Tommy didn’t rip open the letters and start reading as he normally did. He headed for the river, one of the places he often found a bit of calm. Maybe he wouldn’t read the letters at all. Then when his father finally did show up, it’d be a delightful surprise. Delightful surprise? He marveled at the fact he now viewed his father arriving as a casual, surprising appearance, as though a mere acquaintance.
He reached the riverside and pulled the envelopes out. Maybe he should send them sailing away on the sparkling water, not having to be disappointed, or worse, become angry like Mama or disengaged with their father as Katherine was. He could keep the thread of expectation that his father had Des Moines in sight.
The return address indicated it was from the boardinghouse in Texas where his father had been staying at one point, but the writing was female and unfamiliar. Perhaps his father’s landlady had gotten Tommy’s letter and was sending information about his father’s whereabouts. Tommy squatted and dipped a corner of one envelope into the water, a steady current rushing by. Dampness climbed up the paper. Let it go. Better not to know. The moisture swallowed the paper, consuming, nearly reaching the address.
He couldn’t do it.
He stood and opened the letter from Texas, careful not to tear the sodden parts.
To Master Thomas Arthur:
Yur father, Frank Arthur, was here but run out on his failed cotton crop and bills, past due. If you catch word uv im afore I do, tell im pay directly. Or you send it, being the son, he indicated you wer to send money. You, next of kin, his keeper, as the Bible says, as yur father claimd more than once yur an onerabl son. We beleved im.
Tommy’s cheeks burned. He felt as though rheumatic fever gripped his internal organs. Tears stung. He rubbed his eyes with his hat and scolded himself for being a baby. Baby. The voice of Mr. Henderson, the cruel miner he’d boarded with, replayed in his mind, and he could feel the blow to the ear that followed. In an instant, the tears evaporated.
He stared at the envelope from San Diego. He would deal with the Texans as soon as he could, unwilling to allow Frank Arthur’s name to dangle out in the world with anything else awful attached to it. He held his breath and ripped into the second envelope, fingers quivering, willing it to reveal good news.
Tommy Arthur, your pa stayed with us a piece this winter, then beat a path up north and hired on with a crew to sail to some spot I can’t remember as I ain’t never heard mention of the place before. Like he made it up or something. If you get word from him, point him back to us. Owes board for a month, and the money is necessary for the keeping of my children. We need to survive, too.
Bile crept up Tommy’s throat. He swallowed it, blistering his stomach. How could this be true? His father responsible for another family’s trouble? He rubbed his stomach, hoping to dispel the acid. Was this truly the man his father had become? Or always was? Shame followed, guilt for considering these people might have a more accurate view of his father than he did. But that’s not the man he knew, the one who had walked the land with him in Dakota Territory, dreaming aloud, sharing all that was possible, making the best of things when the worst happened, when James died.
Tommy stood and went to a bench near a tree and sat, wind biting through his jacket. He closed his eyes, visualizing a map of North America. He pictured California, the path his father took to get there. He reread the letter from San Diego. No.
His father had promised to come north and east to Iowa, but clearly he hadn’t done that. He wasn’t merely detained and trying to make right with his debt. “I’ll be in Des Moines by midsummer.” Tommy had read the words in the prior letter a thousand times.
Was he already sailing the Pacific? Every statement and excuse Tommy would have once lent his father had turned into a question, had turned his sense of purpose inside out. Was he no longer tasked with helping bring his father back? He looked at the letter from the Texans. He was not his father’s keeper. His father should have been his keeper, provider, protector. It was time to let go. Clearly his father had let go of him.
“Tommy Arthur,” Pearl’s voice cut through the wind. He looked over his shoulder. She stalked toward him in wide strides, bent forward, feet ducked outward, revealed by her tattered, too-short hem, hands balled into little fists, a force sweeping toward Tommy, making him draw back. The sight of her, the girl who set his stomach to fluttering, at this vulnerable time, turned any excitement into humiliation and anger.
She stood in front of him, fists plugged on hips. He pulled his hat down over his eyes. He couldn’t let her see his tears.
He stared at her worn boots, the tips of them nearly touching the toes of his. A faint smell of lemon met his nose, and he wondered if she’d cleaned up before following him. She crossed her arms and tapped her fingers on one arm.
“Go away, Pearl.”
“No.”
“Please.”
She paused and shuffled her feet.
He held his breath.
“I want to warn ya is all.”
He exhaled deeply. She wasn’t leaving.
“Mr. Nelson reported to me just after you left that Judge Calder, his merry men, and god-awful wife are riled up like hens with a fox cresting the hill. Making blustery threats about impure dealings all over town, women, gambling, con artists, fortune-tellers all settling here. They’re not happy about the reputation of our fine city. Some Dreama woman who talks to ghosts and such got everyone’s hair set afire. Meetings are set, mobs are forming, and the law’s gonna stop her just like they did Madame Smalley.”
She breathed deep after unloading the information in one breath.
Tommy pretended to be reading the letter and watched her feet shuffle again. He didn’t know what to say.
She shifted her feet. “I seen ya working for the reverend. The wind rushed by my ears saying his boys are up to no good. You’re up to no good, then, I s’pose?” She balled her fists at her sides. “That’s Miss Violet Pendergrass you living next to, right?”
Tommy nodded once.
“Well, she and the rev and such are running some wrong business there. Heard tell you’re working for ’em.”
Tommy leaned forward, forearms on his legs. “You just heard all this now?”
“Parts of it. I pieced the rest of it together to get me to this point where I see you heading for trouble.”
He shook his head. “Miss Violet’s as nice a woman as I can name. I do chores for her.” He thought of the condoms he’d been tasked with making but dismissed it. “Katherine works the kitchen. Mama works the garden and runs errands. We board in the tiny house next door. Violet keeps a respectable business. I’ve seen plenty of leading citizens, fine men, there. Women, real smart ones just burning through textbooks under her watchful eye. Other women trusting their money with Miss Violet. You’ve read the articles about her, right?”
“She’s up to illegal dealings. She ain’t no—”
“Isn’t. Ain’t ain’t a word,” he said before he could pull the words back into his mouth. He looked her straight in the eye for the first time since she’d arrived.
She drew back, her expression wounded. In that moment, he could see right into her heart, each of his angry words tattooed there. Pearl didn’t have the gift of a gambler’s face.
The guilt was immediate. “I mean, if you want to talk proper like you say you do. I didn’t . . .”
“Well,” her voice quivered. She cleared her throat, glanced away, then gathered herself up. “Maybe you oughta trade that book learning for some street smarts before yer tail end gets tossed in the slammer with them boys you pal ’round with.”
She had that right. Tommy didn’t want to spend any time in jail at all. The stench of urine and perspiration and dirty hair was fresh in his mind, as though he’d been there that day. He thought of the doodads Hank and Bayard had stolen while Tommy was busy delivering the prayers. It was certainly possible people were on to them. Hank and Bayard had starring roles in Judge Calder’s clean-up-the-streets scam, where he tossed them into jail for effect and then released them to do it again.
Still, they would’ve warned him if something was about to happen to him. Wouldn’t they? They were the ones who said Tommy was to go to the judge’s house to work. Were they sending him right into trouble?
Tommy looked at the letters in his hand. He’d crumpled them into a ball. He didn’t like Pearl seeing him like this, in his natural, worrisome state. He’d worked hard to maintain a hard, confident shell. Two letters cracked the façade. Pearl’s news kicked the exposed belly. Tommy was the only surviving son. He needed to shoulder the family’s burdens in Des Moines, not worry so much about his father’s splintered trail.
James never had to work hard at being a moral person in the way the Bible and clergy suggested. Yes, Tommy’s moral dorozhka was more serrated than straight, but he was still headed in the right direction, choosing the right . . . wasn’t he? He was sure if he had to face God the next day, the Great Father wouldn’t hold his lifting of items against him. If there was a God, he’d fully understand every action Tommy took to preserve his family. Heck, if James were still alive, even he would’ve lifted an apple or trinket if it meant staying alive or keeping them together.
But Tommy had to wonder. Were people really talking about his work with the reverend? He had to get away and collect himself before he burst into full, self-pitying tears. Though he knew anything he’d stolen had been for good reason, Pearl wouldn’t understand. Her moral path was set in granite. Mr. Zurchenko would love Pearl for just that reason and Tommy couldn’t bear seeing disappointment in her face if she knew the truth about him. Her scolding expression said as much.
He pushed past her, jogging away. He glanced back as he headed through the trees.
The last thing he saw was confusion drape Pearl’s face. He hated to make her feel bad, but the last thing he needed was her seeing him cry like a baby.