by John Brunner
She had dealt too much in symbols lately: herbs, bones, feathers, blood… None meant what it appeared to mean, but was a mere echo of a greater reality.
To outdo this array of engineering masterpieces ornamented with decoration more spectacular than many a millionaire’s mansion—that defied her imagination. She felt as though she had come to a holy place, a temple to gods she had never dreamed of.
Suddenly she was no longer puzzled about Fernand abandoning the bank.
While she stood transfixed by her fit of insight, there came a clang-clang-clang of bells, dwindling into distance, as though the signal were being given for a ritual to begin. She came to herself with a start.
Thrusting her comb back in her purse, she withdrew instead the other, heavier object she had seized as she ran out of the house. It had been a gift from Alphonse the day he took her virginity, and she had particularly asked for it: a crucifix of solid silver. She might be vowed to the darker Lord. Her son was not and never need be. Assailed as he was by Mam’zelle Josephine, this might yet serve to guard him on his perilous journey.
The tangle of beliefs that hedged her mind like a thornbrake would have been the despair of any theologian. It bore far more resemblance to the mundane world than to an idealized cosmos. Nevertheless it served its purpose.
Determinedly she made for the Atchafalaya.
And still they came!
Struggling at the foot of the Atchafalaya’s stage to control the flood of would-be passengers, Wills sweated and shouted to ensure that no one would be left ashore who had a right to come along, nor anyone aboard who should have quit.
His task was being made no easier by the row behind him. Exactly what was going on, he could not be sure, but he had registered that first this damnable doctor had insisted on leaving at once, then he had quarreled with his nurse and driven her back to the wharf, and now he was ordering Drew not to leave until she had been brought back to him. Crazy! Perfectly crazy!
Suddenly he brightened. He had caught scarcely a glimpse of this nurse when she arrived, but he did recall she was colored, slender, and obviously harassed. A woman approaching him matched that description. Moreover she was brandishing a silver cross as though it were the most important thing in the world. That could explain where she had vanished to. Wills was a lapsed Baptist, but he retained a degree of faith in Christian symbols. Maybe this had some part to play in Cherouen’s healing.
At that moment Cherouen himself was bellowing, “Damn you! Why did you let her go? Didn’t any of you see what happened to Miss Josephine?”
She had been on board this boat Fernand was piloting?
It had been Eulalie’s intention to deliver the cross to some trustworthy officer and then hurry home and conduct protective rites until the race was over. Acting at a distance, she knew her powers. It was always safer, as in any magic, to be at a place the enemy did not recognize.
But hearing that of all names made her rush out of the crowd.
The clerk’s eyes lit up. “Say!” he exclaimed. “Is it you we been waiting for?”
“This is for Mr. Lamenthe! I must give it to him!”
For all Wills knew, there was some link between Cherouen and Lamenthe; at any rate both were French-type names. And the quicker this was sorted out, the sooner the race would start, the better the chance of winning.
Haste overtook him just as Cherouen was persuaded that because of what he had said there was negligible chance of Josephine returning.
“Go on!” Wills ordered, and in Eulalie’s wake signaled for the stage to be lifted, baffling frantic latecomers who still were waving money at him. The freight hoister was already stowed. On the day of any ordinary departure, things would now settle to an orderly routine. But today was very different.
Abruptly it dawned on him that hearing the shout of “Josephine!” must have persuaded him that the quadroon woman was the person sought, and he had let her on board without a ticket or other authority and it was too late to do anything about it. The deckhands were singling off to one line, and the stage was already at a balance, and Motley was ordering him to stop hanging about, and all of a sudden he registered the forces unleashed by the prospect of the race: the masses of humanity on the wharf, on the boats nearby, and on the excursion steamers which were riding so low in the water one could picture steamboat inspectors commandeering a launch and rushing out to serve committal orders for endangering the lives of passengers.
Alarmed at the avalanche of events let loose by a conflict between what after all were mere machines, Wills gathered his papers and rushed up the stage.
Cherouen checked him.
“Did you see Miss Josephine?”
“Didn’t she come up just ahead of me?”
“What? Oh, you infernal idiot! She wasn’t Josephine—didn’t look like her, even!”
Wills stared in disbelief, because he had no faintest notion why the doctor should pick on him, and then the hush that was gathering along the waterfront reached them, like the mood of service at a shrine. There was a not-exactly-silence, for the hiss of steam and the drone of machines disturbed the air, but there was no wind to speak of except a dry harsh dusty breeze the same as this morning’s, and as always at this time of the afternoon the sound of drays and freight hoisters came to an end, the work having been done which would see the scores of steamers on their way.
For a distance of ten, perhaps fifteen steamer-breadths up- and downstream of where the Atchafalaya and the Nonpareil were moored—the latter lacking the upstream advantage of the former by two berths—there was stillness. By thousands there were more people nearby than ever before; noise might have been expected, but the watchers fell quiet, even the eager active ones who had climbed roofs.
Hush.
While he was escorting Dorcas aboard, Fernand’s heart was pounding and his mouth was dry, as though he were a cub again and faced with a tricky night crossing that he knew Drew—on principle—was not about to help with.
For this was the real-life enactment of a dream he had consciously discarded, which had caught up with him nonetheless.
The chief clerk was approaching the head of the stage, giving final instructions to the second mate. Not releasing his arm from Dorcas’s, Fernand hailed them. All around, passengers who had signed up for the thrill of a race were already searching for distractions to alleviate the boredom of waiting until five o’clock. He was proudly conscious of how many eyes were on him and his companion when he said in a loud clear voice, “Dorcas my dear, this is Mr. Motley, and Mr. Sexton. Gentlemen, my fiancée Miss Archer, who for urgent personal reasons desires to accompany me to St. Louis.”
They were too startled to do other than bow politely.
Fernand continued smoothly, addressing Motley, “You’ll see she is suitably accommodated, won’t you?”
The clerk hesitated. All his puritan instincts could be seen rising in his face, stiff as his collar.
“We had planned to keep the freedmen’s bureau closed this trip,” he said finally. “And in any case such proximity of an unmarried woman—excuse me: young lady—to the accommodation of her intended would certainly excite comment.”
Before Fernand could explode at the implied insult, there came a bellow. Spotting Motley from the hurricane deck, Drew shouted, “There you are! I’ve been hunting— Stay put! I’m coming down!”
Motley strode to meet him. Fernand did the same, urging Dorcas along.
“Motley, I told you everything must be set to go by ten of at latest!” Drew barked. “Woodley’s lying downriver, and that makes it twice as likely he’ll try to cut away early! Fernand, what the devil are you—? Oh.” With awkward politeness he clawed his blue cap off his gray and balding head. “Miss Archer, ain’t it? I guess you came to wish good luck to your young man. Things being as they are, though—”
Fernand cut in and explained. Drew blinked.
“Sure, we have empty staterooms! Let her have the best of ‘em! Fernand can afford it, as you dam
n’ well know!”
Motley countered, “But what if the other passengers—?”
“They can swim ashore if they’d rather! Stop wasting my time! I have a race to win and a problem with this crazy doctor who can’t make up his mind if he wants his nurse back or not! Fernand, get up to the pilothouse, damn you! Now!” And aside to Dorcas: “Sorry about the language, Miss Archer, but with a pilot for a husband you’ll hear it all eventually. ‘Some early learn to swear and curse’—and some late, with better reason!”
With a grin Fernand thanked him, and led Dorcas to the boiler deck, where he spotted one of the black women who doubled as maids and laundresses. He issued crisp instructions, handed over Dorcas’s bag, and gave one final injunction.
“Darling, I’m afraid I have work to do, but as soon as I can I’ll come and seek you in the cabin, near the water cooler, okay? And if anybody questions your right to be there, tell ‘em they must answer to me.” He kissed her cheek. And wondered even as he turned toward the pilothouse stairs why her face felt so cold on such a cruelly hot day.
Sharp as ever, Tyburn said, “Are you going to take her out instead of me? I guess you’ll want to, now your girl’s aboard.”
Fernand hesitated fractionally. Then he broke into a broad smile.
“What brings her here, anyhow?” Tyburn pursued. Fernand cast around for words—Motley’s comment of a few minutes ago had reminded him acutely how he had already enjoyed her body in a way approved, it seemed, by everyone except the Church—and managed an adequate summary.
Tyburn gave a wise nod. “Yep. A man not gettin’ any younger, with a sick wife—a girl that good-looking under his roof… I guess she done the right thing to cut and run.”
He heaved his bulk around on the leather bench.
“And something else too. She done you a favor, I’d say. She just gave you a reason for honest hate. I read it in your face. Now you really want to beat the Nonpareil!”
Before Fernand could tell him how right he was, the speaking-tube whistle from the clerk’s office sounded. Expecting captain’s orders, Tyburn unhooked it and listened. A moment, and his face changed. He looked oddly at Fernand.
“Say, are you dead set on sharing your moment of glory with all your womenfolk?”
Fernand gave him a blank stare. Tyburn offered him the tube. He took it and heard Anthony’s voice.
“Mr. Lamenthe, there’s this lady here says she’s your mother and wants to give you something before we leave!”
The world seemed to spin around Fernand. His first thought was: She’s probably bringing me trickenbags!
And then abruptly he grew calm. He felt very old—no, very mature—and cynical as he replaced the tube.
“Guess there’s time for me to see what she wants,” he said with affected casualness. “But it’s lucky she’s still pretty nimble. She’s sure going to have to dash down that stage when the old man sounds three bells!”
Head still ringing with visions of Eulalie and Cherouen’s frenzied reproaches, Josephine abruptly realized she was standing among a group of curious onlookers, mostly white but some black, all dirty, all ill-clad, and all men. They were wondering aloud whether she was drugged or in liquor.
Memory swooped back to her. She recognized what had happened. For a while she had not been herself.
And her faith allowed only one explanation. She had been possessed.
She knew the feeling well, of course. On a dozen nights in every year, when Cherouen believed her to be visiting relatives in Algiers whom she was ashamed to introduce because they were black and backward—but she was loyal to them nonetheless—she let herself be taken over by a god in the presence of a handful of trusted friends, sworn to a secrecy whose breach would lead to worse than mere damnation. But not since childhood had she been possessed in daylight and without desiring to be. (Then it had been said she suffered from fits; she learned better later on.)
The gods did nothing without a reason. There must be a purpose behind this invasion of her mind.
As a flower grows from a seed, conviction blossomed. She gazed around, disregarding the bystanders’ comments. None of the gods she called on would do anything to harm her except to avenge an insult, she knew that. But she must have insulted one of them, because otherwise Eulalie could not have inflicted such agony on her feet and legs. This therefore was most likely a final chance to redeem herself and the god’s honor. By being separated from Cherouen she was at a disadvantage. If she lost the money he paid her, she would be in the plight of any back-street wise woman, and the privacy she prized would be at an end. What might compensate?
Logically, saving her life.
For an instant she thought she had the answer. Eulalie planned to destroy the boat Cherouen was on; by leaving it, she had escaped. But that did not fit! Her own son was aboard too!
Oh. Wait. It did fit. It fitted perfectly. What a way to make the final sacrifice before entering into all the powers formerly possessed by Athalie! What a grand offering to Damballah!
Josephine shivered in awe. There was not enough ruthlessness in all her being to match so tremendous a deed.
And then her roving gaze caught sight of Eulalie herself on board the Atchafalaya, being escorted along the main deck by a gentleman who must be one of the officers, for he was dressed in the highest style, from his tall silk hat to his brilliantly-polished boots. So little time remained until five o’clock, it was impossible to believe she was merely on a sight-seeing tour. She must be intending to take passage.
And commit suicide!
Hopelessly confused, Josephine tried the alternative possibility: that the attack—for by now she was convinced there was to be an attack on one of the boats—was aimed at the Nonpareil. If that was true, how would it be carried out? Something like a stake, probably, a piece of wood in a crucial and strategic spot, turgid with doom…
“You think there’s something aboard the Nonpareil which is supposed to spoil her chance of winning?”
The question came from outside the narrow compass of her awareness. She answered as best she could.
“I don’t think it. I know it.”
“What, then?”
She was able now to register whom she was talking to: a couple of newly arrived white men in their twenties. She had seen them before, though not together. It dawned on her that she must have been musing aloud.
“Well, what?” the younger man said again impatiently.
“I guess it could be…” She passed her hand wearily across her forehead. “Oh, I said already. Like a stake!”
“How do you know?”
“It’s something I can do. It’s a power.”
“Power—dynamis!” A snap of the fingers. “They don’t say a stake of it, they say a stick of it. Could it be a stick?”
“What are you talking about?” interposed the older one.
“This stuff, Mr. Nobel invented. Dynamite! They talk about a stick of it—and can you think of anything better to wreck a steamer with?”
“Obe, I think you’re—”
“Drunk? I don’t believe it. But in any case I have too much money riding on the Nonpareil to take the slightest risk! And if you’re going to be aboard too… Here, ma’am: my arm.”
She took it after a brief hesitation.
“Come with me. We’re going to tell the captain of the Nonpareil all about this.”
“No!”
“Why not?”
“I have to go to St. Louis with Dr. Cherouen! I work for Dr. Cherouen!”
“But the Nonpareil is going to St. Louis too, and what’s more she’ll get there sooner… What’s wrong?”
She had started and bitten her lip.
“N-nothing,” she forced out.
“Well, then! If there’s such a thing on the Nonpareil, you can describe it, seek it out?”
“I could try, sure.”
“Let’s go, then!”
The omen was too plain to resist. She had thought the man who offered h
is arm looked familiar. It had taken a long time to see past the new moustache and the effect of several years’ growth, but suddenly she realized what she had overlooked when he came to consult Dr. Cherouen. Auberon was her half-brother.
And, wits dulled by arsenic and laudanum, never thought to inquire whether he, or his companion, recognized her as well.
She merely did as the god who had possession of her ordered.
Enough of what had passed between Auberon, Joel and Josephine had been overheard for another rumor to take its rise: there’s a plot to blow up the Nonpareil!
Miraculously, like wildfire encountering a shower of rain, it was damped down at once by the general hush of expectation.
Otherwise there would have been fights by the dozen as those who had backed the Nonpareil accused those who hadn’t of being responsible for her destruction.
“That’s to replace Eb?”—incredulous, from Steeples.
“At least he’s sober!”—in a nettled tone from Corkran.
“Only because he didn’t make enough today to get drunk yet!”—from Roy, and the sally earned a round of harsh laughter.
“But why?” Steeples demanded.
“Parbury says. Seems this is the guy who sank the last Nonpareil.”
That created as near to a dead pause as was conceivable in the engineroom just before departure.
“I’ll be damned,” Steeples said at last. “I heard some tale like that, but…” He looked Caesar over curiously. “You fired the gun that sank Parbury’s last boat? And made him blind?”
“I didn’t know until today,” Caesar said. “I shot at a steamer, and I never knew it was his.” He spoke in his most educated tones.