Chapter Forty

On Tuesday evening Chen Fai stood in the shadows cast by the closing down of day and listened hard.

Finally, he heard the sound of footsteps.

He gave a quiet sigh of relief. Pressing closer to the wooden wall of the house that stood at the end of Second Street, the last house before the stretch of ground, dotted with wooden shacks, that led to the miners’ houses, he waited for the first of the miners to walk by on their way home at the end of their working day.

Hiram Walker was one of the first to pass by. Leaning heavily on his stick, his face was etched with fatigue. Joe Walker’s father was alone, he noticed with relief. He’d been worrying about what he would do if Sam Walker had been at his father’s side, but he’d worried in vain.

Gradually, the steady flow of pit-dirt miners who had followed Hiram in their groups of two or three, their heavy boots loud on the boardwalk, dwindled to the occasional one or two. But the miner he was waiting for had yet to reach the spot where he stood concealed.

Relaxing a little, he leaned back against the wall.

Sam Walker must have stopped at the saloon for a drink, he thought with an inward sneer of contempt. What a way for a man with a wife and son to behave. He should go straight back home to them as soon as he left the mine. A father should be with his family whenever possible.

He found himself feeling almost sorry for the fair-haired woman Sam Walker had married, even though she was a stupid woman. She had a pretty face, and would have found a better husband if she’d respected herself as a woman should do. Instead, she’d behaved like a louh geu with Sam Walker before she was wed, and had found herself with a child in her belly. Having shown herself to be a woman of no reputation, she was lucky Sam Walker had agreed to marry her.

And Sam Walker, too, was at fault. He had not shown her the respect that a man should show to the woman he is thinking of taking as wife.

At last he heard the sound of someone else coming along the boardwalk in his direction. Straightening up, he peered cautiously round the edge of the wall and saw a solitary figure in the darkening night, a lunch bucket in one hand and a miner’s hat in the other.

He pulled back a little and smiled inwardly – his wait was almost over. Motionless he stood there, thick-veiled by shadow, waiting for Sam Walker to pass him by.

There was a flurry of air as Sam stepped off the end of the boardwalk and struck out across the open ground.

Chen Fai moved into position and started walking after him.

Sam went a few steps more, turned round and faced him. ‘Oh, it’s you!’ he exclaimed sharply. ‘I thought I heard someone. What d’you want?’

‘To tell you something of interest to you, something I found out yesterday. But I think you’ve had a drink and you may be too drunk to understand my words, so maybe I won’t tell you.’ He made as if to go.

Sam grabbed Chen Fai’s arm and pulled him round to face him. ‘Like you said, I’ve had a drink. One drink. But that don’t make me drunk. If I’d gotten the wages I deserve for the coal I dug today, I could’ve had more than one drink, and maybe then I’d be drunk, but I didn’t. So if you’ve got somethin’ to say, I’ll understand it real well. So say it quickly and go.’

Chen Fai assumed an expression of concern. ‘It’s about your brother Joe, and Charity,’ he said.

‘Don’t you say those two names in the same breath,’ Sam snapped. ‘And anyway, she’s leavin’ Carter, I’m delighted to say.’

‘They are soon much closer than just in the same breath, as you put it,’ Chen Fai said, his tone mild.

Sam stared angrily at him. ‘What are you talkin’ about? Say what you’re tryin’ to say in simple words.’

‘You are correct that she’s leaving Carter Town. But she’s leaving with your brother. They will have a Chinese wedding first, Charity and Joe.’

‘Joe’s gonna wed her!’ Sam stared at him in amazement, then he threw back his head and laughed. ‘Sure she’s as hot as a whorehouse on nickel night, but he’d not be so stupid as to wed her! And he wouldn’t need to. The way she’s followed him around all these years, he could have it for the askin’. And if it’s just yellow whores he wants, he can have his fill at the tong. Nope, he wouldn’t need to wed her.’ He laughed again.

‘But he is,’ Chen Fai said, his face ice-cold.

The laughter stopped abruptly. Sam thrust his face closer. ‘You listen real good. I don’t want my brother’s name in the same sentence as that … that whore. D’you hear?’

Chen Fai gave him a humourless smile. ‘I do. But it is not my sentences you need to worry about; it is the law’s. He will be doing with Charity what is forbidden by American law.’

‘Why, you blam-jam, no account, yellow-skinned—’ Sam raised his hand to strike Chen Fai, but Chen Fai was faster. He caught Sam’s arm and held it in the air.

‘No need to cuss me,’ he said, his voice stony. ‘I’m not the man who is going to break the law and bring shame on the Walker family. I am not the man who make you lose face in front of white miners.’ He dropped Sam’s arm and stepped back. ‘Joe Walker do this; not me.’

‘Why’re you tellin’ me this?’ Sam asked, rubbing the place where Chen Fai had gripped him.

‘Because I think you want to stop this.’

Sam looked surprised. ‘Why would I? In fact, the more I think about it, the more I like the idea of Joe leavin’ again, and this time for good. Without him around, Ma might find some time for me. It’s always bin Joe this and Joe that,’ he added with a snarl, ‘even though I’ve given her a grandson.’

‘And he also may give her grandson. But the son of Joe Walker and Charity will be a child with yellow skin. I think you want to stop this because you not want half-caste child in the Walker family, a child with skin and eyes like this.’ He pointed to his face. ‘Is Walker mother happy to have a Chinese girl in the family, and a son with half-Chinese children? You think this will make white people in Carter Town kind to Walker family when they find out, and they will find out?’

Sam stared at him thoughtfully. ‘You’re right. If my brother had a child with a China woman, and if Carter folk ever found out, I’d never hold my head up again and no one would ever talk to Ma and Pa again. We hate you Celestials.’

‘And we feel same about you,’ Chen Fai said, his voice filled with hate.

Sam stared at him, his eyes narrowing. ‘And what’s your reason for wantin’ to stop it, then?’

‘I do not want to stop it; I want wedding to happen. That is the best thing. But I do not want them to have time together after wedding. I do not want the man who take Charity from me to find happiness with her; I want him in jail. And I not mind if Charity is in jail, too. But in a different jail.’ He heard the bitterness in his voice, and was angry at himself for showing his hurt, and his jealousy.

‘So if you can’t have her, no one will. Is that it?’ Sam asked with a sneer.

‘She brings shame to me and to Chen ancestors. She should have punishment,’ he said firmly.

‘Then why are you talkin’ to me? All you have to do if you want them caught is go to the Marshal. You speak the lingo, after all.’

‘Marshal McGregor likes Joe and Charity, and I think he will not do anything. He will say he will go to tong, but he will not. So they will marry and get away. If I later complain about this, he will lie and say I not tell him. Whites will not believe a Chinaman against a white marshal. And anyway, they are gone from Carter by then. I not want them to have even one night together.’

‘So you want me to tell the Marshal. You think because I’m white, with miner friends, who’ve always thought Joe looks down on them, thinkin’ he’s too special to go down in the dark, dangerous mines, you think the Marshal will have to act on what I say as he’d know we’d all be real mad if he didn’t. Is that it?’

‘Exactly.’

Sam nodded. ‘Okay, I’ll tell him. Not for your sake, but for ours. So when are they gonna get wed? And where?’

Chen Fai’s heart leapt. ‘Next Monday morning,’ he replied, steadying his voice, suppressing the urge to shout out in glee. ‘They must finish ceremony before Marshal goes into tong – it proves they plan to live together and this is what law is not allowing. If they not have ceremony, Marshal can do nothing.’

‘Right,’ Sam said. ‘I’ll do it. There’ll never be a Celestial in the Walker family, not if I can help it, and it don’t bother me if I never see that brother of mine again. And now I’ve agreed, that’s you and me finished.’ He turned his back on Chen Fai and continued walking towards the miners’ houses.

Chen Fai watched him until he was completely out of sight, then he turned and made his way back to his store, a lightness in his step, quiet satisfaction on his face.

‘So you’re back, are you? You obviously stopped for a drink, even though we’ve no money.’ Phebe’s voice was sharp. ‘Your dinner’s ruined again.’

Sam winced. ‘I had one drink; that’s all. I was delayed on my way home.’

‘There’s always a reason, isn’t there?’ she said angrily. ‘It’s never because you preferred to stop a while in the saloon rather than come straight home to us, is it?’

‘A drink helps me unwind,’ he said tetchily. ‘But that’s not what made me late. If you hobbled your lip and stopped naggin’ for a minute, woman, I could tell you what delayed me. Or rather, who delayed me.’

She folded her arms and sat down. ‘So what’s the story for this evenin’?’

‘I’ve bin talkin’ to Chen Fai, haven’t I?’

‘I very much doubt it. You hate him so why would you talk to him? And why would he wanna talk to you? He knows what you think of him.’

‘Aha.’ He gave her a knowing look. ‘He wanted to tell me somethin’ he’d found out and he asked me to do somethin’ he couldn’t do.’ He sat down opposite her. ‘Get me some food, will you, and I’ll tell you what he said. I reckon it’ll interest you. But you’ve gotta promise me not to tell anyone. D’you promise?’

‘I guess so,’ she said, sulkily. ‘But this better not be just another excuse. Let me get your dinner first, though. It’s been on too long already.’ And she stood up and went across to the stove, lifted off the saucepan, piled a mass of over-boiled mutton and potatoes on to two plates and carried the plates to the table. She put one in front of him and sat down with the other.

‘Be quick about it, then,’ she said. ‘Thomas is still pretty restless and he could wake at any time. I can’t be dealin’ with him and listenin’ to you. So what’s this big secret Chen Fai wanted to tell you?’

He picked up his knife and fork, leaned forward and told her.