Nineteen
Since he’d never ridden a railroad before, Gillom knew he wouldn’t be sleeping much, so he purchased a second-class ticket for five dollars, which didn’t include a sleeping berth. He watched as a few folks got on the passenger train after this every-other-night express pulled into Engle about 9:00 P.M. More families got off in that little station after their shopping excursions to Albuquerque, mothers carrying sacks of new clothes and dads boxes of foodstuffs, their kids clutching new toys. One gent carried a new saddle over his shoulder as Gillom brushed past him looking for an empty seat in the day coach, after he’d passed his saddlebags and warbag to a baggage man on the platform.
Gillom pushed past an overweight man dozing on the aisle and took a seat next to the window. Electric lights in the cars were on during its half hour stop in Engle. He could see cattle waiting to be shipped out of pens across the tracks. Gillom was settling into the comfortable upholstery when the whistle suddenly shrilled, the train cars jerked, and couplings clanked, and the steam engine began its hard pull forward.
The fat man next to him was already snoring, so Gillom restlessly got up. The parlor car was half-filled with cattlemen and traveling salesmen, drinking at the stand-up bar or sitting in plush chairs smoking or reading a selection of newspapers or books from racks above the cushioned wall seats. Women weren’t allowed to drink liquor with the men to discourage the many traveling prostitutes, and he’d already been warned by a conductor who looked at his ticket that he wouldn’t be served, either. Gillom paused to have his boots blackened again by a white kid who also served as the train’s butcher boy, selling lollipops, fruit, and cigars to the passengers. The boy wanted fifty cents for his snappy shine, which Gillom thought high and thus declined to tip, earning a scowl. He watched one woman shuffling cards with a few boisterous men at a poker table, but she didn’t appear to be drinking anything stronger than iced tea. He spotted a writing table nearby and commandeered it, using the free pens, ink, and paper to dash off a brief note to his mother.
Gillom then walked the Persian carpeting through a concertina-pleated vestibule between cars, to spare travelers discomfort from wind or rain. He peeked into the dining room, where white-jacketed Negro waiters were tidying up while several tables of diners lingered over their coffee and pie. Gillom wasn’t hungry, so after getting an evil eye from the uniformed black porter in the next sleeper car to the rear, he trudged back to his second-class car. There he crammed beside the snoring fat man and rested his cheek against the cool glass of the window. Squinting, Gillom could just make out the ghostly shapes of occasional cows as they ran away from the scary fire-breathing snake as it roared down dark rails under a silvery moon.
* * *
Deming, New Mexico, sat at the conjunction of two major railroads, so all the passengers had to disembark from the Santa Fe after midnight and fend for themselves until picking up the Southern Pacific headed west out of El Paso the next morning, or early next evening when another SP train arrived from the West Coast headed on to the main city of West Texas. Gillom reaffirmed this from a conductor after they arrived in Deming and he learned his options for the night. Passengers served themselves according to their needs—families hiring a carriage to drive them and their luggage into the railroad crossroad for some fitful sleep at a small hotel. Single men, after seeing their bags into safe storage at the depot, might walk into town for a nightcap at one of Deming’s tough saloons. This wasn’t the most prudent course, for in the early 1900s this was a brawling railroad town so lawless that outlaws rounded up in Arizona were often booted into the next territory with a one-way ticket to Deming.
So he’d been warned. Gillom picked up his saddlebags and wandered off to an outside corner of the depot building, as far away as he could get from the few people milling about inside the station, uncertain what to do with themselves till dawn. The teenager had had enough excitement this very long day, and he nodded off under a starry sky, a bag of unshelled peanuts in one hand and a bottle of fizzwater in the other.
* * *
Come morning and after depositing his gear in the baggage room and purchasing another six-dollar ticket to Benson, Gillom strolled into the dusty burg to wolf down breakfast at the Beehive Café. He mailed his letter to his mother in the little post office inside Deming’s only mercantile, which opened at 8:00 A.M. His westbound wasn’t due in until after ten, so he dawdled down the town’s small main street of shops and saloons and took a gander at its real business—an extensive rail yard composed of an engine roundhouse and train repair shops and freight car sidings shared by two of America’s mightiest railroads, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe, and the Southern Pacific.
Gillom had heard fuel oil was starting to replace coal burners on some Western railroads, but those sleeker, cleaner engines hadn’t arrived on the Sunset Route yet. He marveled at the size of the Mogul locomotives being worked on by mechanics. Then a distant whistle keened and the youth hustled back to the depot to reclaim his bags as the big ten-wheeler chuffed into town spraying cinders and smoke.
Gillom watched better-dressed passengers debark for a morning constitutional around the platform before resuming their journey. He was transfixed by one pretty blonde brushing her linen duster off with gloved hands after she removed it to shake soot off her wardrobe. The teenager snapped out of his daze to get his saddlebags to a porter and clamber aboard the Southern Express himself. They were rolling westward not long afterward.
* * *
Gillom awoke from exhausted sleep after noon, oblivious to the comings and goings of others in their second-class car. What should have been a fast, uneventful trip on the bumpy roadbed wasn’t, for this Southern train was no express, but a milk run, requiring a stop at every way station between El Paso and Tucson. As they screeched into yet another small depot, he complained to a man reading a newspaper next to him.
“We’re stopping again?”
“Southern Pacific has the only twice-weekly train running across the bottom of this country, kid, so they milk their business for all it’s worth. Even making less than thirty miles an hour, it’s still faster than a bumpy stagecoach. No Indian attacks, either.”
Gillom nodded. His mouth was dry from sleeping wide open, catching flies, as his mother used to say, so he roused to stretch numbed legs. This train was much more crowded on its main run than the mixed passenger and freight train he’d ridden in from Engle, and the bar car was its hub. Gillom bought more soda water to wash from his mouth leftover salt from the peanuts. One nattily dressed gent seated alone at a small table against the wall caught Gillom’s eye and beckoned him over, gesturing to the one empty chair left in the parlor car.
“Sit down, young man. Take a load off.”
Gillom did as bid.
“Nice brace of pistols. Where’s a young gun hand like you headed?”
“Bisbee. Hear that’s a fast town.”
“It is indeed. To do what there, may I ask?”
Gillom admired the middle-aged man’s fancy clothing, his ruffled white shirt under his black silk vest which displayed hand-painted red and pink roses on its wide lapels.
“Oh, somethin’ to do with protection—bank guard, stage shotgun, mine security, eventually maybe law enforcement.”
The stranger nodded. “All that copper mining in Bisbee, precious metal shipments, ought to be lots of protection jobs for an aggressive young fella like you. Dangerous work, though.”
Gillom just smiled.
“So you’re a risk taker. Betting your life on your nerve and quickness, your steady hand under fire.” The man reached inside a pocket of the black broadcloth coat he’d draped over the back of his chair and withdrew a deck of cards, which he fanned in one hand, then bent back and riffed rapidly into the palm of his other. Gillom saw the heavy gold rings he sported on either hand.
“Care for a little pasteboards? To pass the long hours till you reach your mining mecca.”
“I’m no gambler.”
“Ahh. Ever tried three-card monte? It’s simple and fast. The right game for a lad with sharp eyes like yours.” The flashy stranger flipped over the top card to show him the ace of hearts, which he laid onto the table faceup. The next two were the king of spades and the queen of clubs, which also went onto the bare table. The dealer slid the rest of his railroad bible back into his coat pocket, then turned the three cards over again, facedown.
“Remember where that ace of hearts was? Keep your eye on her now.” The man began moving the three face cards around beneath his big hands. He stopped and spread his hands wide. “Where is that red ace, sir?”
Gillom aimed an index finger at the card on his left. With a broad smile the gent flipped over the ace of hearts. It was easy.
“Excellent. Okay, let’s make it interesting. Five dollars?”
After a pause, Gillom nodded. The ace was turned back over again and the three cards began their little dance. This time Rogers watched the ace end up on the right.
The gambler nodded. “Your eyes are quicker than my hand, young sir. Ten dollars?”
“After you pay me my five.”
“But of course. You’re a careful manager of your money, sir. I respect that in one so young.” Pulling out a leather change purse from a back pocket, he removed a five-dollar bill and handed it over. Again, the cards were circled, then reversed. Now the ace was in the middle, which the youth pointed to. The gambler shook his head at the correct call, made a production of pulling several Mexican five-dollar coins from his change purse to roll across the hardwood. “Give me a chance at twenty?”
But Gillom shook his head no.
“Oh, c’mon. Surely you’re enough of a sport to allow me a chance at winning my money back?”
Another young man stepped up to the table now, who’d been watching this pasteboard manipulation keenly from a distance.
“I’ll go you for that twenty, mister.”
“Weeell, all right. At least someone’s got sporting blood.”
Gillom looked this young man, in his early twenties maybe, over. A derby hat, a tan-and-black-checked suit, soft brown leather dress boots completed this young buck’s ensemble. No weapons visible. A traveling salesman of some type of flashy, unnecessary merchandise probably. The sport watched the cards move again and with a grin, fingered the red ace.
“Pay up, pardner.”
“Damn! You boys are bleedin’ me to death.” The gambler rubbed perspiring hands across his brow, then off on his shirtsleeves, shooting his French cuffs. “But I’m a sporting man. I’ll take another chance.” He paid off with a small twenty-dollar gold piece.
“Let’s go fifty.” The new bettor agreed. The cards seemed to move faster now under the gambler’s paws, but when he at last paused his shuffle, Gillom’s eagle eye was fixed upon what he figured to be the high heart. He also noticed that one corner of that card seemed to be tipped, bent slightly upon one edge. The new player must have noticed this, too, for with a chuckle of satisfaction, he pointed to that same card. With a grumble, the gambler turned over the red ace once more.
“Damnation! I cannot win for losing today. You eagle-eyed, young bucks are plucking me bare.” This time he peeled off two twenty-dollar bills and a ten-spot to push reluctantly across the table to the flashy bettor.
“Double or nothin’. My last hundred.” For emphasis, the monte man withdrew a one-hundred-dollar bill from his pouch and laid it on the edge of the small table, smoothing it out with his big hand. He stared at the new bettor, but the sport in the derby shook his head.
“I don’t want to take all your money, mister.” The sport looked directly at Gillom. “Kid wants some of this, it’s his turn.”
The gambler now stared at Gillom. “Fair enough. You clipped me, too.”
A small crowd had slowly gathered to watch this table action and from it pushed an older gentleman in a blue hat and coat, a silver watch chain dangling from his vest. He took Gillom by the elbow.
“May I see your ticket, son?”
“Huh? Oh, sure.” Gillom fumbled in his pants pocket, but found the ticket and gave it up.
The conductor looked at the ticket, then steered the youth from his seat and out of the small crowd. “Come with me a moment.”
The big gambler was immediately on his feet. “Hey! This young man was about to bet!”
“Gamble with your own kind, Doc.” The railroad employee pointed at the young sport in the checked suit. “Like your partner there.”
“Mister, I wanted to bet that card,” Gillom protested as the train conductor pushed him to a free corner of the parlor car.
“You saw the bent corner on that ace? Well, I guarantee you that ace was about to be replaced by a bent face card instead,” hissed the older man. “That’s Doc Davis, son, notorious cardsharp. Seen his sleight of hand too many times. That young bettor was his ‘capper,’ helping him set you up. We can’t stop ’em from buying tickets, but I can stop them from running that old monte ruse on our unwary passengers.”
Gillom squinted, peering back at the two cardsharps who were fuming loudly to bystanders near their table.
“I didn’t realize.… Thanks.”
The graying conductor finally smiled. “The Southern Pacific is trying hard to stop card cheating on its rails.” They shook hands. “Save your money, kid. And stay away from the gaming tables.”
Gillom nodded thoughtfully and started for the front exit of the parlor car. He was hungry after his brush with poverty, so he splurged on a full dinner in the dining car, seated at a table for two with white linen and silver service, where he was served by an Ethiopian waiter in a spotless white tunic. The teenager enjoyed foods he’d never tasted before, including salmi of duck, baked veal pie, French slaw, and sweet potatoes, with mince pie, vanilla ice cream, French coffee, and a sampling of cheeses for dessert. For $1.50.
Feeling like an overfed potentate, for the rest of the train ride Gillom dozed in his coach seat and stared out the window at the two-horse towns they had to stop at to take on or put off a mailbag, boxes of goods, or a couple passengers. It was dark when the Southern Express pulled into Benson, a somewhat larger depot on the slow train ride toward the territory’s biggest town, Tucson.
Gillom grabbed his saddlebags from a porter unloading the baggage car and spotted the friendly conductor, who offered a final word of advice.
“Careful with those guns you’re toting, young man. I’d hate for them to put you on the night train to the big adios.”
The teenager waved him away, as with another shriek of its whistle, the Southern Express chugged off into the West.
* * *
He ambled into Benson loosening stiff legs. Because it was midweek, Gillom was able to find a spare bed at the first boarding house he came to. Their communal supper had already been served, so the landlady pointed him toward a nearby saloon. There he ordered the chicken stew, which seemed tasty until the beer slurper stooped over beside him at the long bar remarked it was actually prairie dog. Gillom immediately wished he was back on the train, fine dining.
* * *
Next morning, Gillom Rogers rode the 11:00 A.M. train out of Benson with maybe thirty passengers in its two rail cars, other boxcars filled with store goods. The ticket clerk had explained that this faster express run had just been inaugurated to get the Western mail into Bisbee in time for same-day delivery.
“Business is booming in Bisbee,” the clerk told him, “so the Phelps Dodge Company built their own fifty-five miles of track when they couldn’t get Southern Pacific to run a spur down there from Benson.”
So Gillom rode the small Arizona and Southeastern Railroad on its two-hour run, enjoying the scenery and conversing with a well-dressed gentleman on the seat across from him.
“Going to Bisbee on business, young man?”
“Yessir. I hope to find employment guarding the mines, banks, something in the protection line,” replied Gillom.
The gentleman had been idly blowing smoke rings from his cigar, but he now focused on his fellow traveler.
“That’s necessary work, with all the money generated by the mining industry. You look a little young to be a deputy.”
“Probably. They like you to have a few years’ practical experience before law enforcement will hire you.”
“As well they should. Dangerous job.” The older man blew another smoke ring and was pleased with the result. “Copper is a wondrous metal, son, and as long as its price holds up, a lot of us in mining are going to ride its glittering back to our fortunes. Copper is nearly indestructible and I know you’ve seen it conducting electricity through telephone wires. But it’s also used in ship hulls, cookware, and roofing. Why, those pistol cartridges in that belt around your waist, every one of them contains half an ounce of pure copper in its brass.”
Gillom looked down at his belt to inspect a round. “I didn’t realize.”
“The ore out here is very low grade compared to Michigan’s high-grade deposits. It takes a hundred and fifty pounds of smelted copper to equal the value of one ounce of gold or fifteen ounces of silver. That’s why Phelps Dodge built this little railroad, to lower their connector freight rate on smelted ore down to a dollar a ton. Beats those old mule-drawn ore wagons they used to run up to Benson by six times on price.”
“You must be a mining man?”
The businessman smiled. “Work for Anaconda Copper, the big boy up in Butte, Montana. Copper Queen Consolidated is going to shut down their old smelter in Bisbee. Copper Queen’s building a better smelter down in Douglas, right on the border, twenty-three miles away. They’ve got more well water there and cheaper land to expand on.”
“Huh.” Gillom was impressed. “Maybe I’ll look for work there.”
“You should,” agreed the equipment broker. “But they haven’t found any copper around Douglas. It’s all up there, hiding in those Mule Mountains.”
Gillom pressed his face to the train’s window glass as he followed the mining man’s pointed finger.
“See those two peaks? Think they look like two big ears on a mule?”
“Not really,” said Gillom. The buyer laughed. “How many folks live there?”
“Oh, about eight thousand, I heard.” The equipment broker leaned closer to the window, looking out across the sun-baked plains leading up to mountain crags sparsely forested with Apache pines. “They used to call this isolated place ‘the country that God forgot.’ But that’s certainly no longer the case with Bisbee.”
No indeed, Gillom Rogers thought, and I can’t wait to get there.