Olivia's Mine (22 page)

“But the store,” Olivia protested, “all the
money you and Aaron have put into this...”

“Olivia, it’s a drop in the bucket for both
of us, not to worry. Come home.”

“I want to stay here Father,” she said. “I
can’t explain it, but I like it here. I hated it when I first came
here, but I’ve come to love the people in this town. The store was
a good idea. The first morning’s sales were fantastic. It was so
promising. If only that blasted man had stayed away a little
longer, to really give the store a chance.”

“He was bound to come back sooner or
later.”

He saw the look of disappointment on his
daughter’s face.

“Olivia, are you upset about the failing of
the store or upset about having to tell me about it?” he asked.

“The store,” she replied. “I’ve had to tell
you a few times I’ve failed. I was hoping this time would be
different. It’s embarrassing to tell you, of course, but you’ve
always forgiven me before and I suspect you will now.”

“We can always get you set up in a store of
your own in Seattle,” he assured her “if shop keeping is in your
blood.”

“I’m not ready to leave Britannia yet Father.
I’m not ready to leave Frank yet.”

“Olivia,” her father pleaded.

“No, don’t say it. I know what you’re
thinking. It’s what you’ve been thinking from day one. I made my
bed, now I have to lie in it. I don’t want to put the family
through the scandal of a divorce.”

“It would hardly be the first Bower scandal,”
her father replied.

Although he tried to change her mind for over
an hour, William conceded that for reasons entirely her own, his
daughter wanted to stay in this community. But what she had been
through with the store had hardly been fair play.

“The thing about we Bowers,” he told Olivia,
“is that we always have another card tucked high up our sleeve
while our poker faces play the game. I can see McMichael out on the
street, waiting for someone. He’s asking Frenchie where that person
went, and Frenchie, God love him, is pointing at the store. The man
McMichael is waiting for is the man who could talk the bankers for
the Canadian Pacific Railway into providing a north-south line to
move his precious ore into the United States cheaper and faster.
He’s prayed for that more than he ever prayed for the war to end.
That man he is looking for, my darling, is me.”

Olivia tried as best she could to stifle the
laugh that was within her.

“William!” McMichael exclaimed with genuine
warmth as he entered the store, ignoring Olivia completely. There
was no sense dragging a stranger into this mess, McMichael thought.
He offered his hand out to the American, but it was declined.

“Is there a problem?” McMichael asked, noting
the grave expression on William’s face.”

“There is indeed,” William declared. “I’d
like you to meet my daughter Olivia, the middle girl.”

“Why don’t we use the new tea?” Jimmy asked
old Mr. Li. “This one smells mouldy.”

“Jimmy,” the man explained, speaking slowly,
but speaking very good English, “there is a terrible sickness in
town. They call it the influenza. Thousands of people are dying all
over Canada. But not just here, all over the world. Look at me, I
am an old man. I should be sick, but I am not. Look at my family.
My wife started to get the cough. I gave her the tea. She got
better. Now, I cannot say that all people will get better by
drinking the tea. But maybe it can’t hurt. There are things called
anti-oxidants in green tea, remember, we read that together in the
Chinese medicine book. The new tea is fresh, but it is black tea.
It does not have as many anti-oxidants. The green tea smells a
little musky, yes. It is a little mouldy as it got a bit damp when
I forgot to put the lid back on this tin. But it is my last tin. It
is a big tin. I will give you some. I want you to promise me you
will take the old tea, and make some for your family. I want you
and your mother and father to be safe. Please do the honour of
obeying an old man.” He handed the lad a tin of the tea.

“Okay,” Jimmy sighed. “But they’re not going
to like it.”

Jimmy plugged his nose and drank the old tea
that Mr. Li had poured for him.

“That is a good boy,” Mr. Li nodded. “You may
go now, little Dr. Yada.”

Jimmy left Mr. Li’s home and stopped off at
the Beachcomber market, leaving his wagon outside as he always did.
He took his teapot from it. Since the day after the avalanche years
ago, he had continued to earn pocket change after school going back
and forth to the mine, selling tea, pop and potato chips to the
workers and passers-by on the street.

Things had definitely changed at the
Beachcomber’s market since Olivia’s father paid that fateful visit.
As suddenly as the customers went away, they now mysteriously
re-appeared. Jimmy came in at the same time most days, and the
re-instated Lucy was more than happy to have boiled water ready for
him. Olivia felt it was the least she could do, as his mother was
still without a job. McMichael had found another cleaner who would
work cheaper than Akiko, so she was still without work.

Olivia glanced at the calendar on the wall.
It was hard to believe it was now 1918, and she had been at
Britannia for three years.

“Mrs. Lucy, Mrs. Olivia,” Jimmy began, “I
need you to drink some of this tea.”

He poured a couple of small Chinese cupfuls
for them. They obliged and drank the small amount. Its odd taste
had Lucy making a face.

“I know,” Jimmy admitted. “It doesn’t taste
too good.”

“Tell you what Jimmy, why don’t I give you
some fresh tea to take around, hmm?”

“No,” Jimmy explained. “Anti-oxidants. Mr. Li
says I must use this green tea.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“This tea has magic powers; it will keep us
from being sick.”

“Well,” Olivia offered, “why don’t you blend
it with some fresh tea, maybe just to dilute it a bit?”

“Hmm, that would make it weaker. I would have
to sell more of it to work. I could make more money I guess, but
people would have to buy extra.”

“Don’t let McMichael hear you say that,” Lucy
laughed.

“He would think that it is a wise business
decision,” Jimmy said.

“He would at that,” Olivia admitted.

“Maybe I will take some sweet cookies and
offer a two-for-one deal,” the lad said. “More to offer my
customers and help the bad taste.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Lucy agreed.
“Only I wouldn’t tell them it was bad. Tell them it’s exotic.”

Jimmy paid for the cookies and a bag of fresh
green tea and diluted the mixture he had made from Mr. Li’s leaves,
but only just a bit. Outside in the street, he could see his friend
Lara coming across the road, and he went out side to see her.

“Lara, come have some tea.”

She had been meeting Jimmy for tea whenever
she could escape the hawk-eyes of Mrs. Schwindt, who since the war,
carried even more prejudices with her than she had before.

“Take a sip of the tea, a bite of the cookie,
like that,” Jimmy explained.

“Did you hear the news?” she asked Jimmy, not
waiting for an answer. “I heard the doctor say two more people have
died because of the influenza since the weekend.”

“I know,” Jimmy said. “That is why you must
meet me every day, and have some of this tea, okay Lara? Mr. Li and
I think it is magic. It will keep us well. And I will make sure I
go by the mine office and give some to your father everyday. I will
put it on sale for him because it kind of tastes yucky. He always
buys a cup of tea from me, so he should be okay too.”

“Why is everyone getting sick Jimmy?” Lara
asked.

“Mr. Li says it is a thing called a virus.
Something like a cold germ. He says that this is a very bad one, a
lot like one many centuries ago called the Black Death.”

“Black Death,” Lara repeated, her eyes
growing wider and her voice quivering as she said it aloud.

Mrs. Schwindt came from around the corner and
screamed bloody murder at the two children, knocking the cup from
Jimmy’s hand.

“What are you doing, you heathen?” she
screeched.

Olivia came out from the store.

“What are
you
doing, Mrs. Schwindt?”

“Are you not aware the influenza is spreading
through the town, Mrs. Fitzpatrick?”

“Of course Mrs. Schwindt, but...”

“Germs. The monkey is spreading germs. That’s
how it’s getting around. Going from house to house.”

“I hardly think so, Mrs. Schwindt. Jimmy
sterilizes the cups in boiling water and never uses them twice
without washing them, do you Jimmy?”

Jimmy shook his head.

“I never use a dirty cup. Influenza is caused
by a virus Mrs. Schwindt. I am very careful. This tea is special.
Mr Li, he told me his family drinks it when they are sick and soon
they start to feel better.”

“See,” Olivia said, “there you go.” Olivia
poured another cup and drank it, just to side with the boy. Its
flavour had improved only slightly having been blended.

Jimmy poured a cup and offered it to Mrs.
Schwindt. She swatted this one to the ground as well, breaking the
cup.

“You keep that concoction away from me and
away from our house, do you hear me?”

As it happened, McMichael was coming down the
road and saw the incident occur.

“Mrs. Schwindt,” he yelled, “have you
completely lost your mind?”

“It’s filth, Mr. McMichael. I am trying to
protect your daughter from the influenza.”

“Mrs. Schwindt, I have had quite enough of
your ranting these past few months. We had this conversation some
time ago as I recall. Jimmy is Lara’s friend. Lara and Jimmy meet
every day and have tea while you are taking your afternoon nap. I
know all about it.”

“This tea is special,” Jimmy said. “Would you
like some Mr. McMichael?”

“Of course Jimmy,” he said, “and here’s
another nickel for the cup Mrs. Schwindt broke. I will take it out
of her pay.”

“But Mr. McMichael...” Mrs. Schwindt
began.

“Not a word, Mrs. Schwindt. Not one
word.”

Over the next few months, many people in
Britannia fell ill with the flu, many never recovering. It
eventually hit the McMichael household, Lara coming down with the
flu symptoms first.

Every morning and afternoon, Jimmy, wearing a
cloth mask over his nose and mouth, came and gave Lara some tea and
some home made soup. McMichael had noticed that for whatever
reason, Jimmy’s clientele had a remarkable recovery rate, or didn’t
get the influenza at all. No one in the Yada household had come
down with the flu, despite the fact it was passing from miner to
miner. At the first sign of his own symptoms, McMichael joined the
breakfast, lunch and dinner tea plan along with his daughter. He
was quite ill for a week and a half, but in the end it passed. Lara
also recovered in a remarkably short time, her body building the
antibodies to fight the illness.

There was sadness in the McMichael household
when Mrs. Schwindt, who steadfastly refused to have anything at all
to do with Jimmy, took ill and died. The nanny had been
hospitalized, but did not make it. All in all, seventy-five percent
of young Jimmy Yada’s customers survived the killer disease. His
record was better than Dr. Van Den Broek’s was by far. No one ever
knew what was in the magic potion Jimmy and Mr. Li had conjured up.
It would be into the next decade before spores, similar to those in
the mouldy tea would be identified by Dr. Alexander Flemming
officially as pencillium mould. What would become the wonder drug
of the twentieth century, penicillin, may have been hiding in Mr.
Li’s smelly old tea.

One night, on his way home from his route,
Jimmy was startled by Les Ferguson. Les had been trying for days to
get Jimmy to give him some tea, the word of its magical powers
having spread. Jimmy, not liking Les, had always conveniently run
out. This time though, Les caught him before his last stop.

“Give me some of that tea, kid.”

“No.” Jimmy replied.

“If you don’t give me some of that tea now,”
Les coughed, “I’ll knock you senseless and take it myself.” He
coughed again, the hacking taking the wind from his lungs.

“With your respiratory problems,” Jimmy said
matter of factly, “I hardly think so. Go away Mr. Ferguson, I have
no tea for you.”

Les raised his fist to the child.

“Go away Mr. Ferguson,” a voice said. “There
is no tea for you.”

Les turned around to see McMichael behind
him.

“I think it’s best you head off now.”

Les slunk back into the darkness of the
night, doing as his master said.

“I’m sure glad you came along when you did,”
Jimmy said.

“I’m glad I did too.”

There was a silence between them for a
moment.

“He’s sick,” McMichael offered.

“Oh, I understand that,” Jimmy began, “but I
only have a little bit of the dried tea left. I am saving some for
Christina, in case she gets sick. I could send some down to her.
Lara misses her. I don’t have a big brother or sister, but I think
I would miss them too if they had to go away. Lara would miss her
more if anything really bad happened.”

McMichael was touched by Jimmy’s generosity
towards his eldest daughter.

“That’s a very kind thing to do Jimmy. But
Christina is just away at school. Lara will see her again
soon.”

“That’s the part I don’t understand.”

“What do you mean Jimmy?”

“The influenza is in Vancouver too. The tea
is here. You sent Christina away.

You kept the bad man here. How can we protect
her when she is all alone? Soon may not be soon enough.”

McMichael took a step backward. The musings
of a young boy had just profoundly affected him. Again.

The next morning, McMichael walked over to
Sarah’s house and caught her on her way to work.