Part 17 (1/2)

John rode along the perimeter of the blaze, and dismounted a quarter league southwest of the sugarhouse. There was fire as far as he could see, a line of flames that filled the s.p.a.ce between the horizon and where he stood. Jesus G.o.d Almighty. They were ruined. He was ruined.

He thought of his merchant backers in New York City and a cold hand gripped his bowels and twisted. Nothing had been signed of course; he couldn't sign anything as long as his father was alive. But there was an understanding. He'd given his word: the proceeds of this year's harvest pledged as the down payment on the land in St. Kitts. Not just land, G.o.dd.a.m.n it. Sugar land.

How many years had he argued with his father about it? You didn't have to live in the G.o.d-blighted Caribbean to profit from sugar. The islands were a living h.e.l.l ruled by the lash and burnt by the sun, a place where no white man could thrive, much less a white woman. No one but an African could tend and harvest cane in the remorseless heat of the bug-ridden islands, and even they only did it under the whip. But these days the plantation owners lived in the colonies or in London and left agents in charge of their business. As for the trade between the cane lands and the northern suppliers of the produce that fed everyone in the Caribbean, it was controlled by the s.h.i.+p's captains who ferried the exchange. But if a man owned both, the cane land and the land that produced the food, that man was set for a fortune. But most of those around him were either too stupid to see the opportunity or too land-poor to seize it. Even, G.o.d help them, Ephraim Hale. ”Morris does it,” John had told his father repeatedly. ”So can we.”

Ephraim always gave the same answer: ”Cane's a filthy business. I want no part of it.” Never mind that without the sugar plantations to buy his flour and his vegetables and his beef, he'd be just one more farmer with dirt under his nails eking out a subsistence living.

John Hale did not intend to be that kind of farmer. And by Christ he wouldn't doff his cap to the New York City lords, to the Morrises and the Livingstons and the Van Cortlandts and the like, with their education at Yale or Princeton and their fancy houses and besatined women. Money was the great equalizer. With enough of it a man could be as important as any other, whatever his name or his education. With land that produced cane as well as land that produced wheat, he would be ... No, he would not. Not now. John shaded his eyes and gazed into the flames that were destroying all his dreams.

”Master John!” Six-Finger Sam had run the full distance from the gristmill. He was soaked in sweat and his no-longer-young legs were trembling with the effort. ”Master Moses, he be sending me.” The slave was breathless and these were more words than he'd spoken together in as long as he could remember. But this was a perilous day. A bad, bad day. ”Master Moses, he say to tell you we be soaking the mill and the sugarhouse and the rest until they can't be holding any more water. He say maybe we should cut'”

John turned, and his hand cracked Sam's cheek so hard he felt the shudder up to his own shoulder. ”I'm not interested in what Moses Frankel thinks we should do, you G.o.d-blighted fool. I told you to stay put and make sure those buildings were safe.” His hand hurt, but he felt better. John started to loosen his belt. ”I'll teach you to dis-”

Lightning crackled overhead, followed by a huge boom of thunder. The skies opened and blinding rain-salvation-poured from the heavens.

If the brown robe tried to tell Lantak he would not get his second payment of two hundred livres because the rain put out the fires, he would kill him. Better, he would kill him anyway. Best would have been to kill Uko Nyakwai. By the time he realized who it was who had set the trap for him in the paddock, it was too late to get a dear path for his gun or his tomahawk. Now-Lantak glanced quickly back over his shoulder-he could no longer see the horse carrying the Red Bear. The rain was so heavy he could see little beyond the length of his arm. And the horses were tiring. If more whites came after them on fresh horses it would be bad.

These thoughts were so much in Lantak's mind that he did not see what was ahead of them until one of the other braves drew level and spoke. ”There, beside the road.” He pointed a short distance ahead. ”Two blacks, a squaw and a man. I will get their scalps.”

The brave started to turn his horse toward the man and woman kneeling in the bordering woodland. Lantak watched, uninterested. Then, after a few more strides, he saw who the woman was and he remembered the singing. ”Wait!” he called out. ”Do not touch the squaw. She has a spirit.” He glanced up at the sky. Perhaps it was she who had sung the rain into being. ”Kill the man if-No, don't kill him. Take him captive.” It was this man or no one. Despite the presence of the squaw who had the spirit, Lantak's need drove him. ”He is big. He will endure many caresses.” The brave didn't turn around, but he raised his hand to signal that he had heard.

Quent had started to slow the roan some ways back, well before Lantak and his renegades drew level with the pair of mountain ash that marked the path to the glade. By the time he made the turn that led to the clearing and falls, the Indians were too far ahead to see where he went.

He thundered forward, urging the horse to go as fast as it could on the narrow path, but he was still short of the clearing when he slid off the animal's back. Quent turned the roan around. ”Go on, boy. Go on home. You've earned it.” More than likely the gelding would find his way back to the paddock, or whoever John sent to round up the animals would find him between here and there. John ... Sweet Christ, it wasn't possible. When he thought of all the destruction that had been wrought on this day, Quent felt sick. To imagine that John would have caused such havoc made no more sense now than it had earlier.

Nicole was safe, though. There was no sign of any hostile's pa.s.sage on the path to the glade, and when he got to the clearing it looked exactly as he'd left it. His eyes examined every tree and every square of moss before he left the protection of the encircling trees. Thank G.o.d for the empty glade. Thank G.o.d for the rain. There had been no trouble here. At least not this day.

Quent wasn't sure what had driven him to bring Nicole here. It had seemed so important, but now he couldn't rightly say why. He'd lost one love in this glade, and almost lost another. There was a spirit here. Shoshanaya had called it a nawa, a ruling spirit. She said it was benign and wished them no ill. She was wrong. I'm done with you, nawa. You're a deceitful witch. This place looks like paradise on earth, but it lies.

He made his way to the stream, seeing nothing that caused alarm. He was so wet from the downpour he didn't feel the water of the stream as he waded to the center, only the slight resistance of the swiftly moving flow. He checked the clearing and the surrounding forest one last time before he drew a deep breath and sank beneath the surface. It took some effort to swim against the current, but not a great deal. Another, stronger effort was required when he breached the falls, then he was at the mouth of the cave.

He used both hands to give himself purchase on the cave's edge and pulled his body inside. ”Nicole. Don't be frightened. It's me.” There was no answer. ”Nicole. It's Quent. Where are you?”

He blinked the water out of his eyes and pushed his hair off his forehead. ”Nicole ...” He could see plainly now. The cave was empty. It couldn't be-she'd promised-but she was not there. ”Nicole!” This time he shouted, and his voice echoed back to him from the depths of the underground pa.s.sage. He hesitated, unsure whether to go back to the glade or deeper into the cave. Without light it would be pointless to try and track her in the endless blackness of the pa.s.sage ahead, but she could be nowhere else. Nicole couldn't swim. She paddled a bit, but not well enough to get herself out of the cave and through the falls and into the clearing. She had to have gone deeper into the tunnel. But why? G.o.d-rotting h.e.l.l, who knew why women did anything?

Quent battled his feelings of foreboding, his terror that the nawa had won again and taken from him the most precious thing he had. Rage boiled up inside him. What are you angry at, fool? He asked himself. A spirit? You can't outwit spirits. Deal with what you can control. Nicole was frightened. You weren't here. She couldn't swim well enough to get out through the falls so she walked into the depths of the cave. But a few feet in that direction it was black as pitch. Blacker.

Quent looked around, studying the rock walls. Years ago he and Shoshanaya had hidden tinder, and a lantern here, behind a stone. Which one?

Quent thought for a moment. So much of that time had become a blank to him. He'd made it so, otherwise the grief would have killed him. Ah yes, the one that was shaped like a tepee. It was loose, and if you pried at it a bit ... He used his dirk and the stone came forward. There was a small opening behind it, and in it the lantern and flint and tinder box he and Shoshanaya had put there a lifetime before.

He struck a spark and coaxed the wick to kindle. There wasn't much oil. Enough for perhaps a quarter of an hour. Sometimes they'd made love in this cave, and lingered until it grew dark outside. That's what the lantern had been for, so he could see her smile when she stretched out her arms to him.

”Nicole.” He called her name again and waited. There was no reply. Quent strode forward. In moments the lantern was the only light and everything behind him was darkness.

Before he'd gone a quarter of the way in the tunnel, he found Nicole kneeling on the rock floor, upright, eyes closed and arms loose at her side. She didn't react to the light of the lantern. ”Nicole! Thank G.o.d. I was-Why didn't you answer? Nicole ...”

She did not seem to hear him. Quent put down the lantern and went toward her. When he touched her she shuddered, and finally opened her eyes. He drew her upright into his arms and she made no protest, but she did not melt against him the way she had earlier. ”I was so worried,” he scolded, stroking her hair. ”Didn't you hear me calling you? I told you to stay where I left you. Why did you come into the tunnel?”

”I was following the light.”

”There is no light. Not until you've gone a league and a half, and then you're out by Swallows Children. It's very dangerous if you don't know-Nicole, I was so ... I thought I'd lost you.”

He gave up being angry and murmured the last words against the top of her head. She made no reply, unmoving in his arms. He decided it was the shock that had made her forget that back there, in the glade, before Sampson came cras.h.i.+ng through, everything had changed between them. No matter; later, when things were normal again, he'd remind her. ”It's all right now,” he soothed. ”It's raining, pouring in fact. The fires are out and the Indians rode off the way they came. We've got to get back to the big house. I'll be needed.”

”I followed the light,” she repeated. Quent pretended not to hear.

”Some half part of the wheat crop is destroyed.” Ephraim avoided meeting the eyes of the forty or so people looking at him. ”And all the hay. The sawmill is burned to the ground. Most of the saws are completely useless; one, High Josiah, may be salvageable.” All the saws had come from England with his father and all had names. High Josiah was the pendulum saw that hung on leather thongs from the topmost rafters of the mill. There were no blades anywhere in the colonies to equal those that had been ruined. He'd have to send to London for replacements, and build a new sawmill to house them. It would take upwards of a year before they were back to the place they'd been just this morning, before the disaster of this day. And all these poor devils, white and black alike, gathered here in the great hall of the big house as if it were the church Lorene tried to make it Sunday mornings, they were all staring at him as if they expected some p.r.o.nouncement that would make the horror of it disappear.

G.o.d-cursed savages. May they burn in eternal h.e.l.lfire. Every one of them. Even the one he'd thought he couldn't do without. Mostly her. He thought of her dainty bones, picked clean of flesh long since, lying in the earth up there at Squirrel Oaks. It was Lorene who had insisted a Potawatomi wh.o.r.e be buried with the dead of the Patent. For Cormac's sake. And by then it was Lorene who truly grieved for her. Not him, not then and not now. He hated her.

It was because of Pohantis that his youngest son, the best he'd produced, was someone other than the man he'd been bom to be. If it hadn't been for her, for the fire she kindled in both of them, him and Lorene, Quent wouldn't have been sent to live with the Indians every summer during his boyhood, wouldn't have turned out more red than white. Ephraim tried to push the thoughts away. The household, men and women, slaves and tenants, his flesh and blood, all of them were waiting for him to say something that would give this terrible day some meaning, make it something they could understand.

This ought to be the moment when I tell them Quent's in charge, that he'll take over the Patent when I'm gone and they'll all be out from under John's stupid, b.l.o.o.d.y fist. They respect Quent. h.e.l.lfire, most of them love him. He could say it right now, but G.o.d help him, he dare not. No matter what Lorene said, he could not be sure that Quent had changed.

d.a.m.n the past. d.a.m.n the Potawatomi for making Quent more like them than his own kind. Look at him, standing over there in the shadows. Talking to one of the slaves as if she were an equal. Granted, it's Sally Robin and she's the equal of any woman ever bom. h.e.l.l, the better of most. But I would never allow her to know I think that. Quent lets it show. As if the coloreds, red or black, are the same as whites. Stupid to blame the Indians. It's my doing. Because of Pohantis, and Lorene, the way we all were back then. d.a.m.n the past, bury it in everlasting h.e.l.l. It's now that counts. Quent's wearing buckskins again; he's got his long gun and his tomahawk. Could be he's simply prepared for more trouble ... But I know he's b.l.o.o.d.y well planning something, and that it's not good for the Patent. Or at least, that the Patent doesn't come first.

Ephraim s.h.i.+fted his focus to John, who was sneaking curious glances at his brother when he thought no one would notice. Ephraim caught something in John's eyes. Pure hatred. He felt the weight of it all. So much loss and grief. So many wrong turnings. And G.o.d help him, standing here this long was killing him. His arms were on fire and the two sticks felt as if they might be flaming swords. He didn't have much longer, he knew that. This business would likely speed the end. No bad thing that; he was tired, ready to go. And the sticks weren't going to hold him up much longer. He'd best get on with it.

”Ephraim,” Lorene appeared at his shoulder. Her voice was a murmur, loud enough only for him. ”Let me tell them to bring you a chair.”

”No. I'm fine. Go on with your business.”

Lorene and the big house slaves were busy. As if doing would keep them from feeling. Kitchen Hannah had stirred up her fire hours before, the moment she knew there was trouble. Now there were bannocks and biscuits and salt-rising bread hot from the bake oven built into the wall beside the hearth. Stacks of johnnycakes had come off the griddle stone. Lorene was overseeing the pa.s.sing of the food along with mugs of ale. ”Johnnycakes for the slaves as well,” she'd told Runsabout a few minutes before. ”And ale if they like. b.u.t.termilk if they prefer.” The blacks were as soot-blackened and blaze-weary as the rest.

They were all there, Lorene noted, everyone who lived on the Patent except for the Quakers up at Do Good, who were too far away and doubtless didn't yet know what had happened. The whites sat up front and the slaves were crowded into the back of the room the way they were most Sundays when she conducted services. But everyone was watching Ephraim with a look they never turned on her-as if he held the answers to the meaning of the senseless slaughter, the devastation. Not all. Ely Davidson was staring straight ahead. Lorene moved to him and put a hand on his shoulder. ”How's that bandage keeping, Ely?”

He nodded a wordless reply. Lorene lay a finger on the forehead wound; it was cool to her touch. She'd used one of Sally Robin's unguents meant to ward off pustulating eruptions. Sally was off in a corner speaking urgently to Quent. Lorene considered working her way over toward them, but Ephraim's voice stopped her.

”Eight horses are missing.” He continued his litany of destruction. ”Two were badly burned and had to be put down. The rest, I fear, are gone for good. Seven slaves are dead. That's a quarter part of the stock. Two were mere children. Lilac and Sugar Willie had a lifetime of labor left.” Lorene heard a choked sob behind her. Ephraim seemed to have forgotten that Runsabout was the mother of the twins. ”And then there is the personal loss,” he said, clearly excluding Runsabout and the other slaves from such delicacy of feeling. ”The sawyer's entire family. You have our deepest sympathy, Ely.”

Ephraim paused while Moses Frankel and his kin nodded in the direction of Davidson. They looked embarra.s.sed to have been the lucky ones, Ephraim thought. The sugarhouse and the gristmill were unharmed and every one of the Frankels was alive. They'd lost a few of their best workers; Big Jacob was a particularly terrible loss. Not a black or a white anywhere who knew more about horse-flesh than Big Jacob. That white-haired slave over there pouring an ale for John, that was Deliciousness May as he recalled. Considered herself married to Big Jacob. Ephraim was never quite sure what that meant among the blacks. Still ... ”How did this happen?” he asked. ”How did this abomination come upon us?” They were all waiting for him to answer his own question. d.a.m.ned fools. If he knew the answer he'd be doing something about it, not just standing here counting the cost. But he couldn't go on standing. Not even his iron will could supply the strength for that. ”You,” he pointed to Little George, ”get me a chair.”

John stood up and offered his. In the few moments while Little George took it to the front of the room and helped Ephraim to sit down, his eldest son spoke. ”You ask how all this happened, Father. But we know the answer to that. It was Indians. Savages. If we go to the Mohawk village we'll probably find-”

”It wasn't Mohawk that attacked us.” Quent's voice cut him off.

”You can't know that for su-”

”Yes, I can and I do. I saw them, John. So did Ely. You did not. They were Huron, a band of renegades who have been banished from the longhouses of their birth. The brave leading them is a notorious killer called Lantak.”

Ephraim was startled. Sweet Christ. Huron this far south. The first time they'd come to the Patent they'd intended to take something irreplaceable from the legend they called Uko Nyakwai. And they had. What motive did Huron renegades have to attack Shadowbrook this time? ”You recognized this Lantak?” Ephraim asked. He leaned forward and studied his younger son.

”I did.”