Hallie's Comet

by Denise Dietz

Another thought occurred. “Hallie, how old were you when your great-grandmother died?”

  “I was a little kid. Why?”

  “Maybe your great-grandmother originally came from Colorado and bent your ear with Cripple Creek tales, including the fire. You subconsciously absorbed her stories and—”

  “Granny Bea died in 1984. She was eighty-nine. You just told me the fire occurred in 1896. How could Granny Bea recall events that happened when she was still in nappies?”

  Disregarding Hallie’s use of the word nappies for diapers, Gabe said, “Maybe somebody told her.”

  “Impossible. Assuming Granny Bea even came from Colorado, she was adopted when she was twelve months old.”

  “Farfetched, huh?”

  “Very.” Hallie heaved a deep, quivery sigh. “I’ve still got the blue devils.”

  “I have the perfect cure for that. Let’s go back to bed and snuggle.”

  “That sounds nice, Gabe, but I used acrylic paint and it should be dry by now. I want to prime my canvas, get rid of the fire.”

  “You can’t put out a fire by priming a canvas.”

  “I know, but I want to try. I’ve got to try.”

  Suddenly, Gabe remembered Joe’s Elk Creek casino ghost.

  Was “Knickers” the little girl who had been abandoned during the Cripple Creek fire?

  SEVENTEEN

  The next morning dawned autumn crisp, neither too hot nor too cold. Peering at the sky through the studio window, Hallie saw slivers of sunshine dancing up a storm. Half hidden by clouds, the yellowish ballerinas wore gauzy tutus. But soon those peek-a-boo clouds would thicken, and—

  Rain, rain, go away, Mary Knickers wants to play.

  This time Hallie listened to the voice inside her head.

  Mary Knickers? Holy Moses! The little girl’s given name was Mary.

  Hallie recalled her image when Marianne had gone into labor: a child clad in knickers, starting a fire in a cook stove. She also remembered that, as a little girl, she had often shed her clothes, leaving nothing more than underpants. If she hadn’t been fiercely protected by her big brother, would the other kids have nicknamed her Panties or Undies?

  “Hello, little love.” Gabe entered the studio. “Did this morning’s snuggle banish those blue devils?”

  “Completely.” She felt her cheeks bake. “How can I have devils, blue or otherwise, when you carry me off to heaven?”

  “Hallie, you’re adorable.” Gabe righted the couch, and grinned ruefully at the teddy bear. Scooping it up, he placed it among his other props. “What would you like to do today? Sightsee?”

  “Might we try Cripple Creek again?”

  “No!” As if he regretted his sharp one-word outburst, he said, “Let’s save Cripple Creek for Sunday. I’ve already made reservations at the Imperial Hotel and bought tickets for their famed melodrama.”

  “Sunday?” She walked over to the window. “That doesn’t give me much time.”

  “For what?” Gabe asked.

  Solving the puzzle, she thought. “Exploring Cripple Creek,” she said, making an about-face. “I’m leaving Monday.”

  “Couldn’t you stay longer?”

  “Do you want me to stay?”

  “Need you ask?”

  Walking forward, Gabe tilted her chin and bestowed a kiss on her lips, still slightly swollen from this morning’s activities.

  “Yes, I want you to stay,” he said.

  “I think the little girl’s given name was Mary,” Hallie blurted, avoiding a commitment.

  To stay or not to stay, she thought, paraphrasing Shakespeare. And wouldn’t that be an awesome name for their first born? William Shakespeare Quinn. Billy Q.

  Why was she counting chickens before they hatched? Gabe hadn’t said anything about marriage, and she was glad he hadn’t. To wed or not to wed was a much more difficult decision than to stay or not to stay. What about her family back east? What about her career?

  Horsefeathers! She could paint in Colorado. But would she continue painting Cripple Creek scenes? Gabriel? Lady Scarlet? Knickers? Mary Knickers?

  “I think the little girl’s given name was Mary,” she said again.

  “Hallie, let’s forget the past and simply enjoy the day. I’ll take you sightseeing. You can play tourist. Throw on some jeans and a heavy sweater, lace up your sneakers, and we’ll start with the Garden of the Gods.”

  “Garden of the Gods? Oh, I love that.”

  “As an artist, you’ll love the red rocks.”

  “Do they tickle God’s feet?”

  “No,” Gabe said. “They tickle one’s fancy. There’s a legend about the name. Two men surveyed the glorious scene. One said, ‘Don’t you think that this would be a great place for a Milwaukee beer garden?’ ‘Beer garden?’ the other man said indignantly. ‘Why this is fit for a garden of the Gods!’ Maybe you should bring a sketch pad, honey. Or do you paint from memory?”

  “Hah! You do think I paint from my memories.”

  “No, I don’t. The question slipped out.”

  “Until recently I worked from sketches or photos. Which reminds me. Would it take you very long to develop your pictures from yesterday?”

  “No. Why?”

  “The glen was so beautiful. The Aspen leaves shimmered like a gold lame gown, sprinkled with sequins. I’m not positive I could duplicate the color, but I’d like to try.”

  Hallie sounded sincere, yet Gabe suspected that she wanted to probe his photos very carefully, perhaps even discover the misty outlines of a cabin, a corral, and a rope clothespinned with knickers.

  Knickers. Mary Knickers. The past was rapidly encroaching on the present, destroying the future, and Gabe felt a sorrowful ache in his heart.

  EIGHTEEN

  Forget the past!

  Gabe had told her to forget the past.

  Hallie stared up at the skylight. Why couldn’t she sleep? She wanted to sleep. Every bone in her body ached from exhaustion. Her head ached, too.

  Holding both palms against her pounding temples, she pondered today.

  Correction. Yesterday. It had to be long past midnight.

  First, she and Gabe had toured Garden of the Gods. He had laughingly called the precariously balanced rock formations “a supernatural catastrophe.” But she thought the uplifted sandstone slabs looked more like mystic confections. There were even legendary names for the rocks. “The Angry Dolphin” and “The Eagle With Pinons Spread” and her favorite, “Elephant Attacking a Lion.”

  Then they had walked through the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, up and down twisty trails, pausing briefly so that Gabe could shoot pictures and rest his bad leg. Which, he said, felt fine. Just before leaving, she had bought Cheyenne Mountain Zoo T-shirts for her whole family, including tiny Shania.

  While rain spit and sprinkled, she and Gabe ate a late lunch inside the famous Broadmoor Hotel, and he talked about the hotel’s first annual bathing beauty contest, held in 1925. The girls had been shockingly attired in skimpy black suits with abbreviated skirts and black stockings.

  Gabe’s strong features had assumed mock-horror as he whispered that the stockings had been rolled at the knees!

  After lunch the rain stopped, as if God had plugged up the drain in a vast, porcelain sea of clouds. Gabe phoned Josh, who said that he planned a special candlelight dinner for Kayla.

  Not wanting to intrude, yet agreeing that candlelight dining sounded like a fine scheme, Gabe had grocery shopped for wine, cheese, a loaf of crusty French bread, and candles. Just like a little kid, she had ridden the supermarket cart as they whizzed down the aisles. At the top of his lungs, Gabe had sung, “I want you to be my teddy-bear,” and her cheeks had turned as red as a stoplight.

  Then Gabe had developed his roll of film.

  “I see something strange in the background,” Hallie had said. Gabe’s gray-green eyes looked anxious, so she quickly added, “I see girls shockingly attired in skimpy black bathing suits with silk stockings rolled at the knees.” />
  “Don’t do that,” he had said.

  She had said, “Did you honestly think I might see Gabriel’s cabin?”

  “I think you wanted to see it.”

  “I’d rather see a cabin than a fire—”

  “The fire was in your painting!”

  “—because I was so happy at the cabin.”

  “Hallie, stop it! You weren’t happy. Knickers was.”

  “Mary Knickers!”

  “I don’t care if she was called Mary Knickers or Shirley Temple Knickers. Did you know that Shirley Temple once visited the Broadmoor Hotel?”

  “Hunky-dory!”

  “Please, Hallie, forget the past.”

  “The past brought us together.”

  “No, it didn’t. I’m not Gabriel.”

  “I only meant,” she had said, “that without my paintings we might never have met.”

  “Okay. I’m sorry. Let’s tote our tired bodies into the bedroom, light the candles, then share some bread, cheese and wine.”

  “I’d rather share kisses, Gabe. Kisses are sweeter than wine.”

  Hallie had the strangest feeling she’d said that before. Granted, it sounded like a line from a popular song. However, long before the song had been sung, she had said, “I’d rather share kisses, Gabriel.”

  Gabriel, not Gabe!

  Forget the past!

  But it was hard to forget the past, especially when one’s fingers curled around an imaginary paintbrush.

  With an effort, she stiffened her hand. From the skylight, diluted moonlight shone down upon her taut knuckles. Terror stabbed through her as she watched her fingers convolute again. Her nails gashed her palm and she felt a sorrowful ache in the pit of her stomach.

  NINETEEN

  At first it looked like a parade.

  Then, as more details evolved, a funeral procession.

  A young girl, the bullfight girl, marched alongside a hearse, which held a lavender casket draped with crimson and white roses. The girl’s dark red curls were pinned up, subdued by a straw Boater. In her arms she held a baby. The baby wore two caps, one that hugged its head, one with a frilly bonnet’s brim. Plump legs extended from the baby’s white dress and straddled the young girl’s waist.

  A rider-less black stallion followed the funeral wagon. Atop his saddle lay a cross of pink carnations.

  Heavily veiled women, hollow-eyed miners and children of all ages lined the streets. Most faces were blurred. However, a few meticulously rendered expressions suggested sorrow. And curiosity. One sidewalk child bounced a ball. A second played with a monkey on a stick.

  Hallie smelled the cloying fragrance of roses and carnations, but paint dominated all other smells. Having worked rapidly, wielding her brush like a pinwheel, her T-shirt and shorts reeked from the spill of acrylic oils and paint thinner.

  “Honey?” Gabe swallowed a yawn as he advanced through the alcove’s open doorway. “Again?”

  “Please go back to bed,” she insisted.

  “Not unless you come with me.”

  “The smell.” She bent over double. “It’s making me sick.”

  Gabe raced forward, circled Hallie’s waist, and immediately felt her oven-like heat. “Honey,” he said, trying to modulate his voice, “you’re burning up.”

  “That can’t be true, Gabe. I’m so cold.”

  “Bed! Now! You need aspirin and—”

  “I can’t stand the smell!” Wrenching free, she bolted from the costume alcove and raced down the hall toward the bathroom.

  Gabe had often helped medics tend wounded soldiers, so the sight of a sick woman didn’t perturb him. Quickly, efficiently, he soaked a washcloth with cold water and held it against her brow.

  “Sorry,” she gasped, sitting on her heels. Then, with a strangled cry, she bent forward again.

  After a while, she looked up at him, her eyes unfocused.

  “Sorry, Gabriel,” she said, her voice sluggish. “I didn’t mean to whoops, but I was so scared. Madam and the girls were in church. I left church and ran home because Mama Scarlet didn’t feel good this morning. When she saw me she said she’d spank my be-hind, but before she could, she grabbed her belly and let out a scream. She said to boil water. I washed the sweat from her face and I let her squeeze my hand and I sang a hymn, ‘There is Sunshine in my Soul.’ I guess the baby slid out, but it seemed to pop out. Mama said to cut the baby’s cord with a kitchen knife boiled in water, but I couldn’t move because my legs were shaking so bad. I put my baby sister on Mama’s belly. Then you showed up and cut the cord, so I don’t know why my tummy hurts, but it does.”

  Feeling utterly helpless, Gabe watched Hallie glance down at the tiles. Then, very slowly, she raised her chin, and he saw that her eyes were still glazed over. This time, however, they were almost black with anguish.

  “I saved Mama Scarlet when my baby sister was born,” she cried, “but I couldn’t save her from a broken heart. Why did my daddy come back?”

  Rising, she grasped the sink for support. “He wasn’t et by a bear. Mama Scarlet fibbed about that. My daddy worked on a boat that traveled all over the world. When he came back he stayed with us, but he couldn’t settle down. At the same time Mama birthed my baby sister, my daddy was out riding, hurdling fences, falling on his head, breaking his neck. Mama Scarlet always expected him to come back. Always. She had hope. She gave her body to the miners, but she never gave her soul. After my daddy passed, Mama Scarlet lived one year, twelve short months. She knew she was gonna die. She willed herself to die. It wasn’t the fever that carried her away. It was a broken heart.”

  “Let me carry you to bed, Hallie,” Gabe said. “No arguments, okay?”

  He wished she would argue, or at least squirm a little. But she just lay in his arms, limp as a rag doll.

  * * *

  Somehow, Gabe persuaded the doctor to make a house call. Maybe it was the power of his name, Gabriel Q, which he used shamelessly. Maybe it was the mention of Jenn’s father, still a vital force in Denver politics.

  Gabe didn’t want to drive Hallie to a hospital. He didn’t want her sedated. He kept hearing the echo of her words: I’m afraid I might never wake up … never wake up … never wake up.

  “Twenty-four hour flu,” the doctor grumped, scribbling a prescription for an antibiotic. “Make sure she drinks plenty of liquids and call me if she gets any worse.”

  Gabe knew the doctor’s service would carefully screen future calls, but he didn’t care. The prescription was in his shirt pocket and Hallie would be fully recovered in twenty-four hours.

  But it was forty-eight hours before her fever broke.

  * * *

  The fingers that caressed her brow were warm, gentle. Hallie struggled to raise her heavy eyelids, hoping to meet Gabe’s gray-green gaze. Instead, she saw a Cripple Creek ghost. The ghost looked like Mama Scarlet. Boy oh boy, Joe and the other casino owners would sure get a kick out of this.

  “You’ve had schooling,” said the ghost, “and I’ve kept you from the profession. You’re pure, Mary, and I want you to stay that way. Promise me you’ll stay pure.”

  “I promise, but you’re not gonna die, Mama. The doctor says the fever will break soon.”

  “Promise me you’ll find a good home for your sister.”

  “Please, Mama, you’re not—”

  “Promise, Mary.”

  “I promise.”

  Burying her face in the pillow, she felt her heart plummet. She could easily find a family for her beautiful baby sister, but she was fifteen, already grown. In fact, the Homestretch’s Madam had insisted she take Mama Scarlet’s place and tonight she would entertain her first gentleman. Before she took Mama Scarlet’s place, before she “entertained” her first gentleman, Madam wanted her to sing at the saloon so the gents could get a good look at her.

  “A teaser,” Madam said with a cackle. “When you sing, you must poke your titties out and lift your skirts. If you sing real good and get the gents all fired up, we
might snag ourselves a rich old goat.”

  “I don’t feel much like singing,” she cried, turning over onto her back.

  “Of course you don’t,” soothed a man, his voice tender. He sounded familiar.

  Gabriel? No, not Gabriel.

  Her vision blurred, then cleared, and she saw the saloon’s interior. Gabriel played a game of poker and he had just made a wager.

  “Don’t bet your horse, Gabriel,” she cried. “You need your horse.”

  “She’s delirious, Josh,” said the man with the tender voice.

  Madam laid her cards on the table and somebody shouted, “I’ll be damned! She wasn’t bluffing. A full house. Kings and threes.”

  “He weren’t bluffing, neither,” said another gent. “He’s got a full house, too. Aces and sevens.”

  “Poor Knickers,” said a pasty-faced woman with sparse yellow hair. “Gabriel’s cabin ain’t got mirrors. Guess that’s ‘cause his face would shatter glass. Knickers once stole my hair restorer,” she added gleefully.

  “I did not, you hatchet-faced harlot!”

  “Don’t call me hatchet faced, you bitch!”

  “Shut up, Mollie!” Gabriel glared at the pasty-faced woman with the sparse yellow hair.

  The man with the tender voice added his two cents. “Keep sponging her, Josh,” he said, “while I fetch more broth.”

  She rode Gabriel’s horse, her hands clutching Gabriel around his middle. Glancing up at the sky, catching snowflakes on her long thick lashes, she said, “I’m so cold.”

  She was cold inside, too. Was it true? Would Gabriel’s face shatter glass? Six months ago his handsome face had been badly scarred during a mine explosion and he had lost his right leg at the knee. His father owned the mine. Gabriel had been learning the business “from the ground up” when the explosion occurred. His father wanted him to come home to Denver, but Gabriel continued living in his small mountain cabin.

  “I can’t tolerate my family’s sympathy or my fiancé’s sacrificial attitude,” he had told the parlor girls while he painted their portraits. The girls didn’t care if he was scarred since he made them look so beautiful. She wasn’t sure what sacrificial attitude meant, but she thought it might mean that Gabriel’s snooty fiancé didn’t love him anymore.