The night in the barracks was actually better than I expected and sure beat the hell out of sleeping under a lean-to, although I did miss the stars at night. Breakfast wasn’t half-bad; at least we had fresh bread and hot coffee ready to go as soon as we woke up. The fire watch - yes it is a shared shift duty to watch for fires at night -- woke us about an hour before first light and we were on our boat and ready to go as soon as it was light enough to safely navigate.

We slid downriver under the rising sun and my only responsibility was to have a rifle near to hand in case there was trouble. Amos got the brazier going and I soon had a hot cup of coffee, while Brin had a bone Amos had packed for him. Mostly we just sat and chatted about life and the challenges we faced. Of course, Amos was pining for his new wife.

I eventually told him to keep his eyes open for trouble, then I pulled out my book and read for a while until it was my turn to play lookout. The book itself was inconsequential, just something I had snagged from the Marine House study. What was hidden inside it though, in a rectangular hole I had cut in the pages, was my cell phone, well just a hand held computer now. I was able to read without displaying the tech and snap the book shut if someone approached me. All in all it was a pretty handy little work around.

My calculations told me it was about three hundred and fifty miles to Memphis by river, and depending on weather conditions, we could make it there in two or three days. The wind did pick up nicely in the afternoon so we started to make good speed and we watched the world go by at a nice steady pace for most of the evening. The days were still fairly long and we stayed on the river as long as we could, finally putting to shore at just about sundown.

Mrs. Byrne had stocked in plenty of good food for everyone and it wasn’t long before the camp was quiet except for the occasional sound of the guard on duty. We passed two nights in this manner and made the town of Memphis before lunch on the third day; we’d made good progress.

The town of Memphis wasn’t very impressive and looked to have a population of about two thousand citizens. It would grow very quickly in the coming years but right now it was early days and still far from being that beautiful city.

Much more importantly, there was a steamboat tied up on the beach just sitting there looking ugly and efficient. It resembled one of our flat bottom boats with a wheel on the side and a smokestack poking out the roof, other that that it was almost exactly the same. It was just sitting there with no activity on deck and riding high in the water lacking a cargo.

Once we tied up, Patrick set the men to off-loading our cargo and then Patrick and I set out to see what we could find. A few friendly inquiries led us to an inn where the captain and his small crew were eating lunch. They didn’t appear to enjoying the food or the circumstance and I saw opportunity on the faces of those men.

We got coffee and joined them at the table, Patrick led off doing the captain to captain thing. I simply smoked a cigarette, drank my coffee and followed along. It didn’t take long to get to the story, in a nutshell the company was down in New Orleans and had gone broke. Repair parts had been shipped but paychecks and cash for parts, food and fuel hadn’t come with them. They were broke and stranded and the captain had been feeding the guys out of his own pocket. That pocket was running empty now also.

That was my clue to step in and so into deal-maker mode I went. I found out the captain’s name was Svenson and was introduced to the rest of the crew members. After the pleasantries were exchanged I offered to hire their service for a trip north up the river. A lot of hemming and hawing went on but upon hearing about back pay and signing bonus we had them all. I fronted the cash to purchase the parts and adequate fuel to get us to St. Louis and the sailors started to show some life.

Patrick, the captain and a couple of hands went to pick up the parts while the coalman set off to get fuel delivered, payment on delivery of course. The rest of the hands took me down to show me the boat. They had been sleeping in the empty hold so I set them to packing all of that up and getting everything ready to cast off tomorrow morning. I sent a runner over to fetch Amos for me and passed the message that I wanted a case of corn and one of tomatoes sent over for our journey north.

After that things flowed smoothly. Patrick took part of our crew, peddled our wares and then fulfilled the cargo list that had been sent along with him. I didn’t argue, this all fell under Timmons’s domain now and I stayed out of it. Amos had arranged for our belongings to be transferred to the steamboat and we simply had dinner at the Inn while the boats were loaded.

Moonrise found me fast asleep on the of the cargo house roof of my new steam boat, hoping it didn’t rain and praying this gambit worked. If everything fell in our favor I’d just gotten a steamboat for free, if not I’d make an offer or surrender it if legally required to do so. But this was the frontier in 1822 and the owners had gone broke.

I was pretty sure I had a steamboat.