As he talked, he ate. He drank coffee, he ate again.
And as he talked he found himself putting ideas into words that he had not even dreamed of before. Possibilities occurred to him as he spoke. From an inner pocket he drew an envelope, and on the back of the letter he drew up an agreement.
“The town of Red Horse,” he said, “belongs to me, but it has been abandoned for years. It occupies an intermediate point upon the trail, and with the coming of spring there will be money to be made.
“People will arrive here as you have arrived. They will be short of provisions, almost out of water, and they will need to lay in supplies. For this they will be ready to exchange goods or pay cash.
“I have here an agreement. Those who wish to go no further, and wish to come with me to Red Horse, will sign it. Those who sign will move to Red Horse with me. We will brush up and clean up, and open the town for business. You may sort out whatever you can spare and put it up for sale.”
“I brought a stock of goods,” one man said suddenly. “Planned to keep store in California.”
“Good! We will sell them at���” He caught himself first in time, for he had started to say ‘at exorbitant prices,’ but hastily dropped the adjective. Macon Fallon had observed that even merchants who sell at exorbitant prices do not like to admit to it.
“You will be free to stake claims as long as you leave mine alone, but let me assure you the finding of gold in paying quantity, either here or in California, is a very rare thing. The real gold will lie in the pockets of those who come to hunt for gold.
“Whether they find gold or not, they must eat, wear clothing, use tools. I will take thirty per cent of your business profits, ten per cent of your claims.”
“That’s ridiculous!” It was that girl with the cool eyes who spoke. “We provide the goods, and you take thirty per cent! Why, we can go further west, set up shop, and keep it all.”
He smiled at her across the heads of the others, admiring her slender figure, the way she stood straight on her two feet. At the same time, he wished she were already in California���or back where she came from. Anywhere but here, now.
“The way west is open, of course,” he said. “You don’t need me.”
He turned abruptly and walked back to his horse, filling his hat again from the barrel. He was not worried, for he knew what they must do.
After giving his horse water, he occupied the next few minutes in brushing the dust from his coat, and wiping the action of his Winchester. His wrists were still raw from the chafing of the rope, and he had to watch to keep his cuffs over the marks. From his saddlebags he took his spare .44 and holstered it. It was his good fortune that the lynching party had been both drunk and overconfident.
As he brushed himself off and checked his guns, he considered the situation. Until he glimpsed that weathered sign lying forgotten in the brush, he had not thought of Buell’s Bluff in years. Never having seen a map of the area, and approaching it from a different direction, he had not even realized he was in the vicinity. He had been one of those who had followed that illfated gold rush so long ago. Of course, the town might have burned, but he thought not. At least something would be left. And as he recalled, there was water on the site.
The niche in the hills where the town lay was well hidden, and there was small chance it had been rediscovered, or that any of the original miners had returned. Buell’s Bluff had been in the beginning what he was about to make it again���a fraud and a deception.
Yet, he told himself, how could these people do better? At least it would give their stock a chance to rest and recuperate. With their overloaded wagons they could never cross the desert to the west. Their oxen were already tried beyond their endurance. One or two would surely die, then the others would be unable to haul the wagons, and then more would die.
These were good people, and he planned no deception for them���at least, not one that would cost them anything. And he did offer them hope, and some security without going further.
He could hear them arguing, and the girl protesting. Why couldn’t she keep her pretty mouth shut?
After several minutes the sandy-haired man walked over to him and thrust out his hand. “My name is Blane. This is Tom Damon. Is there gold there? At Red Horse?”
He had them now.
“My uncle said it was the richest strike in the mines.” The most gold his uncle had ever seen was in his wife’s wedding ring. “Naturally, I can promise nothing. I do not know what there is.”
He paused. “Remember this: we do not have to find gold to do business. There will be trade with the wagon trains.”
Blane scowled. “There will be a saloon. I do not hold with whiskey-drinking.”
“Leave that to me. There will be order in the town.”
“All right,” Blane agreed finally. “It is a hard bargain you drive, but we have no choice.”
Would the trail be washed out? Fallon knew what heavy rains could do to any trail in this country; so at his suggestion all the oxen were hitched to one wagon, leaving young Jim Blane, who was sixteen, and Al Damon, who was nineteen, to guard the remaining wagon. Once arrived in Red Horse, they could dismount a wheel and return for the other wagon.
Macon Fallon, somewhat shamed by the hope he now saw in their faces, rode ahead to guide them. He had gone only a short distance when Ginia Blane overtook him.
Ginia obviously was not one to beat about the chaparral. “Mr. Fallon,” she said, “is this a wild-goose chase?”
Something warned Macon Fallon that lying to Ginia would not be easy. The direct look from those cool gray eyes was disconcerting. Buell’s Bluff, hastily rechristened Red Horse, had been a monumental fraud, a gold rush promoted with a few carefully salted claims. Before the fraud was discovered men had rushed in, built stores, saloons, and a hotel. Investors who had missed the Comstock rushed to hand their money to the swindlers of Buell’s Bluff.
Then a salted mine was found, others were hastily investigated, and within hours the exodus had begun. Within days the town was deserted. When the bottom fell out, the thud with which it fell was felt as far away as Boston, New York, and even London. That had been ten years ago, and so far as Fallon was aware, nobody had been near the place since.
“Gold,” he declared with great originality, “is where you find it���and one never knows. It was said to be a great strike, but after the Piute attack it was deserted.”
That statement was true. It had been said to be a great strike, and Piutes had killed the last men to leave the town. Nine men had died in that sudden raid.
“I don’t trust you, Mr. Fallon,” Ginia said, “and if you take advantage of us I shall find a way to make you pay.”
No tracks showed on the trail, nor any evidence of travel. Heavy rains had gouged gullies across the road, and in places had turned the trail itself into a watercourse, cutting deep ruts. Fallon stopped several times to roll rocks into the deeper ruts, or to kick down the sides and make passage easier for the wagon.
The town lay upon a long bench that bordered a wash on the far side. Actually, the wash curved around the bench, which was more than a mile long. The town was backed up against the mountain at the farthest end of the bench, and behind the town there was a scattering of trees. Altogether, as he recalled it, the site was far from uninviting.
Yet nothing in the country over which they rode suggested any town, or any evidence of water. It was singularly barren and depressing.
Suddenly Ginia Blane drew rein. “Where are you taking us? It’s been miles, and there’s simply nothing.”
“If I recall,” he replied mildly, “you will see the town from the top of that rise.”
Suspicious, but willing to give him a chance to prove his case, she rode on with him. They topped out suddenly on the hill overlooking the valley, and the town lay before them, about a mile away. At this distance, it seemed that time had not produced any visible change.
It was even larger than h
e recalled, for there was a street with at least a dozen business buildings, and a scattering of houses and shacks. In sudden panic he tried to remember whether any of the signs carried the name of Buell’s Bluff.
He turned to Ginia. “You had best ride back to the wagons. They might not realize the town is so near and decide to camp for the night. They should come on through.”
Her eyes searched his face. “Is that the only reason you want me to go back?”
She was lovely, no question of that. She had an attractive figure and a charming face; but she was his enemy, suspicious of his every word and move.
“Actually,” he replied, “it is not my only reason. So far as I know the town is deserted, but I cannot be sure. When I ride in I wish to be alone, responsible only for myself.”
“Also”���this was a sudden inspiration���“in a town so long abandoned there are sure to be snakes. This country is infested with rattlers.”
He had scored a point, for she drew up instantly, but she was still suspicious. “You find explanations very easy, don’t you, Mr. Fallon? You are very glib, very smooth. You are also,” she added, “quite a handsome man, very rugged-looking and strong, but I think you are a sham, Mr. Fallon.”
Deliberately, she turned her horse and rode back to the wagons, and he looked after her, feeling no resentment.
Before him lay the town. The sun was setting beyond the distant ridges and they carried a crimson glow along their serrated edges. He cantered down the hill, thinking of the water that lay ahead, as the black horse undoubtedly was also.
Never far behind any boom, Macon Fallon had followed the will-o’-the-wisp of fortune to this place too, only he was younger then, and fortune seemed much closer.
Yet now, if all went well, he might accomplish his objective and sell out within ninety days. It was doubtful if anyone in this land of shifting population would remember the place. People never stopped in this area, but passed on through, bound for California.
His horse’s hoofs drummed on the old plank bridge, still sturdy and solid. Sleeping echoes awakened, warning anyone who might be holed up within the town. Slowing to a walk, he drew his Winchester. At the near end of the street he drew up, studying the situation.
The windows stared with vacant eyes at the lengthening shadows … a bat swooped low above him. The town was a picture of silence and desolation. Coarse weeds and brush grew in the street, and where the boardwalk had broken through, weeds had filled the spaces. Here and there glass lay upon the walk as it had fallen from a broken window. Several of the windows had been boarded up, and the hitch rail was down, lying in the street. The old signs were weathered and faint.
He walked his horse slowly up the street, staring from sign to sign. Memories flooded back…
Buell’s Bank … that one would have to come down. Susan Brown’s Hats, Shoes and Notions … Assay Office … Yankee Saloon … Veitch Hotel: Room & Board … Demings Emporium … General Merchandise … Pearly Gates’ Saloon & Dance Hall … Mom Jelks’ Home-Made Pies, Cakes & Bread … Blacksmith Shop … There were others, some almost illegible.
Riding back down the street, he searched for and found Deming’s ladder, which he had once used long ago, and removed the sign from Buell’s Bank, carefully breaking it up for kindling.
There was no sign on the long bunkhouse that had offered bunks to those less discriminating than the hotel patron. Not far from it was the jail, blasted from solid rock, and boasting three iron-barred cells. It was a gloomy place but, so far as he remembered, it had never been used.
He led his horse to the reservoir back of the Yankee Saloon, a tank built of stone some sixteen feet across and, as he recalled, about eight feet deep. A thin trickle of water ran from the tank, and a somewhat larger trickle ran into it.
He led the black to the water and let him drink, then after a few minutes led him back down the street and tied him near the Yankee Saloon. With the butt of his Winchester he smashed the hasp from the saloon door and pushed it open.
It was still light enough for him to see that the mirror behind the bar was intact, and that there were several rows of glasses and empty bottles. In the back a dim stairway led to a balcony, where cavernous doorways opened to several rooms.
Chairs and tables still stood in the room, and poker chips were scattered about, a few playing cards among them. Dust lay thick over everything, and cobwebs hung everywhere. A folded newspaper lay beside a cup and saucer on one of the back tables. In a corner sat a pot-bellied stove. He opened the stove door and could feel no draft down the chimney. No doubt birds had nested there.
When he stepped outside his boots echoed on the boardwalk. The sun was gone now, and gloomy shadows gathered between the buildings and in the lee of the mountain. Those great empty eyes of the windows stared down upon him.
The short boom had brought capital to the town. Several moneyed men, anxious to realize on such a boom as the Comstock, had been among the first to rush in. It was one of these who had built the hotel and the Yankee Saloon.
When the crash came and the people fled, disappointed and angry, they left all behind that they could not easily carry. Dishes, glassware, books, papers, odds and ends of clothing���all were left behind. They had fled as if in a hurry to be free of any evidence of their gullibility.
A vagrant breeze skittered a dry leaf along the walk���the only movement in this silent place. He was a fool, a fool to attempt what he had in mind, yet what else was there? If those people in the wagons were trapped by circumstances, he was trapped too.
He had worked at many things. He had been a buffalo hunter, a cowhand, trail driver, miner, stage driver, shotgun guard���none of them for long. Longest of all he had been a gambler.
He glanced at the reflection of himself in a darkening window. His eyes could make out no detail, but he knew what was there. A tall man, lean of body, wide of shoulder; a narrow, triangular face, high cheekbones and a strong jaw. On his jaw a bullet scar gave his face a somewhat piratical cast. A tall man wearing a black, flat-brimmed hat and a black frock coat; but Fallon saw more than that: he saw in that vague reflection a shadow, the shadow of failure.
Back down the line somewhere there had been dreams, ambitions, even certainties. Success had been only just around the corner, tomorrow … now where was it? Cynically, and without self-deception, he regarded that shadow in the window. That was Macon Fallon, drifter, gambler, ne’er-do-well, staking his last chance on a town that was as big a fraud as he was himself.
What had Ginia said? That he was a sham. Well, she was right. There was nothing to him beyond that, yet … suppose he could get a stake here? He could go to San Francisco, open a small business of his own, find a house somewhere, settle down. He could go to the theater, read books … he could be a gentleman.
It all depended on what happened here. He must, from these empty shells, create the image of a living, breathing town. He must make those claims appear worked, and he must play upon the imaginations of his possible customers.
Long after dark he heard the wagon rumble across the bridge and turn into an area just outside of town. There they drew up, and there they unyoked the oxen. Ginia rode up the street to meet him.
“Your town doesn’t amount to much,” she said.
“What did you expect of a ghost town? Gaslight and red carpets?”
Blane came up to them. “Depressing,” he said gloomily. “I don’t like it.”
“It’s all right, pa. It will look better by daylight. You’ll see.”
It was evidence of her influence that he accepted her reassurance and walked back to the wagon.
“Pa’s down,” Ginia said worriedly. “I never saw him like this before.”
Macon Fallon removed his hat and let the cool air of evening stir around his temples. “Did you ever put yourself in his place?” he asked. “There’s a man with a wife and family. He’s brought them two-thirds the way across a continent���to what? Your pa,” he added, “is n
o longer a boy. And he’s starting all over, in a new country, with almost nothing. He’s scared, Miss Blane, and he has a right to be.”
“And you?”
Fallon shrugged. “Believe me, no man knows what it means to be scared until he has to think of others besides himself … those he’s supposed to care for and protect. A man with a wife and family has, in the words of Francis Bacon, given hostages to fortune.”
“And you?” she repeated. “Have you given no hostages to fortune?”
“I’m a man alone,” he replied shortly, “a man with nothing to add up but a column of wasted years.”
Deliberately, he started his horse toward the others, and she rode beside him.
A campfire had been started, and Blane stood beside it, talking. “I don’t like leaving that boy back there alone, but these oxen are too tuckered for that trip tonight.”
“I thought young Damon stayed with him?” Fallon said.
Al Damon looked up from where he lounged beside the fire. “He’ll do all right by himself. I didn’t want to wait back there by that damn wagon.”
Blane started to speak, but young Damon Was looking at Fallon belligerently. “What’s the matter? Don’t you like it?”
Fallon stifled a sudden burst of temper. After all, he needed these people. “There have been Indians around, and for that matter it is somewhere in this area where the Bellows outfit have been raiding wagon trains. Somebody should certainly be back there with that boy tonight, so when I have watered my horse again, I’ll ride back.”
“You’re tired,” Ginia objected, “and your horse is, too. You’ve come a long way, mister.”
Their eyes met across the fire. He was tired, and he was impatent too. He would have liked to reach down and pick up that Al Damon and slap some sense into him.
“No matter,” he said. “I’ll go.”
He could not resist a parting comment, and when he was in the saddle he turned and glanced at Al. “Have a pleasant evening,” he said coolly.
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