Bound for Gold--A Peter Fallon Novel of the California Gold Rush

by William Martin

  “Probably pissed off the downstreamers.”

  “Damn right. There’s also evidence that the downstreamers blew up the dam. But when they did, they exposed a gravel bank in the side of the ravine, just loaded with gold. All kinds of stories like that in this country.”

  Wild Bill took a dirt road to the left that led up to the top of a hill and a chain-link fence enclosing a rusted twenty-foot steel tower. A sign on the fence said KEEP OUT.

  “Why are we here?” asked Peter.

  “For history. You’ve seen riverside tailings. You’ve seen dam builders. You’ve seen the Michigan Ditch. You need to see hard-rock deep-hole mining. When they put up head frames and dug holes down a mile, it all changed. Big money came in. Hundreds of men took a wage and went into the ground every day. And the gold-bearing rock came up.”

  “For how long?”

  “This place played out in the 1930s, others stopped running in 1942, when Roosevelt closed the mines as a wartime measure. Most of them never reopened.” Wild Bill pulled back a cut in the chain-link and gestured for Peter to step through. “Have a look down that shaft.”

  Peter felt like an explorer who had come upon an ancient Mayan city in the jungle. The ghosts were still here. But the sounds of machinery running above the mine shafts had been replaced by the almost spectral silence of these California hills.

  “There’s still gold down there,” said Wild Bill. “Gold everywhere, if you believe the geologists. They say that the forty-niners only got about twenty percent of it. The low-hanging fruit.”

  “Is that why everyone around here is so twitchy? Because there’s still a lot of gold out there?”

  “Gold always makes people twitchy.”

  Wild Bill led Peter to the far side of the enclosure, through another break in the chain-link, to the edge of the hill and a panoramic view to the south. They could see two more head frames, and the Miwok flickering and glinting, still doing the work that water had been doing since it first flowed through these foothills.

  “After it rains,” said Wild Bill, “this’ll all be as green as Ireland.”

  Peter looked back to their last stop, above the bend where the dam had been. “When you hear a story of an explosion opening a vein by accident, do you ever think that stories about lost rivers of gold could be true?”

  “Lost rivers?”

  “And maybe lost bags, and a seven-part journal that could be the treasure map?”

  “Sounds like a lot of myth to me, but sometimes, myths have an element of truth.” Wild Bill swept his arm across the scene. “Stories from one end of this country to the other. But if the wrong story gets out, well, people like Ginny O’Hara don’t want to see this country overrun again. That’s really why they’re so twitchy.”

  Peter pointed southwest, to a plateau and a large, flat building, like a warehouse, about three miles away. “Are they the ones overrunning it?”

  “That’s the Emery Mine. They used to give tours. But a few years ago, new ownership came in. Gold prices were rising so they were starting operations again. It’s not open to the public any longer, but maybe we can get a tour. I’m a stockholder. I bought ten thousand shares a while back.”

  “Big investment.”

  “It’s a gold start-up. Cost me a thousand bucks at a dime a share.”

  * * *

  THE MAIN HEAD TOWER for the Emery Mine was about a hundred feet back of the parking lot, near a huge work shed that housed stamping equipment and vehicles. An open pit held a small pond of waste water. And nothing seemed to be happening.

  A dozen cars baked on the tarmac. A minivan or two, a few sedans, half a dozen pickups, and one blue Ford Explorer SUV.

  Wild Bill pulled his pickup in near the SUV. As they got out, a guy sitting in the SUV—black guy, dark glasses, black suit—looked them over. And he must have seen something he didn’t like, because he jumped out.

  Wild Bill whispered to Peter, “He knows I’m carrying. Keep walking.”

  “Hey!” The guy started to follow them.

  Then the door of the office swung open and two men were walking toward them from the other direction, walking fast, looking irritated.

  One was a big guy, like a linebacker—white, dark glasses, black suit, another hard-assed security type with a bulge under his jacket.

  But security for whom?

  The other guy, obviously. He was smaller, Asian, better suit, brighter fabric, blue with lighter blue windowpane. And a little triangular lapel pin.

  Maybe the white guy noticed the bulge under Donnelly’s windbreaker, too, or the double take that Peter did when they passed, because he stepped quickly in front of his man and put a hand inside his jacket.

  And for a moment, they all stood there, facing each other down, five guys in sunglasses, some silvered, some wraparounds, and Peter’s Cary Grant tortoiseshells. They looked like five bugs, different species.

  Wild Bill said with an innocent grin, “Do you gents know if they’re giving tours today?”

  “Ask inside,” said the white guy.

  The Asian may have noticed something familiar about Peter, as Peter did about him, but nothing registered behind the dark glasses. Then the two guards led their boss to the SUV, keeping a protective wall of muscle around him until they got him into the backseat and sped away.

  Peter said, “I know that guy from somewhere, the one they were guarding.”

  Wild Bill raised an eyebrow. “I’m not gonna say it.”

  “If my girlfriend was here, she’d call the P.C. police on you.”

  * * *

  INSIDE, PETER FELT AIR conditioning. He liked it. Eighty degrees in October was just … wrong, even in the Sierra foothills. Reception area was clean and neat: new file cabinets, two desks. A good first impression meant optimism. But on a whiteboard on the wall, in blue marker: Today’s Stock Price, 0.15.

  A woman looked up from her desk. Her face said, “Now what?” as if it hadn’t been a good day and they weren’t about to make it any better. She wore a gold golf shirt and khaki trousers. The shirt had the words, EMERY MINE embroidered and beneath, her name: COLLEEN MALONEY. She listened to Wild Bill’s spiel and gave the “Boston Historian” a once-over. “No more public tours. Insurance issue.”

  “I’m a stockholder,” said Wild Bill. “On that basis, perhaps—”

  Colleen raised a finger and made a call.

  A man in his forties emerged from the hall beyond the glass doors. A little paunchy, combed over, wearing the same uniform. His name: Jimmy Maloney. So a family operation. Jimmy was smiling like an emoji.

  Wild Bill extended his hand and said, “Hello, Jimmy.”

  For a moment, the emoji changed to confusion. Jimmy’s eyes shifted as if he was trying to place this big red-faced guy. Then he glanced down at his shirt and laughed. “Jimmy Maloney, Community Relations Officer. Can I help you gents?”

  Another explanation from Wild Bill Donnelly.

  Smiling emoji back in place, Jimmy said it again: tours no longer available. “Insurance issue, you see.”

  “But my friend here has come all the way from Boston.”

  “Even if we could, the mine manager, who could authorize it, well, he was just—” Jimmy stopped himself before he said more.

  Just what? wondered Peter. Laid off? Fired?

  “We had to shut the tours down once we began the permit process,” said Jimmy.

  Peter asked, “Is that what you told those guys who just left?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The guys who were just here. They didn’t look too happy. Are they stockholders, too, disappointed that they couldn’t get a tour?”

  The emoji kept smiling. “I wasn’t in their meeting. But … you’re a historian?”

  Wild Bill Donnelly said, “He’s interested in gold mining history.”

  “Well, I can give you our prospectus.” He waved them through the doors.

  Jimmy Maloney’s office was first on the left. Loud voices were coming fro
m the last office on the right. Beyond, a sign on a swinging door read, HARD HAT AREA.

  Peter and Wild Bill stepped into the windowless cubicle. On the walls were historical pictures of the mine, a whiteboard with a schedule.

  Wild Bill kept talking: “This used to be a great take. Anytime I had visitors, I brought them here. We’d all get in carts, go down into the ground, feel the heat. See the veins of gold-bearing quartz. It gave you new respect for mining work.”

  Jimmy Maloney went to his computer and called up a 3-D image of the mine. “The main shaft reaches four thousand feet, with a dozen others running off of it. Once we pump it out—groundwater fills those deep holes very quickly—we plan to bring three shafts back on line. With a good ore-to-rock ratio, we can be profitable at—”

  That was when another guy came in. “Jimmy, you’re wanted down the hall. Sorry, gents.” The name on his gold shirt said DON BRAVO. He was a big guy with a broad chest and a dark brow. Hard to tell if he was scowling or just looking.

  Jimmy’s face fell off, as if he was about to lose his job and knew it. He said, “Sure thing, sir,” and introduced Mr. Bravo, head of mill security.

  Mr. Bravo’s eyes went to the bulge under Wild Bill’s windbreaker. He said, “Now, who are you and what do you want?”

  Wild Bill told the truth: local stockholder and Boston historian.

  Don Bravo gave him a “don’t bullshit me” look.

  Peter pulled out his business card and shoved it into Bravo’s hand. He gave one to Jimmy Maloney, too. “Look me up on the internet. And thanks for your time.”

  * * *

  FIVE MINUTES LATER, THEY were driving west again, toward Highway 49.

  Wild Bill said to Peter, “I wish you’d stop giving out your business card.”

  “Why?”

  “As you say, people are very twitchy here in Amador County. First Ginny O’Hara, then the Boyles—”

  “They didn’t get a card.”

  “Something dicey. That Emery Mine spent years getting the permits, satisfying the California DEP over water purification, tailings disposal, and so on, and now … the guys in the other offices were reaming each other out.”

  “About what?

  “I heard them talking about the Chinese, the Chinese money, the—”

  “Bags and rivers of Chinese gold?”

  Wild Bill chuckled. “Lots of Chinese money coming into international gold funds. Chinese government has instructed banks to support gold exploration and production. They offer low-interest loans. They employ agents to buy into good-looking gold investments around the globe. Could be that Emery is backed by a Hong Kong bank. And the big investors aren’t happy. So somebody just got fired.”

  “So we got a conflict between the locals and Chinese … again?”

  “Except now, the Chinese have the power, because they know the golden rule.”

  “He who has the gold makes the rules.”

  They arrived at the intersection of the Miwok Road and Highway 49.

  Wild Bill Donnelly gave a look around.

  Peter said, “You have the light.”

  “Just making sure nobody’s tailing us. Guys who move with heavy security don’t always play nice. And maybe that Don Bravo guy called the boys in the blue SUV.” Then Wild Bill turned south. Nobody appeared to be following.

  As they passed the turn for Highway 88, Peter took out his iPhone.

  A text from Evangeline: “Vineyard table set with places for you and your friend. 12:30. Wonderful wines. Come quick, or I may move in.”

  She’s been tasting, he thought. She’s half-lit. She should have had a bigger breakfast.

  He tapped, “On our way,” and asked Wild Bill, “How long to Manion Gold?”

  “Fifteen minutes.”

  Peter added that, sent the text, and said, “I hope you like Zinfandel.”

  “Almost as much as signed first editions of Robert Ludlum.”

  “If you help me to reconstruct this journal, I’ll see that you get one.”

  Then Peter texted his son: “More Chinese involvement, at higher levels? More talk of Cutler Exploration at Broke Neck? Upheaval at Emery Mine? More to explain.”

  Immediately, a text came back. “More tonight. Dinner with Cutler chief investor, Michael Kou. Maybe Cutler, too. Hunan Garden House, 7:30. Before then, read attachment. Just arrived from Montana branch of Spencer family. Three down, four to go.”

  Peter had questions, but they could wait. He texted: “You’re doing good research without me.”

  LJ answered: “Had good teacher. And the will names most of the heirs. More a matter of persuasion than research.”

  “Who’s left?”

  “Manion Sturgis and Sarah Bliss. Maybe Manion’s bro, George, the other winemaker.”

  “And number seven?”

  “That’s where you come in. Maybe the Sturgis sister in L.A. Not sure yet.”

  “Answers expected tonight.”

  “Answers delivered. But work on Manion, and try his Zinfandel.”

  Peter clicked off the texting function, then clicked to “The Journal of James Spencer—Notebook #3.” He asked Donnelly, “Want to hear some of it?”

  “Sure.”

  So, as they wound through the country where the story unfolded, Peter read aloud.

  The Journal of James Spencer—Notebook #3

  August 10, 1849

  Gold Fever

  Before the sun had cleared the treetops, we knew: I had washed our dishes in a gravel bank that rendered a spoonful of gold for every shovelful of dirt we turned.

  By eight o’clock, we had learned how to placer mine, a process as repetitive and exhausting as working a loom in a Lowell mill: Dig, dump, clear. Crouch, dip, swirl. Bounce, dip, swirl. Dip, swirl, swirl. And do it all day long.

  Dig gravel from the bank or from under the rocks, in the bends and the bars where the river slows and the sediment drops. Dump the gravel into the pan. Clear the rocks and then the stones. Crouch by the river and dip the pan. Swirl away the lighter sands. Bounce to bring out the blackest sands. Then dip and swirl, dip and swirl, down and down, down to the bottom and the beautiful gold, for the only thing heavier than black sand is gold.

  By ten o’clock, Michael Flynn was suffering a high-grade case of gold fever, which caused him to work faster and ever faster, filling and swirling, dipping and bouncing, never stopping, seldom breathing, and talking less than ever before.

  If it is true that life is no more than an accumulation of dreams and memories, then Flynn that morning was seeing a bright dream burn away his harshest memories … all because of gold. He dreamed of going back to Boston, the city that welcomed him with NO IRISH NEED APPLY. He imagined squiring beautiful women, downing champagne and oysters, living on Beacon Hill. And the more color he saw in his pan, the brighter grew his dream, the faster moved his hands, the hotter burned his brainpan.

  Gold fever may kill in time, but like the hallucinations of a febrile man, it may also clarify his vision before death overtakes him. He knows that gold—so beautiful, so indestructible, so rare—has value and utility. But so, he may tell himself, does iron. And from iron, he can fashion a nail. Then he can build a house. From gold, however, he can fashion a future. So dig fast, dip deep, bounce hard, and swirl and swirl and swirl again.

  Every holy Bostonian assembling in the snow aboard the William Winter, every unholy soul inhaling the greed-fog of San Francisco, every know-it-all sailing up the Sacramento, every one of them had suffered symptoms of this affliction. Else, they would not have left civilization in the first place. But no man comes down with a killing case of gold fever until he turns his own dirt and finds wealth by the work of his own hand, as we did that first day.

  * * *

  AROUND NOON, CLETIS ANNOUNCED that this was the “richest damn dirt since Jesus threw the Jews out the temple.”

  “What do we do next?” asked Flynn.

  “We remember what I said.” Cletis had warned us that if we found
gold, we should not cry out or dance a jig or shout loud hallelujahs to heaven. “We keep this quiet, ’cause word’ll spread soon enough, and them smelly miners down the road’ll come crawlin’ all over this hillside like ticks on a curly-haired dog. They’ll stake claims and put up tents and dig holes to shit in, and we won’t be able to do nothin’ about it. Better if it’s just us and them yammerin’ Chinks across the river.”

  We staked three claims, following the laws of Broke Neck. One ran along the river, one on the flatland directly above the bank, ten by ten, and one above that, at the base of the big skull-shaped rock, five by twenty. Cletis said, “A big rock makes the water swirl and slosh and drop whatever it’s carryin’.”

  He put a shovel at one corner of his claim, drove sticks to mark the others. “So long as we leave our tools to show we’re workin’ at least one day a week, nobody can touch this claim. Miner’s Law.”

  I asked Cletis about claim jumpers.

  “A year ago, when I got discharged and come prospectin’, nobody worried about claim jumpers. But more folks arrivin’ every day now. And more folks means less gold. And when there’s less of somethin’ folks want, it brings out the bad in a lot of ’em. That’s a natural law. So there’s more claim jumpin’. But Miner’s Law still holds.”

  “Do you think that those Chinks know Miner’s Law?” asked Flynn.

  “If they don’t, we’ll teach ’em.” Cletis studied the six small men squatting and swirling on the other bank. “But I don’t guess they’d be so stupid as to go stealin’ from such stalwart Christian sons of bitches as us.”

  * * *

  OUR DAY ENDED WITH a take of twenty ounces and total exhaustion. To those who say that I was “soft,” one of those silk-stocking boys who never dirtied his hands until he got to California, I would answer that Flynn knew physical labor as well as any man, and he was more drained than I.

  We had not the energy to do anything but eat our bacon and beans and share swallows from the jug of whiskey that Flynn had bought at Sutter’s.