The Man on the Park Bench

by Don McNair

Aaron Reeder stared south across the small campfire to his fourteen year old daughter and the Tennessee River beyond. The dawn sun flickered over the dark Appalachian Mountains to his left, a flattened egg yolk sandwiched between black rocky peaks and low hanging dark clouds.

  The fire reflected off Phoebe's right cheek, almost hidden by the frayed gray shawl that fought against the stinging wind. The twenty two boats behind her squealed and growled against each other as the boiling river rushed past. His own small skiff nuzzled against Colonel Donelson's flatboat. The two dark blobs on the flatboat’s deck were probably Donelson and his wife or his daughter Rachel, although they could be any two of the boat's thirty or so passengers. Donelson usually wanted to start early, what with the Indians active.

  "Better get this stuff on board," Reeder told Phoebe, nodding toward the blackened pot next to the low fire. "If that thing ain't cooled yet, it won't never be."

  He gathered their bedding as he watched her adjust her kersey skirt and draw her bodice strings tight, and shook his head. All old clothes, all hand me downs, all proof he couldn't take care of his own. Rachel Donelson had given Phoebe that bodice just last week, saying it didn't fit her any more. He’d spent every spare shilling on outfitting his skiff, and nothing was left over for women's things.

  Phoebe leaned over to pick up the pot, and the fire's reflection danced on her face. Sabra. She was Sabra all over again. The same large eyes, the scooped nose, even the pout. Sabra, the woman he'd married, so far away and so long ago.

  Reeder looked around. Other families were dousing their own fires, preparing for the day's float down the Tennessee River. They loaded their boats with clicks and clanks, talked in whispers, looked for Indians hidden beyond the campfires. At least they talked to each other. But his own daughter, his own flesh and blood, wouldn't talk. She'd said nary a word since he'd set her right about that Stuart boy the night before. Aaron looked at her, and their eyes met.

  "Givin' me the silent treatment ain't goin' to help at all," he said. He rubbed his jaw, overgrown with a beard that hid caved in cheeks. "It ain't my fault that boy and his family got the smallpox. I said they're trash, and I'll say it again. Plague take it! You just shake yourself out of this damned mood you're in."

  Not two hours before, a scream from the quarantine camp upstream woke both of them. Could have been a bobcat, though. Maybe even an Indian. For three nights now, ever since they'd made the twenty-eight smallpox people follow back a ways in their own flatboat, Reeder had heard whoops and yells and other strange sounds. Every night when they pulled to shore, Donelson had the bugle sounded to warn the castaways to make camp behind them. Then an hour or two later the commotion would start. They did have their guns, of course, but most didn't have the strength to use them. He'd seen more Chickamaugas along the shores in the past few days than ever before, acting like they owned the river.

  "I'm goin' to go see if the Colonel needs me," he said. He threw the rolled bedding over his shoulder. "You come when you're ready. And goddamn it, straighten up."

  He walked slowly down the bank, feeling for hidden rocks in the johnsongrass with his toes. He pulled his wool stocking cap tighter on his balding head and wished he had warmer clothes. The thin homespun pants and knit woolen stockings just weren't enough. He looked up to where the clouds broke overhead. The widening egg yolk ran down the sharp mountain edges and spilled into the swift river itself, framing the black gathering of boats that hugged the near shore. To the left, two men added packages to a small stack of supplies beneath a white makeshift flag, to be picked up by the quarantined people. It would be a race whether they or the Indians got there first.

  A voice came from the right. "It's not much, is it?"

  Reeder took off his cap and turned toward Colonel Donelson. Rachel jumped off the flatboat and came to her father's side.

  "It's all we can do," Aaron said. He stared at the small pile of provisions and wished he could have given something himself. But all he owned was on that beat up skiff and second hand things he'd picked up at Fort Patrick Henry three months before. The parched corn, a handful of salt, and precious little jerky was about all the food he had left. It might not even be enough for just the two of them.

  "Where's Phoebe?" Rachel said.

  "Mornin', Miss Donelson. She's cleaning up breakfast." Reeder replaced his cap and pulled his boat into shore. He tossed the bedding in and released the rope, and the boat swung back against the flatboat.

  "Can she ride with us today?"

  Reeder looked at the girl. "Well, I don't want her to be no trouble. But I'd be obliged if she could. 'Course, it's up to your daddy."

  He glanced at the Colonel, hoping he'd say yes. She'd be warm in that flatboat. She'd ridden there twice before, the last time when it rained steady for three days, and Reeder had to float down the river under his tarpaulin.

  "We'd be glad to have her," Donelson said. "Rachel, go help get her things."

  "I thank you, Colonel. Anything I can do for you now, afore we get under way?"

  "Well, you could round up the sentries. We should leave as soon as possible."

  "Happy to. Anything to help. S'pose Nathaniel's out there, huh? A fine young boy."

  Reeder walked toward the first sentry. Maybe staying away from him today would help Phoebe get over her sulk. But damn it, she had to see the Stuart boy was no good. He wouldn’t let her waste her life like her mother did. She would marry well. Maybe somebody like Nathaniel, Donelson’s boy would take to her. Stranger things have happened.