Chapter 37

(Riding the Central Pacific Railroad)

The fact that our wagons were loaded down with hidden gold weighted heavily on my mind as we moved further east every day. I wanted us to get to a sizable city and turn that load in to some government office in return for cold, hard cash. I already knew from watching those around me that the Wells Fargo banking system was the safest in the world and that once the funds were transferred to their safekeeping, the need for concern would be a memory of the past.

Our transference of allegiance from the Northwest Pacific railroad system down to the Central Pacific headquarters was both a relief and a regret at the same time.

I was relieved because my future memories of my studies of the past led me to believe the entire Northwest Pacific project was corrupt and ineffective. The concept as constructed in those years before the American Civil War by none other than Jefferson Davis, the eventual leader of the Confederate States of America emphasized the importance of the northern tier of geographical states as being the true anchor of a nation rooted in strategic superiority. His southern roots were strong but as the Secretary of War he understood the strategic implications and he was already looking forward at the lands further north which were at that time falling under the influence of a great naval power, none other than the Russian Empire. President Davis probably never anticipated that he would one day be at war with the Union that he loved so very much. Still, when the call came from his native State, his place of birth, he had no alternative but to return to his roots and organize some semblance of government to defend the ideal of “States Rights”.

My first inclination was to disregard the importance of the Central Pacific railroad system because I had more confidence in the ability of the Northwest Pacific to win out in the gamble for transcontinental success. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the real game was down in Sacramento and points east all the way back to Omaha, Nebraska and the sister company, the Union Pacific Railroad system.

Our sojourn in Sacramento, the gold fields and that entire general region was a vacation from the hustle and bustle of staying alive in a dangerous era. Sure, there were your bandits and your renegade Indians, but they were relatively tame in comparison to the back-stabbing lobbyists and politicians greedy for easy money to be made in constructing a transcontinental railroad line across the entire country.

The inner circle of the Central Pacific hierarchy was a transplanted New York City crowd of high-powered money makers that generally put all other people in the west as tools to be used for their capitalistic concepts of generating bigger and better cash flow. They used the happy ending girls and the risk-taking gunmen for their own ends and all of the normal church-going folks looked the other way because they brought a sense of greatness to their everyday lives. Every dirt-poor farmer had dreams of one day owning their own mansion and being able to light a cigar with real money because they were so rich money was no longer a concern.

Despite that lack of depth of character, I have to admit I admired and liked most of that crowd because they reminded me of home and my days on Wall Street when I labored in my windowless basement to make money for the “big boys” on the inside. Even the so-called “good” women from good families didn’t hesitate to bounce on the chosen one’s laps with juicy sounds of joyful pleasure. The slightest possibility that they might be picked to become one of the members of high society was enough to make females a lot more cooperative when nocturnal opportunities arose unexpectedly. I could easily understand this simple corruption of a personal nature because it stemmed more from human nature than from evil intent.

I was glad that my Clarissa had hooked up with the Mormon preacher because she was out of the scramble for relevance in a frontier territory unkind to any sign of weakness or indecision. She was protected now and I knew that Rachel would find the same kind of protection from some source other than me because she was basically a survivor and never failed to seize an opportunity once presented.

Our wagon train was heavy with gold and we trailed along beside the building crews moving eastward to our destiny at Promontory Point, Utah and the “golden spike” that would crown the achievement of linking the Central Pacific track with the Union Pacific track in a celebration that inspired a nation of dreamers to move west and make their fortune.

We always welcomed the Chinese workers into our wagon train camp and they came bearing gifts of food and drink. I had spent some years in the Far East and the proximity of the Chinese men and women was soothing to me because I was always comfortable in their company. The Central Pacific’s policy allowed the Chinese workers to bring their wives with them and it was a boon to the project because the women established laundry and food services to make the constant travel less rudimentary and even furnished massage and hair-cutting services with their husband’s permission to the workers in need of some sort of respite from the hard days of labor.