Alexander C. Irvine (27 page)

H
e
spent the
day alone on the deck, poling along and trying to fill in the blank spaces in his deductions. He carried two tokens, one from Tlaloc by way of the chacmool and the other marked just as Jane was, by the fire of Xiuhtecuhtli—who seemed to go by several names. Burr had also referred to the god as
huehueteotl,
Ometeotl, and the Old God.

But the knife seemed to have a double valence. If it had been somehow consecrated by fire, that fire had been burning at least nominally in Tlaloc’s service. What did that mean?

On the river, traffic grew heavier as they approached Louisville. Even though he knew it was ridiculous, Archie found himself scanning the decks of passing steamers for Rufus. The old sot had been in the water well before the explosion that tore
Maudie
apart; if he was any swimmer at all, he would easily have made the bank and been picked up by a passing vessel or hiked his way back to Marlon MacGruder’s.

The three slaves, though, hadn’t had any such chance. Archie hoped Gatty was answering for their shackles in whatever forum awaited him in the afterlife.

Strange thought, that. Archie had never considered himself a particularly religious man, but he supposed he’d become a sort of accidental Christian simply by growing up in America. It had never occurred to him to think of things in terms other than heaven and hell, salvation and damnation. Or Purgatory, which was where he’d been since the morning’s exchange with Peter. In the last months, though, his experiences had raised uncomfortable questions.

Whatever the truth was, Archie decided, the specter of Gatty answering to Tlaloc rather than a fatherly Jehovah satisfied his newfound taste for revenge. But on the other hand, Tlaloc might well reward the kind of perversity that defined men like Delbert Gatty. The kind of perversity that led men to buy and sell and shackle one another.

I’m thinking like an abolitionist, Archie thought, and he supposed his experiences aboard
Maudie
had made him one. Certainly watching three men die had forced Archie to take an opinion regarding the shackles that drowned them.

Woolgathering again. What was it about river travel that caused his mind to wander so? It was something he would have to guard against. The chacmool would be only too happy to step into gaps in Archie’s awareness, and Archie knew he wouldn’t always have the kindness of men like Peter Daigle to rescue him. Something about the slavery question kept drawing his attention, though, but he couldn’t quite say what.

It was late afternoon when Peter steered into a side channel of the Ohio and tied up to a short pier on the Louisville waterfront. Marie and the children—even Sonia—came out to bid Archie Godspeed, and Ramon rushed up to give him a quick bashful hug.

Peter shooed the children back into the makeshift cabin, then clapped Archie on the shoulder. “Again,” he said, “luck and God’s grace.”

Marie handed him a small bag. “A bite to eat,” she said, “and maybe a little something else as well.” Coins clinked as Archie slung the bag over his shoulder and again he found himself brought to the verge of tears by a simple act of kindness. Last night they would have killed me to protect themselves, he thought. And today they’ve forgiven, and given me food and money.

He made no effort to hide the catch in his voice as he thanked them again. “What can I say?” he stammered.

“Hush,” Marie said. “Take it, Archie, and take with you our blessings as well.” She straightened a twist in the bag’s strap. “Go now. Find your daughter.”

Archie stood on the dock and watched Peter and Marie pole through the dead water back into the main channel. He lost sight of them as they joined a line of craft waiting for passage through the locks at the Falls of the Ohio, but he stood watching for a long time anyway.

I never wished them luck, he thought. And they still have the mountains to cross.

A large flatboat laden with tobacco tied up where the Daigles had been, and Archie had to move out of the way of its unloading. He walked along the waterfront looking for stage offices. It was probably too late to leave that night, but he thought he might be able to buy a ticket for the next day’s coach to Mammoth Cave.

And what would he do then? Secure a guide and ask to see the chacmool? Strange black fellow, wears green feathers? Changes into a jaguar sometimes?

If I have to, he thought, that’s exactly what I’ll do. But actually he doubted it would come to that. The chacmool would certainly sense him coming, and the feather token would likewise alert him to its proximity. After that, it would simply be a contest of wills.

But wasn’t today the first of the, what,
nemontemi?
The bad-luck days? Archie counted off the days since he’d encountered Tamanend. The ceremony was to take place at midnight on the second of April—the first moments of the third, really. Today was Wednesday the twenty-ninth; yes, it should be the first unlucky day. A tiny bit of good fortune amid all the chaos. The chacmool would be passive these next five days, not wanting to risk queering the conditions for its ritual.

If he could find Jane before Saturday, he might be able to just steal her away. The calendar wouldn’t cycle around for another five hundred twenty years, and the chacmool would just have to wait for another little girl born at midnight on April third, what? a.d. two thousand three hundred fifty-one. He and Jane would live out their lives together, and perhaps an earthquake would bury the chacmool so that future Riley Steens could never dig it out.

Thinking of Steen brought out the flaw in Archie’s plan. The chacmool might not be able to act during the five
nemontem
i,
but its accomplices were under no such restrictions. Or were they? He didn’t know. Steen could be keeping Jane hidden away somewhere, or Royce could be waiting along the turnpike to finish the job he’d started in December; Archie no longer held any illusions about being able to surprise the chacmool simply by turning up alive.

I still don’t know enough fot certain, Archie thought, moving through the crowd toward what appeared to be a ticket office. Have to fly on blind intuition.

Get to the cave, then. That was the first order of business. Everything else would sort itself out once that was accomplished.

The agent at the first window Archie approached sold tickets only for an express to Nashville, but he directed Archie to the offices of the Mammoth Cave line, only a hundred yards or so west. “Believe they’re closed up now,” he said, “but you might check in the morning.”

Archie thanked the agent and walked to the Mammoth Cave stage’s office window. The sun was dropping, and so was the temperature. He thought he would see if he could buy a ticket that evening and then hope Marie Daigle’s gift was enough to purchase a hotel room for the night. If not, he could sleep outside. He’d grown used to it, and the weather was getting a bit more congenial.

The window was closed, but a schedule posted next to the counter stated that the Mammoth Cave Stage ran daily at eight o’clock in the morning, for a two-dollar fare. Digging in the bag Marie had given him, Archie found that he had nearly ten, most of it in silver.

Again he grew a bit misty at the Daigles’ generosity. If everyone emigrating West has that kind of heart, it will be a fine place to live, he thought, and for the first time it occurred to Archie that he could take Jane across the mountains just as Peter and Marie were shepherding their brood. Why stay in New York? His job was certainly lost, and in hindsight it was becoming clearer to Archie that Bennett had never intended to offer him a promotion.

A rush of optimism made Archie giddy and left him wondering why his emotions had been so extreme lately. Western editors wouldn’t be so narrowminded. They would need good men with sharp minds and a bit of experience with presses and type.

Well, he thought. Won’t Jane be surprised?

He caught himself smiling as he strolled up Third Street in search of lodging, riding a wave of certainty that everything would end well. He discarded his earlier idea of simply stealing Jane away; it was cowardly, for one thing, and in any case it was probable that the chacmool, even if it couldn’t pinpoint his location, would know he was coming. There would be no secrets from this point on, no hiding behind proxies and henchmen. Archie meant to end this once and for all. No other father should ever have to endure what he had.

Passing two hotels that looked beyond his means, Archie set his sights on a third, another block away from the waterfront and across the street. Remembering he was in a city again, and not among friends, he reslung his bag underneath his coat and reflexively touched the knife sheathed at the small of his back. He felt strong and focused, prepared for the task at hand; a good night’s sleep and then he would be ready to battle the chacmool on its own ground.

The hotel he’d chosen was flanked by saloons, with clusters of revelers blocking their doors and spilling out onto the street. Archie watched the crowds, remembering similar evenings at Belinda’s Bright and pitying whatever poor soul had to clean up after Louisville’s drunkards. He was smiling a bit, thinking of all the bizarre circumstances that had led him to this place, when one of the figures in the crowd caught his eye.

It was the red piping on the man’s trousers that drew Archie’s attention. He stopped and retreated into the shadowed doorway of a shuttered milliner’s, all of his good cheer flushed away as he recognized Royce McDougall.

His first impulse was simply to keep walking, to find another hotel and disappear early in the morning. Thinking it over quickly, though, Archie realized that if Royce was here, Steen was likely nearby. If his dream was any indication, the chacmool already had Jane, but Steen would know where she was. And Royce would know where Steen was.

What to do, then? He could follow Royce and hope the Rabbit led him to a rendezvous with Steen. But what if he lost track of Royce? Time would be wasted and nothing accomplished.

That settled it. He would have to ambush Royce and just force some answers out of him. The idea seemed foreign, foolhardy even; Royce would be easily Archie’s match in a brawl.

But, Archie reminded himself, he was armed. And if ever their was a time for foolhardiness, it was now.

Royce dropped a handful of coins into the palm of an Indian occupying a stool near the hotel door. Then he broke away from the crowd and walked back down Third Street, in the direction of the waterfront.
He’s posted his sentries,
Archie thought,
and now he’s going to stake out the ticket window himself.

Or he was paying the Indian for whiskey, or a whore, or any number of other things.
Ease up,
Archie told himself.
You have enough problems in this world without inventing more.

Archie thought fast. Perhaps he was jumping at moonshadows, but he had a feeling he was down to his last mistake. Best to assume that Royce was going to the ticket window, and better yet to beat him to the spot.

Taking care to avoid the sight of Royce’s scout, Archie circled around the few blocks back north and east to the dock where he’d first stepped onto Kentucky soil. The fragrant bales of tobacco were gone, but at the base of the dock a pile of broken lumber and debris offered excellent concealment, with a good view of the entire waterfront. Archie climbed over it, mindful of protruding nails, and settled behind it in a weedy patch between the paved street and the riverbank.

From there he watched pedestrians spill out onto the waterfront until he saw Royce. The Rabbit paused at the corner, searching up and down the docks. After a moment, he strolled casually past the Mammoth Cave Stage window and took up a position almost directly across the dockside square from Archie’s hiding place.

Archie crouched watching him until it was fully dark, shifting often enough to prevent his legs going numb and silently willing Royce to move to a location more vulnerable to surprise attack. Leaning on the front stoop of the Rivermen’s Baptist Church, Royce commanded a view of the entire waterfront spreading west to the neck of Shippingport Island. He could even have seen Archie if the night hadn’t been cloudy and the docks poorly lit.

A last few boats unloaded their wares on the dock above Archie’s head, and he drew a few strange looks from boatmen and shore’ workers, but no one bothered to roust him. Apparently it wasn’t unusual for men to hide behind piles of rubbish here in Louisville, or maybe nobody wanted to provoke a man with no ear and the stink of the river on him.

The later it got, the more raucous were the voices and music from the saloons clustered along Main Street and its side alleys.

Archie began to realize that it was only a matter of time before his position was given away by wandering drunks or the local constabulary. He was in a relatively obscure spot, far at the eastern end of the waterfront, but boots still clumped occasionally along the dock above him and enough people were passing that one of them would sooner or later comment on the vagrant peering around the lumber pile by the bank.

Surprise was Archie’s only advantage over Royce; all of his plans depended on it. But Royce stood calmly, working on the stub of a cheroot, scanning the docks even though he must have known that only a handful of boats would arrive and moor before morning.

Of course. Archie could have slapped himself for his obtuseness. Obviously Royce had figured out that he’d missed Archie somehow. That was why he’d set up his impromptu sentry network and returned to the docks—he was assuming that Archie had eluded his attention. So he had returned to keep an eye on the one place in Louisville Archie had to visit sooner or later, the Mammoth Cave stage offices.

And Archie, in his efforts to escape Royce’s surveillance, had instead trapped himself like a rabbit in tall grass. If he moved, there was no way to hide it.

Wait, though; there might be a way to turn this reversal back around. Royce knew that he didn’t know where Archie was, but he didn’t know that Archie knew where
he
was. So now the trick was to lure Royce into a trap, rather rhan spring a stationary ambush. It sounded simple enough, but how to actually do it?

Before he could give it too much thought, Archie stood up, made a great show of looking around, then set off west along the river. He walked briskly in a more-or-less straight line, aiming for the downriver end of the waterfront, where he’d seen narrower streets when wandering earlier. A quick glance back toward the Rivermen’s Baptist Church showed that Royce had left his station, but Archie couldn’t locate him in the crowd and didn’t make much of an effort to; best just to trust that Royce was as good at following as Archie was at leading.