by Noel Loomis
In the year of 1857, thousands upon endless thousands of the gray-canvassed vehicles pulled up at the mighty river, and sometimes the trampled grass was covered with oxen for miles back as the booted emigrants awaited their turn at the overloaded ferries. But some families, already worn by the long, hard trip, impatiently spread down the river from Omaha City to look for other rumored ferries, and some followed the stream up-river, coming at last to the busy ferry of Sandy John Ferguson. Some, passing up the green hills of Iowa for the fabled rich soil of Oregon, paid for their passage in gold, and went on west over the rolling hills. Others, more intent on extracting money wherever they might and by whatever means they could devise, saw opportunities closer at hand. And not infrequently a sharp-eyed man, recognizing the value of the ferry itself, began to test his power against Ferguson as soon as he could…
Ferguson was Irish, with a slight but pleasant brogue. He was tall and lanky, white-skinned and red-haired, and likely to be taken for a highland Scot rather than a Dubliner. He took a turn around a fence-post, up on the bank, with the rope that held the ferry steady in its mooring-place on the Nebraska side of the river, and waited for a heavy-set man in knee-high boots to stride from the ferry onto the small floating pier.
The heavy-set man stomped on the thick boards and glared at a group of men on the bank. “Where’s Ferguson?” he demanded.
Sandy John straightened up. “I’m Ferguson,” he said.
The stranger looked at him importantly. “I am Henry Wiggins.”
Ferguson nodded slightly, his eyes on the man, but said nothing.
Wiggins waved his arms as if his patience was about at an end. “I have waited on the other side since yesterday morning to ride this flimsy pile of logs.”
Bill Benson came down the river bank where he had tied the span of mules that had pulled the ferry to the Nebraska side. He stopped a little above Wiggins, looked at Ferguson, and waited.
Ferguson sighed. He had operated the ferry until two o’clock that morning before he had closed down for a wink of sleep—and still the sun would not be up for another half hour. But he looked at Wiggins from the snubbing-post and said quietly, “This is the west side, Mr. Wiggins.”
Wiggins snorted. “What’s the price?”
“The fare is two dollars, gold or silver,” said Ferguson, walking down a short, muddy incline.
Wiggins held out a piece of green paper. “Here’s five on the Bank of Nemaha.”
Ferguson regarded him steadily. “I said gold or silver, Mr. Wiggins.”
The heavier man looked at him with his shoe-button eyes and said challengingly. “I am told the Bank of Nemaha is good.”
Bill Benson moved a little closer. The men above spread out, and beyond them a big plow horse thundered up at a clumsy trot and came to a stop, tossing his head while a woman slid down from a sidesaddle.
“The Bank of Nemaha,” Ferguson said, “never was a bank. Its only function was to act as a name for the issuance of money.”
The woman started down the sloping bank, raising her skirts a little to avoid tripping.
Wiggins began to swell up. “You’re telling me this money is no good?” he demanded.
“I am telling you nothing,” said Ferguson, “except that the ferry price is in gold or silver.”
The woman came to a stop ten feet above them, watching. Major Yeakel, the mortgage agent, left a big walnut tree where he had been talking with the people from the first three wagons that morning, and came toward Ferguson and Wiggins, followed by the men from the wagons, one of whom looked back and said, “Now, Mrs. Talbot, this here is man trouble. You stay back and keep your ears covered.”
Wiggins looked up and seemed to take assurance from the gathering audience. “You’re takin’ it on yourself to pass judgment on the banks of Nebraska, Mr. Ferguson?”
Ferguson would not be diverted. “You do not like this ferry, Mr. Wiggins?”
Wiggins glared at him. “You’re a highway robber,” he said.
“At Omaha City the fare is four dollars,” said Ferguson. A black-haired man named Jones, who had ferried over a wagon the night before, and who had been talking to the newspaper editor as to whether he should go farther west or take up a claim right there, came slowly down the bank followed by half a dozen others, and now the river bank bore a scattered semi-circle of men, with the woman a little in front of them.
Ferguson looked at the woman on the bank, then at another woman still sitting on the seat of the wagon on the ferry; so far, the second woman had not made a move or a sound. He looked back at the older man. “You are a hard man to get an answer from, Mr. Wiggins.”
Wiggins took in the audience with his quick eyes, and made a grandstand play. “I don’t like your ferry and I don’t like you,” he said at last.
Ferguson appeared unmoved. “Your feeling for me, Mr. Wiggins, can be overlooked, but your dislike of my ferry is a personal matter that I cannot accept lightly.”
“What the hell are you drivin’ at?” Wiggins asked, suddenly suspicious.
Ferguson explained. “I am licensed by the territory of Nebraska to operate a ferry at this point, and I—”
“I heard. I also heard that the first men into the territory made a run for the ferries—like bankers—and grabbed everything in sight, and now they squeeze the last drop of blood out of everybody who comes along.”
Ferguson’s blue eyes were bleak. “The fare, Mr. Wiggins, is two dollars, gold or silver.”
“I won’t pay it.”
The woman came another step down the bank, and stopped. Ferguson glanced at her. In the early dawn, she as young and pretty; under the sunbonnet her white face was framed by black hair, and set off by dark eyes that seemed unaccountably concerned. Ferguson said, “You’d best stay back, Mrs. Talbot. There may be trouble.”
She stopped. “Mr. Ferguson, I am no stranger to trouble—as you should know, since you killed my husband.”
Wiggins took one step toward him, holding out the Bank of Nemaha currency. “Are you accepting this, Mr. Ferguson?”
Ferguson did not look away from Wiggins and he did not raise his voice. “Cast off the rope, Mr. Benson.”
Bill Benson loosened the double half-hitch, lifted off the rope, coiled it in a swift motion and tossed it onto the deck of the ferry. Up on the bank beyond the men, the span of mules, their chain unsnapped from the towing rope, were snipping up a few blades of coarse grass. From the opposite shore (the Iowa side), through the swirls of mist that still moved ghostlike over the water, came the sound of reins slapping on animals’ hips. A chain snapped across the river, the rope creaked, and the log ferry began to move back toward the east.
The woman sitting in the wagon on the ferry showed the first sign of life, and began to clamber down over the wheel. The two pairs of oxen stayed where they were, one ox standing, three lying, all placidly chewing their cuds. The woman stepped on the axle, then, looking behind, she saw the water going by for the first time and clambered hurriedly back to the seat. “Henry!” she screamed, “Henry! Help!” The ferry moved steadily toward the east side through the swirls of mist. Wiggins stared for a moment, then charged Ferguson, who moved only a little—but enough. Wiggins, the heavier of the two, went on by, floundered for an instant and then straightened up as Ferguson’s fist caught him at the corner of his chin. He aimed a roundhouse blow at Ferguson, who evaded it. He aimed another, this one catching Ferguson on the side of the head. Ferguson weaved for a moment, but managed to hammer his bony fists into Wiggins’ face.
Wiggins began to puff. He stood slightly above Ferguson, and stopped for a moment to appeal to the sympathy of the crowd, which, by that time, had grown to thirty or forty—all men but Mrs. Talbot. “I heard about him all the way across Ioway,” Wiggins said, and turned. “You been collecting your pound of flesh from everybody who comes this way.”
“I collect nothing unless they wish to use my ferry,” said Ferguson.
“But if they have no money—”
“You have money,” said Ferguson. “You also have friends, for you have been across the river for two days, trying to work up feeling against me.” He glanced at the men beyond Wiggins. “Are any of your friends in that bunch?”
Nobody answered and Ferguson said sharply, “Mr. Simmons?”
Simmons was a short man, heavy-set. His eyes smouldered, and he said harshly, “We’ll all fry our own fish, John Ferguson, in our own good time—and we’ll have some to fry,” he added.
Ferguson’s eyes lingered on the man for a second. Simmons had tried to buy a half-interest in the ferry, but Ferguson had refused, and now he had no doubt that Simmons would try to get it some other way. Ferguson glanced then at Major Scott, and saw his apparent neutrality. He looked beyond Scott, and said: “Mr. Logan, are you here in the interest of news, or are you prepared to take sides?”
Charlie Logan said, “I come to see what was about to happen.”
“I have never seen you out so early,” Ferguson observed.
Charlie Logan, a spare man with a black beard went on. “I did have news there was gonna be a showdown.”
“I have some things to talk to you about,” said Ferguson, “as soon as I get the ferry going.”
“I’ll be in my office all day soon as I get back.”
“A showdown.” Ferguson said softly, and looked at Wiggins. “It is to be a showdown, Mr. Wiggins—with the editor of the Chronicle in full attendance, having come eleven miles on horseback from Chippewa City. You must have felt sure of yourself, Mr. Wiggins.”
Wiggins leaped suddenly downhill. Ferguson jumped out of the way, and Wiggins’ momentum made it hard for him to turn. He tried to stop, but slipped in the mud and went down on his coattails, sliding. He clutched at the floating pier, but his fingers failed to get a hold on the wet wood, and he went into brown water with a great splash. Mrs. Wiggins screamed. “Help! He can’t swim!”
Ferguson watched Wiggins flounder ashore in three feet of water.
“You tried to kill him!” The ferry was steadily drawing away, and her last words sounded reedy as she tried to raise her voice.
The tall Irishman looked up and smiled gently in the dawn. “Madam,” he said in that carrying voice, “I am sorry only that such a beautiful lady as yourself is married to such a man as this.” He looked down to where Wiggins was climbing up the muddy incline on hands and knees. “If you do not want to swim back,” he said coldly to Wiggins, “you’d best catch the ferry before it gets into deep water.”
Wiggins looked up, his face red. “You rawhided the wrong man,” he said harshly.
Ferguson said without rancor but without bending: “I have encountered the right man, Mr. Wiggins. I have heard much about you. You are a professional squatter and a land speculator, and you have been camped on yon side of the river for some days, making your plans.”
Wiggins was on the floating pier, and now he stood up, muddy and dripping, and his anger was not pleasant to behold.
“I paid you—” he began.
“You have paid me nothing,” said Ferguson.
“I call on all these men to witness that I tendered you payment at the legal rate.”
The pulley that ran along the rope to keep the ferry from drifting downstream, began to screech.
“Not in the legal tender,” said Ferguson, and his eyes suddenly narrowed. “I have been running this ferry for a long time and I have seen some unpleasant men cross this river—but all have paid.”
Wiggins stared at him. “All right, you win,” he said suddenly. “Bring the wagon back, and I’ll give you the money in gold.”
But Ferguson said coldly, “The ferry is half-way across the river. It will cost you three dollars now, Mr. Wiggins.”
Wiggins said with a growl in his voice, “You’ll push me too far.”
Ferguson said, “I know how far I can push you, Mr. Wiggins. I have had an opportunity to judge many men since I have been here.”
Wiggins’ eyes narrowed. “Where do you place me?”
Ferguson said calmly: “You are the kind who tries in many ways to be a big man but who always seems to fall short.” He must have hit Wiggins in a tender spot, for the man stood for a moment without change of expression. Then his eyes hardened, and once again he made the decision that he must have made any times: to be bold and aggressive. He pulled a butcher knife from inside his shirt and, with blade glistening, rushed at Ferguson.
Ferguson went in under the raised knife-arm, his left hand seeking the man’s wrist. He tried to throw him over backward, but Wiggins hunched himself close to the ground and pushed up with all his strength.
Somehow, Ferguson succeeded in wrenching the knife from Wiggins, only to have it knocked suddenly from his grasp. Wiggins went to his knees, took hold of Ferguson’s ankles with his hands, and arose fast with his head in Ferguson’s belly. When he reached his full height, with powerful arms and shoulders he lifted Ferguson’s legs straight up, and Ferguson, already off balance, went face forward over Wiggins’ back toward the ground.
Wiggins gave him a last mighty shove, and Ferguson fell, spread-eagled, and crashed against the edge of the floating pier. It caved in his ribs and knocked the wind out of his lungs, and he felt his consciousness go for a moment. Then he reacted to the chill of the water as he fell in headfirst.
He sprawled out flat, but got his feet on the mud bottom, and stood up to gasp for air. He turned to grasp the pier and start up, but Wiggins stomped on one hand with his heel. Ferguson felt the pain like a hammer-blow, and heard the boot-nails grind against his fingers, then jerked away his hand, staring at the bloody fingers stiff and straight before him. Then the same crashing pain came in his left hand, and he knew it also had been stomped.
He jerked it away, again seeing the fingers straight and bleeding before him.
Wiggins, having retrieved his butcher knife, waited at the edge of the pier. Ferguson was waist-deep in the muddy water. He had a hunting knife inside his shirt, but he did not know whether he could hold it, for his fingers were numb. He waited a moment, wondering if perhaps Wiggins would come after him—but Wiggins waited too.
Ferguson went slowly to one side of the pier. As he rounded the corner, for an instant out of Wiggins’ sight, he reached down into the water and got both hands full of mud. Then he straightened and went toward shore at a wide angle from the pier.
Wiggins moved to meet him, and Ferguson would have to climb a two-foot mud bank to get on solid footing. He stopped at a distance from the water line.
Wiggins looked triumphant as he got set above him.
Ferguson started forward, but saw the butcher knife swinging in an arc for his throat. He ducked and backed away, trying to tempt Wiggins to fall into the water with him.
But Wiggins had an advantage and knew it. He waited for Ferguson to come within his reach.
Ferguson took a step toward the shore. Wiggins balanced on the balls of his feet. Ferguson leaned in, and Wiggins swung the knife. Ferguson swept his right arm around, and the handful of mud landed squarely in Wiggins’ face. Ferguson leaped out of the water, found footing, and turned to grapple.
Wiggins scraped the mud away so he could see. The knife came at Ferguson, and went through shirt and skin and slid along his ribs before it found an open space and went through. But the force of the blow was fairly well spent, and it did not go deep. Ferguson jerked away, snatched the man’s arm with both hands, and broke the forearm over his knee with a savage crack of splintered bones.
The knife dropped into the mud, but Wiggins uttered a strangled cry and rushed at him, his right arm hanging useless.
Ferguson saw the madness in his face. He stepped aside, and hit the man with his shoulder as Wiggins went by, trying to turn. Wiggins caromed off like a billiard ball, and fell on his face at the edge of the water. He rolled over and bounded up, and came back, insane with rage. Ferguson stepped in and hit him in the face, again and again, with all the power of his long muscles. The bones cracked i
n his hands, but he kept swinging until Wiggins went down and sprawled out, limp.
Ferguson turned to the men around him in a semi-circle, rubbing mud from between his fingers. “Mr. Simmons,” he said, “do you want to claim him?”
Simmons glowered, and Ferguson knew that some day Simmons too would have to be whipped. Simmons said slowly, “I will see that he gets back across the river.”
Charlie Logan, the editor, came up. “John Ferguson, what do you aim to do now?”
Ferguson looked at him. “Is there any call for me to do anything but wait for the next ruffian?”
Logan eyed him. “You know what they will say, don’t you?”
Bill Benson brought the mules back and snapped the chain into a ring at the end of the rope, which was no longer moving.
Ferguson took a full breath. “What will they say?”
“They will say that you grabbed this ferry license when you first came to Nebraska, that you have made a fortune from it, that you have killed three men and beaten a dozen others to keep anybody else from interferin’.”
Ferguson straightened to his full height. “What is wrong with that—I mean having a license and making money?” he asked.
Charlie Logan backed away a step. “They might say that you think you’re God, decidin’ who can come acrost and who can’t.”
Ferguson looked at him. “Would you say that, Mr. Logan?”
“Well, I—Lookie here, John Ferguson. You’re a fine scrapper, and otherwise you mind your own business—but this kind of thing has happened too often.”
