Beside Still Waters

by AnnaLee Conti

  “But I don’t know you.” Violet averted her eyes in embarrassment.

  “Forgive me for being rude.” Red stained his cheeks. “I should have introduced myself. I’m John Barston, captain of the Yukon Belle, at your service.” He swept his hat out in a chivalrous arc.

  “I’m Violet Channing.” She stretched out her gloved right hand toward him.

  John grasped it and smiled. “Glad to meet you, Miss Channing.”

  His handshake was firm, though gentle. Even through her gloves, she felt the strength—from long hours of holding a pilot’s wheel, she supposed. “I’m not used to being so formal. Just call me Violet.”

  “Violet it is then.” John’s eyes twinkled. “What a pretty name! Like the color of your eyes.”

  Violet felt heat rush to her cheeks. Would she see more of John in Whitehorse? If so, she’d like her new home for sure.

  Chapter 4

  SAILING THE INSIDE PASSAGE, MID-MAY 1915

  By this time, their steamer was sailing out of the harbor. Another similar ship passed them headed toward the dock. John exchanged a wave with someone on its deck. “That’s the Princess Royal. She alternates with the Princess May on the Alaska route. I know all the crew members on her too.”

  “Oh!” The silence grew awkward. What could she say to keep the conversation going? “You asked the name of the child I’m going to teach. It’s Jenny Henderson, the daughter of George Henderson.”

  John’s face sobered. “Oh, yes, her mother died of pneumonia, and Jenny contracted rheumatic fever. So sad! I know George well. He works for the WP & YRR, just as I do.”

  “The what?”

  “The White Pass & Yukon Route Railway—the one we’ll be taking from Skagway to Whitehorse.”

  Violet laughed. “I didn’t recognize the initials.”

  “Sorry. I’m used to abbreviating it. I forgot you’re not local.”

  “But I thought you said you piloted a sternwheeler.”

  “I do. We’re all one transportation system. The sternwheelers continue the shipping routes where the railway ends.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “You know, I think you are just what little Jenny needs. She’ll love you.”

  “Oh, thank you! I do hope so. I’ve been worrying about that.” Violet looked around at the water and, stretching her arms out over the ship’s rail, breathed deeply. “What a beautiful place!” She turned back to John. “I’m curious about something. Maybe you can tell me. Whitehorse is a strange name. What’s its origin?”

  “Whitehorse does have an intriguing name as well as a colorful story,” John said. “It’s named after the infamous whitewater rapids on the Yukon River. They resemble the white-capped waves at sea that Rudyard Kipling compared to the flowing manes of charging white horses.”

  Violet tilted her head at him. A riverboat captain who knows English poetry? But she said, “How romantic that sounds! Like knights in shining armor.”

  “I guess Kipling had a good imagination.” John chuckled. “But there was nothing romantic about the arduous climb of the gold stampeders of ’98 over the Chilkoot or White Pass into the Klondike.”

  That triggered her curiosity. “What was so hard about that?”

  “Stampeders had to carry a ton of food and supplies, enough for a whole year, on their own backs. It took several trips up and down the ice steps over the high mountain pass unless they were lucky enough to be able to purchase a horse or mule. And many of the animals didn’t make it either.”

  “That’s terrible! Why couldn’t they buy what they needed when they got there?”

  “No place to buy supplies in the Klondike, and the Mounties wouldn’t let them into Canada without enough food to make it through the winter. They didn’t want anyone to starve to death in the Yukon.”

  Violet nodded. “That wouldn’t look good for Canada, would it?”

  John flashed a smile her way. “You hit the nail on the head! But when the would-be miners finally conquered the pass, they still had to navigate the treacherous waters of Miles Canyon and White Horse Rapids, known as the greatest dangers on the Trail of ’98.” His face turned grim. “The vicious White Horse Rapids stole many stampeders’ dreams, and often their lives.”

  “How awful!” Violet shook her head sadly. Then she grinned up at him. “You weren’t on the Yukon then, were you?”

  John threw back his head and let out a guffaw. “No, I’m not that old!”

  Violet smiled saucily. “I didn’t think you were, but you described it like you’d been there.”

  “I’ve traveled on the White Pass Railway so often and heard the stories so many times I feel like I was there.” With a faraway look in his eyes, John continued. “At the beginning of the stampede, two entrepreneurs built tramways on either side of the rapids. For a fee, their horse-drawn tram cars would carry the stampeders’ goods and small boats around the rapids on log rails. A tent town soon grew up nearby to provide lodging and refreshments to the gold seekers on their way to the Klondike. When the White Pass and Yukon Route Railway was completed, the tent town became Whitehorse, its railhead.”

  “Interesting! Thank you for telling me its history.”

  “You’re quite welcome, Violet.” The way he said her name felt like a caress. “We have several days of sailing to get to Skagway.” He smiled, his even, white teeth gleaming in the sunlight. “Would you allow me to be your escort on board?”

  She smiled back. He seemed like a gentleman. And he was a ship’s captain. “I’d be delighted.” Her heartbeat sped up. She shouldn’t get all excited. He was just being friendly. To calm herself, she breathed in deeply. “The salt air is so refreshing—not polluted like Boston.”

  “Boston, eh? You are a long way from home.” He swept his hand out over the waterway they were now traversing. “No matter how many times I sail the Inside Passage, I never get tired of it. We’ll make several stops along the way. This is the Strait of Georgia. That’s the mainland on our right and Vancouver Island to the left. Our first stop will be Alert Bay, a Kwakwaka’wakw Indian fishing village farther up the island. We’ll drop off mail and passengers.”

  Violet noticed that most of the other passengers had gone inside. She shivered and pulled her suit jacket more closely around her.

  “You’re cold.” John nodded toward an entrance. “We can see nearly as well from inside.” He opened the door and held it for her to enter before leading the way up a wide, carpeted staircase to an enclosed observation deck at the front of the ship. Many passengers were already seated there.

  When they found a space, he said, “So you’re going to Whitehorse to work for George Henderson. He’s a good man—engineer on the White Pass Railway.” John sobered. “He sure has had a run of bad luck, though. Sad.”

  “His mother, back in Boston, thought I could help Jenny because I lost my parents when I was about the same age. When you lose your mother that young, you never get over it.” Violet tried to swallow the lump that had formed in her throat just talking about it.

  “I’m so sorry!” John touched her arm briefly. “I think George’s mother is right. You are just what that girl needs.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  John studied her for a moment. “I read sorrow in your eyes, but you have a quick smile. You seem to be sensitive, yet sensible—just what a young girl who lost her mother needs.”

  “I certainly hope you’re right.”

  They sat in silence for a few minutes. Then John asked, “Would you like a tour of the ship? See where everything is?” She smiled brightly. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  They stood, and John offered her his arm. “Did you know that these steamers are known as pocket ships?”

  “Really?” She giggled. “That’s an odd moniker. They’re certainly too big to fit in a pocket.”

  “I’m not sure who thought up that name. It simply means that they are modeled after the luxury ocean liners, only smaller—like pockets compared to a ga
rment, I suppose. They have just about all of the same amenities, though.”

  The two of them descended the staircase they’d climbed earlier, walked down a carpeted hall with windows on both sides, and stepped through a doorway into an empty dining salon full of tables covered with white linens and set with silverware and stemware. “Three meals a day in here are included in our ticket price.”

  “And windows all around. The view from here is wonderful too. We won’t miss anything while we’re dining.”

  John led her back into the hall. “The Princess May was the first steamship bought by the Canadian Pacific Railway Coast Service to connect their trans-Canada railway with the White Pass Railway. She has quite a history. In 1910, she ran up on the rocks on Sentinel Island in Lynn Canal.”

  Violet fastened wide eyes on John. “Does that happen often?”

  “Not in good weather like we have now. It was very foggy when she ran aground.”

  “Was anyone killed?”

  “No, thank God! It was high tide. The momentum of the ship forced her well up on the rocks. Fortunately, there’s a lighthouse on that island so they were able to evacuate all the passengers and crew safely. When the tide receded, she was sitting high and dry with her bow jutting upward. Photographs of it were in all the West Coast newspapers.”

  Violet frowned. “If this ship was wrecked, how can we be sailing on it now?”

  “Oh, they salvaged her—floated her off at high tide, towed her to port, and rebuilt her. While they were at it, they converted her engines from coal to oil-burning, making her the first of the Princess fleet to be so converted.” John patted Violet’s hand resting in the crook of his arm. “Now, one man can do the work that coal-fired ships needed eighteen firemen and nine trimmers to accomplish, and time out of service has been greatly reduced.”

  They passed by several carpeted salons where they heard passengers enthusiastically voicing excited comments about the beauty surrounding them beyond the windows.

  Violet inclined her head toward several gray-haired men with long, shaggy beards, watching silently from shadowy nooks or slowly walking the decks. “Who are those old men? The faraway expression in their eyes is haunting.”

  “Oh, they’re sourdoughs. They see beyond the mountains to the gold rush days now but a memory.”

  Curious to know more, Violet raised an eyebrow. “Sourdoughs?”

  “Old stampeders, miners who climbed the Chilkoot or White Pass into the Yukon and survived the White Horse Rapids. They’re called ‘sourdoughs’ due to their dietary staple—biscuits and flapjacks made from yeast-like sourdough starter they carried in crocks. I’m told they even slept with it in their bedrolls to keep it from freezing.”

  “That sounds uncomfortable.”

  “I guess that was better than dry crackers made from just flour and water.” John smiled. “Now, they live with the ghosts of the dead left along the trail that led from Summit to the Klondike and the memories of the fortunes they gambled away in the States.”

  “That’s so sad! What a waste!”

  John studied her. “You have a tender heart, Violet, but don’t worry about them. They’re reliving the glory days.”

  “What do they do for a living now?”

  “Oh, they travel around Alaska and the Yukon, coaxing a few flakes of gold from the next stream—just enough to carry them to the newest rumored gold discovery. Some actually pick up odd jobs here and there. A few ride my sternwheeler up and down the Yukon River, working out their passage and meals by cutting wood for my steam engines. They’re happy enough.”

  The ship’s bells chimed.

  “Time for lunch.” John took her elbow and steered her toward the dining salon.

  “Good! My stomach’s grumbling. It’s been hours since I ate breakfast.” How fortunate to have a nice-looking gentleman with such a wealth of information about her new home who was willing to share it with her! She’d like to know him better.

  Chapter 5

  SHORTLY AFTER THE EVENING MEAL, the engines powered down, and the ship’s deep horn sounded. Violet turned a questioning eye on John.

  “Alert Bay. Would you like to go back out by the rail? Now that the ship has slowed, it won’t be as cold.”

  “Sure.” Violet stood, buttoned her suit jacket, and slipped her hand into the crook of the arm he offered her. As they approached the rail, she pointed excitedly at tall, black fins slicing through the water. “Sharks?”

  “No, killer whales, or so they’re often called. They’re not really whales, though. They’re orcas, part of the dolphin family.” The characteristic black and white markings of their sleek bodies became visible as several arced above the waves. “Hundreds arrive each summer in nearby Johnstone Strait to gorge themselves on the plentiful fish.”

  Enraptured, Violet watched as the orcas cavorted in the water. “They’re so graceful! And their fins stand up so tall and straight.”

  “Their dorsal fin can grow as high as six feet,” John remarked.

  “They’re such majestic creatures.”

  As abruptly as they had appeared, the orcas were gone. Violet and John turned their attention to shore as the Princess docked.

  “Are those totem poles over there?” Violet pointed to an area filled with tall, wooden poles carved with whales, eagles, bears, and ravens, all painted in vibrant colors.

  “Right. They mark the ’Namgis Indian burial grounds. Those carved symbols of animals and birds tell the stories of tribes, clans, families, or individuals.”

  Violet and John watched a few people disembark and others board. Then, as the sun reddened and sank behind Vancouver Island, the Princess May continued north toward Prince Rupert, the next port of call.

  When the ship again picked up speed, people at the rail drifted back inside to the salons. Soon the throbbing accompaniment of the engines was joined by the murmur of voices and rippling laughter rising and falling behind the lighted windows. The mellow cadence of music, soft-stringed and dreamy, was accompanied by the shuffle of dancing feet. An occasional raucous shout from the smoking and card-playing salons punctuated the evening. The ship became a living, pulsating being.

  As they enjoyed the briny perfume of the sea, John turned to Violet. “See the moon up there, how it silhouettes those craggy turrets? And the soft, gray clouds hang like shimmering draperies on the mountain peaks?”

  “You sound like a poet.”

  “I must confess to having penned a few poems. Sailing back to the Yukon, marveling at God’s handiwork, inspires me.”

  She gazed at him with admiration. “I’m wondering how a riverboat captain on an isolated river knows so much about poetry.”

  John laughed. “As soon as I turned sixteen, I hired on as a deckhand on the ferries of Puget Sound for the summers to work my way through college. I majored in English and planned on being a literature professor at a university. After graduation, I took a year off to see the Klondike and spent a summer as a deckhand on a Yukon riverboat. I loved it.” A smile lit his face. “I studied for a pilot’s license and went on to earn my captain’s papers. I never did go back to school to get my master’s. I still might someday—maybe after I get married and start a family.”

  An undecipherable expression slid over John’s face. He took her hands in his. “And you . . . you are poetry in motion.” He gazed into her eyes. “In the moonlight, your eyes, which in daylight are a most becoming shade of blue violet, now shine clear and gray.”

  Violet knew she was blushing. She hoped he wouldn’t notice in the dim light. She’d always shied away from boys her age. Of course, she’d never met a man like John. She wondered what it would be like to be married to a man like this. A shiver ran through her—and not from the cold.

  “Would you like to go in?” John asked.

  She just wanted to be alone with him. “It is a bit chilly, but I like it out here. It’s so peaceful away from the crowd. Let’s stay a little longer.”

  John shifted to a place where his bo
dy would block the wind.

  He was very considerate. Conversation seemed unnecessary as they stood at the rail, their backs to the glowing windows, enjoying the evening together.

  The ship rose and fell gently as it cut through the swelling waves, making swishing sounds. An occasional seagull flew by with a siren call that seemed to ask why the people on board hadn’t settled in for the night when most of the wildlife had already gone to bed.

  Finally, Violet let out a long sigh. “It sounds like the party inside is winding down. It’s been a long day. I feel so relaxed that I think I could easily fall asleep.”

  “And you haven’t been out West long enough to adjust to the time change between Boston and British Columbia either.” John placed her hand in the crook of his arm. “Let me escort you to your cabin.”

  Violet smiled at him. “I do know the way, but thank you. I don’t feel as alone as I did when I boarded this morning. You’ve opened my eyes and ears to so many new and exciting sights and sounds and have made this a very special day for me.”

  “I’m glad,” John whispered, his breath soft and warm against her ear. “I’ve enjoyed it too.”

  They stepped inside the passageway and walked down past the elegant, carpeted dining salon, the tables set for breakfast, and the social salons, where the music and dancing had stopped at ten o’clock. Through several doorways, Violet noticed men spreading out their bedrolls on the floor. Inclining her head toward them, she asked John, “Why are they sleeping there?”

  “There’s no steerage in these pocket steamers, so the passengers who can’t afford cabins unroll their blankets and sleep on the floor.”

  They descended a wide, carpeted staircase to the staterooms the next level down. As she unlocked her door, John said, “Goodnight, Violet. I’ll look for you at breakfast?”

  She nodded, flashed him a smile, and slipped into her tiny cabin. As she closed the door, she wondered at the meaning behind the expression that lit his sparkling brown eyes.

  The cabin had all the amenities she’d heard a luxury ocean liner’s staterooms had—all tucked neatly into the small space. She set her reticule on the tiny table beside the bed and changed into her white cotton nightgown. Daydreaming of John, she rinsed her teeth, brushed out her long hair, and braided it. When she slid between the sheets, she was pleasantly surprised that the berth had springs under its mattress, unlike the board bunkbeds on the train.