SWAINS LOCK (The River Trilogy, book 1) (24 page)

A worn oriental rug covered most of the
floor, its faded colors indigo and sage, rust and gold. Kevin
guessed that it must once have been worth a fortune. Morrison was
sitting where Kevin had seen him last, in a leather armchair with
its back to one side of the bay window. A matching armchair fronted
the opposite side and a round table of amber marble anchored the
window, uniting the chairs. The room was unlit but the morning
sunlight flooded in, illuminating ribbons of cigarette smoke that
spun and folded in the upper half of the bay. Morrison remained
seated as Kevin entered the room carrying his toolbox and hat.

“Good morning, Mr. Emory.” Morrison’s voice
was breathy and sing-song, with a trace of condescension hiding
behind the cadence. Like the voice of a mischievous schoolchild,
Kevin thought, greeting a substitute teacher in class. “I see you
brought your safe deposit box.”

Kevin grinned, tapping the toolbox as he
crossed to the empty chair. “It’s a burden I never mind
bearing.”

“Please forgive my inability to meet you at
the door,” Morrison said. He took a drag and set his cigarette down
in an ashtray. “My neurasthenia makes sudden movement
difficult.”

Kevin sat down with the box between his
feet, then turned so he could look directly at Morrison. The
trader’s thin face was pale and hairless, with wispy eyebrows lost
behind his wire-rimmed frames and slick, dark hair brushed back
from his high forehead. He could have been almost any age, Kevin
thought. Thirty or sixty.

“Were you able to find the currency we
agreed on?”

“Of course,” Morrison said in a disarming
voice. Kevin heard the black sleeve of his silk jacket rustle as he
retrieved his cigarette and took a drag, then transferred the
ashtray to the windowsill. He reached down for a leather satchel,
snapped its jaws open, and withdrew two coins that he laid on the
table, angled toward Kevin. The first was silver and the second
gold.

“1922 Peace Dollar,” he said. “Eight-tenths
of an ounce of silver.” Morrison handed it to Kevin. Its face
showed the crowned head and flowing tresses of a young woman in
profile, lips parted, engraved beneath the word “Liberty.” On the
reverse a bald eagle perched on an olive branch above the word
“Peace.” The coin felt sharp-edged and clean in his fingers. He
nodded and set it back on the table.

Morrison picked up the gold piece. “1924 St.
Gaudens Double Eagle,” he said, handing Kevin the gleaming coin.
“Not yet circulated.” On its face, Lady Liberty stood backlit by
the fan-shaped rays of the sun. A bald eagle with raised wings was
set against the same rays on the other side, beneath the words
“Twenty Dollars.” The images dissolved into pools of gold as the
coin caught sunlight while Kevin turned it in his fingers.

“Very nice,” he said, laying it beside the
Peace Dollar. “Should outlast my paper.”

Morrison smiled and exhaled smoke into the
air above the table. “Gold and silver are timeless, my friend. They
will outlive you and me. Paper is disposable, vulgar, and cheap –
like the life we all live.” He paused to flick an ash. “But paper
is grist for the grind mill, and our pathetic lives need grain.” As
he spoke, Kevin watched his eyes turn to almond-shaped ciphers,
shifting and dancing in a recessed world. The eyes grew still as
Morrison leveled them on Kevin. “So let’s count your worthless
paper.”

Kevin forced a smile as he bent to open the
toolbox. He withdrew Geary’s bill-stuffed envelope, to which he’d
added the appropriate amount, and pulled out the stack of bills.
“For two hundred silver dollars at six percent?” Morrison nodded
and Kevin counted out the bills. “Two hundred and twelve,” he said.
He pushed the stack halfway across the table but Morrison made no
gesture toward it. Kevin looked at him, then continued.

“And for twenty-four Double-Eagles at twelve
percent…” He counted out four-hundred and eighty dollars and asked
for help calculating the fee.

“Let’s call it fifty-seven,” Morrison said
with a fleeting smile. “That will give you an extra sixty cents for
entertainment in Georgetown.” Kevin added smaller bills to the
second stack. Leaning forward, Morrison swept the bills to the
perimeter of the table, where they came to rest on top of a
circumferential scarlet band. Embedded in the band was a pattern of
nested green and gold triangles, and in the triangles multi-colored
flecks and flakes of marble swirled like seabirds. The money,
shapes, and patterns mesmerized Kevin, and he made a conscious
effort to re-focus on the center of the table.

The Double Eagle and Peace Dollar were gone,
and Morrison was extracting paper sleeves – pale green, with $20
printed on one side – from his satchel. He centered them on the
table. “Six. Eight. Ten,” he said, sitting back. “Those are your
two-hundred Peace Dollars.”

Kevin plucked four random sleeves and opened
their seams; their contents spilled into rows of silver coins.
Nodding at the quantities, he stacked the coins and pushed them to
the center of the table.

“And your gold,” Morrison said. He placed a
single tan sleeve stamped “$500” alongside the others. “There were
twenty-five coins in that sleeve. I removed the piece you saw
earlier, so there are now twenty-four.”

Kevin peeled it open and let the virgin
coins slide onto the table, where sunlight transformed them into a
pool of liquid gold. An involuntary smile spread across his face.
He assembled stacks of five from the glowing pile, leaving four
coins for his flattened palm. Two faces showed Lady Liberty
standing and two showed an eagle in flight.

“I count twenty-four as well. Pretty as a
sunset on the water.”

“Fair enough, then,” Morrison said. He
deposited the bills in his satchel and snapped the jaws shut while
Kevin transferred the sleeves into the bottom of his toolbox and
laid the stacked coins in the hanging coin tray. With the coins
secured, he locked the toolbox and stood up, adjusting his fingers
for a better grip. Empty it weighed almost fifteen pounds, but now
it felt heavier. He snared his hat from the chair and extended his
hand across the table.

Morrison exhaled smoke toward the ceiling
and leaned forward to shake Kevin’s hand with limp, pale fingers.
His lips were pressed into an ironic smile and behind his glasses
his eyes were again dancing a private dance. “Take care, my friend.
Your appreciation of precious metals is well-founded, but you
should try to keep them at some distance. Otherwise they can drag
you down.”

“So long, Mr. Morrison,” Kevin said. He
started across the carpet toward the door. “No need to call your
woman, I know the way out.”

***

As Kevin turned onto the dirt road to the
Rock Creek boat basin, the toolbox felt heavy in his hand but his
heart was light. He and Tom had accomplished the tasks they had set
for themselves in Georgetown. They had delivered two barrels of
whiskey to Finn Geary, which Kevin hoped would solidify the
relationship they had established with him last fall. Most of
Geary’s paper had been converted into hard money. Reddy Bogue had
finally arrived yesterday evening and paid fifteen dollars for the
seven cords. Reddy and his kid had carted away two wagons full last
night and appeared again at first light to take the rest. They had
been stacking the last load as Kevin set out to visit Morrison.

Yesterday morning he had even found time to
visit the M-Street store Ellie had steered him to for fabric. And
while the remains of the rockfish had been consigned to the creek,
a trip to the M-Street grocer on Wednesday had yielded smoked beef,
potatoes, and carrots for the trip back up the canal.

It wasn’t noon yet but the thought of food
made his stomach growl as he approached the scow, which had been
tied up in the basin for over two days now. Mike and Bess were
grazing thin grass and Tom was sitting with his back to the nearest
tree, knees bent and hat lowered over his eyes. The feed trough was
set up, but when Kevin reached it he saw it was empty. The water
bucket next to it was half-full. He walked over to Tom and kicked
his boots.

“Think they might want a little hay before
we ask ‘em to pull us back to Harpers Ferry?” He put the toolbox
down and stretched his tired hand.

“I fed ‘em!” Tom protested, pushing his hat
back and looking up at Kevin. “Didn’t want to give out too much,
since there ain’t a whole lot of hay left. Maybe one of us should
go out and get ‘em some corn.”

“Hell with that. We can get canal-company
corn for nothing. We’ll feed ‘em again on the way up. And they’re
pulling a light boat now anyway.”

Tom stood up and brushed the dirt from his
pants. “Morrison come through?”

Kevin grinned, tapping the toolbox with his
boot and rattling the coins in the tray.

“You ready to get going?”

“Yep,” Kevin said. “Let’s get ‘em
harnessed.” Tom went to the hay-house to retrieve the tack while
Kevin took the toolbox down to the cabin and set it under the
table. He carved two hunks of smoked beef from the side in the
cupboard, refilled his hip flask with whiskey, and returned to the
deck as Tom was emerging with the bridles, breast pads, and
spreader bars.

“Tommy, a toast.” Kevin screwed the top off
his flask and held the vessel high. “To our first Georgetown run of
1924. An unmasticated success.” He took a long swig, then presented
the flask and a hunk of beef to Tom.

“First of many,” Tom muttered. “But the trip
ain’t over ‘til we’re back in Washington County.” He knocked back a
comparable shot. “Now let’s get boating.”

They set their teeth into the smoked meat in
unison, and Kevin followed Tom toward the mooring lines and the
mules.

Chapter 20
Sunset

Friday, March 28, 1924

Lee Fisher pedaled hard and jerked the
handlebars up as the front wheel reached the descending pitch of
towpath below Pennyfield Lock. For a split second the bicycle felt
airborne. When the wheel reconnected with the dirt, he spread his
feet from the pedals and let the bike coast as the towpath
flattened again. As it lost momentum, he squeezed the brake-lever
until it stopped. He stepped off, spun it around, and admired it
again.

Charlie Pennyfield’s bicycle was a black
Mead Ranger with diamond-shaped white accents. Mounted between the
parallel top tubes was a narrow tool compartment also painted black
and white. That compartment was a nice feature, Lee thought, since
it could hold the old leg-irons that he used to lock the bike. And
earlier today when he’d pedaled up to the crossroads market to shop
for tonight’s dinner with Katie, he’d been able to stuff the
sausages and potato salad in the compartment, then somehow make it
back to Pennyfield balancing the cherry pie on the handlebars!

He felt the blood rush to his face as he
envisioned meeting Katie again tonight. The interminable five-day
wait was almost over. His hand drifted into his pocket to touch the
note that he’d found pinned to the lockhouse door at Pennyfield
when he returned from the store. He read it again for reassurance.
“Lee, I’ll see you tonight at 6. Katie.” It still confirmed what
he’d hoped for – Katie had returned from her trip to Alexandria and
would visit tonight.

If she had forsaken their date, he wasn’t
sure when he would have seen her again. The Emorys should be
starting their run back upstream today, and slow as his cousins
were, even they would reach Pennyfield by noon tomorrow. Lee was
boating with them up to Harpers Ferry, so once they got here he’d
be gone. From Harpers Ferry he would have to find his own way up to
Hancock to join Ben Myers because the season would be starting
soon. The repair crews that Lee had locked through this week said
that the canal should be running on all levels down from Cumberland
by April 1. That was Tuesday, only four days away. Spring sunshine
was finally reaching the Appalachian mountains of the upper Potomac
Valley and bearing down on the winter’s sullen layers of snow and
ice.

But Lee was looking forward to a mild March
night far downstream, a night just hours away and full of promise.
Tomorrow morning would leave time for short-term goodbyes, and for
plans to reconvene with Katie along the canal during the weeks
ahead.

***

In the kitchen of the lockhouse at Swains,
Cy arrayed four pint-flasks of whiskey on the scarred wooden table
next to his untapped five-gallon cask. He’d sold fourteen pints on
Wednesday, seventeen on Thursday, and five so far today at the
lock, all at a dollar seventy-five. He grabbed a ceramic jar from
the counter, fished out his roll of bills, and rifled through it.
Sixty-eight dollars. He pocketed a handful of coins, peeled off a
dozen dollar bills, and stashed the rest back in the jar.

The flasks on the table had drained the
first five-gallon cask, but the second cask was full, so he had
forty-four pints of whiskey left. Selling another eight tonight
would give him enough to pay the Emorys when they came through
tomorrow, plus a little to spare. Hell, he could probably even sell
a few pints Saturday morning before the Emorys arrived. But selling
whiskey tonight was critical. With the repair crews around and a
few weekend sightseers, there should be enough potential customers
at the Great Falls Tavern. “Tavern,” he muttered derisively. “A
tavern that don’t sell nothing to drink.” Bad for the patrons, but
an opportunity for Cy. A sudden stab of pain in his left hip
overrode the usual dull ache. He grimaced and an image of Zimmerman
intruded on his thoughts.

To banish it and fend off the pain, he
pulled out his personal flask for a quick shot. He caught his
breath and limped over to the crate in the corner to study the rows
of empty, cork-topped bottles inside. Forty-eight, and I’ll need
almost that many to empty the second cask, he thought. He withdrew
four flasks, filled them with fast-running whiskey, then corked
them on the table alongside the first four. Eight was all he wanted
to carry to the Tavern tonight. His pocket watch read quarter to
five – might as well head over. He distributed the pints into the
pockets of his wool jacket and overcoat. There was no place for his
personal flask, so he left it on the table. He snatched his hat
from a hook and walked outside. Katie was sitting on the bench in
front of the lockhouse.