The Stolen Gold Affair

6 Sabina

On Thursday morning, shortly after she arrived at the agency, a Western Union messenger brought her a belated reply from the Far West Mine Workers Union office in Sacramento. The wire stated that the FWMWU had no record of an employee by the name of Jedediah Yost, past or present. Nor had the organization sanctioned visits to Patch Creek by any of their representatives.

Just who was Jedediah Yost, then? It might be possible to find out from the description of the man James O’Hearn had given to John, though there was little enough to distinguish him. Yost was in his late forties, of average height, slender and wiry; other than a small triangular birthmark on his left cheek and a bootlace mustache, he evidently possessed the sort of bland countenance that would render him unnoticed in a crowd of more noteworthy men. His only known habits were the smoking of short-six cigars in an amber holder and a fondness for and skill in stud poker. Sabina sifted through the agency’s file of dossiers on known criminals. None matched the description or had a record of involvement in any kind of gold theft or swindle.

She hurried out to the telegraph office, where she intended to send a coded wire to J. F. Quinn, John’s alias in Patch Creek, informing him that Yost was posing as a union man. The intention was thwarted, however, when she was told that Patch Creek did not have a Western Union office; the nearest was in Marysville. Telegrams could be delivered from there to the gold camp, but not without the recipient’s address or a prior arrangement as to where it could be picked up. If John had known beforehand where he would be quartered, he hadn’t confided the fact to her.

Drat! She should have considered that Patch Creek would be too small to have a Western Union office. So should John have, for that matter. Both had promised to exchange brief wires, she with background data on Jedediah Yost, he to inform her of his progress and reassure her regarding his welfare. Now neither was possible.

What was she to do? John would surely want the information on Yost, but how could she get it to him? And was it vital? Perhaps not. Yost was already under suspicion in the high-grading scheme; John surely would be keeping an eye on him.

Still, there might well be something in the impostor’s true identity that had a bearing on John’s investigation. It behooved her to do all she could to find out who and what the man was.

She paid a visit to the San Francisco branch of the Pinkerton Detective Agency, where she provided the agent in charge with Yost’s description and possible criminal enterprise. The Pinkertons, as she well knew from her time as a Denver “Pink Rose,” had a far more extensive file of known felons than any other small agency such as theirs. But the branch’s files contained no leads to Yost’s identity.

Calls at two more of Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Service’s rival investigative agencies proved equally unproductive.

There was one other possible source of information on the impostor, but she was reluctant to explore it. It was slim at best, and it would open up old wounds.

As a young metallurgist Carson Montgomery had been briefly mixed up in a scheme to steal gold from a Mother Lode mine, the Gold King, by falsifying reports on the amount and value of its gold-bearing ore. He had backed out before actually committing the crime, but his brief involvement with the conspirators, who were later caught, tried, and convicted, had led to a vicious blackmail attempt by one of them upon release from prison. The revelation of Carson’s checkered past and her subsequent entanglement with the extortionist were not the only reasons she and Carson had parted ways, but they had played a significant role.

It was unlikely, given the fact that ten years had passed since the Gold King cabal, that the man calling himself Jedediah Yost would have been involved in it or that he would be known to Carson. It had been more than a year since she’d last seen Carson, and she had no desire to renew their acquaintance. He surely felt the same way. Still, as awkward as a meeting with him might be, she decided professional necessity outweighed personal feelings. So she girded herself after leaving The Morning Call, proceeded to the Montgomery Block, and called at the offices of Monarch Engineering (no connection to the Monarch Mine, merely a coincidental appellation).

Only Carson was not there. And the officious clerk she spoke to refused to tell her where he could be reached or when he was expected back in the office. Leave a message asking him to contact her as soon as possible? For all she knew he might be out of town, and if he wasn’t, she could hardly blame him if he chose to ignore the request.

She departed without giving the snooty clerk her card. She would simply have to come back again on the morrow, on the chance that Carson would be here then and willing to talk to her.