Chasing Down the Moon

by Carla Baku

  “I promise.”

  Hazel kissed her cheek. “Go on, then. Do what you have to do.”

  “Hired out? The hell you say. I didn’t okay that. Son of a bitch!” Clarence Salyer pitched a fit when he discovered Ya Zhen gone—sounded like a bear with his pizzle snagged in the underscrub, in fact. But it was Old Mol he jabbered at, and perhaps Cora. Mattie only heard him from a distance, and his tantrum put a little shine on the day for her. Ivo was every bit as pissy as Clarence, and she had been forced to listen to him (though she only understood about every fourth word). No sweat off her brow. She got the dining tables fully set while he muttered and growled and slammed things around in the kitchen, then she disappeared upstairs.

  Before she was half done turning guest rooms, the burning in her injured palm told her she’d almost certainly broken the blisters. She tipped the perfume bottle of laudanum repeatedly —only tiny sips, just enough to keep herself going —and still the fire under that bandage made her entire arm an agony.

  By late afternoon, she got so muddled about what she had done and what she hadn’t yet finished, she had to sit every few minutes, hoping the dizzy spin in her head would lift a little. When the last room was as orderly as she seemed able to make it, she gathered an armload of soiled linens and made her way downstairs. The hotel hummed with guests now, all happily eating their crab dinners in the dining room. Everything seemed in fine order; it was clear that no one —not Clarence or Cora or even Old Mol— suspected in the least that a bamboozlement had been pulled, and Mattie didn’t intend to be anywhere around when it dawned on someone that Ya Zhen wasn’t ever coming back. She dumped the linens in the back-porch baskets, grabbed her coat, and scatted.

  It was still light out, a little bit of sun fading into the approaching murk. Her intention all day had been to go from work to the mercantile, to see if there was anything she could do to help Ya Zhen settle in there. But she couldn’t face all that just now. She was done in. She still hurt, and she needed—that terrible feeling of emptiness, as though her very bones were hollow as a bird’s. Even when she saw Rose, just two streets over and hurrying away, she couldn’t call out. Instead, she crouched out of sight behind a myrtle hedge and counted to twenty.

  When she crept out, the street was empty. With her arms crossed tightly over her bosom against the shakes that threatened, Mattie faced toward Chinatown. Blinked. Pivoted toward home. She stood that way for several minutes, counting her breaths, first in, then out. Finally she turned in the opposite direction and started for the waterfront.

  “We can’t wait,” Reverend Huntington said. He was the tallest man Ya Zhen had ever seen. When he first came home, she was astounded; his explosion of white hair looked to her like clouds that hover around a mountain summit. Lucy, for perhaps the tenth time in the past half-hour, wandered to the front windows of her parlor as if wishing for Rose Allen would make the woman appear. She held a little pile of women’s clothing, and she smoothed her hand over the folded fabric again and again.

  “Lucy?”

  When they had talked over their plan that morning, Reverend Huntington told her, it was decided that at four o’clock Rose would come as far as the corner, a half-block from the rectory, and wait. When Ya Zhen left the rectory on foot, she would simply follow Rose —from a distance— until they got to a stretch of road about a quarter mile away that dipped into a swale. Here the road was bordered by a hilly stretch of woods along one side and an overgrown snarl of berry briars on the other. There were no houses with a clear sight line to this spot; Rose would wait there for Ya Zhen to catch up, and Reverend Huntington would pick them both up in the back of his wagon. Then to the mercantile.

  But now, no Rose.

  “Yes,” Lucy said, “you’re right. We’ll have to go ahead without her.”

  Reverend Huntington nodded. “Then let’s make sure we all know what to do.” He went to a small oak secretary and came back with paper and pencil. While Ya Zhen watched, he sketched a little map, drawing in tiny houses and trees and fences. “Now here,” he said, marking one of the little houses with a cross, “is where we are. The church. Where you’re going to walk, Ya Zhen, is here. No houses. That’s how you’ll know it’s the place.” He counted out the number of streets between the rectory and the meeting place —right turn, left turn, right again— then had her repeat it back, without looking at the map. As she recited the route exactly, he nodded. “Just so.”

  In the next room, an enormous clock marked time. Ever since Lucy had picked her up that morning, Ya Zhen felt at giddy loose ends, simultaneously thrilled to be away, and utterly convinced that at any minute someone would come through the door to drag her back to the hotel. Now she was about to step outside, all on her own for the first time in nearly three years, and instead of feeling free, there was fear, like a live thing set loose under her skin.

  “When you see the place with no houses, wait there,” Lucy told her. “Reverend Huntington will be right along for you.” She looked at her husband, apprehension showing in wavy lines across her forehead.

  “That’s right,” he said. “I’ll drive the wagon around a bit, but I’ll be close by.”

  “They will look for me,” Ya Zhen said. “Clarence Salyer. Old Mol. They’ll come to find me.”

  “Not until you’re safe with Bai Lum at the mercantile,” Lucy said. “I’ll send a note to Mrs. Salyer thanking her for sending you, and telling her you had to walk home because the carriage wheel broke. But you’ll be tucked upstairs with little Shu-Li before they even think of searching. You’ll stay put for two days, get some rest, and off to your new home in Oregon.”

  Charles Huntington took Ya Zhen’s hand in one of his. His big palms and long fingers were warm and helped slow her racing heart a little. “When you get right there,” he said, and tapped the spot on the map, “if you don’t see me coming, step a little way into the trees. Not too far, and don’t come out until I call.” He bent his knees to be sure Ya Zhen was looking at him. “I’ll come.”

  She nodded. All she could do now was try.

  Reverend Huntington put on his coat and hat. Lucy handed him the folded clothes she clutched. “Get back just as quick as you can,” she told him. “I don’t dare send a note to Cora Salyer until you do.”

  Out the back door he went, and two minutes later he drove past in the wagon, a heavy canvas tarpaulin tied across the bed. Lucy put her hands on Ya Zhen’s shoulders. “Ready?”

  “Yes.” She was shivering a little. Lucy grabbed a shawl from the coat tree and wrapped it around Ya Zhen’s shoulders. “Here we go. Wait here on the front steps while I go next door. As soon as you hear me chatting up Mrs. Holtz, off you go, confident as can be.”

  It only took a few seconds. When she heard Lucy laughing and talking, she pulled the shawl tight and started walking. As she passed the neighbor’s front gate, Lucy called out in a coolly imperious voice: “Girl, you go straight home, and quick. Cora Salyer wants you back by supper time.” Ya Zhen looked around at Lucy, standing at the open door of her neighbor. Her expression matched that of the other woman: neutral and careless, as though Ya Zhen was no more or less to them than a cloud passing over the sun.

  And then she was at the corner, and out of sight.

  Reilly didn’t try to negotiate Byron’s pay, just handed it over. Late in the day, when Byron had climbed into the loft to shove down a bale, he found an old horse blanket folded neatly near where he had bedded last night. “There’s a ladder up to the hay mow from outside,” Reilly told him as he left, “and that hatch door don’t hardly ever get bolted from the inside. See you tomorrow.”

  The day narrowed toward sunset, and an incipient fog bank hovering over the ocean inched its nebulous face toward landfall. Byron fingered the money in his pocket, rubbing the coins together as he walked. He felt good, tired from his day of work. The swelling in his nose had gone down some, and over the course of the day the pain had faded, as long as he didn’t bend over for too long. He wanted to go stra
ight to Salyer’s and fetch Pearl, lay with her, explain his plans for them, find out who it was that had come to her last night, but he should wait until dark, and he felt ready to eat something. No stolen cabbage tonight.

  In Chinatown, three narrow storefront rooms sold chow, a fragrant hot mix of vegetables, noodles, and bits of meat. Even with his injured snoot, Byron could smell the hot oil odor of the chow shops from two blocks away, and his mouth watered. He stepped into the nearest small eatery. The room was dim. Rough stools stood by tiny plank tables. Off to one side, two Chinese men chopped and stirred mounds of food in large cast-iron bowls, throwing a tremendous sizzle when they dropped the sliced vegetables into the heated oil. Byron held up one finger and the cook nodded. He scooped a plateful of chow out of the wok and handed it over. Byron put a half-dollar on the table and the man fished change out of a box behind him. Several men ate late lunches, early suppers, two or three white men and the rest Chinese. The Chinese men ate from bowls with chopsticks, a nimble manipulation that Bryon found baffling. Pearl could teach him how, maybe, and he would teach her to use a fork, like regular people.

  The food was delicious, hot with ginger and some kind of red pepper. Byron bolted it, wiping his chin on his coat sleeve while he ate. He was nearly finished when none other than Billy Kellogg walk past the shop door. “Billy,” he yelled, his mouth full. A noodle slithered off his bottom lip and onto his lap, and he laughed. I feel good, he thought again, satisfied in the belly. Billy stuck his head in the shop door, squinting around the dark interior. Byron lifted a hand before shoveling in the last bit of his dinner.

  “Hells bells, Tupper, there you are. What are you doing in here, eatin rats?” He honked laughter at his own joke, but sobered when several Chinese men looked over at him. Every one of them was bigger than all five-feet-two of Billy Kellogg, who had the build of a much younger boy.

  Byron joined him on the sidewalk, still chewing. Billy got a look at his face and whistled low and long. “I heard you burned your daddy’s house down,” he said, and grinned. His front teeth were uneven, broken during a fight with one of his nine older brothers.

  “It was the tool shed. You seen my old man?”

  “I ain’t seen him anywhere. Just got the story from Eustace Kilgore. I don’t know where he got it. Maybe your daddy told it to him. You sure it was just the shed?”

  “Was when I left.”

  “So you must be hiding out a while, I guess. Garland was asking around for you. Guess he musta found you.”

  “I’m done with that bastard. Got a job.”

  “The hell you say. Where at?”

  “Livery. I helped old man Reilly fix his broken window and he gave me a job.”

  Billy laughed so hard at this, spittle flew from his lips and his face turned pink. “Shit, Tupper, you ought to celebrate. What do you say? Let’s have some entertainment, then head back to my place.”

  Byron hesitated. He didn’t want to spend too much money. He had to save back at least enough to get him into Salyer’s again. “I don’t want to get too drunk,” he said, remembering Billy’s lament from the night before.

  “I got a better idea than drunk. Let’s go downstreet. Let’s do the palace.”

  “Palace?”

  “The poppy palace. Opium,” Billy said in a stage whisper. He winked at Byron. “Better than a woman.” When Byron just looked at him, Billy’s color rose again and he studied the toe of his boot. “You didn’t tell anybody about last night did you, about what I told you?”

  “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  “Me either.

  “I’m not paying for you.”

  “Yeah, so? I have some. I stole some of the egg money from my ma. Come on, Tupper, do I have to talk you into everything?”

  Byron looked toward the bay, in the direction of the hotel. The sun wasn’t even set yet. He could kill some time, get off the street in case the old man was hunting him again. He nodded at Billy, who looked at him like a dog waiting for a scrap of food. If he had a tail, it would be wagging, Byron thought, and smiled a little.

  Billy broke into his own snaggled grin and pulled Byron by the sleeve until Byron yanked loose of his grip. “Over there, across the street,” he said, giggling. “You’re gonna love this.”

  “How long you been doing it?”

  “I’ve been there a time or two.” He shot a sideways glance at Byron. “Garland knows the place pretty well. I hear.” Byron ignored him.

  About halfway down the block, Billy knocked on a door. There were no windows, and when the door opened, the room inside was dark as the bottom of a well. The smell was strong, like burned coffee beans, but sweeter. The person who had opened now closed the door behind them, and Byron felt a momentary sense of claustrophobia at being shut into the dark room. Then a match flared, and he could make out the dim outlines of furniture and people. Several men, Chinese and white, reclined on bunks built onto one wall, or sat across a single bench that ran the width of another. A Chinese man lit a thin taper and held it to the bowl of a long pipe. The smoker inhaled, a deep draw. He lay back on his bunk, eyes open and unfocused in the thin light of the little candle. The man with the light gestured to the bench. Byron followed Billy, picking his way through the dark room, hoping no one was stretched out on the floor. He had been hearing about the opium den for years, how the smoke corrupted the mind and was part of the Chinese plot to destroy democracy. Most of the stories had come from Garland. As far as Byron could see, at least so far, the men leaning about inside this place didn’t seem any more or less impaired than the ones puking or shooting out gaslights in the alleys behind every tavern in Eureka.

  The candle man stood waiting, and Byron realized he wanted money. He left his one dollar piece in his pocket and held out the rest of his day’s wages. The man swept it off his palm and said something in Chinese. Another man appeared, holding one of the long pipes. He handed it to Byron. The bowl was set in the center of the stem, which was nearly as long as his arm. The candle man lowered the taper and gestured to Byron to lift the pipe to his mouth. Billy watched it all, his pupils large in the dark and his broken teeth glinting in the glow of the flame. Byron inhaled deeply as he had seen the other man do, and held the burned, sweet smoke in his lungs. Immediately he felt a warm and powerful contentment slide over him, as if some large, benign creature, an angel or a butterfly, was folding its wings around his body. He groaned softly, barely a sigh, and rested his shoulders and head rest on the rough wall behind him, a wall that felt as soft as a spring hillock. Somewhere next to him Billy took the opium, but Byron felt cocooned in the sensation of pure contentment, separate. He remembered a certain consciousness from young childhood, before his mother died, when he would waver between sleep and waking, and this was like that, but far stronger. He did not close his eyes, but rode on the sensations like floating in warm water, the sound of his own breathing very much like the in-out rhythm of the ocean.

  Which way? Rose’s feet were moving —running a little, then walking, running again— but every half-block she faltered, her mind pulling her in opposing directions. What if Ya Zhen had already set out? Maybe Reverend Huntington had picked her up at the spot by the gulch and was taking her to the mercantile even now—should I go there instead? But no; surely they’d have waited for a little while, wouldn’t they, before sending her out on foot? Mattie was probably home by now. Maybe she should stop there first and ask her to check at the mercantile for Ya Zhen, to tell them Rose would be there as soon as she checked at the Huntingtons’. Thinking about Mattie scared her, too, after what Hazel had said about the missing laudanum. The fathomless pressure of the afternoon was about to crash into her like a rogue wave.

  Think, Rose. She stopped dead in the middle of the sidewalk, breathing hard.

  There was no time for a detour; a last wispy remnant of February sun hung on, but a foggy twilight was already creeping in. If Ya Zhen had already made it to Bai Lum’s, she was safe, but if she was out on the street, Ro
se might still be able to help. As for Mattie—well, that was a worry that had to wait. She pushed every other thought out of her head and made a beeline to the meeting spot, clipping along as fast as she could without breaking back into her previous unnerved gallop.

  Just a block from the dip in the road, she saw the Huntingtons’ wagon stopped in the street, and a second wagon drawn alongside. Reverend Huntington sat up front holding the reins, and the other man leaned forward with his arms on his knees, talking. Heart hammering, Rose slowed to a normal pace and approached them.

  “But I told him I didn’t care how many apples that pig had got into, that was my pig. I showed him the notch in its ear, and he had the nerve to tell me—”

  “Good evening, Reverend Huntington,” Rose called. Both men turned to look at her, the man with the pig looking none too pleased to have his story interrupted.

  “Hello, Rose Allen!” The look on the reverend’s face was sheer relief. “Mr. Potts and I are having a natter about the fine points of animal property rights.”

  “Nothing fine-pointed about it,” said Potts, sitting up out of his slouch and shaking a finger at the reverend. “By point of law that barrow—”

  “You’re absolutely right, Potts,” Charles Huntington interrupted. “Say, Rose, I can’t let you get away before I tell you that Mrs. Huntington went back to the spot you told her about and found those early fiddleheads, right where you said they’d be. Do you know the place I mean?” He stared fixedly at her, ignoring the other man, who now squirmed in his seat as though stricken with poison oak, so anxious was he to state his case.