Humbug Mountain by Sid Fleischman Read Free Book Online Page B

the outlaws returned with our trunks and sacks of dry food and Mr. Johnson and the chickens and the heavy printing press and all the newspaper stuff. They had fixed boat poles to the sides of the horses like wagon shafts and had dragged everything through the weeds on rough platforms of lumber lashed together. In my Quickshot Billy stories I’d read about Indians toting their belongings that way.
    â€œColonel,” Shagnasty John said, wiping his face with his bandanna. “If I was you I’d camp right here in the cottonwoods.”
    â€œNonsense. There’s good shelter aboard the boat.”
    â€œI’m downright anxious to be up and gone. We made an agreement, didn’t we? Shook on it, too. You don’t want to pack all this plunder aboard.”
    â€œOf course I do.”
    Shagnasty John flashed the Fool Killer an uneasy look. Then he turned his eyes back to Pa, who was handing me a couple of Ma’s flowerpots.
    â€œI’m thinking of the women and children, Colonel,” said Shagnasty John. “They won’t like sleeping even one night aboard that cussed riverboat. No sir.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?”
    Shagnasty John’s gaze seemed to float off somewhere. Almost under his breath, the Fool Killer said, “Can’t nobody sleep much.”
    Shagnasty John was clearly embarrassed to tell what was on his mind. Finally he spit to one side and said, “No one tougher’n me and the Fool Killer. Ain’t scared of nothing. But you’ll never print up that newspaper for us. Not on the boat.”
    Pa said, “I gave you my word, sir.”
    â€œIt’s the woman and children, Colonel. They’ll be too scared. That’s the truth.”
    â€œNonsense.”
    â€œWait’ll you hear them peculiar sounds that come in the night,” Shagnasty John said. “And things’ll disappear. And those blasted crows’ll start calling out your name. I tell you, Colonel, it was all me and Fool Killer could do to stay hid out here. That boat has a ghost aboard. And that’s a fact. It’s haunted.”

9
    THE SHERIFF OF SUNRISE
    Pa set up his printshop in a rear cabin. The boat haunted?
    â€œFlap-jawed foolishment,” he declared. And Ma said, “I’d sooner have a ghost aboard than those two high-smelling ruffians.”
    She gave Mr. Johnson and the chickens the run of the freight deck. I thought about the sounds I had heard, in the engine room. Maybe it wasn’t a rat. Glorietta gave my sleeve a tug. “Wiley, what if there is a ghost aboard?”
    I tried to sound as certain as Pa. “Foolishment,” I said.
    â€œBut Shagnasty John and the Fool Killer—they heard him.”
    â€œOne see is worth twenty hears,” I answered.
    The Fool Killer stood off by himself. He watched us with his deep-socketed eyes as if he had found a whole passel of fools.
    Shagnasty John dusted off his hands after all the hauling about. “How long you figure to take printing us up that newspaper?”
    â€œYou’ll have it tomorrow,” Pa answered.
    Ma said, “Mr. Shagnasty—or whatever it is you call yourself—you or your friend must have seen the ship’s logbook somewhere.”
    â€œReckon we did,” said Shagnasty John.
    Ma’s eyes lit right up. “That’s splendid. Where is it?”
    â€œI burnt it,” the Fool Killer answered in that quiet voice of his.
    â€œBurned it!”
    â€œYes, m’am,” Shagnasty John nodded. “Every scrap of paper we could lay hands on. To start up our cook fires—when we had grub to cook. I tell you that ghost is meaner’ n galvanized sin—even stole the last of our coffee beans. If we didn’t sleep with our hardtack the creature’d have stole that too. Me and Mr. Fool Killer ain’t had a square meal in so long, m’am, it’s a wonder we don’t throw shadows with holes where our