Prayers for Sale (31 page)

She’d invited Tom to take supper with her last night, then asked the young couple to join them, for she knew that Tom enjoyed Nit and Dick as much as she did. It was a fine evening, one of the most satisfying she could remember. The girl, big as a woodshed now, was feeling fit, and her husband stroked her hand more than once, so proud of his young wife as he looked at her belly. He treated her as if she was as precious as a chunk of wire gold, and she was.

The four of them sat with their toddies in front of the big stone fireplace, watching the flames jump up and listening to the wood pop and send up showers of sparks, as they toasted one another with “mud” and “luck” and “regards.”
Outside, the air was heavy, and they knew that snow was coming. They wondered if it would be a big storm or just a dusting that would melt like fog in the next day’s sun. Snow already covered the peaks of the Tenmile; it would be there until July, but there hadn’t been a real blizzard in Middle Swan yet, although it was the last day of November.

Hennie brought out a heavy winter coat of Mae’s and told the girl if she didn’t take it, the moths would eat it. Then she presented Dick with a pair of Jake’s gloves, leather with fur inside, saying they’d do until the dredge shut down for the winter. He wouldn’t want to freeze his fingers. “I found them when I was packing, and I don’t have a use for them,” she explained.

Hennie had a way about her and offered the gifts in a manner that made the couple feel that they were doing her a favor by taking them. Neither looked at the gifts too closely, or they might have noticed they’d never been worn and that the coat was the latest style. Tom had told Hennie once that if she added up all the coats of Mae’s she had ordered from the catalogue to give to needy women over the years, Mae would have had a coat for every day of the month.

The four had seconds of Hennie’s scripture cake. Then they helped themselves to the bottle of Tenmile Moon that sat in the middle of the table, Hennie telling Dick that she’d give him what remained of her liquor when she left out, since she couldn’t take it on the train.

When they were all feeling mellow, Tom said, “I’ve got myself a problem.” He leaned back in his chair, Jake’s solid chair, and Hennie thought that it suited him.

The young folks, comfortable from the food and drink, turned to Tom, waiting for him to continue.

“I had to fire Vern Haslett, the man that’s in charge of the Yellowcat.” Tom paused and explained to Nit and Dick, “If you don’t know, that’s my mine up on the Jackass Trail. It’s not much of a producer, but I have sentimental feelings about it, since my brother Moses discovered it in the old days. I bought it some years back. There’s gold in it yet, and I make wages from it, with enough left to buy a dinner or two at the Grubstake—that is, if Hennie doesn’t order the porterhouse.”

“Why’d you fire him, Tom?” Hennie asked.

“I caught him high-grading!”

“No! The sappy-headed fool! I’d have told him myself where he could get off. What was his excuse?”

“He said he had a brood to take care of, but I didn’t swallow it. He raised a shabby family, and they’d left him long ago. Besides, I paid him good wages. So I told him, ‘Get your bindle, and get going.’ ”

“What’s high-grading?” Nit asked.

Tom explained that a miner high-graded when he stole good ore from the mine he was working. Most high-graders took it out in their pockets or their lunch buckets. Tom knew of one fellow who put a chunk of ore on his head, under his hat. Some even sprinkled gold dust in their hair, then washed it out at home.

“Why, that’s stealing!” Dick said. “A fellow that’d steal from the man who pays him isn’t fit to live with hogs!”

“That’s why I told him it was time to tramp,” Tom said. “He swore a blue streak at that.”

“I hate cussing more’n anything that ever came down my road,” Nit told them. “I never saw the sense in blessing out a person.”

Except for the crackling of the wood, there was silence in the big room then, until Tom glanced at Hennie, the corners of his mouth turned up a little, and continued slowly. “Now I’ve got to find a man to replace Vern, a fellow who likes it underground and one I know I can trust. If I don’t get somebody pretty quick, I’ll just have to shut down the Yellowcat.”

Hennie put her hand in front of her mouth to hide a smile. She knew now where the conversation was going, and she looked at Tom with shining eyes, because he’d found a way to answer one of her prayers. “What a botherment,” Hennie said at last. “That means you’ll put the two other men you’ve got there out of work if you can’t find a manager. Won’t one of them take over for you?”

“They’re just muckers. Those two are all right if somebody tells them what to do, but I don’t believe they’d get much work done on their own. For all I know, they’d sneak off to the picture show at the Roxy in the middle of shift.”

“Where are you going to find a good man?” Hennie asked, wondering if lightning would have to strike Dick before he picked up on the conversation. She furrowed her brow and pursed her lips as if she were thinking hard.

Tom shook his head and sipped his whiskey. “That’s the trouble, isn’t it? Seems like young men don’t care about gold mining today. So many young fellows don’t have a sense of the underground, not like the old miners did. I believe it might be a thing you’re born with. Fellows the age of Dick
here would rather work the gold boat.” Tom paused, for what he said was not entirely true. But Hennie didn’t contradict him, and in a minute, Tom asked, “You don’t know of a good man I can hire, do you, Hennie?”

The old woman looked pensive as she glanced at Dick from under her eyelids. She hoped she wouldn’t have to hit the boy over the head with a chunk of wood to get his attention. “I’m wrecking my brain.”

“I know who can do it,” Nit interrupted suddenly, and they all turned to her. “Dick can. He worked underground at home, and he’s as honest as the day is long. He knows everything there is about mining. Tell them, Dick.”

Both Hennie and Tom looked surprised.

So did Dick. “Aw,” he said, blushing.

“Why, I recollect you said something about that once,” Tom said.

“I worked in a coal mine back home. I know fellows here look down on that. They act like they’re top dog because they mine gold,” Dick replied hesitantly. “But I’ve been inside a gold mine, and I don’t see that it’s much different. I’m a fast learner. I believe I might could do it.”

Tom scratched his head, looking as if he had to be convinced. “Those old boys I’ve got working there now could teach you, I suppose. But they’d sure as heck try to put one over on you now and then.”

“I might look green as a gourd, but I know a thing or two.”

Tom nodded. “I’d hate to hire a fellow who’d quit me to work the gold boat when it started up next spring. I wouldn’t want to do that.”

“Oh no, sir,” Dick said. “I wouldn’t. I recollect I told you I don’t like dredging at all, and I mean it. The dredge pays good enough, and I’m glad to have the job, but if you ask me, a boat’s a sorry way to mine gold. It ought to be dug out of the ground with a pick and a shovel, like coal.”

“He’d rather work underground than on top of it. He says that all the time,” Nit added.

Tom turned to Hennie then for her opinion. “I believe he could do it. Dick’s a worker,” she said. Then she added, “Here’s another thing: He’s neat with his work. His woodpile’s the tidiest in Middle Swan, and I’ve seen the way he keeps his tools in the house, lined up nice and as clean as my silverware. I believe a man who takes care of his equipment like that will be careful. That surely does matter in a mine.” She didn’t need to remind Tom that Jake most likely had died from carelessness. “And he’s awful good to do things for folks. He found that walking stick over there.” She pointed to the fine stick that Dick had presented to her the day the two of them had walked together from the dredge.

“I won’t allow liquor in the Yellowcat. That’s a fireable offense. No warning. If I find whiskey on you underground, I’ll treat you just like Vern Haslett and tell you it’s time to tramp,” Tom warned.

“No, sir, I don’t drink on the job.” They were all silent then, watching Dick, and in a minute, he said, “I believe I’d like that job if you was of a mind to offer it. But I’d have to give a week’s notice at the gold boat. It wouldn’t be right not to.”

“I expect those boys can operate the Yellowcat for a week without causing a cave-in,” Tom replied.

Hennie’s guests stayed long into the evening, Tom explaining the work to Dick, and Hennie and Nit talking about the baby. Snow had begun to fall by the time the young folks went home, lingering for a time at the door, for it was an evening none of them wanted to end. The couple held hands as they disappeared into the darkness. Tom stayed a minute more.

“Did Vern Haslett really high-grade?” Hennie asked.

“He’s been doing it for years. I always considered it a cost of doing business. But I got to thinking after our supper at the Grubstake last week that maybe I didn’t have to put up with it anymore.” Tom chuckled at that, and the two of them stood in the doorway a little longer, watching the snow come down, Hennie hoping maybe it would never stop and she’d be snowed in for the winter. With luck, the snow would keep on falling until summer, and Mae had promised Hennie she could live in Middle Swan in summer. But although a storm might take its time, the snow always did stop.

“That was a fine thing you just did. You’re a good man, Tom Earley,” Hennie said.

“Not always so good, but I try,” he replied.

“It would be nice if the baby came before Mr. Spindle starts at the Yellowcat, but that would mean this week,” Hennie said, as Tom reached for his jacket on the hook beside the door. He told her Nit ought to wait because he’d seen the doctor at the depot that morning, leaving for a few days in Denver.

“Nit says the tyke’s not due just yet, but I don’t know.”

“I helped deliver a baby once.”

Hennie gave him an astonished look.

“I can’t ever do that again,” he added quickly.

Hennie snorted. “ ‘Can’t’ is the awfulest word I ever heard. I never like to hear a person say ‘can’t.’ ”

“Well, if Mrs. Spindle depends on me, she might just as well give up on it.”

“That’s the problem. I guess you don’t know she lost a baby not so long before she came here. It was born dead. She’s scared, and I won’t rest easy until I know she’s had one that lives.”

Tom didn’t reply. He’d never been married, so he didn’t know how such a thing would eat at a girl, Hennie thought, then wondered if maybe he did. But she dropped the subject. It was one for women.

Tom leaned over and kissed her on the cheek.

“Tap ’er light, Tommy.”

“And yourself, Hennie.”

Now, as she sat and stared at the snow, Hennie wondered if it was that secret she hadn’t yet resolved that ate at her. She had to bring the thing to an ending before she left out, and she still didn’t know how to do it. Then it hit her that it was Nit Spindle and not the old secret or the storm or even thoughts about moving to Fort Madison that gave her the all-overs. She couldn’t shake the idea that the girl needed her. The old woman had notions, although she could be wrong about them, which made it seem sometimes that she was nothing more than a busybody. Perhaps this was just one of those wrong times, and calling on the girl would only upset the poor thing. Hennie didn’t want to go out, not into the
damp and cold, when instead, she could stay warm and dry near the coal stove. The stove was an ugly thing, and it smelled, but she was glad for it.

There had been those first winters in Middle Swan, when she built the blaze in the fireplace as high as she dared, but still, she wore her coat and overshoes inside the cabin. Some days, Hennie had Mae play in the bed, under a dozen quilts, so the little girl wouldn’t freeze her fingers and toes. Jake said she and Mae could go below during the worst of the winter, find a little house in Denver, where it was warmer, but he was too precious to leave alone. Only later did she realize that the winters had been easier for him, being underground where the temperature was moderate. Women and children, living day and night in the freezing cold of the high mountains, had the worst of it. They were cold all the time.

“What to do, Jake?” she asked her husband’s photograph, which sat in a silver frame on the mantel. The two of them had had their pictures taken one afternoon on a trip outside some fifty years before. In the picture, Jake looked as handsome as a barber in a fine coat and bowler hat that the photographer supplied so that Jake wouldn’t be captured for eternity in his old jacket and cap. For her sitting, Hennie wore her own cape, which swirled around her like a tent, and a silly bonnet that the photographer insisted she put on. Then someone painted the bonnet’s flowers and ribbons blue and touched her cheeks with so much red that she thought she looked like a hooker.

Hennie picked up the picture of Jake and stared at it. In the photograph, her husband didn’t look the way she pictured him now. Nor did she think of him as he was at the
time of his death. In Hennie’s mind, Jake continued to age, so that now, he was still a few years older than she was, gray-haired, a little stooped, but every bit as handsome as the first day she saw him, as fine looking as Tom Earley was now.