Red Prophet Page 0,47

somewhere lying around being drunk."

Hooch cussed a little. "I'm going to see the Gov about this."

"Not today you ain't," said the quartermaster. "He's got himself a right busy schedule."

Hooch grinned nastily. "Oh, his schedule ain't too busy for me."

"It sure is, Hooch. He said it real specific."

"I reckon he might think his schedule is too busy, boy, but I reckon it just ain't so."

"Suit yourself," said the quartermaster. "Want me to unload the four barrels I got here?"

"No I don't," he said. Then he shouted at his poleboys, most specially at that Mike Fink, cause he looked to be the most likely to do murder if need be. "Anybody tries to lay a hand on that whisky, I want to see four bullet holes in their body before we chuck him in the water!"

The poleboys laughed and waved, except Mike Fink, who just sort of screwed his face up a little tighter. That was one mean old boy. They said you could tell which men had ever tried to wrassle Mike Fink, cause they got no ears. They said, if you want to get away from Fink with one ear still on your head, you got to wait till he's chewing on your first ear and then shoot him twice to distract him while you get away. A real good riverboy. But it made Hooch a little nervy to think what Fink might do if Hooch didn't have a payroll for him. Bill Harrison was going to pay for this whole load of likker, or there'd be real trouble.

Walking into the stockade, Hooch noticed a few things. The sign was the same one Harrison put up four years ago; it was getting ratty-looking now, weathered up, but nobody changed it. Town wasn't growing either. Everything had lost that new look, and now it was plain shabby.

Not like the way things were going back in Hio Territory. What used to be little stockade towns like this were turning into real towns, with painted houses, even a few cobbled streets. Hio was booming, at least the eastern part of it, close on to Suskwahenny, and folks speculated on how it wasn't far from statehood.

But there wasn't no boom going on in Cathage City.

Hooch walked along the main street inside the stockade. Still plenty of soldiers, and they still looked to have pretty good discipline, had to give Governor Bill credit for that. But where there used to be whisky-Reds sprawled all over the place, now there was river-rat types, uglier-looking than Mike Fink, unshaved, with a whisky stink as bad as any likkered-up Red ever had. Four old buildings had been turned into saloons, too, and they were doing good business in the middle of the afternoon.

That's why, thought Hooch. That's the trouble. Carthage City's gone and turned into a river town, a saloon town. Nobody wants to live around here, with all these river rats. It's a whisky town.

But if it's a whisky town, Governor Bill ought to be buying whisky from me instead of this business about only wanting four barrels.

"You can wait if you want, Mr. Palmer, but the Governor won't see you today."

Hooch sat on the bench outside Harrison's office. He noticed that Harrison had switched offices with his adjutant. Gave up his nice big office in exchange for what? Smaller space, but - all interior walls. No windows. Now, that meant something. That meant Harrison didn't like having people look in on him. Maybe he was even afraid of getting himself killed.

Hooch sat there for two hours, watching soldiers come in and out. He tried not to get mad. Harrison did this now and then, making somebody sit around and wait so by the time they got in they was so upset they couldn't think straight. And sometimes he did it so a body'd get in a huff and go away. Or start to feeling small and unimportant, so Harrison could do some bullying. Hooch knew all this, so he tried to stay calm. But when it got on to evening, and the soldiers started changing shifts and going off duty, it was more than he could stand.

"What do you think you're doing?" he demanded of the corporal who sat at the front desk.

"Going off duty," said the corporal.

"But I'm still here," said Hooch.

"You can go off duty too, if you like," said the corporal.

That smart-mouthed answer was like a slap in the face. Time was these boys all tried to suck up to Hooch Palmer.