by William Gear
“A mine? Sarah, what do you or I know about mining?”
“Aboot as much as I know aboot med’cine,” Pat told him. “But laddie, moines are my particular charm. ’Tis called the Piute Lode, about seventy-five moiles east of Virginia City, Nevada. According to the stories, the prospects are unusually promising.”
Sarah sipped her sherry, a crafty smile on her full lips.
“And are they?” Doc asked.
“If you b’lieve the stories, laddie.” Pat’s smile had turned predatory.
Doc knew he was being played. “I take it you don’t?”
“Reckon not,” Pat agreed. “But, more t’ the point, George Nichols does.”
Oh, dear God.
Sarah told him, “For the last month, our partnership has bought up every claim there is on the Piute Lode and filed on as much of the mountain as we can. Rumor is that William Ralston and Pat’s old pal, Johnny MacKay, are battling to obtain it. Those men are bitter rivals who’ll do anything to get one up on the other. If George can get a controlling interest in the Piute Lode, he’ll play Ralston against MacKay for the highest bidder.”
“So, we’re beating George to the punch? And who are Ralston and Mackay? I don’t understand.”
Sarah said softly, “William Ralston is head of the biggest bank in California. MacKay and three of his friends are mining investors who are competing with Ralston in the development of several mines in the Comstock.” She inclined her glass toward O’Reilly. “Pat met MacKay when he was running a placer operation in California before coming to Colorado.”
“We’re old friends,” Pat said easily. “And I staked him a while back when a decision he made wasn’t the right one.”
Sarah added, “George got word of the Piute Lode, that both MacKay’s group and Ralston’s were trying to move on it. It is his intention to scoop them all. He has placed all of his assets as collateral against a loan to buy the eighty-five percent of the Piute Lode that Pat and I own. If his agents can close the deal, he intends to dangle it between MacKay and Ralston.”
Doc lifted his hands in confusion. “Why don’t we sell the Piute Load to the highest bidder ourselves? Especially after what George Nichols tried to do to you, Sis.”
Pat sighed, looked across the table at Sarah, and shook his head in futility.
Sarah laid a long-fingered hand on Doc’s. “Philip, the Piute Lode isn’t quite worthless, but almost. And while George has come into possession of a series of letters a geologist has supposedly written to MacKay about the Piute Lode, I can assure you that neither William MacKay, nor Ralston, have the slightest interest in the Piute.”
“But George Nichols is going to pay…?”
“That’s right, laddie.” Pat savored his sherry. “I nivver loiked the mon in the first place. ’Twill leave me with a warm spot in me heart to break the boy-buggering sot.”
Doc took a deep breath, the impact hitting home. “Jesus, Sarah. He’s going to know you did this to him.”
She gave him a hard-eyed stare. “No he won’t. If he traces the Piute Mining Company to its source, he’ll find an empty office in a building in St. Louis. Piute Mining Company’s papers of incorporation are on file with a law firm in Sacramento. If he manages to discover the company’s bank account, and should he somehow gain access to it, he will discover that it sold its assets to Hancock and Hancock, and that the account has been closed.”
“Dear God.” He glanced at Pat. “And you’re party to this?”
Pat winked at him again. “Aye, and fer a noice profit, laddie. Yer sister won’t marry me any more than she’ll marry George, but unloike him, I niver take personally what moight make me a tidy sum.”
Doc blew out a worried breath. “God help us if George ever figures it out.”
Sarah arched a stately eyebrow. “If he does, it will be because one of three people told him. And they’re sitting right here at this table.” She placed papers on the table before him along with pen and ink. She tapped them with a slim forefinger. “Just sign on the bottom, Philip. Pat and I will take care of the rest.”
He did, wondering all the while if it was a death warrant.
118
June 28, 1868
Billy sat at the table in the dim rear of Central City’s Colorado Nugget saloon and leaned his chair back on two legs; his left foot he propped on the chair across from him.
Down in Black Hawk work was progressing on Hill’s new smelter—the supposed key to unlocking a wealth in gold from the recalcitrant ore. New buildings were going up everywhere. Talk was that a railroad would be built up Clear Creek from Golden—even if the rails and the locomotive, in pieces, had to be hauled in from Cheyenne.
He sipped rye with his left hand, the fingers of his right resting on the Remington’s polished grips.
The revolver had been a good one, though it didn’t look the same as when he’d taken it from the sallow-faced man that day at Dewley’s camp. The bluing had worn off, and though he’d taken the best care of it he could, the metal had pitted in places. The grips, once dark walnut, now balanced between weather bleaching and the darkening oils from his palm. The action, however, remained tight, and he kept it clean and oiled.
The bartender, Mooney, had five clients. He kept them up by the front. As if they understood Billy’s need for solitude, the men spoke softly, rarely glancing his way.
Would George come? Billy had sent a message to the man’s boardinghouse mistress asking that George meet him at two at the Nugget. If his pocket watch was correct, it was now five after.
The hinges squeaked as the back door was opened, and the smell of rot, urine, and feces blew in.
Billy tightened his grip on the Remington.
George—clad in his long duster, the hat pulled low—emerged from the narrow hall, his hands held wide, as if in surrender.
Billy used his foot to push the chair out, and resettled himself, using the table to hide the fact that he’d slipped the Remington free of its holster. “Hello, George.”
“You got a reason for showing up just at this particular time?” George’s voice sounded like a wire pulled too tight.
“Thought I’d drop in. Pay a social call. You remember social calls? Say hello to an old friend?”
“Not funny. Tell me why you’re here, Billy. Is it about the Piute?”
“What the hell would I care about any old Indian?” Billy cocked his head, trying to read George’s posture, the weary slump of his shoulders. Below the hat brim, the man’s shadowed face looked strained.
George glared balefully. “Is it about that trouble at End-of-the-Tracks?”
“End-of-the-Tracks?” How the hell would George know about that?
“What were you doing? Rolling track layers, for God’s sake!”
“What makes you think it was me?”
George reached into his duster and pulled out some folded papers. These he slid across the table.
With his left hand, Billy picked them up, unfolded them, and stared. The best likeness was a drawing of his face, almost good enough to be a tintype. Below, it proclaimed:
Murderer and Thief
$500 Reward.
Wanted for the brutal murder and robbery of
Angus McFarley and Sam Howell
The fine print went on to note that the reward was offered by the Union Pacific and would be payable upon delivery of the miscreant.
“Seems a remarkable likeness of you, don’t you think?” George asked. “My agents tell me that McFarley was one of their route surveyors, and when you hit him with that pick handle, you hit too hard. Same with Howell, though it took him four days to die.”
George pointed at the drawing. “Seems that you almost ran over a man getting away. Turns out he was an artist back East before his wife left him and he ran off to build a railroad.”
George gestured. “Those other two are just circulars. One from Helena, the other from Virginia City. Both of them looking for whoever strangled and burned a couple of whores.
I thought it looked like your work.”
Neither of them had a picture to go with them, just a request for information leading to an arrest and conviction.
George asked, “Want to tell me why you, of all people, were killing railroad men for a couple of dollars like some chucklehead?”
Billy flipped the papers away and took a sip of his rye. “Mostly to keep Win Parmelee from getting suspicious about who I was?”
George seemed to freeze, his eyes like daggers. “Parmelee? You were riding with Parmelee? My people thought they had him in Virginia City. Somehow the son of a bitch killed several of my associates and got away. And you end up traveling with him?”
Billy shrugged, fighting a smile. The stranglers had been George’s men? What kind of strange was that? “I knew I’d heard of him. Seems to me, it was right here, in this place. Mooney mentioned him to you. But here’s the thing, I never knew what your interest in him was until Win told me about the Goddess, and how he killed her man. He says she stole his whorehouse.”
George was stewing, chewing his lip. “So, where’s Parmelee now?”
“Headed to Denver to kill this Sarah Anderson. Reason I’m here? I thought I’d see what you wanted me to do about him. ’Specially after he kilt the whore.”
With tentative fingers George reached up to absently probe the side of his face where a small scar was whitening on his cheek. “That son of a bitch. When’s he planning on doing this?”
“He had some things to do over in Cheyenne. Don’t reckon he’ll be in Denver till tonight at the earliest. Figure he’ll take a day to scout out the whorehouse, lay his plans.”
“The scheming cunt’s sold the place to Big Ed and his partners. She’s bought herself a house at the edge of town. Figured I’d pay her a visit before I headed west. ‘Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord’? In a hen’s ass!”
George narrowed an eye. “That walking-shit friend of yours is forcing me to move my schedule up. Parmelee might be a cock-beater of the first order, but she threw it in my face! Ain’t nobody gonna get away with that. Not in light of what those California peckers just did to me.”
“What California peckers?” Billy asked.
George studied him from under his hat. “You know the names William Ralston, John MacKay, James Fair, or maybe James Flood?”
“Heard of ’em in Helena, for sure. Mining bosses. Fighting with each other, ain’t they? Out in the Sierras? What they call the Comstock.”
“You think Meagher was your biggest kill? Why, Mr. Meadowlark, after you get done filling out my list in California, you’re going to be the most wanted killer in all the world.”
“What did they do to you?”
“Took me for a fucking fortune over the Piute Lode. Don’t know if it was Ralston or MacKay, but someone sold me a pig in a poke.”
“How bad?” Billy wondered, thinking of George’s fortune.
“Bad!” He pointed a hard finger. “But that ain’t your concern.”
“So, after I kill Parmelee, we’re going to California?”
George stood. “Right now we’re riding to Denver. Seems I’ve got to get the Goddess before Parmelee, or that sick buckey is going to ruin her before I get my chance.”
119
June 29, 1868
Butler stepped down and loosened Apple’s cinch. Taking Shandy’s lead and Apple’s reins, he tied the animals off on the hitching post ring. Patting Apple on the neck, he added, “You be good now, old friend, and feel free to add to the piles.”
A ring of old manure was visible around the hitching post where it had been beaten into the street by countless hooves. Business at Doc’s must have been good.
Butler glanced up and down Fifteenth Street. Denver really was turning into a city. New three- and four-story buildings were going up; teams of bricklayers on scaffolding labored in the midday sun. Despite being gone for just shy of a year, he found the changes dramatic.
“Reckon this heah might be the equal of Memphis in a year or two,” Phil Vail said admiringly where he stood to the side. The rest of the men were crowded around the boardwalk in front of Doc’s.
“Don’t seem yor brother missed you none,” Corporal Pettigrew muttered, his hands on his hips. He was looking up at the newly painted wood. Things must have improved. Paint had been scarcer than hen’s teeth, and twice as expensive. Now half the frame buildings on the street sported color.
Butler’s chest began to tickle with that odd mix of excitement and fear. He couldn’t help but remember the anger and pain in Doc’s voice as he’d thrown Butler and the men out of this very building.
“Jus’ get it over with, Cap’n, ça va?” Kershaw insisted. “Otherwise you stand out heah all day, mais oui?”
Butler glanced at the men for reassurance and reached for the doorknob. It rang a bell hanging from a hook. Otherwise the office and waiting room looked about the same. Maybe the bench was more polished, and the clutter of papers on the desk not as neat.
“Be there in a moment!” Doc’s familiar voice called from the surgery.
Butler stepped over to the surgery door, butterflies in his stomach as he peeked in.
Doc was bent over a little boy whose shirt was off, his suspenders down. Back to Butler, Doc leaned over the lad, listening to his chest through some device with tubes that were inserted in Doc’s ears. A worried-looking woman stood beside him, holding what was obviously the little boy’s shirt.
“You say he only gets this when he’s helping stack the hay?” Doc straightened and removed the tubes from his ear.
“Yes, sir.” The woman’s voice was filled with twang. “It gits so bad with the coughing, little Jake here th’ow’s up. Then, to a night, he cain’t hardly breathe a’tall.”
“It’s the hay fever, Mrs. Smith. Sometimes they grow out of it. My advice, and I know it’s hard, is to keep him away from the haying. If he absolutely has to, you give him half a teaspoon of codeine just before bed. But no more. And only when he needs it.”
Butler backed away, smiling. Doc was like himself—if a little thinner-looking.
“Looks like he need t’ clean a little more.” Frank Thompson bent to inspect the coffee stains on the side of the pot where it rested on the stove. Butler shooed him out of the way, carefully tested the pot with a quick tap of the finger, and found it still warm. Taking a tin cup from the rack, he filled it and took a taste.
“God, I’ve missed coffee,” he remarked.
“Reckon them Dukurika could larn a thing er two ’bout a good drink,” Jimmy Peterson added.
“I really miss that phlox tea Mountain Flicker makes,” Butler told him. “Coffee’s good, but I really wish I was back there.”
“Missin’ the missus?” Pettigrew fixed hard eyes on Butler. “Reckon y’all know how we feel.”
“Not all of you had wives,” Butler pointed out, “but Corporal, I never discounted what you all gave up when you enlisted.”
“So, what’s next, suh?” Billy Templeton asked. “You dead set on going back to the mountains?”
“We told Mountain Flicker we’d be back.” At movement, Butler turned, nodding and touching his battered hat brim as Mrs. Smith herded her little boy out, stepping wide of Butler in the process and avoiding his eyes.
“That’s a nice little tinkle bell Philip put up,” Vail noted as the woman left.
“It is, Private.” Butler studied the thing. “But I guess without us to keep watch, it’s the next best thing. Sort of like a picket you don’t have to feed or relieve from duty.”
“Dear God!”
Butler turned at Doc’s cry. “Hello, Philip.”
Doc stood in the door to the surgery as if frozen, his face expressing wonder and disbelief. His right hand clutched a couple of greenbacks. Then he rushed forward, wrapping arms around Butler, hugging the breath out of him.
“God, I’ve missed you! Worried about you! Don’t you ever leave me like that again!”
Butler smiled, tears, unbidden, trickling dow
n his cheeks as he hugged his brother to him. “I’m sorry, Philip. So sorry.”
120
June 29, 1868
Doc pushed his brother back, searched his face, took in his travel-filthy clothing. Butler looked like he’d been in the wilderness, pants threadbare and grease-blackened. He smelled of campfire smoke, stale sweat, and dust. Instead of boots, heavy trail moccasins of a style Doc had never seen clad his feet. A holey excuse of a felt hat—worse than the scarecrows at Camp Douglas used to wear—topped his head.
But beneath the wild tangle of unwashed hair and beard, Butler looked tan, lean, and healthy as a wildcat. His eyes were clear, without that anxious wavering and insecurity.
“Are you all right? Where in God’s name have you been? I’ve been worried sick.”
“I went to the mountains.”
“Where? Idaho Springs? Central City? One of the camps?”
“The Shining Mountains. Up on the Wind River. Where Paw always talked about.” The old fear rose behind Butler’s gray eyes, hard-edged and painful. “I found Paw.”
“What do you mean you found Paw?” Philip knew that look. Butler wasn’t happy with what he had to say. “Don’t tell me he’s in your head, too. Like Kershaw and the rest of your phantoms. You are still seeing them, aren’t you? That’s who you were talking to when I came out.”
Butler glanced to the side in irritation, then waved it away. “I know he’s never liked you, at ease, Corporal.”
Turning back to Doc, Butler said, “Paw ran at Shiloh. Deserted. He never told me where all he went. Mostly I suspect he drifted from tribe to tribe, wearing out his welcome. He ended up with a Sheep Eater band. Before they could drive him out for being a lazy shit, a bear got him. Mangled him pretty bad.”
“Wait” Doc put a hand out, pleading. Realized it was still full of Mrs. Smith’s money, and took long enough to unlock the drawer and stick it in the cash box. Then he seated himself on the corner of his desk, watching Butler’s delighted expression as he sipped Doc’s mediocre coffee.
