The Linen Curtains Puffed out As the Cool Breeze Blew Through the Open Bedroom Window

1.

The linen curtains puffed out as the cool breeze blew through the open bedroom window. The central California air took on a chill at this time of night, and a shiver shook her body.

“mi Caridad,” her lover said, his voice no more than a sigh on the breeze. “You are cold. Let me warm you.” He draped his arm over her and pulled her close to his body, still warm from their dance of love.

She felt the familiar tickle of his mustache on the back of her neck and it comforted her. Earlier he had asked her if she minded that the thatch of hair on his chest was a grey as the mane of hair on his head. Laughing, she replied that she didn’t care one whit about his grey hair; and in fact, he had the stamina of a man twenty years younger.

Then he proceeded to prove her right.

Now, lying in the afterglow, he pulled the blankets up around her shoulders to ward off the cold. She insisted on keeping the bedroom windows open, rain or shine, and he adjusted to sleeping under down and feathers year round. She needed fresh air around her all the time, she told him; she had spent too much time in smoky cabins in Washington and in smoky bars in San Francisco, and would not now settle for less than the cool coastal air of Monterey in her lungs. He accommodated her gladly, anything to help her wash away the memories of her former life. He loved her more than anything, and the joy she and the girl brought into his autumn years far surpassed anything he could have ever hoped for.

He ran his hand over her ample curves, stopping to tickle her in the well of her waist. She giggled as he continued down over her full hips, pinching her hindquarters.

“Diego,” she murmured, “Haven’t you had enough love for one night?”

He kissed her behind her ear, “Querida, it’s never enough…” Again, he pulled her close to his chest, his arm wrapped protectively around her waist. She took his hand and brought it to her lips for a soft kiss, then placed it back under the rise of her breast, near to her heart. She would walk through fire for this man, her champion, her husband, Diego.

He sighed and soon his even breathing told her he slept. After a time she relaxed against his muscular body and she herself fell into a deep, dreamless, slumber.

The next morning, even under the blankets he was cold to her touch, his soul stolen from him in the night. Her cries did not wake him, not even her hot tears could warm him while dotting the flesh of his weathered face. This could not be happening.

She collapsed into her raven-haired daughter’s arms as they carried him out, “Alone again,” she sobbed, “Alone again.”

2.

There was a time when Jason Bolt thought being alone was a terrible thing to be. Being alone meant no one to swap stories with, no one to laugh with, no one to knock back a few beers with. It was unheard of for him to crave solitude. Raising two younger brothers, taming a mountain, running a logging camp; all of these activities demanded the patience of Job accompanied by the gift of Gab. He never quite mastered the former, but made up for it with his undisputed mastery of the latter.

As the largest employer in town, with only Aaron Stempel and his mill nipping at his heels, Jason had seen Seattle grow from its beginning as a tiny burg pock-marked with mud, to one of the busiest seaports in the Pacific Northwest. Seattle’s timber – Bridal Veil Mountain’s trees, felled by Bolt Brothers Lumbering Company and milled by Stempel’s Mill and Fine Finishing – was known throughout the West and perhaps beyond; and that was the problem, he thought as he eased his large frame into the rocking chair on the porch, a cup of hot coffee warming his hands.

The city, and it was now a city, bustled morning, noon, and night, growing every day. Buckboards, carriages and other miscellaneous horse-drawn vehicles choked the streets, and over 3,000 people now lived in his hamlet home. People packed the hospital, the library, the playhouse; all the new gathering places for the Seattle populace. They even had a steam-driven fire engine to help combat the ever-present danger of fire. It was what he had dreamed of, so many years ago; what his father had dreamed of before him, but when he closed his eyes he could still clearly see only the general store and Lottie’s saloon dotting the landscape.

As wonderful as it was to see Seattle take on a life of its own, the constant clamor of people, animals, and construction finally drove him out of town; to the foot of Bridal Veil mountain. There he built himself a cozy two-room cabin, a retreat, far from the hustle and bustle of the city.

From this vantage point, the only sounds that met his ears were the wind whistling through the trees and the gurgling from the creek that provided him with cold, clear, water. The whistles on the trains of the Seattle-Walla Walla Railroad, 5 years new, wailed softly in the distance. Setting his coffee aside, he stretched his neck and arms – they seemed to ache more often these days – and gazed out at the sun setting behind the trees, throwing off a pink and orange glow to the earth below.

He was alone, yes, but never lonely. He spent enough time in town with his many friends and business associates, chief among them Aaron Stempel, to get all of his conversational needs out of the way. Sunday family dinners at Jeremy and Candy’s house came complete with their two youngsters, plus Josh, his wife Virginia, and their new baby; and the attendant cacophony was music to his ears, only because he knew he could go home and leave it behind.

Jason’s taste for business was as acute now as it was more than twenty-five years ago, when he took over his father’s small logging operation with the intention of making it the largest in the territory; a goal he had achieved, many times over. He was always on the lookout for new contracts to fill, new trees to fell. The need burned inside of him like nothing else he had ever known.

If middle age had not mellowed Jason Bolt, it had certainly not curbed his friendly nemesis Aaron Stempel’s lust for business success either. The two men had formed an alliance that see-sawed from friendship to loathing over the years, never forgetting that each needed the other to accomplish their goals. If anything, Jason thought, Aaron was even more driven to succeed now, perhaps because he had so much more to lose. He knew, even after all of these years, that if Aaron was ever presented with the opportunity to spirit the mountain away from the Bolt Brothers, he would not hesitate to do so.

Yawning, Jason felt the chill in the air and walked back inside his house to the blazing fire. No, being alone was not too bad. He did sometimes wish for the company of a woman, but there were plenty in town to provide that. A casual dinner or walk by the lake, perhaps some time spent in more amorous pursuits; Seattle was full of women who could meet his needs for companionship. But he couldn’t consider a more permanent arrangement, as he was defiantly his own man, and he had never met a woman who could give as good as she got. Well, he had once; but he let her slip away, like the trail of a shooting star, to parts unknown.

Only once in a while did he let his thoughts drift to Charity Hamilton. His wife…or ex-wife, rather. It was so long ago, they were so young, he could hardly remember being that young and carefree. He hadn’t seen her now in almost 18 years. He didn’t know where she was or if she was alive or dead. The last time he saw her she was embarking on a ship out of San Francisco, headed for parts south. She and her girls -- her fellow whores -- had to leave town in a hurry. Jason shook his head at the thought of his beautiful Charity as a ‘fallen woman’, a harlot, a prostitute; selling herself to the highest bidder. A rueful smile came to his lips as he remembered how she had explained to him that it was nothing more than a business, not so unlike his own. Leave it to Charity to find a way to equate prostitution with logging.

She loved him, and he her, but he couldn’t give her what she wanted; a man that put her needs first. Back then all he could fathom were his own needs and the needs of the company that his parents had died trying to build.

He had not been a good husband to her, and was determined to never make that mistake again. So, even though they were long ago divorced, he still considered himself a married man –– and had no desire to change the situation.

She was a pistol alright, Jason thought, sitting on his bed and taking off his boots; she was the only woman he could ever envision as a permanent part of his life. He could still see in his mind’s eye her long chestnut hair and warm brown eyes. Of course, along with her beauty came a temper and a puckish attitude that could drive him around the bend. Never a dull moment though, he thought, the small smile playing at the corners of his mouth again. It wasn’t a mistake of youth – their marriage – as everyone thought; it was his obsession with work that was the mistake.

Climbing into his bed, the cool Seattle air wafting through his window, he glanced at the calendar on his wall. It was June 17th 1882; and he and Charity had been married twenty-five years ago today.

3.

It was a gathering of men. Men in dark suits. Men shuffling papers. Men smoking cigars. Not the sweet smelling Cuban cigars that Diego enjoyed, the aroma of which so permeated his clothes so that even when he wasn’t home, he was always near; rather cheap Mexican cigars brought in by the boatload for the masses. Once again, men would decide her fate. It was not an uncommon occurrence in her life, but repetition made it no less wearisome.

Releasing a small cough to register her displeasure with the acrid odor, Dona Caridad Montoya Reyes entered her late husband’s study. Her face impassive, she studied the four gentlemen that surrounded her. Diego’s three sons stood to her left; Miguel, Roberto and Alejandro, possessors of their father’s facial features but none of his grace. Luis Romero, Diego’s best friend, business associate and executor of his will, sat behind Diego’s desk, shuffling papers. Sunlight struggled to cut through the morning gloom to shine through the large windows, but succeeded in providing only glare that glinted off of Luis’ balding head, accenting the few dark hairs that remained.

Luis rose as she entered the room. “Dona Caridad,” he said, taking her hand and brushing her knuckles with his lips, “I am so sorry for your loss.”

She returned his greeting with a small nod of her head, “Gracias, Luis. We will all miss Don Diego.” Withdrawing her hand, she took a seat in the high-backed and ornately appointed chair, the leather crunching beneath her, as she smoothed her black mourning dress with a flick of her long fingers. She could see Diego’s sons out of the corner of her eye; they were all studying the floor, as if the colorful mosaic tiles held the meaning of life.

She sighed as Luis adjusted his glasses and shook out the papers he held in his hands.

“It’s time we got on with this,” he said in English. His words stabbed her through her heart. “…got on with this”, like it was a burden to see that Diego’s last wishes were carried out. Kind Diego, who could never say no to anyone. He had more generosity of spirit in his little finger than existed in all four of these men put together.

Luis’s droning voice filled her ears, indeed her entire head, with Spanish, a language she had never mastered. However, she was quite confident she knew what he was saying, and what Diego’s will would contain. This was California, after all. Diego’s sons would do the inheriting and she would live off their good graces as the lady of the hacienda. She would continue to have nothing in her own name and Juliet…..well, she was quite sure there would be nothing in that will for her. Diego was a wonderful man, and generous to a fault, but society made the rules. As it always had.

Luis continued to read, little beads of sweat forming on his forehead. Still unable to concentrate on his foreign mumblings, she lost herself in her own thoughts; marveling again at how she, Charity Hamilton of Tucson, Arizona, had become Dona Caridad Montoya Reyes, wife of Don Diego Montoya Reyes, benevolent master of the largest hacienda in Monterey, California. How Diego had plucked her from the parlor house where he found her, and took her to be his wife, scandalizing his sons in the bargain. How he had offered his name and home to her baby daughter.

Married for fifteen years, she was content to have found a man who loved her unconditionally. She could not conceive of not having that love. Not to mention the freedom that being the lady of the rancho had brought her. Now that he was gone, it frustrated her to think that future was again not under her control. Today her life would be determined by the four men in this room, three of whom could not care less about her. This story always ended the same, either she acquiesced to them and their plots and plans, “or else.” “Or else” usually meaning she would have to move on.

“Alejandro, Roberto and Miguel Montoya Reyes….”

Charity abruptly returned to the proceedings as Luis named Diego’s sons, and they finally turned their attention from the floor. For a moment she thought Miguel, the eldest, might be salivating, but supposed it just a figment of her imagination. Now grown men, Diego’s sons never got over the shock of their father marrying a ‘boarder girl’ and disgracing the family; although had they actually looked around, they would have seen the rancho run smoothly under Charity’s hand, and their father never happier. But, spoiled boys that they were, their father’s happiness was no concern of theirs, the fact of which Charity was often made painfully aware.

Her thoughts were interrupted by Miguel and his brothers cheering and slapping each other on the back. Well, she thought, it was done then. Fifteen minutes to reduce a life to a piece of property, to be divided up just so. Without a second look at her, the brothers walked out of the study, leaving her in the chair, looking down at her intertwined fingers.