George at the Wheel

But, after all, getting to New Orleans was not so great a task as Tony thought it was. Unluckily for him events took a turn which made it very easy for him to accomplish his object, and that, too, without his father's knowledge.

The next day was Saturday, and consequently there was no school; but Tony went to the city as usual – we have said that he spent all his leisure hours on the levee – and taking leave of his father at the depot made his way toward one of the wharf-boats. There he encountered a well-known coal-dealer, Mr. Vandegriff by name, whose countenance lighted up at the sight of him.

"Looking for a job?" said he, as he shook hands with Tony.

"Not to-day, I guess," was the laughing reply.

"But I am in earnest," said Mr. Vandegriff, as he and Tony walked over the gang-plank to the wharf-boat. "Here's the Armada loading for New Orleans, and she is in such a hurry to get off that she can't stop to coal up; so I have had a barge made fast alongside of her, and she is going to take it down the river with her and coal up while she is under way. When she gets all she wants she will turn the barge adrift, and when one of my tugs comes in, I'll send down after it."

"Well?" said Tony, who knew that there was nothing unusual in all this.

"Well, I want somebody to go with her and check the coal and take the money," said Mr. Vandegriff.

"Where's Hardy?" asked Tony. "I thought he attended to all such business for you."

"So he did, but he will never do it again. I gave him his walking-papers last night. He is too imprudent to handle any of my money. The Handy Andy took a barge down the river yesterday to coal up while she was under way, and as she had a small crew, I sent fourteen of my darkies with her to help. The Handy Andy let the barge go about twenty miles below here, and Hardy was alone on that barge with that gang of men for more than four hours. When the tug came up to take her in tow, Hardy said to the darkies: 'Have any of you boys got a life preserver about you?' They told him they hadn't; and Hardy said: 'Then, if the tug blows up before we reach the city, I shall have to use this to buoy me up till I can swim ashore;' and as he spoke, he drew out of his pocket a roll of bills containing about three hundred dollars, and put under his arm."

"What a dunce!" cried the boy.

"Wasn't he!" exclaimed Mr. Vandegriff. "He acted as though he had no sense. The darkies opened their eyes when they saw the money, and one of them said to him: 'Fore de Lawd, boss, if we'd knowed you had all dem greenbacks in your good clothes, you'd never tuk 'em to de city wid you;' and to tell the honest truth, I don't think he ever would. It would have been no trouble at all for them to rob him; divide the money among themselves; jump into the skiff that was towing at the stern of the barge, and take to the woods. The worst of it is, that Hardy, by that one fool act, has made it dangerous for anybody to go down the river on a barge with a gang of men, unless he is prepared to defend himself. Those negroes have always believed, that the boat knew how much coal she wanted, and paid for it before leaving the city; and that the clerk went down with her simply to see that she didn't take more than she had paid for. But now their eyes are opened, and there are some reckless ones among them who will hereafter be on the watch."

"And is that the job you want me to take?" asked Tony. "I think you had better get somebody else."

"Bless your heart," said Mr. Vandegriff, "there's no danger in going down with the Armada. If there was, I shouldn't think of asking you. She has got her full crew; and I shall send only a couple of my best hands with you to make the lines fast, when the tug finds the barge. They have worked for me a long time; and I would rather trust them, than some white men with whom I am acquainted. I know that money is no object to you," he added, seeing that the boy still hesitated, "but I don't want you to do it for nothing. I'll give you ten dollars."

Tony pricked up his ears when he heard this. If he could get a few more such "jobs" at ten dollars a piece, it would not take him many Saturdays to earn money enough to pay for his sailor's outfit, when he reached New Orleans.

"Suppose I should get into a fight with these two darkies, and keep them from robbing me and running off with your money?" said Tony.

"Then you can keep a hundred dollars out of it, and hand me the balance," answered Mr. Vandegriff, who little imagined that the boy would ever be in a situation to take advantage of this permission. "You'll go, won't you? Speak quick, for she will be ready to start in a few minutes; and I must sign a blank receipt for you to fill out, when she has finished coaling. I haven't time to look for anybody else; and I can't go myself."

"Yes," said Tony, "I'll go."

Mr. Vandegriff walked rapidly toward the office, and as he drew the printed form of a receipt from his pocket-book, the Armada's bell rang. He quickly signed the receipt and placed it in a small account-book which he handed over to the boy, who ran out and sprang on board the Armada.

"All ashore, Tony," shouted the captain, from his perch on the hurricane-deck. "We are in a great hurry. Where in the world is that clerk of yours, Vandegriff?"

The coal-dealer replied by pointing out Tony, who shook his account-book at the captain. The latter nodded his head to signify that it was all right, tapped the bell, and when the lines had been cast off and the staging hauled in, the Armada backed out into the stream, taking the coal-barge with her.

As soon as the forecastle had been cleared up, long planks were run down into the barge, and the crew of the steamer, assisted by Mr. Vandegriff's two negroes, began filling up the bunkers, Tony and one of the clerks sitting on the guard and checking the boxes as fast as they were brought on board. It was about nine o'clock when the Armada moved away from the wharf-boat, and it was a little past three in the afternoon when she cast off the lines and left the barge to the mercy of the current, and Tony Richardson sitting on the forward-deck with more than five hundred dollars in his pocket, and a look of excitement on his face. It was a much larger amount of money than he had ever had in his possession before.

"Don't I wish it was mine?" thought Tony, as he straightened out his leg and passed his hand over the huge lump in his pocket. "I wouldn't see St. Louis again for one while, I bet you."

Notwithstanding his great desire to free himself from the restraints of home and school, and to enter upon the glorious career of which he had so often dreamed, Tony had never once thought of stealing money enough to enable him to carry out his plans. The idea had never once suggested itself to him, and if it had, by any chance, came into his mind, it would have frightened him. He would no more have taken a dollar of Mr. Vandegriff's money to keep him in his runaway scheme, than he would have jumped into the river and made way with himself.

"Now, I believe I will eat my lunch," continued Tony, "and I hope by the time it is finished that tug will be along. What Mr. Vandegriff told me about Hardy makes me just a trifle nervous. But didn't he say that these men were all right? He certainly did, and so I have nothing to fear."

Tony squared around on the barge so that he could look up and down the river without turning his body, and while disposing of the good things, the steward of the Armada had put up for him, he kept a good lookout for the tug whose appearance he awaited with no little impatience and anxiety. Now and then he turned his eyes toward the two negroes, who were seated on the after-deck engaged in very earnest conversation, but he paid no particular attention to them until he saw them arise to their feet, as if moved by a common impulse, and start toward the bow, walking along the gunwales of the barge, one on each side. When the barge was loaded to its full capacity, the top of these gunwales was not more than two feet above the water; but as fast as the coal was taken out, the unwieldy craft rose, and now, when the cargo was almost all removed, the gunwales were six or seven feet high. Each end of the barge was covered by a deck about eight feet long, and this was where the crew stood when they were handling the lines.

This movement on the part of the negroes alarmed Tony, who dropped the leg of the chicken he held in his hand, and sprang to his feet. Something told him that it would never do to allow those men to come too close to him.

"Say, you Mose and Sambo," he shouted, "what are you coming here for? Go back where you belong."

"Want to ax you something, sah," replied one of the negroes – the one at whom the boy had looked when he called out the name of "Sambo." He hadn't got either one of the names right, but still the ones he had given them will do to distinguish them by.

"Stop, right where you are," commanded Tony, who, frightened as he was, managed to speak in a very firm and determined tone of voice. "I can hear what you have to say."

"We's comin' right dar whar you is," said the one who had been called Mose.

As he spoke, he drew a long knife from his pocket, and with a quick movement, threw open the blade, which caught with a spring. Tony's terror was greatly increased by the sight of the glittering steel. It was plain that the men intended to rob him of Mr. Vandegriff's money, but what they intended to do with him after they got it, was not so clear to him. The sight of the knife and the expression on the face of the man who carried it, suggested only the most dreadful things. He looked anxiously up the river, but the tug was not in sight. He turned his eyes in the other direction, but the stream was clear as far as he could see. Beyond a point which jutted out from the left hand bank, a huge black cloud of smoke arose in the air, pointing out the position of the Armada, which was flying down the river with all the speed her powerful engines could give her. There was nobody to whom he could look for assistance; he was utterly alone. He had never before been placed in a situation of danger, and when he thought of it afterward, he was astonished at the manner in which he conducted himself, and the promptness with which he acted.

"Does you see dis yere?" said Mose, holding up the knife so that the boy could have a fair view of it. "Don't make no fursin' or yellin' now, kase if you do, it'll be wuss for you!"

"I am in charge of this craft," said Tony, still speaking in a steady voice, "and I tell you again, and for the last time, to go back to the stern of the barge where you belong. If you don't, you'll hear something drop."

The negroes, who were surprised at the boy's bold front, halted and looked across the barge at each other. If Tony had at that moment placed his hand in his hip-pocket, or made any other demonstrations to indicate that he had a pistol about him, it is very probable that the men would have obeyed his orders, and that he would have been saved from something that afterwards happened; but Tony, being the hero of an adventure that really occurred, and not an imaginary character, did not do this. He was too badly frightened to think of it, and he did just what he ought not to have done. Seeing that the men hesitated, he sought to gain an increased advantage over them and frighten them still more by stooping quickly and picking up two lumps of coal. This simple act reassured the negroes, and Mose shouted across to his companion —

"Hi, Jeff! He ain't got nuffin to shoot wid. Frow dem chunks down, boy, or it'll be wuss for you, if you don't pay some heed to what we're tellin' you!"

The men again advanced along the gunwales, and Tony, knowing that if he allowed them to gain a footing on the deck they would quickly overpower him, suddenly drew back his right-hand and sent one of the lumps of coal whizzing through the air, toward the man who carried the knife. He had been catcher for the Monitor ball club for two seasons, and the members were loud in their praises of the way he threw to the second base. He threw that lump of coal with all the force he could put into his arm, and it went as straight for that darkey's head, as a ball from his hands ever went for the hands of the second basemen. It struck that head too, and bounded from it as it would have bounded from a brick wall; but it checked the advance.

Mose flourished his hands over his head, and after trying in vain to keep his balance, he sprang into the air; at the same time turning his body about half-way around and throwing out his arms, so that when he came down, they caught across the gunwale; and there he hung over the water.

Tony was not a little frightened at the effect of his shot. He thought that the man was about to fall into the river; and if he had, he would have stood a fair chance of drowning, before his companion could have gone out in the skiff and picked him up. But even while these thoughts were passing through Tony's mind, he began to wish that the lump of coal had been larger and heavier, and that his arm had been stronger. Mose was not in the least injured by the blow he had received, nor was he cowed by his narrow escape from being knocked overboard. He still held fast to the knife; and the eyes with which he glared at the boy over the gunwale, were fairly ablaze with fury.

"What you doin' dar, Jeff?" he shouted, as he drew himself up, and threw one foot over the side of the barge. "Can't you frow chunks just as well, an' mebbe better'n he kin?"

These words seemed to arouse the other negro, who had halted and been on the point of turning back, when he witnessed his companion's discomfiture. He quickly jumped down into the barge; and Tony, who had been indulging in the hope that he could hold the robbers at bay until the tug hove in sight, lost all heart when he saw him begin to gather up the coal. He looked about the deck and saw at a glance, that if the negroes were going to adopt his own mode of fighting, it would be impossible for him to defend his position. They would have a thousand bushels of coal within their reach, while Tony had not more than a dozen lumps, and some of these were too small to be of any service. Two of the biggest of these lumps, Tony in his desperation put to a good use. With one of them he knocked Jeff flat, just as he was preparing to rise to his feet with an armful of coal; and with the other, he inflicted a severe cut upon the hand of Mose, causing him to howl with rage and pain, and to drop the threatening knife. By these two shots, Tony unconsciously created evidence that was strong enough to send both the rogues to jail as soon as they reached St. Louis.

Jeff was on his feet again in an instant, and clearing his eyes of the blood which trickled into them from an ugly cut in his forehead, he looked all around for Tony; but the latter had disappeared. The moment the last lump of coal left his hand, he sprang across the narrow deck, and seizing a rope that was made fast to the bitts, descended it hand over hand, and dropped into a skiff that was towing alongside the barge. To shove off, pick up the oars and put the skiff in rapid motion was the work of scarcely a moment.

"Hyar he is, Jeff," shouted Mose, who had at last succeeded in climbing up and seating himself on the gunwale. "Knock him outen dat dar boat, if he don't come back. Bus' de bottom in. Do something mighty lively, kase we's gone niggahs if dat dar tug kotch us hyar!"

Jeff must have thought so too, for his movements were much quicker than they had been before. He climbed out of the barge to the deck as quickly as he could, and opened a hot fire upon Tony, who was pulling swiftly away from the dangerous neighborhood; but although his missiles were thrown with power sufficient to do damage if they had hit anything, they all went wide of the mark, and by the time Jeff's companion could raise himself to his feet and run along the gunwale to the deck, the boy was safely out of range. Mose fired a few chunks at him, but they all fell short, and then it seemed to dawn upon the negroes all at once that their prize had slipped through their fingers; that they had opened the doors of the penitentiary for their reception, and gained nothing by it. It must have been some such thought as this that set them into the wild war-dance that followed. They jumped about the deck, stamped their feet, and whooped and swore at the top of their voices; and Mose shook his knife at Tony, and made furious gestures with the weapon, just to show what he would do if he only possessed the power.

"Well, boys," said Tony, as soon as he could make himself heard, "it looks to me as though you were in for it. I've got this thing in my own hands. You'll stay there until the tug comes, and I'll stay here."

"No, we won't stay hyar, nudder," shouted Mose, in reply. "We kin swim to de shoah."

"You try it, if you dare. If I see one of you take to the water, I'll knock him on the head with an oar."

Tony had not only brought himself safely out of a very dangerous situation, but he had very neatly turned the tables upon those who had intended to rob him, and he felt very jubilant over it. Well, it was something to be proud of, and it was a great pity that he should go deliberately to work and spoil it all by his foolishness.

"I have earned a hundred dollars by this day's work," said Tony, as he wiped the big drops of perspiration from his forehead, "and as soon as I get it safe in my hands, I shall bid a long farewell to St. Louis."

Tony uttered these last words very slowly, as if he were talking about one thing and thinking about another. And so he was. Why should he return to St. Louis at all? he asked himself. Before he left home that morning, something had prompted him to put into his pocket the twenty-five dollars he had saved to buy his sailor's outfit when he reached New Orleans. Why not add to that at least a portion of the amount which Mr. Vandegriff had told him he might retain if he got into a fight with the negroes and came off first best? It is true that he had no clothes except those he carried on his back, and he told himself that he did not want any more. It would be a waste of time to go back to the city after a supply, and he would run the risk of being seen by somebody when he crept out of his father's house with a valise in his hand. There was something about such a proceeding that did not suit Tony. He thought it would make him look too much like a sneak-thief. Besides, he wanted to forget his home entirely, and he could not do it so long as he was wearing any of the clothes his father's money had purchased for him.

"It is now or never," said Tony, to himself "I can go down the river in this skiff to Cairo, purchasing my supplies at farm-houses along the way, and there I shall find some Cincinnati or Pittsburgh boat whose officers will not question me, because they are not acquainted with me. I don't feel just right about taking that money, but I have fairly earned it – I wouldn't go through such a battle again for ten times one hundred dollars – and Mr. Vandegriff said I might have it. Good-by!" he shouted, waving his hand to the negroes, "I'll go and hurry up the tug."

As Tony said this, he pulled toward the Missouri shore, and when he had got out of the current, he turned and rowed up the river. As long as he remained in sight of the barge, he kept his eyes fastened upon the negroes, expecting to see them take to the water and strike out for shore; but as they did nothing of the kind, the boy finally came to the conclusion that they could not swim. At last the current carried them and their floating prison into the bend around which the Armada had disappeared half an hour before, and when the barge was out of sight behind the point, Tony ceased his efforts at the oars and began to look about him.