At length Norton caught the drift of all this volubility, and gazed at the "horse-boat" with no little interest. It was a large craft of forty tons, with an ungainly gallery on the upper deck. On this, as Ayres pointed out, six or seven horses worked a treadmill which in turn worked the large side-paddles, over each gunwale. The boat was a decided novelty, and as Brookfield had broken a number of paddles on his trip up-river, she would be delayed from joining the fleet under Peters and Nevitt, which was leaving in two days.
When Norton had finished his inspection, Ayres turned him toward the city again and they proceeded on their way. Duval had disappeared. Mindful of the rapidity with which things had happened to him on his previous visit, Norton kept a watchful eye on the passers-by; he had an uneasy sense of being watched, and perceived that an unduly large proportion of the men were roughly dressed but excellently armed. It seemed to him that Duval must have filled the town with his own men, and things began to loom up darkly before him.
"These, sir, are the hanging gardens of Mr. Buttet"—and Ayres paused as they reached the lower end of town, speaking in his usual oratorical style and with a sweep of his hand toward the handsome brick house to their left. "From here we gain an excellent view of the river—one of the finest views in the United States, I may say, sir. Yonder you perceive Jeffersonville in Indiana; a little to the left, the magnificent falls of the Ohio. Beyond this, Clarksville and the Silver Creek hills, with the forests and Rock Island completing the panorama. And just ahead of us, sir, an interesting episode is about to be enacted, if I mistake not."
Norton, who was paying little heed to the view but much to what passed around him, loosened his knife in its sheath; the "interesting episode", he concluded swiftly, would be enacted by something better than fists. Lounging on the board walk a dozen yards ahead, and eyeing him with insolent and provocative glances, were two huge rivermen. Both were idly whittling at small sticks, and Norton had no doubt of their intent.
Fastening his eyes on the pair and already angered by their insolent looks, he flung off Ayres's restraining hand and stepped forward. Then, however, something very odd took place.
Swinging around the corner at which the two rivermen stood, came three tow-clad farmers with a snatch of drunken song. One of them lurched heavily against the nearer riverman, who shoved him away with a snarling curse.
"Who—who you shovin'?" demanded the farmer thickly.
"Git out, ye drunken fool," snapped the big riverman angrily, his eye was still on Norton. "Move on—we ain't got time to spend on ye."
"Whoop-ee!"—and the farmer gave vent to a wild howl of rage. "Hurray fer Jefferson! Damn the Democrats! Shove me, will ye? I'll learn ye! I'm a cross betwixt a streak of chain-lightning and a bear-cat! I was sired by a thunderbolt an' riz by an alligator an' I eats rattlers fer breakfast—whoop-ee!"
With which peroration he gave the riverman no chance for the usual exchange of personal history, but with an astonishingly accurate blow for a drunken man landed his right on the riverman's jaw. His two companions instantly fell upon the second riverman and with a whirlwind of blows and dust and flashing knives and yells, all five drove out into the street and left the sidewalk clear.