Golden Spike Metamorphosis

Yam that I am: Windward, downstream- 1867  

Henry knew there were changelings among the Indians and with the Shoshone he found out how they did it.  One morning, when Henry woke from troubled dreams, he found himself transformed in his robes to a horrible orange cat.  Not like a panther.  More like a raccoon.  What’s happened to me he thought. It wasn’t a dream. His people, a proper human folk although a little too small, lay peacefully around the wigwam.  Now you have the gift.  They giggled.  You do not choose your skin.  It choose you when it needs to.  Donnerwetter thought Henry.   

Daisy, being one who never gave in to letting folks see her sweat, made her plans to head for Council Bluffs, Iowa and planned a visit to California for a visit with Phoebe Hearst. Mr. Comely had surprised her with the deed to one of the most coveted riverboats on the river, impeccably maintained, booked for months in advance. It had been one of Henry’s. How was it that he knew everything that she was about and her whereabouts at any given time. She was raged in conflict between her love for his attention to her cravings, and the many promises for a more personal thank you.

There are no rats aboard the S.S. Dart and the galley cat is sometimes seen aloft watching gulls.  Spike always went ashore- always returned.  In the east, the Union Pacific selected a foreign name, calling their construction firm Crédit Mobilier of America.  The latter company was later implicated in a far-reaching scandal which would greatly effect the railroads purpose, described later.  The banker yacht would have been hard to see if not for her billowed sails.  She was keeping well ahead of the Dart.  But not for long.  

Union Pacific Railroad owners and management believed they had passenger safety under control, with the natives accepting the rails as getting the settlers through their lands as long as they didn’t stop. Seven years and one month or so after the golden spike had been ceremoniously hammered into the rails connecting the west coast to the east coast, Daisy was scheduled to take her summer trip to visit her old friend, believing the trip to be safe.  And here was Henry, ruling the most important navigation route between north and south.

He was quite impossibly always at right place at the right time.