Gangway!

    "Well, I just had an idea, see."

    Gabe sat back down. "And?"

    "I got a brother name of Captain Percival Arafoot. You ever hear of him, maybe?"

    "Can't say as I have."

    "Hell, he's the only guy on the Barbary Coast tougher than me."

    "Is he now."

    "You disputin' that, friend?"

    "Not just now, Roscoe. Go on about your brother."

    "Well he's got this ship, see. The Sea Wolf. Now this here's a fast ship, friend."

    "Where is it?"

    "Right now? Up north someplace. What he does, my brother, he smuggles Alaska seal furs down to Seattle; that's how come he's got a fast ship. The Sea Wolf's gotta be able to outrun the Coast Guard, see."

    "So?"

    "So my brother Percival just might be interested in this little operation of yours."

    "Sounds interesting," Gabe said.

    "Course him and me, we'd want a piece of your operation. Not just a fee."

    "No deal. Five thousand for you, five thousand for him."

    Roscoe considered it.

    Gabe said, "You think you could get him down here pretty quick?"

    "If you make it worth his while. Say ten thousand."

    "Six."

    "Nine."

    "Seven."

    "Eight," Roscoe said, "and that's my last offer."

    Gabe figured maybe brother Percival would see three thousand of it if he was lucky, which would leave Roscoe with five thousand of Percival's and another five thousand of his own.

    Enough to make him happy anyhow.

    "Done," Gabe said.

    "Okay. I'll send him a telegram. Ought to reach him soon. He's due into Seattle right about now."

    "Fine… fine," Gabe said. "But I still want a crew for the San Andreas."

    "I thought I just told you…"

    "I know what you told me. But two ships are better than one in this operation."

    "You go

    "Later," Gabe said. And left.

    From the door he looked back and saw Roscoe's eyes glinting at him over the rim of his beer schooner like a pair of gun muzzles.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

    Vangie, through dressing, got up from the bed to yawn and stretch, limbering up her body for the new day. Then, idly scratching her waist at the right side, she turned slowly to limber her mind with a daytime view of the room they'd spent the night in. She liked nice places and this was a nice place, all rose brocade and mahogany finials.

    They had to be early risers, she and Gabe, to be ahead of the hotel maid service, but it was still late enough so plenty of morning sunlight poured through the two wide windows, gleaming on the china pitcher and glistening from the tiny prisms dangling from the kerosene lamps.

    Finishing her turn Vangie looked over at Gabe, who was standing by one of the windows and admiring the silver snuffbox, turning it around and around in the sunlight. His Eastern feistiness and odd hunched way of standing, once so foreign, were dear to her now. It was hard to remember what life had been without Gabe; harder to try to visualize a future life without him. But if he persisted in this Mint business, and if he kept piling one danger atop the other…

    Well. She'd decided not to brood about that, and so she wouldn't. Walking across the room to where he was still fooling with the silver snuffbox, she said, "I was never so surprised in my life as when that went off."

    Gabe shook his head, and hefted the snuffbox-gun in his palm. "One of these days," he said, "you're going to stick your hand in somebody's pocket and blow your fingers off. Or his behind."

    "Maybe I ought to reform," she said. And she was thinking it might be worth it, turning honest, if she could get him to do the same. Keep him from the Mint, keep him from Roscoe Arafoot.

    But he said, "You'll be able to afford reform pretty soon."

    Hiding her disappointment, she nodded at the snuffbox. "You want it?"

    "No, I've got enough." He handed it to her. "Sell it," he said, "we can use the money. It can help us set up for the big job."

    "Gabe, I know you don't like me trying to talk you out of that idea, but…"

    "That's right. I don't."

    "… but I do want to say one thing. Can I just say one thing?"

    "Which thing? San Francisco's better than New York, or you can't rob the Mint?"

    "Neither."

    He gave her a surprised look.

    "All I wanted to say was, please don't have anything to do with those Arafoot brothers. They've got the meanest reputations of anybody along the coast, and they've earned them."

    "Listen, sister, I can handle any six non-New Yorkers you can name."

    "You're underestimating them, Gabe, I promise you. And even if you do get that gold, which is impossible to start with, they'll kill us all to take it away from us if they find out we've got it."

    "Look don't worry about it, Vangie. I've got everything all worked out."

    "You just think you have. You've never met Captain Arafoot."

    "I've met Roscoe. That's enough."

    "Roscoe's the kind one," Vangie said. "I really wish you'd reconsider this, Gabe."

    "Yeah, yeah," he said. But he wasn't listening. He said, "Listen, I wanted to talk to you about something more important."

    "More important? More important than trying to save your life?"

    "I know, I know." He walked away from the window, nodding, hunch-shouldered, so totally into his own head she knew it was hopeless to try to attract his attention. "I need a wagon," he said.

    She didn't realize he meant he wanted a wagon from her until he turned and looked at her and said, "Okay?"

    "Okay? What's okay?"

    "The wagon."

    She pointed at herself. "You want me to get a wagon?"

    "I need it tonight," he said. "At three a.m. Up by the Mint."

    "Gabe," she said, "I pick pockets, not livery stables."

    "Oh," he said. He seemed a bit surprised, but not very disappointed. Shrugging, he said, "I just figured you could get us anything we needed. You've been providing pretty good so far. Okay, I suppose I can go ask Roscoe."

    "Wait!"

    He glanced at her, one eyebrow lifted.

    A wagon. She thought desperately, then gave one quick nod and said, "All right. I'll do it."

    He smiled, as su

    "A wagon," she said. "Tonight, at three."

    He nodded and pointed skyward. "Up by the Mint," he said.

CHAPTER TWENTY

    From the main gate of the Mint the street ran downhill two or three blocks. Then it humped up over a lower hill before it swept all the way down the steep pitch to the waterfront flats, across them and out onto the New World pier. Since the New World was en route to or from Sacramento at the moment, the pier was empty.

    That little hump-actually it wasn't so little-was what bothered Gabe. Everything was downhill, except that stinking hump.