Free Riverboat Blaze by J. R. Roberts Page A

could to get the boat to that bend in the river near Vicksburg, as he knew the water was shallow there.
    “Dillon’s going to be happy that you saved his boat,” Stan McKay said.
    “Fool made the boat too big and too heavy,” Hatton said.
    “Seems like everybody has that opinion except for him,” Clint said.
    “What about the fire?” McKay asked Hatton. “Any idea what started that?”
    “I ain’t been down there, but it had to be an explosion.”
    “I agree,” Clint said. “I could feel it through the deck beneath my feet.”
    “I’ll take some of my men down there and have a look,” McKay said. “Meanwhile, I’ll send my boat across the river to pick up some people and take them to Vicksburg.”
    “You did a good job, Captain,” Clint said, shaking the man’s hand. “I’ll be telling Dean Dillon that.”
    “I don’t think that’ll make much of a difference,” Hatton said.
    “Why do you say that?”
    “That friend of yours is gonna be lookin’ for somebody to blame,” the captain said. “He ain’t about to take the blame himself.”
    Clint was afraid the captain had Dean Dillon pegged right.
     
    There was nobody else on board. McKay had to have a couple of his men swim underwater to see what the damage was in the hold of the boat. They both came up shaking their heads.
    “There’s a hole in the boat on the port side,” one of them said. “Looks like it was blown out.”
    “What caused the explosion?” Clint asked.
    “If you ask me,” the man said, “somebody put some dynamite down there.”
    “Sabotage?” McKay asked.
    The man said, “Looks like it to me,” and his partner nodded his agreement.
    Clint looked at the captain, who had accompanied them down to the first deck.
    “Dillon can’t blame this on you,” he said.
    Hatton laughed and said, “Watch him.”
     
    Captain Hatton came aboard their flatboat and then Clint and McKay went over to the Louisiana shore to pick up some survivors. They didn’t all fit on the two boats, so on the Mississippi side they made arrangements for some wagons to pick people up, as well.
    It was nightfall when Clint got into a hotel in Vicksburg, was able to take a bath, change his clothes, and get a hot meal. He’d been able to salvage his belongings from the Dolly Madison , including his beloved Colt New Line.
    Shelters had been set up for a lot of the survivors who could not afford to get themselves hotel rooms. Many of them had lost their money along the way, or had left it on the boat and had not been able to recover it yet. Arrangements were being made for a salvage run the next day.
    Angela had been able to get a room at the same hotel as Clint. Ava had been recovered from the Louisiana side, and it turned out she had some family in Vicksburg, so she was staying with them.
    The Warrant brothers had not turned up. The bodies that had washed up onto the shores had not yet been collected. That would be done last, after the living were seen to.
    Dean Dillon was nowhere to be found.
     
    Clint actually had a meal with Jerry Sumner that night. Jerry’s wife was in a hotel room, in bed wrapped in a blanket. They were staying in the same hotel as Clint, and they had their meal in the hotel dining room.
    “She won’t come out,” he told Clint.
    “You can’t really blame her,” Clint said. “She’s been through an ordeal.”
    “What’s on your agenda for tomorrow?” Jerry asked.
    “I was thinking about going out to the boat again with McKay and his men. Dean Dillon is still among the missing. What about you?”
    “I offered to go out and look at the boat as an engineer. Maybe I’ll be able to offer somethin’ helpful.”
    “That’s nice of you.”
    “Well, if Margie isn’t gonna come out of our room, what else is there for me to do?”
    They finished up their dinners by stepping out in front of the hotel with cigars.
    “Who would have it in for Dillon and want to sabotage his boat?” Jerry asked.
    “I’m afraid that’s