XX
To get to that pin-prick on the map called Monument, Arizona, you drop off the railroad at Defiance, which is somewhere east of the water tank named Phantom, and then follow an old post road across the lofty plateau in the direction of the mountains to the southwest. After something more than twenty miles, the trail strikes a deeply sunk river bed that winds like a gigantic serpent over the desert toward the declining sun. In one of the coils of this dead river serpent lies what is left of the mining camp of Monument.
From the dusty trail over the alkali plain Brainard emerged one blazing July afternoon, saddle-sore after his unaccustomed exercise, and red-faced from the pitiless glare of the Arizona sun. As he climbed the rocky path on the farther side of the river bed, the sun was sinking in a gorgeous sky behind the wooden shacks of Monument.
The place had the desolate air of a mining camp that had been smothered before its boom had really come. The stack of a large smelter rose from a group of corrugated iron buildings at the further end. Beyond, on the summit of a curious detached mound, set quite apart from all other features of the landscape, there was a considerable mansion with tall pillars along its southern front. This, Brainard surmised, must have been the residence of the owner or the manager of the mine, and his present goal.
Apparently Monument had not enough life left to bestir itself, even on the arrival of a stranger. Brainard slid from his horse unobserved in front of the Waldorf Hotel, which was apparently the most pretentious hostelry in the town. Inside the Waldorf, a Chinaman was serving a customer with a meal of fried steak and liver-colored pie. The only other person in the establishment was a fat Irishwoman dozing in one corner of the large bar-room, to which the Chinaman referred the stranger, with a silent nod. The landlady—for such he took her to be—looked at Brainard stupidly, and to his request for a room merely dropped her head on her ample breast and resumed her nap.
Brainard turned back to the street, and there the only human being in sight was an old man sitting in front of a tiny cottage, which seemed more decent in appearance than the other residences of Monument. Brainard hailed him, and inquired if there was another hotel in Monument in which he might take refuge.
“There’s hotels enough,” the old citizen replied with placid irony, “but they ain’t doing business these days. I reckon you’ll have to put up with the Waldorf, stranger—it ain’t so worse!”
In reply to Brainard’s complaint that the landlady of the Waldorf would not take notice of his arrival, the old man remarked:
“I expect Katie’s just getting over her yesterday’s booze. She’ll come around after sundown. Come over and sit awhile. There ain’t any use of worryin’ yourself in this here country!”
He waved an arm slowly over the empty landscape.