The River Queen (20 page)

But for most of those six hours he just sat, eyes on the water, staring straight ahead.

After he died, people sent me books on the literature of mourning, the nature of grief. A bereavement sampler. None of this did much good except I learned what I already knew. That grief is not a constant, the way love or anger might be. Grief is a sneakier emotion. It comes in waves, when you least expect it, sweeping across you and then it's gone. A sudden storm that comes upon you, then subsides.

*   *   *

In the morning we gas up. Here it costs us $3.96 a gallon. With tax, for one hundred gallons, which is one hundred river miles, I get a fuel bill of four hundred dollars. Later in the year the attorney general of Illinois will charge gas stations with price gouging, but for now this is what I have to pay.

I'm starting to do the math. At this rate, if nothing changes, the fuel costs alone of going to New Orleans from where I am right now would be over five thousand dollars. And that's just one way. If I go with Greg Sadowski, who has suddenly surfaced in Portage Des Sioux, the place where we are headed, he'll have to bring his boat back. No wonder the river is empty. It's not just Katrina or the drought that's keeping barges and pleasure craft off the river. It's the cost of fuel.

The truth is I can't afford it either. As much as I want to get to Memphis and beyond, I'm starting to think that I just can't. I'm going to need a free ride to get myself down the lower Mississippi. It comes to me that it would be perfect to have this boat take me to the end of the upper Mississippi. Then maybe I could hitch a ride south on a friendly vessel that won't charge an arm and a leg. Or fuel costs at least. Jerry has his heart set on ending his journey at Portage Des Sioux, which is at Mile 212, and wintering the
River Queen
there, but I've gotten something else in my head. I want this boat to take me to Cairo. River Mile zero.

With a mug of coffee in hand, I step onto the dock and take Jerry aside. “Can we talk?” I ask him.

“Sure,” Jerry says.

“Look, I'm figuring this thing out and I'm thinking it would be better—well, it would be better for me—if you could get me to Cairo. I mean, I know you don't want to go past St. Louis, but I'd really like to do the upper Mississippi with you. If you could just get me to Cairo. It's the place where Huck and Jim missed the Ohio. It's Mile zero. The end of Illinois. Then I can figure out my way from there.…”

Jerry's listening, his gaze set on the river, but he doesn't say a word.

“I mean, would you consider…?” I am nervous, shaking as I ask. “Would you think about getting me there?”

For a few moments he says nothing, but looks askance in a way that feels like “no.” “Not sure if I can. I've got to figure how many days up and back to Portage Des Sioux. Gotta figure the costs. I need to talk to Tom. And I gotta talk to Kathy.”

“Well, would you?”

“Well, I'll think about it.” It's not a flat-out no. That's better than what I'd thought. He promises he will, but he doesn't make a call. Later in the morning I take Tom aside.

“So,” I tell him, “I've asked Jerry if he'll keep going to Cairo.”

Tom listens, taking this in. “So what'd he say?”

“He said he'd think about it. Do you think he will?”

“Hard to tell with Jerry,” he says. “Never know what he's gonna do.” Tom gives me a slap on the arm. “I'll work on him for you.”

They are getting ready to push off, but I don't think I can go another day without bathing. I try to broach this subject gently with Jerry. Perhaps there's a way to actually hook up our shower, but apparently this will require some work and time and it also means that we'd be using precious water, which we don't want to run out of. Maybe there's another option. I run this by Jerry. I'm willing to find a gas station that has showers. He shakes his head. “How're you going to get to a gas station?”

I have no idea.

Jerry grumbles for a moment, then talks to Tom. It appears there is some kind of a water pump that they've been saving for just such an occasion. Jerry tells me to go put on my bathing suit and when I come back, they've got this pump operating. It's pumping river water through a hose. The river here at the dock is, well, brown, but if I want a shower, what choice do I have? As Tom pumps and Jerry holds the hose, I stand on the dock, shampooing my hair, rubbing soap under my armpits. Discreetly they look the other way.

26

B
OGUS
I
SLAND
, Hail Island, Bell Island, Turkey Island, Otter Island. All these islands south of Muscatine have funny names, I think, as I gaze at the maps and we journey south. My tongue burns and feels numb at the same time from the scalding it took the day before. As I'm heading outside, map in hand, I smash my foot into Jerry's toolbox. “Goddamn it,” I say.

Jerry looks up, startled. “Is my toolbox okay?”

“Thanks, Jer.” Wounded and chagrined, I take my place at the bow, resting my bruised foot on an extra plastic chair. There are dozens of things to trip on or fall over on this boat. There are mooring lines and anchor lines. There are the places where we pump in and pump out and the caps that are on these, as well as the cap where the anchor line goes. I've stubbed my toe literally half a dozen times on this one alone and the boys laugh heartily whenever I do.

There are three ice chests and plastic chairs, and the long stick and the short stick and firewood, and pretty much anyone's shoes. On three occasions I have smashed my foot into the propped-up hatch above the port engine. When I complain about this, Tom says his engines need to “breathe.”

So do I, I want to say, but I resist.

If there is engine trouble, and there often is, I am afraid to come off the flybridge for fear of falling into the bowels of the engines themselves. And of course there is Samantha Jean, who seems to take sadistic pleasure, if a dog is capable of this emotion, in being underfoot. I have a yellow purple bruise on my thigh where I walked into the ice chest and similar bruises on all my toes. Then there are our buoys and fenders and life rings and, of course, the very anchors themselves, which, if they are not stowed, enter my worst dreams.

There's dampness in the air. The edges of my journal and books curl. The cabin is full of flies. My burned tongue feels numb. The banks are lined with trees whose shallow roots are exposed. More pushovers, ready with the slightest shove to tumble down. The river itself is smooth and glossy, the reflection of trees along its bank like a mirror.

It's a slow morning. I have phone reception so I decide to give Kate a ring. I can tell from her voice that she's just gotten up and she's rushing to class. “Hi, honey,” I say, “just wondering if you got that package.”

“I haven't even gone to the post office yet.” Her voice is filled with fatigue and some annoyance. “Look, can I call you later?”

“Sure,” I say, “anytime.” We hang up and already I'm wishing I hadn't called. I phone home to chat with Larry, but I get the machine. Judging by the time, he's probably out for a run. I try to settle down at the bow while Tom has his breakfast of diet Dew and some sponge candy I picked up in East Davenport. Then he goes back up to his berth on the flybridge and cuddles with his dog. We float free through Lock and Dam 17 and hundreds of white pelicans greet us as the lock opens. “Have fun and be safe,” the lockmaster says. When Jerry sees the pelicans, he says, “Cowabunga,” and starts snapping pictures.

On the flybridge Tom whispers sweet nothings to Samantha Jean, whom he has tucked into his sleeping bag. “Give Daddy a kiss. Come on, Sammy. Big kiss.” Meanwhile Jerry starts talking about having me go from Cairo to Memphis in a towboat. He says that I can just hop a ride. Oh great. I can't wait for that. “I'll make a few calls for you,” Jerry says.

We float by a dredging barge that looks as if it landed from outer space. On the shore it's made a huge pile of sand from the river silt it's brought up. All along this part of the river are duck blinds. This must be a major migration route.

We're nearing Lock and Dam 18 and there's a tow and barge ahead. “Looks like she's only six hundred feet,” Jerry says. “Maybe she can take us with.” But it seems we have to wait.

Jerry explains that when they built the lock and dam system in the 1930s the plan was to build auxiliary locks so that smaller pleasure craft wouldn't have to compete with commercial vessels for lockage. “Then World War II happened, and…”— he makes the hand motion he makes when a boat broaches—“that plan went down the tubes.”

The sky darkens and the air has a hot, muggy feel. Suddenly a big storm is upon us. Lightning and thunder explode. A deluge pours down. Tom has left his sleeping bag to air out in the dinghy and in minutes it is soaking wet. He races outside and drags all his bedding into our tiny cabin to dry out along with his bomber jacket and the rest of his things, including, of course, Samantha Jean, who is also soaked to the skin. The cabin has an enclosed, musty smell, not to mention that of wet dog. Fork lightning is everywhere and I recall all the cautionary tales from my river planner as Samantha Jean freaks out and races under my bed.

We are locked out by the barge and tow and Jerry puts the marine band radio on Channel 13 so we can hear what the towboat plans to do. I listen to an incomprehensible voice with what sounds like a thick Louisiana accent. “They're all from the bayou,” Jerry says. “Cajuns. All them towboat drivers.”

It appears we have some time on our hands and not much to do except sit there in the rain, so Jerry lets me maneuver the boat. Gently he shows me how to adjust the shift, which moves the boat forward and in reverse. “Lean into her,” he tells me. “You wanta make a right turn, you do the shift like this. Left, you go like this.” He shows me how if you pull the shift all the way down she'll go into reverse.

With rain pelting the windshield (and no wipers), I'm not having much luck. On this boat shifting is strictly a right-hand maneuver and I am a lefty. Jerry is also left-handed and I ask him if this isn't difficult for him as well. He thinks about it for a moment. “I suppose it would be,” he wrinkles his brow, “if I hadn't been doing it for so long.”

“Well, I'm having a hard time.…”

I'm struggling with the small adjustments I must make with my right hand as I turn the boat right, then left, but I can't quite get the hang of it. I've long grappled with the perils of being a lefty in a right-handed world—can openers, hotel computer mouses, Metrocards for the New York City subway (which all require right-handed maneuvers). I'm definitely feeling challenged here. “Hey, Jer, what happens if I accidentally throw the shift into reverse rather than neutral?”

“Hmm,” Jerry says, “now that's a good question. Let me tell you what happened to my friends, Pete and Jenny. They had a bad marriage to start with, but they were out boating one day and he was going too fast so she wanted to slow them down and he said no so she got angry and went over, trying to pull the throttle back, but she pulled the shift instead and threw the boat into reverse. Melted down the whole transmission.” Jerry pauses for effect. “The marriage ended shortly thereafter.”

I am careful in the wind and rain as I lean into the shift. A few moments later we get a call from the lockmaster and I breathe a sigh of relief. For whatever reason, the tow and barge has decided to fall back and let us go ahead. “Why're they doing that?” I ask as Jerry takes the wheel to maneuver into the lock. “Well, it could be he has to wait for something. Or it could also be, because of the storm, that he just wants us out of his way. My guess is he wants us gone before he goes ahead.” As we move into position on the lock, the barge workers wave. One waves from the rear, but I don't see him so I don't wave back until Tom says, “Mary, he's waving at you,” so I wave again.

We pass the tow and barge, slosh a little in its wake as we ease our way into the lock. The lockmaster in a yellow slicker awaits us. “Not a bad day to be a duck,” Tom greets the lockmaster as we wait for him to let us through.

“Ducks know enough to stay out of the rain,” the lockmaster says. Just then a huge bolt of lightning cracks above us and I scream my head off.

“Bow into the wall,” Jerry says.

“Well, you don't have to get pissy,” Tom snaps back.

“Hey,” Tom says to the lockmaster, pointing to the back of the lock as the gates are closing, “you sprung a leak.”

“Yeah, gotta fix that one,” the lockmaster says as the water rushes in behind us. I'm standing in the pouring rain. Another crack of lightning right above us, the kind that sounds like a firecracker going off in your brain, and I scream again. Tom laughs his head off. The lockmaster laughs too.

“You can go ahead when I open,” he tells us. “No need to wait for the horn on a day like today.” The lockmaster leaves us now. “Have fun,” he says. “Be safe.”

As we leave behind Lock 18 we are listening to the National Weather Service. Chance of rain 60 percent, which I could have told them. Rain may produce hail. Jerry doesn't like this. Hail can damage a boat. Hail is not good for the windshields or the nicely painted fiberglass coat.

“What d'ya think, Tom? Should we head south or tie up behind the wall? Maybe under some trees or something?”

I'm praying for south. I do not want to stay in this fork lightning storm. I really do not want to stay in one place. Tom's staring at the sky. I have no idea what he's looking for or what he sees. “Just looks like a lot of rain. I think we're okay to head south.” Though there is no hail, we are on a river of driving rain. Everything in the cabin is wet and lightning crackles all around us. We opt not to stop in Burlington, Iowa, though I'd wanted to. In this storm there's no point.

In the gray mist and drizzle we spot a tow, pulling a boat upriver. It comes upon us like a phantom, and, as she approaches, Tom and Jerry realize that the tow is dragging the
Princess
back to La Crosse. This is the boat Jerry was supposed to move south before he decided upon doing our trip. It is also the boat that Greg Sadowski was piloting when Katrina hit.