On the Trail of the Truth
Page 26
Derrick looked flattered. “Atta girl, Cornelia! You wanta be a writer, you gotta act like a writer!” He paused, and an expression of importance crept over his face. “Now, Miss Hollister, listen close, and you might learn something about being a real newsman.”
Writing notes on horseback is not an easy thing to do. My pencil went all over the page, but at least I got down the important parts. Mr. Kemble wouldn’t print anything unless I was sure I had the facts straight, so I wanted to make sure I could back up what I wrote.
“If you’re writing about election news,” I asked Mr. Gregory, “don’t you have to report the facts?”
“Facts are slippery things. One fella might look at a fact one way, and somebody else in another way. The people who hired me pay me to dig up facts that they can use against Fremont. They don’t care how I get them, or even whether they’re true. If they can make people believe they’re true, then they’ll have what they want, and I’ll get paid handsomely for my efforts. You see how nice it works out!”
“But that’s not being honest to the people who read what you write, Mr. Gregory,” I said.
“What is honesty? Like I said, I don’t get paid to be honest, but to do a job. And the senator who sent me out here always gets what he wants. So why shouldn’t I profit from his greed?” He patted his saddlebag. “So I’ve got a whole lot of things here that are just what the senator wants, sworn statements, quotes from guys who saw Fremont do such and so. Why, by the time I get through writing it up, the election’s as good as decided in this state. And by the way, Cornelia, no more of this Mister Gregory stuff. If you and I are going to ride together and I’m going to teach you the business of being a reporter, then you at least ought to call me by my name. Fair enough?”
I nodded. “But then why—uh, Derrick—why did you come clear out here, all the way from the South, to write stuff about Mr. Fremont?”
“That’s the beauty of the senator’s scheme! Right here’s where Fremont kicked around before he got famous. Why, his estate runs clear up to just a few miles from here. Anything we can uncover here, people’ll believe it just like it’s gospel, because it’s from the man’s real past, what he was like before he got into politics.”
He stopped, with a serious expression on his face, and looked around behind us.
“You hear a horse back there?” he asked, pulling his own mount to a stop. I reined in alongside him and listened. I didn’t hear anything.
“Maybe I’m just too jumpy,” he said, urging his horse along again. “But I’ve had a feeling like I’m being followed for more than a week now. Maybe I’m just nervous till I get this article written and these papers back to Frisco. But I still don’t like not knowing who’s watching me.”
“Who would be watching you?” I asked.
“Fremont’s people—maybe even Senator Goldwin’s people, for all I know. Politics is a dirty business. Those guys play for keeps. To tell you the truth, it wouldn’t surprise me if the senator had eyes on me, to make sure Fremont’s people don’t buy me off. If I will do his dirty work for a price, then he’s got to figure I’d pull turncoat for a higher offer. You always gotta be figuring how these powerful guys think. Those slavery people are the worst. Right and wrong means nothing to them—it’s strictly dollars and power.”
“Would you turn your information over to Fremont’s side—for a higher price?” I asked.
“Nah, they couldn’t pay me enough to make me cross Goldwin. He’d have me killed inside a month.”
“What do you have that’s so valuable to him?” I asked.
“I’ve got the election in my saddlebag—the end of Fremont’s political career forever, that’s what. Once this stuff hits the press, Buchanan’s election is secure. Goldwin’s happy; he and his slavery boys stay in power in Washington. The anti-slavery forces go down in defeat with their champion, John Charles Fremont, caught with mud on his face and skeletons in his closet. Just think, the Union may owe its preservation to none other than an investigative reporter and man of the hour, Derrick Gregory! And you, Cornelia Hollister, had the good fortune to take it into your head to ask his advice about becoming a reporter right when he was about to finish the story that would sway the election of 1856! You are witnessing history in the making, Miss Hollister!”
“But I still don’t see what you could have discovered way out here in the middle of nowhere that could be so damaging to Colonel Fremont,” I said.
“All right, just for an example, take that little place where you found me, Chinese Camp,” he replied. “My time there was spent doing more than playing cards. You might have seen it on your way in—little Catholic Church, St. Xavier’s. I’ve got a quote from a Chinese man back there as an eyewitness that he saw John Fremont going into the church with a priest last time he was out here, for a private Mass.”
“That can’t be true,” I said in disbelief. “John Fremont isn’t a Catholic . . . is he?” I added, suddenly unsure of myself.
“Who knows? But haven’t you been listening to anything I been telling you about this game of political reporting? Doesn’t matter if it’s true. Doesn’t matter that I had to slip the guy ten bucks to encourage his memory along after I hinted at what I was looking for. If folks think it’s true, it’s good enough and you’ve done your job. No one’s gonna come checking up on it. They couldn’t check it anyway. The source’s name will never be mentioned. My name won’t appear on the story, won’t have anything to do with it as far as the public’s concerned. The story’s untraceable. But the charge will persist, and even if it is only a rumor, it will do its job.”
“It hardly seems right.”
“Right, wrong—who cares? A reporter has a job to do, and he gets paid by people in power with money to pay him. A writer doesn’t decide right and wrong, he has to do his job. Facts are just what you make of them, no more, no less. There was another reason I was at Chinese Camp. You know about the Tong war a few months back at Crimea Flat? Well, I’ve got it on good authority that Fremont’s men rode up from Mariposa and instigated the whole thing because Fremont hates the Chinese and doesn’t like so many of them so near his estate.”
“What kind of authority—same as about the church?”
Derrick laughed. “Now you’re catching on, Cornelia! No, it’s a little more reliable than that. Miners in these parts hate Fremont. They’re jealous of his gold, they think some of it’s theirs. A few of them who got run off the Mariposa at gunpoint for poaching are willing to say just about anything to bring down Fremont. I’ve got sworn statements that Fremont used Chinese slave labor along with the Mexicans when he first started mining the Mariposa, that he falsified surveying reports to change his boundaries to include the richest claims. I got quotes saying they saw Negroes in chains on the Mariposa, and even that Fremont used to get away at night with barmaids, leaving his wife alone at home. I got all kinds of stuff from interviewing people around here. Fremont’s dead when it all gets out.”
“What are you after today? Some other quote from someone who doesn’t like Mr. Fremont?”
He laughed again. “In a manner of speaking. We’re almost to Big Oak Flat. I’m gonna see Jack Savage, Jim Savage’s brother—they founded the place and got rich from it. The Savage brothers and Fremont go back a ways. Savage and his brother led the Mariposa Battalion. Jim got himself killed by the Indians. They were the first white men into the Yosemite valley, and he has a thing or two to say about how Fremont got his clutches on all that land when he wasn’t even here in person. From what I’ve gathered, the senator’s promised Savage a big chunk of the Mariposa if he can give him enough information to contest Fremont’s title. If I can get what I need, it not only makes Fremont out a crook, it might put the Mariposa right in Senator Goldwin’s lap. Half of the old fat judges on the Supreme Court owe their appointments to him, and they would back him up if it came down to a law suit between Fremont and Goldwin.”
“Do you think this man Savage will go against Fremont?”
“What’s that all about?”
“Just a couple months back, Palmer & Cook got into trouble for an illegal breach of faith in handling some securities belonging to the state of California. Fremont was closely involved with them when he was last here. It’s the perfect smear.”
We’d been talking a long time, and within another ten minutes we rode into the little village of Big Oak Flat. Derrick seemed to know where he was going. We rode straight through town, made two or three turns, and eventually arrived at the ranch called the Savage Diggings, the original name of the town in 1848. Mr. Savage must have been expecting him, because we went right in and sat down and the two men started talking. I just watched and listened, and they paid me no heed. But as I glanced around the room I noticed some old copies of the Alta lying around, and a momentary panic seized me.
As I sat there listening, I was astonished at what I heard. Mr. Gregory didn’t just ask questions and write down Mr. Savage’s answers. The two of them talked back and forth and discussed what would make it look the worst for Mr. Fremont—sometimes laughing, even making up situations and other people. By the time Mr. Gregory got to writing down some of the things they’d talked about, it might as well have been fiction. He wasn’t trying to find out what really happened at all, but to make up what he called “facts” and quotations that he and Mr. Savage could agree on that would put Mr. Fremont in a bad light. They said things about Jessie, too, that I was sure were untrue, and I got angrier and angrier. Everything Derrick had told me on the way there was bad enough, but now I saw the deception and lies going on right in front of me, and it made me mad. How could he call himself a reporter, a newsman? He was telling lies to the whole country for that rich Senator Goldwin.
“But you say Fremont got out of the Palmer & Cook Company several years back?” asked Derrick.
“Oh yeah,” answered Savage. “He’s got nothing to do with this current mess of theirs. But it doesn’t matter. His financial involvement in the company can be documented, and by the time he has a chance to refute it, the election will be over. Use it, Gregory. It’ll bring him down in the business circles in Frisco.”
Derrick was busy with his pen. He had written several pages since we’d got here, full of accusations, quotes, names, dates, places, illegalities, rumors—all slanderous against Colonel Fremont.
“But don’t forget what I told you about the purchase of the Mariposa,” Savage went on after Derrick’s pen stopped. “It all hinges on Thomas Larkin, the guy Fremont used to buy the estate. Larkin was U.S. Consul at the time, but he had dealings back to the mid-forties with Alvarado and Michelorena, who owned the property first. I’ve never been able to get to the bottom of it, but if the senator could get to Larkin and, shall we say, win him over with a few hundred dollars on the side, I have the feeling Larkin might be able to provide all the ammunition the senator needs to mount a challenge to Fremont’s title and get the Supreme Court to overturn their ruling.”
Derrick was writing as fast as his fingers could move. Finally he glanced up.
“You are a devious one, Savage,” he said. “I’m sure the senator will be deeply indebted for all your help in putting the final pieces of this article together.”
“I am counting on it,” smiled Savage.
“I will pass along your sentiments when I next see the senator after the election.”
A pause followed. Derrick looked over his several pages of notes, then put them in a leather case along with his pen and ink. He snapped the buckle shut, patted the case with his hand, and let out a long sigh.
“Well, it’s all here,” he said. “I’ll be writing up the article in the next few days, and within a week you should be reading the political obituary of one John Charles Fremont in the San Francisco Morning Globe. I’m sure future President Buchanan will be grateful for your part in effecting the demise of his opponent.”
Derrick rose and extended his hand. Mr. Savage shook it, then offered me his hand also as I got up.
“Nice to see you too, Miss—”
“Hollister,” I reminded him.
“Ah, yes—hmm . . . Hollister . . . seems as if I know that name. You from these parts?”
“My father’s a miner,” I said, evading the question. I hoped his mind didn’t wander to the Alta right then!
“Hmm . . . well, I don’t know . . . your name just seems familiar, that’s all.”
Derrick and I left the house, got on our horses, and started back north the way we had come.
“Looks like I’ve got everything I need, Cornelia!” Derrick said with a smile. “All I have to do now is write it up and take it to the city and my job’s done!”
“Why do you bother with interviews,” I asked, “if you’re just making everything up, anyway?”
“You’ve got to at least give the appearance of credibility, you know! Besides, if anyone does question my sources, I want to have a credible list to give them.”
We rode on a while in silence.
“Why so glum?” Derrick asked. “You’ve just seen political reporting at its best, firsthand. Why, you’re watching how Presidents get elected!”
“It just doesn’t seem right, somehow,” I said.
“Still worried about honesty, Cornelia?”
“I reckon.”
“Forget it. If you want to be a news reporter, this is how it works—who you know, and what kind of deal you can make with them. And watch out for your own best interests! It’s the only way to get ahead in this game—just like in politics.”
We were quiet again for a while.
“Are you going to Jacksonville now?” I asked.
“Nah, we still got plenty of daylight left. I think I’ll get on back to Sonora and bunk there for another day or two while I’m writing this all up. I got a nice room above the Lucky Sluice where I can work.”
“Maybe I could come and see what a finished article looks like,” I suggested.
“Sure. Come on around, that is if your folks’ll let you into a place like that.” He hesitated. “But I guess if you’re old enough to be tracking me down to learn how to be a reporter, you’re old enough to go where you like without your pa’s permission.” He laughed, then sobered and asked, “Your pa’s a miner, huh?”
I nodded, and immediately felt a pang of guilt for not telling him that I didn’t actually live in Sonora.
All the rest of the way back that afternoon, Derrick seemed to be watching and listening, as if he still thought someone was following him. But we never saw anybody and nothing ever came of it.
Chapter 46
An Unexpected Reunion
We didn’t get back to Sonora till pretty late in the evening.
We parted at the edge of town. “See you around, Cornelia,” Derrick Gregory said, then took off toward the middle of town and the Lucky Sluice. I rode back to Nason’s boardinghouse, hoping I wasn’t too late to get my room back—payment in advance!—for the night.
Mrs. Nason almost seemed glad to see me, in her grumpy sort of way. She even heated up some of the supper things for me to eat and said that because they had already gotten cold she wouldn’t charge me for the meal.
As I lay in my room that night, I couldn’t get to sleep. All I could think of was the day I’d spent and Mr. Kemble, and the election, and what I ought to do with everything I’d learned. Finally I got up, lit a lamp, and for the next couple of hours went over my notes and tried to remember ever
ything I’d seen and heard that day. I wrote it down in as much detail as I could. Whatever came of it all, at least I had to be sure of the truth of my facts. I had to be accurate about Derrick’s falsehoods if I was going to tell them to Mr. Kemble in a way that would help Mr. Fremont. My notes weren’t very neat, but I managed to get down most of the names of people Derrick said he’d talked to and quoted from, as well as what he’d told me about making things up and bribing people to say things. And I tried to reconstruct as much of his conversation with Jack Savage as I could so that I’d be positively accurate in my own quotes when it came to disproving the lies that were being told against Mr. Fremont.
When I finally got to sleep, it was after midnight and I slept late the next morning. But when I woke up my thoughts were less confused and my head was gradually coming clear about what I ought to do. I didn’t really stop to consider that the plan was probably foolhardy and dangerous.
First, I’d have to find out what room Derrick was in. After that I’d have to watch him and try to figure out his writing habits. If they were anything like mine, every once in a while his hand would cramp up and his brain would get dizzy and he’d have to take a break and go for a walk or something. And after that . . . well, then I’d just have to hope for the best!
A little after noon I decided to walk up to the saloon just to see if I could run into Mr. Gregory. I didn’t really know what I’d do or say, but whatever happened I had to keep him in my sights. If he left town without my knowing it and got back to San Francisco ahead of me, everything was lost.
There weren’t many men in the Lucky Sluice at that hour, but a couple of tables were occupied. Almost before I was fully inside I heard Derrick Gregory’s voice raised in laughter and talk. He had just won a hand and was celebrating at the expense of his companions. As I walked toward him, I noticed something awfully familiar about the tall thin form sitting beside him with his back to me. Across the table facing me as I approached sat two mean-looking men—one with a beard who looked like a miner, the other clean and well dressed in an expensive suit. If they were together, they sure made an odd-looking pair!