WHEN I GOT BACK to my boardinghouse, I found Miss Carrie Pixley loitering on the boardwalk outside my window. I remembered I had asked her to meet me there daily at 4¹/₂ p.m.

“You better make it six p.m. from now on,” I said. “We adjourned early today because of a pistol-packing monkey.”

“P.K.?” she said. “Is that you? You look different with bangs and spectacles and a stovepipe hat.”

“Don’t forget my false front teeth,” I said, and added, “Looking different is the point of a disguise.”

She said, “Do you have any news about my Beloved?”

“I only saw him for a few minutes,” I replied, taking out my teeth. “I am in what is called the First House and he is in the Second House.”

She said, “One of Old Abe Curry’s daughters is getting married on Tuesday night in the Legislature. All the reporters will be there. Will you go and tell me who my Beloved dances with?”

I took off my stovepipe hat and scratched my head. “I don’t know if I have time,” I said. “Jace asked me to write reports for him and I only have the evenings to do that.”

“Oh, please!” she pleaded. “I simply must find out who he likes.”

“Tomorrow is Saturday,” I said. “The First House is not meeting but the Second House is. I am going because I want to know who the other legislators are so I can get a grip on this Legislature and do a good job for Jace. Why don’t you come along, too, and stand in the gallery? Maybe when Sam sees you he will invite you to go with him to the wedding.”

She clapped her hands. “Oh, what a bully idea!” Then she added, “Do you want me to send another telegram? I will take it to E.B. and everything.”

I remembered what Jace had told me and nodded. I gave her this message for Miss Opal Blossom aka Miss Jane Loveless: J. at Legislature by day, poker by night & not stepping out with anybody. Peter Clever.

As I tore out the page and handed it to Carrie, I felt bad about lying to Opal Blossom, but I did not dare oppose Jace. I wondered how long it would be before Opal Blossom angrily summoned me back from Carson and asked for a refund of my expenses.

That was why I was surprised by Opal Blossom’s reply the following morning.

It was the first telegram I had ever received. Mrs. Murphy brought it with my cold potato.

At the very top it said OVERLAND TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

Then someone had filled in a blank by hand: November 15, 1862

Then: BY TELEGRAPH FROM Virginia City 1862

Below that was: TO MASTER PETER CLEVER

And finally: GOOD WORK. SEND SUMMARY OF LEGISLATIVE BUSINESS DAILY BY STAGECOACH NOT TELEGRAM. MISS J. LOVELESS

At first I thought it strange that she wanted to know about legislative business but then I figured that—like me—she was interested in anything that interested Jace.

It was Saturday and the members of the Council were not meeting but the other group of legislators were. I guess the Second House had to hammer out some bills tossed to them by the First House, like in one of my doodles.

The Representatives met in the biggest upstairs room of the Great Basin Hotel, the room where I had fainted a few days before.

Barry was not there because it was his Sabbath. So I sat near Mr. A.J. Marsh—the famous inventor of Phonographic Shorthand—on account of he had told me to ask him for help.

Instead of just thirteen legislators like in the First House, the Second House had twice that number. Most of them sat in four curved rows of desks rather than just two. I did not think I could memorize another 26 men.

So to help narrow it down, I asked Mr. A.J. Marsh which of the Representatives were important. He pointed out a man named John D. Winters who had introduced a bill called the Corporation Bill last year. That bill was so controversial that fistfights had often broken out between those “pro” (for it) and those “con” (against it). John D. Winters had even pounded on “Monkey” Van Bokkelen with a piece of firewood in the Ormsby House Barroom.

“Did they hammer that bill into a law?” I asked Mr. A.J. Marsh, using my newly learned vocabulary.

“No.” He laughed. “They are still trying to beat it out. In fact, Winters’ s brother punched Gillespie on the nose just three days ago, ‘drawing the ruby’ slightly.”

I decided to give John D. Winters the nickname “Firewood” and I dubbed his brother “Ruby.”

Mr. A.J. Marsh told me who was pro the bill and who was con. I duly made a list, even though I did not understand the bill.

It being a Saturday, the gallery at the back of the chamber was full of bystanders, of whom about half were women. Miss Carrie Pixley gave me a secret wave; she recognized me because she had already seen me in my Jewish Phonographic Boy Disguise. Mrs. Violetta De Baskerville had never seen me in this disguise but was also watching me with narrowed eyes. Had she recognized me, too? When she saw me looking at her she turned away & started talking to a good-looking young man with floppy chestnut hair.

“What are those women doing here?” I asked Mr. A.J. Marsh.

He looked up from taking notes. “Some are here to support their husbands and others to pray, but I believe most of them want Toll Road Franchises.”

My ears pricked up. “Toll Road Franchises?” I said.

Mr. A.J. Marsh nodded. “See that lady with the dark hair in the gray dress? That is Margaret Ormsby, the richest woman in town. She owns the Ormsby House Hotel and lots of other property hereabouts.”

I said, “Is she the one whose husband was killed by Indians two years ago?”

“That’s right. They named this county after him. I believe she is bidding for a Toll Road Franchise from Clear Creek to Lake Bigler.”

“What is a Toll Road Franchise, anyway?”

“It is a kind of private bill that will give you a few miles of road. You take care of it, put up a toll house and you can make up to half a million dollars a year for hardly any work.”

I said, “Half a million dollars a year? For a few miles of toll road?”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mr. A.J. Marsh. “There is big money to be made in many ways apart from silver mining. Toll roads is one of those ways.”

I said, “Who can get a toll road?”

“Anybody, in theory, as long as you get one of the legislators to propose your name and it is voted through.”

“How do you get one of them to propose your name?”

“You have to lobby them.”

“Lobby?”

“Yes,” said Mr. A.J. Marsh. “Lobbying a politician is a little like wooing a woman. You have to be charming and make them like you. You take them out to dinner or the theater. Then, when you are friends with them, you tell them what you want. Tell them you know surveyors or road builders who would make a nice road. Tell them you will not charge too much. Tell them how you will give them free passage on your road. Of course, if that doesn’t work you can always resort to bribes, threats or fisticuffs.” He winked at me and went back to writing his squiggly worm writing.

Ma Evangeline told me when people wink at you it means they are just joshing.

The reporters were passing around an amusing map drawn by one of the legislators and it came to me. It showed Nevada with so many toll roads that the ends of them hung over the border & looked like a fringe.

“They are already calling this the Legislature of a Thousand Toll Roads,” said Mr. A.J. Marsh with another wink.

When the Second House adjourned at 2 p.m., I did not even go back to my boardinghouse but headed straight to the stables to see Cheeya.

I badly needed to clear my head, for it was clogged with strange images of Eyes & Noses & Duck Bills & Fringed Maps & Pieces of Firewood.

I reckon that is why I did not notice the man following me.