Blood Gold by Michael Cadnum

time, wishing I could banter with her, like a gentleman of the world, and win yet another smile.
    â€œBecause some big brute with a knife strapped to his leg came galloping along—hollering out of his face.”
    I wondered if I could have mistaken what I had seen in the Panama street.
    Galloping . The word stung. I had fancied myself quite a nimble runner. And surely I had not made much noise.
    â€œI swear on my mother’s grave,” she added, “that I am no thief. Although,” she added, “I am not sure most gold seekers are much better than robbers, hurrying like crazy men to dig nuggets out of the ground.”
    I explained my own particular reasons for coming to California, speaking as plainly as delicacy would allow. I was not just another gold seeker, I told her. My journey would be complete, I told her, if I found Ezra and explained to him why he was required back home.
    Florence leaned against the rail, and I joined her, both of us watching an egret as it hesitated, startled by the approach of the schooner.
    â€œAnd is this Elizabeth back home a special friend of yours?” she inquired.
    â€œA good friend,” I agreed. But then I found myself adding, “But not in the way you might mean.”
    â€œIs it possible, then, that you did not leave a lady back in Philadelphia?”
    â€œNo, you could say, in all fairness, that I didn’t.” I was afraid that the truth made me sound plain and unworldly.
    Timothy made his way along the rail. I realized that I had never heard the voice of this darkly bearded member of the clan.
    The blood was drying to a long bright wrinkle along his cheek. He gave me a conspiratory nod, with the same combination of gentleness and danger displayed by his father, his eyes twinkling but studying me, perhaps wondering if he would have to cut my throat to keep me from barking—or doing anything to harm Florence.
    At that moment the white-feathered egret took to the air, circling over the auburn marshland. Timothy made a show of holding an imaginary fowling piece, following the water bird’s flight.
    Florence stood very close to me.
    â€œWilliam,” she said, “the women of Philadelphia must be as dumb as oysters.”
    I couldn’t keep myself from laughing. “Florence, what would make you say such a thing?”
    â€œBecause,” she said, “you seem to me like a person very well worth knowing.”

CHAPTER 28
    Captain Deerborn gave me a quick verbal sketch of California geography, between sips of fiery corn liquor.
    A long inland valley, scored by a few navigable rivers, was skirted by rugged foothills. Beyond the ascending hills, to the east, lofted the mighty Sierra Nevada. It was in the streams and culverts of the mountain foothills that the gold was being found. Word was that soon California would join the United States. Meanwhile, the American government did what it could to deliver mail and defend California waters from theoretical foreign intrusion—British, Russian, Spanish. Nevertheless, as anyone could see, no central government operated with any coherence in this lively land.
    â€œThere’s a newly situated U.S. courthouse in Monterey,” said the captain, “but communications being mostly slow, mining camps deal with felons independently, as the need arises.”
    â€œOn the field of honor,” I suggested.
    The captain shook his head emphatically. “If there’s a death there’s an inquest, Willie, and a sensible trial if one is needed. I saw a legal proceeding in Benecia a couple weeks back, and read about one down in Jamestown. We’re gold seekers, not barbarians.”
    I spent most of the time during our short voyage up the Sacramento River belowdecks. The bilge was no longer so black and foul-smelling—it was running clear through the pumps, a bad sign. I liked my fellow laborers, a cobbler from Albany, a glassblower from Toronto.
    It was the second