Burgade's Crossing by Bill Pronzini

Author:Bill Pronzini [Pronzini, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 1477842187
Publisher: Amazonencore
Published: 2002-12-31T23:00:00+00:00

When Quincannon dropped off the mine wagon late that morning, he saw that Samuel McClellan was one of the gaggle of men already waiting in the shade of the gallows frame. Assistant foreman was a cushy job, mostly that of inspection of completed work, and allowed for less than the ten hours other miners spent in the hole. But McClellan was invariably one of the first on the job and among the last to leave-one of the reasons he had aroused Quincannon's suspicions. Once a man turned to highgrading, he thought nothing of working long and hard to line his pockets.

Quincannon took off his miner's hat, sleeved road dust from his face. As early as it was, the day promised more blistering summer heat, with none of the cooling winds that often blew among the high Sierra peaks. Off to his right, the departing wagon raised another column of dust as it started back down the long passage into the Patch Creek settlement. Where the creek itself was visible among willows and aspens, the water caught sunlight and dazzled like molten silver.

He moved across the noisy mine yard. A skip had just clanged out of the shaft and its load of ore was about to be dumped into the bins set beneath the gallows frame. Topmen and mules maneuvered timbers and planks for lowering to the eleven-hundred and twelve-hundred levels currently being mined. Rope men and steel men were already at their tasks. Day-shift miners stood talking and laughing in little groups, waiting for the whistle-half as many as there had been when the Gold King Mine was among the largest and most profitable lodes in the northern mountains. But there was still enough gold to be hacked out of its galleries and cross-cuts to make highgrading profitable and James O'Hearn and the other, absentee mine owners willing to part with a handsome sum to put a stop to it.

Quincannon paused just outside the gallows frame, watching McClellan. The man was in a nervous twitch today, his voice two octaves higher than normal, his laugh forced. And well he might be. He was the weak link among the highgraders, however many there were-Quincannon's guess was no less than three, no more than five. It had taken him less than a week on the job to single out the assistant foreman as a likely suspect, and a nocturnal visit to his lodgings in town had turned up just enough milled dust to confirm his guilt. McClellan seemed to sense that he had been found out. His actions the past few days had grown increasingly furtive, as if he might be thinking of taking it on the lammas with his cut of the spoils. Quincannon had yet to discover where the bulk of the highgrade was stashed, but he maintained a close watch on the assistant foreman. Sooner or later McClellan would lead him to the stolen gold and the identity of his partners in the scheme.

The partners remained shadowy figures. One

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