The Seekers

by F. M. Parker

  Chapter 17

  Errin followed the tracks of the highwaymen south with the Sierra Nevada Mountains rearing up on his left and the wide San Joaquin Valley below him on the right. He approached every ridge top warily, and stopped often to scrutinize the land ahead to check the ravines, the boulder fields, and brush thickets where the thieves could hide and spring a trap on him.

  As he trailed the bandits, the sun had passed overhead and the shadows swung around to point long, dark fingers to the east. The fields of brush had dwindled to but patches, and the dry, wild grass threw a brown blanket over the land. The terrain had become ever rougher with dry watercourses separating long steep ridges that ran down into the valley. The serrated land looked as if some giant lion had clawed the flank of the mountain.

  He climbed his horse up a sharp, rocky ridge and looked over. He ducked quickly, for the robbers were in the valley less than a quarter mile distant. The two men had transferred the pack saddles to fresh horses. Now they were reloading the last of the bars and pouches of gold, from where they had been temporarily stacked on the ground, back into the leather pouches of the pack saddles. Without delay the thieves swung astride their mounts, and leading the packhorses, headed due west down the narrow valley.

  Errin pulled out his map and studied it, comparing the features shown there with the land spread before him. He had heard the robbers mention reaching the Sacramento River before daylight. First they had traveled south some twenty miles. Now on their westerly heading they would pass well clear of the town of Sacramento and strike the river some ten miles downstream from the town. Errin had heard them say that a boat would be waiting, and once away, they would leave no trail for a lawman to follow. The robbers and the gold would disappear.

  He reined his horse around and hurried it down into the creek valley behind him. That valley ran west paralleling the one the thieves traveled. He raised his black to a gallop along the gravelly creek bottom.

  Half an hour later and five miles farther along, the ridge that separated Errin from the route he thought the bandits would take had shrunk to a third of its original size. He rode up to the top and stopped in a patch of oak brush to look down into the valley beyond.

  Nothing moved in the narrow creek bottom below him. Could he have made a mistake in his reasoning of what the men would do? Perhaps they were riding more slowly than he had anticipated. He would wait a little while, and if they did not show, he would be forced to go looking for them.

  Errin’s blood began to strum through his veins for at the bend of the creek upstream, two riders leading packhorses had come into view. His quarry was in sight and now he would take the stolen gold from the thieves for himself. From the way the packhorses moved under heavy loads, the gold must be worth a fortune. He leaned forward low on the neck of his mount and went down through the brush into the valley ahead of the riders.

  * * *

  Lasch reined his horse to a stop. With a worried expression, he twisted around and cast a sharp look behind, and then up at the tops of the ridges both left and right.

  “What’s botherin’ you?” Toll asked.

  “Something’s wrong. Don’t you feel it?”

  “Nope. There’s no way anybody could know where we’re at.”

  Lasch continued to scan the land around him. He stared ahead at the patches of brush bordering the gravelly creek bed. Everything lay quiet and unmoving except where the slow wind stirred the brush on the hilltop. Yet some warning gnawed at him.

  “I feel someone or something’s watching us,” he said.

  “Deer or wolf, that’s all it could be. No sheriff could be close to us.”

  “Could be a cowhand or sheep herder. We wouldn’t want them to see us.”

  “I haven’t seen either sheep or cows. Let’s get onto the river. It’ll soon be dark.”

  “All right,” Lasch said reluctantly. He kicked his mount ahead.

  * * *

  Errin, hidden in a dense clump of bushes, remained motionless as the men halted and sat their mounts. He heard them talking. The man Lasch was a wary animal. Then they came on, each man and horse drawing a long dark shadow behind.

  The clank of iron hooves on the stones of the creek bottom grew loud as the robbers drew close to Errin. He watched them through the bushes, measuring them. Lasch was a narrow, high-shouldered man. He looked wiry. He would be very quick. The second man was square built with a large round head. Errin hoped the men would surrender their gold without a fight for he didn’t want to have to shoot them.

  The men were close enough. Errin pulled his pistol and cocked it. He leapt out from the brush and into a position where he could see both riders. “Halt!” he shouted, pointing his pistol.

  Lasch’s horse, startled by Errin’s sudden appearance, reared high, its hooves pawing the air. The robber jerked the reins tightly to hold the horse up on its hind legs. He shifted in the saddle to be shielded from Errin’s pistol by the brute’s thick body. In the same instant, he grabbed his pistol and fired down at the man on the ground.

  Errin sprang aside as the horse reared and the outlaw’s gun crashed. He felt the wind from the passing bullet on the side of his face.

  He quickly shot up at the rider. His bullet drove in under Lasch’s ribs, plowed upward at an angle and tore free at the shoulder. Lasch tumbled from the saddle.

  Errin swung the barrel of his revolver to the second robber, hoping fervently the man wouldn’t fight. The outlaw, his face hard and determined, had drawn his pistol and was lifting it to point at Errin.

  Errin fired quickly at the broad chest of the man. The outlaw shuddered at the impact of the bullet. He rocked backward. His feet came loose of the stirrups and he rolled to the ground.

  Breathing hard, Errin stared at the corpses of the two highwaymen. It had been a futile wish to think they would give up the gold without a fight. He shouldn’t take their deaths too seriously for they were killers. He bent and went through their pockets and took their wallets.

  He stripped the saddle and bridle from both riding horses and slapped the animals away to fend for themselves. Leading the packhorses carrying the gold, Errin returned to the black. He rode toward the sullen red orb of the sun lying on the peaks of the California Coast Range. The mountains seemed to bleed.

  * * *

  The hours stretched long and weary as Errin traveled through the shadow-filled night. His eyes probed ahead in the dim light of the three-quarter moon. He had left the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains far behind and now journeyed across the wide wheat fields on the bottom of the San Joaquin Valley.

  Lasch had talked about the Sacramento River and a boat to transport the gold to a safe place. Errin had no boat waiting. He must climb over the Coast Range to the town of Oakland. There he could catch a ferry across the bay to San Francisco.

  He stepped down to walk and take the load off his tired mount. There was nothing he could do to ease the burden of the heavily laden packhorses. Nor would he stop, for he must be off the flat valley bottom and in the mountains before daylight caught him. The farmers would be coming early into the fields and must not see him.

  The moon dropped behind the mountains and heavy darkness blanketed the land. Errin saw a star lose its mooring in the black heavens and fall streaking to the north where it disappeared in a final winking flash. He stopped and stared at the spot where the light had vanished. The exhausted animals halted and stood motionless around him. An eerie calm settled around him as if the whole elaborate clockwork of the universe had ceased ticking.

  A bleak, disquieting emotion welled up within Errin. He had killed two men, and even though they were murderers, he hadn’t been able to shake the weight of their deaths. Worse still was the fact that he had fallen so very easily back into his old ways of being a “two pops and a galloper,” a highwayman. It had been only a few days past when he had told Levi that they were in a new land and could start a new life. Should he continue on with being a robber, he might one day kill an inno
cent man. He never wanted to make that grievous error. He felt the ghost of the end that awaited him hanging on the gallows.

  His thoughts focused on Levi. The younger man had proved to be a good comrade and partner. What would he think should he discover Errin had Wells Fargo’s stolen gold? Errin knew one thing for certain, he didn’t want to lose Levi as a friend.

  He shook himself. He was damn tired and that was what was causing his gloomy thoughts. Exasperated at himself, he tugged on the horse’s bridle reins. “Let’s get on.”

  * * *

  The murky shadows of the night died slowly upon the Diablo Mountains. The first frail light of the coming morning dawn caught Errin above the floor of the San Joaquin Valley and halfway up the flank of Mount Mocho. He had found the perfect hiding place for his gold, a field of boulders a few yards distant from an outcrop of lava rock protruding from the mountainside. He could return and easily find this exact spot again. Now to get the task done before daylight came.

  No one must observe what he was about to do. He pivoted about, his eyes straining to pierce the gloomy dusk. The mountainside to the north lay empty. Behind him, the land sloping down into the valley was void of life. He faced south. He jerked, startled at what he saw. A rider sat his mount not a hundred yards distant and watching him.

  Errin was jolted at the totally unexpected presence of the steed and rider and their complete stillness. How had they drawn so close without him seeing them? The horse was of a light gray color and, even in the gloom, seemed to catch light from somewhere and glow with a silver aura. At the same time the slender rider, garbed in some manner of dark clothing, blended almost perfectly into the mountain behind him. As Errin peered through the dim light, the rider seemed to fade in and out, to be there astride his motionless mount one moment and then the next to disappear, like a transparent rider upon a supernatural steed.

  Damn weird, thought Errin as he raised his hand acknowledging the silent rider’s presence. Where did this fellow come from, and why now just at the precise moment Errin was preparing to stash the gold? It was strange that he would be out riding at an hour much too dark for a working cowboy to be about. A feeling came over Errin that the appearance of the rider had some significance. Was he an omen? And if so, an omen of what?

  The man made no response to Errin’s greeting. He simply sat upon his mount facing Errin, and watching him, at least Errin thought so but could not tell for the man’s features were not discernible because of the lighting and distance.

  Errin leaned forward, concentrating on the slender rider. He was flesh and blood, but whether man or woman, Errin could not be certain one way or the other. Was he, or she, the owner of the land where he had selected a place to hide his gold? Regardless of that, the rider had seen Errin with loaded pack-horses at an hour when men should not be traveling. Errin’s plan was spoiled.

  He turned away from the silent rider upon his luminous mount. Leading his horse, Errin went up the mountainside. He must rethink what he would do.

  * * *

  Errin caught the last ferry of the day from Oakland just before it cast off for the trip across the bay to San Francisco. Two rough-looking men, leading their saddle horses, followed him on board the ferry.

  The men, both armed with pistols, had been waiting for the ferry as he came down through the town to the docks. Errin recognized them as part of the gang. They were the two who had dug the trench across the road that had wrecked the wagons of Wells Fargo’s gold shipment. Now they were eyeing the weary pack-horses that were obviously heavily loaded but with something of small bulk.

  Errin turned his back to the men. Upon leaving the strange horseman on the side of Mount Mocho, he had never again considered hiding the gold and later recovering it. For some reason he could not explain even to himself, he took the unexpected appearance of the rider as a sign that he should not keep the stolen gold.

  He had considered the fact that news of the robbery and the death of the four guards would be widely known and because of that he was running a large risk in bringing the gold to San Francisco. Should someone discover what he carried, they could notify the law and he would be arrested as a thief. But never had he thought that he would encounter some members of the gang of robbers who had stolen the gold. Should the men identify the packhorses, they would most likely jump Errin at the first opportunity.

  Night was falling on San Francisco when the ferry docked. Errin mounted his weary black and towing the exhausted pack-horses left the ferry and went onto the waterfront. He checked behind for the robbers and saw them go off along The Embarcadero. Much relieved that the men were not following him, he climbed into the darkening city toward Sansome Street and the Wells Fargo Office.

  A few minutes later Errin was approaching Louden’s office. From half a block distant, he saw the windows of the office were bright with yellow lamplight. Now if Louden was only there.

  In front of the building, he dismounted stiff and weary and tied the horses to the hitching rail. When Errin shoved open the door and entered, Louden was at his desk with three armed men.

  “Hello, Errin,” Louden said. He noted the dusty, exhausted condition of the man. What did the fellow want at this late hour?

  “These your men?” Errin asked.

  “Yes,” Louden replied. “Why?”

  “I got something outside that belongs to you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “About five to six hundred pounds of gold.”

  Louden sprang to his feet. “Gold! You’ve got the gold?”

  “Yep. Brought it to you. Better get it off the street and locked up someplace safe.”

  “Go bring it in,” Louden ordered the men. He spoke to Errin. “Sit down, you look worn out. How come you’ve got the gold?”

  “I happened to see the robbery, but couldn’t stop it. There were too many thieves. So I followed the two that went off with the gold. They decided to fight when I wanted the gold and I had to shoot them. Maybe you know who they were.” He took the wallets from his pocket and tossed them onto the desk in front of Louden.

  Louden studied Errin’s grim face. The Englishman was more than he appeared. Louden picked up the wallets. “Lasch, by God. So that sonofabitch was one of them.”

  “He acted like he was the leader. You’ll see that other man was named Toll.”

  Louden looked inside the second wallet. “Yes, I see. I don’t know him. How many other men were with Lasch?”

  “Five. They went off in different directions. I saw two of them on the ferry when I crossed from Oakland.”

  “That’s good news. You give the Pinkerton agents a description and they’ll go looking for them.”

  The men came inside carrying the leather pouches from the pack saddles. They piled them on Louden’s desk.

  “You’ll find some of the nuggets missing,” Errin said. “Lasch gave them to his men to spend. He told them they’d get the rest of their share when the gold bars had been exchanged for paper money.”

  “Did he say how he would make the trade for paper?”

  “No. He acted like it would be easy to do.”

  “I wish I knew who would make the exchange. Do you know the value of the gold?” Louden asked.

  “Haven’t any idea,” Errin said.

  “Not considering part of the nuggets are missing, fifty-eight thousand dollars.”

  “I knew it had to be a fortune,” Errin said. He felt a tinge of highwayman’s regret at having given up the gold.

  Louden studied Errin. “Have you been in town since the robbery?”

  “Nope. Just followed the robbers and then came overland to Oakland to catch the ferry.”

  “Well there’s something you should know. After I heard of the robbery and the death of my men, I posted a reward for the return of the gold. Ten percent of whatever was recovered. That comes to five thousand and eight hundred dollars. I also promised a reward of five hundred dollars for each and every thief. I owe you a sizeable amount of money.”
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  “Well, I’ll be damned,” exclaimed Errin. “I didn’t expect any reward.”

  “You’re an honest man. Come by my office in the morning and I’ll have a bank draft ready for you.”

  Maybe I’m becoming too honest, Errin thought. Oh, well, it’s too late now. “I’ll be here bright and early. But you’d better make the draft out to both Levi and me. We’re partners and have agreed to share everything half and half. Except for women.”

  Chapter 18

  “The Germans are damn fine workers,” the construction foreman told Levi.

  “Glad to hear that,” Levi replied as he watched the score of men fasten the strong bracing beams to the pilings that had been sunk deeply into the floor of San Francisco Bay by a steam piledriver. In a few more days the five-hundred-foot extension of the pier would be completed, and he, or Errin, would have to find new employment for the men. “Don’t forget us when your next job comes up.”

  “I’ll give you first chance to bid.”

  “Thanks,” Levi said. He moved off along the pier toward the shore. With Errin gone to the gold fields, Levi had posted Green in the office while he took on Errin’s task of visiting the workplaces of their contract craftsmen. He enjoyed being outside in the city rather than performing office duties regardless how important they were.

  He came to a tall-masted sailing ship tied up to the pier. A puffing steam engine was hoisting a cargo net full of long, narrow crates aboard the ship. Curious as to what might be the contents of the containers, Levi spoke to the seaman standing nearby and watching the loading. “What’s in those crates?” Levi asked.

  “Coffins. Each one has a dead Chinaman in it all ready for burial back in their country.”

  “That’s a long way to go to be buried,” Levi said as the cargo net swung down into the hold of the ship.

  “Every Chinaman that has money when he dies is shipped home to be buried with his ancestors. The Flying Cloud will carry two hundred of them back. That French steamship just there,” the seaman pointed at the ship next along the pier, “is carrying three hundred and twenty corpses. Those Chinamen who are poor have just their bones sent home. The Pacific took seven hundred sets of bones last week. It was in all the newspapers. That was the biggest number ever on one ship.”