West of Washoe by Tim Champlin Read Free Book Online Page A

reached the relative safety of the upper level, Flannery turned to Ross. “Recently two miners were killed by a dog in the main shaft.”
    “A dog?” He had visions of a wild, rabid dog loose in the tunnels.
    “They were on their way up in a bucket. A dog tripped trying to run across the mouth of the shaft up top. Fell into the shaft and hit the men a hundred feet below, and down they all went another hundred and seventy-five feet to the bottom. Wasn’t much left of them.”
    Flannery was apparently trying to throw a scare into an outsider. He didn’t know Ross had crawled through many mines more dangerous than this one.
    “That’s about it,” the foreman said, “unless there’s something else you want to see. All these tunnels and shafts look about the same.”
    “I’m ready to go. Maybe I can jot down a few figures on your production, number of miners employed, how many miles of tunnels you have, capital outlay on equipment…that sort of thing.”
    “Sure.” Flannery pointed the way they’d come down. “We can climb back up the ladders, or be dragged up the incline by a steam engine, or be hoisted up a shaft in a wooden bucket by means of a hand winch. Your choice.”
    Ross didn’t relish the long, weary climb up a series of steep ladders. “I’ll take the hand windlass,” he said, choosing the least strenuous way.
    He dispensed with the bucket and put a foot into a loop of the dangling rope. At a bell signal from the foreman, someone at the top began to hoist Ross. He bobbed around, swinging freely and scraped against the walls of the shaft. Eventually he arrived at the top and stepped off onto the landing platform.
    Flannery gave him the statistics he asked for. Ross returned the coveralls and candle, then hiked back into town.
    The usual crowds milled around the streets, sidewalks, saloons, and shops. The place hummed like a hornet’s nest. Ross gazed in wonder at the handbills plastered and nailed to every square foot of space on store fronts, porch posts, fences, and walls. Cheaper than running ads in the paper , he thought. The bills were pushing everything—brandy, cigars, stomach bitters, cheap suits, the variety show at Maguire’s Opera House. Under a boardwalk awning, an organ grinder was cranking out a melody on a well-used, one-legged music box, while a red monkey, less than two feet tall, scampered around at the end of a ten-foot tether, importuning all passers-by with his tin cup. Snatching out the coins that clunked into the cup, he handed them to his master.
    Ross paused for a moment to watch.
    “Now, where, outside of the Mediterranean, could a man see a sight like that?” a voice at his shoulder said.
    Ross turned. “Sam Clemens.”
    “Actually you wouldn’t see that sight in the Mediterranean at all,” Clemens went on, “because that’s a Red Uakari monkey. It’s found in Peru and Brazil.”
    “Now, how in hell would you know that?”
    Clemens shrugged. “I asked him.”
    “The man or the monkey?”
    Clemens chuckled.
    “I saw you at the Enterprise fire the other night, but we haven’t been officially introduced. I’m Gilbert Ross, mine inspector and student of human nature.”
    “Now, there’s a course you’ll never graduate from,” Clemens said, gripping his hand.
    “Can I buy you a drink?” Ross asked.
    “Sun’s not quite over the yardarm yet,” the curly-haired newsman replied. “Besides, I probably had more than my share last night. I’m just getting up and around, and was thinking of breakfast…or lunch.”
    “So was I. Fancy some company?”
    “Sure. This looks as good as any.”
    They ducked into the nearby Howling Wilderness Saloon. A sign on the outside wall advertised a good square meal for 50¢.
    Ross noticed the young reporter was looking a little rumpled—unshaven around the heavy reddish mustache that hid his mouth, white shirt wrinkled, thick, curly hair appearing to have been combed with his fingers.
    “Lunch is on me,” Ross said.