Vandemarks Folly | Page 7

it; although all the time he was swearing at John Rucker and wishing he had skinned him alive, as he pretty nearly did. To feel a gentle hand on my shredded back, and to be babied a little bit--these things seemed to break my heart almost, though while Rucker was flogging me I bore it without a cry or a tear. The captain dressed my back, and said, "There, there, Bubby!" and went away, leaving me alone.
I could hear the ripple of the water against the side of the boat, and once in a while a gentle lift as we passed another boat; but there was nothing much in these things to cheer me up. I was leaving John Rucker behind, it was true, but I was also getting farther and farther from my mother every minute. What would she do without me? What should I do without her? I should be free of the slavery of the factory; but I did not think of that. I should have been glad to the bottom of my heart if I could have blotted out of my life all this new tragedy and gone back to the looms and spindles. The factory seemed an awful place now that I was free, but it was familiar; and being free was awful, too; but I never once thought of going back. I knew I could learn to drive the horses, and I knew I should stay with the captain who had flogged John Rucker. I who had never thought of running away was just as much committed to the new life as if I had planned for it for years. Inside my spirit I suppose I had been running away every time I had gone down and watched the boats float by; and something stronger than my conscious will floated me along, also. I fought myself to keep from crying; but I never thought of running up on deck, jumping ashore and going home, as I could easily have done at any time within an hour of boarding the boat. I buried my face in the dirty pillow with no pillow-case on it, and filled my mouth with the patchwork quilt. It seemed as though I should die of weeping. My breath came in long spasmodic draughts, as much deeper and bitterer than sighs as sighs are sadder and more pitiful than laughter. My whipped back pained and smarted me, but that was not what made me cry so dreadfully; I was in the depths of despair; I was humiliated; I was suffering from injustice; I had lost my mother--and at this thought my breath almost refused to come at all. Presently I opened my eyes and found the captain throwing water in my face. He never mentioned it afterward; but I suppose I had fainted away. Then I went to sleep, and when I awoke it was dark and I did not know where I was, and screamed. The captain himself quieted me for a few minutes, and I dropped off to sleep again. He had moved me without my knowing it, from the drivers' cabin forward to his own. But I must not spend our time on these things.
The captain's name was Eben Sproule. He had been a farmer and sawmill man, and still had a farm between Herkimer and Little Falls on the Mohawk River. He owned his boat, and seemed to be doing very well with her. The other driver was a boy named Asa--I forget his other name. We called him Ace. He lived at Salina, or Salt Point, which is now a part of Syracuse; and was always, in his talk to me, daring the captain to discharge him, and threatening to get a job in the salt Works at Salina if ever he quit the canal. He seemed to think this would spite Captain Sproule very much. I expected him to leave the boat when we reached Syracuse; but he never did, and I think he kept on driving after I quit. Our wages cost the boat twenty dollars a month--ten dollars each--and the two hands we carried must have brought the pay-roll up to about seventy a month besides our board. We always had four horses, two in the stable forward, and two pulling the boat. We plied through to Buffalo, and back to Albany, carrying farm products, hides, wool, wheat, other grain, and such things as potash, pearlash, staves, shingles, and salt from Syracuse, and sometimes a good deal of meat; and what the railway people call "way-freight" between all the places along the route. Our boat was much slower than the packets and the passenger boats which had relays of horses at stations and went pretty fast, and had good cabins for the passengers,