The Mormon Prophet Part 35

"I could row t'other side and back," bragged the boy. "I could row t'other side and back three times in the day."

"You couldn't."

"I couldn't! What will you bet?"

"I suppose your father wouldn't allow you to go, anyway."

He was a fresh-faced, mischievous, eager young rascal, and he found Susannah's manner pleasant and provoking.

"Will you lay five dollars on it?" he cried. "Pap is away down to Quincy. If you'll lay five dollars on it I'll do it."

"But I won't."

The gambling spirit of the young pioneer was aroused.

"What will you lay on it, then?"

"I don't believe you could row once to the other side."

He bragged loudly and with much exaggeration of what he had done and what he could do, and began pushing off the boat to show her his speed.

The boat was a rude craft, unpainted, flat-bottomed, but light enough, and not badly formed for speed. Susannah stepped into it without much hope, scarcely caring what she did, but still provoking the young boatman to attempt the crossing.

"I shan't give you any money," she said, "but you can row me a bit if you like till I see how fast you can go. You don't understand the currents, I am sure."

"Currents!" said the boy, "I guess I understand all there is to know about them."

Talking thus in light banter, they actually proceeded out onto the bosom of the milky flood without hearing any cry from the sh.o.r.e or seeing any one who took note of their departure. The pellucid and comforting light of the blinded sun grew warmer; the hum of industry in the town behind rose cheerfully upon the quiet air, and as the calling of the April bluebird in the fields grew more faint, the splash of the oars and the whirr of the gray water-fowl began to be accompanied by a low distant sound as of a watermill.

"It's the excursion steamer," said the boy. "We'll get in her waves and you'll be scared. Ladies is always scared of waves."

She asked if the steam-boat would stop at the Nauvoo wharf, but he explained, with the knowledge that boys are apt to have of such details, that this steamer was coming from Fort Madison, and would keep to the Missouri side, that he had heard that there were some State officials on board her, escorting the Governor of Kentucky, who was prospecting for a Land Company.

They saw the white hulk of the steam-boat looming upon the water to the north. Her side paddle-wheels churned the flood. A strong purpose took possession of Susannah; she knew what she was going to do.

She said to the boy, "No one could stop a steamer when she once starts until she gets to her next port."

"I bet the engineman could stop her just as easy as that." The boy backed water with his oars suddenly.

"But no one on the river could make him stop and get aboard."

"Yes, they could. My pap stopped one once. We was living down near Cairo, but not near a wharf."

"How did he do it?" she asked, and her interest was intense.

"Why, you just put up your hands like a trumpet and yell through them as loud as you can, and you go on waving and hollering. My pap said the best plan was to call out 'Runaway n.i.g.g.e.r! Large reward!' They'd be sure to stop then to know all about it, and when they'd once stopped they don't mind your clambering up, if you can pay the fare."

Susannah felt herself wholly unequal to the loud task described.

"They would never stop for you," she, said. "You are only a boy, and they would know 'twas only mischief."

His reply was as before. He would lay five dollars on it that he could stop the boat.

She incited him to do this thing also. What faculty of caution the boy possessed was not as yet developed; he left the care for consequences to the sedate lady in the stern, and forgetting his quest of the Missouri sh.o.r.e, lay in the path of the steam-boat and howled unmusically, and marred the peace of the placid morning by shouting concerning a runaway slave and a fabulous reward that was offered for him taken alive or dead.

It is probable that what he said never rightly reached the ears of the men on the deck, but that they regarded the lady as a possible pa.s.senger; the engine was stopped.

"We'd better cut now as fast as we can," said the boy, somewhat frightened. He seized his oars excitedly. "Or shall I tell them a big yarn about the n.i.g.g.e.r?"

They were but slightly to one side. The prow of the steam-boat, which drew but little water, had already pa.s.sed below them. A small crowd on the vessel's deck leaned over the paddle-box. Standing up in the boat, Susannah searched the faces of the men looking down. They all looked at her.

She singled out the captain by some sign in his dress, and pleaded urgent necessity for travelling with him.

"Look here," said the boy, looking up at her from beneath, "I call that a low-down, mean sort of thing to do. Why didn't you tell me square? I'd have brought you if you wanted do come."

She pleaded with the boy too. "It was better for you not to know my secrets. If they ask you in the city you can say that you didn't know."

A dozen hands were held out to help her to climb the ladder on the shelving paddle-box. "Keep off," they cried to the boy, and he swung away from the churning wheel.

Susannah stood upon the deck pale and trembling. The magnitude of the step came upon her, and she was beset by natural timidity and the painfulness of her dependence. The men who stood around her with the right to question were not of a low cla.s.s. The captain, brawny and respectable, spoke for the group. Behind him was a short but dignified gray-haired gentleman whom she took to be the present or former Governor of the State of Kentucky, of whom the boy had spoken. With him were several men who appeared to have some fair t.i.tle to gentility. Other pa.s.sengers pressed in an outer circle.

She would fain have explained herself more privately, but she could not endure to accept the privileges of the boat without explaining first that she was not able to pay for them. "Gentlemen, I have no money. I am entirely unprotected. I have escaped in fear of my life from Nauvoo."

She spoke instinctively, only desiring to set herself right, but when the words were said she knew that she had helped to heap opprobrium on the sect in whose cause so short a time ago she would have died. The pa.s.sengers were Missourians, as was the captain. Among them went a whisper of chivalrous pity for her and of execration for the prophet and his followers.

"Madam," said the captain, "any lady as is escaping from those devils has the freedom of this boat, and no ticket required, as long as I'm in command. Isn't that so?" he asked of the crowd.

The murmur broke into an open chorus of enthusiastic speech.

Wild and deep as was her panting anger against Smith's oppression, Susannah shrank. The thought of profiting by this spirit of partisan hatred scorched her heart.

The Kentucky Governor, a dapper man, who had been regarding her with a temperate and critical eye, now, urged by her obvious distressed timidity, came forward.

"How did you get among the Mormons, may I ask?"

"My husband," faltered Susannah, "but he is dead."

It would appear that her words tallied with some conclusion he had been drawing concerning her, for without further parley Susannah found herself being led in a formal manner down the companion-way. The brief report which she had given of herself had preceded her through the boat.

She heard the pa.s.sengers whom she left on the deck making sentimental remarks. Two coloured girls who were washing dishes in a pantry came to its door and gasped with emotion as they stared at her. In the saloon the coloured waiters gaped.

At the farther end of the saloon a stout and magnificent lady in silk and diamonds was seated before innumerable viands which were spread in circles around her plate. She stopped eating while her husband presented Susannah. She alone of all upon the boat seemed to be overburdened by no surge of sentiment or curiosity. She was a most comfortable person.

Seated in safety beside her, Susannah could indulge the pent-up indignation of her outraged spirit in silent musings upon Smith's degradation and, the certain downfall of all righteousness under the new tyranny. And yet--and yet--the shock of the last few days, forcibly as it vibrated through all her nature, could not eradicate the sympathy of years--the memories of Hiram and Kirtland, Haun's Mill and the desperate winter's march. Justice, her old friend, now her inquisitor, said sternly, "It was in these scenes in which some lost life and some reason that these men lost their moral standards." But her heart cried, "Now that _I_ am insulted, I cannot forgive."

The words of the Governor's wife, cheerful, continuous, and not without diverting sparkle, were an unspeakable rest to Susannah, weary above all things of herself. Whether because of a strong undercurrent of tactful kindness, or in mere garrulity, the good lady's talk for some time flowed on concerning all things small, and nothing great, like the lapping of the river against the vessel's bows.

But at last her companion's situation grew upon her; she enlarged more than once upon her surprise at Susannah's advent, and her feelings of extreme relief that she was safely there.