River Queen (30 page)

Julienne had an awful night. She could not make herself fall asleep. She was hot, the room seemed horribly stuffy, and she developed an acute headache right behind her eyes. She tossed and turned and tried three times to light the lamp and read. But she couldn’t concentrate, and, besides that, it made her head hurt more. Finally at about dawn she slipped into an uneasy doze.

A timid knock on her door woke her up. Groggily she said, “Yes? Carley?”

“No, ma’am,” she heard a soft reply. The door opened, and Robbie Skinner brought in a tray. It held a tin teapot, a mug, sugar, cream, and three slices of dry toast. For a moment Julienne’s throat constricted. It was exactly the breakfast that Tyla had always brought her when she didn’t feel well. But how did this girl know that?

Before Julienne could speak, Robbie said, “Miss Libby told me that she thought she heard you in the night and said to let you sleep late. She said she thought you might like tea and plain toast.” Remembering the previous night, Julienne thought,
Then why didn’t Libby bring it to me?

It wasn’t the sort of tray that set on a bed, so Robbie carefully placed it on the small chest. Then she turned, folded her hands in front of her, and said, “I know you really don’t want me here, Miss Ashby. But I promise you that I’ll work hard and earn my keep.”

Julienne nodded rather curtly. “Thank you, Robbie.”

“You’re welcome, ma’am. Do you need anything else?”

“No, that will be all,” was Julienne’s automatic response. Despite the fact that she hadn’t said it for over a month, she had indeed said those same words to Tyla and other servants thousands of times.

Robbie left the room, and Julienne slowly got up and fixed her tea. It was hot and strong, just like Julienne liked it. Chewing thoughtfully on her toast, she thought,
Earn your keep? Yes, I’m going to watch and see just exactly how you earn your keep, Miss Skinner. I’ll see just exactly how much rescuing you need from Dallas Bronte.

It was a busy day, for Leah, Julienne, Libby, and Caesar had to go to town to purchase enough supplies for a trip that could last anywhere from ten days to two weeks. When they returned, Robbie had already done all of the washing and had the clothes in baskets ready to be ironed. She had then set about scrubbing the ballroom. They had cleaned the corner where their dining table was, after a fashion, but no one had ever had the time to try and clean the rest of the big room, and there was mold and mildew all around the baseboards and windows, and the floor was black with it. She worked on it all day, and then put boric acid paste all around the room. She was still working when Julienne went to bed, exhausted. She had not seen Dallas all day.

Early in the morning they started loading their freight. Dallas came up while Julienne was still brooding over her breakfast, sitting alone in the galley on a stool at the worktable. They had to take the dining table out of the ballroom because the freight was going to take up the entire Texas deck, except for the staterooms.

“I’ve got good news,” he told her, “I think. Inman & Sons has a return load for us, textiles out of Cairo. But we can only grab it if we can get there in six days.”

Julienne’s brow wrinkled. “Is that a problem? I thought you said you could make it in six days.”

“I said in about six days.” He shook his head. “Wish I had even a cub pilot, there’s three or four long straight stretches that a cub could handle, easy. Anyway, I think I’ve got our wood stops and my rest times down so that we should be able to make it in a little less than six days.
If
nothing goes wrong with the
Queen
, or the crew.”

“Why should anything go wrong with the crew?” she asked. Her tone was abrupt because she was still extremely angry with Dallas for kissing Robbie Skinner.

He knew nothing of this and looked at her curiously, but he answered her patiently. “Julienne, I can’t even call what we’ve got a skeleton crew. When this boat is moving, the crew is working, and it doesn’t matter if it’s for two hours or for twenty-six hours. It’s hard, dangerous work. Men can get hurt, or they can just break down and get sick. And the
River Queen
is a good, solid boat, but engine breakdowns happen all the time, and that means stopping the boat to fix the problem.”

Impatiently she said, “So are you saying that we can’t do this? So what are we even doing on this stupid river then?”

“I didn’t say that we couldn’t do it,” he answered, now in a sharp tone. “I’m just trying to explain to you, in case everything doesn’t go perfectly.”

“Fine, you’ve explained, thank you,” she said with ill humor.

“Fine,” he said, turned on his heel, and stalked out of the galley.

“Fine!” she said loudly to his back. He didn’t reply.

JULIENNE DID’T SEE DALLAS for six days. When they stopped and she knew he would come to the galley to eat, she made sure she was in her stateroom or out on the deck sitting in her rocking chair. Dallas wouldn’t allow them to sit out on their deck chairs on the hurricane deck, stressing that it was far too dangerous. Often Leah, Roseann, Julienne, and Carley stayed most of the day in Roseann’s stateroom. Carley did her lessons, Roseann and Leah sewed, and mostly Julienne read.

The reason they had so much leisure time was because of Robbie Skinner. She had taken it upon herself to be their personal maid, even for Carley. She brought them all trays for breakfast, she made up their beds and cleaned their rooms, she helped Leah and Roseann to dress, and after a couple of days Julienne found herself letting Robbie help her too. Every morning Carley was fresh-scrubbed, her hair shining in two perfect pigtails, her dresses and petticoats clean and ironed. Even the ruffles on her pantalettes were starched and crisp.

Julienne, though she was avoiding Dallas, watched Robbie relentlessly. The thought once entered her mind that she was literally spying on the girl, but she was so consumed with trying to figure out if Robbie was falling in love with Dallas Bronte that she didn’t care.

To her surprise, she never saw Robbie with Dallas. At least, she didn’t go into the galley during the few minutes that Dallas was eating a hurried meal before taking a nap. Begrudgingly Julienne had to acknowledge to herself that she knew that Robbie wouldn’t go into Dallas’s stateroom when he was sleeping. That would be entirely too blatant.

But to her surprise, she did see Robbie with Rev Brown. The crew crowded into the galley on Dallas’s breaks, and Robbie would serve them. She rarely smiled, and her behavior was modest and quiet. But often Rev would stay after the meal, when the others had gone down to their quarters to rest. Julienne passed by the galley several times, and Rev would be helping Robbie clean the galley. They talked in low voices, and once she saw Robbie smiling up at him.

They made it to Cairo in less than six days, pulling into their berth at the port on the early morning of Wednesday, June 27. Leah, Carley, Roseann, and Julienne gathered on the deck to see the port. They had never been to Cairo, Illinois.

The deafening steam whistle blew twice, and Carley looked up at the pilothouse, beaming. Then her eyes widened and she pointed. “Look! Look, Mama! Dallas is letting Darcy bring her in!”

Julienne looked up with shock to see Dallas standing by the port windows, waving and grinning at Carley. Darcy was behind the wheel. She turned back to her mother and Aunt Leah, but they didn’t seem surprised at all. They waved and smiled. “What is going on here?” Julienne demanded. “Since when is Darcy a riverboat pilot?”

“Of course he’s not a pilot, dear,” Roseann answered complacently. “But he’s been in the wheelhouse with Dallas this entire trip, and Dallas has been teaching him the river. Darcy seems to enjoy it.”

“Good heavens,” Julienne said faintly.

“It’s no wonder you’re so surprised, Julienne,” Aunt Leah said sweetly. “You’ve been in such a fog this whole trip.”

“You’ve been really, really grumpy,” Carley asserted.

“I have?” Julienne responded. She knew she had been “grumpy” with Dallas, but she had been completely unaware that anyone had noticed.

“Yes, you have, dear,” Roseann added. “I hope you’ll get over this depressing humor soon, it’s so bad for the system.”

“I hope I get over it soon too,” Julienne muttered.

As soon as they got docked and the engines wound down, Darcy and Dallas came out of the wheelhouse. Julienne still didn’t want to talk to Dallas, so she hurried back to the doors to go back to her stateroom. But she heard them arguing, with Darcy saying, “Ring and I can handle this unloading, Dallas, go ahead and go see about that return load we’ve got.”

“You know, you’ve done good, Ashby,” she heard Dallas say. “I’m real proud of you.”

For some reason this irritated Julienne beyond measure, and she fled into her room.

They loaded up their textiles that same day, and left the next morning. Julienne, as before, kept to herself, avoiding Dallas Bronte assiduously. In the six-day return trip she became certain that Robbie Skinner had no designs on Dallas Bronte. She also admitted to herself that Robbie was the perfect servant, quiet, efficient, quick, and smart. The fact that she was so much prettier than Julienne was hard for her to take graciously. Robbie took great pains to minimize her looks, continuously fighting her long blonde hair, pinning it back severely into a tight bun. She wore men’s shirts that were much too big for her, so her figure wouldn’t be outlined. When the crew, including Darcy, were around, she kept her eyes modestly downcast, rarely speaking. None of that mattered, however, for she was quite simply the prettiest woman Julienne had ever seen, and she struggled to keep from resenting Robbie because of it. However, she did still resent her for kissing Dallas.

By the time they got back to Natchez, Julienne was emotionally drained. She had been angry, resentful, remorseful, jealous, spiteful, and finally she grew exhausted, battling with herself. They came into Natchez just at sunset. It was a gorgeous time of day, with a great red sun very slowly inching down to the land. It tinted the landscape with crimson beams of light, making the dirty old port look almost inviting. Julienne was so weary that she hadn’t even come out on deck as they came in. She sat in her stateroom, staring out the window.

Then Carley, who rarely knocked, came bursting in. “Julienne, you’ve got to come see! The
Columbia Lady
’s in, and she’s docked here! And she’s lit up like the stars, and she’s the grandest thing I’ve ever seen!” They had seen the magnificent boat coming and going on the river from her home port of New Orleans, but she hadn’t stopped at Natchez-Under-the-Hill in the last couple of months.

Without much enthusiasm, Julienne took Carley’s hand and let her lead her out on deck. The
River Queen
was just beginning to pass the
Columbia Lady.
Julienne, Roseann, Leah, and even Caesar, Libby, and Robbie had come out on deck for their homecoming. With wide eyes they all stared up at the mighty
Columbia
’s golden decks. Music wafted from the grand ballroom, and with a jolt Julienne recognized the waltz, the same waltz that had played when Dallas Bronte had walked into her life and swept her away in that very ballroom. That had been a world away, a lifetime ago, it seemed to her. The fact that that carefree night had been the last one she would ever have, pressed down hard on Julienne’s heart. Here she was, crawling by that gorgeous, elegant, lavish steamer on the shabby little
River Queen
. She didn’t want to see the
Columbia Lady
any more, and she didn’t want to hear that haunting waltz. Bitterly she turned and went back to her stateroom, which she now viewed with a hostile gaze. Her room looked, to Julienne, like a miserable hovel.

SHE DID’T COME OUT of her room for the rest of the day and evening. After the
Queen
was unloaded and Dallas had concluded all the business with Inman & Sons, he had knocked on her door and called, “Julienne? Are you okay?”

Naturally, in the mood she was in, it annoyed her that he had the nerve to knock on her door. He had done it many times before, in fact, but suddenly Julienne decided that it really wasn’t proper. Yanking the door open, she replied shortly, “I’m fine, thank you.”