Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River]

by River of Tomorrow

  Mercy followed Daniel into the cool, dark shadows of the pine trees. She stayed close behind, trembling, scarcely daring to breathe, expecting any moment to hear some suspicious sound. She kept turning her head slowly, listening first in one direction and then another. About twenty paces from the road Daniel stopped so suddenly that she ran into him. She moved up beside him and saw a black face with huge eyes staring at them from behind a screen of cut cedar boughs.

  “Come out of there,” Daniel commanded.

  A Negro parted the boughs and stepped out. He was young and gaunt, and the clothes that hung on his thin frame were not much more than rags, yet he stood with dignity, his head up, looking Daniel in the eye.

  “What are you doing here?” Daniel asked. When he received no answer, he said, “Are you a runaway?” The Negro shook his head vigorously. “I’m not a hunter, man. If you need help, say so.” The man continued to shake his head. Daniel saw his eyes dart to his right. “Is anyone with you?”

  “No, sah!”

  The words had no more than left the Negro’s mouth when a whimpering sound came from behind him. His nostrils flared, but he faced Daniel without the slightest change in his expression.

  “Drop the gun!” The command came suddenly from behind them, and Mercy gasped in surprise and fear.

  Daniel muttered a curse word, blaming himself for being a careless fool. He lowered the barrel of the gun and turned slowly. A red-bearded man came out of the underbrush, a pistol in his hand. Daniel recognized him at once. It was one of Hammond Perry’s men who had been at the mill a few days ago. For an instant Daniel toyed with the idea of thrusting Mercy behind him and raising the rifle. He was about ready to spring when the man lowered his gun.

  “Phelps? By God, it’s Phelps!” The red-bearded man shoved his pistol into his belt, came forward, and held out his hand. “Edward Ashton. I’m a friend of Levi Coffin.”

  Daniel hesitated before he extended his hand. “Then what the hell were you doing with Hammond Perry?”

  “Do you know a better way to find out what the bastard’s up to than to ride with him? I had to show my hand yesterday when Perry was going to shoot Levi. I was on my way back to Quill’s Station when I ran into these people.”

  “People?” Daniel inquired while shaking the man’s hand.

  “Four of them. They’re damn near starved. I was about to leave to find something for them to eat.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “When I saw you stop here, I had to come back.” Edward Ashton’s eyes darted from Daniel to Mercy, who stood close beside him.

  “This is Miss Quill.”

  “How-do, ma’am.”

  “We have food, Daniel.” Mercy’s hand slipped from Daniel’s arm. “Shall I get it?”

  “What about the Baxters? We don’t want them to know about this.”

  “We done know it.” Lenny spoke and moved out where they could see him. “We ain’t helpin’ no hunters, ’n’ we ain’t helpin’ no niggers neither.”

  “You’ll keep your mouth shut?” Daniel asked.

  “Baxters ain’t got no niggers.”

  “That isn’t what I asked, dammit!”

  “I said we ain’t takin’ sides.”

  “What about Bernie?”

  “He be a Baxter, ain’t he?”

  Daniel turned back to Edward. “His word is good. I’ll get what food we have, then we’d better talk.”

  The four runaways—a man, his wife and child, and his mother—had traveled from lower Tennessee, trying to reach relatives in the North. They had been told to watch for a white man with a blue feather in his hatband. The day before they had seen Hammond Perry pass by, and early this morning Edward Ashton, with a blue feather in his hatband, had found them after being alerted by a sympathetic homesteader from whom they had begged food.

  They ate the food from the basket sparingly, although Mercy could tell they were ravenous. The young woman slipped a small fried pie beneath her shawl when she thought Mercy wasn’t looking. Poor soul, Mercy thought. She’s not sure we mean for them to have it all. The little girl who clung to her mother was so pitifully thin that Mercy wanted to cry. She wished she had more to give, then thought of the coins in her purse. She turned her back, reached into her pocket, selected one, and when she thought she was unobserved, pressed it into the woman’s hand. Tears flooded the woman’s large, pensive eyes when she realized the coin was for her.

  Daniel and Edward Ashton walked away a few paces, and Edward told him about his concern that Hammond Perry would find a way to take George.

  “George has been warned,” Daniel said. “He’ll not do anything foolish. I hope to get back to Quill’s Station before Perry knows I’m gone. Meanwhile Gavin McCourtney will be there. George can tell you where to find him. He’s a good man and has no use for Hammond Perry. As a matter of fact, he’ll kill him if given the chance.”

  “I’d not mind that a-tall,” Edward said with a grin.

  “How do you plan to get these people across the river?”

  “We’ll not cross. I’ll take them to the next stop where they’ll be sent on to Newport. Levi will take care of them from there on.”

  “Look out for Perry. I do believe the man is more than a little crazy.”

  “He’s tied in with a fellow named Crenshaw,” Edward said. “They’re two of a kind in my way a thinkin’. Crenshaw has built himself a three-story mansion down in southern Illinois. The top floor is where he keeps his stud to service the young females. It’s said he’s as cruel a master as ever there was, using the whip and shackles even on the children. The people are treated like animals and work long hours in the salt mine. Most don’t last over a year. He and Perry have got it in their minds to breed a strong strain of Negroes. Crenshaw has political influence. So far no one has been able to prove anything. If Perry gets his hands on George, that’s where he’ll go.”

  “And that’s where I’ll go looking for him,” Daniel said firmly.

  Edward shrugged. “You’d better take the militia with you.”

  “I’m obliged to you for the warning.” Daniel held out his hand.

  Mercy left the basket with the pitiful group and walked beside Daniel back to the wagon.

  “We don’t realize how fortunate we are to have been born white, do we Daniel?”

  “No,” he said thoughtfully. Then, “We’ve got to make up this lost time. I want to be across the Ohio and down into Kentucky before nightfall.”

  * * *

  They stopped at a store in Evansville where Daniel bought some supplies; cornmeal, jerky, raisins, salt, tea, a jug of sorghum syrup, and a bag of sweet potatoes. Mercy went into the store with him and looked at the yard goods while he was making his purchases.

  The storekeeper was a scholarly-looking man with a flowing white beard and scarcely any hair on his head. The well-dressed strangers aroused his curiosity, and after trying to draw Daniel into conversation several times with no results, he tried another tactic.

  “Your missus would sure look pretty in a dress made out of that blue goods,” he said to Daniel.

  Daniel’s eye sought Mercy’s. She saw the mischievous twinkle there as he waited several minutes before answering the storekeeper.

  “She looks pretty in most anything. The blue is her color, matches her eyes. Do you want some of that goods for a dress, sweetheart?”

  “Can we afford it?” Mercy turned her face away to keep him from seeing the flush of pleasure that covered it.

  “I think I can spare a few coins for my wife to have a new dress,” Daniel said smoothly.

  Mercy’s eyes flew to his face. His wife! If only it were true! His eyes held hers teasingly, and she wondered if he were aware of her inner trembling.

  “Thank you, dear,” she managed to say calmly. “You’ve given me six new dresses this year, but if you’re sure you don’t mind, I’d like enough of this for a dress and a bonnet too.” Mercy picked up the bolt and carried it to the counter. She looked
directly into Daniel’s brown eyes. Hers had a look of complete innocence.

  “Women are never satisfied,” Daniel said seriously to the storekeeper. “Give them a dress and they want a bonnet. Give them stockings and they want shoes.”

  The clerk cut a generous length of the material, folded it, and tied it with a string. After Daniel paid for the purchases, they left the store, laughing like children.

  “I’ll pay you for the goods, Daniel,” Mercy said when they reached the wagon.

  “My treat. See that you behave yourself or I’ll take it back and have Rose make me a shirt.” He smiled at her fondly, and her heart pounded with pleasure.

  * * *

  The sun poured its heat directly down upon them as they crossed the Ohio on the ferry and headed southeast with Lenny and Bernie pointing the way. The brothers were in a noticeably better mood now that they were on Kentucky soil. It seemed they no longer feared that Daniel would turn back. While in the open, they rode a quarter of a mile ahead.

  “We ort ta be pert nigh home this time tomorry,” Bernie said.

  “If’n it was just us, we’d be home tomorry night. I figger it’ll be mid-mornin’ the next day ’fore we get ta Mud Creek.”

  “I sure do hope Maw’s not . . . gone.”

  “I hope it too.”

  “What’re we goin’ to do ’bout Hester ’n’ that feller, Lenny? It pure rattles my mind to think of what Maw ’n’ Hod ’n’ Wyatt’ll say. They’ll be plumb ’shamed over the way she carries on.”

  “She be ruint fer another man, it’s sure.”

  “It’s sure!” Bernie shifted his weight on the mule so he could look at his brother. “There warn’t but one bed in that room, Lenny. I seen there warn’t when I looked in the winder, ’n’ I ain’t likin’ what went on none a-tall.”

  “It warn’t a made no difference if’n there’d been a dozen beds. Ain’t no blood-’n’-guts man goin’ to stay cooped up with a sightly woman ’n’ not diddle with her some. This feller ain’t no different than a Mud Creek feller when it comes to that. Hod would’ve diddled, Wyatt would’ve diddled plenty. I shore would’nta let the chance get by. Gid woulda been on ’er like a fly on fresh shit. Hester’s sightly. Ya got to own up to that. She ain’t got no worts on her face, ’n’ she’s got her teeth yet.”

  “We could let it slide ’n’ not tell it.”

  “I ain’t never lied to Maw. She’d see it soon enuff. He ain’t a-lettin’ her outta his sight. ’N’ what’d we do if Hester come up with a belly big as a whuskey barrel? Could ya say we didn’t know? Hod ’n’ Wyatt’d say we was slack-handed on lookin’ out fer our Sister, is what they’d say. They’d be plumb flummoxed that we let it go on.”

  “We can’t kill him. Sister’d be plumb put out,” Bernie said.

  “I’m thinkin’ ya’re right. But somethin’s got ta be done afore we get home.”

  “But what?”

  “I know the what. I jist ain’t figgered out the how. They ain’t goin’ to like nothin’ we do none a-tall.”

  “But, Len, what if’n that feller bows his neck?”

  “We jist got to figger a way to unbow it, is all.”

  * * *

  At dusk they made camp. Lenny found a suitable place in a clearing off the road, near a fast-moving stream. By the time Daniel and Lenny had watered and staked out the horses in the knee-high grass, Mercy had unloaded their food supplies and gathered dry wood for a fire. Bernie had crept upstream to the edge of a clear, cold pool, and ten minutes later a dozen trout lay flopping on the bank.

  Fascinated, Mercy watched him. He scooped a small hole in the bank and filled it with pieces of dry oak bark. He covered this with green branches so that when he lit the fire, there was only one small air hole. The bark produced a single wisp of smoke. After he cleaned the fish, he removed the green branches and placed the fish on the white-hot coals. Soon the sizzling smell of fish drifted up to her.

  Daniel quickly built a small, hot fire and raked aside some of the coals to cover several large sweet potatoes. It all went so quickly that before it was completely dark, the meal was ready. Bernie and Lenny brought tin cups from their packs and accepted tea, sweet potatoes and hoecake. Bernie brought his fish to their fire on a slab of white poplar bark.

  Hungrily, the four of them devoured the dozen trout, the sweet potatoes, and the hoecake.

  “I coulda caught more,” Bernie said.

  “How did you catch them so fast?” Mercy asked.

  “It warn’t nothin’.” Bernie drew a line from his pocket. Attached to the end was a hook fashioned out of the thighbone of a rabbit. The bone of a chicken leg came out with the string. Bernie quickly kicked it away with his foot. Mercy suppressed a smile. They had eaten the chicken the night before, and Bernie had saved some to use for fish bait.

  “I’d like to learn how to do that,” Mercy said. Bernie didn’t answer. He shuffled his feet as if he were going to get up and leave, but he didn’t. They all sat quietly, drinking their tea. This was the first time the Baxters had been the least bit friendly. They were rested and fed and presented with an hour’s leisure, Mercy decided to try and draw them out.

  “Lenny, tell me what to expect when we get to Mud Creek.”

  “We dunno if Maw’s there,” he said crossly. “We been gone nigh on two weeks.”

  “Oh, I hope she is!” Mercy said in a small voice as her eyes sought Daniel’s.

  After a silence Lenny said in a resigned voice, “We done as good as we could.”

  “Who’s taking care of her?”

  “Hod’s woman does most of it.”

  “Do they have children?”

  “Hod claims four.”

  “And Wyatt?”

  “Claims one, ’n’ one comin’.”

  “You’ve not said much about the younger boy. What’s his name?” It seemed to Mercy that the only way she would find out anything about the Baxters was to ask.

  “Gideon.”

  “How old is he?”

  “Fourteen, fifteen, somewhere in there.”

  “Does he go to school?”

  “School? Hell, no! Gid’s wild as a deer ’n’ horny as a billy goat. Gid’s done already poked half the women in the county. Young, old, wedded or not. It makes no never mind to Gid,” Bernie added proudly.

  “I don’t think that’s anything to brag about,” Mercy said in her schoolteacher voice and raised the cup to her lips. She took several gulps of the hot tea to hide her embarrassment.

  “Ain’t nothin’ to be ’shamed for,” Bernie said stubbornly.

  “Did any of you go to school?”

  “What fer? Maw learnt us how to make our name on paper.”

  “Do you farm?”

  “Some. Baxters is best at makin’ whuskey.” Lenny threw the dregs from the tea in his cup over his shoulder.

  “Whiskey?”

  “Yup. We make nigh on to ten barrel a year. Sell it fer a dollar a gallon. Makes all the cash money we need.” He grinned proudly. “I’d sure like to have me a jug a Baxter whuskey right now.”

  Daniel was sitting with his back to a small sapling, listening and watching her. Mercy looked at him, thinking of how comfortable she was with him and how she would hate to have anyone other than Daniel hear those things about her real family. She decided that she could almost like Bernie and Lenny. They were open and honest, and their love for their mother was the reason they had come looking for her. It was also evident to Mercy that the Baxter clan was close-knit and that she would never fit into the family. But then she wouldn’t have to. Daniel was with her, and after the visit he would take her back home to Quill’s Station.

  “It’s about time to turn in.” Daniel’s voice broke into the quiet. “Do you want to sleep in the wagon?”

  Mercy laughed. “It’s too short. My legs would hang off.”

  “All right. I’ll fix you a place under the wagon.”

  “Where will you be?” Mercy asked anxiously.

  “Her
e, with you. You know this country, Lenny. Do we need to set up a watch?”

  “We be nearby,” Lenny said stiffly, and Daniel saw the look that passed between him and Bernie. “Ain’t nobody goin’ to sneak up on ya.”

  “I’ll sleep with one eye open to make sure. Mercy, I’ll hang a blanket over the side of the wagon if you want to get behind it and undress. We’ll let the fire burn down.” He kicked at the fire with his booted foot to scatter the embers.

  “I’d like that. I’ve had these clothes on for two days.”

  Lenny and Bernie wandered off toward the pool where Bernie had caught the fish. Daniel hung up the blanket. Mercy took off her clothes, slipped into a nightgown, and wrapped the blanket around her. Daniel spread a blanket on the grass, and Mercy sat down to take down her hair and watch him make up the bed beneath the wagon.

  “Lenny and Bernie can be quite agreeable . . . sometimes. But I hope the others are not as contrary as they are. I never know what to say to them.” Mercy had loosened her hair from the braid and was brushing it.

  “They’ve lived their lives one way and you another. I’m sure our ways are strange to them.” When Daniel finished making the bed, he lifted his own bedroll from the wagon bed.

  “Oh, Daniel, I hope she’s not . . . gone! I want to see her and let her know I’m all right and that I have people who want me. If she’s gone, Lenny and Bernie will have come all the way to Quill’s Station for nothing.”

  “No. Not for nothing,” he said quietly as he spread his bedroll on the grass.

  * * *

  The clouds scudded low over a rising full moon, letting patches of moonlight shine through. Mercy, lying on the pallet beneath the wagon, thought of Daniel’s words, “Not for nothing,” and her mind hung on them. He was right. Lenny and Bernie’s arrival at Quill’s Station had opened her eyes to a lot of things. It made her aware of how fortunate she was to have been found by Farrway Quill and raised in his home. Most of all, she was now aware of her love for Daniel.

  Mercy was dozing when she was jerked alert by a distant sound—a howling that swelled and grew. Wolves. The word never failed to strike terror in her heart, since as a child she had heard tales of the gray killers. She leaned up on her elbow, her eyes probing the shadows where Daniel lay.