“Mr. Morgan! How are you doing?”
Frank raised a hand in a gesture that was more casual than he felt. “All right, I reckon,” he replied. “I’m just not that fond of the water.”
“You’ll get used to it,” Hoffman called down reassuringly. “We’ll make an old salt out of you!”
Frank doubted that. He didn’t figure he’d be on board long enough to get too accustomed to the sea’s motion.
He was on his way back down to the belowdecks corridor when he encountered Fiona coming up. She wore a grim look on her face, and Frank thought he knew why. He heard sounds of retching coming from behind many of the closed cabin doors.
“Nearly all of the girls are sick as dogs,” Fiona said. “I don’t know what to do. I was on my way to ask the captain.”
“I don’t think there’s anything that can be done,” Frank said. “You’ll just have to let them get over it.”
“What if they don’t?”
Frank shrugged. “Some will. The ones who don’t will just have to be sick all the way to Alaska. It won’t kill them…although they’re liable to wish they could go ahead and die before it’s over.”
“Did you know it would be like this?”
“I figured as much,” Frank admitted. “But I knew there was no way around it. Shoot, I don’t feel too good myself.”
Fiona pressed a hand to her stomach. “Neither do I. In fact…oh, my God, Frank…”
“There’s a bucket in your cabin,” he told her, “or you can hurry on topside and maybe make it to the railing.”
“Ohhh…let’s try that.”
Frank took hold of her arm, hustled her up onto the deck, and over to the railing. They reached it in time, and he looked away discreetly while she was sick. When she was finished, she straightened and pushed back several strands of dark hair that had fallen over her washed-out face. Frank patted her lightly on the back, for whatever good that did.
“I’m not sure it’s worth it,” Fiona muttered.
“You’ll feel differently once we get to Skagway and start out for Whitehorse.”
“That may be even worse, just in different ways.”
Frank couldn’t argue with that, so he just shrugged again.
He helped her below to her cabin and told her, “If any of the girls want to come topside, let me know and I’ll come with them to make sure they’re all right.”
“You think some of the sailors might try to bother them?”
“I doubt it. Captain Hoffman runs a pretty tight ship.” Frank smiled wryly. “I was more worried about one of ’em falling overboard while they’re feeding the fishes.”
Fiona looked like she wanted to punch him. “Don’t even talk about it,” she said.
Frank skipped the midday meal, but by nightfall his stomach had settled down enough so that he was hungry again. When he checked with Fiona and the rest of the women, none of them wanted to eat. He was planning to rustle something for himself from their supplies when he ran into one of the other passengers in the corridor outside the cabins, a man outfitted in the rough but new clothes of a gold-hunter, a sure sign that he was making his first trip to Alaska.
“You’re Mr. Morgan, aren’t you?” the young man said as he held out his hand. “I’m Peter Conway.”
The youngster was trying to grow a beard, no doubt to make him look more like a sourdough, but he wasn’t having much luck with it. The blond whiskers were coming in sort of wispylike. He was tall and broad-shouldered, though, and his grip was strong as Frank shook with him.
“Yeah, I’m Morgan. Call me Frank, though.”
Conway grinned. “All right. I’m pleased to meet you, Frank. Everyone’s talking about you.”
Frank raised an eyebrow. “Everyone?”
“All the other prospectors, I mean. We heard about the things that happened in Seattle, before the boat sailed, how you were in those gunfights and that brawl with one of the ship’s officers.” Conway’s grin grew even wider. “And of course, we’ve all heard about those women traveling with you. We’ve been waiting to get a look at them, but they’re still shut up in their cabins.”
“They’re pretty sick,” Frank said, “and they may stay that way the whole voyage.”
“I hope not.”
“You know they’re already spoken for, don’t you?”
“Yeah, of course. They’re mail-order brides, right? But we’d still enjoy talking to them. Where we’re going, we may not see any respectable women for a long time.”
“That’s true enough, I reckon,” Frank said. “Some of ’em might not mind socializing a little on the way, but that’s up to them. It’s my job to keep them from being bothered.”
Conway nodded, his expression solemn now. “I understand, and I’ll pass the word along. Better yet, why don’t you come have supper with us? That is, if you don’t mind eating with a bunch of cheechakos.”
“What’s that?”
“That’s what they call us newcomers up there in the Klondike, or so I’ve heard. It’s some sort of Indian word.”
Frank nodded in understanding. “Like a tenderfoot or a greenhorn back where I come from in Texas.”
“Yeah, I suppose. Anyway, we have plenty of food if you’d like to join us.”
“Sure. I’m much obliged.” Frank would be glad for the company, and he didn’t think it would hurt anything to get to know some of his fellow passengers.
He followed Conway up on deck. The wind was cold, but the rain had stopped and a group of gold-hunters had gathered around a Primus stove where they were cooking a pot of stew. Conway introduced Frank to the men. One of them said, “You’re the gunfighter they call The Drifter, aren’t you?”
“That’s right.”
“I’ve read books about you, mister. Never thought I’d meet you, though.”
“Those books are mostly made up,” Frank advised him. “And the hombres who write them have pretty wild imaginations.” He took a cup of the stew that Peter Conway handed to him. It smelled delicious.
It tasted as good as it smelled, he discovered as he began to eat. Earlier in the day, he had thought that he wouldn’t have an appetite again until the ship docked and he had dry land under his feet. He was surprised now by how hungry he was. He’d always had an iron constitution, though, and he supposed that included his stomach.
The dime-novel reader sidled over to him again. “How many men have you killed, Mr. Morgan?” he asked.
A frown creased Frank’s forehead. “I don’t carve notches in my gun butt, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“There are so many, you don’t even know anymore, do you?”
“I never killed anybody who wasn’t trying to kill me or somebody else,” Frank said, trying to keep the irritation out of his voice. “I don’t see any point in keeping count of how many fools there are in the world. That’d be a never-ending job.”
“I just can’t imagine what it would be like to shoot all those men, to have that much blood on my hands. How do you sleep at night?”
Frank didn’t answer the question. Instead, he asked curtly, “Where are you from, mister?”
“New York City. Why?”
Frank nodded and said, “I figured as much.”
The man bristled. “What the hell do you mean by that?”
Conway came up in time to hear that last exchange. He said, “Take it easy, Neville. I asked Mr. Morgan to join us. I don’t want you getting in an argument with him.”
“I’m not arguing with anybody,” Neville insisted. “But he insulted New York.”
Frank shook his head. “No, I didn’t. I reckon it’s a fine place. But it’s been settled for a long time. It hasn’t been a real frontier for, what, a couple of hundred years? So you folks back there have forgotten what it’s like to have to fight to defend yourself and your loved ones. You’ve never known any real danger.”