Dawn on a Distant Shore (83 page)

In the new quiet,
Hawkeye sang a death song, telling the story of Robbie's life as he made his
way through the shadowlands.

Elizabeth knelt in the
blood and put her hands on him. Smoothed his hair. "Robbie," Elizabeth
called to him, and then again, louder. "Robbie?"

Hannah's eyes were
bright with tears. "We must let him go," she said to Elizabeth in Kahnyen'kehâka.
"It is his time."

They buried Robbie
MacLachlan and Lady Isabel the next day, and that evening Nathaniel went
looking for his father. He found him in the wood behind the paddocks, perched
high in an oak, deep in conversation with Jennet and Hannah.

"When Simon
died," Jennet was saying, "I thoucht perhaps it was just the fairies
had stolen him awa', and that he wad come back one day. Did you feel like that
when your brother Uncas died?"

Hawkeye said, "I
still do." And then: "Here's your father, Squirrel, come to call us
to table. Why don't you girls go along now. I've been trying to have a word
with him all day."

When they had run off
ahead, Nathaniel said, "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to find you climbing
trees."

"You can see a
good ways from up here," said Hawkeye, dropping down as easy as a man half
his age. "And that Jennet has got a story or two worth taking home."

"Squirrel will be
sorry to leave her behind tomorrow."

Hawkeye nodded. His
thoughts were someplace else, and Nathaniel waited for him to gather them together.

"I don't think
Robbie ever expected to get back to New-York," he said finally. "Long
ago some wise woman told him that he would be buried on Scottish soil. He said
that to me the day we set foot on land. Said that he felt the truth of it in
his gut."

Hawkeye looked around
himself, at the sunset against the hills, deep gold and tawny, and he sighed.
"This was the right place for him to come to die, but it ain't my place,
no matter how I look at it. Ain't yours, either, from what I can tell."

In his surprise,
Nathaniel stopped. "Did you think it might be?"

His father shrugged.
"Don't know what I thought. I was sure before I got here how I'd feel
about Carryck, but now I've seen him and it's not that simple. I don't think
I've ever seen a man so tore up inside."

"It's a hard
price he's paying for his mistakes," Nathaniel admitted. "But I don't
see there's anything we can do for him. The Catholics and the Protestants have
been at each other's throats for almost two hundred years. Even if we wanted to
stay here there's nothing we could do to fix that."

Hawkeye was silent,
and Nathaniel had an unsettled feeling, as if something was coming his way he
couldn't predict or control. He said, "You're putting a fright into
me."

"I know I
am," said Hawkeye. "And with some cause. I thought about just letting
what I know go to the grave with Robbie, but I couldn't live with it. I got no
choice but to lay it out for you and let you make your own decisions. You and Elizabeth."

"What's this
about?" Nathaniel asked.

His father put a hand
on his shoulder. "Giselle Somerville," he said. "And the son she
bore you the winter after you left her in Montréal those many years ago."

While his father
talked, Nathaniel stood in the shadows of the forest and felt the truth of what
he was saying crawl up through him and settle in his bones, word by word.

He said, "She
never told me. Never said a word when I took leave from her, never sent for me."

Hawkeye pushed out a
heavy breath. "I know that."

"But you believed
her?"

"Not at first.
Not until Robbie told me what he knew."

"Iona could have
let me know." The first anger pushing up now, to be swallowed down again.

"She could
have," Hawkeye said. "But then she would have had another child taken
away from her. Do you think she gave Giselle up to Somerville of her own
accord?"

Somerville. All the
time he had been sitting in the Montréal gaol, the boy had been nearby and
Somerville had kept it from him.

"All these years,
Giselle thought he was in France, being raised by her mother."

"It looks that
way."

"Christ,"
Nathaniel muttered. "Now what? Do I go looking for him, or do I leave him be?
Maybe he won't want anything to do with me, or with his mother. I wish I had
had more of a look at him that night in Montréal."

An ache swelled up
deep inside him, like discovering a slowly seeping battle wound hours after the
last shot had been fired.

Hawkeye rubbed a thumb
over his chin. "You'll have to work that out with Elizabeth, son. And I
expect Giselle will have something to say about it --she won't give up until
she finds the boy."

"Unless Stoker
finds her first."

Hawkeye inclined his
head. "She's made an enemy of him, that's true."

From the courtyard
gate came the sound of Squirrel's voice, calling for them. They started in that
direction in silence, and then Nathaniel stopped cold.

"You were
thinking of sending the boy-- What did she call him?"

"Luke."

"You want to send
Luke here, to Carryck."

Hawkeye nodded.
"The thought crossed my mind, but it ain't my decision to make. You need to
think that through."

"Do you think
he'd take an interest in this place?" Nathaniel asked.

"Most men
would," said Hawkeye. "Especially a young man with no land and no prospects.
A young man raised Catholic."

"I'd never see
him," Nathaniel said, feeling the loss already before he had even come to
know the boy.

Hawkeye said,
"I'd have to lay claim to Jamie Scott's place here. I couldn't do that
without talking to Jean Hope and to Jennet first. Making sure they wanted it
that way. Then you'd have to claim Luke as your firstborn."

They were just twenty
yards from the gates now. From the courtyard came the sound of children's
laughter, and Curiosity calling out after them. Elizabeth stood in the window
with a baby on her arm. She had circles under her eyes, but there was a settled
and peaceful look about her that he had last seen at home in Lake in the
Clouds, before they had any idea of what lay ahead. She smiled when she saw him
and raised her hand.

"She's a good
woman," Hawkeye said. "It might hit her hard at first, but she don't
have an unfair bone in her body. She'll come around to the idea."

"Maybe before I
do," Nathaniel agreed, and he went in to tell Elizabeth about his son.

Hannah was waiting for
her grandfather just inside the gate, and she pulled him aside. Something of
the brightness in her had gone away with Robbie's death, some of her trust in
the world. And he remembered now the morning he had walked out of Montréal with
Nathaniel. How he had watched him change as they walked, leaving not just
Giselle Somerville but some of himself behind, too.

"What is it,
Squirrel?"

She said, "I need
your help. I can't do it by myself."

He put a hand on her
shoulder, felt the strength of her and the determination. People looked at the
color of her skin and thought of her mother, but there was so much of his Cora
in her, a fiery heart and a will of iron.

"Tell me."

In Mahican she said,
"Will you come down to the village with me, Grandfather?" It was
strange hearing that language of his boyhood in this place, and it did what she
wanted it to: it shut out the rest of the world and drew them closer together.

"When?"

"After
dark."

He kept his face
impassive. To smile would be to make light of this errand of hers, and he would
not insult her. "What is it that takes us to the village after dark?"

"Before I leave
this place I must kill a bear," she said. And then, more quickly:
"They blinded her and chained her to a post. She asked me to set her free
of this place, and I gave her my promise."

A fine tension was in
her now, her whole body shaking. She said, "I cannot go home and leave her."

"Then we'll go
down to the village after dark," Hawkeye said calmly. "And we'll do
what needs to be done. Let's go in to eat now."

She shook her head.
"I have to go see the Hakim, first. Will you tell them?"

He nodded, and then
waited and watched her run off, fleet as a deer.

Hannah found Hakim
Ibrahim packing his instruments into their cases. He had seen three people he
tried to save buried within two days, but when she hesitated at the door he
looked up at her with his usual kindly and helpful smile.

"Ah," he
said, wiping his hands on a bit of muslin. "I was hoping to see you this
evening. I have something for you before you leave this place tomorrow."

Hannah drew in a deep
breath and let it out again. She had feared he might be angry with her-- it had
been many days since she had come to work with him or even to speak to him--and
found instead that nothing had changed. She said, "Are you leaving,
too?"

"Yes. Tomorrow I
must return to Southerness. The
Isis
is bound for Bombay."

"You are going
home, too, then."

From the worktable he
took a leather case the size of a large book and he put it down before her.
Then he stood back, bowing from the shoulders. "Yes. And I have a parting
gift for you."

Hannah was so
surprised that she did not trust herself to speak. She ran a finger lightly
over the leather and then, with unsteady hands, untied the lacings. Four
scalpels, two with curved blades, forceps, probes, and suture needles, each secured
by a leather strap in a bed of dark blue velvet. The instrument handles were made
of ivory, slightly yellow with age.

He said, "It will
be some time before you are skilled enough to use these, but I have no doubt
that you will put them to good use one day."

She blinked the tears
back, and nodded. "Thank you."

"You are welcome.
Now, I believe you came to talk to me about something else. Lady Isabel, or Rob
MacLachlan?"

"I know what
killed Robbie. The bullet must have hit the artery, here--" She touched
her own chest at the midline. "The aorta. But no one can tell me what Lady
Isabel's illness is called."

He folded his hands in
front of himself. "There is no name for the affliction that I know. I have
seen it only rarely, and each time it ends in death. In the
Al-Qanun
fi'l-Tibb
, Ibn Sina writes of tubercles that settle in the kidneys. The
condition of her skin would make that likely. The only way to know would be to
perform an autopsy, but given the circumstances ..." He paused. "I
thought it best not to impose on the earl's grief."

Hannah thought for a
moment. "But maybe it would be a comfort to him, to know why she
died."

Hakim Ibrahim closed
his eyes briefly and opened them again. "He believes that his lack of faith
in her was what brought about her death, and even if I were to find her body
full of tumors, I could not convince him otherwise."

Hannah said,
"Then he is in need of your help, too."

The Hakim had a very
sad smile. "You have a generous and compassionate spirit, Hannah. But if
you are to be a good physician one day you must learn to recognize when your
skills are not what is needed."

""First do
no harm,"" Hannah said, and now she understood this concept as she
had not been able to understand it before. "But if you cannot help him,
who can?"

"His God,"
said the Hakim. "And perhaps his priest. Now I have a question for you.
Will you write to me, and tell me of your studies in medicine?"

"Yes," said
Hannah. "I would like to do that."

"Then we will not
say good-bye." The Hakim smiled. "For our discussions do not have to
end."

She hesitated at the
door, testing the weight of the surgical kit in her hands. "Do you really think
I can be a physician one day?"

He bowed from the
shoulders. "Of this, my friend, I am very sure."

The smell of the sea
met them at Edinburgh, coming up suddenly as the coach started down a hill toward
the city. Elizabeth sat up straighter, and even Hannah roused herself out of
her daydreams.

"Headed
home." Elizabeth said it aloud now and then, perhaps just to convince herself
that it was really true. They would spend this evening with Aunt Merriweather
and tomorrow they would board a ship. When they next stepped onto land it would
be in New-York harbor.

Curiosity's thoughts
were taking her in the same direction. She said, "Lord willing, we'll be
in Paradise before summer's done. In time for the corn harvest, Hannah. Did you
think of that?"

Hannah nodded.
"In time for the festival at Trees-Standing-in-Water."