Slocum and the two gold.., p.16
Slocum and the Two Gold Bullets, page 16
Slocum swung the chair at the table around, straddled it and leaned forward, his forearms resting on the straight back.
Andrew Stevenson came in, a puppy-dog eager look on his face.
“You won’t guess what’s happened, Sis.”
“Hello, Andy,” Slocum said. He wondered if the man was dense or if he just couldn’t believe his sister would ever enjoy the company of a man that was not her brother.
“Oh, there you are, Mr. Slocum. This is so good. And it involves you, too.”
“What is it, Andy?” asked Daisy.
“Well, when Mr. Slocum turned down Lem’s offer to be marshal, Mr. Aiken got to thinking who’d be a good choice to replace Borrega.”
Slocum sat a little straighter in the chair, his hands gripping the back. He felt as if he stood on railroad tracks and waited for a runaway steam engine.
“What’d he have to say? Mr. Aiken?” asked Daisy.
“He said he knew just the man for the job.”
Slocum held his breath as Andy Stevenson opened his coat and showed them the marshal’s badge pinned to his shirt.
“I’m the new marshal in Victory. Me!” he exclaimed.
17
The howling wind promised another storm laced with rain and snow. Slocum shivered and drew a blanket around his shoulders. The small stove in the corner of the cabin tried its best to keep the occupants warm but failed, no matter how much he stoked it. Slocum looked over at Daisy. The woman went about housekeeping chores, but she looked as if she had gained fifty pounds. She wore every stitch of clothing she had, and it was still only barely enough to keep her warm.
“You and your brother ought to get on back to Denver before winter sets in,” Slocum said. “This place is going to be under ten feet of snow in another month.”
“Denver isn’t as cold, or so it seemed,” Daisy allowed. “But then we had rooms with a dozen other people. We’d all chip in for wood and coal to burn in the common room.”
“And if enough of you crowded close, that added to the heat.”
Daisy smiled wanly.
“You do your part keeping me warm. At night. Sometimes during the day, when you’re not out doing whatever you do.”
Slocum heard the criticism in her tone. He hadn’t bothered telling her most of the time he spent away from the cabin was devoted to following Aiken and Touhy, trying to find what they were up to. Over the long, cold nights since Marshal Borrega had been killed, Slocum had slowly pieced together what was going on, and he didn’t much like it. Basil Aiken was cutting off loose ends. Randall had been one, so Aiken had used him to kill another loose end: Micah Underwood. The newspaper editor would have seen to it that his articles followed Aiken throughout Colorado. So he had to die.
Randall had gunned down the newspaperman, then Zach Hubbell had eliminated him. Slocum wondered how Aiken had intended for Hubbell to die. By Touhy’s hand? That was possible, but the sudden blizzard had saved Touhy the trouble of murdering his partner. Slocum wondered if Touhy realized how close to death he walked every day. Aiken wasn’t the sort to let anyone who knew the inner workings of his scheme remain alive and testify against him.
Slocum snorted and shook his head. Aiken had free rein as long as Andrew Stevenson was marshal. The young man still thought the sun rose and set on the mining magnate. When he wasn’t prancing around pretending to be a lawman, Stevenson still sold stock certificates in the worthless mines Aiken touted. Nothing more had come of the claim that the Mother Lode Mine was on Ute land. Slocum was happy for that, because dealing with Bear Tail had become increasingly difficult. The Indian wanted more ponies to continue his claims, knowing Slocum needed his testimony more than anything else.
That Aiken had not resurveyed the land and discovered it did not belong to the Utes told Slocum more than anything else what a swindler the man was. Any man having such a rich gold mine ripped from his grasp would have moved heaven and earth to hold on to it. He might even have dickered directly with Bear Tail, offering a remuda for every brave in his band. A hundred horses ought to have been a small price to pay for such a supposedly rich claim.
“A thousand horses,” Slocum snorted. Plumes of condensation gusted from his nose and mouth as he spoke.
“What’s that, John?”
“Nothing, just thinking out loud.”
“You still selling horses and other animals left at Smitty’s livery stables?” she asked.
“Not so many left behind without getting paid for now. And not many new prospectors to sell to,” Slocum said.
“It’s as if Victory is dying up and blowing away.”
“Or being buried,” Slocum said. And he didn’t mean under snow.
“I need your help,” Daisy said. She finished wiping off the table, rubbed her hands on her apron and turned to him. The strained look on her face was accentuated by the paleness caused by the cold. This, as much as anything, convinced Slocum she couldn’t stay in Victory much longer—or not in this cabin. When it got really cold, no amount of clothing or burning in the pitiful, small stove would keep her alive.
“If it’s help getting back to Denver, I’ll be more than happy to oblige.”
“Not that. We can’t leave. We can’t, John. You know that. We’re getting rich.”
“Rich?” He stood and went to her, draping the blanket over her quaking shoulders. “Are you living rich? Sell some of the stock, use the money to get a better, bigger stove. Stuff paper in the chinks in the walls. Hell, stuff those worthless stock certificates there. That’s all they’re good for.” He wondered how Rip and Gladstone were doing. If their luck had held, their cabin with the old stock certificates from Aiken’s prior scam would have been long deserted, the pair of miners living high, wide and happy in Denver.
“That’s not true,” she said, but for the first time he could remember, Daisy didn’t sound too convinced.
She turned from him, obviously having a difficult time asking for the favor. Slocum wasn’t inclined to help her out since she so steadfastly refused to give up the hope of getting rich from Aiken’s bogus mines.
“It’s Andy. I’m real worried about him, John,” she blurted out. “Since he pinned that badge on, he’s different.”
“That much responsibility can make a boy grow up to be a man,” Slocum pointed out.
“It’s not that. Something’s eating at him, and he won’t tell me what it is. Every time I ask, he always changes the subject. But it’s powerful bad. I can tell it is from the way he’s acting.”
“What do you want me to do? Follow him around?”
Slocum grunted when she answered. It was as bad as he thought.
“Yes.”
“I’ll do what I can, but no promises. It might be that the job’s bigger than he can handle.”
“Find out. If that’s true, I’ll convince him to resign. Even—” Daisy bit off the rest of her sentence. She turned and grabbed Slocum in a hug, burying her face into the front of his coat. “Even if it means giving up and going back to Denver. I can’t see him like this. I promised Ma and Pa to always look after him. And they upped and died and he’s all I’ve got, and I’m all he’s got and—”
“I’ll see that he’s not in any trouble,” Slocum said.
Most of the day Andrew Stevenson tended to his marshal’s chores around Victory, but when it came to peddling Aiken’s stock certificates Stevenson was a tad less eager. Slocum saw several instances of newcomers to Victory, all het up to find gold and become millionaires, who might have been sold a few shares each. Stevenson talked with them and only halfheartedly hawked the stock certificates. Slocum was too far away to hear what was said, the transaction being conducted in front of the general store, but the set to Stevenson’s body told the tale. He lacked the enthusiasm he once had.
Slocum had little time to reflect on this. Stevenson swung into the saddle and rode out of town at a brisk clip, forcing Slocum to get his own horse and trail along about a mile back. The roads were half frozen, and the wind picked up as it blew down from higher elevations. The knife-edge in the wind, though, did not warn of a new storm. It was still late fall, but the altitude had worked against much new exploration for gold. Even the land office clerk complained of how slack his business had become due to the weather.
The only one Slocum didn’t see complaining was Basil Aiken. The man bustled about, conferred often with Touhy, and spent a good part of his time going from business to business collecting his share of the daily revenues. This told Slocum Aiken was getting ready to simply vanish, having milked as much as he could from the gullible, greedy people of Victory.
He had ridden along without paying much attention to the man he followed. When Stevenson cut off the road suddenly, Slocum had to backtrack and find the small path winding away into the hills. He wasn’t sure what lay in this direction, but from the man-sized gopher holes burrowing into the mountains, it was probably another of the “sure-enough-can’t-fail” gold fields Aiken had been selling shares in.
The trail looked to be chopped up by the passage of more than Stevenson’s horse. Slocum studied the spoor and decided someone had brought a heavily laden mule along here within the past day or two. He heaved a sigh. More prospectors out looking for their elusive will-o’-the-wisp.
“Howdy, mister. You with the marshal?” The voice came from off the trail and startled Slocum. He had been too lost in thought to pay attention to his surroundings. If the prospector hadn’t been a friendly sort, Slocum knew he might have been bushwhacked and left for dead.
“I was looking to find him,” Slocum said. “Got a message from his sister.”
“Oh, Miss Daisy?” The prospector ambled up out of a ravine where he had been out of sight. “The marshal goes on about her a lot. Must be a real looker. All the fellas in town sniffin’ ’round after her.”
“Not so many,” Slocum said. “Not when her brother’s the marshal.”
The prospector laughed heartily.
“Can’t imagine Marshal Stevenson puttin’ any kinda fear into a man. You see the way he wears that hogleg of his? He’s danged lucky he hasn’t shot off his own foot yet.” The prospector sobered and wiped his lips. “You and him friends?”
“Just bringing him a message,” Slocum assured the man.
“I seen him pass by not more ’n a half hour ago. Goin’ on up to the Jackson twins’ claim. Again.”
“Again? He’s up there often?”
“Him and them two talk ’til they’re blue in the face.”
“What about?” Slocum hooked his leg around his saddle pommel and leaned over a bit, wondering if he ought to dismount. When he saw the prospector had his own mule packed, a decent diamond hitch thrown on the contents, he decided to stay where he was.
“Same as the rest of us, I reckon.” The prospector looked over his shoulder and figured Slocum had a good look at his pack mule. “Ain’t no gold up here. It took me close to a week to figger that out, but them Jackson twins, they’re kinda dense.” The prospector tapped the side of his head. “Like they was both kicked in the heads by ole Belle here.” He tugged on the bridle and got the mule to take a step or two so he could pat the animal on the neck.
“So you’re giving up on looking for gold?”
“Ain’t even coal here. I made a fair amount of money off a coal mine up in Middle Park. Sold it to General Palmer so he could run his toy railroad all around the state.”
“You sound like a railroad man yourself,” Slocum said.
“Was. Worked on the Central Pacific ’til they drove the gold spike up in Utah. Then they didn’t need no gang bosses, so I tried my hand at prospectin’.” The man looked more closely at Slocum. “You don’t have the look of a prospector ’bout you. You Stevenson’s deputy?”
Slocum had to laugh.
“No. Wearing a badge isn’t for me. I was looking to give the marshal a message.”
“You said that. You ain’t lookin’ to deliver a . . . lead message, now are you? I like him, even if he is as dense as the Jackson twins.”
“Nothing like that.”
The prospector considered this, Slocum’s demeanor and who knows what else before coming to the decision it was all right to talk a bit more.
“The marshal’s not goin’ to the Jackson twins’ claim. He done talked to them last week. He’s prob’ly headin’ for Colorado Jim’s mine. He don’t say much ’cuz all he does is work. He bored his shaft a good fifty yards into the side of a mountain.”
“And he hasn’t found any gold, either,” Slocum finished.
“Then you and the marshal have been talkin’,” the prospector said, relieved. “That’s all he talks on now, how nobody’s found a speck of precious metal in these hills. Don’t know what it means to him, but what it means to me is I got to get somewhere warmer ’fore winter sinks its teeth into these mountains.”
“Getting cold early,” Slocum allowed.
“Hope you find the marshal ’fore another storm blows in. Colorado Jim’s. Take the left fork, not the right ’less you want to sit all day listenin’ to the Jackson boys tell you their life story. Believe me, it ain’t worth it.”
“Have a safe trip wherever you’re going,” Slocum said.
“Thanks.” The prospector tugged on Belle’s bridle and got the mule going. The pack animal walked along briskly, obviously as eager as her owner wanting to get out of the cold and find warmer climes.
Slocum unhooked his leg and headed uphill, into the mountains where the majority of the new claims had been sold. He got his bearings and decided this was the southern end of the claim he had sold to Aiken—had used extortion to sell. Instinctively, his hand went to his shirt pocket. He still had most of the money left, in spite of the boomtown prices in Victory. It would give him a stake for the next year, if he didn’t spend wildly and chose his poker games carefully.
He found the fork in the road and took the one toward Colorado Jim’s mine, although most of the tracks veered in the other direction to the one owned by the Jackson brothers. Slocum reached a point in a narrow gully where he heard voices—many voices—all yammering at once. He thought it might be the peculiar echoing effect caused by the high rock walls and narrow ravine, then he realized the men were arguing.
Putting his heels to his roan’s flanks, he hastened along the trail and reached a point where he could look down on the mine. A half-dozen horses, mostly looking broke down, and mules were tethered downhill from Colorado Jim’s mine. The men sat around a bonfire, warming their hands and each other’s ears with their hot invective.
Slocum listened and made out the gist of the little powwow going on. He had misjudged Andy Stevenson. After Aiken had pinned on the marshal’s badge, Slocum thought Stevenson would be the man’s lapdog. Everything he heard proved different. Stevenson had been riding through the claims, talking to the owners and finding not a one of them had discovered a trace of gold. He had called a meeting of nearby mine owners and was getting an earful of their complaints.
Stevenson carefully noted everything in a small ledger, nodding on occasion and shouting for the miners to quiet down so he could listen to them one at a time.
Slocum knew Andrew Stevenson had figured out how crooked Aiken was. Would he be able to convince his sister? Tugging on his reins, Slocum turned his horse’s face and headed back to Victory. There was likely to be all sorts of trouble if—when—the new marshal decided to arrest Basil Aiken.
18
Slocum drew rein and looked at Daisy’s cabin. Her brother’s horse was tethered out back, trying vainly to drink through the ice on the watering trough. Slocum dismounted, broke the ice for Stevenson’s horse and his own, then wondered if he ought to interrupt. Since he knew what Stevenson had been up to as he made his rounds as marshal, he decided against it. Let the fledgling marshal try to convince Daisy that Aiken was a crook. Stevenson certainly had the information from most of the miners in surrounding areas, including the claim Slocum had sold to Aiken.
It was all a fraud, and since Slocum couldn’t convince the woman, her brother might.
Slocum sauntered down the street toward the Sweetwater Saloon. Smitty was inside, getting drunker by the minute.
“Slocum, ole buddy, come on in. Set yerse’f down and have a drink. On me!”
“What’s the occasion?” asked Slocum. “You don’t buy drinks for anyone.”
“Sold my stables.”
“To Aiken?”
“Him? Ha! That son of a bitch wouldn’t pay for tendin’ his horses. Came close to turnin’ them nags o’er to you more ’n once.”
“Do tell.” Slocum settled into a chair opposite the former livery stable owner and signalled Lem for a beer. “How long has he been shortchanging you?”
“Ever since he come to town. Thass why I knowed he was a deadbeat. Wouldn’t pay.” Smitty downed his shot of rye whiskey and had Lem bring him another. “I’m well done with Victory. Time to move on. Can’t go west. Not with storms comin’ fast and furious, so I’m headin’ south. Maybe to Santa Fe or even Mesilla. Find me one of them willin’ young señoritas. Did I say I wanted a young one?”
“Good idea. It’s getting colder here by the day, and it’s not even winter yet.”
“These ole bones’re too old to stay much longer. Come ’long with me, Slocum. We make a good team.”
Slocum was amused by the stable owner’s drunken request.
“I’d like to, Smitty, but I’ve got things to do and none of them are to the south.”
“Hell, we kin go east. There’s gotta be some young, willin’ young ladies out that way.” Smitty belched and then shook his head. “Wait a minute. You got yerse’f one aw’ready. Well, good fer you, Slocum. I’ll drink to you and the purty little filly!”
Slocum banged his mug to Smitty’s shot glass and downed the beer. Lem had no trouble keeping the beer cold now. If anything, Slocum might have preferred a hot cup of coffee, if there’d been one available. He was starting on his second beer when he saw Daisy outside, gesturing to him.
