Chapter Nineteen
Mr. Mann doesn’t like me much, and he clearly doesn’t approve of me. But then I’ve run into a great many men in my life who don’t like or approve of me. As well as those who like me very much but absolutely don’t approve of me: they’re the worst sort. But the Manns like the money I bring in, and they appreciate the extras, like this morning’s milk, which I provide for us all. Mrs. Mann seems begrudgingly fond of me, as if she’d rather not be but can’t quite help herself, and they both care for Angus a great deal. Angus simply likes everyone. So we all live together in some degree of contentment.
No matter how long I tried to make it last, I finally reached the end of the pot of coffee. I could make more, of course. I’m not incompetent, although I have pretended to be so at times. But the remainder of the valuable milk, now resting in the cool, dark place under the floorboards Mrs. Mann used as her larder, would have to serve us tomorrow as well.
It looked as if it might turn out to be a lovely day. The sky was a brilliant blue, with the depth of colour of an enormous sapphire that once passed through my hands. (Very quickly, I might add, the stone being far too distinctive to hang onto for long.) You rarely see that colour in England, and since arriving in Canada I have become extremely fond of it. Today, there were no clouds, not even a wisp hovering behind the hills that hid the jagged rim of the distant mountains to the east.
“How would you like to go for a walk?” I asked my son. He smiled at me. My heart stopped beating for the briefest of moments as I considered what a handsome young man I had produced.
“That would be fun, Mother. We could head down the river. There’ll be plenty of ducks and geese around at this time of year. We might even be able to find some eggs, if it’s not too late. Ron says that the moose come out of the mountains to drink, and you can get real close to them. John O’Leary saw a bear, just the other day, not far from town. The mosquitoes are bad, though, so you should wear gloves and cover the back of your neck with a shawl or something. Mother?”
My admiration of my son turned to horror at the very thought of stepping foot into the bush. The moment we arrived in Dawson, and I shakily disembarked from the boat that had dumped us here onto, if not firm ground, at least mushy swamp, I swore I’d never leave civilization again. “I meant shall we go for a walk into town. See who’s about and listen to the gossip.”
“I’d rather not,” he said, “if you don’t mind.”
“Perhaps you can find one of your friends to go down to the river with you.”
He kissed me on the cheek. “Enjoy your walk, Mother.”
If I didn’t love my son so much, I would curse the fates for not giving me a daughter. A dainty girl to dress in pretty, frothy gowns and tie her fair hair in ringlets and ribbons and to parade through town to the admiration of all. I smiled at the thought, realizing that the daughter I dreamed of was the complete opposite of the girl I myself had been. When my parents were alive, and we lived on Bestford, the great Scottish estate, I’d run almost as wild as Angus did today. Until they corralled me for daily lessons in the big house, at any rate. I suppose what I would like most would be to have a daughter who didn’t have to fight her way through the world. Who didn’t have to live by her wits and the variety of skills she learned in the fen and the schoolroom and the streets. And in the bedroom.
Angus tripped over something in the hall. “Damn.”
“Angus!”
“Sorry, Mother.” I laughed, full of love of my son and rinsed my tin mug in the cold, slimy water in the bucket on the wooden plank that served as a sink.
I dressed carefully in my best walking dress. It had a sage green skirt of practical cotton teamed with a white blouse with leg-of-mutton sleeves and green ribbons. I pulled a wide black belt firmly around my waist, took a deep breath, tugged at the belt one more time, and put on my hat. An ostrich feather in a green somewhere between that of the skirt and that of the ribbon bobbed high above the whole contraption.
A bright sunny day, following upon a day or two without rain, had gone a long way towards drying up the streets. Ladies kept to the boardwalk and duckboards, but gentlemen dared to walk down the centre of the road, and horses and wagons managed to get through without too much of a struggle.
I made my way south on York Street towards the river, enjoying the warm caress of the sun on my face and the sound of the soft wind rustling through my ostrich feather. Many of the serious gamblers and dance hall girls leave town on a Sunday morning, taking boats downriver to the United States, where anything goes and there are no sternfaced, broad-brimmed-hatted Mounties to enforce the Lord’s Day Act. Thus for one day a week the town takes on a façade of boring respectability.
On Front Street, the 25-cent waffle-bakery was struggling back to life. The elder sister stood in the street, eyeing the newly hung sign, her scorched hair shorn off almost to the scalp. I waved to her and crossed the street, carefully minding the hem of my skirts. The only bit of my ensemble, other than the mismatching green of every piece, that wouldn’t have withstood the scrutiny of a Sunday stroll in Hyde Park were my boots. No one ventured out-of-doors in Dawson without thoroughly practical footwear.
“Mrs. MacGillivray, how nice to see you,” Miss Vanderhaege said in her strong Dutch accent.
“I’m very sorry about your misfortune. I do hope your sister’s recovering nicely.”
“She’s well, well.” She smiled broadly, revealing a set of teeth that reminded me of a prized stallion. “We rebuild. Open for business tomorrow.”
“I’m glad to hear it, Miss Vanderhaege. You’ve been lucky.”
The smile died, and the horse’s teeth disappeared behind her chapped lips. “Lucky? More lucky if the fire hadn’t happened.”
I couldn’t argue with that, so I took my leave.
I walked past the Savoy to check things out. From the point of view of an observer on the street, it really was nothing to get excited about, in a street of matching nothing-to-get-excited-about establishments. Our casuallyemployed watchman, who paid about as much attention to his duties as I did to his rate of pay, had deserted his post to watch the passing parade. He almost swallowed his thin cigar at the sight of me. I nodded and continued on my way. If there is a more boring job on Earth than watching over the houses of entertainment in Dawson, Yukon Territory, on a Sunday morning, I don’t want to know about it.
I walked to the end of Front Street, down to where it curved to meet the Klondike River. That was far enough: I’d seen and, more importantly, been seen, quite enough. A book waited for me at home, Wuthering Heights by Miss Emily Bronte, which Angus had traded one of his boy’s adventures for as a gift to mark my birthday.
Margaret Collins came scurrying down the boardwalk towards me. I nodded and stopped to pass the time of day.
“Lovely morning, Margaret.”
“That it is, Mrs. MacGillivray.”
“Are you enjoying your walk?”
“Yes, Mrs. MacGillivray.” She wore an inexpensive, unadorned straw hat and a long, full cloak fastened all the way up the front, which I thought a bit too heavy for such a warm day.
“Since living in the Yukon, I’ve found that it’s best to appreciate every beautiful day one is granted. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“I would, Mrs. MacGillivray.”
“When I lived in London, all of society would rush to >the park to enjoy a sunny day. But I found that in Toronto, instead of enjoying what they’d been given, people complained constantly, about the heat in the summer and the cold in the winter.”
“Really?” Margaret said with not the slightest bit of interest.
What on earth was the point of trying to make polite, mindless conversation with an American anyway? They were all of them blunt