George Martin - Fevre Dream

Fire. Out on the river, the Fevre Dream was burning. Abner Marsh felt it all. The terrible sudden roar that ripped at the ears, worse than any thunder. The billows of flame and smoke, the burning chunks of wood and coal spilling everywhere, scalding-hot steam bursting free, clouds of white death enveloping the boat, the walls blowing out and burning, bodies flying through the air afire or half-cooked, the chimneys cracking, collapsing, the screams, the steamer listing and sinking into the river, sizzling and hissing and smoking, charred corpses floating face down amid the debris, the great side-wheeler coming apart until nothing was left but burnt wood and a chimney sticking up crookedly from the water. In the dream, when her boilers went, the name painted on her was still Fevre Dream.

It would be easy, Abner Marsh knew. A consignment of freight for New Orleans; they’d never suspect. Barrels of explosives, stowed down on the main deck carelessly near the red-hot furnaces and all those huge, unruly high-pressure boilers. He could arrange it, and that would be the end for Julian and all the night folks. A fuse, a timer, it could be done.

Abner Marsh closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the burning steamer was gone, the sounds of the screams and the boiler explosion had faded, and the night was quiet once again. “Can’t,” he said aloud to himself, “Joshua is still aboard her. Joshua.” And others as well, he hoped: Whitey Blake, Karl Framm, Hairy Mike Dunne and his rousters. And there was his lady herself to consider, his Fevre Dream. Marsh had a glimpse of a quiet bend of river on a night like tonight, and two great steamers running side by side, plumes of smoke behind them flattened by their speed, fires crowning their stacks, their wheels turning furiously. As they came on and on, one began to move ahead, a little now, then more and more, until she had opened up a boat’s length lead. She was still pulling away when they passed out of sight, and Marsh saw the names written on them, and the leader was Fevre Dream, her flags flying as she moved upriver swift and serene, and behind came the Eclipse, glittering even in defeat. I will make it happen, Abner Marsh told himself.

The crew of the Eli Reynolds had largely returned by midnight. Marsh watched them straggle in from Vicksburg, and heard Cat Grove direct the wooding-up operation in the moonlight, with a series of short, snapped commands. Hours later, the first wisps of smoke began to curl upward from the steamer’s chimneys, as the engineer fired her up. Dawn was still an hour off. It was about then that Yoerger and Grove appeared on the hurricane deck, with chairs of their own and a pot of coffee. They took seats next to Marsh in silence, and poured him a cup. It was hot and black. He sipped it gratefully.

“Well, Cap’n Marsh,” Yoerger said after a time. His long face was gray and tired. “Don’t you think it’s time you told us what this is all about?”

“Since we got back to St. Louis,” added Cat Grove, “you been talkin’ nothin’ but gettin’ back your boat. Tomorrow, maybe, we’ll have her. What then? You ain’t told us much, Cap’n, ’cept that you don’t intend to bring in no police. Why is that, if your boat was stole?”

“Same reason I ain’t told you, Mister Grove. They wouldn’t believe my story for a minute.”

“Crew’s curious,” said Grove. “Me, too.”

“It ain’t none of their business,” said Marsh. “I own this steamboat, don’t I? You work for me, and them too. Just do like I tell you.”

“Cap’n Marsh,” said Yoerger, “this old gal and I been on the river some years now. You gave her over to me soon as you got your second steamer, the old Nick Perrot I believe it was, back in ’52. I took care of this lady ever since then, and you haven’t relieved me, no sir. If I’m fired, why, tell me so. If I’m still your captain, then tell me what I’m taking my steamer into. I deserve that much.”

“I told Jonathon Jeffers,” said Marsh, seeing the little glint of gold once again, “and he died on account of it. Maybe Hairy Mike too, I don’t know.”

Cat Grove leaned forward gracefully and refilled Marsh’s cup with lukewarm coffee from the pot. “Cap’n,” he said, “from the little you told us, you ain’t sure whether Mike is alive or not, but that ain’t the point. You ain’t sure ’bout some others as well. Whitey Blake, that pilot of yours, all them that stayed on the Fevre Dream. You tell all them, too?”

“No,” Marsh admitted.

“Then it don’t make no mind,” said Grove.

“If there is danger downriver, we have a right to know,” said Yoerger.

Abner Marsh thought on that, and saw the justice in it. “You’re right,” he said, “but you ain’t goin’ to believe it. And I can’t have you leavin’. I need this steamer.”

“We ain’t goin’ nowhere,” said Grove. “Tell us the story.”

So Abner Marsh sighed and told the story once again. When he was finished he stared at their faces. Both wore guarded expressions, careful, noncommittal.

“It is hard to credit,” said Yoerger.

“I believe it,” said Grove. “Ain’t no harder to believe than ghosts. I seen ghosts myself, hell, dozens of times.”

“Cap’n Marsh,” said Yoerger, “you’ve talked a lot about finding the Fevre Dream, and seldom about your intentions after you find her. Do you have a plan?”

Marsh thought of the fire, the boilers roaring and blowing, the screams of his enemies. He pushed the thought away. “I’m takin’ back my boat,” he said. “You seen my gun. Once I blow Julian’s head off, I figure Joshua can take care of the rest.”

“You say you tried that, with Jeffers and Dunne, back when you still controlled the steamer and its crew. Now, if your detectives were right, the boat’s full of slaves and cutthroats. You can’t get aboard without being recognized. How will you get to Julian?”

Abner Marsh had not really given the matter much thought. But now that Yoerger had raised the point, it was plain to see that he couldn’t hardly just stomp across the stage, buffalo gun in hand, alone, which is what he’d more or less intended. He thought on it a moment. If he could get aboard somehow as a passenger… but Yoerger was right, that was impossible. Even if he shaved, there was no one on the river looked even approximately like Abner Marsh. “We’ll go in force,” Marsh said after a brief hesitation. “I’ll take the whole damn crew of the Reynolds. Julian and Sour Billy probably figure I’m dead; we’ll surprise them. By day, of course. I ain’t takin’ no more chances with the light. None of the night folks ever seen the Eli Reynolds, and I reckon only Joshua ever heard the name. We’ll steam right up next to her, wherever we find her landed, and we’ll wait for a good bright sunny morning, and then me and all those who’ll come with me will march over. Scum is scum, and whatever dregs Sour Billy found in Natchez ain’t goin’ to risk their skins against guns and knives. Maybe we’ll have to take care of Billy hisself, but then the way’s clear. This time I’ll make goddamn sure it’s Julian before I blow his head off.” He spread his hands. “Satisfactory?”

“Sounds good,” said Grove. Yoerger looked more dubious. But neither of them had any other suggestions worth a damn, so after a brief discussion, they agreed to his plan. By then dawn had brushed the bluffs and hills of Vicksburg, and the Eli Reynolds had her steam up. Abner Marsh rose and stretched, feeling remarkably fit for a man who hadn’t slept a wink all night. “Take ’er out,” he said loudly to the pilot, who had passed them on his way to the plain little pilot house. “Natchez!”

Deckhands cast loose the ropes that tied her to the landing, and the stern-wheeler backed out, reversed her paddle, and pushed out into the channel while red and gray shadows began to chase each other across the eastern shore, and the clouds in the west turned rose.