Doppelgänger (12 page)

Julian was thrilled at the suggestion and leapt voraciously at the adventure. He left Harvard quite suddenly, packing little more than a portmanteau with a few clothes, a writing journal (which he ended up not using at all) and a flask, and spent the next week at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. There he met a young man named Homer Flynn, the son of a Lowell, Massachusetts textile tycoon, who was also headed West. “What say we travel together?” Julian suggested while he and Flynn drank at a Philadelphia tavern. “I'm headed for San Francisco myself. Could be quite an adventure.”

Thus for several weeks he and Flynn rode the rails, slept in seedy inns and flophouses as well as expensive hotels, visited the occasional brothel and consumed staggering amounts of liquor. In St. Louis they fell in with another young traveler, Jesse Parmenter, a bold but penniless youth from lower Mississippi who was chasing rumors of a gold strike in the mountains near some place Julian had never heard of called Seattle. Parmenter could out-drink, out-smoke and out-shoot Julian and Flynn put together, and he quickly became the dominant personality of the trio. He conned both Julian and Flynn into giving him money so he could buy shovels and mining equipment when he reached Seattle. On the Union Pacific train across the lonely panhandle of Nebraska Julian drew up papers for the “Par-Ath-Fly Mining Company”—for
Parmenter-Atherton-Flynn
—of which each of the young men owned one share. “We're going to be rich, boys!” Parmenter whooped, as he passed around one of the many flasks the three carried. “You two can forget your daddies' Eastern money. You gonna have your own Western gold money soon enough, and all the pretty whores it can buy in San Francisco.”

The locomotive pulling the train on which they were traveling broke down midway through the journey. The three shareholders of Par-Ath-Fly were stranded in the desolate rail and cow town of Laramie, Wyoming Territory for two intensely hot and infuriating days. During those two days the news crackled over the telegraphs of the great battle—or
massacre
, as most of the papers referred to it—at the Little Bighorn River in Dakota Territory, in which General George Armstrong Custer and the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment were wiped out by Lakota warriors. Coming as it did in the centennial summer of triumph, the news of Little Bighorn was depressing and shocking.

It seemed to bother Jesse Parmenter most of all. “Damn Injuns,” he spat at the paper as they sat in Laramie's one saloon. “Every single one of them ought to be wiped out. I hope Grant comes at 'em with everything we've got. The West has got to be pacified. It's
our
country, not theirs. Goddamn reds should've learned that by now.”

The train resumed its journey the next morning, but the passenger cars were now quite crowded with travelers whose westbound trains had piled up in Laramie while the locomotive was being repaired. Nearly every seat was taken and Julian rode for many hours squished against the wall of the train by a foul-smelling man from Kansas City, his irritable wife and two restive children. He soon came to detest the journey, sore from sitting on the hard wooden bench, hungry, unable to sleep and disgusted with the whole thing.
I don't care about the adventure of the West anymore
, he thought.
I just want to get to San Francisco and find a soft bed and a good meal.

At one lonely stop—Julian wasn't sure where it was, perhaps somewhere in Utah—even more passengers piled on. One of them was a Native American man. He was unusually well-dressed for an Indian, wearing a brand new store-bought blue suit, a plaid waistcoat and a bowler hat. When he got on Jesse Parmenter happened to be at the rear of one of the cars, smoking and taking a respite from the heat and the crowd. As the train began moving again Parmenter returned and found the Indian in his seat. Immediately his mood soured and his countenance turned hostile. “What the hell is this Injun doing in my seat?” he bellowed, drawing the attention of everyone in the car. “What the hell is an Injun doing
on this train
? Get out of here, you fucking savage!
Get out
, before I scalp
you!
”

A woman sitting in the bench behind the contested seat tried to defuse the situation by offering Parmenter her own seat. “I don't want your seat, ma'am,” he replied contemptuously. “I want this fucking Injun
off
the goddamn train. He knows he don't belong here!”

The Native American himself said nothing but made no effort to move. He reached into his waistcoat pocket and took out his watch, as if nothing at all was the matter, but Julian noticed his hands quivering.

The conductor soon entered the car. “What seems to be the problem, sir?” Parmenter fulminated again about the presence of the Native American, and the conductor asked for the man's ticket. “It's a valid ticket, bought and paid for,” the conductor shrugged, passing it back to the Indian. “There's no law against an Injun buying a train ticket.”

The other passengers were growing annoyed at the fracas. “Find a seat in another car!” one man snapped. Parmenter retorted by challenging him to a duel. “You love Injuns enough to kill a white man for one?”

“I should shoot you for being a loud-mouthed idiot,” the man replied. “But I don't want to waste a bullet on you.”

Julian was becoming increasingly tense—and he could tell that Homer Flynn was particularly uncomfortable at the situation—but he didn't want to enter the fray and turn Parmenter against him.
The conductor might throw all three of us off the train
, he worried. The notion of being stranded at some desolate rail junction in the middle of Utah Territory, surrounded by Indians who were probably a good deal more hostile than the man in Parmenter's seat, terrified him.

At long last the Indian himself acted. He took his carpetbag from under his feet, snapped the bowler on his head and stood up. He faced Parmenter, staring deeply into his eyes and said softly: “When babies cry loudly in the middle of the night, they usually get milk. It's not because they deserve it. Sometimes their mothers just want to go back to sleep.” He then turned away, walked up the aisle and entered the adjoining car.

No one said anything. The sense of shame hanging in the air was almost palpable. Parmenter took the vacated seat, put his foot up on the back of the seat in front of him and reached into his dusty coat for his flask.

It was deep in the middle of the night when the train pulled into the station at Ogden. Here they were to change to a Central Pacific train that would depart in the morning for points west. Hot, exhausted and weary, Julian stumbled off the train lugging his suitcase, following Parmenter and Flynn. Parmenter paused on the platform to light a cigarette. As he did so his eye caught something up ahead. “There's that goddamn red son of a bitch,” he sneered. He glanced back at Julian and Flynn. “What say we go teach that Injun a lesson he won't forget?”

“Forget him,” said Homer. “Let's just find a place to sleep, all right?”

“Not all right. That son of a bitch insulted me with his stupid Injun talk. He ought to know he can't talk to a white man that way.” Parmenter dropped his cigarette to the ground—he'd only taken two puffs from it—and crushed it with his boot. A moment later he took off through the crowd after the Indian, who Julian couldn't even see.

“No! Wait!” Julian ran after him, mainly frightened that Parmenter would do something that would land all three of them in jail. Flynn, never one to go against the herd, quickly followed.

The Indian was walking away from the station around the side of the two-story plank terminal building and into the muddy, almost pitch-black streets of the settlement that to Julian's eye barely counted as a town at all. Parmenter shouted after the man. “Hey you! Fucking savage! You owe me an apology, you piece of shit!”

Julian ran too, now suddenly desperate—he was not sure why—to stop what he suspected Parmenter was about to do. The young Mississippian carried a gun which he'd shown Julian and Homer. It was a Derringer, a “poker-playin' pistol,” as Parmenter had colorfully referred to it. He also boasted with evident relish that it was the same kind of gun that killed Abraham Lincoln. Privately Julian doubted the young man had ever fired it at another person, but there was a first time for everything.

It was so dark in the muddy street that Julian could barely see anything. He thought they were behind a livery stable of some kind for he could hear the braying of horses and the stench of manure was strong. All he could see were two barely discernible outlines.

“You owe me an apology, red man,” Parmenter sneered.

“I apologize for nothing,” the Indian replied. “Leave me alone.”

“Where'd you get them clothes? You get them off a white man?”

“That is none of your business.”

“It
is
my business. Awful fancy clothes for an Injun. You kill a white man for those clothes?”

“I said, leave me alone. I've done nothing to you.”

Julian came up to him. “Come on, Jesse. Let's just find a place to sleep, all right?”

“Why are you taking his side?” Parmenter snapped.

“I'm not taking anybody's side. I'm just saying—”

The Indian seized the opportunity to turn and begin to walk away. For some reason this angered Parmenter. “Hey! Don't you walk away from me! We got unfinished business, Injun!”

The man said nothing. He continued walking.

Julian saw the tiny Derringer flash in the dim light as Parmenter brought it out of his pocket. Aiming it at the back of the Indian's head he hastened to catch up. “I
said
, we got unfinished business! You don't
dare
turn your back to a white man, you uppity savage!”

It happened with a soft
pop
. Julian wasn't sure Parmenter even intended to fire; perhaps his finger slipped on the gun's tiny brass trigger. Probably the Indian never even knew Parmenter had a gun pointed at him. But he suddenly dropped into the mud. Julian did not see the wound but he was sure the bullet caught the Native American at the base of the skull. He probably died instantly.

“Dear God!”
Homer Flynn gasped. He was standing several paces behind, clutching his own bag; he let go of it and it fell to the mud at his feet.

“What are you doing?” said Julian, grabbing Parmenter's arm. The barrel of the Derringer smoked faintly. “You crazy son of a bitch, what are you
doing
?” He knelt down and shook the Indian. “Hey, mister.
Mister
. Answer me!” Parmenter stood over the body, looking stunned, and as Julian glanced up at him he could tell that even he was shocked at what had just happened.

The Indian was dead. Horrified, almost sick to his stomach, Julian staggered to his feet and backed away. “You killed him,” he whispered. “You just murdered a man in cold blood.”

“He's not a
man
, he's an
Injun
,” Parmenter replied, stuffing the Derringer back into his pocket. He knelt down and was doing something in the darkness. It took Julian several seconds to realize it but he was going through the dead man's pockets. “Nobody's going to care. What, are they gonna arrest me? It probably ain't illegal to kill an Injun. I bet there ain't even a sheriff in this town. You want his watch? Feels like a nice watch.”

“No, I don't want his watch,” said Julian.

“He's got somethin' here…feels like…cash.” Parmenter hastily pocketed it and stood up. Julian noticed that he did not go through the Indian's carpetbag, which had fallen to the ground next to him. Parmenter looked almost panicked but tried to cover it with indignation. “What, you got a problem with what I did? Here's one less savage in the West. I ought to join the Army and get paid for killin' Injuns.”

Julian started to back away. “You do that,” he said.

Parmenter shook his head. “You fucking Eastern pansy-asses. You and your goddamn money.” He reached into his jacket again, and for a moment Julian thought he was going to pull the Derringer, but he was reaching for his flask. After taking a drink he spread his arms, smiled and said, “Welcome to the West, boys. You don't like it so much now, do you? You better get back on that train and go straight back to New York. You sure as hell don't belong out here.”

That was the last Julian and Flynn saw of Jesse Parmenter. They wound up sleeping on benches in the station house; Parmenter, Julian thought, slinked off to find a saloon. He did not appear among the passengers that queued up on the Central Pacific platform in the morning to board the next train West. Julian and Flynn did not speak of the incident or of Parmenter, and in fact barely spoke at all. Homer Flynn seemed quickly to lose his thirst for Western adventure. He and Julian parted ways in Reno, where Flynn bought a ticket back east.

Julian continued on to Sacramento and eventually did make it to San Francisco. He stayed there only three days before he too turned around and began the arduous journey back across the continent toward New York and eventually Harvard, whose quiet libraries and paneled dining clubs seemed a far sight more inviting in September than they had in May.

After his trip was over Julian found the certificate he'd written for the stock in Par-Ath-Fly Mining Company folded and stuck between the pages of the writing journal he had never used. He had no idea whether Parmenter ever struck it rich, but the lack of any mention in the news of a gold rush in Seattle left him skeptical. Certainly he told no one of the incident with the Indian. Once, on the ship to Sweden, Julian dreamed of him. He was just sitting there in the crowded train car calmly checking his watch, and he looked up at Julian and smiled.
Never again
, Julian vowed when he woke up.
I will never think of that man ever again if I can help it. It didn't happen. It's in the past. I'm going to forget about it.