How the West Was Won (1963) (26 page)

So long, Sergeant.

And Lieutenant-good luck.

He saddled the gray horse. It was a runner and a stayer, a horse he himself had bought but which they had kept for racing, winning a good bit of money from time to time. Now it was going to have to run.

He mounted up and walked the horse to the edge of the barricade. Vaucelle came over to him. Over there,-he nodded his head but did not point-there don't seem to be any of them. You might make it.

Thanks.

The Indians had carried off their dead, as they always did, leaving only those who had fallen within the enclosure. There were pools of blood here and there upon the grass, indication that the Arapahoes had been hard hit, too. He started his horse trotting down the valley, giving them a chance to see him. He was heading west. That always seemed to be the answer. When things go wrong, go west.

A shot rang out...

He glanced back, surprised to see the distance between himself and the fort. And then he saw the Arapahoes. There was a long line of them strung out along the ridge, and they were coming after him.

He glanced off to the north, and there was another line. They were pointing themselves at some spot ahead where they expected to close in on him. All right, Jubal, he said to the gray horse, let's see what you can do. The long legs stretched out, the hoofs pounded the turf, the wind whipped at his face. The gray had a smooth, wonderful stride, and dearly loved to run. Ahead of him somewhere was tomorrow-with luck. The hoofs drummed a rhythm upon the sod. He crouched lower to lessen the resistance offered to the wind.

Chapter
18

Gabe French paused on the corner and stared along the street. The last time he had walked on Nob Hill he had come looking for a teamster who had once worked for him, and the Hill then had been a cluster of modest wooden cottages. Now they had been replaced by ornate mansions.

He squinted his eyes against the reflection of sunlight from Jim Flood's thirty-thousand-dollar brass fence. It was all of two blocks long, and there was a man at work polishing it. Gabe had heard about that fence. In fact, come to think of it, Cleve had told him of it, and how it kept one man busy every day to keep it polished.

The gray towers of the Hopkins castle with its terraced gardens was diagonally across the street. He walked on by, ignoring the Colton, Stanford, and Crocker houses. He had never visited Cleve's home during his lifetime, and it seemed odd that he should come here now, when Cleve was dead. Yet they had been friends in the old days, and never less than friends in all the years that followed. One man I envied, Gabe said aloud, as he hesitated on the corner. He had something about him ... sort of a flak, I'd guess you'd call it. What was that?

Gabe turned at the query, embarrassed to be caught talking to himself. Asked if you knew where the van Valen mansion is, he grumbled. The man pointed. Right over there. Although you can hardly call it his now. And by all accounts it won't be his widow's after today. They're selling him out, lock, stock, and barrel.

He was a prim little man with small eyes and a sour expression, and the satisfaction in his tone was obvious.

It irritated Gabe French, and he said, They'd not do it if he was alive. Cleve van Valen could raise millions when nobody else could lay hands on a copper penny ... just on his name.

I've heard that, the man said skeptically. But I don't believe it.

Gabe felt his anger mounting. Age had brought a quick impatience to Gabe French.

Heretofore he had been tolerant of fools; he was so no longer. A man must pay his debts, the man continued stiffly. van Valen always lived beyond his income.

There was more'n a few years, Gabe replied testily, when nobody could have lived beyond his income. Time was when one mine paid him upwards of eighty thousand a month. Eighty thousand. Never made that kind of money myself. I don't imagine you did. The stranger glanced contemptuously at Gabe's shabby clothing.

Gabe French tried to stifle his irritation and failed. A man had few pleasures when he grew old, and Gabe allowed himself his irritation at petty things. He had never been known to fret at disaster, but in these later years he found pleasure in grumbling.

He looked at the man coldly. Not to say, he said deliberately, that I couldn't buy and sell many a man who owns a mansion on this hill. As for Cleve van Valen, there was never a better friend than him, or a more loyal one. Came a time-that was years back-glanders got into my horses and I had two freight contracts going, and all my stock dead or dying almost overnight. Somebody told Cleve, and he came over Donner Pass driving a hundred head of horses for me-and that in the late fall with snow falling. He made it through with the pass closing up behind him. Saved my bacon. There was another time when the two of us got ambushed by Modocs up near Klamath Lake. Our horses were killed and I had a bullet in me; and Cleve, he stood them off throughout the day, and in the night got away, carrying me on his back.

The man looked startled. Then you-Why, you must be Gabe French! That's right, Gabe said quietly, and glancing up the street, then down, he stepped off the curb and walked across.

Cleve was dead, but Lilith was alive, and by the Lord Harry, if she needed money he knew where she could get it. The trouble was that Lilith was a mighty proud woman, mighty proud.

Half a dozen rigs were standing in the street and in the short driveway leading up to the house. Gabe walked past them and went inside, pushing through a small knot of men talking by the door.

A crowd was gathered in the hall, and on the stairway stood the auctioneer. Two thousand dollars? Is that the last bid? Ladies and gentlemen, this trophy is solid gold and fully inscribed. He indicated letters on the side of the gold figure. Mr. Cleve van Valen. President of the San Francisco-Kansas City Railroad.' It is a treasure he held dear to his heart. Gabe glanced around, his eyes searching for Lilith. When he saw her he was startled and momentarily dismayed. Somehow, he had never thought of Lilith as being old, yet come to think of it, she must be all of sixty now. She sat in a chair overlooking the hall, clad in a lovely silk gown, her hair faultlessly done. Next to her was a man Gabe recognized as her attorney. Do I hear three thousand for this priceless possession? She was just near enough for him to hear her say, Priceless, my foot! We used it as a doorstop.

The auctioneer spoke again. Why, the gold here alone is worth three thousand- Twenty-five hundred!

Sold!

Gabe edged to the back of the crowd. He was only a short distance from Lilith, but to reach her he had to find his way around through a small hall. He came up behind her quietly.

A sad day, Lilith, her attorney was saying.

Sad? We made and spent fortunes. What's sad about that? If Cleve had lived long enough we would have made and spent another.

A clerk edged up behind her. I beg your pardon, Mrs. van Valen.

What?

The chair. It's been sold.

Take it. She got to her feet quickly, gracefully. Quit apologizing and take it. Or should I say-she smiled sweetly- Take it and be damned'? The clerk grinned. Sorry, ma'am.

Get out of here, she said testily, but accompanying the words with a smile. If there had been any other way to pay off the debts, Lilith, the attorney said, we would have found it.

It doesn't matter. I have two things you can't take, my memories and my ranch in Arizona.

I don't want to dash your hopes, but I am afraid that property is nearly worthless.

It's there, isn't it?

Yes, but most of the cattle have been sold off or stolen. I'll get cattle. If necessary,-she smiled-I might even rustle a few head myself. Cleve always told me most of the big ranches were built with a running iron and a fast horse.

You will need someone to work it, someone to manage it for you.

I have just the man.

Who? the attorney asked doubtfully.

My nephew. He's a marshal down there somewhere.

But at your age, he protested, in that rough country!

Rough? My pa and ma-they were killed going down the Ohio just looking for land.

I guess I've got some Prescott blood in me after all.

Gabe Fernch moved up quietly. Lil?

Gabe! The genuine feeling in her voice brought tears to his eyes, which he hastily excused by faking a sneeze, a very poor imitation. Gabe French! I might have known you would come. Let's go to the kitchen and have some coffee.

She turned on the lawyer. You haven't sold my coffee pot, have you? He flushed. Lilith ... it was part of the set. We sold the silver, you know. A very good price, I might say.

Oh, bother your silver! I mean the old black one. The attorney looked relieved. Oh, of course! No, that's still there. I am afraid we haven't had an offer for it yet.

What he means, Lilith said to Gabe, is that nobody would want it. That's the pot Cleve and I made coffee in all the way across the plains, and many a time after that. In fact, your wife-Agatha-it was ours together. Made good coffee, Gabe said. I never drank better. Together they went down to the kitchen, and put the pot on the fire. Then Lilith sat down and looked across the table at Gabe.

I was sorry about Agatha, and sorry we couldn't come to the funeral. Cleve always hated funerals, and I am almost as bad. Always liked to remember folks as they were, and as I didn't see Agatha buried, she's very much around ... You were lucky, Gabe. You got a great woman.

Don't I know it? I fancied her all the while, there on the wagon train, but never thought she noticed me.

He looked down at his big, square-knuckled hands. I heard you talking up there, about the Arizona ranch. Lil, if there's anything you want ... no matter how much, you just tell me. You know there wasn't a time Cleve wouldn't have bailed me out of trouble, and he did, many a time.

And vice versa. Lilith put her hand over his. Gabe, there's nothing I need. I will have enough when this is over to get to Arizona, and Zeb Rawlings is going to come down and manage the property for me. But thanks just the same.

If I was a few years younger--

Forget it. Zeb can do all anybody can do. He's a marshal down there now, and he was in the Army. Civil War and Indian wars.

I heard about him. He glanced at her thoughtfully. Wasn't he the one who killed Floyd Gant?

Yes-and a good job, too.

I knew Gant. He gave us trouble on the freight lines a few times in Nevada. His brother Charlie was worse. Whatever became of Charlie? I don't know. I didn't know Floyd had a brother. For a while they sat silent. In the kitchen they were far from the voices above, for the kitchen was on a lower floor that opened upon another street. Just a few steps down the hill from that door and you was in Chinatown. They were good times, Gabe, Lilith said suddenly, the best times. Nobody said much about it at the time, but we all had the feeling we were doing something great, that we were building something.

I know. I was talking to a writing feller, man from Boston. He was asking me about crossing the plains and he commented on how many folks-just ordinary folks-had kept journals or diaries or something of the kind. They all seemed to have the notion they were living through something that might never happen again. He was looking around, trying to find those diaries before they were lost.

I started a time or two. Cleve never kept one. But he believed what you're saying. I heard him say so.

She looked over at Gabe again. I was never sorry, Gabe. I never regretted marrying Cleve. We had a good life together.

Gabe nodded without replying. He listened to the sound of the fire, and then when Lilith poured their coffee he crossed one leg carefully over the other. Certainly, he thought, nobody had ever enjoyed their money more. We made it big on the Mother Lode, Lilith said, and when that was gone Cleve went off to Nevada and got in on the ground floor at the Comstock. I think we followed every boom there was, sometimes horseback, sometimes in a rig. I'll never forget that mine near Hamilton. Cleve took three million dollars' worth of silver out of a hole in the ground seventy by forty, by fifteen feet deep, and then a man came along and offered him another three million for the mine, and Cleve laughed at him. I recall.

There wasn't three pounds of silver left in the hole. Cleve had it all. He was offered three million dollars for a hole in the ground big enough for a cellar. Gabe shifted his position on the chair. These days if he sat too long in one position his back started bothering him.

If I'd known about this, he said, I'd have come sooner. You could have kept the house.

I don't want it, Gabe. I must be practical. It's too big for me alone, and when it comes to that, I'd rattle around in it like a stone in a barrel. No, I'd rather be out there in Arizona trying to do something with that ranch. A woman in my position hasn't any business just sitting around. It won't do ... and I wouldn't like it, anyway. I've been busy all my life, and I'm too old to change now. Besides-she smiled at him-I've never been in Arizona. He finished his coffee and got up. When you're ready, I'll take you to the station. And if ever you need me, just send word. Old Gabe will always be standing by.

He held out his hand to her. It's a long time since I carried Cleve across that muddy street in St. Louis so he could win a bet. She took his hand, then leaned forward and kissed him lightly on the cheek.