Sweet Boundless (13 page)

Her restaurant was almost ready, and Joe Turner had added a small icehouse, filled with glacial ice, to the back for storing the perishables. Best of all, a freighter had brought eggs to Crystal, and she’d bought every one with the money in Mae’s jar. She owed her friends much. But she didn’t doubt she would repay them quickly enough.

A bull elk stepped out of the pines to drink at the creek, and she paused to enjoy the sight. He lapped the running water, then raised his shaggy brown head and shook his antlers. He staidly stepped into the creek and crossed before her. When he had passed, she started up again, the Rose Legacy calling to her.

It didn’t really, of course. But the closeness she felt to Rose after reading her diary made it seem so. That it was a site of tragedy failed to dissuade her. She felt close to Quillan’s mother in the place where she had birthed her son and died in the arms of one who loved her. While she wished Rose could have lived, Carina was thankful to know her through her words, written in the red leather diary.

It had inspired Carina to start a journal of her own, and with one of the few bills Quillan had left on the crate beside the bed, she had bought a diary. Maybe no one would ever read it, but her thoughts and prayers would be there. And perhaps someday her words would touch someone as Rose’s had done.

Carina reached the spot where Placerville had stood before the flood. Only gray weathered husks of buildings and sluice boxes and old placer diggings had remained. Now even those were gone. She didn’t miss them. She had once imagined ghosts and shades watching her through the windows and cavities. She was glad the old buildings were gone.

She turned Daisy up the slope and started the climb, the Rose Legacy being located at the highest point up the mountain. It wasn’t a placer mine like the rest. It had been tunneled into the mountainside like the Gold Creek mine just below and west of it. The mine itself was hardly substantial, a short tunnel and a shaft, though the shaft had seemed to plunge to the center of the earth when she had been trapped on the ledge some twenty feet into its darkness. If not for Quillan, she would have died there. She pressed her fingers to the crucifix that hung at her throat beneath her coat. God had truly intervened for her salvation.

She reached the mine and dismounted beside the square foundation of burned stones. A sigh filled her as she glanced at the square, wondering again whether Rose had caused or merely accepted the fire’s claiming her life. She prayed it was the latter. But God’s mercy was supreme.

Leaving Daisy in the small clearing before the tunnel, she headed up the mountain. When she reached the grave, she sat, pulling her knees to her chest. It was here she prayed for her loved ones, and they were many. Mamma and Papa, her sister Divina, Tony and Vittorio and Angelo and Joseph and Lorenzo, her brothers, who had bullied and teased and loved her well. Old Guiseppe and TíaMarta and TíaGelsomina, not a true aunt but her godmother, and so many others.

Sitting beside the grave, Carina ached for them all and was convicted in her heart. She must write them. She must tell them about Quillan. She must tell them that she had married—without Papa’s permission, Mamma’s blessing. Without a ceremony such as they would have given her.

How different it would have been if she’d married Flavio in Sonoma. There would have been flowers everywhere, dancing and singing and wine flowing. Every relative, every friend, dancing and feasting. And Flavio, dark, beautiful Flavio would not hesitate to know her as his wife. He would not leave her for months at a time, then refuse to sleep in her bed.

Carina caught the bitter thoughts. She must not let them take root inside her. She knew only too well her capacity for bitterness and revenge.
Gesù Cristo, help me
. He had before. He had cleansed her spirit and made her His own. Now she tried, but it was difficult. Her own nature wanted to blame, wanted to hurt back.

She looked at the gravestone beside her.
Rose. Wolf
. Quillan’s parents. It was dishonoring to think badly of their son here beside the grave. “I want to love him.” She said it aloud, as though they could hear. But more so, she said it for her own ears. The longer he stayed away, the more it frustrated and angered her.

What chance had she if she never saw him? How could she win his heart? But it was more than that. It was a battle of their wills. He was stubborn. But so was she. He knew she would try, and so he stayed away. If he was near, if he allowed it, she would win. He wanted her. There was between them a belonging, a recognizing, a desire.

It was God’s gift, this love she bore for him. Where had it come from? She hadn’t sought it, hadn’t even known it until they’d wed. But there it was, just as it should be. Only Quillan wouldn’t see it, wouldn’t allow it. Quillan, the rogue pirate, had taken his due, then refused her his heart.

Again the dark emotions swirled within her like a chilling fog. Carina clasped her hands white-knuckled at her breast.
Help me,
Signore. I am so angry
. She shook with it. If Quillan were there now she would kick him—hard. She would throw things; she would holler and call him names. Not one word had he given her after their trip together. He had sneaked out like a thief while she slept. Coward. He would not even stay and fight.

She looked again at the grave. Wolf would not desert Rose. He had stayed with her even to his death. Such was the capacity to love that Quillan carried inside him. Why, why did he refuse it? Was she not beautiful? Not desirable? Was she not willing to make him a home, not able to satisfy him?

Feelings of betrayal rose up, strong and deadly. She had felt it before. She had known Flavio’s betrayal and came to Crystal, one thousand miles, to punish him. She knew she couldn’t let these feelings take hold. But how could she stop them? Prayer.
Signore, per
piacere, give me strength
.

She heard a boot crunch on gravel and spun. Father Antoine Charboneau stood behind her, eyes the same startling blue as the sky. He had grayed these last months, and the lines deepened in his face. But he still had the vigor of a younger man. He smiled, showing yellowed teeth, and she returned it with her own scrupulously white ones.

“I saw your horse and guessed where I’d find you.”

Carina waved her arm. “I’m conversing with God. I thought if I meant to discuss my husband, it would be only fair to do it here, where his parents could defend him.”

Father Antoine laughed. “Very fair.” The one brow lowered. “I trust you’ve not excoriated him.”

“Not yet. But I was working up to it.”

“Ah, Carina,” he said around a chuckle and came to sit beside her. “It won’t do you any good. You’d only have to repent of it.”

“I know. But in here . . .” She pressed a fist to her breast. “I’m willing to face the consequences if just once I could kick him.”

Father Antoine laced his fingers and dangled his hands between his knees. His face took on a puckish look. “I feel guiltily inclined to see that.”

“Maybe between us we could make a deal with God.”

The priest rubbed his chin. “What would you propose?”

Carina raised a finger. “One kick, hard to his shin. And for my part any penance you name.”

Father Antoine dropped his head back and studied the sky. “And then what? After you maimed your husband, what then?”

“Then I would heal him. Didn’t I work beside Papa when I was small, and in the infirmary here after the flood?” She waved her arm over the expanse below them. “The men were thankful for my aid.”

“So I heard. Do you really think that would heal your marriage?”

Carina cringed. She hadn’t meant to let him know how it was with her and Quillan. But then, he would know. He saw inside her like no one else. She sighed. “No. But it would feel better than this helplessness.”

“ ‘Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.’ ”

Carina locked her knees in her arms. “So God would have me meek and helpless?”

“Blessed are the meek.”

“But I’ve tried!” She sprang to her feet. “I’ve held my tongue. I’ve obeyed him. I’ve been willing in every way.” She stalked along the grave. “And all he can say is I should leave him, annul the marriage, dissolve our flawed union.”

Father Antoine refolded his hands. “And what’s kept him from doing it himself?”

She stopped pacing. “How should I know? Responsibility.”

“It could be worse.”

“Oh sì. He could be a drunk and beat me. Or gamble everything away and leave me starving. He could be base and animalistic. He could be blind and deaf and dumb, malformed and simpleminded. I’ve thought of it all, consoled myself with such thoughts when I lie alone night after night.” She drew a breath, thinking she shouldn’t speak so to a priest, nor mention intimate things like sleeping with her husband. But Father Antoine only listened.

She threw up her hands. “What chance do I have if he won’t even stay?”

“What do you think keeps him away?” Father Antoine asked softly.

She dropped her hands limply to her sides. “He doesn’t trust me.”

The priest stood. “Why?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. Because he saw the worst of me.”

“No.” Father Antoine turned and sent his gaze over the mountainside, down the slope and across the gulch. “He was trained not to trust by all of us who failed him. The mother who gave him away, the woman who raised him, the priest who wouldn’t.” He turned back to her. “I hoped by reading Rose’s diary you would see more of Quillan than he’d show you himself. Not that there was much of him in the words, his being an infant only. But that knowing Rose and even Wolf, you would see Quillan’s potential.”

She nodded. Hadn’t she thought the same? Hadn’t it been just so?

He drew a slow breath. “I wrote once to the Shepards. A simple inquiry as to his welfare. The letter I received in return showed me just how wrong I’d been to put Quillan into that woman’s hands. Even so, I left him there. With regret, but no more. I shook my head and thought it a shame for the boy. Then I went my way and put him from my thoughts.”

He pressed his hands to his face, then slid them down to nestle beneath his chin. “When Quillan came to Crystal a man, I knew he had suffered from my neglect. Oh, he was strong, mind you. Too strong. And solitary. Driven. He’d learned to ignore adversity and make his own way. Did I approach him? Did I tell him I’d known his parents, that his mother had trusted me even so far as to give me her son if I would have him?”

Carina’s heart ached for the priest, for Rose, for Quillan.

He shook his head. “My first words with your husband were to marry you.”

She took a step toward him. “Do you know that wasn’t God’s will? How can you say it wasn’t ordained to happen exactly as it did?”

His flesh formed a deep line between his brows as he eyed her. He glanced at the gravestone, then at the rocky mound where he’d buried the diary until giving it to her. She watched him puzzle her words. Where had they come from? Did she believe it?

He looked back to the sky. “Could that be why I wasn’t driven to interfere? That I heard right, thinking I only wanted my own way?”

“Even if it isn’t so, God will bring good from it.” Carina spoke ardently.

He smiled. “How often you console me.”

She smiled back. “I no longer want to kick him.”

The priest laughed. “Then we’ve both gained something.”

She nodded. There was peace inside her and hope. She would reach Quillan. Somehow she would reach him.

EIGHT

One must be careful of dreams; they can become more than imagined.

—Carina

QUILLAN REINED IN THE TEAM and brought his wagon to a stop in front of the Matchless Mine, the new investment of the man whose name was linked with luck, Leadville, and silver: Horace A. Tabor. The man’s luck was legendary already, and Quillan knew enough to hitch his wagon to a star.

Not only did Tabor seem to know where to be and when, he was a generous and congenial man. Quillan honestly liked him, liked being part of his success. And he was. Without the freighters to carry supplies, the mines would be inoperable, even when the rails of the iron horse came through. And Quillan knew at least three railroads were vying for the privilege.

Freighting as he knew it would not benefit from the advance of the rails. But one thing was already established; the trains would not carry the giant powder needed to blast the shafts and drifts of the hard-rock mines. That’s where Quillan’s fortune lay. And he and Mr. Tabor had already established a relationship through the Tabors’ store. Carrying giant powder to Horace Tabor, Quillan could double what he earned freighting to Crystal. Crystal might be booming, but it was nothing to Leadville.

He jumped down from the box and opened the back hatch of the wagon. Sam pranced around his heels until Quillan ordered him to sit. Then Quillan climbed up and bent close to inspect his load. With extreme care, he peeled open the red paper of a stick of giant powder. All over the normally pasty substance he saw delicate white crystals. The temperature overnight had dropped well below fifty-two degrees, and he wasn’t surprised to see that the nitroglycerin in the giant powder stick had separated and frozen.

With extreme care, he laid the stick back with the others in the crate. In its frozen crystalline form, the explosive was as sensitive as the liquid. When Tabor’s workers came to take what he handed down, Quillan gingerly lifted the crate and bent close to one miner’s upraised hands. “It’s frozen.”

The rough, scarred miner took it into his arms like a new baby. “At least we don’t have to thaw it on a stove.”

Quillan nodded. Horace Tabor’s Matchless, like most of the big operations, had a heated powder house. His men didn’t have to hand-thaw the powder, which couldn’t be used frozen because the first tamp would set it off. Other miners weren’t so lucky and many had lost flesh, limbs, and lives thawing frozen powder in their ovens or on their stoves. The point at which the crystals liquefied was the least stable of all.

Quillan reached for the next case and handed it carefully to the Cornish miner, who stood ready. He had no intention of blowing his wagon, team, and himself into oblivion. But for now, the pay was unbeatable, and he could work as many hours as he could stand.