“Went with him where?”

"Prophetstown! That's what kills me, Hooch. They all go up to Prophetstown, or thereabouts, right across the river from Vigor Church. And that's exactly where all the Whites are going! Well, not all to Vigor Church, but up into the lands where Armor-of-Hell Weaver has his maps. They're in cahoots, Hooch, I promise you that. Ta-Kumsaw, Armor-of-God Weaver, and the Prophet.

“Sounds like.”

“The worst thing is I had that Prophet here in my own office must be a thousand times, I could have killed that boy and saved myself more trouble– but you never know, do you?”

“You know this Prophet?”

“You mean you don't know who it is?”

“I don't know that many Reds by name, Bill.”

“How about if I tell you that he's only got one eye?”

“You ain't saying it's Lolla-Wossiky!”

“Reckon so.”

“That one-eyed drunk?”

“God's own truth, Hooch. Calls himself Tenskwa-Tawa now. It means 'the open door' or something. I'd like to shut that door. I should've killed him when I had the chance. But I figured when he ran off– he ran off, you know, stole a keg and took off into the woods–”

“I was here that night, I helped chase him.”

“Well when he didn't come back, I figured he probably drank himself to death off that keg. But there he is telling Reds how he used to have to drink all the time, but God sent him visions and he's never had another drink.”

“Send me visions, I'd give up drinking, too.”

Harrison took another swallow of whisky. From the jug, this time, since the tumbler was on the floor in the corner of the room. “You see my problem, Hooch.”

“I see you got lots of problems, Bill, and I don't know how any of them has a thing to do with me, except you weren't joking when you had the quartermaster tell me you only wanted four barrels.”

“Oh, it's got more to do with you than that, count on it, Hooch. More than that. Because I ain't beat. The Prophet's took away all my whisky-Reds, and Ta-Kumsaw's got my White citizens scared, but I ain't quitting.”

“No, you're no quitter,” said Hooch. You're a slimy sneaky snake of a man, but you're no quitter. Didn't say that, of course, cause Harrison was bound to take it wrong– but to Hooch, it was all praise. His kind of man.

“It's Ta-Kumsaw and the Prophet, simple as that. I got to kill them. No, no, I take it back. I got to beat them and kill them. I got to take them on and make them both look like fools and then kill them.”

“Good idea. I'll handle the betting on it.”

“I bet you would. Stand there taking bets. Well, I can't just take my soldiers up north to Vigor Church and wipe out Prophetstown, cause Armor-of-God would fight me every step of the way, probably get the army detachment at Fort Wayne to back him up. Probably get my commission stripped or something. So I've got to arrange things so the people in Vigor Church, all along the Wobbish, they all beg me to come up and get rid of them Reds.”

Now, at last, Hooch understood what this was all about. “You want a provocation.”

“That's my boy, Hooch. That's my boy. I want some Reds to go up north and make some real trouble, and tell everybody that Ta-Kumsaw and the Prophet told them to do it. Blame it all on them.”

Hooch nodded. “I see. It couldn't be just running off their cows or nothing like that. No, the only thing that'll get those people up north screaming for Red blood is something real ugly. Like capturing children and torturing them to death and then signing Ta-Kumsaw's name on them and leaving them where they'll be found. Something like that.”

“Well, I wouldn't go so far as to tell anybody to do something awful like that, Hooch. In fact I don't reckon I'd give them specific instructions at all. Just tell them to do something that'd rile up the Whites up north, and then spread the word that Ta-Kumsaw ordered it.”

“But you wouldn't be surprised if it turned out to be rape and torture.”

“I wouldn't want them to touch any White women, Hooch. That's out of line.”

“Oh, that's right, pure truth,” said Hooch. “So it's definitely torturing children. Boy children.”

“Like I said, I wouldn't ever tell somebody to do a thing like that.”

Hooch nodded a little, his eyes closed. Harrison might not tell somebody to do it, but he sure wasn't telling him not to do it, either. “And of course it couldn't be any Reds from around here, could it, Bill, cause they're all gone, and your tame Reds are the most worthless scum that ever lived on the face of the earth.”

“Pretty much, that's true.”

“So you need Reds from south of the river. Reds who still haven't heard the Prophet's preaching, so they still want likker. Reds who still have brains enough to do the job right. Reds who have the blood thirst to kill children real slow. And you need my cargo as a bribe.”

“Reckon so, Hooch.”

“You got it, Bill. Dismiss charges against me, and you got all my likker free. Just give me enough money to pay off my poleboys so they don't knife me on the way home, I hope that ain't too much to ask.”

“Now, Hooch, you know that ain't all I need.”

“But Bill, that's all I'll do.”

“I can't be the one to go ask them, Hooch. I can't be the one to go tell them Cree-Eks or Choc-Taws what I need done. It's got to be somebody else, somebody who if it gets found out I can say, I never told him to do that. He used his own whisky to do it, I didn't have any idea.”

“Bill, I understand you, but you guessed right from the start. You actually found something so low that I won't be part of it.”

Harrison glowered at him. “Assaulting an officer is a hanging offense in this fort, Hooch. Didn't I make that clear?”

“Bill, I've lied, cheated, and sometimes killed to get ahead in the world. But one thing I've never done is bribe somebody to go steal some mother's children and torture them to death. I honestly never did that, and I honestly never will.”

Harrison studied Hooch's face and saw that it was true. “Well, don't that beat all. There's actually a sin so bad that Hooch Palmer won't do it, even if he dies because of it.”

“You won't kill me, Bill.”

“Oh yes I will, Hooch. There's two reasons I will. First, you gave me the wrong answer to my request. And second, you heard my request in the first place. You're a dead man, Hooch.”

"Fine with me," said Hooch. "Make it a real scratchy rope, too. A good and tall gallows, with a twenty-foot drop. I want a hanging that folks'll remember for a long time.

“You'll get a tree limb and we'll raise the rope up slow, so you strangle instead of breaking your neck.”

“Just so it's memorable,” said Hooch.

Harrison called in some soldiers and had them take Hooch back to jail. This time they did a little kicking and poking, so Hooch had a whole new batch of bruises, and maybe a broken rib.

He also didn't have much time.

So he lay down real calm on the floor of the jail. The drunks were gone, but the three brawlers were still there, using all the cots; the floor was all that was available. Hooch didn't much care. He knew Harrison would give him an hour or two to think about it, then take him out and put the rope around his neck and kill him. He might pretend to give him one last chance, of course, but he wouldn't mean it, because now he wouldn't trust Hooch. Hooch had told him no, and so he'd never trust him to carry out the assignment if he let him go.

Well, Hooch planned to use the time wisely. He started out pretty simply. He closed his eyes and let some heat build up inside him. A spark. And then he sent that spark outside himself. It was like what doodlebugs said they did, sending out their bug to go searching underground and see what it could see. He set his spark to searching and pretty soon he found what he was looking for. Governor Bill's own house. His spark was too far away by now for him to find some particular spot in the house. And his aim couldn't be too tight. So instead he just pumped all his hate and rage and pain into the spark, built it hotter and hotter and hotter. He let himself go like he never done before in his life. And he kept pushing it and pushing it until he started hearing that most welcome sound.