Read Online Son of Fortune by Victoria McKernan - Free Book Online Page B

jacket of a very old distant cousin who, she had assured him, had died peacefully in his sleep. It was a bit too small all around, but was a soft wool and had nice deep pockets. Even after he paid the rent, he still had enough money to buy two pairs of new socks, two shirts and a pair of sturdy blue pants called denims, which almost all the laborers wore here. The fabric was thick and stiff, but the shopkeeper said it would soften up with wear.
    Though he was unnerved in one way to not have a job, in another way it was nice. Aiden enjoyed walking the streets of the city, looking at people and buildings and shopwindows. At first everything was so foreign it felt like he had landed on the moon. But by the end of the week, he was beginning to make sense of the rhythms and patterns of city life. The best and most amazing part of it all was having so much to read. Magazines and newspapers came infrequently to Kansas. News a month old was considered fresh. But now, with the telegraph running all the way across the country, news from Washington or New York could be in the San Francisco papers the next day. Soon, it was reported, there would be a permanent underwater cable across the whole Atlantic Ocean, linking America to Europe.
    Books were even more scarce and expensive on the prairie. His family had often gone an extra year patching over patches to buy a book. A trader with a copy of
A
Tale
of
Two
Cities
once rode off with six live chickens, half their flock. But Aiden still remembered those wonderful sixteen days of winter when, for one hour each night, the whole family was transported to another world and lost in the story—except for interruptions of stomach gurgles and farts, since they were eating nothing but corn mush and beans.
    Aiden had also put aside a few coins for Blind Sally. Though his daily exploration of the city had brought him back to the Barbary Coast, he hadn’t found the old woman in the daytime, and he wasn’t about to go back alone at night. But two weeks later, when Fish returned from the logging run eager for a night of adventure, Aiden was willing. Fish washed, changed clothes and bolted down his supper, and they were out the door before Magnus could begin his usual warnings.
    “You would think he’s sixty-one instead of thirty-one,” Fish ranted as they walked. “Sometimes I’m ready to push him overboard! Push them all overboard! The same men, the same stories, the same route, the same everything day after day after day. My sextant might as well be a toy.”
    “Couldn’t you just get a place on another ship? Aren’t they always wanting sailors?”
    “Sailors, sure. But I don’t want to be a sailor. I want to be a navigator, though I’d be happy to start as boatswain and work my way up. But I’ve only sailed the coast, no blue water. They want experience.”
    “Well, experience is nothing more than living through your mistakes.”
    “So I need to make more mistakes?” Fish said with a laugh.
    “Exactly.” Aiden slapped him on the back. “I can probably help you with that!”
    The streets of the Barbary Coast felt different now that Aiden was a two-week veteran of the city, walking with a friend and here on purpose, not just lost. The bouncers in their bright waistcoats seemed far less sinister, more like bored men at a tiresome job. Gaslights flickered at this later hour, and there were lots more people walking about. There was still a desperate taint in the air, an overwhelming stink of piss and the weight of danger everywhere, but it didn’t feel like murder was standing square in front of you either. Still, Aiden knew, it was true about there being a body a night. One of the newspapers had a column called “Despicable Crimes of the Barbary Coast” that filled several inches a day.
    “It’s great, isn’t it!” Fish almost outpaced Aiden with his exuberant stride. “Didn’t I tell you?”
    “Great” wasn’t exactly the word Aiden would have used, but there was a certain