“I couldn’t get on there, they always have a full crew. Men stay on and on there, when they’re lucky to get hired.”
“Why not take a chance? What can you lose? We’ll skimp more with money until you get something else. Don’t worry, we’re young and everything will work out for us.” I was so confident.
My beloved husband always listened to what I had to say and we always worked things out together. He was always right when it came to the final decisions. I had hoped my cheerful attitude toward the news he brought would lend encouragement, but he returned to his office with a heavy heart. Our first problem had arisen after only three months.
Late in the afternoon he went to the Tomboy office and asked to speak with Mr. Herron, the manager.
“He’s up on the pipe line but will be here later on,” Alex told him.
George came home, had a hurried dinner, and returned to the Tomboy office. There he met Mr. David Herron, known as a kind, loyal, and considerate gentleman, esteemed by both his friends and his employees.
George stated his problem and asked for work. “Yes, George,” Mr. Herron answered. “I’ll have a job for you whenever your work at the Japan Flora terminates.”
A changed husband returned to me … full of joy and happiness. He completed his assay work, closed the records, and lost not a single day in transferring to the Tomboy Mine, the richest gold mine in Savage Basin.
CHAPTER 5
Baby Billy Batcheller was losing weight. His beautiful brown eyes were dull and lifeless. Jim had rigged a pulley to raise the bassinet into the center of the room and there Billy lay halfway to the ceiling out of the drafts that blew frigidly through Castle Sky High. Dr. Hadley had prescribed fresh milk for him and by special permission it was brought up on the pack train. Anxiety and the troubled days and nights were beginning to show on Beth.
I was greatly concerned about the baby and every morning I went across the trail to help her, although the slightest exertion or attempt to hurry made my heart work faster.
On some mornings I did Beth’s housework while she hovered over little Billy. On other days I watched him, always alert to note any change. He was never a moment unwatched or alone. But he did not improve and lay in a stupor. Beth tried canned milk. Finally, after two days of a special mixture, he showed the first signs of improvement. The bond of friendship between Beth and me grew stronger as happily we watched Billy improve. During these days the walk across the trail and helping Beth were all the extra exertion of which I was capable. I felt listless.
“Oh, it’s the altitude,” Beth said. “I felt the same way when we first arrived.” True, at sea level the air pressure is 14.7 pounds to the square inch, or 30 inches of mercury. We lived at an elevation at which the air pressure was only 9.5 pounds or 19.4 inches of mercury, and the low pressure kept one’s lungs working much faster to obtain the necessary amount of life-giving oxygen.
Yet the continued fast beat of my heart was annoying and the feeling in my chest was difficult to describe. It felt burning, yet icy cold. I had to slow down my walking pace. And my cold feet! Nothing helped until I saw a picture in a mail order catalogue, the standby of everyone in the Basin, of felt shoes which I sent for immediately. They fitted inside my arctics and were comfortable and warm. My foot problem was solved. But I had another one as troublesome.
Occupants had to tunnel out after heavy snowfalls.
Due to the thin, cold, dry air my lower lip split down the middle. It was painful and bled profusely, especially during extreme cold weather. I tried every known remedy except one which old-timers assured me was the only cure. Ear wax! I couldn’t bring myself to use it. So long as we lived up there my lip never healed and to this day a lump of thickened skin remains where the crack was.
Thirty years after we left our home in the clouds, I had occasion to be examined by a physician dwelling at an elevation of only 1,700 feet. He did not know where I had lived.
“You are in perfect condition,” he assured me, “but you have an astonishing high count of red blood corpuscles. Astonishing,” he repeated, “but nothing to worry about.”
“What would cause that?” I asked him.
“It’s hard to say, but sometimes living in very high altitudes will build up such a condition.”
I soon overcame the discomfort of cold feet and high altitude, but bread making was the bane of my existence.
“It’s very easy,” said Mrs. Matson. “There are nine of us and I have no trouble keeping enough bread on hand.”
“It’s simple,” said Beth. Kate Botkin agreed. Attractive Mrs. Driscoll, wife of the chief steward of the boardinghouse, added, “Oh my, yes. It’s nothing at all to make bread, and my four children keep me busy at it.”
Surely I could make bread if I followed their instructions. Patiently, carefully and often they described the different steps: soaking cakes of compressed yeast in potato water, determining the proper temperature at which it must be kept, and on mixing day, adding the proper amount of fresh potato water, flour, lard, sugar, and salt. Each one had her own method of mixing but all were happy with the results.
“Thanks, I understand now. I’ll get it this time,” I replied every time.
But usually when baking day arrived, no bubbles greeted my gaze. The yeast would be dead and I would hurry to borrow a new starter, a mixture of yeast and potato water kept constantly on hand, alive but not active. All my attempts failed and my generous friends supplied the bread for George’s lunch basket. I sent for a bread-making machine—a bucket equipped with a hand-cranked mixer to knead the dough. Surely this would end my troubles.
Confidently I mixed a batch in the new machine and went to bed. Next morning when I lifted the cover from the bucket the dough was no higher than it was the night before. There was no use baking it and I wept as I threw away more flour, lard, sugar, salt, and yeast. But on the next attempt I was delighted to find the dough near the top of the bucket. I molded it in loaves, let them stand the required time, and baked them. The bread came out golden brown, tempting, the wonderful aroma of freshly baked bread throughout the house. I couldn’t resist cutting a warm slice for myself. What a disappointment! I almost cried. The loaf was nothing but a mass of holes with a webbing of dough, resembling genuine Swiss cheese. How would George ever eat the stuff, I wondered. One answer, he had to for there was no other bread for him.
I was one bride who couldn’t boil an egg. Only after repeated trials were our frozen eggs boiled long enough to be palatable. It was hard for me to realize that water boiled at only 190 degrees and to determine the additional time required to boil an egg.
Salad dressing was another Waterloo. If it were a degree too cold the oil would not mix with the egg. Many messy mixtures of eggs, oil and vinegar were wasted, and I did so love mayonnaise!
At home in California I had made delicious cakes and decided to use one of my mother’s recipes. I mixed the batter with great care and put it in the oven for the required time to bake. The result—it remained battery!
I tried a pot roast and we eagerly anticipated dinner. It was browning beautifully and a savory odor came from the pot. George loved meat, and with his strenuous work, required much of it. But alas! No knife we possessed would cut that roast.
One day I said, “All miners eat beans. Do you like beans, George?”
“Yes, of course,” he answered, always amiable about my experiments and probably hopeful of a triumph. So for two whole days I boiled beans. They neither swelled nor softened but remained as hard as marbles.
Most of my days were spent perusing the Rocky Mountain Cookbook, mixing recipes, washing dishes, in a desperate endeavor to set before my husband appetizing meals from our limited larder. I learned to cook the