In the Land of the Long White Cloud

peace. The man was no lawyer, working instead as a coffin maker and undertaker.
    “Someone has to do the job,” he replied, shrugging at Ruben’s question about his career choice. “And the boys thought I’d be interestedin keeping them from killing each other. Since it saves me trouble in the end.”
    Fleur observed the conversation with enthusiasm. If Ruben found an excuse to study law here, then he would not push to return to the claim when they returned from Dunedin.

    Fleurette and Ruben spent their second wedding night in the comfortable double bed in room one at Daphne’s.
    “We’ll call it the honeymoon suite in the future,” Daphne remarked.
    “Doesn’t happen often that a woman loses her virginity here!” Ron chuckled.
    Stuart, who had already helped himself to plenty of the whiskey, grinned at him conspiratorially.
    “That already happened,” he revealed.

    The friends set out for Dunedin around noon the next day. Ruben had acquired a wagon from his new friend—“Go ahead and take it, boy! I can take a few coffins to the cemetery with the pushcart!”—while Fleurette held a few more informative conversations—this time with the area’s few respectable women: the wives of the justice of the peace and the barber. By the time she left, she had a second shopping list for Dunedin.
    When they returned two weeks later with a fully laden wagon, all that was missing was a place to open their business. Fleurette had not planned ahead with regard to that, having counted on continued good weather. Autumn in Queenstown, however, was rainy, and in the winter a great deal of snow fell. However, few had died in Queenstown recent months, so the justice of the peace let them use his coffin warehouse for their shop. He was the only one who did not ask for new tools, though he did have Ruben explain his legal texts to him, to which a few dollars in McKenzie’s fortune had gone.
    The shop’s brisk sales brought the money back in quickly. The prospectors stormed Ruben and Stuart’s business; by the second day, all the tools were already sold out. The ladies required a little longer to make their selections—in part because the justice of the peace’s wife was initially hesitant to offer her salon as a changing room for every woman in the region.
    “You could, of course, use the warehouse’s side room,” she said with a deprecatory look at Daphne and her girls, who were burning with anticipation to try on the clothes and lingerie that Fleur had bought in Dunedin. “Where Frank usually keeps the corpses.”
    Daphne shrugged. “If it’s not being used, it doesn’t bother me. Well, and if it is—what do you bet none of these fellows ever had such a nice send-off?”

    It was easy to convince Stuart and Ruben to make another trip to Dunedin, and by their second round of sales, Stuart was head over heels in love with the barber’s daughter and did not want to go back to the mountains at any price. Ruben took over the little shop’s bookkeeping and realized with amazement what Fleurette had known all along: every trip filled their coffers with considerably more money than a year in the goldfields would have done. It was also clear that he was much more suited to being a merchant than a prospector. By the time the last blisters and cuts on his hands had healed, after he had been wielding a pen instead of a shovel for six weeks, he was completely convinced of the merits of the business.
    “We should build a shop,” he said finally. “A sort of warehouse. Then we could also expand our stock.”
    Fleurette nodded. “Household items. The women desperately need proper pots and pans and nice dishes…now don’t wave it off, Ruben. The demand for those kinds of goods will grow over time since there will be more women. Queenstown is becoming a real town!”

    Six months later, the O’Keefes celebrated the grand opening of the O’Kay Warehouse in Queenstown, Otago. The name had been Fleurette’s idea, and she was very proud of it. In addition to the new salesrooms, the budding enterprise had come into possession of two more wagons and six heavy cart horses. Fleurette could once more ride her cobs, and the community’s dead could once more be drawn to the cemetery respectably instead of being dropped off in the handcart. Stuart Peters had cemented trade deals with Dunedin, and with that retired from his position as chief purchaser. He wanted to get married and was tiring of the constant trips to the