by John Brunner
He had concluded that the man did not even believe in his own cures. He had seen how resentful Cherouen was when called on to dress Walt Presslie’s scald. Surely any doctor should willingly help any sufferer, were it only to bandage a cut finger!
He was considering laying bets against the survival of the second Grammont child in consequence.
Walt himself was poised halfway between fatigue and guilt. Though his blistered shoulder hurt far more than he admitted, he was able to contribute again to the common effort. But he was having to work onehanded, and when it came to heavy jobs like going astern he was left at a loss. Dutch was taking things as they came, and there were a couple of white firemen who could be trusted to go as they were told, whom he had roped in as temporary strikers.
It galled Walt, though, to think that accident had prevented him from pulling his full weight in such a momentous run.
Staff in hand, Drew spent those waking moments when he was not in the pilothouse wandering from deck to deck, mustering a smile and a polite word for the passengers who complimented him on the efficient running of the Atchafalaya, snapping a curse at any member of the crew who was neglecting normal duties because there were so few passengers and so little cargo this time, or because it was a race and somehow different from a regular run. But luckily there were few calls for reprimands. Most of those who worked for him had joined the boat reluctantly; his reputation had preceded him and he was held to be a hard taskmaster. Yet they had come back to sign on for another and still another voyage, sometimes after trying other steamers and finding conditions worse. Little by little he had come to think of himself in terms he had run across in an English novel about schoolboys, which meant nothing to him but which for lack of anything else he had passed an evening reading. There was this head teacher defined by his pupils as “a beast, but a just beast!”
To have kept one’s word; to have kept faith… Surely that would be enough to defend oneself before the eventual throne of the Most High.
Therefore he had made a conscious effort to mingle praise with punishment. Therefore, even more on this trip than on the previous record-breaking one, he was able to say, “Well done!”
To even the lowliest of the dirty, flea-ridden, greasy-garbed, black-nailed, stinking niggers camped out on the foredeck, snatching an hour or two’s repose between shifts: people who with the best will in the world it was hard to recognize as belonging to the same race as Fernand, with his flawless manners and his impeccable attire.
But then there had been years—so many years!—when he himself begrudged the cost of soap, let alone a new coat or shirt, because he was hag-ridden by Jacob’s debts…
Then, he must have looked not altogether unlike this rabble: holes in his boots, his beard untrimmed, everything about him signaling poverty to the world. Why, that morning when he first met Fernand, the boy’s appearance must have put his own to shame, and he was a clerk in a store!
It was a different world he was looking back into from the standpoint of now. One thing only had remained constant.
But he was afraid to think about Susannah and the children. He was coming to wonder whether even the Electric Doctor would be able to help her. The more he thought about that sad letter informing him of her ill-health—the more he talked to, or rather put up with, Cherouen—the more he grew depressed. Consciously he was aware that the boat was running beautifully and that his crew were tuned to their finest-ever pitch. Against his will, however, he felt a terrible sense of foreboding. He knew he ought to spend more time asleep in his stateroom, confiding the race to Tyburn and Fernand. It was impossible. Every time he turned his feet that way, he thought of some other thing that might go wrong, and felt bound to investigate. His eyelids were stinging, as though they were rimmed with hot sand; his stomach churned because he hadn’t eaten a square meal, or at a regular time, since leaving New Orleans.
It hadn’t been like this on the last fast run. Then, he only had a plain ordinary job to do, and he was doing it to the best of his ability. Now he was being pursued, he understood why he had never wanted to race. It was like being a runaway slave hearing the hounds and the patterollers on his track. It was like being doomed to pay off his inherited debts all over again from scratch, because this time half his heart was at stake—his precious steamer!
He had thought, when proposing his bet, that having enough money to finance a new boat, more fitted to compete in this age of railroads, would be sufficient to cushion him against the fear of losing.
It wasn’t.
In a way his decision to hide from the war had never managed—for then he had had his personal justifications to shield him—this experience was bringing it home to him that at heart the reason he was not a gambler was because he could not, could never, face the fact of being defeated.
To have married, and got it wrong: that would have been a defeat. Imagine being Parbury, with his only child dead, his wife a crippled whining misery, his eyesight lost in the moment his proudest possession went to the bottom!
And yet somehow Parbury had come back, and there he was on his rival’s heels, as it were tap-tapping with the stick he carried not because it was useful to discipline lazy deckhands but because without it he could not find his way…
Sleepless, agitated, Drew became more convinced by the hour that fortune had smiled on him too long.
On first discovering that Whitworth found it impossible to shake off his watchman’s habits, so that he prowled the night away, eyes sharp for any irregularity, Underwood had thought he might be trying to usurp the privileges of his senior.
However, it had not been long before the Nonpareil’s first mate realized how lucky he was in having a deputy who could manage with four hours’ sleep, even if he did take them at improbable times. Being himself of a constitution that called for a more normal ration of repose, he was glad to make an unofficial rearrangement of the watch system. Tonight he had agreed to turn out for the coaling stop at Greenville. Until then, he was snoring to his heart’s content.
Woodley had not been informed. It might be safest to let him learn by degrees. Surely, though, it was better for him to have his first mate properly rested before such a crucial event?
Nonetheless Whitworth walked circumspectly, alert for trouble of whatever kind. He was expecting a crisis between Auberon and his brother-in-law. The latter was drinking more than he ought, in company with Major Spring and—who else?—Gordon, whose purse despite his financial problems appeared to be bottomless. Luckily Auberon appeared to defer to the darkie nurse and the reporter, though much of the time the latter was running around bothering people for their opinions of the race. So far he had not cornered Whitworth; doubtless he eventually would.
And if so, what would he say? That regardless of the outcome he planned to leave the river for good?
Whitworth was of two minds… no, three at least. The chance that had come his way not long before leaving New Orleans was perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. To become a commercial representative for a product already in enormous demand back east: that was pregnant with possibilities! Of course, he would have to settle in St. Louis, and his wife had never wanted to leave Paducah, but their marriage was effectively at an end anyhow.
And there was something beyond that mere promise of financial success. There was something which rang around his skull whenever he looked at Josephine and saw how the waiters and stewards danced at her every whim. He had seen one of them actually hand her money!
Wrapped in a scrap of paper. Bearing a message—or a prayer? Who could say?
But there was no doubt about it: this woman had some kind of a hold over the colored crew. And here the Nonpareil was lagging behind despite being faster. Coincidence?
Also the nurse had ordered the stop at Baton Rouge. Coincidence?
Also a black engineer had been hired for the trip. Coincidence?
And if in fact some supernatural influence was at work—which in his view any rational person must admit
to be possible, for he had often witnessed the effect of luck charms on the fate of others, though he himself had never profited by any he had bought—if so, then was it not time that some very natural influence indeed were brought to bear on behalf of this boat which, by all reasonable standards, should be outrunning her opponent?
Except that the Atchafalaya had a colored pilot, and today he had frustrated the Nonpareil’s best attempts to overtake.
By sheer skill? Or because all these goddamned niggers were in cahoots with one another?
The last passengers found their way to bed, and the weary waiters and tenders, yawning as they cleared away dirty glasses and emptied ashtrays and cuspidors, shut down the lights in the cabin. There had been no fight after all.
Whitworth turned his steps towards the pilothouse. He was never entirely welcome there, and he knew it, but at this stage of the race Hogan was holding the wheel, and he found Hogan the more tolerant of the pilots. Trumbull was brusque; Hogan was at least polite.
Parbury was in the pilothouse also, but dozing. There had been no sign of Woodley for an hour or more; presumably he was napping in his stateroom.
“All secure below, sir,” Whitworth said formally as he entered. Here, even to his dark-adjusted vision, there was only a faint glimmer of light, but the white-painted decks cast back what starlight was to be had, and in a little he was able to make out something of the banks.
“No trouble with the passengers?” Hogan inquired as he made a minuscule adjustment to the wheel. “Not even with the witch woman?”
Whitworth started. He said after a pause, “You mean the nurse?”
“Nurse?” Hogan gave a harsh laugh. “Well, I guess she may cure some of her followers if they believe enough.”
Astonished, Whitworth said, “Then you noticed—”
“Noticed what?” Hogan cut in. “How every time we try to overtake the Atchafalaya something happens to prevent it? We got away first! We should have held the lead clear to St. Louis. But Cherouen’s on the other boat, and his nurse somehow found her way aboard ours. And here we are, trailing ‘em!”
“I’ve been thinking exactly the same,” Whitworth said.
“Have you, now? Well, congratulations!” Another minute adjustment of course; they were running on a dead slow bell, but in the distance could be discerned sparks from the Atchafalaya. As so often happened hereabouts, their courses were a hundred and fifty degrees apart, thanks to a sharp headland.
“I’d be a sight happier,” Hogan said savagely, “if I didn’t think there was a connection.”
“You really—?” Whitworth began.
“Yes, I really!” Hogan snapped. “I was brought up by my parents, who remembered life in the old country. For all the Church said or did, there was a grain of truth in the tales they used to tell. And darkies are closer to nature than you or me. They understand things we’ve forgotten as we grew richer and more secure. Falsely secure!”
“Once I was on a boat,” Whitworth said slowly, “where we had a gray mare aboard. Took us more than a day to clear the Grand Chain.”
“Ever had a preacher aboard?” Hogan said. “I did once. Might as well have been going astern, all the headway we could make from Natchez to Vicksburg.” He chuckled, once more turning the wheel by an imperceptible trifle. “Broke all the records for overtaking towheads, I believe! Least, though, he was an understanding person. Didn’t mind when we put him ashore to finish his trip by muleback.”
“Women big with child,” Whitworth said, and waited for a response.
“I had a few of them,” Hogan said ruminatively. “Didn’t make the connection until now. You mean this Mrs. Gattry we had to put ashore.”
“Well, it was while she held us up that the Atchafalaya snuck by.”
“Bad news,” Hogan said, and reached for engineroom bell ropes. Here was a bend they would have to take at walking pace; he was giving an early warning.
“So what about men who dress in skirts?” Whitworth ventured. “And what’s more, act like… I don’t know a word bad enough for that kind of thing.”
“Hmm?” Hogan had been preoccupied for a moment; now he glanced around… not that any details were to be made out in the gloom.
Abruptly he realized what Whitworth was driving at, and exclaimed, “You mean Gordon? Hell, everybody dolls up like that in Scotland! Y’ain’t seen pictures of what Julius Caesar and that bunch wore? Like nightshirts! Glad I don’t have engineers dressed that way, myself. Imagine ‘em clambering over a broken wheel on a bad night!”
Obdurately Whitworth persisted, “But that boy of his! He came right out and said it was true!”
“What?”
The gravelly voice was Parbury’s. Waking, he creaked to a seated posture.
“I chose Gordon to be my partner in creating this here boat,” he stated flatly. “I won’t hear a word against him less it’s proven solid. What did his boy say?”
Whitworth stumbletongued. “Why—why—he said plain as I hear you now that he was Gordon’s… Well, he was…”
Parbury rose to his feet, reaching for the familiar landmarks around him. Once upright, he towered over them both.
“What?”
“It’s not the sort of thing I generally talk about, but I took it for granted everybody knew!” Whitworth licked his lips, recalling their last conversation.
Parbury bent his blind gaze Whitworth’s way; it was impossible to tell whether he had discarded Dorcas’s bandanna or whether its colors had merely blended into the murk.
“If you’re implying what I think, you’re insulting me as well as him! Gordon’s manly enough to suit me, and that’s that! Mr. Hogan, how do we stand concerning the Atchafalaya? Did we not pass Island 88 a while ago? Are we not bound up towards Point Worthington?”
Hogan said with respect, “Even when you re asleep, Cap’n, you don’t let much escape you!”
Shut out by this exchange, Whitworth made his way stealthily to the door.
He was shocked, as a riverboat might be on going aground at full speed.
What had he misunderstood?
Tired, but too overwrought to sleep, Joel made his way to the forward end of the boiler deck. At present the Nonpareil was running easily in a broad expanse of what looked to the layman’s eye to be clear water, but he was aware that following the channel was a different matter from simply avoiding the banks. He shivered as he thought of the risks the pilots were facing, and was glad he did not have their job.
Not that his day had been an easy one. It had come as a grievous shock to realize that the cousin he had so admired had fallen prey to the Pale Death which had stalked other of his idols: John Keats, above all. And had not the same dreadful sickness stolen away the child-bride Mrs. Poe?
Yet he was resigned to the sad truth that disease struck at random, and carried off each time more of the old silly notion that God was always just and merciful. To Joel, the deity seemed now more like a gambler, prepared to shrug off losses and start over on another set of human predicaments. And if the world’s best doctors were like Cherouen— Poor Auberon!
That much said, harder visions now assailed him, associated with the Duelling Oaks in New Orleans. Try as he might, he could not hide from the fact that he was growing scared on his own behalf. When those bitter lines he had penned, attacking his cousin-in-law, appeared in papers that might be received as soon as Greenville, he could himself be in danger.
Unless, of course, Graves had edited them out… but why should he? The way Arthur had treated his pregnant bride was disgraceful, and the world should know of it!
Sighing, he struggled to compose himself, so that he might polish off the rest of his next report. Equally sleepless, a black deckhand below was crooning an old plantation song with subversive intent: “Run nigger run, patteroller ketch you!” Maybe that could supply the image he needed to conclude his piece—the relentless pursuit of the Atchafalaya by her rival.
However, perhaps the moral was inappropriate. Beca
use the man being chased got away.
“Hello!”
A soft challenging voice from behind. Joel spun around. He relaxed as he recognized Whitworth.
“Sorry, sir,” the latter said. “Didn’t mean to startle you… Say!”
“Yes?”
“I guess you’re a literary kind of gent, ain’t you?”
“I allow you might call me so. Why?”
Whitworth hesitated. He said eventually, “This boy of Mr. Gordon’s.”
“What about him?”
“Well…” It was clear Whitworth was having trouble finding the right words. “Well, when I first met him he called himself by some sort of fancy name. He said Gordon pays him to be his—something. And I’m darned if I can recollect what.”
Suppressing his annoyance, for he had not wanted to be interrupted, Joel searched his memory. “What kind of name?” he said finally.
“I don’t know!” Whitworth gave a shrug. “Some long word with s’s in it.”
“Amanuensis?” Joel offered.
“That’s it!”
“What about it?”
“Well—uh—what does it mean?”
Joel cudgeled his brains. “I guess you could render it pretty well by ‘confidential secretary’,” he suggested at length.
“Nothing else?”
“Not that I ever heard of. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to write up my next column.”
At just that moment there was a cry from the sleepless hand at the bow.
“ ‘Ware drift!”
Whitworth darted for the nearest stairs, shouting, “Polemen! Polemen on the double! Move, you sluggards—move!”
Shaking his head in puzzlement, Joel reentered the cabin and resumed the laborious task of organizing his thoughts into readable prose.
At the end of his piece he added a note directed at Abner Graves, stating that if the Nonpareil did not regain the lead by tomorrow sundown, he would definitely take the railroad from Memphis and try to join the Atchafalaya at Cairo.