West of Washoe

by Tim Champlin

  “A sure way to get thrown in jail, in spite of your hold over the governor.”

  “I think maybe Fossett and Tuttle cooked up this whole thing about a duel just to get me jailed and out of the way. Then Clemens jumped in and fouled up their plans.”

  “If that’s the case, the challenge would have been issued to you…not to Clemens.”

  “You’ve got a point.” Scrivener shook his head, gnawing at the corner of his mustache.

  McClanahan came up, brass buttons on his blue uniform gleaming in the lamplight from the saloon across the street. “Martin, did your man, Clemens, get on that stage that just left?”

  “Sure did,” Scrivener said through clenched teeth. “Now that we’re rid of one more dangerous criminal, you’ll be free to turn your law enforcement talents to solving a few of the murders that happen in this town every day.”

  “Don’t be gettin’ smart with your mouth,” the chief said, “or you’ll be eatin’ jail grub with it before the day’s out.”

  “Come on, Ross, I need a drink and a good cigar.”

  Ross joined the editor as he hopped across the street on a series of planks partially sunk in mud. They reached the opposite sidewalk and strode off toward the Blind Mule.

  “Well, I wish Sam would’ve at least stopped to tell me good bye,” Angeline said, looking petulant. She moved out of earshot of everyone except Ross and Scrivener.

  “He was in a big rush to wind up his affairs,” Scrivener explained. “The law was on his tail.” He quickly outlined the situation.

  “They’d arrest him for taking target practice in the desert?” she asked, arching her lovely brows.

  “He was accused of dueling, or planning a duel…or something,” Scrivener said. “It’s a long story. Mostly about politics and vengeance.” When Scrivener tried to explain this to her, it sounded completely ridiculous. “He was really upset,” Scrivener continued, evidently trying to soften the blow. “He thinks an awful lot of you and was afraid he’d become too emotional if he faced you himself. But he did promise to come back. Said he’d try his luck at newspapering in San Francisco. After nearly two years on the Enterprise he felt he was in a rut. This was the spur he needed to move on and seek his fortune.”

  “Don’t make excuses for him,” she said, cutting through the sham. “The least he could’ve done was come by and give me a peck on the cheek.”

  “He would’ve liked to do a lot more than that,” Ross said, then immediately wished he’d kept his mouth shut.

  She heaved a great sigh, nearly popping out of the top of her low-cut dress and distracting Ross, who had to step back and pretend not to notice.

  “He was one of my best friends,” she lamented. “And one of the few men I could completely trust. I told him all my secrets, and knew he wouldn’t repeat them unless I gave him permission.”

  “I know. We’re all going to miss him.” Scrivener lowered his voice. “That information about the stage robbery you passed along to him a week ago helped stop the robbers from getting away with it.”

  She nodded. “I was only trying to help out. I haven’t seen Avery Tuttle since.”

  “He’s the one who put the law on Sam.”

  “I don’t think I could stand to look at Tuttle again without spitting in his eye,” she said, glancing around, as if she expected to see him in the room. “I’m off duty and don’t have an appointment tonight,” she said, abruptly changing the subject. “I could sure use a drink.”

  “I’m buying,” Scrivener said.

  Angeline ordered a sweet sherry, Scrivener his usual gin, and Ross a beer.

  “You don’t have to go to work tonight, and I’m buying,” the editor said to Ross. “Why don’t you order something stronger?”

  “In my wild youth, hard liquor had its way with me,” Ross said. “We carried on a love affair for a time, but I found out shortly I didn’t have the stamina to keep up with it. Old tangle-foot sometimes loosed the tiger in me, sometimes Don Juan, and sometimes the court jester, but I had no control over any of them. Finally got wise enough to break off the affair and I’ve stuck to beer ever since.”

  Scrivener nodded. “Not every man can learn from experience. Most of us continue to repeat the same mistakes over and over.”

  At that moment, in the tack room of a stable located between Virginia City and Carson City, Ben Holladay was convening a meeting with Avery Tuttle and Frank Fossett.

  “I’ll be brief,” Holladay said, turning up the wick of the overhead lamp.

  Fossett held his breath, hoping this impromptu meeting didn’t concern him directly. At least it wasn’t a big inconvenience for him to be called away from a late supper, since he lived only a mile away. Holladay’s stable was better than Avery’s mansion with all its finery, anyway. The Overland Stage Line connected Virginia City to points east and north. The horses and mules for that line were housed here.

  “I want to let you know, after that disastrous hold-up a week or so ago, our boys have pulled off more than a dozen successful robberies of Wells, Fargo coaches. One we hit wasn’t carrying anything much, but that’s rare. Nearly every coach to or from Washoe west across the mountains has valuable cargo aboard. I make sure some of the treasure is being shipped by my stand-ins.” He stood with feet wide spread and hands behind his back. “Wells, Fargo isn’t ready to crack yet, but I’m sure they’re having to subsidize the Pioneer Stage Line with profits from their banking operation. It won’t be long now before they’ll be more than happy to accept an offer from me to relieve them of that money-losing line.” He looked directly at Tuttle with his beady-eyed stare. “When we met before, that man Ross…”

  “Gilbert Ross,” Avery said. “The mine inspector.”

  “Yes, yes. Have you heard any more from him?”

  Avery hesitated, then said: “He killed two of your three men who died in that aborted hold-up attempt several days back. He was only a passenger, but he’s mighty handy with a gun. The newspapers and Wells, Fargo tried to make a hero of him.”

  Holladay’s face suffused nearly purple in the lamplight. He turned away and silently paced the small room.

  “But he’s out of the picture now,” Tuttle hastened to add. “The Enterprise ran a story about Ross’s experience down in the Blue Hole, and his claim the mine was salted. But nobody took any note of it. The mine’s stock has continued to rise.” He expanded his chest, sucking in his paunch. “In fact, we sold two big chunks of stock to British investors.”

  “I know that,” Holladay snapped. He paused. “I’ve brought in a gunman I call The Enforcer.” He paused again to stare at them.

  Fossett looked down at his boots. He was becoming very bored with these dramatic pauses. If the man had something to tell them, why didn’t he just come out with it?

  “I want you to meet him.” He reached for the door latch. “Don’t try to talk to him. He’s a man of…unusual personal traits. And he’s entirely devoted to me. He’ll immediately obey any order I give.” A grim smile stretched his lips. “He’s more like a trained timber wolf than a man.”

  Holladay swung open the door and a lean man glided into the room.

  Fossett felt a shiver go up his back.

  “Gents, this here is Billy Joe Slater.”

  The newcomer stared blankly at them without acknowledging the introduction in any way. In his left hand he held a hat studded with silver conchos.

  Fossett, who was accustomed to judging men at a moment’s meeting, saw a man about thirty-five with black hair and brows, well-groomed nails, hands that had probably not done a day’s work in years. The upper part of his face appeared wind-burned, but the lower part was pale with a trace of the blue-black shadow of his recently shaved beard. He wore a Colt in a black holster. But it was the eyes that held Fossett’s interest. They were flat, dead orbs that looked upon the world with no more animation than if he were some sort of zombie. They seemed to have no intelligence behind them. Except that the eyes were not slitted like a cat’s,
the man resembled a black panther, trained to kill on command. This impression was enhanced when the lean assassin glided, cat-like, out the door.

  “Keep watch outside until we’re finished,” Holladay said. He latched the door and turned back to them. “He’s a deadly marksman with a rifle as well as a Colt. When both guards and drivers begin dying during our hold-ups, Wells, Fargo will have trouble finding good replacements. It won’t be long before the Pioneer Line is mine.” He reached for the door latch. “That’s all for now. I’ll get word to you if I need you.”

  The three men filed out into the darkness.

  So, Holladay had a killer attack wolf on a leash, Fossett thought. Slater appeared to have some inhuman quality. Maybe some kind of crazy who’d kill on command. Fossett began to shiver, and hid the fact by easing his injured arm back into its sling. He knew about Tuttle’s faux pas of bragging to his high-priced prostitute concerning plans to rob the first big shipment—plans that had failed because of his loose talk. Tuttle threatened death to Fossett if he ever told Holladay. Although the damage was already done, a desperate Tuttle swore he’d never touch another drop of liquor. Instead, he distracted himself with trying to get Martin Scrivener and his reporter, Clemens, in trouble with the law. Fossett wasn’t too sure what had happened, but somehow Clemens had been forced to leave town, while Scrivener still occupied the editor’s chair, as sassy as ever.

  Instead of being afraid of Tuttle, Fossett had taunted him. “You won’t be able to do anything to me, if I do tell Holladay,” he’d said. “You’ll be too busy picking out your burial suit. Hope I’m in your will.” He’d laughed in Tuttle’s face. The older mine owner’s cherubic complexion had suffused a bright red. From that moment on, he and Tuttle had hardly spoken.

  Fossett had gradually come to the conclusion that whatever money he was to be paid by Tuttle and Holladay, the risk in continuing to work for them might be too great. It wasn’t worth dying for. Yet, as a one-third owner of the fraudulent Blue Hole Mine, he wasn’t too sure how to extricate himself from the clutches of these plotters. When he’d first entered into this, he was not averse to taking money under false pretenses, but things had gotten considerably more serious. Armed robbery of hundreds of thousands of dollars, innocent people killed, an assassin hired deliberately to murder stage drivers and guards—he began to wonder where it would all end. Even if he wasn’t killed, he could very likely find himself spending the rest of his life in prison, or having his trachea tweaked on the gallows. He was glad he’d eaten supper before he came; he’d have trouble explaining to his wife why he had no appetite.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Before dawn the next morning, Jacob Sturm died. The former miner finally succumbed to the silicosis that had ravaged his lungs. Gil Ross found out when he stopped at the boarding house on his way to breakfast in town. He wanted to have a word with Sturm’s roommate, John Rucker.

  Rucker opened the door to Ross’s knock, and stepped back, mutely gesturing at the pale figure on the bunk. Ross had seen the hearse outside, and recognized the lean undertaker, Cyrus Blackstone, who was unrolling a large piece of white canvas and spreading it on a stretcher beside the bed.

  “Help me lift him,” Blackstone said, and he and Rucker gently moved the body from the bed to the stretcher on the floor.

  Ross took a long, last look at the face of a man he’d never known in full vigor of life. The anguished expression was gone; he’d ceased to struggle for breath, and the seamed face with the gray stubble had relaxed in his last sleep.

  Ross moved out of the way for Blackstone to wrap the canvas over the ravaged body and fasten it to hooks on the sides of the stretcher. Then the undertaker and Rucker, whose eyes were moist, carried him outside and slid the stretcher into the open back doors of the tall, glass-sided hearse.

  “I have two others ahead of him, but I should have his body ready by late this afternoon,” Blackstone said to Rucker as he closed and fastened the doors.

  Rucker nodded, and went back inside.

  “Are you the only undertaker in town?” Ross asked the black-coated man who was swinging up to his high perch on the driver’s seat.

  “I’m it.”

  “How do you keep up with all the deaths?”

  “Hear tell another man is bringing his practice over from Sacramento. Normally I wouldn’t welcome competition, but this time I can hardly wait. If business keeps booming like it’s been for the past months, I’m liable to become one of my own customers.” He snapped the reins and his team started, turning the corner of the building, drawing the hearse toward the street.

  Ross went back inside and found Rucker sitting on a chair, elbows on knees, head in his hands. Ross put a consoling hand on the man’s broad back.

  Rucker looked up. “I’ve known Jake for close onto twelve years. I’m sure gonna miss him…” His voice broke and he stopped.

  Ross considered uttering some platitude about the man being relieved from his suffering, but decided against it. Rucker knew all that, and would hear it from others. Theirs was a hard life that didn’t make for longevity. “Any news from Union Hall?” he asked.

  Rucker nodded. “A strike vote set for tonight.”

  “A strike vote?”

  “Only against the Blue Hole. We’ve had enough of Tuttle. It won’t really be a strike because there’s nothing to negotiate. Besides his breaking the contract in regard to working conditions, the mine is worthless and our men know it. We’ll quit him cold. He’ll have to shut down, because no replacement workers will buck the union.”

  “Won’t that throw a lot of miners out of work?”

  Rucker shook his head. “There’s a big demand for experienced miners on the Comstock.”

  Ross silently absorbed this news. When word got out of the union’s action, the price of Blue Hole stock would drop to nothing. Tuttle and Fossett might be able to sell out dirt cheap to some speculator who would rake through the tailings, or try to rediscover some ledge or vein that was missed.

  Ross drew a deep breath. Virginia City and Gold Hill existed on hope and speculation. Regardless of how much precious metal was actually within these mountains, the whole Washoe area was sustained on delusion. Without imagination and deception, this place would be only a tenth its size.

  “You think the outcome of the union vote is a sure thing?” Ross asked.

  “No doubt about it. I expect it to be unanimous. The vote is only to make it official.”

  “Do you mind if I alert Martin Scrivener at the Enterprise? He can write an article for tomorrow morning’s edition. The paper won’t hit the street until a few hours after the vote.”

  “Good idea,” Rucker said. “By the way, I saw that piece a few days ago about what Gunderson did to you in the Blue Hole.” He shook his head. “Can’t blame you for pulling a gun on a couple of the boys and making them take you to the hoist. Getting lost down there can make a man panic. Happened to me once when I was younger.”

  “I wouldn’t have shot them.”

  “Figured as much from what they told me. You fired to miss and scare ’em. You picked up a few salted ore samples, too, which proves what Jake discovered.”

  “Yeah. The ore is still in Scrivener’s office safe. But that revelation didn’t do anything except make the stock price rise.”

  “Probably because the news didn’t get beyond Washoe,” Rucker said. “I don’t know much about the business end of mining, but most of that stock is likely sold in other parts of the country.”

  “Delusion, trickery, lies,” Ross said, “keep it all afloat.” He shook his head. “A little truth now and then would be refreshing.” He thrust out a hand to Rucker who gripped it. “I’ll be on my way, then. I didn’t know Jacob Sturm long, but he seemed like a fine, honest man. I’ll see you at the funeral.”

  The miners voted to walk off the job at the Blue Hole, and the mine was deserted two days later when they all attended Jacob Sturm’s modest funeral. Ross and Scrivener were there as well. The min
ister held a moving graveside service that had Ross thinking of his own mortality.

  Afterward, he and Scrivener left the cemetery with the dispersing crowd, and walked back to town in the hot June sun. Ross decided he didn’t need any morose thoughts on such a beautiful summer day. He inhaled a deep breath of the dry, invigorating air that carried a hint of sage.

  “You found any more good arrowheads?” Ross asked to divert his own thinking.

  “Haven’t had time to do any hunting lately,” Scrivener said. “But I need to make time. Life isn’t just about work.”

  “If you don’t mind, I’d like to go with you.”

  “You’re welcome. Two pairs of eyes are better than one. Especially since mine are starting to need spectacles.”

  “Reading too much agate type by lamplight,” Ross said. “You know, I’m a pretty fair proofreader. Why don’t I come down this evening, and help you. Maybe you can finish early and go home to bed. Then we’ll do a little arrowhead scouting tomorrow around midday.”

  “How much do you charge for your services?” Scrivener asked with a slight smile.

  “Only good company.”

  “You work cheap. Come on down to the office later. If we skip supper, we can probably be out of there by two in the morning.”

  The wind had begun to pick up. Ross squinted and averted his face from a dust devil cavorting across the sagebrush flat. “Whew!”

  “About time for one of our famous Washoe zephyrs,” Scrivener said, holding onto his hat.

  “I remember those from the first time I was here…mountains tearing the west wind apart and sending it tumbling down this side like an invisible waterfall. Scatters stuff in every direction.”

  “Even buildings.”

  The west wind from the Pacific continued to blow the rest of the day, increasing in velocity, pouring down the eastern slope of the Sierras, tumbling great, heavy globs of air into the valleys below as if it were something that could be seen as well as felt.