CHAPTER 9
That night in Chloride’s shack passed
as quietly as the previous one. Early the next morning, they drank
the last of the old-timer’s coffee, then saddled up and rode down
the gulch into Deadwood.
Bo still had enough money in his pocket
to buy them breakfast at the Red Top, but after Sue Beth’s
disapproval of their plans the night before, he didn’t know if they
would be welcome there. Instead they stopped at the Empire Bakery
on Lee Street, just across the bridge over Whitewood Creek, and
bought a sack of bear sign to eat as they rode out to the Golden
Queen Mine.
Despite the early hour, Martha Sutton
was already in the mining company’s office, and she had the letter
she had mentioned the day before ready for them.
“My superintendent’s name is Andrew
Keefer,” she told Bo as she handed him the folded and sealed paper.
“Mr. Coleman probably knows him.”
Chloride nodded. “By reputation,
anyway. I don’t reckon I’ve ever shook and howdied with him. Heard
tell he’s a tough hombre, but I never heard anybody say he wasn’t a
fair one.”
“That’s a good description of him,”
Martha said. “I’d add loyal, too. He worked for my father for
several years, and after . . . after things got bad, he could have
gone to work for the Homestake or one of the other big mines. But
he hasn’t. He’s stayed right there at the Golden Queen and done
everything in his power to keep it running, even though I owe him
as many back wages as I do anyone. You shouldn’t have any trouble
with him, especially after he reads the letter.”
Bo knew that when Martha talked about
things getting bad, she really meant after her father had died. He
stowed the letter in an inside coat pocket and asked, “How soon
will we need to bring in a shipment?”
“There’s probably already enough ore on
hand to fill a wagon right now.”
“Then we’ll be back with it tomorrow, I
reckon,” Bo said with a smile.
They started to leave the office.
Martha stopped them by saying, “Mr. Creel, Mr. Morton, Mr. Coleman
. . . please be careful. I don’t want your lives on my
conscience.”
“Don’t worry, Miss Sutton,” Bo said as
he touched a finger to his hat brim. “It’s our responsibility. We
know what we’re getting into.”
After they had stepped outside and
Scratch had closed the door, Chloride muttered, “A heap o’ trouble,
that’s what we’re likely gettin’ into. You fellas believe in
jumpin’ right into the fire, don’t you? Ride out to the mine today,
get ourselves killed tomorrow tryin’ to deliver that
gold.”
“We hired on to bring the gold into
town,” Bo said. “There’s no point in waiting, is
there?”
“No, I reckon not,” the old-timer
replied with a sigh.
They mounted up. As they rode out of
town, they passed the Argosy Mining Company office. Lawrence
Nicholson and Phillip Ramsey were just going inside. Both men
paused to look at the Texans and their elderly companion. Nicholson
gave them a curt nod. Ramsey merely watched them with a speculative
expression on his narrow face.
As they started up Deadwood Gulch,
Scratch dug the sack of bear sign out of his saddlebags and took
one of the doughnuts from it. He passed the sack to Bo and Chloride
in turn. Chloride smacked his lips with pleasure as he
ate.
“That’s mighty good bear sign. Helps
lift a man’s spirits,” he declared.
“You mean you ain’t worried about
gettin’ shot tomorrow?” Scratch asked.
“I didn’t say that. But a man could die
a mite happier with a belly full of this bear sign.”
“Maybe we’d better save some for the
trip back tomorrow,” Bo suggested.
“That’s a good idea,” Chloride
agreed.
The Golden Queen was about eight miles
up Deadwood Gulch, he explained as they followed the trail
alongside the creek. The mine wasn’t actually located in the gulch,
but rather up a side canyon that branched off to the southwest. A
smaller stream flowed through the canyon and merged with Deadwood
Creek.
“Where’s the Argosy?” Bo
asked.
“About a mile on up the gulch from
where that canyon veers off,” Chloride answered.
“What’s Nicholson going to do for
drivers and guards now? Has he been having the same sort of trouble
getting men to work for him that Miss Sutton has?”
Chloride shook his head. “Not exactly.
The Argosy can afford to pay more, so there are more fellas willin’
to run the risk. Of course, it don’t take very big wages to add up
to more than the gal can pay right now, since she ain’t payin’
nothin’.”
“She’s promised to make up all those
back wages,” Scratch pointed out.
“Promisin’ is easier than doin’,”
Chloride said.
Bo couldn’t argue with that. The men
who were still working for Martha Sutton were betting that
eventually she would be able to pay them what she owed them. But
like all bets, this one ran the risk of not paying
off.
“And you got to remember,” Chloride
went on, “until a couple o’ days ago, the Argosy shipments hadn’t
been hit. Reese Bardwell kept puttin’ more guards on the wagons
because of what’s been happenin’ to the other mines, so we all
hoped the road agents would leave the Argosy alone. Shame it didn’t
work out that way.”
“You’d probably still have a job if it
had,” Bo said.
“Maybe. To tell you the truth, though,
Bardwell never much liked me, and Nicholson gen’rally does whatever
that big galoot wants. They’d have found some excuse to get rid of
me sooner or later.”
Over the past four years, the hooves of
countless horses and mules and the wheels of hundreds of wagons had
worn a decent trail alongside the creek. The three riders had no
trouble following it. They didn’t push their mounts but instead
ambled along, taking their time. When they passed the site of the
ambush from the day before, Bo took a good look around, but he
didn’t see anything he hadn’t already seen in the wake of the
fight. There was nothing here to give them a lead to the
Devils.
They rode on, and late in the morning
they came to the mouth of the side canyon where the Golden Queen
was located. As they reined in to rest the horses and Chloride’s
mule for a few minutes, Bo studied the steep, narrow, and rocky
ridge that separated the side canyon from Deadwood Gulch
itself.
“Somebody comin’,” Scratch said,
distracting Bo from his thoughts.
Bo looked up Deadwood Gulch and saw
several riders approaching. The man in the lead was familiar, and
as the group drew closer, Bo recognized him as Reese Bardwell, the
Argosy’s chief engineer and superintendent. Bardwell didn’t look
very comfortable on horseback. It took a pretty big horse to carry
him, too, in this case a gray that looked more like a draft animal
than a saddle mount.
“Who are the men with Bardwell?” Bo
asked Chloride quietly.
The old-timer grimaced and shook his
head. “They must be new guards. I don’t recognize ’em. They don’t
look like hard-rock men.”
Scratch grunted and said, “More like
hardcases.” It was true. The three men with
Bardwell wore range clothes and Stetsons, and each had a handgun
belted on, as well as a Winchester in a saddle boot. Their eyes had
the narrow look of constant vigilance that became second nature to
men who lived by the gun.
The Texans and Chloride stayed where
they were, standing next to their mounts, as Bardwell and the other
men rode up. Bardwell reined in. His companions followed suit. The
engineer had a dark scowl on his face as he demanded, “What are you
three doin’ out here?”
“That’s our business,” Bo said. “We
could ask the same of you fellas.”
Bardwell sneered. “Last I heard,
we had honest jobs. You’re just a couple of
saddle tramps from Texas and an old man who can’t be
trusted.”
Chloride’s beard bristled belligerently
as he exclaimed, “Why, you goldurn—”
Bo put out a hand to stop him as the
old-timer took a step forward. “Take it easy, Chloride,” he said.
To Bardwell, he went on, “I reckon you haven’t heard. We’ve got
jobs. We’re working for Miss Martha Sutton at the Golden
Queen.”
Bardwell frowned in surprise. “Marty?
Why would she—Wait a minute. She didn’t hire the three of you to
get her gold to town, did she?”
“That’s right,” Bo said. Bardwell
probably would have heard that news in Deadwood anyway, and Bo was
interested in the man’s reaction.
“I knew she was getting desperate, but
I didn’t know she had turned into a fool,” Bardwell snapped. “It’s
all over this part of the country about how Coleman’s tied in with
the Devils, and for all anybody knows, you two are part of the gang
yourselves!”
Chloride shook a gnarled fist at him.
“By jingo, if I was twenty years younger, I’d hand you your
needin’s, you overgrowed varmint! I never had no truck with
outlaws, and that’s more’n you can say!”
Bardwell’s face darkened again as he
said, “What’re you talkin’ about, you old pelican?”
“You know dang good an’ well what I’m
talkin’ about! That no-good brother of yours!”
Fury mottled Bardwell’s face. His hands
clenched into massive fists for a second before he started to swing
down from his horse. But before he could dismount, one of the men
with him edged his horse up alongside and said, “Probably ought to
forget it, boss. Mr. Nicholson’s expecting you, and he won’t like
it if you’re late.”
Bardwell eased back into his saddle. “I
suppose you’re right,” he rumbled. He pointed a thick, blunt finger
at Chloride. “But you just watch your mouth, old man. Keep runnin’
it and you’re liable to be sorry.”
Chloride just snorted in
contempt.
Bardwell and the men with him rode past
and headed on down the gulch toward the settlement. Bardwell
glanced back one last time to glare at the Texans and Chloride. The
other men didn’t pay any more attention to them, which reinforced
Bo’s hunch that they were hired guns. Men like that didn’t care
about anything unless they were paid to.
Chloride swiped the back of a hand
across his mouth. “Sorry about that, boys,” he said. “Almost talked
my way into a ruckus, didn’t I?”
“We couldn’t have stopped Bardwell if
he’d gone after you,” Bo pointed out. “Not with our fists, anyway.
That means guns would have had to be involved, and then those other
hombres would have taken a hand.”
“Could’ve been bullets flyin’
everywhere, Chloride,” Scratch added.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” the old-timer
said. “I’m a mite too touchy. Always have been. Bardwell just rubs
me the wrong way, though.”
“I understand the feeling,” Bo said as
he put his foot in the stirrup. He swung up and went on, “Let’s get
going.”
They forded the creek and headed up the
narrow, twisting side canyon toward the Golden Queen. As they rode,
Bo asked, “What was that about Bardwell’s brother?”
“There was a rumor goin’ around the
camp that he had a brother who was an owlhoot down Kansas way.
Nobody would ask him about it to his face—”
“I reckon not,” Scratch said. “That
hombre’s fists are big enough he could knock down a door with
’em.”
“Anyway,” Chloride continued, “some
folks said that the law finally caught up to Bardwell’s brother and
hanged him, whilst others claimed him and his gang got away and
disappeared. I don’t know which is true, or if Bardwell even had an
owlhoot brother to start with. I was just tryin’ to stick a burr
under his saddle.”
Bo nodded. “I saw the look on his face
when you brought up his brother. I’d say you succeeded, Chloride.
And I’d say there must be something to the story, too, otherwise it
wouldn’t have bothered him so much.”
“I reckon you’re right. If it was a
lie, he wouldn’t have got so durned mad.”
“That’s sort of interestin’,” Scratch
mused.
“You mean the way a gang of outlaws
shows up and starts raising hell in the same area where Bardwell’s
working as a mine superintendent?” Bo asked. “Yeah, interesting is
the word for it, all right.” He looked over at Chloride as they
rode along the canyon. “How come you didn’t say anything about
Bardwell’s brother before now?”
The old-timer grunted. “Nobody asked
me, now did they?”
Bo had to chuckle. He said, “No, I
reckon not.”
They rode on, and a few minutes later
Bo began to hear the steady, pounding thump of a donkey engine.
“That’s coming from the mine?” he asked Chloride.
“Yeah, they’re probably usin’ it to
haul ore cars outta the shaft. All the mines in these parts started
out as placer outfits, since the first prospectors panned for gold
in the creeks just like the fellas did in the California rivers
back in forty-nine. The bigger operators come in, bought up claims,
and built flumes and long toms to wash more gravel from the stream
beds. But at the same time, they were startin’ to dig into the
slopes, too, hopin’ to find the quartz lodes those flecks o’ gold
in the creeks came from.”
Bo nodded. “That’s the usual pattern
when there’s a gold strike, all right.”
“But the lodes here in the Black Hills
ain’t like the ones anywheres else,” Chloride said. “Most places,
if you find a pocket of gold-bearin’ ore, you can make a pretty
good guess which way it’s gonna run. Not around here. A pocket or a
ledge can run any which- a-way around here, which is why you got
tunnels branchin’ ever’ which way underground. The placer gold’s
just about played out now. There’s just enough left so that most of
the outfits keep a sluice goin’ to get as much dust as they can,
but mostly they’re after ore now.”
“And it takes a big company to do that
effectively,” Bo said. “A lone miner with a shovel and a pickax
can’t dig out enough gold to make the effort worth his
while.”
“Yeah, it didn’t take long for all the
little fellas to get crowded out,” Chloride agreed. “A lot of ’em
wound up sellin’ their claims for little or nothin’, then stayin’
on to work for wages from the big outfits.”
“We saw the same thing happen in
California and Nevada,” Scratch said, “and when we moseyed up here
to Deadwood a few years back, we could tell it was gonna be the
same story all over again. That’s why we didn’t bother stayin’
around and breakin’ our backs lookin’ for gold.”
They rode around a bend and saw the
mine buildings up ahead on their right. The bunkhouse, cook shack,
and mess hall were on the fairly level ground at the bottom of the
canyon, along with a sturdy log structure that housed the
superintendent’s quarters. The mill was built on the slope, at the
head of the main shaft sunk into the ridge. A few smaller storage
buildings were scattered around, and Bo spotted a squat building
made of thick logs a hundred yards up the canyon. That would be
where the supply of blasting powder was kept. A while back, he and
Scratch had worked at a mine down in Mexico, a long way from here
but a setup that had been remarkably similar in some
ways.
Bo saw a corral with a dozen mules in
it, and a couple of empty wagons were parked next to the enclosure.
He pointed them out to Scratch and Chloride and said, “I guess
we’ll be using one of those to haul the gold.”
“Can you handle a wagon like that,
old-timer?” Scratch asked.
“There you go with that old-timer
business again!” Chloride sputtered. “You ain’t no spring chicken!
And I can handle anything with four wheels and mules hitched to
it!”
Bo grinned as he turned his horse
toward the superintendent’s house. “We’d better find Andrew Keefer
and give him Miss Sutton’s letter before he starts wondering who we
are and gets nervous,” he said.
However, it was too late for that. As
they rode up to the house, the door opened and a stocky, balding
man with bushy, rust-colored side-whiskers stepped out with a
shotgun in his hands. He pointed the Greener at the newcomers and
bellowed, “If you’ve come to rob us, you damned Devils, I’ll blow
you right out of your saddles!”