The pilot shouted for everyone to return to his station. I picked myself up and started to trudge toward the hull. Just then, the nighttime sky was lit by a flash of lightning and then a great crack of thunder. Rainwater started coming down in torrents.
“I thought things couldn’t get any worse,” I muttered.
“No, no, is good,” said Hector excitedly.
He was right. On the pilot’s count, shouted at the top of his lungs against the crashing elements, all of us ringing the boat pushed in unison. And the ship . . . sort of . . . sighed. It eased. The War Eagle didn’t find its wings, but it didn’t remain motionless either. There was hope, and it was obvious the rain was raising the river level just enough to loosen the ship.
A cheer went up, and those of us standing by the hull frantically motioned for the other male passengers—who had taken shelter from the storm with the women under the tree canopy—to come join the effort. Nearly all the other men stripped off their outer coats and hurried across the sand toward us, ignoring the pelting rain.
Once our numbers had been multiplied threefold, the pilot shouted out his signal again and we pushed. A collective groan of effort arose. “Keep pushing,” the pilot screamed into the storm. And—finally—the boat slid off the bar and found its bottom.
The next morning, we undertook the very treacherous reloading. The pilot had insisted that the ship drop its anchor in the center channel of the river in order to avoid renewed foundering, so all the cargo had to be rowed out to the ship on makeshift ferries. In the process, several of the merchants lost hogsheads of corn and molasses to the river, and two cows plunged overboard and were carried away by the current. But finally, the process was complete, and by late afternoon, we had resumed navigation.
The following day, I encountered Captain Pound as he was leaving the barbery. Without a word, he turned around and led me back through the hidden door to his office.
“I told you there was nothing to find in the accounts,” he said as the door swung shut behind us. “And I trust you’ll tell your father who’s responsible for this week’s losses.”
“What about the payments you recorded to the Inspector?” I said, a note of triumph in my voice. “I thought you’d just gotten done telling me there was no such person. How do you explain those?”
Pound let loose a short, obnoxious laugh. “Bookkeeping entries to make the sums match,” he said. “Every ship’s log on the river contains the same. When the outflows don’t match the inflows, it’s a way of squaring the two. I told you it was the term we river captains use for the unexplainable.”
I glared at Pound wordlessly. He was hiding something—most likely payments to someone. But whom?
“Perhaps to a relative,” Martha suggested after supper that evening in the salon, when we found another moment to talk. “Maybe he’s sending Daddy’s money to someone on land. Is he married?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care,” I said. “I just want our money. But if Pound’s not going to admit why it’s missing, I’ll have to figure it out another way.”
A crewman walked through the salon announcing that the ship would dock at Memphis the following afternoon. “We’ll be leaving the ship there,” I told Martha. “Have you had a chance to talk with the, er, actress who’s in here sometimes?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t think she’d know anything of interest.”
“Why don’t you go to her cabin now and see if you can get her to talk. I’ll bet you anything she made the acquaintance of at least one of the men, Jones or Bingham. Come find me once you find out.”
Two hours later, Martha hurried up to me on the deserted forecastle. The sky was brilliantly clear and sparkling with stars.
“I’ve been looking for you everywhere,” she said. Her teeth were chattering against the cold, and I slipped my jacket around her shoulders.
“It’s a big ship. I’ve been waiting for you here—figured we’d find some privacy at this hour. Did you talk to that woman?”
“Her name is Pearl, and you were right—she knew both men on that voyage. She’s only a few years older than me, but she’s seen enough for two lifetimes. Maybe more. I can hardly comprehend it.”
Another cabin passenger appeared on the deck, and Martha broke off. We exchanged pleasant remarks about the night sky and tried not to act impatient. Finally, the passenger yawned and bade us a good-night.
“She grew up in Nashville, not far from the Cumberland River,” Martha continued as soon as we were alone again. “When she was fifteen, her mother betrothed her to an old widower with nine children. Can you imagine?” She shuddered. “Rather than accept him, she ran away from home and stowed aboard a packet steamer. She found herself aboard smaller and smaller ships until she was completely out of hope, wandering the levee in St. Louis and begging for pennies. The captain, Pound, approached her there one day, and she’d thrown herself at him, hoping to earn enough to eat for the day. Instead, he made a place for her on his ship. It was like being born again, she told me. A new chance at life.”
“So she’s just like the rest of them—loyal to Pound to the last, I imagine. What did she tell you about Jones and Bingham?”
“She said Jones was a pig. Accustomed to taking what he wanted, with no consideration for others. She was glad, unapologetically, to see him broken by the monte. Said it was his just desert.”
“And Bingham?”
“Bingham only wanted to sketch her. She told him the price for her company was the same however he chose to use it. He didn’t argue. He paid and he drew.”
I laughed in disbelief. “Perhaps he truly is in love with Tessie.”
“It’s very romantic, isn’t it?” Martha replied with a sigh.
“Did she have any idea what happened to Jones?”
“She guessed he took his own life. Said that with how much insufferable pride he carried himself, she couldn’t imagine how he’d have faced his family after having been tricked out of his fortune. And theirs.”
I was still considering this possibility the next day as I again stood on the forecastle, saddlebags in hand, and watched Memphis come into view on a high, level bluff on the eastern side of the river. If we could show Jones took his own life, it would, of course, exonerate Bingham. But how to prove it? Daumier had said Jones died from a blow to the back of the head. That didn’t sound like suicide. And then there was the question of how the body had ended up weighted down in a canvas sack. But perhaps if Jones had killed himself accidentally, in some sort of fit, and then someone else had come along and decided to dispose of his body . . . I shook my head—we needed to find out more before coming to any definite conclusions.
“Still looking for answers, Mr. Speed?” said a gravelly voice. I looked up to find Nanny Mae scrutinizing me. She, too, had a travel bag at her side. Not for the first time, I found myself unnerved by the old woman.
“I wasn’t talking out loud, was I?” I said. “No, of course I wasn’t. I was merely reflecting on the size of the city.” I gestured toward the buildings on the bluff ahead of us. “I expected it to be larger. You’re disembarking too?”
The old woman nodded. “Martha told me the two of you were getting off in Memphis, which suits me fine. My daughter lives not too far from here. I wonder how I’ll be treated by that blasted Quaker when I knock on their door.”
“I imagine he has more to worry about than do you,” I returned. Nanny Mae’s lips gathered into a tight smile.
The river just above the town was checkered by sandbars and islands covered by stands of cottonwood, and the War Eagle was running on low steam as we approached, threading carefully in and out of the obstructions. Pound stood near us on the forecastle, periodically shouting instructions to the pilot house above to ensure the ship steered the proper course.
“You’d think the town fathers would have tried to clear these out,” I said to Nanny Mae.
She shook her head. “The impediments are central to their economy. Charging wharfage to arriving craft, flatboats and steamers alike, is the largest part of the city’s revenue.”
“Look out for Paddy’s Hen!” shouted Pound as we veered near a plump island in the middle of the river.
“There’s one navigable channel,” Nanny Mae continued, “and it runs right to the wharf. The local politicians make it a point of pride to oppose any river improvements.”
“But why can’t ships simply go on past if they want to avoid the wharfage?” I asked.
“Many a flatboat has tried and gotten wrecked. Or ended up going ’round and ’round in one of the whirlpools caused by the bars opposite the wharf. And the town’s organized two volunteer companies to aid their revenue collection. I’ve heard they stand on the bluff up there and fire muskets at any ships that try to run past without stopping to pay their toll to the wharfboat master.”
Captain Pound walked over and, nodding at my saddlebags, said, “You’re leaving us?”
“I am. I’m hoping to track down an old friend. Afterward, I’ll catch a ride on a packet upriver in time for Bingham’s trial in ten days’ time.”
Pound played absently with one of the golden rings on his right hand. “Then I’ll see you back in Alton. Much against my will. Seems we need to appear for trial, me and my crew. The inspector, Daumier, has demanded it, and I’ve decided not to fight him.”
I looked at Pound with surprise. But before I could interrogate him further, a crewman came up to ask a question, and the two of them walked away in close consultation. I was left to wonder what inducement Daumier possibly could have provided to convince the captain to be in Alton for the trial. It was, I thought, the last place he would have chosen to be.
We were close to the landing now. There was a long wooden wharf at the river’s edge, to which was tethered a substantial wharfboat, a three-decker with the name Marmeon painted in fading lettering across the former pilot house. The wharfboat was an old steamer whose machinery and paddle boxes had been removed and which served as a kind of floating receiving station, general store, and hotel. The War Eagle eased in slowly toward the wharfboat, on whose bottom deck several hands waited to secure us.
After we had tied up, Nanny Mae and I joined the line of disembarking passengers. My sister materialized next to us, her travel bags in hand.
“I see you’re going ashore as well, Miss Bell,” I said, looking around warily at the crowd. “Would you honor me with a turn around the streets of this fair town? I hear the views from the bluff are quite impressive.”
We walked across a short ramp to the main deck of the wharfboat, which was bustling with activity. Merchants with freight waited in a line to be assessed by the wharfboat master, a bald man with tiny spectacles who sat hunched over at a desk where the steamer’s boiler once sat, logging the freight in a thick ledger book and filling up a jar already brimming with gold and silver coins. Immediately behind the master’s perch was a row of small shops comprising the other services offered to travelers by the wharfboat operation: a chandler, barber’s shop, dramshop, forwarding agency, and post office.
Martha and I followed the other passengers without freight to the wharf. I looked around for Nanny Mae, but she had disappeared into the departing crowd. So I led Martha up the stairs that had been cut into the bluff. Memphis was a modest village, extending but three or four streets back from the river’s edge. We walked along Front Street, gazing out the whole time at the river, which was several thousand feet across here. The cool afternoon sun shimmered on the cresting waters.
“Lincoln said Ferguson’s plantation was over there, on the western shore,” I said once I had made sure no one from the boat was following us. “There must be a ferry we can catch.”
We looked up and down the riverfront but couldn’t see any skiffs waiting to carry passengers across. I was about to head back into the wharfboat to ask one of the merchants when my sister pointed toward the river. “There!”
A small flat ferry was indeed coming directly toward us. We scrambled down to the shoreline. As the boat approached, we could see it was being propelled by a snatch oar worked by an old Negro man with curly, graying hair. His ferry carried two men as passengers, although they sat with their backs to us.
When the skiff got to within thirty feet, I called out, “You there! Are you familiar with the farm of a Colonel William T. Ferguson?”
“Yessir, I am.”
“Can you take us there as soon as you drop your current fare?”
“I wouldn’t think you’d want me to do that,” the ferryman said, his face lit up by a broad smile.
“The devil I don’t! I insist you row us over.”
The ferry was a few feet from the wharf now, and without responding, the ferryman expertly stepped off with one of his bare feet and pulled his craft flush. His two passengers sprang onto the wharf. One of them was tall, with a beaked nose, long black hair ending in curls obscuring his ears, and prodigious whiskers that sprouted from his jaws like pieces of mutton. He was wearing a formal black frockcoat over a checkered, brightly colored vest. His companion was shorter and compact, with a sour expression and a stained work jersey that stretched to cover bulging forearms.
To my surprise, the tall man strode directly over to us. “The reason Captain Limus won’t row you across the river,” he said, gesturing to the boatman, “is because I am Colonel Ferguson.”
“I didn’t realize. We’re glad to find you. I’m—”
“Wait! Don’t tell me!” He took a further step toward me and peered at my face, his nose not three inches from mine. He walked over to Martha and did the same. She recoiled in surprise. Then he said, “Mr. and Miss Speed, I presume.”