Minnie appeared well pleased with the impact of her news. ‘Dear me, Mr Edwards, you seem to be a bit of a clumsy fellow this morning.’ She turned on her heel, paused at the door and gave him a curt nod before stalking off.
Jimmy stared blindly after the woman. There’d been so much left unsaid when the Harringtons had fled Hokitika. So many times he’d ached to confront the woman who’d taken him in so badly. Now he knew where Claire was, there’d be no rest for him until he caught up with her.
With the tribulations in the Bramwell household, he was loath to ask Henry for time off to travel to Greymouth, but in truth, he wasn’t needed here today. Anyone could see that. Save for the odd concerned customer dropping in with some baking, as they did at times like these, the shop had been quieter than a funeral parlour this morning. It would remain so until they’d buried the baby and knew the outcome of Mai’s illness. He prayed they would not be burying the pair of them.
Still, he thought long and hard before approaching Henry, but in the end it was Henry who suggested Jimmy travel to Greymouth that very day.
‘There’s nothing doing in the shop, and it’s not going to affect Mai one way or the other if you’re here,’ he said. ‘But if you want to get there by tonight, you’d best set off now. Last coach leaves at three and you’ll have missed that, but Cameron at the livery stables should have a good horse for hire. May be best to take the old beach route — it’ll be hours quicker than the inland road.’
Cameron, however, advised otherwise. ‘No, no, Jimmy. There’s been a lot of snowmelt … the rivers’ll be milky. A man can’t judge the depth of them when they’re like that. And you can bank on a good fresh running at this time of year. Too risky … wouldn’t want to lose old Ned, or you.’
Jimmy held back a rueful grin. He had the distinct impression Cameron would grieve the loss of his horse far more than he would Jimmy.
‘Ned’s along at the smithy’s,’ Cameron continued. ‘Threw a shoe this morning, but he’ll be done by now. I was just on my way to fetch him when you came in.’
Jimmy took Ned’s saddle and walked to the forge around the corner in Stafford Street to collect Ned.
As he walked into the gloom of the blacksmith’s he was hit by the heat and a burst of flame from the forge, along with the piercing hiss and acrid smell of rapidly cooling iron.
‘Ned’s out the back. The boy’ll see to him,’ grunted Charlie Horner, the blacksmith, looking up from belting an iron bar on his anvil, and nodding at his apprentice.
Jimmy’s cheeks burned from the heat. He wondered how Horner stood it, day in and out. Despite wearing only a leather jerkin over his bare chest and an apron, the man’s powerfully ropey muscles glistened with sweat and the loud and steady banging of his hammer was an almighty irritation in Jimmy’s ears.
He arrived at the Arahura bridge in good time, passing a group of Maori heading for their small settlement on the other side. He rode hard through Waimea and Goldsborough, finally reaching Kumara, where he exchanged Ned at the Empire Stables, as per Cameron’s agreement with the owner, for Buster, a fresh mount and another of Cameron’s horses.
‘Weather’s closing in,’ the stablehand told him, once he knew Jimmy intended riding on to Greymouth. ‘It’ll be dark soon, so I’ll give you Buster. He’s well used to the road — he could ride it blindfold.’
There was a fine, sturdy bridge over the Taramakau but, as Cameron had predicted, the river was milky from snowmelt and running swiftly. He was grateful for the man’s advice not to take the old beach route. It would have been foolhardy to try to cross rivers in this condition.
Buster made light work of the gallop up the Greenstone Road to the Blackwater Creek junction. The Greenstone Creek, not subject to the snowmelt, he forded without incident.
He could have wished for company on the lonely No Name Road. Dense bush edged one side, the Blackwater Creek meandered along the other. It had an eerie sense about it at this time of day, with the sun rapidly disappearing and slate-grey clouds bunching in the sky. Jimmy was mighty relieved to think that Burgess, Kelly and Levy, the infamous bushrangers, had been dead these past eighteen years, hanged for their brutal crimes. This was just the sort of spot they might have chosen to set upon an unfortunate victim.
He made his way down the long, steep No Name Hill to the town of Marsden. The glow of lanterns was already visible in some cottages. He shivered, imagining himself in any one of the small weatherboard homes, resting a foot on a brass fender, soaking up the warmth of the hearth, a tot of whisky in hand. A large drop of rain splashed on his cheek.
Dismounting, he put on his oilskin coat, grateful the longest part of his journey was over. Only Limestone and Bodytown to pass now before Greymouth.
It was black as pitch, and the rain torrential, by the time he reached Limestone, the scattering of huts and a rundown accommodation house belying the busy place it had once been.
A lamp over the door of the accommodation house, the only bright spot in the dismal and cold night, showed the rain pelting the ground so hard, it was bouncing back up. Kneeing Buster, Jimmy hunched in the saddle, the brim of his wideawake hat pulled well down over his face, and regretfully left the settlement behind.
The rain had eased by the time he made Bodytown. The lights of the odd farmlet glowed temptingly. Had he knocked on a door, he would have been sure of a welcome, a meal and a warm bed, no matter how cramped the dwelling. But his mind was focused on Claire and he pressed on.
It was after seven by the time he reached Ruggs’ Stables in Greymouth.
‘Old Buster’s one of the few horses that could have got you through on a night like tonight,’ the stablehand said, removing the animal’s saddle and rubbing him down. ‘Only has to go somewhere once and he knows the way — never forgets. Cameron got a bargain when he bought him.’
The stablehand took Jimmy in a buggy to the Niagara Hotel in Johnson Street.
Now, on the point of meeting up with Claire again, Jimmy found he was almost afraid to face the woman. He knocked on the door he’d been directed to and stood fingering his stiff white collar, which seemed to have shrunk. What was he doing here? She and that bugger Elmer had fleeced him alive, made an utter fool of him. What could be gained by confronting them now? His money was gone — he’d never get any back; they were far too cunning for that. Jimmy would have turned and fled at that point, but for Claire’s voice calling, ‘Come in.’
He was hit with a surge of anticipation. She was only a woman, and a criminal at that. It was she who should be afraid, not him. Suddenly confident, he stepped into the room.
Claire, though pretty as ever, looked different in some way — bigger than he recalled. Despite his best efforts not to stare at her rounded belly, his eyes took on a will of their own, fixing on it. She was clearly with child. The realisation that she must have been so while still playing the part of his fiancée was like a boot slamming into his stomach.
‘James, whatever must you think of me?’ She lowered her gaze, fluttering her eyelashes in the flirtatious way Jimmy had remembered with longing. ‘Can you ever forgive me?’
After all that had passed between them, he was astounded she could still play the coquette. But he was a wiser man now, and knew her remorse was about as sincere as her Quakerish ways had been. He no longer had anything to say to her; the hope he’d harboured for weeks now — that she would come back to him, despite being married to Elmer — had vanished, along with any desire he’d held for the woman.
She sat on the bed and patted the space beside her, indicating that Jimmy should sit. ‘Elmer’s gone, you know.’
Not about to be drawn into her web again, Jimmy continued to stand.
Claire continued, undeterred. ‘We’d no sooner arrived here than he left me to fend for myself. He took everything. If it hadn’t been for some money of my own he wasn’t able to get his hands on, I would have starved.’ She stared at him, her eyes filling with tears.
She’d rarely looked more vulnerable, Jimmy thought, a lump forming in his throat.
‘I’m so grateful you’re here, James. I would have come to you, but I was so ashamed of what Elmer had done —’
‘Elmer?’ Jimmy let out a raw bark of laughter. ‘You were every bit as bad as he was. The pair of you deserve worse than jail the way you’ve wrecked other people’s lives. And now that he’s upped and left, you expect me to take you back? I must have been mad not to see through you.’
Claire, unused to anything other than gentleness and adoration from Jimmy, looked startled. ‘Oh, James, I know I deserve everything you say, but please believe me. It was never my intention to deceive you. Elmer made me do it. The man frightened me — he is a vile brute. I was terrified of him, too afraid to defy him. I promise I will never lie to you again, but please, please take me with you.’ She clasped Jimmy’s hands, her eyes wide and pleading.
Once, that would have undone him. Even now, with the woman being large with another man’s child, as he looked into her clear, deceptively innocent blue eyes, he was almost convinced. But then he saw a calculated watchfulness in those same beguiling eyes as she sat gauging his reaction to her performance.
‘You’re wasted here.’ He thrust her hands aside. ‘You should be on the stage. I can’t think why you’ve not tried it before.’
He expected her to retaliate with indignation, maybe even fury. He was taken aback when she threw back her head and laughed.
‘Ah, Jimmy … you’re not so easily duped now. You’ve come a long way in a short time.’ Her smile fading, she saw him staring at a diamond and pearl ring lying on the washstand. The engagement ring he’d bought for her, too small to fit on her swollen finger.
‘You’re a good man, Jimmy Edwards, and I have to confess to a twinge of conscience now and then when I was your betrothed. However, business is business.’ Her tone hardened. ‘Sentiment must never be allowed to get in the way of a grand plan. And you must admit, it was a grand plan, James, until this …’ her gaze flicked to her stomach, ‘and your non-existent land got in the way.
‘It’s not often I’ve been fooled, James. Indeed, apart from my beloved husband disappearing in the middle of the night and leaving me with scarcely a penny to my name, I have never been taken for a fool.’ She gave him a quizzical look. ‘Incredible that you, with your bumbling, honest ways, should have duped me so cleverly with your grandiose claims of wealth and land.’
Only a matter of weeks ago, Jimmy would have blushed with shame at Claire’s statement. Now, all he felt was satisfaction that he had lied to Claire and Elmer.
‘I’ll make a bargain with you, Claire,’ he offered, eyeing the ring. ‘Seeing you’re so desperate for money, I’ll buy that ring back from you.’
‘You’ll not get it for a penny less than ten pounds,’ Claire demanded, holding out a hand.
‘I think not.’
Claire shrugged carelessly, a hint of a grin on her face as if she’d never really expected him to agree. ‘Ah, go on then. You were good to me. Five pounds and don’t hang around to argue. I’m liable to change my mind.’
‘One!’ Removing a pound note from the fob pocket of his waistcoat, Jimmy handed it to Claire, picked up the ring, and walked out of the room before she could utter a word of protest.
Jimmy stayed the night in a boarding house further along Johnson Street. The next morning, after collecting Buster from the stables, he set off early for Hokitika. It was a pleasant, unhurried ride back, unlike the day before, when he’d been hell-bent on reaching Greymouth, and Claire, in the shortest possible time. It was a mild and sunny spring morning and he made excellent time until the steep ascent up No Name Hill. It was treacherously muddy and slippery from the recent rain, and Jimmy deemed it prudent to dismount and walk it with Buster.
He felt blessedly free. Free of any yearnings for Claire, and free of the nagging sense of worthlessness that had plagued him since she’d left. To his surprise, he’d slept like a baby the previous night, despite a hard and lumpy mattress. Seeing Claire again had been like having a blindfold removed from his eyes. He’d convinced himself it had been Elmer who’d engineered their schemes, and Claire merely a frightened puppet. Now he knew that wasn’t so. He’d never recover the money they’d stolen from him, but what did it matter? He had a roof over his head, food in his belly, and good friends like Henry and Mai. And Anne Gilpin. She’d supported him in his time of trouble; hadn’t turned her back on him, as he had her. And he’d rewarded the woman by acting like a blackguard. What a fool he’d been.
Engrossed in his thoughts, he barely noticed the scenery as he passed. It seemed no time before he was at Kumara, Buster exchanged for Ned, then an easy canter to Hokitika.
Anne was alone in the shop when he arrived. He was struck by the contrast between her and Claire. Wholesome goodness radiated from her, so unlike Claire’s affected manner. How could he have been so blind?
She smiled a greeting. ‘Mai’s so much better today, though she’s still distraught at losing the baby.’
‘Can’t really expect her to be anything else, I suppose, but I’m pleased to hear she’s improved in herself.’
‘Would you care for a cup of tea while I make you something to eat?’ Anne asked hesitantly, as if expecting him to refuse.
After his long journey, Jimmy had quite fancied the thought of a glass of ale, but a great deal of making up with Anne lay ahead of him. It would seem churlish to spurn her offer.
‘I’d appreciate that,’ he said, removing his hat and sitting at the table.