Auraria by Tim Westover

Author:Tim Westover [Westover, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Goodreads: 23597253
Publisher: QW Publishers
Published: 2012-07-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

Three months later, on a gray morning, Holtzclaw and Shadburn stood on a dais high above the valley. The dais stood at the center of an iron bridge that spanned from the Great Hogback Ridge to Sinking Mountain. Originally, the dedication ceremony was only for the bridge, but Shadburn had insisted that it serve for the dam as well. It was time to close the floodgates and let the lake begin to fill.

Holtzclaw thought it was lunacy. Once the waters started to rise, the old town site would be underwater in a week, and the rest of the valley gone in a month. Far too soon! Holtzclaw had too much work still to do—for Shadburn and for Ms. Rathbun. He had yet to find any investors or any of Auraria’s promised fortunes. He did not have the capital to see either hotel to completion.

“Shadburn, it’s not too late to postpone the flood,” he said, while Dr. Rathbun swelled to a rhetorical flourish in his remarks to the crowd. “There’s no shame in waiting, only prudence.”

“First, Holtzclaw,” replied Shadburn, “I don’t want to endure the indignities and expenses of two opening ceremonies. One barrel of fruit drink will suffice for both of them. Surely you would approve of such frugality. And second, an unstoppable deadline always inspires the best and most rapid work. Set a fire. Start a flood. Place the explosives and light the fuses.”

“It is irresponsible,” said Holtzclaw. “I have hurried as much as our resources will allow.”

“And even then, it is too slow.”

Around the dais was only a handful of spectators. More would have come if the event had been better catered, but when word spread that there would be no cakes, no liquors, no roasted meats, many would-be attendees stayed home. Those who did attend seemed to regret their decision. A woman in a yellow bonnet yawned broadly. Two men in matching cravats studied each other’s shoes. The handful of children, too bored to play with enthusiasm, tugged at the hems of their clothing.

Holtzclaw looked over the valley below. It was a ledger of unfinished tasks and failures. Holdouts needed to be evicted and relocated up the mountain. Buildings and homes needed to be burned so they would not interfere with navigation on the lake. Farm fields had food in them still. Harvesters would take what was large enough to grasp—tomatoes, berries, young corn—and leave the rest for stray turkeys.

The unfinished outline of the Queen of the Mountains glared impatiently at him. Columns and poles and girders stuck out at awkward angles. The hotel’s lawns and gardens were only mud fields. Springs ran untamed; pavilions to cap them had not yet been built. It did not look much like a first-class hotel, but a first-class mess.

The Lost Creek Valley, over which the Queen of the Mountains was meant to preside, was no longer sublime nor picturesque. Forests had been harvested for the flume of the dam, the hotel, the company town, and many thousands of railroad ties.

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