Mississippi Blues by Kathleen Ann Goonan

Author:Kathleen Ann Goonan
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Nanotech Series 2
Published: 2011-11-09T01:33:45+00:00

* * *

Nineteen

Mississippi Blues

I wasn’t sure how far it was to Memphis but I figured that it would take a few days. I also hoped we would overtake the riverboat at some point, but that was more chancy. They had power, and possibly a few days’ head start. I longed to see Verity, yet was willing to keep that yearning in abeyance. Somehow her presence shut down the world for me, narrowed it in to one point. The wideness of everything without her was strange, even a bit scary, but most of all exhilarating.

And Memphis was the blues.

It was so much quieter on the river without that blasted paddlewheel churning away. There was a bleakness in this wilderness through which we drifted; or perhaps it wasn’t bleakness but just a feeling of the place being unpopulated and difficult to traverse.

Heavy forest lined the shores we drifted past. I say shores because of the innumerable coves and islands, because of the sheer irregularity of the river. Headlong we floated, with little control, sometimes fast and sometimes slow. From time to time we saw another raft in the distance and hailed each other, but that was it. No boats, no barges, nothing. Well, that’s not entirely true. Before dawn the churn of a steam engine woke us and its wake almost capsized us. In the heavy mist, as it slid past us, heading upriver, a sheath of rust-streaked black metal lumpy with rivets, I thought I saw a faded rn on the side, for Rural Network, I presumed. But that was all.

I was awake then, and sat waiting for the mist to burn off. The ephemeral blues and grays of the river gave way to gold-shot green along the banks. The air was fresh with only a hint of the heat the coming day would bring. We were full into summer now.

I relished the wilderness. I saw deer leaping along the bank of an island and figured that the land harbored any number of edible critters. But the raft held no rifle, which made me feel a bit helpless and kept us dependent on fish. They were quite plentiful, though—just throw in the hook and find one on it when one thought to check. James was thus occupied at the back of the raft just now, crouched and staring into the muddy water as if he might actually be able to see the fish. The raft made a kind of swishing, burbling sound now and again as it was slapped by a wavelet or rose a bit and fell over a patch of current-braided water. I stood and watched in fascination and fear as we passed a kind of boiling place in the water where the surface was disturbed from below in a circular, upchurning pattern, wondering what caused it. Then it was gone, but we were to pass more of them as the day went on.

We got caught in a large whirlpool shortly before noon. At first it was amusing—we were swept round in a long, slow circle about fifty yards in diameter.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.