Part 6 (1/2)
The Sheldon Jackson School wasn't hard to find, the only octagonal building made of concrete in Sitka, or Alaska, or possibly North America. In the foyer there was a chalkboard with names and room numbers.
Halfway around the octagon I found the door to Benjamin Bower's office open. He was a large florid man with a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. He was jacketless, wearing a plaid weskit with a heavy golden watch chain. Busy watering flowers at the window, he made a startled little jump when I tapped on the door.
”Reverend Bower?”
”Come in, come in.” He turned his attention back to the watering. ”Fast work. Commendable.”
”Pardon me?”
”You're the first. The notice only went out yesterday noon.” He looked up. ”Youare a teacher.”
”In fact, I am. But I'm not here about a notice.”
”Ah. Hum.” He set down the watering can and looked over my shoulder, lost in thought for a moment.
”Have a seat, please, Miss, Mrs....”
I smelled a job but made a quick decision. ”Flammarion-Rosa Flammarion.”
”Ah. Very good.” He eased himself down into a chair and pulled it up to his desk, wheels squeaking.
”And what can I do for a Southern lady this far north?” For some men I use a little more Georgia than for others.
”I've just come from Fort Wrangell.” I took the envelope out of my purse. ”Grace Loden asked me to bring this to you.”
He sighed. ”Let me show you a demonstration of mentalism, Mrs. Flammarion.” He touched the corner of the envelope to his temple and squeezed his eyes shut. ”She needs money.”
”Not so much money as books and supplies,” I said. ”She's in a really bad way. Old books, anything.”
He nodded and slowly slit the letter with a jade opener. He kept nodding as he read it. ”Old textbooks might be possible. There's little money. You don't have religious contract schools down south, do you?”
”I taught in Kansas. We once had them-I taught in a secular school, but gave religious instructions to the Indians in an old Presbyterian one-room schoolhouse.”
He raised an eyebrow at that. ”We used to be a Presbyterian contract school. We could count on about forty, even sixty percent of our expenses to be covered by the church-until a couple of years ago.”
I'd heard something of that. ”The government?”
”That's right. They closed down the system, on const.i.tutional grounds, supposedly-andsupposedly the federal government would make up the loss. But we're not a state. So we're the small pig at the trough, if you'll excuse a barnyard metaphor.” He rolled his chair to a low bookshelf under the window and selected the last in a series of worn ledgers. He rolled back, his nimbleness almost comical, set the ledger next to Grace's letter, and nipped through it.
”I think-here.” He put his finger on an entry. ”Ican help her on the McGuffey readers. We got fifty new ones back in April; the old ones would be in the library back room. Ill have them boxed up. You're on the steamer that had the... unfortunate accident?”
”Yes, theWhite Nights.”
He nodded and put his gla.s.ses back in their case with a snap. ”It will call at Fort Wrangell on the way back. Miss Loden will have her books. And I can find her some composition books and pencils. Could you make sure that they get to her?”
”I won't be aboard. We're getting off at Skagway.”
”Skagway?” He tilted his head at me. ”You're not going prospecting.”
”No; my son is, and a couple of friends. I want to see them off safely.”
”See to your own safety, too. It's a coa.r.s.e and dangerous place.”
”I know. Miss Loden told me to watch out for Soapy Smith and his gang.”
He laughed. ”Unless I've misread your character, I don't think you'll ever see Soapy Smith. He's in a much hotter place than Alaska now.”
I was a little slow. ”Hotter?”
”Mr. Smith died in a gunfight last week. There was some sort of a town meeting about him, on the wharf, to which he wasn't invited. When he tried to force his way in, a guard shot him. He killed the guard as well, as his dying act.”
”G.o.d rest their souls.”
He pursed his lips and nodded. ”Skagway should be noticeably calmer when you and your boy get there.
What then? Back to Kansas?”
”No. I've had enough of that.I thought I'd try my luck in Seattle or San Francisco.”
”Teaching what grades?”
”I did nine through twelve in Kansas.”
”There's a job here, tailor made for you, teaching and missionary work. Not much compet.i.tion.”
”I don't know that I could-”
”You'd be close to your son, Mrs. Flammarion. And to us you'd be a G.o.dsend.” He shrugged and smiled.
”G.o.d's will, perhaps.”
I tried to read his character as he had mine. ”Mr. Bower, may I entrust you with a secret?”
He smiled. ”If it doesn't involve a hanging offense.”
”I left a bad marriage. I can't go back to Kansas because he found me there.”
”You don't believe in divorce?”
”No I do not.”
”Let me hazard a guess: you are not actually related to a French astronomer and novelist.”
”That's correct. I can't use my real name; that's how he found me, after four years. My son tried to join the army.”
He rubbed his beard and stared at the desktop for a long moment. ”You don't want to talk about why you left him.”
”No. Except to a.s.sure you that it was the only course. For my only child's safety.”
”I do believe you.” He closed the ledger quietly. ”You know... Alaska has a fairly difficult examination for teachers. One's performance on that means more than, say, academic records. You've been to college.”