Blood of the Oak: A Mystery

by Eliot Pattison

  Rush, energetically writing in his notebook, seemed not to notice Duncan’s approach. Duncan spoke to his back. “Why is it so urgent to ship fossils to Franklin if he is away in London?”

  Rush spun about in surprise, dropping his bundle of instruments on the ground. “He is a collector of intellectual curiosities. His wife carries on his work in her own fashion. Using his name assures the security of the shipment, for no one would interfere with something bound for the great Franklin.”

  “Bricklin is delivering a box for Franklin. But Bricklin could be collaborating with the killers.”

  Anguish creeped back into Rush’s voice. “Surely no one would dare harm anyone in the Franklin household!”

  They bent to gather up the instruments. “Your friends all died,” the Mohawk said. “What if the Blooddancer passed you by for a reason?”

  Rush grimaced and stared into the fire.” He said after a few minutes, “I am in someplace dark. I hold a candle and keep walking forward.” The night before he had been too overwrought with emotion to answer Tanaqua’s question about his dreams but he had clearly not forgotten it. “I hear a chant and follow the sound. I reach a chamber with a huge fire in the center. Dr. Franklin and the other one are dancing around it.”

  Tanaqua leaned forward. “The other one?”

  Rush’s gaze dropped to the ground at his feet. “He was wearing Dr. Franklin’s spectacles. It was a great bear, a giant bear, more than twice as tall as any man. Yet it seemed gentle, and wise.”

  Tanaqua stared in astonishment at Rush, then walked away to sit by himself. He kept quiet until after sunset, and spoke to Duncan only after Rush had fallen asleep. “I told you my half brother, Kaskay, went to the cave of the spirit bear. It is said the ghost of the ancient bear dances there when the moon is full. That is known only to those of my society,” he explained, meaning his secret society dedicated to preserving the old gods. “This is a sign. Kaskay and the bear need me. In the morning I must leave for the cave.” Tanaqua looked at the sleeping form of Rush. “He is a messenger,” the Mohawk said in a sympathetic tone, “who never understands his messages.”

  THEY ROSE AT DAWN AND STIRRED THE EMBERS INTO FLAME TO make tea and fry the remaining fish. As they struck camp, Duncan, still wary of being followed, once more climbed the ridge, its vegetation now rippling in a rising wind, to survey the river and western road. For several minutes he watched the little grove by the western landing where they had left Bricklin’s dugout, then turned back. As the camp came into view he froze. A hulking figure was bent in the shadow of a bush, a tomahawk in his hand, creeping toward Tanaqua, who was apparently once again listening to one of Rush’s soliloquies about anatomy.

  Duncan shouted a warning but his words were lost in the wind. He ran headlong down the slope, cursing himself for leaving behind his rifle. With rising horror he realized he would never make it in time. He was still fifty feet away when the intruder rose, arm outstretched. Duncan shouted again, to no avail. Then a bundle of fury launched itself onto the stranger’s back.

  Analie hooked one arm around the man’s neck, throwing him off-balance, then grabbed his wrist and bit it as he tried to swing his ax at her. With a roar of anger he broke free of her grip only to have the ax wrenched from his hand by Tanaqua. The Mohawk slammed the side of the weapon into the man’s head, catching Analie as he crumpled to the ground. Duncan, reaching them, grabbed the stranger’s legs and twisted them so he lay on his back. It was Bricklin’s Irish bully, Teague.

  Duncan and Tanaqua bound the Irishman to a tree as Rush dumped out the pack Teague had dropped at the side of the camp. There was only a drinking gourd, a bundle of jerked meat, and a bulging flour sack. Rush looked into the sack, and instantly dropped it, staggering backward before turning to retch up his breakfast. Duncan tried to reach the sack before his Mohawk friend but Tanaqua was faster. Duncan realized he shared Duncan’s own suspicion about its contents, for he stepped to a flat rock and gently emptied the contents onto it.

  Analie gasped and hid behind Duncan. Rush looked up and then retched again.

  There were ten matted bundles of hair. Ten human scalps. Three were of the short scalplock hair favored by Mohawk warriors, the rest were of long strands, some with red and blue beads woven into their braids. They were likely from native women, or even children.

  The muscles of Tanaqua’s neck flexed as he glanced back and forth from the scalps to Teague. His powerful fingers opened and squeezed shut as if imagining themselves around Teague’s neck. There was death in the air, and death on the face of Tanaqua. Duncan stepped between him and the Irishman, knowing that if Tanaqua could not rein in his rage there would be no way to keep Teague alive.

  The Mohawk’s gaze lingered for a moment on Duncan, then he looked back down at the pouch on the log. It was not totally empty. He shook it, and one last macabre bundle fell out. It was a Mohawk scalplock, the front hairs longer and decorated with ochre. It was wrapped in a wampum belt, one of the wide ribbons of beads used by the Iroquois for messages.

  Tanaqua seemed to sag. He lowered himself unsteadily onto the log, then reverently laid the scalp beside him and spread the belt between his hands, staring at it with a stricken expression.

  The silence was shattering.

  It was Duncan who finally moved. Clenching his jaw, he carefully lifted the other scalps one by one and returned them to the sack before breaking the silence. “You knew him.”

  “I told you there were only four of us left,” Tanaqua said in a hollow voice. “The four guardians of the masks. Now there are only three.” He glanced down at the belt, and quickly folded it, putting it into one of his waistcoat pockets. It was, Duncan knew, one of the treasures of the False Face societies. His quick glance had shown it to be adorned with the sun at one end, the moon at the other, a huge bear in the center, and several angular spirit dancers on either side. It would have been handed down from guardian to guardian for generations.

  “The cave where Kaskay kept vigil is on a high ledge on the Kittatinny mountain with a high open ledge at its mouth. What you would call a sentinel place, where the gods kept watch over the southern border of the Iroquois peoples. When he left, Kaskay said they had to know we still cared. He would show them by going up there and fasting for ten days, taking nothing but water, singing the old chants all the time. Kaskay would not have taken weapons to the shrine.” He fixed Duncan with an anguished gaze. “The murder of a guardian would have infuriated Blooddancer. It could be why he left us.” He studied the unconscious Teague with a cold eye, his hand on his war ax.

  “Leave the Irishman with me, my friend,” Duncan said. “There is no honor in killing him like this.”

  After a long moment Tanaqua gave a reluctant nod, then murmured a low prayer as he raised the scalp of his fellow shadowkeeper to the sky. When he had returned it to the sack he rose and nodded at Duncan. “You must go to the Virginia lands. I must follow my lost god. He has shown us how angry he is by his trail of blood. I will have to go to the cave and try to explain. The Trickster might still listen, if he can sense that I speak from the lair of the spirit bear.”

  The Mohawk extended his forearm. His eyes were distant and forlorn. Duncan had the sense that something had broken inside the warrior, and he knew not how to heal it. Tanaqua made a gesture toward the high ridge that overlooked the river. “First I will take these memories of my brothers and sisters to a high place over the river that takes the Iroquois home, and say the words that must be said.”

  Duncan reluctantly clamped his own arm to Tanaqua’s and nodded his farewell.

  Once more the Mohawk gazed with loathing at Teague, then raised his pack and began singing one of the ritual laments of his people as he set out for the ridge.

  Duncan waited until Tanaqua disappeared, then turned to see Analie at the side of the unconscious Teague.

  “Analie!” he cried, and leapt to pull the girl away. Her knife was out, and dripped blood. She had been working on Teague the way Iroquoi
s women sometimes worked on enemy warrior captives, slicing a row of bloody little X marks across his cheeks from ear to ear.

  Teague’s eyes fluttered open. He tasted the blood dripping across his mouth and saw the bloody knife. “Bitch!” he shouted, then spat out blood. “When I lift your hair, girl, I’ll boil it in a pot of walnut juice to dye it black. No one will know the difference. You’re just a little white heathen bitch anyway. Worth five pounds from the governor.”

  Duncan struggled mightily to restrain his own temper, and lost. The Irishman had meant to kill Tanaqua, and no doubt would make good on his threat to Analie if he had the chance. Teague had been carrying scalps as they had journeyed down the river. He kicked Teague so hard in the belly he lost consciousness again, then Duncan opened Rush’s pack to remove the leather roll of instruments. He extracted the largest scalpel and with shaking hands stepped to the Irishman.

  “McCallum! You can’t!” Rush protested from the tree where he had retreated, but he saw the fire in Duncan’s eyes and had the sense not to approach.

  Duncan seized a handful of Teague’s greasy black hair. The scalpel was razor-sharp and the incision, running several inches along his hairline, took but an instant.

  When Rush darted forward, Duncan swung around at him, extending the bloody scalpel. The young doctor held out his hands as if in surrender.

  The blood that now steadily flowed down Teague’s face revived him. When he looked up at Duncan and saw the scalpel his eyes went wide with fear.

  “I should take your topknot and feed it to the crows,” Duncan growled. “I started the job. Whether I finish it depends on what you next say.”

  “Boy!” Teague yelled in desperation at Rush. “He’s gone mad! White men don’t do this to white men!”

  Rush looked down at the ground. Analie took a step closer, raising her little skinning knife again.

  “Surely Duncan,” Rush tried in a trembling voice, “we can’t have him thinking we would—”

  “Most of them scalps I just bought, like a merchant,” Teague explained. “Buy one for a few shillings and sell it for five pounds to that agent in Lancaster. There’s a dry goods sutler there with a commission from the governor.”

  Rush advanced a step.

  “Get back Rush!” Duncan shouted. His fury burned white hot. He could not remember ever feeling such hatred. For Teague, the scalps were just coins in his purse. The victims had probably been taken in ambush. “Were you at Edentown?” he demanded.

  Teague’s only answer was to launch a violent kick at Duncan.

  Duncan hovered just out of reach. “Normally a man wouldn’t bleed to death from that incision but more of that could make it so. Were you at Edentown?”

  “He’ll kill you McCallum. You’ll be dead in a week.”

  Duncan stepped forcefully down on Teague’s leg and leaned over him with the blade. “Did you bring the canoe for the murderers’ escape? Who were the men leaving in the canoe when Bricklin was arriving?”

  “Kincaid and Hobart. Hobart wears spectacles. I waited at the landing for them.”

  “Where are they going?”

  “South. The promised land. Galilee.”

  “You mean Virginia.”

  Teague grinned despite the blood on his lips. “He said he was building up a powerful black hunger. That’s what he calls it. For the black rum on black nights lying with black girls.”

  “Why would they leave you?”

  Teague stared down at a little pool of blood on the back of his hand.

  Duncan asked again. When the Irishman wouldn’t answer he laid the blade along his temple. “Another couple inches, Teague, and you know what will happen? Your skin will start collapsing, sliding down your skull. What a mess. A good doctor might sew it up but it will never be the same. Your face will look like one of those lumpy deerskin balls the Iroquois use in lacrosse. Children will flee at the sight of you. Women will slam their doors and windows.”

  “Bricklin wants to know what you took from that dead man on the river.” The Irishman nodded toward the wooden box they had carried from the river. “But mostly he needs the box back.”

  Duncan paused, surprised. “Mr. Franklin’s fossils?”

  “If you got in the way he said he didn’t mind if you was hurt. You were never supposed to have survived that snake.”

  “Get the fossils and then what?”

  “Deliver them to Mr. Franklin’s house then watch who comes for them.”

  Duncan assumed Rush had pulled Analie away to shelter behind his tree, but she had only gone for a better weapon before charging Teauge again. She slammed a broken limb as thick as her arm into the Irishman’s ribs, raising a sharp cracking noise. The Irishman groaned and sank once more into unconsciousness. “Like you said about Captain Woolford,” she explained, looking up at Duncan. “A man can’t move fast with broken ribs.” She dropped the stick, clasped her hands together, and smiled like a choirgirl.

  Duncan turned to Rush. “Why the fossils?” he demanded. “Are men dying because of fossils?” Rush stared, dumbfounded, at Teague. Duncan grabbed him and shook him by the shoulders. “Why do the killers care about them? Why does Franklin want them?”

  “They are of great intellectual curiosity,” Rush said. “Mr. Franklin is a great natural philosopher. For him and his committee.”

  Duncan stared at him in frustration. He was the messenger who never understood his messages. Duncan opened the box again, puzzling once more over the contents. Surely men weren’t dying for some ancient petrifications. He noticed now a sheet of paper that had fallen to the side of the box. It was addressed not to Franklin but To My Noble Friends, followed by three Latin words, Audentes fortuna juvat, and signed, with a flourish familiar to Duncan, Sir William. Audentes fortuna juvat. Fortune assists the daring.

  He knelt and unwrapped each from its covering of old news journal pages, laying them in a line on a piece of shale. An acorn-sized snail, the oversized louse that Rush had called a trilobite, a fern, a fish, a worm, the foot of what looked like a lizard, and a huge triangular black tooth, nearly as big as his palm. Was there a message in them? Did they constitute some sort of rebus?

  He turned to retrieve the paper wrappings and paused, staring at the first page he lifted as it hung in the air. Against the morning sky he could see tiny holes. He picked up another sheet, straightening it against his leg, and held it aloft. More holes, not random but in lines. He checked other sheets quickly, confirming they all had the tiny pinpricks. Each, he quickly discovered, was squarely under a letter or number of the text. He ripped off the back of a sheet, showing no holes, and pulled out his writing lead.

  G, A, L, he began recording, writing the letters over each hole. The five papers each had different letters or numbers indicated by the tiny holes. After several minutes he had five clusters of letters and numbers. Galilee, said the first, then World’s End, Runners missing, and Massnyconnri.

  “I don’t understand,” Rush said over his shoulder.

  “Messages, Benjamin. The fossils are the perfect cover. Of course some natural philosophers in Philadelphia would be interested in them, and Sir William is a friend of several. The papers would seem to be just trash.”

  Duncan pointed to the last group of letters. “It puts me in mind of a native name.”

  Rush stared intensely at the letters then grinned and, borrowing Duncan’s lead, drew lines between letter groupings. “Just abbreviations. Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, and—”

  “Rhode Island,” Duncan finished. “Why would Sir William think names of colonies must be kept secret?”

  “I told you. I am not trusted with the details,” Rush replied in a self-pitying tone. “Apparently all I do is lure people to their deaths.”

  As Rush repacked the fossils, Duncan lifted Teague’s water gourd and poured it over the Irishman’s head. Teague woke up spitting, then grimaced and clutched his ribs.

  “Where is this Galilee? Is that where Kincaid and Hobart are goi
ng?”

  “South. All I know is south. Down the wagon road. They had me arrange fast horses for them at Harris’s Landing.”

  Duncan lifted the scalpel again.

  “Sotweed country,” Teague hastily added. “They work out of the sotweed country.”

  Duncan stared at the man, trying to decide if he spoke the truth, then finally turned his back on the Irishman.

  Teague seemed to take it as a sign he would not die that day. “We took three at once, me and the boys. They were sleeping, under the full moon. We each knelt by one and then howled like wolves. As they sat up their throats were thrust into our blades. Cut their own throats, ye might say.”

  Duncan’s hand was shaking again. He dropped the scalpel on top of Rush’s kit for fear of what he might do.

  Teague’s face became a hideous mask as he grinned through the streaks of blood. “’Course the easiest way is to just get a buck drunk. Spend a shilling on a demijohn of rum and harvest a five-pound hank of hair by the end of the night.” Blood trickled into his eyes and with a wince he shook his head to clear them. “I’ll kill you, McCallum. I’ll find you and kill you slow, that’s my vow to you.”

  “And I’ll make a vow to you Teague,” Duncan returned. “If I ever find you with another scalp, if I hear you’ve taken another scalp, if I ever hear you are trading in scalps or even bragging about killing natives I will find you. I will tie you down in the forest, and cut open your belly. The wolves will take a day or two to finish you.”

  “Leave me like this and they’ll finish me here.”

  Duncan pulled Rush to his feet and shoved him toward Teague. “This is Dr. Rush of Philadelphia. He has taken a vow to help the injured. He will sew you up with his fine silk thread and get you to the landing.” Duncan reached for his pack and rifle. The frightened young doctor did not protest. “In fact he will care for you all the way to Philadelphia, just a doctor nursing a man who suffered a terrible accident on the frontier.”