Fools' Gold

by Wiley, Richard

  Fujino couldn’t sleep and was too excited to walk the hills. He had packed and repacked the finely webbed snowflakes, laying fine Japanese paper between them, trying not to let them crack or to let sections chip away from the patterns that had been formed. He was going to town, leaving in the morning. He would stake their claim and would see the varied faces of other human beings. He was hired as a translator, he often told himself, but hadn’t spoken a word of English since his arrival. Fujino felt himself growing strong from the work, and as the weeks passed he realized that his body had adjusted itself, that he was equal to it. At the end of the day he was ready for rest and at the end of the night he was rested for work. Not like Kaneda. The old man needed him and there had been a subtle shift in the kinds of work they did. Fujino was working more, the old man less. Still the old man had a better eye for gold and better patience for scanning the muddy bottom of the sluice. Without him, Fujino knew, he would not have made a strike at all.

  Often in the evening after dinner and directly after relating to Fujino some new aspect of Japanese history, the old man succumbed to such heavy sleep that nothing would wake him. Fujino sometimes sang then, from deep in his lungs, but the ashen face of Kaneda, his future father-in-law, would not move; his muscles were in total repose, skin hanging from his facial bones like chicken fat.

  This night, though, even the old man stayed awake in speculation as to what the changes might be in the new city of Nome. When they arrived Nome was only tents, and lumber piled like collapsed houses. What would have happened in all this time? They could imagine streets that ran smooth and parallel. It was something, Kaneda had said, to be in on the building of a city. They talked and what they imagined constructed on the brutal shore was a small Tokyo. Each in his imagination had raked the tents and the milling men from the beach just as one might rake an area in preparation for the landscaping of a garden.

  The two men talked to each other as if sharing the same vision. They got great satisfaction from what they thought had become of the city. Kaneda showed no sign of going to bed, and though the sake had been gone for weeks they allowed themselves the drunkenness of reflection.

  Fujino would leave in the morning, carrying the golden snow-flakes and the claim papers. He would take the mule and try to make the journey quickly. While he was gone, it was decided, Kaneda would also rest. He would keep the mine in operation, but would be satisfied, not with half, but with only a third of the gold per day that they had been accustomed to. Fujino was not to hurry, and was not to brag about the claim or show his purse unnecessarily around the new buildings of the town. It was very exciting. Kaneda really wished he could be going too, or that he might be the one to go since only one could.

  At the height of their excitement, when conjecture had grown and they were happy, Fujino mentioned Kaneda’s daughter. It was a mistake, he knew, but he did not run after his words with apologies or quick changes of subject. “More than anyone else I miss your daughter,” he said, and they both remained quiet. It was not for Fujino to speak now. He would wait. Such a thing was unheard of, but surely Kaneda had recognized the unexpectedness of it, the way it escaped as from a locked cell. Fujino would not look at the old man. They sat like two Buddhas, teacher and student. He could expect nearly anything: a burst of anger, a laugh. The old man pushed another piece of bark onto the fire and began to speak.

  “Our nation of Japan is in reality one family,” he said. “Perhaps I am involved with its history for the same reason that another man might be interested in retracing his family tree.”

  Fujino listened sitting up, head bowed deeply toward the fire.

  “I wish my branch of the family tree to grow well and I wish my grandchildren to bear my name and understand life precisely as I do.”

  The old man stopped again but Fujino did not look up. What was he saying? What did it mean? There was nothing but silence again. Ah history! Kaneda had been thinking of Japan as a family and had remembered several events in the family history that Fujino still had not been told. Tonight he would tell about events he himself could half remember. As a young man, for example, he saw with his own eyes the black ships of the American fleet as they entered the port of Shimoda. He would not speak of his daughter again so Fujino relaxed and began to remember his upcoming journey. He still sat stiffly before the fire, but he thought of Nome. He listened to the old man’s melody, a slow introduction, then a detailed description of the large-boned face of Commodore Perry.

  Finn and Phil bought heavy canvas aprons and filled their pockets with long nails. They dug a square trench and worked for twenty hours mixing concrete and pouring the bath’s foundation. Finn insisted that it all had to be done at once, and that if they watched their starting time they’d be able to do the entire job during daylight hours. They had enough wood for the frame and had a promise of more wood, a promise that they would not have to stop for lack of supplies. Above the swirl of tents, here and there, other such frames were rising. Occasionally they saw an entire finished building side, blond boards reflected in the sun.

  Phil knew the ground and said that poles should be hammered into it, the tops of them surfacing and sticking like earth fingers, just into the hardening cement. That was what they had done with the reverend’s house. It would keep the structure in place for several seasons, perhaps longer. They were going to put the building up around Ellen’s tent; there was no other way. Later they would unfold the canvas, tuck it out through the door and then complete the interior. The ground floor of the building would have a high ceiling, but the upstairs would be small, enough space for a man to stand up, but no more. The idea of a bath had caught on, it seemed. Ellen told them that they were getting twenty customers a day, enough to pay for supplies and to pay Henriette and give Finn and Phil some of what they were owed as well, as a show of good faith.

  “We know your good faith without having it displayed in coin,” Finn said, but he took the money anyway, and used it to buy wool shirts. Winter was sliding down off the top of the world, creeping up to the edges of the farthest gold fields, and they were cold at night.

  The frame of Ellen’s bath went up in a day. The two men worked with nails in their mouths, occasionally shouting at each other unintelligibly. Others worked in other parts of the city, and when Phil or Finn looked away for a moment they would sometimes wave at the others, nails falling from their lips and sticking in the ground like icicles. This was industry: the city of Nome inching upward, the men working long days without complaint. And Ellen’s bath, empty most of the day, was crowded at night. Lines of men stood with towels over their arms. Business was booming. Ellen and Henriette often worked well past midnight, then took baths themselves, splashing and talking over the curtain at two or three in the morning.

  Finn and Phil had been working for three days when John Hummel, the man with scurvy, the first man to bathe in Ellen’s bath, invented beach gold. He had been a loner all his time in Nome, a man who stooped when he spoke to others and covered his bloody smile with his hands. He spit constantly, rubbing his small mouth along the long sleeve of his shirt to dry his disease away. He used a walking stick and when he stood in one place he dug it into the ground. Hummel often roamed the beach, where the stick moved more easily, where the liquid that ran from his mouth was quickly absorbed by the easy sand. This day he noticed five gold nuggets standing like little sentries around the end of his stick, so he picked them up and then sat down on the ground for an hour of hard thought. This was not fool’s gold and he was no fool.

  Hummel cupped his hands and scooped the sand and dug deep. He found a nugget here and there and setting them with the others formed the letter H on the ground next to him. When he looked back toward the city he could see Finn and Phil and other builders high on their perches like birds with hammers. He scooted along the ground, digging, making a trough that moved him toward the water line. Hummel found most of his nuggets within twelve inches of the surface and discovered that the vein was perhaps three feet wi
de and moved up from the water in an almost perfectly straight line. When he moved his digging position, he took with him the nuggets he’d found and re-formed the H shape until it became too large and began to worry him. He changed his strategy, spelling his entire name in smaller letters four inches high. And by the end of the day he had spelled not only his full name but the names of his mother and two of his sisters, and in capitals, the name of the new state of Idaho, where he was born. He plunged the nuggets deep into his pockets and hunched over them when he walked. What was he to do? He walked like a crab past the assayer’s office a dozen times that evening, knowing that to sell the nuggets would mean revealing his find and sending the whole town to the beach, like swimmers. He was no fool. This was not fool’s gold.

  John Hummel waited until the line diminished before paying his two dollars and entering Ellen’s bath. He usually came at the end of the evening, and Henriette hated the sight of him, for it meant that she would have to spend extra time scrubbing at the heavy sides of whichever tub he used. She imagined that spittle of his everywhere, and would not let the slightest part of her skin touch the tub. Here was a man who leaked and she could not abide him.

  Tonight Hummel slipped into the back room quickly and took off his sandy clothes. He had purchased a canvas sack, so, naked and shivering, he quickly transferred all the nuggets to it and took them into the tub with him. His white chest heaved at the sight of the sack of gold. He climbed into the hot water and lowered himself, holding the sack before him like a fig leaf. He felt the weight of it against his crotch and leaned his head back and let the red spittle stain his chin. What did he care? He was rich. He opened the sack under the water and looked through the steam at it and plunged his hands into it, moving the nuggets about with his fingers. He washed his gold with soap. He washed his body, extending long fingers into his mouth and scrubbing up and around his peach-colored gums.

  Hummel had only his sandy clothes, so he slapped them against the side of the tub before he could bring himself to crawl back into them again. He was a rich man and these were the clothes of a beggar. Already he felt it. He let the sack of gold lose the water through its seams and then looked again and was content that the color was now purer than it had been on the beach. He was a rich man but would have to tell someone if he wanted to exchange the gold for money. He would have to ask someone to exchange it for him if he expected to keep his secret, and he decided that he would ask Ellen. She had always been kind to him, had never avoided his eyes while staring at his drooling mouth like the others always did. He waited until he heard Henriette leave the tent, until he thought that Ellen would be alone, then dressed and clean he took his sack of gold through the curtains and laid it on the counter before her.

  Fujino arrived in the dim town at midnight, the mule walking beside him like an equal. For the last six hours it had been necessary to save the mule’s energy so it would not tire and fall. He did not recognize any of the tents or half-buildings and didn’t know where he would sleep. He thought of Kaneda at their camp, telling himself stories. Now, though he was in the city, the place he’d thought of each day since his arrival at the creek, he was exhausted and wanted only to sleep. It would be better to examine what had happened to the place in the freshness of morning. Presently he came upon the iron beds of a new hotel piled high in the street. A tent stood beside them and at its flap was a man with a cigar box in his hands.

  “Welcome, weary traveler,” said the man.

  “Is this a hotel?”

  “It is a place to sleep.”

  Fujino handed the man large coins and, taking the pack from his mule, entered the dark tent. There were many sleepers lying about on the ground, on the mattresses that would soon be used on the gleaming beds. The man dropped the coins into his box and tied the tired mule to a post outside. He pointed toward a stack of brown blankets on the table.

  “Checkout time is eight-thirty,” he said.

  Ellen looked at John Hummel’s gold and told him to go to the assayer’s office. “I’ve no proper place to keep it,” she said. “Many men would come in here for that.”

  Hummel shuffled for a moment and then, like a bat, folded his body around the gold and went directly out. He stood on the bent path before he entered the assayer’s office. Once inside he watched as the assayer added weight to the side of the scale opposite his sack. The man was tired and not aware that Hummel wasn’t just in from the mines. A guard sat, propped against the wall, on a stool next to him.

  “That’s good clean gold. Twelve hundred,” said the assayer.

  “Beg your pardon?”

  “Twelve hundred dollars. Do you want it on account or in cash?”

  “Cash. Twelve hundred dollars …?”

  The assayer opened a heavy safe and placed the gold on the bottom shelf. He took bank notes and coins and placed the correct amount on the counter before Hummel. “There you are, sir. Looks like you’re on your way.”

  Hummel scooped and shoved the money into the sack that had contained his gold. He turned to leave but turned again.

  “I found it on the beach,” he said, standing straight. “I want to stake a claim.”

  The assayer looked up from his books and the guard sat down on all four legs of his stool.

  “The beach?”

  “I want to stake a claim. Right now.”

  The assayer took a handful of claim maps from under the table and showed Hummel what he had to do to register his claim.

  “This brown space is Nome,” he said, “and you’ll be able to recognize all the rivers and streams and the coastline here. You mark in red the site of your claim and give me a dollar and then we both sign here at the bottom.”

  Hummel turned the map around on the table, looking until the rivers and the coastline came clear to him. He took up a pencil and drew heavy lines all along the beach directly in front of the city. He would claim from the Snake to the Nome, the entire beach; that was safe. He turned the paper back and let the assayer see what he had done. His dollar rang slightly on the hardwood counter.

  “That’s our beach,” the man informed him.

  “That’s my claim.”

  “But it’s not possible to make a claim inside the boundaries of the town.”

  The guard stood and walked in small circles. He had a shotgun slung across his arm and he swung his toe back and forth like a schoolboy.

  “That’s my claim,” Hummel said again, hoping.

  “I’m sorry … You found this gold on our beach?”

  Hummel pulled the dollar back toward him, letting it fall into the open mouth of his canvas bag. He looked at the assayer and at the guard.

  “It’s mine gold,” he said, turning. “This is really mine gold.” He hung the money bag around his neck and went directly to the beach again. It was still gray midnight and he was able to find the spot where he’d found the nuggets earlier. The tide was considerably lower now so he dug twenty feet farther, turning the handle of his walking stick in the drying sand, looking again for the gold in the full darkness of the early night.

  By daybreak the news had spread. The story of Hummel’s find had closed the entire town. Twelve hundred dollars, some said more, and he’d tried to claim the entire beach as his own. Those who didn’t know Hummel remembered him when others mentioned the man with the stooped walk and the bleeding mouth, and they laughed.

  Fujino heard about the strike in the New York Kitchen and again at the assayer’s office. He’d exchanged his gold for much more than twelve hundred dollars and left it in the assayer’s safe. He asked around town for Ellen and Henriette and was told about the bath and by mid-morning had made his way there and pushed open the canvas flap, his arms loaded with gifts.

  “Hello,” he said. “I am Fujino.”

  The flap that led to the back bathroom was pinned open. Ellen alone remained; the rest had gone to the beach, following the news and the people, and she was pouring cold water into the blackened pots on the fire.

  �
��Come in,” she yelled, not hearing who it was.

  When she emerged from the back room Fujino bowed and extended the gifts toward her.

  “My lord, Mr. Fujino. Does news spread that fast then?”

  “I am so glad to see you.”

  Ellen shook his hand in both of hers. Though the young man had been on the trail and had slept in a public tent, he was fresh-looking and smiling broadly. He’d changed into clean clothing and had wet his hair, combing it down flat across his head.

  Ellen said, “Are you changing claims then? Do you know about the beach?”

  “I have turned in our profits. We are doing very well. Mr. Kaneda sends his warmest regards.”

  “He is not with you?”

  “He will work the claim slowly until my return. Where is Miss Henriette?”

  “You’ve not heard about the beach gold, have you? They all went down to Finn’s tent to dig. It seems he’s located very near the main lode.”

  While they were talking Phil came in, so Ellen introduced them. The two men looked at each other for a long moment, bowing rather than shaking hands.

  Phil told Ellen that the numbers of people on the beach were growing and that Finn was having a hard time protecting even that portion of sand that his tent sat upon.

  “Most of the town is there with shovels,” he said. “All construction has stopped.”

  “What about the bath?” she asked.