Firebird (36 page)

‘Where's Llinos? I want to talk to her,' Binnie said awkwardly, aware that his bag was standing near the door.

‘She's left for the pottery already, she's nothing if not keen to earn her own living. What's wrong, Binnie? You look down in the mouth. Married bliss not all you hoped for?' Eynon said.

‘It just don't feel right somehow, being married, I mean.'

‘Doesn't,' Eynon corrected. ‘It doesn't feel right.' He smiled. ‘Marriage is a big step and, after all, you haven't given yourself time to get used to it, have you?'

Binnie squared his shoulders, knowing he would have to break the news to Eynon that he was leaving. He thrust his hands into his pockets and stared down at the toe cap of his boot. ‘I've got to tell you something.'

Eynon sighed. ‘I think I know what you are going to say, I can see you've packed your bag. You're leaving us. Don't you think you are being a little impulsive. What about Maura and the baby? Shouldn't you be thinking of them?'

‘They'll be all right by here with you, won't they? You won't throw them out into the street or anything?'

‘No, of course not! But I can't be here all the time, you know, and Maura needs a husband and the child needs a father, don't you think?'

‘I can't do it. She got a ring on her finger, the respectability she wanted,' Binnie said. ‘Now I have to get away.'

‘All right, if you are determined to go I can't stop you. Hold on here, would you?' Eynon disappeared into his study and returned after a moment with a purse of money.

‘Call this your severance pay.' He smiled but it did not reach his eyes. ‘It's more than you'd ever get out of my father.'

As Binnie hurried from the house and began the long walk into town, his spirits rose. He was relieved to be away from Eynon's house, more than relieved to be away from Maura. He felt suffocated by her love. He had made a mistake. He should not have married her. Well, it was behind him now.

Ahead of him, he caught sight of a familiar figure. He quickened his steps.

‘Llinos!' he called. She hesitated for a moment and then stopped to wait for him. In her hand was a bag similar to his own.

‘Binnie, trust you to catch me out when I'm running away.'

‘So am I,' Binnie said, not taking her seriously. ‘Running away, I mean. Where are
you
going?'

‘I'm going to America to find Joe, to find out if he loves me or not.' She looked at him, her head on one side.

‘Llinos, you're mad! No woman travels alone and especially not to America.'

‘Well, there has to be a first time for everything and I'm going. But you, Binnie, what do you think you are doing?'

‘I can't stay, Llinos. Marriage is not right for me. I'm too young to settle down.'

‘You don't mean it? Why, you've only just got married.'

He smiled. ‘I do mean it. As you say, there's a first time for everything.' He measured his steps to hers as Llinos began to walk down the hill. She glanced at him, her eyes shadowed.

‘I don't know what to say, Binnie. I can't agree that you are doing right to leave Maura. Why don't you give yourself a chance to think about it?'

‘How long have you thought about going to America?'

‘Well, I realize I can't keep living on Eynon's charity.'

‘And when did that wonderful revelation come to you?' Binnie persisted.

‘I scarcely slept all night. Georgina made me see sense. Oh, she was being spiteful but she was right, nonetheless.'

‘So you decided this morning to leave? So did I. I can't live a lie for the rest of my life. In time I would come to hate Maura and all she stands for and she would hate me.'

The leafy lanes gave way to the roads at the edge of the town, where the shops and alley-ways sprawled in a confusion of cobbled streets and narrow courts.

Binnie kept step with her. ‘Can I come with you, to America, I mean? I don't have a great deal of money. I could work my passage, though. I could help you to find Joe. Do you know where to start looking?'

Llinos nodded. ‘I know where he is. He wrote to me, this is all I have left of the letter; my father tried to burn it.'

Binnie took the paper and looked at the date. ‘It's been a long time getting here. Joe could be on his way home by now.'

Llinos shook her head. ‘No. I don't think so.' She did not add that she would feel his presence, she would know without doubt if he was coming home.

Binnie looked at her in admiration. ‘Well, Llinos, I take my hat off to you, there's not many women with a sense of adventure strong enough to carry them across oceans.'

‘Don't praise me too soon, there's a passage to be booked, a captain to persuade.' She smiled. ‘Though I must admit it will be that much easier if we appear to be a couple. I understand captains are not keen on lone, unattached females being on board ship.'

Binnie stared ahead of him as they neared the entrance to the docks. The water was filled with ships, some with sails unfurled waiting for the outgoing tide. Others were laid at anchor. Men called to each other as they loaded cargo into the holds. It was a strange place full of unfamiliar smells and the coarse language of the sailors.

‘We should go to the shipping master's hut,' Llinos said. ‘Make enquiries about sailings to America.'

Binnie was grateful for Llinos's clear-headed thinking. He followed her, taking her arm when she picked her way over boxes of fish and the upturned lobster pots that littered the dockside.

Llinos, with unerring instinct, found the building where the sailors and shipping line owners were filling in logs and booking out cargo. She took charge and Binnie watched her arrange matters with a briskness that would have done credit to a woman twice her age. Or any man for that matter.

Within the hour, Binnie found himself accompanying Llinos on board a four-masted barque heading out of Swansea harbour towards the Bristol Channel and the deep seas beyond. His new life was beginning and he embraced it with all the enthusiasm of a man freed from prison.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The river Missouri flowed sweetly, sunwarmed and golden. But summer was waning; it was time to go home. Joe walked the short distance to the stockade and stood at the door of the lodge where he had lived these past weeks with his mother.

In the clearing, the women were grouped around the fires baking clay pots beneath a covering of bark and branches and dung from the fields. It was all so different from the refinements of the Savage Pottery in Swansea and yet the end result was virtually the same. Jugs, basins, cooking vessels took shape, hardened by fire.

‘You are thinking of leaving, son?' Mint appeared silently beside him, her buckskin boots making no sound on the soft ground. She smiled and her dark eyes glinted with merriment. ‘There is no need to leave, Wah-he-joe-tass-e-neen – your bride, your Firebird is coming to you.'

Joe looked at his mother, his eyes narrowing. It was true he had felt that Llinos was near. Was she here, on the plains of America or was it a wish-thought, a dream?'

Mint took his arm and guided him to the top of a small hill. ‘Out there, see the cloud of dust? It is your little white squaw come to claim you.'

He did not ask Mint how she knew these things. The senses of his people were honed to a point of sharpness that was beyond him. The instincts of the Mandan Indians were unspoilt by the march of progress. Their minds were not blunted by the rigours of education as Joe's were.

‘You will marry here, after all, my son.' Mint smiled as she caressed his cheek. ‘Your seed will return one day and live among my people. It is the wish of the spirits.'

Joe was suddenly afire. ‘I must go to meet her. Will you lend me a horse, Mint?'

‘Take the black stallion but don't ride him too hard, he's getting to be an old man. While I wait I'll prepare a welcome. Sho Ka is bringing freshly baked bread and I'll cook some buffalo meat. Don't worry, we will make your white squaw welcome in our lodge.'

Joe looked down at his clothes, Indian clothes made of skins, decorated with beads, and wondered what Llinos would make of them.

‘She will be here within the hour. Make haste, son.' Mint moved past him into the lodge, making a sweeping gesture with her hands. ‘Don't stand there dreaming, go.'

Joe nodded his thanks to Black Crow as the brave swung wide the gate of the stockade. He had become friends with Sho Ka's mate, the two men of similar ages but from different worlds. A bond had been forged between them that would never be broken.

As Joe rode the stallion across the plains he felt the softness of the breeze lifting his hair. He breathed in the scents of the plain, the sound of the buffalo, the calling of birds overhead. It was an open world, a world of big skies and great expanses of virgin land. But what would Llinos think of it?

He thought of her face, of her hair, her hands. His loins were on fire, he wanted Llinos, wanted to own her, to look into her soul. Now she had come to him nothing would keep them apart.

Llinos felt the thump of the horses' hooves as though it was inside her head. The wagon jerked from side to side with bone-shaking abruptness. It was growing hot and the dust rose in choking clouds. It was a frightening land, a land where great creatures roamed, staring with malevolent eyes at the procession of horse and wagon.

The sea journey had taken longer than Llinos had anticipated but she had taken to sailing as if born to it. Binnie on the other hand spent the entire journey in his cabin sick to his stomach at every lurch of the ship.

When night folded around the vast seas, Llinos had questioned her wisdom in undertaking a journey into the unknown. What would she do when she landed on the American continent? She had only the address on Joe's letter to guide her. Would she ever find the Mandan stockade?

In the sea port town of Troy, Llinos and Binnie had lodged for four days in a clean clapboard house near the docks. The plump landlady took her for Binnie's sister and Llinos saw no need to go into complicated explanations.

In the evenings, at supper served around the homely table, Llinos and Binnie had discussed their journey with the other lodgers. When they left, it was with repeated directions, instructions and good wishes to speed them on their way.

The wagon jerked over a rock and Llinos blinked, adjusting her vision to scan the unending land. She flicked the reins, encouraging her horse to walk on. Up ahead, Binnie rode uncomfortably on the small piebald; they would need two animals, they had been told, in case one of them went lame.

She had been glad she had saved the wages she had earned at the Tawe Pottery, for once embarked on her journey she found she needed every penny she had.

As she travelled along the strange alien land, she felt a twinge of guilt that she had left Swansea without a word to her father. She had left Eynon a brief note but she knew they would both be bitterly hurt by her disappearance. But she would write, soon, and tell them she was well and happy.

Binnie shifted his position on the horse and Llinos smiled, he was not used to riding without the comfort of a saddle. But saddles cost money, money Llinos could not afford.

Binnie reined in his horse. ‘Perhaps I should give the poor creature a rest and ride in the wagon for a while,' he said. Llinos nodded. ‘I can see that some poor creature needs a rest and it's not necessarily the horse!'

Like a sudden mist that rises from a river, Llinos felt a strange sensation that Joe was near. She stood up in the wagon and stared ahead of her.

‘Wait, Binnie! There's someone coming towards us,' she said. ‘It's a single rider.'

‘I see him, it looks like a native.' His voice held a note of uncertainty and Llinos saw him finger the knife at his belt.

She felt her heart beat faster. Her hands gripped the side of the wagon.

‘Lord in heaven!' Binnie exclaimed. ‘He's riding like the wind. I hope the man means us no harm.' He straightened and stared ahead of him, his eyes fixed on the swiftly moving horseman.

Llinos held her breath, she saw him clearly now, the dark hair flying, the strong lithe body at one with the big black horse he was riding.

‘Joe!' Llinos shouted his name and the breeze took the words and cast them around the heavens and, as if in response, the rider raised his hand in greeting.

He was close enough to be seen clearly now. His skin gleamed, more bronze than Llinos had remembered. His clothes were edged with strips of leather and his neck and hair were decked with feathers. But as he drew his quivering horse to a standstill Llinos saw that Joe's eyes were as clear blue as she had always remembered them.

She held out her arms and he took her, lifting her easily onto his horse. She clung to him, tears running down her cheeks and into her mouth.

‘Welcome to America.' His cultured voice was as much of a shock as it had been the first time Llinos had heard it. She clung to his waist, her face buried against his broad back. She knew the scent of him so well, she felt his muscles move beneath his coat and she was filled with happiness. He was hers, Joe had not forgotten her.

‘Bring the wagon, Binnie,' Joe said. He turned the horse and rode the animal more sedately now. Llinos clung to Joe, wanting nothing more from life than she had in her arms at this moment. She was with the man she loved, the sun was shining above her, the breeze smelled sweet and even the strange-looking buffalo seemed to watch the progress of the small band with a more benign stare.

‘My mother knew you were here,' Joe said. ‘She is wise and beautiful, Llinos, nearly as beautiful as you.'