Big Meadows Valentine (Eastern Sierra Brides 1884) Read online

  Beth looked up and studied the side of Val’s face. His beard hairs were dark and straight. Unlike her father’s before he got so sick, or her husband’s, it wasn’t bushy. When Val looked over at her and smiled, she turned away and focused on where was driving the mules.

  Jim Dodd. You’re lookin’ for Jim Dodd. You’re married to Jim Dodd.

  CHAPTER 2

  Val insisted Beth wait inside the back door to the market out of the cold while he hauled in sections of frozen beef to be stowed in the meat locker. They were told by a store clerk who helped Val that the butcher was gone for the day.

  Beth looked over the butcher’s work quarters with interest. It appeared clean enough, but the scent from processing meat that clung to the wood of the large butcher block and surrounding counters made her wrinkle her nose almost as much as smell of the dust of the high desert.

  Next, Val steered his team down Main Street past the livery where she had arrived on the stage line.

  “Horses and wagon wheels have knocked down the snow too much,” Val said, shaking his head. “I may have to stay to the less busy streets with these sleigh runners.”

  They crossed Third Street, traveled another block and turned left. Once they were on Second Street, Beth noticed a saloon on each side. Val edged toward the building on the right named The Arcade.

  “Owned by a couple of Germans, Haas and Glunz,” Val explained with a grin. “But, don’t tell them they’re German. They have duchies or something like that over there that until about twelve to fourteen years ago were considered separate nations. One’s from Baden and one’s from someplace starting with a V. Not all Germans like being lumped together as one nation, and these two will let you know it.”

  “You deliver meat to a saloon?”

  “Actually, it’s to the chop shop in back run by another German, Gus Herschel. He likes to cut his own meat. Cooks up steaks mostly, but he also makes sausages. It’s a pretty popular place to eat. I hope you don’t mind waiting for a moment while I take care of Gus’s order.”

  “I’ll be all right.”

  As Val disappeared into the back of the The Arcade with a shoulder of beef braced on his shoulder, Beth twisted around and looked toward the front of the building. As she climbed down from the sleigh, she was once again struck with the realization that up until three months earlier, she had never set foot inside a drinking establishment. Back in Ohio, even with the rumors about where Jim Dodd was and who he was with filtering back to her, she had not gone after him to the bars and whorehouses herself, even when he disappeared for days at a time. But, out west, she soon realized that if she wanted to find the man, she had to go into the type of places he frequented.

  Beth took a deep breath and cracked the front door. Peeking through, she could see that the place was far from crowded, although quite a few men, many of them wearing the red shirts favored by miners, sat at tables or stood up to the bar. A few more gathered around a billiard table toward the front opposite the bar. She pulled the door open further and entered, closing the door quietly behind her.

  Once she stepped inside, the relative warmth from the pot belly stove in the center of the room welcomed her. So did the whistle of one of the men sitting at a table with a card game in progress. He waved her over. As others in the room turned and gaped at her, a ripple of comments, including a few suggestive invitations, increased the volume in the room. Beth ignored them as she started toward the barkeeper. She had learned from experience that they were the best sources of information.

  The bartender looked up from the glass he was polishing and frowned. He motioned her over to the empty table in the front corner at the end of the bar. Beth gratefully dropped into the chair where she would be out of the line of sight of most of the men in the room. She only wished it was closer to the warmth of the stove.

  The bartender nervously sat next to her, far enough that they didn’t touch, but close enough that he could lean forward and speak to her quietly.

  “Fraulein, if work you want, that kind of place Arcade is not. No upstairs rooms we have.”

  Beth’s face warmed with embarrassment or indignation, she wasn’t sure which. It wasn’t the first time a barkeeper has assumed she sought work as a prostitute. Even though she knew her attitude was counterproductive to her wish to obtain the information she sought, she could not hold back the snip in her voice.

  “That ain’t why I’m here. I’m lookin’ for my husband, Jim Dodd. He ever come in here?”

  The barkeep shook his head, obviously more uncomfortable after learning her purpose for being there. He glanced at her left hand as if noticing for the first time the thin gold band on her ring finger.

  At least while her pa was still alive, Jim Dodd had kept up the pretense of being a settled man. He had bought her a wedding ring. As her funds had dwindled during the process of trying to locate her husband, Beth had thought of selling it. At that moment, although the ring held no sentimental value for her, she was glad she still wore it.

  “Nein, Frau Dodd. No. Sorry I am I tink you a...But, ah...”

  “Just say your piece. After what I been through lookin’ for him, ain’t nothin’ you say goin’ to discomfit me none.”

  “Vell...” the barkeeper cleared his throat, “if vomen he like, other saloons in town you go see, ya? Maybe hotels and boarding houses you look, ya?”

  “Thank you, Herr...”

  “Frederick Gluntz. Fritz. Frau Dodd, ve no like vifes looking for husbands here to come, bitte. Please. Bad for business, ya?”

  “Danke, Herr Gluntz. Thank you. You’ve been right helpful. Sorry about disruptin’ your business and all.”

  “Sprechen Sie Deutsch?” Fritz asked, surprised.

  “Nein. No, not so’s you’d know it. On occasion, we done business with the Amish from the next county over. They speak the Pennsylvania Dutch. Reckon I learnt a little German.”

  Beth knew a few German words and expressions. In addition, she had figured out that Germans did not pronounce the “th” sound, but said “t” instead. Also, they pronounced their “w” as “v” and their “v” as “f.”

  “Ach! Pennsylvania?” Fritz tapped his ear. “You sound like...Kentucky? What you say, Appalachia?”

  “Southern Ohio. Out Piketon way. Just across the river from Kentucky, but same neck of the woods.”

  “Ach, come far. Ich komme aus Württemburg.” I come from Württemburg. Fritz pronounced the “w” in Württemburg as a “v.”

  “You’ve done come a mite farther than me, Herr Glunz. I thank you kindly for your help.”

  Reluctantly, Beth rose to her feet. She sincerely hoped she could find Jim Dodd this night. No matter what floozy he was with, Beth had every intention of dragging him away long enough for him to take her to wherever he called home. Her funds were too low to do anything different.

  Beth had already wired for more of her own money when she arrived in Reno and discovered her husband wasn’t there. While she followed the leads that took her from one mining town to the next, she had been living on that and wages from the job as a cook for a society matron in Carson City she had picked up over the Christmas holiday. She did not want to use up any more of the small amount of money she had received as a separate inheritance from her father, money her pa set aside for her just before he died. Judge Bates had set up that money so it could not be used or controlled in any way by her husband. Based on the contract between Jim Dodd and her pa, her support was her husband’s responsibility, not hers. He needed to pay that money back to her. Her problem was to find him, first.

  In Reno, Beth had learned from a rather sheepish Darren Dodd that he had grown tired of her husband’s antics. The two had parted ways months earlier. Darren decided he was better off working to supply miners than being one. Jim Dodd chose to stay in Aurora, unwilling to give up on the rumor that the district was poised to discover the next big vein of silver.

  Out of a sense of guilt for her predicament, Darren had put her up in Reno for
several days until her money came in. Once she convinced him she was determined to find her husband rather than travel back to Ohio, he had bought a stage ticket to Aurora for her and given her a dual barrel derringer he had won in a card game. She kept that in her pocket and the spare ammunition in her reticule. With that, the knife strapped to her calf plus the carbon steel kitchen knife from home she kept at the top of her valise, she felt ready to meet whatever challenge came her way during her search.

  Again, Beth glanced at her left hand. She might have to sell the ring. But, in a land where they were pulling precious metals out of the ground hand over fist, she doubted she would get much for it.

  “Bitte schön, you’re welcome, Frau Dodd,” Fritz said as he also rose. Then he pointed to a counter on the opposite side of the room toward the back. It was situated in front of an open doorway that led, as far as Beth could see, to a kitchen area. “Before leaf, mit Gus you talk, ya? He chop shop owns. Your husband good food likes? Maybe Gus knows.”

  Beth nodded and started toward the other side of the building.

  “I vit you go, Frau. Gus kommt aus Bayern. Comes from Bavaria. Gus English not good.”

  “Danke.”

  They reached the counter on the other side of the room and found a spot between two diners standing while they ate. Beth glanced at the handful of tables situated next to the food establishment. One table held a threesome who appeared to be waiting for their food. Ignoring their stares, she turned back to face the kitchen. She wondered why the men at the counter chose to stand to eat.

  “Gus! Besucher. Visitor,” Fritz called through the doorway.

  A short, balding man that Beth judged to be in his mid-thirties stuck his head out of the doorway. His scowl did nothing to improve his looks which Beth judged to be not particularly handsome. He quickly shouted before disappearing again. “Busy! Warten Sie! Wait.”

  “Danke,” Beth called back.

  Gus stuck his head back out and stared at her a second. Then, holding his pointer finger up to signal them to wait, he disappeared again. Beth could hear the sizzle of fat as Gus turned meat on a hot skillet.

  Minutes later, Gus trotted around the end of the food bar to one of the tables, a wad of rag wrapped around the handle of the cast iron frying pan.

  “Plates! Verrin sie plates?”

  The seated men each held out either an enamel coated bowl or plate. Gus then forked a piece of meat onto each one. Gus returned to the kitchen and returned with a second skillet full of fried potatoes. He started back to his kitchen.

  “Hey, where’s my brat?” a lone diner standing up to the food counter called out.

  Brat?

  “Soon,” Gus answered him with a shake of his head while muttering something in German under his breath. He returned a third time with a half dozen biscuits and proceeded to drop them by twos on each plate belonging to the diners at the table.

  “Sehr gut, ya?”

  “Yeah, Gus, it’s good,” sounded off a chorus of voices.

  With a satisfied smile on his face, Gus started back toward the kitchen, motioning to Beth and Fritz to follow him.

  “Except these biscuits, here, are hard enough to chip rock,” mumbled a lone dissenter at the table. Another commented, “Got no idea what he’s saying, but seems to make him happy when we tell him it’s good.”

  Beth turned to the men and said, “He’s askin’ if you think it’s real good.” Then Beth turned and continued to the kitchen, aware that the men’s eyes followed her.

  Once Beth stepped around the counter and into the kitchen area, she felt her foot start to slip out from under her. Fritz caught her elbow to steady her. She was immediately struck by the mess caused by the fat spatter all over the stove, walls and ceilings. Flour coated a table surface and the surrounding floor. The smell of rancid grease and dirt and another odor that reminded her of cured meat assaulted her senses. It was obvious that Gus did not clean up after himself as he cooked. Instinctively, Beth’s eyes searched the edges of the room for signs of rodent droppings. The scowl on Gus’s face told her he was not happy to have her step inside his domain and survey his mess.

  Fritz proceeded to make introductions.

  “Augustus Herschel, Frau Dodd.”

  Gus wiped his right hand down his pant leg, took her right hand, clicked his heels and quickly jerked a bow over her extended hand.

  “Mein name ist Gus, Frau Dodd.”

  As soon as Gus released her fingers, Fritz switched to German too fast for Beth to follow as he explained why Beth was there. Gus answered in rapid German. Beth guessed by the length of the exchange that they discussed more than her search for her husband. But, as soon as Gus shook his head, she knew that the German chop cook couldn’t help her.

  “There you are!” The familiar voice came from the direction of the doorway leading to the main bar. Beth spun around to face Val Caldwell who wore an exasperated expression on his face. “I thought you were going to wait for me in the sleigh so I could be with you when you came in here.”

  “It was warmer inside,” Beth snapped. “I figured while you was takin’ care of your business, I’d take care of mine.”

  “Now, please don’t get all prickly on me, Mrs. Dodd. If it was too cold for you to wait for me in the sleigh, I’d have preferred to bring you back here in Gus’s shop rather than have you chance coming into the saloon. I worried that something happened to you.”

  “I’m doin’ fine. Done found what I need to know. I’m ready to go.”

  Beth turned and, smiling, nodded to both Fritz and Gus. “Danke.”

  Val shook his head and offered her his arm. Surprised at the gesture, Beth glanced over to study Val’s face before she slid her hand on his arm.

  As they turned to leave, Gus called out to Beth.

  “Vait! Frau Dodd, Kochen sie? You cook?”

  Surprised as Gus’s question, Beth turned back to face him.

  “Ya, I cook.”

  “Cook, vat you say, biscuits? Bread? Beans? Stew? Potatoes? Corn? Rice?”

  Beth answered with a “ya” to each question until Gus got to rice. She gave him a puzzled look. “Can’t say as I’ve ever cooked rice, but reckon I can figure it out.” She looked to Val and Fritz for clarification on rice.

  “They bring it in by the wagonload for the Chinese,” Val said. “You cook it like wheat or grits until it’s soft enough to eat. Tastes pretty good and, like potatoes, goes with most anything.”

  “You got Chinese in Lundy?”

  “Ya. No Chinatown, but outside town they live,” Fritz explained. “Do laundry and...” Fritz glanced at the other two men before he returned his gaze to Beth. “...tings,” he finished weakly.

  Two thoughts coursed through Beth’s mind. First, she hoped that her husband had not developed a taste for Chinese prostitutes, because she did not relish the idea of looking for him in a Chinese brothel. Second, if she needed to find work before she could continue her search, taking in laundry would probably not be profitable.

  “Frau Dodd, vant job?” Gus’s irritated voice recaptured their attention. “For Gus you vork? You cook?”

  “You’re offerin’ me a job as a cook?”

  “Ya!” Gus nodded. “Chops I cook; rest you cook. Ve vork, Ve sprechen Deutsch.”

  Flabbergasted, Beth just stared at Gus. Yes, if she ended up needing a job, she would rather cook than do anything else she could think of. But, a lot depended on exactly what Gus expected of her and how much he was willing to pay. And whether or not she could find Jim Dodd.

  Without looking at him, Beth knew Val studied her, waiting to find out what she would do. She had to make a decision.

  “Can’t rightly say yet, Herr Herschel...”

  “Gus!”

  “Gus, I’m lookin’ for my husband. I may be back directly, dependin’ on what I find.”

  “Morgen. Morning you come, ya? For Gus you cook.” Gus’s chin jutted out with stubborn determination.

  At this point, Val steppe
d forward to capture the cook’s attention.

  “Gus, Mrs. Dodd has a valise with her. Mind if we leave it here for you to watch?”

  After Fritz’s translation, Gus answered, “Ya, Gus vatch. Mit Gus is safe.”

  Beth felt apprehensive about leaving her valise on Gus’s dirty floor, but she figured Val had a reason for asking. While Val left to retrieve her bag, Beth stepped back into the kitchen, spotted what looked like a broom, shoved a crate of potatoes aside and did her best to clean out a space under a work counter. Only a few mouse droppings.

  While Beth was busy doing that, Gus scurried up a ladder and through an opening to what Beth guessed to be a loft area. He returned carrying the largest sausage Beth had ever seen. As Gus came close to her with the herby cured link of meat, Beth identified the scent that had eluded her earlier.

  “Bratvurst,” Gus said in response to Beth’s silent inquiry. “In Bavaria, Gus learn gut bratwurst make. Miners like.”

  Once Val returned, Beth grabbed her valise and shoved it in the space she had cleared. As she left with Val, Gus was already focused on his order of fried bratwurst and potatoes.

  CHAPTER 3

  “We may have to double back, Mrs. Dodd, but, since you said you thought you would have better luck in the saloons with upstairs girls, I hope you don’t mind if we try the Blue Feather next. I have to take care of some business there.” At the scathing glance Beth gave him, Val must have guessed what went through her mind. “Now, don’t be that way, Mrs. Dodd. Not that kind of business. I don’t patronize this place and I certainly wouldn’t bring you in with me if I did. I have my last delivery to make here.”

  Beth looked straight ahead, too embarrassed to face Val.

  “Reckon I owe you an apology. Guess dealin’ with Mr. Dodd’s turned me a mite sour.”

  “No offense taken, Mrs. Dodd. From what little I know of your situation, I guess I can’t blame you for assuming the worst.”