Flight of the Hawk: The River Read online

  He stalked away, leaving Tylor in the darkness by the river.

  Fighting an unsettled feeling in his gut, Lisa paced to the edge of camp and talked with the guards. Hours later, he allowed himself to catch a few hours of sleep until Mayette’s voice called him back to the deadly reality of the river.

  The next afternoon, a towering thunderhead built to the west: an imposing column of impossible white billows that filled the sky. Beneath it, an angry black blanket of rain blotted out the horizon. Lisa’s expedition camped to the banging crash of thunder; they were four miles north of the Little Platte River. The day had been typical of the trip, Tylor struggling most of the way in hip-deep water as he tugged the cordelle.

  Through the long day he had preoccupied himself with Lisa’s speech from the night before. The trader’s words incited that old and familiar urge. The one that goaded Tylor to test himself, to see what he could learn, to dedicate himself to the achievement of an end. That same lurking ambition that had led him into Aaron Burr’s various plots.

  God, he’d loved the game.

  He could feel the seductive siren’s call of intrigue. And he’d been good at it—so good that he’d walked the streets of Santa Fe when the Spanish would have jailed him immediately. He had scouted the missions in Texas, ridden through the southern plains, and sat at the councils of the Pawnee. Through it all, he had sent his cogent reports to Aaron Burr, delineating potential allies, outlining Spanish weaknesses, and listing which corrupt administrators might be bribed or otherwise induced to support Burr’s fanciful schemes.

  To his amazement, somehow Manuel Lisa had picked up on that singular quality that Tylor wished more than ever to hide.

  But do I want to become someone’s agent again?

  The question festered through the long day.

  As the expedition wound its way along the Missouri’s loops and oxbows, the hunters brought in several deer and some waterfowl they’d managed to bag. Lisa spent his time preoccupied with Bijou and Luttig as they sat atop the cargo box and inventoried stores. Based upon their counsel, he tried to decide how to distribute specific articles to different tribes according to their separate fancies.

  Tylor caught Luttig that evening as he penned in his journal.

  “The bourgeois seems to be worried about what to trade where. I thought it was just a matter of a few mirrors or beads for a . . . well, handful of furs.” Tylor cocked his head in a manner he hoped would elicit Luttig’s honest response.

  Luttig smiled wistfully. “Trading on the river is a tricky business. Takes a good head and thorough knowledge of the Indians we have to deal with. In the beginning, anything will do to establish trade: beads, tin pots, mirrors, needles, colorful cloth, and so forth. But once the tribes become used to our goods, they change their demands. One tribe wants tomahawk heads with a blade on one side and a point on the other. “Nuther will demand a different design with a pipe bowl on one side. Some have preferences for iron arrow points in a certain shape. Don’t try an’ take ’em any resembling the style of point used by their enemies.”

  “I guess it’s harder than I thought,” Tylor stated.

  “That’s the easy part.” Luttig scratched his head. “Hard part’s keeping track of each tribe’s required presents. Too many Injuns! It’s a clerk’s nightmare to know which Indian gets what. Who’s got more prestige than his fellow, lest somehow, a higher-ranking man end up insulted that his inferior got a bigger set of tinkler bells—let alone which types of goods sell well in a given season. I tell you, one man will have raided the Pawnee, and he’ll be head chief this year. Next year, it’s another. Always changing.”

  Luttig grinned. “That is the strength of the bourgeois. Lives for the challenge. No one reads the tribes better than Manuel Lisa.”

  “Food for thought,” Tylor mused, as he squinted up at the black storm rolling down on them with flickering lightning.

  Off to the side, Fenway McKeever was watching him through narrowed green eyes. His knowing smile somehow felt as threatening as the brewing storm.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  * * *

  On Monday, the 8th of June, they made eighteen miles and camped below the old Kansas Indian village. Tylor strolled up to see it. The large communal houses, built of picketed logs, were falling apart. Tall and spacious, the closely packed buildings each had room for three or four families around common hearths. The Kansas had abandoned the site several years before after too many parties of Sioux and Pawnee raided them for corn and women. Now they were living a couple of days’ journey off to the west.

  The following day the expedition struggled up a restricted channel in the river. Lisa sent the little boat in the lead to sound the bottom. The trader paced Polly’s deck and shouted orders to the men on the cordelle, urging them on as he watched the angle of the thick line against the mast. Like so many places along the dangerous river, in the narrow channel with its fast-running water, the boats would have no chance to dodge a floating log, or other disaster. Lisa split his concentration between the smaller boat, the current, and the men, making the most of each part of the tricky passage.

  The smaller boat made the tip of the island and started to negotiate an embarrass that had piled up on the upstream side and snarled the current. Less than a hundred yards downstream, on Polly’s cordelle, Tylor sweated his way through the shallows, eyes on the little boat when he could spare the attention. He threw a glance over his shoulder to see Lisa on the Polly’s bow. The bourgeois appeared cool as he watched the little boat swaying in the current just upstream from his prized keelboat.

  The narrow channel threaded its way around the piled snags where the water rushed over broken and interlaced wood. Here lay the trickiest part of the passage. The little boat’s cordellers made their way over the tangle of slick wet logs and pulled with all their might while the polers and patroon nosed the little craft into the rush of the water.

  From where he pulled Polly’s heavy cordelle, Tylor didn’t see what happened, but somehow the men on the little boat’s cordelle lost their footing. As the cordelle was ripped away, the little boat rushed backward in the current, dragging the tow rope behind her. Tylor caught a sudden glimpse of McKeever alone atop the tangled logs in the embarrass; the man was laughing, hands on his hips, as if in a job well done.

  Frantic shouts rose as the men on the little boat sought in vain to set poles and stop the backward rush. The little boat was swung round end for end, first bow, and then sterm catching, as it rushed headlong toward Polly.

  “Cast loose!” Lisa shouted to the cordellers. “Let us go!”

  Within moments, the little boat would crash full into Polly. If that didn’t sink them both, they’d wedge in the narrow channel, plugging it tight. Then, as their combined masses damned the water above them, the pressure would tear them apart.

  Tylor and his companions dropped the cordelle and watched the keelboat drift back down the narrow waterway; polers battled heroically to keep the craft centered in the restricted channel as the current carried it back down the passage.

  In disgust, Tylor and his fellows slogged along in pursuit, knee deep in the rushing water.

  Even then, the little boat continued to close. With a grinding of wood they ran together, men cursing and straining as they sought to push the two boats apart. From where he sloshed through mud and water, Tylor could hear wood splinter. As it did, the little boat swung to one side and grounded, while Polly kept the main current and drifted downriver.

  The little boat lay on the opposite side of the channel, men scampering around the deck checking damage. Tylor struggled into the current and struck out for the vessel. Breasting the rapid water, he touched bottom fifty yards behind the boat and struggled upstream to the stranded craft.

  “How is the hull?” The patroon shouted down to him. “Do we have a breach?”

  Tylor waded around the hull feeling underwater along the smooth sides of the craft. “None I can feel,” Tylor shouted up.


  The other cordellers were scrambling down the opposite bank after the Polly. Tylor waded out and trotted down the sandy bank of the island. Around the bend, he found Polly in a backwater, poles set to keep her from drifting. Lisa was stomping along the deck waving his fists as he cursed in English, Spanish, and French.

  Tylor swam out to the boat and—from where he barely could keep toes on the bottom—looked up at Lisa. “No major damage to the little boat. I’ll check what I can of Polly’s hull.”

  Diving in the opaque water, John Tylor felt his way around the hull; it didn’t even seem scuffed. He surfaced and gasped for air as Lisa bent over the side.

  “Nothing. No holes or breaches.” Tylor swam to where Lisa lent an arm and pulled him over the side.

  Lisa looked sour, jaw muscles rippling. “The forward swivel gun is gone. The braces for the pintle broke on impact. It’s overboard.”

  Tylor looked at the forward swivel gun mount. So that had been the source of the breaking wood he’d heard when Polly’s bow had taken the brunt of the collision. The swivel might prove the final defense for the boat in the event of hostile Indians.

  “Want me to take a couple of men up and dive for it? We might get lucky. I’d like to try.”

  “You might indeed get lucky.” Lisa arched a weary eyebrow. “Take who you wish, and see what you can find.”

  Tylor lowered himself over Polly’s side and lined out the cordelle, struggling to pull the heavy rope to the opposite bank. Cursing, Tylor fought the muddy water and the too-great weight of the rope as the current caught it and carried him downriver.

  Baptiste Latoulipe and some of the others called out as they came stroking toward him. Together they swam the line over to the bank, and the cordellers pulled up the slack while Tylor gasped for breath in the shallows.

  “Baptiste?” Tylor called. “Do you and some others want to come dive for the swivel?”

  “Oui,” the boatman told him with a grin. “We are already wet, non?”

  Tylor, Latoulipe, and François Lecompt slopped their way against the current to easier walking on the sandy bank.

  “We can go farther up and dive on our way down. Water shouldn’t be more than six or seven feet deep in there. When we get even with that fallen cottonwood downstream, we’re too far. Head for shore and try again,” Tylor suggested.

  “The current is fast,” Latoulipe pointed out nervously. “The swivel may have gone far. I do not know . . .”

  Tylor nodded and sighed, studying the swift brown water. “Fast, yes. But it’s narrow, too. Not so much to search. Might as well try, though.” He led the way into the water and struck out for the center of the current.

  Bobbing like ducks, they worked their way downriver, gasping lungs full of air and diving to run their fingers along the gravelly bottom. Tylor kept them at it for four trips.

  Exhausted, they struggled to shore and lay gasping on the sandy bank.

  “The gun could be anywhere in there,” François sighed with defeat.

  “With the bottom so hard, the current may have carried it very far,” Latoulipe grumbled sullenly. “The water is so much faster underneath. Each time I go down, I can feel the gravel rolling under my fingers.”

  “I’ll try it one more time,” Tylor declared.

  “Be careful, mon ami, you are already tired. A lost gun, well, it is not worth a man’s life. We will watch and make sure you are not carried too far by the current.” Baptiste placed a hand on Tylor’s shoulder, concern in his deep brown eyes, water dripping from his soaked beard.

  Nodding, Tylor climbed to his feet and made the last trip upriver along the shore. He gave it all he had, diving into the silt-choked water and groping his fingers into the packed gravels of the bottom, feeling the loose grains of current-born sands as they bounced off his skin. He ran out of air and pushed to the surface, caught his wind, and dove. The chill was getting to him—his limbs going numb with cold.

  Tylor worked his way down to the little boat, knowing it was futile but refusing to give up. He surfaced to see Baptiste and François Lecompt waving him to shore. Wearily he struck out—realized how tired he was, that he didn’t have enough energy left to do more than keep afloat. To his cold-numbed eyes, the shore spun past with remarkable speed. He kept being twirled around, swept along, limp, heaving for air, no longer able to fight the current.

  Had it not been for Baptiste Latoulipe, he might have drowned. The burly boatman swam out partway and towed Tylor back to the shore. The engage dragged Tylor onto the bank and lay him on muddy sand. For a time, Tylor gasped for breath and was tormented by the cold shivers that racked his body.

  “I owe you.” Tylor gasped. “I . . . I . . .”

  “You tried, mon ami.” Baptiste patted his shoulder. “The gun is gone. We must face it. The bourgeois will be proud of your effort.”

  When Tylor looked into Latoulipe’s brown eyes, he saw something he’d not seen for years: respect.

  That sent a curious tingle through him. Something inside him warmed, almost brought him to tears. So very long . . .

  And then, as if out of nowhere, and another thought: McKeever was laughing? Why?

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  * * *

  Considering the problems of river travel on the Missouri, Lisa’s 1812 expedition had had relatively few problems until the collision. Tylor always wondered if Friday, the 12th of June, wasn’t a turning point, especially for the crew’s attitude. What had been almost a lark to the men, grew deadly serious. A subtle anxiety, born that day, dogged their path for the rest of the journey.

  That night they camped on a long sandbar. François Laprise noticed that turtles had been laying eggs in the sand. Laughing, cheering, voyageurs scrambled up and down the bank digging like children until some 200 fresh turtle eggs had been collected.

  They feasted that night.

  John Tylor—stuffed with turtle eggs, venison, and the inevitable hominy corn gruel—pulled contentedly at his pipe and watched the men he worked with. They were a good crew. Latoulipe had turned into a fun-loving companion. More than once, Tylor caught himself laughing at one of Latoulipe’s antics. The man’s company left him with a light feeling he hadn’t experienced since that terrible night in Washington City.

  Tylor wondered if he had somehow found a friend.

  The thought left him feeling slightly uncomfortable. He’d given his undying loyalty but twice in his life. First to Hallie Hamilton, and second to Aaron Burr. Both times he had paid the price for it. The bright, shining youth he had been had now turned to a dull, tarnished, untrusting husk of a man.

  “Tylor!” Lisa’s voice called to him from across the camp.

  John stood and walked lightly to Lisa’s small tent where the bourgeois motioned to him.

  “Evening, Mr. Lisa,” Tylor greeted as he sat in the spot Lisa indicated.

  Reuben Lewis handed him a tin half-full of amber spirits.

  “Once again, we would like to thank you for trying so very hard to find the swivel gun.” Lisa smiled and—with Lewis—raised his tin in salute. To Tylor’s surprise, the liquor was not the rotgut saved for the Indian trade but was instead a very fine brandy.

  “Mr. Tylor, would you mind if we asked you some questions?” Reuben Lewis queried as he leaned back and grabbed his knees.

  “That would depend on the questions.”

  Lisa chuckled lightly. “John, we are curious. That day in my office, you said you wanted nothing to do with going to Santa Fe. What do you know of the situation and circumstances there? Have you ever dealt with the Spanish on a professional level? What can you tell us that we do not already know?”

  Tylor gave each man a careful evaluation. Should he tell them? If he did, would they want to know more about the reasons behind his visit? Would they be able to put that into context with the conspiracy?

  Tylor chuckled dryly, amused that his past lurked behind him like a storm cloud. Would he ever outrun it? He repacked his pipe, and wa
s surprised when Reuben Lewis snagged an ember from the fire for a light. Puffing, Tylor leaned back on a rolled-up blanket. “I wasn’t that impressed with the place as a city. It’s a squalid little adobe village nestled at the mouth of a valley in the mountains. They do, however, have gold, copper, lead, food, and other raw materials to trade. The real wealth is in the silver.”

  Reuben Lewis and Lisa sat up suddenly. “You’ve been there!” they cried in unison.

  “I have.” Tylor gave them an absent smile. “I also didn’t get caught. I suspect your friends McKnight and Baird are in for a very big surprise—that’s assuming they even make it to Santa Fe in the first place. My best guess? They’ll rot in a cell somewhere for quite a while. Maybe even be sent in chains to Mexico City.”

  “Why?” Lewis asked. “Trade would benefit both peoples. Surely that fact can be communicated.”

  Tylor puffed his pipe. “I doubt the Spanish will see it that way for some time. They’re still festering with resentment over Napoleon’s cession of Louisiana to the Americans. More than that, they fear American mercantilism. I believe Mr. Lisa can understand the Spanish system of licensing and control better than any of the rest of us. He’s lived under their rule.”

  “How is it that you did not get caught?” Lisa asked, skeptical eyes on Tylor. “I don’t remember that you were with Pike’s expedition.”

  “I wasn’t.” Tylor felt his mouth twist with that telltale smile. “I had my ways is all. I speak the language well enough to sound like a native. I knew where to go, who to see, and, ultimately, I had protection. That latter can make all the difference when traveling the Spanish lands.”

  “Whose protection?” Lisa asked mildly. “Are you still in contact with them?”

  “No, I’m not.” Tylor was firm. “That door is closed. Further, Mr. Lisa, the man I knew is no longer a factor in the politics of Santa Fe. I can offer you no hope of establishing a liaison there. On the contrary, any mention of me could be most detrimental to your plans to control a piece of the Santa Fe trade.”