Deadly Lode (Trace Brandon Book 1) (7 page)

We held the special shareholders
'
meeting later
in the week
in Vancouver
.
All the items on the agenda passed
.
Montana Creek Mining Corporation
was in business
.

Wally would
start
prepar
ing
private
-
placement documents
,
allowing the company
to
sell shares to
the public in British Columbia, Canada.
The company's treasury would issue t
he shares
.
S
ale of the shares
would dilute our control position
,
b
ut
bring in the capital need
ed
to
start
develop
ing
the Sullivan Mine
.

It took Bill Thorn
ton
about a week to
put it all together. He
called Cyrus and
scheduled a meeting at
Cyrus
’
s
Spokane office.

“
Okay
,
boss, here
’
s
the lowdown. Brandon and his lawyer buddy, Will Coffee, were in Vancouver about a week ago. The Vancouver Securities Exchange filings show they held a special shareholders
'
meeting and merged the
ir
claims into a numbered B
.
C
.
shell corp. Looks like the
y
walked away with about seventy percent control. The
two founders
of the shell company
kept
five hundred thousand shares each.
And
there
’
s
a million shares
in the float
.
The
numbered company was renamed
,
Montana Creek Mining Corporation.
”

“
Damned fine work, Thorny. I think you
’
ll find a little bonus in this month
’
s check.
”

“
Thanks, Cyrus.
”

“
Who were the
original
found
ing shareholders
?
”

“
Walter
Wilkins
, a Vancouver attorney, who remained a director. And a Vancouver
promoter
named Richard Rosenburg.
”

Cyrus rubbed his chin for a couple of seconds
.
“
Okay,
Thorny, find out all you can about Rosenburg. He may have some weakness we can exploit. I know this
Wilkins
character. He
’
s tough, clean
,
and righteous. No
. . .
we
’
ll concentrate on
trying to acquire
Rosenburg
’
s shares.

“
We
’
ll
need a
Canadian entity,
”
Thorny said.
“
S
hares
in
the
private placement
will only be available to B
ritish Columbia
residents
,
or BC corporations.
”

“
Okay, when
Montana Creek Mining
’
s
private placement comes out
,
we
buy all the shares we can get through Twisp River Resources.
Twisp is
a private company,
domiciled in BC.
I own
it one hundred percent though
my
Cayman
holding company, Carib International
.
”

“
Perfect,
b
oss.
”

“
Yeah, it
’
s a start
.
Also, I
’
ll have Twisp River start
buying shares in the open
market. Not enough to draw attention, just steady
buy
orders. We
’
ll see how much cheap free trade we can accumulate.
”

Back in E-Burg, I went to work
preparing
a
three
-
hole coring program. Wally made it clear we needed some good core
assay
results to present to investors
before we could do a successful private placement
.
In the inter
im, t
he
three of us would
have to
loan the company the money to complete
at least the first core hole
.

Bob Malo
t
t
’
s proposal for
building the
drill locations and road repair arrived while I was in Vancouver. The drilling locations were one thousand feet apart. If
we
intersected good ore values, I could extrapolate some inferred reserves. It would be enough to interest the penny stock mine
crowd
in
Vancouver.

*****

I
’
d been so busy with the claims and merger
that
I hadn
’
t had any time for Tina. Now
,
w
ith a few days to kill while Bob
’
s crew completed the mine road and drill pads,
I called
her.

"
Hey, kiddo,
”
I said
,
when
Tina
answered the phone,
“
sorry I
’
ve been out of town so much.
But getting this mining deal put together turned into quite a chore.
”

“
Uh-huh,
”
Tina replied
,
coolly.
“
Are you sure you haven
’
t taken up with another woman?
”

U
h
-
oh, I could be in serious trouble, I thought to myself.
“
No, nothing like that, Tina. I
’
ve been up at the mine most of the time,
”
I said, grasping for tr
action.
“
Look, let me make it up to you. How about supper at the
Cold Creek
Inn?
”
The
quaint little restaurant
was located on the outskirts of Ellensburg, on the east bank of the Yakima River
, a
nd was her
favorite.

“
Well, seeing as how I am hungry
,
and horny, I guess I
’
ll let you off the hook, this time. Pick me up at seven.
And you
’
d
better not be late, cowboy.
”

At seven
,
straight up,
I
knocked on her apartment door. Tina opened the door and
glanced at her watch
.
She was wearing tight Wrangler jeans, cowboy boots
,
and a white blouse with pea
r
l buttons. She looked better than a high
-
grade assay.

“
Damn good timing, Trace,
”
s
he said
,
with a husky laugh.

Hot damn, I might be back in the saddle.
“
Yes,
m
a
’
am. Nineteen hundred hours
,
as requested,
”
I said
,
with a smile.
“
And I am at your disposal for the rest of the evening.
”

“
You
’
d damn well better be,
”
Tina replied, hooking her arm through mine.
“
To the
Inn
, and don
’
t spare the horses.
”

“
There
’
s three hundred of them under the hood,
”
I said
,
as I opened the passenger door of my Bronco.
“
Just remember to buckle up.
”

As advertised, the Inn delivered a
fabulous meal
of Black Angus
rib eye
s, house salad
s
, baked potatoes, and
two bottles of a very limited
vintage,
commemorative
,
Central Washington University
C
abernet.
I found this particular
c
abernet had a soothing effect on the female spirit.
Too bad there were very few bottles of the vintage remaining.

After supper we went back to my place
just outside of town
. I keep a thirty
-
one
-
foot Airstream in a
n RV park
along the Yakima River.
The RV park has
water
, septic
,
and
power
,
all the comforts of home.
Plus
,
t
he
romantic
sound of the Yakima
River rushing
by
.

I don
’
t know if it was the
rushing
river, the
commemorative cabernet
, or the RV park ambiance, but something worked.
We were kicking our clothes off as we climbed into the Airstream. Horny was the right word
.
Tina led me
, and
my
erection
down
the
hallway
to my queen
-
sized bed.
She pushed me down on the bed, straddled my thighs
,
and
guided me home. It would be a horse race to see who came in first.

I
placed,
but could barely walk the next morning.

C
hapter
5

B
ob Malot
t
called and said the mine road
s
and
drill
pads
were ready to go.
After Bob and I were done,
I called Chris Blackstone with Blackstone Drilling Company in Oroville, Washingto
n
.

“
Red, it
’
s Trace Brandon
,
down in Ellensburg.
”

Everybody called Chris
"Red"
because he
had a
Garfunk
el
-
looking mess of bright
-
red hair
. Fortunately, he also had a
sense of humor. A good thing, as he was a big son of a bitch with no neck, a
prominent
chin
,
and Popeye forearms.

“
Hey, Trace,
it
’
s been awhile
. W
hat can I do you for?
”

“
I need to drill t
hree
NQ-sized
core holes
, Red
. Angled at forty
-
five degrees
.
T
otal depths
will be
around
four
hundred feet. Bob Malott
has finished
the access roads and pads
,
and we
’
re ready to turn to the right.
”

“
Sound
s
good, Trace. Send me a location map
,
and I
’
ll get a proposal down to you.
”

“
Have you got a rig available?
”

“
I do. It
’
s a tracked rig
. C
an go anywhere and makes hole like a two
-
dollar whore.
”

I laughed
.
“
Jesus, Red, that
’
s awful.
”

“
Ai
n
’
t it though,
”
Red replied
,
with a snort.
“
All kidding aside, Trace, she
’
s a hole
-
making son of a bitch.
”

“
Okay,
Red
, sounds like what I need. One
more
thing, Red
.
I need damned good core recovery. So take it slow and easy
,
and let
’
s try for one hundred percent recovery.
”

“
Not a problem, Trace. We
’
ll do a first
-
class job.
”

I sent Red the information he needed and dialed up a conference call with Will and Wally.

“
Are you fellows
both
on?
”
I asked.

“
Will
,
here.
”

“
Wally
,
here.
”

“
Good. Okay, fellows
,
I
'm
getting a drilling proposal for t
hree
core holes. I
’
ll do some calculations and figure about
how deep
we should intersect the vein. We
’
ll drill
using
a down
-
hole hammer to just above the vein
. A
nd then
we
’
ll sta
r
t
cor
ing
.
”

Wally and Will both agreed.

“
As soon as we get enough
core
assays back from the lab,
I
’
ll put together a
P
ower
P
oint presentation. Wally
,
I
’
ll leave it to you to set up meetings
with investors and brokers
in Vancouver.
”

“
Sounds good, Trace,
”
Wally replied.

Will
concurred.
“
I
sure
hope the assays are good
.
”

“
They will be
, pardner
,
”
I replied.
“
We
’
ll be
drill
ing
right through the guts of the vein.
”

“
Heard anything more from Cyrus?
”
Wally asked.

“
Nada
, fellows
. B
ut I know
he
’
s out there.
I
t
’
s like an itch I can
’
t scratch.
”

A couple
of
days later, I got Red
’
s drilling proposal. The costs were okay, so I signed
on the dotted line and faxed a
copy of the contract back to him.

Bill Thorn
ton
looked at the copies of Forest Service drilling permits and called Cyrus.

“
Cyrus,
Thorny here. Thought you might want to know
.
Brandon got drilling permits for t
hree
core holes.
Blackstone Drilling has a rig on the way
.
”

“
Interesting. They haven
’
t done a private stock placement yet
, s
o
,
they
’
re
operating out of
good old
H
ip
N
ationa
l
. The
y
’
ll
need the core assays to
convince investors to buy shares in their private placement.
Maybe we should throw a little monkey wrench into their plans
.
”