from my grandmother. Even if she isn’t recovered yet, surely she could ask someone else to answer my letters.”
“Maybe she doesn’t answer because she can’t speak. That happens with apoplexy sometimes. Maybe your grandmother isn’t recovered well enough to write or dictate to someone else what she wants to say. Like we’ve already warned you, Eliza, some people, especially if they are older, never recover from such a condition. Even if someone reads your letters to her, she may not be well enough to understand everything let alone know how to respond.”
Eliza twisted in her seat to face her aunt. “Oh, Aunt Phoebe, I’m so worried about her. And not hearing anything about how she is doing makes it even worse. Surely she’s still alive, or someone would have written to me.”
“People back there know how to contact your Uncle.”
“She’s my grandmother. I want someone to write to me about her. When I ask Uncle Joseph, he says no one has contacted him. He also makes it sound hopeless, like she is on the verge of death. I know she was quite ill when I came here for a visit, but surely she has improved by now. Why won’t someone answer my letters and let me know? I want to know when I can expect to go home.”
“What’s wrong with living here? I thought we’ve been pretty good to you.”
Caught off-guard by Phoebe’s sharp tone of voice, Eliza studied her aunt. She chose her words carefully. “I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful. You and Uncle Joseph have been wonderful to me, Aunt Phoebe. I have greatly enjoyed my extended visit with my cousins. However, it has been over six months. I guess I’m getting a little homesick. I’m ready to go back to Ohio.”
Eliza watched Phoebe glance at her. Her aunt’s forehead creased in an expression of concern, as she now stared straight ahead. Out of the corner of Eliza’s eye she watched Phoebe bite her lower lip as she turned to study her. What did that mean?
Her aunt’s voice softened. “You’re a sweet girl, Eliza. I can’t fault you for being concerned about your grandmother. I’m sure she is surrounded by people who are giving her the best of care.”
Eliza sniffed and blinked back the tears that threatened to fill her eyes. “I don’t know if that is so, Aunt Phoebe, because I’ve heard nothing from her or anyone else back there. I was supposed to start normal school until this happened. I need to return home so I can enroll for this autumn’s session.”
Phoebe glanced at the mill office as they rode past it. “You are of an age to marry now, Eliza. A young, pretty girl like you will have no difficulty finding suitors to choose from. Your uncle has someone in mind he thinks would be a good match for you.”
Eliza grimaced. “I suppose. I know Uncle Joseph is encouraging me to become more acquainted with Mr. Irwin. He’s nice enough, but I just don’t have those kinds of feelings for him. Besides, he almost seems of an age to be more of a friend to you and Uncle Joseph than me. Perhaps I’m not ready to marry yet. I cannot even think about something like that until I know how my grandmother is faring. Surely you and Uncle Joseph can understand that.”
Phoebe sucked in a deep breath and once again pursed her lips. She focused her gaze on the house and spat out her words quickly. “Your uncle has kept in touch enough to know she’s being well taken care of. Don’t worry so much about her, Eliza. As soon as she is able to write again, I’m sure you’ll get a letter.”
Surprised at the bit of information Phoebe let slip, Eliza turned to study her aunt’s typical stoic expression in hopes of learning more. Phoebe glanced at her, and then she lifted her near shoulder to discourage further conversation. Undeterred, Eliza opened her mouth to speak just as they arrived in front of the whitewashed clapboard house in which the Wells family lived. Phoebe pulled the horse to a halt so suddenly the jolt threw them both forward. Eliza grabbed the side of the buggy to keep from tumbling out onto the ground. She watched Phoebe quickly set the brake and wrap the reins around the handle.
Eliza turned again to speak, only to be presented with Phoebe’s back as the woman leapt out of the buggy.
Without looking Eliza’s way, Phoebe spoke over her shoulder as she walked towards the single room stone building that served as the office her uncle had built across the road from the mill. “Eliza, will you please start unloading the supplies I brought from town into the kitchen? Tell Julie and Lydia to help you. I picked up some business mail I need to take to your uncle.”
Eliza stretched across the seat on which her aunt had been sitting and watched the retreating back of the woman as she hurried towards the mill office. She then sat up straight long enough to huff with frustration before she stepped down out of the buggy and grabbed a crate to take into the kitchen. She knew if her aunt did not return soon to tend to the horses, she would be left to take care of unharnessing them and rubbing them down. Julie and Lydia were willing to help with chores in the house, but they both grew lax and whiney when asked to work in the barn. Her cousin Joey often helped with the animals, but she had not seen him since after breakfast when he was sent out to hitch up the team for his mother. She could not count on him being around to help.
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Kerr’s Ferry, California – April, 1882
Chapter 3
~o0o~
P hoebe’s steps slowed as she spotted her husband talking to a man, probably a customer, just outside the mill office door. She waited several feet away and studied her husband with his tall, barrel-chested form and shoulders still wide in spite of now being middle-aged. Unlike her mousy brown hair that had started to grow gray hairs all over, gray streaked the temples of his otherwise dark hair, adding to his distinguished appearance rather than making him appear old.
Phoebe watched the two men shake hands. She did not recall having seen before the young stranger with his light brown hair and eyes about the same color. Judging from his collarless work shirt of plaid homespun woven of different shades of brown and madder red and the medium-brimmed slouch hat he wore, she now guessed him to be a laborer looking for a job. From the smiles and nods, she guessed her husband and the stranger had come to an agreement. She noticed the shine on the seat of his pants as she watched him climb into the bench of a freight wagon pulled by two mules.
As the young man raised his hand in farewell, Phoebe, her hand in her
pocket, took that as a sign she could approach her husband without interrupting his business. Even as he turned his blue-grey eyes to study her—the eyes a Wells trait which had been passed down to Lydia and Joey as well as Eliza, while poor Julie had inherited her own non-descript hazel eyes—his expression changed from a smile to a scowl at the sight of her. In spite of his demeanor telling her he did not welcome her presence, she approached with confidence. She knew he would want what she brought him.
“Get everything you need from town? No one gave you trouble about putting it on the account, did they?”
Phoebe shook her head. She nodded towards the departing wagon. “Who was that?”
Joseph assumed a smug expression. “New man to help haul flour to the railroad. Ol’ Jensen said he’s raising his prices as of the first of the month. Kit Halsey said he’ll do the job for the same price per sack I’ve been paying. When I gave him a quote, I shaved a few cents off what I usually pay, and the kid didn’t know the difference.”
“I see.” Phoebe understood more than her husband thought her capable of. He not only drove a hard bargain, he would take advantage when he could get away with it. However, she knew now was not the time to comment about it. She pulled the two letters out of her pocket and handed them to Joseph. “One is from Eliza’s grandmother.”
Joseph grimaced as he snatched the letters from his wife’s hand. He motioned towards the mill office door. “Come inside, Phoebe.”
Once he closed and locked the door behind them, Joseph glanced at the letter from the county office which he then he placed on his desk. He studied the envelope addressed to Eliza in a shaky, but definitely feminine handwriting.
Joseph shook his head in disgust. “It’s from Caroline again—not dictated to a secretary, but in her own handwriting. Shaky as it is, she must be improving.”
Phoebe looked down at her hands now folded in front of her. “I thought the same. I’m happy for her.”
Joseph glanced at Phoebe with an expression that communicated his disagreement. “Don’t be. That interfering woman is trying to ruin everything.” He ignored Phoebe’s involuntary twitch as she witnessed him tear the envelope open and read the contents of Eliza’s letter.
“What does she say?”
Joseph scanned the contents of the single page before he shook his head and tossed the letter and envelope on his desk. “Same old drivel. She wants to know why Eliza hasn’t written. She thinks it’s time for Eliza to return to Ohio. Eliza needs to be back by this summer in order to get enrolled in the normal school back there if she wishes to train as a teacher.”
“That is what Eliza wants. I hear her speak of it quite often to our girls.”
Joseph rounded on his wife. “Then you should put a stop to such talk. The last thing we need it for her to influence our daughters to desire such nonsense.” Joseph turned to stare out the window towards the gristmill he had built almost two decades earlier and had devoted his life to since. “It is complete foolishness and a waste of money to send girls off for further education. They may work for a year or two—taking the job from a man who needs it—then they turn around and marry. It’s best to save the money and get them wed as soon as possible. Once I get Eliza married off, she will put this silliness behind her.”
Phoebe cleared her throat and looked down as she chose her words. “I know you have been encouraging Eliza towards Daniel Irwin. Joseph, she’s not interested in Mr. Irwin. She mentioned it again today. Yet our Julie—even though Daniel Irwin is over a decade older than Julie, and she is only two years older than Eliza—Julie thinks quite highly of Mr. Irwin. Perhaps you should encourage him to pay more attention to our daughter instead of Eliza.”
Joseph stared at Phoebe as though she had lost her mind. “Phoebe, Daniel Irwin and I are negotiating a partnership. He has agreed to Eliza. You know why it has to be Eliza. He has no interest, personal or otherwise, in either of our daughters, and you know why.”
Phoebe turned away from her husband’s accusing glare. She knew his thoughts regarding her. The Wells possessed physical traits people found appealing. The Wells brothers, both Joseph and Benjamin, had been handsome men. Although Joseph was the larger, more imposing of the two, Benjamin’s stature as a person revealed itself in his thoughtful and civic-minded activities.
Both of the Wells brothers along with others had pursued Eliza’s mother, Rachael Arnold, a slender, beautiful woman with blonde hair and clear blue eyes. She had chosen Benjamin. Eliza had inherited the best of the physical traits of both her parents.
On the other hand, Phoebe knew she was not a beautiful woman. In spite of her two youngest children being blessed with their father’s eyes, both her girls had inherited her pear-shaped figure, her straight, limp brown hair and long face with a chin and jowls that were too heavy to be pretty.
Phoebe had known love in her life. At one point she had loved Joseph Wells with every ounce of her being. She knew he loved Rachael Arnold. That had not squelched her feelings for him, even though she had been realistic enough to realize she could not compete with the local beauty whose family had as much money or more than the millwright’s family. She silently stayed in the shadows and worshiped from afar.
As he pursued Rachael, Joseph discouraged her other suitors, including his own brother. It had been to no avail. In the end, she rejected Joseph and the others and chose to marry Benjamin Wells.
That had been before the Southern states rebelled and the nation found itself fighting a civil war. Not willing to work with his brother after Benjamin and Rachael married, Joseph chose to leave for California. However, even in the late 1850’s, there were few women in California, especially in the gold fields where Joseph first planned to go. He knew he should take a wife with him. Knowing Phoebe had feelings for him, on impulse he had chosen her—his consolation wife—since he could not have the woman he wanted.
With a pang of remorse, Phoebe recalled how at the time she believed all her dreams had come true. It took several years for the reality to sink in that Joseph never loved her. He married her and brought her along to fulfill a need. He never said much, but he found his ways of communicating to her that not only was she never his first choice, now he regretted the choice he made.
Rachael Arnold had been his first choice. And now her daughter was Joseph’s first choice—whether for her prettiness that reminded him of her mother or her estate—Phoebe did not know. However, she felt her heart being crushed under the realization that he would promote his niece first rather than work for the happiness of their daughter.
Phoebe knew she could not speak openly of this to her husband. Instead, she voiced another concern that weighed on her conscience. “Joseph, I don’t feel right about keeping Eliza’s letters from her. It’s wrong that we read them while hiding their existence from her.”
Joseph looked up from the other business letter she delivered to him and glared at his wife. “Don’t you dare say one word to her about the letters. You continue to bring any she writes to me, and don’t ever let on they make it no farther than this office. I have my reasons. You don’t need to understand what they are, or why your obedience to this is so important. You just continue doing what I’ve told you.”
Joseph again turned his gaze to his correspondence as he continued to address Phoebe. “I haven’t forgotten Julie and Lydia. As soon as I get this other matter settled and Eliza out of the house, I’ll find husbands for them, too.
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Kerr’s Ferry, California – April, 1882
Chapter 4
~o0o~
E liza puffed a strand of hair off her forehead. The barn where she had been working to help Joey had provided shade, but she had left its comfortable dimness to get away from the pungent horse odor and in hopes of feeling a breeze off of the river.
Although her cousins had warned her several times, she still found it difficult to believe the weather in California could produce heat waves in
April. In spite of the peaks of the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the east still being frosted in white, the San Joaquin Valley, the region where Kerr’s Ferry was located, did not normally get snow during winter. They had experienced several days of fog so heavy she had been unable to see more than a few feet in front of her. It had not taken her long to decide, except for the bitterly cold blizzards that blew off the Great Lakes, she preferred the snow to fog.
Now, the fog was gone for the year. Instead, the jump in temperature without sufficient time for her body to acclimate combined with the humidity off of the Stanislaus River, left her prickling with heat and her dress sticking to her skin. Already the grass that had been green as a result of the winter rains had turned dry and the color of straw.
As she walked the familiar path towards the mill, Eliza half-closed her eyes and lifted her face to catch the gentle breeze flowing across the water. Rivers she knew. The creek running into the Great Miami River near where she had lived with her parents, and where the Wells Mill owned by her father had been located, was as familiar to her as her back yard. Even though she now lived with her grandmother in Dayton where five rivers merged, she had not lost her love of rivers.
A movement drew her attention. Eliza opened her eyes to catch sight of a wagon next to the mill warehouse. A young man she did not recall seeing before carried a barrel of flour which he next dropped into the back of the wagon.
By the time the man returned with his next barrel, Eliza stood to the side of the wagon. She watched him drop his burden before he turned to her. From what she could see of his face and eyes under the shade of his hat brim, he was relatively young—younger than most of the men her uncle employed.
Eliza tried to ignore the way her heart fluttered as she stared at the man’s face with his hazel eyes that seemed to dance—hazel eyes that shined—so unlike her Cousin Julie’s sedate hazel eyes which seemed to absorb light, not reflect it. This man’s eyes, though, were set in a tanned face with golden tones to his skin. From what she could see of his hair peeking out from beneath his hat, it added to his monochromatic golden-brown good looks.