JACK FELL DOWN
by Sidney McCabe
© 2000
CHAPTER 10
The landlady woke Jack with her usual door-banging and screeching.
The tirade typically began at an unforgiving six a.m., and didn't cease
until late in the evening when the landlady, whose name was Polly, began
drinking and curiously enough grew quiet. Jack had now become used to
this routine, and Polly, who was not unfriendly, was rather fond of the
small young 'boy' who had come to stay in her boarding house/saloon. She
especially liked Jack's accent, and teased her about it, asking Jack to
say certain things
like "oh, bother", "fancy that", and Jack's favorite
mild curse, "Blimey O'Reilly", which sent her into fits of laughter.
New York was a frightening yet wholly interesting place. It wasn't as big as London, but it was certainly getting to that point, and it had none of the familiarity that London had. She had frequented London nearly every week of her young life, but the short time she had spent in America, in the small, dusty towns she had traveled for the Express, had made her edgy in the city, nervous, unsure of herself.
It had taken her nearly six weeks for her cuts and bruises to heal, and Bart's fists hadn't been kind to her still-fragile ribs, either. Doc Cranston had helped her as much as he could, but he was frightened of Bart, and uneasy about allowing Jack to shelter herself in his home. Bart had been made a fool of, at least in his own eyes, and his temper was one to be reckoned with. Jack had stayed with Doc for a few days and then left, heading east, not exactly sure where she was intending to go. She thought of Rock Creek and her friends at least a hundred times a day.
She remembered everyone telling her to come back, Rachel telling her
on several occasions that she would always be welcome, no matter what.
She longed for them all, for the comfort and support she knew they would
give, and contemplated turning her horse around and going back to Rock
Creek nearly every day as she traveled east, but she never did. Bart's
words still rang in her ears, "Did Teaspoon Hunter and those Rock
Creek boys know about this? I swear to God, Townsend, if I ever catch
wind that you're anywhere near a Pony Express station again, I'll have
you hauled into jail, and
Teaspoon Hunter with you! I don't care if he is the marshal in that town!
One word to the firm and I can have him arrested faster'n you can blink!"
What had ever possessed Jack to tell Jimmy that Bart was a good man? He wasn't a good man, he was the worst kind. And so she had continued on with no clear idea of where she might end up, until suddenly, tired of camping on roadsides, she had decided on New York City. Just now she needed the anonymity of a big city.
Polly's boarding house was right in Manhattan. It wasn't an entirely
disagreeable place: it was clean and respectable, all the boarders were
urbane businessmen and wandering gentlemen cowboys, and the saloon girls
were polite to Jack and thankfully kept their distance. Polly sensed something
different about Jack, but her nearsightedness and disregard for any circumstances
other than her own left her unsure as to what exactly it
was that set Jack apart from her other lodgers. She chalked it up to Jack
being a foreigner and left it at that.
Jack had forgotten how much she liked New York. There was a bustling
excitement to it that appealed to her greatly. But she felt guilty that
she hadn't written Lou to let her know she was all right; Lou, with her
keen instincts about those she loved, would surely have sensed something
was wrong by now. There were so many explanations Jack knew she owed to
those wonderful people who had taken her in, when they could just as easily
have sent her packing as Bart had done. But she couldn't go back and endanger
them or their lives in any way. There was so little she could do for them
to repay their many kindnesses, the least she could do was stay away.
But she really did owe Lou a letter.
One Sunday, when the boarding house was quiet -- Polly insisted that she and her saloon girls attend church regularly, and always closed business on the Sabbath -- Jack sat down to begin her letter.
'Dear Lou,' she wrote, 'Forgive me for neglecting you for so long.
I have thought this letter out many times in my head, and I have certainly
intended to write it, but what with one thing and another, I have put
it off. I guess the Robert Burns poem applies to me:
'The best-laid schemes of mice and men go oft astray
And leave us nothing but grief and pain for promised joy.'
It's something my mum used to recite to me when I was a little girl, as
a reminder that no matter how much you planned, no matter how hard you
tried, sometimes things didn't work out the way you wanted them to. And
Lou, it's amazing how right she was. This life I've led since taking that
boat from England has been nothing like the life I'd planned on having.
When I was a little girl all I wanted was to marry a lovely man who liked
to read as much as I did, to move to London with him, and open our own
bookstore. I wanted
simple things, quiet things; I've never had the love of adventure and
daring that you have. It's part of the reason I admire you so much, because
you've got the guts to do things I've never even dreamed of doing. I'm
content to sit back and read about them, whilst you are out there *doing*
them. Mark my words, your name will go down in history, Lou McCloud.
'Which brings me to the actual point of this letter, which I fear may be a long one. I want to tell you what it is that brought me to America, why I became a Pony Express rider despite my fears, and why I have never wanted to discuss it before now. Rachel may have told you the bits of background that I gave her -- about growing up in a quiet seaside village, about traveling with my mother and father -- but I didn't give her that much. It's been too painful even to think about, but I owe you a great deal of explanation, Lou. It began when a school friend pointed out that I didn't look the least bit like my mother. I had my father's hair and ears and crooked teeth, but my eyes and my complexion, my mouth, my hands, everything else about me belonged to no one. I didn't pay her much attention at first, but she was right, and as children will do, I became curious.
'How I found out what I found out would take sheets and sheets of
paper to explain, so I'll simply tell you what came of all my curiosity:
I discovered that my mother was not actually my mother, nor was my father
my father, that I was in fact the child of my father's younger brother
Geoffrey, and an American woman named Jillian, whom I was *named* for.
Jillian was a stage actress, which my family considered disgraceful. Does
this sound sensational, Lou? Like one of those dime store novels Cody
likes to read? I
assure you it's very real, but up until that point in my life I had only
read about this sort of thing in books, lovely stories by the Bronte sisters
and by Charles Dickens, and I had always enjoyed them, whilst feeling
very sorry for the characters who found themselves in such situations.
Suddenly it was my life.
'Not such a bad life, I grant you. There is no doubt that my father and mother loved me very much, and they absolutely adored one another. You've told me about your life, Lou, and I would never want to go through the pain and anguish you went through, or to have had the youth that Noah or Buck or Ike was forced to live through, but please understand that because of what I found out, my life crumbled to bits. Everything I'd ever known was a lie. Every abandoned child in the world has the same thought -- WHY DIDN'T THEY WANT ME? Never mind that I loved my parents, never mind that I had a wonderful life. Suddenly the only thing that mattered to me was to find out why Geoffrey and Jillian, my *real* parents as I thought of them, had not wanted me. Geoffrey was dead, which left Jillian. So I made my decision, and I came to America.
With nothing. I left my mother and father a note, and took the first
boat from Southampton. 'I found Jillian almost straight away. I couldn't
believe how easy it was.
In fact, by the time I got to New York, where she was, and started asking
after her, people who knew her from her plays or knew her personally would
always tell me I was the exact image of her, except my hair was dark and
hers was blond. But Jillian wasn't as amused when I showed up on her doorstep.
She didn't even let me in, Lou. She stood in the doorway and talked to
me as if I were a beggar. She wasn't exactly unkind, just
disinterested. She said she had a show and she had to get ready for it.
She said she could barely understand a word I was saying because of my
accent, and that was part of the reason it hadn't worked out with Geoffrey,
because of his accent. She laughed when she said that. Not cruelly, just
a laugh. And then she said, I'm sorry, little girl, but the fact is I
never wanted kids. I never will want kids. I'm famous here and I like
my life. I'll never get married and I'll never have kids. Go back to Emma
and Kenneth, I know
they're good to you. I'm sorry, but I just never wanted you.
'So I left New York, but I knew I couldn't go home to Searyshire. I was too ashamed, to scared. I knew I'd hurt my parents. They'd take me in and loved me and taken care of me, and I'd thrown it back in their faces. Sometimes I still wake up in the middle of the night crying for them, for my mum's smile and her smell, my dad's laughter and hugs. But how can I ever go back, Lou? Why would they want me back after what I've done to them?
'I just began to travel, all alone, until I quickly realized that America is no place for a young girl to travel alone. I really didn't care about anything anymore, so I cut my hair and bought boy's clothes, and went on like that. Then a bartender I befriended in Missouri told me about the Express, and I decided to try, and they stationed me at Apple Ridge. It was the best thing that could have happened to me, because I met you and Jimmy and Rachel and Ike, and everyone else. No matter what happens, I can never regret that decision.
'Bart found out I was a girl and he fired me, Lou. I've been on the road ever since. It feels like life has done another turnaround on me. My only consolation is that I haven't had to involve any of you in all of this. I'm sorry if you've worried, but I've been fine. You have all been so good to me, maybe for a change I can do some good for someone in return. I'm sorry this letter has gone on so long. I'll write more when I can. Don't worry about me. Jack'
Jack sealed up the letter and the next morning she took it to the post office where she mailed it. It traveled by train to St Joe, and three weeks later was sitting in the Rock Creek general store, while Lou and the others settled into their new station in Sweetwater.
Chapter 1 ¤ Chapter 2 ¤ Chapter 3 ¤ Chapter 4 ¤ Chapter 5 ¤ Chapter 6 ¤ Chapter 7 ¤ Chapter 8 ¤ Chapter 9 ¤ Chapter 10 ¤ Chapter 11 ¤ Chapter 12 ¤ Chapter 13 ¤ Chapter 14 ¤ Chapter 15 ¤ Chapter 16 ¤ Chapter 17 ¤ Chapter 18 ¤ Chapter 19 ¤ Chapter 20 ¤ Chapter 21 ¤ Epilogue ¤