“No, you thilly athth. I’d be on the bottom, food for the fithyeth if I had all that iron on. I got rid of it after I fell in, though my broken arm almotht killed me. Chethuth! The pain! You ever been kicked in the ballth, Tham? Lithten, that ain’t nothin’ compared to trying to undrethth vith a broken arm.”
“Okay, Joe!” Sam said, and he looked around nervously again. Somebody was running his way from the prow, pursued by two men. All were too far away for him to identify them. Behind them was stillness.
The group near the stern was still battling, though it seemed that it had thinned out somewhat.
“I got cut down by thomebody!” Joe bellowed. “And I got loothe then. I grabbed a fire akthe and cleaned up around me and chathed vhat vath left down to the main deck. And then damned if thomebody didn’t knock me over the railing, chuth like that! He mutht have been a hell of a thtrong man, the aththole!”
Joe kept on talking, but Sam didn’t hear him. He crouched by the railing, unable to decide what to do. Though the runners were much nearer now, and coming swiftly, they were still unidentifiable in the dark. He was in agony. In the confusion and haste, his own men might attack him.
He raised the pistol in his left hand, keeping the cutlass in his right. He could aim with either hand, though not well. At this range, though, he could not miss. But did he have to shoot?
The decision never had to be made. As he waited, eyes straining, finger tight on the trigger, he was lifted up and hurled over the railing.
For a minute or so, he was so stunned that he had no idea of what had happened. He knew he was in the water, choking, spitting, struggling. But how had he gotten there? And why?
He bumped into something. His hands felt cold flesh. A corpse. He shoved it away and slipped off the heavy bandolier.
Before him, but now about sixty feet away, was the vast boat. How had he gotten so far away from it? Had he been swimming? Or floating? It didn’t matter. He was here, and the boat was there. He would swim back to it. This was the second time he’d been in The River. What I dip you in three times is true.
As he thrashed toward the vessel, he saw that the railing of the boiler deck was closer to the water than it should be. The boat was sinking!
Now he knew what had tossed him off the deck like a fly shrugged off by a horse. Except that he had no wings. It had been an explosion below the water line. In the boiler deck where ammunition was stored. And it would have been set off, of course, by John’s men.
He had gone through too much. Even the imminent loss of his beautiful Not For Hire, which should have brought tearing pain and tears, did not affect him much. He was too tired and too desperate. Almost, he told himself, too tired to be desperate.
He swam toward the boat. His right hand came down hard on something. He cried out with pain, then reached out again. Wet slippery wood curved under his hand. Gasping with joy, he seized it and pulled himself forward. He didn’t know what it was, a piece of canoe or dugout, but it was enough to buoy him.
Where was Joe?
He called out. There was no answer. He tried again and got the same silence.
Had the explosion gotten Joe? The detonation would have hurled a strong pressure wave through the water. Anyone near it would probably have been killed. But Joe wasn’t close enough. Or was he? It must have been a hell of a blast.
Or perhaps Joe had just lost consciousness from the pain of his broken bone and slipped off into The River.
He called twice more. Someone shrieked from far away, a woman’s voice. Some other poor soul floating in The River.
The boat was visibly settling down. There would be many compartments, large and small, with closed doors and hatches. There might even be enough enclosed air to keep the Riverboat afloat. Eventually, she would drift into shore; she could even be towed in by sailing ships or rowboats or both.