Silver City

by Jeff Guinn

  Mountain View’s informal lending library, conveniently located next door to a bank, comprised almost two hundred books. The town nine “baseball” team held regular practices; participants planned to test their skills at this newfangled sport under game conditions just as soon as an opponent in another community could be found. A bowling alley in the back of the Camp Feed Store provided additional opportunity for the recreation-minded. Proprietor Hope Camp was also the Mountain View mayor. In between resetting wooden pins by hand, he chatted with customers about the telegraph lines that had recently placed the town in instant communication with the outside world. With more silver strikes reported in the area on a regular basis and three more full-scale mining operations soon beginning operations, Mountain View’s potential was unlimited, and its pleasures already plentiful.

  Yet Cash McLendon hated being there. The woman he loved was the reason.

  Years earlier in St. Louis, McLendon had courted and won the heart of Gabrielle Tirrito, who ran a small general store with her immigrant father, Salvatore, in a downscale factory district. But when McLendon’s employer, rich industrialist Rupert Douglass, offered him the opportunity to marry his daughter, Ellen, and eventually take over the Douglass empire, McLendon accepted. He’d grown up as a poor orphan in the St. Louis slums, and the lure of wealth overcame him. Brokenhearted, Gabrielle moved with her father to the small prospecting community of Glorious in Arizona Territory. After Ellen’s suicide, knowing her father would blame him, McLendon fled St. Louis with Patrick Brautigan on his heels. He made his way to Glorious, hoping to reconcile with Gabrielle, only to find her virtually engaged to Joe Saint, the soft-spoken town sheriff. Caught there by Brautigan, McLendon escaped with Saint’s help. After many more months on the run, he ended up in Dodge City, Kansas, and was thrilled to learn that Gabrielle, now living with her father in Mountain View, had not yet married Saint. They exchanged letters and agreed that McLendon would come there; Gabrielle would allow him a final chance to change her mind. To pay for the trip, McLendon signed on to a buffalo hunt that ventured deep into Indian Territory. There, at an outpost called Adobe Walls, he fought in and miraculously survived an epic battle where thirty white men held off nearly a thousand Comanche, Cheyenne, and Kiowa. Chastened and matured by the bloody experience, McLendon used most of his money for train and stage passage to Mountain View, certain that he would win Gabrielle back from Joe Saint, who also lived there. But ten days after his arrival, it was obvious that he shouldn’t have felt so sure. From the time Gabrielle greeted him with a hug and chaste kiss on the cheek more appropriate for an arriving cousin than a lover, things were awkward between them. They weren’t meeting as equals—Gabrielle controlled their future, whatever it might be, and McLendon soon realized that she had no intention of making her decision quickly.

  Gabrielle worked as the receptionist at the fashionable White Horse Hotel. It was managed by Major Mulkins, who had befriended McLendon back in Glorious. Mulkins generously offered McLendon a small room at no cost while he was in town and allowed McLendon to share the staff’s free meals in the kitchen. Without any immediate financial concerns, McLendon could devote every waking minute to Gabrielle, but she had other ideas. Her work hours were long, from dawn to dusk on weekdays and half days on Saturday. Sunday mornings, she played piano during Catholic services held in the barn behind Tim Flanagan’s Livery. During the services, Flanagan’s horses and mules were tethered outside. Gabrielle’s father, Salvatore, now ill and bedridden in the room the Tirritos shared on the hotel’s second floor, occupied much of her attention. And when she was free, Gabrielle insisted on spending just as much time with Joe Saint as she did with McLendon.

  “All I promised you in my letters was a chance,” she reminded McLendon when he complained. “Joe is a wonderful man, and I enjoy his company. If you’re so dissatisfied with my behavior, you’re of course free to be on your way.”

  “No, I wouldn’t even think of that,” McLendon said quickly. “It’s just that I’m anxious. I’ve been here for two weeks—”

  “Ten days. Don’t exaggerate.”

  “Ten days. And not once have you let me talk about my plans for us, or tell you again how sorry I am for all I’ve done wrong. If you’d only let me do that, I’m sure you’d be persuaded.”

  “What you’re saying is, you want to make a fine speech,” Gabrielle said. “As we both know, I’ve heard them from you before. There’s no need for another. I accept that you’re sorry. I realize that you’ve changed.”

  Gabrielle was on a mid-afternoon work break. She and McLendon strolled down the wooden sidewalk past Camp’s Feed Store. From the far side of the building came the rattle of tumbling bowling pins. The wind whipped Gabrielle’s long, dark hair into wild tendrils, and she reached up to pat them back into place. Most women in town wore scarves or wide-brimmed bonnets when they ventured outside, but Gabrielle rarely did. Her lustrous hair was one of her most striking features, and, rather than cover it up, she liked to accentuate it with brightly colored ribbons. “For now I just want to talk about small things and get used to who you’ve become,” she said. “Tell me more about your recent life in Dodge City. Collecting and selling buffalo bones sounds fascinating.”

  “It was tedious, and I always smelled bad from the stink on the bones,” McLendon said. They reached the end of the sidewalk and paused in the shade of Flanagan’s Livery. August was sweltering in northeast Arizona Territory. “This can’t really be interesting to you. There have to be better things to talk about.”

  “But I am interested, and you should be pleased,” Gabrielle said. “Much of a life together would involve relatively minor details. If either of us already finds casual conversation with the other to be tedious, then we won’t match up well in the long term.”

  McLendon sighed. “Whatever you want, of course. But you have to understand—I constantly feel that I’m on trial with you. I’m never certain what to say or do.”

  “Don’t overthink it. I know this is hard on you, but it’s difficult for me, too, and also for Joe. Simply by asking for the opportunity to make this choice, I’m being unfair to him, after his years of love and loyalty. Look, there he is. School is letting out.”

  Two blocks down the hard-packed dirt street, a dozen children of varying ages ran gleefully from a one-room wooden shack that served as a schoolhouse during the week and a Protestant church on Sundays. Behind them, patting passing heads and calling out warnings to watch where they were going, was Joe Saint, thin to the point of emaciation, his thick-lensed spectacles and patchy beard adding to the overall impression of a human scarecrow. Saint had been named sheriff in Glorious because he was scrupulously honest and not at all capable of the casual brutality of many frontier lawmen. Prior to that, he’d been a schoolteacher back East, and always hoped to return to the profession. As a growing community with aspirations of greatness, Mountain View wanted a school and a teacher, even though, as yet, only a handful of youngsters lived in town. Saint gladly took the job, and, for four dollars a day, the same rate that miners in town were paid, presided over students ranging in age from five to fourteen. Now, looking down the street, he saw Gabrielle waving, and waved back. McLendon took note and said to her, “I guess I need to walk you back to the hotel.”

  “Yes, there’s still so much to do today. Every room we have is spoken for, and Major Mulkins says we might need to set up tents behind the building for the overflow. The other hotels are full up too. The town council is never happy to see tents because they think these detract from the town’s image, but it’s either that or turn away visitors who’d spend money with local businesses. It’s a good problem to have.”

  “I suppose I’ll move into the Major’s room with him. He said I could, if you needed my room for a paying customer.” Moving wouldn’t require much effort on McLendon’s part. He’d lost all of his possessions at Adobe Walls and arrived in Mountain View with only his Colt Peacemaker and the
clothes he was wearing. He used most of the few dollars that remained to him after travel costs to purchase another shirt, a pair of pants, socks, and drawers. Having no income bothered him; so did taking ongoing advantage of Mulkins’s generosity. If Gabrielle took much longer deciding between him and Joe Saint, McLendon knew he would have to find work in town.

  Outside the White Horse, McLendon asked Gabrielle, “Will I see you tonight?”

  “Well, perhaps at dinner in the kitchen, if I can get away from the front desk. But afterward, Joe is escorting me to a poetry reading in the meeting room of the Eagle Hotel.” She nodded toward a building across the street. “You could join us, but that might be uncomfortable.”

  “It would be,” McLendon admitted. During his ten days in town, he and Saint had deliberately avoided each other. In all but one instance, their encounters were formal and polite, since Gabrielle was present and neither wanted to upset her. The single time they’d passed on the street and Gabrielle wasn’t around, McLendon nodded perfunctorily while Saint glared and didn’t nod or speak at all.

  Gabrielle started toward the door, then stepped back and put her hand on McLendon’s forearm. “I know this is wearing on you. I’m sorry. I have to be certain.”

  “I understand,” McLendon said. “Just decide when you can.”

  Gabrielle smiled. “Well, I’m sure you’ll find ways to amuse yourself tonight. Bowling? Reading a book from the library?”

  “I think I’ll stand the Major to a drink at one of the finer local establishments. I still have a few dollars in my pocket, not many, but enough for that. He’s being so kind to me.”

  “That’s because he’s glad to see you again,” Gabrielle said. “But I’m gladder still.” She took a quick look around, and then, assured no one was watching, leaned forward and kissed McLendon lightly on the lips. It was the first time she’d kissed him since the cheek peck upon his arrival, and he was momentarily thrilled. But as Gabrielle disappeared inside, McLendon couldn’t help wondering if she had already decided and was drawing out the suspense to make him suffer. It was, after all, human nature to savor revenge.

  —

  MAJOR MULKINS SIPPED bourbon and sighed appreciatively. “A good brand, this,” he told McLendon. “Jim Beam is what they call it. There was no such quality liquor back in Glorious, just raw red-eye.”

  “Tonight there’s fine whiskey and surroundings to match,” McLendon agreed. He was glad to see the Major lingering over his bourbon, since the Jim Beam cost an appalling two bits a glass. Though McLendon had deliberately brought Mulkins to Mountain View’s finest saloon to treat his friend to the best, he couldn’t afford many fifty-cent drinks. “There was never an establishment like this in Glorious either.”

  They were in the Ritz saloon. Businesses in the frontier frequently boasted names far more glamorous than the establishments themselves, but in this case it was apt. The Ritz was well lighted with oil lamps, allowing patrons to enjoy views of flocked wallpaper, mounted hunting trophies—a ferocious grizzly raged in a particularly lifelike manner just inside the ornate swinging entrance doors—and reasonably tasteful paintings depicting attractive women with minimal clothing. Well-dressed businessmen seated in low-backed captain’s chairs conversed at cloth-covered tables or else stood comfortably bent over their drinks at the long wooden bar, propping their well-shod feet on a footrail. Card games, poker and faro, were played in an adjacent room. Dice was forbidden at the Ritz—it smacked of lower-class wagering. There were plenty of ashtrays and spittoons, all regularly emptied by bow-tied staff. Hostesses in low-cut gowns circulated, accepting drink orders and, discreetly, assignations in upstairs rooms. Only high-class, pox-free whores were permitted to ply their trade in the Ritz, and each paid a monthly tax to the town for the privilege.

  “I hope things are progressing to your satisfaction,” Mulkins said, holding up his glass to admire its amber contents. His comment offered McLendon the opportunity to talk about his wooing of Gabrielle without openly asking. Frontier etiquette discouraged direct questions.

  “I’m trying,” McLendon said, and took a small sip of the much cheaper beer that he’d ordered. “I won’t take advantage of your generosity much longer, I hope.”

  Mulkins shrugged. “Gabrielle’s a fine woman. If she leaves with you, it will be hard to replace her at the hotel. But as long as she’s happy—well, look who’s here! Cash McLendon, this is McGehee Fielding, better known as Mac. He’s editor of our newspaper, and he’s been wanting to meet you.”

  A tall man with near shoulder-length hair extended his hand. “A pleasure, Mr. McLendon. It’s exciting to have a celebrity in our midst.”

  The remark made McLendon uncomfortable. Since fleeing St. Louis, he’d done his best to remain inconspicuous. “I’m nothing of the sort, Mr. Fielding.”

  “Of course you are. May I sit down? And stand another round of drinks?”

  McLendon wasn’t sure he wanted further conversation with the man, but any drink Fielding bought Mulkins was one less that McLendon had to pay for. Fielding sat down, fresh drinks were ordered, and the journalist immediately got to the point.

  “We’re trying to get The Mountain View Herald solidly established, and for that we need colorful stories. It makes the mayor happy when we write about businesses opening here and additional stage routes from Florence, but what keeps our circulation growing is stories with some snap to them, some excitement. There just aren’t enough of those to suit my purposes—the Apache are mostly tamed now, Sheriff Hove and his men won’t allow even the occasional gunfight, and the Witch of the West doesn’t claim victims frequently enough.”

  “I thought the Witch was mythological, like St. Nicholas at Christmas or Robin Hood,” McLendon said.

  “If my readers wish to believe in her, then she’s real enough for me,” Fielding said. “People want entertainment as well as actual news, you see. We publish once a week on Saturdays, when folks want to put aside for a while the cares of work.”

  “Of course, but I don’t understand what that has to do with me,” McLendon said. “I’m simply visiting old friends. There’s no entertainment for your readers in that.”

  Fielding took a notebook and pencil from his coat pocket. “But they’d relish a firsthand account of the epic battle barely six weeks ago at Adobe Walls in Texas, the one where you and a handful of other heroes obliterated thousands of bloodthirsty savages. Indian stories always sell newspapers, especially when the white men humiliate them like that.”

  McLendon looked hopefully at Mulkins; maybe the Major would politely ask Fielding to desist. But the Major smiled and nodded encouragingly.

  “Tell Mac about it,” he urged.

  “Well, we weren’t really heroes, and the Indians certainly weren’t obliterated,” McLendon said. “We were fortunate to survive. Wait—why are you writing that down?”

  Fielding said to Mulkins, “Your friend is not only a hero, but modest. Mr. McLendon, how many savages did you personally kill? All with a gun? Any hand to hand? That would be a nice touch.”

  “I don’t wish to discuss it,” McLendon said.

  “Pardon me,” Fielding said. He turned to Mulkins. “Major, you assured me he’d cooperate. That’s why I wrote about the amenities at your hotel being the finest in town, and put that story smack on the front page. I’m going to the outhouse, and when I come back, I expect this to be fixed.” He stalked away.

  Mulkins said, “C.M., I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d mind talking to Mac.”

  McLendon drank beer and tried to keep his composure. “The last thing I want is to have my name in the newspapers. I think the people chasing me have given up, but there’s no way to be certain. Jesus, Major, you were with me in Glorious. Remember what happened there? You of all people should understand.”

  “The White Horse needed the publicity,” Mulkins said. “We’re full up now, but we’ve got to stay th
at way if I’m ever to convince the owner to add a third floor. Then I’d make some real money running the place, maybe get the chance to build another for myself. I want to own a fine hotel again, not just manage one for somebody else.”

  “You helped save my life back in Glorious, and I haven’t forgotten that,” McLendon said, as much to remind himself as to reassure Mulkins. “And now when I need it, you’re giving me free room and board. I’m grateful for all of this.”

  “It was mostly Joe Saint who stepped up for you that night in Glorious,” Mulkins said. “And now here in Mountain View, I’m glad to lend a hand when you need it. Don’t worry—even if you refuse to talk to Fielding, that won’t change. I overstepped and I apologize. But here’s the thing—Fielding’s paper only gets read right around here. The people who were after you are never going to run across a copy of The Mountain View Herald. So if you could see your way clear to talk to him, I don’t think you’d be putting yourself in any danger. I wouldn’t ask if I believed there was the slightest chance of it.”

  McLendon thought about it. “All right, but I’m not doing it tonight. I need to get my story straight, figure out what to tell him. I mean, he didn’t seem real interested in the truth.”

  Mulkins laughed. “Hell, he runs a newspaper. Truth’s the last thing Mac Fielding wants.”

  When the journalist returned, McLendon offered to be interviewed at the newspaper office one day the following week. Fielding suggested Monday, first thing, and McLendon countered with Wednesday afternoon. That satisfied Fielding, who ordered more drinks for McLendon and Mulkins and went on his way. The two men sat in the Ritz for another hour, reminiscing about Glorious and the people they’d known there—Crazy George Mitchell and his common-law wife, Mary Somebody; Bob Pugh the livery owner who’d died so tragically; and rascally Ike Clanton.

  “Any idea whatever happened to Ike?” McLendon asked. “Now, there was a total bastard, a man hardly fit to live.”