The Threshold

by Marlys Millhiser

  When the girls lay exhausted in their darkened room, Callie asked Olina about the right and wrong of the matter. Gentlemen and men in general, Olina explained none too patiently, had certain urges in their natures that caused them to do things a lady did not discuss and did not entice a gentleman to do in the first place. Men could only control these urges if a lady behaved herself. Olina then promptly fell asleep, leaving Callie wondering if the ladies flopping themselves around on the dance floor enticed trouble for their backsides. And what about them, those gorgeous creatures who paraded with her Aunt Lilly after three o’clock in the afternoon?

  The ball had set off the three-day July Fourth holiday. But Mrs. Stollsteimer’s girls and the rest of the staff at the hotel did not have a holiday. The work load doubled on Colorado Avenue when the merrymakers streamed into town. Callie worried her father wouldn’t be able to find her as she gulped gluey oatmeal under the housekeeper’s impatient eye. And she’d saved up so much to talk to him about. First she’d confront him with the presence of a live Aunt Lilly in Telluride, then tell him about the wonderful big schoolhouse here and ask if she could go there as soon as Bram left the hospital and didn’t need her wages. Callie still did not like cleaning things. And she wanted to write to her mother and brother, but had no money for paper and postage. And her shoes were too small, causing her toenails to turn back into her flesh to fester and bleed.

  When John O’Connell did find her, Callie was on her hands and knees scrubbing around the battered cuspidors in the ballroom. She stiffened in his embrace, remembering Mr. Macintosh’s hands, and knew she’d never be able to tell him about it. But Pa was just as eager to be away as he had been to hold her. “The stiffs are marching,” he said mysteriously. “And it needs doing. I love ya, Callie darling, and here’s a letter from your Bram that came inside one to me.”

  Callie couldn’t understand why the miners would be marching today since the parade wasn’t until tomorrow. She bent listlessly to the gruesome floor, Bram’s letter unopened in her pocket. She’d save it as something to look forward to, to help her get through the terrible tedium of her day.

  “Eight-hour day,” Mrs. Stollsteimer remarked at supper, “even my girls work longer than that.”

  There’d been a clamor in the street—yelling, with gunshots for emphasis, and occasional powder blasts that shook the hotel. Callie had assumed it all part of the festivities until there were wild scurryings among the more genteel in the hotel.

  “The bastards have shut down the Smuggler-Union!” a gentleman cried to another, and almost tripped over Callie, again on her hands and knees. Apparently some union men who’d struck in May had surrounded the Smuggler-Union and forced the scabs hired to replace them to stop work. The first report was that a hundred lay dying, but the figure kept coming down all day. By supper the hotel staff learned that union men forced the scabs to march over thirteen-thousand-foot Imogene Pass to Ouray without shoes and told them never to come to Telluride. Callie hoped these union men weren’t the stiffs her pa was marching with and that he hadn’t joined the union with Ma’am too far away to stop him. She didn’t see why he should; they already had an eight-hour day at Alta

  The next morning Mrs. Stollsteimer surprised the girls by letting them watch the July Fourth parade from a third-story window. There was a subdued expectancy instead of the boisterousness this holiday usually generated. The governor of the state of Colorado was sending the lieutenant governor to try to talk the union and the management of the Smuggler-Union into a peaceful settlement of their dispute. It was rumored that Arthur Collins, manager of the Smuggler-Union, had asked the governor to send troops. The latest tally of the results of the disturbance of the day before was three dead and three hurt.

  Even up above it all now Callie could feel the tension in the air. For one thing the fashionable ladies and gentlemen stood on the hotel side of the street. Miners, some with families, crowded the other side. She looked among them for Pa but didn’t see him.

  Boys darted about setting off firecrackers, horses whinnied in terror, dogs barked and ran around in confusion while men cursed them. Babies cried and giant powder exploded at unexpected intervals on the mountainsides. But the red-white-and-blue flags stuck in the storefronts and the small ones held in hands fluttered halfheartedly. Someone had even shoveled up the street, and only a hint of blotchy stains from the horse traffic showed on its dirt surface.

  A brass band marched by in straight lines, tooting mightily with only a few squawks, and for a while tension eased. A fire wagon pulled by huge horses followed, and then a team of barefoot men in their long underwear pulled the hose cart. Wagons rolled beneath her, festooned with pine boughs and young ladies in lovely white dresses. They looked like floral bouquets sprinkled amidst the green of pine needles and made Callie hate her old-lady black dress even more. Men sat ramrod straight on prancing, shying horses. Others walked in uneven rows and some wore strange robes and hats or gaudy costumes or uniforms. All were faceless under their hats from her vantage point above.

  “Knights of Pythias, Order of Redmen, the Masons,” Opal Mae identified each group in a tone of wonder Callie couldn’t fathom. Half Were tripping on their skirts or couldn’t keep their swords hanging straight.

  The sound and panoply moved away down Colorado Avenue and the flags went limp and the smell of fresh horse droppings rose in the mountain sunlight to Callie’s window. And the people shuffled and stared at each other across the street once more.

  24

  Mildred Heisinger absently pressed and pushed at wrinkles in her white gloves, licked a finger to brush at a smudge on one of them. Two engines pulled the train straining around a mountain curve so convoluted she could see the engines across a ravine out the window of her car. The lead engine billowed gray-black smoke that obliterated all sight of the mountainside on which it traveled. The second engine did the same with white steam, and the two vapors mixed to twine through pine and aspen and looked like a grounded thundercloud. The trip back had been long and tedious for Mildred. She looked forward to the suite at the New Sheridan for which she’d wired ahead. And a deep hot bath to cleanse away the grit of the train cloud blowing through open windows. The air had cooled as they’d gained elevation, but the scented pads shielding her travel suit from her armpits gave off unpleasant reminders of the tax one paid to travel.

  The young ladies with her were agog, fluttering among empty seats to catch the vistas on either side, gasping and chattering at what they saw when looking down, holding on to their hats and leaning far forward to look up. They were seven in all. A discreet advertisement in a Kansas City newspaper had netted twelve applicants from which she’d selected nine, and at the last minute two had grown faint of heart at the thought of leaving home. Still a goodly number considering the commission she was to receive from the town for each, in addition to her salary and expenses. And they were all young, of good moral character, and every one had at least a year of work experience. Her prize, Audrey Cranston, settled across from Mildred now, excitement sparking in her eyes like the sparks from the engine stacks. Audrey had worked three years as a bookkeeper for a foundry and came highly recommended.

  Although these young ladies were from modest backgrounds, they had a flair for independence and self-support with which Mildred could identify. They’d heard so much of the “wild west,” the “Rocky Mountain Majesty,” and the lore of the mining camps that her job had practically been done for her. They couldn’t believe that an entire town wanted them. And that someday when they did decide to give up their independence to marry (which all young ladies except Mildred planned to do eventually), Telluride overflowed with strong young men from which to choose.

  “Will we see Indians in Telluride?” Audrey asked her now.

  “It’s possible. Races are held along the railroad track on the July Fourth holiday and many Indians and Mexicans come to race their horses. There may still be some lounging around the depot.” Mildred was confident she’d found the
perfect employment as she gazed with fond good humor at her enthusiastic charges. She’d warned them of the vicious storms of winter, the rudimentary services and shopping available in a mining camp. But they were on a pioneering adventure and Mildred felt a glow at having helped others find their dreams. And all she need do was to stay in fine hotels, dine out, visit museums and department stores, dress in the latest fashions, and read. On this trip she’d limited her interviews to three hours in the afternoons and had the rest of the day to do as she pleased. Mildred wondered at other women’s desire to marry and had noted long ago how quickly all but the rich wearied and faded once they began the inevitable childbearing.

  Charlene Rassmussen sat beside Mildred and gave her an impetuous hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. It’s all so beautiful and I’m so happy.”

  “You haven’t even seen Telluride yet.” Mildred noticed these women did not shutter her out with their eyes but regarded her with respect and something akin to awe. Charlene had worked on a telephone switchboard for a year and had confided to Mildred that her parents insisted she marry a neighbor man with bad teeth, bad skin, bad breath, and thinning hair. Rather than do so, Charlene had left home to come to Telluride.

  Mildred and her companions had attracted a good deal of attention on their trip and particularly the farther west they traveled. One gentleman pointed out an eagle to them now. Charlene smiled at him. He did not have bad teeth or skin or thin hair but was rather handsome in a ruddy sort of way. His speech was educated but his clothes those of a rough workman and his mustache needed trimming. His eyes seemed busy catching every detail both inside and outside.

  Mildred forgot about him as the train crossed a high mountain valley with vast herds of cattle, stopping at each little settlement along the way, and her new friends exclaimed at the number of young cowboys hanging about the depots. But she noticed the ruddy man again as they all stretched their legs on the station platform at Ridgway before boarding the narrow-gauge train that would take them into the even loftier San Juans.

  “Do ya live in these parts, miss?” He appeared beside her and now his speech matched his clothing.

  “I live in Telluride … for the moment.” The fact was she had no permanent address and the idea that she might like to invest some of her earnings in a house came to her just then. It was suspect for a woman not to have a home. But then, almost everything but marriage was. “And you?”

  “Oh, I’ve come to work the mines.” He watched her like he seemed to everyone and everything. “Hear a man can make his fortune in the San Juans.”

  When they reached Telluride he tipped his hat to them and swung off down the tracks with a bedroll over his shoulder. No Indians were there to meet them but Audrey seemed not to notice, just swirled her skirts in an effort to take in all the peaks at once, and a piece of her unruly hair loosened from her coiled braid. “I know I’m going to like it here.”

  An agent from Lawyer Barada introduced himself and guided them to a livery surrey. But Mildred feared the hanging dust from the streets and mule droppings from a loading packtrain along the way might dispel the good intentions of the town’s greeting. The agent deposited her at the New Sheridan, explaining that central lodgings had been provided for her charges at the Victoria Hotel until they were settled in employment. Lawyer Barada was not in his office at the Sheridan Office Building next to the hotel, so she left the list of the young ladies’ qualifications with his clerk. Though weary, Mildred felt good about her trip as she shook out and hung the new clothes she’d bought in Kansas City. The next trip would be to Chicago, with Lawyer Barada’s approval.

  Callie witnessed her ex-teacher’s grand entrance but Miss Heisinger looked right at and through her like the other guests of the hotel. The lieutenant governor of the state of Colorado had arranged a truce between the management of the Smuggler-Union Mine and Miners’ Union No. 63, Western Federation of Miners. Now the stiffs at the Smuggler received a straight three dollars for an eight hour day like those who worked the other mines around, and the town returned to a wary peace. The mine owners were less than happy with the arrangement. Callie heard much mention of “damned rednecks” and the injustices of a pro-labor government in Denver as gentlemen passed her in the halls or lobby.

  And it was in the lobby she loved to be, especially when the sun shone in to warm her. The day after Miss Heisinger arrived, Callie was sent to dust the moldings, tables, Mr. Root’s cage front, and the top strip of wood on the wainscoting. Callie was hoping to chance upon a daydream to help her through the day when the housekeeper swept in from the hall to the ballroom and caught her gazing out the window, feather duster stilled in midair.

  “What am I to do with her, Mr. Root? She’s not worth the money to feed.”

  Mr. Root just shook his head and polished his spectacles with a handkerchief. When the spectacles were off, one of his eyes wandered off by itself.

  “Callie, Opal Mae is sick with a bad tooth and can barely raise her head. You’ll have to hurry and finish here and help Cora on second.”

  Callie climbed to her room before going to help Cora and reread Bram’s letter. Her brother had wanted to die but Ma’am wouldn’t let him. Now he wanted to leave the hospital and Denver. “I’m lonesome for you, Callie girl, and still so weak. Please write. Ma’am wonders why you don’t write also.”

  Callie took off her shoes and rubbed the sores on her toes. She had highgraded some writing materials from the hotel but she was afraid to highgrade coins for postage. Callie buttoned on the torturesome shoes again, slipped into the hall and down the staircase to Miss Heisinger’s suite. Just as she put her knuckles to the door, her teacher opened it.

  Miss Heisinger was dressed for dinner, a summer dress of lace and bows. The ruffles were wrinkled some but her hair and skin shone. Her long gloves and reticule matched perfectly. She smelled of soap and powder and she walked directly into Callie. The girl fell backward onto the carpet runner.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t see … Callie? Callie O’Connell?” A gloved hand reached down to help Callie to her feet. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m sent out to work.” Callie looked away in embarrassment at the memory of her brother carrying a kicking, disheveled teacher through the heart of the camp. How could she ask her for money to send a letter to that very brother?

  “Why are you sent out to work so young? You are such a fine student.”

  “My family has troubles just now, ma’am. My brother—”

  “Oh yes, your brother.” Miss Heisinger’s voice lowered and Callie winced. “I heard of the accident. I’m sorry.”

  “Callie, there you are.” Cora peeked out the door next to Miss Heisinger’s. “Hurry, we must finish this suite before the evening train arrives. A very important guest is coming.”

  Callie turned back to Miss Heisinger, only to find her gliding away down the hall.

  Where was she to get the postage money? Callie swiped at dresser tops and windowsills as Cora fussed about with a carpet sweeper. It wasn’t as if she needed a great fortune. As the train whistle signaled the imminent arrival of their important guest, Callie paused to look out the window. The buildings across Colorado Avenue were lower than the hotel and she could see over them to the dark side of town. Daylight seemed always to linger longer here. There buildings were well lit and through the glass she could hear already the low murmur that hummed on those streets at night.

  Her Aunt Lilly lived. And she lived over there. And she loved Bram as much as anyone. If Callie could find her, Aunt Lilly would surely see Bram’s letter sent off to Denver.

  25

  Charles lay on his back on Tracy’s bed, his feet in the air, his tail up over his lower stomach concealing his nether regions in a modesty suitable to a Victorian cat. The pink lining of his ears, the pink slant of his closed eyelids, the pink outline of his nose and mouth were the only color on him. The rest was snowy fluff. The soft life was making Charles fat. And clean.

  Two daybed
s, two dressers, and a TV set shoved up against the outside door about filled the crib’s front room. The back room was a kitchen except for a small section walled off for a bathroom. The place was even smaller than Callie’s cabin in Alta.

  Tracy lay on her daybed next to Charles and watched television. She’d hung her Dr. Miles’s Number One Hundred and Fifty Gonorrhea and Gleet poster over a bad patch on the wall and a sketch that Aletha had drawn over another.

  Aletha stretched out on her own daybed and attempted to read one of the books on Telluride Cree had lent her. The names of the fabulous gold and silver mines of the region will live forever in the annals of man’s wealth and greed, fortitude and destructiveness. The great Sheridan Mine, the Tomboy, the Smuggler-Union, the Blackbear, the Nellie, and the Gold King—to name a few of the larger employers—hired hundreds of miners, millmen, engineers, and office workers. Their combined payrolls supported most of the business in town. So when strife emerged between management and union—

  “So when it comes to dishwashing detergent there’s no substitute for Subdue. Mrs. Callus’s spotless glassware demonstrates why.”

  —of the Smuggler-Union, an Englishman, Arthur Collins, was hired as manager. Familiar with the methods used in the copper mines of Cornwall and aware of the need for greater output and profit, Collins instituted the fathom system whereby a miner was paid by the fathoms of earth broken rather than by the regular eight-hour shift at the standard rate of three dollars. Men found themselves working longer hours for less pay. The union struck and Collins hired scab labor to continue operations and hired it at the regular three dollars for an eight-hour shift for which the union had struck to begin with. On July 3, two hundred and fifty striking miners attacked as the night shift of scabs came off work. Four men died in the battle and the offending scabs were forced to march over a rocky divide without shoes and told never to return. Peace was restored for a time through the efforts of the state government but—