Lake in the Clouds (70 page)

When he had waited long enough Hannah let him draw her into the shadows and touch her face and kiss her shyly; she had moved away before she could learn the taste of him. When she left Good Pasture to come home to Lake in the Clouds, she had not thought much about him. At night when she woke from unfamiliar dreams that made her body twitch in unfamiliar ways, she remembered the shape of his mouth alone.

In the spring his mother had sent a corn cake to Many-Doves and a question: when would they come back to Good Pasture? There were things she wanted to discuss. It was the old way of starting the marriage negotiations, and that pleased Many-Doves. Hannah was surprised and flattered in a way she could not deny, but most of all she was unsettled.

Once Many-Doves saw that Hannah had not expected the gesture and did not welcome it, she sent the offering back with Spotted-Fox, who had stopped on Hidden Wolf on his way to trade furs in Albany. To Hannah’s relief, Many-Doves had not told anyone at Lake in the Clouds about any of it, not even Runs-from-Bears or Elizabeth. Hannah did not need to explain, or even to think about it anymore. The truth was, she could hardly remember what Walking-Elk had looked like.

Not even a day ago she had seen Strikes-the-Sky for the first time, and she knew already that she would never forget his face.

She could go to Many-Doves and ask her what to do; that was the way these things were handled. She could ask Elizabeth, who would listen quietly and give her good advice. But the idea of speaking out loud what she was feeling made Hannah so anxious that she had to get out of bed.

On the table she saw the neat pile of her daybook and the vaccination records she had begun last night, and that reminded her that Dr. Todd was expecting her this morning. There was work in the laboratory, the notes from his autopsy of Gabriel Oak for her to read, and he wanted to go over the rest of the notes from the Kine-Pox Institution with her.

She was hungry, but Curiosity would feed her. Hannah dressed quickly, smoothed her plaits, packed a basket with the things she would need, and slipped out of the cabin.

Otter and Strikes-the-Sky had put down their pallets on Many-Doves’ porch, and Hannah could not help but notice that they were already gone. They might be swimming under the falls, or in the caves or any one of a hundred places on the mountain. She swallowed her curiosity and trotted most of the way to the village.

The Todds’ kitchen was empty but for Bump, who was finishing his porridge. He smiled broadly to see her and raised a hand in greeting. Perched up on a stool he reminded her of a robin; he was wearing a faded red waistcoat and his head bobbed as he ate. “You’re early this morning, Miss Hannah.”

“Yes, well …”Her voice trailed off, and she felt herself smiling awkwardly. It wasn’t that she was at a loss for words, but that she had the strongest urge to tell Bump about Strikes-the-Sky. There was something about the old man that made her want to talk, as if he were a chest with a sturdy lock, a safe
place to put all the dangerous ideas that wanted to tumble out of her mouth.

He must see her discomfort, but he seemed determined to put her at her ease. Bump hopped down to the floor and pulled out the cap he had tucked under his wide belt.

“I’m off to stoke the furnace in the laboratory. If you want to come along the doctor will follow in a few minutes. Unless you were wanting to give Mrs. Freeman the news from Lake in the Clouds first?”

The house was full of early morning sounds: Curiosity in the dining room talking to the doctor; Dolly singing softly as she swept the hall. Outside the thunk of an axe, and the slow heavy song of a dove. Somewhere upstairs the baby cried and was quieted. While Hannah listened to all of this Bump watched her, his eyes kind and still sharp under the tangle of eyebrows.

“You know about our visitors, then,” she said.

“Oh, ayuh. I expect everybody’s heard by now. The story grows like a beanstalk in the July sun. Down to the tavern they’ll be saying your uncle brought a dozen warriors with him all hung about with scalps and looking for more. Men who are fond of their ale like to dig up a little trouble now and then.”

“I fear you are right,” Hannah said, suddenly more comfortable in this conversation than she could have ever imagined.

“Look at it this way, Friend Hannah.” Bump hitched his way across the room to the door. “It gives them something to worry over besides your smallpox vaccinations.”

He went out into the kitchen garden and Hannah followed him. The smell of lavender in bloom hung sweet in air so still and clear that she could count the trees on the highest ridge. Behind her she heard Curiosity come into the kitchen, the clatter of dishes, a few words exchanged with Dolly, short and sharp and not like Curiosity at all.

Hannah thought of Reuben’s burial for the first time since she had first set eyes on Strikes-the-Sky. She was embarrassed to have let him put everything else out of her mind.

She let Bump go ahead, and went back into the kitchen and to Curiosity.

“Did you get any sleep at all?” Hannah stood across the table from Curiosity. There were deep circles under her eyes and a weariness there that went beyond grief.

“Not too much,” she admitted. “I told that Dutchified nursemaid not to eat pickled cabbage, but did she listen?”

“But Curiosity, she doesn’t speak English,” Hannah said, something she had pointed out many times, so far without any success at getting her message across.

Curiosity waved a hand in dismissal. “Hmmpf. Seem to me like she understand more than she let on. In any case she went and ate the last of that cabbage and her milk went sour and gave that child a bellyache. Ain’t none of us got much sleep. Except the doctor, of course. That man could sleep through the last trumpet.” She said this with no malice at all, as if she admired Richard’s talent for shutting out the world, and expected nothing else of him.

“How’s our Leo this morning?” Curiosity finished, brightening a little with the change in subject. “Or maybe you don’t know. Look like you rushed on down the mountain in a hurry if you got here before Richard finished his breakfast.”

Hannah reached for a biscuit from the platter and broke it in half. “I didn’t have a chance to look in, but he was well last night.”

“Never mind,” said Curiosity with a yawn. “Now that I don’t have to go nurse Reuben I can ride up straightaway this morning. Got to get the baby ready to go anyway. Galileo will be ready to travel by dinnertime.”

Hannah swallowed the last of the biscuit and took another. “Go? Go where?”

Curiosity had turned to put more wood on the fire, and she looked over her shoulder with an expression that was more impatience than anything else.

“We got to get young Leo away right quick. Would have done it last week if it weren’t for Reuben. We’re going to take him to Polly in Albany; she still nursing her youngest and nobody will take no note of another black baby in a city that big.”

“This is about Ambrose Dye, then.”

Curiosity pulled a kerchief from her sleeve to wipe her face. “It is indeed. I’ll kill the man myself before I let him put hands on that child. Lake in the Clouds just ain’t safe enough, not now.”

“Curiosity—” Hannah started and then stopped herself. Any promises she might offer would sound hollow and trite and she could not even believe them herself.

She said, “I hadn’t thought it through.”

The older woman grunted softly. “Look like that visitor already drove everything else out of your head.”

That prickled, but Hannah tried to keep a calm expression. “That is not fair.”

The older woman blinked hard. Then she pushed out a great breath and pulled in another one. “Maybe so. You’ll just have to forgive me, Hannah. I ain’t quite myself.”

She sat down heavily on a stool, and Hannah rounded the table to touch Curiosity’s brow with the back of her hand. Her skin was cool and damp; the calico wrapped around her head was wet through with perspiration.

“You’ve been pushing yourself very hard,” Hannah said. “You’ll get sick next and then we’ll be forced to tie you to your bed.”

Curiosity gave her a half-smile. “Sometime it do seem like the whole world come down on a body all at once. But I’ll rest easier when the boy is safe away from the widow’s overseer.”

An image of Ambrose Dye came to Hannah, looking down at Reuben’s coffin with an expression empty of all emotion. He had known the boy since birth, watched him grow, seen him with his mother and brothers, heard him laughing, and still his death had seemed to touch him less than the loss of a hunting dog.

We regret the senseless accident that sent Reuben too early to his reward.
That hard voice, so harsh and wooden, as if he were reading words from a page put down in a language he didn’t understand. Words meant to dampen the fire, but instead he had breathed new life into it. It smoldered all around them.

Hannah said, “Of course you have to take him away. How long will you be gone?”

“A week at the most. It’s been a good while since we seen Polly and her children. Richard and Kitty will just have to make do while we gone. Kitty needs some watching, but she doing better than I expected and Richard’s got an eye on her …” Her voice trailed off. It was unlike Curiosity, this hesitant tone.

“You only have to ask,” Hannah said.

Curiosity blinked, as if she had forgot Hannah standing right in front of her. “It’s Cookie I’m worried about, but I don’t know that anybody can do anything about it if she get it in her
head to go after Dye. My Galileo was the best chance, but she won’t even look at him when he talk to her.” She shook her head. “I suppose the only thing you can do is keep your eyes open wide and watch. If something should start to happen, why then the best thing would be to send your daddy or your grand-daddy down as a witness; that way Dye can’t overreach himself so easy. And stay clear of the overseer yourself, child. You understand why I’m telling you that?”

Hannah nodded. “I do.”

“Well, then, I done all that I can.” Curiosity pushed herself up and spread her hands over her apron to smooth it.

“Now tell me about the homecoming last night. It sure was good to see young Otter, though I will admit it was a surprise to see him all growed up. He got himself a family?”

Hannah told Strong-Words’ story as best she could, from his early travels west to the Seneca woman who had chosen him as her husband and given him four children, the last just before her uncle started off on his trip east.

“I can see how they’d give him a man-name like Strong-Words,” Curiosity said. “But I still cain’t imagine that boy I used to know as a man with a family to look after. He ain’t changed that much from what I hear. This Stirs-the-Wind has got to be a strong woman if she can take on Otter—I mean Strong-Words—and four youngsters too. And three of them boys.” She snorted a little laugh. “That’s a woman I’d like to meet someday. Now tell me about that friend Strong-Words brung along with him, his brother-in-law I think he said. What’s his name?”

“Strikes-the-Sky.” Hannah’s voice faltered, because she could think of not one thing to say that wouldn’t open up the subject she feared above all others.

“And just why did he come along?”

Hannah shrugged. “He hasn’t said, and neither has Strong-Words.”

“Some things plain enough without talking,” said Curiosity. “Look like Strong-Words has took up matchmaking. Brought you home a husband.”

Hannah bit back the words that wanted to spill out of her. Instead she said, “If that’s what he had in mind he’ll be disappointed. And why would you think such a thing anyway?”

She disliked the slightly frantic tone of her own voice, and
even more than that she disliked the way Curiosity was looking at her, as if Hannah were a child hiding a piece of gingerbread behind her back and lying about it with crumbs on her face.

“Hold on there,” Curiosity said softly. “No cause to get angry. I’m just saying that I saw some things. I saw the way that man was looking at you. And I saw the way you was looking back at him too.”

The biscuit crumpled in Hannah’s fist, and she busied herself brushing the crumbs away to the floor, where the cat wound around her ankles waiting for just such a windfall. When she could talk again she said, “You’re imagining things, Curiosity. There’s nothing to see.”

Curiosity cocked her head to one side and pursed her mouth; it was an expression that Hannah knew well, one that meant she was holding something back. Finally she came over to Hannah and hugged her very hard.

Hannah was surprised, as she always was, at the strength in Curiosity’s thin arms and the comfort they provided. She relaxed a little against the older woman. She had long outgrown Curiosity’s lap but it was almost as good to stand here in the kitchen with her and take her ease.

Hannah said, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

“Shhhh,” Curiosity said, pulling back a little to look her in the eye.

“There really is nothing to tell you about Strikes-the-Sky,” Hannah added, more gently.

Curiosity smiled. She said, “A hole ain’t nothing either, but you can still break your neck in it.”

Hannah let out a thin laugh.

The older woman said, “You give that man a chance, now, you hear me? Don’t go turning away before you hear what he got to say.”

“Yes, all right. I’ll try.”

Curiosity shook her head so hard that her turban wobbled a little. “You surely are a piece of work. Don’t try, child. Do it. No reason to look so embarrassed either. You don’t want to spend your whole life looking after our bumps and scratches, do you? The time come to think about raising up a family of your own. A man can be a comfort sometimes, when he ain’t feeling ornery.” She grinned a little, her old sharp grin.

“Elizabeth didn’t come to that conclusion until she was ten
years older than I am now.” Hannah winced to hear her own petulant tone, but Curiosity only laughed.

“Age don’t got nothing to do with it, and you know it. If Elizabeth and your daddy had come across each other when she was fifteen they’d have ended up together back then. Now maybe you’re trying to tell me that young man ain’t the right one, and if that’s so why then you don’t need to make no excuses. Send him on his way. That what you want?”