Jubilee Trail (84 page)

Garnet shook her head. “You don’t have to, Florinda.”

“But I want to, Garnet. You see, one night I had a long talk with the Brute. I’ve felt better ever since. It’s sort of like I’ve got my mind swept clean. And you’re my best friend and I don’t want any more silence between us.”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Garnet said in a low voice. “I mean—I think I know.”

“You know? But how?”

“I guessed it. That night after the earthquake. I think it was your little girl.”

Florinda nodded. She did not wince or shiver. She could endure a mention of it now. Garnet went on.

“You couldn’t talk about your baby, and you couldn’t talk about your hands. You couldn’t stand the smell and sound of burning flesh that day at the Archillette. Then that night when your dress caught fire and you screamed, everything seemed to fall into place.”

Florinda had listened with a tender surprise. “You’ve known for three months, and you never said a word.”

“No, and I was never going to. I didn’t know you felt any easier about it.”

“You dear,” said Florinda. For a little while neither of them said anything else. Florinda lifted her hands and turned them over, looking at them. “They aren’t as bad as they used to be, are they? Not so red. But they’ll always be pretty awful.”

“You manage very well with them. Your mitts are very becoming.”

“Oh, I manage. Sometimes the fellows catch sight of my hands and ask about them. I give all sorts of silly answers.” She moved her fingers. “Some things I can’t do. I can close my fists, see?—but I can’t spread my hands out wide. I couldn’t reach an octave on the piano, and I couldn’t move my fingers fast enough to play a guitar, and as you’ve noticed, I can’t do fine sewing. But still, I get along.”

She was speaking calmly, more calmly than Garnet had thought she would ever speak about her hands. Still looking at them, Florinda said,

“I’m glad you know. I think now I can bear to say sometimes, ‘Garnet, help me with this, I’m so clumsy about it.’ I couldn’t possibly say that before.”

She turned to look at Garnet again.

“Well, that’s over,” she said. “Now I can be honest about this.” She reached to pick up the aquamarine ring. “Garnet, I’m never going to wear this, either as a ring or a pendant, and I’ll tell you why. This is one of the presents my little girl’s father gave me.”

“Oh!” Garnet said with understanding. “I don’t blame you.”

“He gave me a lot of things,” Florinda continued. “He was rich and generous. If she hadn’t been born, I’d have thought no more of his presents than I think of any of these others. But after she died, whenever I looked at anything he’d given me, I just couldn’t wear it. So I sold them in New Orleans. The jeweler wouldn’t give me what this was worth, and I thought I’d sell it later when I got a chance. But then I came out here. So if you want this ring, you can have it, and don’t get the notion that you’re depriving me of anything.”

Garnet thought she would take the ring if Florinda insisted, but she did not think she would ever want to wear it either. Florinda looked down at the ring, smiling reminiscently.

“He was a nice fellow,” she said. “Terribly amusing. He had a wit like a firecracker. I wonder what became of him.” She raised her head with a sudden thought. “Why, Garnet.”

“Yes? What?”

“You could find out for me, couldn’t you?”

“Find out what became of him? But how could I?”

“You could ask. With all these New Yorkers in town, there might be somebody who knows him. I didn’t want to ask about him myself—you see, he was ashamed of the whole business, and besides he was about to be married and I wouldn’t want any of these boys to be going back to New York and embarrassing him. But he belonged in your social set. You could have known him. Maybe you did. You could say, ‘By the way, there’s an old friend of mine—’ couldn’t you?”

“Why yes, I could,” said Garnet. “Strange to think I might have known one of your admirers in those days. Who was he?”

Florinda handed her the ring. “Here, take it. He was highest society from Bleecker Street. His name was Henry Trellen.”

Garnet dropped the ring. It fell on the floor with a tinkling clatter. Florinda said,

“Why, you did know him, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” said Garnet. For a moment she could not say anything else. Henry Trellen, that pompous bore—and Florinda had just said he had a wit like a firecracker. Henry Trellen, walking down Broadway with her when she said she had never been to the Jewel Box, and stiffly answering, “I am sure, Miss Cameron, that the type of entertainment presented at the Jewel Box would neither amuse nor instruct you.” Henry Trellen, and Florinda! In a hoarse choked voice she gasped, “Florinda, when did you know Henry Trellen?”

“When I was at the Jewel Box. The last time I saw him was the night before I left New York. He told me—why Garnet!” Florinda broke off with a start.

“Yes, yes,” said Garnet. “When was that? Just when did you leave New York?”

Florinda’s eyes were wide and amazed. Her voice too had a strange sound. “In August ’44. He told me his mother had picked out a girl for him to marry. Garnet, did he ask you to marry him?”

“Yes. In September of that same year. Just before I met Oliver. He told you his mother had picked out a girl?”

“Yes, he said she was a nice girl and maybe she’d be the making of him.”

“He was talking about me.”

Florinda spoke unevenly, as if she was having to get her thoughts in order before she could put them into words. “I don’t know why I’m so surprised. There were mighty few people in New York Mrs. Trellen thought were as good as she was. And among those few there couldn’t have been very many marriageable girls. You had a proper family, you had been to a proper school, you were young and pretty and refined—she thought a girl like you could get him away from girls like me.”

“And all he was doing was minding his mamma!” said Garnet. “That fool. I might have known it.”

“But—Garnet!” Florinda exclaimed.

“What now?”

“Did you know he was the heir to all that money?” asked Florinda. She spoke with the awe she always felt before great riches.

“Why yes, everybody knew that. He was the greatest catch in New York.”

“And still you had sense enough to turn him down?”

“It didn’t take any sense to turn him down. He bored me stiff.”

“He bored you? But Garnet, he wasn’t like that! He was one of the most amusing men in town.”

“Maybe around you he was. Maybe he felt at ease with you. But with me—with girls like me—” Garnet could not say any more. She wanted to laugh, and she could not. She also wanted to cry, and she could not; and she did not know why she wanted to do either one. They sat there on the floor, staring at each other.

Thinking back, Garnet could see everything so clearly. Henry could not feel at ease with girls like her because he preferred girls like Florinda. He was always afraid she might somehow suspect his taste, and then maybe his mother would suspect it, that mother who looked like a marble angel. But evidently his mother had found out anyway, because she had made him give up Florinda. She had chosen the flowerlike Miss Garnet Cameron, and Henry had meekly obeyed her. Garnet thought of Henry, having said goodby to Florinda, writing that very formal letter in which he had laid his heart, hand, and fortune at her feet.

Florinda was thinking about him too. She thought about the pitiful sight of Henry when she told him what had happened to that child he had never seen. She remembered how he had said he was no good and never would be, but his mother had picked out a nice girl for him to marry and he supposed he would have to do it. She thought how sorry she had felt for him then. She had also felt sorry for that nice girl, who would be so dazzled by the Trellen fortune that she would not realize she was marrying a man who had no guts.

Florinda still felt sorry for Henry. Poor Henry, who had never deliberately set out to do evil, but who had not had the courage to do either evil or good. Poor Henry, who would go through life spending money he had not earned, and getting very little pleasure from it. Florinda had no objection to men’s spending money they had not earned, especially if they spent it on her; but she thought if they were going to have any fun they had better make up their minds what they wanted and use their money to get it. Still, while she had no respect for Henry, she had a great deal of respect for Henry’s wealth, and the fact that Garnet had not been dazzled by it made her feel an admiration that for a while left her speechless.

“Garnet,” she said at length, “how old were you then? When Henry asked you to marry him?”

“Eighteen. Nearly nineteen. Why?”

“And you were that smart at that age! Garnet, I’d like to tell you something. I’ll never speak another word about not being sure you ought to marry John. You’re smart enough to do anything you want to.”

Garnet smothered a giggle and said, “Thank you.” Florinda took up the aquamarine ring.

“Now what shall we do with this?” she asked. “Do you want it?”

“No, I don’t want it,” Garnet said decidedly.

“Let’s keep it then,” said Florinda, “and some day we’ll give it to somebody we both like.”

That seemed like a good arrangement, so Garnet agreed.

She did not have much trouble finding a New Yorker who had heard of Henry Trellen. The Trellen name was so well known that after a day or two of dropping carefully careless questions at the bar she found a young sergeant who could answer them. He had not known Henry Trellen personally—“Gee, Garnet, I never got about in society like that,” he said laughing—but he had an uncle who had done some business with the Trellen interests. Garnet asked if Henry still lived in New York. “Oh sure,” said the sergeant. “In one of those great big old houses on Bleecker Street.” She asked if he was married. No, not when the sergeant left home. She asked what he was doing now. “Why, he’s not doing anything that I ever heard of,” the sergeant returned. “He doesn’t need to.”

Garnet told Florinda, who smiled derisively and brushed off her hands as though whisking dust from them. “About what I expected,” Florinda said. “Well, that’s something else rubbed out of my past.”

That evening the Brute came in. He told them this would be his last evening at the bar. Tomorrow morning he was going to set out for San Francisco to board his ship.

Until she thought of his actually being gone, Garnet had not realized how fond she had grown of this big Russian with his great insight and his simple heart. “You can’t wait here for John?” she asked wistfully.

The Brute shook his head with regret. “I cannot wait for anything, Garnet. If I do not go now, the ship will sail without me.”

When they had closed the saloon the Brute came into the kitchen with them. While Mickey was bringing Garnet and Florinda their late cups of chocolate, the Brute opened a bundle and took out goodby presents. There was a bead necklace for Isabel and some embroidered leather gloves for Silky, both of which Florinda said she would keep till tomorrow, as Isabel had gone home and Silky had departed on some errand of his own. There was a wooden horse on wheels for Stephen, which he also would not see till morning as he was asleep upstairs. There were slippers for Mickey, which he put on at once, and for Garnet and Florinda there were gold pins to fasten their collars. “Not too fancy to wear every day,” said the Brute. “I wanted to give you something you could wear often, so you would think of me often.” He reached across the table and took a hand of each of them, squeezing their hands in his big fists.

“Garnet! Mickey! Florinda!” came a shout from beyond the door. “Let me in, somebody!”

Garnet had sprung to her feet at the first sound of her name. The gold pin clattered on the table, but she did not hear it. Florinda rescued the pin as she and the Brute too sprang up. They knew the voice as well as Garnet did. John was back from San Francisco.

The Brute put a restraining hand on Florinda’s elbow. “Garnet will let him in,” he said.

Garnet was already at the door, pushing back the bolts. The door swung inward, and there was John, John bristly with beard and splashed with mud, his boys Pablo and Vicente behind him, and his horses just visible in the dark outside. He swept Garnet into his arms. The Brute and Florinda looked at each other, and Florinda said,

“I guess we should clear out and leave them alone.”

“Don’t be so foolish,” the Brute retorted. “Put on some supper. John will kiss her for two minutes and then he will start saying he has had nothing all day but cold pinole.”

“You have such low instincts,” said Florinda, “but I guess you’re right. Mickey, let’s get ready to feed that crew.”

John and Garnet were coming toward them. Garnet’s face was red where his beard had nearly scratched her skin off, and she was wiping tears from her eyes. John had his arm around her. He was grinning with such frank joy as neither Florinda nor the Brute had ever known him to show before. He shook hands with the Brute and kissed Florinda, and she squealed that kissing him was like kissing a hairbrush. John demanded,

“Can you feed us?”

Florinda glanced at the Brute and they both burst out laughing. The Brute said he would help get the supper ready, and Florinda went to get wine for the boys and a bottle of whiskey for John. “It’s on the house,” she said as she put the bottle before him. “Not that you deserve it, you pig. Now I’ll give a hand with the beans. You and Garnet sit here and look at each other.” She went off toward the fireplace, leaving them at the table together.

Garnet was still almost too choked up to speak. Except for gasping, “Oh John, where in the world have you been?”—she had said nothing since she saw him. Now, as she sat with his left arm around her waist while with his right hand he picked up the bottle to pour the whiskey, she thought it would not matter if neither of them said anything for hours. John was back, and she had never seen him look as happy as he did at the sight of her. But they could not be silent for long. John squeezed her waist, saying, “God, I’m glad to see you,” and she said, “You’re really all right now, aren’t you? Your right hand is quite steady on that bottle.”