by Bruce Graham
I began to feel my legs becoming weak.
“Finally, Ramona would be anxious every time you left on a job, whether you would return in a box, or crippled, or would be in jail charged with some crime. Most of your work is away from Trinidad for perhaps weeks at a time. Who would help her with children?”
For the first time I suspected that my developing feelings about Ramona had been reciprocated, even before I sensed them.
“Ramona and I had discussed you joining the firm, or perhaps we would have found you work with people we do business with. That is still a possibility.”
I instantly thought of my father: a day job, reliable, home every night. Perhaps they thought that I was skilled with my hands.
“But the issue of lack of trust is the greatest stumbling block.”
I stared at Ramona.
Tears were coursing down her cheeks, her breath was short.
I reached out for her hand.
She shrank back. “How could you lie to me?” She spun and rushed to the door, hauled the door open and disappeared.
Herrera held out his hand. “There’s your answer, for now at least. Go back to Trinidad, think about your work, yourself. Perhaps in a few weeks she’ll reconsider. Write, and things may work out for the better. Remember that we think highly of you in many ways. Our work is growing and we likely could find a place for you here.” He smiled. “There are worse things than marrying the boss’ daughter.”
I took his hand and held it for several seconds. I turned and shambled to the door and turned. “Thank you and---” My throat felt tight. “Just thank you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
It didn’t take me very long, once I’d become established in Trinidad, to realize that I’d have a lot of free time between jobs. Even while traveling to and from my jobs I would have time on my hands. The second situation, I cured by grabbing newspapers wherever I paused, that I would save until back home. The first problem required more effort. The house was not in the best of repair, having been unoccupied for several years. I spoke to the owners who were agreeable that I do some routine repairs. At first I acquired the usual workman’s tools, then expanded my collection with carpentry tools of some intricacy. By recalling my father’s work I soon was conversant enough with woodworking to be able to replace boards in the walls and floors.
When, after several years, I purchased the house, I increased my work by learning and applying my knowledge to the new system of running water to the kitchen and eventually for the bath. The one trade that I made no effort to master was the eventual electrical system, that I had installed by a trained electrician. I expanded my woodworking, over many years adding a shed and a small barn, that I had to admit were in better condition than the house itself.
I also found that I could order books by mail. Before long I was receiving books, of fiction or history, that sometimes caused the Post Office personnel to be unhappy with having to keep them for my return from being away. I was excited to realize that I could acquire a set of the Encyclopedia Brittanica, which I did when my finances allowed. During times at home, especially during winter evenings, I thoroughly enjoyed expanding my knowledge by leafing through the work. Many subjects I ignored, but mostly dealing with history, geography, basic science, literature, I devoured. By the time I approached retirement I had made it through the letter R. I was sorry, when I sold the house, to include my collection of hundreds of books, including the Encyclopedia. But I wasn’t able to take them and the family buying the house would certainly have enjoyed the treasure trove of the printed word.
In 1877 I was contacted by Thomas Foster of Scott’s Bluff, Nebraska, asking me to track down his brother, Edward, who he believed was in the Chocolate Mountains of Southern California, prospecting for gold. Thomas Foster explained that their mother had died and in order to settle the estate the court needed to know of Edward was alive or dead. Reading between the lines of the several letters we exchanged I inferred that it didn’t matter to Thomas which Edward was, if only he knew which. Thomas explained that while traveling in the vicinity of the Chocolate Mountains Edward had become acquainted with an old prospector who provided Edward with a map and extra directions to what was described as a “lost mine from Spanish days.”
After our discussions by an exchange of letters it was agreed that I was to be paid fifty dollars a day, for any number of days up to twenty, and five hundred dollars advance toward expenses, in order for me to seek out Edward. At the moment I had not the slightest idea of how I would accomplish this task.
Investigation showed that access to the Chocolate Mountains was by weekly stagecoach from Blythe, near the Colorado River, to the northern edge of the Salton Sink. Several stage depots between the two sites included station 4, at the edge of the Mountains, north of where the “Old Spanish Trail” headed across many miles of arid desert up into the Mountains. By the time I gathered this information I was on the verge of reneging on my commitment, when the mail brought Thomas’ version of the map relied upon by Edward.
Fortunately, I was able to time my journey for November, when the heat would be ameliorated. I arranged for four mules and a dozen filled, large water bags, and several satchels of dried food and grain for the mules to be waiting for me at station 4. I arrived bearing my rifle, pistol and one change of clothes. Before the next dawn I arranged my caravan and set out to the curious wonder of the people at the station. The trek across the desert took two days and mounting up the almost invisible trail another two days, concluding with a fork where one barely discernible track led up a steep incline. A cairn of small stones, indicated on Thomas’ map, told me to climb the way for close to a half mile. After the climb of what seemed a half mile I was startled to find the second of Thomas’ markers, the skeleton of a horse or mule, head pointing to the left. I struggled up the slope, the mules becoming more unruly and disorganized.
“Hold it right there,” barked a voice from off the trail.
I gazed around, but could see nothing.
“Turn around and get out.”
“Are you James Troubridge?”
“Who wants to know?”
“Your brother sent me to find you.”
A heavily bearded man in ratty, dirty clothes and ripped hat, holding a Winchester, edged out from behind a boulder. “Drop your gun belt.”
I did as he instructed. “What’s your name?”
“None of your business. Now get out.”
“Your brother Thomas sent me to find you and sign some papers.”
The man seemed puzzled. “You asked for James Troubridge. Who’s he?”
“I told you about your brother Thomas. You can tell me if you’re the one I’m looking for. What is your name?”
“Is this a game we’re playing? Where does my brother live?”
“Nebraska. I have papers so your mother’s estate can be settled.”
The man lowered his rifle to point at the ground. “Mother is dead?”
“Your name?”
“Foster. From Scott’s Bluff.”
I relaxed and moved the mules onto a level spot. “I brought water.”
The man moved down the slope and leaned the rifle against a rock. He reached out his hand.
I shook his hand. “I won’t be staying long, I know you have work to do.”
“When did Mother die?”
“I can’t say. It might be in the papers.” I handed the man the sheaf of papers.
The man went to a shelf on the rocks and sat down. He went through the papers, reading them carefully. He stared into space. Then: “She wanted to see me before she died. Tom had no way to find me. So he sent you. Who are you?”
“Nathan Gould. I live in Colorado and do some bounty hunting.”
“Have you seen the papers?”
“No. It’s none of my business. He said he wanted you to sign them and send them back.”
The man smiled. “Tom and I haven’t gotten along very well. There’s seven years’ difference in a
ges, two sisters in between. He’s a solid, steady hand, I’m a wild, troublesome sort. He’s made the ranch better since Dad died. I wouldn’t help and just went off. This is my way to prove that I’m as good as he is, that I’m a success. Over there---” He waved an arm toward a cave in the side of the cliff and a nearby heap of rocks. “---is my gold find. I’m not sure about how much, but by my way of figuring it’ll be enough to stake me to something. My livestock is dead, and I have no way to get the gold out. Now you’ve brought me the way.”
I shrugged. “I emptied almost two of the water bags on the way here and have used about half of the grain. I suppose if we fill the empty water and grain bags with the nuggets we could stretch the other two water bags to reach the station.”
“We’ll start loading in the morning and leave right after.” He jumped to his feet and waved the papers I had brought in the air. “When I get back to Scott’s Bluff I’ll give Tom what he wants in person.”
I unloaded the mules and we settled down for the night. In the morning we started loading the nuggets that were nondescript and meant nothing to me. By noon we were ready to leave and started out. Four days later, thirsty and with the stock struggling, we reached the station. We unloaded the mules that I turned back to the manager of the station with a return of my security deposit. We relaxed and took turns watching the cargo while we waited for the eastbound stage.
“I want you to sign the papers,” I said on the second day.
Edward looked at me. “Why?”
“Well, what if something happens to you before you get to Scott’s Bluff? Your brother might not honor our agreement, which is that I obtain your signatures. I’d be out the cost of my trip.”
Edward laughed. “You don’t trust Tom either.”
“It won’t hurt for you to sign. And what will you do with your cargo?”
“There’s a saloon in Ehrenberg that does assaying. I’ll turn in my stuff with them.”
“And the papers?”
“I’ll keep them, I’ll tell Tom you did the job.”
“It sounds as if you want to do something other than what the papers say. Look, sign the papers, give them to me, I’ll hold them until you wire me that you’ve gotten to Scott’s Bluff. Then I’ll send them on and you can still do whatever you like.”
“I’ll hold on to them.”
That was the end of that. I couldn’t force him to sign. Two days later the eastbound stage arrived, we left with the cargo and Edward climbed down with his ore at the stage station in Ehrenberg.
Edward held out his hand. “I’ll be in Scott’s Bluff in a week or ten days. I’ll tell Tom that you arranged for me to get out of the desert. You’ll be paid.”
I shook his hand.
In a few minutes he and his cargo were headed for the Gold Diggers Saloon a half a block away. I endured the return trip and arrived home exhausted. On my arrival I found several letters and telegrams, among which was a wire from Thomas Foster:
Notified death Edward Foster Ehrenberg, Arizona. Waiting details town marshal. Advise what happened.
After a night’s rest I drafted a long story of my encounter with Edward Foster and his intended actions when we parted company. I explained that he refused to sign the papers and intended to return to Scott’s Bluff. I appended my statement for my services and expenses and awaited developments. After I returned from a trip to a rancher-sheep herder dispute in Nevada and found no response from Thomas Foster I dispatched a reminder of the amount I was due and curious of what happened with Edward Foster.
In reply I received a Wells Fargo draft for the amount I expected and a letter, less thorough than I would have wanted:
I appreciate your explanation. The town marshal says that Edward became hostile when the assay people valued the ore at less than Edward wanted. The facts of what happened are unclear and the witnesses all connected with the saloon. Edward died in a shootout. The assay people sent on to us their value of the ore. I see nothing more for us to do.
You did your part. What happened was out of your control. Thank you for your efforts.
If he could move on, so could I. My consolation was that I could hardly imagine a project that would be more arduous.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I’d been in Trinidad for enough years for me to feel as if it was home and had put down fairly strong roots when the community became less civilized by the opening of three public houses, where gambling and drinking were more widespread than previously. In accordance with long standing practice I avoided those places and kept what in modern parlance is called a low profile in Trinidad. Unlike the many gun hands in the West I had no wish to wander from place to place, holding and losing jobs as city marshal or deputy sheriff, alternately winning acclaim in a town from which in a few months I was sent packing, often the subject of warrants for gunplay, and continually repeating the process with no place to call home. I had a home and wanted peace there.
During my forty years in Trinidad I became a normal citizen. My work was done in all areas between the Missouri and the Cascades, between the Canadian and Mexican borders, but I studiously avoided even being known as a professional gunfighter in Trinidad. To begin with there was little call for my skills in a community of coal miners and a high proportion of families; most laborers were too weary from their heavy work to carouse in saloons and there were few of those establishments, in fact, only a couple. Aside from the bank manager and the telegraph office and Post Office staff who soon figured out something about what I was involved in, nobody had either the curiosity or time to figure me out. In a conversation I was careful to parry inquiries.
When I became affiliated with the Methodist Church I held back from mingling with the others and never volunteered to serve and avoided requests to help. I suppose that they were resigned to simply accept my gifts that were adequate but not more. I wasn’t immune from the normal human trait of not wanting to be looked down on by my neighbors and others with whom I interacted. I was glad to be viewed as a businessman who traveled.
My one close scrape with being exposed for what I was came when, sometime around 1880, a new minister arrived, from Texas. When he first presided at the Sunday service he appeared familiar, but his name meant nothing to me. The man was an energetic clergyman and took to visiting his flock. When he arrived at my house and introduced himself as Thomas Crowell, formerly a Texas circuit rider.
The Reverend commented that I appeared familiar and asked if I had been to various areas in Texas, including Buffalo Gap. Suddenly he smiled broadly. “You look exactly like the deputy sheriff who rescued a Catholic priest somewhere in the hustings and brought him to the hotel. I was asked to help tend his wounds, since I’d done that sort of work during the late War. You’re him.”
I was prepared to be challenged like this and nodded. “Yes, but don’t mention it, I wouldn’t want to be asked to keep doing that sort of work.”
“Of course. Some people might find law enforcement and gun use objectionable. I don’t.”
I was thankful that our conversation moved away from my past and the Reverend went on his way. He never alluded to it and I had no further threat of exposure from that quarter.
My intermittent G A R membership was on the lowest level of activity: participation in observances, Memorial Day activities, attendance at meetings, occasional appearances at the schools to speak of Army life and demonstrations of training and weapons’ use. I once declined becoming an officer by downplaying my service and at another time, even refusing to demonstrate against a gathering of Confederate veterans, asking that we “let bygones be bygones.” When the local chapter dissolved I continued my connection with several other former members.
I did not anticipate, when I chose Trinidad as my home, that the climate would so closely resemble Vermont’s. A significant amount of snow combined with very cold, occasionally bitter, winter weather made me feel at home. Unlike most of my neighbors I avoided the frigid blasts by remaining indoors. I found little r
eason to leave town on business during the Winter, but when I did a neighbor boy earned a few dollars by keeping the heat on in my house.
I was one of the first persons to sign up to use the new Carnegie Library. I served as a pallbearer for several funerals, including at the Catholic Church. I consulted a local physician for reasons other than “on the job” injuries, including several intestinal and bronchial illnesses, a fall on the ice in front of a restaurant and once when I was caught in the middle of a fistfight between a Union and a Confederate veteran, which caused me to lose a couple of teeth. I had two other teeth extracted by a young dentist, new to town. I hired old Attorney Willets when I purchased my house and old Attorney Burrows when I sold my house, and have outlived both of them. I retained the services of a surveyor to determine the back line of my house lot when the people behind claimed about a quarter of it. I purchased new clothes, footwear and hats from the Goldman store in town, donating the old items to the Church rummage sale; looking back, I can see that the style of my haberdashery changed several times during my life in Trinidad, not much of it being worn out. I hired several housekeepers who kept my house in order and clean. A woman next door, then another two houses away, finally one across the street, served as cooks on those occasions when I hosted poker games and when I was too ill to go to a restaurant.
When I had broadened my field of acquaintances within the Church and the G A R I hosted monthly poker games, at which I would win or lose without elation or resentment. This was during the time when faro games were losing their appeal in favor of poker. I became acquainted with the game at the Iron Horse Hotel & Saloon, in Elko, Nevada. Stranded there during a snow storm on my way home from settling a dispute about a silver mine, I lost about two hundred dollars, along with several others, during poker lessons provided by one Brett Maverick. He was a congenial and obviously honest, card player passing through on his way to somewhere. His good nature kept several of us enthralled while he separated us from our money.
