The Constable's Tale: A Novel of Colonial America

by Donald Smith

  “I myself will be leaving tomorrow by schooner to get my things in order at home,” said Ayerdale, “and then on to Louisbourg, and thence up the Saint Lawrence to catch up with Wolfe. I am pleased to report that my fiancée has agreed to accompany me as far as Williamsburg. It seems Maddie has never seen our Virginia capital.”

  Harry’s interest quickened. As far as he knew, no wedding date had been set. Knowing McLeod’s devotion to good form, he wondered if the judge approved of this arrangement, the betrothed couple traveling together in such close quarters as would be available aboard a schooner. But Harry guessed that if Maddie wanted to go, McLeod would be hard-pressed to say otherwise.

  As the conversation continued on military and political matters, Harry’s thoughts wandered to his feelings about Ayerdale. They were muddled. Ayerdale was a person of substance in one of the most important provinces in the British Atlantic. Possibly he was destined for greatness. Harry envied the man’s winsome looks, a gift of the gods of ancestry, the scar on the side of his jaw only calling attention to the perfection of the rest of his face. Harry wondered if he would ever find out the story behind the wound. The unavoidable fact, he had to concede, was that the prince of Virginia made a far more suitable husband for Maddie than the constable from North Carolina.

  The discussion shifted to the condition of world tobacco markets and the European economy in general, subjects directly pertinent to Harry’s livelihood. Ayerdale let slip a remark about the Scotch being the “Jews of Britain.” Remembering the origins of his host and future grandfather-in-law, he quickly added, “Of course, some of my very dearest friends, including the late governor of Virginia, are Scotchmen.”

  Harry’s innards warmed at Ayerdale’s awkward attempt to smooth over his blunder. He imagined how Ayerdale’s handsomely thin lips, which gave such pleasing shape to his words, could excuse so much.

  CHAPTER 6

  53: Run not in the Streets, neither go too slowly nor with Mouth open go not Shaking yr Arms kick not the earth with yr feet, go not upon the Toes, nor in a Dancing fashion.

  —RULES OF CIVILITY

  HARRY WAS MAKING UP AN EXCUSE TO TAKE LEAVE FROM THE TABLE when McLeod brought the breakfast to an abrupt end, announcing he had to check on some late summer planting at one of his enterprises. Blinn followed Harry and Noah out the door.

  “They should of just killed them all back in ’11,” Blinn said as they mounted their horses.

  “I wonder if it could have anything to do with the Indian old Scroggins was talking about,” said Noah.

  “What?” said Harry.

  “Last night at the tavern, Scroggins was going on about some Indian he’d seen lurking in the woods around his place. He was talking so loud, I thought everybody heard.”

  Scroggins was a small-scale planter of unknown age who lived by himself not far from the Campbell place. Harry turned and looked at Noah. “After all our discussion about Indians, you just remembered this?”

  “The way Carruthers was going on at the table, I was afraid he’d go right out, find the poor man, and hang him on the spot.”

  “What exactly did Scroggins say?”

  “Just that he’d caught peeks of a half-naked red-skinned person prowling about. From the way he was talking it might have been his imagination. He’d caught only glimpses. It was almost like he was describing a ghost. But some of his chickens have gone missing. He’s got his pique up about that.”

  “He’s never said anything to me about Indians,” said Harry.

  “Well,” said Noah, “maybe that’s because he didn’t think anything would come of it. Since I’ve been living here I’ve had the impression people don’t take old Scroggins all that seriously.”

  “Your territory again, Woodyard,” said Blinn. “But I’ll go along. Been a long time since I seen a live Indian.”

  Noah said, “I’ve never seen one at all.”

  *

  On their way out of town, they passed the lot recently vacated by the acting company. The militia was drilling there, marching up and down and making turns and flanking movements to the tempo set by New Bern’s fife-and-drum corps. Six boys and men were playing a recently learned tune, “The Roast Beef of Old England,” reminding Harry of the excellent food he had eaten at Cogdell’s the previous evening. The song was a sentimental favorite of Governor Dobbs, who only a few weeks past had left his rented home in New Bern and moved to Wilmington. Tired, he had let it be known, of New Bern’s weather and general climate, which he said was hurting his health, and also weary of the disrespectful way he felt he was being treated. The more responsible citizens of New Bern, including McLeod, had since started a campaign to get him back, fearing a downturn in their personal fortunes if the capital of the colony permanently relocated. Flattering Dobbs with a piece of music was one small part of a larger strategy to regain his favor. The militia just hoped they would get a chance to play it for him.

  Harry saluted his friends, but they were busy with a right-flank turnabout, wheeling their triple marching column to form a line of skirmishers. The movement was not precise. In fact, it was painfully ragged. But everyone wound up in the correct position at the end, some by running the last few steps.

  “I’m excused from militia duty as long as I’m serving as constable,” Harry told Noah as they continued, the music receding in the distance.

  “This constable business seems a great deal of work for a job that doesn’t pay anything. Not that tutoring pays much better.”

  Something about Noah’s friendly manner made Harry feel at ease speaking openly. “I don’t have to pay taxes during my term of service, either. But there’s more.” He lowered his voice enough so the town constable, riding ahead, could not overhear. “I think John just likes the bit of power that goes along with the office. Carrying out orders of the court, assisting justices, escorting prisoners, serving writs, rounding up drunkards, that sort of thing. Ordering people around appeals to him. I don’t care about any of that. For me, serving a few years as a constable is a way to get the attention of the kind of people we just had breakfast with. They were born into their world of comfort and privilege. I need to make my own way into it.”

  “I can see that is important to you.”

  “Judge McLeod says the next step, after a period of honorable service doing this, would be a church wardenship. Then, in due course, other offices and eventually entry into the Freemasons. All the best men in the Pamlico belong. But that step lies far in the future. For one thing, the initiation fee is more than I took in from my whole plantation last year. To get to the top around here, you need to be rich. But I have every intention of getting rich.”

  “I had no idea I was in the company of one with such ambitions.”

  “It’s not just for me. My mother has worked all her life to see her family at the top of this little patch of Britain. God willing, one day she will.”

  He added silently to himself: And one day, maybe a child of mine will be worthy of marrying a grandchild of a chief justice.

  *

  As they rode along, Harry could not free his mind of the jaunty tune the militia had been practicing. Pastor Reed had gone so far as to add it to their regular Sunday worship service along with the regular hymns, so the congregation would be ready to perform in case Governor Dobbs were to drop in.

  When mighty roast beef was the Englishman’s food,

  It ennobled our brains and enriched our blood.

  Our soldiers were brave and our courtiers were good

  O, the roast beef of old England,

  And O, the old English roast beef!

  There were more stanzas, but Harry had yet to learn them all. Something about how stout old English traditions in the current day were being brushed aside for the macaroni fashions of Britain’s old enemy, “effeminate France.”

  To eat their ragouts as well as to dance,

  We’re fed up with nothing but vain complaisance.

  The tune was circling through his head
when they found Scroggins, whom no one would accuse of macaroni. He was sitting underneath a tree behind his house whittling with no apparent purpose on a piece of wood. His deeply creased face a picture of concentration. His ability to hear their approach possibly diminished by tufts of hair growing out of his ears. As far as Harry could tell, he had not changed his clothes since the last time he had seen Scroggins. He stank of hogs.

  “We hear you’ve seen an Indian,” said Harry, getting right to the point.

  Surprised by the sudden company, and their interest finally in his complaint, Scroggins’s small eyes narrowed in what looked like suspicion.

  “And what care you gentlemen for what I’ve been seeing?”

  “Guess you haven’t heard,” said Blinn. “Edward and Anne Campbell and their son, Andrew, have been murdered. People are saying it might be some stray Cherokee who done it.”

  “I knew that red beast was up to some evil purpose. I would have shot him the first time I saw him up by Trace Creek, but I couldn’t get to my rifle quick enough.”

  “Mister Scroggins, you can’t just go around shooting people,” said Noah. “This Indian you saw might be perfectly innocent of any crime.”

  “Well, somebody has been stealing me innocent chickens. I just found another one gone. Next time I have a chance, I’m going to put some lead in that boy’s belly. See how he likes that.”

  “I’d hate to see you put in irons for murder,” said Harry, taking a step back to get some cleaner air. “We’ll have a look around. Maybe we can save you some trouble.”

  Following Scroggins’s directions, they came to Trace Creek, then set out upstream along its northwesterly run, roughly in the direction of the Campbell house. Before long Harry noticed a downy white feather bouncing along the ground on a mild breeze. He signaled for quiet, though he knew that if there were any capable Indians with hostile intent in the vicinity, the three of them already would be either dead or seriously hurt.

  First they came to what Harry recognized as a rough attempt at a longhouse in the Iroquois style. Slabs of tree bark made a haphazard covering over a framework of saplings not quite tall enough for an Englishman to stand up in. It looked flimsy and unfinished. At the entrance, a sodden pile of somebody’s belongings: a blanket, woolen coat and trousers, several other scraps of cloth and animal skins, and some cooking utensils. A few yards farther upstream, they spotted the Indian.

  Blinn reached for his pistol, but Harry gestured for him to leave it alone. The man looked too old to cause trouble. He was squatting in front of a blackened tin pot containing a freshly cut-up chicken in some water. The man was naked except for a greasy loincloth and turned partly away so Harry could not see his face. Slabs of withered skin flapped and quivered as he struck a fire steel against a piece of flint underneath the pot. The effort had little effect in terms of making sparks. The sparse heap of tinder looked too damp to ignite anyhow.

  Either the old man was as hard of hearing as Scroggins or he was ignoring the trio. Harry stepped closer, deliberately snapping twigs under his boots. The man slowly turned his head, acknowledged their presence with a disinterested glance, and said in unaccented English, “Do you have any fresh flint?”

  “Comet Elijah?” Harry ventured.

  He gave the flint one more weak blow, then threw it and the fire steel to the ground. Comet Elijah had never been known for his patience.

  “Do you know this man?” asked Blinn.

  Certain now of his identity, Harry nodded. He wondered if his astonishment registered on his face.

  “Is that chicken you’re getting ready to cook?” Blinn again. Though he could see plainly that it was.

  “Well, it will keep a man alive. Even though it’s not as good as the roast beef of old England.”

  Harry, Blinn, and Noah looked at each other. They were miles from New Bern. There was no possibility the fife-and-drum corps music could have traveled that far. Or that what Cogdell had served for supper in his tavern the night before would have been reported to this location on Trace Creek.

  “Why did you say that?” asked Harry.

  “What did I say?”

  “The roast beef of old England. Why did you use those words?”

  Comet Elijah frowned, as if feeling accused of something. “I just had roast beef on my mind when you were coming up, that’s all. I don’t know why. I was looking at my little chicken, and roast beef came into my head.”

  Harry felt he needed to be on guard. He wondered what other reverberations Comet Elijah might have picked up, assuming this apparent act of mind invasion was not some colossal coincidence. It was the kind of thing that seemed a regular occurrence with him.

  “Don’t worry,” he said, as if determining Harry’s thoughts perfectly. “I can’t hear anything you want to keep to yourself. Don’t you remember me telling you that?”

  He used his arms to help himself to his feet in the painfully slow way of old people. “Do any of you buckoes know anything of medicine? I have noticed that most white men have some doctor training.”

  “Not much besides what you taught me,” said Harry. “You showed me there is something in the forest to cure most anything that bothers you.”

  Comet Elijah’s features rearranged themselves into a grin. Pleased by the flattery.

  “I fear that something ails my ótkwareh,” he said, mournful again. “It seems to be slowly disappearing. It has retreated noticeably just since the end of winter. I think it is being absorbed into my body.”

  “What is an ótk . . . ?’” whispered Noah, stumbling on the word.

  “It’s Tuscarora for the male member.” Then, to Comet Elijah, “I don’t think we need to see . . .” But he was too late. With a swift motion, the loincloth slipped away from the slender waist.

  “This has happened to many of my people since the arrival of the whites,” he said, gesturing toward the evidence. “So far I have escaped, but now I think it is my time. My body is eating my ótkwareh, and I will soon die.”

  “There is nothing wrong with your ótkwareh,” Harry said. In fact, it looked very healthy for a man of his age. “Now, please put that back on.”

  Comet Elijah obeyed, complaining as he stooped to pick up the cloth that they had not looked close enough to make an informed ruling.

  “Well, I am dying, that is definite. Last night I was visited by some of the stonish clan. They asked if I had seen the Giant Head. He has been gone for a long time, but now he is in the forest again, looking for humans to eat. I know it was only a dream, but such visions come to those who are nearing the entrance to the Sky Land.”

  He scratched his rump, giving it a good deep dig.

  “How is my old friend Natty doing these days?” he said. “And his son—what’s his name? Hendry. Has Hendry returned from the war yet?”

  “Natty is fine. My father is still missing. Lying in an unmarked grave on the Spanish Main, most likely.”

  “I am sorry to hear that. I didn’t think anything good would come of him going off. He never dropped by to see me, so I didn’t know if he was dead or not.”

  Harry’s mind went back to the day everyone decided Hendry was not coming back. He had refused his family’s pleadings and gone off to fight for the king at a place called Cartagena. The Spanish proved not as willing to leave their outpost on the South American continent as the British were eager to see them go. People later called it the navy’s worst defeat in history. Hendry’s mates in the New Bern militia said the last time they saw him, he was walking at a crouch toward the walls of Fort San Lazaro under showers of musket- and cannonballs. The only one of them who had not thrown down his scaling ladder that fearful night and fallen back. Hardheaded to the end, they said.

  Fifteen months later, at the approach of Harry’s tenth birthday, Natty told Talitha he wanted to take the boy on a winter hunting trip in the mountains. It was something Natty and Hendry, along with Comet Elijah and several of their planter friends, did every year during the season when ther
e were no crops to plant or harvest. A weeks-long excursion into the West. Talitha protested that such a trip would be too much for a ten-year-old boy. But Natty said it was time Harry began learning the things Hendry would have been teaching him were Hendry still around. In the end they left it up to Harry. Talitha said later she knew she had lost when Natty turned to Harry and said, “So, son, would you rather spend your time with the men, or stay back here with the women?”

  The trip was moderately successful. More often than not they killed enough to keep themselves alive, and the times when food did run out they were welcomed into villages whose people Comet Elijah knew. But as they began making their way back, they ran into an awful storm. People would talk about it for years to come, how it was the worst outbreak of snow, wind, and freezing cold those mountains had seen in more than a hundred years.

  The men had started setting up their camp earlier than usual that afternoon, knowing from how fast and hard the temperature was dropping, and from a certain uneasy feeling in the air, that they might have to stay there for a while. Harry remembered how he went walking off to investigate a sound he had heard in the forest as the first flakes came down. Before he knew it, the camp, along with the men, were gone. Lost in a grainy gray haze of wind-driven snow.

  He later pieced together what had happened next. As soon as somebody noticed him missing, they fanned out to search. Each man went in a different direction. All Harry remembered was night falling around him and the snow getting thicker on the ground, the snow whipping around him so hard that he could not see beyond the closest trees. He finally lay down beside a rotted-out log for a nap and woke up an unknown time later feeling warm and safe and well under a makeshift shelter of tree branches and slabs of bark. At the entrance a small fire burned cheerily despite the wind gusts. Encircling him were the strong arms of Comet Elijah.

  “I have you to thank for teaching me to be a man, Comet Elijah. You and Natty.”