The officers and passengers had been engaged in making up lists of the wounded and the dead. Among the latter I found the name of Mrs. Goodridge and Mr. Spear. I shuddered as I realized that the worst fears of Emily were confirmed. I informed the clerk of the boat that I had saved one of the passengers, and her name was stricken from the list of the dead, and added to that of the living.
I learned that the body of Mrs. Goodridge had been recovered, and that friends on board of the steamer would take charge of it. There was nothing more for me to do, and I fled, sick at heart, from the awful spectacle. I went to a small hotel near the landing, and though I slept heavily, awake or in my slumber, the scenes of death and woe I had beheld still haunted my mind. I took an early breakfast, and then endeavored to find a boat bound down the river. There was none in Cairo that would start that day, and it might be several days before I could obtain a passage. I could not think of prolonging the agonizing suspense of our passenger on the raft, or of leaving the two females to the care of so heavy a thinker as Sim Gwynn. If a squall or a sudden rise of the river occurred, my assistant would be helpless; and if the raft broke loose, he would not have wit enough to bring it up to the shore again.
I walked up and down the levee, thinking what I should do. I could not charter a steamer, and there was no conveyance on the other side of the Mississippi. While I was thus fretting at the delay, I came to a yard where boats were kept for sale. Most of them were for the use of steamers, and were far beyond my means; but I found a second-hand skiff, which I purchased for ten dollars, including in the price a pair of good oars. It would be a handy thing to have on the raft, and if I had had it when I first saw poor Emily Goodridge in the water, I could have saved her without any difficulty.
In this light boat I embarked at nine o'clock. The raft was ten or twelve miles below Cairo; but the swift current would speed me on my way with little labor at the oars. I pulled steadily, and with just power enough to give me steerage-way; and when I reached the raft, I found I had made the passage in little more than two hours.
"Hookie!" ejaculated Sim, with a stupid stare, as I ran the skiff up to the raft.
"Catch the painter!" I called, throwing him the rope.
"I hain't seen no painter," he replied, staring around him, and letting the rope run off the raft, and the skiff go adrift.
I pulled up to the raft again, and succeeded in making my deck hand understand that he was to hold on to the rope attached to the boat.
"Where did you get that boat?"
"Catch hold, and haul it up," I replied; for I seldom found it practicable to answer Sim's questions.