I did prefer it. I turned to my father. “May I?”
“I don’t have an objection,” my father said.
“Thank you, sir,” I said to my father. I turned to Phineas. “Thank you, sir.”
“Think nothing of it, Billy,” Phineas said. “I prefer the middle watch. It’s the only hour upon which the day has no claim, and is entirely the property of the night.”
“I think sleep is the property of the night,” I said.
He laughed.
So I went up on the weather deck and prepared for the first watch with Mr. Faries, trying to ignore Andrew. The night was cold, even though I was wearing my coat and moving about the ship, but the hours passed without incident. A strong wind propelled us down the river.
I felt nervous when I thought about leaving the Ohio behind. It had been our only road through the wilderness, a reassurance of the way back home. I looked west, across a vast indiscernible landscape, and I could not help but think that until we reached the Mississippi, we would be lost in it.
Mr. Faries rang the watch bell, and a few moments later, Mr. Godfrey and Phineas came up on deck. They trudged toward us, and Mr. Faries bade them good night as he went below. I followed him, walking past Andrew at the mainmast.
His whole body shivered in the cold. But he looked up at me, trembling, and nodded, as though we were just two travelers passing each other on the road. I nodded back and continued on.
Down below, in my hammock, I could not rid my eye of that nod. The honesty in it. And I could not forget the cold. Traitor or not, he needed something to keep warm. I tried to push those thoughts away for an hour or more before finally surrendering to them. I eased out of my hammock, pulling my own blanket down after me. And then I crept from our sleeping quarters, through the Science Deck, and up the stairs.
Phineas stood up at the bow, his back to me, but I couldn’t see Mr. Godfrey. I turned downship and hurried to Andrew.
“Here,” I whispered, spreading the blanket between my raised arms.
“Th-th-thank you,” he said.
I wrapped it around him, tucking the edges over his shoulders, between his body and the mast. It took only a moment for his shivering to subside.
“Much better,” he said. “Thank you, Billy.”
I rose to leave.
As I turned, I spotted Mr. Godfrey standing nearby in the shadow of the mainmast. It seemed he had been there the whole time, watching me. I hesitated, waiting for him to scold me or take the blanket away. But he just nodded his head.
Confused, I nodded back and scurried upship. Phineas was still at the bow, facing away from me. I took the first few steps down the hatch but noticed he was working on something. What could he be doing in the dark? The instruments were still wrapped in oilcloth from the storm. I paused in the stairwell, mostly hidden, watching him.
He hunched over something for a few moments, and then stood up straight, holding that something tight in his hand. He looked over both shoulders, didn’t appear to notice me, and picked up a bottle from the deck. He slipped the something inside it, corked it, and tossed it over the bow.
I swallowed, shocked. It wasn’t Andrew. It was Phineas.
At our elevation, I doubt the splash could be heard, but I imagined it landing in the river and bobbing along until it caught somewhere along the shore, only to be picked up by one of Marin’s men.
I wasn’t sure what to do. But as Phineas turned around, I fled down the stairs, back into our sleeping quarters. I leaped into my hammock and closed my eyes, pretending to be asleep. But my heart pounded and it was difficult to keep my breathing slow and even.
Phineas was a traitor, not just to us, but to the colonies, to England and King George.
I had to tell my father. I had to tell him now. Andrew was up there, tied to the mainmast unjustly. But I was afraid, and I lay there for a long while, eyes shut tight, wishing I had not just seen what I had seen.
I slipped out of my hammock.
“Father,” I whispered, and jostled his arm. “Father.”
He jolted awake. “What are they — ?” He blinked. “Billy? What … ?”
“There’s something I need to tell you.” I looked around at the sleeping men. “Will you come to the Science Deck?”
“Right now?” he asked.
“Yes, sir. It’s very important.”
He dragged a hand down the length of his face. “What is the hour?”
“We’ve not yet passed the middle watch.”
He sat up and nodded. “I’m coming.”
I led the way onto the Science Deck and looked up the stairs through the hatch to make sure Phineas wasn’t nearby. My father slouched into the chair at his work station.
“Now what is this all about?” he asked.
“Andrew is innocent,” I said.
“Billy.” He sounded exasperated. “You woke me for this? We’ve talked about this.”
“But I saw —”
“I don’t care what you think you saw. The evidence —”
“It was Phineas,” I said.
He closed his mouth and cocked his head. “What was?”
“Phineas left that message, not Andrew.”
He sat up straight in the chair. “That is a grave accusation.”
I stared into his eyes. “I know, Father.”
“Tell me what you saw.”
And so I explained to him what I had observed from the hatch. How Phineas had inserted a message into a bottle and dropped it over the side. “It was just like the one I found,” I said.
After I’d finished, he nodded. “You were right to wake me. I will deal with this right now.”
“What will you do?”
“I am going to speak with Phineas about it and hear what he has to say.”
“You’re going to speak with him about it?” He hadn’t offered Andrew that privilege.
“Yes. Phineas is a trusted member of our Society, and as such, he is deserving of the respect that accords.” He took the first few steps up to the weather deck. “Wait here for me.” And he was gone.
My stomach felt ill. I paced around the mast in the center of the room, passing by each station. Mine with its paper and ink. Mr. Faries’s with his tools. Phineas’s, laden with his bottles.
“I knew he was innocent,” Jane said from the doorway, and I startled.
“Oh, Jane, you …”
“I’m sorry I frightened you.”
“Not frightened. Just surprised. Were you listening?”
“When you woke your father, you woke me, too.” She folded her arms, wearing her boys’ clothes. “And, yes, I eavesdropped. And I was right about Andrew.”
“It seems you were.”
“You don’t seem pleased.”
“I don’t know what I am.” Phineas had been kind to me since I had first met him, and I didn’t like to think he was a spy. But I hadn’t wanted to believe that of Andrew, either. “Nothing about this pleases me.”
“What do you think your father will do?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
Moments later, he came back down the stairs with Phineas in tow. My whole body tensed up at the sight of them.
“Billy,” my father said. “Phineas has something he would like to say to you.”
Phineas pushed back his blond hair. “Yes, Billy. I am truly sorry for what you saw. I have failed in my duties. The drinking of alcohol while on watch is a danger to the ship and a disgrace to my better judgment.” He looked me right in my eyes. “You were right to report it to your father.”
“Alcohol?” Jane said.
“Jane?” my father said. “What are you doing up and about?”
“I’m sorry, your conversation woke me, Mr. Bartram.”
“That’s quite all right.” He turned to me. “So you see, Billy. What you saw was not a man engaged in an act of treachery but a man discarding the evidence of his dereliction. An easy mistake to make in the dark of night.”
T
hat was not what I had witnessed. I had witnessed Phineas place something in a bottle, seal it up, and throw it overboard, all deliberately. Hadn’t I? Was I mistaken? Right or wrong, my father had chosen to believe Phineas’s accounting over mine and over Andrew’s proclamation of innocence.
“Phineas has been reprimanded,” my father said. “And I have his assurance that he will not drink alcohol while on watch again.”
Confusion rendered me speechless. A reprimand? “That’s all you plan to do?”
My father raised his voice. “Mind yourself.”
“Allow me to beg your pardon once more, Billy,” Phineas said.
I did not want to grant him my pardon. I wanted to protest and challenge his testimony. But I possessed just enough doubt over what I had seen to hold me back. A flat, “Thank you, sir,” was all I could bring myself to say to him. But I did muster the courage to turn to my father. “I gave Andrew one of my blankets.”
My father nodded. “I noticed that.”
I waited with my chin in the air for my reprimand.
“I would never fault your compassion, Billy,” he said. “You are like your mother in that way, and I admire it.”
That was not the response for which I was prepared.
“And now I think it is time for you and Jane to return to your beds.” He spread his hands and pressed them forward against the air. “Off you go now.”
Jane and I looked at each other. We left the Science Deck, she to her little room behind the curtain, and I to my hammock. Only I didn’t sleep. Confusion and doubt prodded me and kept my thoughts in constant motion. But the more I considered it and reconsidered it, the more I trusted what I had seen, and if Phineas had thrown a message overboard, as I believed he had, what had he written on it?
I felt certain that the French would soon learn of my father’s new plan, and I worried that thought over until the sun came up.
After we had breakfasted, Phineas made an admission to the rest of the crew similar to the one he had made to me. My father stood at his side, looking severe and disappointed, but ultimately forgiving.
I seethed at the sight of it. Andrew remained confined to the mast, although they had briefly untied him so he could eat and relieve himself at the head. The clarity of morning had brought me a firm belief in his innocence. I believed it but could not prove it. Beyond my own word, I wasn’t sure what evidence I would need to convince my father of something he did not want to see. Until I had such evidence, I felt I could do little to change his mind, and it hurt that my word was not enough to do so.
After Phineas completed his confession, the rest of the Society members expressed their indignation at his supposed misconduct but moved on quickly from it and went back to the business of the expedition. When we reached a place where the Ohio wrapped around a long meander and flowed away to the south, we left the river behind and took our journey overland to the west.
The ground we covered was flat and unremarkable. We flew over stretches of forest for twenty-five miles or so until we crossed the Wabash River.
“We’re deep in French territory now,” Mr. Kinnersley said. “The Illinois Country, as they call it.”
“And Madoc lies beyond it,” my father said. He ordered Mr. Faries to take the ship to a higher elevation to minimize the chances of our being noticed from the ground.
At the mention of the French, I imagined Phineas’s bottle still floating in the river. How long until it was found? We had penetrated the enemy’s land, and they would soon be in possession of our strategy.
Throughout the day, I did what I could to make Andrew more comfortable. I brought him food and water, and I left my blanket with him to sit upon or rest his head against. That my father allowed all of this suggested to me that perhaps the smallest root of doubt had weakened the mortar of his stone-walled will.
The ground below remained flat and densely forested, but from our distance I could not discern what types of wood they might be. Mile after mile, hour after hour, a thick rug of deep green stretched from one corner of the horizon to the other.
Jane appeared beside me at the rail, and together we watched the changeless terrain. “Do you believe Phineas?”
“No,” I said.
“Then I don’t believe him, either. I believe you.”
Her words helped me feel more certain of myself. “Thank you.” I turned to look at her. After the rain yesterday, much of her hair had escaped from its braid, forming a tangled blond corona around her head, and she had a little smudge of dirt on her cheek. “I have to do something about it.”
“What?”
“I’m not sure.”
The rest of that day passed, and then the night. Around noon the next day, we spotted a fracture in the unending foliage ahead of us. We had reached the great Mississippi River, and we had done it in just over one week. Such a journey would have taken months by land and many weeks by river. Hopefully that meant Marin and his men were far, far behind us. The bear-wolf, however, still frightened me. It seemed the beast could be anywhere.
My father stood at the bow, peering through one of the telescopes mounted there. He had it aimed to the northwest.
“I see the smoke from Kaskaskia,” he said. “But I would estimate them to be seven or eight miles away. I doubt they can spot us from here.” He checked a compass and called back to the helm. “Change heading, Mr. Faries! Follow the river southeast, one hundred forty degrees!”
“Aye, sir!” Mr. Faries called back.
The de Terzi slowed and turned as Mr. Faries set her sails from the helm and the rest of us trimmed them. She cut a broad, graceful arc through the air, high over the Mississippi, eight hundred miles from Philadelphia, and I was struck once again by the marvel of her existence.
“If we follow the reports we have received,” my father said, “when we reach the confluence with the Ohio, we turn west again. We are approaching the edge of the Madoc legend and must soon sail over it.”
The countryside below remained as it had been the day before. Dense woodland, giving way only occasionally to small patches of open prairie. But its topography began to show greater variation, with rounded hills and shallow valleys and ravines, and the river followed a winding horseshoe course back and forth along their contours.
“The soil will be rich down there,” my father said. “When the river floods, it renews the earth with fresh deposits. One day, this land will realize its potential, and this will all be cleared for farming as far as your eye can see.”
“What about the trees and plants?” I asked. “Doesn’t it bother you that they’ll be lost?”
“The resources of this earth are for our use, Billy, through wise and judicious stewardship. Until this land is tamed, it cannot reach its full potential. Much like the savage nations that now inhabit and neglect it.”
As I listened, I realized that I didn’t feel the same way as my father. I truly disagreed with him. When I thought about the trees below all cut down, I mourned them. I understood the necessity to clear ground for crops, and cut lumber for heating and building, but that did not mean I took pride in such destruction the way my father did. Was it not also wise and judicious to leave the management of nature to itself?
And it wasn’t just this that we disagreed about. There was also Andrew and the Indians. I remembered what my mother had said to me before we left our farm. You are like him in so many ways, but unlike him in others.
Now I understood what she meant. And she was right.
After taking Andrew some food, I went to find Jane. She was on the Science Deck, reading from Linnaeus again. I approached her, and she looked up at me, briefly, before returning to her book. She had cleaned her face and restored her hair to its braid.
“What are you studying?” I asked.
She showed me a page with drawings of the stamens and other structures by which plants are discerned. “I’ve made drawings of some of these for my father,” she said. “I draw them, and then I look here to identify them.”
She shook her head and shut the book. “I’m tired of reading. Let’s go above.”
We went up on deck, and found the horizon to the west had grown ominous and dark.
“Another storm,” Mr. Kinnersley said. “And I trust we won’t be landing to wait this one out?”
“No,” my father said. “We will ride this one out in the air.”
But as we sailed onward, it became apparent that this was a very different kind of storm from the last. Where the previous clouds had been heavy and low, these towered over us, taller than any mountain, far too high for us to fly over. A gale whipped past the ship, and lightning flared in the advancing, churning storm column.
I helped rewrap the instruments in oilcloth, and the canvas thrashed in the wind and tried to escape my hands. We stowed as much as we could below and secured every loose article. After we had prepared the ship, we waited and watched the storm draw nearer. But at a certain point before reaching us, it seemed to change its mind and altered its course to one parallel with ours, moving south down the river.
“Providence smiles upon us,” Phineas said.
“Nature smiles upon us,” my father said.
I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening uneasy and had little appetite when it came time to eat supper. My father assigned me the middle watch with Mr. Kinnersley, at which I groaned.
With the high winds, I worried about Andrew being cold and brought him an extra blanket.
“Thank you,” he said. “That is a bad storm.”
I glanced at it sideways.
“A bad storm,” he said. “If it —” He stopped. He shook his head. I looked in his eyes, and they appeared fearful.
“If it reaches us,” I said. “I will try to persuade my father to bring you below.”
His whole body relaxed. “Thank you, Billy.”
“You are welcome.”
I left him and descended from the weather deck, hoping to get at least a few hours of sleep before my watch. As I passed through the Science Deck, I glanced into the galley. Beyond it, I saw light spilling out from behind the door to Mr. Kinnersley’s cabin. He was in there, working on his devices. I rubbed my head and went to my hammock. But my unease at the storm kept me awake. I lay there with my eyes open in the darkness, counting the passing hours, and when the ship’s bell rang at half past midnight, I sighed and got up.
The Lost Kingdom Page 14