Faithful

by Janet Fox

  “Watches, gentlemen!” called the robber. He rode quickly around to the other side of the coach. My back was to him now. “Let’s get a move on!”

  “Oh, Jeremy, not your watch. My gift!” whispered Mrs. Monroe. Tears began to stream down her face. Now my anger really was peaking. I didn’t care whether he had a gun or not. I hated this man. He was stealing more than things; he was stealing memories.

  Mr. Monroe held the watch in his fingers, turning it to read the inscription, his face white.

  “Move it!” the robber called.

  Mrs. Monroe let out a sob and her husband dropped the watch into the bag and took his wife’s hand. “Though dear to me, you are dearer still. We’ll find another watch.”

  Mr. Connoly, trembling, dropped the bag as it was handed to him. It landed on the floor of the carriage with a heavy thunk, the jewelry clinking like chains.

  “Careful!” yelled the robber.

  Mr. Connoly retrieved the bag and tossed it to Mr. Hodges.

  I covered my mother’s cameo with my hand. He might have taken the others’ memories but he would not steal mine.

  “Let’s go!” shouted the robber. “Everything!”

  Mr. Hodges’s eyes met mine. I held his gaze fixed, but I kept my fingers over the cameo. Then I shook my head, ever so slightly. I would not give up the cameo; I would not give up Mama. Mr. Hodges’s eyebrows arched; his lips were thin, but he said nothing.

  Mr. Hodges closed the sack and swung it out over the side of the coach.

  My back was still to the robber, but I sensed that he took the bag, and I felt a sweep of relief.

  The cold steel on the back of my neck was like an electric shock.

  “Give it over,” came the voice.

  My eyes again met Mr. Hodges’s, and then Mrs. Gale’s. I dropped my hand to my lap and twisted to face the robber, looking down the barrel of his gun.

  He stared over the mask that covered his nose and mouth. To my surprise, he looked startled. Perhaps he’d not expected to meet the eyes of a girl who would not yield.

  “Let’s go!” he said, motioning at my throat with the rifle.

  Then, so unexpected: “No,” I said. I heard the others’ reaction to my defiance. Mrs. Monroe gasped. Miss Pym moaned. My back stiffened with resolve. I felt a shock of joy as I refused to yield to the orders of this man. “No.”

  Mrs. Gale’s voice was a whisper. “Margaret.”

  “You will not take my mother’s brooch.” My voice was so clear and loud that the driver arched around the nervous horses to stare.

  I met the robber’s eyes. They were a bright blue, like the sea on a summer day. Thin lines etched outward from their corners as if he smiled a great deal. He had beautiful eyes. Not eyes like the bear. His were warm, thoughtful. And from another part of me: what a peculiar comparison, a man to a bear.

  For one long moment we stared at one another.

  His expression was odd—I thought I caught a glint of recognition in those blue eyes. His brows furrowed; he looked at the cameo, then back at me. It was as if he were seeing a ghost. His eyes widened. Was he afraid of me? I couldn’t imagine why, and yet there was something in his look. He reined back; his horse took one, two steps away.

  He turned and tossed the bag to one of his companions. The man caught the sack and twitched his rifle in my direction. “What about that pin? Looks valuable.”

  “Save it. We’ve got plenty. Let’s go.”

  The remaining men lifted into their saddles and rode off over the hill in a trail of dust and pounding hooves. Our driver shushed the whinnying coach horses and cursed and spat. Inside the coach we all sat frozen until the robbers were out of sight.

  Then everyone began talking at once.

  “Unbelievable—”

  “Oh, Jeremy, your watch—”

  “It’s the Old West! Just like the stories!—”

  “Mama, that was exciting! Were you scared? I wasn’t scared!—”

  I said nothing. I felt as calm as though I were sitting in a parlor in Newport having tea.

  “That was not wise, my dear,” said Mrs. Gale in an undertone meant just for me. “You might have been killed.” She paused. “But it was exceedingly brave at the same time. You might make a western girl yet.” She smiled. “I’m glad you still have your mother’s brooch.”

  “I’m sorry about your rings.”

  “Yes.” Mrs. Gale sighed. “You see? You were braver even than I was.”

  Yes, and where did that bravery come from? Not from a part of me I recognized, that was certain. It was only a cameo. No, it was my mother’s cameo. It was the one thing I had left of her. My hand went back to my throat, where I stroked the cameo, feeling its familiar texture, the delicate carved face, the grape leaves, the maenad. I was not going to let him rob me of my memories, of my mama.

  I left my fingers on the cameo for the rest of the drive.

  Chapter TWENTY - FOUR

  July 8–9, 1904

  The structure is built of logs, peeled but otherwise in their natural state. In the lobby there is an immense fire place with eight openings . . . The lobby is open from floor to roof except for beams and girders . . . the distance from floor to ceiling is 160 feet. The hotel will be lighted by electricity and heated with steam . . .

  —“Local Layout,” Livingston Enterprise, January 2, 1904

  ELIZA HODGES DANCED ON TIPTOES IN FRONT OF ME. “WERE YOU very scared? Did you think he would shoot you? I wasn’t scared, but Emmy was. Didn’t he have lovely eyes, for a robber? They were blue like the sea. I love the holidays at the seaside, don’t you? You were so brave.”

  We’d arrived at the Fountain Hotel. The news of the robbery had spread like sparks from a wildfire, and we were surrounded by an excited crowd. Most people called me foolhardy—a silly girl—but a few called me brave.

  “I expect it was not a wise thing to do,” I said to Eliza. While the other passengers displayed varying degrees of nervous energy—the Hodges girls practically bubbled up and over like the geysers—I was entirely calm. I’d discovered something hidden in my core, something steely and pure. Something I’d never expected of myself. Miss Pym sat on a rough log bench fanning herself with eyes closed. The men gathered in a tight clutch.

  “Then why did you do it?” Eliza asked, gazing up at me.

  I pondered this. I’d looked into his eyes. When I looked at him I saw something—recognition. It was as if he knew me. As if he were seeing a ghost. I knew he wouldn’t shoot me because he was uncertain about me. “I didn’t think he’d make me hand it over if I refused. I didn’t think he’d shoot me, either. I can’t explain it, Eliza. I only know what I saw in his eyes.” I knelt down to her. “You were a very brave girl.”

  She touched the cameo. “Is it special?” She stared at it. “It is, isn’t it. I can tell.”

  “It’s old. I suppose he wanted it because it’s nicely made. But I kept it because it was my mother’s pin.” I kept it because it was my mama.

  Eliza nodded. “He was clever not to take it.”

  “Clever? Why?”

  “Because it’s magic.”

  “Ah!” Magic, like the camera. Or, more like the bear. I touched the cameo, tracing the face with my fingers. Yes, that kind of magic.

  “It’s like my dolly, the one Grammy gave me. Dolly keeps me safe at night. But Emmy can’t have her. She wouldn’t work for Emmy.” Eliza stroked the doll in her arms. “Unless I said so.”

  I watched her, thinking, Yes, that’s exactly how it works. It’s the kind of magic that faith is made of, the kind of magic that powers dreams. That powered my dream of finding Mama. That core of steel in me, newly forged, made me smile.

  “Eliza!” Mrs. Hodges called to her daughter.

  “Well, bye!” Eliza turned and ran off.

  The hotel desk clerk eyed me. “Is that the pin?” He pointed at the cameo with his pencil.

  I touched it, saying nothing.

  “Nice,” he said, but he seem
ed to be thinking, sheer madness. “If you want to see Great Fountain Geyser, it should be active within the hour. Head out that way. After what you did, you might as well jump in for a swim.” Then he laughed, thinking himself a great wit.

  And I smiled. The fear I’d felt at Steamboat had been swallowed up, the way a small ripple can be scattered and absorbed by a larger wake. My brave show before the robber had changed everything for me.

  Though the rest of the passengers from our coach stayed behind, Mrs. Gale and I decided to go watch the geyser. I followed her out to the trail. White sinter coated the ground; we passed smaller geysers, all quiet. Pools of hot water steamed in the afternoon air.

  I helped Mrs. Gale set up the camera to one side of the viewing area, a low bench of grass that bordered the sinter. Then we waited, the crowd quiet. A Steller’s jay cackled in the pine trees behind us, and from deep in the woods came the chittering of a squirrel. I held my breath, not knowing what to expect. Would I run again? I felt changed, but was the fear truly gone?

  The water in the pool began to boil in violent bursts and the tourists around us erupted into applause. I stood up and took a step backward. Fear rose like bile in my throat, the same horror I’d felt back at Norris, and for a moment I thought I might lose my wits yet again. The bubbling pool, the fragile sinter . . . but it had changed for me. I had changed.

  The geyser threw skyward into a broad fountain, receded, then roared upward again. I was so close that I felt the spray and I stepped backward, moving fast. My foot caught and I fell smack on my bottom in the rough grass, skirts flying, my petticoat a white flag.

  “About a hundred and fifty feet,” shouted one man. In the afternoon air, the steam billowed and puffed in great, roiling, white clouds, almost masking the hot water itself.

  The noise! I covered my ears as the ground trembled under me. This was nothing like the geyser at Norris—this was a spectacle. Steam shrieked from a vent like a train whistle.

  Mrs. Gale disappeared beneath the black hood of her camera.

  The geyser lowered a little and then sprayed again, even higher than before. I couldn’t breathe. And yet . . . and yet it was seductive, that raw power. A thrill rose in me. A longing for more. I sat before the geyser and let my conscious self vanish.

  Beneath my fingers, the ground was alive. It rumbled, creaked, and groaned—with each spray, the earth heaved. And as I sat there helpless and trembling myself, I began to sense the rhythm of it, just as the sea had a rhythm that I knew. The geyser roared and ebbed and roared again, like the ebb and flow of tides. I pressed my hand onto the ground and felt it shudder.

  I cringed as another jet of water shot skyward, but the water caught the sun. It glittered and sparkled like a million diamonds, while the air roared and the ground trembled, and then the magic of Yellowstone caught me, and I was lost to it forever.

  The geyser display lasted nearly an hour. I didn’t tire of watching it even after the other tourists trickled away and left Mrs. Gale and me alone.

  Finally, I turned to Mrs. Gale. “There are others?” I asked.

  “Oh, my dear.” Mrs. Gale laughed, pleased with my reincarnation. “We’ve only just begun.”

  With the childlike delight of anticipation, I clapped my hands.

  In my room that night, I placed Mama’s cameo on the dresser. I’d witnessed such changes in myself in one tumultuous day. I looked into the eyes of a man who held my life in his hands; I saw the earth disgorge its raw power and welcomed it.

  I carried the geyser inside, the rumble and surge, pressing on me like the sound of the ocean beating on the beach. Like the storm-driven waves that I heard at night in a howling nor’easter. Like a shell pressed to my ear, echoing with the wash of the surf. Like hearing my mother’s voice calling from far off, crying, sighing.

  I dreamed of a sea that surrounded me as I stood on an island where geysers played and steam billowed from the ground. I was with Mama, and we were fearless. The mermaids sang to us and our hair was laced with grapevines. We needed nothing else—nothing—for I’d found her and we were home.

  When I awoke in my bed the next morning in the Fountain Hotel, I let that dream float through my mind. I felt that I was closer to Mama than ever.

  Our coach made the short trip to the new Old Faithful Inn, arriving in time for lunch. There were no untoward events. Misses Pym and Braggs nattered in endless exchanges about the dangers of wilderness travel, to the amusement of the rest of us.

  I felt a tug of excitement when I saw the clouds and towers of steam that signaled new geysers and hot springs. I strained to look out the carriage window, and from there had my first look at Old Faithful Inn.

  The inn was a huge log structure with a dozen dormers jutting from the steeply sloping roof. We left our coach and stood under the porte cochere, awestruck by the massive, twisting trunks that formed the columns.

  Mr. Hodges opened the enormous wood doors of the inn, and I gasped. My eyes were drawn up, and up, through a maze of twisted tree trunks and branches that formed balconies, stairways, pillars, and beams. Fires crackled in two hearths of the gigantic stone fireplace facing the door.

  “My!” exclaimed Miss Pym, having a new diversion. “How magnificent!”

  For the first time I understood my father’s excitement at coming to work here. Robert Reamer had designed something unique and beautiful. It was like standing in a fairyland forest.

  In the crow’s nest above the lobby, a string quartet played gentle ragtime. The light from the sun filtered through diamond windowpanes that marched to the top of the great hall. Small desks nestled in corners on the balconies that wound around the four walls. Candles, wired for electricity, cradled against posts, glimmering. The wood floors creaked and groaned as visitors milled about, their eyes raised to the rafters.

  We went back outside along with a crowd of tourists to watch Old Faithful erupt. A gentle mound of white sinter belched steam, and occasionally water splashed and bubbled, then subsided. We stood a short distance from the geyser.

  “Old Faithful is dependable,” said Mrs. Gale. “We shouldn’t have to wait long.”

  She’d barely finished speaking when the geyser exploded in a tall, thin tower of water shooting a comb of spray to the lee.

  I thrilled again at the magnificence of it all, the fear I’d felt at Norris completely vanished. “Impressive, isn’t it,” Mrs. Gale shouted. “And some geysers in this basin are even taller, although not quite as regular.”

  I’d fallen in love and I could scarcely contain my desire. “I want to see them. I need to see them all.”

  “I have to stay in this area a few days photographing the geysers,” said Mrs. Gale. “I’d enjoy having you stay with me to assist me, if that’s possible. We can remain at the inn rather than moving on with our tour group.”

  I hesitated, thinking about what Papa might say, and about my goal, the reason I came on the Tour—my desire to find Mama. I was pulled in two directions; but somehow it felt they were both tugging me toward the same end.

  “I’ll stay,” I said at last. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was meant to be here. I thought about Mama’s paintings, how they had once frightened me so. Her paintings were of all these features: the steaming amethyst springs, the swirls of amber bacteria, the mounds of white silica. She could not forget this place, nor would I, ever. And with the information I’d gleaned from Papa’s correspondence . . . If I were to find her anywhere on earth, it would be here.

  “I’m glad you’ve lost your fear of the geysers,” said Mrs. Gale.

  “Two brave moves in two days. Not only a western girl but a thoroughly modern one.”

  I touched the cameo at my throat and felt my newly born strength. “Yellowstone isn’t what I expected.”

  “I’m always disappointed when things turn out as I expect them to,” said Mrs. Gale. “Shall we go in to our rooms? We can explore the rest of the inn.”

  Before dinner Mrs. Gale suggested that we observe the Ol
d Faithful eruption from another vantage point: from the widow’s walk on the roof. On the roof! I’d managed one great fear, but this was different. She said I’d see the entire geyser basin, and only because of that did I go. I asked her to take the outside while I clung to the inner wall, trying not to look through the open log railings to the lobby below. I remembered how Mama protected me when we walked on the Cliff Walk, how I had to hug the inside wall of the path.

  We wove up the steps, past the musicians, now playing the popular “Meet Me in St. Louis.” I had to move slowly and stop from time to time to shut my eyes. But I made it through the crow’s nest and out onto the broad widow’s walk that crowned the hotel.

  An electric searchlight on the roof of the inn probed the dusk. We joined thirty or so tourists on the rooftop. I stepped out from the stairs, not certain what to expect, clutching Mrs. Gale’s hand. The air was cooling now that the sun had set. The widow’s walk was so large that I could stand where I had no sensation of the edge. I could breathe again.

  I stared out across the landscape at the steam that rose from across the basin, from multiple hot springs and geysers. The Indians had been right: Hell would look like this. I once thought Mama’s landscapes were demonic. I was wrong. If you liked the geysers, it was heaven. And the fumes and vapors would become warm mists, the haunts of angels.

  After the eruption, when we had to go back down the stairs, I clung to Mrs. Gale like a limpet and tried to stay tucked against the wall and within the descending crowd. The mass of people tempered the view downward, but still my palms grew slick with sweat and my knees wobbled. I peppered Mrs. Gale with questions to keep my mind busy. At one turn I made the mistake of looking over the rail. Mrs. Gale had to hold my arm against her side and soothe me like a baby. When we reached the lobby I fell, exhausted, into a chair and mopped my damp forehead with the sleeve of my shirtwaist. Though I was glad to have gone to see the view, I was relieved to be on solid ground again.

  The company of passengers from our coach gathered before the great stone fireplace. As recompense for our having suffered the robbery, the management of the Yellowstone Park Association offered us a free dinner. Before we went in to eat, a young Army lieutenant questioned us about the experience. The thing that everyone recalled most clearly was the color of the ringleader’s eyes.