by Lou Cameron
Before Stringer could answer they were joined by a stunning brunette in a floral print housedress, packing a big tin tray piled high with other things to admire. Winslow introduced her as his old woman, Florida. She struck Stringer as a mite young for Winslow, albeit about right for him.
As Florida Winslow put her trim derriere down in an armchair facing sideways to their sofa, and proceeded to pour coffee and deal marble cake, Big Ben brought her up to date on the earlier grim events of the evening in a blunter manner than Stringer might have, considering her sex and the fact they were eating. But she was likely used to her man’s blunt ways and even seemed to admire him as she told Stringer, “Poor Ben needs way more help to run this place than we can afford. It seems we just get things on even keel a day or so before things start tipping the other way. I swear, there are times I wish Ben and old Tom Ferris had struck water some place more civilized.”
Not knowing who she was talking about, Stringer cocked an eyebrow at her husband. Winslow said, “I was prospecting with a gent called Ferris about the time Borax Smith developed the wagon trace out yonder. Ferris wanted to go on looking for gold. I was the one who noticed how the borax rigs ran sort of empty and desperate the last day’s haul or more into the rail yards. I don’t know why neither Borax Smith nor my sidekick could see that there had to be water, at reachable depth, such a modest way out from the Mojave River’s irrigated strip.” He washed a big wad of cake down with coffee and added, “I reckon that’s why some men spend their whole lives working for others, while some men get to call the tune. Last I heard of poor Tom Ferris he was up on the Alaska Klondike, still hoping to strike color. Lord only knows whether he did.”
Stringer sipped more delicately as he informed them, “I was up there during the so-called gold rush. Can’t say I recall the name Tom Ferris in connection with rags or riches up yonder. You had the right idea here. Prospecting is a lot like poker and the smart money boys use the rare pots they win to invest in something more certain. The Hearst family’s made a hundred times as much out of newspaper publishing than they’d have ever taken out of that gold mine in the Mother Lode they started with. Your old pal, Borax Smith, has used the seed money from his desert operation down this way to build an awesome electric streetcar system all along the eastern shore of Frisco Bay. Another one of our California mining magnates, John MacKay, beat out Bell and Western Union to lay the first submarine cable to Hawaii and, last I heard, he’s out to hook up with the Philippines.” He bit off more cake and swallowed before he added, “That’s what I’d do if I struck it rich. I’d put the money to work for me before it ran out.”
Winslow shrugged and said, “I can’t see my bore wells running out on me. I can’t sell water for as much as gold or even borax, but I reckon I’m just as ambitious as any other desert rat. That is why I’d like to get this town on the map before the borax traffic changes course on us again.” He noticed the puzzled look Stringer shot him and explained, “The first borax beds were discovered more off to the east, so far out that the first outfit run by a gent named Coleman barely showed a profit. Borax Smith figured out how to haul the stuff in bulk across the desert and, better yet, found beds well this side of the steep grade up from Death Valley. But, last I heard, they’ve found borax along with potash and other salts worth hauling further west, around Searles Lake. Worse yet, Searles fills up with an inch or more of water every infernal winter and there’s talk of building a salt works on the site, to load the rigs with pure salt, instead of a good percentage of mud. Should that day come, that wagon trace we water won’t lead no place worth mention, so our only hope will be the sale of irrigation water, electric current and such to settlers attracted out here to this natural garden spot of creation.”
Stringer grimaced, drained his cup, and said, “No offense, but I just covered the land rush down by the Salton Sink and, to tell the truth, it struck me as a game for suckers just off the boat.”
But Winslow insisted, “Desert irrigation up this way is a lot cheaper and less complicated. We don’t need expensive dams and canals across creation. You only have to drill straight down, within a day’s ride of the river, like they do along the Pecos.”
Stringer smiled dubiously and said, “Another wild westerner named Pat Garrett pioneered the water business along the upper Pecos. I’d say his rep as a gun fighter helped a lot. Finding water underground isn’t the problem, if you’re willing to drill deep enough. Getting it to the surface is the problem. I take it you mean to peddle the power for all those pumps you’d like to see in use around here, sudden?”
Winslow grinned like a mean little kid and said, “I thought we agreed a man’s entitled to an honest profit. I can sell electric power cheaper than anyone can make their own, provided I can attract enough newcomers out here. We were talking about my museum and the story you meant to write about me and mine before you rode out to the old covered wagon and almost wound up as dead as my mummies.”
Stringer wrinkled his nose and replied, “Thanks for reminding me. I just love to have gents aiming guns at my back for no good reason I can fathom. As to how I aim to file the story now, I’ve no idea. I have to admit it’s become a lot more interesting, even as it keeps making less sense. I figure, as long as we’re bound to have someone from the county out here, asking questions about Calico, we may as well go whole hog and see if we can get a medical opinion on those mummies while we’re at it.”
Winslow didn’t look too happy about the suggestion. But when Stringer asked if he had any objections, the mummy lover shrugged and said, “Not as long as nobody tries to cheat me outten my excuse for a museum. Do you reckon we could get more folk out here if I built me a streetcar line, like Borax Smith’s?”
Stringer laughed incredulously and said, “If you charged two bits a ride and a dollar a peep at those poor dried up folk, and if you got it, you’d still need the whole population of Barstow, coming out here every day to make sure they didn’t miss anything, to pay for the track alone. Do you really want to know how I’d milk those mummies for publicity, if I was you?”
Winslow grumbled, “I just asked you, didn’t I?”
“I’d set that old Conestoga up in front of your saloon, with a new canvas cover, of course, and sell picture post cards of it, along with cold beer and Coca Cola. To get folk out here to begin with, I’d exhibit the mummies in Barstow, where people could see them, for Pete’s sake. Depending on what the county medical examiner decides they died from, I’d milk it for all the mystery I could while I was at it. I’d even post a modest reward, for any information leading to the identity of the party, and I’d come right out and say I suspected they were packing along a strongbox, or at least a coin purse when they went under.”
Ben Winslow and his wife exchanged glances. She was the one who asked Stringer, sweetly, just what her husband might hope to get out of taking so much interest in total strangers.
Stringer said, “Getting other folk interested in them, of course. As things now stand, there’s not much of a story, and to tell the truth, I’d be on my way back to Frisco right now if it wasn’t for my having to explain a few things to your county and, well, my own infernal curiosity. Can’t you see that a half dozen folk dying a couple of generations ago is hardly news at all? It’s when you get to wondering who they might have been, and who might have done what to them, that you begin to see a two or three page story building.”
Florida brightened and said, “Oh, I see why you want Ben to offer a reward. Even if nobody ever collects it, a lot of folk will want to know more about those poor dears, right?”
Ben Winslow grumbled, “That’s my money you two are jawing about. Aside from that, Mac Kail, didn’t you tell me before that anyone who could identify them mummies would be able to take them away from me?”
Stringer snorted in disgust and demanded, “What do you want from them, publicity for this little desert empire of yours or six stiffs gathering mold in a ’dobe you can’t even rent out as a kennel? It’s not p
ossession of a handful of dry flesh and bones that’s apt to put Esperanza on the map, Ben. It’s the amount of space the story rates in the major newspapers that’s apt to make folk wonder where on earth such wonders occurred. I grew up not far from where they found the first gold nugget in the race of Sutter’s mill. That gold nugget was melted down long before the three of us were born. But tourists still drive out from Sacramento for a gander at where it all began.”
Florida nodded, firmly, and told her husband, “He’s right, dear. The more famous we can make those mummies, the more famous we’ll be for finding them. I swan, I’m starting to feel more interested in the poor ugly things already.”
Her husband said, grudgingly, “I’ll study on it. I reckon I could part with them if someone was to come forward with an offer to bury them in style, with pictures being took and all. I’ll be switched with snakes before I’ll carry them into Barstow for free, though. Let Barstow find its own natural wonders!”
Stringer suppressed a yawn and decided not to argue the point. The odds that Frederic Remington would be in Barstow to sketch those mummies seemed less likely, and less interesting, now that he’d seen the poor dried-up critters. He nodded at the banjo clock on the wall behind Florida’s chair and said, “I can see I’m keeping you folk up, and we’ll have plenty of time to jaw about the mystery by the time the county gets about to thrashing things out. So, with your permission, ma’am, I’d best get on over to the quarters Ben, here, was kind enough to assign me.”
Ben Winslow tried not to grin too dirty as he dryly remarked, “I reckon we’re both up past our bedtimes, old son.”
CHAPTER SIX
But when he got back to Tessie’s ’dobe, neither Tessie nor her leggy French dolly were there to welcome him. It was the missing rag doll that made him wonder the most. He could see Tessie over at the saloon at this hour, but not with that dumb dolly in her lap.
Neither the front door nor any others had been locked. So it only took Stringer a few minutes and a couple of matches to make certain the blonde hadn’t left so much as a shimmy shirt or stocking on the premises as she’d obviously vacated them.
The bed, bedding and other furnishings just as obviously belonged to the town boss, and went with the ’dobe, itself. As he stood by the bed in the moonlit bedroom, absently rolling Bull Durham, Stringer wondered if Big Ben Winslow had known the odd little gal had lit out. He decided Winslow’s sense of humor wasn’t that subtle. In any case, if half of what Tessie had said about her boss was true, she’d hardly have given notice before making a break for it.
He’d been ready to go to bed when he’d headed here from the Winslow’s grander ’dobe. But he wasn’t tired enough to go to sleep alone at this hour.
So he stepped back outside, shut the front door after him, and headed back to the saloon.
It was still open, and crowded for a town the size of Esperanza. As he stepped inside, he was greeted like a regular, even though in fact he only knew a handful of the late night beer drinkers. Skeeter Norris was pumping the player piano for the edification of yet another fancy gal. This one was neither quite as pretty, quite as old, or quite as artificial as Tessie, wherever Tessie was. The gal holding down one end of the piano in her stead used a tad of henna in her upswept hair, and could have used a peasant blouse a size or more larger. For, whether her name was June or not, she seemed to be busting out all over.
She was Skeeter’s problem. Hamp Dugan was leaning against the bar with nobody to talk to but his beer schooner. So Stringer joined him, saying, “I hope Kid got off all right.” To which Hamp answered, dryly, “Is that what they called that young cowhand who had to gun Calico? I reckon he had to get on out to his spread. Maybe he’ll be back, come payday.”
Stringer nodded and said that sounded reasonable, adding, “I assume the county may hear about Calico any day now?”
Hamp said, “Oh, I just phoned it in. We got no Western Union here in Esperanza, but the boss strung a private telephone wire in to Barstow. Soon as we can get more subscribers to the service he means to call it the Esperanza Telephone Company. It connects at the other end to Barstow Bell and, naturally, the coroner’s branch office there. They agreed there was no need to pester San Berdoo with such an open-and-shut case. But you’d best stay in town until they can send a deputy coroner out to take down your deposition. It’s apt to look suspicious if everyone who saw Calico die lights out afore anyone from the county can have a look at him. What are we drinking, MacKail?”
Stringer said beer was good enough for him as well, and as Hamp held up two fingers and then pointed at his own nearly empty schooner, he told Stringer, “We got poor old Calico on ice in one of the storage rooms out back. Not where we keep food or drink, of course. Got him bedded down in a case some water pipe come in, along with some cracked ice and rock salt. I sure hope someone gets out here afore noon, tomorrow. I’d like to bury the cuss, for old time’s sake, afore the boss decides to mummificate him, too.”
Stringer waited until their beers arrived before he asked in as casual a tone as he could manage if it was safe to assume the two of them had been on reasonably friendly terms, up until the odd way Calico had reacted to discovering that shot-up lock.
Hamp sucked some suds off the head of his fresh beer before he replied, “Never would have hired Calico if I’d hated him. As a matter of fact, I always thought he had more sense than Kid. I don’t mind saying I’ve been mulling it over in my head, a heap, ever since you boys rode in with old Calico’s mortal remains. I wish I’d been there. I just can’t picture things the way you and Kid say they happened.”
Stringer said, “Neither can I. My back was turned to both of them. But Kid had even less motive to gun a fellow deputy than Calico might have had to gun me. Even if I had good reason to doubt that old boy’s word, he had us both covered, with a gun in each hand, and only chose to drop Calico, so how else can you read it, if not his way?”
Hamp said, “I can’t. Never would have let him have such a lead if I’d suspected him of acting even more senseless than Calico. It stands to reason a man you’d just saved from snakebite would hardly want another to shoot you in the back. What stumps me entirely is why Calico thought he could get away with anything so raw, for no damned reason I can fathom!”
Stringer didn’t answer as he swallowed some of his own beer. There wasn’t much profit in talking in circles and that was all he’d been doing, since before he ever saw the infernal mummies out back. He muttered, “They never figured out who Jack The Ripper was. I doubt they ever will. Trying to savvy the thinking of a lunatic with a sane and sober mind is one hard row to hoe.”
“Are you writing Calico off as just plain loco?” Hamp asked.
Stringer replied with a shrug, “Unless he was in the pay of a sick-headed mastermind. Can you think of anyone in these parts who’s not only sort of mean but at least sixty years old?”
Hamp shook his head and replied, “The boss and me already thought about that. There’s a few old coots within a day’s ride, and most old coots are mean, of course. But if you’re worried about someone who done something ugly, forty to fifty years ago, you’re barking up the wrong Joshua. There ain’t nobody hereabouts who was hereabouts even a generation ago. The wagon trace ain’t ten years old and Big Ben struck water and started this town even later than that.”
Stringer swallowed more beer, lowered the schooner, and soberly observed, “It’s a free as well as a mighty empty country. Who’s to say a man couldn’t rob some travelers years ago and return to the scene of his crime in his declining years, after things got more comfortable?”
Hamp snorted derisively and asked, “Why? If you stole penny one, forty or fifty years ago, and got away clean, would you come back in your grandchildren’s time to cover up your tracks?”
Stringer shook his head but said, “I try not to giggle at funerals or fart in church, either, but some gents are just sort of contrary by nature. Nobody knows why criminals return to the scenes of their crimes
, but as a lawman you know they do. What if the discovery of those mummified victims, after all these years, possessed some old coot who knew the whole story to come out of retirement to cover up, or try to cover up?”
Hamp looked dubious and decided, “If so, he’s been going about it dumb as hell. If he just let sleeping dogs lie, neither you nor anyone else might have suspected foul play in the first damn place. The boss thought it odd that there wasn’t any money at all among their personal effects, and more than one desert rat sort of wondered about that missing team. But we’d all taken it for more than granted that nobody around today could fill in any missing details.”
Stringer nodded and said, “Remind me never to send threatening notes or hire any back shooters if I don’t want anyone to think I’m still around. Run that missing wagon team past me again.”
Hamp did, explaining, “The boys scouted some, in the first excitement of the find. There was some argument about which way who might have led how many what. But it was soon enough agreed that no bones big enough to go with man or draftbeast lay within miles of that wagon. You might not have noticed, riding in after dark, but from Esperanza south to the Mojave River, the desert ain’t as pure as it might have been the day that jasper lit out with the oxen, mules or whatever. There’s a truckspread here and a cowspread there, and it’s all been surveyed. I’ll allow it’s easy enough to miss a bone or more in a clump of Joshua if you’ll allow at least one man and two or more draft critters would leave a fair-sized patch of sun bleached skulls and skeletons. Remember nobody’s been out this way all that long. So memories are recent. A nester or water dowser might not get excited about finding an ox or mule skull on the desert. But they’d surely gossip about finding the skull of a man, and, so far, nobody ever has. So the boys add it up to the one making a water dash with the team making it. The river ain’t but an overnight pony ride or, say, a day and a half for oxen, and the cuss seems to have taken all but one water bag along with him.”
