Pacifica

by Jill Zeller

  I wanted to believe him but I needed time to think and was relieved to get back to the hotel room and Cecil.

  The next several days a car came to take me to the studio, where I answered questions from a young man named Mr. Kobal with a perpetual nervous smirk on his face. A secretary took notes, and I talked about my encounters with the rebels—leaving out one very personal detail, of course.

  Things went well until the third day, when Mr. Kobal smirked at me and asked, “So tell me about the assault. What was it like? Did he—have his way with you? Did you scratch him?” The secretary made a slight cough, kept her eyes on her notebook. “Did the other men watch? Did any of the other men—”

  I was on my feet. I raised my hand, and the secretary watched me, pencil poised over her paper. My heart galloped painfully under my ribs, thundering louder than the cavalry charge in the battle scene we had watched.

  How could Edison—he wrote about that? “That will not be in the picture. I never agreed to that.” My voice quavered, my throat tight with anger.

  “I’m sorry, Miss Lynch, but I have to ask these questions. I have to understand your emotion, how you felt. We’re bringing this story to the public in a moving picture. This incident—and your rescue by the Colonel. The audience will love it.'

  Before I knew what I was doing, I walked toward the screen door at the end of the hallway. I was still walking when I realized it was really too far back to the hotel. And I didn’t want to go back there, run into Edison and tell him what a despicable liar he was.

  If I had read his pieces in the papers, I would have known, but I didn’t want to read them. I didn’t want to look back too much, for too long. Telling the story this far had been good for me—I was sleeping better, and the constant dread had faded.

  But I had never planned to relive that moment in the cantina. I needed it not to be true, for the horrifying fact was that this could be Francisco Robles’ child I was carrying, not his brother’s at all.

  This thought hit me hard, washing nausea into my throat. I found a park bench and sat, watching streetcars and bicycles passing by, listening to birds and rumbles and honking horns, smelling the dank wet smell of the pond behind me, coated with algae and ducks.

  I could end it. I knew it was possible. Papa had helped society women who didn’t want a child, for whatever reason. Millie would know what to do. A tear stung my left eye. Oh, Millie, why haven’t you answered us? It had been a week, and nothing. By now, she would be on her way to Singapore.

  Sitting still with my hands white-knuckled before me, I tried to remember, to sort out exactly what had happened. Like a salve on a wound, I had coated over the memory of the rape, not wanting to feel the dirt and slime of it and him, wishing I had torn out his eyes or picked up one of those rifles and shot him myself.

  But I couldn’t remember it. He had entered me, I knew that, I was pretty sure, that is, but I didn’t know if he finished; he smelled of alcohol and was drunk; he was soft when he started, then hardened. Tears flooded from my eyes, and I wiped my nose. He didn’t finish, did he? This baby belongs to Jesus Robles. I know it. It has to be.

  “Miss, are you all right?”

  A policeman stood before me, an older man with a mass of wrinkles and a graying mustache. His head tilted as he looked at me.

  Ah, he probably wonders if I’m drunk. “I’m fine, officer. Just a lady’s moment, taking a rest.”

  I must have looked a mess, my face blotched and wet, sitting alone on a park bench in downtown Los Angeles.

  “Yes, miss, I understand. But you should go home.” His hands were behind him; I could see his baton. “All kinds of ruffians around here, wanting to take advantage of a young lady alone.”

  I thanked him and got up. Gallantly, he gave me his handkerchief. “I hope your troubles end soon, miss. Good day.”

  He ambled off, and I walked unsteadily toward the street, breathing in the warm air, a breeze cool on my forehead. Looking back, I saw him watching me. A streetcar rumbled past, and I boarded it, pushing my way toward an empty seat, and listened to the conversation and the bell as the big steel car took me back to the hotel.

  Edison might have been in his room but I didn’t look for him. Cecil ran to see me, and I hugged him close before starting to pack.

  I had only one thing in mind, then, and it was crazy and impulsive, but I had money now, and would get even more from my drawings, and Edison could have his motion picture. I didn’t want a cent out of that.

  I slipped my new wardrobe into my valise, cramming everything in. Cecil under my arm, I walked through the lobby, not even wanting to check out. I didn’t want Edison to know I had left, not until he tried my room and found me gone.

  Sunlight streamed from the setting sun, gilding the city buildings with orange gold, brightening the palms waving in a breeze. My heart seemed to fly upward, and settle somewhere in that endless blue above me. My journey had begun again.

  “Miss Lynch. Miss Lynch!” A young voice, just as the hotel doors swung shut behind me.

  I almost didn’t turn around, but something stopped me. One of the bellmen stood before me, a boy no more than thirteen, I thought.

  “Telegram, Miss Lynch. Came this morning.”

  Taking it, I gave him a coin. My hand shook as I opened it, standing in the street while people walked around me, a stone in a river.

  Got your wire—Arrive Los Angeles—Starlighter 7pm tonight—Milo.

  She had signed it Milo, in case Edison read this. too. I stood shaking, then laughed aloud, clapping my hand over my mouth to keep my happiness from exploding all over the curious passersby.

  9

  “I presume that is good news?” There was a hand on my arm, the voice male and soft. I turned, and looked straight into the smiling face of Dennis Purfoy.

  I was never so glad to see anyone in my life. My hand closed over his, impulsive, perhaps, but my emotions were boiling.

  “Yes, yes. Very good news.” I asked him how he was and he replied better than ever. His skin had lost that pale and bruised look, and he had, since I saw him weeks ago at the hospital, gained back some of the weight he had lost. If there was hurt or grief in his eyes, I couldn’t see it. He looked as happy to see me as I was to see him.

  “They told me at the studio that you were here, and Edison, too.” He looked up at the building as if expecting to see Edison gazing down at us. “That he’s got you signed to do a moving picture about your ordeal in Mexico.”

  A dark weight appeared deep in my gut. “There isn’t going to be a moving picture. At least, not one that I will have anything to do with.”

  Dennis’s eyes narrowed. He pushed out his chin and looked me over, as if seeing my valise and little Cecil under my arm for the first time.

  “You’re not leaving. You can’t leave.” His arm gripped me tighter.

  “I am.” Around my throat and chest a steel band tightened. “Or I was. Now—” I looked down at my telegram. The steel band dissolved, and tears stung my eyes.

  Ondine, you fool. Don’t fall apart now.

  The next thing I knew Dennis had me by the arm, and I was moments later sitting in his yellow coupe. As I struggled with myself, the bright Los Angeles city folded away from us as he drove east, into a valley of orchards and canals. The air lost its tinge of motor oil and sand, and now I smelled oranges, thousands of them, dotting the trees with color. We turned off the road onto a drive flanked by date palms, and at the end stood a hacienda, long and low, of white-washed walls and a red-tiled roof, and trotting toward us was Duke.

  Carrying my valise, Dennis led me inside. I stood in a wide room, a cool tile floor and furnishings of dark wood, so different from the slim, square chairs of the house in Hollywood. The place smelled of cut grass, for at the back were French doors standing open to a patio and a watered lawn.

  My throat closed. I couldn’t catch my breath. My heart seemed to explode with speed, filling all my chest. I must have put my hand to my throat, because D
ennis’s arms were around me as my knees buckled.

  And then tears. Millions of them unwept, coughed up with sobs. I couldn’t stop and he held me, and I howled.

  Tears of anger, bitterness, revenge. Hurt and fear. Tears for Philip and Jesus and poor, poor Hammer. Harriet. And Millie, struggling against herself and her world.

  Then I was sitting on a leather sofa, Cecil on my lap, and Merlin bowing, offering a cup of hot tea. Dennis sat beside me, Duke beside him. He had not turned away in embarrassment or disgust. He held my hand, and when I looked up, he was watching me and I glimpsed his own deep well of grief.

  The steel band was gone. Relief swept up through me, and I could smile, breathe. You’ve been waiting all your life for a cry like that, Ondine.

  Dennis said, “Nola, are you all right now? What happened to you? I should have taken better care of you.”

  “Oh, Dennis. You had your own worries. Far, far worse than mine.”

  “Is that true?” He took my teacup from me, set it on a low, square table draped in a woven runner of geometric pattern, such as Milo and I had seen in Arizona.

  He let the silence hang between us. What does he know about me? I wondered. Had Edison told him everything? I looked away, across the room at a huge painting on the far wall, of a landscape of swirling clouds, rising cliffs, caught in the golden light of an invisible sun.

  Something about the landscape drew me. I saw how the artist had used his paints to capture this ethereal light, and I thought I could walk into that golden valley and everything would be new and without memory.

  “Albert Bierstadt, Sunset in Yosemite.” Dennis’s voice softened. “I’ve had it for some years, but until I bought this place, I had nowhere to hang it.”

  His hand tightened on mine. “I saw your drawings, in the papers, reading Edison’s articles. You know, people are clamoring for prints of those. Have you ever thought of using oils?”

  I couldn’t answer. Of course I had thought of it, but never, it seemed, had found the time to try.

  He continued. “There is one illustration in particular that people want. It’s of the revolutionary Colonel. Robles was his name, am I right? There’s something noble and wild that you captured there.”

  He stopped. My hand was up, as if commanding him to say no more. When I saw I had done this, my face warmed.

  “You know, Nola. You can stay here as long as you like. It’s quiet and peaceful. Merlin can take care of you while I’m at the office—”

  I was shaking my head, my lips pressed together.

  Does he know? That I am pregnant? Did that doctor tell him?

  Shifting away from me, Dennis dropped my hand. “I’m not saying this very well. I don’t mean you’re helpless or anything. Far from it. But after what you’ve been through, not just in Mexico but this mess with me, and Loretta, you should take some time to just take care of yourself. That’s what I mean.”

  And who’s taking care of you? Here I was with my selfish worries, and Dennis, recovering from near drowning and the suicide of his wife was in a far worse state. I was just a single girl who happened to be pregnant, but he was a new widower and a survivor of tragedy.

  Ondine, your journey doesn’t end here, but takes a turn. I touched his hands, clasped white-knuckled on his lap, and then, without thinking, pushed a strand of his sandy hair from his eyes.

  He had confessed to me, about his failures and his brush with death. Now it was my turn.

  So I told him. About the assault, and the execution, and finally, about the child. For this, I told him it was Jesus Robles’ child, and that was no rape but a considered and loving sharing of respect.

  “He said he took me hostage because I was brave,” I said. “Everyone I’ve met on my journey has shone a bravery I couldn’t imagine.”

  And I told him about them all, Philip and Sephira Picou. the Farraguts, Etienne and Armand, the Asher twins, Hammer, Paloma del Castro—all of them.

  “And you, Dennis. You’re brave. You loved Loretta and you risked your heart to save her.”

  Dennis looked up at the painting, and then at me. A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. But not at his eyes.

  He said, “Will you stay, at least for a while?”

  I knew I didn’t really want to leave, so I nodded. Where this part of the journey would take me, I couldn’t have said.

  “I’ll talk to Edison,” Dennis added, chin raised. His voice changed, too, confident and firm, like a chief of Water and Power should sound. “He’s got to understand there are limits to your story, things that don’t need to be told or sensationalized.”

  “Thank you.” I leaned back on the sofa, my body languid and cool, tightenings unwound and uncoiled. “There’s one more thing.”

  I handed him my telegram, still crumpled in my hand. “We have to go pick up Milo.”

  Reading the telegram, I saw Dennis frown slightly, understood that maybe he had thoughts about Milo that were unfounded.

  But he spoke before I could say anything. “I could see Milo adored Loretta. Every man adored her.

  “I don’t think they—”

  “That doesn’t matter. There’ve always been men around Loretta.” He turned to me, still frowning, his lips pressed and unsure. “But I could see Milo adores you, too. And you were—together so much.” He scratched his cheek, looked away. “It’s none of my business.”

  I wanted to laugh, but pulled it back, sat up, took his hand again. “Oh no, it’s not like that between us. Has never been. We’re more like sister—and brother.”

  Dennis’s breath went out in a quick huff and he inhaled. It was decided. I would be staying, Milo would be staying, and my grand journey took a new path, one straight into the sun and the mountains.

  Ondine, the journey pauses as it began, in hope and dream, as all journeys do.

  Then

  Palaces stand on the shores, in colors of ivory and sandstone. In my hand is another hand, that of a small boy who clings to me as he watches gulls wheeling overhead. Children run and play on the grass, chasing a small dog. A family picnics near a stand of gum trees, behind them an elaborate pavilion with a domed roof.

  It’s a rare clear spring day in San Francisco. I have lived here since August, 1916, selling my prints to publishing houses and Mr. Lowe’s newspaper. Emilio and I are a team now; he has joined my one-woman journey into experience.

  Now, in spring of 1919, the war is over, ending last November in shouts of jubilee and tears. My brother fought and returned a broken man, my mother writes to me. At least he returned alive. And just today, as I picked up the daily paper on my way out the door, I saw the headline and article, and I felt as if I had been punched in the stomach.

  My landlady told me Mr. Lowe had telephoned, with a message to come to see him at the paper offices. I knew why he wanted to see me. But with raw throat, and trembling hands, I decided instead to take Emilio to the Marina to see the old Exposition grounds, and maybe a great ship or two plying the waters of the Bay.

  Emilio looks at the birds. It’s birds he wants to see, not dogs or children or the great edifices built for the Pan Pacific International Exposition, some of which have been removed and replaced by rows of stucco houses. His hazel eyes search the sky for anything visible—at night it’s stars and today he points with happy glee at a dirigible floating past.

  For me the clear day, the scent of smoke and salt, the screams of happy children are not so wonderful as usual. I feel as if I had swallowed stones. But I must fight black thoughts that crowd behind me like eager beggars; for Emilio’s sake I must fight.

  Beside the little lake, a group of children watch a flotilla of small boats. Emilio asks, with eyebrows raised, and finger pointing, if he can go to join them. Today he will not watch the sky, but the water instead.

  He runs toward them, little tweed jacket flapping, nearly losing his cap, but he gets his hand on it before it flies off. He is a strong boy, fiercely defending his needs. I sit on a nearby bench to watch; he
re a patch of sunlight warms my freezing hands.

  Zapata is dead. Assassinated by rivals. Reading all the news I could get of the revolution—even the occasional letter from Paloma de Castro—I had followed the struggle. Hearing that Zapata has been killed brings back my dark cloud, as if my stomach is twisted by wringing hands. During my stay with Dennis this dread was followed by many days of being unable to get out of bed. For a time I could distract myself with working on the moving picture about my adventures. It garnered great interest when it showed in the movie halls, then over the following months forgotten when news of the war in Europe overran our hearts and minds.

  But I could not forget. Daily I was reminded of Jesus and his brother as my belly grew with my child. I could not have survived it without Millie’s help.

  She is in Chicago now, in medical school, as a woman. No one except me knows that she is one and the same as Milo Dudek, the brave assistant surgeon of Leopardo, not even Mr. Lowe or Dennis. Her humorous letters about her struggles with professors and the male students delight me profoundly.

  I try to clear my head by thinking of Harriet Farragut. I wrote several letters during my days at Dennis’s hacienda, but none were returned until a few days before Emilio was born.

  I opened it with trembling hands, my throat tight. But the opening warmed my heart as she wrote, Dear, dear Nola. Mr Farragut had kept my letters from her. After Colon, she wrote, I was not fit for anything. It was as if I had lost all power for thought or movement. In the end I felt as if I had lost Daniel all over again.

  When they returned home to the United States, she insisted upon teaching again. Mr Farragut, she wrote, was opposed, but I wore him down.

  It is the only cure for grief, dear Nola. Working to see that others may survive. One avenue for women is teaching, and although I have not yet found a teaching position, I will never give up until I do.