‘It isn’t,’ said Charlie.
‘Will you give me your word on it?’ asked Mayfield.
Charlie looked at me, his eyes asking: Should we let him live? My eyes answered him: I don’t care. He said, ‘If you give us the money, we will leave you as we found you, living and breathing.’
‘Swear on it.’
‘I swear on it,’ said Charlie.
Mayfield watched him, searching for some sign of devilishness. Satisfied, he looked over at me. ‘You swear it also?’
‘If my brother says it’s so, then it’s so. But if you want me to swear I won’t kill you, then I swear it.’
He removed the heavy hanky and flung it to the ground; it clapped as it hit the floor and he regarded it with a measure of disgust. Now he straightened his vest and stood, teetering on his heels, then sitting back down, having nearly fainted from the effort. ‘I need a drink, and something more to clean my head. I do not wish to walk through my hotel looking like this.’ I fixed him a tall brandy that he drank in two long swallows. Charlie ducked into the water closet and emerged with a handful of towels, a bowl of water, and a hand mirror. These were placed on the low table before Mayfield, and we watched as he set to work cleaning himself. He was unemotional as he did this, and I felt an obscure admiration for him. He was losing all of his savings and gold, and yet he displayed as much concern as a man shaving his face. I was curious what he was thinking about, and asked him; when he said he was making plans I inquired as to what they might be. He lay the mirror facedown on the table and said, ‘That depends entirely upon how much of my money you men will allow me to keep.’
‘Keep?’ said Charlie, eyebrows raised. He was rifling the drawers of Mayfield’s desk. ‘I thought it was understood you will keep none.’
Mayfield exhaled. ‘None at all? Do you mean to say, absolutely none?’
Charlie looked at me. ‘Was that not the plan?’
I said, ‘The plan, if I’m not mistaken, was to kill him. Now that we have changed that part, we can at least talk about this new concern. I will admit it seems cruel, to leave him penniless.’
Charlie’s eyes darkened, and he went into himself. Mayfield said, ‘You asked what I was thinking. Well, I will tell you. I was thinking that a man like myself, after suffering such a blow as you men have struck on this day, has two distinct paths he might travel in his life. He might walk out into the world with a wounded heart, intent on sharing his mad hatred with every person he passes; or, he might start out anew with an empty heart, and he should take care to fill it up with only proud things from then on, so as to nourish his desolate mind-set and cultivate something positive anew.’
‘Is he just inventing this as he goes?’ Charlie asked.
‘I am going to take the second route,’ Mayfield continued. ‘I am a man who needs to rebuild, and the first thing I will work on is my sense of purpose. I will remind myself of who I am, or was, for I fear my padded life here has made me lazy. I should say that your getting the better of me with such ease is proof of it.’
‘He describes his inaction and cowardice as laziness,’ Charlie said.
‘And with five men dead,’ I said, ‘he describes our overtaking his riches as easy.’
‘He has a describing problem,’ said Charlie.
Mayfield said, ‘My hope, I will put it to you men directly, is that you will see me through for trip expenses to your hometown of Oregon City, where I shall travel at once and lay waste to the mongrel with the scythe blade, James Robinson.’
He said this and immediately my brother and I had the same, evil thought.
‘Tell me that it’s not perfection,’ said Charlie.
‘But it is too tragic,’ I said.
‘You would protect this criminal acquaintance against what you have done to me?’ Mayfield said indignantly. ‘It is only just and proper that you men assist me in seeing this through. You have taken away all that I have earned, but you can redeem yourselves, at least partially, if you will only let me keep but a portion of my own fortune.’
This self-righteous speech sealed his fate, and we came to the agreement that Mayfield should be given one hundred dollars, just enough to get him to Oregon City, where he would be stuck, and where the first person he asked would inform him of Robinson’s death, and he would know we had known and would recall our amusement in bitter, black blood. The money was paid out in stamped gold taken directly from his safe, which was located in the basement of the hotel. Staring into its open mouth, Mayfield said, ‘That’s the only time I’ve ever been lucky in my life. Filled up a safe with gold and papers. More than most can say, at any rate.’ He nodded solemnly, but his show of bravado soon gave way to passionate emotion; his face dropped and tears began squirting from his eyes. ‘But goddamnit, luck is a hard feeling to hold on to!’ he said. Wiping his face, he cursed just as hotly and sincerely as he could, though quietly. ‘I feel no luck in my body now, and that is a fact.’ He cut a piteous silhouette with his little purse of money, pinching the strings the way one holds a dead mouse by its tail. We followed him outside and watched him tightening and refitting his clothing and saddlebags. He seemed to want to give a speech, but the words either did not come naturally or else he considered us unfit to receive them, and he remained silent. He mounted his horse, leaving with a curt nod and a look in his eyes that said: I do not like you people. We returned to the basement to count the safe’s contents, splitting and pocketing the paper money, which amounted to eighteen hundred dollars. The gold proved to be too much to account for in our travels and so was hidden underneath a potbellied stove, resting on a pallet of hardwood in the far basement corner. This was a dirty job, as we had to dismantle the tin chimney to move the stove back and forth, and we were both rained down in black soot; but when we were finished I could not imagine a soul would ever find our treasure, for no one would think to look in so remote a spot. The rough estimate of these riches was set at fifteen thousand dollars; my take of this more than tripled my savings, and as we left the musty basement, heading up the stairs and into the light, I felt two things at once: A gladness at this turn of fortune, but also an emptiness that I did not feel more glad; or rather, a fear that my gladness was forced or false. I thought, Perhaps a man is never meant to be truly happy. Perhaps there is no such a thing in our world, after all.
As we walked the halls of the hotel the whores were abuzz with the news of Mayfield’s head-wounded departure, and the disappearance of the trappers. I spied Charlie’s whore, looking only slightly less green than before, and took her to the side, asking where the bookkeeper was.
‘They ran her up to the doc’s.’
‘Is she all right?’
‘I imagine. They’re always running her up there.’
I pressed a hundred dollars into her hand. ‘I want you to give this to her when she comes back.’
She stared at the money. ‘Jesus Christ on a cloud.’
‘I will return in two weeks’ time. If I find she has not received it, there will be a price to pay, do you understand me?’
‘Mister, I was just standing in the hall, here.’
I held up a double eagle. ‘This is for you.’
She dropped the coin into her pocket. Peering down the hall in the direction Charlie had gone she asked, ‘I don’t suppose your brother’ll be leaving me a hundred.’
‘No, I don’t suppose he will.’
‘You got all the romantic blood, is that it?’
‘Our blood is the same, we just use it differently.’
I turned and walked away. A half-dozen steps, and she asked. ‘You want to tell me what she did for this?’
I stopped and thought. I told her, ‘She was pretty, and kind to me.’
And the poor whore’s face, she just did not know what to think about that. She went back into her room, slammed the door shut, and shrieked two times.