Califia's Daughters (17 page)

Fayola, the neighbor whose shirt was on Dian's back, hung up a damp towel on an already buried rack near the stove and came to the table with a cluster of mugs and a gigantic teapot.

“Well, if you didn't have enough to eat, it's your own fault,” she told Dian, and handed her a cup of tea.

“A full stomach, a clean body, and a quiet baby—what more could a person ask for?” Dian asked rhetorically.

“What's her name?” asked the woman, nodding at the baby. Dian stared at her blankly, and the expression on her face was too much for the row of children. They began giggling and had to be threatened with expulsion by Jamilla before they went still, but their eyes continued to laugh at Dian.

“Don't you call her something?”

“Well, no. I mean, I guess I think of her as Sixtoes, but that's not a name.” Actually Dian had thought of her as an awful noise and a gigantic problem, if she'd had a moment to think of her at all. Seeing her properly dressed and with a belly full of real food, she seemed much more of a person, even asleep. “I haven't had time to think about it, I guess. What do you think?” She addressed this to the room at large and was met only by a thoughtful silence. The object of their concerted gaze slept beatifically in the man's arms.

“What did you say your daughter's name was?” she asked Jamilla, gesturing at the six-year-old diaper-fetcher with Susanna's eyes and Susanna's questions.

“That's Wilama. She's named for my grand-aunt,” said the innkeeper.

“‘Wilama,'” Dian said thoughtfully. “You know, I have a new nephew named Will, born last Tuesday. That makes him and, er, Sixtoes nearly twins. What if we gave her a name somewhere between Will and Wilama. Willa?”

Wilama would have turned scarlet had she been the color of her namesake, but as it was she just grew a bit darker and collapsed into another heap of giggles with her sisters and friends.

Jamilla grinned widely and untied the apron from her waist. “Past time for bed, all of you. Kiss your new milk-sister good night.” She shooed her kids out the door, lifting the sticky-haired toddler whose milk supply Willa was sharing and carrying her off upstairs after the others. Dian accepted a refill of her cup and settled down for a delicious long talk with the remaining adults, a chance to catch up on the news of the world. The Valley was very remote.

The noises from upstairs gradually subsided as the various sets of feet were put to bed in the part of the inn directly over the kitchen. Willa began to stir, nuzzling hopefully back and forth in the man's neck. When Jamilla came back in, dropping into an oversize rocking chair with the heartfelt sigh of a long day's labor behind her, she accepted baby, mug, and a chair for her feet.

The talk went on until what seemed a very late hour. Tea was exchanged for thick glasses filled with a powerful cherry-flavored liqueur, and the talk turned from gossip and business to criticism of Meijing and the future of the Bay area, which might have been useful for Dian had she been able to remember the details the next day, or indeed been able to understand the conversation. As the evening went on, the formal English gave way to a more colloquial dialect, accented in a way she wasn't used to and which occasionally rendered key words incomprehensible. She did pick up that the man, whose name was Yusuf and who was clearly Fayola's husband, seemed to be the father of two of Jamilla's children as well. And by the evening's end, Dian was relatively certain they worshiped some African deity named ‘Nyame.

It was all terribly interesting, but eventually the neighbors drained their glasses and began to gather up their sleep-sodden children. There seemed to be one too many children for adult arms, so Dian, checking first that her feet were steady on the ground, offered to carry one. She came back a few minutes later to find Jamilla still at the table, feeding Willa yet again, looking amused at the tiny pale head nestled into her large black breast. Dian rinsed and dried the used glasses, and then stood uncertainly. Jamilla turned her smile upward to Dian.

“I'll take the little one in with me tonight, if you don't mind. That way I can feed her without waking up the whole house. Tomorrow I'll give you the names of some friends on the Road north who'll help you. I know everyone on the Road, pretty near, and it seems like half of ‘em have just had babies. Your dogs can go up with you, if you want. Just keep them off the bed.”

Dian assured her that she would, turned with barely a glance at Willa, and went off to a very welcome and beatifically undisturbed night's sleep.

. . . THE ISLAND HAS BEEN ISOLATED
FROM MEN FOR MANY AGES.

F
OURTEEN

D
IAN ROSE, AS USUAL, BEFORE THE SUN.
S
HE DRESSED IN
her borrowed clothes, took the dogs out for a run, checked on Simon, found Jamilla up to her elbows in flour and arranged breakfast for Culum and Tomas, asked after Willa and received news of her peaceful night with gratitude, snagged a mug of hot chicory-coffee laced with cream, and returned with it to her room, where she went back to bed for nearly two hours, reading a frayed and unintelligible novel involving a wealthy male detective, his dauntingly competent manservant, a naked male body that appeared mysteriously in a bathtub, and a bewildering array of other male personages. Under other circumstances this reminder of other times, free from cares and free with menfolk, would have been disturbing, but today it could not touch her, and she lay with the smell of coffee in the room, listening unconsciously to the sounds of feet that grew, reached a peak, and gave way to relative silence. She felt like a queen.

Luxury palled, though, and as there were no signs of servile maids, or competent manservants, staggering in under laden trays, she put her boots back on and went down to appease the empty hole within.

Once downstairs she hesitated. The voices of children came from behind the swing doors, but in the front dining room a dozen women sat with their plates, talking volubly. Gossip, or responsibility? Or was she even invited into the kitchen?

Her dilemma was taken from her when a younger, lighter-skinned version of Jamilla backed through the doors, made a graceful pirouette with twenty pounds of food on her tray, and gave Dian a smile like warm honey.

“Mornin',” she drawled. “There's a chair for you in here, next to the fire. Can I bring you some coffee, or tea?”

Extravagance won.

“Coffee, please. And I hope I'm not too late for breakfast.”

“Never. What would you like?”

“Whatever you have, and lots of it. I just like my eggs soft and bacon crisp.”

“Be right with you.”

And she was. With eggs two degrees from liquid and a tangle of salty bacon that crumbled on the tongue, with two slabs of some soft stuff, neither bread nor pudding, that had been fried crisp on the outside and drenched in honey, with a plate of fried apple slices that tasted of a mysterious aromatic spice and a basket of warm muffins and a plate of buttered toast and more coffee than Dian had seen in a year, until finally Dian admitted defeat and pushed her well-used plate away from her. The woman came and looked down at the debris.

“I thought you said you were hungry,” she said in mock disappointment.

Dian groaned, and allowed her to refill the cup. When the table had been cleared, she sat looking at nothing in particular and bent her ears to the conversations around her. One trio was talking family—a new husband, healthy babies, a house. On the other side of the fireplace, two overdressed women with hungry faces and flabby bodies were trading business stories—a market cornered, a new product brought north, the coup of outsmarting a group of Meijing traders. Their conversations wove in and out, but the one that most intrigued Dian came from the five women seated around a farther table, women who did not have the look of people who would pull out a sheaf of family photographs, who did not have any spare flesh or rings on their fingers. Women who bore the clear stamp of Traveler.

Their talk was difficult to hear over the family and business noises, but after a few minutes one of the women noticed Dian's intent gaze and tipped her head in an amused invitation. Feeling like a peasant invited to dine with royalty, Dian took her cup over and pulled out a chair, added her name to the brief introductions, and sipped her drink while the conversation resumed. It seemed to concern a bridge being rebuilt, and from there the road north and the possible markets opening up along the northern California coast, a place now of silent desolation, impossibly cold in the winters, shrouded in fogs all summer. Talk moved on to the inland valleys, to the gradual reopening of the abandoned but safe delta lands under the auspices of Meijing. Two settlements had been established, northeast of the City, and three more were planned. This would mean growth along the line to the north, the string of small cities that led eventually to Portland.

“Yeah,” said the oldest Traveler, whose eye folds indicated Meijing blood. “And sooner or later Meijing and Portland will be forced to lock horns. God help us then.”

“Is that because of Queen Bess?” Dian asked, eager to demonstrate that she was not entirely without knowledge of the world. But the older woman snorted.

“Oh, honey, they won't wait for her to get involved. Ashtown'll take on Meijing all on its lonesome.”

“Ashtown?” Dian said. “I know someone who spent some time there.”

“She was smart to get out,” commented Rhoda, a burly woman in a plaid shirt who was missing half an ear.

“It's a he.”

“Even smarter, then.”

“What do you mean?” protested another woman, a lugubrious blond woman with the unapt name of Merry. “Ashtown's a nice place. Clean. Honest. Quiet as a graveyard, sure, but nightlife ain't everything.”

“Graveyard's the name for it,” muttered Rhoda.

“What's wrong with it?” asked Dian. Rhoda frowned into her cup, clearly not wanting to answer, but eventually she looked up and saw all their waiting and curious eyes. She laughed uncomfortably.

“I dunno. It's all right, I guess.” She shrugged, although it seemed to Dian halfway to a shudder. “Place gives me the creeps, is all,” she said defiantly, and after a moment the talk moved on.

It was technical talk, of good inns and friendly towns and the places one had to watch for traps and ambushes laid, of where along the Meijing Road to get the best bedding and pans that wouldn't lose their handles, and who had flints and fuel for lighters, and an expensive but efficient little hand-crank dynamo lamp for those nights with more hours than a person cared to sleep. Each of these Travelers had a home, a place to retreat to and play at being part of a family until the days began to lengthen and the feet began to itch, but none of them talked about those places in other than an oblique manner. Dian did not again mention Isaac, or anyone in the Valley.

Dian's cup was long empty and her bladder becoming uncomfortable when a strange noise began to build in the background. She looked out the window but could see nothing. The noise grew, punctuated by a raucous cry like a flock of geese all honking at once, and she got up and leaned up against a window to peer down the road. Children, horses, and chickens began to scatter from the path, and suddenly a gleaming scarlet monster came racing down the rutted roadway. Honking and roaring, the anachronistic monstrosity flew past at the speed of a gallop, turned onto the main road, and vanished, leaving behind it a cloud of dust and the visual impression of five haughty sets of shoulders and heads within.

She turned to the woman next to her, one of the proud-family group. “Do you get many cars along the Road?” she asked. She had seen several on her trip with her mother, and they had made a deep impression on her, not entirely favorable.

“Nah, Meijing's tight with permits. There's maybe one or two a day go past down here, more as you get closer to the City. A family about five miles south has a whole bunch, lined up and waiting for fuel permits. Dream on—they're just for officials and medical use. Although my sister got a seat on one a while back. It was expensive.” Her voice was wistful.

“I'm surprised the people put up with them. I'd have thought they'd throw rocks, or shoot at the drivers.”

“They do if the cars go outside Meijing's borders. But as far as Meijing is concerned, the owners are welcome to a few gallons of gas a month if they're willing to tinker with them.”

Dian shook her head at the noise and at the smell that drifted in through the half-open window. “I'm glad I don't live near them,” she grumbled, and went to take her leave of the Travelers.

She then searched out Jamilla, finding her in the kitchen, nursing Willa while watching with a gimlet eye a young woman rolling out pie crusts. Jamilla glanced up as Dian came in, and then went back to her scrutiny. The apprentice seemed oblivious, and Dian gave her full points—she knew that she herself could never have stood there with that particular pair of dark eyes waiting to pounce on a mistake. The young woman was either nerveless or half drunk.

Jamilla took up two pieces of paper from the table and held them out to Dian. The first was only a scrap, with three names and directions to businesses on them.

“Those are friends along the way who'll help you with Willa. If they're not there for some reason, ask a neighbor for help, but they're almost certain to be there.” Dian nodded and folded the paper into her pocket and turned to the other one, her itemized bill. She stifled a wince at the price of her two meals, but otherwise it was very reasonable. With one exception.

“Why didn't you make any charges for Willa? She kept you up half the night and used a fair number of your diapers.”

“It wouldn't be right. That's the kind of thing that can't be paid off in money. You help someone else in need; that'll pay off the debt.”

“You drive a hard bargain. All right, I'll accept, on one condition: that you accept a gift for your kids.” The big woman smiled at this and took her eyes off her helper for an instant to seal the agreement with a glance. Dian mentally added a large percentage by way of a gift, counting out from her purse the coins minted in Meijing.

“Baby Willa and I—” she began.

“Now, watch out, girl,” Jamilla broke in. “You're getting all crooked, and you'll have a handful of scraps left over. Aisha could do it better,” she scolded. The young woman's brown skin turned pinkish—she was not as phlegmatic as she had appeared. Dian overlooked the interruption.

“Baby Willa and I will try to stop in on our way back down, so you can see how she's doing after the start you've given her.”

“Now, that'd be nice,” said Jamilla. “All right, Tamma, just trim off the edges and I'll do the rest. You did fine.” She disengaged Willa, checked that the diapers were dry, and stood up. Willa did look better, less gaunt than she had been the evening before, more like a baby and less like a starving animal as she lay in the crook of Jamilla ‘s strong arm and squinted at the morning light. Dian was amused at the picture they made, the tall black woman and the tiny, pale, white-haired piglet of a baby.

“You make a fine pair,” she told Jamilla.

The other woman smiled down fondly into the eyes of the small person she held. “She's a good baby, this one. With what she's been through I expected her to be all tense and anxious, but she's not. As soon as she got some food into her she calmed down, like she knew she had people caring for her and the world was all right. She's a bright one, she is. Aren't you?” she said to the serious face, and then looked up at Dian. “You go get your things together, I'll bring her out front.”

A short time later Dian led her saddled horse to the front door of the inn. The clear weather was holding and gentle ripples of steam rose where the sun touched the frosted shingles. The dogs snuffled at the enthralling odors along the road, their noses catching up on the local news and gossip.

Jamilla came out the front door under the sign. Dian studied it for a moment by daylight, then shook her head.

“The painter didn't do you justice,” she told Jamilla, who only laughed. Dian swung herself up into the familiar smooth shape of the saddle and reached down for baby Willa. She was sound asleep with her belly full of warm milk and didn't stir when Dian settled her into the new, proper sling (bought by Jamilla and added, along with the price of five new diapers and a soaker cover, to the bill). Jamilla's son Chinua and the toddler Aisha were on the top step watching the dogs, the other three girls having left for school some time before. Dian sat for a moment looking down at the warm, shrewd black face at her side.

“‘Thank you' is not enough. I am in debt to you, and I don't think I'll be able to pay you back.”

Dian was amazed to see the face break into an expression of pure mischief.

“Oh, no, you're not. No sirree. I gave that debt to ‘Nyame, and ‘Nyame charges interest. The only way you'll work it off is to find somebody with an even bigger problem and help her with it. Or him. That's the only way you'll cancel that debt.” She looked smug at her cleverness, and into Dian's mind came an image of Susanna's face when she had tricked Dian in a chess game and beaten her for the first time.

Dian chuckled and took Jamilla's hand, squeezing it tightly.

“As I said, you drive a hard bargain. I'll try my best to work off the debt, but thank you anyway. I hope to see you in six or eight weeks. Give my love to your kids. Especially Wilama.”

Jamilla's hand slapped the horse's smooth flank as Dian turned away toward the Road, whistling her dogs to her. She rode off into the clear morning, gentle snores coming from the warm body cradled to her chest.

         

Dian had one piece of Valley business before the day was her own, and she found the broker just two miles up from where the side road entered the main thoroughfare. The woman had actually been born in the Valley, moving into town as a teenager when her mother fell ill and stayed on. She was trusted, so that the haggling Dian did was perfunctory—the prices the broker got for Lenore's fabric were higher than anything Dian could have arranged, and the woman positively crooned over a pair of Kirsten's pillow covers. Laine had sent a handful of sparkling jewelry, which she'd found on an overnight trip—best not to ask where, Dian had decided—that, once tested, fetched a startling sum. When business was over, Dian answered her questions about the Valley—Judith's birth, Kirsten's health—then signed the chit with her name in English and its Chinese equivalent, accepted a purse with some of the proceeds in cash, and rode away. Willa hadn't even peeped.