The Copper City

by Chris Scott Wilson

  Pete sat in the shade of a pecan tree, sucking softly on a cigarette, smoke drifting from his nostrils.

  “Much further?” Quantro asked, watching his buckskin stallion making the most of the opportunity to graze.

  “No. These are the Cananea hills that bring us to the cattle country.” He gestured with his free hand. “Turn west from here. Be there by sundown.”

  ***

  Cananea was a boom town. With the discovery of copper, buildings had mushroomed overnight. And none did more business than the Copper Queen, a saloon on Main Street. It had started life as a tent, but later a false front had been built to give a façade of grandeur and now the canvas had been replaced by a clapboard structure more suited to engaging the rigors of the weather. The Copper Queen handled a wealthy trade, catering mainly for the miners, providing a watering-place for their thirst, and also gratifying some of their baser needs. The girls upstairs handled that part of the saloon’s affairs.

  Whiskey was made on the premises and there were no complaints about its quality. Quantity was the more important feature, but if the patrons had ever had the misfortune to observe the saloon keeper as he brewed his fiery concoction, perhaps they would have preferred to remain thirsty.

  The huge vats in the cellar were filled with spring water to which was added gunpowder and black pepper, plus a liberal dose of rattlesnake heads just to round off the flavor. After fermentation the brew was strained and bottled, one measure of real whiskey added to each pint to authenticate its name. The bottles bore no labels, and the end result was real “bumble bee” whiskey, the drink with a sting.

  But what you don’t see, you don’t grieve about, and the whiskey provided enough of a powder keg to your head to make you forget the broiling hell of mining in the indecent climate of Mexico. Even if a few citizens did go down with “Jake’s Leg,” a nervous disorder brought on by drinking bad whiskey, nobody took much notice.

  That evening trade was brisk. Customers shelled out fifty cents a bottle, or those without hollow legs took shots at fifteen cents a throw. The bar was crowded, men almost shoulder to shoulder, the brass spittoons ringing to reward well-aimed shots.

  Quantro and Pete Wiltshire pushed in through the batwing doors and crossed the room. They had made camp in a hollow next to a small creek on the eastern side of town, well away from any buildings. White-Wing had stayed there so her face would not be seen until Quantro could buy her some Mexican clothes to replace her doeskins. There was the matter of jobs to settle too. The sooner he could start work the sooner he would have money to buy his ranch.

  The only gap was between two miners, both nursing almost empty bottles. They were in their working clothes that stank of sweat and dust, and both were unshaven. The one on the left was almost gone, bleary-eyed, and the one on the right, a huge, well-muscled man, sagged against the counter, his bearded face propped up by one hand, his elbow on the bar while his other hand tipped the bottle generously to his lips. The whiskey seemed to have sucked the strength from his knees, both wedged against the solid timber of the counter. There was already one empty bottle in front of him and on the other side of the stained wood the bartender’s eyes occasionally flickered to the big miner while he cleaned glasses on his greasy apron.

  “Two beers over here,” Quantro said, ready to wash the trail dust from his throat, tossing a dollar in front of him.

  “Coming right up.”

  “Whiskey here,” the slumped miner demanded, slamming down his second empty bottle and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. The bartender filled two glasses with beer, then placed them on the counter. Quantro reached out. Before his hand could close around the cold glass, the miner swung. The two beers hurtled toward the rack of whiskey bottles behind the bar. They fell short, crashing to the floor. “I said whiskey here! When I call for whiskey no man gets his before me!”

  Quantro’s voice was calm, assured. “No man butts in on me either, mister. I called first.”

  The miner’s head swiveled, his lips curling into a sneer. “Shut your mouth, boy. When you’re old enough you can talk to men.”

  “You mean when my mouth’s as big as yours?”

  The miner reared back from the counter, hauling himself up to his full height. In back of him, the bartender was vigorously shaking his head, flashing warning glances at Quantro. It was obvious why. The miner stood a head taller than Quantro, glaring down. His muscles bunched convincingly, straining the cloth of his well-worn work shirt as he leaned forward.

  “You wanna say that again, boy?”

  Quantro looked up at him, ice-blue eyes cool and distant. “I don’t give a good goddam, mister, how tall you are. I still say you’ve got a big mouth.”

  “I’ll show you who’s got a big mouth!” the big man roared. He pulled back his arm to throw a punch. Quantro stepped quickly inside his swing. His boot lashed out to crash into the miner’s knee. The big man howled, his cry a mixture of shock and rage, like a grizzly bear seared with a hot branding iron. There was silence in the saloon. The kick had driven the big man back a step, but now he waded forward. His whiskey-slack face was now grim and determined.

  Expressionless, Quantro kicked out again. This time his target was the other knee. The big man faltered, fists swinging out of reach. Effortlessly, Quantro took a pace forward into the circle of arms and drove two swift straight-arm punches to the miner’s gut. He groaned, doubling forward. Just as neatly, Quantro stepped back out of the downward line of travel. His hand snaked to his Colt. The big man’s battered hat fell off as his head came forward. Quantro coldcocked him, the Colt’s barrel creasing the miner’s scalp. He crumpled to the floor.

  Quantro looked up to see the bartender holding a leveled shotgun. As he holstered the Colt, the barrels of the scatter-gun went down and the bartender made an apologetic face as he put the gun back under the counter. He raised a tentative smile. “Mr. Green don’t allow no gunplay in here.”

  “Mr. Green own this place?” Pete asked.

  “He surely does. I thought your friend here,” he gestured to Quantro, “was going to gun down that feller. You understand, gents, I was just…”

  “No trouble,” Quantro interrupted with a wave of his hand. “Where’s our beer?”

  The bartender broke into a relieved smile. “Coming right up.”

  While they waited, Pete gazed down at the felled miner. “Looks as peaceful as a possum.”

  “Or a bear in winter,” Quantro grinned. “Asleep’s the best place for him. Can’t stand a man with no manners.”

  “Neither can I,” said a voice from behind them.

  Quantro turned slowly, his right hand dropping negligently to hover above his holster, ready for trouble.

  Instead of another miner, the man in front of them was conservatively dressed in a business suit. He was smiling, showing a broad expanse of white teeth in his scrubbed face.

  “I thought you handled that extremely well.” He turned to the barkeeper. “Put their beers on my tab, Barney.”

  The barkeep grinned amenably. “Yes sir, Mr. Harley.”

  Harley turned back to Quantro and Pete. “Just passing through?”

  “Why d’you ask?” Quantro countered.

  Harley grinned. “Just making conversation to pass a little time. I didn’t catch your name…” When Quantro didn’t answer, he held up both his hands in gesture of peace. “I didn’t mean to offend you. I just wanted to say how we appreciated the cool way you handled this man.” He motioned to the unconscious miner.

  “Who’s ‘we’?”

  Harley frowned. “You just lost me.”

  “You said how much ‘we’ appreciated it. Who’s ‘we’.”

  He shrugged. “Just the good citizens of this town. More drunk miners than enough causing trouble.”

  The bartender put the two beers on the bar. Quantro pushed a dollar toward him. The bartender shook his head. “That’s all taken care of.”

  Quantro indicated the dollar. “Take it. Nobo
dy pays my way. At least nobody I don’t know.” He said the last with a look over his shoulder.

  Harley took his point. “Please yourself.” He turned on his heel and stalked away.

  Quantro watched him mount the stairs, then took a long draught from his glass. He wiped the foam from his mouth and jerked his head at the bartender. “Who’s he?”

  “Name’s Harley. Some kind of boss up at the mine. He’s very friendly with Mr. Green.”

  “The man who owns this place?”

  The barkeeper nodded. “Owns the mine too.”

  Quantro downed the rest of his beer. “C’mon, Pete, let’s go. Got us some stores to visit.”

  The two men went out on to the street where they paused, looking up and down at the store shingles. Green’s Dry Goods store, Green’s Hardware, Green’s Livery, Green’s this, Green’s that.

  Quantro shook his head and stepped out across the street toward Green’s Haberdashery. “Is there nothing in this town that this Green feller don’t own?”

  “Yeah,” Pete said.

  “What?”

  “Me.”

  Quantro laughed and slapped his friend’s back. “C’mon, we’ve got to go buy a dress.”

  ***

  A small cooking-fire welcomed them back to the campsite outside town. The aroma of rich stew and simmering coffee coaxed them out of the saddle. Pete could see White-Wing squatting by the fire, her Apache dress hidden by a blanket as she stood guard over the cooking-kettle. He came up behind her, sniffing appreciatively.

  “I’m hungry.”

  She smiled her woman’s smile, her eyes leaving Pete’s face to rake the darkness for Quantro. “I thought you would be.”

  Pete hadn’t missed the glance. “Don’t you worry none. He’s seeing to the horses, he didn’t stay in town to find a white woman.”

  The ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. Pete read the satisfaction there. “Brought you something, too.” He held out the parcel he had been hiding behind his back.

  Like all women, she loved presents. With a last quick stir of the pot, she set it on the fire rocks to simmer. Eagerly, she reached out with both hands for the bundle. When the string was off, she parted the paper and pulled out the peasant dress. To Pete’s eyes it was neither pretty, nor ordinary, but to her it was beautiful. Underneath it in the bundle was a shawl, the type the Spanish women use to pull up over their hair. It would help further disguise the girl’s parentage.

  “It’s nothing much, not fine enough for you, White-Wing, but we don’t want you looking too grand, too much like a lady. That’d show us up some.” He chuckled.

  “Bello, beautiful,” she enthused, holding the frock up in front of herself to measure the length against her legs. She looked as though she didn’t know what to do next.

  “Well, go and put it on,” Pete prodded, shaking his head that she could derive so much pleasure from something that had cost so little. He had thought she wouldn’t want to wear white women’s clothes, but then maybe dressing up would be a new and exciting experience for her.

  While she was in the bushes, Quantro finished picketing the horses and came into the circle of the firelight carrying both the saddles. He carefully laid them on their sides to protect the trees, then stood up and looked around. He jerked his head in question.

  “She’s just paying a visit in the bushes.”

  There was a soft whisper of rustling material. Both men swung around. White-Wing stood before them, eyes demurely downcast.

  “Muchas gracias, many thanks.”

  “De nada, señorita, it was nothing,” Pete answered with a slight shrug and a smile. “For me, anyways. He bought them.” He nodded his head at Quantro, who stood silent. Pete watched him, waiting for a comment.

  Quantro’s left hand moved, his eyes on the toes of her moccasins peeking from beneath her dress. He held out a pair of huaraches, open sandals like the Mexican women wore. As she looked up their eyes met for a moment and he felt uncomfortable. Back up in the mountains she had been wild and free, almost a part of nature and he understood how that had been part of the natural attraction she had held for him. Now, dressed in white women’s clothes, that attraction was erased, only to be replaced by another just as subtle that drew him irresistibly. Only during that moment when their eyes met did he realize that the transformation was merely an illusion, and that in fact that same wild freedom was still mirrored in her sparkling dark eyes. She could not lose it, and in that instant he knew it would always draw him to her, a magnetism born of the sheer womanliness of her.

  Her warm fingers touched his as she took the sandals. Coyly, she raised a leg and slipped off her moccasin then replaced it with the huarache. As she leaned forward to take off the other moccasin, the low neck of the peasant dress, held together by a drawstring, dropped away from her body to allow Quantro a view of the cool valley between her breasts. He swallowed dryly, turning away to look toward the fire.

  “Okay, you look fine. Let’s eat,” he muttered.

  The food was good and Pete’d had the foresight to fetch back a bottle of rotgut whiskey to round off the meal. After strong black coffee they drank and smoked while White-Wing continually fussed with her unfamiliar skirts, obviously happy. Pete watched the way her eyes kept switching to Quantro, seeking his approval, but the younger man paid her no mind. He merely stared out into the night, occasionally cocking an ear to the horses.

  “That miner’ll have himself a bad head in the morning.”

  Quantro made a face. “I will too if I drink any more of that rattlesnake whiskey.”

  “Rattlesnake whiskey’s better than no whiskey at all.”

  “Yeah. Maybe when we’re fixed up at the mine we’ll be able to afford something better.”

  “Thought you were figuring to save all your money for a ranch?”

  “Yeah, and you.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes. You’re going to be my partner.”

  Pete experienced a sudden flush of pleasure that he should be included in Quantro’s dream. It did no harm it was only a dream.

  Quantro ground out his cigarette His fingers searched for the thong to unfasten his bedroll. “We’d better get us up to the mine pretty quick after sun-up. If we get taken on, we’ll need all the sleep we can get.”

  “Sure,” Pete agreed. The two men settled into their blankets, leaving White-Wing sitting by the fire. Soon, Pete’s breathing grew deep and regular. She turned to glance at Quantro. His eyes were shaded from the flickering flames by the lowered brim of his hat, his long blond hair framing his face. She rose to her feet.

  The slight rasp of her huaraches on the grass woke Quantro. He had barely slipped into a light doze. Wary, his eyes snapped open. He saw White-Wing standing by the fire, her frame sharply outlined by the flames, tinting her bronze skin even darker than usual.

  As he watched she unfastened the drawstring of her dress, then turning, she allowed it to fall away from her body. Her long hair, shining like a raven’s wing, hung thickly down to the middle of her smooth back and he was clearly aware of her narrow waist that flared to wide hips bordering generous buttocks like two ripe peaches that ached to be squeezed.

  He felt the hunger rise up in him.

  And with the hunger came stirrings of anger. She knew what she was doing. She knew he was awake. Like a rabbit teasing a fox.

  Purposefully, he turned over, his back to her.

  CHAPTER 3

  By sun-up there was already a long queue at the mine office. The Cananea Copper Mining Company, the board nailed above the window read.

  “I’m surprised it don’t say Green’s Mining Company,” Pete remarked as they joined the line.

  “Hope they’re taking on,” Quantro said, counting the number of men before them. He felt awkward, out of place. All the others looked like miners, hard-bitten in their odd assortment of working clothes. Maybe Pete knew something about mining, after all he’d been a prospector, but Quantro had no knowledge about it
at all. He had never seen a mine, much less been in one. He had been born and raised on his father’s ranch under a blue sky in Colorado and had done nearly all his work from the back of a horse. Holes in the ground were a completely new prospect, and not exactly one he welcomed.

  The office window creaked open and the line shuffled forward, closing ranks. From where he stood he could hear the clerk’s voice rasping out questions and the easy answers that came back. They all seemed to know what they were talking about. Maybe he’d made a mistake. He should have found a ranching job, but there again all he could expect as a ranch-hand was maybe twenty dollars a month and his keep. He would never get rich on that.

  While he was still thinking, he arrived at the window. The clerk looked him up and down then stroked his chin.

  Quantro’s feet moved uneasily.

  “You mined before?”

  “No.”

  “Handled ore?”

  “No.”

  “Worked as a teamster?”

  “No.”

  “Can you use a pick and hammer?”

  “Never had to.”

  “You look like a cowhand to me.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then you can handle horses?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. Wait over there.” He pointed.

  Quantro stood with a small group of men who looked just as uncomfortable as he felt. Soon, Pete joined him.

  “Looks like we didn’t cut it.”

  “Maybe,” Pete sniffed.

  Shortly, a broad, red-faced man swaggered towards them, chewing on the stub of a cheap cigar. He announced himself as Scheller, the foreman. “All right. None of you guys worked a mine before, right?”

  Nobody answered.

  “I thought not. Okay, I’m gonna put each of you with a man who knows what he’s doing. You’ll soon pick it up. If you don’t, you won’t last the week.” He studied them as if talking was a waste of time. “Follow me.”

  It was murder.

  Quantro was issued with a fourteen-pound hammer before being led down to the rock face, stumbling in the dim light over the small-gauge tracks for the ore trucks. His job was to drive a long drill into the rock, then knock it out to leave a hole for his new partner, the dynamite man, so he could place the charge. Each set of charges needed six holes.