The Whippoorwill Trilogy

by Sharon Sala

“The preacher has suffered a setback in his calling since we last saw you. He no longer wishes to be referred to as preacher and in fact no longer wishes to be called by his given name. He has taken the name of his maternal grandfather, Eulis Potter. And in the same vein, I would appreciate just being called by my name, Leticia Murphy… or Letty. I’m sure you’ll understand.”

  Mrs. Cocker looked disappointed, but didn’t comment. Instead, she shoved a platter of hot cakes toward Eulis, offering him first serving.

  “Help yourself,” she said. “No ceremony around here.”

  Eulis slid a couple of hot cakes onto his plate then passed the plate to Letty, who took a helping and passed it on. Conversation quickly resumed among the men. They were more than familiar with bad turns in life. For most of them it was the reason they were here hoping to strike it rich—hoping for a miracle. No one cared if some preacher had lost his religion. They cared even less that the ex-preacher had a female companion who was not his wife. But Boston Jones wasn’t as easily sidetracked. He leaned forward so that he was looking directly into Eulis’s face and pointed his spoon at him.

  “So you’re saying that we shouldn’t be expecting any rousing sermons intended to save our souls?”

  “That’s right,” Eulis said, then smiled at Mrs. Cocker. “Real fine biscuits, ma’am.”

  She beamed.

  “That’s a shame,” Boston said.

  Letty was tired of his needling. She’d never liked the man anyway, but he was really starting to get on her nerves. She licked the gravy off her spoon, then pointed it at Boston Jones.

  “Not half as big a shame as all the gold dust you’ll probably steal from the miners in your crooked card games.”

  Boston flinched. He’d underestimated the woman. The men gathered around the table were all looking at him with new interest, and most of it didn’t look good. He glared back at Letty, blaming her for the wave of mistrust. This didn’t bode well for the success that he’d expected.

  “I do not run a crooked game and I take exception to the accusation. Are you insinuating that I’m a crook?” he asked.

  Eulis was starting to get nervous. Letty had accused the man of that very thing without any proof.

  “Letty, maybe you should—”

  Letty pointed down the table at the platter of fried eggs.

  “Would someone please pass the eggs?”

  Eulis sighed. He recognized the jut of Letty’s chin and went back to his food.

  The gambler didn’t have Eulis’s knowledge of the woman or his experience of her persistence. He would have been better off if he’d concentrated on his food instead of pissing off the former Sister Leticia. But since he didn’t know, he pushed when he should have shut his mouth.

  The egg platter came down the table, hand to hand, but when it got to Boston Jones, he didn’t pass it on. Instead, he held it.

  “Lady, I asked you a question. You called me a crook, but you had nothing to back that up other than the fact that we spent a miserable trip together in the same coach.”

  Letty had no qualms about revealing this man’s true colors because he’d thrown the first rock. He’d belittled both her and Eulis, and insinuated that there was something criminal about them using another name. As far as she was concerned, he’d asked for what he was about to get.

  “Actually, it was during that same trip that I saw what you can do. That deck of cards that you fiddled with all the way from Dodge City to Ft. Mays was marked.”

  He slammed the platter of eggs on the table and stood abruptly.

  “You lie! You’re just trying to ruin my reputation to further that damned religion you claimed to preach. You’re nothing but some pious, mealy-mouthed female with a hate against men.”

  “I don’t lie and I don’t give a horse’s ass for your reputation. You threw the first stone here, mister when you started this conversation, and just for the record, I am anything but pious.”

  Eulis grabbed her arm.

  “Don’t, Letty. Don’t speak ill of yourself just to prove he’s a bastard.”

  “What is he talking about?” Boston asked.

  Letty lifted her chin and stared him straight in the face.

  “Oh, that’s just Eulis trying to protect me from myself, which he’s been trying to do, and without success, for some years. I know you’re crooked because I saw your marked deck, and if anyone should recognize a marked deck, that would be me. My last place of residence, before my friend and I started on the Amen Trail, was at the White Dove Saloon in Lizard Flats. So don’t tell me I don’t know a marked deck when I see one, or a bastard when I meet one. I’m an expert at men. I used to sleep with them for money.”

  There was a gasp behind her, which Letty knew came from Mrs. Cocker, followed by a stunned silence from the men at the table. Then Eulis cleared his throat.

  “Gentlemen… Letty, here asked someone to pass the eggs.”

  The man next to Boston snagged the platter and passed it down, then nodded cordially at Letty.

  “Name’s Riley Whitmore. Right nice to meet you, ma’am,” he said, and then nodded at Eulis, too. “Ever been to a gold camp?”

  “Nope,” Eulis said.

  “Me neither,” he said. “I reckon I’m about half scared and the rest of the way excited. Had a farm back in Pennsylvania. Got flooded out three years in a row then hailed out the next year. Decided to try my hand at something a little easier.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ easy about pannin’ for gold,” another man said.

  Whitmore grinned. “Obviously, you ain’t never tried your hand at farming.”

  The men laughed, and the tension disappeared. But Boston Jones didn’t laugh. He quickly finished his food, then got his pack and rode away, anxious to set himself up in Denver City. He told himself these few men didn’t matter. There were hundreds, maybe even thousands of men in the gold fields. He had no reason to assume he’d ever come in contact with any of these people again.

  But that didn’t include Letty Murphy, and promised himself that if the situation ever occurred, he would get his revenge against that woman or know the reason why.

  The Tower Of Babel

  With Four Mile Inn behind them, Letty and Eulis set off for Denver City. Whether they would admit it to themselves or not, they each had dreams of striking it rich. Funny thing was that their dreams never went beyond the strike. Eulis couldn’t see his future past today, and Letty was afraid to think of a future for fear of jinxing it.

  But their excitement was obvious as they chattered amiably while hitching up the team. It continued through the early morning until they rounded a bend in the road about a quarter of a mile from their destination. There, hanging from the limb of a very large oak tree, was the claim jumper the men had hauled out of the Inn last night. Whatever personal goals Art Masters had entertained were over. And by leaving his body hanging in plain sight on the road into town, the message was plain. Claim jumpers and back shooters were not tolerated.

  Eulis looked away and grew silent. But Letty kept looking, staring at the man’s darkened face and soiled clothes and as she did, noticed that he was wearing only one shoe. It wasn’t until they grew even with the dangling body that she saw the other one near an old wooden bucket that had been abandoned by the road. She’d seen men hanged before and was familiar with what some called the dance of death—the kicking and jerking that a hanging man does as the life and breath are strangled out of him.

  “Looks like he kicked the bucket,” she said, and pointed.

  Eulis’s eyes widened as he saw what she was pointing at, and then he looked at Letty, unable to believe that she’d just made a joke about a dead man.

  “Dang it, Letty. You hadn’t oughta make fun of a man like that.”

  “A man like what?” Letty asked.

  Eulis frowned. “You know what I meant. The man’s dead.”

  “So’s the fellow he back shot.”

  Eulis was silent for a moment, then he looked back at Letty and
nodded.

  “You know what? You’re right. The fellow don’t deserve a second thought.”

  Letty smiled smugly. “Of course I’m right. I’m always right.” Then she laughed out loud and elbowed Eulis. “And don’t you forget it.”

  Eulis grinned and the moment passed.

  Within the half hour, they came upon the gold camp. Eulis pulled up at the top of the hill to look down into the valley below.

  “Holy Moses,” he muttered, and whistled between his teeth.

  “What in hell is that?” Letty asked.

  “You cursed,” Eulis said. “I reckon that there is Denver City, although I’d heard it just called Denver, too.”

  “I did curse,” Letty said. “And, I miss-spoke. What I meant to say was, is that hell?”

  The sight below was like nothing either one of them had ever seen. It was like looking at the inside of a very busy, but very violent ant hill. There were people everywhere—in the creek—in the dirt-packed streets—going into tents—coming out of tents—loading wagons—unloading wagons—and fighting. What seemed most at odds with the sight was the Arapaho encampment on the other side of the creek.

  The land at Cherry Creek and the surrounding areas had been given to the Arapaho under the 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty, but once gold had been discovered, the treaty was as good as gone. The Arapaho were a small tribe with light skin and a predilection for chest tattoos, and they had learned long ago that to get along, they went along—often despite misgivings.

  Their chief, Little Raven, had welcomed the white men, whom the Arapaho referred to as the “spider people”, which was an oblique reference to the white man’s constant habit of leaving roads, survey stakes and fences behind them as they went. The Arapaho even went so far as sharing their women with the miners, as was the custom of the tribe, in hopes that they could learn to live together. But it seemed evident that Indians and whites were never going to live side by side in harmony when the whites couldn’t even accomplish that among themselves.

  There were men and tents and horses on the other side of the creek—and noise—noise at such a level that it seemed impossible any one word could be distinguished from the other. A few rough-cut buildings had been erected. Letty could read the signs from here.

  One was an eating house. The only sign above the doorway said MEALS. Another was a saloon called ARLIE’S BAR. The third was a dry goods store, with a sign stating the obvious. They could see another two other buildings in different stages of completion. The rest were tents. There was a sign outside one of the larger ones that read BATHS, which made Letty smile.

  “Look, Eulis. They got a bath house.”

  Eulis resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

  “Baths down there ain’t gonna come free.”

  “I know,” she said.

  “Things are gonna cost a whole bunch more than they’re worth.”

  “I know. I heard Mrs. Cocker at breakfast this morning, too, you know.”

  “That means we’re gonna have to watch the little bit of money we got left. We’ll need to outfit ourselves for huntin’ gold.”

  “How so?” Letty asked.

  “I don’t know,” Eulis said. “I ain’t never went huntin’ for gold before, but there’s bound to be things we need.”

  “I guess… only I don’t think hunting is the right word. We can’t exactly go out there and track it and shoot it down like we did those squirrels we ate.”

  Eulis rolled his eyes and refused to answer.

  Letty sniffed politely, convinced that she’d had the last word, which she took to mean she was right.

  Then a gunshot rang out and they looked back into the valley, watching as one man staggered out of the water, threw down what looked like a big flat pan, then punched the guy standing on the bank. That man fell backward onto his butt, then shook his head, yanked off his hat, got up with a roar and started swinging.

  “Mercy,” Letty said. “Wonder what set them off?”

  “The Tower of Babel,” Eulis said, unaware that he’d spoken out loud.

  “What? Where?” Letty asked. “I don’t see any tower.”

  Eulis shook his head. “Not here. In the bible.”

  “I don’t get it,” Letty said.

  “I don’t remember all the details cause I only read about it once, but there’s this story in the bible about some people all being forced to build this big stone tower. It was to honor some king or somethin’ and I think he swore he was gonna build it all the way to heaven. So God put some kind of spell on all the workers and all of a sudden they began speakin’ in different tongues. They could no longer understand each other, and the work came to a halt because orders couldn’t be followed. They called it the Tower of Babel. I reckon that’s where we got the word, babble. You know… doin’ a lot of talkin’ without really sayin’ anything.”

  “Oh.” She looked down at the chaos below and then nodded. “I get it.” Then she smiled. “Way to go, Preacher Howe.”

  Eulis frowned. “Not anymore… and don’t make a mistake and call me that again. We done run into one fella from our past out here. We don’t want to come across someone from back home who knew the preacher from Lizard Flats, cause they will likely have known of me, too. I know I don’t look like I used to, but I reckon there’s not two Eulis Potters who would be runnin’ with a woman from the White Dove Saloon.”

  Instantly, Letty regretted her words.

  “I’m sorry, Eulis. Sometimes I talk before I think.”

  “Wouldn’t be a very smart thing to do out here.”

  She thought back to the hanging man and shivered.

  “I’m sorry. Real sorry.”

  Eulis patted her knee. “It’s all right, girl. Just wanted you to think a bit, you know?”

  She nodded.

  He flipped the reins across the mules’ backs, and the wagon began to roll down the hill into their future.

  Letty had been awake for hours, waiting for daylight. It was sometime after midnight when she’d heard moisture dropping from the leaves onto their tent. She’d rolled over with a muffled curse, and reminded herself that she and Eulis had to make different sleeping arrangements soon because there was no way they could spend the winter in this tent and survive.

  Already the population of Denver City was less than half what it had been when they’d arrived two weeks ago. Men who’d given up the gold fever had headed out before winter. Almost overnight, the leaves on the trees had turned, and once in a while, there was a thin crust of ice on the creek at first light.

  When they’d picked a place to camp and pan, it hadn’t been based on any scientific reasoning. They’d just gone to the land office and registered their claim. Picking it had been a simple case of availability, with as much privacy as possible, and that had meant going up creek to a somewhat higher elevation. Letty hadn’t minded, although it meant hitching up the wagon and mules every time they needed supplies.

  The first time they’d found color, Letty had been absent. She’d taken a break and gone into the bushes to pee, leaving Eulis ankle deep in water. He scooped a fresh pan of sediment from the bottom of the creek, then began circling the grit and water, letting the silt and rocks sluice out with the assumption that the gold, which was heavier, would stay on the bottom. But it called for a sharp eye and the knowledge of how to tell floss from dross. More than one man had made a fool of himself over iron pyrite, often called “Fool’s Gold”, by running into town waving a poke of the stuff. By the time the assayer’s office had verified the ‘strike’ as worthless, the miner’s face was red, and he was sneaking out of town a lot quieter than the way he’d come in.

  Eulis’s hands were cold, but his feet were colder. The water was getting colder and colder by the day. Panning was soon going to be impossible once the water froze, but they had yet to find even a nugget. If something didn’t happen soon, they would have to leave. They’d never make it through the winter without food and shelter, and at the present time, they had no
money for either.

  With her bladder protesting, Letty tossed her pan onto the creek bank and stomped out of the water.

  “Headin’ for the bushes. Be right back.”

  Eulis nodded without comment. Letty’s frequent trips into the trees to pee, was a common occurrence, and no longer a source of amusement for either. He was too busy watching the bottom of his pan and the circling water as it washed out the dirt and pebbles, when it suddenly dawned on him that this time, there was something in the bottom that hadn’t been there before.

  He straightened abruptly and almost ran out of the creek, afraid that he was mistaken, and then afraid if he’d really found gold that he would spill it back into the water from which it had come.

  “Oh man,” he muttered, as he dug through the tiny grit and sand, then pulled out the small nugget. It was a bright spot of color, and appeared as if it had once been liquid before hardening somewhat flat.

  He pinched it between his thumb and forefinger, then laid it in the palm of his hand and tilted it toward the sun. It didn’t exactly sparkle, but there was a slight glimmer, and that was good enough for him. He curled his fingers around the rock and yelled.

  “Letty!”

  “Just a minute!” she yelled. “I’m busy.”

  “Letty! You gotta come here!”

  “For pity’s sake, Eulis! I said… I’m busy!”

  “Leticia!”

  She stood up from behind some bushes, holding up her pants with one hand, as she parted the bushes with her other.

  “What?”

  He held out his hand. “I think I found gold!”

  Letty gasped as she ran from the bushes, forgetting that her pants were not fastened. Two steps later she was flat on her face, with her pants around her ankles.

  Eulis ran to her.

  “Dang, Letty! Are you all right?”

  Ignoring the fact that Eulis had a more than ample view of her bare butt, Letty rolled over and got up, pulling her pants as she went.

  “Let me see! Let me see!”