How the Stars did Fall Read online

  From the pulpit, the Good Man leafed through the tome, his fingers strangely curved, his back hunched. Finding a passage, he read it aloud, the words not in English but in Latin. When he finished, the crowd clapped and cheered. Then twelve young boys issued from the chapel bearing huge chalices filled with wine and they passed into the crowd and offered a sip of the wine to everyone present. And while the men and women took their sips, the Good Man spoke again, this time in English.

  “Brothers, sisters: even as we come together here, the landed and the wealthy break their fasts quietly in their spacious fields and mansions to the north and the east. They drink of the wine you press, they eat the bread you bake, they take your rightful slaves and breed with them and take the spawn of that union and smash it against rocks. Yes, they use the blood of Negro babies to decorate their halls, and above all they savor the gold you dig out from the ground and spit on it to make sure it is real. Oh, and they grin a wide devil grin of satisfaction, because they relish in the lie that was the Gold Rush. There were no fortunes to be made here. Before you even arrived, the fortunes were theirs already. They tricked you so you could come and work for pennies and live in squalor. Not slaves, but worse. A slave receives three hot meals a day. A slave has a bed to sleep on and a roof over his head. You they give a meager salary and call it a day. ‘Let them fend for themselves,’ they say.”

  The Good Man paused as one of the boys gave him a cup filled with the same wine the congregants had tasted. After drinking from it he continued: “But those days are gone. Miners now sit on the council of this great city. Farmers hold court as judges, and grocers as prosecutors, and every simple man now holds within him everything needed to govern. Even so, we are not yet free. Enemies surround us. Men of ill intent, their paths and ours destined to cross at some point ahead. Their game is war and we will joust with them if we must. But do not be afraid, for there is no force stronger than the will of the common man fighting for his family and his countrymen.” Now the Good Man paused a second time while other attendants brought a bald man, tied up and hooded, up the platform. The Good Man himself removed the hood, revealing the mayor’s face to all those assembled.

  “Here is the face of our enemy,” the Good Man said.

  One of the attendants took a noose and put the mayor’s head through it while another attendant secured the other end of the rope. The sound of the mayor’s neck breaking was like a stone falling a great height and splitting into a thousand pieces and it ignited a wave of euphoria which gripped the congregants immediately. Few understood why but all expressed their feelings one way or another—some by cheering, others by clapping, and some standing in silence, tears streaming involuntarily from their eyes. Daniel himself felt an exhilaration travel up and down his spine and goose bumps on his arms. And this exhilaration brought with it a tremendous clarity and he saw for the first time just how much danger Molly was in. He thought about killing her to protect himself for a brief moment and then felt ashamed at the notion. Instead, he decided he had to go help her escape right then.

  Chapter Six

  Two nights Tennyson remained in Lakeview, renting a bed in the town’s inn and conversing with the locals, trying to find someone amenable to his offer and with enough influence to persuade others. A single thread he could pull and pull until the whole fabric lay unraveled in front of him. Faraday did not sleep in the town. Tennyson had instructed him to remain outside the city limits, coming in only to buy food and other supplies as needed. The doctor had given him a modest sum and Faraday had used it to buy ammunition for his revolver and a few other essentials.

  On the third day, Faraday rode up to the town and into one of the saloons and ordered himself a shot of whiskey. After he had downed the shot he walked out to the opposite side of the town, where graves had been dug up and engraved headstones set down, and there he found Tennyson standing over the dead. Faraday stood next to the doctor and listened without speaking or even looking at the man.

  “Tomorrow at eight in the morning, on the wharf.”

  The message given, Faraday turned and rode back out to his camp.

  Come morning, he traveled out to the wharf, where Tennyson had managed to convince nearly twenty people, men, mostly, but a few women, to listen to what he had to say.

  “Let’s all huddle in close now,” Tennyson said to the gathered crowd. “My name is Dr. Henry Tennyson. Some of you are familiar with me and others not yet, but suffice it to say that I am a learned man and a businessman. I am a man of means and I do not travel often. However, not long ago in my residence in the territory of Oregon, I made a discovery. A grand discovery of enormous implications for the future of this country and the people upon it. And after I had tested this discovery I was consumed by a single consideration. With whom will I share this great secret? And the more I thought about it, the more I knew my discovery was no accident. That God himself had gifted me this knowledge from on high and that it was thereby my sworn duty to share it not with the wealthy and powerful, but with simple and hardworking Americans who by some accident of fate never found their fortune in the streams or in the mines and settled upon this land, carving out modest incomes for themselves all the while eating and drinking and being merry. For the good book says those who would be faithful with little will be faithful with plenty. So I searched for a community of such citizens and when I heard that Lakeview was just such a community, I felt obliged to come down and speak to you good folks. I believe that your hardy kind are the very salt of the earth. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that were it not for men and women like yourselves California would still be another dreary Mexican outpost.”

  Then Tennyson revealed the machine and held it up for all to see.

  “You see, folks, there’s something no one’s ever told you and lots of people have taken great pains to keep from you. Namely, that water, the water we drink and bathe in, is full of gold. More than any vein or inland stream. An endless amount. And I have concocted this device to extract it.”

  Some in the crowd guffawed at the notion and others gasped, but all were intrigued and they listened with rapt attention.

  “How exactly do you propose to do such a thing?” one of the townspeople asked.

  “The exact method is a secret. And I must keep it so; otherwise it will be of no use to us. Now I understand skepticism. If you don’t believe me, then you’re a normal human being. You ought not believe me. At least, not until I give you proof. So as I discussed with the good Mr. Downing here, I will place this machine into the water at the end of the wharf and leave it there overnight. Tomorrow we will pull it up and take an account of what has accumulated within.”

  “That’s absurd,” one of the crowd said. “These men are lying.”

  “Settle down, now,” said Mr. Downing. “We will see tomorrow who is lying.”

  “Thank you. You all shall see. I’m not lying. And every man who comes out tomorrow will be given an opportunity to be an investor in my venture.”

  Tennyson took the machine and walked the full length of the wharf. Putting a rope through a loop that had been carved into the wood, he then tied the rope to the wharf and let the machine drop into the water. It sank until the rope became taut and then it hung there suspended in the liquid like some alchemical anchor, the hope of an entire town heavy upon it. And Faraday thought about how dangerous this work actually was, more than Tennyson appeared to believe it to be— there was no shortage of men in that country who would risk their lives to take such a machine for themselves. Even now Faraday scanned those assembled, measuring each face, looking for tells. None of them had the bearing of a criminal but there was no telling what desperation could bring out of a man. And some of them looked desperate indeed.

  Faraday retired to his camp and spent his time in silent meditation, waiting for his moment to arrive. It came a few hours past midnight, when Tennyson appeared, dragging behind him a chest. Inside it was the diving suit he used to insert the gold mixture into the fake machin
e. Faraday put it on and listened while Tennyson instructed him in its use. Satisfied with his lecture, the doctor brought out a nugget of gold from his coat pocket and gave it to Faraday.

  “I’ll be watching out for you from afar. Give me enough time to get back to the town, then carry the chest over to the lake, put the suit on and dive in. Find the rope and pull the machine up, then take that gold and replace the mercury with it. I left a lit torch at the end of the wharf to give you some light. You ready?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

  Faraday waited the amount of time he thought the doctor needed to get back to town, then he set out and did the work and in less than one hour he was back at his camp. His heart was racing at the thought of being discovered and he could not sleep even after making himself a meal of dry bread and jerky. His little fire had all but burned out by the time the sun came up kingly and golden in the east. He did not return to Lakeview. Instead he slept through the day, his exhilaration finally wearing off, until Tennyson arrived like a portly Midas on his horse, bringing with him a purse filled with gold. He threw it at Faraday from atop his horse.

  “Your share,” he said.

  “How much?” Faraday asked.

  “Sixteen hundred.” Then Tennyson produced from his pocket a jumble of papers and chucked it into the air, laughing. The many worthless pages of parchment signed by the townsmen of Lakeview.

  “Are you mad? What if someone comes out here and finds these?” Faraday said.

  “Let them find it. By then we’ll be far out of their reach.”

  But Faraday was not satisfied and picked up the papers and shredded them with his hands into tiny, unintelligible fragments. Then they rode out together, Tennyson already on about another town he knew they could work.

  The doctor said he knew a simple man in a seaside town called Julian. And the pair rode on to this town and repeated in Julian what they had done in Lakeview. But this time the bounty was smaller, for the Argonauts there were poor men whose efforts yielded little results. Tennyson asked for half of what he had asked previously as an investment, and the Argonauts gave it up eagerly, dreaming of an end to their labors.

  With their gold purses growing heavy, Faraday and Tennyson returned to the road, taking it north towards Sacramento. At one point, the road curved, and Faraday took a look back at the path they had taken and thought he saw a single dark figure against the horizon.

  “There’s someone following us, I think,” he said.

  “Aye. I caught sight of someone back when we left Lakeview. Must be the same rider.” Then he added: “How do you feel about us sleeping in a real bed tonight? I know a place not far from here where we could find some real comfort.”

  “Lead on.”

  So they veered east and came upon a valley with two snow-peaked mountains on either side like great old guardians and they kept on until the vegetation grew sparser and the beauty of the valley faded. Slowly the green turned to brown as the desert encroached around them. And amidst that stark dryness, Tennyson found a path leading back up one of the mountains. Taking this road, they looked up and found hidden by the rocky expanse an ornate manor, in every way foreign to that rugged landscape, jutting out like some cancerous growth. They reached the manor in the evening with the sky gray and the sun dying out and they entered, Tennyson leading the way. He had been there before.

  They entered into an anteroom, where they were greeted by a woman in a long, embroidered dress. The place was clean but it held an earthy scent of old wood and even older land, as if they had stepped onto ground long ago consecrated to some forgotten subterranean deity. The mistress of the house offered them a seat on one of the plush velvet couches that adhered to the walls of the anteroom. The single window was small and an opaque curtain covered it such that the only thing allowing them to see much of anything at all was a candelabra burning on the counter. The mistress asked Tennyson how he was and why he’d taken so long to come back and once their small talk came to an end she drew herself up and gave a half curtsy.

  “What is it you gentlemen require?” she asked.

  “Two rooms,” Tennyson answered.

  “Twenty dollars apiece.”

  Faraday’s eyebrows rose at the price, but Tennyson placed his hand on his shoulder, reassuring him.

  “Still an inclusive figure, yes?”

  “Of course. Whiskey. Women. Laudanum. Whatever it is you gentlemen desire.”

  Tennyson produced from his coat a pouch with some of the gold they had acquired and handed it to the mistress. She walked over to a counter and spilled the gold coins out, setting them one on top of the other like some new Tower of Babel in miniature, the edifice teetering under the candlelight. While the mistress weighed the gold, she whispered a song to herself in a Slavic tongue to the rhythm of the music emanating from the halls of the manor.

  “Pape satan, pape satan aleppe,” she began.

  The mistress opened wide the doors, the music gusting out. A mischievous tune and to it danced a host of whores fair and foul, some as young as fourteen. A few hoary widows and one pregnant, her bulbous protrusion heavy with the burden of life, and a babe sitting on the floor playing with a wooden horse and women of seemingly every extant tribe, the full palette of skin colors on display, and one walleyed androgyne naked in the center of the hall, dancing and dancing. Some of the women sat on the laps of men and some danced in a circle, each following the other, a procession of wanton desire, and at the center of all their striving a master of music performed, his tunes flowing outward like a gentle breeze so sweet it rendered that whole country and all of the warring bands upon it as mere emblems of a world too absurd to actually be.

  Tennyson and Faraday took a seat and the mistress brought them a tray bearing a bottle of whiskey, unopened, and two glasses. And while they poured themselves some whiskey, the music ceased. The musician, bearded and wearing a long yellow cloak and a bright blue vest, handed off his instrument to another and took his bow and all of the patrons clapped for him. He sat next to Faraday. With no signal from him, the mistress brought the musician his own tray. This one held an already-lit opium lamp and a pipe and a bowl and some opium paste laid out on a plate like a garnish. The mistress took up a portion of the paste with a needle and held it above the lamp for a while, the heat slowly cooking the pea-sized mass. Then she placed that portion in the bowl and the musician, as if taking this as his cue, took the pipe and set it across the flame and inhaled the vapors coming up from the bowl.

  This whole scene left Faraday transfixed, for he had never seen anyone partake in that manner, but while he stared at the musician and his gaudy dress, a woman sat next to him and took his hands in her own. Not wanting to offend, Faraday did not break her grasp. And when the whore asked if he wanted to dance, in a heavy Russian accent, he only smiled and did not answer.

  “Be careful with that one,” the goateed musician said to Faraday. “Her grandfather was a gypsy of some importance and the souls of the gypsies do not transmigrate into the afterlife but hang around their descendants, guarding them.” After saying that, the musician took another deep draw of the opium vapor and paused as if thinking about some profound fact that had suddenly occurred to him. Then his head fell back and he let out a roar of a laugh.

  Faraday took up the whore’s offer and the two of them danced together to the now-diminished tune, and they drank together and as they circled the room they let go and each found another partner and danced some more, until the circle completed itself and Faraday and the whore found themselves in the crowd and joined together again. By now night had set in and the many candelabra and chandeliers that illuminated the hall burned ever brighter, and when the dancers passed by the flames, their shadows drew upon them, climbing the walls like escaping phantoms. Finally the whore whispered in Faraday’s ear, calling him to her room, and the couple left together, climbing a narrow staircase and into a hallway lined with more candelabra and macabre paintings of three-headed dogs and men in white r
obes standing in an ancient courtyard, their unfurled scrolls bearing the number nought nought one, and one painting of a solitary Indian with long hair and a colored face playing the quena.

  Inside her room, the woman sat on the bed. Faraday found a bowl filled with water and wet his face. Then he undressed himself and sat in front of the whore. She did not move. Did not speak. Faraday initiated contact but the woman did not respond to his touch. He thought he ought to be more direct so he told her what he wanted her to do to him.

  “You want me to do what?” she asked. And she laughed at the nakedness in front of her. “You know you will die, soon? He has his eye on you. There is no way to hide.” she said. Her voice sounded the same but the way she said it was strange and masculine.

  Startled, Faraday answered as if addressing not the woman but some other being which had just entered their circle. “I’ve been through bad and worse already. Nothing ahead I can’t deal with.”

  The woman stared back, her face blank. Then she began to sob and mumble something incoherent in her mother tongue, and she dropped her eyes and when she lifted them again and beheld Faraday the sobbing turned to wailing. A dreadful, high-pitched wailing. Faraday tried to console her.

  “What’s wrong?” he said.

  But either she did not understand or could not express whatever assailed her. Soon the mistress found them and helped the woman off the bed and into the kitchen for a drink of water.

  “What did you do?” the mistress asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Go back. I will help her.”

  Returning to the main hall, Faraday saw that Tennyson and the musician had begun a conversation. They sat next to each other, the gaunt musician with his cavernous face and the portly doctor. The figure of one exaggerating that of the other.