Gear, W Michael - Novel 05 Read online

  "I admire a man who knows his path so well." Eckhart smiled thinly. "If I might offer a word of advice ..."

  "You may."

  Eckhart pushed back his chair and stood. "Not all of your fellow travelers can be counted on to share your, er .. . 'enlightened' sentiments. I would be careful of the manner in which I expressed such opinions. Good day, sir."

  "And a good day to you." Richard scratched his ear as Eckhart retreated to a table offering a card game.

  Richard snorted in mild irritation, then found his place in Kant and settled back for a pleasant day, dissecting the problem of autonomy of will and the supposition of freedom. Later, in the privacy of his cabin, he would dream of Laura again.

  Winter's hold was breaking. The first stars were flickering to life in the darkening sky as Travis Hartman shouldered a keg of gunpowder from the freight wagon's tailgate and carried it toward the low doorway that gaped like a black maw in the warehouse wall. The place had been built of squared blocks of gray limestone, the ashlars poorly dressed. Hickory and white ash had been laid crosswise for beams, then planks and a foot of earth had been used to complete the roof. A thick oaken door provided security in addition to the heavy iron hasp.

  Muck clung to Travis's moccasins as he slopped along the trail beaten in the melting snow. The first robins were already flitting from branch to branch in the surrounding trees, greedily eyeing the places where the snow had melted. Spring would come, even after a winter like this one.

  Travis ducked through the low doorway into the darkness. A single candle illuminated the stacks of crates and kegs, for everything had to be protected against rats and mice. The room smelled dank and musty, the way a dirt-floored warehouse should.

  Dave Green stood braced over a flour barrel, which he was using as a table for his ledger. "Last one?"

  "Yep."

  "That's thirty kegs of powder. Ought to be enough for two years."

  Outside, one of the mules snorted and shook its harness.

  Travis blinked in the darkness, counting off tens on his fingers. "I reckon."

  Green rubbed his broad forehead as his gaze darted from keg to keg. "We've got everything we need, Travis. Two hundred trade rifles, stacks of four-point blankets, foo-fawraw by the barrel, flour, lead, flints, mirrors, knives, copper kettles, vermilion and ocher for grease paints, strike-a-lights, a half ton of tobacco, ten tins of whiskey, and all the rest."

  "But not enough men," Travis said dryly.

  Green made a face. "You been around again?"

  Travis kicked at the dirt. "T'ain't easy, Dave. Can't jist come out and say, 'Hyar, boys. Who's fer the Shining Mountains and two years on the Big Horn?' Do that and you'll have army folks swarming about like skeeters on the Platte."

  Green braced his arms over his ledger. "Damn it! It's not enough that a man's got to trust himself to two thousand miles of snags, sawyers, and savages, all set to sink him or scalp him, but the damn gov'ment's against him, too!"

  "I reckon it's Ashley, Chouteau, and Astor, hoss. Just like you said." Travis found a twist of tobacco in his possibles, slipped his knife from its sheath, and cut a chew from his twist. Green was silent while Travis got the quid juicing and spat. Travis then added, "I got fifteen men willing, no questions asked. That be all, Davey. I reckon if'n we was ter leave tomorrow, I could shanty up another twenty or so."

  "We can't leave tomorrow. And damn it, we can't have it out that we're heading upriver to trade. I need that God-cursed license!"

  "Wal, ye ain't gonna get it." Travis scratched his ear.

  "Hoss, ye'll just have ter wait yer turn and hope the good Lord'11 provide."

  "My turn has to be now, Travis. Colonel Atkinson is upriver subduing the tribes with his army. Joshua Pilcher's Missouri Fur Company is weakened—half their forts are abandoned. William Ashley gave up on the river after the Arikara shot his brigade up in '23. He's way out west someplace, Meanwhile, Pratte and Chouteau have something in the wind. I think it's with Jacob Astor. It's like a crawling in my gut, Travis. American Fur is going to partner up with Pratte and Chouteau. If I don't get upriver and establish a trading post with the Crow, I'll be muscled right out of the trade."

  "Do or die, eh?"

  "Reckon so. When we head upriver, Travis, you've got to be my eyes, ears, and guard dog. I want you out roaming, scouting. We're taking more than enough risks as it is. I must be the first boat up the river."

  "Like you said, the army is up there somewhere. How ye gonna handle that?"

  Green half-closed his eyes, as if seeing upriver, into the future. "We'll know when they're close. Word travels downriver faster than keelboats. When we hear, we'll put up behind an island, maybe hole up in some creek. They'll drift right on past—and be no wiser for it."

  "And Fort Atkinson?"

  "I've got forged papers that say I'm carrying goods for Pratte. They won't stand close scrutiny, but by the time they find out different, we'll be long gone. Meanwhile, to avoid the whiskey embargo, you, my friend, will offload the whiskey two days downriver and bypass the fort to the west. We'll meet up two days' travel upriver."

  "Risky bizness, Dave."

  Green nodded. "That's why I sent for you, Travis. I don't know anyone else I could trust to get me through. You know the Indians, the land, the river. If I can't have a brigade, I want the next best thing. That's you, Travis."

  Travis chuckled. "You do take all, Davey. Reckon it jist might end up fetch or spit, though. Yep, she's gonna swing according ter whether we get enough men ter make a go of her."

  Green nodded soberly as his gaze rested on the stacked goods. He'd bet the results of his years in Santa Fe, all that blood and sweat and danger. The scars on Travis's face pulled tight as he grinned. Dave Green was his kind of man. All he had to do was sneak his boat up a dangerous river, past powerful rivals, a hostile government, and build a fort in the wilderness where no one had been able to maintain a fort before. All that—provided Green could hire enough men to fill out the expedition without the authorities catching on.

  February 1, 1825 Paducah, Kentucky

  Dear Laura:

  This is the first opportunity I've had to post you a letter from any place where it might conceivably be delivered. I am sending this letter, and the accompanying notes, to you care of the steamboat Victory. I am well, but somewhat thinner. Since leaving Pittsburgh, barbaric as it was, meals have been wretched—mostly salt pork and beans in the beginning. But as we have traveled farther downriver, the menu has tended more and more toward venison and corn, which farmers sell or trade to the boat during the frequent stops for wood to refuel the boilers.

  Perhaps Sally might create something edible out of this crude fare, but for my part, cuisine within a monastery might actually come as an improvement.

  Let me tell you something about how we travel. Steamboat speed, I have learned, comes at the price of quiet and solitude. In the beginning, the clanking, rattling, squeaking, and rhythmic shish-shishing of the paddle drove me half to distraction. Only after days has it faded into a dull monotony of the subconscious. When the boat shakes, the walls wobble and creak as if they will collapse around my ears. While I have become somewhat accustomed to it, I shall never be fully relaxed in this loose stack of kindling.

  Laura, this you might find amusing. I've become quite familiar with the grim aspects of farming and husbandry, not by choice, mind you. Rather, I am forced—by virtue of the thin plank walls—to listen to the mindless babble of ignorant farmers seeking new land, merchants discussing prices and goods, and boatmen talking endlessly of water and vessels and ice in the river.

  When we parted, you asked me to report all of my adventures. I must admit that, to date, I have nothing adventurous to report. The frontier, quite to the contrary of the stories, is dull, squalid, and about as stimulating as a lump of warm tar.

  Your Obedient Servant, Richard Hamilton

  "Port Massac!'' came the cry from the pilothouse.

  Richard marked his place in Ka
nt and stepped out on the gallery with the rest of the men. The sky had gone blustery again, leaden clouds so low they seemed to skim the skeletal gray mat of trees. Chop smacked the gravelly banks, and the dark, clear waters of the Ohio had turned slate-colored.

  A smell of rain carried on the cold air. Richard turned up his collar, the chill bracing to the skin. He was eager for exercise. The deck shuddered as the Virgil backed water. Foam rolled up from under the rocking hull to swirl away in sucking whirlpools. The crew shouted and gestured up at the pilothouse as the bow nosed in toward the landing on the north shore. Bells rang somewhere in the boat's guts.

  Richard shook his head at the sight of Fort Massac. The settlement lay in a clearing cut from virgin forest. At the whistle's shrill blow, men had appeared from the log structures higher up on the bank. Fort Massac differed little from the other tiny settlements Richard had seen, its only distinction being that it rested on the last suitable landing above the mouth of the Ohio. Below this spot, the land was susceptible to flooding.

  Deckhands threw lines out to the waiting men on the bank and dropped the plank. Dugout canoes, a couple of pirogues, and a canted keelboat had been pulled up on the mud.

  Richard tapped his hat securely onto his head, picked up his grip, and descended the stairs to the deck before following the excited swarm of people ashore. Everyone was talking at once, calling for the news, asking about conditions upriver.

  Richard found the inhabitants as distasteful as their pitiful trading post. The only women were Indians, their round, brown faces expressionless as they watched from the rear. The most common sort of men were bearded American hunters, each dressed in fringed buckskins glazed in dirt and grease that made the leather shine blackly. French boatmen composed the second common group. These wore equally dirty cloth garments that bagged about the limbs, colorful sashes, and flopping wool hats—generally red in color. The third, smallest, contingent consisted of the type of ruffian Richard took to be half-breeds.

  The sticky mud had been churned with God alone knew what sort of filth. He winced as the goo oozed around his polished black boots, but trudged up the landing. He glanced uneasily at the forest. Did it lie in wait for him? Was that where the sense of menace came from?

  Men were packing wood from a rickety stack down to the boat, fuel for the ravenous boilers. Someone cursed, yelling that the wood was still too green to burn well.

  "Take it or leave it!" came the rejoinder.

  Stumps stuck out of the ground throughout the so-called settlement, as if Fort Massac had been built straight out of the wilderness. The air smelled of hickory smoke, decay, urine, and the mixed pungency of manure. Bits of broken crockery, shards of glass, excrement, and splintered bone littered the charcoal-blackened earth.

  The low-roofed log huts, rough-notched, had been chinked with mud and roofed over with earth. The insides were dark as caves behind green-hide doors that hung on leather hinges.

  "Dirt into dirt," Richard whispered. A filthy little girl of about five ran past—an image of sooty smudges, tangled dark brown hair, and a snot-wet nose.

  Dogs were fighting somewhere, accompanied by loud whoops of encouragement. Richard pinched his nose as he looked out back of one of the rude cabins. Animal hides had been pegged to the wall and added their stink to the piles of human excrement. Two pigs were rooting through the mess, snorting and squealing at each other as they nipped and butted a ball of some sort before them. Brown, muddy, and tattered, the thing rolled awkwardly as first one pig, then the other, savaged it with its tusks, occasionally ripping a strip of pulp from the . . . Richard started, his hand tightening on the grip. Dear God, it's a human head!

  "I would not worry, m'sieur. It is only an Indian, a Shawnee who was caught stealing, I think. The grave, you see, she was very, how you say . . . shallow." The words, spoken with an atrocious French accent, brought Richard around with a start.

  A swarthy boatman leaned against the log wall, feet braced, head cocked. The man might have been a caricature. No human should have had shoulders that broad. The V of his chest tapered to an insanely thin waist. The wide black belt held a pistol, knife, bullet pouch, and hide sack. Corded muscle packed the man's arms until they matched the thickness of his bandy legs. Moccasins clad his feet and splotched leggings rose to his thighs. A heavy wool shirt, grimy gray, barely concealed a chest fit for a Greek god. His face was long, the nose thin and hooked. A light brown beard hung well past his chin, and greasy black hair fell over his filthy collar.

  But the eyes—a predatory blue—had an icy quality that pierced Richard like frozen needles. Richard backed away as if stung. He'd reacted this way only once in his life, when he'd opened a box given to him as a practical joke—and discovered a serpent within.

  Yes, a serpent. Cold . . . deadly.

  The boatman casually returned his gaze to the pigs' prize.

  "How a man is buried says a great deal about him, no? In his case, she could be said zat Indians who drink too much of another man's whiskey and are slow to draw zee knife get buried shallow, eh, mon ami!"

  Words cramped in Richard's throat. Those blood-chilling eyes had fixed on the grip, seeming to stare through the heavy cloth to the banknotes within. Richard tucked the grip protectively to his breast. His knees had begun to wobble as he backed away.

  "Ah, maybe you do not like Indians?" The man shrugged. "Very well. This Virgil, she is a good boat? Fast?"

  Richard jerked a nod.

  The boatman chuckled at Richard's unease. "I am called Frangois, m'sieur. A ... I suppose you would say native of these parts, eh?"

  "B— Bonjour" Richard spun on his heel, fighting the urge to run full-tilt back to the boat.

  "Un moment!"

  "Quest que c'est?"

  "You go to Saint Louis, amiT' Frangois was striding beside him, a faint smile on those deadly thin lips.

  "Yes! Yes! Now, excuse me, please. I must go!"

  A hand clapped on his shoulder, the grip tightening like a vise. Richard shivered in spite of himself. He shot a frightened glance into those frozen blue eyes.

  "You travel well on this boat? She is good, oui?"

  "I suppose . . . yes. I... er, it hasn't sunk yet." Richard tried to smile. His guts had gone runny. "If you'll excuse me."

  He wanted to gasp with relief when the callused hand withdrew. By dint of will he kept his legs from quaking, but hurried for the plank and the safety of the Virgil

  When he'd climbed from the lower deck to the gallery, he glanced back. The boatman had followed to stop at the end of the plank. Frangois's eyes narrowed as if in thought.

  What was it? Richard ran a cool hand over his hot face. Why did he make me afraid? It's irrational The swine-gnawed head, that was it. It would have unsettled Achilles.

  Richard paused at the railing, the grip clutched to his chest. Sanity began to replace his blind panic, his heart slowing, breathing returning to normal. The trickly feeling in his guts began to recede.

  "Eh! Mon ami!''' Francis called up from the landing. "I think we will become good friends, non!"

  Shamed by his irrational fear, buoyed by the high safety of the gallery, protected now by the sanctuary of the cabin deck with its whitewashed wood, windows, and its stewards, Richard called down: "I think not, monsieur. I prefer the company of gentlemen to that of animals. Perhaps you had better go back and root with your hogs!"

  Francis stiffened, eyes narrowing to slits. "Francis will not forget your words, rich man. Life, she is full of little surprises, non?"

  With a deep breath, Richard pivoted on his heel and entered the main cabin. He returned to his reading chair beside the stove and settled himself. His heart was racing again, nerves tingling. Despite the cool air, he felt overheated. His hands shook.

  What did you just do? Take hold of yourself, Richard.

  Picking up Kant, he listened to the hissing sounds of the boilers, the banging and knocking as cargo was moved.

  The man was so . . . bestial.

&
nbsp; Dismiss it.

  But the way those eyes had pinned his soul. . . .

  Richard stood, easing up to the window overlooking the landing. Packs of furs were being loaded; the captain, standing by the plank, was making notations in a ledger book. Francois had vanished from the crowd milling on the shore.

  You’re being silly, Richard. He willed himself to return to his chair. On impulse, he picked up the grip and unfastened the clasps. Inside, the crisp banknotes remained perfectly packed. Nothing more than paper. Nevertheless, they seemed to have taken on a terrible weight.

  FIVE

  Errors do not occur just because we do not know some certain things, but because we undertake to judge even though we do not know everything requisite. A large number of falsehoods—indeed almost all of them—owe their origin to such impetuosity. Do you know some predicates of a thing with certainty? Very well then, make these things the basis of your inferences, and you will not err. But suppose you wish to make a definition with them, although you are not certain that you know everything requisite for such a definition? If, in spite of this, you risk a definition, you will fall into error. It is possible therefore to avoid errors if we seek certain and distinct cognitions without presuming so readily to give definitions.

  —Immanuel Kant, An Enquiry into the Distinctness of the Fundamental Principles of Natural Theology and Morals

  Coals burned bright in the firepit at the center of the lodge. The hearthstones—rounded river cobbles thrown into the fire—glowed eerily. Fire has a puha all its own. Heals Like A Willow twisted a strand of her black hair around and around her finger. How did it happen that heating in fire would make dark, impenetrable stone glow reddish-white? She gave up twisting her hair and held her hands out to the radiant warmth.