Thoroughly ashamed, but acknowledging he deserved to know the truth, Mary sadly shook her head, dropping her eyes to her hands where they lay in her lap as they twisted together. “No…at least, not the way you mean.”
She felt his eyes questioning, but he remained silent. Waiting.
After a few minutes of getting her thoughts together, she began the sad saga.
“I guess you have a right to know. So, I’ll…I’ll start at the beginning. My…my mother died right after I was born. So, my older brother, Hank, and I were raised by our father. He worked as a fireman on packet boats all around the South, the last one was the ferry, City of Lincoln. We did all right. Until, one night,” she wavered, the memory still bringing pain. “One awful night, my brother got accused of stealing something he didn’t take and when a lynch mob came after him, he jumped on his horse and rode away. Then, Pa, he got into a fight with someone who was bad-mouthing Hank. They wrestled, and my father was shoved or rolled too close to the firebox in the Lincoln’s boiler room…” she stopped, as ever, unwilling to picture the results as tears swam in her eyes.
“God in Heaven, Mary! I’m so sorry,” Dwight whispered, leaning over to wrap her in his arms for comfort. Oh, how wonderful those arms felt around her! She nestled her head in the curve of his neck and shoulder.
“What happened then?” he murmured against her hair.
She sighed, crestfallen. “They came and told me, and said I had to get out of our cabin—that night. But Dwight…I had no place to go. The awful man, Clive Tobin, wouldn’t even let me take any supplies or food, or very many clothes. I crammed a carpetbag with what I could grab while he was right behind me barking, ‘Hurry up!’.” She heard Dwight release a gasp of shock. “At the last minute, I snatched up some of my brother’s clothes that I’d washed and were hanging over a line by the fireplace,” she tilted her head to view Dwight’s sympathetic countenance.
“Oh honey, what did you do? Where did you go?”
Mary turned back to face the vista below. “Well…I couldn’t stay in Lincoln, and I couldn’t stay down at the wharf with the stevedores and such, that’s no place for a female, especially at night. So, I snuck on board the first packet boat I saw, hid out where nobody could find me, and just rode the river until I could come up with a plan. It was hard, and it was many days before I let myself cry over my father. They…they wouldn’t even give me time to give my pa a wake or a decent burial… My brother…” she shrugged. “I don’t know where he’s at, but I pray he didn’t get caught by that lynch mob.”
Dwight kept his arms around her, gently rocking. “How long did you ride the river?”
“Oh, about a month.”
“A month!”
Her eyes took on a bit of a sparkle as she glanced up again at his surprised but admiring expression. “I’ve been around packet boats all my life, Dwight. I know every nook and cranny. I got pretty good at scrounging for leftovers from the crew’s kitchen—but I only took what was extra. Most of the time, I was wearing Hank’s clothes to blend in. I switched boats when I thought I might be found out—and I was almost caught one time and had to sneak off. I had to leave my bag behind.” She paused in the story, remembering how she had slipped onto a gambling boat and had found a gentleman’s fancy wallet full of money. Although she put it back where she had found it, she had taken a twenty-dollar bill from it, figuring at the time that the high roller wouldn’t miss it. Now, however, she felt guilty for the theft, although she had already asked the Lord’s forgiveness over it.
“And then?”
“I snuck onto the J. Houston after that, and I was doing pretty good when I left my hiding place one night to scrounge for food and…ran smack into him…”
“Hobbs?”
Her body quaked just hearing his name, and she answered with a jerky sort of nod. “Only he told me his name was John,” she sneered. “I was scared to death that he would turn me over to the captain—I didn’t know that he had stole on board, too, disguising himself as a crew member. He told me he’d hired on at Platte City, but that was a lie. He laughed and said he thought it was funny that he’d caught himself a girl stowaway.”
The memories of that night came rushing back and Mary wished she hadn’t eaten so much for lunch, as the food in her stomach began to feel a bit sour. Oh, how she didn’t want to even think about what came next, but…
Closing her eyes, she related softly, “He tricked me into drinking some kind of liquor. I’m not sure what it was, but it made me feel sort of funny…dizzy like. I couldn’t think straight. Then he…he kept telling me how pretty he thought I was, even in my brother’s clothes, and…and…I let him talk me into going with him to an empty cabin.” By now, tears were filling her eyes at the memory and the humiliation of it.
Suddenly, she turned in Dwight’s arms and buried her face against his chest. “Oh Dwight, I’m so ashamed. After…after it was over…he…” she wavered, gulping back tears. “He tossed a ten-dollar bill at me and said…” her breath hitched. “He said, ‘There, now you’re a workin’ girl.’ And he told me I could make lots of money being nice to men.” Dwight growled a not so nice name for the blackguard and tightened his arms around her, his hands tenderly caressing. “By the time he got through with
