Dead water - Barbara Hambly [66]
“As I said, I was halfway back to you with the news that the boat hadn't let steam down, when I recognized Sophie,” said Hannibal, panting as he leaned his weight on the bar to the timing of the chant. “I followed her back to the boat, and she went straight to their stateroom. I watched to see if I could get in—they clearly hadn't abandoned it—and just as it began to get light, who should appear but the guilty pair themselves, La Pécheresse with a false beard and enough padding to hide her Junoesque curves, and Weems in a very fetching French-blue gown and veils. I was looking around the boat to see if you'd followed them back when we put out. They must have bribed Molloy to keep steam up—Tredgold was furious when he woke up about an hour later.”
“The more fools they,” murmured January. “Since Molloy was one of the Bank's depositors. He must have laughed when they handed him the money—probably the remainder of what Weems got from Cain. Molloy's too good a pilot for this to have been an accident—with the luggage in a shambles you couldn't get to it, but he could. I saw Weems and Fischer leave the hotel but didn't recognize them.”
With solemn mischief, 'Rodus led the chant:
Massa, he an ugly man——uhn!
Missus, she a sinner——uhn!
Skin a flea for tallow an' hide
An' gimme the bones for dinner——uhn!
It was dark by the time the skiff was loaded up, and the two coffles of slaves were put to work helping the deck-hands replace the cargo in the holds under Thucydides's sharp eye. Iron cressets loaded with firewood burned on the deck and on the bank to light the work, and all the white men were given rifles and set to guarding the bank, with the exception of Mr. Quince, who declared that violence of any kind was repellent to his nature. “Milksop,” said Cain impersonally, pulling on his coat and taking up a rifle—his own, a .50-caliber Henry, not one of the Lemans from the ship's store.
A belated dinner was served in the Grand Saloon, and January retired to Hannibal's stateroom, where the fiddler tipped Thu to send in a copper tub and hot water for a bath. “It's one thing there's never a shortage of on a steamboat, thank God,” said Hannibal as January stripped off his mud-crusted clothing and settled in the round towel-draped tin vessel. “Rose was going to dump the boilers if you didn't show up by the time the cargo was re-loaded. With everyone on deck it wouldn't have been difficult.”
January smiled. “That's my Rose.”
“According to Tredgold, we should be under way by the time dinner is finished, and Mrs. Tredgold ventures to hope you and I will play after dinner, though I don't expect there will be much in the way of dancing.” Hannibal knelt on the bunk—there was almost no floor-room left with the bath—and dug through his portmanteau for clean shirts for them both. “I think we can safely venture to say that neither Weems nor Fischer will abandon the boat tonight. With the luggage jumbled as it is, they probably couldn't find their own trunks, even if they had some means of transporting them elsewhere, and there's a fog rising. I doubt Molloy could see the flag on the landing of any plantation we pass, and the next town is Mayersville, fifty miles up-river. It's small. I suspect we're safe until we get to Greenville, sixty miles beyond that.”
“We may not have to worry about them leaving the boat,” said January softly. “But I saw Mrs. Fischer as she looked down at us turning the capstan—I saw the look in her eyes. We're not safe.”
Though it would have been pleasant to linger in the bath, he was mindful of his responsibilities to friendship. He got out promptly, while the water was still hot, so that Hannibal could bathe as well. The fiddler looked haggard, as if he, too, had not slept after their shared vigil outside the Majestic Hotel the previous night; January could