Red Prophet: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Volume II (38 page)

“You only did half the labors of Hercules in the last twenty-four hours,” said Taleswapper.

“Her what?”

“Hercules. A Greek.”

“I got to find Ta-Kumsaw,” said Alvin. “I shouldn’t have let him go, but I was so tired.”

“You’re White, too,” said Taleswapper. “Think he’ll want you with him?”

“Tenskwa-Tawa prophesied,” said Alvin. “As long as I’m with him, Ta-Kumsaw won’t die.”

Taleswapper supported Alvin as they walked to the one place that let them approach; they climbed the gentle grassy rise between Mounds and crested the hill. They stopped and looked down. Taleswapper saw no path—just thorns, vines, bushes, brambles. “I can’t get down through that.”

Alvin looked up at him, puzzled. “There’s a path as plain as day.”

“For you, maybe,” said Taleswapper. “Not for me.”

“You got in here,” said Alvin.

“With Ta-Kumsaw,” said Taleswapper.

“He got out.”

“I’m no Red man.”

“I’ll lead.”

Alvin started out with a few bold steps, as easy as if he was on a Sunday jaunt on the commons. But to Taleswapper it looked like the briars opened wide for him and closed up tight right after. “Alvin!” he called. “Stay with me!”

Alvin came and took him by the hand. “Follow tight behind,” he said.

Taleswapper tried, but still the brambles snapped back and tore at his face, cut him sore. With Alvin going before, Taleswapper could make his way, but he felt like he was being flayed from behind. Even deerskin was no match for thorns like daggers, limbs that snapped back at him like a bo’sun’s lash. He could feel blood running
down his arms, his back, his legs. “I can’t go any more, Alvin!” said Taleswapper.

“I see him,” said Alvin.

“Who?”

“Ta-Kumsaw. Wait here.”

He let go of Taleswapper’s hand; he was gone for a moment, and Taleswapper was alone with the brambles. He tried not to move, but even his breathing seemed to provoke more stings and stabs.

Alvin was back. He took Taleswapper by the hand. “Follow me tight. One more step.”

Taleswapper steeled himself and took the step.

“Down,” said Alvin.

Taleswapper obeyed Alvin’s tugging and knelt, though he feared that he’d never be able to rise again through the briars that closed over his head.

Then Alvin led his hand until it touched another hand, and suddenly the brambles cleared a little, and Taleswapper could see Ta-Kumsaw lying there, blood seeping from hundreds of wounds on his nearly naked body. “He got this far alone,” said Alvin.

Ta-Kumsaw opened his eyes, rage burning. “Leave me here,” he whispered.

In answer, Taleswapper cradled Ta-Kumsaw’s head in his other arm. As more of their bodies touched, the briars seemed to sag and fall away; now Taleswapper could see a kind of path where he hadn’t seen one before.

“No,” said Ta-Kumsaw.

“We can’t get down from here without each other’s help,” said Taleswapper. “Like it or not, if you’re going to get your vengeance against the White man, you need a White man’s help.”

“Then leave me here,” whispered Ta-Kumsaw. “Save your people by leaving me to die.”

“I can’t get down without you,” said Taleswapper.

“Good,” said Ta-Kumsaw.

Taleswapper noticed that Ta-Kumsaw’s wounds looked much fewer. And those that were left were scabbed over, nearly healed. Then he realized that his own injuries didn’t hurt anymore. He looked around. Alvin sat nearby,
leaning against a tree trunk, his eyes closed, looking like somebody just flogged him, he was so spent and dreary.

“Look what we cost him, healing us,” said Taleswapper.

Ta-Kumsaw’s face showed his surprise, for once; surprise, then anger. “I didn’t ask you to heal me!” he cried. He tore himself out of Taleswapper’s grasp and tried to reach toward Alvin. But suddenly there were brambles twining around his arm, and Ta-Kumsaw cried out, not in pain, but in fury. “I won’t be forced!” he cried.

“Why should you be the only man who isn’t?” said Taleswapper.

“I’ll do what I set out to do, and nothing else, whatever the land says!”

“The words of the blacksmith in his forge,” said Taleswapper. “The farmer cutting down the trees, he says that.”

“Don’t you dare compare me to a White man!”

But the brambles bound him tight, till Taleswapper again made his painful way to Ta-Kumsaw, and embraced him. Again Taleswapper felt his own wounds heal, saw Ta-Kumsaw’s vanish as quickly as the vines themselves had let go and dropped away. Alvin was looking at them with such pleading, as if to say, How much more strength will you steal from me, before you do what you know you have to do?

With a final anguished cry, Ta-Kumsaw turned and embraced Taleswapper as fully as before. Together they made their way down a wide path to the bottom of the Mound. Alvin stumbled after them.

They slept that night where they had the night before, but it was a troubled sleep. In the morning, Taleswapper wordlessly packed up his few goods, including the book whose letters made no sense. Then he kissed Alvin on the head and walked away. He said nought to Ta-Kumsaw, and Ta-Kumsaw said no more to him. They both knew what the land had said, and they both knew that for the first time in his life, Ta-Kumsaw was going against what was good for the land and satisfying a different need. Taleswapper didn’t even try to argue against him anymore.
He knew that Ta-Kumsaw would follow his path no matter what, no matter if it left him pierced with a thousand bleeding wounds. He only hoped that Alvin had the strength to stay with him all the way, and keep him alive when all hope was gone.

About noon, after walking almost due west all morning, Taleswapper stopped and pulled his book out of his pack. To his relief, he could read the words again. He unsealed the back two-thirds of the book, the pages where he did his own writing, and spent the rest of the afternoon writing all that had happened to him, all that Alvin had told him, all that he feared for the future. He also wrote the words of the poem that had come to him the morning before, the verses that came from his mouth but Alvin’s vision. The poem was still right and true, but even as he read the words in his book, the power of them faded. It was the closest he had ever come to being a prophet himself; but now the gift had left him. It was never his gift at all, anyway. Just as he and Ta-Kumsaw had walked on the meadow without seeing anything special, never guessing that for Alvin it had been a map of the whole continent, so now Taleswapper had the words written down in his book and had no notion anymore of the power behind them.

Taleswapper couldn’t travel like a Red man, through the night, sleeping on his feet. So it took him more than a few days to get all the way west to the town of Vigor Church, where he knew there’d be a lot of folks with a long and bitter tale to tell him. If ever a folk needed such a man as Taleswapper to hear their tale, it was them. Yet if ever there was a story that Taleswapper was loath to listen to, it was theirs. Still, he didn’t shy from calling on them. He could bear it. There’d be plenty more dark tales to tell before Ta-Kumsaw was through; might as well get started now, so as not to fall behind.

16

Gilbert de La Fayette sat at his vast table, looking into the grain of the wood. Several letters lay before him. One was a letter from de Maurepas to King Charles. Obviously, Freddie had been won over by Napoleon. The letter was full of praise for the little general and his brilliant strategy.

So soon we are going to win the decisive victory, Your Majesty, and glorify your name. General Bonaparte refuses to be bound by European military tradition. He is training our troops to fight like Reds, even as he lures the so-called Americans into fighting in the open field, like Europeans. As Andrew Jackson gathers his American army, we also gather an army of men who have better claim to the name American. Ta-Kumsaw’s ten thousand will stand with us as we destroy the ten thousand of Old Hickory. Ta-Kumsaw will thus avenge the blood of the slaughter at Tippy-Canoe, while we destroy the American army and subjugate the land from the Hio to Huron Lake. In all this, we loyally give the glory to Your Majesty, for it was your insight in sending General Bonaparte here that has made this great conquest possible. And if you now send us two thousand more Frenchmen, to stiffen our line and provoke the Americans into further rashness, your act will be seen as the key intervention in our battle.

It was an outrageous letter for a mere Comte—and one out of favor—to send to his King. Yet Gilbert knew how the letter would be received. For King Charles was also under Napoleon’s spell, and he would read praise of the little Corsican with agreement, with joy.

If only Napoleon were only a vain posturer with a gift for seducing the loyalty of his betters. Then La Fayette could watch his inevitable destruction without soiling his own hands. Napoleon and de Maurepas would lead the French army to disaster, such a disaster as might well bring down a government, and lead to a curbing of the King’s authority, even an expulsion of the monarchy, as the English so wisely did a century and a half before.

But Napoleon was exactly what he seduced Freddie and Charlie into thinking he was: a brilliant general. Gilbert knew that Napoleon’s plan would succeed. The Americans would march northward, convinced that they faced only Reds. At the last moment, they would find themselves in combat with the French army, disciplined, well-armed, and fanatically loyal to Napoleon. The Americans would be forced to array themselves like a European army. Under their attack, the French would slowly, carefully retreat. When American discipline collapsed in the pursuit,
then
the Reds would attack in devastating numbers, completely surrounding the Americans. Not one American would escape alive—and almost no French lives would be lost.

It was audacious. It was dangerous. It involved exposing French troops to serious risk of destruction, as they would be vastly outnumbered by the Americans. It required implicit trust in the Reds. But Gilbert knew that Napoleon’s trust in Ta-Kumsaw was justified.

Ta-Kumsaw would have his revenge. De Maurepas would have his escape from Detroit. Even La Fayette could probably claim enough credit from such a victory to come home and live in comfort and dignity on his ancestral lands. Above all, Napoleon would become the most loved and trusted figure in the military. King Charles would surely grant him a title and lands, and send him out a-conquering in Europe, making King Charles ever richer
and more powerful and the people ever more willing to endure his tyranny.

So Gilbert carefully tore de Maurepas’s letter into tiny fragments.

The second letter was from Napoleon himself to Gilbert. It was candid, even brutal, in its assessment of the situation. Napoleon had come to realize that while Gilbert de La Fayette was immune to his intoxicating charm, he was a sincere admirer and, indeed, a friend. I
am
your friend, Napoleon. Yet I am more a friend of France than of any man. And the path I have in mind for you is far greater than being the mere toady of a stupid King.

Gilbert reread the key paragraph of Napoleon’s letter.

De Maurepas merely echoes what I say, which is comfortable but tedious. I shudder to think what would happen if he were ever in command. His idea of alliance with the Reds is to put them in uniform and stand them in rows like ninepins. What foolishness! How can King Charles consider himself anything but a halfwit, forcing me to serve
under
such an idiot as Freddie? But to Charles, Freddie no doubt seems like the soul of wit—after all, he does know how to appreciate the ballet. In Spain I won a victory for Charles that he did not deserve, and yet he is so spineless that he lets his jealous courtiers maneuver me to Canada, where my allies are savages and my officers are fools. Charlie doesn’t deserve the victory I’ll bring him. But then, Gilbert my friend, the royal blood has grown thin and weak in the years since Louis Fourteen. I’d urge you to burn this letter, except that Charlie loves me so well that I think he could read it word for word and not take offense! And if he did take offense, how would he dare punish me? What would his stature be in Europe, if I hadn’t helped old Wooden-head to a case of dysentery so I could win the war in Spain, instead of losing it, as would surely have happened without me?