Into the Wilderness

  Over a solitary supper—Hannah was still busy with Falling-Day—Elizabeth brought up the subject again. “Where do you think Richard could be?”

  It was not a new question, and Nathaniel shrugged, as he always did.

  “Your guess is as good as mine, Boots.”

  “ ‘Excessive worry will not resolve anything,’ ” Elizabeth recited.

  “Right again.”

  “But I can’t help wondering.”

  He sighed, and put down his fork. “O’Brien has been nosing around on the mountain.”

  “Oh, now that is one way to distract me. Something new to worry about. Did you catch him at it?”

  “Bears ran across him on the north face.”

  Elizabeth looked up sharply. “Near the mine?”

  He nodded. “Don’t worry, he hasn’t found it.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because he hasn’t showed up here with your father and brother and Billy Kirby behind him,” Nathaniel said.

  “Of course, Billy is behind this, and my brother behind Billy. Lord God,” Elizabeth muttered. “Does he have the right to trespass, as a treasury agent?”

  “I ain’t exactly sure,” Nathaniel admitted. “But he got off quick enough when he ran into Bears. I’m on my way to see the judge tonight, to find out for certain.”

  Elizabeth busied herself clearing the table. He caught her wrist, drew her across to sit on his lap with a thump.

  “I don’t want you worrying overmuch, Boots. It’s just another week to the hearing, and we’ll be clear then. I’ll stick closer to home in the meantime.” He blinked at her, and then tried for a grin. “I promised you life wouldn’t be boring, didn’t I?”

  She touched her forehead to his. “Right at this moment, I would not mind boring. Do you want me to come with you?”

  “No. You can’t hold your temper around your father—don’t frown at me that way, Boots, you know it’s true. I’ll wait till Julian is down at Axel’s, to catch the judge on his own.”

  “Suddenly an evening shucking corn sounds quite pleasant.” Elizabeth began to climb off Nathaniel’s lap, but found that he was not ready to let her go.

  “You don’t need to work so hard, Boots,” he said softly. “I worry about you.”

  “Pah,” she said, tweaking his ear. She took his hand and spread it across the slowly increasing curve of her stomach. “I’m as healthy as an ox.”

  “And just about as heavy.” He grinned, wiggling underneath her.

  Elizabeth yanked harder on his ear this time. “I shall remember that, Nathaniel Bonner, the next time you want me to sit on your—lap.” And with a little push she was up and away.

  For the recital Anna Hauptmann promised five dozen doughnuts and a wheel of her good cheese; the Gloves, cider and ale enough for all; the other families, blessed with fewer material goods, pledged apple and pumpkin pies, corn fritters and baked beans. Curiosity announced that if she was making one cake, she might as well make two. The schoolchildren came to Lake in the Clouds by special invitation on the night before the recital to practice their singing, and to make popcorn balls, sampling extensively as they went.

  There was much discussion of what to sing, in what order, and whether or not audience participation should be encouraged, or tolerated.

  “Just try to keep our ma from singing,” said Hepzibah, licking her fingers.

  “Not during ‘Barbry Allen’!” warned Jemima. “ ‘Barbry Allen’ is mine!”

  “We’ll make sure your mother has a full plate,” Elizabeth suggested to the Glove girls. “So she won’t feel compelled to sing along.”

  This made sense to Jemima, who went back to squeezing popcorn into tortured shapes.

  “Is the judge coming?” asked Hannah.

  “He is,” confirmed Nathaniel from the corner where he was casting bullets. “Told me so himself.” He raised a brow in Elizabeth’s direction, seeing her frown. “I think you’ll be surprised at the audience you get. It’s the talk of the village, your recital. Do you think you’ll have your mouth unglued by that time, Ephraim?”

  Ephraim mumbled an answer through a great mass of molasses and popcorn.

  “He don’t know his poem yet,” Henrietta announced primly. “I heard him trying to say it to Ma today, and he couldn’t get past the third line. Maybe Dolly will have to say it for him.”

  Ephraim took a threatening step toward his sister, and Elizabeth caught him up neatly. “Well, then, you’ll have to come to the schoolhouse in the afternoon and practice. If your mother can spare you. Could we possibly try ‘The Lass of Richmond Hill’ now? All of us?”

  Rudy McGarrity, blessed with his father’s musical ear, provided the tone and the children were off at a great gallop, with cheerful enthusiasm if a notable lack of synchronization. They followed this with “Robin Adair” and concluded with a thunderous rendition of “Yankee Doodle.” Outside, Hector and Blue raised their voices to sing along.

  Elizabeth made a mental note to herself to make sure the dogs were securely tied up far away from the schoolhouse for the duration of the recital.

  Paradise was a hardworking, no-nonsense kind of place for most of the year, not much given to taffy pulling or picnics. At first worried that folks would just ignore the school recital—something he did not know how to warn Elizabeth about—Nathaniel began to imagine what might come of excesses of hard cider, high spirits, and old grudges scraped newly raw. The combination of Polly’s wedding and the school recital on the heels of a rushed but successful harvest was a powerful one, and he watched its approach as he would watch a dead tree in a windstorm, to see in what direction it might decide to fall.

  The day arrived, and Paradise surprised him by turning out in its best. Jack MacGregor, a man known to spit at his own shadow when it got too close, showed up for the wedding in a regimental kilt so moth-eaten and dusty that it set half the village to sneezing; Charlie LeBlanc had invested in a top hat two sizes too small, and it perched on his pinkish skull like a hen at roost. Most of the men owned nothing more than two sets of buckskins, and had had to dig to the bottom of their trunks.

  “Ain’t seen the back of so many uniforms since we run the Tories out of Saratoga,” announced Axel, drawing sharp glances from his daughter and a giggle from his grandchildren. “Schau, Anna.” He poked her with a long finger. “Ain’t that the jacket Dubonnet wore to his own wedding? Must be ten year ago.”

  Even Billy Kirby had made an effort: his buckskin and his hair both approached something a man might call clean. There was no sign of Liam, or O’Brien. Nathaniel was glad of Bears, back up on the mountain to keep an eye on things.

  The Bonners were barely settled in the pew behind the Hauptmanns when the service began. Yankees might be the kind to spend their free time in a church but Yorkers had other ideas, and Witherspoon knew his congregation and their worldly leanings: over the years he had learned to carve his services down to the bone.

  Under the pitched roof the crowd generated a lot of heat. Elizabeth’s color was high, and there was a sheen of sweat on her brow, but she smiled when Nathaniel caught her eye. Between them, Hannah hopped with excitement, until Many-Doves leaned over to give the child a pointed look. Many-Doves was getting a few looks herself: she didn’t often come to the village, and people took note. He was not much given to prayer, but Nathaniel wondered if they could all get through this day without some help from Above.

  In a new dress of deep green, cut generously so that she could move and breathe, Elizabeth listened to the ceremony, craning her neck to catch a glimpse of the bride. Even above the rustling and coughing of an impatient congregation, she heard Polly’s calm voice as she recited her vows; she wondered if she had sounded so composed, but at the moment she could remember nothing of her own wedding except a series of disjointed images, and the feel of her hands in Nathaniel’s. This put her in mind of Mrs. Schuyler, which in turn raised the idea of aunt Merriweather; Hannah tugged on her skirt, rescuing her from her wor
ries. The congregation was on its feet and singing. Polly and Benjamin were making their way down the aisle with Curiosity and Galileo just behind.

  “I thought it would take longer,” Hannah said.

  “Oh, it will,” said Many-Doves. “Another thirty or forty years, most likely.”

  Elizabeth bit back her smile, but Nathaniel laughed out loud.

  The wedding party had been set up on tables behind the church on the small green that ran down to the brook. Under a stand of maples flaming in oranges and reds, children already gathered around plates of sweets. Dolly Smythe called to Hannah, who disappeared into the crowd of children without a backward glance.

  The men were opening a keg of rum.

  “Can’t have a wedding in Paradise without rum,” Nathaniel said, taking in the look of surprise on Elizabeth’s face. “Don’t worry, Boots. I’m not about to partake.”

  “A toast to honor the bridal couple would not be unreasonable, Nathaniel.”

  He shook his head, his eyes traveling over the crowd. “Not today.” And then: “I wish my father were here.”

  With a frown, Many-Doves dealt Nathaniel a pinch hard enough to make him jump. “This is a wedding party,” she reminded him. “Not a war council.”

  “Yes, please,” Elizabeth added. “Today of all days. The children are so looking forward to the recital. And look at Curiosity, I have never seen her so happy.”

  Nathaniel moved away from Doves, rubbing his arm. “I’m no match for the two of you, Boots. I’ll give it a try.”

  He took Elizabeth’s hand and the three of them made their way toward the bridal couple. What a strange but wonderful thing it was, Elizabeth thought, to hold a man’s hand in a crowd. It made her feel very young and silly and at the same time very pleased. It was just five months since she had been a bride herself, after all, and for Many-Doves it was even more recent. Elizabeth caught sight of Molly Kaes teasing one of the Cameron brothers, and she shook her head slightly to herself.

  “It’s the business of the day, Boots,” Nathaniel said, reading her thoughts. “Harvesttime and courting go together.”

  “And a rush of babies in the spring,” added Many-Doves, patting her own belly.

  Polly and Benjamin accepted their good wishes with pleasure. Elizabeth let Galileo press a glass of punch into her hands, and she spoke a few words with Manny and Daisy. Curiosity, for once at a loss for words, simply hugged her and smiled. As the brother of the groom, George had decided to take charge of entertainment, and together with Joshua he had begun a game of boules. Many of the men were wandering in that direction.

  Elizabeth finally turned away to find herself face to face with the judge, and Julian.

  She looked over the crowd, hoping for some distraction which would reasonably take her away, but her father’s tone, tentative and friendly, stopped her. Not for the first time Elizabeth wondered if it was her father’s role in Chingachgook’s death which had caused this sudden change in his attitude, or if there was some other, less visible or pleasant motivation. He had even been willing to speak to the treasury agent on their behalf; or so he had claimed to Nathaniel. Now he was trying to meet her eye, like a schoolchild looking for praise.

  “You are looking very well, daughter.”

  His face was drawn thin, but his hands were steady and he had lost some of the vacant look in his eyes. He held a cup of punch rather than rum, she saw with some relief. But Elizabeth could not think of one topic to discuss with him that would not soon bring them to an argument, and so simply thanked him.

  “Has your harvest gone well?” he asked, directing the question to both Nathaniel and Many-Doves.

  “Very well,” Many-Doves said. “We are pleased.”

  “You are gaining weight, Elizabeth.”

  Her head snapping up in surprise, Elizabeth saw that her father was sincere: he did not know about her condition, or he never would have made such a remark. She had never had the opportunity to talk to him alone and pass on this information, but she thought by now someone would have pointed out to him what would soon be obvious to all.

  At the same time, there was a new look on Julian’s face. He had not known, but he did now.

  “I did not mean to offend,” the judge said, looking uncertainly between Elizabeth and Nathaniel. “It suits you, after all.”

  Nathaniel cleared his throat. “Well, that’s good to hear,” he said, his hand moving to the small of Elizabeth’s back as if to keep her from running away. “Because she’ll gain a sight more before she’s done. There’s a child on the way, I guess you didn’t realize.”

  The deep flush on her father’s face might have been embarrassment, or dismay, or joy; Julian’s reaction was less ambivalent. With one piercing look at Nathaniel, he turned and walked away.

  An hour before the recital was set to begin, Dolly, Hannah, and the Glove sisters were arranging food while Elizabeth hung garlands of the last of the summer asters. Excitement and silliness were running very high, and she was beginning to worry about the boys, who had been sent to fetch more cups and should have long been back from this errand.

  Anna arrived with doughnuts and the distressing news that the wedding party had broken up and was drifting resolutely in the direction of the schoolhouse.

  “Folks been waiting months to see the inside of this place,” she said, taking the garland out of Elizabeth’s hands and climbing up on a chair in a businesslike fashion. “Couldn’t wait anymore. Anyway, you want the men with another hour’s worth of rum in their bellies? Let me do this, you got other things to attend to, I fear. I just saw that son of mine running away from the Necessary with the McGarrity boys.”

  It turned out to be good advice: Elizabeth found Jemima Southern in the outhouse with a board wedged up under the handle. To her surprise, the child was perfectly calm when she finally emerged.

  “I knew you’d find me,” she said. And then with a forward thrust of her chin: “They don’t like my singing, but I’m going to sing anyway.”

  “The boys are just overexcited, Jemima. You have a beautiful voice, whether or not they will admit it.” Elizabeth could meet her eye calmly, because this was the truth.

  The child’s sharp gaze swept across Elizabeth’s face. “You would let me sing, even if I croaked like a toad.”

  A small laugh escaped Elizabeth. “If it were important to you, perhaps I would. But more likely I would try to convince you to recite some poetry.”

  “My pa liked me to sing to him,” Jemima said. “ ‘Barbry Allen’ was his favorite of all.” With an air of desperation, the child said: “You didn’t like my pa, and he didn’t like you.”

  There was a lot of noise from inside the schoolhouse, laughter and a little girl’s voice raised in protest, but Elizabeth tried to focus on the small pale face in front of her. “Jemima. Whatever the lack of understanding between your father and me, I am very glad to have you in my classroom—don’t scowl, it doesn’t suit you. I will admit that you and I sometimes do not see eye to eye, but I am glad to have you here. And I am glad that you are going to sing. You will do the school great credit. Now, shall we get ready for our guests?”

  Ruth Glove’s small, sleek head appeared at a window, her eyes round with delight and delicious anxiety, her mouth rimmed with crumbs. “Jemima!” she cried. “Come see our doughnut tower!”

  With a grumble that did not quite hide how pleased she was to be a part of the high spirits, Jemima ran up the steps and into the classroom. Elizabeth hung back for a moment, content to let Anna cope while she took this last chance to gather her thoughts.

  The late afternoon was clear, the air as cool and crisp as apples. A flock of geese passed over the lake, silent as the clouds above forests of flame and deep green. She wondered if they regretted leaving the world below them behind as they hurried south, to places less colorful but warmer.

  Nathaniel was on the path now; she caught sight of him once, twice, and then he came out of the woods just above the schoolhouse. He w
as leading the bay gelding, loaded with the things she had sent him for: more candles, in case the recital ran past dark; the corn bread and apple crumble that Falling-Day had made for the party; and the packages Elizabeth had so carefully wrapped late last night, her gifts to her students for their work over the summer.

  Elizabeth was struck forcefully by the sight of him, coming toward her. It still seemed improbable, that she should have arrived at such a place in her life. She wondered what the world would be like without him in it, and found she did not want to know.

  Nathaniel had just begun to believe that maybe they would get through the whole recital without trouble when the first rumbles made themselves heard.

  The crowd’s attention was fixed on Ian McGarrity as he fought his way through “John Barleycorn.” Elizabeth stood off to one side with her arms folded, ready to prompt him, but the crowd had done her out of the job, and with good spirits. There was not one man or woman in the crowded room who hadn’t learned the poem as a child, and didn’t mind the chance to prove the fact by helping out Ian.

  Elizabeth looked as happy as he had ever seen her; perhaps it was some of that, and her quiet energy, that was wearing off on the crowd. Even those who had kept their children away from the school in the summer after she had run off with him were scooting farther forward with every new piece, as if they would like to be up in front of the room and reciting.

  But there was noise outside, and it was more than raccoons after the corn. Nathaniel didn’t have to take a roll call to figure out who was responsible. Most of Paradise had managed to squeeze in, even the troublemakers: Liam Kirby right up front, his face still shadowed with fading bruises. Dubonnet, with his son sitting on his lap, directing the musical proceedings with a well-gnawed popcorn ball. The Camerons, drunk enough to sing along on “Yankee Doodle.” The judge sat well to the back with Witherspoon, both of them slightly blurry-eyed but attentive. It would be all they could do to keep Witherspoon from reciting the bit of Greek poetry he called his own; the judge was sure to offer a story or two of his own adventures.