The Lost Kingdom

by Matthew J. Kirby

  Between the four of us, Andrew’s weight did not feel heavy at first. But as we made our way down a gradual hill and then up another, stumbling and picking through dense forest and underbrush, the burden grew. Sweat soaked my scalp and my clothes, and before long we all took off our coats. The muscles in my arm ached, then burned, then lost feeling.

  We took to switching sides periodically to give our limbs a respite, and I felt a wave of relief when we stumbled upon a path through the thicket.

  Andrew craned his neck to see. “It’s a hunting trail. This is definitely Osage territory.”

  The path quickened our pace, and we covered more ground than I would have expected before we stopped for the night. The exhaustion from the day stole any conversation, and after a quick and silent meal, we fell wordlessly onto our bedrolls.

  I closed my eyes and listened to the wind through the trees overhead. A stream trickled somewhere nearby. The sounds flowed into my ears and gave me something to focus on, something other than the pain lancing from my shoulders to the tips of my fingers, and I fell asleep.

  The next day passed in much the same way as the previous. We marched, following game and hunting trails on a winding course westward through hilly country. The trees grew denser, and the air more heavy, and again we collapsed after many miles into the deepest of sleeps. The sun rose and set on a third day that looked no different.

  “At least we’ve had no more storms,” Mr. Faries said on the morning of our fourth day in the wilderness. “And if the skies hold the way they are now, none today.”

  “Let us hope.” My father laid out Andrew’s sled. “We should be moving on.”

  Andrew leaned against a tree, testing his weight on his wounded leg. “I think I’d like to try walking on it.”

  My father turned to Phineas. “Can he?”

  Phineas shrugged. “Possibly. If he can bear the pain. I don’t expect it to break open or bleed.”

  My father turned back to Andrew. “We’ll bring the sled with us. In the event that you need it.”

  Andrew nodded, stepped forward, and winced.

  My father looked at his leg. “Are you certain about this?”

  Andrew stood up straight. “Yes, Mr. Bartram.”

  “All right, then. Let’s move out.”

  We formed a column and set off down the trail. Andrew hobbled along, slowing our progress, but it seemed we made better time than had we been carrying him, and my shoulders and arms were grateful.

  Around midday, we came down into a valley where the path we followed intersected a vast tract of trampled earth and grass. It filled the bottom of the valley, curving away from us in both directions. At first, the openness of it suggested a country lane, like the Darby Road, which ran by my father’s home and garden, only much broader. But the air about it felt off somehow, foreign and forbidding in a way that accused us of trespassing.

  Phineas pulled his lank and sweaty hair back from his face. “It looks like a road.”

  My father knelt and touched the earth. “It is an incognitum road. As a species, they seem to have a kind of communal memory or instinct. They reuse the same paths for their migrations generation after generation, and century after century.”

  “What drives them?” Phineas asked.

  My father stood. “Food. They devastate the flora whenever they stop to graze and must then move on.”

  Andrew panted harder than the rest of us. “If we … follow their road, we might be more likely to meet a hunting party. … If that is what you want.”

  “That is what we want.” My father looked down at his compass.

  How could he not see that Andrew was trying to help? How could he simultaneously accuse Andrew of treason but continue to use him as a guide? It did not make sense to me, and it led me to believe, or hope, that perhaps my father harbored some doubt of Andrew’s guilt.

  “This incognitum road runs northwest.” My father snapped his compass shut. “We will follow it in that direction.”

  So we crept along the edge of the ancient path, in the footsteps of giants laid down through the eons. They had been traveling this road in their herds long before we colonists came. Perhaps longer than the Indians had been hunting in these woods. The true depth of the impression their feet had left on this land would be hard to measure.

  I listened for them as we walked. I hoped, in spite of my fear, that I would hear them coming, either in front or behind us, and have a chance to see their terrible march. But nothing in the forest noise changed. Insects and birds. We stopped with the setting of the sun, and made camp just off the road in the trees.

  Spirits seemed higher around the fire. Andrew had made the day’s journey with little trouble, or at least with little complaint. But I noticed he was already sleeping as the rest of us prepared for bed. That night, I ended up lying near Jane, with my father on her other side. It felt odd to sleep so close to a girl who wasn’t one of my sisters. I lay on my back, and at first, I wasn’t aware of anything else around me. Just her.

  But then I looked up.

  I saw a broad span of crisp sky. The spray of stars stretched from one hemisphere to the other, along the incognitum road, and I realized it had been days since I had seen the heavens. I had grown used to camping beneath a shroud of trees.

  “That is Ursa Major,” Jane whispered.

  I turned my head toward her.

  She pointed up at the sky. “There, you see it?”

  “No. Where is it?”

  “Look.”

  She nudged closer, and I stretched slightly toward her to sight along her arm.

  “Do you see the Plough?” she asked.

  That I knew. It pointed to the North Star. “Yes, I see that.”

  “The Plough is Ursa Major’s shoulder and foreleg.” She traced the shape with her finger. “See, there is her nose, and those are her hind legs. She’s the Great Bear.”

  A bear. I had not thought of the bear-wolf for several days, and the sight of the constellation now chilled me. “You say it’s a her?”

  “Yes. She used to be a beautiful nymph named Callisto, until the jealous goddess Hera turned her into a bear. Callisto’s son, a mighty hunter, saw her and didn’t recognize her, so to save her from being hunted, Zeus put her in the heavens.”

  With her story, the bear-wolf faded from my mind’s eye. “Did your father tell you that story?”

  “He did. We gaze at the stars together.”

  “My first watch on the ship, he told me he would acquaint me with the heavens.”

  I saw her smile in the darkness. “And he still will, once we’ve returned home.”

  I folded my hands behind my head. “I’d like that.”

  “The Six Nations see a Great Bear, too.” She rolled onto her side, facing me. “That’s what my father says. Only they also see three warriors hunting it. One with a bow, one with a pot for cooking, and one with wood for the fire.”

  The similarity struck me. “They see a bear, too?”

  My father looked only for differences. He examined the Indians and others in the same manner that he examined plants, searching out the qualities that separated them from one another. But what about the things we held in common? What did we share? I rolled onto my side to face Jane. The night had turned her golden hair to silver.

  “So we see the same thing as the Six Nations,” I said. “The same sky. The same stars. The same bear.”

  “That’s true.”

  “We look with the same eyes.”

  “I suppose we do.”

  I flopped onto my back. The stars glinted for me, just as they glinted for anyone looking at them in that same moment. “Ursa Major.”

  “Ursa Major,” Jane said.

  The Great Bear.

  Thunder woke me. At first, I thought I was back on the ship during the storm, and I leaped to my feet. But as the woods came into focus, and I remembered where we were, I saw them.

  Incognitum.

  A great herd thundered by us, stam
peding but feet away, a surging mass of brown fur, studded with tusks. The ground trembled. The sharp odor of their musk buffeted my nose. They lifted their trunks and bellowed with the deafening sound of a trumpet. They bumped shoulders and shook their heads and charged forward along the road.

  “Stay in the trees!” my father shouted to all of us over the roar.

  We didn’t need to be told that, and I was grateful we hadn’t camped in the road.

  “There must be a hundred of them!” Mr. Godfrey said.

  “God almighty,” Phineas said.

  Some of them appeared to be males, larger bulls with longer tusks. Most appeared to be smaller females, and as the stampede thinned, I saw younger incognitum among them, juveniles unable to keep up with the bulk of the herd. But they weren’t alone.

  “See how the young stay together!” My father leaned forward and pointed. “And the females surround them to protect them! Incredible!”

  As he said it, one of the juveniles broke free, but it didn’t fall far behind before one of the mothers came and rounded it up. Jane laughed next to me. I wanted to make a drawing of them, but I didn’t want to look away to pull out my paper, quill, and ink.

  After they had moved past us, the tail end of the herd came into view, the ones that moved more slowly than the rest. An old grizzled male shambled along, separate from the others, trying its best to keep up. Its massive tusks swung low.

  Something darted in the corner of my eye and struck the old bull in the side.

  An arrow. Hunters. The crack of gunfire echoed.

  The beast bellowed and leaped forward, but a volley of new arrows caught it, lodging in its thick hide. More gunfire. The beast spun to face its attackers, unsteady and alone, the sounds of its herd fading in the distance. Indians emerged from the trees on both sides of the old incognitum and from behind it, perhaps a dozen of them. Some came out of the trees only a few hundred yards from where we now stood. They approached the animal slowly, bows drawn, rifles aimed, calling back and forth.

  “It could still charge them,” Andrew said. “This is the most dangerous moment.”

  I wondered if he had ever engaged in such a hunt.

  The incognitum reared up on his hind legs, its trunk high in the air, and bellowed again, and in the sound I thought I heard its pain and anger and confusion. It brought its front legs down with a heavy thud, shifted and swayed on its legs, and I thought it might be preparing to run or attack. But a moment later, it settled. It planted its feet, held its tusks up proudly, and stood its ground as if waiting for something.

  “Would you look at that?” Mr. Godfrey’s voice cracked. “The old man is ready to die.”

  One of the hunters shouted a command, and then they all fired as one.

  The incognitum jolted and rushed forward in the direction of its herd. But the beast made it only five of its long paces before it stumbled and crashed forward into the ground. Someone had made a killing shot.

  A cheer arose from the Indians, and they rushed to the dying animal.

  “We have found a hunting party.” My father took a deep breath. “I should announce our presence.”

  “Wait,” Andrew said. “Not yet. Let them calm down first. They’ve just risked their lives.”

  “And they are still holding their weapons,” Mr. Faries said.

  My father squinted at the Indians. “You are right. We will wait a short while.”

  So we watched as the hunters set about butchering the incognitum. So much blood. So much meat. So much skin and fur. But everything about the exercise, beginning with the kill and ending with bare bone, played out with efficiency and skill, and I admired the hunters for it.

  Meanwhile, a few of the Indians built a very large fire, right there in the middle of the incognitum road. Then they cut saplings and stripped branches and lashed them into several racks around the flames for drying and smoking the meat.

  “They’ll camp here for several days,” Andrew said. “Cooking and preserving the kill.”

  I took the opportunity to sit down and make some drawings. First I sketched the incognitum herd as I remembered it, the details still vivid in my mind’s eye. Then I sketched the old bull, rearing up, and I drew the Indians approaching it. I made a third sketch of the scene before us now, the aftermath of the hunt. Jane watched over my shoulder as I drew, and she smiled.

  After I’d finished, my father looked at the drawings, and his face showed no reaction, pleasure or displeasure. A moment later he pulled a white handkerchief from his pocket. “I am loath to approach these Indians. I do not trust them.” He put on his coat and straightened it. “But we have no choice. I want you all to remain here.”

  He took a step toward the hunting party.

  “Would you like me to interpret?” Andrew asked.

  My father turned. He appeared caught, snagged on the thorns of his own thoughts. He didn’t trust Andrew. Hated him, even. But he needed an interpreter.

  “My son saved your life,” he finally said. “And four of us carried you for three days. I hope that counts for something.”

  Andrew limped forward. “You can trust me, Mr. Bartram.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  My father held the handkerchief aloft and stepped from the trees. Andrew followed. The two of them appeared small and exposed in the road. They had not gone but a few yards when a cry of alarm went up among the hunting party.

  I rushed to the tree line, still concealed, and watched.

  My father marched forward, the white handkerchief fluttering, as the Indians grabbed up their weapons and came at him. When he was halfway to their fire, my father halted. Andrew stood next to him, and I marveled at their bravery.

  The Indians reached them a moment later and surrounded them, guns aimed.

  Andrew held up his hands. I heard his voice, but could not quite discern the words. Was that French? One of the Indians came forward. His loud voice sounded angry. Andrew’s remained calm. Their exchange lasted a few moments, during which my father stood still. And then the Indian spoke to my father. Andrew leaned toward my father, translating, and then my father replied to the Indian, which Andrew also translated.

  This pattern repeated itself several times. Those of us in the trees waited and watched. Jane came up beside me and took my hand in hers. It distracted me at first, but I found myself squeezing it a moment later.

  And then the Indian said something to his companions, and the gun barrels came down. My father turned and waved to us in the trees.

  Mr. Godfrey cleared his throat. “Well, I think that means we should go to him.”

  So we gathered up our packs and hesitantly stepped out from the trees. Mr. Faries lagged behind. I turned to see him reach back and tuck the leather bag containing his glass lenses in the crook of a tree.

  “One can’t be too careful with these,” he said. “I’m ready now.”

  They were Osage, as Andrew had predicted. They were all very tall, much taller than any of the Society members, with heads shaved back to the tufts of hair at the crowns of their heads, and tattoos and paint on their bodies and faces. Beads and bones hung low from their ears, and they had shaved off their eyebrows.

  Only one of them spoke French, and I assumed him to be their leader. He wore a white cotton shirt, embroidered with shells, and tattoos crawled up his neck from beneath his collar. He refused to give his true name, but asked us to call him Louis. Through Andrew, he told us they were on one of their three annual hunts. Their homelands lay farther to the west, and it was normally in the endless plains beyond where they found bison and incognitum and lions. His small group had come east after deer, but found the herd of incognitum we had just seen.

  “We weren’t well armed or prepared for such a hunt,” Louis said, and Andrew translated. “But we decided to attempt it.”

  I looked around us, meat sizzling and smoking to one side, the incognitum carcass hulking on the other. I tried to imagine the bravery attacking such a creature called for, even with
the proper weapons.

  “We watched you from the trees,” my father said. “And we were astonished. None of us had ever seen such a thing.”

  Louis smiled, said something to his companions in his language, and they smiled and nodded. He then asked, “What are you English doing here?”

  “We were sent by our king.” My father’s voice carried authority. “We have come to trade.”

  “We do not trade with you.” Though Louis spoke through Andrew, his eyes never left my father’s face. “Our treaty and alliance are with the French. You know this.”

  My father nodded. “We do not ask for your furs. Those are for the French. But does your treaty with them include the exchange of information?”

  Louis leaned back. He said something to the men at his side. They murmured with him. Louis leaned forward. “What kind of information?”

  “We are seeking a people in these parts.” My father looked at the rest of us. “They would not be English or French. They would be something else, but not Osage or Indian. They are the people of Madoc.”

  As he said the name, some of the Indian hunters reacted. Their eyes opened, they shifted, and I sensed that though they did not understand my father’s words, they had heard the name Madoc before.

  Andrew began his translation, but Louis held up his hand to silence him.

  “We do not speak of Madoc,” he said.

  They knew about Madoc’s people.

  I could see the other Society members thinking the same thing, looking back and forth at one another, nodding, smiling. We were close to achieving the purpose of our expedition.

  My father’s voice pitched higher with excitement. “Then you know —”

  Louis held up his hand again. This time, I heard anger in his voice. “We do not speak of Madoc.”

  “You do not understand,” my father said. “They are our kin. We have been searching for them.”

  Louis stepped closer to my father, right up to him, their chests but an inch or two apart. He said the same words in his tongue again. “We do not speak of Madoc.”

  My father, to my amazement, did not back down. “We only wish to find out where they might be.”