“How very commendable of you, Miss. I knew there was a tender heart beating ‘neath that cold, hard captain’s chest of yours.”
I cast my stern eye on him. “You are, of course, referring to how I have been treating this girl, Higgins, and think less of me for it?”
“Um.”
“Well, Higgins, when dealing with those whom you will command, you may start off harsh, and then later go softer as everyone finds their place and knows how things go, but,” I say with teacher’s finger in the air, “you can’t do it the other way around.”
“I suppose that’s wise, Miss,” he says.
“You, however,” I say, “may be nicer to her. After she is
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done with her chores, draw her a bath, if you would be so good. Back in our quarters. She is likely to be shy with you, so ask Katy to scrub her head and check her for lice. Is there anything you can do with that straw thatch of hers?”
“Well, after Katy washes it up, we’ll see what we can do.”
“Good. For now we must deal with our two new recruits. Remember what I said about starting out hard? Well, I think it truly applies to these two louts.”
We both look forward and see the Hawkes boys lounging about the bow, smoking vile-smelling pipes and talking, talk that is punctuated with snorts and guffaws. They are facing away and cannot hear us approach.
“Garsh, Matty! Three girls aboard and all of ‘em purty. Four, you count Crow Jane! Hot damn! This is gonna be the best job ever!”
“Well, I ain’t that hard up, to count that Crow Jane,” says brother Matthew, “but I gotta agree. You see the ass on the boss lady? She be skinny and meaner’n a snake, but that tail’s still nice and round and fine,” says he, describing a shape with his hands.
“Wouldn’t kick it outta my bed, me neither, no sir, hot damn! This is the best boat we ever been on, Brother,” says “Thaniel. “Geeeeeeeez, we done died and gone to Heaven!”
“That Katy girl, now she some long and tall, but that don’t mean she ain’t pretty, oh, no. Lord.”
“And that little Clementine, Matty,” added ‘Thaniel, “if’n she ain’t cuter’n a speckled pup, I don’t know what is.”
“Seems like these men need some cooling down,” say I, loud and clear, “before Katy Deere puts a couple of arrows deep into their ardor, or I have them thrown in the river with some heavy chain around their necks.”
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The boys’ heads jerk around, startled to find me standing there in a state of high indignation.
“Sorry, Boss, we didn’t know you was listening,” says Matthew, trying to stop his giggling but failing in the attempt.
“You two were supposed to be rigging the new oarlocks. Why are you not doing that?” I ask, with my stony Look firmly in place. “And stand up when I’m talking to you.”
“Now, Boss, we’re jest waitin’ for the parts. That boy Jim went to get ‘em. Here he comes now,” says Nathaniel, getting to his feet and beginning to look a little worried.
“Never thought I’d ever say this, Mr. Higgins, but this ship just might need a cat-o’-nine-tails.”
“Indeed, Captain,” says Higgins. “One can easily be made.”
“We’ll get right on it, Boss…er…Captain, right now,” says Nathaniel, putting an elbow in his brother’s ribs.
Jim Tanner comes aboard bearing the hardware needed to rig up the oarlocks for the two additional sweeps, just as the girl Clementine comes out of the hold hatchway with a basin of dirty dishwater to throw over the side. He looks at her, and she looks at him and then goes back down below.
Yes, I had told this Clementine Fletcher to sweeten up, and against all odds, she did.
Oh, it was a slow process, from the surliness she showed on the first day aboard to a gradual lightening of mood on the second day, as she grew to know us and become more comfortable. She still continues to study me, like she did on our first meeting, though, as if she’s trying to make up her mind about something—about what, I don’t know.
I decided to have her bunk in the after cabin with us, what with those randy Hawkes boys sleeping up front, and
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so she put her belongings on the bottom bunk, under Katy and me. We sleep on the top bed, because we’ve installed some portholes for light and ventilation, and that’s where the porthole is. I like to be able to look out when we’re all locked down, and I also like the air.
That first night, Clementine started quietly crying.
“She’s just homesick,” I whispered in Katy’s ear.
“Don’t think she’s got a home, from what she’s said to me,” whispered Katy back.
I rolled over and reached out my hand in the darkness.
“Come on, Clementine,” I whispered. “It’ll be all right, you’ll see. Here, take my hand.”
“No. I’ll be all right,” came the choked voice from below. I withdrew my hand.
The sound of weeping subsided. I had the feeling that she had shoved a corner of her pillow into her mouth to stifle her sobs.
“Prolly just misses her man,” whispered Katy.
“That’s gotta be it,” I agreed, but didn’t quite believe it. There’s something else going on here, I was thinking. Then I put it out of my mind and went to sleep.
The next night, after a long day of boat work and a full evening of performance, we once again turned in for the night, and once again the weeping started up.
This time I said to Katy, “We’ll switch beds. Send her up here. She’s disturbin’ everybody’s sleep.”
“Huh, it’d be a pleasure,” said Katy, slipping out of the bunk, “what with you twitchin’ and hollerin’ and talkin’ in tongues in your sleep half the time, then goin’ stiff as a board sometimes and sweatin’ the bed wet. Hell, yes, I’ll send her up and git me a full night’s sleep for a change.”
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I know she doesn’t mean it, her and me being like sisters, and all.
Clementine slipped in next to me, not protesting but still sniffling. I put my hand on her shoulder and drew her to me.
She stiffened.
“Now, Clementine, you don’t have to like me, but you do have to be quiet. Jim and Mr. Higgins are on the other side of that curtain and you are disturbing their rest. You don’t want that, do you?”
I could feel her head shake. “No,” she whispered.
I had noticed that in the doings of this past day, when work was stopped and meals were served at a long table set up on the bottom hold hatch between the rows of passenger and crew bunks, it was Jim Tanner and Clementine Fletcher who most often sat together. I further noticed that, when the work was done and all took their ease, it was Jim and Clementine who sat together with fishing poles to idle away the time. I even heard her laugh one time at something he had said.
I noticed also that before she would eat, she would put her hands together, close her eyes, and mumble some words, when none of the rest of us did.
“Good. Now go to sleep. Tomorrow will be a brighter day, you’ll see. Soon we’ll take you to the General Butler with us so you can see the show. Would you like that?”
I felt her head bob up and down.
“Good. Now go to sleep.”
She settled into my side and gradually grew quiet. After a while her breathing became slow and regular. And then, after a while, so did mine.
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***
That night, as I lay tossing and turning as usual, I had the most unusual dream—I dreamed that Clementine had gotten out of bed and gone down, as I supposed, to use the pot. Some dream time went on and I dreamed that there was, of all things, a cold pistol put to my temple, and I heard the sound of a hammer being drawn back and cocked. What a strange dream, I remember thinking. It’s not one of the things that I regularly dream and scream about. Funny, ain’t it? Then I dreamed I heard the sound of a hammer being brought back safely down to half cock, and presently Clementine crawled back into bed and I stopped dreaming till I woke in
the morning, her flaxen hair across my face.
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***
Chapter 30
J. Fletcher, Convict
On a road gang
Somewhere in the God-awful USA
Miss Jacky Faber
Also somewhere in this God-awful USA
But no doubt in a state higher than my current one
Jacky,
We shuffle out of the Pittsburgh prison at dawn, clad in our prison stripes, left legs shackled by the ankles to a long chain, after having been fed a ration of oatmeal, molasses, and weak coffee, made from some plant that grows wild here and isn’t even remotely related to a coffee tree. Sailors on the meanest ship would complain of this fare, but so be it. I shan’t complain. It is my lot and I will accept it.
Then we are all loaded onto a rough cart and taken on a jolting trip to the outskirts of the town, to a place next to the Ohio River where some seawall work needs to be done, and we are, of course, the ones chosen to do it.
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I am, as Fate and the ever-so-humorous gods would have it, fettered next to Mike Fink, my supposed partner in my crimes against the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and must listen to his rants both night and day. He says he has taken a shine to me. God help me.
On the first day, we were shown the work that had to be done. There was a quarry where tons of what appears to be a sandy stone were blasted out of the quarry wall and hauled on carts by some convicts up to the rest of us, who would then use our hammers to break the bigger pieces into littler pieces that would be tamped into the space behind the seawall. It was called, not very poetically, the Rockpile.
While I was slaving away at the Rockpile, I added meaning to this deadly drudgery by picturing the many heads that I would very much like to have seen split, from Midshipman Bliffil to the pirate LeFievre to Captain Scroggs to Captain Blodgett to Captain Rutherford to many others I have met in this life. In my fury I even conjured up some half-buried jealousies and pictured smashing the knees of Robin Raeburne and the same of Randall Trevelyne. I am sorry, Jacky, but I am beyond rational thought. I swing my hammer with great gusto: Here’s one for your toes, Randall! Smash! You like that, you arrogant son of a bitch? Try to get on my girl, will you? Well, here’s another! Smash!
I was in an absolute orgy of jealous destruction, but I was restrained in time by my mentor.
“No, no, boy, y’see, y’gotta just do the least bit they require,” said Mike with all the reasonableness of a schoolmaster. “Otherwise, if you do too good a job, they’ll just nail you again as soon as you step outside the calaboose, ‘cause they’ll want you back. Y’see?”
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I did see, and I slowed down my hammering and let my simmering resentment burn off. But I did not stop thinking and nurturing my resentments: There was the man Beatty to consider. Since I had grown a beard and pulled the ribbon from my hair to let my hair hang loose about my face, and affected an idiot’s slow drawl when in his hearing, I do not think he recognized me. In fact, I was able to hear him talk to one of his compatriots to the effect that he and his partner, McCoy, would be heading south to a place called Johnstown after he got out of this hole. It warmed my heart to know that.
But my heart was not warm for long, for once again, that night Clementine did not appear at the jailhouse window.
Mike was sympathetic, in his way. “Should’ve kep’ that one and got rid o’ the other one. She seems like a good girl.”
A good girl, indeed, I thought, as I grasped the cold bars and looked out onto the empty street….
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***
Chapter 31
***
Clementine continues to sweeten. She arose singing from our bunk this morning and went straight to her work, helping Crow Jane get the stove started up from last night’s coals and the breakfast on the table.
I had thought to take my meals in my cabin, separate from the others, as befits my station, but I decided against it. For one thing, I didn’t want Higgins to appear to be waiting on me hand and foot, which, of course, I certainly enjoy, but it would damage his image as First Mate. Second, I liked the conviviality of sitting at the head of the long table and eating and drinking with my mates. Oh, sometimes I will take my dinner solitaire, when the occasion demands, but not now. The passengers will also join us at this table. The Hawkes boys must be taught some manners before that, though. I invite Mr. Cantrell to join our table and he does. I insist that the girl he has with him join us also, but she shakes her head and takes her plate to a corner to eat.
After serving, Clementine sits down next to Jim, who seems to appreciate the company. After the breakfast cleanup and the day’s laundry are done, I’m sure the two again will be sitting on the bow, fishing and talking, their heads together.
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The Hawkes boys sit at the very foot of this table, but they are learning their manners, very slowly but surely. There is hope for them, I think, crude as they now are.
I decide to take Clementine to the performance tonight, as a reward for her new cheerfulness, and I think it would be good for her to broaden her horizons some—I have the feeling she has seen very little of the world. I’ll take Jim, too, since we can leave the Belle in the very capable hands of Crow Jane.
After the day’s labor is done, Higgins and I set to work on Clementine’s appearance. The hair is freshly washed and Higgins steps back and considers it, scissors in hand.
“Hmmm. We’ll snip a little bit off here”—he applies the scissors quickly and surely—“and here. And we’ll curl this, then tie this up in a bow. I think that will do it.”
The girl does not know quite what to think, but she goes along with it. Higgins heats up the curling iron and goes to work.
“There, what do you think of that?” I ask, holding the hand mirror up for her to gaze upon her newly coiffed self. Two curled ringlets hang by either side of her face, the rest of her hair being swept up top and tied with a blue ribbon.
She is amazed.
“And what do you think your young man will think?” tease I.
“Ooooh. I don’t know what he’ll think,” she says. “I don’t know what to think myself.”
“What’s his first name, anyway?” I ask, putting away combs and pins.
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“Jai—” she begins, and then coughs. “Jake. His name’s Jake, short for Jacob.”
“Is he a good man?” I ask. “And how old is he?”
“Yes, he’s a good boy. ‘Bout eighteen, I figure.”
“Did he put those there?” I ask, pointing to some old yellow bruises high up on her arms.
“No. Pap done that. That’s why I run away.”
“Ah. What’s Jake in jail for, if you don’t mind me askin’?”
“Got caught up in a fight that warn’t none of his concern.”
“Ah, well, that happens, doesn’t it? When the boys want to fight, sometimes you just gotta let ‘em.”
“I reckon,” she agrees, softly. “Still, it tore me up to see him hurt like that.”
“Well, he’ll be out soon,” chirps I, “and you’ll have a most joyful reunion.”
Strangely, she does not smile at the prospect but only nods and looks down at her hands.
“But as for now,” I say briskly, “let’s get you out of that dress and into something more suited to the evening. I shall lend you my serving-girl gear, which is what I usually perform in, and I shall wear my blue dress instead…Now, Higgins, don’t look at me that way. I know it’s a bit scandalous, but is not ‘scandal’ my middle name? Come on, be a sport and stuff me in.”
I had fashioned my blue dress after a dress I’d seen worn by a Mrs. Roundtree. I had sewn it while I was on the Dolphin and figuring I was about to get kicked off. In which thinking I was absolutely right, by the way. Mrs. Roundtree was a lady in Palma de Mallorca, who practiced what is
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sometimes called “the oldest profession,” but who was very kind to me in explai
ning how things work. I, myself, do not think hers is the “oldest profession”…I think runnin’ a scam is the oldest, but let that go. As everybody who knows me realizes, I am a somewhat eccentric Biblical scholar. However, it is possible I could have picked a more modest model for my first dress, I will allow that.
With a heavy sigh, Higgins hauls the dress out of my seabag and goes to set the iron on the stove, and I turn to strapping Clementine into my serving-girl rig.
We are about the same size, but I think that’s because she maybe ain’t stopped growing yet.
So anyway, on with the black stockings—she’s got a tattered pair of drawers, so that’s good ‘cause I don’t have to give her one of mine—then she dons the blousy white shirt, black skirt, and then the black vest to top it off. I stand back and survey my work.
“Good,” I say. “You look the very picture of the hardworkin’ barmaid. When we get there, I’ll set it up with Molly so that you’ll be helping Katy—pickin’ up and washin’ the empty mugs, wipin’ off the tables, carryin’ in the trays of food and drink. Don’t worry, you’ll get the hang of it right quick. When you learn to count change, you can wait on tables in your own right.”
She nods, smoothing out the unfamiliar cloth under her hands.
“All right, we are off to the merry dance,” I crow as we leave the Belle, me and Higgins and Katy and Clementine and, right next to her, Jim Tanner.
Jane lights up her pipe and sits by the gangway, Jim’s rifle
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over her knees, as we depart. Behind her the Hawkes boys sit with their long legs dangling over the side, whining, “How come we’uns don’t get to go, too?”
” ‘Cause yer a pair o’ no-good drunken louts who’d drink up all the profits and then start fightin’ with each other and then get thrown back in the calaboose ag’in,” says Crow Jane, “after we’uns been trainin’ y’uns all week and y’uns eatin’ up all the food and bein’ nothin’ but trouble. Nope. We got a ‘vestment in y’uns and yer gonna pay it off if’n I got anythin’ to say about it.”
Mississippi Jack: Being an Account of the Further Waterborne Adventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman, Fine Lady, and Lily of the West (Bloody Jack Adventures) Page 17