Far From Home

by Val Wood

  ‘N-no,’ she said slowly. ‘I didn’t mean like Charlesworth. I meant someone who believed in this valley and was willing to work with you, and not only for profit.’

  ‘If there was such a man, yes, indeed I would.’ He glanced around at the men, who all seemed very weary and despondent. He shook his head. ‘We have looked into all possibilities, but there is not such a person. Most men only want the certainty of gold.’

  She smiled then and glanced at Kitty who was standing next to Ted, their fingers touching. ‘I am not a man, Mr Dreumel,’ she said. ‘But I am willing. I have been to the bank in New York and arranged a transfer of my funds to their branch in Philadelphia. If you are prepared to work with a woman, then I will gladly be your partner. Kitty and I have travelled here only for this purpose. At least – I have.’

  Wilhelm Dreumel’s gaze flickered for a second between her and Kitty and Ted, who was now gripping Kitty’s hand. Then he took a breath. ‘You may lose your money, Georgiana.’ It was the first time he had called her by her Christian name. ‘I cannot promise you good fortune.’

  ‘Can you promise me a challenge?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, yes.’ He laughed. ‘That I can promise!’

  ‘Then will you accept my offer?’ She waited in anticipation, willing him to agree.

  His eyes held hers. Such an honest blue, she thought. I would always trust him to do what was right. Then he smiled and his round cheeks dimpled in the way she remembered. He gave a small formal bow, which only he would do, she mused, out here in the mountains.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said simply. ‘I will be glad to accept.’

  They talked into the night, Georgiana, Dreumel and Ted, whilst Kitty went with Isaac to see what was in the stores. They decided on a plan of action. Dreumel wouldn’t after all mortgage his newspaper business, which had been his reluctant intention, but they would use Georgiana’s capital. He was, though, uneasy about it and suggested that in case the project should fail, he should take her on as a joint partner in the Star newspaper.

  They would travel to Philadelphia after she was rested and have everything drawn up legally. Then they would buy more equipment for the shaft and explosives for opening up the creek.

  The journey took three days of hard riding across the hot rocky plain and then continued by canal boat. Wilhelm had insisted that Kitty should come too. ‘You can buy the stores you need,’ he had said, but they both knew that she was there as a chaperone.

  It was whilst Dreumel was showing Georgiana around his newspaper office and introducing her to his staff that she had an idea, which she put to him when they adjourned for coffee in a nearby hotel.

  ‘I suggested to you once before that you— we,’ she corrected humorously, ‘need people to come to the valley. Not only miners,’ for he had said that they would need more men for working on the shaft, ‘but people to make the valley into a proper community. Why don’t I put together a news article about this rich land? This—’ She contemplated. ‘This golden valley, and invite people – families – to apply.’

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘I do remember what you said, and I have given the idea consideration, even though I did not think that it would be possible to carry it out.’

  He reached out and touched her arm, letting his hand lie gently and patting her with his fingers. ‘But now, because of you, all things are possible.’ His eyes for a second seemed sad and moist, but as he withdrew his hand he added cheerfully, ‘Together, Miss Gregory, I feel that we can succeed.’

  ‘Mr Dreumel,’ she began, ‘do you not think that we could be less formal? As you know, my name is Georgiana. I wish you would use it.’

  ‘I would like to,’ he admitted. ‘I have old-world values. I have only been waiting for permission! It was a slip of the tongue when I used it previously. The men call me Bill,’ he added.

  ‘But I would like to call you Wilhelm,’ she said softly. ‘It suits you so well.’

  Their first priority was to open up the creek at the eastern end to let the waters flow out more easily, and to blast an opening through the rock to allow waggons in. Georgiana had been astounded when she and Wilhelm had set out on their journey to Philadelphia when, at the end of the valley, they appeared to be confronted by a mountain wall. As they drew closer she realized that the rocky outcrop in front of them stood apart from the mountain and that there was a track leading out behind it. It was a canyon with high rocky walls, which, from the outside of the valley, couldn’t be seen.

  ‘At some time in history,’ Wilhelm had said as they rode through onto the open plain, ‘there has been a rock fall which hid the valley from view.’

  She had looked back. The opening through which they had come could no longer be seen. Even the waters of the creek seemed to have disappeared, emerging as a gushing waterspout through a break in the rocks. ‘Except from the Indians, the buzzards and the eagles who could see it,’ she had replied, remembering what Lake had said.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Only them.’

  Georgiana wondered what Lake would think as she sat and wrote the article for the newspaper, extolling the beauty of the valley and creek and its potential for family life. Would he be angry that this once secret valley, which he had shown to Wilhelm Dreumel, was about to be opened up to others and irrevocably changed?

  Letters started to pour in and people arrived on the doorstep of the newspaper office after reading the article. Georgiana interviewed the applicants herself, spending several days in the office. The days ran into a week and then another, as more and more people applied.

  She chose practical people, men who had a trade but not much money, families with young children, storekeepers and farmers and a young couple who were both teachers and newly married. Wilhelm took on three more men for the mine, older men who had been to California but had grown disillusioned and disappointed with the mediocre returns.

  Then, one day, Georgiana had a visit from a woman. She was well built with dyed hair piled beneath a feathered and chiffon concoction, held in place by a glittering hat pin, and wearing a low-cut gown which displayed her rounded curves. She was not young but had been attractive in her day. She wore carmine on her cheeks and lips and said her name was Nellie O’Neil.

  ‘So, why would you want to come to this valley, Mrs O’Neil?’ Georgiana asked cautiously. She didn’t seem the type to want a quiet life.

  ‘Well, ma’am,’ she said in a dry, husky voice. ‘I’ve been around and about quite a lot for most of my life. Had a few ups and downs, some good times, some bad. But now I’ve come into a little bit of money – don’t ask me how, cos I wouldn’t want to shock you.’ She gazed at Georgiana from bright blue eyes, which had pale threads of red in the whites. ‘But I’ve had a dream, you see. Had this dream for a good many years, that when I was older – and I ain’t admitting to being old!’ she added hastily. ‘That if I made any money I would set up in some nice place and run a saloon.’

  ‘Oh!’ Georgiana said. ‘A saloon!’ She remembered that she had once suggested the same to Wilhelm.

  ‘Nothing rough, you understand,’ Nellie O’Neil emphasized. ‘Jest a nice place where men could come and unwind after an honest day’s work. They don’t always want to go straight home, you know!’

  ‘N-no, I don’t suppose they do,’ Georgiana admitted and, in spite of her first misgivings, found she was warming to Mrs O’Neil.

  ‘I know about liquor,’ Mrs O’Neil said. ‘And I understand men, and you needn’t worry that there would be any hanky-panky, though you’ll find that when the word gets around about this place, the dancing girls will start to arrive. I know, cos I’ve done it myself in my time. But I’d send ’em on their way if you don’t want them there.’

  ‘Well—’ began Georgiana, her breath quite taken away, but she saw something like pleading on Nellie O’Neil’s face. ‘I suppose that men would like to have somewhere to meet, and have a game of cards, a drink or a chat.’

  Nellie O’Neil raised her eyebrows. ‘A chat! W
ell, I guess you could call it that. I was thinking more of a jaw about what’s happening out in the world, gold prices, what price cattle is fetching and so on.’

  ‘Yes,’ Georgiana said weakly. ‘Of course! That is what I meant.’ She smiled at her. ‘Can I let you know, Mrs O’Neil?’ she asked. ‘I shall need to speak to my partner.’

  ‘Sure you can. Call me Nellie,’ she said, getting up from the chair and primping her curls. ‘I’m staying in Philly for a few weeks.’ She bent towards Georgiana. ‘Don’t worry about funds,’ she whispered, though there was no-one else in the room. ‘I’ve got plenty to buy what I need. But I’d need help to build a saloon.’

  ‘There is a longhouse already which could be rented,’ Georgiana told her. ‘It would only need to be adapted.’ And we could build Kitty a new bakery store, she mused, with a proper oven. She put out her hand. ‘I’m sure we can do business, Nellie. I’ll contact you soon.’

  When they arrived back at the creek she put the idea to the men, who were all in favour, though Wilhelm had reservations. But he was soon persuaded. ‘You can rent the longhouse to her,’ Georgiana said. ‘Build another storey onto it and she can take occasional visitors as well as live there herself.’

  ‘Like a small hotel?’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’ she replied.

  The rock was blasted and the waters poured through, leaving the creek shallow. ‘It’ll find its own path,’ Ted said, as he watched the waters run down into the plain.

  A committee was formed at Georgiana’s suggestion and a plan of action drawn up. Three carpenters and a wheelwright came back with Wilhelm after one of his trips to Philadelphia and they, with Pike and Jason, began to build the bridge across the creek whilst the water was low. At first they had decided on a footbridge, but then it was realized that if the community should grow, as inevitably it would, a wider bridge to take a horse and waggon would be necessary. The sound of sawing and hammering, whistling and sometimes cursing, could be heard all through the days, ceasing only when the sun went down.

  Wilhelm, Ellis, Ted and Isaac began the conversion of the longhouse to make it ready for Nellie O’Neil. The upper storey was to be put up later when the carpenters were finished at the bridge. Then an opening for the road was blasted through, the explosion echoing around the valley and reverberating through the mountains. ‘Folks will wonder what that was.’ Ted shook his head and pressed his eardrums. ‘Bet that could be heard down in Philadelphia.’

  The men cleared the rubble and ruminated that it needed a second blast to make it wide enough for two waggons driving in side by side. ‘Folks will be coming and going along this road,’ Pike said. ‘We’re planning for the future.’

  ‘When we find gold,’ Ted said positively, ‘I want a piece of land in the next valley. I’ll plant corn.’

  ‘Me too,’ Pike agreed. ‘If we have corn planted for twelve months then no government department can take it from us.’

  The summer was almost over and the men were eager to finish the blasting so that the first of the new settlers could come before winter. As Wilhelm had bought and owned the whole valley, he would sell off plots of land and timber, and the newcomers would build their own cabins.

  ‘We’d like to buy a piece of land from you.’ One of the carpenters came to Wilhelm on behalf of himself and the other tradesmen. ‘We’d build a community workshop,’ he said. ‘Not all the folks coming will have the know-how to build for themselves, so we’d buy the timber from you and charge them a daily rate.’

  ‘Things are happening so fast,’ Wilhelm said to Georgiana one evening as they sat on the bench outside the freshly painted saloon. ‘Before we know what’s happened we shall have a new town here!’

  ‘It’s so exciting, isn’t it?’ she said enthusiastically. ‘I’m so pleased, Wilhelm, that you allowed me to be a part of it.’

  ‘Allowed you to be part of it?’ He was astonished. ‘Without you, Georgiana, it would not have happened!’

  Have I then accomplished what I set out to do? she mused. Have I achieved equality? Certainly the men here treat me as their equal. They even swear and curse in front of me, she thought wryly. Except for Isaac and Wilhelm, of course. Isaac still calls me Miz Gianna, and Wilhelm is never anything but courteous.

  ‘Why are you smiling?’ Wilhelm interrupted her musings.

  ‘I was thinking of how I have changed.’ She laughed. ‘I am no longer an English lady. I have broken fingernails, rough hands and a sun-browned skin. And I draw water from the creek. I am a different person from the one I once was!’

  He smiled back at her. ‘I think not, Georgiana,’ he murmured. ‘You are what you always were. But you were shackled by convention, as you would have been if you had stayed in New York, where propriety rules just as in England. But out here . . .’ His glance took in the valley, the cattle across the creek and up the mountains where the last rays of the sun were glinting red and gold. ‘Out here you have cast off those shackles and found the freedom you always wanted.’

  She followed his gaze. They scanned the radius of the mountains and both, simultaneously, caught the movement on the eastern edge. Wilhelm put his hand to his eyes to narrow the view, but Georgiana knew, almost without seeing. She could tell, by the throbbing of her temples and the pulsating in her body, just who it was.

  ‘Lake!’ Wilhelm murmured. ‘I thought he would come.’

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered, and Wilhelm turned an enquiring gaze upon her. ‘Yes, indeed.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Lake showed no surprise at what had happened in the valley since his last visit, but when he had greeted Dreumel, he looked closely at Georgiana. ‘I heard that you were travelling in the forest,’ he said bluntly.

  ‘The guide told you?’ she queried. ‘Is he a friend of yours?’

  ‘No. Not a friend,’ he stated flatly. ‘He’s evil. A desperado. A killer.’

  She was shaken. ‘I hope he didn’t follow our trail?’

  ‘He did for some time,’ Lake said, still keeping his eyes on her face. ‘You wouldn’t have heard him. But then his way was barred.’

  ‘Barred!’ she said. ‘By what? Surely he wouldn’t have been stopped by a fallen tree or a rock?’

  ‘Not by either of those. By a bear!’ He stared unblinkingly at her. ‘It blocked his path and he had to retreat.’

  ‘He didn’t kill it?’ she asked anxiously.

  He shook his head. ‘He said he had no time to load, or he would have done.’ His mouth twitched disdainfully. ‘He’s a braggart. He wouldn’t have been able to strike. She would have killed him first.’

  Georgiana’s heart thudded. ‘She?’ she asked, in a small voice.

  ‘It was a she-bear. More dangerous than the male.’

  ‘We saw one too,’ she murmured. ‘At least, I did. I let her know of our presence and she went away.’

  ‘You didn’t mention the bear, Georgiana,’ Dreumel said quietly. ‘Were you not afraid?’

  ‘Yes. I think I was, but I didn’t want to alarm Kitty.’ Then she gave a sudden smile. ‘We sang for the rest of the journey. We frightened all the wild animals and wild men away!’

  Both men shook their heads at her in admonishment but said nothing more.

  Lake stayed for three weeks. He told Wilhelm and Georgiana that he had known the valley would one day be occupied again. ‘The Iroquois moved on to fresh hunting grounds,’ he said, ‘but their spirits remain here to watch over it.’

  He assisted the men by working on the road by day, then he rode into the mountains in the evenings, returning after dark and making his bed on the floor of one of the men’s cabins.

  ‘Where do you go?’ Georgiana plucked up courage to ask him one evening. She had watched for his return until quite late. ‘Are you hunting?’

  ‘No,’ he said, in his usual abrupt way. ‘Not here.’ He looked down at her. ‘I go to be quiet. Away from people.’

  ‘I see,’ she said, feeling disappointed but not knowing why. ‘Of
course. You are used to being alone.’

  ‘Yes. Tomorrow you can come.’ His tone was decisive. ‘You can ride behind me.’

  She bit on her lip and pondered. Would that be the right thing to do? Her emotions were in a turmoil whenever he was around, and when he wasn’t she was constantly watching for him.

  ‘Are you afraid?’ His eyes held hers.

  ‘Yes,’ she answered swiftly. ‘I am.’

  ‘There is no need,’ he said. ‘You will be safe with me.’

  He doesn’t know it is of myself that I’m afraid, she thought, not wolves or bears or wild men! I know I would be safe from all those things when he is there. It is the thought of being alone with him that makes me tremble.

  The next day the men brought about the first explosion at the western end of the creek, but the rock was harder than they had expected and the gunpowder they were using produced only a small hole which allowed a mere trickle of water through.

  Wilhelm and Ted conferred. ‘We’ll use nitroglycerine,’ Ted said. ‘That’ll shift it.’

  ‘No!’ Wilhelm objected harshly. ‘It’s not stable. Someone could be killed. And in any case we couldn’t get it.’

  ‘Yes we can,’ Ted said. ‘I’ve got some.’

  ‘Good God!’ Anger showed on Wilhelm’s usually calm face. ‘Where is it? Where is it stored? We could all be blown to pieces!’

  ‘Safe.’ Ted’s expression was stubborn. ‘It’s buried and away from the valley.’

  ‘You were going to use it for the shaft!’ Wilhelm accused him.

  ‘In the beginning I was,’ Ted admitted, looking away from him. ‘But then I thought better of it. The site was too confined, it was too dangerous.’

  ‘I’ve trusted you—’ Wilhelm began.

  ‘And you still can,’ Ted said quickly. ‘It would save us so much time and effort. I’ll do it,’ he said. ‘I won’t ask anyone else to use it.’

  ‘No!’ Wilhelm was adamant. ‘We cannot take the risk. But how can we get rid of it?’

  Ted seemed disappointed, but he just shrugged and said that he knew how.