by Rae Carson
“You mean Jefferson!”
He nods. “Your daddy was with me that day. McCauley told us Jefferson had been missing for hours. He was afraid the boy had gone after his mama, who was halfway to Oklahoma Territory by then.”
I know this story. Well, part of it. Jefferson told me my daddy found him in a ditch by the road, several hours out of town.
“Daddy found him,” I said. “But you’re saying it was really Mama?”
Jim nods. “We looked for half a day. Finally Reuben went home to your mother, carrying Jefferson’s favorite blanket, and begged her to use her gift, just this once. And forgive me, Leah, I don’t know the details of how it all worked; your mama and daddy didn’t like to talk about that sort of thing, even with me. All I know is that blanket helped her somehow, and she sent Reuben off with specific directions on how to find the boy.”
“Well, I’ll be.” I knew. Somehow I had always known there was more to my mother than met the eye. Her final words make a lot more sense now. Trust someone. Not good to be alone as we’ve been. Your daddy and I were wrong. . . .
She wasn’t just talking about my gift; she was talking about hers, too. About feeling so alone with a certain bright, screaming knowledge you think you might die of it. About being so full of fear that you never dared trust anyone with that knowledge, not even your own daughter.
But I’ve dared. I’ve dared a lot. Even in my darkest days, hemmed in on all sides by awful people like Hiram and Hardwick, I’m surrounded by people I can trust.
That was Mama’s final wish for me.
I put my hand to her locket, dangling at my throat. I did it, Mama. Just like you hoped.
The proprietor clears his throat. It’s definitely time to go. I pull out some coins to pay for our meal, and Jim tells me when I’ve counted out enough. “Let’s go,” he says, rising from the table.
I squint at the light when we step from the building. The sky has cleared, and the air has warmed. Large and Larger are still keeping watch from across the street.
“It appears your caution in choosing our establishment for lunch was well founded,” I say.
“Friends of yours?” he asks.
“Friends of Hardwick. Or maybe just employees. I don’t think Hardwick has friends.”
“That’s as sure as heaven. Most of his friends would turn on him in a second if he couldn’t pay them. Let’s head to the waterfront.”
Eyes bore into my back as we amble along the shore. I know this part of the city better than any other. Ships on one side. Warehouses on the other. Streets turning into docks as they stretch out into the bay. We stroll down Battery as far as California Street, Large and Larger continuing to trail casually behind.
“Sorry to bring my troubles your way,” I say.
“What? Oh, you mean them. Negros are followed all the time, everywhere we go. White folks just assume we’re up to no good.”
How have I never noticed that before?
“You all right, Miss Leah?” he says. “That was an awful lot to take in back there.”
“I . . .” I reckon it was an awful lot. “I’m fine. Better than fine.” And it’s true. It almost feels like a weight has lifted from my shoulders. I make sure Large and Larger remain a safe distance behind us before adding, “I’m eager to get back to the business of figuring out Hardwick.”
He shrugs. “In that case, what are we standing on?”
I glance at my feet. “I don’t know. Land that used to be water?”
“Exactly. We’re standing on the most valuable property in all of San Francisco. This is where all the business happens. It’s flat and easy to build on. If I could open a store anywhere, I’d do it here.” A sweep of his arm indicates the water. “And all of that?”
“Future land.”
“Yep. And here’s the thing—Hardwick doesn’t have to wait for it to be land in order to sell it. The whole thing is marked out in a grid several blocks into the bay. There’s an auction every month—”
“Let me guess. Next Tuesday.”
“That’s right. A sheriff’s auction.”
We had made inquiries about the auctions when we were thinking about buying Becky’s house. “Cash only, paid in full up front.”
“In the morning, right before the auction starts, one of Hardwick’s men passes out maps showing available lots. Prices vary widely month to month, depending on how much cash he thinks people have.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I thought future land might be cheaper than real property, so I went to a couple auctions thinking maybe I’d buy a lot to build my general store. I had my eye on a particular corner at Market Street and Drumm.” He points to a spot on the water, which is, I’m guessing, the future intersection of Market and Drumm.
A man is rowing a small boat out in the bay. Jim waves at him, and the man waves back. Jim beckons him in our direction.
“That’s going to be the heart of the business district someday,” Jim says. “Now, if you were Hardwick, and you didn’t plan to stick around long, what might you do?”
It takes a few seconds for my mind to put the pieces together and find the answer. “Sell the same piece of future property to a bunch of different buyers.”
“Last two months, I watched the corner of Market Street and Drumm get auctioned off twice.”
“Cash in full, up front, both times.”
“You got it.”
I rub my forehead. “So Hardwick is planning to leave. He’s not going to wait around for the courts to settle this.”
“That’s my guess. You want to go visit Hampton?”
The man in the rowboat has pulled up to the edge of the dock. “Whoa. We can do that?” I say.
Jim grins, saying, “Sometimes it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission.” He helps me into the boat, which wobbles precariously as I settle onto the bench. The sailor pulls away from the shore, and I wave merrily to Large and Larger, who stand on the dock with their hands on their hips, watching us go.
Wind whips my hair, and salt spray stings my face and chills my fingers. Fortunately, it’s only a short paddle across choppy water to the sheriff’s floating jail. I assume we’ll climb up and go inside, but the sailor rows us around to the far side of the brig, out of sight of shore. The water is rougher out here, and our little rowboat rocks unsteadily as Jim raps hard on the side of the jail ship. A small round porthole opens just above, and a dirty white face peers down.
Jim calls out, “We’re looking for a fellow by the name of Hampton!” A moment later, Hampton’s face appears in the porthole, and I think, Surely this is the strangest visitor calling I’ve ever done.
I cup my hands to my mouth. “How’re you doing?”
His forced smile doesn’t fool me even a little bit. “The quarters are small and the meals are smaller, but at least nobody’s working me to death.”
“Hang in there,” Jim says. “We’re working on your situation.”
“Does my friend Tom know about this?” Hampton asks. “He could set it to rights.”
I hesitate, and the waves bump our rowboat against the side of the brig. I start to grab the edge of the boat, but think better of it. If we hit the side of the ship again, I could lose those fingers.
Finally I shout, “Tom had to a take a job in one of the law offices.”
“I trust Tom,” Hampton says. “He’ll help, regardless of where he’s working.”
“You need anything?” Jim calls up.
There’s shouting inside, and Hampton glances away from the porthole. “Gotta run,” he says. The porthole slams shut.
“Well, that visit didn’t last long,” I say.
“I’m not sure the prisoners are technically allowed to receive,” Jim says.
The sailor says nothing, just picks up the oars and rows us back to shore, taking us close to the Charlotte.
“Thank you, Jim,” I say as we reach our familiar dock. “For today. For everything.”
“Anythi
ng for Reuben’s girl,” he says. Then something in my face makes his eyes narrow. “What are you thinking, Leah?”
“I’m thinking I have one big advantage over Hardwick, but only if he never, ever learns what it is.”
Chapter Eleven
My uncle Hiram wanted to be rich because he thought it would make him important. He thought money would make people show him the respect he wanted. He had a picture in his head: politicians and businessmen asking for his opinion. A big chunk of land. A wife, servants, maybe even a daughter like me.
And everything he did, from speculating down in Georgia, to murdering my mama and daddy, to following me out to California and making me dress up and parade around his gold mine—it was all about building that picture in his head.
We all have something like that. I’ve got one, too. The picture in my head includes me and Jefferson together, neither of us hungry, in a nice cabin with a woodstove and a big bed with a pretty quilt like my parents had. It makes me blush a little to think about that bed.
Hardwick has something he wants, too. Some picture in his head that requires all this money. Something he does with the gold coins besides pile them up in banks.
So that’s why, come nightfall, Henry and I are waiting in a hired carriage outside Hardwick’s San Francisco mansion. I’m wearing a nice dress Becky picked out for me—she spent part of the day searching the best shops for wedding dresses—and the bodice makes me itch. Henry is wearing yet another new suit. I had to pay for it, but he insisted it was necessary.
Hardwick is the last fellow I care to get to know or spend any time with, but for our plan to succeed, I have to learn more about him. I have to figure out what picture he sees in his head.
I pull aside the curtain in the carriage window and take another look: adobe walls, tile roof, several sprawling wings and outbuildings, nested in a garden property, all surrounded by a wall. The only entrance is a wide iron gate. Guards shadow the gate, the orange glows of their cigars and cigarillos like stars against the night. This was once the villa of some Mexican official, and it survived the recent fire without any damage.
“I wonder how much a place like this costs to buy,” I say, not really expecting an answer.
But Henry says, “He didn’t buy it. He rents it from one of the local dons, a man who prefers to live on his ranchero than in the city.”
I can’t imagine renting a place so huge. “So he’s not putting down roots.” Just like Jim suggested.
“Maybe,” Henry says. “He’s been here less than a year. He was living in Sacramento, but when the weather turned cold last year, or maybe when they had the convention for statehood, he sold off a chunk of his interests in Sacramento and elsewhere. Shifted his operations to San Francisco.”
“How do you know so much?”
“I always come home from a night of cards poorer in cash,” he says solemnly, “but richer in knowledge.”
“I’m glad that’s . . . paying off for us. For some reason, I thought Hardwick had been here a while.”
“His interests are spread out all across the territory,” Henry says. “But his activities here have increased noticeably. Seems like he’s old friends with the new sheriff, and they figured out some deal with the auctions.”
“I keep hearing about this sheriff,” I say.
“He and his deputies used to be part of a notorious gang of steamboat robbers.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
I peek out the curtain again. Hardwick will leave his compound eventually, and we aim to follow him. Surely the guards have noticed our carriage by now, skulking here in the dark. “Do you know how Hardwick came to be here in the first place?” I ask, to pass the time and keep my mind off what might happen if the guards grow suspicious.
“He probably landed in San Francisco with the navy in 1846. He was a war profiteer, buying supplies on the cheap and selling them at marked-up prices to the army. His nickname was John Mealy Hardtack.”
“Hardtack? Like the biscuits?” We ate an awful lot of it on the trail to California. If I never do battle with those molar breakers again, it will be too soon.
Henry nods. “He bought old hardtack biscuits, usually filled with mealworms, and sold them to the army, who didn’t have a lot of other options.”
“And the sheriff—wait, something’s happening.” Beyond the wall, lanterns bob across the property. A team of horses noses toward the gate, ready to leave.
“Seems like the army is how Hardwick met Sheriff Purcell,” Henry says, dropping his voice, though I’m sure no one can hear us from all the way across the street.
“How much do you know about Purcell?”
“Not much. After the war with Mexico, he and his gang left the army and returned to their old ways, only this time they robbed and terrorized Mexicans and California Indians. Apparently that qualified him to be elected sheriff. That’s why you don’t see too many Indians here in the city, outside of the mission anyway, and the ones you do see are most likely to be Sioux or Cherokee, come west like the rest of us.”
“You found out all of this by gambling?”
“Of course,” he says. “There’s no more popular topic of conversation in all of San Francisco right now than Hardwick. Every man of money either wants to work with him, copy what he does, or avoid him like the measles. But he has an advantage, something no one can quite put their finger on.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Henry lifts the curtain and points. “I think it’s her. Most folks think he’s courting her, but no one is sure. I’d bet my first edition of the Coquette there’s more to it than that.”
Guards pull open the iron gate to let out the carriage. Hardwick, dressed in a suit and top hat, offers his newest associate, Miss Helena Russell, a hand as she climbs inside and takes a seat.
“Henry, what’s an associate?” I whisper.
He looks puzzled. “Someone who associates?”
“No, I mean, is it a polite way of saying something else? Does it mean something like . . .”
“Business partner?” he suggests helpfully.
“Prostitute? Mistress?”
“Not as far as I know. Why?”
“When Hardwick introduced Helena Russell to me, he described her as his newest associate. I’ve been struggling ever since to figure out what that means.”
“You’re not the only one.”
Hardwick’s carriage pulls out of the gate and clatters down the street. Henry sticks his head out the door and tells our driver to follow, not too closely, and to stop when it does. Our carriage lurches forward. The road is not as smooth as I’d like, and I find myself grateful for the seat cushions.
“From what I can gather,” Henry says, “Hardwick has never been married, and never been publicly involved with any woman. It’s a common problem here, seeing as men have outnumbered women ever since the war. So a month or two ago, when Miss Russell showed up, everyone assumed that Hardwick had finally found himself a lady.”
I think of her strong arms and calloused hands. “I don’t think she’s a lady.”
“Lee! Are you being catty?”
“No! I didn’t mean it like that. I mean she’s not . . . refined. She’s . . . like me, I guess.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” he says sternly.
“I wasn’t fishing for reassurances.”
“Well, Miss Russell is an odd one, that’s for sure. She doesn’t accept lunch invitations from the wives of the other rich men and politicians. She’s not engaged in charitable work for the improvement of the city. She hasn’t hosted any parties.”
“What does she do?”
“She accompanies Hardwick to all his business meetings. She’s met every one of his partners and major clients and political allies. Some find her unnerving.”
It is unnerving, the way she always whispers in his ear.
The carriage rattles to a stop. Henry peers out the window. “Ah, the Eldorado. Miss Helena Russell is
accompanying him to a gaming house.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Not lately. But before she arrived, Hardwick never gambled. Now he plays high stakes every night. Apparently he’s as lucky in cards as he is in business.”
The door opens, and Henry tips the driver as we step down.
The world shifts beneath my feet, and I grab Henry’s arm for balance. “Henry, there’s an awful lot of gold in there,” I whisper.
He gives me a sympathetic look. “You’re sure you want to do this?”
I take a deep breath, letting the gold sense surround me, pass through me. Things have been a whole lot easier since I learned not to fight it. “I’m sure,” I say, already steadier on my feet.
A huge crowd is gathered outside, and we start to push past elbows and cigars to reach the entrance. But the dress I’m wearing is like magic; men part for me and tip their hats like I’m a one-woman Fourth of July parade. And maybe I am. All the gold here is setting off fireworks right behind my eyes.
Inside is a high-ceilinged, smoky parlor. Eight gambling tables take up most of the space, and an excited mob surrounds each one. Lots of Mexicans here, in dusty serapes and more elaborate boots than I’m used to. White men in shirtsleeves and suspenders shout in a variety of accents, announcing their origins from the Yankee north, the cotton south, the Irish isle, and faraway Australia.
A long bar runs the length of the parlor. On the wall behind it are shelves with row after row of bottles. Lots of men and a very few women crowd against the bar, drinking and laughing. In a little balcony above, a pretty Negro woman plays the fiddle.
The room smells of sweat and booze and cheap tobacco, which I’d normally find distasteful, but this time I inhale deep, letting the scents ground me. Because otherwise I’d be overwhelmed by gold, not just by the amount of coins in play, but by their constant movement. It’s like a whirlpool of stars.
For a brief, fool-headed moment, I imagine calling all of that gold toward me. Part of me wants to do it. But this time, it wouldn’t be a cloud of soft dust, coating me, turning me into the Golden Goddess of miners’ tall tales. It would be a deadly hail of coins. Enough to bury me.