The California Trail

by Ralph Compton

  Desperately, Rosa sought something or somebody to which she might cling, to draw strength. She took the old locket, the size of a two-bit piece, all she had that had belonged to her mother, and for a moment held it to her heart. Seldom had she thought of the old locket, for it brought painful memories of that day when her parents had been murdered and mutilated. Now she held it up to the light from the window, running her thumbnail around the groove in the edge. Dirt had collected there, and she tried to remove it. Suddenly the locket divided, and the startled girl was looking at a very old photograph of herself when she had been very young. But the other half of the locket startled her the most, for there was some very fine engraving. Rosa got up, went to the window, and in the better light, she read: Rosa Onate June 2, 1830.

  Slowly, she turned to the bed and sat down. Had it been only seven years since Gil had found her hiding from Mexican soldiers, after her parents had been murdered? Beyond a doubt, it was her own childish face in the locket, and June 2, 1830, must have been her birthdate. That meant she had been thirteen when Gil had found her, and she was now past twenty! Once it would have excited her, for it would have made her a woman in Gil’s eyes. Now, unless something changed him, it wouldn’t matter.

  Restless, Rosa got up, stepped out into the hall and locked her door. For a moment she paused before the door of the Donnegans’ suite, listening, but heard nothing. She walked down the stairs, and finding the lobby still deserted, paused before the double doors that opened into the saloon. The doors were propped back, and while she couldn’t enter, she could see into the dim interior. Two of the poker tables were occupied, and there was the slap of cards as hands were dealt. She could hear a soft whirr and a clatter, and her eyes followed the sound to the far end of the room, to what she would eventually learn was a roulette wheel. A lone man sat at the bar, oblivious to it all. Judge Donnegan had three bottles on the bar before him, and a multitude of glasses. So he spent his free time in the saloon, and Rosa decided such information might be useful. Hungry, she went into the café. She still had sixty dollars of the money Gil had given her at Tucson, and the $550 in gold she’d found in the outlaw cabin, back in New Mexico.

  “Come eat with us, Rosa!” cried a familiar voice.

  Juan Padillo sat at a corner table, and with him was Ramon, Vicente, and Pedro. Ramon got an extra chair, and Rosa gladly joined them.

  “Van said you stay in town,” Juan Padillo grinned, “and there be nobody to cook for us but us. We come in so we don’t have to eat our own cooking.”

  “I will be here as long as the Donnegans are,” Rosa said.

  “Is good,” said Ramon. “We do not trust them, but it is not for us to say. We fear that Senor Gil be in trouble.”

  Rosa spent an enjoyable hour with them, but they all turned somber when it came time to pay the bill. For the five of them, it was twenty-five dollars!

  “Por Dios,” said Vicente, “mebbe our own cooking not be so bad after all.”

  When Rosa left the café, Donnegan was still in the saloon. With these gold country prices, where was he getting the money to spend the day drinking? Rosa thought she knew. Having eaten, and having spent some time with part of the outfit, she felt a little better. As she ascended the stairs, the big clock near the registration desk struck three. Rosa stretched out on the bed and slept. When she awakened, it was to a knocking on her door, and the room was almost dark.

  “Who is there?” she asked.

  “The hotel has a lamp for you,” said a voice in the hall.

  Rosa opened the door to find a young man standing beside a four-wheeled cart loaded with coal-oil lamps. He removed the white porcelain globe from one, lighted it and handed it to her.

  “We do not leave them in the rooms in the daytime,” he said.

  Rosa placed the lamp on the dresser and closed the door. Then she sat on the bed, watching the flickering flame as it wrestled with the shadows in the small room. She could hear knocking on other doors, as more lamps were delivered. Finally there was silence, and it seemed a long time before there was another knock, and it wasn’t on her door. She eased it open just enough to see out. Gil stood in the hall, and when the Donnegans’ door was opened, he stepped inside. Rosa sat down on the bed, tears creeping down her cheeks. She had hoped he might at least see how she was, and speak to her. With a sigh, she got up, poured water from the pitcher into the pan, and washed her face. She then slipped out her door into the hall, and down the stairs. She would reach the theater ahead of Gil and Kate.

  “Where’s the judge?” Gil asked, as Kate closed the door behind him.

  “In his room asleep,” Kate said. “He’s not feeling well.”

  “How long is this thing—this play—goin’ to last?” Gil asked.

  “I don’t know,” Kate replied, “but what do you care? The theater’s within walking distance, and you have a room across the hall.”

  “I also have a herd of steers out yonder by the lake, and an outfit that likely wonders why the hell I’m in town, sleepin’ in a hotel.”

  Kate laughed. “You’re a big boy. You don’t have to answer to a bunch of cowboys. Besides, your brother left the chili pepper here, to see that I don’t take advantage of you.”

  Gil didn’t laugh. His face flushed, and she knew she’d gone too far. Hastily she tried to undo the damage.

  “I’m sorry. I understand your concern for your herd and your men. You can ride out early in the morning, and you’re only a few minutes away.”

  Slowly the fire in Gil’s eyes faded and his anger died. He straddled a chair, keeping his silence, and Kate wisely did the same.

  Rosa was one of the first to reach the old theater. Admission was two dollars. The stage was a half circle, with the seating curved around it. There were three sections of hard benches, facing left, right, and center stage. Being early, she took a seat at the very front, center stage. She didn’t care if Gil and Kate saw her. There were coal-oil lamps along the walls, lamps at stage right and stage left, and one on the wall at center stage, which would light the area behind the actors. Still, the interior of the place was almost dark.

  When the play began, the theater was less than a third full. While Rosa was fascinated by all the actors, she was especially impressed by Nicholas Bonner. He was maybe twenty-five, with dark eyes and dark, curly hair. There was an intermission following the second act, and since there was no curtain, some of the women from the audience approached Nicholas Bonner before he could leave the stage. One of the women was Kate, and Rosa wondered what Gil thought about that.

  As Rosa observed Kate’s fascination with the actor, she was struck with an idea so powerful, she missed the rest of the play as she thought about it. She must meet this actor, Nicholas Bonner, and she must do it tonight. But it wasn’t as difficult as she had imagined. The audience departed quickly when the play ended, for it was late. Rosa remained where she was, until the little man who had collected admissions began blowing out the theater lamps.

  “You’ll have to leave, ma’am,” he said. “We’re closing.”

  “I wish to see Nicholas Bonner,” Rosa said.

  “You should of done that durin’ intermission. He’ll leave by the stage door. If he ain’t already gone, you can catch him there.”

  The actor was coming down the back steps as Rosa rounded the building. He paused, and she halted, out of breath.

  “Well,” he laughed, “the later it gets, the prettier the girls, and here I have only the moonlight by which to observe.”

  “I wish to meet with you tomorrow,” Rosa said. “In private. I must hire an actor for several days. I can pay.”

  “Beautiful lady, I’m sure it would be more lucrative than what I’m doing, but I’m sorry to say that I am already committed. I will be stuck here every night for the rest of the week.”

  “I will not need you at night,” Rosa said. “Only in the mornings and afternoons. Please, will you meet with me in the morning, where we can talk?”

  “I have
a key to this back door,” he said. “It will be unlocked. Be here at nine o’clock.”

  “I will be here,” Rosa said, and before he could say more, she was gone.

  Far into the night Rosa lay awake, thinking, planning. The “play” she had in mind would depend almost entirely on Nicholas Bonner, and only he would be acting. The rest of the players—Gil Austin and the Donnegans—would be unaware of their roles, for their parts would be very, very real.

  July 10, 1850. San Francisco

  Van rode in the next morning, and when he didn’t find Rosa in her room, waited for her in the lobby. At that moment Rosa was seated on a hard bench in Nicholas Bonner’s dressing room.

  “I wish you to convince a woman you are madly in love with her,” Rosa said. “I will pay you five hundred dollars. Can you do it?”

  “I have done that a few times,” the young actor laughed, “but never with five hundred dollars to sweeten the pot. Who is she, and what am I to do with her once she is smitten?”

  “You met her last night. The one with the falsely colored red hair. Now here is what I wish you to do with her . . .”

  Rosa worried all the way back to the hotel. Could she make it work? She had to! Van was right. This Judge Donnegan had some nefarious scheme in mind, and even as he discussed it, he was accumulating an enormous hotel bill—perhaps hundreds of dollars, at San Francisco prices—that Gil Austin might have to pay. She was startled but pleased to find Van waiting in the lobby, but so shaky was her plan, she dared not reveal it, even to him.

  “I did not wish to sit in the room alone,” Rosa said. “I have been walking.”

  “Has anything happened?”

  “When you and Gil left yesterday,” said Rosa, “the judge spent the rest of the day in the saloon drinking. Gil may have to sell the herd to pay the hotel. A meal in the café costs five dollars.”

  “My God,” said Van, “no wonder Gil brought the Donnegans’ horses back to camp. I’d better get yours out of the livery and take him with me.”

  “Did either of the Donnegans come down while you waited for me?”

  “No,” Van said, “I reckon his honor is sleepin’ off his drunk. He’ll be down later in the day to load up again. Just wait’ll I get back to camp! I’ll come down on Gil like a brick wall, allowin’ this old bastard to use our money to keep himself in whiskey!”

  “No, please,” Rosa begged, “leave him in the saloon. I need him there for the next two or three days, and I will need you to take a message to Gil. Whatever you must do, ride in every day at noon. With you away, Gil must remain with the herd. Then when I am ready for him, you will take him an important message.”

  “You have a plan, then?”

  “Yes,” said Rosa, “but I cannot tell you more until I am more sure of it. Will you trust me?”

  “Every step of the way,” he said. “Tell me what to do, and when.”

  * Lake Chabot, near present-day San Leandro

  * The harp is an elaborate towel rack mounted above the oak commode. It is so named because of the shape of the harp hand-carved into the wood.

  25

  Once Van had ridden away, Rosa went to her room. She counted heavily on Judge Donnegan heading for the saloon as soon as he was physically able. While she waited, she read and reread the note Nicholas Bonner had written for delivery to Kate Donnegan. It suggested a time and place for their meeting that afternoon, and extended to Kate an invitation to attend tonight’s performance of Hamlet as Bonner’s guest. It was her strongest move, Rosa thought dismally, and her only one. It was almost noon before she heard a door open and close. She eased her own door open, and to her relief, saw Donnegan walking unsteadily toward the stairs. She gave him a few minutes, and once the hall was clear, crept to the Donnegans’ door. Under it she slipped Nicholas Bonner’s note, returned quickly to her own room and closed the door. The time Bonner had suggested was two o’clock, in his dressing room at the theater. Rosa wondered how often the young romeo had done this. She felt foolish, having paid him for what he might have done for nothing, but she couldn’t gamble on that. When again she heard the Donnegans’ door open and close, she watched Kate hurry down the hall toward the stairs. She smiled as she recalled Van’s description of Kate Donnegan from the rear. Van had said there was more activity than two bobcats fighting in a sack. Rosa stretched out on the bed, satisfied the bait was more than adequate. Tonight Gil Austin was in for a surprise, which might just be the first of many.

  Kate hurried across the lobby, not caring if the judge happened to see her from the saloon. The old fool was becoming overconfident, she decided. Without her to lead him on, how long could this dumb cowboy be kept at bay, while the judge drank himself into a daily stupor? Judging by the café, saloon prices must be staggering. With food and drink being charged to their room, the hotel would soon demand an accounting. This was Thursday, and Nicholas Bonner’s last performance of Hamlet would be Saturday night. She could do, and had done, worse than this young actor, and the timing was right. Once she pulled out, and Gil Austin took his eyes off her curvy behind, he would divert all his attention to the portly judge. She smiled grimly to herself, contemplating the furor, and hurried toward the anticipated rendezvous.

  Without telling Gil, Van had begun inquiring about life—and prices—in the goldfields. Gold, in any form, was going for sixteen dollars an ounce. Potatoes, when they could be had, were three dollars a pound; pork—fatback—was fifty cents a pound; flour, forty cents a pound; and sugar, sixty-two cents a pound. A good mule sold for two hundred dollars. Van spent some time on the waterfront, talking to miners who had a stake and were getting out.

  “Our first day at Coloma,” a pair of grizzled men told Van, “we went to this tent store an’ bought us a meal. We got two tins of sardines, maybe half a pound of cheese, a pound of butter, a packet of hard bread, an’ two bottles of ale, an’ my God, it was forty-five dollars!”

  Van laughed. “I’ll stay away from there. What’s the name of the place?”

  “Sam Brannan’s. We heard that he saw all this acomin’, and he bought ever’ damn tin pan in Californy. Then when we all showed up, a-needin’ them tin pans, he was gettin’ sixteen dollars apiece. That’s an ounce of gold.”*

  Van was astounded at the number of ships around which there was no activity. Finally he was able to talk to a man who looked as though he might be an officer from one of the vessels.

  “Lad,” said the seafaring man, “a goodly number of them vessels has been abandoned. The minute they dropped anchor, their crews jumped ship an’ lit out for the goldfields. I brought in the Comet, an’ by God, I had to unload her myself, an’ I was the captain. I’m told that since July 1848, out of thirteen hundred men, the United States Army has lost more than seven hundred. Deserted, taking their arms and horses, an’ them sent to force the deserters back to duty didn’t come back neither. The pursuers an’ the pursued went off to dig for gold t’gether.”†

  Van visited a few of the shops, asking about the prices of beef.

  “Name your own price,” he was told. “Meat’s scarce.”

  “Why?” Van asked. “There must be game in the mountains.”

  “The Sierra Nevadas? Damn right they is,” said a shop owner. “They’s deer, antelope, jackrabbits, quail, an’ flocks of ducks an’ geese. But nobody’s got time to hunt. Men are half starved, livin’ on beans, sufferin’ from land scurvy, and workin’ sixteen-hour days. They ain’t no cure for gold fever, ’cept gold or starvation, whichever comes first.”

  Gil reached the hotel after dark, and when he knocked on the door to the Donnegans’ room, there was no response. At the desk he learned that Kate had gone out in the early afternoon, but that Judge Donnegan was in. Gil went back upstairs and pounded on the door until he began to draw unwelcome attention. He even tried his own key, unsuccessfully. Finally he took his knife, slipped the blade between the edge of the door and the jamb, and forced the latch. While there was no lamp, there was enough light from the wind
ow for him to see that the sitting room was deserted. He was between the two bedrooms, and he knew the one on the left was Kate’s. He found the door unlocked and the room deserted. In the other bedroom he could see the judge sprawled across the bed, fully dressed.

  “Judge?”

  The only response was a loud snore. When Gil moved closer, he could smell the whiskey. His honor was dead drunk.

  “Damn,” he said.

  Kate unlocked the door, wondering where Gil was and what he might be thinking. When he suddenly spoke from the darkness, she almost dropped the lamp she’d picked up at the registration desk.

  “This is a hell of a time of night for you to come driftin’ in alone.”

  “Next time, I’ll bring somebody with me. You’re not my daddy.”

  “Speakin’ of your daddy, he’s piled on his bed, out cold as a dead trout, and smellin’ like he’s been dunked in a barrel of forty-rod whiskey.”

  “He’s entitled to a few drinks.”