Calico Palace

by Gwen Bristow

  Mrs. Chase was passing toasted crackers with cheese, dishes of olives and nuts, and pretty little cakes. Kendra managed a few nibbles. She kept thinking,

  —Nothing lasts forever. Before long I can get out of here. I can be alone. Oh thank God I’ll be alone. Please don’t let Loren ever guess this. Please, please let me get over it, some day, somehow.

  At last it was time to go. They began thanking Mr. and Mrs. Chase for a pleasant evening. Kendra said the proper phrases, and found herself on her way home with Ralph and Serena. It seemed a long way, but they got there and said good night.

  Kendra went upstairs to her room. She saw a faint glow in the grate. They had plenty of fuel now, for a ship had come in with a cargo of coal and Loren had bought enough to last the winter. Kendra built up the fire and watched the little flames run among the coals. She heard Ralph try the front door to make sure it was locked, and his footsteps as he went to his and Serena’s bedroom downstairs.

  She took off her clothes, but she was not sleepy. She had never felt more wide awake. Lighting a candle, she put on a dressing-gown and sat in front of the fire. The flames crackled cheerfully. Outside, the wind was rising. Kendra put her head into her hands and forgot about the fire and the wind and all the other sounds in the house and out of it; she forgot everything but Ted and how happy he had made her for a little while.

  —Why can’t I cry? she wondered.

  It would be such a relief to cry. To do anything. Anything but sit here and remember, sit here with her hands holding her throbbing temples, her heart thumping in her chest, her spirit torn into little pieces of pain because she missed Ted as she had never missed anybody else, she wanted him as she had never wanted anything else in her life.

  There was a knock on the door. Kendra started. The knock came again and she heard Serena’s voice.

  “Mrs. Shields?”

  —What on earth, Kendra thought. Why does she have to bother me now?

  With an effort she went to open the door. “Yes, Serena?”

  Serena was holding a woolen wrapper around her. There was a smile of apology on her rosy innocent face.

  “I’m sorry to trouble you, Mrs. Shields, but I thought this might be important. It’s a letter for you.”

  Kendra heard her with a puzzled frown. “A letter?”

  Serena held out a folded paper sealed with wax. “A strange man knocked at the front door,” she explained, “and Ralph answered. The man gave him this and asked him to take it to you.”

  A hundred cudgels began to beat on Kendra’s head. She took the letter, and managed to say “Thank you.” Serena went downstairs. Closing the door, Kendra went back to her chair by the fireplace.

  She broke the seal and unfolded the paper. As she saw the writing her hands began to shake so that the paper rattled between them. Her eyes clouded; it was several seconds before she could steady them enough to read.

  Kendra my dear,

  Tonight I heard that song again. Love is like a dragonfly. If you don’t know what it did to me—but of course you know.

  I came down from Sacramento yesterday on the schooner. My plan was to take the first boat for Honolulu. I had no plan to see you. I had asked about you, was told you had married Loren Shields. A good chap, I suppose; I saw him only once, but at any rate I understood that you were done with me.

  So I thought I would go on to Honolulu and let you alone.

  But this evening I walked over to see Mr. Chase. You may remember, before we went to Shiny Gulch last year I put my first gold dust on deposit with him. This evening I went to ask him what time he would be in the store tomorrow so I could get it. But I found his house all lit up and saw horses tethered outside. He was giving a party. I could not see indoors because of the curtains, but I could hear music. Somebody had opened a window. The music was good. I didn’t want to interrupt, but there was no harm in stopping a few minutes to listen.

  Then I heard it. They were playing guitars. They began to sing that song.

  And I was back with you at that ball in the Comet House, dancing to that tune and falling in love.

  I thought if I didn’t see you again I would go mad. I walked to the nearest bar, told them I wanted to see Loren Shields on business, asked where he lived. They told me, and they told me I could not see him now because he was out of town.

  Kendra, a few lines back I said when I heard you had married Loren I understood that you were done with me.

  But are you, Kendra?

  After all there has been between you and me, can you throw it away?

  I am waiting in front. Come down and open the door.

  Come down, Kendra.

  Ted

  32

  KENDRA STOOD UP. SHE walked to the end of the room and back again, holding the letter with both hands. Her hands came together and clasped each other, crushing the letter between them. She looked at the curtain covering the front window. If she should blow out the candle this room would be almost dark, no light but the glow from the fire. Not nearly as bright as the moonlight in the street. She could push the curtain aside and see Ted waiting there. Waiting for her.

  It would be so easy. All she had to do was slip downstairs and open the door. If she went softly, Ralph and Serena would hear nothing, suspect nothing. Her bedroom was at the front of the house, theirs at the back, and the rising wind would blur all other sounds. Nobody would ever know.

  —Nobody, thought Kendra, but me.

  She looked at the bed with its smooth white counterpane. The whole room was like that. Smooth, seemly, well ordered. Like Loren and Loren’s gentle embraces. Nothing about this room reminded her of that rude bumpy covered wagon she had shared with Ted.

  —Nobody would ever know, Kendra thought again. Nobody but me.

  —But I would know.

  She twisted her hands together, hearing Ted’s letter scrunch between them. She seemed to hear her own voice, an angry scornful voice speaking angry scornful words under the trees at Shiny Gulch.

  —You’re a halfway person. That’s what I can’t stand. A coat with one sleeve, a house without a roof, a bridge that stops in the middle of a river—who wants those? Things are no good unless they’re done.

  The crumpled paper dropped out of her hands and fell on the floor. She struck her fist on the mantelpiece. The candle shivered, her shadow shook on the wall. She wondered,

  Was I talking to Ted that day? Or to myself?

  She began walking again, making a path up and down the room. Again her thoughts took words.

  —Kendra, you are not a halfway person. What you do, you do. You’ve always been that way. Always, except for Ted. You love Ted and you hate him too. And Loren? You don’t love Loren and you don’t hate him either. But you do respect him.

  She remembered what Loren had told her just before they were married. He had been in love with her, but while he was in Monterey she had married Ted. “So of course,” said Loren, “I put you out of my mind in that sense.”

  She remembered. He had made a courteous call, to congratulate Ted and bring her a basket of wild strawberries. Then he had gone away, and he had not tried to see her again until Mr. Chase told him about the breakup of her marriage to Ted. Loren was not a halfway person.

  —And you, Kendra, she told herself, you are not going to be one either.

  She picked up the wadded letter from the floor. She was not going to read it again. If she read it again she might lose all her courage. She tore the paper into shreds and threw them into the fire. Taking her candle she went out and made her way down the stairs.

  The house was dark and ghostly. Outside, the wind blew hard. In spite of her woolen dressing-gown Kendra shivered as she went along the hall to Ralph and Serena’s room at the back. Thank heaven they had not yet gone to bed. She could see a line of light under the door, and she heard them moving around.

  She knocked. After a moment the door cracked open and she saw Serena’s startled face.

  “Why, Mrs. Shields!
Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong, but I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble Ralph to go to the door again. The messenger who brought this letter is waiting for an answer, but it concerns a matter of business that will have to wait till my husband comes home. I don’t know anything about it.”

  From inside the room she heard Ralph’s voice. “Something you want me to do, Mrs. Shields?”

  He sounded both dutiful and irritated. Ralph was no doubt almost or quite ready for bed.

  “Yes, please,” said Kendra. “I hate to ask you, Ralph, but it’s getting very cold and if the poor fellow waits much longer he’ll catch pneumonia. Tell him I said there is no reply.”

  “All right, Mrs. Shields, I’ll tell him. Soon as I can put on my shoes and find my overcoat.”

  “Thank you so much,” said Kendra.

  She turned and ran up the staircase and into her own room. The candle blew out as she hurried; she did not care. Her eyes were burning and her throat felt sore. She wanted to scream. She almost did scream. Throwing the candle on the hearth, she clenched her teeth on her sleeve to keep quiet.

  Downstairs, Ralph was not trying to keep quiet. She heard him tramping along the hall and opening the front door. She waited tensely until she heard him come back. Glad his chilly chore was over, Ralph shut the door with a bang. She heard him push the bolt and tramp back down the hall.

  Kendra had wondered why she could not cry. She did not know; she knew only that now she could. She was crying already. Now that Ted had heard her answer she broke down utterly, and fell across the bed while great wrenching sobs tore through her with a force like pain.

  She was crying as she had never cried before and she could not stop. She cried until the sobs wore themselves out and she lay limp on the bed, exhausted, her cheek on the wet pillowcase.

  After a while she realized that she was cold. The fire had died down, and there was nothing left in the grate but a few embers glowing among the ashes. Kendra turned down the coverlet and got into bed. The sheets were like slices of frost. From outside she heard the wind, that wild San Francisco wind, wailing and groaning around the hills.

  Her body ached all over. She remembered Marny’s remark as they rode into Shiny Gulch that first afternoon. “I feel like I’ve been beaten up by experts.”

  She had felt that way too, that day. But she had not minded because she had been so happy. She tried to remember what it was like, that expectant sense of adventure. She could not remember.

  How dark it was. The moonlight was gone. The wind must have blown in more clouds from the sea, for now she heard the rattle of rain.

  The rain had a sort of rhythm, a soothing sound. The sheets were getting warm. Kendra’s taut muscles began to loosen. After a long time she fell asleep.

  When she woke, the rain was still coming down. Through the windows came a gray light that reminded her of the Cynthia’s cabin at Cape Horn. She could not tell what time it was. A clock stood on the bureau, but she had not thought to wind it last night and the clock had stopped at a quarter past three.

  Kendra stretched and turned over. The air on her face was cold, but the bed was warm and comfortable. She had not slept enough and her eyes ached from last night’s tears, but she felt better than she had felt last night. She turned back the covers, shivering as the cold air struck her, and put her feet into her slippers. They were soft fleece-lined slippers made in Scotland, a gift from Loren when Chase and Fenway had bought some goods from a British brig.

  How cold it was! Maybe Serena had coffee on the stove. Serena would no doubt have been up long ago to give Ralph his breakfast before he went to the store. —At least, thought Kendra, I’m glad I don’t have to go out in this rain.

  Hugging her dressing-gown around her, she opened the door. Up the stairs drifted the odors of coffee and bacon, and the sound of footsteps. Kendra went to the head of the stairs and called, “Serena!”

  Serena ran out of the kitchen and came to the bottom step. “Oh Mrs. Shields, you’re up at last! I was getting worried about you. Are you all right?”

  “Oh yes,” Kendra assured her. “The rain kept me awake last night, that’s all. What time is it?”

  “Why, it’s after ten,” said Serena. She added, “I hope Ralph got to work all right. He said if the mud should be too bad this evening he’d sleep in the store.”

  “Good idea,” said Kendra. “Is there any coffee left, Serena? Will you bring me a cup?”

  Serena nodded, and a minute later she brought the coffee. Not the most polished of attendants, as she came upstairs she had spilt some coffee into the saucer, but frontier living had made Kendra less fastidious than she used to be.

  But though not urbane, Serena was a kindly soul. “Don’t you want to come down and let me fix you some breakfast?” she was asking. “You can get warm in the kitchen.”

  Much as she would have liked to get warm in the kitchen, Kendra did not quite yet feel able to bear Serena’s cheerful chatter. She said she would like to wash before breakfast, and asked Serena to heat a pot of water. Serena went down, and Kendra began to sip her coffee.

  She looked at the ashes in the grate. Somewhere among them was Ted’s letter. Setting down the cup she went to the front window, drew back the curtain, and stood looking out at the rain and the mud. Out there, Ted had been waiting for her last night.

  —Now he’s gone, she thought. I sent him away. I suppose I’ll never see him again.

  All of a sudden she found that she did not care.

  It had happened. What had happened to Pocket, what he had promised would happen to her, had happened at last. She did not love Ted any more. Nor did she hate him any more. She simply did not care.

  Amazed at her own self, Kendra let the curtain drop. She went to the washstand and bathed her burning eyes with the icy water in the pitcher. What, what had become of the yearning she used to feel?

  She could not answer. She did not know. But whatever the reason, that old ache was gone. She thought of Ted. She remembered how he looked, the tone of his voice. She remembered how he had disillusioned her, and the self-pity of him as he tried to say it was everybody’s fault but his own. She remembered how she had fallen in love with him and how she had stayed in love with him. Why had that love taken so long to go? Again, she could not answer. All she knew was that she was not in love with Ted any more.

  But neither did she bear him any ill-will. Ted had ceased to matter. She was free.

  Kendra sat down on the foot of the bed, not thinking, but merely being aware of things around her—the fragrance of coffee, her warm dressing-gown, her soft fleecy slippers, and in this town of shacks and tents, her own house firm against the rain. And Loren.

  She asked herself, now did she love Loren?

  No, she did not. But she respected him and she trusted him.

  —I am not in love, she thought. I suppose I’ll never be in love again.

  She missed being in love. Something was gone out of her, something vast and important. But in its place had come a curious kind of peace.

  33

  NOW THAT HER THOUGHTS were no longer full of Ted, Kendra was surprised to notice how much was going on around her. In these first weeks of 1849, every man, woman, and child in San Francisco was tingling with expectancy.

  She could sense it everywhere. At home, on the street, in the trading posts, people were talking about one subject and only one. The steamer from New York. They were talking about the steamer and wondering who would be on board. “Wouldn’t it be fun,” exclaimed Marny, “if the steamer should bring somebody we know!”

  For at last, at last, the gold fever had reached their countrymen on the Atlantic side. At last, real Yankee Americans were on their way from the States to look for gold in California.

  True, during the past year hundreds of newcomers had poured in. Among them had been many Yankees. But these Yankees had not come directly from their own country. They had come from Hawaii, Oregon, Mexico. True again, some men had come he
re from the States since the gold fever began. But these were men who, like Warren Archwood, had not heard of gold before they left home. They had come out for other reasons, and heard about gold after they got here. A workman named Jim Marshall had found gold at Sutter’s sawmill in January, 1848; now it was January, 1849, and so far not one single person had come from the United States to look for gold.

  But now they were on their way. They had learned about gold from the two military couriers who had been sent to tell them.

  As Hiram had said to Kendra when they rode in from Shiny Gulch, these two men had set out last summer with reports for the national government in Washington. Commodore Jones of the navy had sent Midshipman Beale, Colonel Mason of the army had sent Lieutenant Loeser. Both men carried official letters. They also carried samples of gold.

  Beale got there first.

  He made a toilsome journey down to Mexico, across to the eastern side of Mexico, and up to Washington. He reached Washington in September. Here he gave his letters to the authorities, and showed them the sample he had brought with him. They said the stuff looked like fish-scales, but they sent it to the Mint. The Mint reported that the fish-scales were twenty-two carat gold.

  Rumors of gold had already seeped into the States. Seamen who had left the west coast last spring before the storm really broke had told the yarns they had heard on the waterfront. Landsmen had shrugged and said, “Oh, you know how sailors talk.” Men in the army and navy, sending letters home by the ship captains, had mentioned that some fellow had found gold in the hills. Several such letters had been printed in the home town papers. The homefolks had remarked, “California sure does sound like a fine place.” Nobody had been excited.

  Even after Beale got there, the homefolks did not get really excited. Not right away.

  His news was announced by a Washington paper, the Union. A few days later it was repeated by the Baltimore Sun. Somebody brought a copy of the Sun across Mexico, and a week after Mrs. Chase’s party a vessel came from a Mexican port to San Francisco with this copy on board. The new weekly paper, the Alta California, quoted what the Sun had to say.