Lake in the Clouds

by Sara Donati

  The door closed on her grumbling. Hannah listened, but she could not hear Mrs. Douglas moving through the house. She imagined that the old black woman must be trembling with laughter as she made her way through the halls to the kitchens.

  She would come through the swinging doors with her hands on her hips and the women busy with the day’s baking and cooking would pause, floury hands held in midair while they listened to the story of two boys in a water fight out on the public street where God and man could watch. And then Marcus would come to the door and they would laugh while Mrs. Douglas rubbed his head dry with a piece of toweling, talking the whole time about the kind of hardship that waited around the corner for black boys who forgot their manners, duties, and good sense.

  The kitchen would smell of yeast, of meat turning on the spit and cornbread in the oven, of vinegar and cinnamon and ginger. The door would open and close as the other servants came and went with well water, fish fresh from the river, onions from the root cellar, eggs slipped from the nest by quick brown fingers. They would stay to talk for a minute, to swallow down cornbread spread with the drippings from yesterday’s joint of beef, to chop parsley for the soup pot.

  Most of the servants in this house were black, but none of them were slaves or even indentured; they could move about the city as they pleased once their work was done. No doubt some of them went to the Free School, and knew Manny Freeman.

  Hannah looked down again at the empty walkways winding through Bowling Green, studied the houses where wealthy men still slept behind drawn draperies and closed windows. With sudden purpose, she went to the dressing room and searched out her simplest gown.

  She picked out Marcus right away by his damp hair and the gleam in his eye. He was seated at a long trestle table between Peter and Ethan, where all three boys were applying themselves to breakfast with enthusiasm. Hannah was almost sorry when Ethan caught sight of her, jumping up with his spoon in his fist, grinning so joyfully that all of Hannah’s doubts about this journey disappeared. Whatever else might come of their time in the city, Ethan had put his worries behind him for a while at least, and that was worth a great deal.

  “Miss Hannah.” Mrs. Douglas greeted her with a polite but puzzled smile. “We can bring your breakfast up to your room if you too hungry to wait. No need to come belowstairs, you realize. Didn’t anybody show you the bell pull in your room?”

  All around the crowded kitchen dark eyes were fixed on her, but there was neither friendship nor animosity in any of them. They simply didn’t know what to make of her, an Indian woman who had been welcomed into the house as a guest, a colored woman they must treat as though she were white.

  Hannah said, “I would like to sit down and eat with the boys, if that isn’t too much trouble.”

  Mrs. Douglas hesitated just long enough for Hannah to realize that the older woman was concerned. No doubt she had seen and heard many things out of the ordinary in the Spencer household, but Hannah knew that this was very possibly the first time that a guest had asked to eat in the kitchen with servants and children.

  Hannah said, “I am far more comfortable here than in the dining room. It reminds me of home. Please let me stay.”

  They made a place for her at the trestle table, and the housekeeper filled a plate with hot biscuits, ham drizzled with honey, and a great mountain of cornmeal mush topped by a puddle of melted butter. Hannah assured Mrs. Douglas that it was more than she needed or had hoped for, and gradually the kitchen settled back into its normal rhythms.

  “Today we are going to Wall Street to see Dr. King’s orangutans,” Ethan announced. “And then to Mr. Bowen’s waxworks. There’s a likeness of President Jefferson.” He went on outlining a day’s outing that would have exhausted anyone but a child who had been cooped up on a sailing boat for two days.

  “I expect we’ll have to pour you into your beds tonight,” said Hannah, and all three boys nodded their heads in cheerful agreement.

  “Will you be going along too, Marcus?”

  The boy swallowed. “Yes’m. I go wherever Peter goes.” He held up his head proudly. “I’m in training to be a manservant.”

  “A manservant do more listening than talking,” called Mrs. Douglas. “That’s a lesson you ain’t learned yet.”

  “My father is taking us,” said Peter. “He’s not going down to his offices at all today. You’re coming too, aren’t you, Hannah?”

  “I can’t this morning,” she said, cutting into her ham. “I promised Curiosity and Galileo that I would see Manny right away. I have a package for him.” And a message, she thought, and caught Ethan’s eye. He ducked his head to study the tines of his fork.

  Ethan was the only other person who knew that part of the reason she had to see Manny was to pass on news of Selah. He also understood very well what a delicate business it was, and he had promised faithfully to never speak of it to anyone. What he didn’t know, of course, was that Liam Kirby had given her another message for Manny, and by far the more worrisome one.

  Tell him to step careful, and to stay out of Micah Cobb’s way. Tell him, it wasn’t just luck that sent Vaark to the Newburgh dock.

  The clock in the hall chimed seven, and Hannah wondered when she would be able to slip away. Certainly not before she had checked on Kitty, and Will and Amanda had come down to breakfast.

  Marcus had stopped eating to watch her, his brow furled. He said, “Miss Hannah, how do you know Manny Freeman?”

  “We grew up together,” said Hannah. “He is almost ten years older than me, but I spent a lot of time with his family. Do you know Manny from the Free School?”

  “Everybody know Manny,” said Marcus. “Ain’t that so, Grandma?”

  Mrs. Douglas came to the table with a great copper bowl of egg whites tucked in the crook of her arm. “That’s true enough,” she said, whipping the whites with a fork.

  “Maybe you can tell me how to find the Free School,” Hannah said. “I’d like to see him today, if I could.”

  “You don’t need to go all the way to the—” Marcus started, and then stopped at the cold look his grandmother gave him.

  Mrs. Douglas said, “We see Manny from time to time.”

  Peter had been very quiet until now. He was naturally timid, the kind of boy who was so happy to be in the company of older boys he admired that he didn’t trust himself to speak. But he obviously felt he needed to break that rule, because he stood abruptly as if he had been ordered to give a formal recitation in front of a stern teacher.

  “But we see Mr. Freeman almost every day,” he said in his high, soft voice, his narrow brow furled in confusion. “He comes to visit with my father. Sometimes he comes with Dr. MacLean and sometimes Mrs. Kerr and sometimes alone. They stay in Father’s study for a very long time and they talk about society business. Sometimes Father lets me stay, if I am quiet.” His voice dropped, and he leaned across the table toward Hannah. “Sometimes Mr. Freeman brings me a carved animal for my collection. He is very good at carving.”

  Mrs. Douglas was looking decidedly uncomfortable, her mouth pursed into a tiny, tight O. She said, “You boys run off now and leave me to my work.” And to Hannah: “Miz Hannah, if you would be so kind and wait for just a minute?”

  When the boys had disappeared into the garden, Mrs. Douglas handed her bowl to another woman and sat down heavily across from Hannah. For a moment her energy seemed to desert her, leaving her face to old age and worry. There was a streak of flour on her brow, and Hannah had the urge to wipe it away.

  Mrs. Douglas had a kind smile. She said, “Peter is a sweet child, always so eager to help that he maybe said more than he should.”

  Hannah realized with considerable surprise and disquiet that the housekeeper was admitting that Peter had been reporting secrets not meant for her to hear, and asking her to forget all of it.

  She said, “You don’t know me, but I hope you’ll believe me when I say that I wouldn’t repeat anything that might cause Manny Freeman or the Spencers or …
” She paused, and considered the intelligent, wary look in Mrs. Douglas’s eyes.

  “Or any voyager harm.”

  A flickering across the old woman’s eyes, recognition and fear and relief too. Then she leaned across the table and put a hand on Hannah’s forearm, squeezed hard.

  “I got to be getting breakfast on the table,” she said. “But I hope you’ll come back and talk to me again sometime soon.”

  “I will,” Hannah said, immensely relieved and pleased that she had managed to build some kind of understanding between them. “I will come back. But if I could ask you first for directions to the Free School—”

  Mrs. Douglas nodded. “I’ll ask Cicero to show you the way in an hour’s time or so. Will that do?”

  Hannah assured her that it would serve very well, and then she found her way to the next breakfast table, where Will Spencer was sitting alone and reading his newspaper.

  Will insisted that she sit down to keep him company in spite of the fact that she had already had her breakfast. With what he meant to be a stern expression, Will informed her that Amanda was with Kitty and had left instructions not to be disturbed.

  Hannah said, “I appreciate your concern for me, but I am supposed to write to Richard today to report on her condition and treatment. It’s my responsibility, even if her doctors dislike that idea.”

  Will narrowed his eyes at the mention of the doctors. “Tomorrow is time enough for you to take all that on your shoulders. I insist on having my way on this for today at the very least. And you have other engagements as well. This afternoon I will take you to the dispensary and introduce you to Dr. Simon. After that you may be better able to write to Dr. Todd.”

  “What about Dr. King’s monkeys?” Hannah smiled. “The boys will be very disappointed to miss them.”

  “The boys will miss nothing at all,” said Will. “And you will not be left on your own to go out into the city. Now tell me, how did you leave your stepmother and father?”

  This brought Hannah up short, for the one thing she had failed to discuss with Elizabeth was how much information about the current trouble at home should be passed on to Will Spencer. It was hard to imagine Elizabeth keeping anything from Will, but then to involve him in the smuggling of slaves was something that Hannah did not like to take upon herself. Neither could she lie to him directly.

  If Will was disturbed by her long silence, he showed no sign of it. Finally Hannah said, “Liam Kirby came back to Paradise a few weeks ago, looking for an escaped slave. He hasn’t found her, as far as I know.”

  Will blinked at her, his face impassive. “I remember Liam from Paradise,” he said finally. “You were once very good friends. He lives here in the city now, you must know.”

  “Yes.” Hannah stood abruptly. “I really should look in on Kitty, she will think I’ve forgot her altogether.”

  “Come now,” Will said with a smile. “I won’t ask questions about Liam Kirby if you prefer not to talk. But you can’t run off until I’ve given you all this post that your old friend the Hakim left for you.”

  “The Hakim? Hakim Ibrahim was here?”

  “Last week. He was sorry to hear that he would miss you, and he sends his very best wishes.”

  Hannah slumped back in her chair and searched in vain for something to say that wouldn’t sound childish and discouraged, but Will had already turned his attention to the pile of newspapers and packages beside him. After some sorting he brought a great armful to Hannah.

  “I know you must be disappointed, but I think this will help a bit.”

  She began to sift through the unexpected bounty, dividing it into piles. A large batch of extracts from letters and medical journals that the Hakim had copied out for her, bound with string; a very heavy package she could not identify by shape; another of books; a small box securely nailed shut; and seven letters. Five were addressed to her father or to Elizabeth, but two were for her.

  “I will leave you to your post,” said Will, and withdrew before Hannah could make herself look up from the letters in her lap to thank him.

  The thicker letter was from the Hakim, and would most probably require that she open the box and packages as she read. She put that one aside to save for later. The other letter was from her cousin Jennet at Carryckcastle in Scotland. Hannah had not seen any of her Scots relatives in seven years, but her correspondence with Jennet had kept the connection very much alive. She had the room to herself, and so she opened it carefully and unfolded the pages.

  Dear Cousin Hannah,

  It’s four months or more since we’ve had word from Lake in the Clouds. No doubt a fat letter will come the morrow with news enough to satisfy what my mother calls my unladylike curiosity, but as the Isis leaves the Solway Firth this afternoon bound for New-York, I cannot wait any longer to put down on paper what news there is to tell, good and bad.

  My father writes his own letter to your father, and still bids me report that we are all thriving, and in good health. As an obedient daughter I must do as he asks, and now to that I add my own words: it’s no so true as I would like it to be. Father is overtired of late and in some pain, though he would rather cut out his tongue than admit such a thing. He has got the habit of resting in his greenhouse when he thinks nobody will take note and has no strength even to care for his beloved tulips. My mother his guidwife says that the Earl of Carryck can take his rest where and when he pleases, and what better place than among the flowers and plants that give him such pleasure?

  The simple truth is that he is as stubborn and wily as ever he was, as stubborn as all the earls of Carryck afore him. No doubt my brother Alasdair for all his sweet devilment will grow to be just like him, for it’s a trait bred in the bone and there’s wee use denying it. How else to explain a man of eighty-one years who claims he needs no doctor to help him to his grave? And still he could not turn away Hakim Ibrahim when he arrived with the Isis just ten days ago. We were gey pleased to see him, for all my father’s protests. The Hakim’s tonics and teas and oils seemed to bring some relief, enough at least to make my mother sing again in the mornings. The earl even spoke of riding out with Luke to see the tenants.

  Then just yesterday the Hakim asked to see my mother alone in the surgery and when he left she was white-faced and more snappish than I’ve seen her in a good long while. She announced to me that the earl would outlive us all, no matter what the doctors had to say about it. But in truth she’s frightened, as are we all. Even Alasdair seems to ken what lies ahead, and for all his tumbling about and noise he comes of an evening to lay his head on Father’s lap and let himself be petted, like a wolf cub almost tamed.

  The truth of it is, the earl has been putting his affairs in order for six months or more. How many times have I heard him tell my mother that with such good men to depend on she need not bother herself with the affairs of the earldom. There’s Ewan Huntar wha has been our factor these three years since he returned hame from his studies in Edinburgh. Never will I understand why a man needs Latin to see to the running of the castle and the tenants and shipping, but the earl is weel pleased with Ewan and says he has the sense for money and the head for law. Luke can turn his hand to inkpot and ledger too but he’s pleased to leave it all to Ewan. He and Nezer Lun bear the responsibility of keeping Carryck strong and the men ready to defend kith and kin from Campbells or even Englishmen, should it come to that.

  In that much Luke has changed no a single mote. He’s still most content rushing about on horseback. He and Nezer spend all their days thinking up one drill after another to keep the men sharp and ready, and when they tire of parading up and down and turning the heads of the lasses from the village, then they gallop off to the hunt and are gone for days at a time.

  It’s seven years since your father and mine made the agreement that brought your half brother here to Scotland. Betimes it seems as if the others forget that Luke was born far away in Canada and never set foot on Carryck lands until he was as old as you and I are now—but I rememb
er, and so does Luke. My lady mother claims that he’s a Scott of Carryck through and through, but she kens him no so well as I. When we go riding it seems that Canada is all he cares to talk about, how vast it is and how green with trees and about his Granny Iona the runaway nun, and the great river named after a saint crowded with blocks of ice as big as houses in the spring so that men leap from one to the next and lay wagers on who’ll land first in the drink.

  Perhaps it has to do with his mother’s going hame to Montreal last year. He seldom speaks of missing her, but I see it in his face and every day a bit stronger, the wanting to be away. For a while I thought that Ewan’s sister Katie might tie him down to Carryck with a bairn. Your brother is as fond as any man of the lasses, but he’s no completely daft and all her twitching and giggling have brought her naught but a sorry reputation. Luke is no more interested in gypit Katie Huntar than am I in her brother Ewan, and should my father lay praise upon his keen and balding head from dawn till dusk.

  Were it no for my father’s poor health I should go down the Firth myself and board the Isis for New-York, if only to prove I’m still the Jennet who showed you the fairy tree and faced down the Pirate (I meant to say straight off that the Hakim brought news of Stoker: he has a new ship called Revenge and he plies his wicked trade in the Sugar Islands), and not such a melancholy creature as I must seem from this letter of mine. For all our sorrows we find a good deal to laugh about, as we did yesterday when wee Alasdair put his head in an empty honey bucket in order to lick the bottom and couldn’t get out again. We laughed until we wept, all of us, and Alasdair too, rolling around on the ground and kicking his legs so that I had to sit on him before Luke could get a hold of the bucket and cut the hoops.

  You make no promises about coming to Scotland, so I suppose it’s up to me to do the traveling, Hannah Bonner. You’ll be thinking that we’ve kept your brother far too long and it’s high time that he visit home again, and so my newest plan is this: if we canna keep Luke here, I’ll bring him to you in the endless forests, and what great adventures we’ll have.