The Belle of Eerie, Arizona - Chapter 7, Part 1

Posted 04-07-20 

By Christopher Leeson

Chapter 7, Part 1

Tuesday, December 26, 1871 Continued

At that moment, Nancy Osbourne stood and went up to join Reverend Yingling at the podium. The latter withdrew a space and Miss Osbourne was left facing the crowd. She drew a deep breath.

“I remember Myron Caldwell very well,” she said. “When I came to Eerie, he was an eighth grader. In Myron I saw a boy who was often sad and often angry. I wanted to help, but I scarcely knew what to do. I was only seventeen years old, new to my job and adjusting to a new home. I was both unseasoned and disoriented.

“Even so, my instincts should have been better. Like him, my brother and I had lost our parents a very early age. I should have grasped what Myron was feeling. I knew oh so well what it is like to live each day in a daze, trying to hide my grief and endlessly asking myself why fate had used me so unfairly. Fortunately, little by little, my wounds, and Carl’s wounds, too, closed. That healing, which I believe come from the mercy of God, was the very thing that could have eventually rescued Myron.

“Alas, our young neighbor was not granted time enough to attain peace and reconciliation. When we remember Myron, we should not recall the violent last moments of his life, but the good student and the good friend that he could have been, had only fate dealt him fewer blows. Who of us is so sure that he would have performed better than Myron did under the same circumstances? In the comfort of his home, each of us ought to give thanks to our Creator in so far as we have had an easier path to walk than did young Myron Caldwell.

“Today I join my prayers with the reverend’s, asking mercy for our departed neighbor. We hope with all our hearts that moment before He faced eternity, Myron found time enough to repent at the knees of Christ and ask forgiveness. If such a thing happened, his unexpected death would have been the very last of his sorrows.”

Miss Osbourne concluded her eulogy with a nod to the people.

After Nancy stepped down, the minister resumed his position at the podium. Fixing his glance upon Irene, he said, “Dear Mrs. Fanning, as the nearest and dearest to your nephew, have you any words to offer for the boy whose spirit has so regrettably departed from our veil?”

Myra glanced at Irene's profile. Her aunt hadn't said anything about having to speak. What could she possibly say, the girl wondered, that wouldn’t be a damned lie?

Irene Fanning reacted slowly, as if wrestling with the twin bullies of bashfulness and duty. Then, with an expression of sorrow and resolution, she stood up and went forward.

Upon the teacher’s dais, the widow began with these words: “Dear friends and neighbors. I can hardly express my family’s appreciation for the friendship you all extend through your attendance here today. Your support lends us the strength of our brethren and reminds us that we are never alone. In the warmth of your sympathetic society, we are able to feel that we are a part of a greater whole.

“Myron left us a year ago, determined to plot his own course. I worried about him every day while he was away, and prayed every evening that God should show him the way to a better place. A sad event has happened, but who can say that my wish was not granted, or that it will not be granted soon?”

At her desk, Myra couldn’t help but scowl. Better place? Nothing had been rescued from her disaster except rags and ruins that didn’t add up to any kind of life, at least one that she wanted to live.

“Many people believe that death ends all hope for the unsaved,” Irene continued, “but God is a god of life and nothing happens against His will. And His will, we all believe, is to do His utmost to deliver every soul. Our Methodist faith holds that unrepentant sin leads inevitably into an unhappy eternity. But is that necessarily so? Who of us now gathered here can doubt that whatever God wishes to achieve, He can achieve. But He expects us to do our part. The onus upon us is light; we only need to raise our eyes to Him and take His gifts.”

Myra looked around the room. Yingling’s face had tightened with concern and, perhaps, disapproval. Other parishioners, too, seemed doubtful. But not all of them. There might have been some Catholic well-wishers amongst the crowd, and these would have had no reason to disparage Mrs. Fanning’s optimism. In fact, her words endorsed one of their deeply-held doctrines. But Myra realized that her aunt wasn't challenging the Methodist faith, nor was she endorsing the beliefs of another denomination. She was confessing a secret, maybe because she so disliked telling lies.

“I believe in my heart,” Mrs. Fanning continued, “that the spirit of Myron is still very near. I feel his presence every day. I believe that, by God’s Mercy, Myron's ultimate fate is not yet set in stone. I retain fond hope and I wish, with all my might, that he can accept God’s grace even from the place where he is now and that his repentance shall open the door to another world.”

Myra cringed, hoping that no one around her was smart enough to understand what was really being said.

Mrs. Fanning was not finished yet. “I had no children of my own, but even without parenting skills I came to Eerie with only one purpose in mind -- to help a child who had been left all alone. I nonetheless felt unready. At nineteen I had been widowed, and my loss had come even before I could stop thinking of myself as a new bride.

“In trying to give comfort, I depended very heavily on prayer. Oftentimes, I confessed to our Creator, ‘I cannot do this by myself, Lord; I need your guidance.’ I suppose that I was asking for a miracle because I felt so inadequate for carrying out my responsibilities.

“Friends and parishioners, is it really necessary for us to believe that any soul is irrecoverably lost at any particular moment? I think that God must see the days of our lives differently from we are able to do. We must not lose hope, even in what seems to be our darkest moments. We should continue to let our prayers fly freely to Heaven. Unforeseen things happen; a lamb may be lost, but a lamb can also be found. It is the very best of shepherds who will leave a hundred sheep in the pen and go out, even into the storm, to find the one lamb that has strayed. Prayer is how we plead for our shepherd to reclaim us. Prayer is very powerful and prayers are often answered.”

After a brief pause, she said, “Thank you.” Then, solemnly, Mrs. Fanning stepped out from behind the podium.

Myra, as if feeling eyes on the back of her neck, looked over her shoulder. In the thick of the Severin family sat George, looking at her intently, but with an indecipherable expression.

#

Thursday, December 28, 1871

At home, two days following, Aunt Irene suddenly told her niece, “It's time that I took some milk and eggs to our customers in town. Would you like to come and do some shopping?”

“No thanks,” the girl had replied. “I've been in town on Saturday, Sunday, and Tuesday already.”

“But we weren’t able to shop then.”

“I can’t think of anything I need. Anyhow, I still don't have any money. And it’ld be nice to get back to reading Mark Twain.”

“If you say so, but I have a few things that I could usefully pick up. Come, help me load the milk.”

The milk cans were kept in the cold-cellar, which was accessible through a pair of sloping storm doors. The dugout, located under the house, kept perishables cool in warm weather. Also, it reduced the chance of freezing during winter’s frosts. As a team, they carried each can individually to the buckboard. That being complete, Aunt Irene dressed for town and subsequently set out down Riley Canyon Road.

Myra watched her keeper grow small and distant before setting to work searching the house. While doing so, she tried to not make it look like thieves had rummaged the place. The first places she searched were the most accessible locations. When these didn't yield anything, the girl climbed into the loft and rummaged amid the tangled piles of storage. While she explored, Myra was thinking about what should be her next step in the event of finding nothing. Her best bet, it seemed, would be to confronting her aunt directly concerning the lost days of the past. Obviously, though, that course might end badly for her.

Every trunk, box, and bag that could possibly hide a bundle of letters seemed worth examining. The light was dim in the tightest crawl spaces and she had to move her candle repeatedly from one spot to another. The first letters that she found were unimportant ones going back to Civil War days. In general, it appeared that not many people had been writing to Irene over the past five years. She seemed to have lost all connection with Pennsylvania and New Jersey after she had gone West -- except for a few very reserved cards sent by Uncle Amos’ wife Claudella and her daughter Abigail.

Turning up a letter pack dated from 1866, Myra reacted as if she had found treasure. Down on the kitchen floor, standing by the window, she read each return address quickly. The girl espied one sent by from Irene herself, dated from late July! She eagerly unfolded the single page it contained and read it carefully.

“Dearest Sister,

“This is the worst possible news I could ever have imagined. I can’t stop thinking about that poor man who died so terribly! How could Christian people become involved in a mine robbery? It sounds beyond belief. And what about the neighbor whom you say helped you? Tragedy upon tragedy. Since reading your words has been like hearing the words of an angel. He is saying 'For what shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?'

“Your letter thankfully lends me at least one small morsel of comfort. Your moral senses seem to be intact, though you claim to have done incomprehensible things. I will be brief, because you clearly grasp everything that I could possibly offer as advice. Here I sit, at a loss as to what to say. I want to help you and your family get through what will certainly be a time of anguish. I want to come to Arizona, if you will only permit it. The whole family must take council. Much must be done, but, truly, we dare not act in haste. A great deal may be lost should we act in any ill-considered way. Whatever course we choose to follow, it must directed toward doing the most good and the least harm.

“Please do not argue against my coming. My place is with those whom I most love. My present town and my little rented room holds nothing for me except sad memories.

“Write back immediately, dearest, and afford me the hope, if possible, that you have spoken in exaggeration. I will pray that things are not really so black as they now appear. I will keep praying for your welfare until the very moment that we are reunited.”

With all my love,

Your sister Irene.

#

Myra sat back in her chair, her face yellowed by the light of the kerosene flame. 'They were thieves,' the girl whispered to herself. In fact, Irene’s letter made it sound like they had killed a man. And one of their neighbors had somehow helped them to carry out the crime!

Thoughts buzzed around her mind like large bottle flies. The mention of a mine robbery told everything she needed to know. It all fit in with what Sheriff Talbot had said about the clerk who had robbed his employer and then ridden away. Had he gone to her own parent's farm? Why? Had they all been in on the plot together? Were her folks so greedy that they had murdered their confederate the very moment that he had shown up with the loot? Was there an unmarked grave somewhere on the family property? And what had become of the stolen gold? Had it all been spent before the her parents’ death, or was some of it still hidden close by?

That was it! Matt Grimsley, she now recalled, had kept nagging Irene about selling him the farm, almost from the first day that she had arrived. “You'll sink every penny you have into this place and you won't be able to make things work,” he’d said. “You don't know beans about operating a farm, Missy, and you’ll be needing more help on this land than just a boy.” Irene, Myra remembered, repeatedly had to tell the neighbor that it wasn't up to her to sell out, that the farm belonged to Myron. She’s insisted that whatever happened to his family legacy had to be left to him, but he was still too young make such a faithful decision.

It was now starkly clear as to why Grimsley had poked around the edges of the property so often. He probably had clues about where the gold might be buried.

Myra flared with hot anger. She felt like going out and shooting the schemer dead. But, a moment later, she remembered that it was cholera that had killed her folks, not Grimsley. He was selfish and greedy, yes, but so was everybody else. Worse, this particular person, bad as he was, was Kayley's father. Nothing that happened had been the kids’ fault; they almost certainly didn’t know that their pa had done something wrong. Maybe even his own wife didn't know.

Besides, even if Myra had a gun pointed at his very heart, she wouldn’t have been able to pull the trigger. That damned magic spell wouldn’t have let her.

The girl sat were she was for a while, unsettled, confused. It wasn't that Myra thought that stealing was so bad. She had herself tried to live by the grab. But never in her wildest imaginings had she ever supposed that her own parents were capable of sinking so low. The lessons that they had tried to teach to Myron were just the opposite.

Myra could hardly put her mind around the fact that her parents weren’t good people. They had, in fact, been just like her. Knowing the truth about them was like being stabbed with a Bowie knife.

Feeling weak and sick, Myra rested her head upon her arms and wept.

#

Eventually, Aunt Irene came back. Her tired manner changed abruptly when she saw the expression on Myra’s face.

“What's that funny look you have?” Mrs. Fanning asked.

“I know about it,” Myra said, her voice hardly better than a small rasp.

Irene blinked. “About what?”

“Tell me, and don’t lie. Did my folks kill a man and take his gold?”

“Who told you such a thing?!” the farm woman exclaimed.

“You did. I read the last letter you wrote to my mother.”

Irene felt like a sawed tree trunk ready to fall. “Myra! You shouldn't have done that! Why did you want to dig through those old letters?”

The girl had turned away and was staring off toward the hearth fire. “I was trying to find a reason to think that things weren’t as bad as they seemed to be.”

For a moment, neither of the kinswomen spoke. Myra broke the silence. “You should have told me about it all!”

Irene shook her head. “What good could that have done? Would it have made a grieving boy feel any better? Would it have made him any less angry? Would knowing about something so awful prevent him from running away? Remembering your parents with love and respect made you a better person. I didn’t want to take that away from you. It seemed to be my duty to carry the burden alone, so that you wouldn’t have to carry it, too.”

“I loved them!” the girl shouted.

“Yes, and that love was good and right. It’s your love that will help you remember the very best about your folks and, in time, it will help you to forgive them. I've been trying to do that for the last five years.”

“Did they really commit murder?” the seventeen year old asked tremulously.

Her aunt grimaced. “It was a complex tragedy. I read your mother’s letter only once. I never wanted to read it again. I don't remember all the details of her confession, but I'm sure that she felt that she and your father were responsible for his death.”

“I have to know what they did. I’ll lose my wits not knowing.”

“I understand. You’re hoping that there is something that will make things seem a little less dark. Maybe there is.” Irene took a deep breath. “I still have your mother’s last letter. But are you sure that reading it won’t cause your heart to break?”

“I can’t feel worse. I have to make sense of this.”

Irene was silent for a moment and then, without words, she took the lantern from the table and ascended into the loft. Myra stayed by the table, watching. The moving lamplight could hardly be seen behind the clutter. Then were rummaging sounds.

Only a few minutes later, Irene came down from above. She had left the kerosene lantern hanging from the small iron hook above the ladder, freeing one of her hands to carry a wooden box. She placed this mysterious object on the floor and then went back up to retrieve the lamp. Myra sat staring at the box as if it were the cage of a deadly viper. When Irene returned, she placed both the lantern and the small box on the kitchen table, side by side.

TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 7, Part 2