Red Jacket Page 4

  “Zakov the Russian wolfer has a bad leg break and a broken arm. Bone pressing against his skin,” Bapcat reported.

  “Did you clean it?”

  “Best I could.

  “Where is he now?”

  “With the Widow Frei. I suspect she’ll do further tidying.”

  The gray-headed Kochendorfer nodded. “Hope that’s all she does.” That said, he left to find a way to Copper Harbor.

  “Didn’t expect you until July for the fur sale,” Vairo told his friend.

  “Got other business.”

  Vairo grinned. “Word’s out: Roosevelt. You hear about the troubles brewing hereabouts?”

  “No.”

  “One-man drills.”

  “This is bad?”

  “You were underground; you know. Fewer jobs, greater danger. A man from the Western Federation of Miners is here trying to stir the soup and make it boil over.”

  Bapcat had spent a horrendous three years as a trammer, hand-filling metal and wood cars with ore. He’d seen at least thirteen men die in his last two years, and was driven out by what became an uncontrollable fear of being in a tight place in the darkness. His heart would race, sweats would start, and he would nearly pass out. Kochendorfer had finally ordered him to stay aboveground and find another way to make a living. By then he had saved a stake, turned to trapping, and never looked back.

  “Strike coming?”

  “At first I thought not, but now I’m not so sure. The low-pay boys seem pretty troubled by everything. I hear the union will call for a member vote and ask mine operators to meet. If dey agree to meet the union, maybe stoppage can be avoided. If not, who knows? Seems to me likelihood of operators agreeing is nil.”

  “Mine owners always have the high ground,” Bapcat said to Vairo.

  “Si, is always the same. The country you are in does not matter,” Vairo said. “Calumet and Hecla is Rome, capisce, a cold and ruthless city-state that enforces its will? C and H owns the town, and everybody lives here, me included. I doubt the WFM has faced the likes of C and H. How long you out of the woods, Lute?”

  “Tonight, but I’ll be back.” He left coins on the bar, but Vairo pushed them back. “Dominick’s friends don’t pay. Good furs this winter?”

  “Quality’s the best ever, but numbers are way down.”

  “That mean anything, you think?”

  “Just that there’s fewer animals.”

  “What about nature’s so-called bounty? Is such shortage in this country even possible?”

  “I think it must be,” Bapcat said.

  “You’d think God would arrange it so man never runs out. Genesis tells us God made whales and fowl and so forth before He made man, and this was for man, his crowning creation.”

  “I guess it comes down to the fact that people keep making too many more people,” Bapcat said.

  “Like coniglio,” Vairo said, elbowing him. “Ah . . . but family is the only thing, my friend. We should find for you a fine Italian wife, and you should start making your own bambinos.”

  Bapcat held up his hands and laughed. Being with Jaquelle Frei three times a year was about as much distaff company as he could tolerate. To live with a woman? Not likely.

  “Ciao, Dominick,” Bapcat said on his way out, walking past two bloodied men who were whaling at each other in the street with sturdy barrel staves that looked like long black bones.

  8

  Houghton, Houghton County

  SUNDAY, MAY 18, 1913

  The electric trolley delivered Bapcat to Hancock, where he caught another trolley across the canal to Houghton and got a room at the Marjoanton Hotel. The desk clerk gave him the once-over. “Food down at Vertang’s, whiskey’s at the Miner’s Hat, both on the Avenue,” by which he meant Shelden, the town’s main drag.

  The clerk looked at the sign-in sheet. “Copper Harbor, eh? This is the big town, son; best be careful. Feelings sometimes run raw for strangers in these parts.”

  Bapcat got a venison steak and fried potatoes at Vertang’s. It was tough, stringy meat, but he was hungry, and would have to put up with restaurant fare until he got back to his camp.

  Not one to crave or need alcohol, the one-time Rough Rider wandered Shelden Avenue, listening to the din from various establishments, including a sporting house. Although there was no sign outside, the ladies preening and posturing on the porch made it clear what sport their employer catered to. A small red lantern illuminated the tableau.

  Farther along the street a small wiry man crashed into him and viciously swatted him to the side, snarling, “Stay the hell out of my way, you bloody lummox!”

  Immediately back on his feet, Bapcat drove his boot hard into the side of the man’s leg, causing him to collapse in a heap on the walkway, his collision with the ground sounding like a sack of flour dropped from a high roof.

  The man rolled over and tried to get up but Bapcat, his temper in full flare, kicked the man in the mouth with his heel and sent him careening backward.

  The fracas ended with Bapcat being ganged and held by several men while others helped the downed man to his feet, all of them apologizing and fawning like drooling toads. “Sorry, Cap’n Hedyn. This man’s clearly a public menace. Sheriff Cruse is just down the street. We sent a runner to fetch him.”

  The man called Hedyn rubbed his mouth, hocked up some blood, and spit. Bapcat sensed the man was getting ready to retaliate and the trapper wanted to be ready, but the men holding him were maneuvering him in a slow dance, keeping him just beyond the smaller man’s reach.

  “Men die for less,” Hedyn said through loose teeth, his eyes bright red, his form glowing like a serpent crawling out of a fire.

  “You knocked me down,” Bapcat said, and he could immediately hear the man hiss in response.

  “You know who I am, boy?”

  “Not the world’s bare-knuckle fighting champion, that’s for damn sure.”

  Hedyn was glaring now, trying to move his jaw, wincing.

  A large fat man with a square head arrived, huffing under the strain of moving too fast and demanding to know what was going on, like the others, kowtowing to the man called Hedyn.

  Uniformed deputies arrived, handcuffed Bapcat, and led him away, slapping the side of his head as they went. It was impossible to retaliate.

  He heard the fat man say behind him, “Sorry about this, Captain Hedyn. We’ll take care of this troublemaker.”

  Hedyn said, “Cruse, you’re supposed to keep order in this sad excuse for a town. If you can’t do your job, I guess it won’t be all that hard to find a replacement.”

  “You’re right, Captain. You’re absolutely right. It won’t happen again.”

  •••

  Two hours later Cruse opened the door to the stinking cell, sat down across from his prisoner, and offered a cigarette. “Bapcat, is it?”

  The trapper nodded, ignored the cigarette.

  “One of Roosevelt’s chosen few, we hear. Listen close, bub—it’s one thing to snuff a bunch of Spaniards on some tropical isle, but you can’t go roughing up leading white citizens. You know who that was you knocked on his ass like a discarded cur?”

  “No.”

  “Captain Madog Hedyn of the Delaware, the hardest mine boss in Copper Country.”

  “He knocked me down.”

  “Nobody disputes that, Bapcat, but sometimes facts are irrelevant. See, we all got roles to play in life’s grand drama, and yours and mine is to be politely subservient to the Hedyns of the world. I’m sure it happened just as you say, but I’m still gonna have to hold you a few days before I let you go. Appearances count in this life,” the sheriff added.

  “I have to be in Marquette on Friday.”

  “I can work with that,” Sheriff Cruse said with a f
at grin. “The justice of the peace will charge you with disturbing the peace and public drunkenness. You pay a fine and it’s over.”

  “I haven’t had a drop to drink,” Bapcat said. “And, I want a trial.”

  Cruse looked pained. “These things are misdemeanors—infinitesimal matters in the greater scheme of the universe. We make it a point to not waste public treasure or time adjudicating petty matters.”

  “I have a right to a trial.”

  “Studied up on the law and the Constitution, have you?”

  “No, but I know my rights—and President Roosevelt is expecting me Friday.” He threw this into the stew, not knowing if it was precisely accurate.

  Cruse reacted immediately with a sort of pained moan and sigh. “Well, I see how you want to play this,” the sheriff said. “And to level with you, I’m not one to create a ruckus when it ain’t needed, so you’ll sleep it off here tonight, and we’ll let you loose tomorrow.”

  “I already paid for a hotel room tonight.”

  “Good. You might want to consider that a cheap lesson in manners.”

  “The man called Hedyn came at me.”

  Cruse frowned and waved a hand. “You need to go to Marquette, then git, but don’t let me catch you around here again—unless you’re ready for the full bite of the court.” Cruse slammed the steel door and left him alone to try to sleep in a room that stank of old vomit, sweat, blood, and shit.

  One of the jailers looked in on him later. “Are you really going to see Roosevelt?”

  Bapcat nodded.

  “Makes this your lucky night,” the man said. “Cruse protects them mining moguls like they was virgin saints, but you’re going to get out without even a lesson-bearing beating.”

  “Am I supposed to be grateful?”

  “Couldn’t hurt.”

  “Pass a message to your sheriff and to Hedyn: I see them again, it won’t end so quietly.”

  “Cruse won’t like that, and as for Hedyn, I don’t go near Beelzebub’s spawn unless I have legal reason to be there, which I don’t. I were you, I’d stay far away from the captain. Cruse, he’s got deputies to fight his battles, but Hedyn likes to fight his own, and he doesn’t stop until his opponents are totally done for. You know where the term upstanding citizen comes from?”

  “No.”

  “Them’s the ones still standing when the big fights are finished,” the guard said. “You didn’t win no fight tonight, son. You may have got one started, is all.”

  9

  Marquette, Marquette County

  FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1913

  The office of W. S. Hill was on the third floor of a red stone building that housed Citizens Bank on the street level. Bapcat made his way up the wooden stairs to a door with the lawyer’s name painted in gold on a smoky glass panel. The floors had no dust. He could smell wood polish. The door opened into a reception area with an older female receptionist, her mouth frozen in what looked like a rictus of permanent pride or confidence.

  He held the envelope out to her. “Bapcat.”

  She hardly glanced at the document and nodded toward a door to her left. “Through there, second office on the right.”

  He followed her directions and found himself in a doorway looking at a grinning, gap-toothed Theodore Roosevelt, who popped to his feet and enveloped Bapcat in a powerful bear hug. “Corporal! Glad you came!”

  “Colonel, uh, Mr. President . . .”

  Roosevelt nickered enthusiastically. “I prefer ‘Colonel’ with my boys!” he said. “Sit, Corporal—take a load off.”

  Bapcat felt Roosevelt studying his face. “You have a scrap, did you, Corporal?”

  Bapcat decided to be direct with his old CO. “Nothing important, Colonel. I don’t mean to jump the gun, but I don’t see how I can be much help in this trial of yours.”

  The former president’s eyebrows danced. “Good gracious, son. To be honest, I don’t see that you can help in the trial, either, but I’m sure you would if you could, and I truly appreciate such sentiment. The letter was my way of getting you out of the woods, Corporal. You’re still trapping up in Copper Country?”

  “Yessir.”

  “Making a go of it?”

  “Ends meet . . . eventually,” Bapcat admitted, more a statement of hope than reality.

  Roosevelt smiled. “Never the complainer. Still ample animals up there?”

  “Populations are shrinking, all species.”

  The former president frowned. “It’s the same across the country, Lute. It’s sad—a national shame.”

  Roosevelt was wearing the thick pince-nez eyeglasses the Rough Riders had referred to as his nose-pinchers. He adjusted them to a better perch on the bridge of his nose. “Want to do something about the problem, Corporal?” the colonel asked.

  A man coughed from the doorway. Straight-backed, graying hair, high cheekbones, tall in stature, aristocratic in bearing. Behind him, another man, this one short and possum-like, with a protruding thin nose and a sweeping gray walrus mustache.

  Roosevelt stood. “Corporal Bapcat, meet William R. Oates, your state’s Game, Fish and Forestry warden.”

  The straight-backed man shook Bapcat’s hand with a sharp, firm grip. Bapcat could feel huge calluses on the man’s palms and fingers, a working man’s honest hands.

  “And this is Chief Deputy Warden David R. Jones,” Oates said, stepping aside to allow his smaller companion to reach his hand out.

  “David,” the smaller man said.

  Bapcat responded, “Lute.”

  “Please be seated, gentlemen,” Roosevelt said.

  Bapcat remained standing.

  Oates began. “The president has given you his highest personal recommendation—very high indeed. He tells us you are a man cool of heart and head when circumstances are most dire.”

  He thought about Hedyn and Sheriff Cruse, and nearly laughed.

  “You trap the Keweenaw?” Jones asked.

  “Since 1903,” Bapcat said.

  “Productive?”

  “Less and less.”

  “Market hunters?” Oates asked.

  Bapcat tried to think before answering. “I hear they take deer and ducks and geese to the south of me, but I haven’t seen them out where I am.” Market hunters killed en masse, processed dead game, and shipped it to high bidders or contractors, almost always in the Midwest’s big cities. “No market-hunting of beavers that I’ve seen,” Bapcat added.

  “It was endemic early in our country’s history,” Oates said. “But castor colonies are down, yes?”

  Endemic? “Beaves is down some, I guess, but market-hunting them was long before my time,” Bapcat said, trying to lighten what felt like a very tedious conversation in the making.

  “Free enterprise,” Oates said softly. “Which matches products to wants and sells to the highest bidder.”

  What do they want with me? Bapcat wondered.

  “You know Sheriff John Hepting?” Jones asked.

  “I do.”

  “Your opinion of the man?”

  “Honest, a good man; has his own opinions on things.”

  “What about Sheriff Cruse of Houghton County?” Oates asked.

  Until last night he’d never talked to the sheriff, but he’d heard about him. “It’s said by some that he likes to curry favor with the mine owners.” Last night pretty much supported this contention.

  “Captain Madog Hedyn of the Delaware mine?”

  “Met him just once,” Bapcat said, reeling under the irony of being queried about the very man he’d thrashed just the night before.

  “And?”

  “They say he’s a hard man.”

  “Ever hear Hedyn’s name in connection with market-hunting?” Oates asked.

&n
bsp; “No, sir. I live way out on the tip of the peninsula, and I don’t get a lot of company.” Or welcome it.

  Oates exchanged a look with Jones. Bapcat was thin, almost six foot, with a short black beard, large hands, and dark hair. “I see your knuckles are abraded. You ever considered working as a lawman?” Oates asked.

  Bapcat shook his head and looked at his hands. “I fell down. What kind of lawman?”

  “Deputy State Game, Fish and Forestry Warden,” Jones said.

  “Game warden?” Bapcat said, seeking clarification. “Me?”

  “Yes, deputy game warden. Chief Deputy Jones here would be your immediate supervisor,” Oates said.

  Roosevelt immediately weighed in. “These are fine men, Lute, and they need skilled and trustworthy men like you who know their way around the woods.”

  “Ordinarily,” Jones said, “counties pay deputy wardens, and we jointly select the men, but past choices have often been entirely political. Warden Oates and I want to put the focus squarely on conservation and resources, not politics. We want our men hired for their knowledge and skills, not their connections. We want high-minded, dedicated, professional lawmen, not political hacks. The job is supposed to be about the resources, not who you know or who owns what. President Roosevelt did the same thing when he headed the Civil Service Commission in Washington.”

  “Keweenaw County?” Bapcat asked.

  “Houghton and Keweenaw,” Oates said, “but you will be paid from our offices in Lansing, not by either county. You can hire an assistant as our second deputy, but only on a trial basis. Let’s take some time to measure people before we commit to permanent hires. You can, of course, hire other assistants on a temporary basis as you need them, when season or circumstances dictate. Your pay will be three dollars and fifty cents a day, every day.”

  Jones said, “You provide your own firearms and ammunition, and your own means of transportation. You own an automobile?”

  Bapcat shook his head. “Doubt an automobile would help where I live. What roads we have outside the towns are bad when they’re at their best. A horse might be more useful.”