After two weeks of working odd jobs, Bill’s suspicions toward God were more firmly rooted. He could clearly see he was going to have to go this alone, if he was going to go at all. He had never for once imagined leaving the children behind, and even now as the solution became increasingly evident, he argued the point with himself.
Patience would never approve of leaving Leah and Jacob behind,
he argued with himself. Standing over a stack of logs, Bill split the pieces into firewood and continued his internal conversation.
I could leave them with Karen Pierce and her aunt,
he reasoned.
Leah adores them and is looking forward to getting some
education from Karen. Those women would see to it that the kids
were safe and sound. Jacob wouldn’t like it, but he’d have no
choice. He’d have to obey me
.
Bill brought the axe head down on the log. The dry wood split easily.
I could talk to the Pierce woman and see if she would
allow me to leave Leah and Jacob. I could promise to send for
them or return myself. I could promise her some of the gold I
collect
. The entire matter seemed quite reasonable. Surely she would see the importance of keeping the children safe in Dyea while he went on into the Yukon.
Nagging doubts began to form in his mind, however. How would the children perceive this action? Coming so soon after the loss of their mother, they would certainly feel he was deserting them as well. Bill didn’t want to give them that impression, but he also knew finding gold was their only chance to get back what they’d lost so many years earlier.
I’ll just explain it that way,
he reasoned.
They’ll understand.
They’re good children
. He felt the sweat trickle down his back as he continued to chop the wood. He would still have to convince Karen Pierce, even if he could persuade Jacob and Leah. Then a thought came to him. Karen was looking for her father. As far as Bill knew, she hadn’t found him, nor heard any word of him.
Perhaps I could offer to look for him
. The idea began to take root.
If I offered to look for him, the children
could just naturally stay with her until my return
. The idea had great merit. Never mind that he’d be looking for Wilmont Pierce on the Chilkoot Trail north to the Yukon.
He finished his work and collected his pay before heading over to the Colton tent store. He tried to plot out how he might approach the subject without seeming desperate. Already the autumn had set in and time was getting away from them. Most folks told him he was a fool to even consider going on—that the police would close down the borders when the blizzards set in. But Bill didn’t care. Even if he only made it as far as Sheep’s Camp, some twelve miles away, he would be that much closer once the Mounties actually allowed folks to head north again. Besides, the bad storms might not even come and things would remain open and the travelers could just keep moving north. Either way, he didn’t want to lose out on the chance of a lifetime.
Dusting wood chips off his jeans, Bill entered the store to find it stocked with goods. For the past two weeks there had been nothing but plank board stacked neatly in a pile at the side. Karen had informed him that these would be set atop barrels once Captain Colton arrived with the said barrels, the goods stored within them.
‘‘Hello, ladies,’’ Bill called out as he pushed through the already gathered crowd. ‘‘Looks like you’re getting things set up for a day of selling.’’
‘‘That we are, Mr. Barringer,’’ Doris announced. ‘‘Have you come to purchase something, or were you looking for Leah?’’
‘‘Actually, I came to talk to Miss Karen, if she has a spare moment.’’
‘‘Well,’’ Karen said, looking at the growing crowd, ‘‘right now doesn’t appear to be a good time for a talk.’’
‘‘I understand,’’ Bill replied. ‘‘Maybe later?’’
Karen hurried to tuck the straw packing back inside the crate. Straw was just as valuable as most anything else.
She
could probably sell it for a fortune,
Bill surmised.
‘‘Look, Papa,’’ Leah called from behind a stack of duck cloth tents, ‘‘I’m helping with the store.’’
Karen blushed slightly. ‘‘I hope you don’t mind,’’ she said, holding out a lantern for a potential customer to inspect. ‘‘We put her to work. We’ll pay her, of course.’’
‘‘I don’t mind at all,’’ Bill replied. ‘‘I was hoping both Leah and Jacob could find something decent to put their hands to.’’ He wondered silently what Patience would have thought. Would she have been proud to have her able-bodied children working, or would she have been disappointed that he had taken them away from the safety they knew in Devil’s Creek?
We were happy in Colorado,
Bill thought.
We might have
gone on being happy, even if we were poor, had Patience lived
. Even if she’d lost the baby they would have grieved, but together they would have made it through. Bill sighed and couldn’t help but think of how it might have been.
Karen returned her attention to the customer. Within a moment she made the sale and stuffed the bills in her apron pocket. ‘‘I could meet you in a couple of hours,’’ she suggested, seeing that Bill was still standing idle.
Bill hadn’t realized how quickly he’d allowed his mind to wander. It took very little to find himself drifting back to Colorado and happier days. ‘‘Two hours would be just fine. How about we meet out back behind the tent?’’
‘‘Sounds good.’’
For the next two hours Bill attempted to think of various things he might say. He wanted to appeal to Karen’s friendship with Leah. The two had formed a steady bond since Karen first offered to school Leah. They were often together, especially when Bill and Jacob headed off in the early morning hours to help with road improvements to Skagway. Leah liked Karen a great deal, and Bill couldn’t help but wonder if she’d been seeking to fill the void left by Patience.
But while Leah was close to Karen, Jacob was close to no one. Not even to Bill. He rarely talked and was always moody. He wanted nothing more than to be left to himself. The boy was hurting, but certainly no more than Bill. It was impossible to help someone with their speck when the log in your own eye was blinding you to their need. Jacob had said very little since his mother’s death. He’d been faithful to see to Leah’s safety, but other than that, he was clearly not the same vibrant boy who’d pleasured their household some months earlier with tall tales of adolescent feats.
But then, Bill wasn’t the same happy-go-lucky father, either. Patience’s death had taken a big toll on all of them. The children mourned their loss of a mother, and Bill mourned the loss of his heart and soul. Patience had been his anchoring stone. She had kept him from being too headstrong or self-serving. Patience would never have approved the trip north, but then, if Patience had lived, they probably would never have thought to join in such chaos.
No, that wasn’t true. Bill would have thought of it. The moment word came about two tons of gold shipping into Seattle’s harbor, he would have been digging up maps and information to see what the easiest and quickest route north might be. He would have plotted and planned it out, and then he would have taken it to Patience, extolling for his wife all the virtues of such an adventure. Then after he had settled down, Patience would have explained the pitfalls. She would have no doubt talked to him about the children’s needs and how such a plan would require far more investment than they could ever manage. She would have explained how supplies for just one person would have cost at least five hundred dollars and that they were lucky to have five dollars to their name on payday.
Bill smiled and he fixed her image in his mind. Soft, dark curls like Leah’s and a face that must have been lent her by an angel. He could almost smell her sweet lavender soap. Almost touch her and . . .
‘‘Pa? Are you all right?’’
He hadn’t realized that tears were streaming down his cheeks until he heard the voice of his daughter. Looking up, Bill wiped his face with a dusty handkerchief. ‘‘I’m fine, princess. Just fine.’’ He looked at Leah and shook his head. She looked too old to be only twelve. What kind of trouble would that prove to be? Hadn’t he already seen men eyeing her in a way that suggested they were considering how she might figure into their lives?
Studying her for a moment, Bill patted the crate beside him and motioned her to sit. She was the very image of her mother. How could he possibly leave her behind? How could he leave Jacob, whose spirit was still so wounded?
‘‘Are you all right, Pa?’’ Leah asked again. She reached out her hand to take hold of his.
Bill closed his fingers over hers. ‘‘I’m fine. I was just thinkin’ about your ma. I think she would have liked it up here. Don’t you?’’
Leah smiled. ‘‘I think she would have thought us plumb crazy.’’
Bill smiled and nodded. ‘‘I believe you’re right.’’ He gave her hand a little squeeze. ‘‘Fact is, I was just thinkin’ that as well.’’
Leah shifted her weight and leaned against Bill. Her presence comforted him. How could he dare to venture north without them?
‘‘Pa, are we always going to live in a tent?’’
Bill put his arm around Leah’s shoulders. ‘‘Of course not. Someday we’re gonna have a fine house.’’
‘‘Like when we lived in Denver?’’
‘‘You can’t remember back that far,’’ he said, reaching up to tousle her curls.
‘‘I remember the way Mama talked about it, though,’’ Leah replied. ‘‘She said it was so pretty. She had dainty cups and saucers to serve the church ladies tea.’’
Bill frowned. He was happy that Leah couldn’t see his reaction. He remembered Patience boxing her collection of fine china and selling it to the secondhand store. It brought them just enough money to pay off one of their more pressing debts. He’d hated himself for letting her sell the collection, but hate soon turned to pity and misery. He could hardly even bear to look Patience in the eyes for weeks. She had told him it was all right, that they were only dishes. But he knew otherwise. He knew how much she’d loved her china.
‘‘I promise you, Leah, one day you’ll have a set of china just as pretty as your ma’s,’’ Bill declared. ‘‘As soon as we strike it rich up north, that’ll be one of the first things we send off for.’’
Leah snuggled against him contentedly. Bill felt sheer gratitude that she didn’t question him. She believed in him. Somehow that almost allowed him to believe in himself.
‘‘I’m sorry it took so long, Bill,’’ Karen said as she stepped around to the back of the tent. ‘‘Now, what can I do for you?’’
Bill finished stacking some of the shipping crates and wiped the sweat from his neck and forehead. ‘‘I was just wondering if you’d had any word on your father.’’
Karen shook her head. She’d talked to so many people in the last couple weeks, and while some knew her father, none knew where he could be found. ‘‘I still have no idea where he is, if that’s what you’re wondering.’’
‘‘I’m sorry. I was hoping maybe you’d found him and that I just hadn’t heard.’’
‘‘It’s very kind of you to care,’’ Karen replied, surprised by his concern.
‘‘I wonder if you would mind,’’ he began, ‘‘if I asked around and gave a bit of a look for him myself?’’
Karen looked at the bearded man with surprise. ‘‘You? But why would you want to spend your time that way?’’
‘‘Because I know what it is to lose someone,’’ he replied softly. ‘‘I can’t go finding what I’ve lost, but you can.’’
Karen felt an overwhelming sensation of emotion. That this near stranger should care so much for her happiness and father’s well-being was a pleasant surprise in this land of greed.
‘‘I’m very touched that you would give of yourself in that way. My father is very precious to me,’’ Karen said. She looked beyond Bill to the mountains. ‘‘I know he’s out there somewhere. I feel it—down deep.’’ She turned to Bill. ‘‘Do you know what I mean?’’
He nodded and his expression suggested that he, too, had known what it was to be so closely bound to someone that he could tell whether they lived or died, even if they were far away.
‘‘I have a photograph,’’ she said. ‘‘I could give it to you and you could use it to ask questions. I’ve shown it around a few places, but of course there are places I cannot go—or maybe better said, I
should
not go.’’ She grinned. ‘‘But I would go into the pits of hell itself if it meant finding him.’’
Bill nodded. ‘‘I understand.’’
His soft-spoken nature put her at ease. Looking at the man, Karen firmly believed he knew and understood her grief. Then it dawned on her that with Jacob and Leah, Bill would be rather tied down.
‘‘Since you offer to do this for me, might I suggest something in return?’’
‘‘What?’’ Bill asked.
‘‘Leah is a great help in the store. We’ve already sold most of the supplies Captain Colton brought this morning. However, we still have a few things and she could continue to help and I would also be happy to school her. Jacob too.’’
‘‘Jacob has a full-time job. He just got it today. He’s going to be helping to put in some of the dock piers. I’m not sure when they’ll get started, but he shouldn’t need you to fuss over him. It would be good to know that Leah is taken care of, however. I wouldn’t want any of the menfolk getting the wrong idea about her.’’
‘‘Absolutely not,’’ Karen said, knowing full well the kind of ideas the gold-rushing fanatics might get. She’d already turned down eight proposals in fourteen days, most from men who were old enough to be her father, much less know him.
‘‘If you would be willing to keep her here with you,’’ Bill suggested, ‘‘I could put the tent up right here in back of the store. She and Jacob could sleep out here in case I was gone late into the night.’’
‘‘Oh, Bill, you mustn’t spend all your time searching for me,’’ Karen chided. ‘‘You have to earn a living and see to those children. I wouldn’t feel right if you sacrificed your own family for mine.’’
‘‘I wouldn’t be doin’ that,’’ he said. ‘‘I just figured your pa might well have taken himself up the trail a bit. It’s only twelve miles or so up to Sheep Camp. I hear tell from the Tlingits here in Dyea that there are a lot of the Indian folk living in and around there, what with that being a good place to hire packers.’’