“Jaimy? In buckskins, of all things…”
“Hmmm…” says Higgins, and then goes quiet, plainly mulling over all this.
“Is there reason to hope?” I ask, ready to grasp at any straw.
“I think there is, Miss,” he says. “You know he can only go to New Orleans, don’t you? You’ll surely be able to catch up with him there and explain things. I’m sure Captain Allen will be happy to write out a statement detailing the extent of your relationship with him.”
“But what if he gets there and is able to book passage back to London, where he surely would be wantin’ to go?”
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“You said he was dressed in buckskins, so I can only assume he met with unfortunate circumstances on his journey and had to work his way downriver as best he could. I don’t believe he would have the money to book passage.”
I think on that for a moment, then say, “Thank you, Higgins, for trying to make me feel more hopeful, but that won’t wash. Jaimy could ship out as a mate or, if he couldn’t manage that, then as a common seaman. Anything to get as far away as possible from m-m-me.”
“Hmm. Well, maybe a ship won’t be available. Maybe Lightfoot and Chee-a-quat will be able to find him. You must not give up hope, Miss.”
Another heavy sigh. “I know, Higgins, I know. Oh, why must I always mess up everything?”
“Your impulsive nature is part of your character, part of what made you so charming to Mr. Fletcher in the past, and what, I am quite sure, will make you charming to him in the future as well.”
“I hope so, Higgins,” I say, putting my hand on his. “You are so good to try to cheer me, but, oh, if you could just imagine my shock at seeing him, just coming out of the blue like that. I am shaken to my core and I still cannot fathom just how he got here.”
“Well, I’m guessing that Ezra Pickering figured a way for him to be freed from HMS Juno, or maybe it was a handsome bribe paid to Captain Rutherford—we do remember him as a greedy sort, don’t we? And then Mr. Fletcher took off after you. You will recall that Mr. Pickering knew where you intended to go.”
“You’re probably right. And if I hadn’t decided on a
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swim, we’d be preparing for a wedding right now. We even have a preacher to say the words.”
“Yes,” says Higgins, “I imagine he was right behind us the whole way and”—Higgins stops and I look over and notice his upper teeth bite his lower lip as if he had suddenly realized that he had just said something he regretted—“and could I get you a glass of wine, Miss, for your nerves? And perhaps you might think of putting your skirt back on?”
I frown. What is he trying to gloss over? From the corner of my eye I see Clementine start to edge away. She must have been listening, she…
Then it comes to me, as seconds ago it had come to Higgins, but it hits me a lot harder. That time, outside the jail in Pittsburgh…Mike Fink taunting me: I know a secret thing…and I ain’t gonna tell you what it is… and then later…Oh, my God…
My name is Missus Clementine Fletcher!
Slowly I rise from my chair and turn to face her. As soon as she sees the look on my face, she cuts and runs aft.
“Why, you scheming little bitch!” I snarl and take after her, hands hooked into claws.
“Miss, don’t!” I hear Higgins shout behind me, but I will, oh, yes I will. You’re gonna get it, you sneaking, two-faced—
Clementine runs to the stern, turns, and sees me still comin’. Her eyes are wild, tears stream down her face. She hooks her leg over the rail and turns to Jim, standing openmouthed at the tiller. “Goodbye, Jimmy! Always remember that I loved you more than anything else in the world!”
And she launches herself off into the deep water on our starboard side.
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“You ain’t gettin’ off that easy, damn you!” I screech and dive in after her. No, you ain’t!
I resurface just as her head breaks water, and I am on her in an instant, putting my hands about her throat.
“What a fool I was! I took you in, I cared for you, I loved you as a sister, and then I find I have clasped a snake to my bosom! I’m gonna kill you!”
But I ain’t gonna do that at all, ‘cause while I’m expectin’ her to squall and thrash and fight back, she doesn’t do that at all. All she does is hang there all limp in my grip, sobbing, her yellow hair plastered to her head, her face contorted, with tears pouring from her eyes.
“Go ahead and kill me, I don’t care! I don’t! Jimmy ain’t gonna want me no more and I’d rather be dead! Just let me go. I don’t know how to swim, so you just let me go, if’n you want to kill me!” Her bawling redoubles, her mouth opens, and her lower lip goes back over her bottom teeth, her eyes still squeezed tight shut. “God, you give me Jaimy, then you give me Jimmy, then you take ‘em both away! Oh, Lord, how could you do that to me?”
I release my grip on her neck and put my arm around her waist, and my other arm under her legs, behind her knees and tread water, holding her there.
“Nobody’s gonna kill you, Clementine. Just hush, now, hush. Everything’s gonna be all right, you’ll see.”
What I see is a very concerned Jim Tanner rowing toward us in the Evening Star. In a moment he is alongside us and I hand him Clementine’s trembling form.
“Take her off for a spell, Jim. You’ll need to talk. I can swim back to the Belle. And I’m sorry, Jim, for how I acted.”
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He nods, but he ain’t lookin’ at me. I swim back to the boat and climb the ladder.
Higgins insists that I change into decent clothing and I do it and go back to my table up top. Jim and the other boat had thrown out their anchors when Clementine and I hit the water. So be it, I think, let us stay here for the night. To hell with it. To hell with everything.
Higgins brings me up food and drink, for I certainly don’t feel like being sociable with my crew this evening. Captain Allen, I notice, has the good grace not to sit at his table and taunt me with his smirk, and I am glad of it.
As I sit and force myself to eat, I steal glances over at Clementine and Jim, still sitting in the Evening Star. I can see her shoulders shake as she sits apart from him, telling her story. This goes on for a while, then I see him put his arm around her and he draws her to him, and she lays her head on his shoulder. They remain that way for a while and then Jim picks up the oars and rows back to the Belle.
Higgins notices me still glowering as he sets down a glass of wine.
“Do you know the meaning of the word hypocrisy, Miss?”
“Of course I know what it means, Higgins, and I take your point. I have been a complete hypocrite, and I know it.”
I have smooched, sparked, and wriggled my way halfway around this world—Randall, Robin, Jared, Padraic, Arthur McBride, and finally Richard Allen, and I should expect Jaimy to be an angel? No, it’s not fair.
Jim hands Clementine up the ladder and Chloe takes her by the hand and leads her into our cabin, to get her dry and presentable. Jim comes up to me and looks me square in the
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eye, unsmiling. He says, “Clementine and me are going to get married. Today. I’m gonna go tell the Reverend now.” He ain’t askin’ my permission, but I nod anyway.
So we do have a wedding aboard the Belle of the Golden West on this day. It just so happens that it is not my wedding, which should have been the one so happily celebrated, had not cruel fate and my own headstrong stupidity intervened.
“Dearly Beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of Almighty God,” intones the Very Reverend Jeremiah Clawson, “to join in Holy Matrimony Mr. James McNeil Tanner and Clementine Amaryllis Jukes…”
We are assembled below, bathed in soft candlelight. Matthew Hawkes is Best Man, and Yancy Cantrell will give the bride away. Crow Jane is Matron of Honor, and the rest of us girls are bridesmaids. Jim is dressed in a clean white shirt with a bit of lace at the throat that I’d insisted he wear for this special occasion, while
Clementine is decked out in a stitched-together white gown we hastily made from the play’s tearaway dress, to which we’d added some flounces. While we were doing this, I sent Daniel over to pick some flowers I had spotted earlier on the bank, and with them I made a posy chain for her hair. When I placed the floral crown upon her head, I said, “May you have a happy life, Sister. Jim Tanner is one of the finest persons, man or boy, that I have ever met.” She nodded and squeezed my hand.
With that, I kissed her on the forehead, and we led her up to her wedding.
“If there is any here among us who object to this marriage, let him speak up now, or forever hold his peace…”
No one objects, and the thing is done.
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“Very well. Do you, James McNeil Tanner, take Clementine Amaryllis Jukes to be your lawful wedded wife…”
We hold the party out on deck, under the moonlight, so as to give the newlyweds a place to flee to, a cabin of their own having been set up below. All are dressed in their finest. Toasts are drunk all around, coarse jests traded, and eventually the bridal couple goes below. A delighted Clementine tosses her flower crown before going down and a surprised Katy Deere catches it.
The party continues above for an hour or so, to give them some private time below. I sit with Higgins, Yancy, and the Reverend at my table, while the Hawkes and the Honeys carouse down on the deck. After a bit, I call out to Richard Allen, “Get over here, you complete rascal, and have a glass of wine with us.” And he bounds over.
“Is it not a crazy world?” I say to the party at large.
“Indeed it is, Princess,” agrees Richard Allen.
“And I hope you’ll soon be able to pronounce it a wonderful world as well, Miss,” says Higgins.
“Oh, yes, Higgins, I do, after all is said and all is done.” I lift my glass in the light of the full moon. “On to New Orleans.”
“Hear, hear,” says my dear company.
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PART VI
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***
Chapter 62
***
” ‘My Dear Mr. Fletcher: Your former fianc��e, Miss
Jacky Faber, has requested that I relate to you the particulars of our relationship. I am happy to do so’…”
We are seated at my cabin-top table, and Captain Allen, dressed in full uniform down to the spurs on his boots, is reading from a letter that he holds in his hand. My small fleet has arrived in Baton Rouge, and he and his men are preparing to leave us for good. The Britannia has been sold and horses hired to take the soldiers directly down to the coast to where a cutter awaits to transport them back to their base in Jamaica. Richard was of the mind that with New Orleans having only recently become American, a boatload of fully armed British redcoats might not be received too kindly by the largely French populace, and so he made the decision to go overland from here and thus avoid that city.
“…Ahem. I am happy to say I galloped your pretty little dollop of trollop from St. Louis down to Baton Rouge and she proved a most spirited mount, as we—”
“Give me that, you!” I snatch the paper from his hand and read what he had actually written there.
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To Lieutenant James Fletcher,
Greetings from a fellow officer and admirer of Miss Jacky Faber. Here is a brief history of my time in her company: She was captured by our party far upriver, she escaped, and she took us prisoner in return. I gave my parole and we traveled downriver together, my mission having been aborted by her actions. “We bore each other no ill will and soon became friends.
On the day you arrived on the scene, Miss Faber had decided to take a swim in a private, secluded area, and I, unbidden, decided to join her, and, surprising her there, demanded the settlement of a silly bet she had made and lost, the wager being for a kiss. A long kiss. She acquiesced, being a girl of her word, and I was collecting my winnings, as it were, when you showed up.
I swear to you, Mr. Fletcher, that what you saw then was the entire extent of our intimacy. She has often spoken of you in the most glowing terms, declaring that she was promised in marriage to you only.
I know what you must have surmised when you saw us together in that pool, and I regret that you beheld that, but I further regret that your suspicions were in fact not true, for I found her a most neat and beguiling piece of work and I would have been delighted to say that I enjoyed all of her charms. But I cannot in all honesty say that, for, alas, it would not be true. More’s the pity.
If you object to my saying these things, you may find me at my barracks in Kingston, Jamaica, and you may have satisfaction.
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I congratulate you on winning the favor of such a lovely and spirited young woman and I am,
Your Humble and Most Obedient Servant,
Captain Richard Lord Allen
P.S. I offered to make her Lady Allen, but she demurred. Pity, that.
I fold the letter and put it aside. “Thank you, Richard. That was kind of you. I don’t, however, recall the great Lord Allen asking the very common commoner Jacky Faber to marry him.”
“Ah, I just threw that in for good measure.”
“So it’s a lie then, my lord?”
“All right, will you marry me and become Lady Allen?”
I laugh. “I can’t tell whether you’re joking or not, you rascal. But the answer is ‘no,’ either way.”
“Pity, that,” he says in mock seriousness. “Wouldn’t that just put the Old Man’s nose in a vise, though, my bringing home something like you as his daughter-in-law? ‘Father, may I present my wife, the extraordinary showgirl and actress Miss Jacky Faber, the Toast of the Mississippi and the Lily of the West? Lift your dress to show Father your fine knees, dear, if you would.’ The Old Prune would drop dead on the instant. Ha! It’s damned tempting. Are you sure you won’t reconsider?”
“No.” I laugh. “But I will thank you for your kind protection on our journey here.”
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“My pleasure, Princess,” he says, looking out on the preparations for his departure that are taking place on the dock. Sergeant Bailey is having a fine time ordering the privates about as packs are being loaded and horses are being bridled, saddled, and cinched up. It is plain that these cavalrymen will be glad to get back in the saddle again.
“I think you should be all right, as regards safety, from here on down. The land is quite settled and there are no reports of hostile Indians about. And we haven’t seen those slavers for a while.”
I nod and reflect that no, we have not. We spotted them a few times, lurking around the edges of our crowds, but they made no move against us. We had found out, by asking about, that they were the Beam family, Pap Beam and his five grown sons. They were supposed to have a farm of some sort on the river and from there ranged up and down in search of escaped slaves to sell back to their owners. The Beams were much feared in this region, by both blacks and whites, and all gave them a wide berth.
“I’m sure we’ll be all right, Richard. We’re going to stay well out in the river, and that should be protection enough.”
“You’ll not set up for a performance today?”
“No, we’ll get under way as soon as you take your leave. We’re all anxious to get to New Orleans as soon as possible, me to see if I can find Mr. Fletcher, the others to enjoy the charms of a real city after this long journey.” I shake my head. “No, I think the showboat Belle of the Golden West has had its final curtain call. Besides, how could poor Prudence Goodlove ever manage without her Captain Noble Strongheart?” I say, smiling and putting my hand on his.
He laughs. “I did enjoy that bit of nonsense, though.”
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“As did I, and I did enjoy your company, you arrant knave, even though you did mess things up.” I see Sergeant Bailey come to the edge of the landing, leading a saddled horse. “I think the sergeant wants to speak to you.”
He turns to look.
“All packed and read
y, Sir,” says Sergeant Bailey, saluting with his open hand held up to his hat, his shako, as they call it.
“Very well, Sergeant,” says Captain Allen, rising from his chair.
I, too, rise and go over to the edge of the cabin top and look down at the men, each standing by a horse. “Goodbye, Sergeant Bailey, it was very good to know you. Goodbye, Willie, good-bye, Freddy, give my regards to Kingston. Goodbye, Seamus, I hope you see Ireland again soon, and may you, Archy, once again roam the heaths of Scotland. Alfie and Walter, good-bye and the best of luck. All of you give my regards to Mother England should you get back to the home ground—she may not love me, but I still do love her. Farewell all and Godspeed.”
Each of the men touched their hands to their shakos as I said their names. As with all the leave-takings and departures of my life, my eyes start to mist up.
I turn to Captain Allen and extend my hand. “Goodbye, Richard. Fare thee well.”
He takes my hand and bows over it, and I dip down in a deep, formal curtsy. When I come back up, he says, “I once heard you use the saying ‘Might as well be hanged for a wolf as for a sheep,’ and I agree, Jacky, I might as well.” And with that he puts his arm around me, bends me back, and puts a real kiss on my mouth.
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He releases me, and I say, “Goodbye, you rogue. Go now, your men are waiting.” Go now, before I start really crying.
He plants another kiss on the back of my hand, steps down to the lower deck, and then off the Belle of the Golden West, his saber hanging by his side, his spurs jangling. He goes to his mount, puts foot in stirrup, and swings up into the saddle, and all his men follow suit.
Wheeling the horse about, he takes one last look back at me and calls out, “Goodbye, Princess, I will remember you, and you can count on that!”
He puts the spurs to the horse’s flanks and gallops off and away.
I stand and wave till I can see him no more. And I will remember you, Lord Richard Allen, oh yes, I will, and you, too, can count on that.
I shook all thoughts of dashing young captains of cavalry from my head and wasted no time in getting under way again.
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 40