Dorothy Garlock - [Annie Lash 03] (10 page)

Around them in the clearing lay broken limbs and uprooted saplings. After the heat of the day, the air was cold on their wet bodies. As they walked back through the grove toward the river, the sun, low in the west, broke through, but it offered no warmth.

Eli joined them as they reached the bank above the sandbar, which was completely covered with swiftly moving river water. The flatboat had been struck by a sawyer. The top of a submerged tree was embedded in the muddy bottom of the river and a long strong limb jutted up hard and sharp through the bottom of the flatboat, thrusting it upward. Impaled like a butterfly on a pin, the raft thrashed about on the swift current. A foot of brown river water sloshed to and fro on the aft deck. The steering oar was gone. Two of the stout poles the men had sunk into the river bottom to help secure the boat were broken.

“Bloody hell!” Eli swore.

“Don’t worry, Eli. It can be fixed. Light will know what to do,” Maggie said soothingly and placed her hand on his arm.

Light’s face was expressionless when he looked down at his wife. Maggie seldom touched anyone, and here she was stroking the arm of this man.

Eli appeared to be charmed. His expression held a mixture of awe and admiration. He lifted his eyes to Light’s face.
The man knew of his desire for his wife.
Their eyes locked for a long moment, then Eli moved away and waded through the water to the boat.

The multitude of vultures and other river fowl that perched along the riverbank turned their backs to the sun and stretched their wings to dry. The deluge upriver had filled the creeks that flowed into the Missouri. The brown and muddy river raced on, carrying uprooted trees and broken branches. Dead logs pried from the sand and gravel bars along the river joined the parade.

The front of Eli’s boat was tilted upward. River water washing over the stern had not yet reached the shed. Light and Maggie’s packs were above water. Light pulled a dry blanket from his pack, wrapped it about Maggie and cautioned her to stay near the shed lest the boat lurch suddenly and she need to grab onto it.

Eli met the threat of disaster to his boat with calm. He knew it would not immediately sink. Its buoyancy depended on the thick timbers of which it was constructed. But strong and as tight as it was, it would not hold together long under the punishment of grinding against the sawyer that had impaled it and the buffeting of debris coming downriver.

Paul and Kruger came out of the woods and joined them on the slanting deck.

“
Mon Dieu!
” Paul exclaimed.

“I make goot strong boat,” Kruger bragged.

Eli said nothing. He’d traveled the rivers on flatboats since he was a lad and knew that along with the unbearable exasperation one could cause a man, they possessed a single definite virtue. They could endure almost anything. A couple of strips of planking could mend a hole adequately if the understructure were strong. He’d not have attempted this venture if he hadn’t been sure of that.

“What’ll we do?” Paul asked.

“Cut her loose.” Light and Eli spoke the same words at the same time. They looked at each other in surprise.

“First we unload.” Eli went to the shed and came out with an armload of muskets, rolled them in a canvas, and placed them on the roof.

“Paul, you and Kruger start hauling cargo. Let’s get it ashore. When she breaks loose from the sawyer, she’ll either float or sink. The river current has made a deep cut here. She’s on the edge of the bank. When she tilts back, if she does”—he looked pointedly at Kruger—“water will wash into the shed.”

“
Verdammt!
It von’t sink!” Kruger seemed to take it as an insult to his ability as a craftsman.

With the men carrying kegs of gunpowder and whiskey, sacks of salt, and bundles of tobacco, and Maggie bearing the lighter goods, they made numerous trips to the riverbank through the foot-high water that covered the sandbar. Paul stayed aboard the boat and lifted the heavy kegs over the side to rest on the shoulders of the men.

Maggie managed not to be onshore at the same time as Kruger. She was aware that not only was Light watching the man, but so was Eli. Once when she passed Otto on her way to the boat, his thick lips stretched in a grin and he eyed the way her wet britches clung to her bottom and thighs.

“The riffer iss full of vater snakes, missy,” he murmured, his eyes lingering on her breasts. “Vatch ya don’t get a bite on yore pretty little titties. Ja?”

Shortly after that Maggie had seen one of the snakes cutting through the muddy water, its head up, its long body making serpentine curves, winding its way downriver. She watched it until it passed the boat.

When all the cargo was unloaded except the tools that were hung on the sides and ceiling of the shed, they returned to the boat, wet and hungry. But there was no time to think of their discomfort.

Eli removed his shirt and boots and lowered himself into the fast-moving water on the river side of the boat. He groped in the dark until he found the tree limb. He came up gasping for breath.

“The son of a bitch is a foot or more thick. Give me the saw.”

Eli took a deep breath and sank under the boat again. It seemed a long while before he came up to hang onto the side of the boat, gasp agonizingly for breath and then vomit some of the water.

“Kruger . . . come take a turn on the saw.”

“
Verdammt!
Ya tink I fool.”

Paul swore viciously and began to unlace his heavy boots.

“Are you refusing to take orders?” Eli spoke calmly, but his mouth snapped shut and his nostrils flared.

“Dis iss no fuckin’ ship,
captain.
Vat ya gonna do? Make me valk ta plank? I ain’t goin’ down ta get bit by vater snake.”

“Damn you! If we don’t get off this sawyer before dark it’ll rip this boat apart.”

“Ain’t
mein
boat. Ya gott it fer half a vat it vorth. Ain’t no skin off mein arse if she breaks. I’ll build me raft an’ catch current down riffer.”

Light reached for his rifle, checked the load and put it in Maggie’s hands. He pulled off his shirt and moccasins, loosened the string holding the pouch about his waist, rolled them into a tight bundle and placed it on top of the shed.

“You know what to do,
chérie.
” He went over the side. “I can stay down for a count of thirty,” he said to Eli before both men sank under the water.

With her back to the shed and the heavy gun in her hands, Maggie waited, her eyes roving from the place where Light had gone under to the men on the deck.

“Vat ve got iss Indian mitt book learnin’.” Kruger laughed nastily. “Are ya figgerin’ ta shoot me if yore man don’t come up?” His lust-filled eyes traveled over Maggie.

“Leave her be,” Paul snarled.

“Dem snakes likes to viggle in and outta timbers on the bottom of the boat. The Indian iss liable to get hisself snake bit.”

“Shut up, Kruger.”

“Ever see a man bit by a vater snake, pretty
fraulein?
” Kruger moved a step closer to Maggie. “Dey swell all up like a toad—”

“Hush your mouth!”

“Don’t mind him, Paul,” Maggie said quietly. “He’s just a talkin’ t’ hear his head rattle. He’s not scarin’ me a’tall. Snakes is scared of what they don’t know, and I don’t reckon they’ve ever seen a man under a boat before.”

Eli came up and took several deep gulps of air and went back down, and a few seconds later Light came up to hold onto the side of the boat and breathe through his open mouth. His eyes went to Maggie and she nodded that she was all right.

“Anything we can do up here?” Paul asked when Eli came up for another gulp of air.

“Cover the hole if she breaks loose.”

For the next half-hour Eli and Light took turns struggling to drive the saw through the tough, water-soaked tree limb beneath the boat.

Then the completely unforeseen happened. The limb, when partially cut through, bent under the weight it was sustaining and wrenched out of the hole in the flatboat’s bottom, releasing the craft. The boat rose with its buoyancy, and the water on the deck leveled out and began to run outward through the hole made by the limb.

The German hooted. “
Verdammt!
Tol’ ya I vas bess boat builder!”

Light came to the surface.

“Name of a cow!” Paul grinned, his white teeth showing through his black beard. “She’s going to float.” He took the saw from Light.

“River’s coming up,” Light said and pulled himself up over the solid low rail. Cold had tightened the skin over his high cheekbones, and his voice was hoarse from swallowing river water.

“Where’s Eli?” Paul, on his knees, bent over the low railing, peering at the surface of the water. “Where’s Eli?” Paul asked again anxiously.

Light turned, looked down, and then stepped over the rail and slid back down into the river.

Maggie waited beside Paul. Time seemed to go on forever. Light’s head broke the surface. He took a gulp of air and went back down. Paul flung a foot over the rail.

“Wait.” Maggie put her hand on his arm. “Light will get him.” Something in her tone caused Paul to hesitate.

Kruger came and hovered over Maggie to look over the side. She moved the end of the long gun until it was poking into his belly.

“Move.”

The bald-headed man laughed. “Ya effer seen a man vat vas drowned,
fraulein?
He look chust like vhite fish.”

“Shut your blasted mouth!” Paul shouted and shoved Kruger with his foot.

Kruger drew back his fist. “Vatch vat ya do, ol’ man!”

At that moment Light’s head came up out of the water. He grabbed at the rail with one hand. His arm was around Eli’s neck.

“Take . . . him,” he gasped.

“
Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!
” Paul was clearly distressed. He leaned down and grasped the limp body under the arms, but it was too heavy for him to lift over the rail.

While Light was climbing over the rail, Kruger, with his massive strength and a snort of disgust, hauled Eli up and unceremoniously dumped him on the deck. Eli lay there gray and lifeless.

“Det as doornail,” Kruger pronounced without feeling.

“He ain’t dead!” Maggie’s eyes were as deep as storm clouds. She raised her small head defiantly and spat with all the fury of a vixen at bay. “Ya ugly old vulture!”

Far from being angry, the German stared at her with admiration.

Paul stared at his inert friend in disbelief.

Light quickly turned Eli over on his stomach and straddled his back. With the heels of his hands beneath Eli’s shoulder blades, he pressed down hard, released and pressed again. Maggie handed the gun to Paul, knelt down and turned Eli’s head to the side.

“Dat do no goot. He det already.” Kruger stood, feet spread, hands on his hips.

Light ignored him and continued the rhythmic pumping. Suddenly Eli’s mouth opened and water spewed out. He groaned. Paul let out a whoop. Light pressed several more times. More water came. Light stopped when Eli gagged. He helped Eli up to rest on his forearms, then stepped away while he vomited.

Eli rolled over on his back and looked up. What he saw was the face of an angel bending over him.
Have I died?
It was the first thought that crossed his mind. Then he remembered the terror of being there alone in the dark, his lungs bursting, his foot caught when the sawyer bent. Before consciousness left him, he had been sure he was going to die.

“Are you all right, Eli?” the angel said.

His vision cleared and his eyes focused on Maggie’s face.

“Yeah,” he croaked.

“Light saved ya.”

Eli pulled himself up to a sitting position and looked toward his feet. The skin was scraped from his ankle. It was raw and bloody. He looked up at the slim dark man. Water was still running down Light’s face.

“Thanks.”

Light nodded, reached for his shirt and pulled it over his wet torso.

“
Mon Dieu,
Eli, that was close.” Paul was still visibly shaken.

“Yeah. Close.” Eli rolled over on his knees to stand. He grabbed onto Paul when he attempted to put his weight on his injured foot and leaned heavily on him until they reached the shed.

“Flood water has brought the river up,” Paul said. “We can tie up to the bank.”

“If it goes down as fast as it came up we could be stranded on the sandbar. Loosen the mooring and let her drift back down river a ways, then pole into the bank.”

“Only got two left,” Paul said and grabbed one of them.

Light used the other pole to keep the craft close to the shoreline. The men strained at the poles and finally maneuvered the craft close to the bank, and Paul tossed a mooring line up over a stump to hold the boat until he could scramble up the bank and secure it. Without a steering oar they would be helpless in the current.

By the time the raft had floated alongside a three-foot bank, twilight had descended. Gusts of cold air came off the river and chilled everyone. Maggie stood beside Eli, who was holding onto the roof of the shed. She had helped him pull his dry shirt on over his head. Shivering herself in the cool breeze, she draped her blanket up over his shoulders to protect him from the wind. Still he shuddered violently, and despite his clenched jaws, his teeth chattered.