The Story Keeper (15 page)

“Oh, shoot!” Hannah started toward the barn, and Mike joined her in hot pursuit of Blackberry.

“That’s my fault,” I admitted. “I was afraid if I tied him fast, he might pull away and break the reins, so I just looped them.”

But when I turned back, Evan wasn’t watching Mike and Hannah dash into the pasture; instead, he’d leveled an intense look at me. “What kind of business?”

My thoughts scattered and adrenaline surged through my body. This wasn’t at all how things were supposed to happen. I liked to control my negotiations. That was how I made them successful. But now that he’d asked, I couldn’t exactly lie. “I came here about a manuscript.”

“You’re in
publishing
?” He spit it out like it was a dirty word, his hands leaving his pockets and bracing on his hips, the muscles in his jaw tight and angry.

“Yes, I am. I’d just like five minutes of your time. I’m an editor at Vida
 
—”

“And you lured my aunt into bringing you up here?” He leaned toward me so that I was forced to crane upward to meet his gaze.

“No. It wasn’t like that. She and your grandmother were hoping we could
 
—”

“So in order to get what you wanted, you took advantage of my aunt, my grandmother who’s dying of cancer, and a little girl whose mother just ditched her six months ago? Nice. Do you people have any conscience? At all?”

Guilt stabbed. Hard. Had I taken advantage? Was he right? “If you’ll just
listen
for a minute. Just let me get a whole sentence out.”

He leaned even closer, so close that I saw the flecks of silver in the centers of his eyes. Molten, just now. “Lady, I don’t
need
a whole sentence. Whatever you’ve got to say, I am
not
interested, and you are leaving.”

“I drove your aunt up here,” I protested. This was a disaster. What was I supposed to do now, strand the woman and bolt like a stray dog caught in the yard?

“I’ll see that she gets home.” He pointed the way to the front gate before he turned and started toward the barn on clipped, angry strides, leaving me dumbfounded. “Get in your car and get off my place. Now.”

Chapter 15

The Story Keeper

CHAPTER SIX

It troubled Rand no small bit, this habit of hers. It had been troubling him for three days now. Each morning when he woke, he found Sarra sitting on her handwoven blanket, knees folded beneath her, the necklace lying before her on the ground. Her ritual was identical, day by day. Always, the object of her worship
 
—the necklace bearing the six beads and the carved-bone locket box
 
—was removed with great ceremony. Then the sliding lid of the box was unfastened, and the parts of it were lifted to the sky with reverence before being placed upon the ground. When possible, a salvaged ember lay between the lid and base, its smoke carving a thin trail in the early light, the stream broken exactly three times by her hands as she waved the smoke over herself, anointing in some strange way, breathing in the essence of her deity as she performed her morning sacramental.

It was not so much the pagan nature of the ceremony that disturbed him
 
—he’d seen such things in his travels with his father. It was the strange and seemingly blasphemous intermingling of native words and symbols with those that were holy and sacred to his own faith.

Along the leather cord that held her box, the various beads were adorned with carved animal totems
 
—fish, birds, and what appeared to be a sea turtle. He might have doubted it this far from the ocean, but the necklace also contained slips of purple wampum shell of the variety often traded among native tribes as items of value. He had also come to recognize the narrow etching on the exterior of the box as the Maltese cross, similar to those he had viewed in the ancient churches of southern Europe.

Inside the box, on the reverse of the lid and the interior base itself, were carvings. He had come close enough during her worship to discern them as that of a man and a woman. The images had clearly been painted at one time, perhaps gilded even, but the colors had largely worn through, leading him to believe that the box was quite old.

He had gathered, both by looking and by listening to her ceremonials, that the images were perhaps those of the Virgin Mary and Jesus the Christ, and that the girl knew, in some rudimentary form, whom the reliefs were intended to represent. Interspersed in her prayers were the names of the Holy Mother and the Son of God, uttered along with portions of a guttural language unfamiliar to him
 
—Cherokee, perhaps. As she prayed, she touched the turtle, the fish, the birds, and each bead along the necklace strand lying before her.

The juxtaposition of sacred images with earth totems disturbed Rand more each day. These were the sort of affronts that his grandfather had quite often preached against. As bishop, it had always been his responsibility to correct in mission churches the inevitable entry of local superstitions. It was, of course, important that the missions emphasize strict adherence to the approved teachings of the church.

This morning, he took the journal and gold-nibbed pen from his saddle pack and began a sketch as he watched her. With three days passed on the trail and no recent signs of pursuit, he’d begun to take note of her means of gathering foodstuffs and other supplies from what the forest provided. As he had cataloged these things in his book, it was only prudent to catalog her as well.

Or so he told himself. In truth, he was fascinated by her in some way he could not fully comprehend nor cared to consciously examine. Though she was not one to speak unless spoken to in this uneasy partnership of theirs, he understood that her intent was to return to the place from whence she’d come, that place being far away. She had traveled the distance with her father, and Rand had come to understand that her father was of no higher estate than Jep and his cohorts.

At whatever point they did finally reach this town she knew of, Rand hoped to arrange some sort of safe care for her, purchase a horse for himself, and then decide how to proceed from that point. These last rigorous days had gone some distance toward quelling his wanderlust, and another light snow had begun this morning. They’d
camped on a ridge, and from here he could see the dark and ominous clouds billowing in. Snow clouds, though Sarra appeared strangely oblivious to the flakes settling over her skin and resting like gems on her long, dark lashes as she continued her morning chant.

          
“O-gi-do-da ga-lv-la-di céus

          
ga-lv-quo-di-yu ge-se-s-di santificado

          
tsa-gv-wi-yu-hi . . .”

For a moment, Rand became lost in her song, and he too forgot the snow. Instead, he found himself approximating her words on the page opposite the rendering of her. He let go his fear that brimstone might soon enough rain from the very heavens to which she had raised her face, and he found himself studying her
 
—an opportunity he’d seldom been allowed these past three days of flight, lest she be given to the assumption that he was no different from the men who had deprived her of her liberty and sought to savagely violate her person. The one time Rand had touched her, intending only to steady her as they crossed a frigid stream, she had pulled away so quickly that it set both of them off-balance, dooming them to sodden clothing below the knee for several hours. The drying out of those things had necessitated their larger fire last eve.

He’d reminded himself to take care in his manner toward her in the future. He could only imagine what horrors the hand of a man might conjure in her thoughts, what this poor, bruised and battered creature had endured.

          
“De cada dia de-s-gi-du-gv-i na-s-gi-ya tsi-di-ga-yo-tsi-ne-ho tso-tsi-du-gi

          
perdoai-nos as nossas ofensas,

          
assim como nós perdoamos a quem nos tem ofendido.

          
E não nos deixeis cair em tentação, mas u-yo ge-sv-i

          
e men.”

He transcribed the last of the chant and labeled the sketch of her, though he was not certain why. It was unlikely he would ever forget the details of this woman with whom he had endured the most tenuous and uncomfortable hours of his life.

Sarra, a Melungeon girl,
he wrote, and then, realizing that if he should yet perish here, his wish was for his family to know what had become of him, he added the date and a note pleading that anyone who might find his journal would return it to his family.

The silence struck him suddenly, and he looked at Sarra, found that she had focused on him and was now peering curiously toward his sketch. He turned away, embarrassed, and closed his book. When a time presented itself, he would make further notations about her rituals.

The idea possessed him with a certain guilt, a conviction that rather than observing, perhaps he should have been instructing her against these practices. Instead he found himself, day upon day, with breathless curiosity, watching this wretched but strangely alluring creature. . . .

Sarra couldn’t ken why he was lookin’ at her that way, though it didn’t figure to matter much. She could get shed of him if she’d a
need to, but they had a better chance together, and truth be told, he wouldn’t last out a day on his own. If Jep and the others didn’t get him, the mountains would.

When he sat watchin’ her that way, though, seemin’ to try to cipher her from the inside out, she thought mayhap it’d be sooner ’stead of later that she’d pull foot and disappear off in the trees or fade away down some holler, and leave him to hisself. Then she’d trek back home to Aginisi’s mountain in Tennessee country. But each time she thought of that place, she wondered whether she could find the way there on her own.

So many times on the trail with her daddy, she’d crawled inside herself, took her mind back home to Aginisi’s cabin, and she knew she was losin’ track of things as they traveled, lettin’ the rivers and the hollers and the strange-shaped rock faces slip by unmarked in her mind. But there was a grievin’ pain inside her, and it shot clean to the bone in this body, and all she could do was leave her eyes and her ears and the body behind and sail across her mind to the known places
 
—the ones where Gran-dey kept her safe with the Good Book and Aginisi taught her the Lord’s Prayer how
she
knew it, some in Cherokee and some in the old talk that’d come across the sea with the story keepers, long time ago.

Sarra’d said the Lord’s Prayer each day before leavin’ out from camp with Rand in tow. It was a mattersome thing to start the day with openin’ the little prayer box and offering up these mornin’ words, just as Aginisi had taught her. The words were a comfort, remindin’ her that even though she’s so far from home, she wasn’t but a whisper
from Father God. He lived down all the deepest hollers and up all the highest mountains, just as the Good Book promised. Always, he was within hearin’ distance.

Many’s the time they’d prayed together, her and Aginisi, after Gran-dey was gone. Things was harder then, but the prayers said had scared off wolves scratchin’ round the cabin in the winter and brought food when the corn pone ran short, when they’d used all the good things that’d been put up from last summer’s garden and the crocks waited, washed and empty in the root house. It was prayers that kept them through the hungry days and cold nights when the wild things ran near, hungry theirselves. Was prayers that put the foot of a little snowshoe hare in a snare or brought a possum out routin’ close to the cabin for no reason at all. Close enough for a clear shot at him. It was prayers that made the shot go true and gave meat when meat was needed.

All them things, Gran-dey taught her first and Aginisi taught too. All them things, Sarra learnt in that little cabin tucked along the crick. When she said the prayer, she heard Aginisi’s voice and knew that Aginisi had spoke true in the last moments before Sarra was took away by her daddy, leavin’ Aginisi to wait out the end hours of dyin’ by herself.

There’s none can move us too far a piece for love to find us, child. It’s love what ties us to heaven. A-le e-tsa-lv-quo-di-yu ge-sv ni-go-hi-lv-i.

The glory is forever. Those were Aginisi’s last words to her in Cherokee. Her death words. It was a done thing now.

From the corner of her eye, Sarra saw Rand watchin’ her as she tied Aginisi’s prayer box round her neck, where the breath of them prayers would be close to her heart while she walked. Long’s Rand didn’t touch her, she’d let him walk along again. She owed him that for savin’ her life, at least. It was a right thing she was doin’.

She did wonder about him some, though. Why he’d took the risk for her. And why he’d come to this place at all, with the cold season settin’ in. Why he scratched in that book of his and made pictures in it and tucked leaves tween the pages now and again. Why he watched her the troublesome way he did. Why he wanted to know about the roots and the leaves and the things the forest give to eat.

Why he was so different from anybody she’d ever come across before.

She’d thought to ask after him some, to understand his strange ways, but it was safer to keep shy of him, having nothin’ more to do with him than just walkin’ alongside and sharin’ a night camp.

“Ain’t a good sky,” she said, tucking her skirt twixt her legs as she squatted down nearby him, but out of reach, to bind up her blankets. “More snow’s a-comin’.” Sooner or later, it’d be heavier than just a dustin’, she knew. She’d kept them to the slopes so far, even though the goin’ was hard. Less chance they’d be seen. Down on the cricks and rivers, the snow’d be less, but the people’d be more. Brown Drigger and his dogs would use the old trails along the bottoms, and so would Jep and his men. No need of them venturin’ up the higher country. They knew, soon enough, the weather’d bring her right to their hands.

“Well, surely we’re near the settlement you mentioned. You said two days, perhaps three.”

She didn’t hear him right off. Instead, she was watchin’ his book. He’d scratched a picture in it today. She couldn’t gander what it was, but she wanted to. Might be she’d sneak a look later, while he was off to hisself someplace without his possibles bag.

Her mind was slow to turn to what he’d said
 
—
the settlement
. By then, his eyes were narrowin’ at her. She’d given somethin’ away without meanin’ to.

“There is no settlement, and you’ve no idea where we’re going. That’s the truth of it!” He stood, a hand flyin’ airborne like he meant to throw it from his body.

She shied away, scrambled back to her feet, and lifted an arm to block the blow. In the time with her daddy, Brown Drigger, and Pegleg Molly, her reflexes had got good.

“Stop that!” His look was fire now. Hot. Angered. And somethin’ else that caught her unawares. He looked like she’d hurt him in some way, like the lie had broke somethin’ between them. “Stop looking at me as though you’re expecting a beating.”

She was, of course, but she mustered up a couple words. “I ain’t.”

“I’m
not
,” he spat, his chin jutting out to give meaning.

“
You
ain’t?” He was likely the strangest man she’d ever knew. Wasn’t much chance she’d be givin’
him
a beatin’. He outweighed her by twicet.

“No. You’re
not
. I’m
not.
” Both hands fluttered through the air this time, his voice rising. A bird skittered from the tree above. “
Ain’t
is a foul word. Nothing for a young woman’s mouth. Good heavens, were you reared in a den of blackguards as well as liars?”

There were words she didn’t ken, but she knew enough, and she thought of Aginisi and Gran-dey, who’d raised her up and kept her safe and taught her all there was to know of survivin’ from what the forest give. Aginisi and Gran-dey, who were gone now. Who’d been spoke ill of . . . by this helpless buckwheater who knew nothin’ of how to keep hisself alive on the mountain.

Her hackles rose up as she scooped her blanket and the tiny bundle of tinder she’d tucked close to her skin to keep it warm and dry for tonight’s fire. Hitchin’ up her pack, she went to walkin’ without givin’ him much as another word.