Jack Strong was having breakfast in the hotel restaurant when Curly Bill Brocius entered ahead of the men the Ranger recalled from the Comanche reservation, and a few more he didn’t. Nine in total, ten including Jimmy Miller, who clung sheepishly behind some of the brutes whose smell reached the Ranger long before their presence.
Steeldust Jack sipped his coffee and went back to work on his plate, which was piled with scrambled eggs, bacon, grits, and biscuits swimming in gravy. He pretended not to notice the presence of the ten gunmen until a well-dressed, mustachioed man who looked younger than his years slid through the makeshift tunnel they formed. He was thinner and shorter than Steeldust Jack had expected of someone with his notoriety and growing power.
The Ranger hitched back the long coat he hadn’t shed, to make sure the handle of his Colt was in easy range, never missing a beat with his eggs. He glimpsed John D. Rockefeller coming his way, the gunmen falling into step behind him.
“My associates tell me there was some trouble on an Indian reservation yesterday that’s claimed my interest, Ranger.”
Steeldust Jack looked up, waited to swallow his mouthful before responding. “Your associates tell you they were the cause of it?”
“On the contrary, they informed me one of their number was found murdered and they were merely trying to ascertain more about his killing.”
“They tell you the man’s body was found outside the reservation proper and, in the wake of ascertaining this, they trespassed on sovereign land?”
“They didn’t have to. I’m well aware of the law.” Rockefeller pulled back the chair across from Jack Strong. “You mind if I sit down?”
Steeldust Jack gestured for him to take the chair, snatching a bite of a biscuit and stuffing another forkful of eggs into his mouth.
“I have great respect for your organization and the entire state of Texas,” Rockefeller said, pushing his chair back under the table and signaling for a cup of coffee. “And I apologize if any man in my service treated you or the Texas Rangers with any modicum of disrespect.”
“Small amount,” Jack Strong said, laying his own coffee back down.
“Pardon me?”
“Definition of the word modicum. It means ‘small amount.’”
“You must be a well-read man.”
“I do my share, Mr. Rockefeller. Know a bit about history, too. Like how you used your riches and family name to avoid service in the Civil War.”
Rockefeller bristled, not noticing as the barman set a steaming mug of coffee down before him. “My shipping business was the sole means of support for my mother and younger siblings. My joining the army would have doomed it and them.”
“Lots of men buried off battlefields were the sole means of support for their families, too. How do you suppose those families are getting by now? But that’s not the point, Mr. Rockefeller. The point is you didn’t just sit out the war, you profited off it, when shipping down the Mississippi became one of the war’s first casualties. All of a sudden, the shipment of Midwestern crops was pushed eastward—through Cleveland, sir, where you just happened to be based. At the same time, there was a load of government contracts for food, clothes, and guns, and I hear told pretty much all of it went through that port up in those parts you pretty much controlled.”
Rockefeller pushed back his suit coat and tucked his thumbs in the pockets of his vest, his face framed by the steam rising off his coffee, which made him look as much like a ghost as a man.
“You accusing me of being a good and fortunate businessman, Ranger?” he asked.
Steeldust Jack wiped his mouth with a napkin. “No, sir. I’m accusing you of getting rich off the blood spilled by other men. You packed your warehouses with salt, clover seed, pork, and other supplies to support the war efforts. Then you created artificial shortages and delays to drive up prices while men starved to death before a bullet could take them.”
Unruffled, Rockefeller lifted his mug and sipped his coffee, studying Steeldust Jack through the curtain of steam. “Know what I did with all those profits, Ranger?”
“No, sir, I do not, though I suspect you got richer still.”
“I did indeed. As luck would have it, headquartering my operation in Cleveland put me a hundred miles from one of the most revolutionary developments in human history: the discovery of oil in the town of Titusville. A risky venture, for sure, but where else was I going to put all that cash? There’ve been times in my life where I’ve been short on money, but I’ve never been short on vision.”
Steeldust Jack still had plenty of food on his plate, but he’d lost his appetite. While looking straight across the table at John D. Rockefeller, he also followed the hands of each and every gunman flirting with their holstered pistols. All but the kid Jimmy Miller, that is.