The first thing I saw when I reached the landing was a small pile of stumps sitting off to the side. I wondered what they intended to do with those. Timmons filled me in quickly when he saw what I was looking at. Those would become a water break about fifty yards upstream. It’s intended to reduce the current around the landing, as well as to stop any flotsam from hitting the dock. The shipwright and one other guy were working on the boat. There really wasn’t much for us to do down there, so we headed back up to main camp.

We walked back up, with Brin doing dog stuff in front of us and Lunch trailing dutifully along behind. We merely observed the progress made thus far while discussing women, children and other casual subjects. Creating relationships and building personal connections was important; I needed my leaders to trust me.

The road team was hard at work digging, cutting, and pulling out stumps. It was the cleanest and most permanent way to remove a stump. As boatmen, they all were interested in creating that safe harbor for their dock. Patrick pointed out that the water break would also create a great spot for fishing. I let them know that lunch would be here soon and to keep up the good work.

Timmons and I left them to their business and head up towards town. Thinking about lunch, I remembered that we had a butcher in the village now. They should be able to have sausage available for their travels next year. He pointedly complimented the rations we were giving the men and noted that morale had been significantly higher on their on the Ft. Dickinson trip. Given that was an easy trip, but good food had played a role in that, also.

At the top of the bluff, I pointed out where I thought the warehouse and trade house would go. I showed him the spot across the road from them, where I wanted to put the inn and bunkhouse. The inn would also serve as a chow hall for our men. All eating and drinking would be restricted to that area. We didn’t need the rodents, and associated diseases that came with them, in the bunkhouse where they could decimate our ranks.

We stopped by the woodshop for a while. They were making decent progress already. They had managed to fell three trees in the log storage area and were hard at work on the next set. I reminded them to grade the wood as they felled the trees, then stack them accordingly. There's no sense in using furniture-grade wood to build a dock. I passed along the same message to them, about lunch being on its way soon. Then we left them to their labors.

For the rest of the walk, we discussed recruiting, particularly down in St. Louis. It was vital that we add additional people. We preferred to add families. Our big sticking points would be on racism and religion. We needed a doctor, of some sort, most of all. At that point, I decided that I’d be going on this journey with him. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to deposit some of the gold into a major bank. While I still had a deal pending with Henry Leavenworth, I wanted to keep a certain amount under lock and key. Bank drafts would do me fine for any major transactions.

We had made it back to camp, but were going out again soon. So I left Lunch saddled but unbridled him so he could eat freely. Horses can eat just fine with the bridle on, but why force him to do so? I hung the bridle on the pommel and turned him out to the pasture. I’d have Timmons saddle up for the rest of our tour. Walking wasn’t bad, but it sure got tedious after a while.

Timmons took off to find his wife and I walked over to my place for a while.

Mary and one of the black ladies were just starting to serve the kids their lunch, so I sat down and joined them. It’s always fun to converse with little kids in school. They were always excited and fun to talk to. I learned that, after lunch, they had rest time and then they would play games for a little while. They were all excited because they were going to learn how to unzip pea pods, after play time. I smiled at Mary and headed back to the corral to meet up with Timmons.

We saddled up and headed over to the road crew to see how they were progressing. My biggest concern was strife over race or supervisory authority. I guess we’d find out quickly enough. Better it should happen now than when I’m gone.

They had started down at the prairie end, to make working the logs easier. We wanted to drop all of these logs down there to use making a cabin and rails for our split rail fence. We didn’t intend to graze down here, year round. Once the weather got hard, the herd would stay in the upper pasture near my homestead.

Two of the crew were down here, clearing fallen trees that Holder had dragged down with the mule. The logs were cut to length and rolled over to a row of logs already in place. There were already almost thirty logs lined up there. So things were going well on this, also. We made some small talk with the guys and then headed up to visit with the rest of the team.

Michelle and Sonya were there, delivering lunch. They had almost followed us down the trail, behind us by only twenty minutes or so. We hung out with the guys while they ate, and then joined their work party for a couple of hours after lunch. I got my axe swinging time in, and used the time to know each of the guys better. It would take more than one week for everyone to accept me, but it was a start.

When dinnertime came around, I regretfully put my axe back on the saddle and headed up to camp for an afternoon of meetings and planning sessions. I’d rather pull stumps than sit through an afternoon like that, but this was pretty much my future.