The Floor of Heaven (27 page)

So Charlie had a plan. He wanted Billy to head down to the wharf in the morning and speak to the man who had sold the schooner. He instructed Billy not to be too direct, but to try to learn where the two man had sailed off to. And while he was at it, Billy should also keep his eye out for a cheap boat. More then likely, Charlie explained, we’re going to have to chase after them.

As Charlie gave his instructions, he noticed that he was losing Billy’s attention. His companion’s eyes were fixed on the Indian women standing in a single line across the room. Charlie had seen them before. They came into the saloon most nights, some even carrying babies wrapped in blankets on their backs. They’d plunk their little ones on a bench and then the squaws would assemble in an orderly row. The piano would be playing and some nights a fiddler would join in, too, and the Indian women would stand in their spots, moving their hips in time to the happy music. If a miner came over and asked them to dance, they’d let him drag them around the floor for a bit and hope to receive a quarter for their company. Course, if the miner and the squaw were of a mind, they might also head to a tent out back for some more-intimate activities.

Think I’d like to try a dance with an Injun maiden, Billy said. He’d turned away from the squaws and now was looking across at Charlie. Perhaps you’d like to accompany me?

No, Charlie said curtly, and left it at that. He didn’t want to explain about Mamie; just the thought of reopening that wound was unsettling. You go have yourself a good time, he told Billy. Only don’t get too tired out. I’m counting on you to head down to the wharf in the morning.

Billy nodded in agreement. Well, if you’ll excuse me then, Billy said with an exaggerated politeness as he rose from his chair. But just before he made his way across the room he paused to ask Charlie what he intended to do tomorrow.

“I’m gonna break my arm,” Charlie revealed with a smile.

ACTUALLY, CHARLIE had no intention of breaking his arm. He just wanted people to think he had. He decided that if he was going to quit his job at the mine to go off in pursuit of Schell and Hubbard, he’d need a good excuse. A fake broken leg had quieted a lot of suspicions when he’d gone undercover at the Keeline Ranch in Wyoming. A broken arm, he reckoned, should do the trick up in Alaska.

It was Charlie’s first night back on the late shift, and at the midnight “lunch” in the dining hall he made a point of making his presence known. He entertained everyone at his table with tales of his carryings-on with the squaws in Juneau the night before. When the meal was over, he snuck off to the basement.

Once he’d determined that he was alone, he went to work. He removed his shirt and began rubbing his left shoulder with a few wood chips he’d found on the floor. He kept at it fiercely, and before long the skin was covered with a bright red bruise. Then he put his shirt back on and returned to the mill.

He’d already selected the location for his accident. There was a steep stairway up to the second floor in the building where machines that the men called “squeezers” began the process of separating quartz from the gold. He waited until the other workers were hunched over the squeezers with their backs to the staircase, and then he fell. It was quite a tumble. He landed broadside in the mud and slush at the bottom of the stairs. His impact was so hard that the lantern he was carrying shattered into pieces.

The thud of Charlie’s landing echoed through the room, and the men hurried over. It’s my shoulder, he complained with a good deal of truth as they lifted him to his feet; he hadn’t intended to land that hard. I hit it against a timber post at the foot of the stairs, he went on through gritted teeth.

By the time the doctor arrived, there was no need for Charlie to act. His shoulder was throbbing. The doctor removed his shirt and, with considerable tut-tutting, observed the large red bruise on his shoulder. See if you can raise your arm, the doctor ordered. Playing to his audience, Charlie struggled mightily, but in the end he couldn’t lift his arm at all. Still, the doctor diagnosed that the shoulder was not broken, just badly bruised from the crash into the post. A couple of the men helped Charlie to the infirmary, and he moaned all the way. Once Charlie was sitting on the examination table, the doctor rubbed liniment into his shoulder and put his arm into a sling. You’d better spend the night here, the doctor suggested. Charlie readily agreed.

The next day at noon, Charlie showed up at the dining hall with his arm in the sling. There were at least a hundred men at the long table, and Charlie made quite a fuss. He was in pain, and he insisted that someone help him cut his food. The following day at lunch he went through a similar performance, complaining loudly and being needy. So no one at the mine was surprised when, three days after the accident, Lee Davis said his good-byes and drew his final pay. Arm in a sling, trudging along as if each new step was a painful effort, he boarded the ferry for Juneau.

BILLY MET Charlie on the wharf. I got some news, he announced right away. Schell and Hubbard sailed into Juneau last evening. Their schooner was moored in the harbor all night.

Where’re they now? Charlie asked hopefully. If they were still in the harbor, he’d board the boat and, with luck, wrap the case up by nightfall.

They set sail this morning, Billy revealed, his words prickly with frustration. He had no idea where they were headed.

Well, said Charlie as he removed his sling and flung it to the ground, we’d better find out.

Mamie, Siringo’s “child bride,” and their daughter, Viola

(A Cowboy Detective, 1912)

Bluff Creek Bridge was the landmark signaling that a hurrah cowtown was a short ride ahead. It was there Charlie hung this sign.

(A Cowboy Detective, 1912)

Soapy Smith, a man in black: an image calculated to suggest sober ecclesiastical propriety as well as both position and success (Denver State Library, Western History Collection, z-8903)

George Carmack, dreamer of golden dreams (Alaska State Library, P01-1923)

Charlie and his shrewd mentor, James McParland, the superintendent of the Denver Pinkerton Agency office (A Cowboy Detective, 1912)

Charlie and his fellow operative, the free-spirited and fun-loving Billy Sayles (A Cowboy Detective, 1912)

The Great McGinty comes to Denver—and Soapy tries to reinvent his life in the process. (Denver State Library, Western History Collection, F-23860)

The Treadwell Mine on Douglass Island—at night its buildings would light the Alaskan sky with their electrified glow. (University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections, UW 29271z)

During the first winter in Dawson, the sourdoughs had no money, only gold. They paid for food and supplies by emptying their pokes into the “blower.” (© Bettmann/Corbis)

For a strike to be official, it had to be registered with the Canadian authorities. Here prospectors line up in Dawson to file their claims. (Alaska State Library, P.E. Larrs Photograph Collection, P41-215)

Once the first treasure ship reached Seattle, “Klondicitis” spread. People crowded on to steamships, determined to head off to an unknown, unexplored, and frozen land. (University of Washington Special Collections, Wilse531)

Prospecting was a lonely life, filled with hard work and wishful thoughts. (© Corbis)

Soapy holding court in “Jeff’s Place” in Skagway, Alaska. (Alaska State University, Wickersham State Historic Sites Photograph Collection, P277-001-009)

Bill Moore, foreman of the LX Ranch and murderer on the run in Alaska (A Cowboy Detective, 1912)

Soapy, enjoying his reign, leads the Fourth of July parade through the streets of Skagway. (Alaska State University, William Norton Photograph Collection, P226-067)

The hard men of the 101 Committee. They wanted law and order—no matter whom they had to kill to get it. (Alaska State University, William Norton Photograph Collection, P226-129)

John Stewart holding his poke of gold. After he was robbed, the 101 Committee set out to get justice. (Alaska State University, William Norton Photograph Collection, P226-090)

The autopsy of Soapy Smith. It was as if people couldn’t believe he was dead. (Alaska State University, William Norton Photograph Collection, P226-786)

Members of the Soap gang after they were rounded up, their rule of terror and intimidation ended (Alaska State University, William Norton Photograph Collection, P226-065)

Charlie (right) on the set of Tumbleweeds with the actor Bill Hart. Siringo was the last American cowboy, the real-life hero the movie stars wanted to play on the screen. (Riata and Spurs, 1927)

TWENTY-ONE

wo days later, an hour before dawn, when the night sky still held Juneau’s harbor in a deep and stolid darkness, the two detectives set off in pursuit of the thieves. They had purchased a forty-foot Indian canoe that was painted, Charlie observed with a chuckle, “in all the colors of the rainbow.” More to his liking, its bow and stern were built high above the water and that, he judged, would give them some protection if they hit rough waters. So there wouldn’t be a constant need to paddle, they had rigged up a tall-masted sail. As a barefoot boy in south Texas, Charlie’d spent summers frolicking on the Gulf of Mexico, chasing crabs, oysters, and seafowl. The waters running along the Alaskan coast might be more tempestuous, Charlie conceded, but he felt confident that he’d sufficient experience to handle a small sailboat in any conditions. Then again, it was Charlie’s nature to feel confident about most things he set out to do.

It had also occurred to Charlie that they’d need a cover story to explain why they were traveling up and down the coast. If they caught up with Schell and Hubbard—and there was no guarantee they would; they didn’t even know which direction the thieves had sailed—it’d still be necessary to win their confidence in order to learn where they’d hidden the gold. Two strangers had better be able to offer a reasonable explanation for their having paddled to some godforsaken corner of the wilderness in their rainbow canoe, or else things could swiftly turn scaly. Gunplay, Charlie imagined, might very well be inevitable; nevertheless, he’d prefer to sort out the whereabouts of the gold before he had cause to draw his big Colt. He gave the problem considerable thought, but in the end it was Billy who hit on the story that struck them both as perfect. They’d pass themselves off as whiskey peddlers. It was an occupation that would provide reasons enough for stopping into the many Indian villages scattered along the coastal waterways and rivers, and at the same time it’d give them opportunities to inquire if their customers happened to have recently seen their friends’ schooner. Along with a newly purchased chart of the Alaskan coast, they’d stowed twenty-five gallons of Canadian rye whiskey on board. Of course, the challenge now would be making sure there’d be any of the whiskey left to sell. In the two days it’d taken to rig the mast, they’d already gone through an impressive number of bottles.

Then, just as they were getting set to sail, Charlie had another idea. This was his case and he was the senior operative, but he’d led men in the past and knew that hard feelings could be the undoing of any expedition. The fact that he liked Billy also prodded his concern. So when they boarded the canoe he offered an arrangement that, he hoped, would ease any problems between the two of them before they occurred. Why don’t we, he suggested, take turns being captain of the ship? “When you’re the captain,” Charlie said, “I’ll be your slave and vice versa.” Billy swiftly agreed.

With Billy assuming the captain’s duties for that first day, they sailed out from Juneau’s harbor. They were embarking, both men felt, on a curious undertaking. They’d no knowledge of where Schell and Hubbard had headed, but on a hunch they’d set course toward Admiralty Island. It was only about fifteen miles south of Juneau, and as far as Charlie could learn it was little more than a rugged strip of spruce and hemlock forest populated by Tlingit Indians and packs of big brown bears who feasted like kings on the running salmon. But it was where, Billy had heard, Schell and Hubbard had spent some days before they’d reappeared in Juneau. If they didn’t find the thieves moored off the island, then their plan, such as it was, was to sail up and down the panhandle coast until they either spotted the schooner or met someone who had. In their time both detectives had trailed horses, cattle, and men, but never a schooner on water. Still, neither of them found the prospect daunting. The oddity of it sparked their old sense of adventure; it had been, after all, the imagined notion of participating in the unexpected that had provoked Charlie to abandon his merchant’s apron and Billy his parents’ comfortable London home. In their bold and spirited way, both men were kin to the heroes who’d settled the West. They were self-sufficient men with grit. With the new morning, they sailed south on smooth waters with merry hearts, full of an eager excitement at the thought of what lay ahead.

TWO DAYS later, Charlie was convinced that they were doomed. When he had first felt the change in the wind, he hadn’t paid it much mind. The day had been still, and from his captain’s seat in the stern he’d been busy manipulating the paddle as a rudder to steer the canoe up a wide inlet several miles long that led to Admiralty Island. At least now, Charlie thought, he’d be able to let the wind take the sail and he could sit back and enjoy the scenery. The island was in the far distance, a speck of gray-green forestland, and a herd of honking sea lions had suddenly appeared. The big, glistening animals swam playfully alongside the canoe, causing Charlie to wonder if they intended to escort the boat all the way to shore, a good five miles. Or maybe they’d simply come over for a close look, as curious about him as he was about them.

Minutes later, rain joined in with the wind. There were only large scattered drops at first, but quickly the drops got thicker and rain poured down. Still, Charlie shrugged it off; a cowboy learns to put up with considerable weather and, in fact, prides himself on maintaining a contemptuous attitude toward its inconveniences. Also, he was captain. He felt it’d be improper for him to complain about a little rain. Besides, Charlie could see that Billy was not in a smiling mood. The rain must’ve surely been bothering him, because this was one of the rare times when Billy, who liked a good conversation, was keeping quiet. This struck Charlie, always competitive, as another good reason to maintain his pretense of disinterest in the soaking they were getting. It’d provide one more occasion for a sturdy Texan to lord it over “Hold Hengland,” as he’d taken to calling his English partner.