The Case of the Deadly Desperados

by Caroline Lawrence

  If a person has the heel of one foot on the ground with the toes pointed up to the sky, he is happy.

  If the feet get jiggly & do a little dance, the person is excited & happy.

  If one foot starts twitching or kicking, it shows the person is unhappy.

  If a foot is tapping & there is no music, that means the person is nervous or wants to go.

  If someone’s body is turned towards you but one or both feet are not, they don’t really want to be with you.

  One or both feet sometimes point in the direction the person wants to go.

  A person sitting with legs stretched out & ankles crossed is feeling relaxed & confident.

  Ankles hooked around the chair leg show the person is nervous or trying to control himself.

  People usually cross a leg towards a person they like.

  Deliberately touching someone else’s foot under the table is almost always a signal of some kind. Between a man & a woman it means desire.

  When Jace told me this last rule I asked him what exactly he meant by “desire.”

  Jace asked Stonewall to bring him a whiskey & while he was at it to treat himself to one, too & he might as well get us a fresh pot of coffee & some cake.

  Stonewall ordered the coffee, put a bottle of whiskey & three glasses on the table & then went off to find some cake. Jace filled one of the small glasses & offered it to me. When I shook my head he took a sip.

  He said, “P.K., do you know about men and women, and what they do together?”

  I said, “I have seen horses & dogs mating. And once a man and a woman behind the Dry Goods Store in Temperance.”

  “Well, sometimes it is about more than just mating. There is desire.” He nodded towards a pretty Mexican woman who was coming downstairs. She was wearing a shimmery low-cut dress & a wave of men moved towards her like iron filings to a magnet.

  “Oh,” I said. “That kind of desire. Sparking.”

  “Don’t you ever feel desire?” said Jace.

  “No,” I said. “I think what men and women do together is stupid and strange.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Twelve.”

  Jace sipped his whiskey. “You’ll feel different in a few years,” he said.

  “No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”

  Jace raised his eyebrows, then leaned forward & looked at me real hard.

  “P.K., if you don’t mind my asking, are you a boy or a girl?”

  I stared at him.

  Why was he asking me that question?

  Nobody had ever asked me that before.

  Was it because I had been dressed in pink gingham when he caught me and he had only just now recognized me?

  Or was there another reason?

  I glared at him.

  Jace examined the tip of his cigar. “The West can be a dangerous place for a girl. Here on the Comstock there are about a dozen men for every woman. Maybe more.” He gestured towards the woman in the sparkly dress. “That’s why girls like Mercedes over there get rich so quick. They can charge as much as they like for a dance. But a year from now she might be dead of too much dope or of despair or of having her throat cut, like poor Short Sally. They say one of her lovers cut her throat from jealousy,” he added, taking a pull from his cigar.

  My mind was a jumble of things I could say to him, but I did not know which of them to speak out, so I just fumed.

  Jace blew the smoke down. “A dozen men to one woman ain’t natural. The papers claim we are all gentrified here in Virginia City, with our school and front gardens, our churches & charity balls, and our new piped water. But this is still a rough place for a woman. Or a girl.” Jace looked up at me. “If I had a daughter I might consider dressing her up as a boy, just to keep her safe.”

  At that moment, Stonewall came up with a fresh pot of coffee & refilled our mugs. A Chinese waiter appeared from behind him & put down three plates of vanilla layer cake. He gave us each a knife & fork & linen napkin.

  Jace nodded his thanks to Stonewall, who had pulled up a chair.

  I had finally decided what to say. “There is a verse in Saint Paul’s letter to the Galatians,” I began.

  But Jace held up his hand to stop me. “Don’t you go quoting Scripture at me. Stonewall might tolerate it, but I won’t.”

  Stonewall kind of smiled & picked up his fork & dug into his piece of cake.

  So did Jace.

  He chewed thoughtfully for a few moments.

  Then he winked at me. “You may be a Freak of Nature, P.K. But you are a freak that is going to earn us both a lot of money.”

  I thought, “Money is good. But what you can teach me is worth all the gold & silver in the Comstock.”

  Ledger Sheet 36

  LATER THAT NIGHT, Poker Face Jace took me to the New International Hotel, where he had a “Sweet of Rooms.” We went towards the B Street entrance, and passed right by the Notary Public, which was shut up & dark.

  The lobby of the International Hotel had Turkey carpets & potted plants & polished brass spittoons & frosted glass coal oil lamps on the wall. I was glad I was wearing my fancy “tony bunch” getup with my coat & plug hat.

  At the desk, Jace asked the porter to have three meals sent to his Sweet. While he was ordering, I saw the big grandfather clock there & could not believe my eyes. It was nearly 11 o’clock at night. The hours had whizzed by.

  When we got to the room, all the lamps were lit. Jace took off his hat & jacket & hung them on pegs just inside the door. It was the first time I had seen him without his hat. His hair was gray at the sides & thinning on top. I realized he must be even older than Pa Emmet, who had turned forty last year.

  It was one of the nicest rooms I had ever seen. I took in the red velvet curtains & striped wallpaper & patterned carpets on the floor. There were polished wooden tables & velvet upholstered chairs & a marble fireplace & a brass spittoon. A balcony faced east over C Street. I went out there for a time, but the howling wind nearly tumbled me down into the canyon. If it had been light, I knew a magnificent view of Virginia City & the surrounding country could be obtained. I reckoned that was why they called it a “Sweet.” There were two bedrooms & I could see a mirrored wardrobe through the open door of one of them. The reflection showed a four-poster bed.

  “Do you see what money can buy?” said Jace. He had poured some water from a jug into a washbasin & was splashing it on his face.

  I said, “I believe the ironwork upon this house alone cost over four thousand dollars.”

  He patted his face dry with a linen towel & nodded. “This is what they all aspire to.”

  There was a soft knock on the door & Stonewall went to open it. A Chinaman in a spotless white apron brought our supper into the room on a narrow rolling table. He unfurled a white linen cloth & covered a square card table by the fire. Then he put out silver cutlery & last of all the plates of food. It was pork cutlets, mashed potatoes & greens with biscuits & butter. There were no hairs in the butter.

  The three of us ate it sitting there by the warm fire. There was apple pie & cheese after, with black coffee. I was hungry & it was good. We ate in silence & that gave me a chance to look around the room & see all the nice things that money can buy. Jace’s Sweet was bigger than our pine-log cabin in Temperance.

  After we finished our pie, Jace sent Stonewall out with my key to Isaiah Coffin’s Studio.

  As the door closed, Jace sat back in his chair & lit a cigar. “What brings you to Virginia, P.K.?” he said.

  I thought for a moment, wondering if I should tell him the Truth or not. But I wanted his knowledge more than I had ever wanted anything, so I said, “My foster ma and pa were murdered yesterday and the killer is after me.”

  His eyebrows went up. “Who is the killer?�
�

  “Whittlin Walt and two of his pards.”

  “That is disturbing news.” Jace leaned over to one side so that he could tap ash into the fire. “I have heard of Walt.” He sat back. “Why Virginia City?”

  “I was trying to get as far away from Walt as I could.”

  “Did you succeed?”

  “No. Walt and his pards are here in Virginia. They are still looking for me.”

  “Why are they looking for you?”

  I thought for a moment. Then I said, “Because I know it was them that killed my foster ma and pa.”

  He said, “Now you are lying, P.K.”

  I said, “How could you tell?”

  “The first time you paused, you were thinking whether you could trust me or not. Your eyes slid one way. The second time—just now—you were forming a lie and your eyes slid another way. Why is Walt after you?”

  I wondered what he would do when he learned about my Letter. Then I decided it did not matter, as long as he kept teaching me what he knew.

  “I have a Letter,” I said.

  “Show me.”

  I unbuttoned the top button of my starched shirt & pulled out my medicine bag. I noticed my hands were shaking a little as I opened it up. I handed my Letter to Poker Face Jace.

  “Thank you, P.K.,” he said. He looked at me for a long moment & then unfolded the Letter. As he read it, I observed that his fingers were long & pale & tapered. The fingernails were real clean.

  At last he folded the Letter & looked at me. “I suppose they have told you that this could make you fabulously wealthy? That you will be a millionaire?”

  “Yes,” I said. “If it is not a forgery. I have to take it to the Notary Public on B Street to notarize it and then to the Recorder’s Office to register it as mine. And then maybe to the judge.”

  He said, “I thought as much.”

  Then he handed back the Letter. He did not seem interested in it. That surprised me.

  He said, “P.K.?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Don’t fall in love with gold. Gold is a trap & a snare. Gold drives men mad and ruins families.”

  “I thought they were mining silver here.”

  “Silver. Gold. Same thing.”

  “But you like silver and gold.”

  “No. I like money. There is a difference.” He sucked on his cigar but it had gone out. He frowned at it. “P.K., you just showed me that you are willing to trust me. As a reward, I am going to give you the best piece of advice you will ever get.”

  “Yes?” I said. I realized I was sitting forward in my chair and I reckoned my pupils were big.

  Poker Face Jace struck a match & held it up to the end of his cigar & sucked at it. He turned it until it was burning evenly.

  “There are three types of people in this town,” he said. “One: the big nabobs. They are the rich mine owners with responsibility for thousands of men. Two: the miners themselves. They risk their lives every day and their only hope of wealth is speculating. They are the stupidest. Three: the suppliers of goods and services. They are the smartest. They will prosper, but they will have to work hard.” Jace examined the end of his cigar. “If you want to succeed in Virginia—or any other mining town—don’t live off the mines, live off the people who live off the mines.”

  I nodded. That made sense. Also, it fit with what Pa Emmet always said about Greed & Mammon.

  Jace took a puff of his cigar & blew the smoke up. “Then, of course, there’s me,” he said. “My job is to relieve all three types of their money.”

  The door opened & Stonewall came in. He had retrieved my buckskins and moccasins from Isaiah Coffin’s.

  “Any problems?” asked Jace, going to the wardrobe and pulling out a spare blanket. “Any irate photographers or Hurdy Girls waiting in ambush?”

  Stonewall shook his big head and handed me my own clothes. He also gave me back the key to the Photographic Studio. I put it in my medicine bag.

  “I want you to put on your buckskins,” said Jace. “And wear this blanket around your shoulders. Stonewall will take you to a nice Two-Bit Saloon down on C Street.”

  “What is a Two-Bit Saloon?” I said.

  “A Two-Bit Saloon is where they make you pay twenty-five cents for a drink or a cigar, rather than half that, which is what you pay at a ‘bit house.’ Stonewall will show you where it is. Don’t let on that you know him. Just follow him into the saloon and sit on the floor inside the door and keep your head down. You are going to pretend to be a Paiute beggar boy. But you will be looking at the feet of the men playing poker with me.”

  Jace drained his coffee cup & examined it. It was a china teacup with pink & blue flowers on it.

  “Stonewall,” said Jace. “Bring me the—”

  But Stonewall was already there, holding out a tin cup.

  Jace tipped his head towards me & Stonewall gave me the cup.

  “Use that cup,” said Jace. “If one of the men playing poker with me has dancing feet, I want you to shake your cup so it jingles a little. Not a castanet, you understand. Just a little clink. Then put it back down on the ground with the handle pointing towards the man who holds the best cards. Like the needle of a compass. That will show me who has a good hand.”

  “That is cheating,” I said.

  “Not really,” said Jace, wiping his mouth & mustache with a napkin. “If you were looking at his cards, that would be cheating.”

  I thought about it. “All right,” I said.

  “If you see someone’s foot kick out, or if he pulls his feet back beneath his chair, what will that mean?”

  “That he has bad cards?”

  “Most likely. In that case I want you to keep hold of the cup but make sure the handle points towards the man who is nervous. Got it?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Jingle for good hand, then cup on the floor. Keep it in my hand if someone is twitchy.”

  “And remember to point the handle. But be discreet. Now, usually those Two-Bit Saloons won’t tolerate beggars but I gave one of the barmen a silver half-dollar and asked him to be nice to any Blanket Indians.”

  I nodded to show I understood.

  “If I think we are in danger of being discovered, I want you to vamoose. This will be my signal: I will untie this cravat from around my neck and tuck it in my front pocket. You can come back here, but don’t let anybody see you. Stonewall will show you the tradesmen’s entrance. Can you do that? Can you find your way back here if necessary?”

  “Yes. I am real good at sneaking.”

  “Good. Then go in the other room and put on those clothes.”

  Ledger Sheet 37

  I WENT INTO JACE’S BEDROOM to change.

  It was real nice. It had a brass four-poster bed and a big wooden wardrobe and some striped wallpaper. I took off my high-tone trousers and shirt and was glad to put on my own buckskins. The blanket was pale yellow & nicer than any blanket I had ever seen a begging Indian wear. But I dutifully wrapped it around my shoulders and went back out.

  “Not bad,” said Jace, looking me up and down. “But your face is too clean. Come here.”

  I went over to him. He dipped the fingertips of his right hand into some cool ashes in front of the fire & then stroked them across my face. After a moment’s consideration he added some ash smudges to the pale yellow blanket, too. “That’s better,” he said. “But there’s still something missing.”

  He went to the hat stand & took down a black slouch hat with a hawk feather in the band.

  “I won this off an Indian last week,” said Jace. “Lucky I kept it.”

  As I put on the hat, I caught a whiff of bear fat, which made me think of my Indian ma. The hat was slightly too big & came down over my eyes. So I took the folded wanted poster from m
y medicine pouch & crumpled it up & stuck it up inside the crown of the hat & tried it on again. This time it did not impede my vision.

  Jace nodded and blew smoke up. “Go back in there and have a look at yourself in the mirror,” he said.

  I went back into the bedroom and stood before a full-length mirror on the wall. I saw a grubby Blanket Indian with an expressionless face staring back at me. I noticed the eyes beneath the brim of the oversized hat were real dark, like Jace’s, so you could not easily see the black part get bigger or smaller. What was the word Jace had used? Inscrutable.

  I felt pleased at what I saw, but I noticed my expression did not change one whit.

  “Stop admiring yourself,” said Jace from the doorway.

  How could he tell? Then I noticed the toe of my right moccasin was pointing at the ceiling. I was not even aware of it. I dropped my foot and looked at Jace.

  He may have winked at me, but I could not be sure.

  “Stonewall,” said Jace. “Take P.K. down to Almack’s. I will see you there in twenty minutes or so.”

  Stonewall was sucking a lemon wedge. He tossed it into the fire & rose up out of his chair. Then he went to the coat-rack & put on his coat & hat & gun belt.

  I followed Stonewall out of the room. As we went along a plush corridor I said, “Would you really have blown my brains out today?”

  He stared at me with his left eye. His right eye was looking somewhere else.

  He said, “Course not. I was just trying to scare you into giving me any gold pieces you might of stole off Jace.”

  I nodded. That made me feel a little better.

  “Why are you called Stonewall?” I said.

  “Do you know who Stonewall Jackson is?” he said in his growly voice.

  “Yes,” I said. “He is a famous general in the Reb army.”

  Stonewall said, “He is a military genius. I call myself after him because I do not like my real name.”

  “I don’t like my real name neither,” I said.

  Stonewall grunted & opened an unmarked white door. Narrow stairs led down & we emerged right onto the boardwalk of C Street.