CHAPTER 9
The youngsters got bored pretty quickly and wandered off, which Preacher considered a good thing. If you had to have kids, he thought, best to wait until they were nearly full-grown to meet them, the way he had with Hawk That Soars.
Some people got sick on boats, but not Preacher, especially not on a stream as placid as the Mississippi was at that time of year. The Powhatan chugged steadily downriver, the paddle wheel at the back of the boat throwing a glittering spray of water high in the air around it as the miles fell behind. The only excitement came whenever a riffle appeared, signifying the presence of a sandbar or some other sort of snag, but each time that happened, the Powhatan’s pilot steered expertly around the obstacle.
The deck passengers could buy sandwiches and fruit from a boy who came around with a box of them. Preacher made do with an apple at midday. He had to be careful with the little money he had left, so that he could eat during the trip and also have something left for whatever he needed to buy once he reached New Orleans. He had plenty of powder and shot, but a man couldn’t eat ammunition.
Of course, after he retrieved that stolen money from Edmund Cornelius and Lucy Tarleton, he wouldn’t have to worry about that, he reminded himself.
The riverboat put in to shore frequently, not only to take on cargo and passengers at the settlements it came to, but also to take on wood for the firebox down in the engine room. Because of those stops, the vessel didn’t cover a great deal of distance during the day.
Boats sometimes traveled at night, but that meant running a risk because snags couldn’t always be seen in the dark. Most captains weren’t willing to take a chance on ripping out their boat’s hull. Too many of them had wound up on the bottom of the river because of that.
When evening came, the Powhatan tied up at one of the towns on the river’s eastern bank. Preacher didn’t know the name of the place. During the day, he had seen numerous other boats on the river, ranging from stern-wheelers and side-wheelers churning northward to flatboats and keelboats heading in both directions. This stretch of the Mississippi was probably the busiest waterway in the country. So Preacher wasn’t surprised that several keelboats had tied up at the settlement, too.
It also came as no surprise that several taverns operated near the riverfront. Preacher heard raucous music coming from at least one of them. Fiddles and squeezeboxes put out sprightly tunes that floated through the evening air over the water.
Passengers were free to go ashore and spend the evening in town however they wished, as long as they were back on board the next morning when the Powhatan cast off. After a day spent in the open on the deck, Preacher thought a mug of beer might go down nicely. He slung his bag over his shoulder, picked up his rifle, and headed for the gangplank that had been put in place between the deck and the wharf extending into the river.
One of the crewmen—not the man who had given Preacher a hard time when he first boarded the boat in St. Louis—was standing near the gangplank. Preacher asked him, “What do they call this place, anyway?”
“The settlement, you mean? It’s Carver’s Junction.”
Preacher nodded toward the buildings and asked, “Are any of those taverns over yonder the sort that a mild-mannered fella like me oughta steer clear of?”
“You mean where there’s liable to be trouble?” the young crewman said. “I’d stay away from Rancid Dave’s.”
“Rancid Dave?” Preacher repeated with a chuckle. “They really call him that?”
“Just get downwind of him. You’ll know why! But yeah, that’s the roughest place in Carver’s Junction, I’d say.”
“I’ll remember that,” Preacher said solemnly as he started down the gangplank. “Much obliged, son.”
As he walked along the riverfront street in the twilight, he asked the first local he encountered which of the taverns belonged to Rancid Dave.
The man raised his eyebrows and answered, “You don’t want to go there, mister. People make bets on how many killings there’ll be in the alley behind the place each night.”
“I’ll chance it,” Preacher said. “I’ve been known to be pretty good at takin’ care of myself.”
The local sighed and said, “Well, if you’re sure . . . That’s it there, the third building along.” He indicated a squat, windowless structure that appeared to be cobbled together from logs, stone, and mud.
“Much obliged,” Preacher said with a nod, then ambled on toward his destination.
Rancid Dave’s smelled pretty bad when he opened the door made of thick, rough-hewn planks, and stepped inside, but no worse than many other frontier taverns Preacher had visited. Pipe smoke, along with the dank odor of the dirt floor, mixed with a combined stench of spilled liquor, human waste, and unwashed flesh to thicken the air.
Several lanterns and candles scattered around the single room lit the place with a dim glow quickly swallowed up by shadows in the corners. A low mutter of conversation came from customers seated on crude stools around tables made from barrels. The bar to Preacher’s right consisted of planks laid across more barrels. Jugs of whiskey, probably distilled right out back, sat on a shelf behind the bar that also held a couple of lanterns, one at each end.
A short man, who looked almost as wide as he was tall, stood behind the bar. A black, tangled beard hung down over his chest and compensated for the lack of hair on top of his head. He wore a grimy apron over a homespun shirt with sleeves rolled up to leave thick, hairy forearms bare. When he grinned at Preacher, the lanternlight glinted off a gold tooth in the front of his mouth, next to an empty spot where another tooth hadn’t been replaced. He waved a hand with sausagelike fingers at the mountain man and boomed, “Come on in, stranger. Welcome to Dave’s. You off that riverboat Powhatan?”
Preacher supposed the man didn’t refer to himself as Rancid Dave. Could be he had grown so accustomed to his own stench that he didn’t even smell it anymore. Preacher did, though, from all the way across the room.
He braved the smell anyway and approached the bar. “Yeah, I’m headed for New Orleans.
“What can I get you?”
Preacher glanced at the men on either side of him, both of whom nursed drinks in tin cups. “You have any beer?” he asked.
Dave shook his head solemnly. “I do, but you wouldn’t want it. Skunk fell in the barrel and drowned, and I ain’t got around to fishin’ it out yet.”
Preacher noted that the man didn’t say he intended to dump that beer, just fish out the dead skunk. “What else you got?”
“Whiskey!” Dave rested his hands on the plank bar. “Best in these parts.”
Preacher nodded. “I’ll give it a try.”
Dave got a jug off the shelf and a cup from under the bar. He pulled the jug’s cork with his teeth and splashed clear liquid into the cup, then set it in front of Preacher.
“Be a nickel,” Dave said around the cork clenched between his teeth.
Preacher laid the coin on the bar and picked up the cup. He eyed the contents warily, wondering if it might be better to throw the drink back quickly. Dave hadn’t mentioned any dead animals floating in the barrel where he cooked up this stuff, but Preacher didn’t think such a possibility was beyond the pale.
He risked a sip, then frowned and took another. Then he looked up at the proprietor and said, “Dave, this here is some of the best, smoothest-sippin’ whiskey I’ve ever tasted.”
The gold tooth glinted again as Dave grinned. “Told ya! Drink up and I’ll pour you another.”
Sometimes you found a flower growing out of a dung heap, Preacher reflected. This whiskey reminded him of that, and he supposed it was the reason men chose to drink here despite the absolute squalidness of the place and its reputation for violence. Preacher swallowed the rest of the potent liquid in his cup, then after Dave filled it again, he turned to look around the tavern as he drank at a more leisurely pace.
Men sat at all the tables and filled most of the places at the bar. A group of roughly dressed fellows crowded around a large round table in a rear corner, talking and laughing loudly. Their clothes marked them as rivermen. All of Dave’s customers looked like rivermen, Preacher noted, except for a few who probably farmed in the area or maybe worked as woodcutters. Folks probably did a booming business supplying wood for the fireboxes of the riverboats traveling up and down the Mississippi.
One of the men sitting at the big table in the back glanced up, spotted Preacher looking in their direction, and abruptly heaved to his feet. Thick slabs of muscle on his arms and shoulders stretched the homespun fabric of his shirt. He had a flat-topped beaver hat canted at a rakish angle on his head, which as far as Preacher could see, was as bald as Rancid Dave’s. Unlike Dave, though, this man didn’t sport a beard.
He had a number of tattoos on his arms and peeking out through the drawstring at the throat of his shirt, as well. As the man left the table and swaggered toward the bar, the mountain man saw more tattoos curling up his neck onto the back of his head. Preacher had seen tattoos like that in the past, usually on men who had spent a lot of time on the high seas, sailing off to exotic islands. He had never felt the urge to do that himself, but he could understand how some men would give in to such wanderlust. He had done the same thing, only in a different direction, to the mountains instead of the sea.
This man came up to Preacher and demanded, “What are you supposed to be?”
“Don’t reckon I get your drift,” Preacher drawled.
“You’re wearin’ buckskins like a blasted Injun. Even carryin’ a tomahawk like one of them savages. Are you white or red?”
“I’ve knowed plenty of fine red men, but I happen to be white, nearabouts as I can tell,” Preacher said.
“I’ll bet you cozy up to those squaws, though, don’t you?” The man poked a blunt finger against Preacher’s chest. “Injuns ain’t nothin’ more than animals, and any man who’d crawl into their robes with ’em is an animal his own self!”
Dave leaned on the bar and said, “Hold on there, Abner. I don’t want no trouble in here.”
The man called Abner snorted, giving Preacher a good whiff of the whiskey on his breath. “Shoot, there ain’t been a drop of blood spilled since the boys and me got here. That’s plumb peaceful for this place!”
“Maybe I’d like for it to stay that way.” Dave reached under the bar and picked up a bungstarter. He laid it on the bar to emphasize his point.
Abner didn’t take the hint. Maybe he was too drunk for that, or just too belligerent. “You’re warnin’ the wrong man, Dave. I ain’t the one lookin’ for trouble. It’s this varmint, comin’ in here lookin’ like a Injun! It’s gettin’ so decent men can’t get a drink in peace!”
“Don’t push it, friend,” Preacher advised. He started to turn away. He had places to go and things to do, and he didn’t need the distraction of a brawl. He tossed back the rest of the whiskey in his cup and placed the empty on the bar, then reached in his pocket to get out another nickel and pay for the second drink.
“Never mind, mister,” Dave said. “That one’s on me.” He hoped Preacher would leave and trouble could be forestalled that way.
Abner yelled, “You’ll buy a drink for this Injun-lover but not for me? Well, you can just go to Hades, Dave! And as for you, mister—”
“Don’t say it,” Preacher warned, tight-jawed with anger.
Abner ignored those cautionary words, probably because his companions had gotten up and were moving toward the bar, as well. He didn’t want to back down in front of them. Instead, he let the curses spill out of his mouth, vile epithets directed at Preacher, who still would have let it go as he started to walk out of the tavern.
Abner grabbed him, and Preacher didn’t allow any man to lay hands on him like that. As Abner’s hand closed on his shoulder, Preacher pivoted, brought his right elbow back sharply, and rammed it hard into Abner’s solar plexus, making hot air and more raw whiskey fumes gust out of the man’s mouth.