Bates. Maybe even for life. You see I was praying for a long time for a way to get away from Mr. Bates’ place. You and Dominic had to be answers to that prayer.”
James’ way of viewing events and their results humored Rudolph and perplexed Thomas.
“He’s right, Thomas. If you hadn’t been such a dumb head and hit my brother then we would both still be in Germany.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” James said. “That revolution there in Germany a few years back killed thousands of your people. One or both of you could’ve been killed too if you were still there then.”
Thomas and Rudolph thought of those from their village who were victims of the revolution and of whom they had read in letters from family. This caused them to grow silent as James said his “goodnights” and prepared his bedroll. The conversation was renewed over breakfast the next morning.
“What James said yesterday has made me think.” Rudolph yawned. “It’s all your fault that I came to this crazy country with its wild men who will kill you for a horse.”
“My fault? You didn’t have to follow me here, Scheiskopf!” Thomas wanted to wallop Rudolph even harder than he had struck his brother 12 years earlier outside of the Gasthaus. But when he stood to launch his attack he collapsed. His illness had weakened him to the point that rising suddenly to his feet made him dizzy enough to faint. As James helped Thomas back to a sitting position, Rudolph continued to vent his long bottled up emotions.
“Yes, if it weren’t for you, Herr Schmidt, I’d have married that barmaid from Munich or maybe a nice girl from our village and be happily making beer for a living.” He sneered.
This time Thomas’ response was one of resignation. He simply let his head droop in shame and gave no answer. Equipped by his Maker with the ability to sense others’ emotional condition, James knew that Thomas was as low as a bare-knuckled boxer laying face down for the count. Yet Rudolph continued to flail away with words that wounded until James intervened.
“Mr. Rudolph, please. Thomas is hurting. Please let him be.”
Rudolph snorted. He then stood up and kicked dirt into the fire and began to clean the pan that they had used to fry their eggs and bacon. Thomas slowly raised his head.
“I’m sorry.” It was the first time he had said those words to Rudolph.
Rudolph snorted again and clenched his fists.
“You are right. It is all my fault,” Thomas said. “A lot of nights when I can’t sleep I try to imagine how different everything would be if I hadn’t run away.”
“Well, you know what they say. You can run but you can’t hide.” James tried to put the matter into perspective.
His companions frowned as they attempted to understand yet another saying that they never had heard in their native tongue. This time Rudolph directed his scorn at James.
“Is that what the tribe that made you into a slave told you? That you could run but not hide?”
James smiled. “Not exactly with those words. They were too busy strutting around like the cock of the walk because they knew they were getting what they want by trading us to the slave gangs from the ships. Their selling us to the slavers was no different for them than hunting down a lion or any other beast.”
“Cock of the walk?” Rudolph shook his head. James’ expressions were more of an irritation than an education. “The sun is almost up. Let’s get going.”
That morning’s journey was mostly silent as Thomas stung from the inner wounds that Rudolph had inflicted. Meanwhile, Rudolph stewed in his own inner turmoil as he ruminated on how much better his life could have been if he had not tried to do what was honorable and chase Thomas across the ocean. James simply enjoyed the scenery.
The inhabitants in the valley that stretched for hundreds of miles to the south were mostly those from various Indian tribes and Mexicans who had remained after the war had ended two years earlier. Few of the recent immigrants had settled there yet. The hundreds of thousands of Americans, Chinese, Mexicans, Central and South Americans, and Europeans who had flooded into California were concentrated where gold had been found or in the cities and towns that served as conduits to the gold fields. They were uninterested in the agricultural potential of the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. This soil would eventually yield every crop from almonds to rice, cotton to pistachios, grapes to oranges, wheat to hops, and support every kind of livestock. They were Argonauts, their only ambition, to find gold.
The Indians that they encountered mostly fled when they saw the three riders approaching. Tales of others being murdered by the surge of immigrants to California had passed from tribe to tribe.
Because they journeyed through the heart of the San Joaquin Valley, the trio’s first encounter with outlaws proved to be their last. Most of the bushwhackers, thieves, bandits, card sharks, and other troublemakers preyed on the mining camps or those journeying to and from them. The tales of Rattlesnake Dick stealing horses and Joaquin Murrieta robbing stagecoaches in the Sierra filled newspapers nationwide. Later on Black Bart would rob 28 Wells Fargo stagecoaches and become a legend as he left works of poetry at the scenes of his crimes. One such work eventually led to his capture as the paper on which it was written revealed his whereabouts.
They did their best to play the part of cowboys as they moved south. While none of the three wore the trademark wrinkles and weather-beaten face of genuine cowboys, they all sported hats that resembled what many cowpokes wore. That and the guns around their waists gave them enough of an appearance to hide their farming and mining backgrounds somewhat. When they passed through an expanding cattle ranch near the center of the state they were even offered jobs by a foreman who invited them to dinner. He cooked up thick slabs of beef for supper.
“Listen boys, I can use all three of you. All of my cowpokes deserted me for the diggings. I can tell you all are still sort of green around the edges. But I can teach you everything there is to know about being a cowboy. Once you got that down you got yourselves a job no matter where you mosey on to.”
“We appreciate your kind offer but I am sick,” Thomas confided. “My doctors have told me I must get to warmer weather or I might die.”
“What’s ailing you, then?”
“They say it’s pneumonia.”
“Oh. Well there’s no way you can be sticking around here then. The winter rains will be hitting us soon. How about you other two?”
“I have to get back to my family in New York.” Rudolph explained his change of heart. “I’ve had enough of California. I’m sorry that I ever came all the way out here. I am sorry that I came to America. I belong back in Bavaria.”
The disappointed foreman glanced at James. He felt his possible new hires slipping away one by one.
“I’m with Thomas, sir,” James said. “I feel obligated to help him reach his doctor in Los Angeles.”
He turned over the slabs of meat to cook their raw sides and stared at the flames. The fire spit and crackled as the fat from the beef dissolved and fell into it. After rolling a cigarette and lighting it he offered tobacco and papers to his guests. All but Rudolph declined. He had picked up a tobacco habit while mining around Placerville. After the meal the generous host offered the empty bunkhouse to the weary travelers. The next morning he fed them a breakfast of fried eggs, steak, and coffee. As they ate he gave his reasons for leaving Texas.
“It’s too wild down there. Too many gunslingers and other yahoos shooting up the place all the time it seemed like. I started out when I was 14 running the Beef Trail to New Orleans. That was okay. Once in a while we’d lose a few head in the swamps in the quicksand.” He smiled as the memories came back. “Once a gator that looked to be 15 feet long even snatched a cow in his mouth and drug him away underwater. We all shot at him but it seemed like the bullets were bouncing off his thick alligator hide.”
“Fifteen feet?” Thomas was sure the cowboy was imitating the German Baron.
“Well, maybe ten feet. But he really did get him. Then I started running Texas Longh
orns up into Missouri way. We took them all the way to St. Louis, Springfield, and Baxter Springs. Those were the days. I came out here because the grass is always greener like they say. In some ways it is. It’s a whole lot easier driving cattle a couple hundred miles to Sacramento than it was driving them a thousand miles from Texas to Missouri.”
“The more I meet people like you the more the cowboy way of life appeals to me,” Thomas said.
“Me, too.” James agreed. “But why didn’t you take off for the diggings too?”
The old cowhand smiled. “A man’s got to do what he does best. For me it’s herding and driving cattle. If what you said about being a cowboy is your real feelings you both got a job here if you heal on up and decide to come on back.”
The land grants, first given out by Spain and later, Mexico, had minimally impacted the valley. Now a U.S. territory, California had yet to be overrun by settlers who wanted to homestead. Most settlers who wanted to farm instead of prospect had followed the Oregon Trail to that state’s rich fertile valleys. It was the hordes of itinerant miners who drifted from one mining camp to another who had invaded California.
Down in the valley elk, deer, and antelope roamed at will and their herds multiplied because of the plentiful water and grazing. Enough rivers, creeks, and streams emptied into marshes and ponds at the bottom of the
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