Blood Gold (5 page)

The stranger looked away with a sigh. Then he turned back, fixing first Ben and then me with his bloodshot eye, including the doctor with a final, particularly urgent glance. Dr. Merrill seemed to grow even leaner and more quiet under this examination. “Surely I've done you no offense,” said Dr. Merrill quietly.

The ragged stranger gave an unsteady bow. “I am known to my friends and colleagues as Jacob Rushworth, of Lynn, Massachusetts. Not six months ago I ate off bone china and drank India tea. Euclid and plane geometry were my playing field. I was a schoolmaster.”

Indeed, I was embarrassed at the first estimate I had taken of this poor soul. Now I could discern in this ragged, sweat-bleached figure the outlines of former dignity.

“And you'll be master of a school again,” I suggested.

“Triangles will still have three sides,” suggested Ben.

Our new friend gave a weary laugh at our attempts at consolation. He leaned close, like a man telling a secret. “I have ten dollars' worth of gold dust in my pocket,” he confided. “And the people back home expect me to come back rich.”

In an age when any laboring man could make a dollar a day, this was a disappointing amount.

Jacob Rushworth lowered his voice, and sobriety began to creep across him, his face assuming the contemplative look of a man drunk only on regret. “But to make matters worse, in Sacramento City,” he said, “they have more than gold fever—they suffer from a plague.”

Dr. Merrill had set down his medical bag. Now he folded his arms.

“I saw a room full of dead men,” said Jacob Rushworth, growing more sure that he had our full attention, “stretched out in rows. Rendered lifeless—by disease.”

“It's easy for rumors to have a life of their own,” said Dr. Merrill dismissively, but unable to fully disguise the concern in his voice.

“I saw it strike doctors, too,” said the schoolmaster. “One day they'd be stepping along as lively as you. The next morning, they'd be stretched out stiff on the floor, thieves stealing the nuggets from their pockets.”

Not bothering to hide his impatience, Dr. Merrill probed for a moment in his pocket, and pressed a gold eagle dollar into the former teacher's hand.

“Every one of you,” croaked the schoolmaster as we left him behind, “will look death in the eye.”

CHAPTER 10

The shop's proprietor was a tall, brown-skinned man in a broad leather belt and tight-fitting yellow pants, a dashing figure. He gave a nod to Ben and me, and a bow to Dr. Merrill, who, in his expensive silk waistcoat, managed to look every inch the gentleman.

The proprietor's English was heavily accented. It was like hearing one's familiar language through a rippling atmosphere, the sounds both distorted and beautified. He suggested a drink he called
chichi
, the fresh juice of the sugarcane, followed by a dish of the fish he had personally purchased from the fishing fleet. He enumerated the varieties of sea fish on his fingers. “We have mackerel, gentlemen, and we have both bonitos and shrimp.”

I did not recognize these varieties of sea life. I was starving for a beefsteak, but Dr. Merrill said that he had heard that the bonito was “the queen of fish.”

“The king, sir,” corrected the shopkeeper amiably. “The very king of sea fish.”

The proprietor's daughter was a dimpled young woman, her shoulders covered in a shawl fastened with a brooch. She was pretty, in her modest dress, and Ben gave her one of his radiant smiles.

“The ladies always take a liking to Ben,” I explained for Dr. Merrill's benefit.

“It fills Willie with purest jealousy,” said Ben with a wink, “that they scarcely give him a look.”

I didn't dare respond to that—it was too close to the truth.

I sampled the
chichi
and gave a happy nod, at which Ben drank his straight down. I was wary, after having seen what ardent spirits and tropical heat could do to someone like Mr. Rushworth. But this drink contained little, if any, in the way of alcohol. It was both cool and sweet, with a residue of pulp at the bottom of the cup when the drink was quaffed. Dr. Merrill tasted a little of the
chichi
, and then asked for a bottle of rum.

Bonito is a delicious fish, not as pale-fleshed as cod, and more meaty. Ben and I dined with pleasure, and even ate a form of vegetable our proprietor explained was called plantain, a white-fleshed starchy vegetable that fries up golden brown and which he sprinkled with lime juice.

The doctor ate well, but not as heartily as the two of us. While Ben entertained me with stories of long-ago pirate raids on this historic town, Dr. Merrill kept a polite expression on his face, drank rum, sucked on portions of green lime, and for a long while said little.

Ben and I agreed it was the best meal we had eaten in our lives, although I realized as soon as I had said this that I was forgetting Aunt Jane's cooking, fine roasts of chicken and beef. I was also overlooking the meals I had eaten with Reverend Josselyn and Elizabeth, mallard and pheasant a local shopkeeper claimed to be “fruits of the fowling piece,” but which I had always suspected had been caught in snares.

“It's a blessing for Mr. Sweetland,” said Ben, “that he was traveling with a doctor.”

Dr. Merrill gave a thoughtful smile. “Any wound in the torso invites sepsis.”

Ben had been leaning forward, bright with apparent faith in Dr. Merrill's skill. Now he sank back in his chair. “But you sold Mr. Sweetland a pint of liver tonic.”

“May his liver, in any event, remain sound,” said Dr. Merrill.

Ben tried to ask the question as though the answer mattered little to him. “What sort of plague do you suppose troubles the miners?”

“Perhaps
plague
isn't the word I would use,” said the doctor.

“What would you call it?” asked Ben.

If you didn't know Ben well, you'd mistake his sunny countenance as one easily deceived. Ben was the one who used a dictionary to inform me they called the California nuggets placer gold after the Spanish verb for
to please
.

“Maybe you would call it
pestilence
,” suggested Ben, with just a touch of pepper in his voice.

I offered an attempt at humor, putting on a scholarly voice and intoning, “What is the exact meaning, gentlemen, of the phrase
every one of you will look death in the eye
?”

Ben laughed, but not loudly.

“I believe it's time,” said the doctor with something like a smile, “that we sought livelier entertainment.”

Afternoon cool filtered through the shadows as we followed Dr. Merrill down a long, cobbled lane.

The doctor bought cigars, which he shared with the two of us. Speaking an amalgam of French—which any educated gentleman knew—and simple Spanish, he inquired from one shop to another, asking questions I could not begin to understand.

I was unused to smoking cigars, although I had taken to chewing tobacco since leaving home. A cigar takes more mental effort, making sure the smoke draws well and that the ashes don't spill on your shirtfront. And there is always a certain awareness of the figure one is presenting, a man-of-the-world jauntiness that can keep the smoker from observing his surroundings too closely.

I became aware, however, of a certain tawdry cheer in the streets we now wandered. Beautiful women leaned in the doorways and made soft noises with their tongues, the way some people attract the attention of their favorite cat.

Ben leaned against a lime-washed wall near one of these brightly clad women and said something in Spanish, flashing one of his smiles.

He got a smile right back in return, and only when I tugged at his arm would he break off conversation.

I asked what he had said to these dazzling, strangely alluring women, and he said, “Something poetical out of a book. Something in Spanish about starlight, wine, and dark eyes.”

“And what,” I ventured with both heat and curiosity, “did they say to you?”

Ben laughed.

“You let them toy with you, Ben,” I said.

“Certainly not,” he protested, with a show of false innocence.

“All a woman has to do,” I continued, “is roll her eyes at you, and you're a puddle at her feet.”

“I'll start calling you Reverend Willie,” said Ben, with more than a touch of impatience in his voice.

Dr. Merrill was waving us through a large door.

Lamps illuminated our passage down coral-stone steps. Through the atmosphere of cheroot smoke I smelled feathers, a cloying dustiness in the atmosphere, and the ammoniac tang of bird droppings.

Most of all the odor of sweat and liquor struck me as we descended into a room. A crowd of men yelled, howling in several languages, gazing down at a pit soaked in blood.

CHAPTER 11

Two scarlet-and-blue roosters were circling each other, the spurs of the claws already stained red.

Feathers spun about them like scythes, and soft stars of feather down floated in the air. The two cocks stalked each other in a caricature of the jauntiness I had been feeling not long before, their heads held just so, each stride a jerky, self-aware swagger.

A blur of feathers, and a struggling, confused tangle of wings broke up with both roosters sprawling. One of them flapped his wings, not to fly but to swing himself up off the wet, clawed soil. The brilliant, iridescent creature's tail feathers shook, beautiful ink-blue arcs of plumage.

But only after a long moment was it clear that the stiff-legged march the cock recommenced was following a frantic course. The bird's head was at an angle, and as each step took the rooster from the center of the cockpit, the head disengaged a little further from the spine. By the time the rooster began circling crazily, the head was dangling upside down from the spouting hole of its neck.

Ben shook his head at the sight of this carnage, and the doctor rolled his eyes.

“Keep your pennies in your pockets,” called the doctor through the din, “until we go next door.”

Now we crowded our way into a wide room, less raucous but nevertheless filled with Americans. A courtyard beyond held a splashing fountain, and a large, thick-branched tree, glossy leaves reflecting lantern light. In the center of the room was a roulette wheel, which I recognized from stories about the evils of gambling.

I had wagered twice in my life. Once was in a horse race along Maybeck's Green, when the filly Athena's Glory beat the entire field at the summer fair. Even Aunt Jane had placed a bet that day, and her sporting bid hardly counted as gambling. The other, more illicit bet was at a prizefight, a sport frowned on by the law.

Jack Tiernan of Boston had fought Mike Ryan, late of County Mayo, for over two hours, until the bout was stopped by the police. While both bare-fisted fighters were beaten bloody—so badly I had to close my eyes at times—and Tiernan looked about ready to drop, all bets were off because of the interruption.

I had sworn off gambling. I had made my oath on Holy Scripture, just one week after my confession to Aunt Jane that I had gone to an illegal sporting event. I believe that a sworn oath is a vow a man simply cannot break. I did, however, recognize that betting on the turning of a brilliant wheel, or the turn of a card, was by no means as low as gambling on the life and death of a pathetic, drunken bird.

“Show me how to play this game,” Ben was saying over the din.

I decided to seek adventure elsewhere.

I found it soon enough.

CHAPTER 12

I breathed more easily when I was out in the soft air of the street once more, leaving the doctor and Ben to their sport.

Maybe Ben was right. Maybe I was turning into a stiff-necked sort—Reverend Willie indeed!

Nevertheless, I relished my solitude. The air was pleasantly warm, and from the gently glowing interiors drifted laughter. A Spanish song, lilting and sweet, made me believe I could understand the lovely foreign verses. And perhaps I almost could, discerning longing and love in the verdant rhymes.

I don't know how long I stood there, puffing on the remnant of my cigar. I let the stub fall into a puddle, where it sizzled and gave off a faint ghost of smoke in the muted dark. I had set forth on this journey toward the goldfields with a definite, very determined purpose, and once again the world I was traveling through took me by surprise.

I took a step up the street, startled out of my tobacco-induced reverie. I cocked my head.

There it was again, that sound.

Someone groaning.

When I saw Jacob Rushworth, he was lying beside an ivy-laced wall.

He was muttering in his drunken daze, groaning, his face lit by a candle in a nearby window. A shadow worked at his clothing, a hand darting, searching. As I approached, a figure ran, leaving Mr. Rushworth's trouser pocket cut wide open.

I ran hard after the thief, without wasting a breath in calling out. I suspected that this at last was one of the Spanish-speaking bandits we had been fearing so long, and that my shouted demands would fall on uncomprehending ears.

The thief was nimble, splashing through puddles, startling a row of tethered mules, racing along stone church steps. He led me deeper and deeper through the angling streets of the sprawling, night-sodden town.

And I ran right behind him.

CHAPTER 13

We sprinted through the slumped, vine-ravaged remains of old walls.

A mound of charred sugarcane gave off a sick-sweet perfume, and a large stone wheel gleamed in the starlight, crusted with the remnants of sugar stalks. In the darkness a billy goat shied from the fugitive, and as I sprinted past, the animal made a tentative complaint, turned and tried to run, kept in place by an invisible tether.

The thief glanced back—a pale, thin face in the starlight. I ran even harder. But as we approached the edge of the jungle, roughly tilled fields and sleepy shacks, I began to grow uncertain. My quarry was not far ahead of me—I had been able to keep the pace.