by Pat Murphy
“If I never smell another orange, it will be too soon,” said a woman who was stepping off the gangplank. She was a slender woman with auburn curls, wearing a dress the color of new leaves. She seemed to be speaking to him.
“Why is that?” he asked, craning his neck to search for Mrs. North. He couldn’t see her anywhere.
“The hold beneath my stateroom was filled with oranges, and I’ve been smelling them day and night for the past two months,” she said. “It was a lovely smell at first, but after two months, I would kill for a peach or an apple, anything but an orange.”
Max nodded politely, but did not respond further.
“Are you meeting someone?” she asked.
“Yes, but I seem to have lost her in the crowd,” he said, frowning.
“A woman?”
“Yes, yes,” Max said, a little impatient now. He was concerned for Mrs. North’s well-being. Though she craved adventure, he thought she would be bewildered by the noise and confusion of the dock. He thought the woman who addressed him was being rather brazen. “She was standing by the railing when the boat docked. There she is!” The woman in gray was making her way down the gangplank. “Mrs. North!” he called, waving frantically. “Mrs. North.”
She did not look his way.
Max felt someone tap him on the shoulder. The auburn-haired woman again. “That’s Miss Hector,” she said. “She’s come to San Francisco here to manage a school.” She smiled. “But as it happens, my name is North. Audrey North.”
Max stared, dumbstruck.
“You must be Max.”
Max realized his mouth was hanging open and closed it. With an effort, he managed something like a smile. “Mrs. North,” he said. “Audrey. My apologies. I didn’t think…I thought…”
She smiled, an expression far more genuine than his own.
“What did you think?” she asked.
“I thought you would be older.” He spoke without thinking, then colored when he realized how very impertinent he sounded.
But she continued smiling. “I’m forty-four years old,” she said. “That’s quite old enough, I think.”
Her smile widened as she waited for him to respond. He could not think of what to say. He had imagined a plain, solid woman—rather like Mrs. Selby with a literary bent.
“I thought…” he hesitated, then continued, “I thought you would be in mourning.”
She shook her head. “I wore black all the way to Panama,” she said. “That was all I could manage. In the end, the heat decided me. I commissioned this dress from a local seamstress.”
Max nodded, but could think of nothing to say. So many men came to California and left their past behind. He supposed it was only fair for a woman to do the same.
“And what else did you think?” she asked.
The last of the passengers was stepping off the gangplank. “I thought you might like to get to a hotel and freshen up,” he stammered.
Somehow, despite his confusion, he managed to find her luggage and engage a horse-drawn cab to take them to the hotel where he had been staying, a clean, unpretentious establishment on a quiet street. On the way to the hotel, she asked about Sarah. He told her when he had seen the girl last, how she had been then. “The snow has melted in the high country,” he said. “She’ll be looking for me, wondering where I am.” He asked about her journey, and she told him about Latin American fruit markets and storms at sea.
At last, they reached the hotel. He unloaded her bags and she arranged for a room with Mrs. Price, the proprietress.
“Why don’t you take a moment to refresh yourself?” Mrs. Price suggested. “If you would like a bit of tea, I could bring that to the parlor.”
“That would be lovely.”
An hour later, Max was sitting in the parlor by the front window when Audrey came downstairs. She settled on the horsehair sofa across from him with a sigh.
“Do you know, it feels like the entire city is rolling beneath me,” she said. “I can feel every wave and swell.”
“You’ve got your sea legs,” Max said, then caught himself. He blushed at having mentioned her legs, something one just did not do.
She stared at him, scrutinizing his face with those intense blue eyes.
“My apologies,” he said hastily. “I’ve been in the hills too long. I…”
“Max,” she interrupted. “Why are you afraid of me?”
“Afraid of you?” He shook his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I…”
“I’ve seen it before. I make men nervous.”
“My dear lady, you’re being foolish. I can’t imagine…”
“You’ve been terrified since you met me at the ship. You’ve been blushing and babbling about nonsense.” She considered him with a steady gaze.
He avoided her eyes and started to bluster, knowing he was blustering but unable to stop himself. “Terrified? My dear lady, you’ve been on that ship too long. You’re talking to a man who has faced grizzly bears. Afraid of you? I don’t know what you could be thinking. I…”
She giggled. No question about it. She definitely giggled. He stopped in mid-sentence, glaring at her.
“Exactly what do you find so amusing?” he asked.
“I was remembering a letter you wrote to me a few years ago. You told me that you had tried to explain to Sarah what lying was. She didn’t understand no matter what you said, until she mentioned that you were afraid of Jasper Davis. You told her you weren’t. In your letter, you went on at some length about your ability to bluster. And after you had gone on for some time, Sarah said…”
“You’re lying.” He finished her sentence.
Audrey grinned at him. “You certainly didn’t exaggerate your ability to bluster,” she said.
He nodded. Her eyes were as blue as Sarah’s—a brilliant, honest blue that caught the light, sparkling with good humor. “Well, I’ve had a lot of practice. People expect an author to bluster a bit, I think.”
“You do it very well.”
“Thank you.” He studied her face.
“Remember—we’ve been corresponding honestly for some thirteen years now.”
He leaned back in his chair, still considering her face. “If I’d known we were going to meet, I might have been a little more careful about what I wrote.”
She shrugged. “Too late now. I know your secrets.”
“Not all of them.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Maybe not all, but enough.”
“All right, you asked why I’m afraid of you. I’m afraid because you’re very pretty and you’re very smart and it’s been years since I was around a lady.” He paused. “I was expecting you to be rather stout and matronly.”
“You sound a little disappointed.”
“Just surprised. I expected a woman in mourning, and I found a woman who giggles at the first sign of bluster.”
She nodded. “You were expecting Mrs. Audrey North, a stout New England matron. But when I crossed the isthmus, I decided that it was time to reinvent myself. I am no longer Mrs. North of New Bedford, grieving widow of Captain North, pillar of her community. Oh, no—I’m simply Audrey North, a woman looking for her niece among the wolves. And I’m certainly not a lady.”
Max nodded. “There’s a long tradition of men coming west to leave their past behind,” he said slowly.
“That’s exactly it,” she said. “I’m starting fresh.”
“All right then,” he said. “Let’s start again.”
She reached out, took his hand, and squeezed it, a gesture of sudden affection. “That’s better,” she said. “Now I’m not afraid of you, and you aren’t afraid of me.”
“Were you ever afraid of me?” he asked.
“Terrified,” she said steadily. Then she waved her hand, dismissing the past. “Now that all that is settled, let’s talk about where we go from here. I understand that we’d best take a riverboat to Sacramento and catch a stagecoach from there to Nevada City. Then perhaps by ho
rse and mule from there to Selby Flat. I am looking forward to seeing my niece as soon as possible.”
20 THE CIRCUS COMES TO TOWN
“Clothes make the man.
Naked people have little or no influence in society.”
—Mark Twain
MEANWHILE, IN THE CALIFORNIA FOOTHILLS, Professor Serunca’s traveling circus was preparing to head for Selby Flat. Before they left, Helen raised the question of Sarah’s clothing. She spoke first with Miss Paxon.
“I wonder,” she began cautiously. “If Sarah is corning to town with us, I think…perhaps we should make sure she is properly dressed.”
Miss Paxon glanced over at Sarah. The wild girl was standing beside Ruby, patting the elephant’s trunk. Beka sat at Sarah’s feet, gazing up at the elephant. The poodles had gathered around them. It looked for all the world like Sarah was introducing Ruby to the wolf. As she watched, Ruby’s trunk snaked over to Beka, sniffing at the wolf and being sniffed in return.
Miss Paxon studied Sarah’s legs. “Yes, you have a point. No point in starting a riot on our way into town.”
“I have a skirt she could wear,” Helen said.
“Why don’t you ask her if she’d like to do that?”
Sarah caught the scent of Helen’s nervousness as the woman approached, clutching a bundle of fabric. Sarah turned away from Ruby and Beka, leaving the two animals to continue getting to know each other, and studied Helen’s face. “What is wrong?” she asked Helen.
“I thought you might like to borrow a skirt,” Helen said. “So that you will be properly dressed when we get to town.” She shook out the bundle in her hands and held up her blue serge traveling skirt. “The length is about right. We’d have to pin the waist in a bit, but otherwise it would be just fine.”
Sarah stared at the fabric. “Why would I wear that?”
“Because all the ladies do.” Helen paused, gazing at Sarah’s exposed legs. “And you really need to cover your legs.”
Sarah frowned. “I am not cold.”
“You don’t wear a skirt to keep warm,” Helen said. “You wear it so no one can see your legs.”
Sarah looked down at her legs. “Why?” she said.
Helen hesitated. “Well, because…because it’s not proper.” She frowned, realizing how much she sounded like Aunt Bridget. Climbing trees wasn’t proper. Eating horehound candy wasn’t proper.
Sarah looked puzzled.
Helen touched her own skirt. “It will look quite nice,” she said uncertainly. “People will stare if you go to town dressed like that.”
Sarah studied Helen’s skirt. “Last night,” she said, “when you were climbing down from the tree, your skirt got in your way.”
Helen nodded. “Yes, well…it does get in the way sometimes. But ladies are supposed to wear skirts.”
Sarah fingered one side of the skirt that Helen held, examining the material. She tried to imagine running with that fabric rustling around her legs. She smiled, thinking of what it would be like to wear a skirt when she was with the wolf pack. The wolves could have a great tug of war, pulling on it. “It would be difficult to fight in a skirt,” she said.
“Ladies don’t fight,” Helen said.
Sarah stared at her. “They don’t?” She shook her head. “I can’t be a lady.”
Helen looked very distressed. Sarah scratched her head, trying to think of what she might do to make Helen happy. She was already fond of this woman. Sarah glanced at the Professor and Cassidy, who were loading the wagon. “I could cover my legs with trousers,” she said.
“Ladies don’t wear trousers.”
Sarah shrugged. This information seemed irrelevant. “Or I could wear these clothes. I am happy like this.”
In the end, after some discussion, Sarah borrowed a pair of the Professor’s trousers. Helen buttoned her shirt and instructed her to keep it buttoned. She braided Sarah’s hair, which Sarah rather liked, mutual grooming being a common way to show affection in the pack.
Eventually, the wagon was packed, Sarah was dressed, and they were ready to go. Sarah persuaded Beka to ride in the wagon with her and Helen, while Cassidy drove. Miss Paxon and the Professor rode Ruby.
For a time, the wolf was content. She and Sarah had hunted for quail in the predawn hours, and they were both well fed. She slept by Sarah’s feet.
As they traveled, Cassidy and Helen chatted about this and that—about the weather, about Cassidy’s travels, about how England differed from the States. Sarah listened—having nothing to contribute to the conversation—and watched the two of them. She was aware of another conversation, one of gestures and touches, that accompanied the flow of words. Cassidy touched Helen’s hand to get her attention and point to the woodpecker flitting past. Helen tilted her head, looking up at Cassidy as if his comment on the heat were most original. Cassidy put his arm around Helen when instructing her on how to drive the wagon, putting his hands over hers and demonstrating how she should hold the reins. The couple did not comment on this unvoiced conversation, and that puzzled Sarah.
As the day wore on, Beka grew restless, nervously licking her lips and gazing from the wagon with apprehension. Finally, she licked Sarah’s hand and stood, making her intention to leave the wagon clear. Taking the loose sleeve of Sarah’s shirt in her teeth, she tugged on Sarah’s arm, whining low in her throat.
“What’s going on?” Helen asked.
“Beka will go,” Sarah said. She stroked Beka’s ears. She shared the wolf’s nervousness, the sense that she was going where she did not belong. But she did not want to turn back now.
Leaning down, Sarah rubbed her head against the wolf’s in a gesture of affection, as she gently freed her sleeve from the wolf’s grip. Beka licked Sarah’s face, then turned away, leaping down from the moving wagon and heading back into the hills.
“Where is she going?” Helen was clearly concerned about the wolf and about Sarah. She took Sarah’s hand and squeezed it. “Why is she going?”
“She is going to the hills to hunt,” Sarah said. “She is going because she does not belong here.”
Holding Helen’s hand, Sarah watched the wolf disappear into the brush.
Selby Flat had changed considerably since Max had led his mule down from Grizzly Hill to report the murders of Sarah’s parents. The town now had a blacksmith, a butcher, a baker, a bootmaker, a justice of the peace, a doctor, and a barber, and never mind that the last two were the same man. Though Selby’s was still the largest hotel in town, three rival establishment offered rooms as well. The town included a stagecoach stop, four saloons, two general stores, and a school.
Masons had established a lodge in town, as had the Ancient Order of E Clampus Vitus, an equally secret society. The Masons had constructed a fine brick meeting hall near the center of town. The Clampers, as the members of E Clampus Vitus called themselves, met in an old miners’ log cabin down by Rock Creek.
The Ancient Order of E Clampus Vitus claimed origins in 4004 B.C. Some spoilsports said that the order had been created in the late 1850s as a drunken response to the Masons, the Odd Fellows, and other fraternal orders. Not so, said the Clampers. Adam, the Clampers said, was the Order’s first Noble Grand Humbug, the title given to the leader of a chapter. The society counted among its past members such luminaries as Solomon, George Washington, and Henry Ward Beecher. Since these individuals were conveniently dead, they could neither confirm nor deny their membership in the order.
The Clampers’ motto was Credo Quia Absurdum, “I believe because it is absurd.” Their meeting hall was designated the Hall of Comparative Ovations. Their symbol was the Staff of Relief. Upon initiation, all members were given “titles of equal importance.” Their avowed goal was to assist widows and orphans, particularly the widows. Their primary activity was initiating new candidates in extravagant and drunken rituals. They were reputed to do good works, but the truth of that was difficult to ascertain. Since no Clamper could ever recall the events of a meeting on the following da
y, the activities of the society were assured of remaining secret.
Selby Flat’s main street was the same dirt track that Max had walked along back in 1850—wider to accommodate stagecoaches, but just as dusty in the summer and just as muddy in the winter. The street was occupied by scratching chickens as often as it was by other kinds of traffic.
On the summer day that the circus came to town, a sow and her piglets were asleep in the shade by the barbershop. A couple of hounds had been sleeping there, but the pig had run them off. She outweighed the dogs by a considerable margin and wasn’t about to put up with any nonsense. If she wanted a spot in the shade, she took it. She was sleeping soundly when the distant trumpeting of an elephant disturbed her rest.
“What the hell was that?” asked an idler on the porch of Selby’s Hotel. “I never heard anything like it.”
Ruby led the way, carrying Professor Serunca on her back. The Professor shouted as people poured from the saloons and the hotels to stand on the sidewalks and gape. “The show starts an hour before sunset!” he shouted. “Come one, come all! You’ll be astounded! You’ll be amazed!” An easy promise to make: The crowd was already astounded and amazed by the colorful invasion of their town.
Cassidy was mounted on the white mare. As he rode, he juggled brightly colored balls. The medium-sized poodles rode on the backs of the bay horses that pulled the wagon. Miss Paxon stood on the wagon seat, and whenever she lifted her hand and shouted “Up!” the poodles stood on their hind legs and waved their paws, dancing to stay balanced.
Helen drove the wagon, clutching the reins and watching the horses nervously. She’d never driven a wagon before. From dime novels, smuggled into her aunt’s house and read surreptitiously, she knew that horses were always running off with women so that dashing young men could rescue them. Cassidy had assured her that this would not happen, but she did not quite believe his reassurances. Still, she had enjoyed the time he spent teaching her to drive the wagon.
Sarah sat quietly at Helen’s side, not waving or shouting. She watched the people who thronged the streets, examining their faces with grave interest as she passed. No one paid any attention to the quiet figure on the wagon seat.