Thrust From the Hand of God

By Jason S. Litz

One selfless act, one naïve decision, so innocent in the making, so condemning in effect, how foolish John had been not to expect trouble to follow. Murder or self-defense, what did it matter? One man was dead and another wanted revenge.
Having grown up with a silver spoon in his mouth, John is a young man who sets out on an adventure of self-discovery. His confidence is on the rise until a single failure in judgment sends him fleeing for his life. Wanted for murder, John’s flight carries him throughout a nation broken by war and stitched together by the transcontinental railroad. Along the way he encounters an array of colorful characters. Friend or enemy, mentor or tormentor, each will have a profound impact on John and his fate. Hounded by a mercenary posse, John must remain a step ahead to survive while waiting for a resolution he fears will never come.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jason S. Litz
• Release date: Feb 17, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311646798

Jason S. Litz

You are reading this bio either by accident or because you have an interest in my writing. The one thing about being an author that I have found uncomfortable is the request for a bio page everywhere I turn. I am generally a private person but more than that, I feel pretentious writing about myself simply because I am an author. That being said, I will provide a little insight. My father and his father were trim and door carpenters. They could do other carpentry but they specialized in the detail work. My dad was also a talented artist. My other grandfather was a mechanic in a civil service job, winning a number of awards for quality and innovation. I had one grandmother who retired from A&P and my mother was an elementary school teacher. Combine this DNA and you get me with too many interests for my own good. I particularly enjoy working with mechanical things and I can fix practically anything. I also build furniture when I have time and do my own home repair and remodeling work in most cases. Oh the list I could detail for you of all my interests but what they usually boil down to is frustration for not having enough hours in the day. However, two interests which have played key roles in my writing have been my love of travel and my passion for history. I have traveled the United States extensively and local history has often been my focus. There is something eerily compelling about standing in the midst of hushed voices in a museum or the twilight breeze across the desert or prairie... Excuse me, I was drifting into my imagination and if I don't stop now I might be get stuck there for a while. As for my writing, my mother had the most significant impact. As a kid I can remember she was always writing something and she won a few awards. It is because of her writing that the thought of me as a writer seemed reasonable. I wrote a few short stories and about half a novel in high school but I allowed life to pull me away from it. It wasn't until several years ago when I had one of the most vivid and unique dreams that I began to get serious about writing. Out of nowhere I dreamt the key points of the plot for Thrust From the Hand of God and the rest of that story fell into place as if by supernatural means. I know that many people these days do not believe in God and Christ seems to be on the public enemy list but I do feel God gave me this story and I credit any success it has to Him. I do not write Christian Fiction but I do not write smut either. My goal is that any reasonable reader will enjoy my work, be entertained by it and learn something in the process. I am a firm believer that a book should teach you something. For instance, Thrust From the Hand of God has a lot of great history wrapped into it but don't worry, it is painless, I promise. After all, what good is any work of fiction if it does not first entertain? Since that fateful dream I have had several others like it, each providing me with the core of another unique story. The list of stories spans several genres and it is my desire to write them all. For now, I humbly ask you to give Thrust From the Hand of God a chance. Based solely on the feedback I have received I do believe you will be pleasantly surprised.

Book preview

Prologue of the Expelled

John’s heart drummed and his broken nose throbbed to the frantic rhythm. The same bass drum pounded in his ears, which bristled between beats. The cotton beneath him was firm but provided welcomed cushion under his elbows. The burlap wrap of one bale scratched at his side where his disheveled shirt left him exposed. Had John been a few weeks earlier, he would have been buried inside a megalith of cotton stacked three decks high, obscuring everything above the waterline except for the pilot house and chimney tops, but this run to New Orleans was lighter and the roustabouts capped his hideout with only a single course of bales. The clean, almost fragrant scent of the cotton and the earthy odor of the burlap permeated the air, as did the fine particles of lint which filled his nostrils and chafed his throat with every nerve-stuttered breath.

John cocked his head to one side, trying unsuccessfully to align both his eyes and his nose with the crack between the bales. Through it he managed to scavenge a humid but cooler breath of river breeze, smelling pleasantly of mud and algae. With his right eye pressed to the corner of a cotton bale, his left eye browsed the narrow scene the makeshift loophole afforded him. Movement behind a short stack of crates grabbed John's attention. His pursuer was aboard, creeping about and poking the muzzle of his pistol in every niche. The man paused along John’s periphery to scan the deck for hiding places sufficient in size to conceal the young man he hunted. The stranger spun slowly, his body led by his murderous gaze. When he stopped he was staring squarely at John’s hideout. John jerked his face back into the darkness. Had he been seen? Did John make eye contact or did the distance play a cruel joke?

The man stepped to his right, out of view but not out of the scene. Indelicate boot clops from an ungraceful man’s attempt at stealth were John’s only warning of danger. They continued to his left until the heap of crates ended then turned and started toward him, gaining purpose.

One selfless act, one naïve decision, so innocent in the making, so condemning in effect — how foolish John had been to not expect trouble to follow. Murder or self-defense, what did it matter? One man was dead and another wanted revenge. Perhaps he would soon have it.

John’s conscience chastised him. At home he had everything, so why had he felt the need to leave in the first place? Now it looked like he would lose it all and with his passing might go the family business. His brother was in no shape to manage it and how long would it be before illness took his father? Then there was Melissa. He had lost her, he had found her and now was he to forfeit her for eternity? So far-reaching was one choice.

With no weapon but his fists and no means of escape, all John could do was pray. Encased against a wall by four-hundred-pound bales of cotton, there would be no fight or flight, only cowering helplessly in the dark.

The footsteps came to a halt mere inches from John, followed by the distinctive triple click of an Army Colt’s hammer.

~ I ~

Like Father, Like Son

Life is a journey that is often mapped out but seldom ever followed. Though we start on course, detours inevitably intrude, leading us down paths we never imagined and to destinations we never considered. Sometimes these changes in our itinerary are unwelcome. Hopefully, more often than not, these changes are blessings. Looking back at our deviations, which at the time seemed to send us backward or in circles, some prove to be blessings in disguise; the work of the Lord Himself, the only one high enough to see the road far ahead. That is not to say we will find our destination to be the same one we had plotted but hopefully one that is equally satisfying. With the help of the Lord it can be a destination beyond any we had dared hope to reach.

The letter was dated July 1845. It was written by his grandfather to his father twenty-five years ago; seven years before John’s birth. It had been tucked away in a safe deposit box with other important papers and was discovered by John’s father as intended, upon the death of its author. Meant as encouragement to John’s father, the letter summed up the life of his grandfather. This paragraph was all that remained of the letter. The apologies and regrets, the personal advice, the do’s and don’ts, they were lost or sentimentally hidden away long ago. Those pieces of the letter had been too difficult to bear, a sad reminder of John’s grandfather.

One other line from the letter’s missing pages had been copied along the left margin. It read, Son, never be foolish with what the Lord has provided, never gamble or live beyond your means so that you may never lose what you have worked so hard to gain. John’s father, William, had rewritten it there to always remind him… never make the same mistakes.

More than reassurance to William, who carried the scrap of paper in his vest pocket throughout his early days on the river, the letter was the spark that ignited his passion to make his own way in the world. Now it lay safely in a wooden box in the top drawer of William’s bureau where it was meant to remain private, but John had found it as a child while rummaging through his parents’ things as children are prone to do.

John folded the weathered page and carefully put it back, trying to conceal his intrusion. He and his brother Thomas knew the story behind the letter and John often snuck upstairs to read it. Its words he knew by heart, but there was just something which stirred him about holding the tattered page yellowed with time.

John was almost eighteen years old, one summer from being the same age his father was when he left Richmond on his journey west. Unlike his father William, who left home with a few clothes and built a small shipping empire by hard work and providence, John was born into planter society where he needed nothing and wanted for little. There was no need for him to go off to seek his fortune or adventure but then there were the idolic images his father’s story had built in his mind as a child.

Was it a young man’s need for adventure or the need to affirm he was his own man that haunted John more? Inspired by his father’s tale, in John’s daydreams he played the leading role and the stories had many bold endings all of which proved John triumphant over the surrounding world. That was as a boy but now John was reaching the age when fantastic stories from his imagination were giving way to more serious plans.

It was more than just his father’s broad build and Black Dutch features or his temper, slow to kindle and hard to snuff, which John inherited. There was something further to give him a unique connection with William. Like his father, John did not want to live his life based off another man’s success. Even if he did not need to prove it to those around him, John needed to prove to himself he could make it on his own. Sure, in time he would take over his father’s shipping business and the plantation, but first he had to know he could survive and even prosper if the silver spoon had not been his at birth.

Downstairs the maid was humming to herself as she set the dining room table. All the windows were open in the house, inviting the cool spring breeze in as the guest of honor. John stepped out the back door to what smelled like the fragrance of adventure. It was the invigorating scent of spring, whose source cannot be pinpointed but whose effect on a man is like none other. For John it was like fuel on a hot flame.

Weeks passed yet he was still trying to decide what to do. He had seen what the river offered all the way to the gulf as well as some miles north. His current internal debate was whether to go west to the frontier or maybe north to see if the stories he had heard of frigid winter weather were true. The West was wild and certainly full of adventure; it was also full of deserts, cutthroats, Indians and a number of dead adventure seekers. Though spring did not follow quite the same calendar in the South as it did in the North, it was soon to arrive above the Mason-Dixon; the rise in the river said the snow melt up north had begun.

North versus west; both held compelling arguments for and against, and after days of self-consultation he decided to go east. Alabama and Georgia probably held more in common with home and because of it they would give him a familiar start to his first solo journey. If this did not suit him, he could always travel north from there to Virginia to visit relatives, some of whom he had never met, and then from there go west to California on the recently completed Transcontinental Railroad while passing over the rowdier territories. In truth there was one place near Chattanooga which held his interest with morbid intrigue. How to explain this to his mother and make her understand? How could she? Of course he would not mention Chattanooga to her because it would pain her unnecessarily.

John’s older brother Thomas followed the 24th Mississippi Infantry to Georgia in search of adventure but soon discovered the building blocks of adventure were tedium and terror. Late in November 1863, at the Battle of Lookout Mountain, a small piece of shrapnel hit Thomas low in his back. It sank deep in his flesh and lodged against his spine, making doctors afraid to operate, concerned surgery would cause more damage. Though he survived the wound, his legs remained useless.

The family was told the boy’s spine was traumatized but not severed and results were difficult to anticipate. John often wondered if it was self-pity weighing down his brother’s legs. Thomas spent most afternoons confined to a chair on the front porch. Two of the field hands carried him in and out of the house each day. Now Thomas’ adventurous fantasies consisted modestly of walking through the orchards surrounding the house. At night, the men would carry him up to his bedroom where Thomas would stare at the ceiling from his bed.

John walked down the hill, speaking to all the workers in the barn and workshops. All were ex-slaves and most knew John’s father as their master prior to the war’s end. Now they worked the land and kept up the house for room and board along with a wage or a share in the crops if they worked the fields. Only three of the family’s former slaves left after the war.

Many in the South who had something to lose lost it, and John’s father had been hurt financially by the war but enough of his small empire remained intact to rebuild. He managed to keep at least one boat operating at all times and the farm planted. This was not just good for William’s family, it offered all of his former slaves a chance to remain as paid workers so they would not have to wander about in search of work. These newly freed men understood what William was trying to rebuild and asked little of him. Having a place to sleep and a meal on the table meant the most and William had been good to them. Some freedmen left their former masters, if for no reason other than to exercise their freedom to prove to themselves it was real. For some freedmen, uneducated as they were, travel was a gamble and still others were considered as part of their former master’s family and therefore stayed on with them. William Thornton’s family was an exception in that the war had not turned their world upside down.

From the pasture past the barn, John spied his father riding his horse along the oak-lined front drive up to the house. William had hitched a ride on one of his boats for a meeting in New Orleans and made it home for supper one week later. John walked back to the stables eager to see his father. He took hold of the bridle as his father dismounted.

Well, John, I see you held the farm together while I was gone this week, William bragged through a wry smile.

Yep, all by myself. I planted the back field, shoed three horses and painted the house. John grinned and looked over at George who was the foreman on the farm and longtime friend of his father.

George smiled and came over to relieve John of his father’s horse. It’s the truth, yes suh, me and the boys been settin’ in the shade ev’ry day figurin’ how we’s gonna keep our jobs since we ain’t needed no mo’. A heavy grin stretched from ear to ear as George played along.

Well, George, don’t you worry none, I expect we can find something for y’all to do. Besides, John here’ll be going to college pretty soon. We’ll need a couple dozen men to take his place when he goes. William slapped George on the shoulder in jest and affection.

Oh, that’s good ta heah suh, good ta heah. George could not help but carry a laugh with him into the stable.

Though John was the author of the joke, he only smiled a bit. The remark about him attending college had pushed his mind back to the problem of explaining his plans to his mother and it seemed he would have to explain it to his father as well.

Is it supper time yet? William put his arm on his son’s shoulders.

Must be close, I just saw Mary setting the table.

Good, let’s go eat. I’ve been wantin’ some of Kate’s cornbread all week. The two of them started back toward the house.

After a round of greetings for William, the family sat together at the table. Among the conversation was William’s description of his trip. Looks like we will be getting a new boat after all. William looked boastful. James Rees has begun building it and we should have it later this year. That will give me some time to find a suitable captain.

The new sternwheeler would fill the last void in the fleet left by one of the two vessels William lost running supplies and troops for the Confederates. Soon four Thornton riverboats would ply the Mississippi River.

So John, it’s time you started working with me learning the business so you can take it over one day, William spoke in haste and excitement over his news.

William! exclaimed John’s mother, Elizabeth, who commanded attention. We agreed John would attend college before getting involved with the business.

Yes, I know but he won’t leave for school till the fall. Do you expect him to just sit in the house until then?

I just don’t want him getting attached to it the way you are and not want to go to school.

Well, I certainly hope he does get attached to it. If he doesn’t there’s little point then, is there? A hint of offense colored William’s voice. And how can you say that I am too attached to the business? I’ve put everything I have into it to build it and then rebuild it and never once have I neglected this family!

William’s reply pricked Elizabeth but he had not raised his voice. Elizabeth was a petite woman, beautiful but with a fiery temper to rival her husband’s. Physically she posed no harm to William but her words pierced his soul.

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean you were too attached. I just know that if John were as attached as you he would never leave it. I hope he does get that way but not until after school.

Well, there is no reason for him to waste several months when he can learn so much. Besides— William was drowned out by his own terrible coughing.

This was not the first spell of near-convulsive hacking for William. Over the last few weeks he had fought with shortness of breath, coughing and fatigue. As this bout ended, it gave John the break in the conversation he was seeking.

Momma, I am looking forward to going to school and I do plan to go, but before I do I want to travel east, John blurted to his own surprise.

No! You’re going to school. If you want to go to school back east, then you pick where and we will send you but you are going to school.

But Momma, you’ve got to understand, I have to. I have to know that I can make it on my own. John feared where this conversation might lead.

You can live on your own at school. Now I don’t want to hear another word about it. His mother was stern and extremely determined. The family had money, but they did not have the formal education to go with it and she was determined John would.

I am not a child anymore. Living alone at school is not what I am talking about! Daddy, you should understand what I mean. I promise I’ll go to school and I promise I will come back to take up the business with you, but I have got to know that my existence is not based solely on your good fortune. John earnestly needed and wanted the support of his father.

Before William could answer, Elizabeth struck the table with the blunt end of her fork. I’ve had one son go off looking for adventure and you see what it got him. I’m not about to lose another. As soon as the horrible thing escaped her lips, Elizabeth clasped her hand over her mouth in shock and turned to stare pleadingly at Thomas. Oh, Thomas, I… I… I’m so sorry… Elizabeth twirled up and out of her seat and ran upstairs in tears.

John opened his mouth to speak, but his father just held up his hand and comfortingly said, Don’t worry… I’ll take care of it. You just finish eating and… he made a motion with his hand toward Thomas and darted his eyes from John to his brother and back again. John understood and nodded lightly as his father walked off to find Elizabeth.

Thomas sat in his chair and stared at the table. He had no more tears left for himself, they were spent long ago; neither could he excuse himself and politely step outside to be alone in his pity. He just sat there looking vacantly at the table. Anne, his wife, was seated to his right and she put her arm around him knowing there was no consolation she could give.

Anne was engaged to Thomas before the war, but when he returned crippled and with no way of reasonably supporting his family, everyone expected her to quietly bow out of the situation. She did not. Instead she married him with all the love she ever held for him. Anne was all that helped Thomas cope and yet there were times when it seemed he resented her for marrying him.

Elizabeth thought she knew her temper but the tamest of beasts sometimes bite. Her motherly fears were amplified for John because of Thomas. John held her dreams now and all of her hopes were on him.

After supper John went out onto the front porch. Anne took care of Thomas and there was little John could do that would not remind his brother of his problems. Perhaps if John had a girl, someone sweet and innocent to fret over him… maybe the love of a good woman could hold him but there had only been one girl who ever gripped John that strongly. For her he would have done anything but as with so many things, the war took her, though indirectly. He had lost her to a terrible riverboat accident. The boilers exploded, ripping apart and sinking the boat on which she and her family had taken passage, bound for St. Louis. The sorrow it brought had shaken his faith for a time and still slipped upon him now and then, to torture him.

With a heavy mind in tow John decided to walk to the village, what the family called the old slave quarters where the now freed workers still lived. It was a pleasant evening and the spring night air enveloped him like a soft old blanket. A few lightning bugs danced on the easy breeze and crickets serenaded with their age-old lullaby. John knew on such an evening he would be met in the village with a campfire and music, good distractions for an unsettled mind.

As John topped the small hill separating the main house from the village, he gazed over a cluster of weatherworn lapboard huts with door frames painted blue to keep out the haints. From a swept dirt field came the sound of a crackling fire and incomplete chords from a five-string guitar. John approached the fire and sat on a short piece of log standing on end; he knew he was always welcomed here. Many a boyhood evening had he spent in the village. Tonight was especially fine weather and everyone there was soaking it up, knowing hot, humid nights were soon to follow.

A bottle made its way around the fire to John; he had been drinking George’s homemade wine since he was nine, unbeknownst to his mother of course.

John, what you a lookin’ so down in the mouth for? Nanny Kate, George’s wife, asked with the concern of a mother. Her son Willy and John had found plenty of mischief growing up together. If apprehended, it was Nanny Kate’s stern lecture and firm hand they feared. She struggled but kept up the guise of a no-nonsense disciplinarian no matter the stunt, including the time the pair whitewashed the dog and again a few years later when the two read a story of brave, noble knights and Nanny Kate caught them in the back pasture on horseback with lengths of river cane under their arms, ready to joust.

I’m fine, John replied with the same lack of sincerity a son would when having a problem he pretended not to want to discuss.

Come on now, child. I’ve knowed you all yo’ life and I knows when you ain’t right.

My momma wants me to go to school more than anything else in this world, other than maybe Thomas to walk again. Daddy wants me to learn the business and is chomping at the bit for me to finish my obligation to my mother so he can get me on the river. John scribbled in the dirt with a stick as he spoke. I want both of those things but right now I need to go out and see the world and… well… I want to know whether or not I could make it on my own without my father’s good fortune.

You sound jus’ like my Willy. He’s been gone since the war ended. Last letter we got he was clean up ta Chicago or some such as that, Nanny Kate spoke in a proud, upbeat tone but it did not fully mask the sadness in her words.

During the war and before the Siege of Vicksburg, Willy ran away four times, each time fleeing toward the rumors of the Union Army. It was an uneasy period in the South. The war had made people concerned of slave uprisings as well as Yankee attacks. Each time Willy was captured, but upon the fourth incident the sheriff returned him accompanied by a message from some of the locals who found him, stating that if William could not control his slaves they would. If they captured Willy again, William would not get him back unless it was to bury him.

William let George handle it the first two times, but on the third William reluctantly locked Willy in an unused smoke house for a couple of days. The fourth and final time William knew what he must do and he hated it. George and Nanny Kate were longtime companions for William, and Willy was named after him. It was for Willy’s sake, William told himself, as he drug the stiff-necked teen into the barn by the twine binding his wrists. The first lick of the wide leather strop was out of concern for Willy. The boy’s luck was gone and the word was out. Someone would likely kill him next time. William’s emotions were uncorked with the first lash and the second was harder, not enough to draw blood but sufficient to bruise them both. The scolding from his neighbors chafed William’s pride, and he began to throw the weight of his embarrassment into the leather. Willy was bedridden for three days afterwards, too sore to move.

Neither George nor Kate held any true animosity against William, though the days following were tense and quiet. A brutal lashing from William was far better than what might await Willy the next time he ran. William had always treated George and his family much like free people, and Willy’s flights were only bucking the notion of being a slave. In retrospect, William would have preferred to set Willy free than whip him, but there was still Mississippi law with which to contend. William also threw all his boats into the defense of the Confederacy, and he received word the Union wanted him captured. No way would he have risked approaching Union soldiers to take a hotheaded slave boy off his hands. Whether or not there was another alternative was irrelevant, what was done was done. George and Kate were forgiving; their son was alive. Willy, however, held a bitter grudge and left the plantation as soon as the loss of the war afforded.

John liked Willy but the memory of that time made him uneasy. John said little for over an hour then slipped away back to the house and to bed where his thoughts picketed against sleep.

John woke with the dawn, not remembering losing the battle with sleep. Avoiding breakfast, John crept secretly out of the house and down to the stable. It was the Sabbath and the world was still. Birds sang hymns in the trees above and the dew glistened in reverence below. Nothing commanded as much respect as Sunday in the South. It was truly a day the Lord had made, and if you listened you could almost hear Him moving across the landscape, taking pleasure in His creation… reminding us of His presence.

John saddled his horse, Sunset, for a ride to the back side of the property. There lay a secluded pasture and a stream below it, ever gurgling toward the Mississippi. John felt peace in its solitude. As a child he spent many tranquil hours rambling its shady banks. Few others passed its way except for the occasional fisherman.

He fished all that morning and by noon had quite a catch. It was cold down in the woods near the stream; the mist rising from the water dampened everything, adding more bite to the chill. John built a fire on a flat piece of ground among low lying weeds. By two o’clock his fish were scaled and emptied. John put a sharp stick in each one’s mouth and leaned them over the fire with a log chocking the other end to keep them suspended over the low flame.

From across the pasture came the clop of hooves. John stood and eased the few steps to the edge of the tree line where he could peer through the curtain of bright spring foliage. The rider was John’s father, no doubt coming to give him a scolding for skipping church. John went back to tending his fish while his father dismounted and hitched his horse to a branch next to Sunset on the pasture’s edge.

How’d you know where to find me? John rotated his fish, his seclusion interrupted and his problems creeping back into his mind.

Where else would I have looked? You’re always here. We missed you in church this morning. The pastor asked if you were sick. I told him you weren’t feeling yourself. Those fish smell pretty good. Think you can spare one? William sat against a large oak, cradled between two mighty roots.

I suppose I could. Sorry I skipped church but I expect God is probably more apt to be out in these woods if He is anywhere.

Well, He’s in these woods for sure. He’s everywhere. But He’s in church too. Just as Jesus said, ‘Wherever two or more people gather in My name I will be there.’ God desires us to band together in worship. William was no perfect man but he had improved with time and a great deal of prayer.

Oh, I know. It’s just that sometimes I need to be alone with God, and it just happened that it was a Sunday morning this time. I meant no disrespect.

I know you didn’t. Don’t worry about it. There will be plenty more Sundays. William hesitated for a moment then said, I talked to your mother last night for a spell. You were right, I do understand what it is you’re after. Maybe, just maybe, I’ve gotten her to understand too.

John’s eyes widened with anticipation; he had held no expectation for what he just heard, not after last night. John was attentive now, no longer turning the fish out of nervous habit.

She definitely still wants you to go to school and I want you to work with me, but I suppose there is no rush. There’s more than three months before school would even start, add that in along with waiting until next year and you’ve got at least fourteen months available. Besides, if something happened to me I know you would come right on home. You’ve got enough knowledge of the business to take over in an emergency, and there are several men who know nearly as much as I do and who practically run it for me anyway, all good, trustworthy fellas. Most have been with me since I started a quarter of a century ago. William paused in contemplation. Lord only knows where the time’s gone. William realized he was letting sentiment lead him off track and he pushed himself up straight between the roots. Anyway, you have our consent to go out and see the world. Just don’t forget about us poor folks back home.

Thanks. I will probably be so homesick I won’t know what to do. I promise I will be back soon. I’ll go to school as close as possible so I can be home as often as I can. John handed his father the largest fish.

Smells good— Coughing racked his father and choked his words.

You sick?

Yeah, umm… I’ll be good in a second.

It seems to be getting worse.

I don’t think it’s any worse. Your mama keeps hounding me to see a doctor. Maybe I’ll go just so she’ll leave me alone. What say we do some fishing after we eat? Maybe we can get up a big enough catch for supper.

Sounds good.

The two fished the rest of the afternoon. John’s mind went wild with thoughts of adventures he might have. Nervousness over the solo trip began to be a new problem but John welcomed it. What was an adventure without a little nervous anticipation? John could not believe he was going and without a fight.

Such is our common misfortune; we sometimes get what we want.

~ II ~

The Journey Begins

John spent the next week close to his mother’s side in part because his father asked him to but also due to a bout of pre-travel homesickness. In the evenings, after his mother went to bed, John would rummage through his father’s old war maps. He planned a route headed northeast across Mississippi and Alabama. Never had he intended his entire route to be by horseback; he had ticket money saved for when a riverboat looked more appealing than a saddle. When he reached the Tennessee River it would be a good chance to rest his horse and his posterior by boarding a riverboat to the burgeoning city of Chattanooga.

Once he satisfied his curiosity, if indeed it was satiable, perhaps it was better to decide each leg of the journey in its own time. The maps were full of mountains, streams, swamps, all corralled by the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. Instead of presenting a single superior itinerary, the maps served to remind the carefree wanderer of all the possibilities missed.

The following Sunday found John in church as was expected. That afternoon, full of Sunday dinner, John packed his saddlebags with all he planned to carry. A couple changes of clothes, powder and ball for his pistol, a picture of his family and a small Bible were packed carefully away. The hours drug along; it was the longest day John had ever known. Eventually night fell and John lay in his bed praying for sleep but his excitement would not let him rest. His mind alternated between the wondrous adventures he would have and the worry of being alone. Just riding his horse along an unknown road would be a great adventure, something dreaded by most men as a waste of time but for John it was an offense not to savor every step.

To his surprise, the sun caught John sleeping. The solemnness of breakfast centered on his mother who remained quiet, including the clink of her silver to china which seemed muted. When she did speak, it was to correct the table manners of John or his brother. Even their father William was not immune to her scolding. When she reprimanded him for having his elbow on the table, William’s anxiety lashed back at her. Dammit woman, I’m a grown man and I paid for this table and I’ll put my elbow on it if I please!

Regret hit William before his mouth stopped moving. He knew what was on his wife’s mind and, in an odd attempt to both smooth out his comments and bolster her faith in her boys, William added, You ought not to worry them either. They’re both grown men now and we raised them right. If one of ’em wants to hold his knife in his right hand while he eats with his fork in his left then so be it! They know right from wrong, including when to be on their best manners.

For certain, John should know his manners well. Rarely did a social function, Sunday morning pew or meal go by when his mother did not have a comment on his etiquette. John should be able to write a book on the subject, but he could not help resisting her refinements to his character, a natural trait of most boys which some men never lose.

John said little as his mother was by now teary-eyed. After breakfast, he walked out on the front porch with his saddlebags slung over his shoulder. The one instance John had been away from home for an extended period was when his father gathered everyone and put them aboard a boat as the Union regiments positioned their troops for the Siege of Vicksburg. Left alone, George remained to care for the property; free or slave he was the one man William knew he could trust. What a relief it had been to return to find George and the house unscathed. No doubt John’s mother was looking ahead to the day John would return home.

John flopped the saddlebags across a rocking chair, stepped down off the porch and looked back to breathe in his home once more as a pearl diver takes in a breath of air to go to the ocean floor. The large Federal columns along the porch stood as sentries to the house. Lining the front avenue stood patriarchal oak trees with long mossy beards. Beyond the avenue on either side and under the watchful eyes of the elder oaks stood adolescent pecan orchards planted a year after the war ended. To the left of the front walk lay his mother’s rose garden. She enjoyed it more than any other part of the plantation, and when she was not tending to it she loved to sit and rock on the porch overlooking it. The patchwork of color it provided extended into the house via crystal vases in nearly every room. To the right of the house began a pasture which tumbled over low rolling hills toward the bayou. The stable and workshops stood at a distance from the house, separated by a long, gradual slope. Beyond was the village.

George approached, leading John’s horse saddled and ready. George was a fine specimen of a man with a good heart. Well, Mista John, you’s ready to go out inta the world? We’s shore gonna miss ya ’round here.

John smiled back at George, at a loss for what to say that would not hang in his throat. When John’s father and mother stepped out onto the porch, George glanced their way and spied John’s saddlebags, retrieved them from the chair and strapped them to the saddle while John spoke to his family.

William eased down the steps toward John carrying a long wooden box. He turned back toward the porch and set the box on the top step and spoke as he unhooked the two brass latches. I don’t think you have ever seen this; it has been stowed away in my office for years.

Inside was a huge leather sheath with a beautiful black wooden handle protruding from it. John gripped the handle and gave it a tug. Shyly a long blue blade emerged; it was a Bowie knife and the finest piece of cutlery John had ever seen.

William smiled at his son’s astonished look. It was my old captain’s. It’s the knife he’d have killed me with the night of the card game. I wore it and still do any time I am piloting the river, generally under my left arm inside my coat. Most captains keep a knife as a sidearm and I learned why that same night; knives don’t misfire, and they still cut when wet. I keep a knife with me... just in case.

John studied the glint of the steel and the deadly beauty of this work of art. The blade was almost a foot long and the handle six inches. Tight ripples of color ran the length of the blade, iridescent shades of blue and purple like drops of oil on water. Eight inches from the hilt the blade’s spine was clipped to quickly meet the edge of the blade. The two edges were one, with no break in their line and sharp as any razor. The handle tapered wider to the butt and the blade was more than two inches wide and a quarter inch thick.

You’ve got my old Colt, don’t you? John nodded that he did. Even with it at my side I always carried that Bowie with me on the river. I’ve always tried to learn from others’ mistakes, including those of my old captain. I can still see him standing in the door with the knife in his hand. One of the fellas who started the whole mess pulled out an old Walker-Colt but all we heard was the snap of the cap. The captain laughed at him and told him he ought to fire that thing from time to time because his powder was damp. Then the captain came after us with this very knife. He was a bear of a man… Anyway, you keep both with you but stay out of trouble. Don’t travel at night and be wary of people. There’s a lot of meanness roving about these days, William warned though he trusted John to be safe.

Here’s two hundred dollars. William handed his son a leather pouch. This should help you if you meet hard times. I don’t want you getting stuck so far from home and not be able to get back. This should buy you a boat ride back if necessary and you keep it for that reason… and hide it!

John nodded and coughed up a thank you. The air smelled heavy with approaching rain and to the west an ominous black cloud slowly cast its shadow in his direction. It was needless to wait until the storm passed; it was spring and there would be another storm tomorrow.

His mother stood leaning forward against a column peering out from behind it at the men below her feet. She had promised herself she would not cry today, not until John was gone. John walked up the steps and hugged his mother.

Where is Thomas? Is he not going to see me off?

Thomas had a bad night last night, the dreams again. Anne is taking care of him. His mother managed to hold herself together.

Thomas was prone to nightmares for which Anne was his sole confidant. From what little she told the family, it was assumed the nightmares were of his last battle and injury but Anne was not completely open with the family. She saw herself as the protector of Thomas and what Anne said regarding Thomas was gospel. Anne performed her duty so well even Thomas’ mother let her be and pried no further, to the surprise of everyone. If the truth be known, it was the only way his mother could cope.

Tell him I will write. John was sad not to see his brother wishing him well, but he knew the best thing was to leave him to Anne’s care. Not so long ago John used to admire his brother, whom he thought could do no wrong. Thomas was strong, brave and more importantly determined. In the years since the war John’s admiration for Thomas had slipped into pity. It was not that Thomas lost the use of his legs; it was that Thomas gave up trying.

John stepped back down off the porch, took the reins from George and then grabbing a large tuft of mane in his left hand, stuck the ball of his left foot in the stirrup and stepped up into the saddle gracefully. George threw a hand up to shake John’s goodbye.

William walked over to the horse and put his hand on John’s knee and leaned in toward John. In a soft voice he said, Write often so your mother won’t worry so much… So I won’t worry so much.

John smiled and promised to do as his father asked. The distant rolling of thunder, long and low, caught everyone’s attention. John’s mother looked at him with pleading eyes. Hadn’t you ought to wait until the storm passes? Maybe go tomorrow instead?

His mother knew as well as he that this was just an excuse to hold him another day. This time of year the weather was either stormy or suspect to be.

I’ll be fine. John ran his fingers through his hair, pulling it from his forehead and pinning it there with a threadbare piece of gray wool vaguely resembling a confederate cap. He gave his last goodbyes and, with a tug of his left hand, guided the horse toward the mossy canopy and down the avenue of oaks.

The first few steps of this journey had not been too bad, he thought. Maybe it will all be a series of steps forward, none more or less eventful than any other. A little adventure would be nice though. John assured himself he would most likely be sick of adventure before he saw these oak trees again. Near the end of the avenue, the last place he would be able to see his front porch, John turned to give one final wave goodbye. His family returned the solemn gesture, including Thomas, who sat in front of an upstairs window with a silent hand in the air.

The black cloud was gaining on him. Maybe if he hurried along it would go north a bit and he would stay dry on his first day out. Turning back to the road, he spurred his horse into a trot. Calm began to return to him with increased distance. Goodbyes were tough but once he was on his way the excitement began to cheer him. Each mile he traveled looked like the mile before, but it did not matter. What mattered was John was now on his own, alone except for the occasional passing carriage or rider and the cows grazing in pastures here and there.

The low rumble of thunder behind him began to creep up slowly, the sound like that of cannon in the distance. John had mixed emotions about missing the war. Perhaps it had been his one chance at glory and adventure, but at the same time his brother’s wound quenched a bit of that fire. Everyone watched the clean and pressed troops march off to the beat of a drummer and everyone saw them stagger or be carried back home with stained shirts and souls; missing limbs, life or hope. John knew a little of what war was like. Having accompanied his father into Vicksburg once the Yanks moved out, John never imagined destruction like what he saw there. In his mind, war was fought on open fields amongst brave and noble men. The canvas in his head had not been painted to include rotten horse carcasses lying in the roads or malnourished soldiers and citizens enduring months of shelling. It did not include ancient ruins, which upon closer examination, proved to be the fragments of modern cities. As grotesque as it might be, John’s secondhand picture of war was incomplete. He had been spared many horrors; for instance, what picture could ever describe the stench of death, carnage and spent powder which blanketed a well-used battlefield?

Philosophical thoughts on war were cut short as the cannon barrage he imagined became distinct, violent claps of thunder. John’s horse, Sunset, flapped her ears back and forth wildly as the thunder surrounded them on three sides. John looked across a pasture the instant a bolt of lightning speared a huge oak near the opposite tree line. Several cows lay still under the false shelter of its canopy and John prayed for their safety and his. The wind began to gust, nearly taking his cap while trees bowed in obedience. Fearing he might be next, John searched the horizon for any signs of a farmhouse but there was nothing. He had passed through a small town short of five miles back, but that was too far now and on the wrong side of danger. John gave Sunset a nudge in the flanks with the heel of his boot, and the horse was more than happy to oblige. Sunset lurched into a gallop but John knew they would not outrun the weather.

The menacing cloud dimmed the sun and painted the countryside in a green hue. Rounding a bend, John saw a road branching off to the right and a small cotton house a couple hundred yards away. He led Sunset off the main road as a tremendous clap of thunder cracked directly behind them. Sunset threw her ears back and lurched down the road at breakneck speed straight to the storehouse. The bottom fell out as the doors shut behind them. All four walls, the floor and even the rafters were littered with tufts of cotton skewered to splinters along the rough sawn boards. So deafening was the downpour, the overhead thunder was all that pierced its roar. Terrifyingly monotonous, the wind came as one long gust, wailing around the corners and whistling under the door. It made the barn shudder and creak and drove the rain in through the cracks in the siding. The intruding gale created a blizzard of cotton lint swirling round and round in the dim light inside the little building. John pulled his cap down to cover his nose and mouth while holding tightly to Sunset’s reins, stroking her muzzle to calm her.

Five minutes later the storm was gone as abruptly as it appeared. The sun shone brighter as though the clouds had polished it. The remaining clouds filtered its glow, casting a vivid yellow tint on everything. John opened the door to the cotton house and was met by a thick, soggy stillness. A flurry of white accompanied them as he and Sunset stepped out of the building. The humidity put a strain on breathing and the early afternoon sun worked diligently to pull the fallen rain back up into the air, making the temperature feel ten degrees warmer. John led Sunset to the main road. Everything was clean and quiet save for the sound of dripping in the fresh canopy above.

Not being particularly superstitious, John paid no mind to the faint notion this storm was a harbinger of a troubled venture. What if it was, did it matter? He had ridden it out safely and kept mostly dry doing it. In fact the next few days were uneventful, bordering on dull. As he made his way into the mountains, the odd scenic view would hold John’s muddy-river attention as would a waterfall or crystal clear and swift running brook. It was not until he arrived in Decatur, Alabama, on the banks of the Tennessee River that his sense of adventure was aroused.

It was afternoon but John was cautious entering the saloon; he knew it did not take much for one drunk to shoot another and then not remember why. The first clue of an empty room was the hollow echo of clinking bar glasses. Behind the bar a stout barmaid was organizing the cleaner glasses onto shelves underneath. All the tables were empty except for one near the end of the bar that was cluttered with two loafers playing chess. The corner behind them was filled with an upright piano and decorated with broadsides from the theater down the street. Their bottom edges were faded and tattered by inebriated shoulders and hands, as was the varnish across the chair backs where filthy fingers gripped them tightly to support many a drunken sing-along.

Ma’am, do you know when the next boat leaves for Chattanooga? John asked politely as he moved closer to the bar.

Simp McGhee is due in any time and I know he’ll leave out for Chattanooga tomorrow morning at nine. Won’t none get you there faster. The barmaid replied easily, surprising John who had expected a much feistier answer.

You best like living dangerously son, if you’re gonna ride with Simp. The loafer facing the bar felt the need to interject, more likely out of his own amusement than any concern for John.

You hush up! Everybody knows Simp’s the best captain on the Tennessee. The barmaid responded briskly with an implied sense of the threat of violence.

Well, who’s crazy enough to argue that he ain’t? The loafer came back on the ready and turned his eyes to John. Son, I’ve seen him fight a duel on the river with a cannon. I was here when they exchanged words. See, what happened was Simp saw this other boat nearing the dock but Simp was in a hurry and didn’t want to wait his turn so he gave it hell and cut the other boat off—

You watch what stories you tell around here or I’ll cut you off. The barmaid’s polite demeanor was not wasted on the loafer but she had plenty to spare for John. Don’t you pay him any mind. Simp’s a goodhearted fella and the best on the river, never had an accident.

The loafer was quiet this time, it was his move and he did not recollect how his opponent came to possess his knight and king’s bishop. Regarding these two chess players there was a known story accompanied by rumor fueled by conjecture. Not one to pass up gossip or a chance to share it, the barmaid filled John in on the two vagrants over there as she understood it.

The two men had worked on a sternwheeler farther down river but one dark night a boiler blew. As boiler explosions go it was tame, for the vessel stayed afloat long enough to catch fire and all survived except those men in the boiler room. The clerk managed to save the moneybox and the watchman managed to save the clerk. The moneybox did eventually settle at the river’s bottom but not before the pair of rescuers pulled from it anything that would spend. The only absolute facts were the boat had burned and sunk and the two men were alive, beyond these the story could change depending on who told it.

Afterward, every man burdened by surviving the accident had to find a new job. The clerk and the watchman decided to look for work up river. Decatur marked their second town and sixth week as professional loafers. Between the two, the loquacious watchman seemed to horde all the personality, but what the reserved clerk lacked in affable tonnage he made up for in taking account of a good opportunity to cheat and get away with it.

The watchman was alternating a stern glare from the clerk to the pieces he captured and back, foolishly expecting a confession when a steam whistle blew.

There comes Simp now, the barmaid claimed triumphantly.

Yeah, speak of the devil, the loafing watchman bellowed, more interested in his stake in the conversation than the mysterious movement of his chess pieces.

You better watch yourself or’ll run you outta here, the barmaid replied.

You can’t be treating paying customers like that, the watchman snapped back, unaware his queen was slipping into jeopardy.

You’ve been nursing that same beer all afternoon and you still haven’t paid for it. Putting the big-mouthed watchman in his place, the barmaid turned and mumbled where only John heard, I can’t let him talk bad about Simp in his own place.

So Simp owns this saloon? John asked.

Yeah and he’ll be along later but first he’ll stop off at Kate’s place. There was a peculiar friendliness in the barmaid’s voice when she spoke to John, almost affectionate, both motherly and flirtatious.

Is that another saloon? The question was John’s effort to further a conversation which was not altogether unpleasant, though perhaps a little uncomfortable.

It’s a sporting house Simp set Kate up with… She looked up to gauge John’s reaction but instead of blushed cheeks or carnal eyes the barmaid found mild puzzlement in John’s face so she clarified. A brothel.

John raised his head in one big nod and tried to treat it as normal conversation to keep his color even. When the barmaid was done with the glasses, she took a break and chatted him up over a beer he did not request. Their talk was pleasant and in it the barmaid learned John’s family was in the shipping business on the Mississippi.

The watchman turned loafer had a keen prying ear and jumped in uninvited. I bet he’s never seen a stretch of water like the chute. Don’t expect they have such as that on the Mississippi.

Didn’t I tell you to hush up? bawled the barmaid.

Well, the young man ought to know what he’s in for if he’s going to ride with Simp up the chute. Genuine concern gently laced the watchman’s gossip.

The chute ain’t no match for Simp. You quit trying to stir up trouble or you’ll be doing it in the gutter. The barmaid then turned back to John. Excuse me a few minutes. I’ve got to bring some things in from the back. Don’t pay that fool any mind. The barmaid left by a door near the end of the bar next to the corner piano. John began to take stock in the rest of the room when the loafer sidled up alongside him.

No pilot runs the chute. They snub the boats through with a steam wench but not Simp! He’s gonna blow a boiler one day doing that. Don’t listen to her. I know she paints me to be a fool but I’ve been on the river for twenty years. I tell ya, some folks like Simp and some folks don’t, but not a one will be surprised the day his boat explodes. John did not know what to make of the watchman’s warning but the stories did not end there. This one time Simp got to feudin’ with another captain about something or other which turned into a duel to be commenced from the decks of their respective boats. The other captain had no idea what he was in for. He walked out on deck to find Simp bearing down on him with a cannon and little river separating him from it.

The watchman carried on until the sound of clanking bottles announced the barmaid’s return, at which the watchman quickly slunk back to what remained of his chess game. The barmaid walked in, set a small wooden crate on the bar and began sorting its contents. John considered asking her if the stories held any merit but he knew it would start an argument between the barmaid and the loafer. Though John had grown up hearing wild tales of river men, he also knew old-timers like the watchman felt a certain obligation for funning a young man. Soon the barmaid leaned back to peer out the end window then turned to a beer keg, poured a glass of beer and put it on the bar, followed by a bowl full of beer she set on the floor in front.

Why are you putting beer on the floor? John could not help but ask.

Yonder comes Simp, the barmaid replied.

In a moment the door swung open and in stepped a dark-haired, potbellied man and a pig.

~ III ~

Simp McGhee

Have a good trip I hope? the barmaid asked the potbellied man as he followed the pig across the room to the bar.

Good as any. How are things around here, Pricilla? I see those two are still cheating each other and nursing beer, came the reply from the potbellied man, referring to the clerk and watchman who pretended to pay him no notice.

Pricilla, the barmaid, nodded sarcastically then pointed to John in a change of subject. Simp, this is John… Thornton? John gave her confirmation and she continued, His family runs a shipping operation out of Vicksburg, and he’s off on a bit of a ramble and was heading up to Chattanooga and I told him there was no better captain to travel with.

A faint huff of condemnation rose from the chess board. The watchman’s eyes swung open wide at the turn of Pricilla’s head in his direction. The audibility of his disfavor surprised even him and quickly the watchman snapped at the clerk for an imaginary infraction to hide his own indiscretion. Pricilla let the matter go.

Simp lowered the beer glass from his mouth, wiped the foam from the dark mustache dividing his round face then thrust a friendly hand to