Free Dead Water by Barbara Hambly Page A

declared compared favorably to the version she had seen at Covent Garden in London.
    “And if you'll believe that,” murmured Hannibal, eyeing the majestic brunette, “might I interest you in some stock I have in a diamond-mine in the Nebraska Territory?”
    It was Mrs. Fischer, January noticed, who took it on herself to draw pretty Dorothea Roberson away from Molloy's fair-haired inamorata Miss Skippen, and to whisper something to Mrs. Roberson and Mrs. Tredgold that apparently sealed that sprightly young lady's fate. By the time the ladies retreated to their own parlor again at ten—accompanied by Mr. Quince, who proceeded to lecture them on the Grecian System of Round Dancing and the evils of alcohol—there was a decided space between Miss Skippen and all the rest.
    After their departure, the men settled down to cards again. Davis, Molloy, Gleet, and a bachelor planter named Lockhart made up one table of whist and—January never quite saw how this was maneuvered—Hannibal and Byrne formed up a set against the Massachusetts mill-owner Dodd and Weems.
    They were still at it two hours later when January put up his borrowed guitar, finished the coffee Thu had quietly brought him, and nodded good-night to the impassive steward. Weems was winning, and played his cards with an air of cocky excitement and new-found delight. January saw the glance of almost sleepy amusement that passed between Hannibal and the gambler Byrne, and could have pitied Weems if the man hadn't effectively ruined him and Rose. It was fascinating to see them set him up, playing as much on his greed and vanity as on his inexperience: “Lord, you're hot tonight,” murmured Hannibal approvingly, and Byrne shook his head, adding, “Look like it's not going to be my evening.”
    January was reminded of those farm-wives who made pets of their rabbits so the little creatures wouldn't run away when it came time to knock their heads off for the pot.
    Dodd, of course, simply chomped and slurped his way through the “little after-dinner snack” he'd ordered of pickled eggs and crullers, seeming barely to notice how much he lost.
    The night was close and hot when January emerged onto the upper deck promenade. The hard silvery light of the quarter-moon sparked on the paddle where it threshed at the water, and from above him he heard Molloy's voice calling jovial insults at his assistant pilot, a gangling and talkative young man named Souter. From the other side of the boat as he descended the steps to the lower promenade, he heard the slave men singing:
“I'm goin' away to New Orleans. . . .”
    And like the sweet breath of evening wind, the voices of the chained women rose in the response,
“Good-by, my love, good-by. . . .”
    Closer, below him in the well of darkness, a woman's voice gasped, “Let go!”
    “S'matter, honey, you too fond of them Frenchies to want a
real
man?” The voice was drunken, the accent from up-river somewhere, Kentucky or Tennessee.
    Another voice giggled, “Can't tell us a pretty yeller gal like you, you ruther have one a' them black bucks over there, 'stead of Kyle an' me.”
    “No—”
    “You hear somethin', Kyle?”
    “Not me. 'Fraid she must be speakin' Frenchy. . . .”
    January had already started down the stair—wondering what the hell he could say to an unknown number of intoxicated white boatmen that wouldn't get him beaten up—when he heard Rose's voice: “Allow me to translate for you gentlemen.”
    She spoke in the carrying steely tone of a schoolmistress, and as he sprang down from the stairs he saw the little group by the thin reflected glow of the engine-room door. There were three of them, shaggy-haired, dirty, and bearded, in faded shirts and Conestoga boots, hemming in the fairy-like little maidservant he'd seen following Mrs. Fischer on board. One of the boatmen had pulled off her headscarf, her thick hair hanging in a dark coil to her waist. She was pressed against the piled wood, arms folded tight