Fortune

by Craig W. Turner

  WILTON’S GOLD

  BOOK ONE: FORTUNE

  by Craig W. Turner

  Edited, Produced, and Published by Writer’s Edge Publishing 2014

  All rights reserved.

  Smashwords Edition

  © 2014 Craig Turner

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Other Books by Craig Turner

  Fortune

  Fulfillment

  Fate

  For Nadine

  Thank you

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  WILTON’S GOLD has been a five-year leg of a two decade journey of novel writing for me. My path to publication of this series has been influenced and inspired by so many people, and I cherish all of them – my test readers, my followers on social media, and my friends and colleagues who simply let me bounce ideas off of them. Specifically, I want to thank the following:

  Nadine, my wonderful wife, who never begrudges me my writing time even though there are literally hundreds of things I should be doing around the house. And my children, Karissa, Joel, Sarafina and Mariella, for always inspiring me to do something they’re proud of. For a writer, there is nothing quite like having one of your children ask you to open Microsoft Word for them so they could start working on a book of their own.

  My mother, Barbara, who got the writing bug when I was in high school and asked me to edit her stuff for her (so many commas!). Grandma, for her inspiration every day, and for taking me to Universal Studios Hollywood in 1989 where we had the opportunity to go on the set of Back to the Future, Part II. And Aunt Laura, for always, always encouraging me in whatever I’m setting out to do.

  Chad Baldwin and the folks at Writer’s Edge Publishing, for taking a chance on this new author and building a fantastic partnership, and Jennifer Wilson, my editor, for her insightful work on my manuscripts – as difficult as time travel is to write, with the twists, turns and loopholes, I can’t imagine that editing someone else’s time travel interpretation is any easy task.

  Two people that don’t know me personally, but whose small interactions with me had a tremendous influence on these books: author coach Mark Malatesta, for his well-thought out advice to change what was a pretty awful working title. And Sara Megibow of the Nelson Literary Agency – in a reply from Ms. Megibow to an early query letter, Ms. Megibow offered some invaluable feedback on one of my characters that ended up having a tremendous influence on all three books.

  Of course, Jesus Christ, for his blessings on me and my family, and for always giving me the inspiration to keep writing – that the story of Joe Wilton and his gold came directly from a dream in the middle of the night is a testament to the fact that we always must be ready for inspiration to strike.

  And finally, Steven Spielberg, Robert Zemeckis, Bob Gale, Michael J. Fox, Lea Thompson, Thomas Wilson, Crispen Glover and Christopher Lloyd for inspiring a 12-year-old kid that time travel was just about the coolest concept possible. Without question, I would not have written these novels without Back to the Future’s influence on me – and I hope they live up to the genre that BTTF created. Looking forward to catching up with Doc and Marty on October 21, 2015!

  PROLOGUE

  Jeff watched as Dr. Murphy walked slowly away from the sidewalk café and into the midday crowd along 36th Street, leaving a half-eaten piece of salmon behind. From his vantage point he couldn’t tell for sure, but he thought the man might be shaking his head. While he wasn’t surprised at the reaction, he had to admit he was a little disappointed. He’d been preparing for this meeting for weeks and in his mind it had gone very differently.

  Even as Jeff deflected the refusal, though – it hadn’t been the first time in his professional life he’d been told ‘no’ after all – he felt the need to reconsider his approach if he was going to effectively recruit. Today’s meeting with Dr. Murphy wouldn’t be the last time he’d be telling someone that he’d discovered human time travel. Finally, he tried to put himself in the shoes of someone receiving that information for the first time, and laughed aloud. Amazing that he hadn’t tried doing it before. It wasn’t the easiest thing to hear.

  First of all, it wasn’t particularly believable. To most everyone on the planet, including the hundreds of people walking past him on the sidewalk, time travel was a myth. A tool in science fiction movies. A fun topic for discussion on a family road trip. Jeff had to concede that the news that time travel was possible could be incomprehensible to someone not previously involved. While he’d been shooting for excitement and intrigue in his grand reveal, he’d ended up producing doubt and reluctance.

  He also should have known better than to underestimate Dr. Murphy. There were dangers inherent in time travel, and while Jeff had duly acknowledged them in his research, he’d personally done his best to ignore them in order to keep pressing forward. From the beginning, he’d been convinced he could maintain control. He’d had no way of knowing whether Dr. Dexter Murphy was the adventurous or conservative sort before he sat down at the lunch table, but in retrospect, he should have expected that he’d look at things from multiple angles, given what he did for a living.

  Still, between getting past his initial shock at the concept and then walking away from the conversation, the man had asked relevant, insightful questions. Jeff had at least piqued his interest, even if the radical nature of the topic had ultimately scared him off. But it was definitely enough to build upon, which he had no choice but to do. He needed a historian. He needed this particular historian.

  He looked around to see if their waiter was in sight. No luck. Since he hadn’t received the check yet, he estimated the tab for lunch based on his memory of the menu and threw three $20 bills onto the table. Then he broke into a full sprint after Dexter Murphy.

  CHAPTER ONE

  August 13, 1849

  Though he’d been training with it for weeks, the Colt Pocket Revolver felt foreign in Jeff Jacobs’ hands. Never having experienced a gunfight in the Old West, he knew that no amount of practice would have been enough if he was to be called upon to use it. The gun would help him play his part, and present him as a legitimate threat, but there was every reason to hope he wouldn’t need to consider firing it.

  He knew the moment Joe Wilton and his team would come trudging into sight, as precisely as he could, but nothing could alleviate his impatience. Which wasn’t surprising. For the first time in a long time, he found himself not in a rush. No smartphone incessantly vibrating in his pocket alerting him to some supposedly urgent e-mail. No next meeting to get to or plane to catch. There was a big part of him that wanted to relax and enjoy it for a while. But that would’ve defeated the purpose of the meticulous planning that had gone into being right here at this exact moment. In-and-out was what he’d told his partners, and though the serenity of this particular mountain pass beckoned to him, the peace would be necessarily short-lived.

  He gave himself a small bit of leeway, smiling innocently as he holstered the gun. He couldn’t name a person who wouldn’t want to be right where he was, about to do what he was about to do. It’s why people still watch movies about the Old West – to take themselves to another place for a couple hours, remembering what it was like to feel young again, running around the backyard playing Cowboys and Indians. He was living it. It took all of his concentration to stay focused on the job and not contemplate the world he’d nudged his way into.

  Trying to focus on what was coming, he centered himself in one thought: he was the scientist. And if he was having this much trouble staying on task, he could only imagine wh
at was on everyone else’s minds. He remembered Dexter saying at one point that he’d done over 200 reenactments between the Revolutionary, French and Indian and Civil Wars. He’d even dragged Jeff to a couple, where he’d suffered from that definitive fish-out-of-water feeling. But what could Dexter Murphy, having dedicated his life to American history, be thinking at that moment sitting in the Henness Pass – or what would soon become the Henness Pass – waiting for a misguided but well-intentioned American icon to come into view? He could see him across the way, similarly crouched, behind a large protruding block of granite. His shaggy hair poked out from beneath a brown, wide-brimmed authentic felt miner’s hat. Selfishly, as the one who made the moment possible, Jeff thought he would’ve enjoyed sitting next to his friend, hearing his admiration for what they’d accomplished.

  The sun was just beginning to descend, its orange light brimming the top of the enormous trees, meaning that the Wilton party would be appearing shortly. They were due to set up camp about two miles to the west, where Joe Wilton would write in his diary by firelight, about the nervousness that had plagued him throughout the day, carrying the kind of load he was carrying. He would settle off to sleep only to be ambushed by thieves at dawn.

  There were four in Wilton’s party – not counting the sharpshooters he’d cautiously hidden in the trees. According to his handwritten account, he’d been so uptight about traveling this little-known road, deviating from the more popular, but definitely more treacherous, Donner Pass, that he’d sent four members of his team to watch from above as the wagon cut through the mountainous forest.

  Joe Wilton wasn’t in California to find gold as so many others were – he already had it. Lots of it, emblazoned in gold bricks marked with the seal of his own private mint. But his goal was to get it to San Francisco, where business was beginning to boom and a man like him would be able to multiply his fortune quickly. At least that’s how he put it in his own words, in a journal he kept that, in Jeff’s time, resided at the California Gold Rush Museum. According to Wilton, his key to success was making the trip very quietly, to avoid arousing any conflict.

  Ultimately however, his fears were realized, as a notorious gang of bandits led by the interminable Daniel “Bad Dan” Carmichael swept through the camp in what would now be the next morning, and made off with about sixty gold bars – valued at $2.1 million in present day dollars – murdering five of Wilton’s men in the process and sacrificing one of their own. Wilton did eventually make it to San Francisco, relying upon his business savvy to create a living for himself as an innkeeper, but his fortune was lost right here in the Sierra Nevadas. The gold bricks were never again seen, likely melted down to hide their origin.

  In his diary, Wilton wrote of his surprise from the morning attack, how even the grittiest of his navigators did not see it coming, and how they’d been most worried that, if harm was to come to them, it would’ve been in the narrow path through a particularly deep ravine about two miles east of the area they’d chosen to set up camp. In that spot, the depth of the trail had put the wagon dangerously out of the sight of his sharpshooters, themselves footing more treacherous ground for at least fifteen minutes. A concerted effort could’ve taken the party from the front or back with little resistance – if they could outrun the pursuit that would surely follow, carrying that large weight of gold. If Wilton himself had planned the ambush, that’s where he would have made it.

  Of course, this was the trail that now separated Jeff and Dexter, and the other members of their team, Emeka and Abby, who were hidden somewhere in the brush. If everything went to plan, Bad Dan Carmichael would not be stealing Wilton’s gold the next morning, no matter how history had written it, because it simply wouldn’t be there for him to steal.

  A small rock struck the ground near Jeff’s foot. He looked up at Dexter, who’d thrown it his way. Dexter motioned with his head to his left, Jeff’s right. Wilton was coming down the path, right on schedule. Jeff’s own amazement over the accuracy of their information was quickly superseded by a burst of adrenaline. They would have time later to self-congratulate.

  His hand went to his revolver. Authentic 1849, like everything else in each of their ensembles. If the wagon was coming, that meant that Wilton’s men were in the trees above them. Currently, they’d be blind, but that would only last so long. His group had to be quick, decisive, and hopefully out of here before a shot was fired. His Colt was ready, though, in case they met hostile resistance. Everyone on the team was similarly armed, but with explicit instructions that no one was to discharge a firearm without it being a life-or-death need. All of their planning was to ensure that wouldn’t have to happen.

  Under Dexter’s tutelage, Jeff had spent the last several months studying every detail of Joe Wilton’s life. He knew everything about the man that the history books were willing and able to share. Amazingly, he was now about to meet him. Albeit not under the most pleasant of circumstances.

  While he couldn’t yet see the wagon from his vantage point, he could hear the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves on the rocky forest floor. He noticed Dexter sinking further behind the rock, as his position was now clearly in sight. In the final few moments he had before springing into the situation, he went over the details he’d memorized from the diary. Three men – Wilton, his driver, and a business partner – and one woman, Wilton’s wife, Virginia, would be in the party. Wilton and the business partner were armed, though neither was a particularly good shot or fond of drawing weapons. The driver was not armed. Based on Dexter’s interpretation of Wilton’s diary and other writings he’d researched, the team would wholeheartedly look to their leader for guidance in any situation. The plan here was to disarm Wilton himself quickly, and then have the others surrender. If a shot was fired, it would alert the men in the trees and they’d have to make a hasty decision to leave with or without the gold.

  The noise of the horses’ footsteps slowed. As he’d written, Wilton was obviously nervous about this part of the trip, and was proceeding as cautiously as possible. Emeka and Abby should by now have emerged from their hiding places, and would be advancing on the wagon from the rear, at this point unnoticed. Jeff drew his pistol and waited, his eyes fixed on his friend across the trail.

  After a moment, Dexter motioned with his hand that the time had come. As Jeff stood, he realized how hard his heart was pounding. Three years ago he’d been a lab geek buried in spreadsheets and algorithms, his only life to speak of being a couple of Coors Lights every other weekend at TGIFriday’s at the far end of the Culver Place Mall, and those with his sister. Now he was about to rob a stagecoach, in 1849 California, taking possession of a couple million in gold bricks. For a quick second, he wondered if his parents would’ve been proud.

  Pulling his bandana over the lower part of his face, Jeff materialized from out of the trees and approached the wagon, his Colt drawn. Wilton’s driver, a 30-year-old farmer from Mississippi named Lucius Fitzsimmons, who according to Wilton’s diary would be shot and killed the next morning in the ambush, caught sight of him immediately, and started to shout.

  “Keep it quiet,” Jeff said in a strong voice, still walking toward the man. “Keep it quiet.”

  When Fitzsimmons failed to listen immediately, Emeka the ex-Marine was next to him like a flash, hanging off the side of the stage, a Bowie knife planted against the man’s temple. Jeff had never seen anyone move so fast. “I believe you were told to keep quiet,” he said.

  The driver frowned and relaxed his grip on the reins. The wagon came to a complete stop. “Ummmm, Mr. Wilton?” He called back to his passengers. “We’ve got some company.”

  “Who’s that?” The voice coming from inside the wagon was guttural, almost exactly what Jeff would have guessed based on his knowledge of Wilton.

  “Not sure,” Fitzsimmons said as he calmly took off his straw hat and set it down on the seat next to him. He used his forearm to wipe his brow. His appearance, too, was almost exactly as Jeff had pictured from Wilton’s jour
nal. Not that he’d described him, so to speak, but he’d talked about him enough that Jeff expected the stubbly face and watchful eyes of a wilderness traveler. “But they’re armed. Would you like to speak with them?”

  Silence for a moment. “Not particularly.”

  By this point, Dexter had made his way to Jeff’s side, his face similarly covered. Seeing Dexter’s red-and-black bandana made him realize that Emeka hadn’t covered his own face, something he’d have to scold him for later. They were not there to make a mark on history, and Emeka’s olive skin, as bestowed upon him by a Nigerian mother and Tennessean father, as well as that noticeable scar on his cheek, would stand out.

  “We hear say you’re carrying gold ingots with you to San Francisco,” Dexter said, loud enough for Wilton to hear. Jeff was impressed – not all history nerds could be counted on to provide practical application of their craft so believably. “We’d like to help you make better time by lightenin’ your load.”

  Another pause. Jeff immediately wondered if Wilton didn’t know what to do, or if he was strategically stalling to allow his marksmen time to realize something was wrong. If they came to the end of the pass and the wagon didn’t meet them there, they’d surely double back to look for any signs of trouble. Finally, Wilton’s head popped out of the canvas. He had a burly, oval face with what would be described as a big nose and tousled hair – this time, not the look Jeff expected. He glanced first up at Emeka, then at Jeff and Dexter as they faced him. “And how did you come to hear that?” he asked.