Ten Thousand Charms

by Allison K. Pittman

  “Didn't save room for dessert?” he asked.

  “Oh, don't tease like that.” Gloria leaned back against the wagon's wheel. “I couldn't eat another bite.”

  “Really? Are you sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “Because I have another bite,” he said in a playful tone.

  She sat up straight.

  “It's not much, you know, just a little somethin'…”

  He reached one hand behind his back and brought it back holding a small plate. The sun was nearly set and the little camp was bathed in shadows, so Gloria couldn't see exactly what it was. He held the plate in front of her face, moving it back and forth slowly, causing her head to follow its movement.

  “Chocolate?” she said in a tiny, hopeful voice.

  “Cake.”

  “For me?”

  “Well, I don't know. After all, it was a church dinner, and really only the people who go to church ought to get to eat.”

  “But you let me eat all that other food,” Gloria said, not caring that she sounded whiny and weak.

  “That's because you were starvin’ and pathetic. Now you're full. I'm not sure you deserve this.”

  He picked up the slice of cake and brought it slowly toward his mouth.

  “Please!” Gloria called out. “Just a bite. I don't need the whole thing, but I haven't had chocolate since Virginia City. Just a bite? Please?”

  “This cake was made by the preacher's daughter herself. What kind of person would I be if I gave it to some person who doesn't even have the decency to listen to her father's sermon?”

  “Just a bite and I'll go to church next time.”

  “Yes, but what about the time after that?” John William had returned the cake to its plate. “How about this? You go to church for every bite you get.”

  “All right,” she said. “One visit to church for every bite. Now give it.”

  She reached for the plate, but John William snagged it away from her. Holding the plate in one hand, he used the other to pinch off a corner of the cake. Gloria marveled at how such huge hands could maneuver such a tiny morsel from the plate to her open, waiting mouth without dropping so much as a crumb.

  “That's one week,” he said, smiling.

  “Now wait a minute.” Gloria's protest was silenced by yet another pinch of chocolate.

  John William laughed at how her eyes crossed as his hand approached, so she closed them and kept them closed. Bite after bite, she tried to focus on the flavor, but could only feel the texture of his fingers as they brushed against her lips. The delicious morsels may as well have been sawdust. She clamped her lips shut and opened her eyes.

  John William was ready, staring right into them. Yet another pinch from the half-eaten cake was held suspended between them.

  “How many was that?” she asked.

  “I lost count.”

  “It doesn't matter.” She opened her eyes and took the remaining piece from the plate and plopped it, whole, into her mouth. “I'll go as long as I'm here with you.”

  John William studied the pinch of cake he held in his fingers before popping it into his mouth.

  “That's all I ask.”

  hat's the house?” Gloria asked. “Must be,” John William replied. “Mrs. Brewster said the place was about three miles north of town. She said it had a house, garden, single slant-roof barn.” His voice filled with promise as he listed each attribute.

  Just behind the house, if she stood up in the wagon and craned her neck, she saw a blanket of green.

  “Wheat,” John William said. “Acres and acres of it.”

  “The house looks big,” Gloria said. “Did she have a lot of children?”

  “None.”

  “Then why the large house?”

  “1 don't know Maybe they—”

  “And look at the door. It's beautiful!”

  John William chuckled. “Yeah, you sure see that comin'.”

  It was painted a bright blue and, next to the sky, was the bluest thing Gloria had ever seen. She couldn't imagine anything more inviting, until the door opened and Maureen Brewster walked onto her porch, smiled and waved.

  “That's her?” Gloria said.

  “That's Mrs. Brewster.”

  “She looks nice.”

  “She is. I think you'll like her.”

  “Why?” Gloria asked, genuinely puzzled.

  “Because deep down inside, you're nice, too.”

  The kitchen was perfect. A large eight-paned window looked out to the company path. Just underneath it, a hand pump drew well water into a galvanized sink. Tiers of shelves stocked with an orderly assortment of spice tins and pretty blue crockery adorned the wall on both sides of the window. The workspace counter rounded the corner of the room, creating a convenient L-shaped surface. A length of calico hung from its edge, and Gloria felt an overwhelming urge to take a peek underneath it. A crystal vase full of fresh flowers sat in the middle of a round table; the cuts in the glass cast a pattern of rainbows on the glossy wooden surface. “It's beautiful,” Gloria said, her voice little more than a breath. She carried Danny across her shoulder.

  “Thank you,” Maureen said. “We've been very happy here.”

  “Why would you ever leave?”

  “Now, Gloria,” John William said, his voice chastising.

  “No, no," Maureen said. “Believe me, it's not an easy choice. But I can't work the place alone, and my sister and her husband have a place for me back in St. Louis, so…” Her voice trailed off in sigh accompanied by a shrug and a shake of her head.

  “Yes, well,” John William spoke into the awkward moment. He held Kate, the baby's back against his broad chest, and the little girl pointed a soggy finger toward the flowers on the table. She emitted a gurgly gleeful sound, and every adult in the room welcomed the distraction.

  “Yes, aren't they pretty?” Maureen said. “They're violets. Here.”

  Maureen reached into the vase and pulled out a purple stem. She ran it lightly across the little girl's face before placing it in the waiting chubby fist. Kate immediately put the flower into her mouth, made a face, and pulled it out again.

  “She's always hungry,” Gloria said.

  “Can't imagine where she gets that from,” John William said, smiling.

  Gloria shot him a face that equaled Kate's in its sour displeasure.

  Maureen laughed and said, “Let me show you the rest of the house. This, of course, is the kitchen. I'll bet you're glad to see a proper stove again.”

  “Why?” Gloria asked.

  “She's not much of a cook,” John William said.

  “I see." Maureen pulled back the material that skirted the countertops revealing shelves full of clean, empty jars. “Just about ready to put up what's in the garden. And there's a creek in the south corner of the property with some wonderful blackberry bushes. Makes the best jam you've ever had.”

  “1 can't make jam,” Gloria said.

  “Of course not, of course not. We'll divide up the job. You can pick the berries, I'll make the jam.”

  “I've—”

  “Never picked berries?” John William interrupted, smiling.

  “Now you stop.” Maureen gave John William a slight slap on the arm. “Everybody's picked berries.”

  I haven't, Gloria thought.

  Maureen led them into the parlor adjoining the kitchen. An imposing fireplace dominated one wall. A line of dainty figurines graced its mantle, as did a cheerful ticking clock and a sepia-toned daguerreotype of a much more somber Maureen with her hand resting on the shoulder of a serious-looking man.

  “We had that made last spring,” Maureen said, running a finger along the gilded frame. “Just about three months before he died.”

  “He was very handsome,” Gloria said, though most of his face was obscured by his heavy whiskers. She glanced over at John William and the full beard that months of growth had produced. She secretly wished he'd shave.

  “These are stones take
n from the Umatilla,” Maureen said, stooping slightly to stroke the hearth. “And my husband made all the furniture himself.”

  A long cushioned high-backed bench sat against the wall adjacent to the fireplace. Two chairs of a similar style created an inviting view of the flames. Gloria ran her hand along the back of a chair. Someone had sanded the wood to silk. The third wall housed a window that looked out to the garden. Underneath the window was a wicker basket full of mending and a willow rocking chair.

  “You thoroughly capture the morning sunlight there,” Maureen said, pointing to the chair. “It's perfect light for sewing.”

  “I don't sew,” Gloria said. Danny was beginning to fuss a little, so she repositioned him.

  “Well, I can see well need to have a long talk about just what it is exactly that you can do. Now, let me show you the bedroom.”

  Gloria opened her mouth for a smart remark, but the look on John William's blushing traumatized face stopped her.

  There were two bedrooms. Their combined space took up nearly half of the square footage of the house. The first was the room Maureen Brewster shared with her beloved Ed. A large bed took up most of the room, the thick mattress nestled between ornate head and footboards. It was covered with a cheerful quilt and piled high with pillows. On either side were two small tables, one of which had a kerosene lamp and a well-worn Bible. A curtain ran the length of one wall, concealing a series of hooks on which Maureen hung her other clothing. A large chest of drawers stood against the wall opposite the bed, and next to it sat a washstand.

  “Ill probably leave the bed,” Maureen said. “Leave all of the furniture for that matter. If there's one thing we learned on the journey here, furniture's not suited to travel.”

  Neither John William nor Gloria spoke. There was an overwhelming sense of true, lasting love in this room, and when they did happen to glance at each other, their expressions mirrored a mixture of humility and shame before they quickly looked away

  The second bedroom was bare, though not empty It contained the furnishings of its function, but there was no sense of life in it. Much smaller than the first room, it had a narrow bed tucked into a corner and a large wooden trunk on the opposite wall.

  “The bed's actually fixed to the wall,” Maureen said, pulling back a corner of the quilt to demonstrate. “Ed figured it would be easy enough to just put a railing around the two open sides. That way when we didn't need a crib any more, we'd just have a bed. We kept the rocker in here for a while.

  Something happened to her voice as she spoke. It was as if Gloria and John William had left the room and she was left talking to the ones who lived, or should have lived, in the house with her.

  “You never had any children?” Gloria asked. She'd been carrying Danny this whole time, and now she clutched him a little closer.

  “Gloria, don't—”

  “Ed and I married late in life,” Maureen said. “I was thirty-two, he was almost forty. We wanted children, prayed for them. I figured if God could give a miracle to Sarah—”

  “She's the one who laughed,” Gloria said.

  “Yes, she did,” Maureen said. “But I wouldn't have. Every day, from the day we married until the day he died, I prayed that God would send us a child. I guess He just didn't see fit.”

  “You would have been a wonderful mother,” Gloria said. “I can tell.”

  “Thank you, child. And who knows? I'm only fifty. Maybe I'm still just too young.”

  There was a ripple of laugher.

  “Course I'd have to find me a husband first.”

  There was another ripple of laughter, but this one distinctly thinner.

  “Mrs. Brewster?”

  “Please call me Maureen.”

  “Maureen, then. I need to feed the babies. May I go somewhere and sit down?”

  “Of course, dear. Go on into the parlor. Sit in the rocker. That's what it was made for, you know Never been used to nurse a babe…” Her voice started to drift again.

  “Maureen," John William said, “I'd like to take a look at the property, if you don't mind. The barn, crops.”

  “Certainly I've had a few neighbors over to help, just to keep the place up, you know. Ed has—we have—I have everything you could need as far as tools and equipment. Livestock, you'll see.”

  “Are you coming with me?”

  “No, no, son. You just go on. I'll just take this little one,” she took Kate out of his arms, “and talk with Gloria. She can tell me all your secrets." Maureen delivered this comment with a jaunty wink, and John William seemed amused by Gloria's shocked expression.

  “She might at that,” he said. He walked toward the doorway of the tiny bedroom, but before leaving he turned and said, “You know, they say confession is good for the soul.”

  Nothing, Gloria thought, had ever felt as good as sitting in the willow rocker, staring out at a budding garden while feeling the rhythmic tug of a baby at her breast. She was nursing Kate who, as usual, had been too impatient to wait for Danny, who lay on a blanket near the hearth, contentedly mouthing a silver spoon. Maureen was in the kitchen putting a pot of leftover stew on the stove to heat and sliding a pan of bread into the oven. The faintest aromas were just beginning to drift through the house.

  This could be a home, Gloria thought. This could be my home.

  Maureen came into the room, wiping her hands on her apron. She settled her tiny frame into the chair to the right of where Gloria was sitting.

  “Well, I must say,” she said, “1 feel like a regular lady of leisure sitting down in the middle of the day. There's plenty I should be doing, but 1 think it would be nice to sit and chat for a while.”

  “Yes," Gloria said, a bit uncomfortable. Chat meant questions and questions meant lies, and though she had known Maureen only for a matter of hours, she knew she could never bring herself to lie to this woman.

  “Your children are beautiful,” Maureen said, looking wistfully at Danny, who was now engrossed in shifting his spoon carefully from one hand to another.

  “Thank you,” Gloria said. She dislodged Kate, now sated, and closed her blouse. She brought Kate to a sitting position on her lap and began rubbing and patting her back.

  “Twins,” Maureen mused. “What a blessing.”

  “Mm-hmm." Gloria focused intently on a tiny spot on the back of Kate's neck. A single little freckle. She'd never noticed it before.

  “1 have cousins who were twins, but they were both boys. Not identical, but they did favor each other.”

  “Really”

  Since they left Silver Peak, babies in tow, Gloria had heard this same conversation countless times. Every family they encountered—at supply stops, river crossings, well-traveled roads—had something to say about the “twins.” People commented on how much they looked alike, how very different they looked, their own twin siblings, cousins, children. They sang little rhymes, made dire predictions, quoted superstition, and through it all, Gloria and John William shielded the truth with silent nods and mumbled appreciation for the stories.

  Maureen was still speaking, a cheerful friendly patter, but Gloria hadn't heard a word. Somewhere in the middle of hearing the exploits of Maureen's adventurous twin cousins, Gloria looked at her and said, “They're not twins.”

  “What?”

  “Danny and Kate. They're not twins. They're not brother and sister at all.”

  Maureen didn't look as surprised as Gloria thought she would.

  “John William and I, we're not—”

  “It's all right, child.”

  Maureen got up from the chair and sat on the floor at Gloria's feet. She put a comforting hand on Gloria's knee.

  “This is John William's daughter,” Gloria said, handing Kate down to Maureen's lap. Maureen held the little girl close, and Gloria got up from the chair, gathered Danny and settled in to nurse him.

  “And this is…Danny is my son.”

  “Gloria, darling, you don't need to tell me—”

  “Please. P
lease let me.”

  She locked her gaze with Maureen's, and even though the older woman nodded a smiling consent, the words just wouldn't come. So she looked into the earnest contented eyes of her son and let the words flow out of her.

  “I was born in California.

  And then it was so easy Her mother, the men, the migration from one mining camp to another. She told stories that should have racked her body with sobs, but the steady suckling of her son kept her grounded. Kept her still. She placed her thumb in Danny's soft palm and gathered strength from his grip.

  “After Mother died…”

  Her own legacy. Her migration. Dubious fame and tainted fortune. And pregnancy.

  “I still don't know why I went to Jewell…”

  She could have stayed in Virginia City, had an abortion, given it away But she'd worked for Jewell before, felt a connection.

  “She reminded me of a mother,” Gloria said. “Not my mother, but a mother. She always took care of us girls.”

  Maureen sat, still and soft at Gloria's feet. She said nothing except the occasional, “Poor child.”

  “And then I met John William.”

  Silver Peak. The birth, her death, the deal. Leaving. All of it, every mile, every hardship, every test of patience and fortitude. Everything that led up to this moment, this conversation, this… smile.

  It was the first time Gloria chanced to look at Maureen's face, and she was shocked to see the wide smile that infused the older woman's face with unblemished youth.

  “I think you may be the strongest woman I've ever met,” Maureen said.

  Gloria squirmed under the admiration in her voice. Danny had fallen asleep, his warm milky mouth was slack, and she felt the tiny puffs of his breath against her bare skin. She shifted him gently, just enough to close her blouse.

  “I just wanted my baby to have a father,” Gloria said. “I always wanted a father. Dreamed of having one. I used to wait for him to show up and take me away from my mother and… everything.”

  “Child, child.” Maureen reached up to clasp Gloria's hand. “Don't you know that you have a Father?”

  “No, I don't.”

  “But you do, Gloria.”

  “You mean God?” Gloria gave a scoffing laugh. “A lot of good He's done for me.”