“PULL THE DAMN captain out of the whorehouse!” shouted one man.
“Let’s get on with it!” called another.
We were on the wharf in Davenport, and people were making their opinions known. The object of scorn, the steamboat War Eagle, sat before us, two days late in departure. I think the crew on the riverboat found the fuss amusing. They could have come out and told us we would leave that morning, but instead they started feeding the boilers. When the first smoke appeared, a ragged cheer rose up. The mate came on to the upper deck, but he wouldn’t speak until all were quiet. “Listen well,” he said. “We’ll begin loadin’ up the fore plank, but only them with cabin passage. The rest of you’ll wait.” A groan came from those who had pushed to the front. I was at the back, so I didn’t care.
I had come to Iowa by way of Cincinnati, where I had spent the winter washing dishes and mopping floors—guarding my money, not afraid to sleep cold or miss a meal. When the weather turned in March, I traveled to Davenport. There I bought common passage on a steamer that would take me to St. Paul, a graceful side-wheeler that had an upper deck with rooms that rich people could sleep in.
Once the cabin passengers were on and safely tucked away, the rest of us were allowed to board. Up we went, and to watch the crush, you might have thought we were staking claims for gold. But it was berths we were looking for, and when I got inside, I discovered that they were stacked two high with little room between. Most of the bunks had been taken, but I did find a lower one that was empty and no worse than the others. Then a hand grabbed me from behind. “That there would be mine. I seen it first.” I turned to see a heavy man with sores on his mouth. I glanced about for another place.
“No! He was here before you.” The words had come from a strapping young man on the bunk above, a clean-shaven fellow with determined eyes. The heavy man shrugged and went away.
“Thank you,” I said. “I’m Joseph Lobdell.”
The young man gave a nod. “Owen Carter. What puts you on the river?”
“Oh, I’m running away.” My foolish candor had invited the next certain question, but Mr. Carter didn’t ask it. He just said something about doing the same and went back to reading what looked like a letter. I stowed my things and glanced about. No cough or snore or anything else was going to be private, and any changing of clothes would be under the covers. Still, I was aboard and would be heading north within the hour.
When the whistle blew, everyone ran outside to watch. The boat shuddered as the great wheels began to dig at the water. Out into the river we went, and soon Davenport passed out of sight, as did all of civilization. A little later, the mate called everyone on the lower deck inside. Once we were all squeezed in, he stepped up on a box so we all could see him.
“All right, you flop-eatin’ wharf rats,” he said, “you’re now citizens of your own little country. Here the captain is God, and I’m the archangel. And so long as we’re out on the river, we don’t have to answer to the bloody governor of Iowa or nobody.” The mate smiled and showed his bad teeth. “Now listen well, ’cause I’ll say this once. If you are so much as seen on the deck above, you’ll wish your mother had never bared her arse to your pa.”
These words were plain enough. Everyone understood that to the Minnesota Packet Company we were no better than cargo. Worse than cargo, because we moved about and had certain needs, whereas cargo remained where it was. When the mate left, a few people said choice things. Then most of us went back outside to look at the swampy woods and the occasional shack with chickens and dirty children—grown men too, doing nothing but sitting on stumps and watching the river.
I walked to the steamer’s back end where I found a dozen bales of burlap stacked against the cabin. I climbed up on one and made a nest for myself. Then I untied my bag and brought out my violin. The instrument had done well for me in Honesdale, but not since then. In Cincinnati, the saloons didn’t take to the fiddle. The same was true in Davenport. And a day earlier, on the wharf, I had stopped an officer of the War Eagle and asked if the company might like me to entertain the passengers. The man looked at me like I had mange.
“I’m sure you’d love to get on the cabin deck,” he said, curling his lip. “Love to get your hands in people’s pockets too, I’d bet.”
I sat on the back of the War Eagle and began to play the violin. I would entertain myself and the common folk. A few of those nearby leaned back and closed their eyes as though the music were bringing them to another place. It did the same for me, the place being the glass factory on Dyberry Creek.
I had not seen Lydia in eight months, yet all through the winter I had thought of her. I wanted to write. I wanted to speak my heart and make my apology. But I knew that I should not—I shouldn’t appear in her life again in any form, so she could go forward with the fewest reminders of my deceit. I was a deceiver and a liar. I couldn’t deny it.
But one part of that burden I no longer carried. I didn’t struggle any more with what it all meant. Whether I had loved Lydia as a man loves a woman or if I was just an oddity of nature—none of it mattered. I was not looking for a husband, nor was I looking for a wife. I could not imagine loving anyone other than Lydia. Women who were not Lydia held no more interest for me than men did. For whatever reason, I had loved her. Now she was gone.
And gone also was any love-fevered notion of having become a man. I hadn’t become a man and didn’t want to. What I wanted were the freedoms that came with being a man. I wanted to work for pay and come and go as I pleased—those privileges and others that came to me so long as I was wearing britches and addressed as Mr. Lobdell. And in that disguise, I sat on the back of the War Eagle and played a dozen songs. Then a young man in ship’s uniform appeared.
“Please come with me,” he said. With some dread, I put my violin in my bag and followed him up the stairs to where I had been told not to go. I didn’t think they were going to hang me from the yardarm, but I did think I was to be taken to task for playing music without the mate’s permission. But when we got topside, the young man showed me to a chair in the forward parlor and told me that if I were to play the violin, I could eat my dinner with those on the cabin deck.
How had this come about? Perhaps some passengers above had inquired as to why those below were being entertained while they who had paid more were not. I thought it best not to ask and instead offered my hand. “Joseph Lobdell.”
The young man took it grudgingly. “Mickey Harrelson.”
“And what’s your position?” I asked, seeking to be polite.
“Mud clerk.”
I couldn’t tell from his manner if this were a real position or if he was just having fun with me. “Forgive my ignorance,” I said, “but what is a mud clerk?”
Mr. Harrelson shrugged as if to say it was not a position of importance. “I check everything that comes on or off the boat. Match it with the bills of lading.”
“And you like working on the river?”
“Yes, I want to be a captain someday.” Mr. Harrelson’s eyes drifted out to the gray water. “Of course, when I was a boy, all I dreamt about was being a pilot. He is higher than the captain, you know.”
“But that’s not your dream now?”
The young man shook his head. “And it wouldn’t be yours neither. You recall that girl in school who could spell every word, no matter how long it was?”
“I do,” I said, holding back a smile. “Well, to be a pilot you need a memory better than that, ’cause you need to know every snag and wreck for a thousand miles of river, see in the dark, and talk to God too.”
Just then there was some shouting down below. Mr. Harrelson frowned. “It’s like this every year. The first trip upriver is ugly. When they lower the plank in St. Paul, there’ll be a crush worse than at Davenport, as though they think they’re going to race to the Suland and claim the best piece for themselves. What’s your business in Minnesota?”
I gave the mud clerk a big grin. “I’m racing to the Suland.”
“Whatever for?” he asked, as if there could be no world beyond the river.
“I want to raise horses.”
This was the first time those words had passed my lips, and I felt the thrill of it. Mr. Harrelson gave a slow nod that I took as cautious approval.
* * *
A little after the noon hour, the War Eagle tied up to a flatboat filled with cut wood. The mate blew a whistle, and half a dozen men appeared, among them Owen Carter, the young man who bunked above me. Their job was to carry wood onto the steamer. They did this in return for rights to the grub pile, a disgusting mound of leftovers set out for the crew.
The mate yelled and cursed at the men to work faster, though none that I could see was being lazy. Then, out of nowhere, he gave Owen a shove. Owen stumbled and almost dropped his wood. He righted himself and looked hard at the mate. The mate’s smile became wide, as though inviting him to do something. Owen paused but then turned and continued on with the wood. The mate was called away, and that was the end of it.
Late in the afternoon a raw wind drove many people back into the parlor. There was not a great deal of society on the boat, the season being early, but what there was sought to gently advertise itself. Where one sat and with whom became a subtle dance. I watched from my chair and played songs, and because the words were not sung, I could play whatever I liked. I even played a certain song about a mule’s private parts, sweetly, as though it were a waltz.
But all displayed gentility came apart upon the clang of the dinner bell. The women were given their own table in the back parlor, and when I saw the manners displayed by the men, the reaching and grabbing, I understood why.
Beyond providing my dinner, my duties upstairs gave me access to the cabin water closets—far superior to anything below. There I was able to wash in private with a basin of warm water. And as to the fear of being discovered, I felt in less danger on the riverboat than I had in Honesdale. On the War Eagle, everyone was out of place, so I wasn’t an object of interest. And I had been living as a man for a year and no longer looked at people for that extra moment to see if they suspected me. I continued to speak from the back of my throat, but I had already found that it’s not the pitch that makes words manly. It’s the certainty, deserved or not.
I stayed late on the cabin deck that first night, and when I went down, the lower deck was dark. I found my bunk and made myself as comfortable as I could. I had barely gotten settled when I heard a low growl. “He touches me again, I’ll slug him one.” It was Owen Carter, speaking, it seemed, to himself.
“Don’t do it,” I said, knowing he was talking about the mate. “That’s what he wants.”
“I don’t care.”
“He can have you whipped,” came a voice from across the aisle.
There was a brief silence. Then Owen’s voice. “He just better be careful.”
* * *
The next day, the small, green leaves changed into buds as we headed north and backward in season. A person had to be well wrapped to stay outside. When the wind picked up or a shower fell, those on the cabin deck retreated to the parlor, which was warmed by stoves at either end.
Around noon the boat put in at Galena. The men were called to wood-up, and once again, the mate began to berate them for no apparent reason, calling them women, among other insults. I kept my eye on Owen from the deck above, though the mate didn’t seem to pay him special attention. But when Owen passed on his third run, the mate stuck out his foot and tripped him. Owen fell against the cabin wall, and the mate laughed for all to see. I had seen the whole thing and it was done with purpose. I had the sudden thought that the mate did this on each voyage, picked some strong young man to humiliate—to show that in his position he could do whatever he liked. The normal chatter on that side of the boat stopped as everyone watched to see what would happen next.
Owen once again righted himself without a protest as though nothing were out of the ordinary. Without looking at anyone he rearranged the wood he was carrying, and I hoped that this meant that he was going to continue on without any trouble. And that’s the way it seemed it would go. But once the wood was secure, instead of moving away, Owen stepped toward the mate and for a long moment looked him in the eye. The mate wasn’t smiling now, appearing uncertain himself as to what was in store. Then, without any change in expression to serve as warning, Owen dropped the wood. The heavy pieces fell, and the mate’s sudden attempt to pull his feet back made the top half of him lurch forward. In this posture he received Owen’s fist, the contact making an awful, cracking noise.
The mate screamed in pain and fell back against the rail and then down onto the deck, blood gushing from his nose. In a matter of moments it was all over the place. The mate managed to raise a bloody hand and point at Owen. “Get him.”
The men nearby remained still as their arms were full and they owed the mate nothing but wood. Then several burly crewmen appeared out of the boiler room. Seeing them, Owen turned and ran to the back of the boat. Next thing, he was up on the rail, leaping across six feet of water onto the wharf where he landed hard and was grabbed by a constable.
“Bring that man on board,” screamed the mate, spluttering blood. “He assaulted an officer!” The constable looked up and said nothing. “Bring him up here, I say!”
“I seen what happened,” the constable said. “This man is in the State of Illinois and will stay in my custody.”
The mate might have made a bigger fuss, but his nose was broke. He was brought up to the officer’s quarters from where you could still hear his cries and cursing. I ran down to the main deck and then inside where I found someone stuffing Owen’s bag. It was Josiah Johnson, who slept across the aisle, a man traveling with his wife and two boys. I rolled Owen’s blanket and followed Josiah out the riverside door. We made our way around the back and then worked forward to where, below, Owen stood beside the constable, no longer in his grasp.
* * *
When I came on deck the third morning, I saw that everything had changed. The river no longer looked like a river. It was miles across and surrounded by turrets and bluffs. I found Mr. Harrelson by the rail.
“What is this?”
“Lake Pepin,” he said. “The Dakotas call it the Lake of Tears.” He stopped there, leaving it to me to ask him why they call it the Lake of Tears. Mr. Harrelson gave a sly smile. “They are said to have cried ’cause they didn’t murder the first white men who came upon it.” I laughed. Mr. Harrelson then pointed to the far shore. “That’s Maiden Rock.”
I looked over to a piece of high land with a cliff facing the water. “Is it a famous place?”
“Oh yes. An Indian girl is said to have thrown herself off. She was to be married but loved another.”
I looked again at the precipice and the jagged rocks below it. “And the brave she loved?” I asked. “Did he follow her over the cliff?”
The mud clerk gave a shrug. “I never heard anything about that.”
The boat moved forward that night with no turns or shudders, as we were still on the lake. When done with the violin, I stayed topside and watched the men play poker. The game took place at a round table near a sign that said, “Gambling on the War Eagle is strictly forbidden.” I already knew from Mickey Harrelson that the sign was there only so a man couldn’t complain to the captain if he woke in the morning with his land stake gone.
I was familiar with poker from my time at Blandin’s. Nothing at all to the rules—some hands were higher than others, and the high hand won. The real game was in making people think something that wasn’t true. If you had good cards, you wanted others to think that they weren’t that good, and sometimes, at just the right moment, you could win with nothing at all. It was a game where a man’s nerve and a woman’s keen eye might work well together, but I never dared play at Blandin’s—I was too busy being the little brother.
I watched for a time, gaining a sense of how each man played—whether he liked to bluff or just ride his luck. Then a man got up and said he was done for the night. I waited to see if his chair would be taken. When it wasn’t, I took it and said the words I’d been itching to say all those months at Blandin’s. “Deal me in.”
A certain quickening of the pulse comes with sitting at a table and gambling with money—a feeling of danger and sensation. I could see the tightness in faces, feel the heat off bodies. I felt the vibration in the floor and was aware that this room of peeling elegance was floating into the wilderness. I had climbed into man’s sacred cave.
Thirty dollars was what I gave myself to play with, one quarter of what I still had. My first few hands were so bad that I got out of the way in a hurry. Then I got lucky and won two hands. The pots were not large, but suddenly I was working with other people’s money. Only two at the table played with caution. The others were just loudmouths. When they won, they acted like they were born clever, and when they lost, they took pains to show how put upon they were by fate. Some drank too much. The conversation became coarse.
“The first redskin I see,” said a heavy man across the table, “I’m gonna shoot’im right out. Don’t care if it’s no squaw, neither.” There was laughter, as though he had told a funny story.
“Why shoot ’em,” said another man whose eyes were red, “when you can sell ’em whiskey at any price?”
“And get what?” said the heavy man. “Some stinking shells or last year’s jerky?”
That was the prelude to another game of seven stud. By the fourth card up, the heavy man opposite me had two jacks and two fives showing. I had a king, two sevens, and an eight showing. Underneath I had a jack and a nine. I shouldn’t have even been there, but I did have possibilities and my winnings had made me a little reckless.
The man with the two pair bet five dollars, as though he already had what he needed underneath, only four of us still in. The man to my right dropped out with a show of disgust, as though some good friend had let him down. I had already decided to fold, but then I noticed the man to my left scowl. He should have stayed still. If he was leaving, I had a chance. I called, and the man to my left tossed his cards. It was down to me and the heavy man across the table.
The two pair looked real good, sitting there like eggs in a pan. But I didn’t think their owner had anything else. He was the bragging kind, and if he had the full house, he’d be getting ready to crow like a rooster. It wasn’t there. That was good as far as it went, but he still had me beat. I needed a seven, a ten, a jack, or a king. Any one of those would win the hand for me—I was almost sure. I had one of his jacks, and I had seen one of his fives earlier.
When the final card came, I lifted its corner. It was a queen and no help. I held my face steady and looked at the man across the table. He wasn’t eager to meet my eye, and that told me what I needed to know. Still, he had me beat. But the riddle was his to solve, and he must have been feeling a little naked. Everything he had was there for all to see. And why was I still in? I couldn’t be there with just two sevens—the dimmest wit on the boat would know that.
Sensing that he was now the prey, the man tapped his finger to say that he didn’t want to bet. It was for me to do it, and I didn’t want to push too hard—didn’t want him to think that I wanted him gone. And I knew for him it wasn’t only the money. He also feared the moment when whatever I had underneath would appear and make him look the fool. I let out a sigh and then put in five dollars as though sorry it had come to this. The man folded. I nodded like he had done the smart thing and tossed my cards face down.
That night I won near forty dollars. And so taken was I by the drama that had I been a man and could have borne the scrutiny, I would have, then and there, become a riverboat gambler.
* * *
The next morning, the rail became prime property, as many wished to get an early view of St. Paul. From a distance, the town looked a little like Cincinnati, perched as it was on several large terraces above the river. At the boat landing we were greeted by every imaginable proposition—land to buy, maps to goldfields, offers of transport, the company of ladies. Everything that one might imagine as a need was offered in fact or fancy.
Lodging in St. Paul was for the rich. Those with little money lived in camps on the land north of town. I bought some bread and smoked buffalo and joined the parade to that meadow, already busy with those who had arrived before us. The end nearer St. Paul was filled with shanties in which people had stayed the winter. Several served as stores, selling just about anything that might be useful. I bought some rope and canvas to make a tent. Others did the same. We moved through the field until we found some open space.
I pitched my tent near that of Josiah and Agnes Johnson. That night we made a common fire and cooked and shared what food we had. After the meal, I took out my violin to celebrate our arrival. Agnes’s face brightened when she saw me lift the bow, but every song I played ended up sounding sad. Soon, all of us were sitting quiet, thinking about loved ones left behind.