Chapter Twenty-Nine
All that night they march dumbfounded like a band of footsore penitents through sparse declivities of rock and shrub, the three Englishmen in front, downcast, bleeding and bedraggled, and Keasik in the rear, heartsick and riven by loss.
At dawn, as the ash-gray earth turns slowly back to brown and green, they climb the shale scarp of a drumlin and peer off toward the north into the humped and mottled distance, looking out for any sign that they are still being pursued by their enemy.
Shaw peers through the brass spyglass, then passes it to Hearn.
“Smoke,” he says, pointing. “But why would they trouble to stop two miles short and build themselves a fire?”
“Because they don’t want to catch us and risk another battle is my guess,” Hearn says. “They just need to stay close enough to watch and be sure that we keep going south and don’t change our minds. Once we cross the White River, they’ll leave us alone, I suppose, and then we can rest for a while.”
They look across at Abel Walker, who is leaning against a boulder with his eyes closed, his mouth ajar, and his ashen face sheened with sweat. Where the spear went in, his jacket is torn and stained black with blood.
“With a wound so deep, it’s a miracle he’s got so far as this,” Shaw says in a low voice to avoid being overheard. “But I don’t suppose a few more miles will make a difference either way.”
Shaw puts the spyglass back inside his satchel and calls for them to leave.
They descend again in single file along the drumlin’s drooping crestline, then across a hoof-pocked isthmus and into another low-sided valley, floored with muskegs and clusters of dwarf juniper and pine.
The sun climbs higher in the sky, and as they walk, their thin shadows stretch sideways across the fell slope like the bars of a cage or the black tines of a harrow.
A few hours later, when they reach the White River at last, Hearn and Shaw separate and start searching along the bank for driftwood.
By the middle of the afternoon, they have gathered just enough between them to build a passable pontoon, so Hearn lashes the torn-off limbs together with some lengths of rope rescued from the wreckage of the camp, then they push the gimcrack craft out into the shallows and hold it steady so Walker and Keasik can clamber on top.
The river is perhaps fifty yards across, mud brown, and as it flows, the surface swells and blisters, rising up and guttering again like something raucous and alive.
They use their muskets held upside down as makeshift paddles and stow the powder horns and shot pouches in the leather satchel, which John Shaw ties about his neck to keep it safe and dry.
Upon reaching the opposite bank, they set up camp above the low, rust-colored bluff using the larger sections of the raft for tent poles and the rest as firewood.
Since they have no one else to do it for them now that Nabayah and Datsanthi are dead, Hearn goes out alone with a musket and shoots two grouse, which Keasik plucks and then roasts for their supper.
Abel Walker lies asleep close to the fire with his head resting on a folded blanket and a poultice made by Keasik from white fungus and seedheads pressed against his wound while the other three eat.
Shaw has the sack of gold close by his side and will now and then touch it unthinkingly, Hearn notices, as you might a charm, for luck or for comfort.
“No doubt it will be a sore journey back to the Fort from here,” he says. “Sore and hungry and awful long.”
“I suppose it will be, but that can’t be helped.”
Since they fled in disarray from the esquimaux village, they have not tried to discuss the root cause of the calamity, but Hearn senses that Shaw, now they feel safe again, wishes to broach that topic.
“We walked into a devilish trap back there,” he says. “That’s how I see it. They never had any intention of keeping their word.”
“I don’t believe it was a trap. The chieftain was truthful, but something went wrong.”
“I’d wager it was all planned out in advance. I’d wager they tricked you from the start only you weren’t sharp enough to see it.”
“They didn’t trick me,” Hearn replies, trying hard to remain patient. “Hekwaw lost his reason and acted suddenly from some impulse I don’t understand. I can’t say why it happened, but none of it was planned. I’m sure of that.”
John Shaw shrugs and prods the fire with the toe-end of his shoe.
“Whichever way it was, the lad has paid an awful price and we’ve left half our treasure back there in the ground. I expect that’s two things we can both agree on.”
“Abel may still recover,” says Hearn, “and if he does, you and he can mount another expedition next year.”
“That spear went right through him and now we’re five hundred miles from the Fort with no guide to lead us back and no medicine. How can he possibly recover?”
“I don’t think he’ll die.”
“What you or I think or don’t think makes no difference. What will happen will happen.”
Hearn knows that Shaw is right, but he doesn’t want to believe it.
He has grown fond of Abel Walker without intending to; the lad is thoughtful in his way and has a simple, youthful hopefulness that Hearn, despite himself, admires.
Walker is not the same as Stephen Cowper, who was wise and capable, but he is similar enough to remind Hearn sometimes of what he lost that night at Yarmouth Roads.
To have this faint but precious echo of his departed friend removed now and in such a rough and bloody fashion, then afterward to be left alone in this dread place to absorb the second loss, is a possibility that chills his heart and makes him fairly tremble.
“You recovered from your own wounds before,” he reminds John Shaw, “when all hope seemed lost, so why should the lad not follow your good example?”
“Because I had the chloride of gold to heal me, that’s why. But that bottle is emptied and we have no other.”
The next morning, Walker is too weakened and sickly to stand up or walk, so while Keasik and Shaw venture abroad to look for food Hearn remains beside him in the tent.
The murmuring of the river outside is low and constant, and the sun presses through gaps in the weeviled deer hides to light and warm them.
Walker drifts in and out of sleep while Hearn occupies the time by carving a drinking cup from a knob of driftwood.
When he notices that the lad has his eyes open once more, he asks him if he wants some water to drink.
“What’s that noise I hear outside?” he says.
“That’s just the river going past. We made our camp up on the bank, if you remember.”
“The Thames, you mean. Is it the Thames I can hear?”
“Not the Thames, no. It’s the White River. We’re out on the Barrens and a long way from London, Abel.”
Walker nods easily, as if he realizes his mistake.
“Is John Shaw here? I don’t see him.”
“He’s gone hunting. He’ll be back in a little while, I expect.”
Walker nods again, then licks his lips and sniffs.
“I can smell the bread from the kitchen.”
“There’s no kitchen here. Perhaps you smell the ashes from the fire outside?”
Hearn waits for an answer, but Walker shows no sign of having heard his last remark. The skin on the boy’s cheeks, which used to be ruddy and youthful, is crinkled and yellowish now, and his eyes as he gazes upward have a dull and distant glaze.
“Where is Mother gone?” he says after a long pause. “I want to speak to her.”
Hearn stiffens at the question, then takes a breath to calm himself.
It’s a kind of waking dream, he thinks, no more than that.
After all Walker has been through, his mind is playing tricks.
Hearn is about to explain that Abel’s mother isn’t present when the lad suddenly groans with pain and looks horribly afraid, so, instead of speaking, Hearn puts his hand on his shoulder to calm him and presses gently down.
Walker moves his left hand across his chest and places it on top of Hearn’s.
It is cold to the touch and almost weightless.
“I don’t feel well. I don’t feel well at all. What should I do?”
“You should rest now. Try to sleep, then you’ll feel much better.”
Walker blinks slowly and lets his mouth fall open. The tongue inside is thick and gray, and his labored breath smells sour and fetid.
“My mother is dead,” he says after several minutes in which neither man has attempted to speak again. “I just remembered. And my father is in Bedlam.”
“I believe that’s true.”
He closes his eyes for a moment and nods.
“It took me by surprise,” he says. “The Esquimaux’s spear, I mean. I didn’t expect it.”
“Of course not. No one could have.”
“I don’t suppose I’ll ever see the Factory again after this great calamity, shall I? Or my uncle Magnus?”
“Don’t speak like that, Abel. You mustn’t.”
Walker moves his hand away, shades his eyes against the glimmers of light, and takes in another slow and creaking breath.
“If I die out here, then you should keep the gold at least,” he says. “Promise me you will.”
“That gold’s not mine to keep.”
“But you should keep it anyway. For my sake.”
Tom Hearn shakes his head.
“Rest now,” he says. “And no more talking.”
Abel Walker looks at him with fading eyes and smiles a little, then puts his blood-stained forefinger up to his cracked and arid lips.
“No more talking. As you wish, my lord.”