Serpent Never Sleeps (15 page)

"You don't have to give your answer today," he said. "The cabin's not ready yet. It needs things. Chairs. A bench. A table. And a proper bed—I've been sleeping on a pile of cornhusks. Glass for the window, and a curtain, too. We need a curtain badly. You could choose the color you like best. The Indians are curious about the window, having seen none before. They come up and look. All times of day. Put their noses inside and just look."

I didn't answer. The cake pan was getting heavy so I shifted it from one hand to the other.

"Leave it. 'Twill be a covenant between us," he said. "I'll hang it on the wall by the fireplace."

I gave him the pan and walked on toward the river. A four-pronged buck crossed our path and bounded away through the trees.

"Just the right size to roast in the fire," Tom said. He gave me a quick glance, aware that I was silent. "You're not worrying about food? About the Starving Time? We'd never want here in Henrico. The forest's full of deer and such. It's not like the swamps at Jamestown."

It was very quiet as we came to the trees that bordered the river. Then there was a sound, a high-pitched stuttering sound. I'd heard it before.

"Turkey cock calling its mate," Tom said.

"Indians make that sound, too," I said.

"You don't need to fear the Indians any more than the starving."

"I don't fear either one."

"What is it then? Why are you so silent, walking along with your eyes on the ground?" He stopped, reached out and lifted my chin. "It isn't that Rolfe fellow occupying your mind, is it?"

John Rolfe was one of the neighbors who had come to the housewarming, a nice, well-spoken young man. I had been with him and Mistress Rolfe when their baby died in Bermuda. And after his wife died in Jamestown, he had been attentive to me.

"I saw him hovering over you today, smacking his lips over your cake."

"It was terrible cake," I said, to get his thoughts off John Rolfe. "The flour was weevily and I had only a spoon of molasses and the fire went out twice while it was baking."

"But Rolfe thought it was wonderful tasty, ate most of it." Tom rubbed his forehead. "Oh, I understand well enough how you could be taken with him. He's handsome and a right proper gentleman. And now he's got a big parcel of land all planted out."

John Rolfe didn't like the rough Indian tobacco and had gotten his hands on some tobacco seeds from the West Indies.

"The tobacco he's raising is far better than what the Indians raise," Tom said. "He'll soon be making money. I haven't even planted my fields yet." He
thrust out his brown hands and square wrists. "But that time is not far away."

Through the trees the river came into view, winding slowly to the sea. A south wind had sprung up, rustling the trees. The turkey call sounded again and was answered from the far shore of the river.

"In the name of all that's good," Tom asked, "what is it? What makes you hold back?"

"Everything," I said. "The awesome forests that go darkly on forever. The sounds of things that lurk there. The river that winds on and on soundlessly. The nights that smother you with stars. The summer's scorching suns. The winter days of driving snow. The dying and the dead. Jamestown and Henrico and Virginia! Everything!"

Tom looked away. He was hurt. His hurt would have been deeper had I said that though Anthony Foxcroft was dead, I had not forgotten him, nor would I ever.

Once the rebuilding of Jamestown and the building of Henrico were well under way, Marshal Dale acted swiftly in the search for Pocahontas.

During the winter, he had read the reports Governor Percy had gathered. He was certain that she was living somewhere on the Potomac River or one of its tributaries. Why she was there did not matter, nor whether she wanted to return to Jamestown. What mattered was that she be found as quickly as possible and reunited with her father before the storehouses ran dry and the colony starved.

He called Captain Argall and me to the fort, which he had rebuilt and armed with rows of cannons. We reached his quarters by a long flight of steps in the shape of a corkscrew and came out breathless, into a large room stuffed with armor. The walls were decorated with crossed swords and flags, mementos of Marshal Dale's campaign in Flanders.

We found him standing at a small window, really a gunport, looking down upon the river and Captain Argall's ship.

"You were on the Potomac only a few months ago," he said to the captain. "And before that, sent by Lord De La Warr. Both times you were treated well?"

"Yes, and fortunate in making the acquaintance of Japazaws, king of Pastancie. The king was well disposed toward me because years ago he was befriended by Captain John Smith. It was the reputation of Smith among the Patawamake that made it possible to bring back eleven hundred bushels of splendid corn."

"Unfortunately gone, consumed weeks ago," said Dale. "You also brought three hostages and left one with Japazaws, an Ensign Swift, as proof of good will. But more important, you brought news of Pocahontas."

"Rumors."

"But believable ones."

"At least a shadow of the truth," Captain Argall said. "She's somewhere in the vicinity, possibly on one of the creeks, but not on the river, because I was there. The Indians along the creeks are extremely dangerous."

"Can you navigate the creeks?" Dale asked.

"Not in the
Treasurer.
She draws close to nine feet. But I could if I carried a longboat."

"When can you sail? The earliest? As you know, our storehouses are almost empty."

"There's a leak to attend. A list to the mainmast. Work on the rudder. This is Monday. Say in a week."

"Kindly get at it," Thomas Dale said. He waited
until Argall had left, standing at the gunport until he saw him climb the ship's ladder, before he spoke to me.

"I have called you," he said, "because I hear that you have met and talked to Pocahontas. Is that right?"

"Yes, sir. At the Powhatan temple in Werowo-cómoco."

He gave me a dubious glance. "From what I heard of your trip I expected to find an experienced woman. But before me stands a mere maiden. How old are you?"

"Nineteen, sir."

"God befriend me! This is not a frolicsome day in the country, an English picnic. This is an Indian mission fraught with danger, as Captain Argall testified."

"No more dangerous than life in Jamestown," I replied, fearful that my chances had slipped away. "Captain Argall sailed the Potomac twice and has told us that he was well treated there."

"Captain Argall was on a different mission. He was trading beads and bells for food. This has nothing to do with trade. We are on a search in strange waters. Our quarry is a proud, headstrong girl protected by powerful friends. She can't be captured by force and hauled away to Jamestown. She must be persuaded, ever so gently, to join us."

"I agree. I'll talk to her gently and kindly."

"In what, the King's English?"

"She does speak some English, sir. But since that
time, I have studied some of the Indian dialects. There are six captives here at the fort and I've learned from them."

Marshal Dale looked impressed. To further impress him, I added, "Also some of the languages spoken around the Potomac, like those used by the Susquehanna and the Masgawameke."

"Quite remarkable," the marshal said. "And no doubt you've learned the sign language, which I understand is common among the various tribes."

Eagerly I made the signs of clouds, the sun, the moon, a voyage of five days, a pretty girl, and a tall, ugly man. I would have made more signs if the marshal had not broken in to say that with some trepidation he would accept me as a member of the Argall party.

"But mind you," he warned, "Captain Argall is a disciplinarian. He'll brook no female vapors. I repeat, this is a most dangerous undertaking. And you must think of it as such, not as a girlish prank."

"Oh, the good Lord forbid it, it is no prank, Your Honor. It is a most serious undertaking."

"De La Warr told me when we last talked in London that you were a heedless sort. I am inclined to believe him right. Therefore a word of caution before you set off. A lively sense of fear has saved many lives. And it could well save yours, Miss Serena."

Fear? Fear, as always, was far from my thoughts, but I frowned, nodded, and said, "I'll remember your words. I'll be fearful, Marshal Dale."

Striding to the gunport, he watched the men idling on the deck of Argall's ship. After a moment he shouted down, "Stir your stumps, rascal outcasts, or I'll see that the captain is promptly among you with a cat-o'-nine-tails."

He turned his angry gaze upon me, half-smiled as he saw my beaming face, then suddenly shook his head. "It won't do," he said. "An unfortunate idea. I would be dismantled limb from limb if you were killed. It's a man's job. It requires a firm hand and a cold eye. We deal with savages, not with the civilized. Indians understand only the sword. They cower in their dens now that I have used it upon them."

They did cower. Along the James and its streams, throughout Southern Tidewater, Dale was known as a bloody monster. There was scarcely a family among Powhatan's people that did not mourn a brother, a husband, or a father, someone he had tortured or killed. The laws he used upon the Indians were even more ferocious than the Laws of Blood with which he ruled Jamestown.

I saw that my dream, my chance of returning to England, was slipping away. It made me angry. "You don't need a man with a sword and a cold eye to bring Pocahontas back to Jamestown."

"Something tells me she won't return without them."

"From what Captain John Smith has said about her and from what I have learned, she will not return if she's ill-treated."

"We don't need to ill-treat her. If she resists, we'll take her firmly by the hand."

"And bring her here against her will? 'Tis nonsensical, sir."

The scar across his forehead turned dead-white. It was a warning, but I did not heed it.

"You'll have a sullen girl on your hands. Who, if I know her, will not lift her little finger to put so much as a grain of corn in your empty storehouses."

"You know more about her than you do about Marshal Thomas Dale."

"Yes, much more. She is like me, I found. She won't be threatened."

"Marshal Dale does not threaten. He acts, as you well know."

"You can't force her into anything, no more than her father could. She was Captain John Smith's dear friend. Her father objected to their friendship. She defied him. She saw Captain Smith whenever it pleased her. Pocahontas and I are nearly the same age. We are alike in many ways. We have talked together. We can again."

The marshal began to stride, his boots pounding on the floor, his sword clanking at his side. He glanced out the window, shouted something, and fixed me with a sidelong stare.

"You're mother to a child, a solemn, pale-faced little thing. Have you made provisions to care for her if you go?"

"No, but I shall, this day."

"I repeat again, 'tis a dangerous mission you embark upon. If you're captured and slain in some heathenish rite, I will see that she's properly taken care of."

Heathenish rite? Death? It was a sobering thought, yet it passed quickly.

"Gather yourself," he said. "Be ready to sail within a fortnight."

"I am ready now," I said in a firm voice. "And if I don't return, will you take proper care of Humility?"

"A promise."

"And send her to England?"

"Yes, to England."

"To Foxcroft?"

"To Foxcroft, which I knew well before you were born."

Captain Argall, working his crew around the clock, driven by Marshal Dale, had his ship ready to sail at noon on Monday of the following week. Marshal Dale sent us off with a fiery speech.

"Remember," he said from the riverbank, resplendent in his marshal's uniform, "that you go on a voyage fraught with the gravest dangers, one that must not fail. The life of the colony, its existence, depends upon you. Remember that a captive girl brought Naman to the Prophet. A captive woman was the instrument by which Iberia was brought into the Christian fold. You'll be faced by the devil's vast minions, you who are so few. But remember that God gives the weak of this world the strength to confound the mighty."

Humility stood beside him, clutching the hem of his velvet cloak. At the last minute he had demanded that I permit him to care for her while I was gone. She was in safe hands. Still I wondered if he'd spoil her, if she'd be bedazzled by his glittering sword,
jeweled chains, and loops of gold braid, by bits of food taken from the barren storehouse.

We took Quemo, the Patawamake hostage, with us. The day was hot. The shores of the Chesapeake were lost in haze, but a brisk south wind filled our sails and drove us hard through the night. We were becalmed the next day in an airless maze of isles and inlets.

There was fear among some members of the crew, Marshal Dale's warning still ringing in their ears, that we might be ambushed in one of the narrow passages. But Captain Argall assured them that the Indians in this part of the Chesapeake were friendly.

"I've made the voyage twice before," he said, "and found them well disposed toward the white man."

A tall, powerfully built man with a steady eye, a captain thoroughly familiar with the ocean seas and the Virginia waters, he lessened their fears. But the next day, as we passed close upon the shores of a wooded island, not an Indian to be seen, a shower of stone-tipped arrows descended upon us. Three of our men were wounded and one was pierced through the heart.

We entered peaceful waters on the fourth day under a deep blue sky, a beautiful forest marching down to the shore and the air loud with bird cries. But here, too, there was a sudden alarm.

Coming upon a break in the forest on the landward side of the bay, the lookout called down from the mainmast that he saw what looked like an encampment of a thousand Indians. As we drew closer, we saw that it was a great herd of shaggy beasts grazing along the grassy banks of a stream, animals Captain Argall said were buffalo.