River

October 1811

Pittsburgh

Lydia

This is the month that it will begin. The steamboat is complete. The New Orleans sits floating in the river, tied up to the dock next to the shipyard, ready to take on passengers. The cabins are full of the ornate fixtures that Nicholas wanted to install, one aft cabin designed to accommodate ladies, and one fore for gentlemen. The bright blue color of the boat’s paint gleams in the sun, and the steam engine is shiny and powerful and ready to prove itself to the world.

Pittsburgh has been watching us all year, not believing that we would get to this point, but we have proven them wrong. The boat is ready. We just have to finish preparing the provisions and the crew for launch.

The maiden voyage of the ship is not for passengers, but it is very much for the public. This is what will establish steamboat travel as a completely plausible means of transportation and commerce.

We have both heard the gossip, the laughs, the mockery. The ship does look unusual with the piston and crossbeams and huge paddlewheels along the sides. And of course the boat is enormous, very ambitious in its scope.

The biggest obstacle, it has been predicted, will be getting the boat over the Falls of the Ohio river at Louisville, Kentucky. I do not believe that it has ever been attempted by a vessel this large. But Nicholas and I did the calculations, and I am absolutely certain that it will work.

Once we push off from the dock here at the Monongahela river, the confluence with the Allegheny river is only a short distance away. There, the Ohio river has its origins. After we are past the Louisville Falls, we will reach the Mississippi river, then onwards all the way down to Natchez and finally New Orleans.

The population of Pittsburgh is both critical to our endeavor and critical of it. The negative publicity we have generated is one of our biggest obstacles. Nicholas and I have never shied from controversy, but our plan to go together on this voyage is creating more uproar than even I imagined it would.

When it became obvious to the community that I am expecting a baby, and that I am still planning to accompany my husband on the maiden voyage of the first steamboat to ply the waters of the Mississippi, the local gossips exploded in outrage. How could Nicholas endanger the lives of his wife and baby in this way? How could Lydia possibly contemplate taking such a risk? What kind of husband and man is he? What kind of wife and woman is she?

I will show them what kind. The devoted kind. We are utterly committed to each other. Having worked on this project nonstop for a year, there is no way that I am going to miss the trip. And there is no way he would try to stop me - he wouldn’t dream of it. He knows I can’t be stopped. That’s a lesson he learned when I was only thirteen years old.

Besides, I was also pregnant for our flatboat trip two years ago, and that was far more uncomfortable and dangerous than this is going to be. While Nicholas methodically explored and measured and evaluated the waterways along the entire route, we spent six months on what was basically a floating box on the Mississippi river, being buffeted by the current, dodging sandbars, barely escaping assorted scrapes with Natives and illness and disaster. We got through all that just fine, and our daughter Rosetta was born healthy and fit at the end of it. This will be nothing compared to that.

So I am just ignoring them all. It doesn’t matter what they say. We are doing it, together.

Natchez

Gregor

The pilings are all in. The gigantic contraption that has loomed over the docks for months, the pile driver, has done its work, pounded all of the enormous logs vertically into the silt of the river. There they stand, ready to provide the foundation for the steamboat dock.

The crew has shifted over to this new phase of the dock’s construction. This is a straightforward task, more similar to other construction projects, just lining up and hammering the planks into the pilings to form the dock.

I know that Nicholas and Lydia will be launching the New Orleans this month, will soon be on their way south on the first boat of its kind to travel on the Mississippi. The dock will be ready for them to arrive, generous enough to accommodate the enormous steamboat as it docks here in Natchez.

I am arriving Under-the-hill for another day of toiling together with my crew. They seem to have forgiven me for my blunder in dropping my rope the other day, and I have managed not to disgrace myself again. It looks like the entire crew has beaten me here this morning, and I toss my coat into my little office, roll up my sleeves, and prepare to get to work.

I realize that two members of the crew are missing. David and Ben are not here. Huh.

Wolk tells me, “Ben has made his decision, and is telling David goodbye in their room.”

Oh. I knew it was coming, but it still makes me so sad.

Poor Samuel.

Poor David.

Poor Ben.

Ben

David is furiously packing his belongings into his sack, which has been neglected and unused underneath his bed for a couple of months now. We haven’t needed our travel sacks, being so comfortably settled in here working for Gregor and living in the boarding house.

I am sitting on my bed, staring at him in dismay. My belongings are already all packed. I know he doesn’t really want to go, but every time I try to stop him from packing he glares angrily at me and tells me to shut up.

I have to try again, though. He doesn’t have many things, it only takes a few minutes to stuff them all into the sack. He straightens from his bed, which he has been leaning over as he fills his bag, and looks around the room to see if he has forgotten anything.

I reach over, grab his arm, and pull him down, forcing him to sit next to me.

“David,” I tell him for the hundredth time, “you aren’t coming.”

His jaw is stubbornly set. I know that look. “Obviously I am.”

“There is no reason for you to go. You like working here. You are happy,” I sigh. “Don’t let me ruin that for you.”

“Is this about getting arrested?” he asks, wildly. “You know that didn’t mean anything. Nothing came of it.”

“No, it’s not that,” I shrug.

“If you would just tell me why on earth you are bailing, maybe I could understand,” he yells at me. I know why he is so angry. Here I just suddenly announce that I have to leave, then refuse to tell him why. He still doesn’t know about me, about Samuel. He never will.

“I just have to go,” I say. “And I don’t want you to come. You should stay here. You’ve told me you never want to work flatboats again. I know you hate the Trace. And I know how much you like it here.”

He looks so miserable. “You can’t go without me. I’d rather come with you than stay. We’ve always done this together.”

“Well,” I say, harshly, realizing that I’ll have to be cruel to get him to give up on this, “maybe I’m sick of that. Why do we always have to do everything together? Maybe I’d like to just go off on my own for once.”

He stares at me, shocked. “What?”

“Maybe it would be nice to have a quiet journey for a change,” I go on, brutally, “not have to listen to you chatter all the way up the Trace.”

His mouth opens but he can’t even respond to that. I have always teased him for being so talkative, and he has always teased me for being so quiet. It is part of who we are, part of what we love about each other, part of why we are such good friends. It’s always been this way.

I see the pain flash into his eyes, and a sense of betrayal.

It kills me.

But I can’t let him come. I know that, for once, he has found his place. It isn’t wandering around with me. It is with this big group of friends, people that can talk just as well as he can, people that he can relate to. Straight people. Normal people. Men who can fall in love with women, not with each other. I’ll never fit in, and he already has. This is so good for him. I’m not.

I have to finish this. “I’m going,” I say. “You’re not. I don’t want you to come.”

For once he is speechless. His face flushes red, as red as it was when I thought he was dying from blood poisoning. His expression is full of rage and pain when he slams out of the room, leaving me sitting alone with my grief.

Gregor

I watch unobtrusively as David stomps towards us from the boarding house, without Ben. He is visibly distressed. But he doesn’t say anything, he just grabs his toolbelt and takes his place at the construction site. Soon he is pounding in nails with his hammer, as hard as the pile driver pounded the logs into the silt. The other workers obviously wonder what is wrong, but they leave him alone, just work alongside him. I’m sure they’ll realize soon that Ben has gone.

I don’t want either of them to have to endure another scene, so I leave the construction site and start walking towards the boarding house. I know Ben intends to come and tell me goodbye, to give his notice.

I sigh. I wish it wasn’t happening, but I cannot force other people to my will. I’ve learned that I’m only human, my wishes and plans are no more important than anybody else’s. If Ben has decided to leave, it isn’t my place to stop him. Wolk regards me sadly, but the wolf remains silent.

Ben sees me coming when he leaves the boarding house, his rucksack slung across his back. He looks as upset as David did.

I wait for him to come up to me.

“I’m quitting,” he says without preamble.

I nod. “I’m very sorry to hear that. I will miss you.” I am not going to try to talk him out of it. He is too miserable here.

His face is full of both determination and anguish. He looks at the ground, and I can tell that he wishes that he could find the words that have never come easy to him.

I reach over and put my hand on his arm. Maybe it will help. “I’ll look out for David for you,” I tell him. I can’t tell him the same about Samuel - I am not supposed to know anything about that.

His brow furrows with misery, and he glances towards the dock. I know he sees David there, ferociously pounding nails. I don’t think he can speak, so he just nods, and turns away.

I wait a moment, watch him walking towards the hill, then I turn back to the construction site. As I approach I see David pause in his work, his eyes following Ben as he climbs towards town, towards the Trace.

I wonder if Samuel will see him go by on the way past his office.

“No. Ben plans to take a more roundabout route, in order to avoid passing by there.”

I shake my head sadly and return to work.