Part 20 (2/2)

”Has m'sieu feefty dollair, cash?” he asked.

”Fifty dollars?”

”Oui, m'sieu. Pour zat ve call ze mattair--how you say?--sqvare.”

The Captain looked at Al and nodded, for the amount was about one-third of what the man's first demand would have made it.

”But I haven't even that much, Captain,” said Al, despairingly.

”I have forty dollars, Al,” said Wallace. ”Take that.” He thrust his hand into his pocket.

”Pshaw, that's all right,” broke in the Captain, stopping him. ”I have plenty, but we don't want to be bled, that's all.” He turned to the factor. ”Very well,” he remarked. ”We'll pay you fifty dollars, cash.

Now where's the boy?”

”M'sieu has ze cash money here, dans sa poche, for geeve me now?” the factor persisted, anxiously.

”Yes, yes,” replied Captain Lamont, impatiently. ”But before I give it to you, you must first show us the boy.”

The Frenchman waved his hands pathetically.

”Oui, mais je ne peut pas show ze pauvre boy. Il est depart down ze rivair pour la S'in' Louis pour--two veek.”

”You say you can't show him?” exclaimed the Captain. ”He started for St. Louis two weeks ago?”

”Oui, m'sieu, oui. Sur le steamair _North Vind_. Je poot heem ver'

comfor'ble sur le steamair. He shall reach S'in' Louis safe.”

”Huh! That remains to be seen!” grunted the Captain. Then he looked sympathetically into Al's disappointed face. ”Well, my boy,” said he, ”that seems to be all there is to it. Your brother has gone down and you can do nothing but follow. Here is your money, factor. We thank you for your trouble.” He handed the Frenchman fifty dollars in greenbacks from an amply filled wallet, for the steamboat officers of those days earned handsome salaries and were seldom without plenty of money.

Then the Captain and his two young companions retraced their steps to the steamboat landing and the _Belle Peoria_ resumed her journey. Al was perfectly certain that the Frenchman had simply robbed them of fifty dollars, for he did not believe that Te-o-kun-ko had either asked or received one cent of ransom for Tommy's delivery. He was, moreover, far from satisfied concerning his young brother's present safety, but he was helpless in the circ.u.mstances, and could only hope that Tommy would reach St. Louis all right and would there seek his uncle, Mr. Colton.

Ten days sufficed to bring the _Belle Peoria_ to Omaha, and here her captain received so tempting an offer to carry a cargo back to a point up-river that he determined to accept it. His decision was an unexpected misfortune to Captain Lamont, but the latter was not a man to be discouraged by such untoward events. It will be remembered that on her way up-river, the _Island City_ left a large barge at Omaha which had so impeded her progress that she could not tow it further. This barge was still lying moored to the bank where it had been left, and into it Captain Lamont loaded his engines and other machinery from the _Belle Peoria_, determined to complete his journey to St. Louis by drifting down-river with the current.

The size of the barge was such that it could easily accommodate the cargo of machinery and still leave ample living room for the entire crew of the s.h.i.+pwrecked _Island City_. Many men were necessary to handle the unwieldy craft with oars, sweeps, and rudders in facing hard winds, in sparring off from bars or snags, and in encountering the many other perils and embarra.s.sments incident to such navigation. Tarpaulins were spread over the boat, protecting both the machinery and the crew; a galley was arranged and a cook stove set up; a sufficient supply of provisions was laid in for the first few days of the journey; and, thus equipped, the strange craft set out on her southward voyage.

It was a slow journey, but no one could have called it monotonous, for a score of times every day all hands were called out to hard work of one sort or another. Now it was to pole the barge off a shoal place on which she had drifted, or again, to row her down the length of some bend against a flat head wind which was beating her back up the river faster than the current bore her the other way. Occasionally the men had to land and, taking hold of a long ”cordelle rope” attached to the barge's stern, walk up the bank in a long, straining line and pull her back into the channel from some ”blind chute” into which she had blundered, dragging her along as in the early days of the fur trade the crews of the keel boats were obliged to drag their vessels clear from St. Louis to Fort Union, except when rare favoring winds allowed the use of a sail. More than once during the long days between Omaha and Kansas City, Al and his companions worked for hours up to their waists and shoulders in the water alongside the barge, freeing her from some obstruction or a lodgement against the bank.

But all labors have an end, and at length the great bend at Kansas City came in sight, with the little town straggling along the river and the rugged, precipitous hills rising behind it, which in a few decades were destined to be covered with the crowded dwellings and the towering business structures of a great metropolis. The barge was moored for the night, and most of her crew, including Al and Wallace, seized the opportunity to get a glimpse of civilization once more and to hear the news of the day by strolling up-town in the evening.

”I'll tell you what I want,” said Wallace, as they walked along Broadway, looking into the brightly lighted shop windows and enjoying the novel sensation of being on a busy street with crowds of people about them. ”I want a great, big, tall, fat gla.s.s of lemonade, with ice in it. I haven't had one since I was in St. Paul last.”

”Nor I since I left St. Louis,” rejoined Al. ”That for me, too.”

They soon came to an ice-cream and confectionery store where a number of people were sitting about at small tables, eating, drinking, and talking, quite after the manner of dwellers in a real city. The boys took their places in two vacant chairs at a table where two men were seated, one a soldier and the other a civilian. After giving their orders to the waiter, the boys sat silent for a moment, feeling an embarra.s.sing consciousness of their decidedly soiled and unkempt appearance in the comparatively well dressed crowd, which included a number of ladies. Presently the soldier at their table said to his companion, after a silence induced by the intrusion of the boys upon their privacy,

”Well, anyhow, I'll tell you if old Pap Price ever gets as far as the Kansas line with his ragam.u.f.fin army, we'll give him a reception that he won't forget soon.”

Al and Wallace began to listen, for this sounded interesting.

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