Authors: L. A. Meyer
"Hey, pretty boy, how yew doin'?" His words were slurred and his eyes rolled about, not quite able to focus on us in the dark. "Yew ready for some fun? Some manly fun, boy? Some..."
That's when the fact of two pairs of white eyes peering at him from the loft instead of just one suddenly registered in his sodden brain.
"What the hell? Clemmie? What yew doin' here?" He lowered the lantern and started back down the ladder. "That's it. Gonna kill the both of yew right now."
My mind, which had plainly been At Ease for the past hour or so, snapped back to Attention.
He's got the gun down below and he's going to use it. On us.
I jumped out of the straw. "Get over there, up against the back wall!" I hissed at Clementine, and lunged over to where I had seen a heavy block and tackle hanging from its lines. It was probably used to haul heavy loads up to the loft. Its bottom hook was fastened to a metal hoop, but I was able to free it, so that the heavy block swung freely in my hand. I waited but I did not have to wait long. Pappy Jukes's head reappeared at the top of the ladder, and this time he had his rifle in his right hand, and,
damn!
a pistol in his left!
I swung the block toward his head, and as I did so, he fired the pistol. I jerked back as the ball flew by my face, nicking my right earlobe but doing no other damage. My aim with the block and tackle, however, was true, and it caught him in the middle of his forehead and toppled him backward off the ladder. I heard the thud as he hit the floor below, and I followed him down, leaping off the edge of the loft, hoping to catch him before he could aim the rifle.
I caught him all right. I landed with both of my heels on his chest, knocking the wind completely out of him. His rifle was lying off to the side, so I leaped over and picked it up.
I needn't have hurried. Jukes lay at my feet, his face contorted in agony. His left leg was twisted up under him at an odd, but to me rather pleasing, angle. I pointed the rifle at his head.
"My leg's busted, Clemmie, oh God, help me, Clemmie, my leg's busted." He moaned. "Fetch me that rake, girl, so's I kin stand up and git in the house. Oh Clemmie, fetch it fer me like a good girl."
Clementine appeared at the side of the loft, again clad in her flimsy yellow dress, took one look at him sprawled helpless on the floor, and climbed down the ladder. She gazed at her father in the circle of light cast by the lantern, careful, I noticed, to keep out of reach of his hands.
"Ain't fetchin' nothin' fer you, ever ag'in, you mean ol' man. You kilt Ma with yer meanness. You kilt any pet I ever hadâmy bunnies, my kitten, my ducklingsâyou kilt 'em ever' time you found out I was lovin' 'em, and you laughed when you did it. But you ain't gonna kill me, no, you ain't. I got half a mind to jest tip over that lantern and burn up this barn with you in it, I do, but I ain't like you, Pap, so I ain't gonna do it. But I ain't fetchin' nothin' fer you, neither. I'm leavin' here, I'm leavin' with Jaimy, and I ain't never been happier in my life."
Jukes looked at her, and then at me, with a cold, level glare of pure rage. "I'll git yew two, I will. Jest you wait."
"Clementine," I said, "get the horse out and tie it to the porch rail."
She went to do it, picking up bridle and reins on her way. The horse whickered quietly as she entered the stall. "There, there, Daisy, it's all right. We're leavin' here, and you'll never be whipped by that mean ol' man ag'in."
"You," I said to Jukes, "you move and I'll put a bullet in your head. I have been an officer in His Majesty's Royal Navy. I have been in battle, and I know how to kill a man, believe me. When she gets the horse out, I will bar the door from the outside, just like you did for me. If you connive a way to get out, I'll kill you out there. Is that clear?"
I was rewarded with an even more withering glare of hatred from the helpless Mr. Jukes.
Clementine backed the mare Daisy from the stall and led her out of the barn. I bent down and retrieved the empty pistol and, with the same hand, picked up the lantern. I went out the door, and from the now pitch-black interior I heard, "Yew come here. Yew steal my girl and then yew go and steal my horse. I place my curse upon yew. May yew rot in Hell."
Fine, old man,
I thought as I closed the door and slammed down the latch,
curse away.
Attending to the business at hand, I saw that Clementine had, indeed, tied the mare to the rail and had gone into the house. I followed with the lantern and found her stuffing some things in a sack.
"Blankets," she said, "pots, some flour, cornmeal, and we'll need a water jug..."
"How about gunpowder, balls..."
"That chest over there."
I went to the chest and found a powder horn, flints, and bags of balls, for both pistol and rifle, all of which I stuffed into an empty powder sack also kept therein.
"Money?" I asked, the last shreds of civilized behavior having been drained from me in this violent land.
"Oh, he's got some, but he never tol' me where he hid it. You could put hot coals to his feet and he'd not tell you where it was, I know that. Here, these're his Sunday-go-to-meetin' overalls. They're clean. I just warshed 'em. Only shirt he's got is the one he's got on."
I caught the overalls and put them on. It struck me that I had been essentially naked for the past twenty or so hours and was becoming quite used to it. I was becoming a savage in a savage land.
The rough garment was quite huge on me and hung loose on my frame. Only the shoulder straps kept it up. Upon seeing me in it, Clementine giggled, then said, "Oh, yes, and needle and thread, too. And here's some cloth to make you up a shirt." These items she also threw into her sack.
"What else?" I asked.
"Ain't nothin' else here," she said. "Not for me, anyways. Let's go."
I blew out the lantern and we went back outside. The first threads of the light of dawn were beginning to appear in the eastern sky. I made slings of our bundles and we slung them about our waists, there being no saddle to affix them to. I climbed up on Daisy's very broad back and reached down for Clementine. She took my hand and vaulted up and settled in behind me, and we rode slowly off.
I took one last look back at the silent barn, but she did not.
As we rode along at a slow walk, which is all I suspected that the massive Daisy could ever do in the way of speed, Clementine Jukes wrapped her arms about my waist and put her face against my bare back. I felt her slim body pressed against me. I felt her lips kiss me between my shoulder blades. I felt her long flaxen hair blow about my shoulders, and sometimes in my face, in the soft morning breeze.
"Mrs. Clementine Fletcher,
mmmm.
I really do like the sound of that, Jaimy, I do," I heard her purr.
Oh, Lord...
We did, as Mr. Fink commanded, cast off immediately, or almost immediately, for Higgins had to go sell the horses to Mr. Tweedie first. While he was gone, the rest of us stowed our gear below and then came back up on deck to await departure. When Higgins returned, he was not at all pleased, I discovered, as he stepped back on board.
"Damned thief! He knew we were at a disadvantage, so I could barely get more than the cost of our drinks from the blackguard!"
I put a restraining hand on Higgins's sleeve. "Dear Higgins, set your mind at rest. Right now the locals are having their way with us, but I promise you that it will not always be so. Let's live in the moment. All our gear is stowed and we should be at ease. After all, Higgins, the horses are sold, which means you do not have to ride one of them."
He agreed that this was a very fine thing, indeed, as he scurried about to see what cooking gear might be contained on this bark.
"Cast off!" roared Fink, standing aft at his steering sweep as soon as Higgins was aboard. "You, boy! Take off the stern line! Coil it down! Move yer ass, or I'll kick it all the way to Pittsburgh!"
Jim looked to me, angry. I gave a quick nod and mouthed
do it
and gave him a wink to let him know I understood the blow to his pride.
"Aye, aye,
Sir
," said Jim. He took off the line and coiled it expertly down on the deck, ready for its next use.
Our first day out on Mike Fink's flatboat is most pleasant. It's a fine, warm day and Fink, with what seems to be very little effort, keeps the boat on a leisurely course close to the eastern shore. I, naturally, waste no time in casing out the boat, which turns out to be a very well-made craft, well-found in her knees and planking. Quite new, too. As soon as I can, I go below, to thrust my shiv into various parts of the frame, but I can find no softness, no damp rot of any kind. A remarkable piece of work, I conclude.
The belowdecks area is fitted out with twenty bunks on each side, with curtains that can be drawn over each for privacy. In the center is an open hold for cargo, with a ladder going down into the bilges.
Jim Tanner is with me as we examine the inner hull of the flatboat. "Jim," I say, "I want you to watch this Mike Fink in every way, especially in how he handles this boat. Learn how to operate that sweep. Pretend to admire him and draw him out as to how this boat is run with a full crew on board. Appeal to his considerable vanity. I shall ask Higgins to do the same. All right?"
Jim nods, mollified now that he has a mission. I believe he is as happy as I am to be back on water, no matter fresh or salt and in spite of the boisterous Fink. There's not enough of a roll on this flat river to quicken the heart of any true sailor, but it's something.
Katy Deere, too, seems content to be here. With her skirt pulled up almost to her waist, she sits on the prow, her long legs dangling over each side. Her bow in hand, strung, nocked with a fishing arrow, and with its length of light line coiled beside her, she looks down into the dark water for whatever it might offer up.
Much later, when back on deck, I commend Mr. Fink on the quality of his craft and his skill in guiding it, and he guffaws in what I have already learned is his usual manner of speech ... or rather, his usual mode of shout, "Oh, yes, and she's a fine one! Fitted out for passengers, as you've probably already noticed. Yeah, I seen you crawlin' and nosin' around down there. Jus' took thirty holy pilgrims up to a tent revival up in Jacob's Holler! Two whole dollars each!"
"As big and strong and manly as you so plainly are, surely you could not have gotten this heavy craft with thirty stout pilgrims aboard up this swiftly flowing river?" I ask, doing the arithmetic in my head: Thirty souls upriver at two dollars each equals sixty dollars, while we four poor souls were charged one hundred dollars for going
downstream.
Ah, Mr. Fink, I do think you've got it coming to you.
"Nah! I had a crew of ten and I dumped 'em off up there. Mike Fink don't need no crew to navigate downstream, no, he don't!"
He looks slightly offended, as if anyone could think otherwise.
"I see," I reply, and settle myself down on the edge of the low cabin. The cabin, itself, takes up most of the deck room, leaving only a narrow path for what I now know would be the boots of the crew as they poled this boat upriver, or guided it on its way down.
As I sit watching the trees on the banks go slowly by, Higgins comes up bearing a tin tray with a cup and steaming teapot upon it. Somehow he has managed to find a clean white tea towel, which he drapes over his arm before he pours the tea from the battered pot we had gotten at Katy's place into the cup he had picked up from God-knows-where.
"Thank you, Higgins," I say, lifting the cup to my lips. "
Ummm
... Wherever did you get the sugar?"
"It happened, Miss, that Iâ"
"Who the hell is she? Some kind o' princess or some-thin'?" asks the mystified Fink upon seeing this performance, for performance it truly is. "And who the hell are you to be waitin' on her like that?" He squats on the stern next to his sweep and peers suspiciously at us.
"In a way, she is, Sir," explains Higgins, imperturbable as always. "She is the chief executive officer and major stockholder of Faber Shipping, Worldwide. I am an employee of the same corporation and, as such, am performing my duties in that regard."
"Well, ain't that somethin'," replies Fink, considering this concept in the dark recesses of his mind. "
Hmmmm
..."
"May I pour you a cup, Mr. Fink?" asks Higgins.
"Might's well. Ain't got no whiskey, and damned if I was gonna buy any off that damned Tweedie, neither, thirsty as I am, which is
very
thirsty. Thirsty enough to drain a middlin'-sized lake, if'n I drank water, which I don't. Ain't drunk nothin' but good corn likker since the day they pulled me offa my mama's teat, I ain't. Hell, ol' Mama, Torty Fink, which was her given name, liked her corn, too, so I figure the mother's milk I was gettin' outta her was a good fifty proof. It was a good way fer me t' get weaned, as I see it."
At this, Fink throws back his head and bellows out a song at the top of his plainly very huge lungs:
OH, IF THE RIVER WAS WHISKEY,
AND I WAS A DUCK,
I'D DIVE TO THE BOTTOM,
AND NEVER COME UP!OH, "CORN WHISKEY, CORN WHISKEY,
CORN WHISKEY," I CRY,
IF'N I DON'T GET CORN WHISKEY,
I SURELY WILL DIE!
He goes into a high keen on the word
cry,
drawing it out to something like "
CA-RYE-EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
" before finishing off the verse.
"Tha's a good song, don't tell me it ain't," says Fink, well satisfied with his performance.
"An excellent song, indeed, Mr. Fink, and so well done, too," I say, applauding. Actually it sounded like gravel rolling off a tin roof, but the song itself has possibilities. I shall have to get the rest of the verses. But not just now.
"Thank you, girly-girl," says Fink. "I sung that song in memory of my dear mama."
"Mother Fink has gone on to her reward?" I ask. "I'm so sorry."