“No. I’m not. But once in a while she makes it very tempting. All these years go by and I still think of her. Then I run into her—”
Reg had to move down the bar to serve a pair of new customers. He was a burly, quiet gent, one of those men whose presence had a calming effect on people. A real asset in the bartending business, especially given the nature of Western saloons, where fights were as common as beers. Fargo imagined that when a brawl broke out Reg had two weapons—the ball bat behind the bar and his own assertive presence.
When Reg came back, he said, “You’ve probably noticed we’ve got a lot of crazy people running around these streets of ours.”
“Gold?”
Reg nodded. “Sort of ugly what gold does to people. You take a nice, decent feller everybody trusts— he gets a little gold and suddenly he sees everybody as his enemy. He’s got to protect the gold. I’ve seen it over and over. Works the same way from the other side too. You have two friends and one of them gets a strike and the other doesn’t. The one without the strike gets jealous. A lot of time—and I’ve seen this happen too—he gets so jealous that some night he’s all drunked up and he kills his old friend in cold blood. That’s the kind of effect gold has on people.”
“And then you’ve got one mine owner trying to take over another mine owner.”
“That’s what’s going on around here. Already been a lot of men killed. The more gold, the more killing.” He laughed. “That’s why I’m happy to stay behind the bar here and mind my own business.”
Reg had to serve a few more customers. Fargo looked around the place. Lamps were lowered over poker tables. A man in a funny little hat and red sleeve garters was sitting down to play the piano. Three men at one table were rolling dice.
Boomtown. You’d find men here from Europe, from Asia. All trying to get rich. Reg was right. Otherwise decent, reasonable, realistic men would leave their homes and families to come west to search for gold. And when they got out here, something happened to them. They changed, no longer decent, reasonable, or realistic. Too many of them changed into hungry wolves.
Reg came back. “This probably sounds kind of crazy, giving advice to the Trailsman. But this is one of those towns where it’s hard to know who to trust. I want Anne to be happy. I doubt she’ll get you to the altar but she’s got a chance as long as nobody turns you into a corpse. So just watch yourself. I don’t want to see that little gal disappointed.”
This time when Reg went down the bar, there was an air of sadness about him. Fargo figured that despite his earlier words, the man was still painfully in love with Anne. It must have been hard for him to talk to Fargo about the woman he loved—the woman who loved Fargo and not him.
But Reg was one of those rare people—he put the wishes and needs of his friend Anne above his own wishes and needs.
Anne was lucky to have a friend like Reg.
Fargo hadn’t enjoyed himself this much in a long time. The steak cooked exactly the way he liked it, the potato soft and moist, the waiters around only when needed. But it was the company of Anne that made the meal memorable.
After they had eaten, they talked far into the night over fine wine, far after the restaurant was closed to the regular guests.
As he had guessed, she was the owner of the hotel. She had sold her ranch after one rough winter and headed west, ending up here with enough money and the right timing to build Placerville’s largest and nicest hotel and saloon. She hadn’t remarried and had no intention to.
“You spoiled me, Fargo,” she said at one point, putting her hand on his and looking into his eyes. “Not only for other men, but you showed me that there was more to living than just a ranch and cattle.”
“So, are you happy here?”
“More than I ever thought possible,” she said. “Sure, I have my problems, but I also have far more good days than bad. And this place is a gold mine without having to lift a shovel.”
“And what happens if the mines start to play out?” Fargo asked. He couldn’t begin to count the number of towns that had boomed and then vanished into dust over the years when the gold or silver ran out. Or the railway passed the town by. Or the water went bad.
“I’ve been watching,” she said, her eyes and expression serious for the first time in the conversation. “If it starts to look like it’s going to dry up, I’ll sell out quickly and Reg and I and a dozen others who came with me from Colorado will move to another city, build another place, and start again.”
“You’ve sure got a good friend in Reg.”
“I sure do,” Anne said. “He took over as ranch foreman after you left. He’s now my hotel manager, the person I trust to run this place. He’s almost my business partner. He designed this place and helped build it. He gets a share of the profits as well.”
“He still loves you, you know.”
Anne looked directly into his eyes. “And I’m still in love with you.”
Someday down the road, if he ever got too old for moving around, Anne might be the one he would come back to. But he wasn’t that old yet, and she knew that.
“So,” Anne said, sipping her wine and sitting back, “what’s this long story that brought you to Placerville?”
He told her everything, including what had happened on the Placerville road yesterday.
She nodded, even though there was worry in her eyes. “Cain is a good man. Very well respected around here. He treats his men well and plays fair. It makes sense he would be your friend. But some of these other mine owners you want to stay clear of.”
“I’d be grateful for any local knowledge I can get,” Fargo said.
Then he leaned forward and lowered his voice just to make sure no one could hear, even though the dining area seemed clear and their table candles were the only ones still burning in the room. “What do you know of Henry Brant?”
Anne looked disgusted at the very mention of the name. “The worst of the worst. And his daughter is as bad as they come as well. I won’t even allow his men to drink or eat in here. He’s known to play poker over at the Benson Saloon. I hear Cain’s son is mixed up with the daughter. Doesn’t seem right to me.”
“I heard that too,” Fargo said.
“So why the hushed tone and the question?” Anne asked.
Fargo told her about his brief meeting with Sarah Brant, and then about the horses and gear that the robbers had been using. “It doesn’t add up completely, but it sure points a finger.”
“And I wouldn’t put it past the Brants to be behind the robbery attempts on Cain’s shipments,” Anne said. Then she too lowered her voice to a whisper. “There are rumors that the Brants’ mine has mostly played out and they’re working underground toward Cain’s tunnels that are still hitting vein. But they’re only rumors and there’s no way of proving it until something happens underground and Brant breaks through into one of Cain’s tunnels.”
Fargo nodded. “It wouldn’t be the first time there’s been a war between mines underground.”
After another half hour of talking business, Anne stood and stretched. “It’s getting late and a lady like me needs her beauty sleep.”
Fargo could feel the disappointment hit his stomach as he stood. He had hoped for another ending to this evening.
Anne smiled at Fargo and pulled him closer to her. He was a good foot taller than she was and she pressed in close and looked up at him, her eyes twinkling. She smelled great and he could feel her ample breasts pressing into him as a reminder of good times in the past.
“To really get my beauty sleep, I could use a good man to tuck me in.”
“I’ll be as good as I can be,” he said.
She eased up on tiptoe to kiss him. “I’m counting on that.”