by Sarah Maine
Ballantyre had continued to pull off his boots but had looked up and given him a tight smile. ‘I know. And I’m not concerned. I’d just like to speak to this Achak myself.’ And that was as far as he had been willing to go.
‘So waddya say, Mister Larsen?’ asked Skinner that evening when everyone was back in the camp. Marcel had been out hunting and brought back a young hind which he had hung and drawn, and it was now roasting on a spit over the fire. ‘Do we stay here, or head on up past Split Rock Portage?’ No one had heard any shots and when asked, Marcel had shown them his bow, and the place in the deer’s neck where his arrow had brought the creature down. ‘Or we could go on farther up still. Island Portage’s no problem, and it’s a great spot to fish, both sides of the island. And then Pine Portage—’
‘It sounds like a lot of portages,’ said Ballantyre.
‘Short ones though.’
Larsen looked at his friend. He looked worse than ever this evening, quite alarmingly so. Haggard and drawn, almost as if he were ill. Perhaps he was— If so, then they would be better to stay put. ‘It’s dramatic country upriver, but the fishing is just as good here.’ He had looked forward to showing Ballantyre the gorge with the cliffs on both sides of the river, but it seemed that the farther north they went the more troubled his old friend grew. He glanced around looking for Evelyn, but she must have still been in her tent.
‘It would save the men a good deal of trouble,’ Ballantyre agreed.
‘Don’t consider that, mister. The boys are—’
‘Fit. Yes, you said.’
Skinner missed the sharpness in Ballantyre’s tone and continued undaunted: ‘— and if we camp at the place I’m thinking, then anyone who wants to can go on all the way, upriver to Lake Nipigon. The boys’ll take ’em. Then they c’n come back down through some of the rapids, and that’d be somethin’ to remember.’
Evelyn and Clementina now emerged from their tent and came over to the fire. Clementina sat down beside her husband, while Evelyn perched on one of the tree stumps at the edge of the shadows, her eyes fixed on the roasting meat.
‘Perhaps we should ask the ladies how they feel.’ Ballantyre turned to where his daughter sat, and Skinner rehearsed the options again. ‘So, my dear, what do you think?’
She seemed to jerk to attention. ‘Who were all these women?’ she asked, as if emerging from a dream. ‘That the lakes are named for? Helen, Jessie, Marie—’
Skinner shrugged. ‘Womenfolk belonging to the mapmakers, I suppose. Wives, sweethearts, daughters, mothers—’ She nodded, but said nothing more.
‘What about you, my love?’ George asked his wife, who gave him a meaningful look which he somehow failed to interpret. ‘You’re game, eh?’
‘You said we might encounter some Indian camps upriver, Mr Skinner,’ said Ballantyre, but his eyes were still on his daughter.
‘Sure. Bound to.’ Skinner spat expertly into the fire. ‘And some of the finest scenery in the land. And it’s wild country, bear country, moose—’
‘Bear country!’ exclaimed Clementina, looking across at her husband.
Skinner cackled. ‘Don’t you worry, ma’am, they’re full of bugs and berries this time of year. Fat and content. And there’s some old Indian rock paintings, high up on the cliff face. Bit of a climb but there’s a good trail.’
Evelyn ate little and handed her plate back to Tala almost untouched; she had no appetite and she had found the fresh venison tough and fibrous. She had positioned herself on the edge of the group hoping to avoid attention, not meeting James’s eye when he brought her a mug of coffee. Had she imagined it or had he paused there a moment, looking down at her? The relief at learning of her father’s innocence was now wrestling with guilt that she had believed James had been McAllister’s killer, and she had not looked up.
But she was still appalled at her father’s duplicity! And more than ever, she needed someone to explain—
Rupert dragged his seat over to be beside her. ‘All bets are still on, you know,’ he said. ‘So we will reconvene tomorrow, at first light.’ She responded with a vague smile. ‘Best time, you know, and for all that my pike was universally despised, it was the only damned fish we caught.’ She parried his teasing as best she could then pleaded tiredness, made her excuses and rose, bidding them all good night. Her father turned his head and put out an arm to delay her.
‘Off to bed, Evie?’ He rose, pulling her to him, and bent to kiss her forehead. ‘Good night – and rest you well, my dear.’
She lifted her eyes to meet his and encountered a look of such profound sadness that she dropped them again, nodded blindly and headed for her tent.
Once inside she undressed quickly and pulled on the cotton shift that she slept in, shivering as she crept under the furs. She burrowed deep, desperate to be able to feign sleep when Clementina appeared, and turned on her side and watched the flickering light playing on the slanting wall of her tent.
Carefully, deliberately, she went back over the conversation she had had with her father. He had demanded that she tell him the whole, and it had all tumbled out in an incoherent babble, like the discharge from a lanced pustule – five years’ worth of festering confusion and fear. When she had finished he had stared back at her in horror, then held her tight against his chest, his hand cupping the back of her head until she grew calm, before pulling away. ‘Look at me, Evelyn. No, look at me. I did not kill the poacher. Nor did James.’ And with grim determination, he had made her go back, step by step, over the events of that night: from seeing the body on the cart, to what the servants had said, and then to her desperate quest to find him, and his terrible expression when she encountered him in the study, and finally to finding James in the study – and to the conclusions she had drawn.
He was silent for a long time after that.
‘And then, next day, when I heard about Mr McAllister, I thought that must have been James, after he left me in the study—’
‘And so,’ he said, ‘you made killers of us both.’ He stared out into the blackness of the forest. ‘My poor child.’
‘James had a knife—’
He nodded, and the silence again stretched out between them. ‘If only you’d come to me,’ he had said at last.
‘I tried. But there was that man with you—’ Above them the trees creaked as the wind passed through them, and for a brief instant she saw that same thunderous look pass across his features. ‘And later— I couldn’t, not after what James had said.’ He remained silent; she thought he would never speak again. ‘It made a sort of sense, you see—’
‘Yes,’ he said, on an indrawn breath. ‘I do see, and you were so very young.’ He stared up into the swaying trees, at where the tops were lit like torches by the low sun, and remained silent.
‘Did James kill Mr McAllister?’ she asked at last. Now that the central question regarding her father and Jacko’s death was resolved, this mattered so much less.
‘No.’
She waited for more. None came. ‘Then who did?’
‘Neither James nor I.’
‘But you know who did?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you know who shot Jacko?’
‘Yes.’
Tension coiled tight between them again, and she began to protest, but he raised a hand. ‘Don’t ask me, my dear, because I shan’t tell you. Not yet—’
‘Does James know?’
‘Leave it, Evelyn, please—’
Indignation had swelled in her. How could she leave it there? ‘But you allowed everyone to believe it was James. You let them hunt him down, you loosed the dogs—!’ Half a story would no longer do, but she had seen his jaw clench and he had shaken his head.
‘Not yet,’ he had repeated. ‘It is still dangerous for James. He’s a wanted man with two charges of murder hanging over him, and Melton is a magistrate.’
That was too much. ‘But George would never do anything!’ she had protested. ‘Not if you explained things to
him.’
He had gripped her arm as tightly as he had at the station. ‘I’ll deal with this my own way, Evelyn.’ There was a look in his eyes which frightened her. ‘And then I’ll explain everything to you, and to James. When it’s safe to do so. Judge me then, if you will. Both of you.’ And he had pulled her to him again, holding her close, hard up against the beat of his heart.
But now as she lay there, listening to the sounds of the forest as it settled into the darkness, she felt her newly vanquished demons begin to stir again, and rally. A killer her father was not, perhaps, but for five years he had allowed the world to believe that James Douglas was.
Chapter 19
‘You want to see an Indian camp, mister?’ Skinner asked Ballantyre as they gathered for breakfast next morning. ‘’Cause a bunch of ’em arrived late last night, and set up camp a little ways downriver.’ He gestured to where a blue smoke haze rose above the treetops about a half mile downstream. ‘The boys’ll take you there if you like.’
‘Will they speak English?’ James heard Ballantyre asking as they assembled at the shore a little while later. He had observed Marcel go on ahead and had a hunch that, whatever language was spoken, Ballantyre would learn little about Achak’s whereabouts should he make enquiries. Then James watched stonily as Dalston first assisted Evelyn into the canoe and settled himself beside her, leaning close to talk, his hand on her arm.
‘We could make it an annual event,’ he was saying. ‘Why don’t we? During the salmon run. There’s a prime river running through Melton’s estate; I’ve often fished there. And Clemmy says you’ll be coming to stay.’
‘Yes, maybe.’
‘And we’re only ten miles away, y’know. You can come and admire Pa’s hothouse and his peach trees. He’s terribly proud of them, spends hours bullying the gardeners. They taste of nothing but mush, but don’t tell him I said so—’
‘No. I won’t.’
‘And if he offers you one you’ll know where you stand. Only the favoured few get offered the peaches.’ And he used his hat to waft away the flies from above Evelyn’s head.
Why, for God’s sake, did Ballantyre let her within a mile of the man?
James turned to find that Ballantyre was also watching them and he met James’s scowl with a cool look before stepping into the other canoe, leaving him with no option but to take up his paddle and propel them into the current.
He stared at Evelyn’s back as they crossed the river, at the knot of hair in the nape of her neck and her slender shoulders, and marvelled again at the difference five years could make. When he had seen her at the station she had been a stranger; he would have passed her in the street – just another young lady, well dressed and with that indefinable air of superiority. But all that had fallen away as they travelled north and he had recognised again the child he had known, the joyful, rebellious, but essentially lonely, child. He would like to talk more with her, but he wouldn’t.
They reached the opposite bank, downstream from their own camp, and were met with a chorus of barking from dogs which lined the riverbank, noses uplifted. A group of native boys ran down to meet them, some dragging the dogs aside while others ran into the water to grab onto the boats and haul them out of the current, before ushering their visitors up the slope to the camp.
James followed.
It was a typical native camp, like any other, with shelters such as those Tala and Machk slept in, except these were more substantial, and for real, not show, and were surrounded by the usual chaos of dogs and children. To one side fish and meat drying racks had been set up, and various pelts had been slung from the trees for inspection. Fishing harpoons propped against the trunks provoked a flash of memory of spearing salmon back home, with Jacko, under a clouded moon.
He had often seen groups camped here before, and through the summer had witnessed a lively trade in native souvenirs with the various anglers, the proceeds from which were spent in the company stores, on food and cheap whisky. A dollar in cash was worth a lot. He recognised the woman who squatted beside the fire, sewing beads onto the toe of a moccasin, and exchanged a nod with her. She had spread examples of her work out on the rocks nearby, a couple of baskets, a purse, a pouch, and a pair of fine white doeskin gloves, too fine to be useful but designed to catch the eye of a passing tourist. The head of the camp was a man in his late forties who came forward to greet them, holding out a bottle and offering them a drink. James watched with malicious pleasure as Ballantyre nodded his acceptance, took a drink, and then paused, his eyes widening as the liquid stripped the lining from his throat. But Ballantyre thanked the man courteously and adroitly avoided the offer of more. Larsen managed to finish his too, though more slowly, as did Melton, while Dalston, less than discreetly, spat his out.
James left them to it and drifted to one side, bestowing a nickel on an urchin who tugged at his trouser leg but refused the tatty muskrat skin on offer. Then he leant his shoulder against a tree and watched with unholy amusement as Ballantyre questioned the man about the possible whereabouts of Achak with Marcel acting as interpreter. This the half-breed did with a convincing urgency, and through him Ballantyre was directed vaguely to the north, and then to the west, as the man held up fingers to suggest that Achak was one, two, maybe three days’ journey away in any one of these directions. Eventually Ballantyre gave up and Marcel threw open his arms in sympathetic regret.
It was laughable, and in fact the whole scene was absurd. These visitors, with their well-cut tweeds and twills, the women with their straw hats and button boots, and all of them with that God-given air of condescension—
At the edge of the fire a brown-skinned child was amusing himself by flicking ash out of the fire with a stick, yipping strange little commands at a half-grown puppy until one of the women snapped at him to stop. She dusted the ash from her wares and brought over a woven basket and a little box for Lady Melton to examine, pulling at her sleeve to gain attention. There followed an elaborate mime of questions and answers until Marcel was again called upon to interpret.
As he watched them he had failed to notice that Evelyn had left her friend’s side and moved across to him. ‘Do you speak their language, James?’
‘Enough to get by.’ He quickly surveyed the group but no one was paying them any attention. She looked different this morning, less strained. Pretty—
‘She does very fine beadwork,’ she said, gesturing to the goods laid out on the rocks.
‘Buy something then. They need the money.’
‘I will. That little box perhaps. What is it made of?’
‘Quills from a porcupine. Like a hedgehog, only bigger.’
‘Seen something you fancy?’ Dalston strolled up, smoking a cigarette. He glanced briefly at James before presenting him with his shoulder and picked up a purse which was heavily beaded, the fastening slightly off-centre, and raised it to his nose. ‘Hmm. Sort of smoky boot leather.’
Evelyn went over and took up the doeskin gloves, and slipped one on. ‘These are beautiful.’ They were gauntlets rather than gloves and her little hand was lost in them; the wide-fringed cuffs reached halfway up her arm. ‘Such fine craftsmanship.’
‘How much?’ Dalston addressed the woman, and she raised three fingers. ‘Three dollars! I’ll give you one.’ He held up one finger but the woman shook her head, and took back the gloves.
‘Wait.’ Evelyn turned back to James. ‘Is that a fair price?’
It was an outrageous price, but he nodded.
‘I’ll give you two dollars. Two dollars,’ Dalston repeated loudly, and held up two fingers, but the woman merely sniffed.
‘Papa! Have you three dollars to give this woman?’
Ballantyre turned and looked across at them, glancing at James.
‘No, hang on! Here, let me—’ Dalston pushed his hand into his pocket, but Ballantyre was there before him and handed the woman the money, nodding his thanks as she gave him the gloves.
‘Very pretty, my dear.’ Ballantyre p
assed them to Evelyn and returned to his inspection of the furs.
Dalston glared at James, holding him in some way accountable. ‘Perhaps there’s something else then?’ he said. ‘But, you know, these people expect to haggle. It’s a sort of game with them—’
‘Is it?’ Evelyn again addressed James.
‘They haggle over the furs they bring in. But it’s never a game.’
From the corner of his eye he saw that Ballantyre had turned back to listen, and he called Evelyn over to where he was examining the furs. ‘Tell me which you like, my dear. This, perhaps? For a collar, I thought.’ And he draped a pelt of silky blackness tipped with silver around her neck. Dalston fired another angry look at James before going down to the water’s edge, where he sat beside one of the canoes and lit another cigarette.
James’s eyes followed him. There he was: Jacko’s killer; yards away from him smoking with an air of bored condescension, displaying the same contempt for their hosts and their ways as he had shown Jacko. And here he was, doing nothing about it.
He would not hold back for much longer, so Ballantyre had better reveal his hand—
When he turned back he saw that the visit was drawing to a close. Ballantyre had bought the silver fox fur, and was handing out cigars to the men, and making their farewells. Evelyn came across to James in her quick impetuous way. ‘I’ll take the little box too, the one made from quills. Please will you ask her how much it is? And please don’t haggle.’
‘No? Then I’ll see to it you’re robbed blind, ‘ he said softly. And a smile lit her eyes.
A thin mist was floating just above the river when Evelyn emerged from her tent next morning and she paused a moment to watch patches of it blown across the surface, filtering the sun’s rays. She could see James and Louis down at the river edge, stripped to the waist, crouching to wash, and then using their shirts to dry themselves before filling leather buckets with river water which they brought back up to the camp. As he passed, James gave her an almost imperceptible nod.
