On the Fringes

Author(s): Randi Samuelson-Brown

Location(s): Cripple Creek

Genre(s): Fiction, Historical

Era(s): 1890s

A clairvoyant, a mining swindle and a fresh start.

Although Maude has the unusual gift of clairvoyance, she suffers from a bad marriage. Together with her con artist husband Charley, they travel west by train in 1895, to start anew in the lawless West—where money is plentiful and the taking comes easy. Charley falls ill en route, forcing them to disembark in North Platte. They find shelter in a seedy, run-down hotel that turns into a glorified poker parlor after dark where Charley abandons Maude with $67.10 to her name and little else. Rattled, Maude knows one thing, and one thing only. She’s leaving North Platte behind. She can go East just as easily as West but strikes out to one of the Colorado gold camps, intent on making her fortune. On the journey she comes up with a plan to advise on mining and ores. The only problem is that she doesn’t know a thing about it.

Maude arrives in Cripple Creek and is immediately thrilled by its wide-open nature, and the sense of money and opportunity flowing. She falls in with the underworld of the mining town’s red-light district. In time, Maude finds a ‘gypsy woman’ without a shred of ability although she runs a Fortune Emporium. Maude asks for a job, but she has to pass a test before she is hired. The gypsy presents a young man whose palms show that he is honest and forthright—and there’s money in those lines. While there may be a mutual attraction, Maude is still legally married and not truly free.

Then comes the day Maude waited for. A laundress comes to the fortune parlor wanting to know whether she should sell her husband’s claim or not. Maude tries to read the woman’s palm, but all she can see is a tangled mess. They take the woman’s ore samples to the assay for firing—convinced the news will be fortuitous. But that’s not what happened. The results came back that the prospect hole was nothing to get excited about. Fearing she can’t survive on her own, Maude turns to the madam at the Mikado asking for a favor. She wants to know if Julia has picked up on any mining ‘gossip’ of value. Julia heard that the assay results were falsified. All of a sudden Maude is entwined in the failing relationship between the madam and her fancy man—a man who needs a producing mine.

Maude hurries to tell the laundress about the deception. The laundress searches for the claim deed: and it turns out that her husband has sold it for whiskey to none other than Maude’s erstwhile husband. Now in Cripple Creek, he enlists Maude’s help with the promise a cut of the proceeds and an uncontested divorce. Telling the madam’s fancy-man that a claim is up for sale, he visits the mine and is convinced he’s found the real deal. Harboring doubts, Maude convinces Clayton to return back to the mine with her, the bond between them growing closer. Clayton believes that the prospect hole may be salted. However, the transaction goes through and Skiptown lives up to his end of the bargain making Maude a free woman with money in her pocket.

Skiptown decides to stay in Cripple Creek. After all, money is flowing, isn’t it? Maude decides to try her luck up in Denver. However, a fire sweeps through Cripple Creek destroying the town. Maude leaves part of her gains for restoration of the town before boarding the train to Denver. Clayton jumps onboard just before the train pulls out and hands her a silver dollar.

“Isn’t that what a good fortune costs?” He asks with a wink.

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