West of Washoe (13 page)

Ross heard some commotion at the rear of the coach and looked to see two more bandits on foot throwing back the leather flap of the rear boot. They had to holster their guns to lift out the two heavy treasure boxes. Ross gritted his teeth in frustration. In spite of all the precautions, the hold-up was going off without a hitch so far. He heard no sound from within the coach. The bandit posing as a fare-paying rider was likely holding a gun on the other passengers, nullifying any resistance from them.

A rifle
cracked
from behind them. One of the bandits
dropped his end of the load and toppled over onto the box. The other bandit jerked his pistol and fired two shots at the following outriders, sixty yards back, who were in the act of leaping off their mounts and taking cover on each side of the road.

The two masked robbers near the front of the coach dashed back into the heavy stand of trees on the right. The long pine across the road blocked the team and coach from moving, but the horses panicked at the explosions of gunfire, jumping and tossing their heads. Nobody was at the reins as Moody was crouching low in the front boot, long pistol jumping in his hand as he fired at the fleeing bandits in the thick stand of pines.

Ross felt the guard next to him flop down and heard the ratcheting of the Henry’s lever. The battle was on. Without being aware of drawing his gun, Ross had his Colt in hand and fired down at the distracted robber behind the coach. But it was a snap shot and the slug
spanged
off the iron rim of the rear wheel. Suddenly aware of danger from both directions, the masked outlaw dived under the tall coach.

The shotgun messenger jumped down from his seat to recover his short double barrel from the ground. Just as he snatched it up and turned, he caught a slug in the knee from the outlaw under the coach. He crumpled to the ground. A hand with a gun thrust out the coach window. A tongue of flame darted from the muzzle and the guard, who was struggling to crawl to cover, flopped over on his back.

Individual shots exploded into a general roar, nearly drowning screams from inside the stage. Slugs ripped rough chunks of bark from thick pines. Bullets struck splinters from the top edge of the stage as the hidden gunmen zeroed in on Ross and the guard atop the coach. Flat on his belly, Ross felt very exposed and dared
not move. But they were something of a moving target, Ross realized, feeling the coach jerking. The brake was set, but the rearing and plunging of the squealing team set the coach to rocking and sliding.

Ross heard the muffled
boom
of a shot beneath him. The bandit inside was shooting at someone. Another blast from below and a slug tore through the roof next to his elbow. The inside plant was trying to clean off the top of the coach!

Furious, Ross sprang off the roof, flexing his knees to cushion the landing, rolling to the ground and then to his feet in one fluid motion. He thrust his Colt inside the coach window. A well-dressed fat man was in the act of firing another shot upward through the ceiling. Ross eared back the hammer and shot him pointblank in the side, filling the coach with burned powder smoke as the passengers cringed from the blast.

Suddenly Ross felt something burn his left heel. The man underneath! Ross leaped to his right and rolled behind the legs of the nervous horses. Lying flat, arms extended, he fired once, then was blinded by a hoof scuffing dirt into his eyes. He frantically blinked his watering eyes to clear his vision as the robber fired at him. But the slug was deflected by a spoke in the front wheel. Ross got off another shot. Through blurred vision, what appeared to be a dark blob stopped moving. As his watering eyes began to clear, Ross saw the robber lying still under the coach.

The firing became sporadic, and then stopped. Ross’s ears were ringing from the explosions, as he moved away from the
thudding
hoofs. How many more were there? He tried to make a quick count, but his mind was in a whirl. At least two in front and two in back. The ones in front had gotten away into the trees, probably where their horses were tied. The two in back were
down. The outriders had gotten one and he’d gotten the other, plus the man inside the coach.

The shotgun guard was lying nearby, probably dead, or close to it. Ross got cautiously to his feet, carefully wiping the remaining dirt from his eyes.

Moody was back on the box. “
Whoa!
Easy!” His mellow voice had a calming effect on the team as he drew on the reins. But the horses were still stamping and walling their eyes.

Ross heard the sound of receding hoof beats in the timber as the two remaining bandits made their getaway.

By some miracle, the guard atop the coach had not been hit and climbed down, being careful not to touch the hot metal of his Henry rifle.

Ross opened the coach door. “Everyone all right?”

A woman was slumped in the seat. “She just fainted,” the second woman said, reaching for Ross’s hand to climb out. Her knees nearly buckled, and she sat down weakly on the ground, her face drained of color.

The rest of the male passengers got out and Ross went to confer with the guard who was examining the shotgun messenger on the ground. “Dead,” he stated, straightening up. “Well, we got three of them, and they got one of us,” he summarized with a grim look on his face. “Helluva human price, but these bandits keep right on trying.”

“The four boxes are safe,” Ross said. “Three on the ground and one still in the rear boot.” He swung up his Navy Colt at the sound of hoof beats. But it was only the uninjured outriders reining up close by.

With the team under control, Moody stepped down to join them. He took off his hat and wiped a sleeve across his brow. Drawing a deep breath, he looked from one to another. “Get the bodies up top and lashed
down,” he said, returning to practicalities. “Reload the treasure boxes.” He reached inside his duster and pulled out a flat flask. “Anybody wants, can have a jolt of this forty-rod to brace up. Make sure the passengers are all right, while I check the horses. Then a couple of you help me secure a line to the lower end of that pine across the road, and we’ll tie off to the coach. I’ll back the team down slowly and we’ll drag that tree out of the way far enough to go around.”

“I’m not sure Wells, Fargo pays me enough to do this job,” the guard said, leaning his Henry against the coach. He reached underneath to drag out the body of the robber.

Moody gave a tight-lipped smile. “You could be humped over a ledger somewhere, ruining your eye-sight for half the money.”

“You got a point.”

Ross felt a wetness on his ear and put his hand to it. His fingers came away bloody. He took his bandanna and carefully pressed it to the earlobe that began to sting where the bullet had clipped it. Blood dripped on the shoulder of his jacket.

As the adrenaline ebbed, he noticed he was limping, unable to put weight on his left foot. Sitting on the ground, he removed his shoe and sock. The flesh on the inside edge of his heel was purpling, but the slug had not penetrated his foot, only grooved the hard leather edge of the shoe’s heel. “Lucky,” he muttered, putting his sock and shoe back on.

A total of four men were dead, and one of the male passengers had a slight wound in his calf muscle where a bullet had penetrated. The stage was riddled with holes. But the four treasure boxes were intact and Ben Holladay’s plan had been dealt a sharp setback.

“Where’d they hit you?” one of the outriders asked, seeing Ross holding a bloody bandanna to his head.

“Just nipped my earlobe and my heel.”

The lean, wind-burned rider spat out the used-up lump of chewing tobacco stored in his cheek. “Hell, I been bit worse by bedbugs.”

Ross ignored the jibe, pocketed the bandanna, and reached into his coat pocket for his spare cylinder. He saved the empty one, and felt to be sure his .32 back-up pistol hadn’t fallen out of his inside breast pocket. It was still a long way to Placerville.

Once the coach was again under way, it carried a mostly subdued, shaken group of people. Four bodies lay on the roof, tied side-by-side to the hand rail. Moody had covered them with a well-worn roll of canvas he used to protect parcels in the front boot.

While inspecting his team, Moody had discovered a bullet crease across the rump of one of the wheelers, but the wound was superficial. The guard with the Henry rifle took the place of the dead shotgun messenger on the box beside the driver.

Ross rode inside, seated next to the woman who’d been revived from her swoon. He occupied the seat of the outlaw he’d killed.

As Moody pushed the team along the level road, then down the long, gradual grade, Ross began feeling queasy. Normally the rocking motion of the coach, even when someone was smoking a cigar, didn’t bother his stomach. He turned his face toward the breeze blowing in the window and tried to concentrate on imagining himself relaxing by a lake in fresh air and bright sunshine. This had worked in the past to keep him from vomiting. But his thoughts kept returning to the fight as he replayed the gun battle, step by slow step. He began to realize his stomach distress was a reaction to having shot and killed a man—something he’d never done before. Regardless of how justified this was, he couldn’t get around the fact that he’d taken a human life. If he could’ve gotten the drop on the man to arrest
him, or maybe only wounded him…Ross leaned closer to the open window for fresh air. He’d been fighting for his life and the lives of others, and had no time to think—only time for reflex action. He didn’t even know the man’s name. After the fact, he regretted his decision to deal himself into this situation. It was really none of his affair. He took a deep breath and leaned back against the leather seat, feeling drained.

The wounded man was a miner on his way to San Francisco to see relatives. One of the men had helped rip the miner’s pants leg up high enough to expose the bullet hole, then tied a bandanna around the wound, which had minimal bleeding. The bullet had penetrated his calf, lodging too deep to be extracted without a sharp knife. The man shouldn’t have tried to resist the undercover robber once he had drawn his gun.

No one spoke; everyone was lost in thought. Two of the men kept consulting their watches and looking out the windows at the sun declining behind the mountains, evidently hoping to reach Strawberry Valley soon. Ross managed to fall into an exhausted doze, heedless of any potential danger from another hold-up down the road.

Without further incident, the stage rolled into Strawberry Valley station at dusk. The four bodies and the bullet-riddled stage caused a stir among even the hardened teamsters and miners who’d stopped to lodge at the three-story inn. The stationkeeper, John Barry, ordered the dead hauled to a storage room at the rear. He announced the remains would be shipped back to Virginia City on the next eastbound freight wagon, or stage, at Wells, Fargo expense.

After a short supper and a change of teams, the driver, new shotgun guard, two outriders, and most of
the passengers, running more than an hour behind schedule, would continue on to Placerville. During supper, the dining room was abuzz with conversation about the attempted robbery.

Both women passengers and one of the men decided they’d had enough for one trip and elected to remain at the Strawberry Valley station overnight. Since the lodge was nearly full, Barry gave the last available room to the women—a cubbyhole under the eaves on the third floor, while Ross and the other male passenger would be relegated to the floor of a storage room off the dining hall.

Still feeling queasy, Ross avoided the noisy company at the dining tables and went into the barroom for a beer to settle his nerves and stomach. Other men filtered into the bar and Ross overheard snatches of conversation about the hold-up. It was mostly garbled facts they’d culled on the fly from those who’d gone on with the stage.

Two red-shirted men leaned on the polished mahogany a few feet away.

“Say, mister, your name Ross?” the younger of the two asked.

Ross cringed inwardly. “That’s right.”

“Hear tell you blasted hell outta them road agents,” the taller man said.

“Who said that?” Ross was startled out of his lethargy.

The taller man yanked a thumb over his shoulder. “Those two women passengers and that chubby gent with them. Said it hadn’t been for you, those robbers would’ve killed more of you and gotten away with the treasure boxes, too.”

Ross twisted to look over his shoulder at the man and the two women. “Well, it wasn’t quite like that.”

He hoped these two would get discouraged and leave. He was in no mood to be sociable.

“We got the blow by blow of what happened, and they say you’re a hero,” the younger man insisted. “Saved their lives when you shot that fella inside the stage.”

“I was just trying to save myself,” Ross said.

“I’d be proud to buy you a drink, Mister Ross.”

“The name is Gil.”

“Barkeep, another of whatever Gil is drinking.”

A foaming pint was slid down the bar.

“Gents, I appreciate this, sure enough,” Ross said, “but I’m no hero. I was just fighting like the driver and guards. Those five robbers had us cold, from front and back and inside the coach. And the road was blocked with a tree. If anybody deserves credit, it was those two outriders who came up, shooting.” Ross didn’t know what the passengers had told these men, but he might as well tell the facts of what happened from his own perspective. “Once the outriders opened fire and killed one of the robbers, the others were distracted. The two masked men up front jumped for cover in the trees to avoid rifle fire from the rear. Then the two guards, the driver, and I saw our chance to put up a fight.”

“One of those ladies said you stuck your gun in the coach window and shot the man who’d been holding them at gunpoint. Then she fainted and didn’t know nothing else until she come to after the fight was over. She said that was the most courageous thing she’d ever seen, what with that robber trying to shoot through the roof and all.”

Ross glanced toward the three at a table just inside the door. The younger, more attractive of the two women, smiled at him. He turned back to the bar. Now wasn’t the time. “Look, gents, I’ll give a report on all
this to Wells, Fargo, but right now I’m really tired and I want to go clean up and get this ear tended to.”

“Yeah, you got bloodied up some,” the taller man said admiringly. “Are you a company guard, too?”

“No. Just a passenger.” He started to urge them to split the untouched beer in front of him, but then thought better of it. In this country, some men who bought drinks took it as a deadly insult if a stranger refused their hospitality. And he wanted no more conflict just now. He finished his first beer and started on the second.

“Tell us how it happened, Gil. Give us the details,” the younger man urged.

Since he was drinking on them, Ross thought he’d better oblige. He didn’t want to go over it again, but he’d been replaying the details in his mind ever since it had happened anyway.

“All right, just this once. Then I have to go.” He started at the beginning of the trip and gave them a somewhat abbreviated summary of the attempted hold-up, downplaying his own role. “And that’s about it, gents.” He drained his glass. “No more to tell. Now I’ve got to go. Thanks for the beer.” He slid away from the bar feeling full and gaseous after two pints on an empty stomach. He wondered if he should have gone on to Placerville where he could have easily found a hotel room for the night. But he felt a need to get back to Virginia City as soon as possible.

He found John Barry, who was overseeing the kitchen help, and inquired about some soap and water.

“You need more than that,” Barry said, glancing at the dried blood on his head and coat. “Set you down over there, and I’ll fetch my wife, Edith. She’ll fix you right up.”

And Edith did fix him up. She gently washed his head with warm water and, using linen thread and a small needle, took two stitches to close the wound in Ross’s earlobe. “You’ll be a might shorter on that side now,” she said, putting away her sewing kit.

“Nothing about me is symmetrical, anyhow.” He smiled.

“You’ll want to snip those threads and pull them out in a few days,” she added, as if her duties as hostess had included sewing up more wounds than hems or buttons on shirts.

He thanked her profusely. Then he borrowed a blanket. After a trip to the outhouse, he returned to fashion a nest for himself in a corner of the storeroom behind buckets and brooms where he wouldn’t be stepped on.

The next morning his upset stomach was gone and his appetite was back, making the soft May morning even more lovely. He was among the first to belly up to the dining table. A half hour later, he came away pleasantly stuffed with flapjacks, maple syrup, and sausages washed down with three cups of coffee.

John Barry, who functioned as a Wells, Fargo agent on an as-needed basis, cashed in the unused portion of his ticket.

The first eastbound stage rolled in on schedule at 8:20 a.m. With only four passengers inside, it was not as heavily loaded and had room on top for the four stiffened corpses. No spare wood was available for coffins, so the bodies were tightly wrapped in canvas and bound to the top of the coach. The driver was a stranger to Ross, but wore the usual Wells, Fargo white linen duster. A small, taciturn man, he looked a bit sour when told he’d be carrying four dead passengers the rest of the way to Virginia City.

The trip back to Virginia City was uneventful, and the stage rolled to a stop in front of the Wells, Fargo agency at 3:30 that afternoon. Ross stepped down, wincing at the pain in his bruised heel.

He headed straight for
The Territorial Enterprise
, two doors away, and found Martin Scrivener just starting his workday.

“You back already? Wasn’t expecting you until at least tomorrow night.” He glanced sharply at Ross’s damaged ear and spots of dried blood on his coat. “Looks as if Angeline’s report was right about a hold-up.”

“You might say so.”

“Tell me about it.”

Ross hooked up a chair with his foot and sat down by the editor’s desk. “The driver of the stage I just came in on is hauling four bodies and has the tale second-hand. But if you want a first-hand account, get out your pencil.”

Ross told Scrivener the entire story. The editor asked a couple of questions to clarify some minor points, then sat for a long, thoughtful moment. “Anybody else come back on that stage with you who was there when it happened?”

“No.”

“Then we got an exclusive. The telegraph wire hasn’t been stretched to this town yet. This is almost worth getting out an extra edition.” He paused, rubbing his goatee. “No, I think not. We don’t want these robbers…Holladay, Tuttle, and Fossett included…to get the idea they’re important enough to warrant an extra. Our early morning headline will still be an exclusive. I’ll have room if I bump out that two week-old war news.”

Ross rose. “Reckon I’ll go soak in a hot tub at the bathhouse,
and then get some sleep. If you need me, I’ll be at our boarding house.”

On his way down the street, Ross hardly noticed the normal daily uproar in the saloons he passed. He’d become inured to the loud talk, the hoarse swearing, crashing glass, hurdy-gurdy music, blasts of gunfire, along with the cheerful musical wheeze of the organgrinder’s box, and the monotonous
rumble
of the stamp mills in the distance. Grimly he reflected he now fit in with all these worst dregs of humanity because “he’d killed his man.” Often that expression had fallen on his ears since his arrival here, spoken as if it were a badge of honor, a pass into hell’s membership club. He was one of them now. The realization made him feel queasy all over again, and somehow dirty, as if he’d committed some unpardonable sin, which forever separated him from decent human society.

With an effort, he thrust the thought aside. What was done was done. The men were dead and couldn’t be brought back. Besides, he himself might be the one lying in the undertaker’s parlor if that bandit’s shots through the coach roof had been accurate—or lucky. So much of life was determined by luck. Some didn’t consider it luck or happenstance at all. A few of his acquaintances believed everything that happened was foreordained. To Ross’s way of thinking, that denied the existence of free will, in which he was a firm believer. God, in His infinite knowledge, knew the future, Ross reasoned, so He was aware of what any man’s choices were going to be. Yet, for Ross, the Almighty compelled no one’s actions. If any man wanted to send himself to perdition, he had to work at getting there. He couldn’t count on divine help.

Before he realized it, his ruminations and wayward
feet had carried him past his favorite Chinese bathhouse.

An hour later, wrinkled and clean, he went on to his boarding house, and began to write up his first-hand account of his experiences on the Washoe Express. Besides the dry report he was composing, he also kept a journal into which he poured all factual details, impressions, descriptions, and characters. By the time he left this place, he could, by selecting, rearranging, and polishing, have a book he felt would sell anywhere in the country. Easterners would be fascinated to read about the Wild West, even though he might have to tone down the reality of Washoe to make it credible to readers who hadn’t experienced it in person.

A week rolled past rather quietly. Everyone, it seemed to Ross, was resting, gathering strength for the next crisis or onslaught, or whatever was to come in the drama in which he’d become a player.
The Territorial Enterprise
had run the story describing Ross’s harrowing ordeal in the Blue Hole Mine, and his finding of the ore salted with gold flecks. There was no apparent reaction to the piece. To the average citizen, corruption and fraud were a daily occurrence to be ignored as commonplace. The attempt on Ross’s life was likewise nothing to remark about, given the frequency of more direct methods of murder. The article relating the details of the foiled hold-up of the Washoe Express, except for the number of men killed, was also routine. It was considered a dull week if at least five or six hold-ups were not reported.