She had rejected him! His own wife, the one woman he thought he could love. No, she had not rejected him—he had failed her! That was it. And now he had lost his erection. This was unbelievable. Was he so incapable of love that when he did feel something special for a woman, he couldn’t perform? Did he have to hate them first, the way he hated Elly and all the others?
He didn’t know how to handle this. His wife lay practically writhing in pain, weeping—on their wedding night! He walked over to the bed, bending over her. “What the hell is wrong, Irene?”
“I…don’t know. It was…so painful.”
“If you’d just let me get it done—”
“No! Something is wrong! Oh, god, Chad, I’m so sorry! I’m so sorry! I don’t know what to do!”
He began dressing nervously. “I’ll leave you alone for a while.”
“No. I don’t want to be alone. Not on our wedding night.”
He came back over, bending down to kiss her cheek. “I’m sorry I hurt you. You rest. I’ll figure out what we can do. Maybe I can find a doctor.”
“No! I don’t want a doctor looking at me!”
“Well, we sure as hell have to do something, now, don’t we?”
She shivered at his anger and frustration, and she wanted to die. He finished dressing. “I’ll be back in a while.”
He was suddenly out the door, and Irene stared at it, astounded that he had left her at such a terrifying moment. She needed him with her. She just wanted him to hold her in his arms and tell her everything would be all right. Ramon would have. He would have been willing to be patient, to give her some time, to try once more and then let her see her own doctor if it didn’t work. Most of all, he would still love her just as much. It was not love she had seen in Chad’s eyes when he left. He looked as if he were an angry, stubborn, betrayed little boy.
Chad stood in the hallway, considered going back inside, then decided against it. He needed to know right way that he was still all right. He knew a couple of whores who would keep quiet. They would understand that sometimes a man’s wedding night was disastrous because his wife was such a prissy virgin. He would go see them, prove he was just as much a man as ever. Maybe in turn they could recommend a doctor who knew about these things, someone who could get over here and discreetly fix whatever was wrong with his wife.
He headed down the back stairs, making sure no one saw him.
Irene had never known such pain and humiliation, nor would she ever forget the terror her husband put her through that first night. After she lay there alone and confused for two hours, Chad finally returned, bringing with him a doctor she had never met. She well knew Denver had its share of quacks, with people of all walks of life coming to the gold town. She begged Chad to wait until morning and get her own family doctor, but Chad refused.
“I can trust this man not to say anything. I don’t want others knowing I couldn’t break in my own wife on her wedding night!”
The words had stung, and she felt like a miserable failure. She was sure she smelled cheap perfume on her husband. Had she frustrated him so that he had gone to a whore on their wedding night? Was this doctor a man who administered to such women? Chad made her drink something that made the room spin. His face became a blur. She felt the horror and humiliation of being exposed to the strange doctor, yet she felt lifeless, unable to speak or resist. The pain he caused her then was beyond description, and she passed out.
She awoke to a gray morning. Rain continued to fall, and Irene began to shiver. She felt cold, too cold for a warm spring morning. She felt a hand on her shoulder then. “How do you feel, honey?”
She pulled away. “Don’t touch me,” she answered, wanting to vomit. “What did that man do to me?”
She heard a deep sigh, felt Chad sitting up. “He said some women just can’t…there’s a kind of wall there a man has to break through. With some women it’s just a little more difficult, that’s all. It has to be done with an instrument.”
She curled up more tightly. “How dare you let him do that to me?” she groaned.
He reached over and picked up a thin cigar, lighting it. “Irene, it had to be done. You want to be a wife to me, don’t you? I only did it to help you.”
“You visited a whore last night after you left me, didn’t you?”
He puffed on the cigar. “There are things you have to understand about men, Irene. One is that you can’t take a man halfway. It’s almost painful. I had to get some relief, that’s all. I only did it because I didn’t want to hurt you. It was obvious I wasn’t going to be able—” He sighed again and rose. “Once you’re healed, everything will be fine.”
Just like that, she thought. Everything will be fine. You weren’t man enough to stay with me when I needed you most, to hold me when I needed holding, to be a little more unselfish about your own needs. You couldn’t have waited one or two days, let me see my own doctor.
How she wanted to spit it all out to him. But her marriage was so new, and she wondered if he was right about a man’s needs. What did she know about such things? Maybe he really thought he had done the right thing. But she could not imagine that Ramon would have reacted the same way. Even after what she had just been through, she could still think of Ramon, knew that she would have let him make love to her, even though such a thing seemed revolting at the moment.
Chad came around to her side of the bed, kneeling beside her. “I’m sorry for what you went through, Irene.” She closed her eyes, and he touched her face. This time, to his relief, she did not pull away. How could he explain what her rejection had done to him? He could never explain it, because to do so would be to tell her about his mother’s lovers, about his brutal childhood. He thought she would be disgusted, scared by what he’d seen and known. “I promise,” he continued. “Once the pain and bleeding subside, you’ll feel just fine, and then we can try it again.” He moved to take one of her hands. It felt cold and clammy, and he hoped she was not going to get sick because of this. How would he explain it? “Just promise me you won’t…you won’t tell anyone,” he asked. “It would be very embarrassing for me.”
“What about me? I feel like a failure,” she said weakly.
He set his cigar aside. “Maybe we both failed each other a little last night.”
But I didn’t do anything wrong, she wanted to argue. I couldn’t help it. “Why couldn’t you just have stayed with me, Chad?”
He squeezed her hand. “Believe me, honey, it’s best to get these things done and over with. It’s hard for me, too, you know. I mean, a man wants to be the first, you know? He doesn’t want his wife’s virginity taken by some doctor.”
She groaned at the words, grasping her stomach, loathing the memory, wondering now if she could ever enjoy making love. The thought of letting him try again was horrifying, yet she knew that she must, or her marriage would end up just like her mother and father’s. She did not want a marriage on paper only, with her husband running off to the whores.
“I’m sorry…the way it happened,” she told him, swallowing her pride, deciding that with her marriage so new, she must work quickly to patch up the hard feelings, try to get things off to a better start. “Please be patient with me, Chad. Don’t go running off to those other women.”
“Never again,” he lied. “You rest, and I’ll have breakfast sent up. Later today we’ll load up and head south. I’ll bet it’s not raining there. You’ll feel better soon, Irene—with the warm sunshine, in the country you love.”
Her eyes teared. She needed to cry, needed someone to talk to, but there was no one. “Yes,” she answered. “That does sound good.”
He patted her hand and rose to dress. The rest of the day was agony for Irene. She felt nauseated, and she bled heavily. She forced herself to get up and wash and dress, forced down a little food, forced a look of happiness when her parents came to see them off. Her mother hugged her, asking if she was “all right.” Irene knew what she meant. How could she tell the woman what had happen
ed? And she certainly couldn’t tell her father. She would have to suffer the horrifying memory in silence. Who would understand anyway?
She gave her father an extra hug, suddenly longing to stay with him, to go back to the mountains. She knew she would not see him for a long time. He was leaving right away for Georgetown, where silver had been discovered. He intended to check out the silver strikes for himself, do some investing. Silver was the new hope for Colorado’s sagging economy. From Georgetown, Kirk would head for San Francisco, to take care of some business and sell the remaining Kirkland mines there. Business had grown to such an extent in Denver that it was becoming increasingly difficult to continue to manage all the Kirkland holdings still in San Francisco.
At that moment Irene wished she could go with her father, wished she was a little girl again, living in a little shack in the Sierras, back in a time when, in spite of poverty, her life was carefree and full of adventure.
With great effort she managed to climb into the carriage, waving good-bye to everyone. Once their baggage was loaded up, they were off, headed for Colorado Springs. Irene could feel the heavy bleeding, prayed nothing would show. The pain was still with her, and she made the long journey nearly unconscious on Chad’s shoulder. She told herself she had to get through this, had to rise above it. After all, she was a married woman now. Nothing could be changed. There was no going back.
The rain continued to pour, and snow in the higher elevations continued to melt at an unusually rapid rate. Colorado’s Front Range was deluged, the hills around the headwaters of Cherry Creek were saturated. People who had lived around Cherry Creek for several years had never known it to swell dangerously beyond its banks, so no one was overly worried about the unusually wet weather. A few people who lived on the edge of the creek evacuated, but it was only an annual spring precaution.
Like most others, Ramon also was not worried. He lay in bed late in May, thinking about things forbidden, wondering about Irene. Had Chad been good to her on their wedding night? Had he been gentle, considerate? It could not have been easy for someone as innocent as Irene. He knew, because he remembered the fear in Elena’s eyes, remembered the pain he had brought her. He had even offered to wait, but Elena had wanted it done. He felt there was a fragility about such things for a woman; sensed that the wrong move, the wrong words that first night with Elena could have affected all the rest of their nights together.
He sighed and turned onto his side, feeling tense, angry. He had felt this way ever since Irene’s wedding day. Night after night he was tortured with the vision of Chad Jacobs taking what Ramon still felt should rightfully belong to him. He wondered if he would ever get over this feeling, hated himself for it. He wondered sometimes if he should just leave Denver, perhaps go to Cheyenne, another growing town to the north. Or he could go someplace like San Francisco, or farther east, to St. Louis.
It would be best, yet he knew he would not go, because to remain in Denver meant being near Irene, even though he could not have her or even express his feelings in any way. She belonged to another man now, and he belonged to another woman. Such sacred relationships were not to be soiled, and he had often confessed his sinful thoughts, lighting candles, asking the local priest at the Catholic church he attended to pray for his soul. These feelings must end once and for all.
He heard a rumbling sound then, frowned, strained to listen. He had never before heard anything like it. The ground seemed actually to shake, and he thought at first perhaps the area had been hit by a rare earthquake. The rumbling grew louder, and at the very instant he realized what was happening, the house literally exploded.
He was at once engulfed in cold water. The bed was swept out from under him. He grasped for Elena, but she was gone. He thought at first he was going to drown, as he struggled in dark waters, trying to get air. At last his head bobbed above water, and he gasped for breath. “Elena,” he screamed. “Elena! Juan! Where are you!”
He realized he was in the open air, being washed along with pieces of buildings and logs. A huge boulder smashed into his side, and he cried out from the pain of broken ribs. He tried to see in the darkness. Where was Elena! And where was little Juan! He could hear screams, cries of agony, and the rumble of the rushing water was deafening. Buildings creaked and snapped, and his own house had been completely swept away by some sudden surge of flooding water. He figured it must have taken the route of Cherry Creek.
He moved in a kind of strange dream world. Nothing was real. People were screaming for their families and loved ones, and rain poured out of the dark night sky. He was cold, so cold. He could feel he was naked, his long johns swept right off him by the torrent. Every breath brought excruciating pain from his broken ribs. He grabbed out at things to keep from sinking, finally catching a tree branch that kept him afloat. “Elena,” he shouted, the tears coming then. “My God, Elena, where are you! Juan! Juan!”
Was this his punishment for lying in bed and thinking about Irene? The woman who loved him, who had given him a child—the woman who should have been first in his heart—might be dead. And his son, his little Juan! How could he bear such a loss! He could only pray that somehow both of them had survived.
Irene basked in the warm sun, her only comfort. She sat in a lounge chair outside the new Colorado Springs branch of the Kirkland Hotel. She and Chad had been in the new resort town for nearly two weeks now, Chad busily taking care of business matters for Bea while there. For the first week after their disastrous wedding night Irene’s pain and bleeding had continued. Chad seemed anxious and frustrated. As far as Irene could tell, he had not gone to see any prostitutes, but after that first night she felt she could never fully trust him again.
Chad’s inability to understand what she was going through was a great disappointment. The fun and friendship they had shared before they got married had suddenly vanished, and Irene convinced herself that it was her own attitude that was the problem. She had to get over this, had to get this marriage quickly back to where it should be, or it would be finished before it began. She refused to let it be a failure, to bring shame and embarrassment to the rest of the family.
She had finally managed to dredge up the courage to allow Chad his husbandly rights. On that second try at mating with his new wife, he was not gentle. She had sensed his anger, and was hurt by it. Perhaps he was still upset that he had technically not been the one to “break her in,” as he had so crudely put it. He had shoved hard, brought more of the terrible pain, but she had gritted her teeth and had not cried out. She wanted so desperately to be a proper wife. Chad had ravaged her, made her feel used, as if she were a whore.
After that first time he had wanted her every night, and she wondered if most men were that way. He at least seemed to soften toward her, to lose some of the anger. He became gentler, prompting her, touching her in ways that ignited at least some desire on her part. But she was so tired and still in pain. She didn’t want to make love so often, but she kept quiet about it, convinced it was a wife’s duty to submit to her husband’s needs.
She had imagined it all so differently. She hoped that maybe once they were home in their own house, and especially if she could get pregnant and give Chad a child, things would get better. After all, he did love her. He had told her so night after night; and he certainly seemed to enjoy making love to her, even if she didn’t experience the same satisfaction. Maybe a woman wasn’t supposed to like it, maybe even the whores didn’t like it, just did it for the money.
But now, lying here in the warm sun, with Chad gone off on business, she felt her thoughts turn again to Ramon. She knew love was not supposed to be like this at all. It would all have been different with Ramon. But it had not been Ramon who put the wedding band on her finger, and it was not Ramon who shared her bed.
Her eyes stung with tears. She loved Chad, and she knew the main problem was her inability to forgive him for that first night. It still gave her nightmares. The memory of it made it difficult to want to give Chad any pleasure at
all. She told herself she must forgive him, forget what had happened. They would soon set off for Europe. This was supposed to be the most exciting time of her life. But she was tired, so tired. She had been unable to eat and had lost weight, and when she looked in the mirror she saw a face too pale.
She closed her eyes, enjoying the peace and quiet. Moments later her temporary peace was interrupted when she heard the clatter of a carriage approaching at nearly breakneck speed. She opened her eyes to see it was Chad. He ordered the driver to stop and climbed down. “We’ve got to get packed,” he said, rushing up to her. “We’ll load the carriage and head back home.” His eyes were wide with concern.
“Chad, what is it?”
He helped her up. “There’s been a terrible flood in Denver. The wire came in while I was at the post office. We’ve got to get back there!”
“A flood! In Denver? There’s only little Cherry Creek—”
“That’s what flooded. It came unexpectedly, a literal wall of water, they say, in the middle of the night. So many people are dead, Irene. Half the town was washed away!”
“Oh, dear God,” she murmured, hurrying with him up to their room. She tried to remember just what buildings were closest to the creek, and she wondered if the offices of the Rocky Mountain News had been lost. What else was near the creek? She hastily threw some clothes into a carpetbag, then felt a rush of cold through her veins. Ramon lived near the creek. The flood had hit during the night, when people were sleeping. So many must have died. Could Ramon have been one of them?
Sick fear filled her heart. Please, not Ramon! In spite of the fact that they could never be together, just knowing Ramon existed had been a comfort to her. To think he could be dead brought a great empty, lonely feeling to her soul.
In the Shadow of the Mountains Page 38