George did not know what to say. The old man had lost all connection with reality. “Father, I think we had best go,” he said softly.
“Don’t you talk to me in that patronizing tone, you cowardly little sniveling bastard!” Jacob Wilkenson whirled around and glared at his son. “If you had been considerate enough to be killed in Matthew’s place, this would not have happened! Matthew was able to help me keep these people in line, but not you, oh no. I knew you would not soil your lily-white hands with such business! You would think it beneath you!”
“Oh, I have soiled my lily-white hands, so much so that I cannot bear to think on it. But no, I would not have had truck with your illegal and utterly immoral business, not that you ever thought to ask me. Believe me, I am ashamed of what I have done, and even more so of what you and Matthew have done. And I think you are about to reap the crop you have sown.”
“Get out! Get out, you sanctimonious coward! Go stand in the hall with the women and the old men!” Jacob screamed, but George’s eyes were drawn past his father to the field through the window. A great column of smoke was suddenly visible at the edge of the frame. The glow of a great fire lit the trees that separated the Wilkenson plantation from the Page home three miles away.
“What?” Jacob asked, and turned around to see what George was staring at.
The pirates were pouring into the field by the river, dozens of them, hundreds for all George could tell. They must have
taken the road that led along the banks of the James from the Page place to theirs. They were half a mile away at the bottom of the field and closing on the house like a pack of wolves. Even over that distance he could hear their howling and screaming.
The two Wilkensons stared silent for a moment at the coming threat, the wave of death sweeping up from the river.
George swallowed hard, fought the terror down. “Come, we have to go,” he said. Surprised by the tone of authority in his voice, despite the fear.
“No,” his father said, as if pleading for permission, “no, I must stay and explain to these men-”
“Father, we must go.”
“No!” Jacob whirled around, red-faced, remembering who he was. “No! I did not build all this by letting bastards like that LeRois tell me what is what! These men do not tell me what to do, no man tells me what to do, I tell them! Do you hear me? I tell them!”
Incredible. Jacob Wilkenson’s pride. His pride was the source of his strength, and his pride would not let him leave, because leaving would be as much as admitting he had done a stupid and horrible thing. Jacob Wilkenson would die before he did that, he would go down insisting that he was right.
George realized all of that, and he also realized that his father would let his family die as well before even tacitly admitting to a mistake.
“We’ll be leaving now, Father,” George said.
His eyes moved to the window again. Long shadows tugged at the pirates’ feet as they charged up the hill. He saw blades glinting in those rays of sun that found their way through the trees. He saw heads bound in cloth, crossed belts holding weapons that slapped against bare chests as the men ran, cocked hats, torn coats, bearded, dirty, blood-streaked faces, grinning faces.
“Yes, yes, good, you go, you goddamned coward, you go and take all those cowards with you, and when this is over
don’t come back!” Jacob screamed, but George was already out of the room when he finished.
He ran down the hall to the front door. “All of you, come along, hurry!” he ordered, throwing open the door and gesturing with his arm, and the frightened people in the foyer shuffled out the door.
“What about your father? Where is your father?” his mother asked as he half pushed her out the door.
“He will not come, and there is nothing I can do,” George said, and his mother made no reply. She would not be surprised. No one knew better than his mother the kind of idiocy of which Jacob Wilkenson was capable.
They hurried down the steps and across the circular drive, and George realized that he did not know what he would do next. The old people could hardly walk. They certainly could not make it to Williamsburg on foot, and there was only his horse nearby.
“Damn it, damn it…” George looked around. The shouting and hooting of the pirates seemed to be right on top of him, but they were still on the other side of the house. “All of you, hurry off into those trees,” he said, pointing toward a stand of oaks near the end of the drive, fifty yards from the house. “I shall go for a wagon of some sort.”
The others were too frightened to protest, for which George was thankful, for he knew it would take only the mildest of arguments for him to change his mind. They hurried off in their awkward, shuffling way, and he turned and rushed around the house toward the stables.
The pirates were swarming over the porch of the house, smashing in windows and kicking in the back door. George paused for a second to watch the destruction, then turned and ran.
He was breathing hard, and his chest ached and burned, when he finally swung open one of the big doors of the dimly lit, whitewashed stable and squeezed through.
The only transportation there was an old dray, pushed toward the back. The family coach was in the coach house,
but the horses were there in the stable and he did not care to try to bring them all together under the eyes of the pirates. Rather, he selected one of the draft horses, a great beast of Flemish descent, and led it over to the dray.
He could hear the primal, terrifying sound of the hordes tearing through his home, the shouting and howling punctuated with breaking glass and shattering wood. He did not want to think of what was happening there as he fumbled with the unfamiliar harness of the dray. The horse shifted nervously.
George fitted the bit in the big animal’s mouth, slipped the bridle over its head. The slow, intricate work of fitting the horse in the tack had given George’s fear the chance to gather again. He was near panic as he stepped across the straw-covered floor and peered out of the door.
There were only a few of the brigands still outside, those who had paused to swill from their bottles before plunging in through a smashed door or window. He could see more of them in the house. They were absolutely frenzied, ripping curtains down, slashing with swords at anything that could be destroyed. He had heard that sharks behaved that way when feeding, but he had never imagined human beings capable of such. He wondered if his father was still alive. Wondered, but did not care.
The Wilkensons had done this to themselves, to the colony. He sucked in a long breath.
His first duty was to get his family safely away. His next was to make some effort to save the tidewater. He knew what that would entail, and the very thought of it made him sick even through the fear.
Slowly, quietly, he pushed the stable doors open and stepped back into the shadows. No one had noticed, but they would not miss the dray rumbling past. He raced back into the stable and climbed up onto the rough seat. He picked up the reins, took another long breath, held it, and then exhaled, yelling “Hey, yah!” and flicking the reins against the horse’s neck.
The big horse, already nervous from the noise and from George’s unfamiliar hands, burst into a gallop, barely in con
trol. They charged out of the stable-horse, dray, and driver-with stalls, tack, tools, and doors flying past, and raced down the beaten road toward the front of the house. George could hear nothing but the thunder of the heavy hooves, the creaking dray, moving faster than it was ever intended to move, and he was suddenly afraid that the horse would not stop when he needed it to.
Then through the rumble and the pounding he heard a surprised exclamation. A pistol fired and the ball buzzed past. George hunched forward and flicked the reins again, but the horse was running as fast as it could.
They whipped around the front of the house and down the drive. The stand of oaks was a blur as the cart bucked and shook on the dirt road. George pulled back on the reins, shouting, “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” and to his infinite relief the horse slowed and then stopped. It shook its head, whinnied, and shifted nervously on its huge hooves, but it stayed essentially still.