by Fools Gold
She had regained her composure as she sat down again opposite Mark.
“You said hello to your friend?” Mark asked.
“No,” Libby said. “I made a mistake. It wasn’t my friend at all.” She picked up her knife and fork. “This chicken looks delicious,” she said. “I hope I haven’t caused yours to get too cold.”
“To be truthful with you, I do not get too excited over meat,” Mark Hopkins said sadly. “I much prefer vegetables, which are still of disgustingly poor quality in this city. I am hoping you and your gardens will soon remedy that. You’ll be able to keep my new store supplied and become a very rich woman in the process, of course.”
Libby managed a convincing smile, but it was as if she were a puppeteer, operating the strings that moved her mouth. At the end of the meal as Mark Hopkins escorted her back to her hotel he asked, “Have you given any more thought to buying land here? There are still some good bargains, but I doubt whether there will be much longer.”
“Very well,” Libby said decisively. “I’ll take your advice. I’ll have some money sent down to you and you can buy me land. I’m sure I can’t go wrong if I rely on your guidance.”
“You’re a wise woman,” Mark said. “And you won’t be sorry. In fact, if I were the marrying kind, and I’d already made the fortune I intend to make, I’d ask you to marry me—although I’m sure you wouldn’t want to be stuck with an old dodderer of almost forty.”
Libby smiled, touched again by his kindness.
The next day she met with Señor Alfonso, the Chilean merchant. He was a little round man with a pencil-thin moustache and soulful eyes. His appearance was of a harmless puppy dog but a few words with him convinced Libby that he was very astute and probably very powerful.
“I have a very good trade going,” he said suspiciously. “How I know you don’t take my trade from me?”
“Señor Alfonso, I’m just one woman,” Libby said demurely. “I am growing crops to support myself and feed my family. How could I possibly be a threat to you?”
Señor Alfonso shrugged expressively. “Very well,” he said. “Alfonso will see what he can do for you. Just tell me what you need and Alfonso will get it for you.”
When Libby left him she had put in an order for apple, peach, cherry, and lemon trees as well as grape seedlings and as many fruit and vegetable seeds as he could procure. Feeling well-satisfied, she took the girls shopping and let them choose toys and candies while she treated herself to luxuries like soap and perfume, hair ornaments and silk stockings. They met Ah Fong at the dock, looking very pleased with himself.
“I meet a man from my village,” he said. “He will take letter home for me with money to look for bride. Also I tell him I will need men to work in the fields. Also,” he said, grinning, “I get Chinese spices and noodles and now I eat proper Chinese food again. You wait till you taste, missee.”
Later that day they sailed back up to Sacramento. By the time the first rains came in early November, Libby was installed in her snug little house with new furniture and real carpets on the floor. Potatoes and winter cabbage, turnips and beets were planted in newly dug ground. A shipment of fruit trees and grape vines was on its way from Chile and she enjoyed frequent visits from her Mexican neighbors, learning Spanish as she taught Conchita English. In fact, she would have been truly content for the first time in her life if it had not been for the empty void where her heart should have been.
CHAPTER 31
THE RAINS BEGAN in earnest. When the creek came out of its banks and raced wildly down into the valley sweeping down tree trunks and other debris with it, Libby was glad she had taken Ah Fong’s advice about positioning her house. She sat in front of the fire as the children played with new dolls or did their lessons in newly bought schoolbooks, and sewed clothes for the baby. She was glad she had something to do and something to look forward to, or the future would be impossibly bleak. So she put all her energy into the coming baby, sewing lace around delicate pillows and embroidering coverlets.
How surprised my mother and my governess would be now if they could see that I did finally learn my embroidery stitches, she thought with a smile. Then she was overcome with sadness that her mother would probably never see her new grandchild. For a moment she picked up a pen, intent on letting her mother at least know she was safe. Then she remembered her father’s threats to take the children and have her certified insane. It was better that they not know where she was, at least not yet. She thought of home with longing, especially now that Christmas was approaching—good food, good company, presents and parlor games—and suddenly it wasn’t enough that she was able to provide a warm secure house for her children. She wanted more. She wanted friends and family and a place where she belonged.
With these memories foremost in her thoughts, she put extra effort into preparations for Christmas as she made pies and puddings. She decorated the house with pine branches and red berries and at night after the children were asleep she made doll cradles to match the real cradle waiting for the baby. A box under her bed was full of sugar mice and Chinese teacups, oranges and nuts, hair ribbons and bright beads which she had bought in San Francisco for the children’s Christmas stockings.
At least they will have a happy Christmas, she thought wistfully.
On Christmas Eve she was shelling nuts in front of the fire when a sudden spasm of pain swept over her. She glanced at the little girls, sitting together cutting out Christmas garlands from paper. The second jolt of pain was so strong it made her gasp out loud.
“What’s the matter, Mama?” Eden asked, glancing up.
“Go out to the kitchen and get Ah Fong,” she said, trying not to convey any alarm. “Put on your cape, or you’ll get wet.”
Ah Fong came over right away, his hands feathery from the goose he was plucking. “Missee want?” he asked.
“Ah Fong, go to the neighbors and get Dona Con-chita,” Libby said in a low voice.
“Now?” Ah Fong asked, looking out at the rain that was sheeting down. “I not finish goose yet.”
“Now,” Libby said firmly. “I think the baby’s coming.”
Ah Fong looked at her suspiciously. “Ahh!” he said. “I go now. Take mule, not horse—too much mud.”
“Yes, take the mule,” Libby said, trying to talk and breathe at the same time as the next pain shook her. She went through to her room and paced up and down, unwilling to go to bed while the pains came quicker and quicker. At last they were coming so fast and strong that she undressed herself and lay down, the sweat pouring down her face. She fought not to cry out and frighten the children.
Her first two deliveries had been a blur of pain and there had been a doctor and nurses hovering around her all the time. She was very conscious that both the girls had been small babies and this baby was in no way small. The pains came faster and faster until she scarcely had time to catch her breath between them. Her abdomen felt as if it was encircled by a steel girdle which was being squeezed tighter and tighter until breathing became impossible. When the pains got too bad she bit down on the bedsheet to stop herself from crying out and frightening the children.
The children, however, had never seen their mother in bed in the middle of the day and sensed that something strange was going on.
“Mama, can we bring you something?” Eden asked, her Little face tight and pinched with alarm.
“Don’t you feel good, Mama?” Bliss demanded. “You want me and Eden to come and sit with you?”
“Be good children and leave Mommy alone,” she managed to gasp between pains. “Everything’s going to be fine. Ah Fong will be back with Dona Conchita any moment.”
But as the minutes turned to hours and no help arrived, she began to feel very frightened. The storm worsened, the rain drummed against the wooden roof and the wind screamed around the chimney. She felt hot, sticky blood running down her legs and still the baby did not come. She watched the light fade from the sky and told herself that no help would arrive once i
t got dark.
It got darker and darker.
“Mama, it’s supper time,” Eden whispered around the door. “Bliss is hungry.”
“Can you be a big girl and light the lamp for me?” Libby asked in scarcely more than a whisper herself. “Then you can take sissy over to the kitchen and see what you can find to eat.”
“I can do it, Mama,” Eden said.
Soon soft light filled the room, but it was of little comfort. It occurred to her for the first time that she might die and she wept for the baby she would not see and for the children who would have no parents. She prayed that Conchita would bring them up as her own. She slipped in and out of consciousness, welcoming each brief respite when time was suspended and the world became unreal. It seemed to her that she was a ring of molten iron and was being forged in a furnace, stretched and molded into an impossible shape which must surely break her apart. Outside, the dark red glow of the furnace was the light of an open door and it would take only a small effort to fly toward it.
She was dimly conscious of a last great rending, then fireflies hovered around her face, disembodied heads floated in starlight, and she was suddenly cold.
“Gracias a Dios. Est un nino,” she heard a distant voice saying and from very far away came the sound of a baby crying. A warm hand was holding hers. Someone was sponging her forehead.
They’re laying me out for burial, she thought and was glad that she was not going to be buried unwashed. That’s good, she told herself and slipped away.
When she heard noises again she opened her eyes very cautiously because the light was fierce and she was frightened to see whether she was in heaven or hell. She was very surprised, therefore, to find that it was ordinary daylight, a weak, wintry sun, shining in through her window. Someone was humming in the next room, a sweet, high voice that she couldn’t quite identify.
“Mother?” she asked, because the voice reminded her of childhood.
Immediately, a face looked around the door and a small, round woman scurried to her side. “Ah, querida, you wake,” she said, smoothing back the wet hair on Libby’s forehead. “Miguel!”
Libby recognized Don Miguel’s gray hair as he stood uneasily in the doorway. “My felicitations, Señora Libby,” he said.
“Is it daytime?” Libby asked.
“Si. Is Navidad. Christmas,” Miguel said, smiling broadly. “You have the Christmas baby.”
“My baby?” Libby asked, cautiously bringing her hand down to her stomach. “I have my baby?”
“Si. He sleeps. Beautiful boy,” Conchita said, beaming at Libby.
“I have a son,” Libby said, closing her eyes in contentment.
“Thanks to God,” Conchita said. She wiped a tear.
“My wife fears last night that we come too late,” Miguel said softly. “There was so much water. We could not cross. When we come we find you lying like dead and the baby just arrived. My wife sit with you all night and pray.”
“Thank you,” Libby said, reaching out to touch her hand.
“De nada,” Conchita said. She moved across the room and bent to the cradle on the floor. Then she placed Libby’s son in her arms. At the sudden movement he opened dark-blue eyes and seemed to look straight up at his mother, staring at her unblinking.
“He is a beautiful boy,” Libby said.
“What name you give him?” Miguel asked.
Libby wanted to say Gabriel but she had a sudden inspiration. “He’s a Christmas baby so he should have a Christmas name,” she said.
“Jesus. Jesus good name,” Conchita said reverently.
Libby smiled. “I can’t call him Jesus,” she said. “Imagine opening the door and shouting, “Jesus, lunch is ready.”
“Is good name in Spanish,” Conchita insisted. “Many men called Jesus.”
“Not in English,” Libby said. “He’d get teased in school. But I could call him Noel. That’s a nice name, isn’t it? And I’d like to call him Michael after Don Miguel.”
“Not after his father?” Miguel asked, showing concern.
“His father is gone,” Libby said. “I must forget the past and think of the future now.”
CHAPTER 32
THE WINTER RAINS ended, spring came with sweet-scented winds and new green grass, Libby’s strength returned gradually, and Noel Michael continued to thrive. He lay on his blanket, watching his mother and sisters, his dark eyes seeming to be interested in everything around him, breaking into a body-wiggling smile when anyone paid him attention. To Libby he was still a miracle. She would watch him as she nursed him, marveling at the chubby hand clutching her finger, still amazed that she had produced anything so perfect. To the girls he was a large doll. He allowed himself to be carried and held, tucked in blankets and dressed in bonnets for long periods before finally putting up a howl of protest when Bliss squeezed him too tightly.
In the fields Ah Fong was watching over new shoots as if they were all his own new babies. When he wasn’t pulling up any weed that dared to appear between his plants, he was prowling the Flores’ land, coming home with a sack full of cow patties which he then dug into his soil. He made the final arrangements for four Chinese field workers to join him and Libby had a construction crew build a line of one-room cabins behind the main house. The first winter cabbage was harvested and sold. The first spring crops were planted in their place and a procession of ox carts bumped along the rutted track up from Sacramento bearing fruit trees with roots in burlap, gnarled, dead-seeming grape vine stock, and bags of seed corn, plus packets of tomato, squash, melon, and pepper seeds. Libby looked doubtfully at the peppers. “I’m not sure about these,” she said. “Will anyone want them?”
“Jalapeños, si!” Conchita said excitedly. “All miners like jalapeños. Very hot! Make good chili beans.”
So the peppers were planted and Ah Fong started work on planting the fruit trees, looking out each day for his expected helpers. The two lemon trees went next to the house where Libby could admire them and she started a grape arbor for shade. Don Miguel also suggested she plant a cactus hedge around her property to keep out wandering deer and cattle. He gave her plants to start one around her fields but she rejected the idea of one around her house.
“I chose this site for the view,” she said. “I don’t want to look at a lot of prickly leaves.”
“One day you might be glad of it,” Don Miguel said.
She did, however, accept from him a fierce half-grown puppy to train as a watch dog. He proved to be afraid of nothing and tireless, chasing the two kittens onto the roof when there was nothing else to do. He also became completely devoted to Libby, not letting her out of his sight for a moment.
Up in the mines the water slowly dropped in the riverbeds and allowed more miners to go back to work. It had been a hard winter for many of them. They had not made the profits of the year before and those newly arrived last fall had been near to starving. Rumors of highway robbery and marauding bands of outlaws filtered down from the mines, magnified with each telling. Libby, occupied with her family and her farm, was little worried about the rumors. They rarely saw strangers, not being on a main route up from Sacramento. She felt that her house was far enough removed to be safe and went unconcerned about her chores.
She was in the middle of hanging out a line full of washing when she heard the sound of hoofbeats. She looked up to see Don Miguel and his son riding up in great agitation.
“Thank God you are safe,” Don Miguel said as she came to the door. “We feared the bandits had come to you too.”
“Bandits?” Libby looked up in alarm.
“We were herding cattle for spring branding when a group of armed men rode up,” Manuel said, glancing across at his father.
“They pointed guns at us. At first I think they kill us and I say my last prayers,” Don Miguel said. “But they keep us there, with many guns pointed at us while their brothers drive off twenty of my cattle.”
“That’s terrible,” Libby said.
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��When they are done, they laugh and tell me that they will be back for more, whenever they want them,” Don Miguel added.
“But they can’t get away with it,” Libby said. “Could you identify them? You must go to the sheriff in Sutter Creek.”
Don Miguel shook his head with a bitter smile. “What would he do? He is Yankee like these men. He is probably friend of these men. There is no justice for Californios in Yankee territory.”
“We must get more men, as I have been saying, Papa,” Manuel said. “We will hire our own guns to guard the cattle day and night.”
“I do not like shooting and killing,” Don Miguel said. “I do not wish to be responsible for bloodshed.”
“Then what is the answer?” Manuel demanded angrily.
Don Miguel shrugged expressively. “I do not know, my son,” he said. “God’s will is the answer.” He turned his deep-set eyes to Libby. “But more I am concerned for you, Señora Libby. Living alone with these animals around. Will you not bring the children to our house until these bad the men have gone?”
“Thank you, Don Miguel,” Libby said, “but I can’t leave my fields now. This is the most important time of year. I’ll have four Chinese employees to supervise by next week and crops to be taken to market as soon as they are harvested. Besides, what could they steal from me? My money is in the bank and I have nothing of real value in the house.”
Don Miguel looked at her with embarrassment. “These men are not just hungry for food,” he said softly.
“I keep my rifle loaded at all times,” Libby said, “and Buster barks when he hears anything suspicious.”