"How noble of you!" Her voice held irony, and the tone dismayed me. I stared at her, about to make some angry retort, but said nothing. That seemed to irritate her even more.
"I have not asked you to do this for me," she said, "and I would not. It is a fool's errand, going off to find a girl you know nothing of on an island you have never seen and where you'll find naught but enemies."
She turned around to look at me. "Do you believe for one minute that Joseph Pittingel or Max Bauer would let you go? At the first word of such a thing they would have you dead, killed in some manner. You would do better to go back to that far land from which you come and cultivate your corn!"
Her disdain for my sense was obvious, but it only made me resolve the more. "Believe what you will. I shall go."
I got to my feet, wishing to have no more words with her. Maverick was frowning at his pipe, Blaxton seemed amused by something, and Yance was smiling. What a smug lot they were! I'd be well rid of them, even Yance!
Turning to the door, I said, "Tomorrow, then, Henry. We will be off to Damariscove and a ship if we be so fortunate."
Diana turned away, ignoring me, and I stepped out into the darkness.
It was very still and damp; a fog came in from over the bay and from the sea beyond. Many a tale of the sea had I heard from my father and those of our men who had sailed with him, tales of bloody sea fights and ships captured or sunk, of Newfoundland and of the Irish coast. How long before I'd see my beloved hills again and the slopes all pink and rose with rhododendron and laurel? How long?
As a boy, I had walked the seaside when with my father. I went to the shore above Hatteras, a long and sandy shore, with a salt sea wind blowing and the salt spray in my eyes and the sea birds calling as they swooped above. Long had I looked upon ships and dreamed of the places of their going, the far places, the mysterious places, the wild romantic names, Shanghai, Gorontalo, Rangoon, Chittagong, and Zanzibar.
Dreamed of them, yes, but of my own hills the more. I wanted only to be back there, but first to stamp out this ugly thing, for I thought of Noelle in such a plight and no one to come to her aid. If harm were done to any whom I loved, I should come back; if it were from the dead, I should come back and lay a hand upon those who were evil.
The fog moved around me in strange curls, caressing my cheek with ghostly fingers, placing a chill kiss upon my brow with a small touch of moisture. The palisade loomed before me, and I went to the gate. A shadow moved, and a man stood there. "I be Tom," he said, "on guard this night. Is there aught I can do for you?"
"I thought of going out," I said.
"I would not," he said. "There be unholy things i' the night and a whisper of moccasins, methinks. I'd stay within and be glad, for the wall is strong."
"Aye, you are right, and if all goes as I expect, I'll be needing rest before I go down to the sea."
"They'll be bedding for the night soon," Tom said. "The master is no late stayer these nights. Ah, I've seen the time when they made the welkin ring with their singing of songs and drinking of ale, but not with the reverend here. Besides, there's a deal of work to be done, and all must rest."
"Is there trouble with Indians at all?"
"It's been a time since. Oh, there's petty thievery and such like but no more than is expected. You can't blame them," he added. "We've so much that is new and some'at curious to them, so they be picking up this and that to look at and sometimes to carry off. They do not have the same thoughts about ownership as do we, an' 'tis but natural."
"Aye." He made sense, this man. I wished all might be as understanding, yet it was much to expect when most newcomers thought of the Indians as savages, ignored by the good Lord unless saved.
It may have been my father's easy way with folks or perhaps my mother's way or Lila's or the teaching of Sakim, but I was not one for believing all who believed not as I to be therefore heathens. Many are the paths to righteousness, and ours, I think, is but one.
Inside they'd put down a pallet for me close by the fire, but I drew it somewhat away. I liked not to sleep too warm but cool enough to sleep lightly so my ears can hear what moves about.
All were asleep, or seemed so. I drew off my boots and looked to the charge on my pistols and then stretched upon my pallet and stared up at the dark timbers, lit by the flickering fire. It was in my mind to go south to the Indies, yet there was uneasiness on me, for I should be venturing far from lands that I knew and among men who were strangers to me and whose ways I knew not.
In the night it rained, and I awakened to hear the sound of it on the roof and in the yard outside. Lying awake, I thought of the rain falling in the forest, and I wondered where Max Bauer was and those who had been with him. Here I was safe. Yet Diana had spoken truly, for if they were slavers and discovered my intent, they would kill me or seek to kill me. Nonetheless, I knew this foul business must be ended or no maid would be safe to walk free upon the land.
Or was it simply that something deep inside me still longed for the sea, something inherited, something only half held, some unnamed yearning? What man truly understands his motives?
Yet there was something else, something of which I had heard my father speak when talking to Jeremy or the others, that where man was, there must be law, for without it man descends to less than he is, certainly less than he can become. Even on the frontier where no law had yet come, man must have order, and evil must be restrained or punished.
No man had made me my brother's keeper, but if no other moved to restrain evil, then I must do it myself. These men had injured one whom I--I could not complete the idea. It was not true. It was only that--
I went to sleep.
Morning dawned, cool and damp with a wind from off the bay. Yance and I walked outside into the sea wind and stood together. "Don't worry about my crop," I said. "The birds and the squirrels will harvest for me. Tell them where I am gone and that when spring comes I shall be with them again."
"Kin, be warned. They are not easy men."
"Aye. That I know."
"Where will you go?"
"To Jamaica at first to ask about where many sailors come. I do not think there are secrets at sea even though some may believe so. At Damariscove, where I go to find a ship, I shall also ask."
"Kin, do you remember John Tilly? And Pike? They were trading to the Indies in the Abigail, named for our mother. And the Eagle, too, the craft that took mother to England. That one traded to the Indies, also."
"Aye. I remember."
Henry came to the door. "Do we go now? I am ready."
"And I. Good-by, Yance. Care for things until I return. And do not go off a-hunting. Stay close to Temperance for a bit."
"You know how to give advice," a voice said, "and do you take your own?"
It was Diana, standing alone and very still just outside the gate. I blinked at her, not quite understanding, but I held out my hand. "I will come back," I said.
"Oh, will you?" She looked straight at me, her eyes wide. "And what then, Kin Sackett? What then?"
"An end to this bad business," I said.
Her fingertips scarcely touched mine, and then she turned sharply away. What in the devil was the matter with the girl?
"Go, then," she said over her shoulder. "Go."
Chapter XI
Quiet lay the water over which we moved, with no sound but the ripple of our passing and the steady chunk of the oars. Fog lay thick about us and somewhere ahead an island. A long, thin, wooded island, and there was the harbor, Damariscove, settled, it was said, by a Captain Dammerill.
Yet the fisherman whose boat we hired shrugged when I said it. "Aye, it may be, but there were lads as came ashore there to dry their fish many a year before he ever caught the shadow of it."
My father, too, had spoken of this, for fishers from the Grand Banks had come here to smoke or dry their fish before heading homeward for the shores of Europe. I spoke of this, and he looked at me again.