by John Jakes
After a couple of seasons of trouping, Cody had wooed his old friend Hickok into the cast to pump new life into the show. The night Julia had seen it, the fledgling actor had forgotten many of his lines—no real loss, since the wretched script required him to exclaim such things as, “Fear not, fair maid, you are safe at last with Wild Bill!”
To make up for his nervousness, Hickok had diverted the audience by throwing one of his revolvers at a spotlight, and firing blank cartridges so close to the Indians that they shrieked and danced in genuine pain.
On this trip, Hickok had displayed no traces of that fear-induced sadism. In fact he’d remarked several times that he wished he were back in Cincinnati, living unrecognized with his recently acquired wife. Julia thought the protest rang false. There was a peacock quality about the man; he covertly watched others to see whether they were watching him. He liked being admired, as did his fellow scout Bill Cody, whom small boys idolized. Gideon said Cody was a near-alcoholic and a notorious womanizer even though he had a wife and family. Hickok seemed to have neither of those faults.
The mounted travelers had come together solely for mutual safety. Some of them knew one another, but Hickok had several times made clear that he wasn’t responsible for the behavior of any of them. There were a couple of really bizarre characters in the group. One Julia liked very much—dapper Charles Utter from Denver. Or Colorado Charlie, as he’d introduced himself at the first station where the horses were changed. He was a gambler by profession, following the latest gold strike. He boasted that he took care of his shoulder-length blond ringlets with a curling iron borrowed from his wife.
The one member of the party Julia disliked was a coarse young woman in her mid-twenties. She was just now riding up beside Hickok, who was on the left of the coach. The young woman annoyed Julia with her foul language and coarse ways.
The girl had a blunt, almost masculine face and coppery hair which she kept tucked up inside a crushed and filthy cattleman’s hat. She wore denim trousers, drover’s boots and an old Cavalry jacket with corporal’s stripes. Hickok addressed her as Calamity, never explaining why. Earlier, she’d tried to make friends with Julia by stating in a somewhat unique way that she believed in female freedom.
“I do whatever I goddamn please. I once lived in a barracks at Fort Laramie just ’cause I took a notion to do it. I was there three weeks ’fore the officers caught me. I never go to bed sober, and lie down for anything in britches so long as the pay’s good enough.”
Julia did her best to be cordial to Miss Calamity Cannary, but it was hard; she just wasn’t that broad-minded.
Letters continued to come to the Boston headquarters from remote hamlets. The letters usually asked for a speaker. Wherever possible, Lucy filled the requests, and she’d done so this time. The letter bringing Julia to the Bad Lands had come from a Mrs. Myrtle Oates, who said she helped her husband operate a hotel for miners. Julia hoped the itinerant prostitute who’d attached herself to Hickok wasn’t typical of the audience she’d be facing in Deadwood City.
One thing lessened her worry about the camp’s roughness: among the riders was a slender chap who seemed to have taken a fancy to her, though in an eminently polite way. He was about thirty, with a thin mouth and good manners that helped her overlook the puffiness beneath his dark eyes, the unhealthy pallor of his cheeks, and the swollen redness of his nose. He was much too young to be a drunkard but he had most of the characteristics.
Still, his smile was engaging, even if it was accompanied by breath that smelled of the gin he kept hidden somewhere. Julia had never met the man before, yet there was something familiar about him. He seemed to be a friend or at least an acquaintance of Hickok’s, though they didn’t hobnob much. He’d told her that he, like Wild Bill and Colorado Charlie, was a student of the picture cards. Wandering gambler, she supposed he meant.
The young man had mentioned his name when he’d introduced himself back near Custer. Unfortunately she’d forgotten it. But his name wasn’t as important as the brace of revolvers he wore, or the buffalo rifle he carried in his saddle scabbard. She was glad of his protective presence; he was just now jogging up on the right side of the rocking coach.
He pointed ahead into the defile. “Won’t be long now, Miss Sedgwick. I imagine you’re tired of riding.”
“I surely am.” Her legs and derrière ached.
He took off his loaf-crowned sombrero and fanned his forehead. A white streak of hair above his left eyebrow lent him a rakish look. “Sun’s warm for April. I’m anxious for a bath and a change of clothes.” Unlike Hickok, he was dressed in worn cowhand’s garb. “Might attend your lecture, too. Never heard someone of your persuasion speak before. Where’s the talk to be given?”
“In the dining room of a hotel called the Miner’s Rest.”
“Oh,” Fowler said, “that’s a grand establishment, that is.” His tone said otherwise.
She was about to question him on it when Hickok, who was leaning out of his saddle to hold a match to Calamity’s cigar, suddenly straightened. Julia had given up the cigar habit because the smoke made Carter cough, and he said that anything so noxious had to be bad for you. He was probably right.
Hickok raised a hand to indicate half a dozen motionless figures silhouetted against the sky atop a rock formation about a half mile away. As Julia gazed at them, she was aware of Hickok drawing one of his revolvers.
The watching men stepped backward across the top of the rock and vanished. But not before Julia had a distinct impression of feathers jutting from their hair.
Hickok kept his gun drawn while he studied the shadowy pines on either side of the narrowing road. There was a hard set to his mouth and a disappointed expression on his face. Finally he slid his gun back in the holster.
“Those were Sioux,” said the younger man on Julia’s right. He continued to remind her of someone, though she couldn’t place who it was. He had a soft, musical voice. Perhaps he’d been born in the South.
She nodded. “I assumed they were.”
From the left, Hickok said, “Going to be war in these parts. The braves have been getting ready all winter. I heard Bill Cody’s old outfit, the Fifth Cavalry, may be hauled up here from Arizona. General Merritt wants Bill to quit playacting for a while and come back and scout for him.”
“I’m not surprised there’s going to be trouble,” Julia said. “When General Custer marched in here two years ago, he did so illegally.”
Hickok clearly didn’t like the statement. She recalled that he’d served in the army. Been one of General Custer’s favorite scouts, in fact.
“Well,” he said at length, “the hostiles better not ask for war because they’ll get that and a lot more. They’ll get scorched earth. People are sick of the tribes standing in the way of progress.”
Annoyed, Julia said, “I thought the Sioux were standing where they’re legally entitled to stand. Isn’t this area guaranteed to them by treaty? Isn’t it sacred ground?”
“Yes, indeed,” said the young man on the right. “But gold’s a lot more sacred to the white man.”
“You can’t stop progress,” Hickok insisted.
“Progress or robbery?” she replied. “Last year the treaty commission offered six million dollars for all the disputed land up here. Of course that was hardly a fair price. If there’s a bonanza of gold in the ground, the land might ultimately be worth ten times as much.”
The young man chuckled. “Red Cloud and Little Big Man and Spotted Tail got so insulted they countered with a demand for a hundred million, then walked out of the powwow. Now the government looks the other way while prospectors come in”—he grinned in a cynical way—“as well as those of us who mine the prospectors.”
“No disrespect to either of you gentlemen,” Julia declared, “but I think the government’s policy is muddled and despicable.”
“The devil it is, woman!” Hickok growled. “Let me tell you which land belongs to the white man. Any land he needs and can
take. That’s why the army’s getting ready for war.”
Hickok’s attitudes infuriated her, but she decided it was futile to quarrel. She turned to the younger man.
“Since we’re almost to our destination, I must make a confession. You’ve been a very pleasant companion, but I’ve completely forgotten your name.”
Hickok snickered, then spurred ahead. The young man reddened. “Jason Kane,” he said. He spelled the surname and stared at her as if expecting a reaction.
Puzzled, she replied, “Thank you, Mr. Kane. I won’t forget a second time. You remind me of someone, but I can’t—wait.” She clapped her gloved hands together. “It’s a friend of mine in New York City.”
In a strangely hoarse voice, he repeated, “New York?”
“That’s right. You don’t resemble him physically. But your voices are quite a bit alike. My friend’s a newspaper publisher—”
What in heaven’s name was wrong? The young man looked as if he’d been struck.
“Tell me your friend’s name,” he whispered.
“It’s Kent. Gideon Kent. Do you know him?”
For a moment the young man was too stunned to answer. Then an opaqueness came into his dark eyes. He jammed the sugar-loaf hat on his head. Then came another abrupt and mystifying change: a touch of sadness in his expression.
It was quickly gone. “No, never heard of him.” He touched his hat brim and rammed his spurs into the flanks of his calico, making the horse leap ahead. He cantered away in front of the coach.
“My,” Julia said softly. “First I angered Mr. Hickok, and now I’ve offended him. In the latter case, I don’t have the slightest idea what I did.”
Fowler stuck a wedge of tobacco into his cheek. “I ’spect he was peeved that you forgot his name the first time. He’s just like—” A sly movement of Fowler’s eyes indicated Wild Bill. Lowering his voice, he went on. “Jason Kane ain’t no Hickok, mind you. In a lot of ways, he’s worse.”
“I can’t believe that, Mr. Fowler.”
“Don’t be fooled by those la-de-dah manners. He can lay it on for the ladies if he wants. But he’s nasty as a rattler when he’s riled, and it don’t take much to rile him. He’s half slopped with drink most of the time.”
“How do you know so much about him, may I ask?”
“Why, I been hearin’ tales for two or three years. Wild Bill told me about the drinking. He said Kane downs a glass of spirits with his morning eggs.”
“I see. Hickok told you. That explains a good deal.”
Fowler missed the sarcasm. “I think they used to be pals, don’t you see. But I kinda get the impression they fell out at one time. Kane may fool you with his smile”—if what Fowler said was true, the young man had done exactly that—“but he’s killed plenty of men. Plenty.” He shook the lines over the four-horse hitch. “Hah! Come on, you slowpokes! Let’s hurry on home!”
“Goddamn right. I’m in danger of expiring from sobriety,” the coarse-faced Calamity yelled, quirting her horse. She too went racing down the narrow road ahead of the coach, hallooing to announce the caravan’s arrival.
ii
Deadwood Gulch was a long, rock-walled canyon bordered by a noisy stream. Several mining camps had been established along the stream. Julia’s destination, Deadwood City, was the largest. As the coach pulled in behind those who’d ridden ahead, she quickly surveyed the camp. Her face fell. She’d seen many a raw new town between the Mississippi and the Pacific. But she’d never set eyes on any place as appallingly primitive as this.
Deadwood City was a hodgepodge of lean-tos and tents with a few unpainted pine buildings mixed in, the whole straggling out in the trampled mud without observable plan or pattern. The camp’s winter population had been a few hundred. Fowler claimed there would be twenty or thirty thousand present by summer’s end.
Her first look at the Miner’s Rest Hotel showed her why the coach driver had been sarcastic. The hotel was not one of the camp’s four or five wooden structures, but a huge canvas tent. A secondary sign advertised UPSTAIRS ROOMS. Evidently a second floor had been built into the tent’s upper portion.
The Concord creaked to a halt in the mud, right in the center of the camp. Grubbily dressed men swarmed around the coach from all sides. They divided their attention between Hickok, who stayed in the saddle and basked in his celebrity status, and Julia, whom the miners apparently presumed to be a new addition to one of the Gulch brothels. Jason Kane couldn’t protect her; he’d disappeared.
A bearded fellow reached up to squeeze her leg through her skirt. She boxed his ear. From the left side of the coach, Calamity shouted, “Here, mister. You want to feel somethin’, make an arrangement to buy me a drink. That there’s the lady who come in to give a speech tonight.”
“The suffrage lady?” yelled another man in the boisterous crowd. “Oh, boy. Lute Sims has a real fine reception waitin’ for you, woman.”
“Who’s Lute Sims?” Julia called, but the man wouldn’t answer.
She uttered a short, impatient sigh, hoisted her skirts and climbed down the wheel with an assist from Charlie Utter.
Pistols visible beneath his frock coat kept merriment over his curls at a minimum.
“Let me help you with your valise, Miss Sedgwick,” he said, “so you make it to the hotel safely.”
“But it’s only just over there, Mr. Utter.”
“Yes, but I hear this is a rough camp.” As if to punctuate the point, a shotgun boomed somewhere along the stream behind the tents and buildings.
Julia looked around while Utter claimed her valise from the coach boot. She said, “Someone was supposed to meet me.”
“Must have gotten delayed.”
Frowning a little, she thanked Fowler for letting her ride beside him, then took the gambler’s arm. Most of the other miners had formed a circle around Wild Bill, who’d dismounted and was absently stroking his long hair as he announced that he’d be happy to have someone stand him to a drink. And could anyone tell him the best place to gamble?
As Julia and Colorado Charlie labored through the mud to the tent hotel, she noticed a second tent standing ten yards behind the main one. A sign on the rear tent read, MINER’S REST DINING ROOM. So that was where she’d be speaking. Good Lord.
But where was the woman who’d written to Boston? Julia had clearly stated her day and time of arrival in a letter sent weeks ago. She was beginning to feel this part of her tour was hexed.
Colorado Charlie lifted the front flap of the big tent. He put Julia’s valise inside and bid her good day. A stout, gray-haired woman with a mole-dotted face stood behind a lobby counter consisting of a plank laid across two barrels. The woman eyed Julia with an expression close to dread.
Trying to act unconcerned about the decidedly strange reception, Julia walked past a shaky-looking stair to the second level. The gray-haired woman began twisting her apron. Though it was still daylight, the tent’s interior was dim, and it took proximity to the counter and a lantern hanging from the low wooden ceiling to finally show Julia there were tears in the woman’s eyes. Instantly, she curbed her annoyance.
“Mrs. Oates?”
Oh—oh, yes, ma’am, I’m Myrtle Oates. And I know you’re Miss Sedgwick. I heard the coach pull in. I was too ashamed to meet it. Your lecture’s got to be canceled.”
“Canceled?” As kindly as she could, she went on. “I’ve come a hundred and fifty miles out of my way to speak here. Why in the world would you want to cancel the moment I arrive? Don’t you expect anyone to show up?”
“Oh, yes, we’d have an audience.” Mrs. Oates nodded. “Six or seven—uh—ordinary ladies, and a bunch more of the chippies.”
“That’s all right with me,” Julia said, struggling to keep a snappish tone out of her voice. Something was frightening the gray-haired woman. “The Association doesn’t draw moral distinctions between its various sisters. Others may, but not—”
“You don’t understand. I found out there’ll be men showin’
up.”
“That isn’t a problem.”
“Men showin’ up to cause a muss!”
Courtleigh’s name flashed into her mind. She laughed silently at the reaction. It was preposterous; his reach wasn’t that long, nor his interest in her that consuming these days.
“Don’t worry, Mrs. Oates. It happens frequently. I’ve been mobbed, punched, showered with rotten fruit, had an audience of eight hundred stampeded by firecrackers, another one panicked by chemical smoke—if a possible disruption is all you’re fretting about, we must certainly go ahead. I won’t be offended if there’s trouble, and I’m sure I can deal with a few rowdy miners.”
The woman lowered her head, whispered, “One of them’s liable to be worse than rowdy.”
“Who is that?”
“A terrible, vile-tempered man named Lute Sims.” Julia recalled hearing the name shouted just after the stage stopped. “Back in Ohio his wife got hold of a pamphlet by one of the leaders of your movement. I don’t rightly know which lady. But after Lute’s wife read it, she ran off and I guess that affected him pretty bad. In his head, I mean.”
The tired, red-knuckled woman looked close to breaking down. “What I’m trying to tell you, Miss Sedgwick—while I apologize to you in the humblest way I know—is that I’m scared to death for you to speak in Deadwood City. For three days Lute Sims has been going up and down the Gulch telling everyone he’ll cause trouble if you show your face. Real trouble. He’s been saying he’ll hurt you. We’ve no law here yet. And Lute’s the type who doesn’t just jaw. He’ll do what he says. He’s a crazy man.”
Julia shivered. It might be wise to heed the warning and—
No. That would make the entire side trip to the Bad Lands a waste of time and the Association’s money. It would be cowardly to boot. She’d be hanged if she’d retreat.
She tried to reassure Mrs. Oates with a smile.