Bellewether

  In truth it had caught him off guard, when she’d first met his gaze—and she hadn’t done that till he’d thanked her for taking the justacorps from him to dry by the fire. Beforehand and after, she’d seemed most determined to act as though he were invisible. He’d found that annoying. It wasn’t that he was so vain as to think every woman should show him attention, nor even that he was accustomed to getting it, but for some reason he would have liked hers.

  For his part, he’d had trouble noticing anyone else since she’d burst in upon them, her hair falling free of its pins underneath the plain cap that was soaked through in spots from the force of the rain, like the bright yellow gown with its hem rather more wet than rain could have made it. He’d thought of a morning, more years ago now than he cared to remember, when he had been left at the edge of the woods to keep watch in the deadly grey hours before dawn, and all in his view had been dreary and dark, and the chill and the damp had crept through him so deeply he’d felt he might well turn to ice. And then sunrise had come—not a gradual brightening, but all at once, unexpectedly, piercing the clouds in a single, straight, glorious beam of clear light that had warmed him and brought his cold limbs back to life.

  He’d felt that again at the moment she’d come through the door of the kitchen.

  It could have been none other than his woman from the water, for the colour of the gown was unmistakable. She’d been young—hardly out of her girlhood. Her feet had been bare and her cheeks had been bright and her smile had been wide, but the instant she’d caught sight of him and de Brassart, that smile had died.

  He had not seen it since.

  He had found that annoying as well, though he hadn’t known why, so he’d focused his thoughts and attention where they should most properly be, on her father and brothers—for, given the likeness in feature and colouring, they were all clearly one family. And while the father appeared to be friendly, the brothers were yet unknown entities.

  Jean-Philippe’s life and career had depended for so long upon his ability to gauge the minds and intentions of men, that the measure he took at first meeting a stranger was usually true, but he trusted it more if he tested that first swift impression by careful and calm observation.

  The younger brother had the air of recklessness that came with youth and arrogance. The way he’d stepped towards his sister when she’d first come in might have appeared to some a gallant move to place himself between her and potential harm, yet Jean-Philippe had seen it as a move designed to stop the woman in the yellow gown from interfering in a situation that the younger brother was enjoying. Not from cruelty or from spite, but in the way a hound kept tightly leashed enjoys the scent and promise of a new pursuit and new adventure.

  He was taller than his older brother, with a cleaner line of jaw and eyes that held a quick and keen intelligence. A young man Jean-Philippe might have not minded having under his command a few years hence, once time and life had taught him caution.

  But it was the elder brother with the lighter hair, the one who’d stood beside the hearth while they were in the kitchen, who would most need watching.

  There was something in his quiet, steady gaze that was unsettling. Jean-Philippe had often seen that same expression—or more properly, the absence of it—in the eyes of soldiers who had faced the darkness of a battle and been lost to it, consumed by it. Such men were unpredictable. Such men, in his experience, were dangerous.

  At dinner in the afternoon the elder son had held his silence, although in all fairness it had been a mostly silent meal. Uncomfortable.

  It had been, for Jean-Philippe, a disagreeable discovery to see this family kept a slave. He knew it was as common here as in Quebec—perhaps more common—but from the opinion he had formed of Monsieur Wilde he’d hoped . . .

  But there she’d been, a tall girl with a slender build and deep brown skin, her hair bound tightly back beneath a cap that matched her mistress’s. She, too, had barely met his eyes, but when she had, it had been with a guarded watchfulness. She’d carried out the common dish of vegetables and meat at dinner but had set it down with a hard thump before retreating to the kitchen, where she’d stayed, leaving the family and their “guests” to serve themselves, which he had done with little confidence.

  Nothing he’d eaten thus far in this province had led him to think that the food would be good. And observing how fiercely the woman in yellow had frowned while she’d seasoned it over the hearth, he’d been doubly wary. He’d tasted his dinner with caution . . . and found it surprisingly excellent. She’d cooked with wine, which he hadn’t expected.

  But then, there were many things here that he hadn’t expected.

  His mind, so used to danger, might indeed see threats where there were none. And yet, no man could live a day ahead of death for all the years he had without gaining the sense to know when things were wrong. There was something at play here, some deep current running a turbulent course through this house that had been here before their arrival, and as when he faced a new river he found himself seeking to study that current, the better to steer in it.

  Over dinner it had become clear to him that he was not the only one there keeping a close watch upon the elder brother. Nor was he the only one relieved when, at the ending of the meal, the elder brother had done nothing more than push his chair back and excuse himself and gone upstairs in private.

  Jean-Philippe had marked the sound and the direction of the footsteps as they crossed the floor above, and while he did not know the layout of the upstairs rooms he knew the elder brother’s was the room directly over the small chamber off the kitchen that he would himself be sharing with de Brassart.

  Theirs was not a large room. Jean-Philippe had not found much within it that could occupy his time during the long hours that had stretched between their dinner and the evening meal, but having no alternative he’d focused on the tasks he could control. His coat had dried, and he had brushed it. He had polished every button, and the buckles of his shoes and belt, and then his sword.

  A sword had never been his favourite weapon. He preferred a long gun or a hatchet in his hand, but the English had removed those useful things from him at Fort Niagara and allowed him only, under the surrender’s terms, to keep his sword—a weapon, he presumed, that they thought fitting for an officer.

  Like many things that came with rank its ornaments did little to enhance its practicality. The hilt was showy, done in silver figured with heroic scenes whose players he, from lack of education, did not recognize. His uncle, who had given him the sword some years ago, had not known either who the heroes on the hilt might be. The blade, to him, was more important, etched with the words: Draw me not without cause; sheathe me not without honour.

  It wasn’t a motto unique to this sword. Jean-Philippe had seen it writ on other blades as well. The only thing that marked this one as his was that his uncle had paid handsomely to have the name “de Sabran” etched above the motto in bold lettering. “A name that has long served the king,” his uncle had reminded him. “See that you bear it proudly.”

  There was little scope for pride, he thought, in being made a prisoner.

  But still he cleaned the sword and slid it back into its scabbard and arranged it on the mattress of his bed against the wall so he would have it at his back while he was sleeping.

  That would not be for some hours. The rain was still pelting in fury against the small room’s only window, but from what he saw of the sky and the cloud-filtered light he could tell it was late afternoon, not yet evening. His muscles and mind raised a silent and impatient protest against their continued confinement.

  Not far past the window the watery line of the trees at the edge of the forest was beckoning. He found it galling to think he could not even walk outdoors now without asking permission. And worse, he could not even ask for permission without also asking de Brassart to translate his words.

  It was maddening.

  He almost never cursed aloud, especially when there were wom
en standing in the next room within earshot, but the words he muttered now beneath his breath would have been impolite to translate.

  She could not have heard them. Even though his chamber door stood open she was by the hearth, too far away. Yet from the corner of his eye he caught a swirl of yellow skirts against the floorboards as she turned to lift an iron cooking pot onto its hook with clanging force. And when she shot a glance at him it told him very plainly that she wished, as he did, that he was not here.

  • • •

  De Brassart was taking his time getting ready for bed. He was one of those men who had rituals. Vanities. He was still carefully rolling his stockings when Jean-Philippe asked him, “What was it she said to you?”

  “Who?”

  “Our young hostess. At supper.”

  Their supper, just over an hour ago, had been a simpler affair than their earlier dinner. The woman in yellow had served them herself, and de Brassart had asked her a question she’d answered with firmness.

  De Brassart now shrugged. “I asked if they owned but the one slave, and she said in fact they owned none, because one person cannot own another.”

  “She said that?”

  “She did. Which proves that she knows nothing of the law, or that I did not understand her speech correctly. They have strange ways of expression here,” de Brassart said. “Their English is not always proper English. Their words and turns of phrase are as corrupted as the French your people speak, and I confess some meanings may escape me.”

  Jean-Philippe let the small insult pass by, being used to the active disdain of those men, like de Brassart, who lived by their status and gains in the towns and frontiers of New France while insisting the ways of Old France were superior. He needed no man to tell him his worth, nor the worth of his colony.

  “Perhaps,” de Brassart said, “I can devise a better way for her to use that pretty mouth of hers, while we are here.” His tone and smile left no room to misunderstand his meaning.

  And that insult, while not aimed at him, was one that Jean-Philippe could not let pass. “That’s vulgar talk, unworthy of an officer, and I would have you take it back.”

  “Or what?” De Brassart arched a lazy brow. “You’d call me out? Here, in this corner of a godforsaken colony? It seems a lot of bother.” He’d have shrugged it off, but Jean-Philippe persisted, still more calmly.

  “I would have you take it back.”

  “Oh, fine. I take it back, then. But the days will pass more slowly if I’m not to be allowed any amusement. Still,” de Brassart said, “it is of little consequence. I cannot think we’ll be here long before we are exchanged. There are sufficient English officers imprisoned at Quebec, I’m sure the governor is even now arranging a cartel.”

  A possibility, thought Jean-Philippe. Though no cartel would suit him if it did not also free his men. His thoughts turned once more, darkly, to their whereabouts and comfort, for he knew they might be lying in the open at the mercy of the rain tonight, or crowded on the stone floor of a prison plagued by rising damp and sickness, while he lay stretched full length upon a clean straw mattress on a sturdy bedstead with a blanket of good wool.

  His thoughts grew darker still, and did not let him sleep. Not even when de Brassart had, at last, stopped fussing with his things and fallen silent for a while until beginning an uneven snore that, in its turn, seemed to awake the man above them, who began to pace the floor with careful steps as though he did not wish to wake the others from their sleep.

  Jean-Philippe was used to being on his guard. He’d lived the best part of his life in camps and forts and battlegrounds, and while he might be ill accustomed to domestic life and to the noises of an ordinary family in the night, his senses still were tuned to know which sounds were ordinary and which meant a threat.

  Above, the elder brother ceased his pacing and a door creaked open, quietly. The footsteps slowly and with stealth crossed overhead, and then as cautiously began descending the back stairs. They took their time. They paused, and came into the kitchen, where they paused again.

  Within the chamber Jean-Philippe lay still and quiet, feigning sleep, but tensed in every muscle and aware of the man’s presence on the other side of their closed door. His sword lay where he’d placed it, in its scabbard at his back, and he prepared himself to reach around and use it if it came to that.

  The silence stretched.

  De Brassart snored, and snorted once, and rolled.

  And then the moment broke. The man within the kitchen moved away, his footsteps pausing farther off, then starting up more heavily, as though he’d put on boots. The kitchen door was opened, once, and shut with firmness.

  Years of instinct told him that the danger, for tonight at least, was over. Jean-Philippe relaxed his body, but his mind took longer to comply. When sleep did finally come it brought not rest but troubled dreams, in which he was again back in that cold and dreary forest, keeping watch alone, his limbs like ice. Except this time when dawn arrived—still in that sudden spear of golden light—it swiftly moved away from him and even though he followed it and tracked it through the trees against the darkness, it stayed always out of reach.

  Charley

  I didn’t realize I was playing with my bracelet until Malaika commented, “You’re going to break that.”

  She was right. It was made of glass beads strung by hand on a stretchy band, not meant to handle continual stress. I had made it at a sleepover in high school, with a friend who’d had a jewellery-making kit. I still remembered just how hard it was to keep those beads together in their pattern, neat and smooth, without them sliding off the other end and spilling out onto the carpet, but after hours of trying, I had conquered them, and more than ten years later those same beads were still in order.

  Usually the bracelet lay buried under more expensive items in my jewellery box, and probably only Freud knew why I’d chosen to wear it today.

  Maybe I’d needed some reassurance that one thing in my life was holding together the way that it should, because so far my Monday was not going well.

  “So,” I summarized, “we won’t have windows?”

  Sam Abrams raised one shoulder in a shrug that managed to be both accepting and apologetic. “Not the ones we planned for. Sorry.”

  Great, I thought. The first hour of the first day of our restoration work and I hadn’t even made it to the door before discovering we had a problem.

  I’d actually been happy for a moment when I’d pulled into the parking lot and seen the men at work already, with the little backhoe digging purposefully into the earth as it began to excavate a trench around the old foundation. Then I’d seen Malaika standing to the side, arms folded, talking to a dark-haired man I’d recognized as Sam from his broad shoulders and the deep tan of his muscled arms against his plain white T-shirt. If Malaika’s frown of concentration hadn’t warned me, I’d have known from Sam’s expression as he turned to say “Good morning” that my morning wouldn’t be remotely good.

  Not that it was anybody’s fault. The expert sub-contractor whose job it was to deal with all the windows couldn’t have foreseen he’d fall and dislocate his shoulder with such force that he’d need therapy and time before returning to his job. And I felt sorry for him.

  But the delay Sam was talking about would mean our windows would not be in place by the time we had set in our schedule. And finding someone with the same credentials and experience who could step in to take over on short notice wouldn’t be an easy task. Working on heritage buildings was a specialized skill.

  Malaika’s frown was fading. She was not so much an optimist as she was simply stubborn, and I’d noticed that she didn’t get held back too long by obstacles. “Well,” she said, “there must be an alternative. Let’s think, now.”

  Sam was doing that already, thoughtfully taking stock of the windows on the second floor, eyes narrowing against the morning sun.

  Now that I’d been told Sam was a Mohawk, I could see it for myself a little. Not th
at there was any one way for a Mohawk man to look—I knew that much from my time at the Hall-McPhail Museum planning re-enactments and exhibits, when I’d worked in consultation with a few Mohawk historians, one of whom had been a blue-eyed blond.

  They’d taught me, among other things, respectful terminology.

  The oldest of the men had called himself Native American, the second had preferred the term Indigenous, and their younger colleague had assured me there was no collective term that everyone agreed upon, advising me the best thing was to learn which nation somebody belonged to, and refer to that instead. Which had made sense.

  I knew that “Mohawk” wasn’t what they called themselves in their own language, but I couldn’t call the proper word to mind just at the moment. I was trying to remember it when suddenly Malaika’s voice broke in.

  “Sam, you could do this,” she said, “couldn’t you?”

  Still looking up, he paused before he answered. “I was thinking about that.” Another pause, and then, “Not all at once, like Jake would do, but if I took a couple every week and did them in the evenings, yeah, I think I could.”

  “And match the price?”

  The corners of his mouth quirked upward briefly. “Tell you what. You buy me lunch, I’ll match the price.”

  “Okay, then.”

  They shook hands, and that was that. Sam put his hardhat on again and gave us both a friendly nod before he walked across to check the progress of the backhoe and the workmen who were following behind it in the trench, doing more careful digging up against the stone foundation wall, with shovels.

  Since Malaika was my boss, I didn’t question her decision. But once Sam was out of hearing, I said very casually, “He’s qualified to do that, is he? Carpentry?”

  “You’ve seen the fireplace mantel in my dining room? He made that. And the dining table, too. If anything,” she said, “he’s overqualified. He’s got a degree in architecture, too. Will you just stop with that poor bracelet? Have you had coffee yet? No? That’s your problem, then. Let’s get you some.” She led me the few steps along the side walkway to where our staff entrance led into the kitchen of the already renovated Victorian side of the Wilde House.