LITMIR.BIZ

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“We need you.”

      I didn’t have no answer to that. Truth is, I didn’t much care for this Transactions company and what they were up to. I think she read it in me, because she started in on me.

      “Our company’s going to control the Swamp Creek Mining District quite soon, Mr. Cotton. There’s the two big mines, and all the outlying ones. The big ones are proven, and have lots of reserves, but the smaller ones are only now being explored. We pick up the rights to them at auction, mostly because their claims are faulty, and it’s going to pay off. The claims on the two big mines, they’re both faulty, too, and we’ll have them in a few months. But we need professional staff, good men who’ll help us. That’s where you fit in.”

      “I’m not sure I’m following you, ma’am.”

      “It’s miss, not ma’am. The last thing I want from life is marriage.”

      “What is it you want, ma’am?”

      “Lovers,” she said.

      Me, I get dizzy mighty quick, and I was getting plumb loose on my pins just then. I looked at old Carter, and he was just smilin’ away like he’d heard it all before.

      Scruples just smiled. “You probably don’t approve of us. It doesn’t matter. We make a fair offer on the smaller mines, some of them hardly proven up, and if the owners resist, we apply some muscle. We certainly don’t want anyone to get hurt. Usually, a little show of force is all that’s needed. And then we record a new claim that’ll stand up. We’ve gotten five smaller mines that way, and we’re having them evaluated. Some will be worthless, and that’s why this business is a risk. But once we have the small operations up and running, and get a revenue stream going, we’ll tackle the Big Mother Mine. That’s the crown jewel of Swamp Creek, and it’s yielding a clear profit of half a million a year, with no sign of pinching out. And the Fat Tuesday Mine’s not far behind.”

      He was making it sound like some regular business deal, far as I could tell, but I got to remembering what old Agnes Cork told me, all about Brashear, the crooked clerk for the district in cahoots with this bunch, and it wasn’t so regular at all. And all them gunslicks out there at the Cork place, they were fixing to kill old Agnes and take over.

      I got to my feet, and pushed that fancy cup and saucer away. “I guess I’ll go collect Critter and head down the hill,” I said.

      “Wait!” she replied.

      I didn’t much care to, but I thought I’d hear her out.

      She came right up to me and peered into my eyes. “I guess we’re not paying you enough,” she said. “So here’s some incentive. Each time you clear out the squatters from the mines we’ve got, you can spend one night with me.”

      That hit me in the pit of my stomach. I could hardly manage it.

      “Each success, one night. I think you’d like that.” She smiled. “I’d like it, too.”

      I sure was getting into places where I ain’t been, and I couldn’t hardly make sense of it.

      “Your hundred a month, plus your pleasures,” Scruples said cheerfully.

      “How come me?” I blurted.

      “Because of your big gun,” she replied, and laughed sweetly.

      My mouth, it was so parched I couldn’t hardly reply. She smiled and beckoned me to one of them rooms in the Palace Car I’d not seen when we were going from rear to front. I followed her to a door, and she opened up, and there was a small but fancy bedroom with a big old bed in it, and just room enough to get around in there. It sure was a purty place, with lots of quilted stuff and things like that, but that’s not what caught my eye.

      Above the bed was a big long oil painting of Amanda, spread out on some sort of couch I hardly ever saw before, and she wasn’t wearing a stitch. She was just lying there, all golden colored, with a little smile on her face, and her lips parted a little, and the rest of her sort of waiting for the evening to begin. I just plain stared, not having seen anything like that, not even in some saloon, where they got naked ladies in paintings, but them ladies usually got some gauzy thing sort of protecting them a little. But not Amanda. All of her was just plain caught in oil paint, and I took off my hat and stared.

      “Well, all right, I guess I’ll do her,” I said, pushing aside all them objections that’d been crowding in my mind.

      Just one night, I thought. I’d get some old miner to move along, and have myself just one night with her, and just the thought of it made me want to get the job done in two seconds.

      “Then we have a transaction,” she said.

      I wasn’t so sure what all that was about, and must have showed it.

      “There are a few details still to be worked out,” she said. “But it’s clear enough, isn’t it, Mr. Cotton? For each trespasser you remove from our mining properties, you get one night, and only one, with me.”

      She smiled. There was more in her purple eyes than business.

      “I’ll get right on with it,” I said.

      She motioned me to the cozy parlor at the rear of the Palace Car, where Carter Scruples was waiting. He had donned one of those neck scarves, danged if I could remember the name, but ascot came to mind from something I’d read. First time I’d ever seen one.

      “I’m glad, Cotton,” he said. “You have certain valuable skills we happen to need.”

      He meant I knew how to handle a gun, which I sure did.

      “You just give me a list,” I said.

      “Well, we need to look at a few details before this is finalized,” he said.

      I knew it. There was always a few strings. You cut a deal with someone, and next thing, they’re adding a few strings. It’s the damndest thing how a deal gets worked upon after the handshake, and not before.

      He eyed me cheerfully. “Once you’re in our employ, you’ll follow our direction without cavil.”

      I sure didn’t know what a cavil was. “I don’t have any cavils,” I said.

      “Objections. You’ll proceed agreeably as directed. Agreed?”

      “No wiggle room?”

      “You can always discuss it with us, if you think something won’t work. We’re not some sort of Prussian militarists here.”

      “What if these here people I’m evicting get excited, like Agnes Cork?”

      “You will remove them by whatever means.”

      “And confiscate their property,” Amanda added. “We consider it payment for rent.”

      “What else?”

      Scruples frowned slightly, as if a little bit perplexed by the human race. “It sometimes happens that someone wants to abandon his agreement with Transactions. We can’t permit it. Once you’re in, we expect absolute loyalty until such a time as our goals are reached. The earliest you can seek release is one year from today.”

      “That’s a long time some fella can’t even quit.”

      “Then don’t join us.”

      But Amanda, she was winking at me and fooling with a button.

      “Anything else?” I asked.

      “If you should betray the trust we place in you, you will be considered to have gone over to the other side, and we will deal with you.”

      That riled me some. “I’m not some switcher, and there’s no call for you to accuse me. I join up with some brand, I’m loyal to the brand. I got one other question. You got the same deal with the other ones, the fellers out there in the barn?”

      “Our arrangements are confidential, and that applies to

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