“Know any of the contractors up there?”
“Pretty near all of ’em—seems. Some of ’em been on the job six months, ye know. These people, the main contractors, didn’t move in until they couldn’t sub-let any more of the work. Then they hadta take holt an’ handle what was left—and they got a rarin’ tough job, too.”
“Back in Utah, as I was traveling West,” said Joshua thoughtfully, “a stiff who had been working here told me that a man called Bloodmop Mundy had a piece on the Gold Belt Cut-off. Is that so?”
“Well, it was until about three months ago, an’ then he ups and dies.”
“He’s dead?”
“Well, they planted him, anyway,” drawled California Bill. “I reckon their intentions was good. Nice hombre. His daughter is runnin’ the outfit now. That is, her and her maw; but Madge is the boss because Mis’ Mundy is retirin’ like. Some kid, this here Shanty Madge. Pretty as sunset on a mountain lake. An’ she’s makin’ good with the work, but they got a whopper of a job. One o’ these days a whole blame hill’s gonta fall down on ’em; an’ then I’m thinkin’ somethin’s gonta go bust. Bloodmop was makin’ good for the last sev’r’l years, they tell me. Started in as a gypo man back East, with a few old skates an’ a handful o’ geed-up tools. Come West an’ branched out, and was swingin’ big jobs in Nevada an’ California. Then he took this one, subbin’ offen Demarest, Spruce an’ Tillou—biggest thing he’d so far undertook—seems. An’ then—just gettin’ a good start—he croaked. But Shanty Madge’ll swing it, if that confoun’ hill don’t come down on her an’ ruin her complete. There goes th’ blame’ triangle, an’ we gotta get to work. Say, I didn’t get yer name, ol’-timer.”
CHAPTER XVI
THE ROAD TO G-STRING
SO the end of Joshua Cole’s quest was at hand. Up there somewhere in the mountains was Madge Mundy—“Shanty” Madge, as California Bill had called her. He wondered, as he worked that afternoon, what she would be like. He knew why they called her Shanty Madge, for he remembered all that she had told him about “gypo” men and “shanty” men, as small contractors were called on the railroad grade, and since leaving his home town he had worked in several camps, so that he was familiar with the vernacular. She would be over eighteen now, and he tried to picture her at such an age. But always his mind presented the photograph of a pretty little girl with expressive Oriental-topaz eyes, and red-gold hair streaming down her back, with skin the color of the mythical Indian girl who saved John Smith’s life.
And Bloodmop Mundy was dead. Aside from Beaver Clegg, Joshua had known no other man friend, and he had warmed instinctively to the bluff, rough-and-ready gypo man. Would Mrs. Mundy remember him? He had liked Mrs. Mundy, and now, with the experience of years to aid him, he was able to look back and wonder at her serenity and her strange devotion to a man of Bloodmop Mundy’s type.
Joshua was unpresentable. His clothes were frayed and his hair needed trimming. His shoes, too, were relics; and altogether he made a disreputable-looking figure. He must work at the camp of Demarest, Spruce and Tillou, he told himself, until he had earned enough money to buy respectable clothes before seeking Madge. And the thought of seeking her filled his heart with dread. She might remember him, but that would be about all. Surely, since she had grown up a hundred men had made love to her. Was she still interested in the stars?