By Mokelumne River

Frank Bosworth and Li Ping raised their heads from where they crouched by the shore when Medicine Mutt started barking. They peered up the slope and spied three figures on horses coming down the trail, kicking up dust behind them. Frank and Li Ping poured out the water and gravel from their tin pans back into the river, put the pans down, stood up, and watched as the three men drew nigh.

They were big, mangy fellows, with leathery faces and bristly beards and an ill-favored look about them. Pistols hung from their belts and rifle butts stuck out from their saddles. The one in the lead wore a tall, worn stove pipe hat, and he gave a gaptoothed grin as he drew his horse up half a dozen paces from Frank and Li Ping. Tall Hat’s two companions wore beat-up Stetson hats – one black, one white – and took their places behind him, one to each side.

“Well, now, what have we got here?” Tall Hat said to Frank. “How’s the lady river treating you, fella? She coughing up?”

Frank smiled amiably and shrugged. “She’ll favor us yet.”

Tall Hat looked down at Medicine Mutt and said evenly, “Will you get your dog to stop nipping and sniffin’ at my horse’s heels afore I plug him?”

Frank said, “Now, no need for that. He’s just doing his job.” Then to Mutt: “Down, boy, down. C’mere.” Mutt circled away and lay down at Frank’s feet, staring at the three strangers warily.

Tall Hat looked over Frank appraisingly. He nodded at the revolver that hung low on Frank’s right thigh. He said, “You carry that like you know your ways around a .45. You in the war?”

Frank responded, “I got me into a few scrapes in my time.”

Tall Hat eyed Li Ping, taking in his black pants and black robe, his shaved head with his queue – that long, rope-like braid of hair that Chinese men wore – hanging down his back. Tall Hat snorted and said, still addressing Frank, “Why you got a Chinaman with you? He your cook?”

Frank glanced at Li Ping. “Well,” he admitted slowly, “he’s actually sorta my boss. My prospecting partner, really, but this here stake we got is mostly on his coin.”

Tall Hat straightened up and leaned back in surprise. “Your boss? Well, don’t that beat all!” He turned back to his companions. “Don’t that beat all, fellas? You ever heard of such a thing?”

The one behind him to his right wearing the black Stetson said grimly, “Damned affront to the Almighty, if you ask me. A white man working for a John Chinaman.”

Tall Hat faced Frank again with a look of disapproval. “What’s the story behind that?”

Frank shrugged again. “Li Ping’s been wanting to bring in his girl from across the ocean; been mooning over her and planning his wedding ceremony and all. He’d saved up from his railroad work on the Union Pacific, but he needed a little more, so he thought prospecting might be the way to go. I worked on the Union Pacific myself and knew him from there. He asked me to join him, and so here we are.”

Tall Hat shook his head. “Now, that ain’t right, bringing in a China woman to breed more squinty-eyed pups. Unless’n of course he puts her up for some whoring, which might be okay. Them China women are sweet enough when you ain’t got coin for a proper white whore.” He guffawed when he saw that Li Ping had turned from staring narrow-eyed at Frank to glaring furiously at him. “Why, fellas,” he said, “I do believe this John Chinaman’s getting what I’m saying. So who says their heathen minds can’t fathom Christian talk?”

He sighed expansively and said to Frank, “Well, now, fella, seeing as how you ain’t exactly been living right, taking up with a swarthy Oriental and all, I gotta say that some righteous retribution is in order.” He looked around at the small encampment. “You got some nice prospecting gear here: nice tent, couple of good nags, probably got some good vittles and maybe even some whiskey inside your tent. Not to mention John Chinaman’s coin. And I got a feeling you weren’t exactly forthright about your luck and prolly got a few nice shiny nuggets squirreled away. Ain’t that so?”

Frank sighed.

Tall Hat continued, “So I think taking it all would be a good and proper fine for, you know, breaking all sorts of laws of God and man.”

Frank said placatingly, “Come on, fellas. If I read you right, you boys were in the big fight, same as me. We all seen enough plundering and shooting and killing to last a lifetime. Ain’t no need to go down this road.”

Tall Hat said, “You’re right, there ain’t no need to go down this road. All you gotta do is unhitch your gun belt and let it slide down to the ground and this’ll all turn out nice and peaceful.”

Frank sighed again. “Well, fellas, no one could ever claim I ain’t a peaceable man. Why, I remember a time in Kansas, when I came across a couple of fine gentlemen like yourselves and I – “

“Oh, for crying out loud,” Li Ping said and pulled a gun from his robe and shot Tall Hat in the chest.

Tall Hat’s horse reared, dumping him on the ground. Li Ping shifted his aim to the right of the horse pawing air and plugged White Stetson as he was drawing his rifle from its saddle holster. Frank got Black Stetson on the left. None of the three men got off a shot.

Li Ping strode to the men lying on the ground with Mutt padding by his side, barking excitedly. He kicked the bodies one by one. One of them stirred and moaned; Li Ping aimed at his face and fired.

He walked back to Frank, tucking his gun back in his robe, shaking his head in exasperation.

“What?” Frank said. “I was working my way to it.”

“How? By talking ’em to death?”

“I was, you know, trying to lull them so I could make my play.”

“Yeah, that’ll work. And what was that about telling them about me and my girl back home?”

“What? They was going to be dead anyway. Where’s the harm in shooting the breeze sometimes? You’re always so damn silent.”

Li Ping frowned. “I’m paying good coin for this here business venture. The least you can do is hold up your end and take care of these varmints when they show up, like you’re supposed to. Do I gotta do everything myself?”

“Ahhh, you always take things so damn serious.”

(June 2011)