Jacob looked up with astonishment, seeing his grandparents run across the room. The tall stranger opened his arms and put them around the two. He towered over them both, and Jacob suddenly found himself, for some reason, afraid. From the reactions of his grandparents, he realized that this man must be his father. The years of loneliness when he had not seen him swept over Jacob. It was a strange feeling for him. There was a longing to rush forward and join the little group, but he merely stood to his feet and held the book tightly in one hand, staring at the three. A hardness gripped him, and he remembered the years when he was a small child and he had wept silently in his bed night after night, longing for his father. And now he suddenly appeared—yet the man standing before him was a total stranger.
Hawk felt strange and uncomfortable. It had been a long time since he had been to Williamsburg. His parents, he saw, had grown almost totally gray, and as he held them, they seemed very frail to him. And then he looked over at the boy who was staring at him. He looks exactly as I did at his age. He detached himself from his parents and walked over to the boy. “Well, Jacob, look at you. Almost a man,” he said quietly.
Jake swallowed hard. He did not move but stood there stiffly. He could not think of a thing to say, and he could not bring himself to embrace his father. The only people he had ever embraced were his grandparents. Finally he said, “Good day, sir.”
Hawk blinked at the terseness he heard in his son’s voice, but the thought came, We’re strangers, not father and son. And that brought another streak of pain, for despite the strong resemblance to himself, he saw many of Faith’s features in the boy. Memories flooded back of that night Faith had died and he had walked out.
“Come and sit down. Tell us where you’ve been—what you’ve been doing.” Esther came and took Hawk’s arm. “Josh, you look so brown.”
“A man gets that way when he stays outdoors in the woods all the time.”
“When did you get in?” James asked.
“Just late last night. My friend Sequatchie is waiting outside.”
“Waiting outside? Well, go bring him in!”
“All right, but not everybody wants an Indian in their home.”
“I’m surprised you would say a thing like that!” James said. “Any friend of yours is welcome here. Go bring him in this instant!”
Hawk rose, opened the door, and went outside. “Come on in, Sequatchie.”
Sequatchie entered hesitantly, for it was he who had insisted on remaining outside. He was wearing his usual dress of fringed buckskins and moccasins. His single scalp-lock hung down his back, and he looked smooth and polished without lines in his face.
“This is my friend Sequatchie. Sequatchie, this is my father and mother, and this is my son, Jacob.”
Sequatchie greeted the family and said, “It is good to be in your home.” He looked over toward Jacob and studied the boy carefully. Turning to Hawk, he said, “You have a fine son. He looks like you.”
There was a moment’s embarrassed silence, and then Esther Spencer began at once, saying, “I must fix you something to eat. You must be hungry.”
Hawk protested, but he could tell that she really wanted to make him and Sequatchie feel welcome. They all sat down in front of the fire, and after his mother came back from instructing Ellen about the food, he said, “I’m sorry that I’ve been gone so long. Time just seems to have slipped by.” He wanted desperately to apologize, to tell them how hard it was for him to come back to this house. It was like a knife piercing his heart. The night that Faith had died here was still painfully vivid in his memory after all these years.
“We’re just glad you’ve come now, and we’re glad that you’re here, too, Sequatchie,” Esther said. “Have you known our son a long time?”
“Yes, we are brothers.”
“Sequatchie saved my life,” Hawk said, then he began to tell them how he had met Sequatchie, and how his Cherokee friend had given him a new name. “My name is Hawk on the other side of the mountains. I’m more comfortable with that, but it probably won’t be easy for you.”
“Hawk . . . well, that’s a strong name,” James Spencer said. “Now, tell us what you’ve been doing out there.”
Awkwardly Hawk began to speak of his life over the mountains. Sequatchie sat back, and finally when the food was brought in on a tray, he tasted it with interest. It was a fine white cake, and he did not wait for a spoon but picked it up in his hand and ate it.
Across the room, Jacob suddenly grinned, the first sign of life that he had shown. Sequatchie caught it and smiled at the boy. “Good,” he said. “You eat, too.”
Jacob had kept himself back out of the group, but now he reached out and took the plate that his grandmother had offered. Ignoring the fork, he picked up the cake with his hand and stuffed it into his mouth. “Good,” he said to Sequatchie, smiling.
Hawk saw instantly that the boy had a sense of humor, and he was glad that Jacob had made the gesture of friendship toward the Indian.
Time seemed to drag very slowly, and if it had not been for James, who had skillfully drawn Sequatchie out by entertaining them with his stories of Indian life, it would have been even more awkward.
Finally, James sensed that it might be okay to leave Hawk and Jacob alone, and he said, “Sequatchie, you come with me. Mrs. Spencer and I will show you how we live here. Then someday maybe I’ll come across the mountains and you can show me your home.”
The three left the room, and after a long silence in which neither spoke, Hawk finally said, “How have you been?”
“Very well, sir.”
Another long silence filled the room and Hawk thought, This is not going to be easy. We have nothing to talk about. “Do you like your studies?”
“Yes, sir.”
Politeness—that was all. There was a coldness in the boy’s tone, and Hawk desperately wanted to break through it, but the harder he tried, the more difficult the one-sided conversation became. He got up finally and looked out the window, saying, “Fine day outside. I could go around and see some of the places where I used to go when I was a boy. Maybe you could come with me.”
Jake was staring at his father, his eyes hooded. Abruptly he asked, “Why did you run off and leave me?”
There was such anger and pain in the tone of his son that Hawk could have taken an arrow in the back with less of a shock. When he’d first left, he had gone over this in his own mind many times, trying hard to come up with a good answer. Now, he went over to where the boy was standing and reached out and placed his hand on his shoulder. “I nearly lost my mind when your mother died, son,” he said quietly. He tried to explain how the loss of his wife had brought such pain that he could not bear to think of it. He related how he had fled, almost like a madman. “I . . . I know I was wrong to leave you,” he said. “But I was almost crazy. I would’ve been no man for a young boy to be around,” he said lamely.
“You didn’t have to leave!” Jacob said.
“Your grandfather and your grandmother have done a better job of raising you than I could have.”
Jacob’s eyes burned with bitterness, and he said, “You left me! Do you know what it’s like to be without anybody?”
“You have your grandparents.”
“I didn’t have a mother, and I didn’t have a father!”
Hawk had never felt exactly as he did at that moment. Guilt welled up in him. He knew he had been wrong, and finally he said, “Son, try to understand. I . . . I can’t live in a town. I have to be out-of-doors. I have to be moving or I’ll go crazy.”
“You could’ve taken me with you!”
Hawk felt the boy’s shoulder tense under his hand and he said quietly, “I couldn’t have taken a baby with me into the woods! I nearly died myself. The first few years I was out there, it was just a matter of trying to stay alive every day. I couldn’t have taken care of you!”
Jacob looked up, and his lips trembled as he said, “How . . . how long are you going to stay? A long time?�
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Hawk cleared his throat. “Well . . . no. We’re leaving tomorrow to take a group of settlers back over the mountains—”
“Go on! See if I care!” Jacob slapped his father’s hand away and ran out of the room, his eyes bleared with tears. He almost ran into his grandmother. Dodging by her, he ran out of the house.
Esther came in at once and walked straight up to her son. “What’s the matter with Jacob?”
Hawk turned to her, his eyes glazed with pain and frustration. “There’s nothing the matter with him,” he whispered. “But there’s something the matter with me.”
“Are you going to stay for a while?”
“No, I’ve got to get away, Mother.”
“Josh, you’ve just arrived—and it’s been so long. You . . . you can’t leave—not now. Jacob needs a father.”
“He needs a better one than I am! Father can take care of him!”
“It’s not the same thing,” Esther said, her eyes pleading with her son.
“He’s a better father than I could ever be.”
“He’s getting old now, and he’s not well. Jacob needs you, Jehoshaphat.” She pronounced his old name, all of it, and the sound of it brought back many memories. Hawk turned away blindly and went to the window. He stared out but saw nothing. Seeing his parents and his son after all these years had deeply stirred feelings in him that he had tried so hard to avoid. His mother came over and put her arm around him. “You can’t run away forever, son,” she said.
****
Early the next morning Hawk and Sequatchie were preparing to leave. Hawk had tossed and turned all night. The previous afternoon and evening he had tried to get close to Jacob, but the boy had merely stared at him harshly, his lips drawn into a tight line.
Sequatchie had wisely said nothing. But he had seen the pain in the boy, and the longing to have his father stay. Desperately, he wanted to do something to bring Hawk to his senses. He had prayed, but he knew that Hawk did not want to hear about God. When they rose that morning and went down to breakfast, Jacob was not there. After they sat down, Mr. Spencer asked the blessing, and Hawk asked, “Is Jacob sick?”
“No,” Esther said simply. She tried to think of some way to soften what the boy had told her, which was, “I never want to see him again! He doesn’t care anything about me!” Looking at her son, tears threatening to spill over, she simply said, “Jacob does not want to see you.”
Hawk started to say something but stopped. He felt miserable and ate only a few bites. He pushed the food around on his plate, and finally when the meal was over, he stood up and said, “Well, they’ll be waiting for us. We’ve got to get them over the mountains safely.” He moved to the front door, accompanied by Sequatchie, then he turned. His mother embraced him, and tears ran down her cheeks.
“Come back safe. Your father and I, we pray for you every day.”
“I . . . I know you do, Mother.”
James Spencer embraced his son also. His heart was breaking at the thought of Josh leaving so soon. He wanted to hold him tightly and keep him from going. His voice choking with emotion, James muttered, “We love you here, Josh. We always will. Remember that.”
Upstairs, Jacob was in his room. He was crying, and as he looked out of the window, keeping well back, he saw his father and Sequatchie step outside and move around to the side of the house where the stable was located. Soon they came out, mounted, and rode away. The sounds of the horses’ hooves rang on the stone pavement, and Jacob’s eyes blurred so that he could not see clearly. He watched until his father and Sequatchie disappeared, and then with a choking sob, threw himself on the bed and stuffed the bedclothes against his face so that he made no sound as he lay there weeping.
Chapter Nineteen
The Journey Begins
As the two long hunters made their way down through the busy streets of Williamsburg, Sequatchie’s eyes ran over the assorted shops and townspeople in bewilderment. Several times he stopped and asked, “What is this place?” At one of them he insisted that Hawk go inside. It was a wigmaker’s establishment, and Sequatchie had never seen anything like it. Because of France’s King Louis XIII, wigs were all the rage. As rumor had it, the young French king was going bald at twenty-three. He became depressed and put on a wig, and soon all his courtiers followed suit. Soon women followed, adorning their wigs with jewels and fresh flowers. European wigs were quite colorful, and some even dared to wear blue or pink ones. The colonists were more reserved and stayed with the natural colors, though there was a preference for white powdered wigs.
Sequatchie prowled around the store, and the diminutive wigmaker’s eyes never left him. The man’s hands were trembling, and Hawk grinned, for he saw that the wigmaker expected to be scalped.
Hawk was amused by Sequatchie’s curiosity, and he said, “How about if I buy one of these for you, Sequatchie?” He picked up a large wig with masses of curls and stuck it on the Indian’s head.
Sequatchie glanced at the mirror in front of him and was startled at his strange reflection. Jerking the wig off, he threw it at Hawk and said, “White men are foolish!”
“I expect you’re right about that, Sequatchie. At least where wigs are concerned.”
Sequatchie stomped out of the shop, and the wigmaker gave an audible sigh of relief. As they made their way farther, Sequatchie asked many questions about Williamsburg and the ways of the people who lived there. Finally, turning to face Hawk, he ventured, “Maybe sometime soon we come back and visit your son.”
“Maybe,” Hawk grunted.
Encouraged by even this much response, Sequatchie said quietly, “A boy is like a piece of pottery. You’ve seen the squaws make them. When they’re soft, they can mold the clay into any shape they like, but when the clay gets hard, it’s too late. What’s done is done.” He paused and glanced at his friend. “Boys are like that. Your boy’s already almost a man, but he needs you still.”
Hawk shook his head. He did not want to talk about it and quickly changed the subject. “I’ve got a friend I want you to meet. We’ll pick up some supplies at his place and then go meet these folks we’re supposed to guide back to Bean’s settlement.”
****
Jacques Cartier entered The Brown Stag and ran his eyes across the room. At once he saw Rhoda Harper, who had her back to him as she stood behind the short bar, putting glasses on a shelf. Stealthily the big man advanced and without warning threw his arms around the woman, squeezing her. “Ah,” he said. “You little pigeon! I am back!”
Rhoda was accustomed to being grabbed and mauled by those who frequented the place. It went with being a tavern girl. When she turned around, however, and saw the face of the man who held her, she gasped. “Jacques!”
Cartier grinned and kissed her noisily. “Yes, little pigeon. It’s been a long time. Too long! But now I am back, as you see.” He looked carefully and saw that she had aged somewhat. Her smooth face had a few lines that were not there the last time he saw her. But her figure was better than ever, fuller and rounder. “Come,” he said. “We must talk.”
Rhoda did not protest as he led her out of the tavern to the single door at the back. She followed him inside the small room with a table and four chairs used for card games and meals. She sat down in the chair, leaned over, and put her chin in her palm. “I didn’t expect to see you ever come back here, Jacques. As a matter of fact, I heard you were dead!”
“I am in good health, for a dead man,” Cartier said.
He was lolling in the chair, and she saw a scar across his neck and down to his chest that had not been there before. He looked tired and worn, but Rhoda knew how strong he was. The buckskins were molded to his muscles, which were large and heavy. “What are you doing in Williamsburg? I thought the French had all left this country.”
“No, we have not all left. There’s still a few of us here, and we have some big plans.”
“Frenchmen aren’t too popular around Williamsburg,” Rhoda said.
“Ah, wh
at does it matter what they think of Jacques Cartier? Let them say so, and I’ll slit their throat.”
“You haven’t changed, Jacques.”
“You have not changed either. Still the beautiful Rhoda!”
He sat there boasting about his exploits, and Rhoda wondered why he had come back to the Colonies. Since the Line of Demarcation, most of the French had left the country. Finally she said, “I know you, Jacques. You’re not here for nothing.”
“That is right, my Rhoda. I have come to do you a big favor.”
Rhoda laughed without humor. She ran her hand through her hair and shook it free, saying, “You never did a favor for anyone in your life!”
“Maybe I am a changed man.”
“And maybe the moon’s made out of buttermilk! What are you up to, Jacques?”
“I have a little job that I want you to do for me, and I will pay you well. Look.” He pulled out a leather thong around his neck and extracted a heavy deerskin bag suspended on it. Tossing it into the air, he caught it, and it made a musical clinking sound. “Gold,” he grinned. “Lots of gold, and some for you if you do this little job for me.”
“What kind of a job would I do for you?”
Cartier leaned forward and whispered, “There is a party of settlers that will be leaving Williamsburg soon. They are going to a place called the Watauga. I want you to join up with them.”
“Why should I go there? Where is it?”
“Very far away. Across the mountains.”
“I don’t want to go there. I’m afraid of the Indians.”
“As long as Jacques is around, no Indian will harm you. But that doesn’t matter, you will not actually go to the mountains.”
“Stop talking in riddles, Jacques. What do you want?”
“All right. Listen to me. I want you to join this group. They’ll be glad to take you. They need new people at the settlement.” He grinned at her, tossed the bag up, and listened to the coins jingle inside.
“And why would you want me to do that?” Rhoda demanded.
“I do not want them to reach their destination. I want them to turn back before they get to the Watauga.”
Over the Misty Mountains Page 21
