Yet sleep wouldn’t come. Images of a young woman dressed in a wedding gown kept him awake. Tempted as he was to quit, he couldn’t. She was out there somewhere, and it was his responsibility to find her—dead or alive.
Chapter Three
Patience bent nearer the fire and tried to soak up its paltry warmth. The flames had burned low, letting the frigid air seep back in.
“I’m so c-cold.” Wilson huddled beneath a blanket, teeth chattering. His fever had broken sometime during the night, and he looked more alert.
“I know you are.” She bit her lower lip, wondering how long they could survive the elements. One lone log remained, and she had hoarded it the past hour. After much internal debate, she’d taken off Lenore’s gown and put on a pair of wool pants and a shirt that were hanging on a peg. The old prospector’s clothing swallowed her frame, but the warmth overrode any fashion concerns.
She knew by now the moon had slid behind the tallest mountain and darkness blanketed the mine. She stirred up the fire, seeking the coals’ meager warmth. Come morning she had to find more firewood. They must have heat to survive. She didn’t know what time it was. The prospector didn’t appear to have had a clock, and she didn’t feel up to stepping outside to check the sky. How would they know when it was light outside if they were buried in the depths of the earth?
Her joints were stiff and sore from her wild ride, the fall from the horse, and the stumbling around in an attempt to find this place. Sleeping on a stone hearth trying to stay warm hadn’t helped matters. She had an ungrateful thought, quickly squelched, that it would have been nice if God had led her to a house with a comfortable bed. She immediately felt ashamed. God had promised to take care of her needs, not her wants. She had needed shelter, food, and warmth. He had supplied all three. Wilson had needs too. If God had sent her to care for him, who was she to complain?
“Where did you come from, P?”
She looked up. “What did you call me?”
“P. I like it better than Patience.”
She suppressed a grin. “And what’s wrong with Patience?”
His eyes twinkled with mischief. “Possibly nothing, but it seems a bit pretentious.”
She laughed. “Perhaps you’re right. Regarding where I came from, I was kidnapped.”
His eyes grew wide. “Really?”
She nodded. “Really. There was an accident, and the kidnapper and his horse were killed. I wandered around in the cold until I found this place.”
Wilson’s features sobered. “Why were you wearing a wedding dress? Did you get married?”
“Oh no.” She smiled, wishing she had, but she hadn’t met her intended yet. She explained the circumstances, and the boy nodded.
“What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. Try to find my way back to Denver City, I guess. Whatever I do, I’ll take you with me. I wouldn’t leave you behind.”
Wilson picked up the poker and stirred the fire, making the flames come to life. The dancing light threw the planes of his face into sharp relief. Patience picked out the clean-cut features, the shock of carrot orange hair, which was almost as bright as the flames. Put him into better clothing, put a little meat on his bones, and he’d be a good-looking boy, she realized. He had nice manners too. Someone had done a fine job of raising him. And educated. All those big words, like pretentious.
Now he looked at her, his expression grave. “You can stay here and run the mine.”
“Mine?” She had forgotten about the mine. How could she forget something like that? “What kind of mine? Productive or played out?”
“Oh, there’s gold all right. The old prospector worked it a little every day, even though the mine’s haunted. Some days he got a fair amount of gold.”
Patience gasped. “Gold? There’s really gold here?” Her face fell. “We can’t work the mine; it isn’t ours.”
“We can claim it. Nobody knows the old prospector’s dead. It’s ours for the taking.”
“Ours?” She eyed him doubtfully. “And what do you mean, the mine’s haunted?” She didn’t believe in ghosts.
“Gamey O’Keefe. His spirit lives in the Mule Head, but the old prospector paid him no heed. He worked the mine anyway.”
“Did the old prospector ever see the ghost?” She’d put this to rest right now.
“I don’t know, but it’s haunted all right. I’ve never seen anything either, but I’ve heard things.”
“Well, when we see the ghost, we’ll worry about it. Until then, I prefer to believe he’s just a superstition.” Patience pursed her lips thoughtfully. “And we could … honestly claim the mine?”
“Sure—it’s ours for the taking. I can’t claim it for myself because I’m only a child. No one would take me seriously. But you could claim it in both of our names. You’ll have to do it quick because there’s a lot of unscrupulous people around who’d love to get their hands on this piece of property.”
She could tell from Wilson’s earnest expression that he wasn’t sure if she would include him in the venture, and she hastened to assure him, “I wouldn’t leave you out.”
But still, the idea of running a mine was overwhelming. There was so much she didn’t know. Excitement flickered through her, in much the same way as the slow flames flickered around the heavy firewood.
Gold! Think of all she could do with the money from the mine. Why, God had turned a scary situation into a blessing. With a gold mine, she and Mary and Lily and Harper would never have to worry about their welfare again. And it was a worry. They couldn’t stay at the parsonage in Denver City forever.
She could buy a house, and the four of them could make a home. Wilson too. He had to be included in this. Mary was sickly with asthma. They could take care of her. And Harper was black. There weren’t many opportunities for black women. Blacks were treated unfairly even though the war to free them had been fought years ago.
Suddenly she wasn’t scared anymore. She should have known God would take care of them. With gold from the mine, the people she cared about the most would be secure. Instead of worrying about a bleak future, they would have plenty. She smiled, looking forward to the exciting and productive months that lay ahead. She would find a crew to work the mine. The diggings would pay their salaries. She would take care of Wilson—and notify Mary, Lily, and Harper of her whereabouts as soon as she found out for sure just where she was. Why, the kidnapping had been a blessing all along! She had to pinch herself. Gold!
She owned a gold mine!
Or she would, just as soon as she could get to an assayer’s office and stake out her claim.
Wilson interrupted her plans. “What are you thinking about? Dreaming of being rich?”
“No. Well, yes, I suppose. I was just thinking of what we would be able to do with our earnings.”
“My guess is we won’t be doing much. You’ll never get a crew to work here.”
She stared at him. “Why ever not?”
“I watched the old prospector try to get men. They won’t come. They’re superstitious, and they think it’s a bad-luck mine.”
She laughed in relief. Bad luck? Superstitious nonsense. “They must have other reasons. He probably didn’t know how to approach them—or more likely, he didn’t have any business savvy. There are people like that. You can always find someone who needs a job. I’ll find men to work the mine, and I’ll make us rich in the process.”
She closed her mind to Wilson’s doubting smile.
Hefting a canvas knapsack over her shoulder, Patience started off before sunup the next morning, with Wilson in tow, to claim the mine.
Cutthroat, Randy Doddler, Shirttail Diggin’s, Bloody Run, Bladdersville, Gouge Eye, Humbug Creek, Red Dog, Tenderfoot Gulch, Lost Horse Gulch, Gulch of Gold, Mad Mule Gulch—there were a hundred and one gulches where her mine could have been.
And the closest town to Mule Head was Fiddle Creek.
What struck Patience when they entered town was that nearly every m
an wore a beard. Not one man in a hundred had a clean-shaven face. Some looked to have cut a swatch of hair from around their mouths so they could feed themselves more easily, but in general all the males looked alike: flannel shirts, heavy boots, trousers saturated with muck, and long, matted hair.
Stepping over ankle-deep ruts to cross the street, she stared at the large assemblage of masculinity. She jerked Wilson out of the path of a careening wagon. They had walked for forty-five minutes to reach the small mining community, but the weather had held. Frozen ground had not impeded their journey.
The town itself was an eye-opener. Tucked at the base of a foothill, the camp appeared on the surface to have no civilized refinements. A vast sea of tents sprawled at the base of the mountain, interspersed with crudely assembled buildings that looked to have been thrown together with rampageous zeal. Wagons were lined up, people living out of the back of them.
Traffic had no right-of-way, with many conveyances traveling right down the middle of the street. Patience yanked Wilson from the path of another careening wagon. Rude. The citizens of Fiddle Creek were downright rude!
The stench coming from the livery stable was crippling. Manure from hundreds of horses and oxen that freighted up and down the main street was piled high.
A round of six shots erupted from one of the nearby saloons, and patrons scrambled out of windows and doors in search of cover.
Gripping Wilson’s hand tightly, Patience forged her way down the crowded sidewalk in search of the land office. Her eyes watered from the blend of odors of livery stable, chicken feathers, grimy cats and dogs, and unwashed humanity.
Wilson, wearing his Sunday best, made a face when his shoes made a loud clunking sound with each step. “I’m not going to like it here,” he predicted. Pinching his nose between his thumb and forefinger, he hurried to keep up with her. “It smells as bad as the old prospector’s socks in late August!”
“It’ll be fine,” Patience soothed, more concerned over how she was going to find the assayer’s office than the odors around her. She must also send word to her friends in Denver City that she was well and happy, and that she had a gold mine!
Coming down the middle of the street was a small funeral procession. The bereaved walked hand in hand, grim-faced. Some wept openly. Stepping aside to allow the mourners to pass, Patience restrained Wilson, waiting while the small cortege stopped in front of a modest-looking house with an open grave beside it. A couple of sturdy-looking chaps gently lowered the casket into the ground.
The minister, a tall, sparingly built man with ruddy cheeks and a receding hairline, opened his worn Bible, and addressed the people. “Brethren, it is a sorrowful occasion that unites us this day. In this most solemn of hours we gather to pay our final respects to Sister Oates—let us pray!”
The minister’s powerful voice washed over Patience. She nudged Wilson, and they bowed their heads with the mourners.
“Heavenly Father, we ask that you look down on Sister Oates’s family and her precious loved ones. Grant them the peace that passeth all understanding—”
With her head still bowed, Patience snuck glances at the crowd through lowered lashes. She noticed that one of the mourners began to examine the dirt he was kneeling on as the preacher droned on.
“He’s not bowing his head,” Wilson whispered.
“Shhh.”
“Sister Oates was a kind and obedient servant, Lord! Those she leaves behind will take comfort in knowing that at this very hour she walks hand in hand with loved ones who have gone before her.”
The mourner began to edge his way to the mound of fresh dirt piled high beside the grave, passing the word to the fellow next to him. Gold!
The preacher shot him a disapproving stare but continued. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust …”
Whispers of “gold!” gained momentum throughout the crowd. First one man and then another started to paw the earth. The preacher, setting his Bible aside, gazed thunderstruck at the ground, then shouted. “Gold! You’re all dismissed!” Dropping to his knees, the man of the cloth clawed the dirt, the solemnity of the moment shattered.
Shaking his head, Wilson watched the spectacle taking place. “It bears repeating. I’m not going to like it here.”
Grasping him firmly by the hand, Patience crossed the street, glancing over her shoulders to watch the greedy frenzy. The casket was dragged out of the grave and moved to a different spot to allow for more digging.
To her dismay, she learned the wire line between Fiddle Creek and Denver City was down due to heavy snows. She could not send a wire informing her friends of her whereabouts.
“When will the line be fixed?”
The man behind the counter shoved his green eyeshade back and glared at her. “When will the line be fixed?” he mimicked. “If I’ve heard that question once, I’ve heard it a hundred times. I’ll tell you, I ain’t got no crystal ball, and the good Lord don’t let me in on no secrets. So I don’t know when it’s gonna be fixed.”
“Well, goodness, there’s no cause to shout.” Surely this was the rudest place she’d ever been. She left the telegraph office, intent on laying claim to the mine and getting home before dark. She’d wire Denver City the next time she came to town.
“Oh, dear,” she murmured when she finally spotted the assayer’s office a few minutes later and saw that the line was backed up clear to the street.
“It’s going to take forever, isn’t it?” Wilson said nasally, still holding his nose from the stench.
“A while, I’m afraid.”
Taking her place at the back of the line, Patience looked around her, dismayed to see the recorder’s office was every bit as chaotic as the streets. Yet she had no other choice but to wait. She had to claim the mine before greedy speculators beat her to it.
For more than two hours they stood in line, wedged between smelly old men who shouted and pushed and shoved and said awful things to each other.
Recalling the earlier conversation with Wilson who said that most men worked for the larger mining companies, she leaned forward to shout above the din to the man standing in front of her.
“What’s going on?”
“New strike—big one, over near Poverty Flats!”
“Gold?” she asked hopefully.
“Silver.”
As Patience’s part of the line edged nearer the building’s entrance, she heard male voices raised in a circus-like atmosphere. Timidly, she opened the door and stepped inside. A sea of men’s faces turned to stare, then continued on with their conversations.
Around two o’clock her head began to pound. She glanced down when she felt Wilson yanking on the hem of her jacket.
“I’m hungry.”
“It won’t be much longer.” She patted his head consolingly. It had been hours since they’d eaten a meager fare of cold bread and salt pork, but if she stepped out of line she’d lose her place and have to start over again.
“I’m tired, and my shoes are too tight,” he complained. He sagged against her, visibly weary from the long journey and the extended wait. Patience was starting to wonder if she was doing the right thing. What if the mine was worthless? What if it yielded so little gold she would be forced to return to Denver City empty-handed? She couldn’t bear the thought of coming so close to an answer for her and the other orphans and losing out. They depended on her, and she had promised God she’d always take care of them. This mine would help her keep that promise.
Here, in a strange town, with even stranger-looking men flanking her on all sides, doubts assailed her. If anything were to happen to either Wilson or her, there would be nowhere to turn for help. Loved ones in Denver City were worrying themselves into a stew—how was she going to let them know that she was okay?
A scuffle broke out and two hefty-looking men hauled the ruffians outside. She tensed when she overheard two men ahead of her talking.
“Silas Tucker will grab any unoccupied mines around here; you can bet on that.”
&nb
sp; “Tucker’s a leech,” the second man sneered. “Wouldn’t be the first time he jumped a claim.”
Patience moved Wilson closer. For over an hour she had been aware of a scruffy individual two places in line ahead of her. He was, without exception, the most tattered and torn man she had ever seen. He was a caricature of an old miner—unkempt red hair, filthy beard, the rim of his old brown hat disgraceful. What had once been a flannel shirt now hung in ragged scraps, covering most of his soiled trousers.
Her eyes meandered to his boots and found that they had more holes than leather. The man stood head and shoulders taller than the other miners.
“Look, Wilson,” she whispered. “There’s a man with hair the same color as yours.”
Wilson’s face screwed with disgust.
“Except yours is cleaner,” she added.
“P!”
She patted his shoulder. “Much, much cleaner.”
The man suddenly turned, his eyes nailing Patience.
With a hushed catch in his throat, Wilson stepped back.
For a moment Patience couldn’t breathe. The stranger’s arresting clear blue gaze captured hers. Caught off guard, she felt color flood her face and realized he knew she had been staring at him. For a moment she thought she recognized him; then she quickly dismissed the idea. She couldn’t know him—she didn’t know anyone in Fiddle Creek.
Yet recognition briefly flashed in his eyes, and he suddenly smiled. He was about to doff his hat when he must have thought better of it. Instead, he graciously bowed from his waist. “The boy is weary. Would you like to take my place in line?” His hand indicated their chaotic surroundings. “It won’t help much, but some.”
Moving Wilson protectively closer, Patience summoned her most charitable smile. “No, thank you. We’ll wait our turn.”
Conceding with a gracious nod, the man turned back to continue the wait.
The hands on the clock crept from three to four. Wilson reeled with fatigue, clinging to Patience’s trousers like a wet blanket.
“Are we any closer?” he asked. She heard his stomach rumble conspicuously.
Patience Page 3