Wake of the Perdido Star (4 page)

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Authors: Gene Hackman

BOOK: Wake of the Perdido Star
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“I'd like to go with him, Mother.”
“Yes. Go and give to Jen and Mary my good-byes.”
Jack raced off the boat and down the wharf to where his father had just turned the corner. He caught him within a block and scrambled onto the back of the empty wagon. Jack's father glanced at him without expression.
“Ma said it was all right for me to come along.”
For a few moments Ethan said nothing. “You seem to be getting very independent, young man. Nothing I say to you seems to have any effect. But I want you to listen to me very closely.”
His father leaned close.
“I'll say this once. Don't interfere in this matter of the sale of the horses and wagon. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Father.”
Ethan seemed to know where he was going, for he glanced from time to time at a small handwritten map he evidently had been given on the ship. They pulled up to a livery stable at the edge of town. A well-muscled man was shoeing a mare next to an anvil and forge.
“Good afternoon, sir.” Jack's father called out. “The name is O'Reilly. I am also of the trade.”
The man ignored him completely, continuing his work.
“I had my own business in Hamden, Connecticut. Did mostly rifles and such.”
“As you can see, I'm busy,” the blacksmith said. He looked at the horses and wagon, his eyes stopping on Jack. “If it's shoeing you need, can't get to it before Thursday.”
“No, brother. It's not shoeing I need,” Ethan spoke gently, “but a home for this fine team and wagon. My family and I are bound for the southern islands and need to sell our team.”
The smith dropped the horse's hoof and walked slowly around the wagon, shaking his head.
“I couldn't do you any good, mister. But my brother Cyrus maybe could. Tell you what—there's a tavern back toward town. You might have passed it. Peele's with a double ‘e.' If you like, we could maybe go talk to my brother. He owns the place. By the way, when would you be leaving town?”
“Tomorrow afternoon, late. We sail on the
Perdido Star
.”
Jack didn't like the man. Rude and slippery, he thought. He hoped his father recognized the man's slyness.
The smithy quickly took his horse inside the barn and came back buttoning a shirt around his ample waist. “My brother bought the tavern about a year ago. Does pretty well with it, all in all.”
Jack hoisted himself on the back of the wagon while the two men climbed up front. He watched the man, who introduced himself as Jonah Peele, speak to his father. Ethan nodded politely and clucked at the horses, blind to the man's rattling. When they got to the tavern, Peele quickly went inside while Ethan tied up the horses.
“The man is full of himself,” he told Jack. “But he seems an honest sort.”
“Pa, I don't like this fellow. I think—”
“You mind what I told you before, Jackson.”
Jack felt a quick flush come to his face, but remained silent. He wondered if this was yet another one of his father's business dealings that would go astray. Ethan was an honest man who assumed others would act accordingly, and Jack had seen him defeated a number of times in the simplest of transactions.
The interior of the tavern was dark, with a sour smell of ale and urine. Crowded with some very rough types, Jack thought: sailors, dockworkers, laborers. The blacksmith had already begun whispering to his brother, who tended bar. Jack and his father stood awkwardly in the middle of the room.
The bartender, a large man with a red beefy face, finally looked over his brother's shoulder at the two. He signaled them over.
“What will it be, lads? First one's on me.”
“No, nothing, thank you,” Ethan said.
The man's quick grin faded. “If we're to do business, you'll first have a drink.”
“My son will have a sarsaparilla,” Ethan said, shrugging. “I'll have an ale, thank you.”
The other patrons sensed something was going on and drifted closer. Jack felt trapped. After allowing father and son a few polite sips, the bartender eased his bare arms down to the wet bar top.
“What do you need to get for your team and wagon? My brother Jonah says they're fine animals and the wagon's in good repair.”
Ethan took a sip of the foamy ale. “I would need fifty dollars apiece for the horses and another fifty for the wagon.”
The men at the bar were listening intently. The bartender dropped his head down to his thick hairy arms; he seemed to be thinking. Jack didn't like any of this; it felt like an act. Then with a ball-fisted bang on the bar, he yelled, “Done!”
Startled, Jack flinched. He caught the two brothers glance at each other.
“I'll have your money for you tomorrow at one o'clock sharp. Be here with the team and wagon.”
Pleased, Ethan reached across the bar to shake hands, but Cyrus Peele had already turned to his waiting customers. With a nod to the brother, Jack and his father left the suddenly hushed establishment.
“They're a different breed of people here,” Ethan said expansively. “You can't really compare them to the small-town folk we're used to.” He seemed in good spirits. “They're loud and boisterous, but I think if you look through all that, you'd see an honest lot.”
Jack didn't agree. The brothers had a foxlike quality, and he felt the deal was consummated too quickly. The bartender never even went outside to see the team; but his father had told him to stay out of his business, so he said nothing.
Still, he did not share in his father's satisfaction as Ethan related the story of the trade to his wife back at the ship. It disturbed Jack to have his excitement over the coming trip interrupted by this gnawing uncertainty about the horses. Finally, though, he allowed his thoughts to drift to the high seas, to billowing sails, and a million stars guiding them south to Cuba.
On deck, Jack marveled at the complexity of ropes and cables
stretching to the tops of the masts. Walking down the gangplank to get a better look, he spotted two young women staring at the ship from the end of the dock. There was something familiar about the tall one with the red hair. As Jack moved toward them, they turned quickly and started down Derby Street, giggling. He followed, and caught them at Hodge's Wharf.
“Please don't think me rude. I just wanted to thank you for the fine directions you gave. Colleen, wasn't it?”
The girls looked at each other and laughed.
“Yes, it's Colleen. And this would be my friend, Prudence.” The brilliant green eyes teased as Colleen spoke. “And what would be your name?” Jack was stunned that she pretended not to remember.
“It's Jackson, but everyone calls me Jack—except my parents, at times.”
“Jacksooon.” She elongated his name as if making fun of it. “I'll be off. Have yourself a day of sun and health.” She grabbed Prudence by the arm and started down Derby.
“Would you join me in a cup o' tea at the inn yonder?” Jack asked.
Colleen turned. “Tomorrow, Jacksooon, maybe tomorrow.”
His hands were shaking as he watched her walk away. What if they had accepted my offer of tea? he wondered. I have not a penny to my name.
The next day at one o'clock, Jack and his father returned to Peele's tavern with the horses. What looked to Jack like the exact same group of people filled the pub. Cyrus Peele started speaking almost before they were through the door, his brother standing quietly at the far side of the room.
“Mr. O'Reilly, good to see you again, sir. I have a bit of bad news, I'm afraid. You see, the bank is after me, and a few of my suppliers came this morning unexpectedly. And, well, the upshot is, I don't
have the money for the team. I know this puts you in a bind, what with your boat leaving in just a few hours and not having time to go looking for another buyer.” The bartender glanced around, making sure he had his audience. “But I'll do this: I'll give you thirty-five dollars for the lot, and I'd be stretching things to do that.”
Ethan's color faded after the man's first words. The patrons began to stare. He knows he's been duped, Jack thought; Peele obviously waited until the last minute so they would have no other choice.
Jack's misgivings about the Peeles were accurate. That sense of cold calmness he knew so well rose up his spine. He looked across the room at the younger brother, who put on an innocent face but seemed to grow nervous under Jack's steely gaze. Jack contemplated smashing the whiskey bottle on the bar into the face of the bartender and then getting the fat one across the room before he reached the door. His thoughts stopped, though, when he noticed his father's head drop slightly, nodding in recognition of what had happened. A wave of caring poured through Jack.
“I don't believe, sir,” Ethan began in a weak voice, “that you are dealing in good faith.”
The bartender's eyes went cold. “You can take it or leave it, bumpkin.”
Ethan's humiliation caused outright laughter. The whole bar seemed in on the joke. Jack felt his face burning, and he did everything he could to control himself.
“I'll take your money, sir,” Ethan said, “on one condition.”
The bartender spread his arms on the bar and looked around, thoroughly enjoying the moment. “Name it.”
“You've bested me in this deal,” he said. “That I can live with. But you, as a man, will give me your promise that you'll treat the animals well. Do I have your word?”
“You have my word as a Peele, sir,” the bartender said. Jack wondered what that was worth. There was loud clapping from customers and the show was over. The two out-of-towners had
been taken down a notch or two, and all seemed to have had a good time at their expense.
They walked back to the ship in silence. Jack's father seemed to have aged over the last two hours, his gait halting, eyes unfocused. Jack wanted to comfort him, say something to relieve his pain. But when they reached the ship without a word, Ethan slipped quietly to the bowels of the boat, and the comfort of his wife.
Jack stayed above deck. Quince, the huge sailor who had shown the family to their quarters, stood off marking goods as sailors carried provisions belowdecks. He glanced at Jack.
“Are you looking forward to shipping out, lad?”
“Yes,” Jack answered, having taken an immediate liking to this man. “But maybe a little scared, too.”
“Well, that be natural, boy. We're all a little frightened at first. You'll get use to her and once you got yer legs under ya, there be nothing like it.”
Jack thought a moment. He wanted desperately to confide in this man, to ask his advice on something that had been running through his mind for the last hour. “Excuse me. But your name is Quince, right?”
“Quince it be. Oliver Quince, but all the lads call me Big Q or Quince, whatever pleases ya.”
“I've a problem that needs solving,” Jack raced on, trusting his instinct about the fellow. “If you've been wronged by a knave of a man and have limited time to make things right but feel it must be done, what would you do?”
“You got but one life to live. If you want your peace of mind, you need to set to rights what's bothering ya.”
This relieved Jack. “Exactly what time do we leave?”
Hansumbob passed by just then and shouted, “Six bells on the noggin, and if you're not on board, you're sure to get a floggin'.” Ole Bob grinned wide, as ugly a face as Jack had ever seen, but with a warmth that was irrepressible. Jack crossed the deck and made his way down the gangplank.
Hansumbob walked along the deck parallel to Jack. “What be your name, lad?”
Jack shouted his name as he picked up his pace away from the ship.
“Be proud of yer name, Jackson, we got plenty a strange ones on board: Coop, Red Dog, Cookietwo. One day, Bosun Ben Mentor asked Cookietwo how he arrived at that name and he near threw'im in the bay, did Cookietwo, so now Mentor checks his soup real careful.” Hansumbob had reached the stern of the ship but was still talking. “The captain won't wait and it's a long swim to Cuba.”

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