whatever means,” he said.
I knew right then he was working around the truth of it with a mouthful of fancies.
“You mean push ’em out at gunpoint,” I said, “and using them guns if I have to.”
Scruples smiled. “It’s worth a hundred dollars a month to you.”
Holy cats, that’s more money than I ever seen before, and it made me itch. But I’d have to use my six-guns to kill people just for hanging on to the mines they started up. I thought about that, and I thought about the two slicks I’d met today, the one near the Mint and the one he called Lugar, and I didn’t much like the idea.
“I think not, Mr. Scruples,” I said.
“I don’t ask a second time,” he said.
I collected my sweaty old hat and stood up, and holy cats, that blonde walked in, and her hair was down around her shoulders, and I plumb stopped whatever I was doing right then and there.
Chapter Four
Well, I’d wandered up the hill and dickered with this here Scruples, and there she was, standing there and smiling, and I went weak at the knees.
“Mr. Cotton,” she said, extending a creamy hand.
I hardly dared take hold, but I managed it, and pumped away until it occurred to me I oughter stop.
“I’m Amanda Trouville, and pleased to meet you.”
I just gawked there, not being in control of my senses, and words just wouldn’t fill my mouth or even come into my poor old head.
I guess you’d call her a golden blonde. Least, that’s how it come to me. She had that soft blond hair, my ma used to call it dishwater blond because it had a bit of light brown in it, but you couldn’t use that there word, dishwater, on Amanda Trouville. It just didn’t fit. That flesh, my ma used to call it peaches and creamy, and maybe that fit well enough. Peaches, that was pretty good. Her eyes, they were purple, I’d make an oath to it, first purple peepers I ever seen. But that hardly describes her. She was above medium, and curvy, but not too curvy, and well formed, far as I could tell. She wore a simple gray dress, and darned if it didn’t have pleats in it, something I hardly ever seen, and it was unbuttoned a bit at the neck, where that peachy flesh sort of disappeared.
I was half crazy, and was thinkin’ maybe I’d better just vamoose now that I got a good look. She was a rich man’s woman, and not for the likes of old Cotton.
“I’ve heard so much about you,” she said, makin’ me more nervous than I’ve ever got in all my life. What’d she hear? Probably no good, for sure.
“Do sit down, Cotton. I’ll have some coffee with you.”
Scruples, he just settled a cup and saucer before her.
“Cat got your tongue, Cotton?” she asked, and them purple eyes sort of took me in, scraping over me like I had no secrets left.
“Well, ma’am, I was just wonderin’ how come you’re Trouville and he’s Scruples, or maybe I’m just getting myself into more trouble here.”
“Oh, we’re not married, Cotton. We’re partners. We’re equal owners of an enterprise. We’re in business together.”
Well, there’s business and there’s business, and I didn’t dare ask what sort of business.
“Our company’s called Transactions, Incorporated. Carter and I believe that all of life’s a transaction.”
“Ma’am, I don’t know one end of that word from the other.”
“Oh, of course you do. Transactions are agreements. We believe in negotiating agreements with others, and that’s how we live. Our personal arrangements are a transaction. I am his lover and he supports me. He pays me a thousand dollars a month to go to bed with me. But it’s not an exclusive contract. I am free to made my own arrangements.”
I was getting mighty flustered here, and I sort of thought maybe I’d gotten into something I couldn’t get no handle on. I thought there’s married people, and people who go to whorehouses, and people who work in whorehouses, and I didn’t know anything else was floating around except old maid schoolmarms.
She didn’t look mean neither. I always thought them women were hard as a Dutch oven, but her gaze was sweet, and she had little smileys around her eyes. I sure couldn’t make no sense of her, but I didn’t have to. Every time she shifted around, all I could think about was what was hidden from my poor eyes.
Carter Scruples, he must of seen me making moon eyes, because he sorta took over.
“Amanda, Mr. Cotton doesn’t think he’ll join us.”
I hated like hell to be called Cotton, that not being my real handle, but I just shut up and smiled.
I’d gotten what I came for, a look at this here blonde, and I figured it was time to get out.
“I’m on my way, sir.”
“Oh, don’t go!” Amanda said. “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
