There hadn't been
enough to do Mixer's entire coat in fur, so Santa had stitched
together lengths of beaver skin and wool. The finished product was
a striped coat of deep brown and grey, with a fur collar and cuffs.
Santa dismissed it as her imagination but Mixer appeared taller the
moment she put it on him; taller and steadier, although his
enormous behind still gave him balance troubles from time to
time.
Titania brought
him to the house every day, giving him time to appraise Pater.
Other than the almost daily insults, Mixer sensed no particular
animosity from the old man towards him or any of the others.
Pater's thoughts, such as they were, were relatively simple and
straightforward. Mixer played with him from time to time, sending
him outside to get water, then making him forget what he'd gone out
for, or making him think that the skinny pigeon he selected from
the four Bull offered him was the best of the lot, leaving the
fatter birds for the rest of the family. Mixer didn't like Pater's
habit of taking off for days at a time, but he wasn't strong enough
to stop him. There was a feral quality to the old man; an instinct
that could not be overridden.
He'd discovered
that this was true of his siblings as well. He could make them do
many things, but he could not override who they truly were or force
them to do anything against their own nature. Instead, he practiced
using their characteristics and their habits — good and bad — to
his own ends.
Being at the house
also gave Mixer time alone to consider his options and figure out
how he could use what he had learned about the Constable inheriting
the farm. Back at the orchard he’d only just begun to put his plan
into action when it had been foiled by the Landlord. And the law.
He'd had no choice but to start all over again.
Mixer looked out
the window and listened to Pater snoring.
The old man had
been gone for the past two days and had returned late last night,
drunk. Mixer had stayed with Titania that night; it was raining
hard and Titania didn't feel like going out into the wet to return
him to the barn. They were woken up when Pater came stumbling
through the front door and smashed into the wooden table in the
middle of the room. Titania had told Mixer to stay where he was,
but he'd crept to the front of the bed and peered out through the
curtain.
Titania helped
Pater into a chair near the stove and threw a blanket at him. She
banked up the stove and put a pot of water on to boil. While the
water heated, she rubbed the old man's head dry with a corner of
the blanket then helped him take off his shoes. She wrapped his
bare, bony feet in a towel. When the water boiled she made him a
weak mug of valerie tea. Ma had always made Pa drink it whenever
the Constable brought him home drunk from the Piggy Gristle. It
wouldn't sober him up any faster but it would guarantee that he'd
have to get up every few hours to use the outhouse.
"Drink this.
Better?"
Pater mumbled.
Titania said
nothing. When Pater had finished the tea, she poured him more and
gave him a hard biscuit.
"Eat that. It'll
soak up the cider," she told him.
"S'not cider."
Titania
shrugged.
"'S whiskey."
Mixer started to
push Titania's thoughts but found her already where he wanted her
to be.
"Where'd you get
whiskey, old man?"
Titania grabbed
Pater's chin and raised it so that his eyes met hers. His eyes grew
wider and he shivered. He drew the blanket tighter around him and
was quiet for a while. When he spoke, he did so carefully, trying
hard not to slur his words.
"Maple whiskey.
Ah've got a still."
"What other
secrets are you keeping from me?"
"None. Swear."
"How can I be
sure? Maybe you're getting tired of us? Maybe you want to get rid
of us?"
"Nah, nah. Don't
care what youse do. Saves me huntin'. 'N I can tell that boy cop
where he can get off. Maybe he ain't gonna get this farm when I die
after all."
"Why would PC
Pierre get the farm?"
"'Cause he's
prob’ly the only one who wouldn't screw me over."
"Why not give it
to your son?"
Pater sat up
straighter in the chair.
"Sorry bastard.
‘Sides, he’s gone. No, had to give it to that boy cop. He's dumb
but he ain't a liar. He would have been fair about it. Die without
one and any arsehole can take your prop'ty."
"Die without one
what?"
Pater took a swig
of the tea.
"Boy cop tole me
it's called a will. The law don't make sense. 'Fore you came here,
that boy cop tole me that I oughta say who gets my prop'ty when I
die. Said that the county'd take it if I didn't pick someone.
Worse'n that, he tole me that if someone was squattin' on my land
and they was over twenty, they'd get it. How's that for the law,
huh? Give a man's prop'ty away to some dirty squatter. Weren't
gonna take that chance. That cop's dumb, just like his daddy and
his granddaddy 'fore him but he's no liar."
Mixer scanned his
sister's thoughts. Titania's mind was already putting pieces
together. If anything happened to Pater, she thought, the Constable
would inherit the farm. Then she thought, the Constable likes
Porkchop.
"So what did you
do?"
"He wrote it down
on a piece of paper and had me make an X on it, so it's all legal.
But I lost it."
Titania heard
Mixer's quiet intake of breath behind the curtain.
"But I guess that
medicine girl of yours can write it down again for me."
"Jelly?"
"Not like I plan
on dying anytime soon, so don't think you're getting my prop'ty
tomorra. But, well, you ain't done such a bad job here. Better'n
some dirty squatter."
Pater chewed the
biscuit and swallowed the last of his tea.
"Your sister, the
older one...?"
"Porkchop."
"Yeah. She's gotta
be near turned, right?"
"Near enough."
Alone in the
house, Mixer took off the beaver and wool coat, laid down on
Titania’s bed and drew part of the coat over his legs. Outside the
window, he could see Porkchop wandering in the back field, her head
bent down, watching her feet. Pater continued to snore.
If the Constable
was smart enough to know the law, Mixer thought, if he was smart
enough to convince a crazy old coot like Pater to hand over his
property to him, then he was smart enough to keep a copy of Pater's
will and still had the legal right to the farm. That could have
been a snag in his plans had Titania not revealed the Constable's
feelings for Porkchop. Pater's rhythmic snoring made Mixer's
eyelids feel heavy. As he fell asleep, new plans circulated through
his brain.
___
Porkchop squelched
through the back fields. It was still too wet to plant but they
couldn't afford to wait any longer; Forest had said that the rain
would stay a while longer but that hotter temperatures were on
their way. If they waited too long, the roots wouldn’t establish.
The key had been drainage.
Narrow had
proposed digging out the ditch that ran along one edge of the
field, to draw off the excess water and channel it towards the reed
beds. Porkchop and her brothers had spent an entire day digging;
the clay bed beneath the topsoil was heavy and they had been so
tired and filthy by the end of it that they had all jumped into the
freezing cold creek, fully clothed, as much to wake up as to wash
off the muck. But it had been worth it; the ditches were working,
slowly siphoning the water off the furrows and into the cattail
marsh.
She stared at the
mud and thought of the future, the bone dry future. She had brought
up the subject over dinner one night weeks ago.
"The marsh will
retain enough for the fields and there’s the creek," said
Forest.
"The clay will
help, too," Jelly added.
"It’s the drinking
water I’m worried about," said Porkchop. "If there was a way to
store all this rainwater...what we could really use are some
fermentation vats."
Narrow devised a
solution. He borrowed pine resin from Jelly and coated the inside
of an empty crate with it then laid cattail leaves over top of the
sticky mix. It leaked at first but Jelly added a bit of goose fat
and some charcoal to the resin, making it stronger. The next
attempt worked. A dozen waterproof crates now lined the northeast
side of the barn and each day they emptied the excess rainwater
from the cisterns into them. More crates were inside the barn in
various stages of completion.
Tomorrow at dawn
the hard work would begin. With Titania taking care of Mixer, the
rest of the family would spend the next several days planting.
Porkchop came to
the ditch and was pleased to see water flowing slowly but steadily
into the swamp. Some of last year's cattails still stood, their
brown flowers exploded in soft, puffy strands. One of the green
flowers on a new plant suddenly bobbed up and down as the rain
began again. She took one last look around, scanning the horizon
and the top of the hill in the distance, and then returned to the
barn.
___
Hap took to the
bicycle as though he'd been riding one all his life and easily kept
pace with the Landlord's two black horses, although he stayed far
enough behind to avoid detection. They rode until nightfall when
the Landlord arrived at a small hunting cabin and pulled into the
yard.
"We'll stay here
tonight," he told Marvellous.
He left her tied
to the cart while he fed and watered the horses then led Marvellous
to the cabin, his hand tight around her bicep.
Hap saw them
disappear inside. He found a clearing in the woods across the road
from the cabin, wrapped the blanket and Rank's oilskin coat around
him and bedded down for the night. He couldn't risk a campfire.
Other than a few
minutes snatched here and there, though, sleep eluded him. He knew
that Marvellous was strong and could take care of herself but he
couldn't stop thinking about what the Landlord might be doing to
his sister inside the cabin.
___
"So that's what
you'll be doing," said the Landlord.
He'd explained the
workings of the orchard to Marvellous over a cold dinner of pork
and biscuits. They ate with their fingers while sitting on benches
that lined two of the walls of the small cabin.
"I can hire some
day boys to help you get the place up and running," he said.
"I doubt I’ll need
any help," Marvellous said quietly.
"Ha! It’s a big
place. Lots to do," said the Landlord.
He drained his
flask and got up to look around the cabin for more.
Marvellous reached
into her jacket and withdrew a goatskin bag. Still seated, she
offered it to him.
"Try mine," she
said. The Landlord walked over to her and looked down, first at her
then at the bag.
"Tell you what,"
he said, taking it from her, "I’ll give you a trial period, let’s
say a week? If I don’t like what I see, I’ll do what’s best."
He took a swig,
gave a nod of approval, and tossed more back. He sat down beside
her but was only able to paw at her hair a few times before he
passed out.
She could so
easily kill him right now but she didn't. She still needed him to
guide her and Hap to the orchard; without being physically on the
land any claim she might have would be gone. But there were other
things she could do, as she'd done that night. The herbs she'd
added to the wineskin wouldn't hurt him; just put him into a deep
sleep. And make him piss a lot the next day, she smiled to
herself.
She thought about
what her mother had trained her not to do. She might have to use
some of those defects. She didn't care about the word. She didn't
take many things personally. She could do things that others
couldn't; it was as simple as that. Some defects, like knowing all
about plants, was something anyone could do, given some training.
Marvellous knew this but had always kept that opinion to herself.
But her other defects were not things many people could do. She
could reach great speeds and could look in on someone's thoughts
while masking her own.
And then there was
her ability to change. With intense concentration, Marvellous could
change her appearance. Her grandmother had had it but not her great
grandmother, Marvellous' mother had told her after the first and
last time Marvellous changed. She hadn't told her seven-year old
daughter that her grandmother had been beaten to death by a town
mob and then thrown to the crab beds just off the coast.
"You can't let
people know what you can do, Marvellous," she'd said. "People will
be afraid of you."
"Why?" Marvellous
had asked. She had only changed her hair colour and her height a
bit; she didn't know why her mother was making such a fuss.
"It's like what I
told you about your speed, do you remember? People are stupid. They
think that anything they can't explain is a defect and that somehow
it's going to hurt them. They are afraid of what they don't
understand. It's maddening! What they think of as defects are often
perfectly normal skills!" her mother had said all in a rush. She
had paused then and her shoulders relaxed. "You can't blame them, I
suppose. If they weren't taught, you can't expect them to know any
better."
As she had grown
up, Marvellous had often wondered how her mother could ever have
had any sympathy for people. In Marvellous' experiences growing up
in the port town, it wasn't just some of the people who were
terrified of their own shadows it was virtually all of them. And of
the few who weren't, she could never be sure they wouldn't turn her
in just to shift the attention from themselves. She'd learned
quickly not to trust anyone or to let herself be trusted. Until
now. The sad little man who had followed her all the way here
trusted her.