He squinted at me. “Ever occur to you that somebody might come after you?”
Klosters had already come after me. I said I’d only done a piece on Mussel Slough and some looking into Mammy Pleasant so far, not to mention my researches on Senator Jennings again.
“Took the side of those Sand-lappers. I couldn’t believe you’d do that. Son.”
“Well, it is history.”
“Lot of leeway in history,” my father said.
He ordered a second bottle of wine.
“I think Wally could get you a job down at Fourth and Townsend. How’d you like that? I guess they use writers down there.”
“No, thanks,” I said.
“What are you, Antimonopoly?”
“Yes, sir,” I said, and chewed and could not swallow.
“Son,” he said heavily. “Without the Railroad this City would be just a pissant Mexican mud village. This state wouldn’t be a great state. This state would be nothing at all. Who is the biggest employer in this state, Son?”
I chewed and nodded. The Railroad.
“I just can’t think how a son of mine can be so misguided. Almighty God Bierce. He has set you against the Railroad, has he?”
“No, sir. I joined a Democracy Club when I was a fireman.”
“My, God!” the Gent said. “Son, the Railroad runs this State.”
“Well, it shouldn’t,” I said.
“Shouldn’t isn’t the issue, Tommy. “Is is the issue. The SP is.”
Conversation died as we forked into our food, but I could feel the electricity of my father’s indignations.
The Gent detached his napkin from his collar, filled our glasses again, squared his shoulders and said, “My boy, there are two ways of looking at life. You can approve of things, go along with things, live the good life God gave you, take advantage of the pleasures, appreciate what comes your way, have good friends that would ride the river with you. So when you come to the end of the road you can look back and say, ‘Thank you. Lord, for the fullness of my days.’
“Or you can be a cold, hateful, disapproving chap. I will say your Almighty God Bierce is one of those. He may hate preachers, but he is a preacher. He will find the bad spot in every apple, he will look at the foul a person has done, not the decent. I will grant you he is a powerful chap, but, Son, nobody loves a reformer. They start out sour, and they grow sourer day by day. And when they come to the end of their time they can’t look back at fullness or happiness, all they can look back at is that they hated everything and they didn’t change one Gol-durn thing.”
“Well, but they tried, sir,” I said.
“Tell me, Son, does he have any friends?”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
“Tell me, does he love his wife?”
“I don’t believe so,” I said.
He looked pleased. He pointed a finger at me. “Tommy, you remember what I say. You will come to feel the chill from that damned-righteous jobationing preacher of yours. You just mark my words.”
Dishes were cleared away. Spumoni was brought, and port and cigars. I turned down the cigar, but the Gent lit up and blew blue smoke.
I said, “What time does the Evening Express get in?”
“Supposed to get in at nine-thirty, I think it is. But it was powerful late. We didn’t arrive until about eleven.”
So much for Rudolph Buckle’s alibi for Beaumont McNair! Every time Beau became a suspect again I felt the familiar check in my breath.
I said, “As Bierce says, passengers on the SP are often exposed to the hazards of senility.”
“That’s a good joke,” the Gent said, as though he meant it. He flourished his cigar, enjoying the cigar, the flourish, the poker game that had paid for this dinner and everything but his son.
“Do you remember, Pa, when you and I used to go fishing on the River by the big snag there?”
“I do, boy; I do remember. Better days!”
“Do you remember who it was brought me the books to start me reading?”
“By George, you were a reader, weren’t you?” He gave me a naked, grateful look. There were some things I could thank him for.
“Pa, there is something I am going to have to bring up, that I have found out.”
“What is that, Son?”
“We were talking about Senator Jennings just now. I remember you told me a lot of people on the Washoe used false names. He was Adolphus Jackson there.”
“Long time ago, Son.”
“And you were E. O. Macomber.”
“Why, that’s right,” he said, jutting his chin. The slashes of white in his whiskers gave him a theatrical, actorish air. “How do you know this, Tom?”
“That’s what I went to Virginia City for. To find out about the Society of Spades. There’s a picture of you all. Highgrade Carrie, McNair, Gorton, Jackson and you.”
“Society of foxes and sheep,” he said, with a grunt of amusement. “Sheep got fleeced, foxes got the grapes.”
“Euchred,” I said.
“Why would you be interested in that?”
“The Morton Street Slasher has something to do with the Society of Spades.” I could feel the tickle of sweat beneath my arms.
“You are going to have to explain that, Son.”
I tried to explain. Someone was murdering whores and leaving spade cards on their slashed bodies, and it had to do with the fact that Lady Caroline Stearns had been a madam in Virginia City, and because she and Nat McNair had combined with Al Gorton to swindle Adolphus Jackson and E. O. Macomber.
My father was as Railroad as Senator Jennings.
“My goodness,” he said mildly. “It do look bad for Aaron and me!”
All at once I was frantic to get away from him, from here, to try to think things through. “Will you come and meet with Bierce and me tomorrow?” I said.
He gazed at me steadily for a long moment. “Son, I don’t think I will. I can see through Bierce, you see. What he wants is to embarrass the Railroad. And he has got his eye on me and Aaron Jennings through this Spades business, which seems like hocus-pocus to me. I work for the Railroad, and Aaron has his Railroad connections. It won’t do, you see. It is another sheep and fox game, and Bierce is a fox I would just as soon not get tangled with. So, no, Son, I am sorry, no.”
“Tell me one thing,” I said.
“If I can.”
“Who was the father of Caroline LaPlante’s child?”
“Is that what you were after in Virginia City, Son?”
I said that was what Bierce wanted to know.
“Well,” my father said, laughing. “Everybody knew it wasn’t Nat.”
When we had parted and I was making my way back down Montgomery Street, I felt as though I had been run through a stamp mill, and I was left with trying to decide whether or not to tell Bierce my father had been E. O. Macomber.
And just then I discovered in my jacket pocket the heavy little disc of a gold eagle that the Gent had slipped there.
17
INDISCRETION, n. – The guilt of woman.
–THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY
On Sunday I calculated that the Brittains would be attending Trinity Episcopalian Church at Post and Powell and would be back at 913 Taylor about 12:30. So at noon I rented a shiny rig with a sleek brown gelding at the Brown and Willis Livery Stables and headed up Nob Hill. Solid fog had settled into San Francisco, as though my father had put a Sacramento blight on the City weather. I shivered in my buggy, feeling depressed and inadequate, smothering in secrets.
On the porch of the Brittain house a lanky policeman sat in the wicker chair with a cup and saucer before him. I explained that I would be Amelia’s guardian for the day, citing Sgt. Nix as authority. He waved a hand, looking relieved.