by Pat Murphy
“Your friend Beka?” the Professor asked Sarah softly.
Sarah nodded. She stood, listening for Beka’s answering howl. There it was again—maybe a mile distant.
She smiled at the Professor. “I really must be going.” It was another of the polite phrases Max had taught her.
“Wait,” Cassidy said. “You can’t…”
But Sarah was no longer there to be told what she could not do. She vanished into the night, leaving the circus behind.
18 UP A TREE
“I have always been rather better treated in San Francisco than I actually deserved.”
—Mark Twain
AS A LITTLE GIRL, Helen Harris had preferred climbing trees to dressing like a young lady and attending church. Her aunt Bridget, who had taken Helen in at age six and adopted her when her mother died, had broken her of this habit. But at age twenty-two, after abstaining from tree-climbing for more than sixteen years, Helen Harris found a use for the skills of her youth.
She was traveling with Miss Paxon. The two women had made camp halfway between Jones Bar and Selby Flat when a hungry black bear lumbered from the bushes and indicated an intense curiosity in the contents of their saddlebags.
Kicking off her shoes and hiking up her long skirts, Helen had scrambled up an oak tree in record time. Miss Paxon had followed, with alacrity. From a safe perch in the branches, the two women watched the bear claw open Helen’s saddlebag and thrust its head inside, snuffling loudly. The beast was, Helen suspected, smelling the horehound candy that Helen had secreted in the bottom.
Helen shook her head ruefully. Aunt Bridget would say that God was punishing Helen for self-indulgence. If Helen had not packed candy in her bag, the bear would not be rummaging through her things. Helen glanced at Miss Paxon. The older woman was watching the bear with interest and showed no signs of intending to blame this incident on Helen. Relieved, Helen returned her attention to the bear.
The bear pulled its head from the bag. Helen’s best shawl was now draped around its neck. Ignoring the shawl, the beast continued to claw at the bag, tossing out clothes and pamphlets until it reached a paper sack full of candy. Grabbing the bag in its mouth, the bear shook it vigorously, scattering candy on the ground and looking, Helen thought, as disapproving as her aunt would have looked under similar circumstances.
Helen’s Aunt Bridget was what many would call a God-fearing woman. God was, in fact, the only personage Aunt Bridget feared. Aunt Bridget was wealthy, having outlived a husband who had been a very successful banker. She was stubborn and did not put up with foolishness. She regarded horehound candy as one of many forms of foolishness.
Helen’s mother had died of a fever when Helen was six. When Helen remembered her mother, she remembered her laughter first. Her mother had been a happy woman, always laughing and joking. Helen remembered her papa as a pair of arms that held her and scratchy kisses that smelled sweetly of tobacco.
According to Aunt Bridget, Helen’s father had been a ne’er-dowell, some sort of criminal. Helen’s mother had met and married him against her family’s wishes. He had been sent away to the penitentiary when Helen was five, and Helen’s mother had come to live with Aunt Bridget.
According to Aunt Bridget, Helen was very lucky that Aunt Bridget had been there to take her and her mother in, and to keep Helen from the orphanage when her mother died. Helen was not entirely convinced that this was lucky, having wondered at times if the orphanage might not be a cheerier place than her aunt’s house, a mansion filled with ancient furniture and equally ancient servants.
Aunt Bridget disapproved of candy. She disapproved of dime novels. She disapproved of fun, and she disapproved of Helen. Aunt Bridget’s disapproval was, in a sense, the indirect cause of Helen’s current position in a tree.
When the American Temperance Society started a Chicago chapter, Helen’s aunt had been one of the first to join. After all, she disapproved of drinking. Aunt Bridget had taken a grim pleasure in the Society’s holy war against the demon rum, writing letters to the newspapers, singing hymns outside the local tavern, coercing family friends into signing the Temperance Pledge.
Helen, leading a sheltered life under her aunt’s control, had welcomed the Temperance Society activities. They had provided her with an opportunity to leave the house, to sing in the streets, and to catch a glimpse of another world—the dark and intriguing world of saloons and drunkards and the women who consorted with them.
Not long after the formation of the chapter, Miss Paxon, a Temperance lecturer who had letters of introduction from Society chapter presidents in New York and Boston, had come to town. When she arrived, she checked into a respectable downtown hotel, but that lasted only until Aunt Bridget met her. “You’ll be my guest for as long as you are in the city,” Aunt Bridget insisted.
And so Miss Paxon, a tall blond woman with piercing blue eyes, came to stay in one of Aunt Bridget’s many spare rooms. Helen’s aunt was very happy about this. Though Aunt Bridget did not say so, Helen knew that this was another skirmish in the ongoing war between her aunt and Mrs. Thompson, the president of the Temperance Society chapter. By having such an august visitor as her guest, Aunt Bridget had somehow won.
That Friday, Miss Paxon spoke at the Temperance Society’s regular evening meeting and told them of her mission. She was going to California, she told the assembled ladies. “The good Lord has called me to do his work and I, his humble servant, have promised to obey. I am called to California on a mission of love, a rescue mission, a holy mission to save the men of California.”
Miss Paxon was a powerful speaker, especially when it came to descriptions of drunkenness and depravity. The picture she painted of conditions in California had some women reaching for their handkerchiefs, while others (including Helen’s aunt) clenched their fists.
Helen sat at Aunt Bridget’s side, watching Miss Paxon exhort the crowd. As she watched, she wondered what it would be like to hear a call. Helen wanted very badly to go to California, that distant land of gold. Was that the same as hearing a call? She would gladly help Miss Paxon with her work. Helen suspected that was not the same as hearing a call, but maybe she just wasn’t listening hard enough.
At the podium, Miss Paxon warmed to her subject, speaking of the great work that she could do—if only she had the resolve, if only she had the courage, if only she had the support of the women of the nation. She lingered on this last part. She needed their prayers, but she needed more than that. She needed funding to support her work.
Her audience was greatly moved. They wept; they applauded. Mrs. Thompson passed through the audience with a little basket, and the assembled ladies reached into their purses and donated generously. Then Helen’s aunt stood up and said that she would, from her own pocket, match the money collected in Mrs. Thompson’s basket.
Miss Paxon thanked them all for their generosity and thanked Helen’s aunt in particular. Aunt Bridget smiled in triumph, and the meeting ended with ringing applause.
That evening, Miss Paxon and Aunt Bridget lingered over tea in the drawing room. Helen retired, ostensibly to her bed, but actually to Miss Paxon’s room. She wanted to talk to Miss Paxon in private; she wanted to discuss what constituted a call. She wanted to ask Miss Paxon to take her to California.
It was a warm spring evening, and Helen opened the window to let a breath of fresh air into the room. As luck would have it, the breeze from the open window stirred the papers on the small writing desk, sending them fluttering to the floor. Helen hurried to gather the papers, glancing at them as she did so. For the most part, they were pamphlets and flyers related to Temperance Society activities in various cities, but the paper that caught Helen’s eye was something else.
“Gitana will tell your future,” it proclaimed in bold type. Beneath the type was a picture of Miss Paxon, draped in exotic scarves and smiling mysteriously.
Helen stared at the flyer, mystified. Why would a respectable Temperance lecturer be telling fortunes? Unless she wasn�
�t really a respectable Temperance lecturer.
Helen rummaged through the other papers—the ones on the desk and the ones in Miss Paxon’s satchel on the floor. She felt guilty doing it, but she justified her action to herself. This could, she thought, be part of the good Lord’s plan. He had sent a breeze to disturb the papers to help Helen in her quest to do his work. It was a bit of a stretch, she realized, but it comforted her some.
Among the papers she found other flyers advertising Miss Paxon’s services. The woman was a spiritualist, a dancing instructor, and a professor of mesmerism and phrenology. There were playbills from several theaters advertising “the amazing Gitana.” A sketch showed Miss Paxon dressed in a costume made mostly of feathers, holding a large boa constrictor.
When Miss Paxon returned to the room, Helen was sitting in a rocking chair by the window, clutching the flyers. The single candle that burned on the mantelpiece cast a wavering, uncertain light. The shadows shifted and moved around Helen like wild creatures—now running, now lying still.
“Helen,” Miss Paxon said softly, “what are you doing here?” “Please close the door,” Helen said. She was not sure what to do. She had, before coming to the room, prepared an earnest speech about her desire to go with Miss Paxon and save the unfortunate drunkards in California. Now that speech no longer seemed appropriate. “I wanted to talk with you,” Helen said. “I have to go to California with you.”
“I see.” Miss Paxon glanced at the papers in Helen’s hand and frowned. “You’ve been looking through my papers?”
“I just came to talk. The wind blew the papers, and…” Helen was flustered, but determined. “I looked at them when I gathered them up.”
Miss Paxon seated herself in the straight-backed chair on the other side of the window. “Why do you have to go to California?” she asked calmly.
“I want to get away from this place.” Helen waved the hand holding the flyers in a gesture that included the dark-paneled walls that seemed to press closer in the dim light. “I can help you with Temperance lecturing.” She glanced down at the flyers. “Or whatever you do. I just want…” She struggled for words.
Miss Paxon smiled. “You want to go on an adventure. You want to run away and see the world.” She studied Helen. The girl could make trouble by showing those flyers to her aunt. Helen had not threatened to do that just yet, but Miss Paxon knew that the possibility was there.
“Can you dance?” Miss Paxon asked.
“A little,” Helen said. “I like music, and I can play the pianoforte.”
“Of course you can.” Every young woman of means could play the pianoforte. “Can you act on stage?”
Helen’s eyes widened. “I’ve never tried it.”
“You don’t seem to be shy. Your voice is pleasant enough.” Miss Paxon had been traveling alone for the last year. It had gotten a little lonely. It might be pleasant to have a young companion for a time, if the companion were the right sort of person.
Miss Paxon reached for the deck of tarot cards that she kept in her traveling bag. The cards were wrapped in a scarf of Indian silk. Keeping her eyes on Helen, Miss Paxon unwrapped them and held them out to the younger woman.
“Cut the cards,” she said. “I’ll make my decision then.”
“Why?” Helen asked. “Why should I cut the cards?”
Miss Paxon smiled. “The cards will tell me who you are. Then I will know if I wish to travel with you.”
“But you know who I am,” Helen said. “I’m Helen Harris.” “Cut the cards.” Miss Paxon’s voice allowed no disagreement. Helen reached out. Her hand was shaking as she touched the deck. She had never played with cards; her aunt did not approve of games of chance. She did not know how the cards could tell Miss Paxon anything at all.
She cut, then Miss Paxon took the cards from her hand and studied the card on top. The picture showed a young man in motley clothing, wandering along the edge of a cliff. Over his shoulder, he carried a bag that Helen somehow knew held all his worldly goods. Behind him, a little white dog danced on its hind legs.
“It’s the Fool,” Miss Paxon said, smiling. “The divine innocent. If he falls, the angels will catch him and set him down safe. He is guided by his foolishness and innocence, but there’s no harm in him, and no harm comes to him.” She studied Helen for a moment, then said, “Be ready to leave tomorrow.”
Helen stared at her as she wrapped the cards in the silk scarf and placed them in her bag. “Will you talk to my aunt?” she said, her voice shaking. “Will you persuade her?”
Miss Paxon shrugged. “Write your aunt a letter explaining that you’ve decided to go west. Pack a bag—just one bag. Leave the rest to me.”
They left at dawn the next day, catching the stage west. When Helen asked Miss Paxon if she had spoken to Aunt Bridget, Miss Paxon just shrugged. “I left your letter on her tea tray. I didn’t see there was any need for further discussion,” she said.
They went to California, spending a good portion of the money Miss Paxon had collected from the Temperance Society on the trip. By the time they reached San Francisco, Helen had steeled herself to participate in anything Miss Paxon proposed—from stage acting to dancing instruction to mesmerism. But rather than pursuing any of those occupations, Miss Paxon arranged a meeting with the local chapter of the Temperance Society, a group of half a dozen women.
When Helen asked her about this decision, Miss Paxon smiled. “You thought we’d do something more exotic? Maybe a little sinful?” Miss Paxon shook her head. “Plenty of sin in this city already,” she said. “But virtue is in short supply.”
At the time of Miss Paxon’s arrival, San Francisco’s chapter of the Temperance Society had not managed to close any saloons. They had all but given up on the cause.
Miss Paxon rallied them. She asked Mrs. Victor, the leader of the group, to take her to the city’s most prosperous tavern. Outside that establishment, she asked Mrs. Victor, a woman with a voice deep enough to shake the windows, to lead the group in hymns. There in the street, over the rattle of dicing cups and the laughter of drunks, Miss Paxon shouted prayers. She exhorted the men in the tavern to come out and save themselves.
The owner was one of the first out the door. “Ladies,” he said to them, “how long do you intend to keep up this racket?”
Miss Paxon smiled at him. “Until every man in your establishment has signed the Temperance Pledge,” she said.
The man shook his head. “You’ll wait ’til hell freezes over,” he said good-naturedly, and returned to the bar.
The ladies continued their hymns, and Miss Paxon resumed her shouting. A number of drinking men good-naturedly abandoned their posts at the bar and, responding to Miss Paxon’s call, joined the ladies for a time, singing “Rock of Ages” with gusto and cheerfully signing Temperance pledges with inebriated scrawls. A man named Harold repented with great zest and fervor, weeping on Helen’s shoulder. “Hold my hand to give me courage,” he asked Helen, and of course she did. He planted a whiskey-scented kiss on her cheek and thanked her from the bottom of his heart.
The owner came out a second time. A good portion of his clientele was now in the street, singing drunkenly. “Ladies, you are ruining my business,” he said. “How can I persuade you to be on your way?”
Miss Paxon smiled again. “Repent and pray with us,” she said. “Leave off this evil business.”
The owner returned to his establishment, shaking his head. Harold left Helen then and went to stand by Miss Paxon. Mrs. Victor had begun another hymn, so Helen could not hear their conversation. But Harold moved away purposefully through the crowd. He was no longer weeping. In fact, he was grinning. He headed into the tavern.
Not five minutes later, the owner came out a third time. “Ladies!” he shouted. “Your devotion has touched my heart.” And he went on at length about how their singing had reminded him of his dear wife, long departed. It was her death that had turned him to drink, he said, and listening to them he had realized how it mus
t pain his wife (who was now among the angels) to see him drinking and selling the demon rum to lead others into the path of wickedness. But he was a changed man; he would sell rum no more; he would change this place of evil into a Temperance hotel, where only tea and healthful beverages were served. And he had them, the ladies of the Temperance Society, to thank for it.
It seemed to Helen that his delivery lacked conviction. Twice, he glanced at Harold, who smiled and nodded and winked, more than once. “Why are you winking?” she whispered to him.
“Winking back tears,” he said. “Tears of joy.”
Helen had her doubts about this.
“So you can be on your way,” the owner said. “Happy that you have done your duty.”
Miss Paxon smiled. “I think we’d best stay a time and pray with you.”
“You have done so much already,” the man cried. “I cannot ask any more.”
“You do not have to ask,” Miss Paxon said. “We are only too glad to be here in your time of need. We rejoice with the angels in heaven at your salvation. Let us sing together.” She turned to Mrs. Victor, who was ready to begin another hymn.
“I must express my gratitude,” the man shouted. “How can I help you, who have helped me so much? I know! I can help by spreading the word to others. You must take this message to the hills. As depraved and wicked as we are here in San Francisco, the men in the mine fields are ten times worse. But you good ladies could melt their hearts and get them to mend their ways.” He turned to the drunks and the gamblers who had come from his saloon and all the other saloons on the street. “Men!” he cried. “We must take up a collection. We must send these good ladies to the place where they can do the most good. To the mining camps—where men are sorely in need of their assistance.”
And the tavern owner took off his hat and took a hundred-dollar bill from his pocket. “I’ll start the collection with this,” he said, “for I am the greatest sinner amongst you.”
“Let the young lady pass the hat!” Harold cried.