The Scandalous Mrs. Wilson

by Laine Ferndale

  No. Enough. She reached the edge of the bluff just in time to hear three sharp hoots. The steamboat pulled away from the dock.

  No sign of Owen on the decks facing the shore or on the dock. He must truly be gone now. Her throat tightened. The only thing that kept her from weeping was the knowledge that her foolishness would not become gossip fodder for the town. She had not humiliated herself by racing down to the dock with petticoats dragging and hair askew, and she would not show a tearstained face to the world either.

  From her vantage point on the bluff, she could see the whole town. One big hotel. A few small bathhouses. A general store. A bank. Rows of houses and tiny cabins peering like busybodies down at the boardwalk. The black scorch where Doc Stryker’s had been. Not one of the townspeople scuttling about below looked up to where she stood. Even the girls at Wilson’s went on without her: buying groceries, running errands, perfectly capable of coping. Not needed, Jo Wilson sat on top of the hill for a very long time as the town of Fraser Springs went about its business. She stayed until the SS Minto grew small on the horizon and then vanished from view. She stayed until the wind smoothed over the wake the boat left behind, until it seemed that the town was perfectly isolated, like a village in a Christmas snow globe.

  Finally, she stood up and smoothed the front of her dress. She would set Owen Sterling out of her mind. She had friends who cared for her. She had her business, with employees and clients who depended on her and respected her. And she had her pride and her independence. That was all so much more than most people had. It was important to stay firm in the decisions you make in life, she decided. She just had to keep her eyes facing forward and her shoulders straight. She strode down the hill and back to Wilson’s.

  PART 2

  Chapter 27

  July 20, 1910

  Dear Mrs. Wilson,

  Over the past year, your fellow Fraser Springians (Springites? Springers?) sent you thirty-three of the nastiest letters I’ve ever laid eyes upon. Happily, those lies had the unintended consequence of bringing me to Fraser Springs and introducing me to you. But even though these slanderous letters played a role in our meeting, I cannot allow them to have the final word.

  So I am sending you one more letter along with a small gift. I trust it arrived in one piece. I sold my article on Fraser Springs. Mr. Harrison was able to negotiate a handsome sum for it, and when I recalled your difficulty getting replacement glass for your broken window, it seemed to me that you should benefit from my good fortune. It is, after all, your story, and I hope that when you read my article, you will find that I did it justice.

  Yours,

  Owen Sterling

  P.S. I am sadly short on bricks, so I hope you will accept conventional mail. If you would care to correspond, you can reach me care of the rooming house where I am staying, which I’ve listed below.

  • • •

  The Vancouver World - Front Page - Sunday Edition, August 9, 1910.

  Identity of Hero Journalist Revealed

  Last week, we published a Letter to the Editor from Mrs. Robert McSheen of Fraser Springs, which called on the publication to reveal Ross Wister’s true identity so that he might be commended for his valiant actions.

  In the end, we consulted with the man himself, and he gave us permission to reveal his real name. The truth of Ross Wister’s identity may be shocking for those of you with young lads in the house, or those who enjoy reading adventure stories yourself, for Ross Wister is none other than famed novelist Owen Sterling.

  Sterling is the author of over thirty adventure novels for boys, including Trouble on the Mountain and Escape From Raven’s Peak. His stories are beloved by readers of all ages and have played a crucial role in inspiring our boys to engage in healthful outdoorsmanship. We here at The Vancouver World are proud to call Owen Sterling one of our own, and we intend to show this pride with a ceremony attended by our dear Mayor (and owner of The Vancouver World), The Honorable L. D. Taylor, to be held on Hastings Street on August 19 at one in the afternoon. All members of the public are welcome to attend.

  The Vancouver World - Social Pages – September 1, 1910

  Vancouver’s Most Eligible Bachelors and How to Meet Them

  By Miss Imogen Thornbush

  Ladies, should you think that courting season is over just because we’re putting away our picnic baskets and summer pastels, think again. Fall and winter have their own charms, and whose thoughts don’t turn to romance when the seasons bring us harvest dances and cosy fireside chats?

  The fact is plain: there is no wrong time to meet Mister Right. That is why I have taken the liberty of speaking to Vancouver’s best and brightest in order to compile the most up-to-the-date list of our fair city’s most eligible bachelors. Of course, we must not go hunting for men as if they were grouse in the woods. No, the art of courtship is one of refinement and subtlety. Sometimes, however, love needs a little push. If we sit at home working on our petit point today, we may soon find ourselves spending another summer chaperoning the ‘dates’ of our friends. Victory favours the bold, ladies!

  So in this spirit, here is my list of Vancouverites to set your sights upon (and where to find them!).

  First, and perhaps unnecessarily, we must draw your attention to celebrated author and real-life hero Owen Sterling. Mr. Sterling set our hearts aflutter when he rescued two people from a burning building (and was too modest to boast of his heroics!). When girls see his sparkling blue eyes and woodsman’s physique, they practically pull each other’s hair to get a seat at the table with him. Truly, he is the complete package. A man whose career is devoted to the thinking up of wholesome adventures is bound to be a devoted father, and you will never run out of conversation with this brainy fellow.

  Though some might find his zeal for the muddy outdoors distasteful, he also moves in the finest circles. My sources tell me that in the past few weeks he’s been spotted at a whirl of society dinners, galas, and fundraisers. Pluckier gals might also try to join him on Wednesday nights at the British Columbian Naturalist Society meetings. Hope you can tell your spotted owl from your black-tipped chickadee, girls!

  Whatever you do, my advice is to ACT FAST if you want to become Mrs. Owen Sterling. A man like this won’t remain single for long.

  Chapter 28

  Nine weeks without him, and yet Owen Sterling’s voice had never left her head. It came through as she prepared salve or scrubbed floors or sought out knots in the pale, doughy backs of the rich women who came to see her now, their rosewater-scented bodies so different from those of the miners she was accustomed to. His voice came in the memories that even the smallest details of the bathhouse could trigger. The axe leaning against the wall was a reminder of the contest he’d had with Nils. The chipped enamel cup recalled all those times he’d sat in her dining room, inhaling the smell of coffee with his eyes closed. Sometimes a man with his physique would be sitting at the long slab table, and she’d forget he’d ever left. Oh, there you are, she found herself thinking. So good to see you again.

  But, no, Owen was back in Vancouver. Sometimes she would dream that she was traveling on a tram down city streets past an endless scroll of buildings with advertisements painted on the sides, and dogs and horse carts and people running across the streetcar’s path and alongside it, drifting in and out of her vision, not looking at her. No, she could never live in Vancouver.

  Fraser Springs wasn’t a bad place, really, nor was it hopelessly set in its ways. The same people who had penned acid-tongued hate letters now seemed genuinely happy to see her. They invited her to church group meetings, where she tried her best to swallow the dry cookies and the too-sweet lemonade, grainy with sugar crystals, and agree with Mrs. McSheen that, yes, business was booming, and yes, it was the Lord’s work, and yes, also probably a little bit of Mrs. McSheen’s work as well.

  Jo was waking up earlier and earlier these days. She was dressed and downstairs well before dawn this morning. She was almost disappointed to see that, de
spite last night’s larger-than-usual dinner crowd, the kitchen had been left spotless. Every surface gleamed in the flickering yellow gaslight. She sighed. Deep down, she knew that she could scrub the floor until it shone and the wood polish chapped her hands, but every time she looked up she would still imagine Owen walking in with Nils. She could rub coat after coat of wax on the long table, but it wouldn’t stop her from picturing him sitting on the bench with the top button of his collar undone and his hair askew, joking over bacon and coffee.

  It didn’t matter. She tied on her apron, cinching the strings unnecessarily tight, and picked up the tin buckets they used to fill the big kitchen washtub. Hauling water in from the pump house was usually a chore they left for Nils or one of the other men, but this morning she very much needed the mental clarity that came from lifting heavy things.

  By the time she made it back across the yard, with only half of the water sloshed onto her skirts, her breathing was heavier, but her racing thoughts had slowed. She stirred up the stove, hauled in a half-dozen loads of split firewood, and scrubbed enough potatoes to feed a small army. She’d begun cutting in lard for biscuits when Ilsa, muzzy and half-awake, silently joined her at the scarred countertop.

  They worked together in silence for a while, Ilsa chopping the still-wet potatoes into chunks while Jo kneaded her mountain of dough.

  Finally, Ilsa cleared her throat. “If that’s biscuits, they’ll be hard as rocks the way you’re working them.”

  Startled, Jo looked down and experimentally pushed at the smooth white mass with the heel of her hand. It sprang back like India rubber. Ilsa was right; it would be impossible to roll this out. She huffed in frustration, sending little eddies of flour swirling onto the floor. Abandoning the traitorous biscuits, she stalked across to the stove, jabbed at the coals, and slammed the largest of the cast iron lids into place. She winced at the loud clang that burst across the domestic tranquility of the kitchen.

  “Jo. Stop,” Ilsa said quietly. Jo took a deep, steadying breath before she turned around. “You’ve been running yourself ragged like this for weeks and weeks. Eventually you’re going to have to tell me what went wrong.”

  “I am aware of that, Ilsa,” she snapped.

  There was another long silence, but she knew Ilsa well enough to recognize this one as punitive. She squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to turn away from the red glow of the stove.

  “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t snarl at you just because I ... haven’t been sleeping well.” She could see the question on Ilsa’s face as clear as if the pretty blonde had spoken it aloud. “For the thousandth time, I don’t want to talk about Owen Sterling. I misjudged the situation, and that’s all there is to it.”

  Ilsa left her potatoes to move the two biggest skillets onto the range to heat. Standing elbow to elbow with Jo, she asked, gently, “Did he hurt you?”

  “I ... beg pardon?”

  “Did he force himself on you?” Ilsa’s voice was low. “Physically.”

  “What? No! No, of course not.”

  “Thank God for that, then. I didn’t think he was that kind, but you never know.” Ilsa’s expression of relief was so plain and so sincere. Certainly she’d dealt with worse things than a man leaving her.

  At a loss for words, Jo ran her fingers down the condensation on the edge of the washtub and flicked the moisture into the glossy black skillets, where the droplets instantly danced and sizzled away. There was still no motion from upstairs. The rest of the establishment seemed to have collectively decided that today was a holiday.

  Together, the two women sliced bacon, boiled coffee, cut the god-awful biscuit dough into rounds and loaded them into the oven. Jo realized she had momentarily run out of useful tasks. More to keep her hands busy than anything, she ladled out two cups of strong, bitter coffee and handed one to Ilsa.

  After a few silent sips, Ilsa asked, cautiously, “What did you misjudge, exactly? Why are you down here frying potatoes with me when you could be having breakfast in bed in Vancouver?”

  Jo turned her blue-and-black enameled mug nervously in her hands. “Who did you hear that from?”

  “Doc Stryker. He tried his best to keep his mouth shut, but I’m very charming.”

  Ilsa was the best friend she had, and she was right. Jo sighed. She had been shutting everyone out, trying to keep her disaster of an affair with Owen Sterling to herself. But Ilsa wouldn’t judge her, surely. “We were ... intimate. More than once. And it was lovely. He was lovely. But he wanted more than I could give him.”

  “Well, some men do have strange tastes. I once knew a girl who had a regular caller who ...”

  Jo did not want to hear the rest of this little anecdote. “He wanted me to go away with him to Vancouver. But he never said anything about marriage. Or ... or love.”

  Ilsa’s expression was almost maternal. “Is that all? Lord, you had me thinking it was something against nature. Of course he fell in love with you. Any fool could tell that.”

  “But it isn’t that simple! I have a life here. People depend on me, and I can’t give all that up to go trailing after some man I barely know. Especially one who hasn’t proposed and who’s already lied to me once about who he is.”

  Ilsa took another slow sip. “Is that what you argued about so badly that he ran off back to the city? Giving up the business?”

  “That’s the only real option, isn’t it? His whole life is in Vancouver.”

  “He could be a writer from anywhere, though, couldn’t he?”

  “I ...” Somehow, this thought had not occurred to her. It certainly wasn’t traditional for a husband to move for a wife and not the other way around, but that didn’t mean it was impossible. She shook her head sharply to jostle away the words “husband” and “wife.”

  “It was him that sent the new window, wasn’t it?” Ilsa asked carefully. Jo shrugged.

  “Jo! That must have cost him a fortune! Most of us only get some draggle-tailed carnations after we fall out with a beau.”

  “I know. It was a very thoughtful gift. But I haven’t heard a single word from him since. He probably already fell in love with some pretty rich girl who read about him in that awful ‘Eligible Bachelors’ column. I don’t need to be rejected a third time by the same man. I’ve washed my hands of him.”

  Another silence stretched out, but the air between them was so much more peaceful than before. After a few minutes of listening to the soft noises of boiling water and the first morning birds, Ilsa set her empty coffee cup down. It made a bright plink noise against the table. “Well, you know your own mind, and I’ll never convince you to feel something you don’t.” She rose and walked around the table to Jo’s chair, and placed her hands on Jo’s upper arms. “Thank you for telling me what happened. Finally.” She pulled Jo into a hug that had more forgiveness in it than most church sermons.

  Jo returned the squeeze, smiling. Then she stood and took their cups back to the sink.

  “Did you ever write him? To let him know you got the window?” Ilsa asked from the other side of the kitchen.

  Jo sighed. Of course Ilsa had a parting shot. “I signed for the delivery.”

  “That’s not the same thing, though, is it? He sent you a grand apology, and for all he knows, you smashed it into little bits.” She shrugged dramatically. “Anyway. I’m going to go wake up Mary and the rest of the lazy cows. Your terrible biscuits are probably done by now.”

  Ilsa disappeared up the stairs. Jo dropped the cups into the sink and then stared out of the window without truly seeing anything.

  Damn. It seemed she had a letter to write.

  Chapter 29

  There was nothing natural about the clubhouse of the Ontario Naturalist Society. The only wood in the room was holding up the bar, and that had been carved and lacquered and buffed until the grain was gone from it. The green velvet curtains made him feel claustrophobic, and the swags in the wallpaper reminded him of leering eyes.

  “Owen?”

 
He hadn’t been paying attention to what Dubs was saying.

  “Sorry, Dubs. What was that?” Dubs was smoking a thin cigarillo, adding to the haze of smoke that seemed to hover over everyone in the room.

  Dubs laughed at him good-naturedly. “Distracted by all the pretty girls who just happen to be so very interested tonight in the migratory pattern of wolves?”

  Owen sighed. He glanced down at his notes for tonight’s talk. He was halfway through his speaking tour, but the idea that all of these people wanted to hear him was still jarring. Tonight he would give a speech to the members of this small club, but tomorrow he would address the entire Canadian Parliament. The Naturalist Society had asked him to contribute to their effort to get the government to reconsider a bill to increase the wolf cull, which would devastate the wolf population. Apparently his moderate celebrity made him a more appealing spokesman than the tweedy old professors who formed the bulk of the Society’s membership.

  Usually these meetings attracted a small audience of those professor types, leavened by a smattering of laymen looking for a captive audience for tales of the insect collecting they did when stationed overseas during the Boer War. Today, however, young women made up the majority of the attendees, and they were all dressed for a gala, not a dry lecture.

  “Looks like Ottawa has just as many science-minded young ladies as Vancouver and Toronto did,” Dubs noted wryly. He had accompanied Owen on his tour, and Owen was grateful to have a friend in the audience.

  “Wonderful.” It seemed that blasted matrimonial column had preceded his arrival in every stop of this tour.

  “Enjoy it while it lasts, Mr. Vancouver’s Most Eligible Bachelor. Most men would give their right arm to have so many attractive women feigning interest in wolves just to speak to them.”