taps the picture on its lower border, under Thomas. âI thinkâ¦I think we can say heâs happy here.â His voice lifts at the end, as if by accident the observation has become a question. He glances at Hope.
âYes.â
I try to speak but nothing comes out. I start to clear my throat, but have to cough to do it properly. âAre the other photos from the night like this?â
âLike this? In some ways yes, in some ways no. There are costumes, but the others are bigger groups or a man and a woman.â She looks at my father, but heâs still focussed on the image. âI can find no other quite like this, two men only.â
âWhat a special thing to have,â he says when he finally looks up. He turns to me. âIs there a place for it in your bag? Make sure it doesnât get bent. Put it in a book or something. My iPad Mini. Itâll fit there, in the case.â
âAnd soon after that,â Hope says, a serious tone back in her voice, âI am sorry to say, the story ends. There was an outbreak of typhoid fever early in 1897.â She opens a folder, leafs through the documents and draws out a single sheet of paper. âThere were many cases in the hospital. Asignificant number of deaths, processed quickly, buried quickly.â
She keeps the documentâitâs a listâfrom us as she studies it, holding it up so only she can read it. She finds the section sheâs looking for.
âHere.â She places it in front of us, pointing to the place. âThere is an error. This is why it was not on the internet when you looked for it, Ken, in the Alaska Vitals.â
It is a page from a register of deaths, covering a week in February 1897.
âThis is a church record,â Hope says, ânot a government record. The Territory of Alaska started recording deaths in 1913. So the Alaska Vitals for earlier were compiled later, from other sources.â
Below the name âHarper, Stanton Lâ is âHandler, Thomas Câ, both dead from typhoid fever on the same day. Their ages appear as thirty-three and twenty-two, their occupationsas doctor and hospital watchman/labourer. Stanton Harper has Boston as his birthplace, Thomas has a blank. Most of the other names on the page are typhoid deaths, too.
âThomas C Handler,â my father says. âTwenty-two.â
âThere is no Thomas Handler in Juneau at that time,â Hope says.
The story is over, the search is over. February 1897, twenty-two.
My father picks up the photo from the ball again and rearranges his glasses on his nose. He looks at it closely, going from one face to the other. âHe was a good man? Stanton Harper?â
âHe was. Iâm sure he was.â Hope waits, but my father doesnât speak. âEdwardâs second letter arrived shortly after. There was a new doctor then. People were leaving Juneau for Dawson City, for the new gold rush. The Klondike. The letter was filed. We donât know if Thomas diedin the hospital or at the house. Perhaps at the house. For both of them.â
My father looks up, over his glasses. âAnd where is he buried? Do you have any idea of that?â
âAn idea, yes. Only an idea. Nothing certain. You see this? These entries?â She points to a narrow column near the right of the page. âPlace of burial? You see the ditto marks, the âdoâ?â She says it like the word, âdoâ, not as âd, oâ. âIt cost five dollars to dig a grave in those days, and a casket cost twenty. And that was at the best of times. In the typhoid outbreak, there were many bodies needing quick burial and not many people to bury them. And miners dying with nothing but a couple of pans to their names. That is probably the âdo, do, doâ you see further down the page.â
The word âEvergreenâ appears for one name, and âdoâ for the five below it.
âSometimes it just
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