“Not now—” Jack shook his head and looked again at Sir Rowan. “You were saying—there’s no way to get to Austin quicker than three days?”
“I said a motor-carriage. They can go thirty miles in an hour. Some almost a hundred on a hard road.”
“Yes, Sir. Ok, I’ll ask: Is there an automobile in this town?”
Sir Rowan raised one eyebrow and rubbed the white hairs erupting from his chin. “Only one. Mine.”
“Yours?” Iain frowned. “You have an automobile?”
“You find that surprising?” asked Sir Rowan.
“Aye, I do,” said Iain.
“Better than any horse. It never kicks or bites. It bucks a bit. It does that.”
“And fuel?” asked Jack. “Do you have—?”
“Young man, would you ask a man if he has grain for his horse?”
***
Thirty minutes later, behind the store, the Pinkertons were getting driving instructions, with Iain standing by, laughing each time Jack ground the gearbox from neutral to the go gear.
“If you can’t manage better,” yelled Sir Rowan, unamused, “then I’m afraid only the big, annoying fellow can drive. I’d truly prefer otherwise.”
“I’ll get it, I’ll get it,” cried Jack, puttering the car forward. As he did, the back of the car came into Iain’s view. Attached there was a small board with painted words:
SIR ROWAN - FARRIER - BM1.
Iain motioned toward it. “What’s that?”
“That’s my boot sign for my horse services. Isn’t it clever? And it has the number of my telephone on it. BM1. Number one in Battle Mountain.”
“How many telephones are there, here?”
“One.”
“Oh,” said Iain, watching Jack attempt to turn the automobile around at the end of the street. “You’re a farrier, too?”
“I am.”
Iain grinned. “An English farrier of two horses in a one-telephone, one-automobile desert town.”
“Other horses come through. Jackasses too.”
“They won’t if those things take over,” said Iain, pointing toward the Oldsmobile.
“That’s the irony of the sign, don’t you see? It being on my auto,” Sir Rowan giggled. “The farrier’s auto. Do you understand?”
“Not really.” Iain kept his gaze on the automobile. It was almost back to them, but Jack had no intention of stopping—or perhaps he couldn’t. In any case, Jack drove past Iain and Sir Rowan, cackling joyfully from behind the wheel.
***
The automobile was Oldsmobile Model N, the Touring Runabout sort. It was green with yellow pinstripes and white rubber tires. Its steering wheel was in front of the right, front seat, and under both front seats was a seven-horse-power engine. On the front was a hooded box, the “French sort,” containing the machine’s water, gas, and batteries. There was no windshield, but two matching pairs of goggles were provided.
Sir Rowan was all too happy to tell its story. It had been abandoned the same year it was made, 1904, when the owner attempted to drive it from San Francisco to New York. But that journey came to an abrupt and noisy halt near Battle Mountain when the crankshaft bolts sheared away. The man took the next train back to Sacramento, pledging he would return for his precious wiz wagon. But he never did.
At that time, the local blacksmith, a seventy-eight-year-old Civil War veteran—whom Sir Rowan referred to as “my dear friend” and “the kindest man you could ever know if you were lucky enough to live so long”—kept the automobile covered in a shed. As the months passed, the blacksmith learned to repair and drive the machine; and when he died (eight months and six days ago), he bequeathed the vehicle and his farrier business to the Englishman who owned the mercantile and saloon, Sir Edmond Rowan, the blacksmith’s partner and fellow Confederate.
***
By 2:00, Jack had mastered the brake, clutch, and fuel pedals, and got the Oldsmobile putt-putting along steadily. So they loaded it for the journey to Austin. With the “farrier” sign removed, a rear cargo platform had been rigged to hold bags, guns, food, extra water and fuel, a block and tackle, a hundred feet of hemp rope, a hand pump, and extra tubes for the tires. Sir Rowan then gave them final instructions: under no circumstances should they attempt to go across open country. In fact, they should never leave the railroad’s right-of-way at all. They paid him three hundred dollars—almost all the money they had left—a price based on Sir Rowan’s prediction that he would soon be coming, on Hector’s other horse, to recover his machine, or what was left of it.
***
As instructed, they followed the railroad right of way—smoothed from decades of slow wagon, cattle, and sheep traffic. After passing a water station at Dillon, Nevada, an hour into the journey, the thrill of motoring began to fade. They settled in to watching the road ahead, bracing themselves for each jolt and bump. Encountering no one on the road, they saw only occasional cowpunchers on yellow splotches of grass in the shimmering distance.
In the second hour, as the sun poured itself on them, Iain began a lecture on the peculiarities of aerodynamics.
“It makes no sense,” said Jack. “I don’t think you know what you’re gummin on about. They’re wings—they have to flap.”
Iain grew frustrated. “It’s about the flow of the air. A bird flaps to make air go over its wings. Stop, stop!” he exclaimed, pointing at a hawk. Jack slowed and stopped, but kept the engine idling. “See? He only flaps to maintain speed, to keep air moving over him. Or he can float, just glide, if the air’s already moving. Or if he’s coming down. I’m telling you, it’s the moving air.”
“Humph.” Jack scrunched his mouth in consideration. “Alright. Well, I’m going to stick to these things,” he said, patting the steering wheel as he got the Oldsmobile moving again. “I’m going to get one. Just watch. You can go kill yourself flowing air over your wings. But I’m getting one of these.”
“Fine. Stay down here. But I’ll be up there, going three times as fast.”
“Hey, Iain,” Jack said, putting on a presumptive air, “I’ll wager you don’t know why automobiles go. It’s because of the Earth?” He pointed to the passing sands. “See? It’s because the ground is flowing under the wheels!”
“Actually, sheep-bugger, you’re sort of right.”
“Damnit,” Jack said with a laugh. “I give up.”
***
After another hour of rolling past pitiful efforts at community, places with names like Walters and Clarks, whose signs were their biggest feature, they saw him: a figure on horseback, on their road, a good mile ahead in the early-evening orange. Iain, who was driving at the time, eased the car to a stop. “Is that him?” he asked.
Jack switched his goggles for binoculars. “Must be.”
“Thought we’d have seen him sooner.”
“He’s on a mission,” said Jack.
“He might kill that horse.”
“Nah.” Again through the binoculars. “He’s walking it.”
“Do you think he knows we’re back here?”
“He’s not looking, but I bet so. He probably heard the engine.”
“So, what do we do?” asked Iain. “Just drive by him?”
“What else can we do? He’ll probably stop later, for the night.”
“He might shoot us.”
Jack had been thinking the same. Not only might Swain kill Adams, but he might try to kill them too. All to cover his tracks. If their bodies were found, which was unlikely, it’d be reasoned that Adams had killed them. “He might try,” said Jack. “Tonight, we can pass him close by and take our chances. Or go wide around.”
Iain looked at a nearby hill. “Let’s walk up there and see about going wide around. Sounds better to me.”
“I agree,” said Jack, grabbing their map.
***
<
br /> In the purple pink light of day’s end, the Oldsmobile clattered slowly across rolling hills of gold-lit sagebrush, far from the railroad. No doubt about it, Jack and Iain were breaking Sir Rowan’s no-off-road rule. They stopped to refill water and fuel at a providential ranch house, twice more to replace tire tubes, and three times for Jack to crawl underneath to clean dust from the two carburetors. Just after dark they encountered a deep washout that sank them almost past the wheels, but the block, tackle, and rope resolved it. By 11:30 that night, moving in the glow of the accomplice moon, and by the yellow flood from the acetylene lantern fronting the machine, they again found the railroad with its wagon-road easement. Soon they were three quarters the way to Austin, with Captain Swain snoozing somewhere far behind.
<><><>
– 45 –
FRIDAY
March 22, 1907
By 4:15 in the morning, Jack and Iain were just west of Austin. The moon had deserted, leaving the stars to their void, flickering the chorus of an ancient phrase. But the men didn’t see it. They were fast asleep under the chassis of their machine.
***
At first light they were groggy, eating cold biscuits, discussing their hastily devised plan for capturing Steve Adams—assuming he was indeed inside the building beyond the next hill: Stokes Castle. Slender and three-stories tall, made of granite blocks, it was a veritable fortress with sweeping views of all approaches—save one: the hill immediately behind it. Built by a wealthy mine owner named Stokes, it was intended as his family’s home in the wilds of Nevada, its thick walls meant to protect them from the riff-raff of the unclean, the foul, the common. But Stokes had visited it only once, back in the nineties. Now it was abandoned, welcoming lonely trespassers who found its multiple floors and cool, stone walls irresistible. The most recent squatter was Lloyd Lillard, uncle of Steve Adams. Though they didn’t know for certain, Jack and Iain presumed both uncle and nephew were in the house and armed.
***
By the time the sun had fully risen, they were prone on the hill adjacent to the tall house, rifle, shotgun, and two revolvers in their hands. They figured the earliest Swain could arrive would be around noon. Thus, for the morning at least, Adams was theirs—if they could get him. The plan was simple: wait until he went to the privy—located between the house and the hill—and then run down and attack him. The artless nature of the plan was bothersome, but neither could think of anything better. Surely Adams would need to piss or take a shit, but would he go to the outhouse to do it? They hoped his morning coffee was strong.
<><><>
On that day, far away in Boise, Carla watched from a two-horse carriage as freshly arriving passengers streamed from the depot. Her eyes danced over them. Today, finally, a friend would arrive. Someone would be in Boise whom she could enjoy, someone to help distract her heart and mind from her daily wondering about Jack, questions that seemed to fill her chest with each breath. What did it mean that he hadn’t written? She had no claim on him. They’d been together very little, actually. Their longest encounter was the trip out to the college where … where she had killed her prior lover, and Jack took the blame for it. If that didn’t mean they were fated for each other, what did? But why would he not write her? Had something happened? Was he dead? No. Banish the thought.
Her eyes locked on Winnie, then approaching. “There she is,” Carla whispered to herself. She threw open the coach door and was out, her dark, Gibson-piled hair bouncing beneath her velveta hat. Within eight steps, she embraced her friend. “Winnie! I’m overjoyed to see you!”
“Carla,” said Winnie, recoiling. “My goodness, I thought I was being attacked by the Pinks again.”
“What? Silly, it’s me. Turn, turn, let me see you.”
Winnie gave a perfunctory pivot, her travel-wrinkled skirt whishing. “It was a long trip, Carla. May we—”
“You look stunning. I want— Yes, of course. You must be tired.”
“You heard about Bill?”
“Of course. It’s terrible. He’ll be so happy you’re here.”
“Yes.” Winnie motioned the bellman toward her bags.
“This is for us,” Carla said, pointing at a coach and driver. “Saratoga, please.”
“Yes, Miss,” replied the driver.
During the short ride, Carla was a blur of information, pointing out the courthouse, the Idanha Hotel, the telegraph office, directions to the Caldwell home of the dead governor, and then the Saratoga Hotel as they approached it. The horses came to a stop, and the driver was out of the box helping two bellmen unload Winnie’s luggage. The women stayed in the coach.
“You’ve had some trouble here,” said Winnie with a squinty smile, like a dog proudly revealing it had dug up another’s bone.
Carla blinked. “You heard about that?”
“Mr. Farrington was ours. His death was a loss to us.”
“He would’ve killed me.”
“You did what you had to … I suppose.”
The driver stood at the door. “Ladies?”
“A moment,” said Winnie.
“Yes, Miss.”
Winnie looked again at Carla. “Do you have another in mind?”
“Another?”
“Another Pink to spy for us.”
Carla shifted in her seat, her thoughts heating, wondering who Winnie meant by “us.” This wasn’t the happy reunion Carla had expected. Rather, the message was clear: Winnie was in charge—at least in charge of Carla. But Winnie had been through an ordeal too, hadn’t she? Winnie had been there in Denver when Haywood was arrested. It must have been awful, Carla reasoned, but a mile better than killing a man. She had done that, killed, but was still being pleasant. “Yes, I have another Pink. Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“He fancies me, and agrees with our—the Federation’s cause.”
“The cause of the worker?”
Carla frowned at the forced expression. “Yes. That.”
“His name?”
“Agent Garrett. An operative, I believe. Or he was. Now Jack’s a full agent.” A wave of guilt hit her. Why was she telling Winnie this? Hadn’t she decided to keep Jack out of things. Why try to impress Winnie?
“Jack?” asked Winnie, noting the use of the man’s first name.
“What can I say?”
“A great deal, apparently.”
“No. I don’t know.”
The driver gave another tap outside the door and spoke loudly. “Ladies, if you could. I must—”
“This is Federation business,” Winnie snapped. “Leave us be.”
“As you wish,” grumbled the deep voice. “I’ll need to add it to your fare.”
Winnie resumed with Carla. “Is he here, in Boise?”
Carla shook her head. “He’s been gone for a few weeks. I said that in my telegram. I told you.”
“Of course! Jack Garrett. PJG.”
“PJG?”
“Yes! Pinkerton Jack Garrett, right? Your ‘love’ who went to San Francisco.”
“Well, ‘love’ is a bit … I was being … What do you mean, PJG?”
A smirk moved across Winnie’s lips. “He must be handsome.”
“Uh-huh,” Carla murmured and smiled. “But he’s not for you.”
Winnie gave a fake chuckle. “Then, who did you leave for me?”
Carla’s brow furrowed. “You’re with Mr. Haywood, right?”
“I’m not with Bill, of course,” said Winnie. “And a revolution is not just one man.”
“All right,” said Carla, thinking: Nor one woman.
“Besides, Mr. Darrow has barred me from visiting Bill. He said it would look poorly to jurors. I plan to anyway. Meanwhile, I have some time, and I have this.” She waved a hand over her body.
Carla rallied herself. “Perhaps the special prosecutor
?”
“Senator Borah?”
“He’s handsome,” offered Carla. “A senator. And their attorney.”
“He knows who I am.”
“The sweeter the challenge.” Carla knew Winnie would never bed Senator Borah, but after today’s treatment by this one-time friend, it was a delicious thought, imagining this socialist slut attempting the feat. Even the arrogance to consider it—to think she, Winnie, the defendant’s mistress, could win the bed of the prosecution’s lead attorney. Hubris at its finest.
“I’d have to ask Bill,” said Winnie.
Carla blinked, now more confused. She snapped open the coach door. “Let’s get you settled here.”
***
Outside, at the back corner of the coach, hidden from any window, the driver had been listening. He jumped at the sound of the door latch and moved to the other side.
<><><>
They smelled the bodies near Stokes Castle before they realized they had been looking at them all morning: three men, piled one atop the other. The top one’s throat appeared cut.
“Jesus Christ,” whispered Iain. “His uncle?”
“Probably not,” said Jack. “I imagine that swine family sticks together.” He examined a quartz rock in the dirt nearby and collected his thoughts. “Maybe it was this: Adams got here a couple days ago, but his uncle wasn’t here, only those three unlucky souls.” After another long breath, Jack continued, “There’s something good though, about them being down there dead like that.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“We know Adams is in there.”
“Or was recently.”
“Yes,” said Jack with a snort. “Or he was. Like bones outside a bear cave.”
Iain pulled the rifle up and took aim at the back door. “One bullet, right through the sombitch’s head.”
“Somebody will. Someday. But not us.”
“We’re just the unlucky bastards who have to keep him alive.”
“Mn-huh.”
American Red Page 38
