The Crystal City

9

Expeditions

It took some doing, but they found the nicest dresses in the whole company that would fit them, and decked out Dead Mary and her mother, Rien, so they could pass for slaveowners. Slightly shabby, perhaps, but it wasn't completely impossible that they would have a mammy slave like La Tia seemed to be and a sturdy young man like Arthur Stuart.

It's not like strangers would be rare in this country, either. Ten years ago the only white folks here was trappers or fugitives. But when most of the reds who didn't want to live white crossed over the Mizzippy, it opened up this land to settlement. Around here, if your house had been standing for five years, you were an old-timer. So nobody'd be too surprised to see two ladies of a family they didn't know-or so they hoped.

Alvin refused to go to the door of the plantation house with them. "What good does it do for you to see how I'd do it?

I'm a white man, and not a word I say would be useful to you after. I'll be watching in case anything goes wrong, but you've got to do it yourselves."

La Tia and Arthur Stuart waited just off the porch as Dead Mary and Rien stepped up to clap hands and call someone to the door. Soon it was opened by an elderly black man.

"Good evening," he said gravely.

"Good evening," said Dead Mary. She was doing the talking because her French accent was not so pronounced as Rien's. And because she could do a better job of faking high-class conversation. "Sir, my mother and I would like to speak to the master of the house, if we may."

"Master of the house away," said the old man. "Mistress of the house poorly. But the young master, he here."

"Could you fetch him for us, then?"

"Would you like to come and rest inside, where it's shady?" asked the old man.

"No thank you," said Mary. She had no intention of getting out of sight of Arthur Stuart or La Tia.

Soon the old man returned, and brought with him a young man who could not have been much over fourteen years old. Behind him hovered a white man of middle age. Not the master of the house, and not a slave, so who was he?

Mary addressed the young man. "My name is Marie Moore," she said. They had agreed an English last name would be better for her, suggesting that her father had simply married a Frenchwoman. "My mother is shy about speaking English."

It was the middle-aged man who leapt to answer. "Parleyvous francais, madame?"

"Mr. Tutor," said the boy, "they come to see me."

"Came, young master," said Mr. Tutor.

"This is not my lesson right this very moment, if you please." So the boy was faking being high class just as much as Mary. He turned back to her with an irked look on his face, but quickly changed it to an expression of dignity. "What do you wish? If you wish to have water or a bite to eat, the kitchen's around back."

This was not a good sign, that he was treating them like beggars, when he should take them for slave-owning gentry like himself.

Fortunately, Mr. Tutor saw the gaffe at once. "Young master, you can't ask ladies to go around back as if they were servants or beggars!" To Mary and Rien he said, "Please excuse his lapse. He has never met a visitor at the door before, and so-"

"They're not ladies," said the boy. "Look at their dresses. I've seen better dresses on slaves."

"Master Roy, you are being impolite, I fear."

"Mr. Tutor, you forget your place," said Roy. He turned back to Mary. "I don't know what you want, but we got nothing to contribute to any cause, and if I were you I'd be careful, cause the story is that a whole passel of folks crossed over Pontchartrain last night. Rumor's been spreading all over and they say they're a lot of runaway slaves. We've got ours locked down today just in case they get some bad ideas, but you'll never keep those two under control if they get ideas."

Mary smiled and put on her archest high-class voice. "There's danger about, and yet you do not invite two ladies inside because our dresses are not new enough to suit you. Your mother will be pleased when all the neighbor ladies hear how we were turned away at your door because the young master of the house was so proud." She turned her back on him and started down the stairs. "Come along, Mother, this is not a polite house."

"Young master!" said Mr. Tutor, in great distress.

"You always think I do wrong, but I tell you I know they're a bunch of liars, it's my knack."

Mary turned around. "You say that you have a knack for discerning a lie?"

"I always know," said Roy. "And you and your mother got liar written all over you. That's rude to say, I know it, but Father has me go with him when we buy horses or slaves or anything expensive, because I can always tell him when the man is lying when he says, This is as low as I'll go, or, This horse is right healthy."

"You must be quite a help to your father," said Mary.

"I am," said the boy proudly.

"But not all lies are alike. My mother and I have fallen on hard times, but we still pretend to be ladies of substance because that allows us to uphold our dignity. But I would be surprised if we were the first ladies to come to this house planning to deceive you about our rank in the world."

The boy grinned sheepishly. "Well, you got that aright. When her friends come to call, the lies come thicker and faster than hail in a storm."

"Sometimes you should let a harmless lie stand, sir, without naming it so, for the sake of good manners."

"I could not have said that better," said Mr. Tutor. "The young master is still so young."

"They can see that I'm young," said Roy, irritated again. To Mary and Rien he said, "Why don't you ladies come on inside, then, and we'll see about maybe something to drink, like ... lemonade?"

"Lemonade would be lovely," said Mary. "But before we accept your kind invitation, we heard that your name is Roy, but not your family name."

"Why, we took our name from what we grow. Roy Cottoner, and my father is Abner Cottoner, after some general in the Bible." "And in French," said Mary, "your first name means 'king.' "

"I know that," said Roy, sounding irritated again. He was quite an irritable boy.

They followed him into the house. Mary had no idea if they were doing things properly-should Mother go first, or should she?-but they figured Roy wouldn't know, and besides, they were already tagged as impostors, so it wouldn't hurt if they got a few things wrong.

"Master Cottoner," said Mary.

Roy turned around.

"Our servants are thirsty. Is there..."

He laughed. "Oh, them. Old Bart, our houseboy, he'll show them around back to the cistern."

Sure enough, the elderly black man was already closing the front door behind him as he headed out to where Arthur Stuart and La Tia were waiting. Mary wished she had more confidence in Arthur Stuart's knack. But Alvin seemed to have confidence in him, so how could Mary refuse to trust in his abilities?

Roy led them into a parlor and invited them to sit down. He turned to Mr. Tutor. "Go tell Petunia we need lemonade."

Mr. Tutor looked mortally offended. "I am not a servant in this house, sir."

"Well what do you think, I should go tell them myself?"

Mary suspected, from what she knew of manners, that that was indeed what he ought to do, but Mr. Tutor merely narrowed his eyes and went off to obey. Mary was just as happy to have him out of the room.

She watched as Roy took a pose in the archway. It looked studied and unnatural, and she suspected that he was imitating the way he'd seen his father stand when company came. On a full-grown man, the stance would have seemed languid and comfortable.

"Master Cottoner," said Mary. "We have, as you guessed, come to ask for aid."

"Father isn't here," said Roy. "I got no money."

"It happens that we don't need money. What we need is permission to bring a large group of people onto your land, and feed them from your larder, and let them sleep the night."

Roy's eyes narrowed, and he dropped his pose. "So you are from those people who crossed Pontchartrain."

"We are indeed," said Mary. "There are five thousand of us, and we'd rather have your help offered freely. But if we have to, we'll just take what we need. We have hundreds of hungry children among us, and we don't mean for them to go hungry."

"You get out of my house," said Roy. "You just get out of here."

For the first time, Mother spoke. "You are young," she said. "But it is the essence of dignity to pretend to desire what you cannot prevent."

"My father'll shoot you down like dogs when he gets home."

"Roy!" A woman's voice came from the hall, and a frail-looking woman came into view behind him, wan and bedraggled from sleep, a robe drawn around her shoulders. "Roy, in my house we will be polite."

"They're a bunch of runaways from Barcy, Mama! They're threatening to take food and such from us."

"That's no reason not to be polite," said the woman. "I am Ruth Cottoner, mistress of this house. Please forgive my ill-mannered son."

"You shouldn't apologize for me, Mama, not to thieves and liars!"

"If I weren't so ill, I'd have reared him better," said Ruth sadly.

Then she pulled up a musket that she had been holding behind her leg. She aimed it straight at Rien and before Mary could even scream, she pulled the trigger.

The gunpowder fizzled and sparked, and a double handful of smallshot dribbled out the end of the barrel.

"How odd," said Ruth. "My husband said it was loaded and ready to fire."

Arthur Stuart appeared behind her. "It was," he said. "But sometimes guns just don't do what you tell them."

She turned around to face him, and now for the first time there was fear on her face. "Whose slave are you! What are you doing in my house!"

"I'm no man's slave," said Arthur Stuart, "nor any woman's neither. I'm just a fellow who doesn't take kindly to folks pointing muskets at my friends."

La Tia appeared behind him. "Ma'am," she said, "you lay down that foolish gun and sit." La Tia was carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade and six glasses. "We gonna have a talk, us."

"You leave my mother alone!" shouted Roy. And he made as if to shove at La Tia. But Arthur Stuart was already there and caught his wrists and held him.

"You will die for laying a hand on my son," said Ruth.

"We'll all die someday," said Arthur Stuart. "Now you heard the lady. Set."

"You have invaded my home."

"This ain't no home," said Arthur Stuart. "This is a prison, where sixty black people are held captive against their will. You are one of the captors, and for this crime you surely deserve terrible punishment, ma'am. But we ain't here to punish nobody, so maybe you best be keeping your thoughts of punishing us to yourself. Now set."

She sat. Arthur propelled Roy to another chair and made sure he, too, sat down.

La Tia put the tray on the small serving table and began to fill the glasses with lemonade. "Just so you know," said La Tia, "we notice that some fool has lock all the black folk into their cabins. In the heat of the day, that be so mean to do."

"So I let them all out," said Arthur. "They're drinking their fill at the pump right now, but pretty soon they'll be helping our company find places to camp on your lawns and in your barns, and setting out a supper to feed five thousand. It's like being in the Bible, don't you think?"

"We don't have food enough for so many!" said Ruth.

"If you don't, we'll impose on the hospitality of some of your neighbors."

"My husband will be back any time! Very soon!"

"We'll be watching for him," said Arthur. "I don't think you need to fret-we won't let him accidentally hurt somebody."

Mary couldn't help but admire how cool he was, as if he was enjoying this. And yet there was no malice in it.

"He'll raise the county and have you all hanged!" said Roy.

"Even the women and children?" asked Arthur Stuart mildly. "That's a dangerous precedent. Fortunately, we aren't killers, so we won't hang you."

"I bet Mr. Tutor's already run for help," said Roy smugly.

"I take it Mr. Tutor is that soft-bodied white man who has read more books than he understood."

Roy nodded.

"He's standing out in the yard with his pants down around his ankles, while some of the illiterate black folks are reading to him from the Bible. It seems they heard him make a big deal about how black folks couldn't be taught to read because their brains wasn't big enough or they got baked in the sun or some such theory, and they're proving him wrong at this moment."

"You were busy out there," said Rien.

"I'm a sick and dying woman," said Ruth. "It's cruel of you to do this to me in the last weeks of my life."

Arthur looked at her and smiled. "And how many weeks of freedom were you going to give any of your slaves, before they died?"

"We treat our servants well, thank you!" said Ruth.

As if in answer to her, Old Bart came into the room. He didn't walk slowly now. His stride was bold and quick, and he walked up to Ruth and spat in her lap. At once Roy leapt up from his chair, but Old Bart turned to him and slapped him so hard across the face that he fell to the floor.

"No!" cried Mary, and her mother also cried out, "Non!"

"We don't hit nobody," said La Tia softly. "And no spitting, neither."

Old Bart turned to her. "The folks out back, they all wanted to do it, but I said, Let me do it just the once for all of us. And they chose me for the job. You know this boy already done had his way with two of the girls, and one of them not even got her womanlies yet."

"That's a lie!" shouted Roy.

"My son is not capable of-"

"Don't you try to tell black folks what white folks is capable of," said Arthur Stuart. "But we're done with all that now. We ain't come here, sir, to bring vengeance or justice. Just freedom."

"You bring me freedom, and then say I can't use it?" said Old Bart.

"I know what you doing," said La Tia. "You a house slave, you try make them field slave forget you sleep indoors on a bed, you."

Old Bart glared at her. "Every day I got them treating me like dirt, they in my face all the time, you think a indoor bed make up for that? I hate them more than anybody. Me slapping him stead of killing him, that what mercy look like."

Arthur Stuart nodded. "I got respect for your feelings, sir. But right now I don't care about justice nor mercy neither. I care about getting five thousand people safe to the Mizzippy.

And I don't need to have the whole country stirred up by a bunch of stories about slaves slapping the children of their former masters."

"They ain't gonna tell no slapping story," said Old Bart. "They gonna tell that we killed this white boy and raped that white woman, and cut that stupid teacher all up. So as long as they gonna tell it, why not do a little of it?"

Ruth gasped.

"You already done all you gonna do," said Arthur Stuart. "I told you why. So if you raise a hand against anybody else while we're here, sir, I'll have to stop you."

Old Bart smiled patronizingly at Arthur Stuart. "I'd like to see you try."

"No you wouldn't," said Arthur.

Mary tried to defuse the situation. She rose from her chair and approached Ruth Cottoner. "Please give me your hand," she said.

"Don't touch me!" cried Ruth. "I won't give my hand to an invader and a looter!"

"I know something about disease," said Mary. "I know more than your doctor."

"In Barcy," said Arthur Stuart, "everybody came to her to know if they was gonna get better when they was sick."

"I'll do no harm," said Mary. "And I'll tell you the truth of what I see. Your son will know if I'm lying."

Slowly the woman raised her hand and put it in Mary's.

Mary felt the woman's body as if it became part of her own, and at once knew where the cancer was. Centered in her womb, but spread out, too, eating away at her inside. "It's bad," she said. "It started in your womb, but it's everywhere now. The pain must be terrible."

Ruth closed her eyes.

"Mama," said Roy.

Mary turned to Arthur Stuart. "Can you ...?"

"Not me," said Arthur Stuart. "It's too much for me."

"But Alvin, don't you think he-"

"You can ask him," said Arthur Stuart. "It might be too much for him, too, you know. He ain't no miracle worker."

"You have some kind of healer with you?" said Ruth bitterly. "I've had healers come before, the charlatans."

"He ain't mostly a healer," said Arthur Stuart. "He only does it kind of, you know, when he runs into somebody who needs it."

Mary let go of the woman's hand and walked to the window. Already the people were walking onto the land in their groups of ten households and fifty households. Blacks from the plantation were guiding them to various buildings and sheds, and there were noises of pots and pans, of chopping and chattering coming from the kitchen.

Among the swarming people, it was easy to pick out Alvin. He was as strong as a hero out of legend-Achilles, Hercules-and as wise and good as Prometheus. Mary knew he could heal this woman. And who could then accuse them of stealing, if he paid her back with years and years of life?

Verily Cooper's thighs always got sore when he rode. Sore on the outside, and sore in the muscles as well. There were people who throve on riding, hour after hour. Verily wasn't one of them. And he shouldn't have to be. Lawyers prospered, didn't they? Lawyers rode in carriages. On trains.

Riding a horse you had to think all the time, and work, too. The horse didn't do it all, not by any means. You always had to be alert, or the horse would sense that no one was in control and you'd find yourself following a route to whatever the horse happened to smell that seemed interesting.

And then there was the chafing. The only way to keep the saddle from chafing the insides of your thighs was to stand in the stirrups a little, hold yourself steady. But that was tiring on the muscles of your legs. Maybe with time he'd develop more strength and endurance, but most days he didn't take such long rides on horseback. So it was raise yourself in the stirrups until your thighs ached, and then sit and let your thighs chafe.

Either way your legs burned.

Why should I do this for Alvin? Or for Margaret Larner? What do I actually owe them? Haven't I given them most of the service since I've become their friend? What do I get out of this, exactly?

He was ashamed of himself for thinking such disloyal thoughts, but he couldn't help what entered his head, could he? For a while he'd been a friend and traveling companion to Alvin, but those days were gone. He'd tried to learn makery with the others in Vigor Church, too, but even though his own knack was to see how things fit and change them enough to make them fit exactly right-which, as Alvin said, was one of the key parts of making-he still couldn't do the things that Alvin could.

He could set a broken bone-which wasn't a bad knack to have-but he couldn't heal an open wound. He could make a barrel fit so tight it would never leak, but he couldn't open a steel lock by melting the metal. And when Alvin left his own makery school to go a-wandering, Verily couldn't see much reason to stay and continue the exercises.

Yet Alvin asked him to, and so he did. He and Measure, Alvin's older brother-two fools, that's what they were. Working to teach others what they hadn't learned themselves.

And not making much money at lawyering.

I'm a good lawyer, Verily told himself. I'm as good at law as I am at coopery. Maybe better. But I'll never plead before the Supreme Court or the King's Bench or any other lofty venue. I'll never have a case that makes me famous-except defending Alvin, and then it was Alvin who got all the notoriety, not that Verily minded that.

And here his attention had wandered again, and the horse was not on the main trail. Where am I this time? Will I have to backtrack?

Just ahead the road he was on crossed a little stream. Only instead of a ford, as most such roads would have, there was a stout bridge-a covered one, too-only ten feet long, but well above the water, and showing no signs of weakening even though as Verily knew, all the covered bridges on this road had been built by Alvin's father and older brothers, so no other travelers would lose a beloved son and brother because some insignificant river like the Hatrack happened to be in flood on the very day they had to cross.

So the horse had taken a turn somewhere and now they were headed, not direct west to Carthage and on into Noisy River from there, but northwest to Vigor Church. It would be a little longer getting to Abe Lincoln that way, but now that Verily thought of it, this was the better way. It would give him a place for respite and resupply. He might hear news. And maybe the love of his life would be there, ready to introduce herself and take him away from all these complicated things.

Alvin's got him a wife and a baby on the way, and what do I have? Sore legs. And no clients.

What I need is to find a lawyer in Noisy River who needs a good courtroom lawyer in his practice. I think I know how to partner with another lawyer. I'll never be a partner to Alvin Maker. He's his own best partner, except perhaps for his wife, and as far apart as they always are, it's hard to call that much of a partnership either.

I'll take a look at Springfield, Noisy River, and see if it looks like home.

And I won't go through Vigor Church. The love of my life is not there. For good or ill, it's my love of Alvin Maker that shapes my life, and I was sent to serve him in Springfield. I'll take no circuitous side trip.

He turned his horse and did not go far before he found the fork in the road where the horse had taken the wrong turning. No, be honest, he told himself. Where you took the wrong turning, hoping to flee like Jonah from your duty.

Arthur Stuart watched Alvin close, hoping to learn how to heal this kind of disease. He hadn't caught the details of how Alvin fixed up Papa Moose's foot, but he grasped the main lines of it. This woman's cancer, it was going to be harder. Once Dead Mary had pointed out what was going on in her body, then Arthur had been able to find it, but it was hard to see the boundaries of the cancer, to know where the good flesh left off and the bad began. And there were lots of little spots of it scattered here and there inside her-but there were some he wasn't sure about, whether they were cancer or not.

So when Alvin came into the house and greeted him and La Tia and Rien and Dead Mary, Arthur Stuart could hardly wait to take him to Mistress Cottoner.

Alvin bowed over her hand, and gravely shook the hand of the boy as well, though Roy was sullen about it.

Then Alvin asked if he might sit beside her and take her hands, "because this goes easier if I'm touching you, though I can do it without if you prefer."

In answer, she placed her hands in his. And there, sitting in the parlor, with all the noise of the business of camp outside, and some of it inside, too, as people bounded in from time to time, demanding a decision from La Tia or Rien, Alvin set to work changing her inside.

Arthur Stuart tried to follow along, and this time Alvin was moving slowly and methodically. Almost as if he were trying to make it clear for Arthur-and maybe he was. But always the most important details seemed to elude him. He'd see what Alvin was looking at, and he'd feel how he was seeking out the boundary between good flesh and bad. But how Alvin knew when he had it right, that's what Arthur Stuart just couldn't fathom.

But some things he could see. How, when Alvin broke down the sick flesh, he made it dissolve into the blood to be carried away. How he made sure to connect everything up inside when the cancerous parts were gone. How he left her strong.

"I feel sick," she murmured.

"But not in pain," Alvin whispered back.

"No, no pain."

"I'm almost done. Your body is helping me find all the wrong places. I couldn't do it without your own body's help. You know how to heal yourself, not in your mind, but in the flesh and bone and blood. It just needed a little ... direction. You see? There's no miracle here. My knack is no more than finding what your body already wants to do but can't figure out for itself, and . .. showing the way."

"I don't understand," she said.

"The sick feeling will pass when the last of it comes out of you at stool," he said. "By morning at the latest. Maybe sooner."

"But I won't die?"

"Can't you feel it?" said Alvin softly. "Can't you feel how right things are inside you now?"

She shook her head. "The pain's gone, that's all."

"Well, that's something, ain't it?" said Alvin.

She began to weep.

At once Roy rushed to her, put a hand on her shoulder, and looked in anger at Alvin and Arthur Stuart. "She never cries! You made her cry!"

"She's crying in relief," said Arthur Stuart.

"No she's not," said Alvin.

"You hurt her!" said Roy.

"She's crying because she's afraid." He looked to Mistress Cottoner. "What are you afraid of, ma'am?"

"I'm afraid that when you go, it'll come back."

"I can't promise you it won't," said Alvin. "But I don't think it will. But if it ever does, you send me a letter. Send it to Alvin the Miller's son, at Vigor Church in the state of Wobbish."

"You can't come back here," she said.

"Damn right he can't," said Roy. "I'll be bigger then, and I'll kill him!"

"No you won't," said Mistress Cottoner.

"Will so. Stealing all our slaves! Don't you see, Mother? We'll be poor!"

"We still have the land," said his mother. "And you still have your mother. Isn't that worth something to you?"

Her steady gaze must have said something to the boy that Arthur Stuart just didn't understand, because the boy burst into tears and ran from the room.

"He's young," she said.

"We've all been guilty of that sin," said Alvin. "And some never get over it."

"Not me," she said. "I was never young."

Arthur Stuart reckoned there was a whole story behind that, but he didn't know what it was. If his big sister Peggy had been there, she would've knowed, and maybe she could have told him later. Or if Taleswapper had ever been here and learned her story and wrote it in his book, then maybe he'd understand. As it was, though, he could only guess what she meant when she said she was never young.

Or what Alvin meant when he answered her, "You're young now."

"For a few hours, maybe," she said.

Alvin opened his hands to let hers go. But she moved quickly and caught him by the wrists. "Oh, please," she said. "Not yet."

So he sat there a while longer and held her hands in his.

Arthur Stuart couldn't watch it for long. There was no healing going on now. Alvin wasn't doing a blame thing with his knack. He was just holding hands with a woman who looked at him like he was God or a long-lost brother or something. It made Arthur Stuart feel like something was wrong. Like his adopted sister, Peggy, was somehow being betrayed by this. Those aren't your hands to hold, Ruth Cottoner, he wanted to say.

But he said nothing, and went outside, and saw how La Tia was quietly making decisions and keeping things moving without raising her voice. She even laughed sometimes, and got smiles and laughs from those who came to her.

She saw him, and called to him. "Come here, you!" she said. "I don't got enough Spanish to understand this man!"

So Arthur Stuart got back into the business of camp, and left Alvin alone in the house with a woman who was half in love with him. Well, why shouldn't she be? He just saved her life. He just looked inside her body and saw what was wrong and fixed it up. You have to love somebody who does that, don't you?

It was no riverboat they boarded for the Mexico expedition. Steve Austin must have found somebody with mighty deep pockets, because what they had was a three-masted lateen-rigged schooner, good for the coastal trade, and with oar ports like a galley ship because the Gulf of Mexico was so often calm. There were full blown cannon on this ship, and field-pieces to take ashore when they got there. Artillery, by damn!

Calvin's respect grew for Sieve Austin's ability to get things done. Naturally, there were plenty of people willing to put up money to conquer Mexico-if they believed the expedition could actually succeed. And since there was almost no chance that it would-not with just one ship and a hundred or so minimally obedient "soldiers"-the fact that he got so much money behind this project meant that Steve Austin knew how to sell.

That's something I need to learn, thought Calvin. I'll watch this man and learn how he persuades people to invest money in insane projects. That would be a useful knack to have.

The ship turned in the river with the help of a couple of lines still attached to shore, so there'd be no chance of it getting out into the perpetual fog on the far bank and being lost. Then they cast free and began the long, stately voyage to the Mizzippy's mouth.

Not far below Barcy, the fog on the right bank thinned and well before they reached the open sea the fog was gone. That was interesting. The fog must not be attached to the river, it must be attached to the boundary of the land that Tenskwa-Tawa intended to protect. Which made Calvin wonder if there was fog along the coast, too, and fog between the Mexica lands and the lands that Tenskwa-Tawa had taken under his protection.

Or was Tenskwa-Tawa somehow allied with the Mexica? Did Tenskwa-Tawa maybe do some of this human sacrificing, too? And if he does, does Alvin know about it? What an interesting thought. All this high-mindedness about opposing slavery and trying to prevent a bloody war, and all the time he's best friends with a red prophet who chums up with the heart-ripping savages of Mexico.

Not that Calvin didn't know it all along. Alvin pretended to be virtuous and only use his power for "good," but he didn't know what "good" was any more than Calvin did or anyone else. Whatever story he believed in, whatever "us" he was protecting against "them," Alvin had to think that whatever he was doing was noble, but it wasn't. It never was. Alvin was just like everybody else, doing what he wanted that he thought he could get away with, using whatever power came to hand, and stepping on whoever got in his way.

At least Calvin knew that about himself. Didn't have any illusions.

He looked out over the sun-shimmered water as the breeze caught the sails and bellied them and allowed the ship to zigzag its way out to sea. So smooth and clean, this ocean, so bright and dazzling. Downright blinding, when the sun reflects on the little waves and the light gets thrown into your eyes. All so clean, with the little white clouds parading along in the bright blue sky.

But underneath the water was murky, the bottom was filth, and creatures crawled there, devouring whatever they could, and getting scooped up into shrimpers' nets like God coming down to punish the sinners. Only there wasn't any punishment, and there weren't any sinners, just hungry brutal animals that got caught, and hungry brutal animals that got left behind.

Alvin tries to live on top of the bright blue sea. But not me.

Around him the other soldiers of the expedition were laughing and joking and boasting about what they'd do in Mexico. But Calvin had a pretty good idea that when it came right down to it, Steve Austin's plan consisted of getting ashore somewhere and then using Calvin's powers to impress potential allies and terrify the Mexica. These laughing, boasting men-they were hirelings, every one. And there weren't many hirelings who rented out their courage along with their bodies. As long as nobody was shooting at them, as long as they didn't see their comrades turned to corpses, they'd be brave. But when trouble started, they'd be gone.

Well, why not? So will I.

Poor Steve Austin. All this money, just to carry some cannons to the Mexica.

Then again, he might just win. After all, he had Calvin Maker, the man with power who wasn't ashamed to use it.

Wasn't it Calvin who kept the wind blowing, nice and steady, and always in a direction they could use? Not a soul on board suspected that it was him. But when you've got me aboard, you don't need those oar ports.

It was evening, and everyone had eaten. Thick fog now surrounded the Cottoner plantation on every side, though in the middle the air was clear and they could see stars.

Arthur Stuart was proud of having learned how to shape the fog. It was hard to realize that only a couple of weeks ago, he had just been learning how to soften iron, and it was so agonizingly slow. But he was like a toddler who struggles to take a couple of steps, and then two weeks later is running headlong through the house and yard, bumping into everything and having a grand old time.

Fog or clear air. Arthur Stuart could decide.

"It's just fog," Alvin told him when he got so excited. "You didn't make a new moon or move a mountain."

"It's weather" said Arthur Stuart. "I'm making weather."

"You're making a fence around some people who need protection," said Alvin. "Don't start showing off, and don't start trying to decide who gets rain and who doesn't. Once you get a storm started, it's mighty hard to slow it back down again."

"I'm not gonna start no storm," Arthur Stuart said scornfully. "You know me all these years, and you think I'm Calvin?"

Alvin grinned. "I ain't confused on that point. But you ain't never gonna be able to tell me. It ain't my fault, I didn't know!"

"So you're gonna teach me everything?"

"Everything I think of."

"Who taught you?"

"My own stupid mistakes."

"So if stupid mistakes have done so much for you, how come you won't let me study from the same teacher?"

Alvin had no answer to that, just a laugh.

And then it was time for Alvin to go.

"You have to sleep," said Dead Mary to him. "Don't go till morning."

"Night time's the best for me," said Alvin. "And I'll sleep as I go."

Dead Mary looked confused.

"It's a thing he learned from the reds," said Arthur Stuart. "He runs in his sleep. We got some of that last night, crossing the lake. Didn't you hear it?"

"Hear it? What does running in your sleep sound like?" She laughed, thinking Arthur Stuart was joking.

But in a moment she had forgotten Arthur again. She was back to watching Alvin, and it occurred to Arthur that watching Alvin was pretty much what she did, whenever she wasn't actually compelled to do something else. She didn't look at him in that emotional way Ruth Cottoner had. It was something else. Perfect raptness. Complete intensity. As if she wanted to own him with her eyes.

Ruth Cottoner, that was love, all right, love made of gratitude and relief and fear and trust in this man who had saved her. But Dead Mary, she loved him, too, but it was something else. It was purposeful. She hadn't yet got what she wanted. But she meant to get it.

I can't know that, thought Arthur Stuart. I'm not Peggy, I'm no torch to see inside folks' heartfires.

And anyway, Peggy wouldn't send Alvin into a place where some other woman was going to fall in love with him.

Then again, for all Arthur Stuart knew, women were always falling in love with Alvin and he had always been too young and dumb to notice. He remembered a few times, sure. Never amounted to much. It's not like Alvin ever flirted back.

But this time Alvin didn't seem to see how she looked at him. Because maybe she was more subtle. After all, Arthur hadn't seen it himself until just now, just tonight. So maybe Alvin didn't notice how her gaze was always attached to him, how she listened to every word, how she worshiped him. But notice it or not, it had its effect on him. He kept turning to her. He'd be speaking to somebody else, but he kept glancing at her, as if checking to make sure she'd heard him. As if he expected her to get some joke that only the two of them knew.

Only there was no joke between them, there was nothing, there hadn't been time for anything, Arthur Stuart had been there, hadn't he? Almost always, except that very first time they met, when she led him to that cabin in the swamp to heal her mother.

This Dead Mary, all she ever sees in every man she meets is whether he's sick or not, and if he's gonna die of it. But in Alvin, what does she see? The man who can make her nightmares not come true.

No, she sees power. To change the world, change the future.

Or maybe it's just them strong blacksmith's arms and shoulders.

And what do I care, anyway? It's not like Alvin's going to fall for her. He doesn't even look at other women than Peggy-if he ever did I'd know it. So what difference does it make to me?

It's not like Alvin's the only man around here who can do things. I may not be able to heal folks, but I held up the other end of Alvin's bridge, and that ain't nothing. I kept Ruth Cottoner's musket from firing. I made the fog.

What am I thinking? She must be five years older than me. And white, and French. Though I can speak French now pretty good. And I'm half white, and what difference should it make, anyway, once we get out of slave country?

No. I'm a child in her eyes, and a half-black one at that, and most of all, I'm Alvin's prentice maker, and he's the real thing, so why should she ever look at me?

Good thing Alvin's going, though. Good thing he's got errands to run. Wouldn't want to have a lot of distraction, when they had so much to do.

Alvin didn't make a big deal about going. He'd done all he said he'd do. La Tia and Arthur and Dead Mary and Rien knew their jobs-Dead Mary and Rien to distract the folks in the big house until Arthur Stuart and La Tia could get the slaves free and learn what all they had to know. It wouldn't always be like this, of course, with the man of the house gone and the slaves all locked down in their cabins and the overseer drunk and easy to keep asleep. And there'd be no healings of sick women, with Alvin gone. But they'd manage.

And the last thing Alvin wanted was for all the thousands of refugees from Barcy to see a lot of fuss about him going. Especially not if anybody was going to get emotional and plead with him to stay. That would fill the camp with uncertainty. As it was, the people who had actually done all the important work today were still with them. And when folks started asking where Alvin was, they could say, He's scouting on ahead, he'll be back soon.

So when it came time for Alvin to step away, most people didn't even notice that he'd done it.

Only Arthur Stuart, and he didn't run up to Alvin and say any last words, just gave him a grin and watched him shoulder his poke, slip into the trees, and move on into the fog.

When he looked away from where Alvin had faded from view, nobody else even seemed to have noticed.

Except Dead Mary. She was ostensibly talking with her mother and a couple of Frenchmen about something, but her gaze was fixed on the place where Alvin had last been visible.

It's love, thought Arthur Stuart. Girl is crazy with love. Or something.

It took a while for folks to settle down. They hadn't got much sleep, so you'd think they'd all be tired, and the children had fallen asleep about as soon as their stomachs were full. But there was conversation and wonderment and worry, plenty to keep things humming for an hour or so after the meal and the cleanup were over.

Arthur knew he needed sleep as much as anyone, maybe more. But first he checked to make sure the fog was in place. That was his first job, and if he failed at that, what would he be worth? So he walked the perimeter of the camp one last time. A couple of the blacks just released from slavery on the Cottoner plantation saw him and came and gave him thanks, but he refused, and just said he didn't give them anything God didn't give them first, and then excused himself to finish checking on things.

When he got back to the big house, most everyone was asleep. And it occurred to him that he hadn't arranged so much as a blanket for himself.

No matter. The grass was dry and the air was warm and he didn't mind the insects. He found an empty patch of ground not far from the edge of the fog, where nobody else was sleeping, and he sat down and started rubbing the bottoms of his feet with grass, which he found was soothing after a day's walking. His shoes were somewhere near the house, he remembered now. He'd get them in the morning, or do without. Shoes were good to have in winter, but they were a bother to have to carry around all summer, when mostly you wanted to feel the ground under your feet.

"So he's gone," said Dead Mary.

Arthur hadn't even noticed her approach. He cursed himself. Alvin always knew who was nearby. And Arthur Stuart could see the heartfires, the near ones anyway. He just wasn't used to looking. There were hundreds around him now, all sleeping. He hadn't been paying attention.

"And you are the maker now," said Dead Mary.

"Prentice maker," said Arthur Stuart. "If that. My real knack is learning languages."

She said something to him in a language that sounded partly like Spanish and partly like French.

"I got to learn them first," said Arthur. "It's not like I already got all possible languages inside my head."

She laughed lightly. "What is it like, traveling with him all the time?"

"Like being with your brother-in-law who sometimes treats you like a kid and sometimes treats you like a person."

She smiled and shook her head. "It must be wonderful, to see him do these noble things."

"He usually does no more than one noble deed afore dinner, and then he's done for the day."

"You're teasing me," she said.

"You want to know what it's like?" said Arthur Stuart. "Just ask your ma how thrilling it is every time she sees you find out whether somebody's sick, and whether they'll die of it."

"How could you ever get used to something like this?"

"I'm not trying to get used to it," said Arthur. "I'm trying to learn to do it."

"Why? Why do you need to know, when he can do it so much better?"

Didn't she have any idea how hurtful it was to say such a thing? "Well, it's a good thing I did learn something, don't you think?" he said. "Or we'd have to have a bunch of watchmen out tonight, and in this group, how many reliable guards do you think we'd find?"

"So you really made the fog? He didn't do it?"

"He started it, to show me how. I made the rest."

"And you can do it tomorrow?"

"I hope so," said Arthur Stuart, " 'cause we got to leave this fog behind. If we stayed a second night here, this plantation wouldn't have anything left to eat and the Cottoners would starve."

"They won't starve-they don't have all those slaves to feed now, remember?" She lay back on the grass. "If I could travel with him, I would be happy every minute of every day."

"Don't work that way for me," said Arthur Stuart. "About every other day, I stub my toe or eat something that makes me queasy. Otherwise, though, it's pretty much ecstasy."

"Why do you tease me? All I'm doing is telling you what's in my heart."

"He's a married man," said Arthur Stuart. "And his wife is my sister."

"Don't be jealous for your sister," said Dead Mary. "I don't love him that way."

Yes you do, thought Arthur Stuart. "Glad to hear it," he said.

"Can you help me?" she said.

"Help you what?"

"This globe of crystal water he made, that I've been carrying with me-"

"As I recall, you had a couple of boys who were sweet on you pushing that wheelbarrow most of the day."

She waved his tease away. "I look in it and what I see frightens me."

"What do you see?"

"All the deaths in the world," she said. "So many I can't even tell who is doing the dying."

Arthur Stuart shuddered. "I don't know how the thing works. Maybe you only see what you've been trained to see. You already know how to see death, so that's what you see."

She nodded. "That makes sense. I was going to ask you what you see."

"My mother," said Arthur Stuart. "Flying. Carrying me to freedom."

"So you were born in slavery."

"My mother spent all her strength and died of it, getting me away."

"How brave of her. How sad for you."

"I had family. A couple of families. A black one, the Berrys, they pretended they were my real parents for awhile, so folks wouldn't tag me as a runaway. And the Guesters, the white family that actually raised me. Alvin's mother-in-law, Old Peg, she adopted me. She meant it, too. Though I reckon Alvin's been more my father than Peggy's father was. He's an innkeeper, and a good man. Helped a lot of slaves get to freedom. And he always made me feel welcome, but it was Alvin took me everywhere and showed me everything."

"And all before you were twenty."

"I don't reckon we're done yet," said Arthur Stuart.

"So you can tease me, but I can't tease you?"

"I didn't know you were teasing."

"So you don't speak all the languages." She laughed at him.

"If you don't mind, maybe it's time for sleep."

"Don't be mad at me, Prentice Maker. We have a lot of work to do together. We should be friends."

"We are," said Arthur Stuart. "If you want to be."

"I do."

He thought, but did not say: Just so you can use me to stay close to Alvin, I reckon.

"Do you?" she said.

Does it matter what I want? "Of course," he said. "This is all going to work better if we're friends."

"And someday you'll help me understand what I see in Alvin's globe?"

"I don't even understand what I see in my soup," said Arthur Stuart. "But I'll try."

She rolled onto one arm and leaned toward him and kissed his forehead. "I will sleep better knowing you're my friend and I can learn from you."

Then she got up and left.

You might sleep better, thought Arthur Stuart, but I won't.