The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton (43 page)

There was another saloon in the side street where I was standing — no doubt every man in the state was guaranteed by law to a glass and a place at some bar or another — and so I went in there. This one was very dark. It was an old log structure, about twice the size of a claim cabin, with but two small windows, on either side of the door. It took some moments for my eyes to adjust to the dim light after I went in. The darkness gave me a spooky feeling. I could hear and sense others in there but couldn’t tell, really, how many or what they were doing. The bartender greeted me and said, "Step to your right, sir. The bar’s to your right."

I whispered, "You need some light in here."

"Well, sir, our patrons rather prefer this." He had an English accent. "It’s a relief from the outer glare, you know."

"Oh."

"Whiskey?"

No doubt he couldn’t see how young I was. Or maybe he didn’t care.

"Sure," I said. "But mostly I’m looking for someone."

"A gentleman of the imbibing sort?"

"Pardon me?"

"Is your quarry a drinking man?"

"Oh. Yes."

"Name?"

"They changed their name. They killed an abolitionist over in K.T back in june."

"Indeed! And what do you want with these brave fellows?" The bartender’s whisper had come to match mine, which seemed appropriate in such a spot.

"One of ’em’s my pa, and the other two’s my uncle and my cousin. My ma wants ’em."

"Well, now," he said, and set a very small glass of whiskey in front of me. I looked at it. He said, "Will you be needing to chase that, then?"

"Pardon me?"

"Do you prefer to chase your shot of whiskey with a drink of water?"

"Oh. No, thanks."

Another customer came up to the bar, and the bartender walked off into the shadows. I glanced around. No one seemed to be nearby, so I lifted the shot glass to my mouth and touched the liquid in it with my tongue. That or the fumes rising off the liquid sent me into a coughing fit. The bartender returned.

"Unaccustomed to a fine malt, then?" he said.

I continued to cough, and he took away my shot and poured it into a bucket under the bar. I shuddered to think what would become of whatever was in that bucket. Certainly, in Missouri, it would not go to waste.

"Well, now. Tell me a bit more about these members of your family. Men of strong belief and ready action, then, like all the chivalry? Where are you from?"

"Palmyra, Missouri."

"Hmm."

"My cousin’s the easiest to distinguish. He’s about my height, got a pale moon face. Blue eyes, brown hair about down to his shoulders. My pa and my uncle look about alike. They got dark beards and long dark hair."

"That brings so many to mind, you know."

But I sensed that he did know something.

I said, mimicking pride, "An’t everybody’s shot a G— d— abolitionist, though! And my uncle an’t a bashful sort. He would of talked about it."

"Many talk about it who haven’t actually performed the deed, however."

I hadn’t thought of that. The Englishman walked away again, and I adjusted my braces, which I had fixed up a bit better but which were still a nuisance. I was beginning to be able to distinguish things in the dim light, but clearly this was not a saloon where men did anything but drink quietly, their glasses at their fingertips. Any of the other customary Missouri pastimes—gambling, shooting, teasing, bragging, and even spitting— would be nearly impossible in here. The bartender and another man now approached me, and the bartender said, "Allow me to present Mr. Beaumont Pollifax, who prefers the appellation ’River Snake—’ "

"I comes up quick and I comes up silent, and sometimes I passes you by, and sometimes" — he leaned close to my face—"I bites!"

"Mr. Snake accords us the honor of his custom at our establishment every day, but we are not the only ones, because he maintains what you might call a route or a round that takes in something on the order of eight or ten establishments of all varieties and characters. Mr. Snake does seem to remember two men and a boy boasting of shooting a man in Kansas Territory who held sentiments that were repugnant to their own—"

"Now," said the River Snake, "it was toward dark, because I saw them as they was goin’ in, and I was goin’ in at the same time, and I noted that the sun was a-settin’, because, you know, you got to get yourself right every day, or you can get all turned around. Once, I got to a point where I was so turned around thet I was awake when I couldn’t get no whiskey, and I swore ..." He trailed off, then looked at me, then said, "Well, if it was about dark, then I would of been goin’ into the California—"

"Which is situated down by the river," said the bartender.

"And Joab, who’s down there—"

"Employed in serving up refreshment for the patrons—"

"He been there a year or more, and you know, he never takes a drop, so he would remember everything them boys had to say. But they was pleased with themself, I’ll say!"

I must have gasped, for I felt an inner constriction that was almost a swoon at the thought of their pleasure. The bartender turned a frankly inquisitive look upon me and said, "Plenty of the rougher sort down there, you know. Some of us hesitate to go amongst them."

"Them Kickapoo Rangers they had useta come down there," recollected the River Snake. "I stayed away from them boys while they was comin’ in there. Almost decided to keep away from the California altogether, but it don’t do to change your ways. That’s how I got turned around that time."

I said, or croaked, "May I buy you a whiskey, Mr. Snake?"

"Well," he said, "anybody may buy me a whiskey. An’t often anybody does, though, haw haw!"

The bartender poured out another of those little glasses, and the River Snake picked it up and seemed to throw it into his own face, except that his mouth was open to receive it. He then said, "Whew! Well, son, I’ll walk ya down there, even though it’s early in the day. I do believe I need a change."

I said, "Thank you, Mr. Snake."

The bartender watched us hard, his eyes following us out the door.

The sunshine of afternoon nearly knocked me over. The River Snake actually staggered, but he caught himself, then said, "Son, I don’t know if I kin make it down there this time of day, but let me give it a try."

"I need to get my horse."

"That would be good. That’d be very good."

When I brought Athens over, the River Snake leaned against him, and he half turned his face into the horse’s shoulder as we walked slowly along. I would say that we made a strange picture, but that would imply that someone among the teeming busy throngs of Kansas City was looking at us.

At the California, the River Snake seemed to revive. At any rate, he woke up, told me to stay outside, opened the door, and returned a moment later with the bartender, who was all business. He certainly did remember that party of men, he said, as if he prided himself on his excellent memory and was pleased to show it off. Two bearded men and a beardless boy. "They was celebratin’ a blow struck against the evil interloper," said the bartender.

"Was one of ’em named ..." Nothing came to me, and then: "Abel?"

"Well, I don’t know about that. One of ’em called another one ’Samson,’ but I don’t know if that was the given name or the last name, and they used the name Chaney, too, I think." That could be either, also, I realized.

But I was amazed at the success of my investigation. I had the wit to put a few coins in the bartender’s hand, as a gesture toward the River Snake, and then to croak out my thanks, but after that, all I could do was get on Athens and give the old boy a kick. We trotted. Samson and Chaney! Samson and Chaney! Yes, of course! I could see them all the better now! I expected them to rise up in front of me on the street, their misdeeds written all over them, and recognition of me, the pale and screaming wife (Had I screamed? Had I not screamed? Perhaps only they knew), transforming their pleasure in themselves into fear and guilt. Ha! Or, as the Missourians said, haw haw!

Back at the newspaper office, I sat quietly at a desk and wrote my article. From time to time, I referred for stylistic models to the copies of old papers that were lying about in stacks. My article ran as follows:

As our friends are aware, our struggle against the thieves and murderers of the so-called Free State party takes many forms. Though most southern-rights sympathizers are good law-and-order men (however their patience is tried by the creeping slowness of the judiciary in Kansas), extreme elements do and must exist, for the sentiments of active and loyal southerners must have their outlet. Everyone knows that vigilance committees, who would seize the law and make righteousness their own, are frequently proposed by even the soberest men, whose patience has been sorely tried by the devilish antics of the so-called Free State party. Few should be surprised, then, that certain small groups of men, young men, have formed themselves around the territory and that they are only waiting for the opportunity of making a name for themselves.

Your correspondent, himself a young man, went out recently and beat the countryside in search of one of these elusive bands, in order to bring you news of their doings and of the sort of lives these young soldiers of the southern cause have been leading. We are not aware that any news of these young men has been printed in any other newspaper in the territory, and so all of their doings have the added interest of mystery.

I found five men, I will not say where, I will not say how, except to remark that their neighbors knew them, and were grateful for the protection their presence in the neighborhood afforded. I understood that a sixth was away from the camp on a provisioning expedition. Of the five present, Captain Joseph Mabee was clearly in command. Captain Mabee is a tall son of the deep south, Louisiana to be precise. Both circumstance and conviction brought him to our area—the circumstance being employment on a riverboat, the conviction being loyalty to honorable southern principles of freedom under the law. A fine horseman, Captain Mabee was especially grieved at the recent loss of his lovely mare to a ball from the gun of an abolitionist thief. He averred that he would most likely not be able to find or afford such a mount again, in spite of the excellent reputation of horseflesh in our area.

The other four members of the party shall remain nameless, in accordance with the demands of their chosen field of battle. Suffice it to say that of these men and boys (two were not above eighteen years old), two were native Missourians, one was a son of our sister state to the south, Arkansas, and one, a native Ohioan, came over to the pro-southern side because he was so disgusted with the deeds of the so-called Free State party. He said to me, "They call themselves Americans, but I don’t see it." None of these young soldiers could be said to be possessed of an education, but all have a rough eloquence as they discuss their adventures so far.

The group has been together since the Pottawatomie massacre in Kansas Territory, which all men know took place in May, shortly after the successful campaign of our forces against the abolitionist hellhole of Lawrence. These honorable young men were so outraged by those Pottawatomie murders that they felt they could not live without acting against the sort of criminals and madmen that were coming into the territory from the northern states. They therefore left their happy homes, much to the distress of each of their mothers, knowing that perhaps they would not soon see their families again but that the cause was a just one and that, at any rate, it had gotten their blood up so that they could sit by no longer. Three of the young men were friends, and two came in later.

As to their present style of life, it is, of course, rough and not without deprivation. From time to time, their neighbors offer them a good meal. Otherwise, they fall back upon their own cooking. They have been given shirts, boots, and even a pair of pants by grateful southerners, and the captain has been promised another mount to replace his much-lamented long-legged bay mare. In the meantime, the camp is full of the excellent fellowship that grows out of an active conscience satisfied by an active life. And the band is making plans to move against the enemy in the enemy’s own territory, though how soon this will take place, your correspondent is not at liberty to reveal.

There are those among us who revile and deplore such groups as these, and it is true that they stand outside the law, but do they stand outside of moral righteousness? No one can deny that they answer a need felt in every breast for some stronger reply to the depredations of the so-called Free State party. We may wish the necessity for them gone, but in the meantime, we certainly wish them well!

Mr. Morton read this through, holding the paper close to his face and tapping his spectacles on the desk instead of positioning them on his nose, and afterward pronounced the writing "satisfactory but not bold enough. However, it will do for a first effort. Franklin can set it in type. He’ll show you that part of the business one of these days." He patted me on the back. I smiled and nodded, and went outside.

I have to say that the composition of this piece put me into a welter of strong feelings. I had taken it up, still pleased with my discovery of "Samson" and "Chaney," in something of a playful humor. What you’ve got when you go in disguise are some feelings that belong to your original self and some feelings that belong to your new self and are feigned feelings in many ways, but some of these feelings overlap, and it’s a job trying to keep them separate and identified. I thought my disguised self could go ahead and write up those boys’ story in the style of Mr. Morton’s paper and that it would remain outside of me, like the hat or the boots I had stolen on the boat. But what I found out was that my piece had a way of talking back to me. Every lie I put down on the paper made a claim, and every claim those lies made, made me mad. But I couldn’t seem to stop them. They ran right down the pages, one after another, each sentence that was a lie bringing forth the next one, until I got to the end. The truth seemed to protest, but it couldn’t really get in there. There wasn’t a place for it, for one thing, and my project couldn’t afford it, for another. I had to grip Thomas’s watch pretty strongly while I was writing the second-to-last paragraph, and pull it out and set it on the desk, right under my gaze, while I was writing the last paragraph. And then, to make it all the more complicated and hard to take, when I reread the piece I couldn’t help being a little proud of it. It didn’t tell much of a story, but there were some nice turns of phrase in it, and I was a bit insulted at Mr. Morton’s estimation of it. But then, after what you might call the flood of writing had ebbed a bit, I was ashamed of the sentiments it portrayed and also of how I thought it would make people feel when they read it. But then, after that, I was still a little proud of actually having written something other than a letter, and even of knowing that it was going to be set in type and printed out. Ah, it was all a tangle, and it made me want to run off to get away from it, but I couldn’t even do that, as I still had "Samson" and "Chaney" to uncover before Mr. Morton asked me to write him another piece and get myself into an even thicker tangle.