Mississippi Jack: Being an Account of the Further Waterborne Adventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman, Fine Lady, and Lily of the West (14 page)

Please don't wake up, Mike!
I'm thinking as I pull him to shore, fearful that the shock of the water might restore him to consciousness. This was the only way we could do this, him being so huge and heavy and all.

"Hold the anchor!" I cry, and Katy ties it off and the boat stops moving. There is another splash as a shirtless Jim Tanner jumps into the water, as planned, to come help me drag my burden to the shore.

My fears are groundless—Fink doesn't wake up, but snores peacefully on as he is hauled to shore.

"Damn, he weighs a ton." I grunt as we pull him out of the water so that only his feet remain submerged. "But that's good enough. Let's go." Jim unties the rope from both tree and Fink and we start off.

Fink stirs and we freeze, but he only smiles and says, "Swans..."

Jim and I swim back to the boat and are pulled aboard. Jim goes to the steering oar and the anchor is hauled and taken aboard and we are under way again.

"I wish you the joy of your new command, Miss," says Higgins, smiling. "I shall lay out some dry clothes."

Still dripping, I jump up onto the cabin top and plant a wet foot on each side of the centerline, the better to feel the action of my boat.

Oh, how good it feels!

We arise this morning at dawn as masters of our own fate—or masters of our own boat, anyway. We breakfast on biscuits, maple syrup, and bacon, and then head back out into the current to continue our journey.

Yesterday, after we had parted company with the redoubtable Mr. Fink, we continued on our way with much singing and revelry and bragging about what clever scammers we were, but it turned out to be not quite as easy as we had supposed—the current had picked up some, likely the result of a heavy rain upriver, and we were pitched about in a most unseaman-like way. I know that Jim was mortified at not being able to keep the boat's head up when we got spun around several times. We brought up two of the long oars—
sweeps,
as Mr. Fink had called them—and fixed them in their oarlocks and went to work, with Katy and me on one and Higgins on the other, and we were able to keep her bow to the west till evening, when, exhausted, we pulled in to the shore as night was falling.

Higgins whipped us up a good dinner from the provisions he had bought back in Kennerdell—some bacon, salt pork, a kind of dried beef called jerky, and even a good smoked ham. And a halfway decent bottle of wine made, it was said, from the fruit of the wild grapevines we had seen growing along the shore. "Fox grapes," Katy announced. "Ain't good fer nuthin' 'less you add pounds and pounds o' sugar to 'em." So we were rewarded for our labors and our good cheer was restored.

As we sat watching the evening sun go down in a glorious sunset, I got up and poured a libation of fox-grape wine over the bow, then said, "I christen thee the
Belle of the Golden West!
Long may you sail! Or float ... or drift ... or whatever..."

"Hear, hear," cheered my crew, raising their glasses.

Today, however, the water flows smoothly and the winds stay calm, and we are able to ship the sweeps and rely only on the steering oar. I set up a watch rotation such that every one of us four would become skilled at the handling of it. Under Jim's now-expert tutelage, we all do attain a measure of proficiency, but I certainly wouldn't want to do it for a living, as it takes a certain amount of brute strength to move the thing. There were several times when my feet were lifted from the deck in my efforts to make the damned oar behave.

It is plain that we shall have to hire more crew when we get to the mighty Ohio. How we will pay them, I don't know, but I'll worry about that later. Maybe we'll pick up some paying passengers in Pittsburgh. Going to have to get some good maps there, too, so's I can gauge distances and figure out what to charge my customers. By the mile, I think, and the money up front.

***

In the afternoon, as things are going smoothly, I sit with Higgins and we discuss the events of the past day.

"You do not think he will cry bloody murder when he gets up and finds his bearings but not his boat?" asks Higgins. "While it has been my pleasure to serve you these past years, still I would prefer not to be hanged by some unwashed, illiterate American mob for flatboat theft in this benighted wilderness. I had fancied a rather more elegant end to my days—something more in the line of a peaceful death after an honored life, followed by a stately but tasteful funeral featuring endless ranks of weeping but well-dressed mourners covering the casket containing my mortal remains with mounds of perfect yellow roses."

"Very poetic, Higgins," I say, "and I hope all that comes to pass for you, but not all too quickly, for I need you here by my side and not reclining elegantly dead in some vault in Westminster Abbey."

"Westminster Abbey," muses Higgins. "I do like the sound of that."

"Anyway," I say, breaking into his self-elegy, "when Mr. Fink wakes up, he will think that he fell overboard during a drunken stupor and he'll consider himself lucky to be alive. I'm sure he is right now making up a tall tale to fit the occasion. Shall I give it a shot? Very well:
Thar I was, throwed overboard by the biggest wave ever seen east of the monster waves of Bor-nee-oh, tossed down to the bottom o' the river whar I sucked up enough mud to chink all the log houses from Ohio to Saint Louis. I come back up to the surface and spit up all the dirt inta one big pile and that pile become Mount—
"

Higgins laughs, then says, "All right, Miss, very well composed. I think Mr. Fink himself would be pleased."

"Besides, Higgins, do I not have in my possession a Bill of Sale for this boat, signed by Mr. Fink, himself? Any court in the land would surely honor it." I had taken the piece of paper upon which Mike Fink had so laboriously penned his signature and I had written the Bill of Sale for the boat above it, all legal-like. The price was fifty dollars, the amount I had already paid him, which I think was fair. Serves him right, too, 'cause he shouldn't have been so greedy. Mr. Fink has found to his sorrow that it's not a good idea to try to cheat an old Cheapside hand.

"Yes, you have shown me the paper. I think Ezra Pickering, while aghast at the speciousness of the whole thing, would nevertheless be proud."

"So you see, Higgins," say I, "there is absolutely nothing to worry about. And, furthermore, if you think I feel guilty because of this, think again. Think how he cheated us on the fare he was charging us to Pittsburgh. And if you really think that Mike Fink came by this boat in any way honestly, well, I've got some stock in an under the English Channel tunnel company I'd like to sell you."

"Very well, Miss," replies a jocular Higgins, "I shall pass on the stock, put legal concerns out of my mind, and concentrate my thoughts on dinner. If you'll excuse me."

I go up to sit for a while with Katy and watch the shore slip by, all deep and dense and green. The cleared farms are growing fewer and farther between, as are the tiny towns. I wonder if there are any Indians lurking just beyond the edge of the forest?

Katy and I are both delighted to shed our dresses now that Mr. Fink has left our company—it's back to undershirt and drawers without stockings, just as we were dressed in the hold of the
Bloodhound.
Higgins expresses some concern that our attire might keep poor Jim in a state of constant excitement, but I reply that he'll have to get used to it, as the rivers are long and the work will be hard and dresses get in the way. I promise, however, to sew us up some heavier canvas trousers as soon as we can get the cloth. Meanwhile, randy Jim should keep his mind on his nautical studies and not on us.
Boys, I swear...

We neither see nor catch anything edible, and so I go back to the spot on the cabin top right up in front of Jim, at his steering oar, and flop down on my back. Lolling about in the sun, I decide to call this spot the quarterdeck. I think on that: the quarterdeck of the
Belle of the Golden West,
Lieutenant J. M. Faber, Commanding.

Yes, I do like the sound of that, I do. And so, my bully crew, on to this Pittsburgh, where we shall see what we shall see.

Jaimy Fletcher
Kittanning, Pennsylvania
USA

Jacky,

We reached the Allegheny four days ago at the town of Kittanning. It was a wretched little town with very little to offer, but it did have a dock from which I hoped to gain us passage downriver.

It was noon, with the sun high overhead, so we had time to take care of some things before finding a place to sleep for the night. I went to question the people at the dock as to our chances of finding a boat going downriver, while Clementine had the sad duty of taking Daisy off to sell her, the forests around the river getting so thick that we could not think of taking her farther.

I was informed that without money "y'ain't got the chance of a snowball in Hell of gettin' on a boat, but mebbe if one comes down needin' a hand, well, mebbe ... You'll just have to wait and see what comes by."

Clementine came back, disconsolate, with a sack that contained two smoked hams and a jug of whiskey.

"It was the best I could do, Jaimy, I'm sorry, but at least the people seemed like they'd be kind to her." She turned away as her fingers brushed at her eyes. I knew, from the way Clementine would lay her face against the mare's neck on our journey here, that Daisy was the only thing in her former life that she could love and be loved by in return, if only in the simplest of ways: a neigh, a welcoming whicker, a happy toss of the head when the girl would come into the old plow horse's sight.

I assured Clementine that she had done well by both Daisy and me, and I put my arm around her and drew her to my side to lend her comfort. Then we trudged off to see what we could do in this town till opportunity presented itself. At least, finally, I had made it to the river.

There was a livery stable, owned by a Mr. Owens, and he offered me the job of shoveling manure and sawing and chopping wood in exchange for breakfast, dinner, and supper for Clementine and me. We could sleep in their barn if she would help Mrs. Owens with the house and laundry chores. We gratefully took the offer.

So, for the next four days, I endured some of the most grueling work I have ever done. I shoveled manure into barrows and then took those barrows out to fields and spread that same manure around, countless trips back and forth, back and forth.

Once, when I wheeled the barrow nearby the Owens's house, I heard Clementine inside singing as she went about her tasks.

Come all ye fair and tender ladies,
Take warning how you court young men,
They're like a star of a summer's mornin',
First they'll appear and then they're gone.

They'll tell to you some loving story,
They'll tell to you some far-flung lie,
And then they'll go and court another
And, for that other one, pass you by.

If I'd a-knowed before I'd courted
That love it was such a killin' crime,
I'd a-locked my heart in a box of golden
And tied it up with a silver line.

I stood there and listened, and it humbled me that while she sang happily in her present state, I grumbled and cursed. I picked up my barrow and moved on.

When I was not moving manure about, I chopped, sawed, and split wood for the coming winter's fires. I thought often, Jacky, whilst trying to neatly split a log with one blow of my ax, how you have often observed that no skill is worthless and that something can be learned from the meanest of jobs. And, while I cannot claim to like it, I have grown quite lean and sinewy in dealing with this harsh American life. I am probably in as good a physical condition as when we belonged to the Dread Brotherhood of the
Dolphin
and swung through the rigging like crazed little apes.

Not having the luxury of a razor, my beard has grown out, too. I have never been unshaven before, and I find my whiskers grow out black and fine. Clementine says she likes it, saying that while my chin formerly rasped her cheek, now it is all soft and silky. On our journey here, she was fond of smoothing it out with her fingers as we lay abed for the night. Yes, and she'd stroke it sometimes in the daytime, too, when we would lie on a verdant creek bank, taking the sun and ... well, resting.

I caught my reflection in a horse trough one day and was quite shocked. With my long dark hair and pointy beard, I looked every inch the bloody pirate, except, that is, for my clothes. No piratical elegance there. My only two garments were Pap Jukes's overalls and the shirt that Clementine had sewn for me. The shirt, actually, was quite fine, but the rough overalls and bare feet made me appear to be the simplest of country bumpkins.

The nature of my situation is not lost on me: I cross the American wilderness in pursuit of one girl, while yet another girl stands by my side. If those two brigands had not waylaid me, none of this would have happened. I know that I would have caught up with you and things would be vastly different right now. But then Clementine, too, would have been stuck back at that awful place with no joy, no hope, no future, only vain wishes and prayers uttered by mountain streams, heard by nobody.

I do not know what to think and so I shall think about nothing. After our day's labor, we return exhausted to our nest in the hay and burrow in. She lies down next to me and we sleep deeper than I have ever slept before. I shall take it day by day.

I know I can only take one day at a time, but I also know I grow more and more fond of her every day.

***

It was on the morning of the fifth day in Kittanning, while I was filling yet another barrow with ordure, that I heard a commotion down by the river. It sounded like a boat coming in to the dock! And here I had been despairing of spending the rest of my life as a manure-hauler! With hope surging, I ran down to see. On my way, I saw Clementine up in the kitchen window of the Owens place and called out to her to come running and she did, catching up to me at the foot of the dock.