Song of the Spirits (In the Land of the Long White Cloud saga)

by Lark, Sarah

  A short while later, it had been determined that sixty-six men had entered the mine that morning, not including Joe and Timothy, who had gone down later. They had already found twenty dead, most of them in the vicinity of tunnels one through seven, which had not collapsed. They were now digging near tunnels eight and nine. The hours ticked by slowly.

  Afterward, Elaine could not have said how the day passed. She helped make tea and sandwiches, but she was hardly aware she was doing so. At one point, the pastor asked her to drive into town to retrieve more provisions. Though the families of the victims could not bring themselves to eat anything, the miners were devouring untold quantities of food. Roughly a hundred men were now working in the mine, working in shifts to avoid stepping on each other’s toes. Several sections of the tunnel had collapsed completely, and the quantity of rocks and dirt was massive. Dead bodies were continually being brought to the surface.

  As Elaine bridled Banshee, she once more came upon Fellow, saddled and still waiting. It seemed no one had the heart to take him away. The rescue workers probably thought that was another bad omen. Elaine, too, struggled with the ludicrous hope that Timothy might appear at any moment and swing up on his horse, as long as Fellow was waiting. But then she gave herself a kick, removed the gelding’s saddle, and led him into the mine’s stables.

  “Your master will find you here too,” she said quietly. Suddenly she felt tears spring to her eyes. She cried softly into the horse’s mane. Then she steadied herself and made her way back to town.

  Greymouth had been numbed by the catastrophe in the Lambert Mine. The Lucky Horse was closed, and over at the Wild Rover, all was still. The rest of the ladies in the women’s association had been cooking. Although two of them joined her, Elaine wondered what there would be for more workers to do. At first, they had all thought they would be caring for the wounded, but so far Dr. Leroy had been needed only for the minor injuries of the rescue workers. All the men the workers had brought up from the mine were dead.

  As Elaine passed the Wild Rover, she saw Kura. The young woman had come to work but found the pub empty inside. She seemed to be weighing whether she should go back in when she caught sight of Elaine.

  “I heard about the mine,” Kura said. “Is it bad?”

  As Elaine looked at her, she felt, for the first time, neither anger nor envy nor admiration.

  “That depends on what you think ‘bad’ means,” she said through her teeth.

  Kura looked as impassive as ever. Only in her eyes could Elaine detect something like fear. That day, it occurred to Elaine for the first time that her cousin could express her feelings only through song. Perhaps that was why she needed music so desperately.

  “Should I come along?” Kura asked. “Do you need help?”

  Elaine rolled her eyes. “As far as I know,” she said gruffly, “you possess none of the qualities needed at the mine at the moment. Neither the art of seduction nor operatic arias are going to be of any use.”

  The ladies in Elaine’s wagon pricked their ears noticeably.

  Kura’s conciliatory tone vanished.

  “And yet I have a rather enlivening effect on men,” she said in her darkest, most lascivious voice, tossing her hair back gracefully.

  Kura’s bravado would have left Elaine speechless the day before. But now she looked at the girl coolly.

  “In that case, you actually could put yourself to good use. So far we have thirty-three dead. If you’d like to give it a try…”

  Elaine gave Banshee a quick flick of the crop, and the horse pulled away with verve. Kura hung back silently. Elaine had won the duel of words, but no feeling of triumph washed over her. On the contrary, she felt tears welling up as she directed her horse toward the mine.

  As the rescue operations dragged on into the night, the only bright spot was the birth of Cerrin Patterson’s baby. A healthy boy, who would hopefully offer his mother some consolation for the loss of her husband. No one had told Cerrin yet that her husband was dead, and when Elaine heard that, she looked fearfully over the rows of victims laid out in one of the sheds. Perhaps they had already found Timothy and were keeping it secret from her and the Lamberts.

  That was not the case, but Elaine was deeply shaken by all the dead. She found Jimmy among the victims, the coal digger who admitted to her on his beer-soaked nights that he was afraid every day before he entered the mine. Charlie Murphy’s wife was weeping hysterically over her husband’s death, even though he had beaten her often and then regretted it bitterly afterward. Elaine saw apprentices among the dead, boys who had proudly drunk their first beer at the Lucky Horse after their first day of work, and ambitious young workers who had tried their best to court her when she had first started at the pub. One day he would be a foreman, Harry Lehmann had told her with pride. Then he would be able to offer her a good life. Now he lay there, limbs shattered, like so many of the dead who had finally been recovered.

  The rescue operations were now pushing into those areas where the explosions had first been triggered. The pitmen there had not died of gas poisoning but struck by rock or burned. Timothy could hardly have made it so far into the mine. In fact, he should have been among the first dead retrieved.

  Around eleven o’ clock that night, Matt Gawain finally emerged from the mine. He had exhausted all of his strength, and the men had finally forced him to take a break.

  Elaine found him in Mrs. Carey’s improvised tea-and-soup kitchen, where he was pouring tea down his throat and spooning stew into his mouth like a starving man.

  “Matt! Still no news about Tim?”

  Matt shook his head. His face was sunken, and black with coal dust. He had not bothered to wash. None of the pitmen had. There was no point, since they were just lurching into the kitchen to recover for a few minutes before their next turn.

  “We’re slowly making our way into the area where we heard the knocking, if there was any. We haven’t heard anything for hours. But if there are survivors, that’s where they’ll be, near the new air shaft. Those are newly dug tunnels with their own ventilation system, or they’re supposed to be. But it’s tough. The passages there have completely collapsed and they’re often still burning hot after the fires. We’re doing our best, Lainie, but we might get there too late.” Matt choked down a piece of bread.

  “But do you think that Tim…” Elaine almost resisted getting her hopes up again.

  “If I had been in his place, that’s where I would have tried to get to. But who knows if he made it? There are still tunnels we haven’t dug out. Theoretically, someone could still be there. In any event, we’ll get to the air shaft soon. If we don’t find him there…” Matt lowered his head. “I’m going right back in, Lainie. Wish us luck.”

  Matt did indeed go back in, though Dr. Leroy would have liked to prohibit him from doing so. After all, he was swaying with exhaustion. However, he wanted to be there for the last shovelful—and to potentially carry out test drillings if a suspicious hollow appeared. The danger in the mine was far from over.

  3

  Elaine moved aimlessly about the mining complex, where the victims’ families and many of the volunteers from the village had settled down to rest a bit. Mrs. Carey and Berta Leroy were asleep on the beds that had been prepared for the wounded. Dr. Leroy was dozing in Marvin Lambert’s armchair. He’d had cots brought into a side room for the Lamberts themselves. Marvin had ended drinking himself into a fitful half sleep, and Berta, no longer able to stand Nellie’s histrionics, had put her to bed with laudanum. Timothy’s mother was now sleeping peacefully beside her husband, who tossed and turned restlessly, appearing to curse in his sleep.

  Most of the wives and children of the victims had been taken home. Some of them were holding wakes. Those who still had loved ones below continued to wait by the mine’s entrance. It was a warm night. Though the women were trembling, it was more from fear and exhaustion than cold. Mrs. Carey had nevertheless had blankets distributed.

  Madame Clarisse or
dered her girls home. There was nothing more they could do there, and she did not like to leave them unattended at night. Even exhausted men were men, and they would see the prostitutes as fair game. The pastor took them back to town in a freight wagon. Elaine, however, had only shaken her head when Madame Clarisse asked her to bridle Banshee again.

  “I’m staying here until they… until they…” She did not finish, afraid to break down in tears. “No one will try anything with me,” she added once she had regained her composure.

  She ended up collapsing in the stall next to Banshee and Fellow, snuggling into a bale of hay with Callie in her arms. It seemed to be her fate to find solace only in animals.

  But then, as the morning dawned, a yell started her from her half sleep.

  “They found someone!” a jubilant voice announced. “There’s a sign of life. Someone is clearing away rubble from the other side.”

  Elaine rushed from the stables without even shaking the straw out of her hair. In the yard she saw a young man surrounded by a cluster of women.

  “Who is it?”

  “Is there more than one?”

  “Are they injured?”

  “Is it my husband?”

  “Is it my son?”

  Over and over the same questions. Is it Rudy, is it Paddy, is it Jay, is it…

  “Is it Tim?” Elaine asked.

  “I don’t know! I don’t know!” The young man could hardly hold back the tide. “So far there have only been noises. But they’re digging there now. Maybe another hour.”

  Elaine remained near the other women, shaking, crying, and praying right along with them. They were weak with exhaustion and fear. And this was their last chance. They knew that the men were not likely to find other survivors.

  It took more than two hours for the message to make it to the surface.

  “It’s one of the boys, Roly O’Brien. Let his mother know! The boy’s a bit done in but he’s unharmed. And…”

  The women rushed to the entrance of the mine and looked expectantly at the hoisting cage.

  “The other is Timothy Lambert. But let the doctor through, quickly now, it’s urgent.”

  Elaine stared in a state of disbelief at the stretcher on which Timothy was carried into the fresh air. He was unconscious, but he didn’t look as though he were sleeping. His body lacked any rigidity. Elaine felt like she was looking at a marionette whose joints had been flung carelessly any which way. But he had to live, he simply had to!

  Elaine wanted to come closer, but Dr. Leroy was already tending to the injured man. Elaine watched anxiously as the doctor felt for his pulse, listened to his breathing, and delicately felt his body.

  Finally, the doctor straightened. Elaine attempted to read his stonelike face.

  “Doctor,” she said desperately. “Is he alive?”

  Leroy nodded. “Yes. But will that be good news to him in his condition?” Leroy bit his lip when he saw Elaine’s horrified face. “I need to examine him further.” The doctor averted his gaze and turned to the men with the stretcher. “Take him in and lay him on one of the beds, but be careful. This man’s broken every bone in his body.”

  “Now, don’t drive yourself mad with worry, my dear,” Berta Leroy said, watching the girl sway as the men lifted Timothy’s stretcher. “My spouse tends to exaggerate sometimes. It may not be so bad after all. After such a short examination, he can hardly know anything for certain. Just let us take a closer look first.”

  “But he’ll get better?” Elaine asked anxiously, supporting herself gratefully on the older woman’s arm. “I mean, the broken bones.”

  “That’ll work itself out, my girl,” Berta reassured her. “The main thing is that he’s alive. Mrs. Carey, could you give me a hand here? Do you have some tea for the young lady? With a drop of brandy in it, perhaps?”

  Berta gently pried Elaine’s clammy hands from her sleeves and followed her husband and Timothy into the office. Elaine got a grip on herself and started after them. She did not want to be left behind. She knew it was irrational, but she felt that nothing could happen to Timothy as long as she was near.

  “No, not you,” Berta said, shaking her head firmly. “We won’t have any use for you in there. We need to inform his parents now too, and you—don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re not his official fiancée. And we don’t want any trouble with the Lamberts.”

  Although Elaine’s brain accepted that logic, she nevertheless had an overwhelming urge to hammer on the door as it closed before her.

  Then she saw Matt Gawain and some of the other members of the rescue party. They surely knew the circumstances of Timothy’s rescue. After all, they were just then leading the second survivor into the office. Roly O’Brien entered the makeshift hospital on his own legs. Though he was a little shaky, he was wholly unhurt; his mother was at his side, crossing herself and sobbing with joy. He looked a bit disoriented, but after awhile he would undoubtedly be basking in the general attention. Already questions were pouring in from every side.

  Matt did his best to shield Roly from the deluge of inquiries. “The boy urgently needs to eat something,” said the foreman. “Can you see to that, Lainie? We did find these two near that air shaft, by the way. They managed to escape the gas, but the rocks that fell after the explosion caught Timothy. The boy was sitting safe and sound in the tunnel, however, and actually had quite a bit of space. He might have gone mad from loneliness, but he would have survived for days.”

  “It was so dark,” Roly whispered. “It was so horribly dark. I… I didn’t dare move. At first, I thought Mr. Lambert was dead, and that I was all alone, but then he woke up.”

  “He was awake?” Elaine asked excitedly. “Was he the one knocking?”

  Roly shook his head. “No, that was me. He couldn’t move; he was buried up to here.” The boy indicated the middle of his chest. “I tried to pull him out, but it didn’t work, and he told me to stop; it only hurt him. Everything was hurting him. But he wasn’t afraid at all. He said they’d dig us out for sure. He told me I just had to find the air shaft, by following the movement of the air, and hit against the wall with a rock. Right below the shaft. So that’s what I did.”

  “And he was conscious the whole time?” Elaine clung to this hope. Timothy could not have suffered any serious internal injuries if he had spoken with the boy all day and half the night.

  Mrs. Carey placed a cup of tea and a plate of sandwiches on the table in front of the boy. Roly drank thirstily while simultaneously trying to shove the food in his mouth, causing him erupt in a fit of coughing.

  “Eat slowly, child,” Matt grumbled. “Nothing else is going to fall on you today, and if my nose doesn’t deceive me, the ladies are warming up some soup for you.”

  Elaine waited impatiently for the boy to swallow.

  “Roly, how was Mr. Lambert?” she asked impatiently. She would have liked to shake the boy.

  “He went in and out the rest of the time. He was awake for a while at first, but then he wasn’t doing as well. He moaned and talked about how dark it was, and I was crying too. But then I heard them digging somewhere in the tunnel, and I thought they were getting us out, so I screamed and drummed on the walls, but Mr. Lambert wasn’t really aware of what was going on at that point. They really need to give him something to drink!” That only just seemed to occur to Roly, and he looked almost guiltily at his teacup. “He kept talking about how thirsty he was.”

  Roly’s words did nothing to soothe Elaine’s uneasy heart. She heard loud voices and crying coming from the office next door. Matt noticed it too and looked concerned.

  “His heart was still beating strongly,” he said in an effort to comfort Elaine.

  She couldn’t stand it anymore. Determined, she went to the door and let herself in. Let Dr. Leroy toss her out—at least she would see whether Timothy was still alive.

  But the doctor and his wife were too busy just then to even notice Elaine. Berta was seeing to Nellie Lambert, who was crying
pitifully, while Dr. Leroy tried to calm Marvin Lambert.

  “That was just like Timothy! Nothing but nonsense in his head. I always tell him that those boys aren’t worth sticking your neck out for. But he was always trying to save them. At the risk of his own life! Couldn’t he have led the rescue operations from out here? That foreman, that Matt Gawain, he was smarter. He didn’t go storming into some adventure without thinking only to come back a cripple.”

  “Matt Gawain has been in the mine for hours,” Dr. Leroy said, seeking to appease him. “And your son could not have known there would be further explosions. Other people would say he was a hero.”

  “Some hero!” Marvin mocked. “He probably wanted to dig the buried men out himself. We can see where that got him.” He sounded bitter, but Elaine could smell the whiskey fumes. Perhaps the old man was trying to make himself feel better, albeit in his own vicious fashion.

  Elaine followed the elder Lambert’s gaze to Timothy’s slender frame on the bed. Thank God he was still unconscious so that he was spared his parents’ reactions. His face looked gray, as did his hair. Although someone had done a quick job of washing the coal dust from his hair, a layer of greasy dirt was still lodged in his pores and the laugh lines that were so characteristic of him. To her relief, Elaine saw that his chest rose and sank evenly. So he was alive. And now that someone had spread a blanket over him, he didn’t look quite so disjointed and shattered.

  Marvin Lambert held his tongue for a moment as his wife launched into a new fit of hysterics.

  “And now he’ll be lame for the rest of his life. My son, a cripple!” As Nellie Lambert sobbed, Berta Leroy looked as though she had reached the limits of her patience.

  Nellie collapsed over Timothy’s bed, and he groaned in his sleep.

  “You’re hurting him,” Elaine said, feeling a violent urge to tear the hysterical woman away from her son. Instead, she pulled herself together and gently drew Nellie Lambert away before Berta could intervene more firmly. Nellie fled into her husband’s arms.