Snippet #1776581

"She did what?"

"I ain't kiddin' yer, Injun. I don't think I ever seen such a shave-tail. She done got up on a table, hoicking up her grand skirts about her and said-" Dutch John removed a foul-smelling cigarillo from his mouth to take his voice up a few painfully cracked octaves. "-I gone fork over twice their usual pay to anyone who joins me!"

Ashkii suddenly broke into laughter and his horse, a desert dun called Sik'is, flicked her ears at the noise.

"Who's to tell her what 'usual pay' is?" he said, subconsciously extending a hand over Sik'is' neck to sooth her.

"Well, exactly. I'm tellin' yer, if I were thirty years younger, I'd be rushin' over to 'er like a shot," said Dutch John. His long arthritic fingers satisfied with the quality of the contents of the sack Ashkii had just handed to him, they delved into his jacket pocket to extract a few bank notes from its depths. "These fox furs are as fine as cream gravy, Injun. I ain't sorry to do dealin's with you, not like some of the bilks in this town. You get yer hands on any more, you come to ol' Dutch John ta sell 'em, yer hear?"

With surprising strength, the elderly man dragged the large sack from Sik'is' saddle and slung it over his own shoulder, lending him the effect of a wrinkled snail hefting a burlap shell on his back. Ashkii, who'd counted the notes with as little apparent care as not to appear rude, slipped them into his own pocket and proceeded to tie Sik'is to the wooden hitching post he'd been leaning against.

"You ain't gone go in? It's as bully a deal, as I ever saw," said called Dutch John over his other shoulder as he made his slow way down the street. "That piece of calico dancin' around on that table ain't gone last long if she runs into one o'your kind out there..."

Ashkii shrugged. "There's no rush. Do you see any other Diné around here?"

Dutch John's cackling was soon lost in the crowd and Ashkii palmed a coin to one of the boys who looked after the hitching posts before taking a seat in the shade next to a boarded-up store on the other side of the dusty road. It was true of course; without a substantial amount of firepower (and this was something that this woman, whoever she was, undoubtedly didn't have if she was resorting to yelling out job advertisements whilst standing on a table in a saloon), it would be foolish for anyone other than a very experienced lone tracker to head out into the wilderness without at least some means of communication with the local tribes. In the past, Ashkii had been a happy convenience for such expeditions; whiter than those pesky full-blooded Redskins but still ultimately an Injun. Perfect for not getting one's hands too dirty. He'd be a happy convenience again. For twice his usual price (and then some).

There was another reason he'd not bothered to venture into the saloon, however. The eastern mining company that was slowly chipping all of the copper out of the mountain that loomed over Jerome had brought in a new batch of miners today. Those twenty or so men were currently occupying a large proportion of the tables inside Paul and Jerry's Saloon getting progressively soaked on gin. They'd learn eventually (when more sober), as most did, that Ashkii was a regular fixture in Jerome but now was not the best moment for making introductions. Not if he wanted to keep his nose on the right side of his face. At any other time, he might had risked it for a couple of glasses of Kessler but if Dutch John was right... Well, he'd wait it out and watch for his to-be new employer.

Tugging his hat further down to shade his eyes, Ashkii yawned and took of his jacket, settling down in his shirt-sleeves against the sun-warmed wood.