Free Homecoming Girls by Val Wood

he asked to be remembered to you. He’s heard of all your achievements through Uncle Wilhelm.’
    Ted pursed his lips. ‘Has he? The world is not so large after all, then.’
    He sat down with them and asked about their journey on the ship and the train.
    ‘The railroad is getting closer to Dreumel,’ he said. ‘Another couple o’ years and it’ll be here. Not into the valley,’ he added. ‘I’ve seen the plans and they’re going to build a station out on the plain, where I dare say another town’ll spring up. I’ve staked a claim already,’ he said shrewdly. ‘It’ll be a good investment for Robert and Caitlin.’
    ‘Have you, Da? Really?’ Caitlin was astonished. ‘What’ll we do with it?’
    ‘Sell it,’ he said. ‘Or build another hotel.’ He turned to Jewel. ‘So if you wait another ten or more years before coming back you might find another town. What name will it have, I wonder?’
    ‘I might not wait so long,’Jewel said thoughtfully. ‘It depends on what I find out on this journey.’
    He looked at her curiously. ‘Find out?’ he said. ‘Are you looking for something?’
    ‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘I am. I’m looking to find out who I am. About my beginnings. About my mother.’
    Ted Allen whistled softly through pursed lips. ‘But that’d mean going to California. That’s where your father was when Georgiana found him.’ He frowned slightly. ‘You know, don’t you, that I came to America with him – as his valet?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes, I did know,’ she said. ‘I think I know most of my father’s history, though I can’t recall when I was told, only that I always knew. Mama—’ She smiled. ‘Gianna always explained my background and made sure I never forgot it. I’m so grateful to her for that.’
    She paused, looking thoughtful, and they all gazed at her, unwilling to interrupt her train of thought, knowing that she had something else to say.
    ‘But,’ she went on at last, ‘I know nothing of my birth mother. Only that her name was Tsui, and that my father met her in a bar in California where they both worked.’
    Ted shook his head. ‘I’ve always found that so difficult to comprehend,’ he murmured. ‘Your father working in a bar, I mean, knowing him as he once was. But in this country anything can and does happen. Even a leopard might change his spots.’
    Jewel gazed at him. Ted, having been in her father’s employ, would have seen him in a different light from his friends and family. She had been told by Gianna that he was a good and loving father, and from the little memory of him that remained she knew it to be true.
    ‘But my mother,’ she said, thinking out loud. ‘That’s what I need to know. To find out about her.’
    ‘But you’ve only just arrived,’ said Caitlin. ‘You can’t go off to California. Not yet!’
    ‘I don’t intend to. I want to show Clara this part of the country before we leave, and there’s no hurry. We might even come back if my mission is successful.’
    Jewel smiled at Clara. Clara had declared when they had first set out on their travels that she wanted to see everything .
    Caitlin was staring at her with her lips slightly parted. Then she looked at her mother and then her father.
    ‘Da!’ she said, and licked her lips. ‘Ma! I want to go with them. Can I? Can I go to California?’

CHAPTER EIGHT
     
    ‘What! Don’t be ridiculous.’ Ted was completely taken aback. ‘No. No, you can’t.’
    ‘Why can’t she?’ Kitty asked quietly. ‘If Jewel and Clara can go, why can’t Caitlin?’
    ‘Go where?’ A boy of about sixteen came into the room. He was tall, taller than Ted, and nearer his father’s colouring than his mother’s, but he was undoubtedly their son.
    ‘Is this Robert?’Jewel said. ‘You won’t remember me.’
    He shook his head. ‘I don’t, but as Caitlin has talked of nuthin’ else but Jewel coming, I guess that’s who you are.’
    He raised a hand in greeting, and on being