Mercury's Rise (Silver Rush 04)

by Ann Parker

  “Oh, Harmony.” It was all Inez could think to say.

  Harmony hastened, “I don’t mean to sound hard-hearted. My heart aches for Mrs. Pace. But I’m worried. No, more than that, I’m frantic.” She twisted the handle of her parasol, and it began to rotate, sending pulsing shadows over her face. “Jonathan knows nothing about the business of health resorts, spas, mineral waters, cures, and the like. He has always been so cautious before, and now it is as if he has some sort of fever, as if he has lost his mind. He’s thrown all caution to the wind.”

  Inez shook her head, mute. Inside, she damned the folly of men who jumped into deep waters at the siren call of easy money, when they had no knowledge of the currents.

  “That’s not like my Jonathan,” Harmony continued. “Why, just this morning, he was saying we would get rich, that it would be so simple. We invest a little money now and we make that amount ten, a hundred, a thousand times over, in less than a year. A year!” Her eyes looked dark and fearful in the shadow of the parasol. “He doesn’t seem to see this is a huge gamble, one where we could lose nearly everything. He’s playing a game and, and I don’t believe he knows the rules. We could be ruined!”

  Inez thought how familiar this all sounded. The belief in the “sure thing.” The talk of getting rich overnight by betting the whole pot, because the returns looked so good and the deal was such a sure bet. The risks, the odds, the repercussions of losing—all seemed as insubstantial as smoke when Lady Luck smiled and gestured with her fan.

  Inez asked urgently, “Has he signed anything yet?”

  “Not yet. I begged him to wait. What could a couple more days matter, I said. I pointed out it would give him time to think this over, gather more opinions, more information, because, no matter what he said, it is a great deal of money. He finally agreed to wait when he saw how upset I was becoming. But this morning he left, right after breakfast, with Mr. Lewis and that Dr. Zuckerman. I don’t quite know who Dr. Zuckerman is, really. He says he is a local physician. I’m guessing he may be involved in the hotel in some way. When he joins us for meals, he always hovers around Jonathan. Oh, Inez. I know Jonathan chafes at home. He runs the business for Papa and does a wonderful job, but I don’t think Papa gives him enough credit nor the responsibility nor the due that Jonathan feels he should have. I believe he sees this opportunity as a way to make his own fortune, apart from Papa. He even said, with what he would make from investing in the Mountain Springs House and its future, we would be free. That was his word, free.”

  Inez couldn’t stand seeing Harmony so distressed. She walked over to her sister and took Harmony in her arms. Harmony remained stiff, her arm still crossed in front of her, hand locked tight on her elbow, a barrier between them.

  “I won’t let that happen,” said Inez. “I have seen this behavior before, in Leadville. Only up in the mountains, it’s silver, not soda springs, that drives men mad.”

  “There is something going on here, Inez.”

  “I’ll find out what it is. Only, be careful, Harmony. Go along with what people say. Be agreeable, and don’t argue. But don’t let your husband sign anything. Point out the other opportunities in Colorado, in the San Juans, in Leadville. I could talk to him about silver mines up there, what the word is on the street for good investment. Maybe we can distract him enough to at least make him pause and weigh other possibilities. Still, he probably wouldn’t countenance business advice from me, a woman.” She felt her throat go tight with panic. “Surely, surely you can keep him from inking on the dotted line, for just a few days.”

  “What will you do?”

  “I’ll talk further with Mrs. Pace and Mr. Calder. I’ll ask around. Discreetly, of course, and see what I can find out about the Mountain Springs House and how it stands, financially.”

  Harmony put her forehead on Inez’s shoulder. “When we first made arrangements to come out here, Jonathan said, if I liked it, we could buy a small summer home.” Inez felt her tremble. “That way, we could be close by you. We could be a…a family.”

  She pulled away, wiping her eyes, and walked over to a small group of flat-topped rocks while Inez followed. “I didn’t mean to talk about all that, it just spilled out. But I’m glad I did, and I’m grateful that you’ll help. I’ve been feeling so at sea about this. Too, I’m glad we finally have some time to ourselves.”

  Harmony approached a table rock just the right height for sitting. A boulder perched atop one edge, leaving just enough room for them to sit side-by-side. Harmony dusted off the flat surface, and spread out a linen cloth to sit on, indicating to Inez to join her. Inez sat, shifting away from Harmony so as to not crush her skirts. Inez’s elbow barked against the rough surface of the boulder and she exclaimed in annoyance as a sharp pain radiated up her arm. She set her hand on a dark stripe in the middle of the rock and nudged it, experimentally. The boulder rocked, just a little. Inez hastily removed her hand, thinking that someone should give the massive rock a good shove and send it to the ground, where it would be less of a nuisance and a danger. She wished she’d had more to eat that day than a few sips of coffee and ersatz lemonade. With all that Harmony had told her, she felt her stomach roil with nausea and dread.

  Harmony closed her parasol and set it, like a line of demarcation, between herself and Inez. She then untied her wide-brimmed straw hat, removed it, and flapped it like a fan, stirring the tendrils of dark brown hair curling at her temples.

  “I actually had a different question that I wanted to ask you, Inez. I do hope you won’t take offense at what I’m going to ask.”

  Inez covered Harmony’s gloved hand with her own. “Nothing you could ask will offend me. What do you want to know?”

  “Now that your husband has returned,” she cleared her throat, and continued with a tremor to her words, “is it your intention to take William back?”

  Inez slid her hand away and fisted it in her lap. “I won’t lie to you. I’ve thought about it, hoped it would be possible. But it is a complicated situation between Mr. Stannert and me. I believe he is anxious we regain William and become a family again. I’ve discussed William’s health with our doctor in Leadville. He thinks that, with William now a year older, he might be able to handle Leadville’s weather and altitude.”

  “You can’t!”

  Inez flinched. It wasn’t Harmony who spoke, but Lily.

  Inez twisted around to find Lily standing in the path, a soiled nappy in one hand, William’s fingers clasped tight in the other.

  “You can’t take Wilkie,” Lily repeated. Her face was blotched red with anger. “We’re his family, not you! He belongs with us. The missus and mister and me.”

  “Lily!” Harmony sounded horrified. “That’s enough!”

  Inez rose slowly, retorts in a turmoil. Possible responses battled for speech, including, “How dare you presume!” and “I most certainly can take him,” and “I am his mother. No matter what happens, no matter how long we are apart—a day, a year, a lifetime—nothing will change that.”

  Before Inez could settle on one or the other or something entirely different, Harmony marched forward, took William’s hand from Lily’s, and said, “Go back to the hotel. Now. I will speak to you later.”

  Lily looked down at William, whose face was beginning to scrunch up, preparatory to crying.

  “I, I’m sorry, ma’am. I just said what I know’s the truth. You and the mister, you’re the only family he knows.”

  “These are not matters for you to decide or remark upon. I hired you to take care of Wilkie, and that is all.”

  Lily’s shoulders crumpled in, and she looked as if she might start crying as well. Without a word, she turned and threaded her way back through The Narrows.

  Inez remembered her last glimpse of William when she left him with Harmony at the Denver train station. His little face had peered at her over the shoulder of the nursemaid Harmony had hired, features squeezing together in puzzlement as Harmony and the nursemaid boarded with him on the train
.

  William was now crying and calling out, “Eee-eee” at Lily’s departing back. He looked up at Harmony, and said, “Want Eee-eee.”

  Harmony crouched down and said, “There, there. Lily will be waiting for us at the hotel. Now, show me. Where is your nose?”

  He stopped crying and touched his nose.

  “Where are your eyes?”

  He blinked his eyes rapidly, then covered them with both hands.

  “Good, Wilkie! Now, where is my nose?”

  He reached out and touched Harmony’s nose.

  “Good!” She picked him up and walked over to Inez. “Wilkie, look at the pretty lady here.” She directed William’s gaze to Inez. “This pretty lady is your maman.”

  Inez smiled in what she hoped was an encouraging manner.

  William stared at her as if she’d suddenly sprouted an extra head.

  “No.”

  William’s dismissal of what, to him, was clearly a lie was unambiguous. Not just in the single syllable, but in his posture, in the incredulity that bloomed in his eyes as he regarded Inez. The cold gaze made Inez sick at heart.

  Harmony pushed on. “Where is maman’s nose?”

  He turned back to Harmony and touched Harmony’s nose.

  She pushed his hand away and said, “No.” She sounded desperate. “I am not maman. Wilkie, look, here she is. This is your—”

  Inez interrupted. “You will only confuse him, Harmony.” With a sudden inspiration, she said, “I have it.” She leaned down and looked into William’s eyes. “William, I am Mutti. Can you say that? Mutti.”

  The doubt and suspicion in his face lingered for a moment, then cleared. He ventured, “Mutti?”

  “That’s right.” Inez nodded encouragingly. “Where is Mutti’s nose, William?”

  Slowly, he reached out, touched the tip of her nose with one finger and said, “Mutti nose.” A fleeting look of puzzlement, something half-remembered, seemed to flit through his eyes. Then, it was gone.

  Relieved and hopeful at last, Inez captured his finger and kissed it. “Yes, William. Yes.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  “I am sorry, Inez.” Harmony sounded subdued. “When he first began calling me Mama, I tried to correct him. I should have insisted he call me differently. Tante, for instance.”

  Inez nodded, thinking that yes, she should have, but it was too late for that now. Then, she had a sudden thought. “Does William call Jonathan…”

  “Papa,” Harmony stopped, and covered her eyes with one hand. With a shaking voice she said, “Inez, I never thought twice about it, after a while.”

  “When Mr. Stannert arrives, it would be politic to let him know what’s what before he sees William again,” Inez said grimly. “So he’s not caught off guard.”

  A rhythmic squeak-crunch-squeak-crunch of approaching wheels on the other side of The Narrows stopped their conversation.

  The squeaking and crunching grew louder, reverberating in the rock passageway ahead. Through some odd trick of acoustics, Inez also heard a strangely familiar but as yet disembodied voice ratcheting through the passageway ahead of its owner. A voice, soothing as the water shushing in a stream, but not clearly male or female, said, “…has treated many such as you with remarkable results. He practiced all through The War of the Great Rebellion and has impeccable credentials.”

  The amplification cut off as an invalid chair emerged from The Narrows, propelled by Nurse Crowson. Inez now recognized the voice as hers. The hunched figure in the chair, heavily swathed as it was, was clearly Mr. Travers from that morning’s meeting in the garden. Nurse Crowson, slightly bent over, was murmuring into her patient’s ear as she pushed. Harmony called, “Good day, Mr. Travers, Nurse Crowson.”

  The nurse halted and straightened. Her expression, at first surprised, passed to a frown, and then a soft smile to fit the words, “Good afternoon, Mrs. DuChamps, Mrs. Stannert. How was your constitutional?” Her gaze switched to William. “How is your son today?”

  Inez’s instinct was to clutch William close, to hide him and any lingering infirmities from the nurse’s critical, cool gaze. Her response, “He’s fine” was overrun by Harmony’s “He is breathing well, no coughing, plenty of stamina. Good appetite and sleeping soundly.”

  Nurse Crowson’s smile widened fractionally. “Excellent. I’m glad to hear the tonic and the climate are having the desired effect. The combination of Dr. Prochazka’s medicines and the inherent healthfulness of the springs and air are quite miraculous. Take one or the other away, and the results could, indeed, be quite different. Of course, the specifics of his condition must be carefully monitored. Not all respond to the same regimens in the same way.”

  Mr. Travers wheezed, his chest heaved, and he fell into an escalation of wet-sounding coughs. Inez, who was no stranger to consumptives—Leadville also had its share of “lungers” looking for the right combination of dry air and altitude to affect their cures—nonetheless winced at the racking noise. His fit passed, and Travers sucked in a tortured breath to wheeze, “Must…see…the doctor.”

  Nurse Crowson resumed pushing the chair. “We will arrange it.” She nodded to Harmony and Inez as she and her patient passed by.

  William regarded the chair and its turning wheels, then looked at The Narrows and up at Harmony.

  She nodded encouragingly. “Go ahead, Wilkie.”

  Wilkie ran into the passageway. He stopped, still within sight of Harmony and Inez, tipped his head to look up at the overhanging cliffs, then hopped up and down and began shouting. His delighted hoots and shrieks echoed back to Inez and her sister.

  Harmony lowered her parasol in the shade of the strait. “We should probably walk a little faster so we can have time to rest and dress for dinner. There is usually a musical concert afterwards, although the musicians vary. I believe they rotate amongst the various Manitou hotels, and I don’t recall who is playing tonight. Tomorrow, it’s games in the parlor. Charades, tableaux vivants, and so on.”

  Inez inwardly groaned at the prospect of having to endure endless parlor games and halting musicians of uncertain talent, but said, “If you will be there, so will I.”

  She lowered her parasol to follow her sister. Before passing through The Narrows, she glanced back up the path to where they had stopped. Nurse Crowson and her charge had paused at the same point, as if to take in the view further up the canyon. Only the nurse, instead of facing the scenery like her patient, was gazing toward Inez and The Narrows, with a barely discernible frown.

  ***

  No sooner had they turned off the path to town and headed to the back of the hotel than the stable boy Billy darted up to them, remembering at the last moment to snatch off his cap. “Mrs. Stannert, Mr. Morrow says he has the trash ready for you to look at.”

  Harmony looked at Inez, mystified. “Trash?”

  “In the confusion last night something fell from my valise,” Inez improvised hastily. “Mr. Morrow was kind enough to clean out the stagecoach so I could see if I can find…” Find what? Her imagination failed her. She finished lamely, “…it.”

  “Well, then, we shall see you at dinner.” Harmony leaned over and whispered, “I’ll try to arrange it so that you don’t have to sit next to Aunt Agnes again. Once a day is quite enough.”

  Inez smiled her gratitude to her sister, kissed the top of William’s head, then hurried after Billy. He led her to an area inside the stables that was, Inez happily noted, out of sight of guests strolling the back gardens and the verandas.

  The tarp was stretched out, the refuse and debris displayed such that she could see each piece separately. Inez was grateful she wouldn’t have to root around through a mish-mashed pile of garbage.

  Morrow was standing by a table consisting of a plank supported by two sawhorses, examining what looked like a worn girth strap. He looked up as Billy and Inez approached.

  “Afternoon, ma’am. Glad the boy found you. Here’s all we found in the coach. Floor’s clean as a whistle now. I s
et Billy to scrubbin’ it down with lye and ashes. You couldst probably eat your dinner from it and be satisfied.”

  A memory of Mr. Pace retching on her skirts and the floor rose before her. Inez quickly suppressed it. “Thank you, Mr. Morrow, Billy.” She strolled before the tarp, examining the contents.

  A couple of empty whiskey bottles. Moldy bits of bread that looked hard as rocks. A lady’s glove. The odd bits of newspaper, waxed papers, empty snuff tins, and apple cores that she had glimpsed before. Then…

  “There!” she exclaimed, triumphant, and pointed. “Billy, could you bring me that small cork? It’s by the apple cores.”

  Billy, looked at her, doubtful, then at Morrow, who nodded.

  He stepped onto the canvas, picked up the small, elongated, stopper, and handed it to her.

  She fished Mrs. Pace’s tonic bottle from her pocket, pulled out the replacement cork, and compared it to the one Billy had given her. They looked the same, except that the one from the coach still had wax adhering to the top and sides. She plugged the bottle with it, just to be sure.

  It fit.

  Chapter Twenty

  Up in her room, Inez shed her dusty clothes and set them aside for the hotel maid to freshen. Wearing her satin wrapper, she set the small tonic bottle and its stopper on the polished wood table in the center of the room. She toyed with the coiled tubing that fed the table’s gas lamp, thinking back on the death of Mr. Pace, and the various things she’d learned about the Paces’ visit and about Manitou in general and the Mountain Springs House in particular since her arrival.