Tales from the Promised Land: Western short stories from the California gold rush Read online

  Tales from the

  Promised Land

  Five Western Adventures from the California Gold Rush

  John Rose Putnam

  copyright© 2013 by John Rose Putnam

  Contents

  Bottomless Bartlett’s Beautiful Bride

  Uncle Charley

  Payback at Murderer’s Bar

  Firebaugh’s Ferry

  Stoddard’s Gold

  Cover art by George Caleb Bingham

  Bottomless Bartlett’s Beautiful Bride

  Women were far more rare than gold in the early California gold rush

  I stood there idly wiping clean glasses with a dirty bar rag and watching my only customer shovel food down his maw like a hungry grizzly bear after a long winter nap. Bottomless Bartlett they called him and the man could pack enough grub away in one day to feed Kearny’s Army of the West for a week. He ate all the time and never seemed to get enough. No doubt he was a big fellow, at least a head taller than anyone in San Francisco and not an ounce of fat on him. Bartlett was as fit as a fiddle and proud of it.

  Six eggs scrambled together with hot chili peppers, four pork chops each half as thick as your little finger is long, a loaf of fresh bread smothered in a pound of butter, three plates of refried Mexican beans, all washed down with a pot of coffee and five pints of beer. Now, if all that wasn’t enough, he hollered for my cook to bring him dessert. Right away Rafael burst out the kitchen door with a plate full of apple pan dowdy and Bartlett dug right in like he hadn’t seen food in a month.

  “Bartlett, why don’t you find a good woman and settle down? You could save a small fortune just eating at home,” I said, knowing as soon as the words passed my lips that I had stepped in a deep pile of fresh horse leavings.

  “Aw, Willie, you know there ain’t no woman around gonna marry me. Heck, I just ain’t good looking enough for any of the gals I know.”

  There it was. The south end of a northbound mule looked better than Bartlett and had more brains to boot. His ears were too big, his nose too small, his muddy brown hair had never met a brush or a comb and lay on his head like a rat’s nest on top of the gnarly stump of a broken down pine tree. Bartlett was as homely as they come.

  But I’d already stepped in it. I had to keep going no matter how much it stank. “You spent two years in the gold country, Bartlett. Can’t you cook for yourself?”

  “Never got much past bacon and flapjacks,” he mumbled his mouth full of pie.

  “Well, there ought to be one woman in this town you’d take a fancy to,” I said before I’d thought. There must be ten or twenty men for every gal in town. If any one of them wanted to get married, and most didn’t, they had their choice—and ugly Bottomless Bartlett wouldn’t be at the top of any girl’s wish list.

  “Aw, Willie, them women is always talking at me, ordering me around. Even when I was a kid, with my Ma and three older sisters, it was Bartlett do this, Barlett don’t do that. Day after day they’d nag at me, run me ragged—dang near drove me batty. Finally I packed up and left for California. Ain’t met no woman here who didn’t want to boss me around like an old plow horse either.”

  I couldn’t help but think that was because he was dumber than that old plow horse but thankfully had the good sense not to say so. “Surely there must be one—”

  “No, Willie, not that I’ve met. Heck, having a wife who could cook and who loved me without having to yap all the time would make me as happy as a honey bee in clover. I’d give a hundred dollars—no, I’d give two hundred dollars—to anyone who found the right gal for me. But it ain’t no use. There’s no woman living who’d go for a guy like me.” He stuffed the last of the pie down his throat, swilled a whole glass of beer in one swallow, belched loud then pushed his chair back from the table with a screech.

  “Wait up, Bartlettt. Two hundred dollars you say?” I asked, never one to let easy money pass me by with the seeds of an idea already rattling around in my head.

  “Yeah, Willie, two hundred dollars—in gold,” he said as he burped again.

  “Consider yourself married then,” I vowed without the foggiest notion that I could pull off the hare-brained scheme that lurked in the dark corners of my greedy brain. But two hundred in gold was a pretty fair reward for what I had in mind—even if I had to split it with someone else.

  “Rafael,” I yelled and the kitchen door swung open quickly. Rafael had been listening to my conversation with Bartlett, as usual.

  “Si, Senor,” he said, a knowing smile lifting the corners of his bushy moustache.

  “Take care of the bar for me. I got to run down to Pike Street. I’ll be back before the noon time crowd gets in.”

  “Pike Street, Senor? It is too early for the ladies, no?”

  “This is business, Rafael, not pleasure.”

  “Oh, si, si, funny business with the ladies, I comprendez. Rafael will tend the bar.” His smug grin said that he hadn’t believed a word I said about doing business on Pike. I ignored him and hurried out the door. After all, two hundred dollars was two hundred dollars.

  I walked west on Clay Street for a block and a half then turned south into a small alley lined with Chinese push carts selling vegetables and fruit. Halfway to Sacramento Street I knocked loud at the door of a two-story wood frame house where all the windows were shuttered tight. When no one answered I pounded on it again, louder, and hollered. “Open up, Jasper. I ain’t got all day.”

  In the blink of a gnat’s eye the heavy oak door creaked opened and a tall man in a checkered vest peered out, his face as black as a lump of coal. “Mistah Willie, it’s way too early fo’ th’ ladies. Cain’t ya wait till noon?” he said.

  I pushed my way inside and he closed the door behind me. “I ain’t here for a gal, Jasper. I need to see to see the boss lady toot sweet. I reckon she’s up and about.”

  “Why yessah, Mistah Willie. She up but she don’t see customers no mo’.”

  “I know that. But this is business. I got a deal she can’t pass on. Go tell her it’s Wildcat Willie Wingett and I got a hundred dollars in gold for her.”

  “Yessah, Mistah Willie. I’ll sees if she decent.” Jasper left for the back of the house while I nosed about in the parlor wondering why the Madame of one of the biggest bordellos in San Francisco would worry about being decent.

  Then the wide double doors to the dining room swung open and the lady of the house swept into the room. Standing all of four foot something from the tips of her dainty toes to the top of her ink black hair piled up high on her head and held together with an ivory comb and a couple of those sticks the Chinese use instead of forks, she looked stunning, as usual, her face powdered as white as the parson’s soul, her lips as red as a fresh strawberry. Clad only in a floor-length robe that looked like somebody’s calico quilt outfitted with fancy braids and big ivory buttons, Madame Ah Hoi carried a mighty punch in a tiny package.

  “You, why you here? Too early. No lookee. No feelee. No—”

  “That ain’t why I come, Ah Hoi.” I interjected before she bit my head off. “I got a deal for you.”

  “No! No deal. Last time you try pay me brass—no gold. Go way!”

  Clearly she hadn’t forgotten my little accident, but . . . I smile innocently.

  “Now that was just a big mistake.” I explained. “Besides you got your gold. We’re square now. Let’s let bygones be bygones.”

  “You be gone, chop chop!” She waved a dismissive hand at me. From the nasty scowl on her face I felt lucky she didn’t
have a knife.

  “Hold on now. Just listen. You got a gal here that ain’t working out.” I scratched my head. What did Jasper tell me that girls name was? Hadn’t seemed important last week. Oh yeah. “Her name’s Sue something—”

  “Su Li,” she said, suddenly interested. “Why you want Su Li. She not happy here. No good for business. She ugly—feet too big. Men no like. Now all she do cook.”

  Yes! I thought, one down one to go. “Can she speak English,” I ask eyes wide.

  “Su Li Chinee. Why you care?”

  “Because Su Li is perfect. Listen, I can marry her off and you and me can get a hundred dollars each in pure gold. Whatta ya say?”

  Now Ah Hoi’s eyes were sparkling. She leaned in closer. She was interested. “One hundred dollar, real gold—no funny money?” She sure didn’t want to let that little thing with the brass filings go.

  “No! No funny money. Real gold. One hundred dollars.” I assured her.

  “Hokay, I listen. What I do for gold?”

  It took me the better part of that morning to explain the whole thing to Ah Hoi. She kept saying that Su Li was too ugly and no man would want her because of her big feet, but I finally got it through that thick pile of black hair that must have been plugging her ears that Bottomless Bartlett didn’t care one fig about Su Li’s feet. He was interested in other things, like her cooking and that she couldn’t nag him half to death speaking only Chinese. Finally Jasper jumped in and helped me explain, but only after I had promised him a bottle of my best liquor. Still it was worth it if everything worked out.

  The next day I got to the saloon earlier than I had in years. From the incredible aroma that swept in from the kitchen everything was going exactly as planned. I walked behind the bar, popped a cork and poured myself a tumbler full of rye. It looked like a real profitable day coming.

  The front door swung open at exactly five after eight and Bottomless Bartlett breezed in looking as dumb as ever, rainwater dripping from his India rubber overcoat.

  “Morning Bartlett,” I said, trying to act nonchalant and not spill the beans.

  “Howdy Willie. Fine day ain’t it?” Bartlett went on.

  “As fine as we’ve had in a while, except for this cold rain and that nasty north wind,” I answered and poured him a glass of beer.

  He sat at his usual table just as the kitchen door popped open and Rafael appeared, a tray balanced over his head. With a flourish he plopped the platter on a table and whipped off a plate of dumplings and stuck it in front of Bartlett. I could see the big oaf’s smile bust out across his ugly mug from way behind the bar.

  “You gotta new cook, Willie?” he asked, eyes bulging.

  “Sorta,” I answered. “You like Chinese?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

  Bartlett nodded greedily then stuck a fork full of dumplings in his face.

  I drained the rest of my rye. “That smells good,” I said, but Bartlett ain’t listening.

  He had the plate clean faster than a good hound dog can tree a coon but Rafael was ready with a jumbo bowl of soup. Bartlett didn’t even drop his fork. He just grabbed a spoon in his left hand and had at it. Next came a simmering serving of fresh bay shellfish over a bed of steamed rice smothered in oyster sauce. Poor Bartlett couldn’t get enough and shoveled it into his mouth first with the fork and then with the spoon.

  The kitchen door blew open and Su Li padded into the room with tiny steps from her oversized feet. Black hair piled high, face powered white, lips bright red and smiling; she looked exactly like a Chinese porcelain doll, so fetching that I almost didn’t notice the roast goose sizzling tantalizingly from the tray she carried.

  To my great surprise Bartlett didn’t notice the goose either. Instead the big lug leaped to his feet so fast his chair flew halfway across the barroom. He ripped his beat up black hat from the rat’s nest atop his head and stood there with his jaw scraping the floor, staring at Su Li as if he’d seen a ghost, and holding the hat over his privates like a man caught with his pants down.

  Su Li must have been scared out of her lily white rice powdered skin by the sight of such an ugly awkward ogre looming over her looking about as stupid as he really was. The tray with the roast goose began to teeter and would have toppled to the floor had Rafael not had the good sense to grab it and put it safely on the table.

  I was sure that all my good intentions were to go up in smoke. Clearly terrified at the pathetic creature standing before her and fully aware of our plan to have her marry the poor rube as a way to escape her life at the cathouse, Su Li would no doubt turn and bolt for the door as soon as she recovered her senses.

  Then, to my utter amazement, she cracked a small smile, stuck her hands together inside the spacious sleeves of her quilted bathrobe, bowed low in front of Bartlett and said something so soft and sweet in Chinese that even a hard-nosed former three-card monte dealer like me had to sniffle back a tear or two. She looked up at the big dope and blessed him with a smile so warm it would have melted all the snow at the top of the highest mountain in the Sierra Nevada.

  Suddenly it dawned on me that Su Li just might actually like Bartlett. Why I couldn’t fathom but what man can comprehend the wilds of a woman’s mind. “Bartlett,” I cried. “She’s the one. I found her for you. Don’t be a coward. Ask her to marry you before she changes her mind.”

  His head swung toward me, eyes wild. “Me, marry her?” he asked in a trembling voice.

  “Yeah, you!” I yelled. “Ask her quick before it’s too late.”

  A weird, lopsided smile crept across his kisser, his wide eyes rolled dreamily around his head. “Yeah,” he whispered mostly to himself as he dropped to his knees and took the poor girl’s teensy hand in his gigantic paw just as gently as a mother would when powdering her baby’s bottom. “Will you marry me?” he mumbled, looking for all the world like a man who’d had too much punch at a Saturday night dance.

  Her ruby red lips beamed back at him as her alabaster face bobbed up and down in answer. I, for one, stood totally stunned that such a beautiful, fragile thing could ever agree to enter into holy matrimony with a galoot as homely as Bottomless Bartlett.

  “Bartlett,” I yelled. “My two hundred dollars!”

  He never took his eyes from her, just reached into his pocket, pulled out a leather bag and tossed it in my direction. Luckily I managed to snag it before it crashed into the cut glass mirror behind the bar. Then he swept her into his arms like a man does when he carries his new bride over the threshold and headed for the door.

  “Where you going, Bartlett?” I yelled.

  “Find a preacher,” he said, his eyes still glued on Su Li.

  “But it’s storming like blue blazes out there,” I reminded him.

  “Yeah,” he said, then ducked out the door with Su Li still in his arms and disappeared into the muddy mess of Clay Street.

  The kitchen door banged open and Jasper strode up to the bar and held out his hand. “I be takin’ Ah Hoi’s hundred dollars an’ da’ rye whiskey ya owes me, Willie.”

  I popped a new bottle of Buzzards Breath Rye onto the bar and pushed the leather pouch over to him. “Split it up yourself, Jasper. Ah Hoi don’t trust me no how,” I mumbled, still stunned that a fellow like Bottomless Bartlett could win himself such a beautiful bride so easy. It made me think there just might be a slim chance for an old rotten-hearted barkeep like me.

  “Senor, what do we do with the goose?” Rafael asked, a carving knife in hand.

  I looked up. That goose sure smelled inviting. “Ain’t no use to let Su Li’s good cooking go to waste.” I said.

  “Su Li?” Jasper blurted. “Why dat gal cain’t boil water what she don’t burn some. All dis stuff fixed up by Miss Ah Hoi’s private cook, Wang Chow.”

  “Wang Chow,” I mutter. “You mean—”

  “Yessah, Mistah Willie. She cain’t cook a lick.”

  “Oh Lord! Next you’ll tell me Su Li talks English.” I said, sure that was a total impossibility.


  “Oh, yessah. She yammers away at all dah customers ‘bout mendin’ they sinning ways. Miss Ah Hoi so mad at her she made her cook, just to keep her out da way.”

  “You mean—”

  “Yessah, Mistah Willie. Ya done been had again. Dat gal went to a Mission School in China. Cain’t cook a’tall but she talks bettah’n I does.”

  “Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle. What about poor Bartlett?” I moan.

  “Oh, Senor Bartlett will be fine, I think,” Rafael opined then sliced off a healthy chunk of goose and popped it into his mouth.

  “Yeah! After all he’s the one that got the gal.” I pulled out another bottle of Buzzards Breath and filled three glasses on the bar. “Bring that bird over here, Rafael. We may as well celebrate. Our good friend Bartlett is getting married today.” I raise my glass in a toast. “Here’s to Bottomless Bartlett and his beautiful bride,” I proclaimed.

  “Si si,” cried Rafael

  “Yessah, Mistah Willie,” Jasper agreed.

  “Drink up and dig into the goose, friends. I reckon we’ve seen the last of those two for a while.”

  And truer words were rarely spoken. Right after the honeymoon Bartlett shelled out the lion’s share of the gold he’d mined for a restaurant along the waterfront. But with Su Li’s warm smile to greet the customers and Bartlett’s brand new brother-in-law Wang Chow cooking, the place straightaway became the tastiest and most popular eatery around. It just goes to show ya. You never can tell about folks these days.

  Uncle Charley

  Charley Parkhurst was one of the most famous stage drivers in the gold rush, but Charley kept a powerful secret for a lifetime.

  Charlotte stirred for the first time in a while and I glanced over from the magazine in my lap. We’d been on board since early morning and I knew the trip was tiring for her. “I’ve been reading about all the trouble the British are having lately,” I said, mostly to make conversation and maybe take her mind off the tedium of train travel. “In South Africa this July, Lord Chelsford overran King Cetshwayo’s whole army and took his capital at Ulundi. If you recall, Cetshwayo is the man who butchered so many British soldiers in January. The Brits took him prisoner and shipped him to England.”