River With No Bridge

by Karen Wills

  Patrick turned toward her with an eager smile. “Save me a dance, Nora. I’m still a good enough man for that.”

  “That and more.” Rose laughed. “I’ll be having another baby. I didn’t want to say it before. I’m certain we’ll have a boy this time.”

  “I’m happy for you.” But even as Nora spoke, her heart sank for the two of them. So poor and still so hopeful.

  “Mrs. Larkin, may I have this dance?” Bat Moriarty extended a hand. “I’ll not go away. I’ll dance you down every street all the way home if you won’t dance with me now.”

  “You’re a ninny, Bat. I’m promised to Patrick for this one.” She felt confident now among old friends. But then she noticed two women from church, heads together, hands hiding their mouths, their eyes shifted toward Bat. Nora had known all along walking in with him was a mistake.

  Patrick moved tentatively as Nora guided him among other dancing pairs who stepped aside when she and Patrick veered too close. “Nora,” Patrick’s voice was stern. “I’ve said it before. Whatever possessed you to let the gambler move in for a lodger? Why didn’t you rent a room to the devil himself?”

  “He’s not that evil,” Nora answered. “We scarcely know the man is there. He pays his rent on time, and Helen and I have our meals alone. Maybe we’ve misjudged him a wee bit. He’s kind enough to my daughter.”

  “When God took my sight He replaced it with sight of another sort. I sense such things about the girls I love as would astound you. I tell you now, this man Bat Moriarty will bring you grief bitter as our Tade’s passing. Tell him to go, Nora Larkin, while you still can.” The music ended. Nora stared into Patrick’s whitely scarred face and filmed eyes, the very picture of a stone oracle, apart and unyielding. Further talk would be useless. Doubt and conflict entered her heart.

  She guided him back to Rose, who took his hand from Nora’s.

  Bridget waved from across the room. Relieved, Nora rushed away from Patrick and Rose. She and Bridget embraced as her friend told her good news. “My Michael and I have set a date at last.”

  “I’m happy for you. It’s a blessed state.” They chatted about Bridget’s wedding plans and where she and Michael would live. For the present it would be in rooms at the Centennial, where Bridget had been promoted to assistant manager.

  “What would you and Bat Moriarty be about now?” Bridget asked in her usual blunt way.

  “Oh, bother the lot of it. I made the fatal mistake of letting him walk me here, and now Patrick has me doomed, Rose is worried sick, and the gossips are entertaining themselves in fine style.”

  “Bat still sees Cat Posey, you know,” Bridget said.

  “Well.” Nora’s temper flared because Bridget felt she needed to tell her. “By all means, let him. He’s only my lodger, you know. It’s business.”

  Michael, a stocky man with sandy hair and watchful eyes, claimed Bridget for a dance. Dispirited and excluded, Nora watched the two, so young with such a promising future. She had no grand future and had thrown trouble on the precarious present. The bright room suddenly seemed garish, the good people in it meddlesome gossips. Nora walked to the doorway to breathe cool air. Bat appeared behind her.

  “Ready to leave?”

  Nora shook her head. “We shouldn’t have walked in as we did. I’ll go home on my own as I ought to have come.” She brushed an unwelcome tear away.

  He stepped in front of her, amused. “Nonsense. All nonsense. I’m going to claim my harmless, overdue dance. I’ll dance you home so we won’t be walking together.”

  The fiddler commenced, and Bat bowed. A rebellious impulse tinged with loneliness and longing swept Nora into Bat’s arms. She smelled his familiar combination of cologne and tobacco. Her cheek brushed against the velveteen collar of his frockcoat and she relaxed into the lilt of a Celtic reel. As Bat guided her in circles down the boardwalk, she glimpsed a mask-like face—oblique eyes watching from an alleyway. Could that be Jim Li? Bat’s hand on her waist reclaimed her attention.

  At home Nora lit oil lamps, creating shadows in the corners of every room. She turned at last to face him. His look blasted heat through her. She began to speak, then stopped and turned away, raising a hand to where the pulse raced in her throat. Bat’s arms encircled her from behind, his lips kissing the nape of her neck. Had she felt this before? In a dream?

  “This isn’t right,” she murmured as her back arched against him.

  “It is right. It’s the only thing that is.”

  Nora sought for a reason to stop until Cat Posey occurred to her. “Stop it. I’m not Cat Posey. You can’t just take me as you wish.”

  “Cat is nothing, an old friend. We haven’t been together except for a drink at Erin’s Joys for months. She sleeps with one of the other girls for that kind of pleasure.” In answer to Nora’s startled stare, he explained, “It’s the way some of them can stand the life.”

  “What a country you travel in when you leave my house at night, Bat Moriarty.”

  “It’s a country rich with many pleasures. But none could compare with nights of love with you, Nora.” He ran languid fingers through her tumbling hair and dropped a kiss on her shoulder.

  “I have a child and a reputation. I can’t be what you want to bring me to.” She did not speak the next thought. I’m a good Catholic girl. What if there’s a child?

  He answered her fears. “Then we’ll marry. I crave you. I have since we met on that train and I first laid eyes on you in that ridiculous black coat. Little Nora. Always in mourning. Let me make you happy. Helen sleeps peacefully in another home tonight. Let’s not waste this gift of time.”

  His hand slipped to her breast, caressing it, and with the other he tilted her face toward his to kiss. When he released her, caught between dreams and the irresistible memory of lovemaking, Nora took his hand as if pulled by gravity to lead him to her old room. They undressed, stopping for caresses, for lingering kisses. It felt so good to be touched, to be filled by a man again.

  The smelters of the Neversweat billowed poisonous clouds the color of pearl in the moonlight, clouds that drifted skyward to disperse in tatters high above the turbulent city. The stars sustained their cold impassive vigil over the great delights and follies of humanity.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Nora spent a sleepless night after Bat, sated and content, spooned against her. She tried not to move for fear of disturbing him. It had never felt that way with Tade. She finally dozed, to wake at dawn gazing on the profile of her lover distant and disregarding her in sleep.

  “Forgive me, Tade,” she whispered. “But my life continues. It seems it must.”

  She thought how censorious Father O’Toole would be. But watching Bat Moriarty open his eyes, she couldn’t sustain regret. As before, he had that capacity to seem fresh and unrumpled, even coming out of sleep. He pulled her to him and Nora for the first time experienced lovemaking in daylight.

  After a delicious time of drifting in sensual pleasure, she raised her head, tangled gold-red curls falling over Bat’s smooth chest. “I must bring Helen home,” she said. “Sure and Rose will know what we’ve been up to when she sees me.”

  “Everyone should gaze on you,” Bat said, his voice muffled as he nuzzled her throat. “You are a wonder.”

  Bat left to see what he’d missed in the way of games. Nora picked up scattered clothes from the night before, put on an everyday housedress, and left for Rose and Patrick’s. The exhilaration born of sensual pleasure dimmed as she approached their door. But the dreaded reproaches didn’t come. Rose’s attention focused on feeding her brood and Helen.

  Wanting to stay, Helen ran and hid under the older girls’ bed. Their laughter encouraged her, but Nora coaxed her away with the promise of a real tea party, for once glad of the Murphys’ everlasting commotion.

  Nora went into her home expecting somehow that life would have changed, but Bat’s door stayed closed, only silence from the other side. No sign of last night remained. Nora had the promised tea p
arty with Helen.

  As Nora went about baking and sewing, lapping anxiety churned to waves of guilt. She said the rosary while Helen napped. Bat’s door opened after their supper. He walked through the house, dashing with that dangerous edge. He chucked Helen under the chin and turned. “Oh, Mrs. Larkin. There seems to be something amiss in my room. May I see you for a moment?”

  Nora followed Bat, who took her in his arms. He cupped her breast, and then moved his hand lower. She didn’t resist or respond. So Bat had no doubt she was his for the taking from now on. Without speaking he released her, tipped his hat, waved to Helen who lifted her favorite doll’s arm in a floppy farewell, and was gone.

  Next morning Nora didn’t hear Bat come in. His door remained closed. She put the house in order and saw to Helen’s needs. At the market several Chinese sold red tomatoes, bright carrots, and varied greens. The vendors in their distinctive clothes, hats, and speaking their own language all looked familiar. But Jim Li, the one whose name she knew, wasn’t among them. At his former stall, she heard a dissatisfied Welsh woman berate the girl trying to serve her. “I can’t understand you. Where’s the one who used to be here? The big one who speaks English? I want to deal with him.”

  “Jim Li gone Helena. Jim Li gone.” Small as a child before the broad Welsh housewife, the Chinese girl bowed.

  Nora shrugged. Just as well. She wondered that Jim Li had stayed in Butte as long as he had. She’d heard that Helena had a large Chinese community.

  Back home she baked cinnamon rolls and bread as Helen took scraps and formed them into letters and numbers, then sprinkled them with cinnamon and sugar. Nora dreamed in spite of herself as she kneaded a pillow of bread dough, that Bat might break his routine and have dinner with them. He’d spoken of marriage to make things proper. Then she thought of the gambling. Distracted, she remembered his kiss. She shook her head. It must come right somehow.

  He didn’t emerge. Finally, she knocked on his door. No response. She turned the knob and pushed. The bed hadn’t been slept in. He hadn’t come home at all that morning. Odd. She hoped he was well, but she could hardly go to the saloon and ask.

  Nora read nursery rhymes with Helen. Helen favored the line, “Gentlemen come every day, to see what my fine hen doth lay.” Nora found it unnerving. They prayed, then Nora tucked the sleepyhead in, relieved of the need to pretend calm. Helen had an only child’s way of focusing on her mother’s moods, so Nora tried to keep fears and sadness at bay.

  She sighed and sat to darn stockings, the ticking clock and constant hum and shift whistles from the mines the only sounds.

  At midnight she went to bed, lying awake listening to Helen’s soft, rhythmic breathing. Was Bat with Cat Posey? He’d told her they were just friends. In the early-morning hours she said a rosary, dressed, and sat at the table, hands folded on its scratched surface. She resolutely faced the door. Tade had never caused her a minute’s worry. She thought of how he used to come home straightway from work. Tears stung her eyes.

  Bat didn’t come.

  Helen woke up. Shoulders burning from the tension of her vigil, Nora mechanically washed and dressed her daughter, then prepared oatmeal. By midmorning the narrow house began to close in. She imagined having to stand, arms straight out, hands pressing the walls back to keep them from crushing her and Helen. “Come on, my treasure.” She shoved Helen’s arms into a sweater. “We’ll go see Aunt Rose.”

  Helen brightened. “Aunt Rose!” she crowed. “We’re going to visit my Aunt Rose Murphy and all my Murphy friends.”

  They found Rose scrubbing laundry over a tub behind her house, mostly little girls’ worn knickers made from flour sacks. She brushed disheveled hair out of her eyes and greeted Nora with urgent gloating. “Well, did you hear the news about your fancy lodger?”

  Nora’s heart jolted. “I’ve heard nothing about anyone. What is it?” Helen let go of her mother’s hand and scampered off to join the girls.

  “It appeared in the Miner. Here, I’ll show you.” Rose dried her hands on her streaked apron and motioned Nora inside.

  “Just think,” Rose said, opening the paper to personal notices. Nora’s hands shook. She read where Rose’s finger left a damp smudge as Rose read aloud, “The wife and children of Bat Moriarty seek any information regarding his whereabouts. He is rumored to be in Montana. Contact Deirdre Moriarty c/o General Delivery, Saginaw, Michigan. Modest reward offered for good information.” Nora took the paper, reread it, then folded and laid it on the table before she faced Rose. Any words had drained out of her head.

  “Is he at your house now?” Rose asked.

  Nora struggled to be matter of fact. “Not for over a day. I wonder if he knows.” She lowered her eyes again to the newsprint.

  “I’ll wager so. Might be planning a quick escape, the scoundrel. Is he paid up in his rent?”

  “Not quite, Rose,” Nora said, rising from the table. Her voice shook in spite of her. “Not quite paid up.”

  “I wonder how Cat Posey will take it. I guess the likes of that upstairs girl wouldn’t mind knowing her fancy man engaged in adultery.” Rose couldn’t help having a bit of malicious fun with the scandal.

  Nora winced, but said nothing knowing how the Dublin Gulch housewives like Rose despised Irish prostitutes. What would they think of her now? Making a quick good-bye, she took Helen home, and as she passed through her kitchen’s yeasty fragrance toward their bedroom she noticed Bat’s door ajar. He must have come back to explain! She flung it open. Empty wardrobe doors gaped. She pulled drawers out of the little dresser. Empty.

  The gambler she’d given her honor to for one night of passion had fled without a word. Nora sat on the bed, emptiness all around her. Then, with a growl, she tore the bedclothes off, yanking sheets and blankets to the floor. She grabbed them up and set about doing laundry, heating the water to nearly scalding before she rammed the bedclothes into it. She scrubbed the room after that, on her knees, wiping every trace of Bat Moriarty from her home.

  Helen watched her mother with a sensitive child’s awareness that this was not a time to make trouble. She asked no questions, although if Nora had noticed, the questions were in her daughter’s eyes. Nora only muttered wild, strange words into the armoire as she scoured its inside.

  Helen finally had to ask. “Did Bat die?”

  Nora finally turned to her daughter’s frightened face. “Oh, my treasure,” she said, the rage replaced by remorse that she’d caused Helen to look so stricken. “He had to leave, Helen. He has a family back in Michigan. That’s a state far away.”

  “But, I wanted him here. With us.”

  Nora gathered Helen to her. “Oh, so did I,” she murmured into her child’s sweet-scented hair. “Oh, so did I.”

  In the evening, her hands raw from hot water and harsh soap, Nora remade the bed and moved her things back in. Whatever the loss of money, she would never again take in a lodger. At least the comfort existed that no one knew about her fall. She would have to tell one soul, good Father O’Toole. He would hear her confession. Afterward Nora would put that foolish night behind her. She willed herself not to think of Bat’s touch or the delicious abandonment to lovemaking after the lonely drought of widowhood.

  When the Sunday Butte Miner appeared on the newsstand, Nora read more shocking information. Cat Posey lay dead from a morphine overdose. A friend returning from a night’s work to the room they shared found her, dead for some hours. Her friend stated the deceased had become despondent after being deserted by a man she believed would one day marry her.

  So Bat Moriarty had talked marriage to a prostitute, the same ruse that toppled Nora into his arms. She shuddered and reached for the rosary beads, but her hand hesitated, and she left them untouched. She’d brought herself to the level of pathetic Cat Posey, a shameful joke.

  She gritted her teeth. He wouldn’t be the death of her, not of Tade Larkin’s widow and Helen’s mother. She picked up the beads and pressed them against her burning forehead. Then she slip
ped them back into her pocket and looked around her neglected kitchen. Time to tidy up. At least things could be made right on the outside.

  Overwhelmed by weariness in the weeks that followed, Nora thought it due to a heavy workload and bitter remorse. When she missed her time of the month, she felt the first sense that dark wings spread across the sky, whirring in pursuit, catching up to her.

  Soon other signs showed themselves. Nora’s heart plunged with the certainty that her single passionate night with Bat Moriarty, a man who’d abandoned one family and broken the heart of a tough Butte prostitute, couldn’t be washed away after all. She thought ruefully of all the times with Tade when no more children had come, and now this. Fear of the future, of shame, of the loss of respect this would bring, of a return to worse poverty, tore at her.

  Sitting at the table, head in hands, she yearned to unburden herself to Rose, but balked at the thought. Even in anguish, she hated to admit Patrick had been right. She felt shamed enough without acknowledging she’d scorned wise advice. Patrick’s warning words tolled in her memory like funeral bells. She’d ignored the oracle and now must live out her fate.

  Later that night in the darkened kitchen, Nora stood at the window, glaring toward the life-thieving mines, anger vying with desperation. What should she do? Finally at first light, stiff from spending hours in a chair, she stood and made coffee. She must leave Butte, America, the place she’d thought her lifelong home. She’d believed this little house would signify dignity and freedom from want. Now through folly she’d tossed away what little she’d kept after losing Tade. Bat could walk off. She’d forgotten that a woman’s curse is always to pay—like Eve who ate of the forbidden apple.

  As soon as she could comb Helen’s tangled gold hair and help her dress, she took her delighted daughter to Rose’s. Leaving Helen playing jump rope with the Murphy girls, Nora proceeded on to the Centennial, telling Rose she planned to ask about hiring on there.