Sarah Todd

by Chloe Garner

  “Done two hours ago,” Kayla said, coming into view around a curtain carrying a tray. “You can get changed back there.”

  Sarah looked at the dress suspiciously and Kayla laughed.

  “No going back now, Sarah. Chop chop. We’re on a schedule.”

  The dress had buttons up the back, which Sarah let Kayla fasten, then she stepped in front of the mirror.

  Kayla was already brushing her hair. She stood, more than a little astonished at what she saw.

  “Kayla,” she said.

  “I know,” Kayla said.

  The dress moved with her as she breathed for a moment.

  “Your mama would be proud,” Sarah said. It wasn’t something she would have asked for. Nothing about it, the curves, the color, the lace, the high collar, none of it looked like something that Sarah would have chosen or identified for herself.

  And yet, it was formed perfectly. The sternness of it, the sense of confidence, even - as Kayla had observed - the color had a sort of I-dare-you feel to it, one that was familiar to Sarah.

  The brush worked quickly, and then a pick came out, and then more tools that Sarah had never seen before, and braids began to work their way into her hair.

  “I didn’t sign on for this,” she said halfheartedly. Kayla said something, but the comb in her mouth made it incomprehensible.

  After the braids, there was powder for her face, other things, makeups and scents that Sarah had never spent so much as a thought on, but clearly Kayla had thought this through.

  Sarah hardly recognized her form in the mirror as Kayla threw open the curtains in front of the main windows to let in the morning sunlight.

  She was spectacular.

  She would never, ever do this again, but there she was, something she’d never been before.

  She’d been prepared to sacrifice her dignity for this, but she felt at least as dignified standing in the mirror now as she would have in her hat, duster, and boots.

  “Knock ‘em dead,” Kayla said. “If you leave now, you should be a few minutes early.”

  Sarah turned to look at Kayla.

  “I don’t know why you did this.”

  Kayla raised an eyebrow at her.

  “For one, because I’m never gonna get another shot at it, and I’ve wanted to see what I could do with you since the first time I saw you.”

  Sarah shook her head.

  “Never again.”

  Kayla grinned.

  “Get out of here.”

  Sarah went out to where Gremlin was tied - too many people wandering around to distract the black horse and let him end up somewhere where she’d never find him again - and got her documents for the auction.

  She was nervous.

  Dammit, she hadn’t been nervous... since she could remember. Leaving for school, maybe? Nervous had always been angry’s half-hearted little brother, and she was plenty good at angry. She didn’t need nervous.

  But there she stood on the sidewalk, five feet above the roadway, holding a stack of papers under her arm and wearing an orange dress, queasy.

  It was going to happen one way or the other. With a headstrong jerk of will, she went back into Kayla’s shop and got her gunbelt off the wall, strapping it on to Kayla’s silent disapproval, then went back out and strode down the street toward the livestock pens.

  It was only as she turned onto Second Street that she realized people were staring at her. Quashing her first instinct to glare back, she ignored them, keeping her head up and maintaining an easy, intentional pace toward the auction. Several of the investors were there, making their own way from the houses. Coriander was the first to recognize her.

  “Sarah Todd?”

  Sarah spared her a quick glance.

  “Morning.”

  There was a sense of speechlessness, then Coriander gave her a head shake.

  “Didn’t know they had a seamstress out here of that quality.”

  “I’m given to know she’s one of the best on the continent,” Sarah said.

  “It shows,” Coriander said. “And you wear it well.”

  “Thank you.”

  She went to sit at the table set up at the head of the finished auction hall, laying out her papers and organizing her thoughts.

  People sifted in, talking about the fight yesterday, the tavern last night, the auction today. The conversations had a feel of money to them, that the people holding them knew that the stakes would be cutthroat, that pretenses of civility were no more than that.

  Then there was a hole of silence behind her.

  The Lawsons had arrived.

  “That’s not your seat,” someone said.

  “Like to see you take it from me, Rich,” Sarah said without turning. The silence deepened, and Sarah felt goosebumps rise on her arms. She scolded herself. More important things going on, right now. They needed to get through the auction.

  “Well,” Jimmy finally said. She still didn’t turn. Chairs to either side of her pulled out and Little Peter sat down next to her, staring openly and not without hostility.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he whispered.

  “Waitin’ for the Lawsons to be ready to auction off a passel of claims,” Sarah said. “Money’s just waitin’ for you, out there.”

  She didn’t look at him, but the suspicion rolling off of him was satisfying.

  “Are you ready then?” Jimmy asked, sitting silently in the chair next to her. She turned her head slowly, calming her face. No clues in the eyes, cheeks still, flat, mouth straight.

  “Ready when you are, Lawson.”

  He nodded and stood.

  “Welcome to the auction.”

  The room went quiet, eyes directed at Jimmy with intensity. Sarah unrolled a large map and put it up on an easel. It was her claims map, pockmarked with the large and small claims from the last eighteen years, since she’d started tracking them. The new claims were all marked there, but with nothing to distinguish them from the older claims; it was up to her to know which were which. The map was useless to anyone else.

  “This is the land that Lawrence lays claim to,” Jimmy said. “Anything outside of this map is out of our authority, and not under Lawson protection. This is a complete list of all claims, past and present, going back well further than anyone here cares about. The only person who knows which claims are active is Sarah and the claim owners themselves. It makes this transaction secure from interference from outside parties, from our side. Any security measures necessary to protect your claim and any resulting absenta need to be negotiated with the Lawson family moving forward.”

  “Also means there isn’t any way of confirming what it is you’re selling until after we’ve bought it,” someone said.

  “I made no pretenses otherwise, when I came to visit each of you individually,” Jimmy said. “We have one active claim, which you’ve seen. Based on the knowledge we got from that claim, we have projected a number of additional claims that have a higher likelihood of hitting absenta. Sarah has gone so far as to rate them in terms of likelihood, but you acknowledge by bidding that we don’t warrant any of those numbers. Mining is prospecting, and prospecting is gambling. Some of you may strike it rich out here, of none of you may. It’s very unlikely that all of you will.”

  “They say you’re digging differently at the new claim,” another voice said.

  Jimmy gave the audience a terse little smile.

  “That isn’t my field of expertise. Sarah administers claims and I enforce them. Any advice you want on how to pull rocks out of the ground will need to come from someone else.”

  Sarah saw Thor and Apex slide into the back row along with some of the other local prospectors. She didn’t know what was going to happen to all of them. They could go on like they had, but the greater money would be in selling their experience to the investors here and working the new claims. She wondered how many of them would submit to working for a paycheck like that.

  Jimmy indicated the map again.
/>   “The winning bidder for each claim will get the exact location of the claim they have won from Sarah, and we will escort you or a representative of your choosing to mark the limits of the claim at your convenience. All bids must be closed in cash. I know most of you won’t be carrying that kind of cash this trip, but,” the corners of his mouth twitched up slightly, “I know you’re good for it.”

  “Whatcha gonna do with all that paper?” someone called. “Swim in it?”

  “You may have noticed that we don’t have a digital economy out here, yet,” Jimmy said. Yet, Sarah heard. “You’ll want to keep that in mind as you’re compensating your new employees.”

  Sarah knew there was a second reason that everything would be in cash, and would continue to be in cash, even if and when Lawrence got connected to the rest of the world - mining was a famous money laundering opportunity, if you got the right mine. They wouldn’t even have to make a profit, so long as they pulled enough absenta out of the ground to beat their next best laundering opportunity.

  Jimmy would know that, too, and would have been targeting men with the biggest incentive to hide their real incomes.

  They were going to make a fortune.

  Jimmy pressed his lips and put his hands together silently.

  “Are there any further questions?” he asked, nodding once at Sarah. “Good. Then we’ll get started.”

  ––—

  The first three claims were just the bidders feeling each other out. Each claim had a score on it, but other than that, they were undifferentiated, and there was little reason to want an early or a late claim specifically, other than the proven one that would come at the very end. They were sharks circling each other over bait, and the prices on the first three claims were wildly varying. The best of the three went for the lowest bid by about a third. After that, though, the men started bidding harder and faster against each other. A couple of them seemed to be content with just one claim, but the rest bid regardless of whether they’d won a previous claim, and the prices climbed steadily.

  Sarah had never personally seen a tenth of the money they were bidding for the claims, but she sat, watching the auction happen, knowing that she would be getting half of everything that came in, easily keeping the number in her head.

  She wasn’t just going to be wealthy. She was going to be the richest person she’d ever met, outside of Jimmy’s friends there in the room with her. And Jimmy himself.

  Somehow he coaxed bids out of the room without asking. It was an effect, one that Sarah didn’t understand but that she could observe as clearly as the paper in front of her. They were bidding, yes, to impress or intimidate each other, but also to prove to Jimmy that they deserved to be there. That he’d picked the right people.

  All except Coriander.

  The woman sat with her hands folded over her knee, watching the event with the sense of a reporter or a wealthy spouse. There was a sharp interest, but not the same predatory, hungry attention that the rest of the men gave the room. She was relaxed, almost casual.

  Sarah found her attention returning to Coriander over and over again as the morning matured and turned into afternoon. Sixteen claims went, three to go plus Pete’s claim, and still the woman hadn’t uttered a word. The men were exhausting themselves, and Jimmy’s eternal ability to predict such things meant that young women, the few remaining from the homesteads, Sarah recognized, arrived and started passing out cold drinks and sweets. Sarah accepted a small plate of chocolate truffles from one of them, ignoring the woman’s wide eyes at Sarah’s appearance.

  She’d managed to forget for a few minutes, basically the amount of time between her natural resettling to keep her legs from falling asleep.

  The seventeenth claim went for more than any of the previous ones, despite being one of the ones Sarah was least confident in, and the eighteenth was off like a shot. She turned to watch Jimmy now as he took more bids, feeling her hair move in its strange patterns as the braids and loose hair played across each other. He didn’t look at her. When she turned around, she noticed Lise, Sunny, Kayla, and Rhoda coming in. Sarah stilled her face again as Kayla beamed at her and Lise did a careful double-take, then ignored her. Rhoda tipped her head to the side for a moment, then whispered something to Kayla. Sarah tried not to wonder too much what it had been. No way in hell she cared what the Lawson wives thought of her, dress or no dress.

  The bidding continued, Jimmy calm, low-toned and in control, holding conversations with various men. Still Coriander held her seat quietly. The money continued to stack up, higher and higher, as absenta greed drove the investors to near-lunatic levels of interest in the last few claims.

  Nineteen started slow, one of the best claims by Sarah’s guess, as the men eyed each other. Finally, Maxim stood up. He’d won one other claim at this point.

  “I’m done,” he said, making a substantial, final bid. There was silence for a moment as the men glanced at Maxim and each other, and then one of Jimmy’s contacts from the coast south of Intec stood. His bid was ten percent larger than Maxim’s. Maxim nodded to him and went to stand at the back of the room, crossing his arms and leaning against a wall. One by one, the other men dropped out as the bid jumped higher and higher in much larger increments, now.

  Sarah waited as the room grew silent for a longer period.

  “Is that it?” Jimmy asked. “We have one claim left. This is the last unknown claim. I’m going to award it to Bard if no one else is prepared to outbid him.”

  There was more silence. Jimmy inclined his head.

  “That’s it, then,” he said. “We’ll move on to the proven claim.”

  He put the last page down on the table as the man called Bard came up to claim it, then stepped back. There was no page for Pete’s claim. They’d seen it themselves; there was nothing more for Sarah to tell them. There was a stirring in the room as the men prepared for the fight to come. Simply because she’d been watching her all day, Sarah saw Coriander shift, simply recrossing her legs, but it was the signal Sarah had been waiting for. The woman tipped her head and Sarah watched her as she opened her mouth and spoke.

  The bid was fifteen times the highest bid yet.

  The room went still.

  “Anyone want to challenge that?” Jimmy asked.

  There was a long pause, and then one of the men stood.

  “Who is she?”

  “Does it matter?” Jimmy asked, his voice very, very even.

  “I hate to be disrespectful, but yes, it does.”

  Jimmy didn’t answer. Coriander seemed to be content to keep her identity to herself, as well.

  “How do we know this isn’t a scam?” someone else asked. “That she isn’t a plant to keep the best - the only claim for yourself?”

  “I am only here for the proven claim,” Coriander said. “I don’t care for your gambling enterprises. I represent a very deep pool of wealth, and I did bring cash.”

  “You brought in a ringer,” a new voice accused.

  Jimmy coughed.

  Once.

  Quietly.

  The silence that came afterwards was intense.

  “I will make this offer exactly once,” Jimmy said after an intentional gap. “You can walk out. Now. You put your winning claims on the desk, we’ll auction them again, you can go back to your buildings and await the train. I will consider that to be the end of our working relationships. You have fifteen seconds.”

  There was a subtle shuffling as everyone seated in front of them, save the Lawson wives and Coriander, did their best to be invisible.

  Jimmy actually waited the entire fifteen seconds. The whole thing. The room stayed frozen, waiting it out.

  “I see,” Jimmy said finally. “Let’s not do that again. Does anyone wish to outbid Ms. Coriander?”

  There was another shifting as men considered the value of the mine. Coriander sat, unconcerned, looking benignly up at Jimmy and Sarah and the Lawson men.

  The mine was worth more than that. Sarah knew
it, and the men knew it, but with fresh-seeded doubt about whether Jimmy would come through on the promise of the claims, realizing the amount of money currently pledged to him in cash, Sarah wasn’t sure he would get any more bids. Jimmy came to sit on the front of the table, his posture easy.

  “Let me take a moment to give you a part of the story that maybe you haven’t gotten yet,” he said quietly. “You all probably know that Lawrence is where the Lawson family originated. All six of us were born here, and my father ran the protection here for prospectors and miners most of his life. What you may not know is that my mother was the daughter of a prospector. Before Lawrence existed, Eli Lawrence came out to a stretch of mountains and started panning for gold. This was before anyone discovered absenta, or could have guessed its value. He brought very little of value with him, just the equipment for mining, a gun to hunt enough meat to feed himself, and a young wife who would die in childbirth six years later.

  “Before Perpeto, before absenta, before the town that you’ve had the pleasure of seeing, even before the rail line made it out this far into the desert, Eli Lawrence became a wealthy man, first in gold, then in precious stones, and finally in absenta. His daughter was Elaine Lawrence, my mother, and this town bears his name. We have come home in a much more significant sense than many of you have the privilege to understand. The Lawson house is the oldest standing structure in town, and we intend to inhabit it for the foreseeable future. The prospects for Lawrence are tied to the absenta in those mountains, and, yes, we are fairweather friends to Lawrence.” His eyes cast down and to the side with just the hint of humor, there for Sarah’s benefit. “We left when the absenta dried up last time, and we’ll probably leave again if it fails again. But I see no sign of that, and barring mining collapse, this is where you’ll find us.”

  He looked back at his brothers, who gave little nods, businesslike, resolved.

  Jimmy stood and spread his hands.

  “Now, fair is fair, gentlemen. Are there any further bids?”

  There was another beat of silence, and Jimmy extended his hand to Coriander.

  “There it is. We have a winner on the final claim. You can see Sarah at your leisure any time to get the coordinates of your claim and to arrange a tour to visit it. The train leaves at midday tomorrow, and I know many of you have complex business waiting for you back home, but you are welcome in Lawrence as long as you care to stay. If you would like referrals to prospectors who are familiar with the region, Sarah is the person to speak to for that, as well. Granger, at the general store, is another worthy resource. Please help yourself to further refreshments.”