by John Brunner
“What sort of trouble?” Peter Corkran demanded. “Far as her boilers and engines go, she’s running fine. Right?” He sought confirmation from Roy and Steeples. Eb Williams was not present; from the beginning he had preferred to avoid these discussions.
“I’m not talking about that,” Woodley said. “I’m talking about the fact that we’re not getting our proper share of either freight or passengers. Has the Nonpareil somehow acquired a bad reputation?” As he spoke, he gazed fixedly at the pilots on his left.
“Why look at me?” Hogan demanded. “If I weren’t happy with her, I’d never have signed my contract.”
“Same holds for me,” Trumbull snapped. “She’s handling fine, now she’s been fitted with the chain wagon.”
As always at the faintest whisper of criticism of his darling, Parbury cocked his head like a hound sniffing the breeze. But he said nothing.
“Right,” Hogan concurred. “When she’s loaded she acts like a lady and shows just the turn of speed we were hoping for. We’ve taken the horns in a handful of short trades already. Trouble is, she doesn’t get a chance to prove how long she can keep it up. It’d help”—with a glare at McNab—“if we didn’t have to make so many way landings!”
“We’re having to take any cargo we can get,” McNab retorted. “You want her well loaded, we want her to pay her way! So we’re obliged to!”
“But why?” Woodley barked. “Why are we not flooded with requests to carry freight and passengers both?”
“Try hiring new agents,” Iliff suggested sourly.
“Knight’s are a good firm and they’re doing their best,” McNab insisted. “So are our other agents up and down the river. No, the trouble is, though I’m sorry to have to say it…” He hesitated, looking at Parbury and at once away again, and concluded, “People are afraid of these rumors about a race. There’s danger in it. Who’d want his goods to float home by the water, scorched and sodden? Or travel that way himself?”
“Danger?”—from Gordon. “In a boat that I personally tested to two hundred per square inch?”
“We haven’t been allowed to make that public,” Iliff said meaningly, in his turn glancing at Parbury. “But Ian’s wrong, anyway. People aren’t scared of a race. They’re hoping for one. They think they’re doing us a favor by not overloading her. Think a lighter boat is more likely to run out Drew’s!”
“If that were so,” Hogan objected, “putting that card in the papers should have fixed the trouble.”
On their last visit to New Orleans they had seen an advertisement from Drew denying that the Atchafalaya would race with any other steamer. At McNab’s insistence Woodley had published a similar statement.
“Anyway, that argument only affects freight,” Trumbull said. “Before the war, when there was the least chance of a race, you couldn’t buy passage on either boat for love or money. Where are the sporting fraternity? They ought to be coming aboard in droves!”
“Before the war!” Hogan countered. “Things have changed.”
“The amount of money that’s been bet simply on whether there will or won’t be a race says you’re wrong,” Woodley declared. “Mr. Parbury and I have discussed this at length and reached complete agreement.”
Gordon started, as though suspecting goings-on behind his back. Woodley looked straight at him as he continued.
“There’s one way to settle the matter. There must be a race, and we must win it.”
Parbury gave an emphatic nod, and his cadaverous face broke into a Halloween grin.
Response was about equally divided into relief and dismay, and for a second Woodley was afraid of a shouting match. Then into the air burst an explosion of music—of a sort. During their last trip Manuel had had to fire one of his cornet players for drunkenness, and now he was auditioning a possible replacement, who was very loud but conspicuously off-key.
“Crazy Dago!” muttered Whitworth. Underwood chuckled; Burge did the same. The tension faded, giving Woodley his chance to go on.
“Whatever you think,” he stated flatly, “so long as Drew holds the horns for our regular trade, the Nonpareil will never be the automatic choice of shippers and travelers. We’ll go on begging for our fair share of business, and for a splendid boat like ours the notion’s crazy!”
“Damned right!” exclaimed Gordon, who was now paying full attention. Whether he had expected a public interrogation concerning his debt to the Marocain Bank was impossible to judge, but his alarmed reaction to McNab’s challenge was over, and his manner was back to normal. Turning to the pilots, he added, “She can do it, can’t she?”
There was a pause; Trumbull and Hogan exchanged glances. At length the latter said, “There’s no doubt we can make a very fast run. But how can we force Drew into racing? I believe his card where I wouldn’t believe ours, Captain—with respect! He never has raced any of his boats, and he won’t start now.”
Parbury spoke up sharply. “That’s simple! We’re due to leave New Orleans next Friday, July first. Give us a quick trip downriver and we’ll leave on Thursday instead, Drew’s regular day. If we pull away from the wharf together he can’t pretend we’re not racing as far as Cairo.”
“If I know him,” Corkran said bitterly, “the moment he sees we’re stripped for a fast run, he’ll decide to stay over an extra day and leave us to race the clock instead of him.”
“If he does,” Woodley said, “the whole world will know why. And people who backed him to win will be so disgusted, we can look forward to taking over his Memphis and Vicksburg and Greenville business, can’t we?”
His tone of confidence was infectious. Those who had been minded to voice objections, even McNab, seemed to think better of it.
“And do we have to strip her?” the captain pursued. “I’m not sure Drew gained much advantage by taking out windows and removing guards. At all events the Nonpareil has a far finer line.”
That earned a smile of approval from Parbury, who put in, “At least her decks ought to be painted white, though.”
There were general nods; that was a wartime trick, designed to make the most of moonlight and even starlight.
“I’m not so concerned about that,” Trumbull said with a frown. “What’s more important is that we have sufficient freight to ballast her. Can we get enough cargo for St. Louis, or at least for Cairo? Or would we have to make it up with way-landing cargoes? That would mean more stops and longer ones.”
“Why not ballast her with fuel?” Gordon proposed.
Both pilots looked at him stonily. Hogan condescended to reply.
“Fuel has to be kept on the move, Mr. Gordon—towards the boilers. For a high-speed run you need solid freight in exactly the right positions. Besides, there’s a question of cost.”
Iliff had brought a file of documents with him. Now he handed a list to the pilots.
“Here’s what we have engaged for our next upriver trip. Will it be enough?”
As one they shook their heads. Hogan said, “You’ll have to make certain we have another hundred tons of St. Louis freight. Never mind what—just get it. Do you have a list of passengers?”
“Here. Of course some will cancel when they learn departure is a day early.”
“But a good few more will insist on joining,” Trumbull said.
“That doesn’t matter,” Woodley put in. “Just so long as we accept none who won’t go clear to St. Louis with us. The ones we’re engaged to convey to way stops can be transferred to other steamers or take their chance riding an empty coal flat. I want delays cut to the bone. On the way down we’ll leave messages to have fuel ready at the proper points, and…” He hesitated, glancing sidelong at the pilots.
“And,” he finished with forced brightness, “we’ll cable for pilots to join us under way, to spell you so you’re always at your freshest in the pinch.”
For a long moment Hogan and Trumbull digested that, plainly wondering whether to take it as an insult or a wise precaution. McNab resolved the probl
em with a remark that amounted to surrender.
“I can tell you’ve given a deal of thought to this, Captain,” he murmured, and everybody was glad to accept the formula, even the pilots. After sighing with resignation, Hogan put the next obvious question.
“Like who, Captain?”
“I thought Zeke Barfoot out of Memphis, and Joe Smith and maybe Tom Tacy out of Cairo, because it’s getting kind of tricky towards Cape Girardeau.”
Two weeks ago, at just that spot, Hogan had almost gone aground. He was unable to object without being reminded of it; Woodley’s tactics were impeccable. He gave a sullen nod of consent. At once the gathering was transformed by excitement. Unwilling to admit it, all of them had been looking forward to a showdown.
Parbury gave a gentle cough.
“But so as not to make a liar out of Mr. Woodley…” he said. The point registered at once; he amplified it nonetheless.
“Nobody should state that there is to be a race! It’s safe to say we’re attempting a fast run—that much will be clear from our refusal of passengers for way stops, and the rates we shall have to offer to secure enough cargo for St. Louis.”
“Ruinous!” McNab was heard to mutter behind his hand.
“The hold and staterooms will be full at top rate on the trip after!” Woodley murmured equally softly.
Parbury went on: “But if something goes wrong—not that we expect it to, but if it does—a deal of money has been wagered, as Mr. Woodley reminds us. One would not want people disappointed. We know we plan to race if possible. Drew will guess it straight away. Shippers and shipping agents will likely do the same, and some passengers too. But let them draw their own conclusions. Don’t give ‘em one ready-made.”
Outside, the music resumed. Either the offender had been told to sling his hook, or Manuel had forcibly retuned his instrument; this time the sound was at least bearable.
Over it Woodley stated, “Captain Parbury is correct! Remember what he said, and abide by it.”
Hogan looked him square in the face. “Captain, you talk an awful lot about what’s being bet on this race. Would any of that money by chance be yours?”
Woodley only smiled. He was intending to turn the question with some comment about having entire confidence in the boat—because he had in fact bet a great deal, more than was wise—but before he framed the words Whitworth chimed in, stage-whispering.
“At least it’ll give the niggers something to occupy their minds, if you can call them minds…!”
There was a gust of laughter. Woodley slapped the table and rose.
“About your duties, then! And make sure she’s completely fit to take the horns!”
Humming, Woodley lit a Havana cigar—a smoke he had taken to in imitation of Gordon. He was extremely pleased with himself. He felt that for the first time he had exercised full captain’s authority aboard the Nonpareil. Necessarily he had still shown deference to Parbury, but by now he was confident of becoming his own man. He would have died rather than admit it publicly, but since taking up his present exalted post a great realization had dawned on him. Command was not something you could buy, as he had at first imagined. It was to be earned, or learned, or maybe the best word would be gained.
For weeks, for months, he had been obliged to describe the difficulties he was having to his acquaintances, particularly those he used to gamble with, to excuse his apparent loss of interest in his old haunt, the Limousin. But it was impossible to make people who had never worked for a living—who, even if they had seen service, had been granted officer rank because they were born to appropriate status, not because they were equipped for it—understand that there were subordinates who weren’t servants, or slaves, and could not simply be told to obey or quit. The standing of a pilot, in particular, was baffling to young men accustomed to being waited on since they left the womb.
It was also still making Woodley seethe in private. Obtaining Hogan’s and Trumbull’s consent to the engagement of specialists for individual stretches of the river was a triumph, the first step on a road that would lead to him being truly in control.
Not that the credit was wholly his. Accidentally, by obliging his pilots to sign fixed-term contracts, Gordon had given them a stake in the success of the boat. When they quit, it would do their future prospects no good at all if the Nonpareil had run at a loss during their time with her.
The news of Gordon’s financial unsoundness had not come as a complete surprise; once or twice in New Orleans he had heard rumors and scoffed in the hope they would go no further. But someone was keeping the story alive, and presumably that someone had an interest in belittling the Nonpareil. Perhaps he had bet more than he could afford on this race that kept not happening; perhaps he had a grudge against Parbury, or Gordon, or even Woodley himself; perhaps he had been bribed by Drew to sow tares!
As things had turned out, everybody had wound up on the same side, all wanting—all needing—a record run.
When it was over, and he had claimed the horns off Drew, then if ever in his life he would be able to respect himself. Instead of an old blind man—instead of a fat foreigner—when people thought of the racing steamer Nonpareil, they would associate her name for evermore with Cato Woodley!
ON THE TURN OF A CARD
29TH JUNE 1870
“Of late, European telegrams have recited in glowing accents all details of yacht races in British channel and Atlantic ocean. We are gravely told by the cable that Mr. Asbury, on board his yacht, the Cambria, is coming to America with prizes of the immense value of £250. How insignificant the contests of these miserable little sailing vessels, contrasted with this pending between magnificent steamers on the greatest river in the world, and how trifling these gold and silver cups with which victors are rewarded in European yacht races, when here, in this remote quarter of the globe, a single steamboat captain is said to have staked money and property to the extent of $200,000—£40,000—on the issue of the struggle…”
—Memphis Appeal editorial, 1st July 1870, quoted by Manly Wade Wellman in Fastest on the River
Across the darkened offices of the Intelligencer, Abner Graves bellowed, “Siskin! Isn’t your piece ready yet?” Late though it was, the steam presses were working full blast. Speech less than a shout was not worthwhile.
“Just a minute!” Joel called back, and for the dozenth time compared the two concluding paragraphs he had drafted for his article. One stated that there would be a race when the Atchafalaya and the Nonpareil left port at the same time, and one referred readers to the steamers’ respective advertisements as evidence that there would not.
The bulk of his text was a résumé of what Drew had told him this morning (and it was a journalistic coup to have secured so long an interview with that thorny character), followed by some remarks by officers of the Nonpareil. He had hoped for Woodley or Parbury; both, however, had declined on the grounds that advancing their departure to Thursday had made them far too busy. Why, then, the advancement? He had at least been able to ask the second clerk, Mr. Iliff. But his reply was thoroughly unsatisfactory: “Commercial reasons!”
Following all this equivocation, what else could he include to make up his word count but reference to the heavy betting that was going on? He was kept au fait by Auberon, who took malicious delight in reporting who had laid how much, at what odds, on the success of which steamer.
At first Joel had cared not at all whether he won or lost his two cents. What mattered was to get back on good terms with his cousin. If there had been a secondary motive, it ceased when Louisette became Mrs. Arthur Gattry.
Little by little, however, he had begun to think that not having his own way for once might do Auberon good. His time in Europe had made him so overweening!
And a couple of weeks ago Joel had been firmly convinced that this was how it would pan out, for Drew had inserted an advertisement in the paper that was to run until canceled. A galley proof of tomorrow’s river advertising column lay beside him; he reached fo
r it and once more read the familiar words:
A CARD
Having proved that the steamer Atchafalaya can make a fast run, I take this method of informing the public that reports of her intending racing, are not true. Passengers and shippers can rest assured that she will not race with any boat leaving the same day. Business intrusted to my care, freight or passengers, will enjoy the best attention. Verb. sap.
H. DREW, Master
He had been even more encouraged when a response from the Nonpareil appeared, also with instructions to let it run. Here that was again too:
A CARD TO THE PUBLIC
Reports having been circulated that the steamer Nonpareil is going out for a race, such reports are not true, and the traveling community are assured that every attention will be given to the safety and comfort of passengers. The running and management of the Nonpareil will in no way be affected by the departure of other boats.
CATO WOODLEY, Master
True or false, though? Auberon—with, for a change, at least a shadow of proof—had described bets that Woodley had placed months back, when his gambling cronies mocked him for taking up a demanding occupation instead of living by his wits. And in the first flush of enthusiasm for the new boat, other people could easily have been dragged along and later regretted their rashness. So far, so logical.
But money was still being laid on both contenders, and Auberon was giving names and figures. Some were surprising.
Who then, beyond Woodley, was inspiring confidence in the Nonpareil? The Marocain brothers? It would be in their interest in one sense, inasmuch as they had huge sums secured by her success in trade; contrariwise, though, let it but be whispered that a banker was gambling with his clients’ funds, and…!
True, they harbored a double grudge against Drew, not only because he had recruited Fernand, but also because he, however inadvertently, had triggered off the panic that came near to ruining the bank five years ago. But the risk of a second similar panic was too great. No, it couldn’t be the Marocains.