“I am to stand here until the ship is out of sight,” said the guard.
“You can stand there until hell freezes over. Don’t matter to me.” Looking up at Johannes who towered above him, the sailor’s eyes squinted, “What’s your name, boy?”
“Johannes.”
“A soldier at some time, I would wager,” said the old man appraising Johannes. “Well, you look more like a dandy now—a filthy dandy, to boot.” He gestured at the ropes that secured the boat to the dock. “Cast off those bowlines. We’d better put out to sea. We don’t want to waste the general’s time.”
The pitch of the tug was therapeutic. Johannes learned the captain’s name was Olaf LaPierre. Part Dane, part Scot and one quarter French. Though he was an intelligent man, he had a vivid imagination, which he at times applied to his never-ending stories. There were extra clothes on board that were a bit short for Johannes’ tall frame but they worked. Olaf had ingeniously rigged a sea shower with a wood-heated tub from which sprinkled warm seawater when a chained lever was pulled.
Luxuriating under the warm trickle, Johannes first bathing in weeks was interrupted by a gruff, “What are you doing in there, boy? Playing with yourself? Those boilers are hungry for coal. Get a move on.”
Days later, chugging into Bremen Harbor, the tall young man and short older one stood together on the bridge of the boat.
As their wake washed the shoreline of the harbor, Olaf gave Johannes careful instructions on how to take on needed coal and fresh water. Then the old man put on his faded captain’s jacket.
Johannes watched him. “Going somewhere?”
Olaf laughed loudly. “I need my annual man cleaning and just so happens, I have a good woman in this port.”
It was midday. The waters of the harbor were calm but dirty with garbage and human sewage, industrial dumpings and waste products from the steam engines of the ships. Johannes had said nothing concerning the reason he was on the boat. He and Olaf had merely talked of travel, the military and women in general.
With dockhands tying off the tug, Olaf turned to Johannes. “Well, boy, I will be back in a few hours.” He hesitated, then added, “You’re a good hand. Not bad company, either.” He looked down at his feet as if embarrassed and raised his eyes back to Johannes.
“Why don’t you stay on with me? We go back and forth to Copenhagen, and every once in a while, over to Portsmouth when the season is right. Sometimes I have work along the coast of Normandy. Good-looking women on the coast of Normandy. Fine cognac.”
Johannes liked the old man. Putting his hand gently on Olaf’s shoulder, he said softly, “Thank you. That is a very kind offer. If my situation were different, I might very well say yes. But I cannot go back. And one who cannot go back must go forward.”
Olaf’s face fell, and he nodded.
Johannes continued, “I am glad you understand.”
“Where will you head?”
Johannes smiled. “I think, Olaf, that this dumb descendant of a Viking is going to America.”
“America?” Olaf repeated, his eyebrows rising in surprise. “My boy, that’s close to a month and a half’s voyage from here. What on earth will you do over there? I hear it’s a wild place.”
“I have no idea what I will do. That’s the fun of it. But somehow, I know that is where I must go. It is where I want to go. A place where I can be me. A new life demands a new land.”
Blinking rapidly, the tug captain reached into his pocket, his voice husky. “There are a few ships that leave from here. Damn few go directly to America, I think. But there are several that leg over to Portsmouth or Liverpool and then head across the Atlantic from there. I hear there are several places you can land over there but New York is the biggest. Here…”
Johannes looked and saw money in Olaf’s outstretched hand—five Danish twenty-Kroner gold coins.
“You’ll need passage and a little bit of spending money to get over there. This will get you at least that far. I think there’s a ship making port tonight or tomorrow, The SS Edinburgh. She was just launched. I think she’s one of them that goes to Portsmouth, Liverpool and then New York.”
Smiling warmly, Johannes extended his hand and closed the old man’s weathered fingers back over the money. “I have money but I thank you just the same. I think this should stay with you, to keep this man of war going.” Johannes’ arm swept the length of the tug.
“You have money?” Olaf’s head cocked to one side with skepticism.
Reaching down, Johannes pulled off a boot. “Let me borrow your knife.”
The old man handed him a small knife he drew from his waistband. Johannes deftly unscrewed the heel from the boot, pulling ten one-hundred-pound English bills wrapped over five twenty-Kroner gold pieces. He winked at Olaf. “I never go anywhere without my boot. I will stay with the boat until you return from your rendezvous.”
Johannes had picked up the German language while in the military. Standing on the dock, his shoulders hunched against the damp harbor wind, he listened to the thick German accents as he supervised the water tender and coal wagon workers restocking the tug.
Several hours later, Olaf swaggered down the wharf. “It’s always good to find out I am not yet too old to bring a smile to a woman’s face,” he said, laughing. They spoke for several minutes, shook hands and Johannes stood on the dock waving to the grizzled figure hunched over the wheel on the bridge of the boat as it steamed away.
That night the SS Edinburgh arrived. Johannes secured passage in steerage to save money. The next morning he and other passengers embarked. It was a slow process and the dock was very crowded. A long line of people dragged baggage and trunks up the steep gangway.
Halfway up, he heard one of the deckhands shouting at two men in a wagon not far from the ship. “You, in the way there. Get that wagon moving. Be quick about it!”
Each time the queue paused on its way up the gangplank, he looked back at the wagon. The men appeared to be young. One of them was slight of build. He struggled with a trunk in the rear of the wagon and had to be helped by the other. Might even be a boy. They stood close, face to face, talking for a long moment, the younger of the two wiping his eyes. They embraced. Must be brothers, Johannes mused to himself.
Almost to the deck, he was delayed again. An enormously heavy lady and her huge valise had become wedged at the top of the gangplank. One of the crew was trying to pull her through. He tugged on the front of her jacket and she screamed at him in Russian slapping him on the hand. Laughing, Johannes moved his eyes back to the wharf. The wagon had disappeared from sight. The man it had dropped off shouldered a duffel, picked up a leather case and was reaching down for a trunk to drag over to the ship.
The rotund lady in front of him was finally freed but her high-pitched curses were continuing as she waddled down the deck toward wherever she would be housed for the voyage. Johannes hoped it wouldn’t be anywhere near him. Stepping onto the SS Edinburgh, he asked a sailor the way to steerage. Humming a military tune, he headed down to find a good bunk.
CHAPTER 8
JANUARY 16, 1855
JACOB
Four hundred three miles northwest of the bustling harbor of Portsmouth, England, a gray and seamy evening cloaked the cobblestone streets of Dublin, Ireland, slushy with dirty, melting snow of a wet winter storm. The brown brick of city buildings stood dull with late-winter grime. O’Reily’s Tavern was teeming with the Saturday afternoon crowd. The air hung stagnant with the brown smoke of cigars and cigarettes. There was a boisterous buzz from the patrons crowding every chair and stool and standing shoulder-to-shoulder at the bar. In the far corner, a group of men had gathered around a table centered under a low-hanging chandelier with four gaslights, each with a copper canopy reflecting illumination downward on the soft, green felt covering the surface of the poker table.
This quiet group was intently watching a poker game. Not a word was spoken among the seven players. This was not a friendly recreational round of cards. Ther
e was no love lost among any of the men fingering their cards and glancing with suspicion at one another over their hands. A large pile of chips and coins were heaped in the center of the table.
Jacob O’Shanahan was sitting in a chair with his back to the very corner of the room in his usual spot. Wide-set, pale, blue eyes in a square, slightly ruddy face intently surveyed every player. He was not a big man but he was stocky. Hunching his large shoulders forward, he concealed the cards he held in beefy hands with scarred knuckles.
The buxom, red-haired lady of the night who sat on his lap, one leg draped over his thigh, both arms curling around his neck, ran a finger softly over his thin lips. Her once-pretty face was thick with makeup. Glancing up at her, Jacob noticed she was hungrily fixated on the pot. Pushing his cards together, Jacob laid them down upon the felt, picked the top one and threw it face down into the center of the table.
“One,” he said with his customary surliness.
The players studied Jacob’s impassive features. Several men at the table turned and cast glances at one another.
The tall man sitting to Jacob’s right barely moved his head. In an unpleasant tone he said, “Going for the straight, are you now? Or is it a flush you’d be hoping for? Maybe you should have that tart play your cards.”
Jacob felt his face reddening. “Stow it, Shawn,” he snarled. He commanded the woman, “Get me a coffee, lassie.” Watching her walk off, hips swaying in the exaggerated way of all trollops, he muttered, “Just like my mother,” and spit on the floor. “Damn whore.”
“One,” he repeated hitting the table with his fist. “Keep them fingers from my face when I’m playing, tart! The redhead rose quickly to her feet, her features mutating from coy to fearful. Hesitating for a second, the dealer pushed one card face down toward Jacob. The watching crowd drew a collective breath.
He had been the last to draw. Most of the others had seen what fate had dealt them. Shuffling his cards between his fingers, his eyes roved the faces of each player. He did not look at the card. The first player to bet counted out twenty pounds in silver and threw the coins into the pile. The heavy metal pieces made a muffled clang, as they nestled in with the mounded pot.
Cursing, the next man threw down his cards. “I’m out.”
The following player likewise discarded his hand to the center of the table with disgust. “Me, too.”
The fourth player made no sound and his face revealed nothing. Reaching into the pile of money in front of him, he counted an amount equal to the bet, pushing it slowly toward the pot. The fifth player matched the bet, too.
The sixth man, Shawn, to Jacob’s right, laughed without humor. “I think the lot of you a bluffing, and whether you are or not, I’m taking this pot. I call and raise.”
Jacob noticed that Shawn’s eyes slid up to the redheaded whore who had returned with Jacob’s coffee and now stood behind him resting her trinket-jewelry-festooned hands lightly on his shoulders.
Jacob felt yet more heat rushing to his cheek. Peeling just the corners of his cards off the felt, he spread them enough to see all the edges as a hand. He didn’t say a word as he matched the bet. The players remaining in the hand did likewise. There were no raises.
“Let’s turn them over, please, gentlemen,” said the dealer.
All complied except Shawn and Jacob. Jacob had always harbored an intense dislike for the brash taller man and he knew Shawn felt the same toward him. Looking at no one but each other, they turned their cards over one by one. Shawn had beaten Jacob twice in the last hour in close hands, both times for large pots. Jacob’s pile of coins and paper money was far lower than when he had taken his seat in the game. They both turned over their last cards simultaneously and Shawn began laughing derisively.
“Well now, O’Shanahan, I guess you couldn’t cheat your way into this pot, either. I think a flush beats a straight, doesn’t it?” Shawn reached for his winnings, turning his head toward the whore, with a wide grin. “Aye, Miss Redhead, better come over here and sit on my lap, since O’Shanahan doesn’t have the money to pay you now.”
Shawn’s outstretched midsection was exposed as he partially stood, reaching toward the center of the table, both arms outstretched.
“You son of a bitch!” shouted Jacob, launching himself from his chair. Using his body as a ram, his shoulder hit Shawn in the ribs. They tumbled to the floor, both men leaping immediately to their feet. The crowd was shouting and stomping their boots. Rolling chips and coins twirled around the dirty wood planks. Shawn had his fists up, his stance that of a man who knew how to box. Jacob knew he was probably outmatched by the taller man. Bending slightly, never taking his eyes off Shawn, he tugged up the cuff of his trousers and reached into his boot. A stiletto suddenly flashed in his hand. The crowd became silent.
Taking two steps back, Shawn partially lowered his fists, “Don’t want to fight like a man, eh, O’Shanahan?” He spat. “I don’t have a knife.”
The two men circled, wary, much more at stake than a bruised cheekbone or the chips on the floor. The crowd was growing; the outer bounds of the circle of men pressing the inner band forward, narrowing the space occupied by the two adversaries.
“Let’s make this even, mate.” One of the men in the crowd drew out a knife, and handed it to Shawn. Leaping forward as Shawn stretched for the offered blade, Jacob slashed upward with the stiletto. The blade tip caught Shawn below the ribcage on the left, slicing upward toward his right shoulder.
Shawn cried out. “You bastard! You’ve killed me!”
A crimson line welling blood appeared diagonally across his solar plexus and chest. Crumpling to his knees, he bent his forehead to the floor. The crowd began to murmur. His eyes darting from man to man, Jacob cut the air with the stiletto. The blade shone a dull gold and red in the gas light. Backing to the table, he grabbed piles of money, which he shoved into his pockets. “Anybody else wants a piece of this blade, step right up!”
Wielding the stiletto, he advanced toward the crowd, which immediately parted. As he neared the entrance to the tavern, he turned and swung the knife back and forth as several men advanced. Then he was out into the night, swallowed by the bustling crowds along Clancy Street.
Jacob’s heart was pounding. That was damn stupid. Trotting away with glances over his shoulder, his mind raced, must have been a hundred witnesses. That fat constable Tom Rourk will make it his mission to track me down.
He forced himself to slow down. I think it’s time, lad, to get the hell out of Ireland. There was no need to look suspicious. Stopping for a moment on a darkened corner, he mulled the possibilities, then made a decision.
Half an hour later, Jacob was slouching in the dark corners of the buildings by the harbor, out of reach of light from sputtering streetlamps. He studied the fishing trawlers carefully, concentrating on the ones that needed paint or maintenance. On one such vessel, he noticed the crew carrying supplies and making ready the nets. A tall, lean man who wore a dark blue sea coat, white cap and a large beard seemed in command. Skirting the edge of the light, Jacob walked down the dock to the boat.
“Who’s the captain here?” he asked. A deckhand looked up. Pointing at the man in the blue coat and muttered something in French. Jacob walked down the dock a bit further, about midships, where he could hail the captain in the least obtrusive way.
“Hello, there. Could I talk to you? You are the captain, right?” Turning, the bearded man peered into the darkness to see the source of the voice. He walked over to the gangplank and came down on the dock with caution.
“Let’s step over here,” Jacob said, motioning to an even darker part of the dock.
“What do you want?” the captain said without moving.
“Where are you going? When do you leave?”
“None of your business, mate. Who are you?” A definite edge cut the tall seaman’s voice.
“I am a man needing a ride and willing to pay for it.”
The captain’s fingers stroked his beard.
“Where, and how much?”
“Portsmouth Harbor would be fine. And how about twenty pounds? That ought to be more than enough.” Jacob held up several coins so they reflected in the dimly lit streetlamps several hundred feet away. The captain reached out his hand but Jacob withdrew the coins.
“Why not Liverpool? It is much closer.”
“No. Do we have a deal?”
The captain stood silent and still for a brief moment.
“We have a deal. Drop you at Portsmouth. We can fish the channel. I have heard the cod are in the run there, anyway.” He paused. “Make it thirty pounds, since we’re sailing you half around the British Isles.
Where’s your gear?”
Clenching his teeth, Jacob agreed. “Thirty pounds it is. I have no luggage.”
The captain’s eyes narrowed in the gloom. “The law then, is it? What did you do?”
“That’s like me inquiring where you’re going fishing,” said Jacob.
Chuckling softly, the captain pivoted toward the boat, “Come along, then.”
*****
Long heavy swells rolled in from the south from England as the trawler rounded the point and left the shelter of Dublin Harbor. The little boat yawed and pitched. Though only minutes had passed since they had hit open water, Jacob had to cling to the rail. Must have been that damn rotten salami I had in that hole of a tavern
.“Hey there, bloke. You look green. Never been out in the water, eh?”
Jacob looked up from his slouched position, then shifted his eyes quickly back to the deck. “What’s it to you, sailor boy?” he said, his voice strangled.
The sailor was younger and slight of build. His eyes widened at Jacob’s tone.
“Aw now, mate, just trying to be friendly. Most people not used to the roll do get sick, you know. It’s nothing to get angry over. Here.” He held out a thick piece of new hemp, about five inches long. It was an odd amber color.
“What the hell is that?” asked Jacob.
Threads West, an American Saga Page 7