CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Up the dusty slope toward Francis's gold mine came a large wagon full of small boxes marked TEAK. Ittzy was driving, and Gabe was sitting on the high seat beside him, smiling around at the countryside. Captain Flagway was perched atop the cargo with his braided cap at a jaunty angle and half-full flask of whisky dangling from his hand. Francis and Vangie rode a brace of matched white horses beside the wagon.
The sun shone. Birds sang. An occasional rabbit hoppity-hopped across the green and sunny landscape.
They arrived at the entrance to the mine, and all dismounted. Francis said, "I can't help it, you know, I just have trouble absorbing this. We're bringing gold to a gold mine."
"That's right," Gabe said. "And we're going to start selling it right back to the Mint again, one bar at a time." He turned to give Vangie a big grin and say, "Unless you still think we're gonna get caught."
She looked all around in the sunlight, frowning and squinting as though baffled by the non-appearance of the United States cavalry. "I just can't understand it," she said. "How can the Government let a thing like this happen?"
"I guess they must be thinking about something else today," Gabe said.
Captain Flagway leaned against the wagon and toasted the world at large with his flask. A crumpled smile was on his lips and a sputtering gleam in his eye. "Oh, happy day," he announced. "At last I'll be going back to Balsi… Balder… Baltimore!"
Gabe grinned at him. "That's right, Captain," he said. "You're on your way."
"Well on my way."
Vangie, trying not to show her emotions on the surface, said, "Well, Gabe, I guess you'll be on your way, too. Back to New York."
"New York." Gabe smiled faintly in reminiscence, then frowned a bit, gazing out over the hills toward San Francisco. Wisps of fog were beginning to drift through the valleys with the approach of sunset. "Old Twill," Gabe said, thoughtfully. "You know what the trouble with Twill is?"
Vangie didn't care what the trouble with Twill was. She wanted to know what the trouble was with Gabe Beauchamps. "No, I don't," she said.
"He doesn't understand where the future is. Life is moving West, Vangie. This is where the future is… right out here."
She couldn't believe her ears. "Do you mean that, Gabe?"
"I'm kind of getting used to things out here," he said.
"You are?"
"The slower pace, the small-town life." He shrugged. "San Francisco isn't too bad, for a yokelville."
Francis said delightedly, "Gabe, you mean you'll stay?"
"The burg has possibilities," Gabe said. "I might invest here."
"The cancan shows," Francis said. "They're going to open again, I got inside word. You could…"
"No," Gabe said thoughtfully, "I don't think so."
"Oh, yes, Gabe!" Vangie cried. "Show business!"
"The cancan shows," Francis said, "are the wave of the future. A man could get in right now on the ground floor. That's what I'm doing with my share, becoming an entrepreneur."
Vangie clutched Gabe's arm. "Oh, Gabe, say yes!"
"I just don't think so," Gabe said.
Vangie frowned at him, bewildered again. "Well, what, then?"
"I've been thinking," Gabe said, "about real estate."
"Real estate?" Vangie looked around, looked back at Gabe again. "You mean houses?"
"No, land."
"But all the land in San Francisco is already built on."
"Outside town," Gabe said. He nodded, agreeing with himself. "Across the Bay, I think."
"Across the Bay?"
"Land should be cheap over there."
Vangie said, "Well, of course it's cheap. There's no way to get to it, nobody wants it."
"Some day," Gabe said, "there'll be a bridge across the Golden Gate."
Vangie stamped her foot in impatience and disbelief. "For Heaven's sake, there will not!"
Francis said, "I do doubt that, Gabe, you know. That's far too wide for any bridge."
"I think they'll do it anyway," Gabe said. "Put a bridge right across. And then that land up there… What's it called, anyway?"
"Oh, who knows!" Vangie cried.
"Marin County," Francis said. "But Vangie's right, Gabe, that land up there won't be worth much. Now, the cancan shows…"
"No," Gabe said. He just had a feeling deep down inside that he was right. "Land," he said.
"I'm going to open a chain of discount stores," Ittzy said. "And never clerk in any of them."
"I'll stick to land," Gabe said.
"Oh, Gabe," Vangie cried, at her wit's end. "You've done everything right, you got away with the robbery even though you shouldn't, and now you're just going to throw it all away."
"Land," Gabe said.
"You never listen!"
Gabe nodded. "That's right," he said.
He gazed out over the raw new countryside; his countryside now. Vangie and Francis talked to him, argued with him, pleaded with him-but he never listened.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
BRIAN GARFIELD lives in the pre-1900 general store of Alpine, New Jersey with his wife, English actress Shan Willson, and a platoon of dogs and cats. The thirty-four year old Arizonan has been a jazz musician, a college instructor, and a reluctant soldier. He has lived in many places from San Francisco to Paris, and has written several well-received novels ranging in subject matter from Wall Street to the Old West. Described by the New York Times as a "virtuoso," he is the author of the non-fiction study The Thousand Mile War, as well as the recent suspense thriller Death Wish which has become a "cult" book and will soon appear as a United Artists film. A former president of the Western Writers of America, Mr. Garfield reports that shortly before writing his half of Gangway he was caught cheating at cards and was shot by Donald E. Westlake with a .32-caliber poker chip.
DONALD E. WESTLAKE was born in a filling station near Aardvark, Oklahoma, early in February. Attending public schools in Pittsburgh, Akron, and Sinking Province, he took his degree in elliptical engineering from the Brooklyn Academy of Music late in June. Mr. Westlake has operated a bootleg yellow pages factory in Detroit, panned for gold in Albania, and was the copywriter responsible for the unintentional double meaning in the Prune Whip Yogurt advertising campaign of 1966-67. Turning to writing after his left leg was bitten by an alligator in the New York City sewer system, Mr. Westlake has addressed himself to the central concerns of our troubled times with all the verse and passion with which he pursued his earlier, more active career. His first novel, Sprigs of Eiderdown, won the coveted Prix Fixe, the most prestigious literary award ever offered by the city of Marseilles. Many of his tales of adventure have been made into television playlets without his knowledge or consent. He makes his home in a converted bathysphere in Lake Como, Switzerland, and has never paid any income tax.