21. A day at Jeff Smith’s Parlor was an expensive undertaking
The newest friend delivered to Jeff Smith’s Parlor brought with him from the gold fields $2,600 in gold, (about $80,000 today). It took Smith’s henchmen most of the rest of the day and evening to extract it from him. But they were persistent, as their boss would have wanted, and they managed to get it all. Stewart first lost only the cash he had on him, about $90. When he was offered a loan to continue the game, he went with the hustlers to the safe, in a nearby store, where he had secured his gold. The hustlers then stole the sack, according to Stewart’s version of the story. He reported the theft to a deputy marshal, unfortunately for him one on Smith’s payroll.
The merchants and businessmen of Skagway had no problem with miners spending all of their hard-earned money in the town. In fact, they welcomed it. It was the idea of his spending – or rather losing – all of it in one establishment to which they objected. Leading members of the committee met, and sent a message demanding that Soapy return the money. He refused. They then demanded that he return most of the money. He refused again. When the demand for repayment became more strident, Soapy replied that the miner had lost the money in “sporting games”, and that he had not been forced to play, but did so of this own free will. By then Skagway’s leading citizens had had enough of Jefferson Randolph Smith.