"I have. Brought a rig and crew down, and I've got more coming. Just to drill someone else's well, I get around five thousand dollars."
"Good heavens."
"And I've my own land and leases here. I'm going to be a very rich man, Jessie. Doesn't that interest you?"
Her face closed. Did he really think money would make her forgive what he had done, make her expose her family any further to his plotting? As he became more powerful, he could only become more dangerous.
"I guess money doesn't interest you,” he decided bitterly. “Reckon that comes of always having had it. Hey, Turner!” He had turned away from her to hail someone at another table. “Where's André Malliol living?"
"Oh, he's got him a house out in Spindletop Heights. He's tradin’ land and leases an’ rentin’ ever’ room in his place to three or four boomers for as much as the traffic will bear."
The man laughed, but Jessica gasped in indignation. Obviously Malliol was working only for himself and ignoring his responsibilities to her grandfather while he used her grandfather's house as his base and a source of personal profit.
"There you are,” said Travis. “That what you wanted to know? I have to get out to my crew, but I'll see if I can find you a train ticket back to Fort Worth. Tell Oliver if he wants me to deal with Malliol for him, I'll do it.” He waved the waiter over and paid the two dollars for their plates of ham and eggs, plus a four-dollar tip.
"Travis,” exclaimed Jessica, “have you gone mad? You overtipped that waiter outrageously."
"You either tip four or five dollars, or the next time you come for a meal, the service takes forever and they've just run out of most everything on the menu you order. Now do you want me to go to the railroad station with you?"
"No, I'll take care of it myself,” said Jessica absently. She had already decided to find the sheriff and have Mr. Malliol and his boarders removed from her grandfather's property. If they weren't paying rent, they'd have to go. Then she could stay in the house while she interviewed people to take over Mr. Malliol's neglected duties. With all the men milling around town, it shouldn't be too hard to hire a replacement. She'd have to find a telephone and call Oliver long distance to tell him her plans. “Good-bye, Travis. Thank you for breakfast,” she said with cool politeness as they emerged from the restaurant.
He gave her an angry look and strode away.
André Malliol, a weasely looking fellow, short and slender with dark, lank hair, found it inordinately amusing that a strange young woman would expect him and his paying guests to vacate the house in which they were living. His amusement disappeared when the sheriff, at Jessica's request, arrived with the proper legal papers and the weaponry to effect an eviction.
Ras Landry made so impressive an appearance that Jessica could hardly keep from grinning. He had a face suitably stern that could be transformed by an amiable smile if he were so inclined. He had a soft Louisiana accent, but otherwise seemed the quintessential Westerner with his wide-brimmed white hat, his beautifully tooled boots, and his two pearl-handled revolvers with which, one of his deputies had told her in a voice hushed with reverence, the sheriff was “very handy.” Mr. Malliol too must have heard of the sheriff's talent with his fancy guns, for her grandfather's ex-business manager left without further argument, he and two other men then in the house.
Having cleared the place of occupants, the sheriff advised her not to think too badly of Mr. Malliol. “Everyone's gone oil mad, Miz Parnell,” he said. “No one wants to work for regular wages when they think they can strike it rich an easier way. Now, I'll just tack up this notice on your door that the owner has repossessed the house. We got the belongings of the boarders who haven't come in yet out on the porch, and here's a shotgun for you to keep a few days till those who lived here are convinced they can't come back. You know how to use a shotgun?"
Jessica had no intention of using the shotgun, but she thanked the sheriff for his concern and, bidding him good-bye, turned to the pigsty in which she would have to spend a night or two. It was disgusting; Malliol and his boarders had left the house grimy and littered. Putting water on to boil, she considered which room to attack first. Even the water was disgusting. It smelled bad. And the sheriff had warned her not to drink it unboiled, lest she contract “the Beaumonts,” evidently a virulent form of diarrhea which Ras Landry was too gentlemanly to explain with any clarity.
General Phil Sheridan had been quite right about Texas, thought Jessica, at least as his comments applied to Beaumont. She too would rent it out. Hell could hardly be worse. In fact, she intended to rent out this particular part of Beaumont once she had cleaned it up. She ought to be able to get a fortune for a decent house even if it was surrounded with oily muck and assaulted by revolting smells and noises.
Tomorrow she'd have to walk into town since she was not about to spend twenty dollars of her grandfather's money on a hack ride. Should she be unable to hire a man immediately, perhaps she could rent a bicycle. Yes, that was a cheering thought, the only one she'd had since finding Travis still alive. It would be a joy to ride a bicycle again.
The thought of pleasure immediately brought to mind Travis's kiss. Oh Lord, how vulnerable she still was! Swallowing back the pain of her hopeless love for him, she took up a mop she'd found unused in a corner, lifted the hot water from the stove, and set to work.
Jessica faced the morning bleary-eyed. After three attempted intrusions by Malliol's former boarders, she had been too nervous to sleep again. Each time in the night when anxiety or intruders awakened her, she rose, lit an oil lamp, and added another paragraph or two to her article for the Gazette on her impressions of Beaumont and Spindletop. Once in town she planned to post the material, but she hoped fervently that the day would see a reliable man hired to replace Malliol so that she could leave.
She donned the other outfit she had brought with her, a walking skirt, a smart blouse with a choker collar, a jacket, and sturdy boots. Then she set out on the three- or four-mile walk. Jessica was dusty and tired by the time she arrived, only to discover that she must share her breakfast table with three drummers from east Texas who had come to sell various products and stayed to make their fortunes, although none had yet achieved that aim.
As soon as the first finished his breakfast, another man, tall and broad with a full mustache and a slight Germanic accent, dropped into the chair and introduced himself as Captain Anthony Lucas. Jessica's eyes went wide. “The Captain Lucas who brought in the first well?” she asked.
"Yes, madam,” he replied with formal courtesy. “Do I understand that you represent the Duplessis lumber interests?"
Jessica nodded doubtfully. If he had some complaint, she didn't know how she could answer it, being totally unacquainted with the state of her grandfather's business in Beaumont. She assumed that it must be chaotic after Malliol's defection.
"Thank the gut Lord,” murmured Captain Lucas. “You may have heard of the fire on the oil lake below my vell."
Again Jessica nodded.
"Ve haf lost three carloads of lumber as vell as a frame building that housed eighty men."
Jessica tried to look sympathetic while wondering why the man was interrupting her breakfast with his tale of woe.
"Ve need lumber."
So that was it. “I'm hoping to hire a man today to run my grandfather's business here in Beaumont. Shall I send him to you as soon as—"
"You haf the power to act for your grandfather?"
"Well, yes, but—"
He made an offer on enough board feet to replace his losses, a good offer. Jessica smiled pleasantly and reiterated that she would be glad to send her grandfather's manager to conclude the deal as soon as she had hired a manager. The captain looked impatient and made a better offer. Jessica sighed, put down her fork, and said, “Since I have just arrived in town, Captain Lucas, and have no idea what the market price is—” He made an offer that Jessica considered ludicrously high, too high to pass up. “Very well, sir,” she replied,
“I shall arrange for delivery by week's end, provided that, after inquiry, I do not find your offer under the market."
"Madam, you vill not,” the captain assured her and, beaming, shook her hand. “By veek's end,” he repeated happily as he went away. The remaining salesmen looked at her with respect as she consumed her last piece of ham, took her last sip of coffee, and tipped the waiter what she considered to be a more ludicrous amount than Captain Lucas had offered for her grandfather's timber. Then she went to the Crosby House and posted a notice of the job as Duplessis manager, to the post office to mail her newspaper article to Fort Worth, and to various stores in search of a rental bicycle so that she would not have to walk home.
As it happened, there were only two bicycles not privately owned in Beaumont, both the property of a merchant who desperately wanted to rid himself of a product for which there was no market. He refused to rent one of his machines to Jessica, although it had the drop frame devised specifically for ladies. Instead he offered her a very good price to induce her to buy. Sighing, Jessica agreed, although she would have to take it back on the train and would then own two bicycles.
She walked her new machine back to the Crosby House, not an easy feat with so many people on the sidewalks, and was disappointed to discover that no job hunters had applied for the position. Jessica went to the newspaper to put in an advertisement and then to visit the mayor, a round man dressed to the nines but absolutely discouraging about her prospects of finding a man, any man, to take the job.
By late afternoon, thoroughly disheartened and unwilling to take another meal in one of Beaumont's overcrowded, understaffed restaurants, she purchased groceries and pedaled the three or four miles back to her house, where she found and gave short shrift to yet another Malliol boarder. She spent the evening washing sheets in an iron kettle and writing an article on boom towns where well-paid jobs went begging while fools pursued will-o'-the-wisp dreams of wealth and power.
Chapter Nineteen
Jessica interviewed two men in the next two days. One was drunk; the second offered to take the job in return for a lease on some property Oliver owned west of Spindletop. Thoroughly discouraged, she secured Captain Lucas's lumber herself, although she had to travel east by train and hack, staying overnight in another strange town, to set up increased shipping from her grandfather's sources. When she returned to Beaumont she was glad of her foresight, because other drillers approached her with orders. Evidently the local lumber king, a Mr. Carroll, could not meet the demand, which made Jessica wonder how much business her grandfather had lost because of his manager's defection.
A message from a Mr. Tolliver also awaited her on her return, and she hoped fervently that he would be an acceptable candidate for the job she was now doing. Instead he proved to be a bluff, fast-talking man who claimed to own the land on which her Spindletop Heights house stood. To Jessica that was the last straw. She was exhausted from her long journey, from having had little sleep in a strange bed, and from the strain of trying to do business with lumbermen who thought women belonged in the nursery with the babies, not on the road issuing instructions to their betters. In one case, it had taken an irate telegram from her grandfather to move a stubborn employee to cooperate.
And now some shifty-eyed cheat thought he was going to claim her house, the house she had scrubbed herself, the very bed where she planned to drop as soon as possible for twelve, maybe fourteen hours of sleep. She rounded on an astonished Mr. Tolliver and snapped, “I suppose you're going to tell me you have ownership papers to the icebox I cleaned out before I left, to the sheets I washed, to the—"
"Lady,” interrupted Mr. Tolliver, “I ain't interested in your household goods. I just want to hire a drillin’ rig an'—"
"Well, let me tell you, Mr. Tolliver, I can cite the deed history of that piece of land back to the days of the Republic of Texas, back to Spanish land grant times."
Mr. Tolliver looked taken aback. “Now, ma'am, I got this conveyance—” he fumbled in his coat pocket and brought out a wrinkled piece of paper “—from John Jack Placerman."
"What is that?” Jessica snatched the paper from his hand.
"Like I said, it's a conveyance."
"This is not a legal document."
"No, ma'am. It's—well, it was an inside wrapper from some Mail Pouch chewing tobacco."
"You're claiming my grandfather's land on the basis of something scribbled on a chewing-tobacco wrapper?"
"Well, you bein’ a lady, ma'am, you probably don't realize—"
"Mr. Tolliver,” said Jessica haughtily, “I studied law for three years at Columbian University in Washington City, the capital of our country, so do not try to tell me what is and is not legal."
"You're a lawyer?” Had she declared herself a brown bear, Mr. Tolliver could not have been more surprised.
"If anyone actually took your money for that chewing-tobacco wrapper, Mr. Tolliver, you'd best take him to court, for you won't have a prayer against my grandfather and me. Our title to that land is unassailable."
"Maybe we could strike a deal on the mineral rights,” said Mr. Tolliver. “It ain't like I care about the house. We could each put up—"
"Good day, sir.” Jessica slapped the tobacco wrapper into his hand, stalked away to retrieve her bicycle from the merchant who had sold it to her, purchased groceries, and went home. Mr. Tolliver, she reflected with satisfaction, had undoubtedly thought he could hornswoggle her because she was a woman. Realizing that she would probably be the object of further such efforts, she resolved to research her grandfather's land holdings at the county courthouse.
On subsequent days she rode her bicycle into Beaumont, carried out her studies at the courthouse, took several more substantial lumber orders, saw to the early delivery of Captain Lucas's order, established a bank account with his payment, and fended off men who wanted to lease the land on the hill. She always smiled sweetly and said, “I am not interested in disposing of the drilling rights at this time."
The answer usually prompted a higher offer. In fact, the whole process intrigued her, and she became quite curious as to how high a bid would ultimately be made. Of course, she did not plan to accept. Jessica didn't want an oil derrick in her front yard and had no intention of entering a lease agreement as long as she had to live in the house. Her grandfather seemed to think that might be for some time, or so she surmised when he sent her law books and most of her clothes after she informed him of the additional lumber orders she had negotiated. However, though she did not want to lease her yard, she was learning a lot about how the agreements worked. Beaumont and Spindletop might be unsavory, but they were fascinating.
Because of her courthouse researches, she could now drive off people who made bogus claims on her grandfather's land by treating them to extensive discussions of deed history and land law. Although she knew the court dockets to be crowded with suits, none had been filed against her grandfather since her arrival. In fact, she had been so successful in fending off would-be claimants that two suits were dropped and several men had asked legal advice of her, which was flattering. Would they pay her? she wondered. Would it be legal for her to accept fees? She'd have to find out.
In the meantime, she needed to call her grandfather about wholesaling hardware here in Beaumont. The orders were to be had, and the prices being charged were phenomenal. She herself had bought a hammer to nail down a loose shutter at her house and been astonished at the cost. After making her purchase, she talked to the store owner about the possibility of buying from Duplessis Hardware. The man expressed an interest, although he was more interested in rumors about the latest lease offer she'd refused.
"Good for you, little lady,” he'd said admiringly. “Wish I had some land up there, although I don't know if I could hold out the way you've been doing.” Jessica gave him an enigmatic smile, but wondered if she should tell her grandfather of the offers. She might be depriving him of good money because of her own selfish desire to avoid oil raining down o
n her roof or a well catching fire in her front yard. Jessica shuddered at the thought and decided to court local admiration a while longer, at least until someone took over for her.
She had reached the point of suggesting that her grandfather send a manager from Fort Worth, but he insisted during their last telephone conversation that he had no one to send, certainly no one who could do as competent a job as she. His praise was welcome, but would he feel so pleased if he knew of the offers she had refused?
"Jessica?"
She looked up into the eyes of her husband. Now she knew why he had stayed away. He hadn't heard that she was still in town, not if his surprise and indignation were any indication. “Goodness, Travis, you're just the man I needed to see,” she improvised quickly.
Travis frowned. “You mean you came back to town to see me?"
"Well, no. Actually, I haven't left—except for a quick trip to east Texas. I just have one question.” She'd ask him whether her latest offer on the Spindletop land was a good one, for she really did want to know, not that she could be sure Travis would give her reliable advice. Oliver might trust him; she didn't. Still, this way she could talk to him impersonally for a few minutes, then make her escape. How wonderful he looked in his flat-crowned hat, jeans, and boots, but wearing only a plaid wool shirt and a leather vest against the nippy March weather.
"Where are you staying?” he demanded.
"My grandfather's house on Spindletop Heights."
"My God, you're not up there by yourself?"
"Yes, Travis, I am. Now my question—"
"I'll see you home and have a look at the place."
He sounded extremely irritated as he took her elbow in one large, rather grimy hand and turned her down the street. “I'm not finished with my business,” Jessica protested. She did not want Travis coming home with her.
"I don't know what Oliver's thinking of, letting you stay here in Beaumont by yourself."
"Let go of me, Travis. My bicycle is back there at—"
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