Comstock Lode (1981)

by L'amour, Louis

  At least a dozen new buildings were going up, and he guessed there would be three or four hundred men in the area. Probably more, for Gold Hill and Silver City had become communities.

  Melissa met him at the door. "I saw you coming," she said. "Jim's here."

  Ledbetter was seated at the table with a cup of coffee and some doughnuts. "Sit down," he said, "I've been wishful of seeing you."

  Trevallion dropped into a chair and accepted the coffee and doughnuts Melissa put before him. He glanced up at her. "How are you doing?"

  Ledbetter chuckled. "You should do so well! She can't bake them fast enough! My guess is she's staked a better claim than anybody on the lode." He put down his cup and looked at Trevallion. "How about you?"

  "I've been washing a little dust."

  "A pan won't do it. You need a rocker, or better still, a sluice."

  "Maybe. I may not stay long."

  Ledbetter glanced at him thoughtfully but offered no comment. After a moment he said, "Before the summer is over, there will be three or four thousand men here."

  He sipped his coffee, then dunked a doughnut. "Val," he said, "you be careful."

  Trevallion's expression did not change. Ledbetter was puzzled by him, having known many men. Trevallion was a slim, dark-featured man with the broad, powerful shoulders common among men who used a double-jack for hours at a time. When he smiled, which was rarely, Trevallion was, he reflected, a remarkably handsome man.

  "Somebody's interested in you," he commented. "Asking around here and there. Have you got enemies?"

  "Who hasn't?"

  "With your savvy you could become a rich man," Ledbetter commented. "Atwood over to Grass Valley assayed some of that blue stuff they been throwing out. Runs three thousand to the ton, I hear."

  "There's always rumors. I've heard five different stories on how rich it is."

  "Surprised they haven't tried to hire you over at the Solomon. They're sinking a shaft."

  "I was asked."

  "If you go over there-Crockett is all right, a solid man. Hesketh, well, I don't know. He's a man I'd watch. He's in touch with some of those high-flyers in San Francisco."

  "A bookkeeper, isn't he?"

  "Aye, a bookkeeper. Knows every ounce of ore that comes from any claim on the Comstock, and he's bought a few claims himself. Some of them don't make sense. He's bought cheap, too."

  Trevallion glanced at Melissa. She was filling out a little, eating better, no doubt. She had two men and a woman working for her now.

  "Jim? This man who has been asking for me?"

  "Big, slow-moving man. Takes his time, I mean. Handlebar mustache and a bad scar over one eye. He's no miner, I'll bank on that. I never heard his name, but he seems to have money enough to live and get around."

  Ledbetter finished his coffee and stood up. "Got to get back over to Mormon Station-Genoa, I mean. I'm meeting a Mexican over there with some mules to sell."

  "Branching out?"

  "Uh-huh. But one day I'm going to pack it all in and go back to Kentucky. I'll buy me a place there and settle down to raise horses."

  He left, and Trevallion refilled his cup. Ledbetter at least had a plan, an idea of what he wanted. He might never really do what he said, but at least he had it in mind. He had somewhere to go.

  Trevallion gulped a mouthful of coffee, then suddenly angry with himself, he started to rise. Slowly he sat down again.

  There was a man riding by on a rawboned paint gelding, a big man with a handlebar mustache. As he drew abreast of the bakeshop he squinted his eyes to stare within. Where Trevallion sat it was dark and shadowy, and there was not one chance in a hundred the rider could make him out, but Trevallion noticed something.

  The rider had a deep scar over one eye.

  Chapter XI

  Trevallion had no memory of the man. Watching from where he sat, he saw him dismount in front of Eilley's and tie his horse there.

  His first impulse was to walk down, sit opposite him and give him a chance to open the ball. Yet there was no use inviting trouble.

  His memory for the night of his mother's murder was stark and clear, yet he had seen only a few of the men's faces, and those only half-seen in the flickering light from the camp-fires. Yet this man could be one of them.

  But why hunthim? Had the deaths of Rory and Skinner alerted them?

  The chances of the group still being together were slight. Such men had a way of drifting, taking up with anyone who was available to do whatever they had in mind.

  Suppose, however, the man who came from the shadows, the unknown men, knew what was going on? He was the only one who had come out of it with any money and somehow he did not fit the pattern of the others. All of them had the look and manner of typical border ruffians but him. There had been something cold and calculating about him.

  Melissa returned to the table with a cup and filled it from the pot, then his. "Mr. Trevallion? There's a lot of talk going on about Secession. The men who come here for coffee argue about it and sometimes they get very angry. I don't even know what they are talking about."

  "It's a matter of States' rights," he said, "and the slavery question is involved. With most of the men who come in here I believe the slavery question is secondary to the right of a state to do as it pleases. You must remember that better than half of the men in camp are from the South, and whether a state is to be admitted to the Union as Slave or Free is very important to them."

  "I wish they'd take their arguments somewhere else! That's about all they talk about except for how dangerous Langford Peel is or who will win when Heenan and Sayers fight."

  "Just listen," he advised, "and stay out of it. They won't expect a woman to know anything about politics, so you don't have to take sides. Keep your own conscience and let them debate the issues. Nobody is ever convinced by argument, anyway. They just think up new reasons for maintaining old positions and become more defensive. The thing for you to remember is that no matter what they believe they all drink coffee, eat doughnuts and,pies."

  "But there are so many new names to keep straight. Who are Heenan and Sayers?"

  "Prizefighters. Heenan is an American, Sayers an Englishman, and they are both good. Heenan is the better of the two, I believe, and he is also somewhat larger."

  "And Langford Peel?"

  "Sometimes a gambler. He's a very good man with a gun-used to be a soldier, in the Cavalry."

  "Do you know a man they call Ol' Virginny?" she asked.

  "I do. If he ever advises you on anything pertaining to mining, pay attention. He knows what he's talking about, drunk or sober."

  "What about Mr. Comstock? The one the lode is named for?"

  "He's a four-flusher, Melissa. He got hold of some maps and estimates left by the Grosch brothers, and on the strength of that, he's laid claim to everything around."

  "I know. He convinced O'Riley and McLaughlin that they were on his ground and they took him in as a partner. Mr. Penrod is a partner, too."

  "There's nothing wrong with Penrod except the company he keeps."

  The bakery had become a clearing house for information for Trevallion, as sooner or later everyone stopped by, and the men talked freely among themselves or to her. Most of the miners had worked ground that was soon played out in other places and this, they felt, would be the same.

  From where he sat, he could look out the door or the windows and see the entire side of the mountain was scattered with prospect holes and beginning mine shafts. Penrod had told him they were down over fifteen feet and expected to reach thirty before long. Several others were down as far and most of them were finding ore.

  Trevallion finished his coffee. The paint horse was still tied at Eilley's.

  He looked into his coffee cup with disgust. What in God's world was he doing with his life when all he could think of was that killing ten years ago? All around him things were growing, expanding, becoming, and now was the time to do ... whatever he intended or wished to do. Was he to be dri
ven always by hatred? Had it become so much a part of him that he was an empty man?

  Ten years in the mountains and wild country of the west, and what did he have to show for it but two dead men, neither of whom was worth the pinch of powder it required to toll.

  He was twenty-two, but he knew men of his age who owned mines or ranches, who had become or were in the process of becoming wealthy, or achieving something for their country or themselves.

  It was a time when no man asked another his age. A good half the men on the Comstock were his age or younger. It was what a man coulddo that mattered. Several, no older or wiser than himself, had staked good claims here.

  Of course, if this place followed the pattern, these men would sell out and move on, driven more by the urge to discover than to develop. In fact, few of them had the knowledge or the business skill needed to develop a mine. They were the seekers and finders, the men who knew placer mining and surface indications. Few had any knowledge of hard-rock mining or what it entailed.

  The discoverers lacked the mental and emotional attitude needed to develop and improve a mine. It would be a long process, and much money would be needed to open up a mine such as these would be.

  Until now he had been a finder-a finder and a mover. If he was to become anything here, he must become involved in development.

  He made a decision then. He would forget that night ten years ago, as he knew his mother would wish him to forget, and his father also. He would look about, stake a likely claim, and work it. He would, if possible, acquire a working interest in another mine, perhaps with Crockett.

  When he looked again, the horse was gone. Irritated, he got up and went to the door. Neither horse nor rider was anywhere in sight.

  He walked into the street and went over. Eilley had been washing clothes and cooking for miners for some time. She was a hearty, easygoing, friendly woman who stood for no foolishness and treated all the miners as so many unruly boys, and they loved her for it.

  "Howdy," she glanced at him sharply. "Hadn't heard you was in camp today."

  "You had a visitor just now, a big man with a scar and a mustache."

  "I did. He's a good eater, too."

  "Know him?"

  "Waggoner, and he's a bad one. Leave him alone. I mean even you, leave him alone."

  Trevallion dropped on a bench. The place was empty, and Eilley was cleaning up around. "Get yourself a claim, Eilley. This is it."

  "It?"

  "The big one. I've got a feeling."

  "I'll believe that when you get a claim. What is it with you, Trevallion? You've more savvy about mining than any man in the fields, but you just drift. Why don't you find yourself a woman and settle down?"

  He grinned at her. "I'm waiting for you, Eilley."

  She laughed. "Now ain't that likely? No, I ain't your type, and I spotted it the moment I first seen you. I look 'em over, Trevallion. After all, I've been married twice, and I ain't agin tryin' on another one, but not you.

  "Even if you were my type I'd fight shy of you. You wear that gun too loose, Trevallion. I don't want my husband brought home on a shutter or hangin' at the end of a rope."

  He glanced at her. "Ever know me to hunt trouble, Eilley?"

  "No, I never. That's what worries me. I can understand a trouble-hunter like that Eldorado Johnny from down the country. He's a nice boy but he sure does fancy himself as a bold, bad man. What makes me uneasy are these quiet, easy ones like you."

  "I'm just a prospector and a miner, Eilley."

  "Aye, but I wonder what you're prospectin' for. Wasn't it you who killed Rory?"

  "I caught him cheating."

  "So you did. And had some talk with him, too, a lot of talk nobody could make any sense out of. Seemed like there was something between you."

  Trevallion got up. "What do you know about Waggoner?"

  "He's always got money. Doesn't flash it around, but he doesn't count it, either. And he's not prospectin' and he ain't lookin' for work. I'd say he's the kind to fight shy of."

  "Eilley? We're old friends. Keep your eyes open."

  "To what?"

  "Oh, I'm just curious. I'd like to know who his friends are-if he has any."

  "What's between you?"

  Trevallion stopped in the door. "That's just it. I don't know, but he's been asking around about me."

  He went back, tightened his cinches, and rode down the canyon toward Silver City and Dayton.

  Trevallion did not hear the voices behind him. He did not see the miner who had come in just after he left. "Who is he, Eilley? He has a look about him."

  "Aye, he's a Cousin Jack. As good a miner as lives they do be saying, but a lonely man and a man to leave alone."

  "A trouble-hunter?"

  "Trevallion? I should say not. But he has a way about him that makes men just back off, but not women."

  "So that's Trevallion? I've heard about him." The miner was about five foot ten, with a quiet, easy way. He had a certain hesitancy in his speech. "It pays to know the good ones," he added, "the ones a man can trust."

  "There's no better." Eilley paused then looked up from the dishes she was washing. "There's a black thing riding him, I don't know what. He killed Rory, you know?"

  "Rory had been asking it for years."

  "So he had, so he had! Nonetheless there are some who say Trevallion pushed him into it." She dried a cup and placed it on the table. "There was a friend of Rory's. A man named Skinner. He's dead, too, found with a gun beside him but shot dead."

  "This man Trevallion, who are his friends?"

  She brushed a wisp of hair back over her brow. "He has none, and seems to want none. He's helped the lass down at the bakery some, but she knows nothing more than the rest of us."

  "A drinker?"

  "Not him. A drink now and again maybe, but a drinker? No. Watch him, John. He's a man who is completely in control of himself, and he seems to want nothing from anyone, anywhere."

  "Would he work for someone else?"

  "If he liked him, he might. Usually he washes a little dust here and there, keeps to himself. He brings shirts for me, and when I take them down to the hot springs to wash, the pockets are always empty. I have to watch the others, they leave things. I save them and return ... nothing ever in his pockets and no ragged, worn clothes. Neat, patched sometimes, but neat."

  At the office of the Solomon, Crockett closed the door behind him and went to the table that served as his desk. Albert Hesketh, who worked at a long table opposite, did not look up.

  Crockett seated himself and cocked his feet up on the table and looked thoughtfully at his bookkeeper. "How's everything?" he asked, finally.

  Hesketh looked up. "Fine, Mr. Crockett. I think we could use two more men and we'll need a shift-boss."

  "Tried to hire one." Crockett got out his pipe. "A Cornishman named Trevallion."

  Hesketh continued to make entries in the ledger.

  "They tell me he's a top miner."

  Hesketh blotted the line. "And did you get him?"

  "Turned me down," Crockett said, "and they say he's the best." He took his feet down from the table. "We need him. I want to open up a cross-cut between our east and west drifts to improve the air circulation down there. Better for the miners," he added, "and I want to sink the shaft deeper."

  "We are getting out good ore." Hesketh made the simple statement, but it sounded like an objection. "We can show a profit without further expenditure."

  "Damn it, Hesk!" Crockett said. "I'm not interested in just showing a profit! There's a big ore body down there somewhere and I want it!

  "Oh, I know! We have to spend more than we're making to do it, but I'll be damned if I'll go against my hunch! There's silver down there! Tons of it! And I want to get it out. Trevallion's our man. I know he is, and I'll be damned if I take no for an answer. I'll see him again."

  He stoked his pipe. "Or you can."

  "No. I'd rather you did, Mr. Crockett. You are the one who believes in tha
t ore body, and you are the boss." He hesitated. "If you think Trevallion's the man, hire him. Personally, I believe there are several around town who would serve us better.

  "I hear," Hesketh added, "that he's a sullen, unresponsive sort of man."

  Crockett lit his pipe and threw the match on the floor, and Hesketh's lips tightened a little.

  Trevallion here? Well, why not? He might indeed find that ore body, and if he did the stock...

  Why not, after all?

  Chapter XII

  Trevallion studied the gold in his pan under a small glass. It was not a good grade of gold, and during these past years he had handled a lot of gold dust. This was impregnated with silver, and he doubted it would go for more than ten dollars to the ounce.

  So far he had made a living and edged ahead a little, yet that was not what he wanted. What was happening in Virginia town and Gold Hill was getting to him. Men were coming and going. Not a few gave up in the first few days, others lasted for weeks, some for months. The water was bad, food was expensive, and powder was also. Everything had to be brought over the Sierras from California. Jim Ledbetter was running six trains of mules now, and couldn't keep up with the business.

  "Val," he said seriously, "quit the mining and come in with me. I need help, and we can be rich-rich, I tell you! The money in these camps is in supplying what they need.

  "No matter whether they find silver, they still have to eat, they have to wear clothes, they have to sleep! Eilley's getting rich just washing clothes! She rinses them out really good and pans out the dirt and she's doing better than some of the placer miners are."

  Trevallion computed the small stake he was holding. He was a careful man, never a gambler. Uneasily, he shifted in his chair, looking out the window at the crowded street. It was his first time in Gold Hill or Virginia in over a month.

  He'd had the feeling he was being stalked, hunted. As a result he had simply pulled out, had left his claim in the canyon, and had wandered over east and staked another claim in a canyon above Pipe Spring. On the certain theory that a man who makes no tracks leaves no tracks, he stayed where he was, killing an occasional deer, living sparsely and working hard.