“I am a witch, boy.”
“When I was young a band of mummers came to the market town near my home. My father took me. They had an African witch who danced and shook rattles and terrified me. Later I looked under her tent and saw her preparing for a performance. It was just an old hag who was blacking her skin with burnt cork.”
“You are a fool if you believe only what your eyes see.” She straightened, and her eyes narrowed. “Shall I tell you how you will die, Duncan McCallum?”
“I want to know how five children will not die.”
The words brought a hard, intense stare from the woman. “There’s an island in the North,” she replied. “The children will enter, but no children will leave.”
A shiver ran down Duncan’s spine. He could not tell if it was the old aunt or the witch who spoke now. “Then tell me this: Why did you go west toward the Mingoes when Mingoes tried to kill you in Albany?”
Hetty’s uneven grin revealed a missing tooth. “You don’t think I know how to make a Mingo arrow, boy? I burnt my own cabin down.”
He stared at her in disbelief. A dozen questions leapt into his mind, but then he saw Hetty looking over his shoulder. He turned to see Ishmael standing on the bank above them, looking at them with a pleading expression. “I don’t know what to do,” the boy said.
Conawago was bent over Macaulay. The big Scot had lain down for a quick rest but wasn’t getting up. He seemed to be in a restless sleep. Duncan checked his pulse. “He probably hasn’t slept in two or three days,” he said. “Just exhaustion. Leave him be.”
When Macaulay awoke in the evening, he accepted a mug of one of Conawago’s teas then leaned against a tree to listen with the others as Sagatchie and Conawago told tales of heroes who were now constellations in the sky. Even Hetty offered a legend, of dragons that fought in the skies of a long lost land called Wales, flying so high they became creatures of the stars as well. Ishmael, lying on his blanket and pointing out shapes in the sky, took delight in learning that while he had always known the cluster of stars overhead as the Dancers, the Welsh called them the Pack of Dogs, the Scots called them the Sisters, and the English called them the Pleiades.
The moon was high when Duncan awoke in a sweat. He had been dreaming of dead Scots again, but this time his father had not pointed at him from the gibbet but toward a dull glow beyond a hill. When he reached the top he discovered Conawago tied to a post, singing his death chant as flames consumed him. Huge warriors encircled the fire, joining in his chant, facing outward to assure no one disturbed his dying.
He sat in the moonlight, trying again to link the pieces of the puzzle before him. Dead Mohawks at Bethel Church. Captive children being taken north to be killed. A missing treasure of the British king. A witch who sought out the half-king. He threw wood on the fire and by the flickering light examined once more the slips of paper he had brought from Henry Bedford’s school. The raiders had only killed the children whose names matched those of the families at the settlement. What was different about these children? Why did the raiders trouble over them? He turned the papers over and not for the first time puzzled over the lines and arcs drawn on the original side of the paper. The strokes were bold and deliberate. They could have been part of a design, a drawing for a mechanical device. He extracted the musket ball he had cut from Conawago’s shoulder and rolled it between his fingers, gazing up at the moon.
With a sudden start he found the hell dog at his side, but the creature simply settled down with his head on Duncan’s leg. A nighthawk trilled from a nearby tree. A woman laughed. A duck called out from the river.
A woman laughed. The hell dog was suddenly up and alert, circling the fire. It glanced at Duncan then looked toward the river. Duncan grabbed his rifle and together they stole down the path. They halted in the shadows as two figures rose up out of the water, thirty feet apart. Instinctively he raised his gun, then he slowly lowered it.
The water glistened on their naked bodies as Sagatchie and Kass approached each other on the sandy beach. The dog cocked its head in curiosity. Kassawaya spoke softly, Sagatchie laughed, and the Oneida woman pulled him down with her onto the sand. The moon would not be refused.
Duncan touched the dog’s head, and they retreated back to camp.
The corporal was not inclined to stir in the morning, and Conawago insisted he was strong enough to paddle, so they laid Macaulay in the canoe. By early afternoon he had a raging fever and was thrashing about so much they had no choice but to pull onto the riverbank. Duncan clenched his jaw as he studied the soldier. He was hot to the touch, and pustules were erupting on his face.
“I’ll be fine,” the corporal said in a hoarse voice. “Just a bit of tea, lad.”
They stayed on the shore, making an early camp. The tea Conawago brewed from several different leaves quieted Macaulay’s ragged breathing, but Duncan knew it would bring only temporary comfort.
“A little rest,” the burly corporal kept repeating. But Duncan had seen the misery in his eyes, and he conferred with Hetty then urgently ordered Sagatchie and Kass to stay away, to make their own camp down the river.
As the setting sun washed the camp in a coppery light, Macaulay asked to be propped up against a tree. “I was only in that damned death cave less than an hour,” he groaned. “It’s like that cursed darkness followed me out of the ground.”
“People can get smallpox by brushing someone on the street or standing in a tavern crowd,” Duncan said in a tight voice.
“Standing in a tavern,” Macaulay repeated. “Let’s say it was from kissing a bonny lass,” he added, forcing a smile. Duncan saw fear in his eyes now. Hetty, who had confirmed that she had survived several smallpox epidemics in the past, had stayed in camp and now appeared with a small birch bark pail of water. She tore off a patch at the bottom of her skirt and began wiping Macaulay’s brow.
“I survived Ticonderoga,” the corporal said, as if in protest. “Every man in my squad died, but I swore I wouldn’t let that damned fool English general get me killed. I fought the French up and down the lakes.”
“Is he dying?” Ishmael asked as they gathered more firewood.
“He began dying the moment he followed us into the lower depths of the iron hole.”
“But he’s built like a bull.”
“The army loses more men to disease than it does to battle.”
Ishmael jerked around as a sudden roar burst from the camp. Duncan ran back, expecting a bear. It was the Scottish bull, raging at the hand fate had dealt him. Macaulay, impossibly, had hauled himself up and was stumbling toward the river, bellowing his anger. He faltered as Duncan arrived, staggering toward the river, struggling to lift one leg, then the other. As Duncan reached him he collapsed with his arm in the water.
“The damned fever. . If I can but cool the flames in my head,” Macaulay moaned as Duncan hauled him upright. He had used up his strength. They had to half-drag the big man back to his pallet of pine needles, where he dropped into unconsciousness.
When Macaulay woke it was hours later. He stared up at the gibbous moon. They both knew he would not see the sun again.
“I remember sailing into Stornaway harbor with a boat full of halibut,” Duncan said, raising a weak smile on the big Scot’s face. “My grandfather would trade the fish for tweed from the islands. There would always be women in the square working the cloth, singing the waulking songs,” he said, referring to the ancient rhythmic chants used by groups of island women as they kneaded the hard fibers on planks. “It was magical. He had to drag me away when they were singing.”
“Aye, my mother used to make me sing them with her as we chopped peat out of the moor,” Macaulay remembered. As Hetty wiped his brow, Macaulay tried to sing in a faltering voice, but the effort ended in a spell of ragged coughing.