BLACK POWDER, GRAY HOPE:
VENGEANCE

Chapter One

On the Dock

    Each of us, somehow will find the courage to stand up to evil, said Patrick’s father. He suspected that his daughter, Patrick’s sister, had been abused by Morgan’s plantation overseer.

*****

     It was the kind of evening that a shaman would describe as red, or sacred. Far across the calm water of the river to the southwest, scattered clouds were being pushed by a soft wind off the Gulf of Mexico. The setting sun was painting the underside of the clouds a soft pink. The sun's reddish light lit the stuttering waves of the wide river, making thousands of tittering pink diamonds in the waves.
     The pink light coated the white breast of a great gray heron in the shallows. She stood silent keeping watch for a small green frog. Silver flashes betrayed the presence of small two-inch white fish, but the somber heron was disinterested. She knew that a small frog was the perfect dessert to cap off her day along the river. Behind her a soft 'plop' by the shore told her that a careless frog might be swimming toward her motionless legs. She moved her head ever so slightly to the right and saw the fluttering motion of the frog's legs. Her neck bent to the right when she turned her head toward the frog. Her mouth opened slightly…
     There was a sudden 'huff' from the steam engine aboard an upward bound wood and metallic behemoth. She raised her head and the frog escaped into some brown leaves piled in the shallows. The behemoth was a wooden side-wheel steamer of two decks and three masts with twin chimneys. Her boilers produced 34 pounds of steam pressure that pushed at two large four-foot cylinders in their ten-foot cycle, turning the two paddlewheels outside her hull. Each cycle of a cylinder produced a 'huff' from the steam engine. The third or fourth 'huff' convinced the heron to abandon her perch in the shallows. She ponderously flapped her great wings and took flight across the water, circling ahead of the steamer, gaining altitude. She flew into a beam of late-evening sunlight; her white breast turned a brilliant light gold color. Then she turned away and circled around the steamer, heading into the quiet marshes to the east of the great river.
     The half-circle houses that protected the paddlewheels were painted white with the words 'DANIEL WEBSTER' emblazoned in fresh red paint. The first level deck, or boiler deck, held cargo covered with tarpaulins, lashed to the deck. The second deck was festooned with kerosene lamps that were being lit by a deckhand. Along the starboard railing passengers were gawking up river, trying to get a first glimpse of the New Orleans piers and warehouses. The Daniel Webster had 31 staterooms on her 'passenger' deck and accommodations for 116 passengers, some of whom were dressed in their 'Sunday' finest for the arrival in New Orleans. It had been a fast trip, New York to Baltimore thence down the coast around Florida.
     A fair wind was blowing north across the Gulf of Mexico and seemed to aid the voyage of the Daniel Webster. Six and seven foot swells 'pushed' her along on her route to the north. The passengers, however, were bound to look forward to the safety of land; the crew told them exciting stories about the Music Halls in the French Quarter of New Orleans. Daniel Webster moved upstream in the relatively quiet water near shore. Her goal was the Poydras Street wharf near the French Quarter.
     About a mile short of Poydras Street, the Daniel Webster passed close aboard the Algiers docks, passing the Steamer St. Louis and the Steamer Memphis Belle, tied close abeam to the docks. Memphis Belle was off-loading bales of cotton that were being placed into wagons and hauled off the docks. A gang of men was hauling boxes of cargo aboard St. Louis and off-loading bales of shingles and lumber.
     The relatively quiet passengers aboard the Daniel Webster heard the coarse, vulgar swearing of the dock masters, who were probably not aware of the passage of the gaily-lit ship. One or two laborers on the dock stopped to watch the ocean-going vessel pass toward Poydras wharf. The swearing only increased. The dock masters and deck hands of the Memphis Belle and St. Louis were determined to finish their loading. Their captains, John Black and Jeremiah Abraham Bellows had wagered $100 dollars in gold on their race to the pier at Baton Rouge, a distance of 80 miles.
     Off to the west the last shades of pink in the sky were turning black. Aboard the Algiers dock, the dock laborers and deck hands continued their sweating and swearing, trying to meet the deadlines set by their ornery, blustering First Mates.

*****

     “Hey you, the tall man, move that box, dammit!” shouted a deck hand on the St. Louis. The deck hand was frustrated that their cargo bound for Vicksburg and St. Louis was not coming aboard fast enough. He reached up to scratch his graying hair and found a straw entangled in his greasy hair. He stopped to look at it before he swore again, “Move that box, you cousin to a Texas sloth.”
     The tall man on the dock bent over and picked up the box. He lifted it easily onto his shoulder and walked up the ramp to the stage at the steamer's bow. He walked to the deck hand Murphy with the gray hair and looking him over said, “Where do you want it?”
     The deck hand jumped back apparently afraid the taller man might drop the box onto his head. Ten feet up the deck, the Mate laughed.
     “Don't insult the dock crew, Murphy. They have short tempers,” said the Mate walking toward the two men. “Don't you, mister?”
     When the tall man didn't answer, the Mate asked him again, “Short temper? Or do you speak Francais?”
     “English, sir. If you don't mind.”
     “Well, get on with it. Get your legs moving, dammit,” said the Mate. He turned his back and walked up the deck.
     “You heard him,” said Mr. Murphy, watching the taller man. Murphy took one step backwards. The taller man turned toward the cargo pile that was accumulating in the center of the forward boiler deck. He moved his box onto the pile. On the boxside were the words Plain Dealer - Vicksburg and underneath the words „printing press cylinders?.
The tall man walked back toward the deck hand Murphy, and stopped. Murphy looked up at the man called Patrick or Paddy. He had clear blue eyes above the scraggy start of his first mustache on his sharp, handsome face. Murphy said, “So?”
     “If you don't mind, Sir, a question?”
     Murphy was looking into the eyes of a young man of 17 or 18 years, trying to fathom his purpose. His brown hair was bound into a gray cloth rag tied in sailor fashion around his head. His clothes seemed to be clean, but Murphy had been fooled many times by a man's clothing.
     “Looking for work? I'll just bet. Right?”
     “Yes, sir. Beggin' your pardon.”
     “No work. We have a full crew.” Murphy looked at the other men moving cargo boxes onto the forward deck, and smiled. “Keep it up, you lousy sons of an Acadian whore.” He shouted this epithet so loud that several men on the dock glanced in his direction. “Move it, you,” he added to the tall man. Then he changed his mind.
     “One moment,” the old deck hand named Murphy said quietly. He looked around to make sure no other men were in earshot. “How come you is so polite? Most of these sons of bitches would cut my throat just to get my job if I turned my back.”
     “My mother was a genteel woman, or so I was told,” said the tall man who went by the name Patrick Fynmore Harant. “She whacked me good every time I forgot and swore in the house. My father could swear outside, but never inside the house.”
     “Well,” said the deck hand Murphy slowly. “I'm hogswallered.”
     “Yes, sir,” said Harant. He turned and followed three men, rejoining the long procession that wound onto the dock and back onto the St. Louis. The Mate walked back to Murphy and asked him about the tall man.
     “Lookin' fur work, Sir,” replied Murphy.
     The Mate continued his trip around the cargo pile on the 'stage' - the forward deck, inspecting the placement of the cargo, making sure it would not shift. He was proud to be serving aboard the St. Louis, because the crew received a $10 dollar bonus this past Christmas. He felt Captain Bellows was entirely too generous, but many crews envied the St. Louis deck hands. The St. Louis was one of the newer 'flat-bottomed' steamers, designed to navigate in shallow water better than earlier steamboats.
    “Nother poor shanty Irishman,” said Murphy to himself. Out on the Algiers dock, Harant picked up another box marked 'press cylinders' and hauled it aboard the St. Louis.

*****

     At 10:30 p.m. the work crews gradually slowed down, realizing they were about finished. When the last box was stowed aboard St. Louis, the Mate from Memphis Belle walked over and offered the men ten cents as a bonus to finish loading the Memphis Belle. Most of the men headed for the pile of cargo up the dock. The pile was diminishing quickly. Patrick Harant hesitated, looking in the direction of Murphy.
     Murphy saw him standing there. He said nothing.
     The Mate from the Memphis Belle, a burley sort 'who loved his barley' according to reputation, walked over to Patrick and prodded him with a short stick.
     “What, youse is too good to work any more?” In the shadows cast from the few kerosene lamps, the Mate's hair masked his face. Harant saw stubble on his face and a broken tooth. The man's hand holding the short stick was large. His forearms looked enormous. The Mate spit, and a glob of black tobacco smacked onto Harant's worn black shoe.
     “No, Sir,” he said quietly looking down at his shoe. He took two steps back from the Mate.
     The Mate did something unexpected. He tossed the short stick into the space between the dock and the St. Louis. From a back pocket he pulled a short round pin, used to belay ropes on the sailing ships. He smacked it into his fist. When Harant didn't move, the Mate reached out and prodded him with the vicious-looking pin.
     “Get to work dammit,” he slurred slowly. He raised the pin and smacked it into his hand again. Harant turned and walked toward the workers near the Memphis Belle.
     “That's better,” said the Mate.
     “You like to intimidate the biguns, dint ya?” said Murphy from the safety of his perch inside the railing of the St. Louis.
     The Mate looked at him and grinned. Murphy laughed. “Looks like you met up with someone who broke your tooth, dint he?”
     “Ahhh,” said the Mate. He raised a hand and touched the stump of his tooth. “Get stuffed you slimey little frog.”
     There were many things that Alphonse Horatio Murphy would tolerate. After all, he bore the first names of the captain of H.M.S. Victorious and the Admiral of the Fleet, Horatio Nelson. Murphy grew up listening to tales handed down from father to son about the deeds of two uncles who served aboard Victorious at the Battle of Trafalgar with Nelson, who defeated the French navy but lost his life. He could not tolerate being called a 'frog'.
     “That cooks it, you baboon!” shouted Murphy. “You are definitely the son of an Acadian whore who slept with my father when he had the yellow pox from a Chinaman.” Each word of this long stretch of words grew increasingly louder. When he finally reached the 'tail-end' all of the men on the dock were aware that the loading master of the St. Louis had just called the Mate from the Memphis Belle the illegitimate son of a Chinaman.
     Murphy turned and handed his manifest to a deck hand that was standing nearby. The man was grinning from ear to ear, expecting Murphy to uphold the honor of the St. Louis. Murphy turned and marched to the stage, stepped onto the ramp and walked off the steamer. He was followed by two deck hands that carried kerosene lamps. Up the dock, several men were moving south toward the St. Louis.
     Aboard the Memphis Belle, a man moved out of the shadows on the Texas deck. Her captain John Black looked down at his Mate and swore. “Dammit Mister Ript, we ain't got time for this foolishness. Heave off, there. Leave him alone. He's at least a foot shorter than you are.”
     “Yah, you;re right Captain.”
Murphy was now standing just in front of Markey Ript. When Ript turned to walk toward the Memphis Belle, Murphy spat on his dark blue jacket. Ript heard the spitting sound, more than felt it. He turned back toward Murphy just as a fist came out of the dark near Murphy's waist that bit into his jaw and lifted the bigger man clear off the dock. He landed with a thud, falling backward onto the dock. The men around him backed up, forming a half-circle. Ript spent a long half-minute to clear his mind. He began to pull himself up. From a distance could be heard a police whistle. The Algiers docks were famous for fistfights - blacks against blacks, English against the Acadians. The whistle might be alerting other fight aficionados or the whistle might be summoning the police.
     The Memphis Belle’s mate, Markey Ript rose slowly onto his feet. He glanced around at the men surrounding him. He turned back toward the shorter Murphy, and took two steps toward Murphy. From the back of the crowd of men, someone yelled, “Don't let him get a-hold of you.” All of the dockworkers were now circling the two men. Aboard the two steamers, men lined the railings, peering into circles of light on the dark pier.
     Ript took a swing at Murphy. His momentum carried him too far. Murphy came in low and hit Ript in the chest. He was about to hit Ript again when the big man's right elbow came down on the top of Murphy's head. The shorter man staggered. Ript's left hand came out of the darkness and grabbed Murphy by the back of the neck. He pushed him away. When Murphy was almost at arm's length, Ript swung his belaying pin, catching Murphy with a loud 'thwack' in the side of the head. The smaller man's ear split, spraying blood.
     From the direction of New Orleans came the sound of men running. Someone was blowing a police whistle. The owner of the Algiers docks had sworn to crack down on the fist fighting when three news reports appeared in the English language Journal Express, and two of his investors threatened him with jail time if he didn't stop the fights.
     Ript hit Murphy again, this time in the back of the head. Murphy sagged onto his knees. Many of the men were turning to flee away from the fight. “Damn Mick …it's about time someone taught you…” said Ript while he was swinging his club back to get in a third blow. Out of the darkness behind him a hand suddenly grabbed the belaying pin and pulled it away from Ript.
     “What the…?”
     “That's enough,” said Patrick Harant, leaning into the circle of light being cast by the kerosene lamps. Murphy's two friends were holding the lamps and trying to help him to his feet.
     “Do youse understand Eenglais, you Wop?” shouted Harant. He pointed the belaying pin at Ript's forehead, hesitated for a moment, and then rapped him with the round end of it.      The big man stepped back away from Harant.
     From up the dock, someone said loudly, “Watch out there.”
     The warning came too late. A hand shot out of the dark and hit Patrick's arm above the wrist. He dropped the pin.

*****

     “You are charged with Accessory to Wounding,” said the small man in the white shirt with the apron covering his substantial stomach.
     “Not guilty,” said Harant.
     “Who asked you?” said the small man. “Not that it matters a damn.” He continued to write in the large ledger on the desk in front of him. Patrick looked around the room. It seemed rather fancy, compared to the hovel Patrick had been living in. The walls were of plaster. Earlier two policemen in black uniforms had escorted Patrick from a holding cell to the small brick building on First Street. A sign on the outside read, First Recorder’s Court, Parish d’ Orleans. It was a two-story building, and the Superior Court for the region of Orleans sometimes met in the formal meeting room on the second floor.
     The Orleans Parish recorder, called Henry Hillyberry by his friends, had held the post of Recorder, what some would call Justice of the Peace, since 1849. He charged the Parish $5 for every case he heard, and kept ten percent of all the fines. If a man was poor and could not pay the fine, Hillyberry would sentence the man to work on the docks and then he collected directly from the dock owners and ship captains. Hillyberry loved to drink the Spanish wines that were shipped in from Jamaica and Cuba. On this particular morning Hillyberry was nursing a glorious headache complete with spots before his eyes.
     The policeman standing behind Patrick Harant put a hand on his shoulder and forced him to sit down in the chair that faced His Honor, Henry Hillyberry.
     “Are you a slave?” asked Hillyberry.
     “Do I look like one?” replied Patrick.
     “The prisoner will answer the question. I have to know for my records.” His honor Henry smiled at the policeman standing behind Patrick, as if to say, See. They are all the same. Truculent and Argumentative.
     Patrick looked at the Stars and Stripes that hung on the wall behind the Recorder. There were 16 stars. To the right an ornate frame with carved grapes and leaves surrounded a print of an engraving of Andrew Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans. A large calendar, promoting Randsonn Lumber hung to the right of Andrew Jackson. When Patrick looked at the small man behind the plain oak table that served as a desk, he realized the man was waiting for something.
     “No, Sir. I am not a slave.”
     “Are you one of our red-skinned heathens?” asked Mr. Hillyberry.
     Patrick Harant hesitated. Hillyberry waited, then he laughed. “No, I don't suppose you are, not with that brown hair. What are you, for my records, dammit, speak up.”
     The policeman behind Patrick poked him in the shoulder. “Irish, Sir.”
     “Born where?”
     “Natchitoches Parish, Sir.”
     “And your parents are?”
     “Sharecroppers, Sir. On the Morgan Plantation, James Winter, Esquire, owner, Sir.”
     Patrick saw his Mom and Da sitting on their porch, enjoying a bottle of home-made beer. ‘There are times when it is smart to be patient,’ his father said
     “Polite, aren't you?”
     When Patrick didn't respond, Hillyberry looked down at his ledger. “Born on the plantation, I would guess?”
     “Yes, Sir.”
     “Where?”
     “Where what?”
     “Don't be difficult, young man.” His Honor, the Parish Recorder reached out to a carafe of wine that sat to his left on the table and refilled the glass he had placed next to his ledger.
     “Hair of the dog!” he said directly at Patrick Harant.
     “Hair of the what?” said Patrick somewhat dumbfounded.
     “Never mind,” said Hillyberry. “Where is this so-called plantation? I never heard of it. You ever hear of it?” he asked the policeman standing behind Patrick. When the policeman said nothing, Hillyberry said, “Well?”
     “We lived west from Natchitoches on the road out to Fort Jesup. Then my father bought land south of Shreveport on the Red River after fighting in Texas in 1836. Then he lost the land playing poker with a Yankee, damn him. His all-mighty-highness James Rhodes Morgan bought the land from the Yankee scum and allowed us to stay as sharecroppers.”
     “That's enough. I get the picture.” Hillyberry referred to the report he had in front of him. “The Algiers policeman who grabbed you last night said you had a belaying pin in your hand. There was a victim, name of Alphonse Horatio Murphy …that's enough to give me a bleeping headache…” The silent policeman behind Patrick Harant laughed out loud. “Shut up dammit,” said the older man behind the table.
     “Were you holding this so-called weapon?”
     “Yes, Sir.”
     “Did you hit Alphonse …uh, dammit, Murphy?”
     “No, Sir.”
     “Says here the Mate aboard the Memphis Belle, this man called Markey Ript, hit the loading master of the Steamer St. Louis. This man Murphy received six stitches in the side of his head and four stitches in his ear. The local gendarme reports he heard this Murphy yelling for thirty minutes. The doctor was drunk that stitched him. Do you know where Markey Ript is?”
     “No, Sir.”
     “Are you in league with this Mister Ript?”
     “No, Sir,” answered Patrick politely, although he was guessing that 'in league' meant that he had somehow helped Markey Ript.
     “Forty-five dollars.”
     “I beg your pardon, Sir?” said Patrick looking at the Parish Recorder.
     “I see you are confused. Don't be. You are guilty of Accessory to Wounding. You were on the dock. That is $45 dollars in gold.”
     “I can not pay it, Sir,” said Patrick. His shoulders slumped. He thought this cranky old man was going to see that he had not hit the man called Murphy.
     “Sixty days. You work on the Algiers docks. Your pay will be paid directly to this court. In two months… mebbe less… your fine will be worked off. You will be housed in the banana warehouse behind the Algiers docks. Stay away from the blasted bananas. There are snakes in those bananas and they love to bite an Irishman now and again,” he added laughing.
     The policeman gripped Patrick's shoulder and tugged him out of the chair. Patrick felt himself pushed toward the door of the 'courtroom' and he tried to turn back toward His Honor Henry Hillyberry. When he turned, he saw that Hillyberry was already through the back door, probably heading for the outhouse behind the small brick First Recorder's Court building.

*****

     On Christmas day of 1861 the Berrymen, for so they were called, were given half of a cooked turkey, some boiled yams, a pot of boiled fish and a bucket of beer. They enjoyed the feast. The docks were quiet all day. After eating, the men stretched out on the cotton bales they had unloaded the previous day and enjoyed the sun.
     Patrick Harant was a little thinner. The long days under the watchful eyes of the guards bothered him. He was constantly thinking about escaping, but kept his thoughts to himself.
     On December 28 the Recorder set up a table in the warehouse and reviewed the status of each of the prisoners. Mr. Hillyberry told Patrick that he had worked 18 days; that meant he had a credit of $12 towards his $45 fine.
     “But why not $18?” stammered Patrick without thinking.
     “I have expenses,” said the rotund gentleman. “These guards have to be paid, and we are deducting for your meals.” He reached up and scratched his head.
     “That does not…”
     “What? Does not what?” said the Recorder. He looked at the guard standing next to the line. The guard swung a short whip that snapped on Patrick's arm, ripping the cloth of his shirt. The guard motioned with his head.
     Patrick walked back to the bunks in the warehouse.

*****

     “I don't know how I can be a 'Dangerous and Suspicious Character'. I'm too Purdy to be suspicious,” laughed the prisoner known as Ransom Purdy. Through cracked lips he smiled and displayed whitish teeth. He avoided the chicory coffee that was served with old bread that they received in the early morning. Purdy was notorious for his good mood. He was of average height and relied on the other prisoners for help with some of the heavier cargo. The prisoners were larger, black men; Hillyberry kept them for their ability to work.
     During a pause in the middle of January, Purdy looked at Patrick and said, “Have you figured out your sentence, yet?”
“How do you mean?”
     “Your sentence. How can you pay off the fine when you don't get one dollar for each day you work?”
     “Oh, that,” said Patrick slowly. He waited.
     Purdy chuckled and added, “Of course, you're lucky. The slaves get sold. Their sentence is in-ter-mined-able.” He laughed again, watching for a reaction from Harant. “Since I been here, I heard that six men of the 'darker persuasion' were sentenced. Two were hung. The other four were confiscated property and sold to pay the lien that His Honor the high and large Hillyberry levied. They were sold the next morning and put on a steamer to the plantations near Vicksburg.”
     Purdy looked Patrick over. “Are you an abolitionist?”
     “Hell no, dammit,” said Patrick.
     “Where you from?”
     “Up the Red River.”
     “Are you one of those Acadians I hear about, what some call a Cajun?”
     “Farther north than where they live,” said Patrick trying to figure where Ransom Purdy was going with these questions.
     “Why did you come to 'Orleans'?
     “I have a sister. When she turned fifteen, the overseer at Morgan Plantation took an interest in her. One night she came home with a ripped dress and a little blood on her leg.”
“Sometin' happened that you had to leave?” said Purdy with a slow grin. “That's my bet. I'm right, ain't I?”
     “Mebbe.” Patrick didn't know how much he should reveal. He saw an image of the Overseer with a bottle of whiskey in his hand just before Patrick hit him with an axe handle. Purdy seemed like a sensible person, but Patrick wasn't sure.
     “Anyway. Your sentence. It will work out to 90 days. The Recorder got caught already keeping prisoners beyond the sentence they received.” Scuttlebutt around the docks was the Recorder narrowly avoided going to jail.
     “Yeah, but hell, three months is a long time.”
     “Keep your eyes open. Mebbe (as you say) we'll see a chance.” Purdy grinned. A feeling of infectious laughter hit Patrick. He did not laugh, but he did smile at Mr. Ransom Purdy, the only other white man among the prisoners.
     “Who knows,” said Purdy. “The new year may bring new opportunities.”