Crows & Cards by Joseph Helgerson Page B

seamstressing too and could sew a tolerably straight line, though he didn't think any more kindly of that duty than any of his others.
    I gave Ho-John a careful looking over but couldn't spot nothing out of the ordinary 'bout him, 'less you counted the lodestone he kept on a piece of rawhide around his neck. He claimed that stone always pointed north, which was the general direction of the Free States and his hopes. I'd known others with hopes, of course, but none what had a north, south, east, or west attached to 'em. Other than that lodestone, the only thing that Ho-John cared for at all was the hounds living out back. He considered those dogs family and pampered 'em worse than royalty.
    There were six guest rooms at the inn, all upstairs. One room was Goose's, one belonged to the Professor, and one went to Chilly and me. The rest were on hand for any gambler too liquored up to make it home without falling flat. The first floor had a couple of gaming parlors out front, the kitchen to the rear. Large affairs, the parlors were. They had tables built from scratch by Ho-John, right handsome ones too, with plenty of split-bottom chairs around 'em. Lanterns hung everywhere, as nighttime was when all the gambling got done.
    Paintings fancied up some of the walls, with President Washington being a favorite. Goose Nedeau liked to claim he was related to the old French families around town and so gave Lafayette equal billing. Napoleon and a couple of French kings named Louis got footage too. The guests were pretty rough on the paintings—sassed 'em regular. Their words were considerably shocking, but their tongues never did fall out, the way Ma had always claimed mine would if I'd dared speak thataway. It was just one revelation after another around that inn, and grown up as most of these discoveries made me feel, I wouldn't have had it any other way.
    'Course, the reason all these paintings got talked to so much was the bar, which took up the side wall in the main parlor and served everything from bust-head whiskey to some special punch dipped from a kettle. The Professor, who presided over the bar, wore a mostly white apron and tied black garters around his sleeves. He had a slow, friendly way of pouring a drink that made everyone feel welcome. All the gamblers said so.
    It didn't sit too good with Chilly, but me and the Professor and Ho-John fast became friends. The reason for that was the respectful way I kept my distance from the Professor's hens and the fact that I didn't complain none about Ho-John's cooking. I ran errands for one or the other of them whenever I had the time, but mostly I was kept hopping with my apprenticing. My days didn't have much room for being homesick, though such feelings did rear their heads at the darnedest times, say when passing the whale sign, or when listening to the hounds howl, or when a steamboat whistled away over on the river in the middle of the night when everything was lonesomest. But such bouts lasted only as long as it took me to remember who'd bundled me off to St. Louis in the first place.
    Since Goose Nedeau was in league with Chilly, he now became my teacher too. He appeared to be thrown together out of gristle and ruin, a hard-luck gambler who made little honking squawks in his throat all the time, like some sick goose. Most days he spent a good deal of time complaining that he hadn't had a good solid breath since Andy Jackson first muddied up the White House twenty years back. He shaved regular and missed various patches of stubble regular too. Bad as his hands shook from swilling whiskey, he rolled a loose cigarette that dropped enough ash to set himself on fire once or twice a night. His prize paisley vest was pitted with burn holes, and smoke seemed to rise like early morning fog off his silver mane of hair. He said he'd been forced into innkeeping 'cause of his health, though he didn't seem to take much interest in his new profession. Mostly he sat around dredging up days of