They pushed the horses hard, for they feared they might be followed. Alicia Jamisson would not sit quietly in Fredericksburg waiting for Jay to come home. She would have sent a message to Williamsburg, or gone there herself, to warn him of what had happened. Were it not for Alicia’s news about Sir George’s will, Jay might have shrugged his shoulders and let them go. But now he needed his wife to provide the necessary grandchild. He would almost certainly chase after Lizzie.
They had several days’ start on him, but he would travel faster, for he had no need of a wagonload of supplies. How would he follow the fugitives’ trail? He would have to ask at houses and taverns along the way, and hope that people noticed who went by. There were few travelers on the road and the wagon might well be remembered.
On the third day the countryside became more hilly. Cultivated fields gave way to grazing, and a blue mountain range appeared in the distant haze. As the miles went by the horses became overtired, stumbling on the rough road and stubbornly slowing down. On uphill stretches Mack, Lizzie and Peg got off the wagon and walked to lighten the load, but it was not enough. The beasts’ heads drooped, their pace slowed further, and they became unresponsive to the whip.
“What’s the matter with them?” Mack asked anxiously.
“We have to give them better food,” she replied. “They’re existing on what they can graze at night. For work like this, pulling a wagon all day, horses need oats.”
“I should have brought some,” Mack said regretfully. “I never thought of it—I don’t know much about horses.”
That afternoon they reached Charlottesville, a new settlement growing up where Three Notch Trail crossed the north-south Seminole Trail, an old Indian route. The town was laid out in parallel streets rising up the hill from the road, but most of the lots were undeveloped and there were only a dozen or so houses. Lizzie saw a courthouse with a whipping post outside and a tavern identified by an inn sign with a crude painting of a swan. “We could get oats here,” she said.
“Let’s not stop,” Mack said. “I don’t want people to remember us.”
Lizzie understood his thinking. The crossroads would present Jay with a problem. He would have to find out whether the runaways had turned south or continued west. If they called attention to themselves by stopping at the tavern for supplies they would make his task easier. The horses would just have to suffer a little longer.
A few miles beyond Charlottesville they stopped where the road was crossed by a barely visible track. Mack built a fire and Peg cooked hominy. There were undoubtedly fish in the streams and deer in the woods, but the fugitives had no time for hunting and fishing, so they ate mush. There was no taste to it, Lizzie found, and the glutinous texture was disgusting. She forced herself to eat a few spoonfuls, but she was nauseated and threw the rest away. She felt ashamed that her field hands had eaten this every day.
While Mack washed their bowls in a stream Lizzie hobbled the horses so that they could graze at night but not run away. Then the three of them wrapped themselves in blankets and lay under the wagon, side by side. Lizzie winced as she lay down, and Mack said: “What’s the matter?”
“My back hurts,” she said.
“You’re used to a feather bed.”
“I’d rather lie on the cold ground with you than sleep alone in a feather bed.”
They did not make love, with Peg beside them, but when they thought she was asleep they talked, in low murmurs, of all the things they had been through together.
“When I pulled you out of that river, and rubbed you dry with my petticoat,” Lizzie said. “You remember.”
“Of course. How could I forget?”
“I dried your back, and then when you turned around …” She hesitated, suddenly shy. “You had got … excited.”
“Very. I was so exhausted I could hardly stand, but even then I wanted to make love to you.”
“I’d never seen a man like that before. I found it so thrilling. I dreamed about it afterward. I’m embarrassed to remember how much I liked it.”
“You’ve changed so much. You used to be so arrogant.”
Lizzie laughed softly. “I think the same about you!”
“I was arrogant?”
“Of course! Standing up in church and reading a letter out to the laird!”
“I suppose I was.”
“Perhaps we’ve both changed.”
“I’m glad we have.” Mack touched her cheek. “I think that was when I fell in love with you—outside the church, when you told me off.”
“I loved you for a long time without knowing it. I remember the prizefight. Every blow that landed on you hurt me. I hated to see your beautiful body being damaged. Afterward, when you were still unconscious, I caressed you. I touched your chest. I must have wanted you even then, before I got married. But I didn’t admit it to myself.”
“I’ll tell you when it started for me, Down the pit, when you fell into my arms, and I accidentally felt your breast and realized who you were.”
She chuckled. “Did you hold me a bit longer than you really needed to?”
He looked bashful in the firelight. “No. But afterward I wished I had.”
“Now you can hold me as much as you like.”
“Yes.” He put his arms around her and drew her to him. They lay silent for a long while, and in that position they went to sleep.
Next day they crossed a mountain range by a pass then dropped down into the plain beyond. Lizzie and Peg rode the wagon downhill while Mack ranged ahead on one of the spare horses. Lizzie ached from sleeping on the ground, and she was beginning to feel the lack of good food. But she would have to get used to it: they had a long way to go. She gritted her teeth and thought of the future.
She could tell that Peg had something on her mind. Lizzie was fond of Peg. Whenever she looked at the girl she thought of the baby who had died. Peg had once been a tiny baby, loved by her mother. For the sake of that mother, Lizzie would love and care for Peg.
“What’s troubling you?” Lizzie asked her.
“These hill farms remind me of Burgo Marler’s place.”
It must be dreadful, Lizzie thought, to have murdered someone; but she felt there was something else, and before long Peg came out with it. “Why did you decide to run away with us?”
It was hard to find a simple answer to that question. Lizzie thought about it and eventually replied: “Mainly because my husband doesn’t love me anymore, I suppose.” Something in Peg’s expression made her add: “You seem to wish I had stayed at home.”
“Well, you can’t eat our food and you don’t like sleeping on the ground, and if we didn’t have you we wouldn’t have the wagon and we could go faster.”
“I’ll get used to the conditions. And the supplies on the wagon will make it a lot easier for us to set up home in the wilderness.”
Peg still looked sulky, and Lizzie guessed there was more to come. Sure enough, after a silence Peg said: “You’re in love with Mack, aren’t you?”
“Of course!”
“But you’ve only just got rid of your husband—isn’t it a bit soon?”
Lizzie winced. She herself felt this was true, in moments of self-doubt; but it was galling to hear the criticism from a child. “My husband hasn’t touched me for six months—how long do you think I should wait?”
“Mack loves me.”
This was becoming complicated. “He loves us both, I think,” Lizzie said. “But in different ways.”
Peg shook her head. “He loves me. I know it.”
“He’s been like a father to you. And I’ll try to be like a mother, if you’ll let me.”
“No!” Peg said angrily. “That’s not how it’s going to be!”