Sarah sipped her sherry, a crafty smile on her full lips.
“And are they?” Doc asked.
“If you b’lieve the stories, laddie.” Pat’s smile had turned predatory.
Doc knew he was being played. “I take it you don’t?”
“Reckon not,” Pat agreed. “But, more t’ the point, George Nichols does.”
Oh, dear God.
Sarah told him, “For the last month, our partnership has bought up every claim there is on the Piute Lode and filed on as much of the mountain as we can. Rumor is that William Ralston and Pat’s old pal, Johnny MacKay, are battling to obtain it. Those men are bitter rivals who’ll do anything to get one up on the other. If George can get a controlling interest in the Piute Lode, he’ll play Ralston against MacKay for the highest bidder.”
“So, we’re beating George to the punch? And who are Ralston and Mackay? I don’t understand.”
Sarah said softly, “William Ralston is head of the biggest bank in California. MacKay and three of his friends are mining investors who are competing with Ralston in the development of several mines in the Comstock.” She inclined her glass toward O’Reilly. “Pat met MacKay when he was running a placer operation in California before coming to Colorado.”
“We’re old friends,” Pat said easily. “And I staked him a while back when a decision he made wasn’t the right one.”
Sarah added, “George got word of the Piute Lode, that both MacKay’s group and Ralston’s were trying to move on it. It is his intention to scoop them all. He has placed all of his assets as collateral against a loan to buy the eighty-five percent of the Piute Lode that Pat and I own. If his agents can close the deal, he intends to dangle it between MacKay and Ralston.”
Doc lifted his hands in confusion. “Why don’t we sell the Piute Load to the highest bidder ourselves? Especially after what George Nichols tried to do to you, Sis.”
Pat sighed, looked across the table at Sarah, and shook his head in futility.
Sarah laid a long-fingered hand on Doc’s. “Philip, the Piute Lode isn’t quite worthless, but almost. And while George has come into possession of a series of letters a geologist has supposedly written to MacKay about the Piute Lode, I can assure you that neither William MacKay, nor Ralston, have the slightest interest in the Piute.”
“But George Nichols is going to pay…?”
“That’s right, laddie.” Pat savored his sherry. “I nivver loiked the mon in the first place. ’Twill leave me with a warm spot in me heart to break the boy-buggering sot.”
Doc took a deep breath, the impact hitting home. “Jesus, Sarah. He’s going to know you did this to him.”
She gave him a hard-eyed stare. “No he won’t. If he traces the Piute Mining Company to its source, he’ll find an empty office in a building in St. Louis. Piute Mining Company’s papers of incorporation are on file with a law firm in Sacramento. If he manages to discover the company’s bank account, and should he somehow gain access to it, he will discover that it sold its assets to Hancock and Hancock, and that the account has been closed.”
“Dear God.” He glanced at Pat. “And you’re party to this?”
Pat winked at him again. “Aye, and fer a noice profit, laddie. Yer sister won’t marry me any more than she’ll marry George, but unloike him, I niver take personally what moight make me a tidy sum.”
Doc blew out a worried breath. “God help us if George ever figures it out.”
Sarah arched a stately eyebrow. “If he does, it will be because one of three people told him. And they’re sitting right here at this table.” She placed papers on the table before him along with pen and ink. She tapped them with a slim forefinger. “Just sign on the bottom, Philip. Pat and I will take care of the rest.”
He did, wondering all the while if it was a death warrant.
118
June 28, 1868
Billy sat at the table in the dim rear of Central City’s Colorado Nugget saloon and leaned his chair back on two legs; his left foot he propped on the chair across from him.
Down in Black Hawk work was progressing on Hill’s new smelter—the supposed key to unlocking a wealth in gold from the recalcitrant ore. New buildings were going up everywhere. Talk was that a railroad would be built up Clear Creek from Golden—even if the rails and the locomotive, in pieces, had to be hauled in from Cheyenne.
He sipped rye with his left hand, the fingers of his right resting on the Remington’s polished grips.
The revolver had been a good one, though it didn’t look the same as when he’d taken it from the sallow-faced man that day at Dewley’s camp. The bluing had worn off, and though he’d taken the best care of it he could, the metal had pitted in places. The grips, once dark walnut, now balanced between weather bleaching and the darkening oils from his palm. The action, however, remained tight, and he kept it clean and oiled.
The bartender, Mooney, had five clients. He kept them up by the front. As if they understood Billy’s need for solitude, the men spoke softly, rarely glancing his way.
Would George come? Billy had sent a message to the man’s boardinghouse mistress asking that George meet him at two at the Nugget. If his pocket watch was correct, it was now five after.
The hinges squeaked as the back door was opened, and the smell of rot, urine, and feces blew in.
Billy tightened his grip on the Remington.
George—clad in his long duster, the hat pulled low—emerged from the narrow hall, his hands held wide, as if in surrender.
Billy used his foot to push the chair out, and resettled himself, using the table to hide the fact that he’d slipped the Remington free of its holster. “Hello, George.”
“You got a reason for showing up just at this particular time?”
