No Good Deed 23

The ladies' accommodations went by the name of stateroom, and although that was a little grand, they certainly put mine own to shame. Whilst not so commodious as to permit the wielding of any feline with gusto, that was no handicap to the entertainment both ladies provided. Miss Shirley was most inventive in preserving her honour for any future husband and would have stood higher in my affections, had not her aunt surpassed all my expectations. From the moment she excoriated me for being an uppity nigger until - at the appropriate moment - she began bellowing out a tune unknown to myself but whose lyrics included 'Brothers will you meet me,' she seemed rapt in her own performance as a woman at the mercy of her own property. It seemed that if any such event might one day come to pass, the woman would gladly join the Abolitionist cause. I was reminded, not for the first time, that women were indeed strange creatures.

It was dusk as I made once more for the saloon bar. A pair of birds circled above; although of no great size, they had a predatory look. Suddenly, both made a dive towards me, I swept off my hat and began flapping it at them in a most undignified manner.

'Guess they liked your hat, brother.'

I did not divert my attention from the task in hand, at least until the report of a firearm sounded altogether too close to my ear. The birds flew off, alarmed but unharmed.

'Mississippi Kites, dang pests.'

I turned toward the owner of the voice. On noting his attire, it was with a sinking feeling that I realised I was in the company of such a one as I would cross an ocean to avoid. Viz. A clergyman ornithologist.

The man was tall and gaunt, thin-lipped as a banker. His attire was as black as sin; his thin and angular limbs gave him the look of a crow or one whose function was to scare them. Inevitably his hand was out, and I took it, dropping it quickly – for it was as clammy as a toad.

'Reverend Elijah Truecross, Southern Baptist Church, Cairo, Missouri, pleased to meet a Christian man aboard this ship of shame.'

'Anson Northrup, at your service.'

The Reverend's eyes slitted,

'No, suh, not at mine, nor God's,' and he gave me his back, a prospect marginally more pleasing to the eye than his front.

The saloon bar was as busy as I had yet seen it. I had hoped to engage Haycock in conversation, in the hope of coming to some arrangement to our mutual benefit, but there was no sign of him, or his cousin. The overgrown youth was there, but I felt he would prove an unreliable confederate. The only party to Duchamp's departure of this life was the large fellow with his malodorous cigar. Thankfully he was not yet seated at a card table, merely dwarfing his fellow drinkers at the bar, who gave him plenty of elbow room. Even so I watched him strike another drinker with that very joint, and the ensuing altercation gained the big man another bottle of whiskey to stand beside the quarter full exemplar in front of him. This might be the very fellow, I thought and I clapped him on the shoulder, hand of greeting out, ready,

'Anson Northrup, I wonder if I might have a word?'

He turned round very sharply and, if his handgun had been on the bar too, I thought I might have regretted disturbing him. He relaxed,

'The Britisher!' he said, then thrust his jaw toward me.

'Actually, nothing of the kind, an extended visit....'

'Sounds like a Britisher, hell if yuh don't look like one in that hat! Near as makes no difference to me. Caulfield McGraw, folks call me Cuffy.'

He took my hand at last and shook it hard. I jerked my head towards the entrance and we went out on deck.