Bone River (6 page)

T
HE SERE GRASS
was stiff and prickly beneath my bare feet where I sat on the hill overlooking the valley, a basket of berries at my side, my saffron skirts shifting about my legs with the hot dry summer breeze. I was waiting. Waiting and impatient, and that waiting grew and grew until I was so tense and anxious I did not think I could wait another moment.

Then I felt him. I turned to look.

Everything changed.

I rose to run, my foot catching the basket, upturning it, and the berries spilled onto the ground, a pool of them like blood, the basket rolling and rolling down the hill, the design woven into it—light reeds against dark—flashing as it rolled, and I could only stare at it, frozen. I could not move. He was here, and I knew what was coming, and I was afraid. I was afraid and I could not run and could not scream—

I woke with a start, sitting bolt upright, sweating, choking, my chest so tight I could not catch a breath. I gasped, panicking, clutching my throat.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Junius’s voice, sleepy and alarmed. He grabbed me, and I fought him, unthinking, still caught in the dream, trying to get away. “Lea, stop. It was a
dream. It was only a dream.” He pulled me hard into his chest, murmuring, “It’s all right, sweetheart. It’s all right.”

My fear faded in the reality of Junius’s warmth, the darkness of the room, the moonlight casting a subtle light beyond. I was here, in my bed, in my room.

I took a deep breath, and another, until my heart fell into a regular beat.

“A bad nightmare?” Junius asked.

“Yes,” I managed. “Yes. It was...terrible. I was waiting and...and the basket overturned, and it was so...so horrible...” It sounded ridiculous when I said it. Not the least bit frightening.

Junius whispered, “Ssshhh. Ssshhh. It’s all right. Nothing to worry about. Just a dream.”

I lay back with him, snuggling into his arms. I listened to the rise and fall of his breathing, the beat of his heart, until the dream faded and was gone.

The next morning, Junius said, “That was a bad nightmare you had last night,” and I nodded and told him I couldn’t remember it, which wasn’t true. I tried to forget it as I went about my chores, though I couldn’t. There was something about the dream that carried, that made me even more anxious, and it all settled around her. I wanted to see her, to touch her, to be reassured—
about what
? I found myself pausing in the middle of carrying milk to the springhouse, staring at the barn, murmuring, “What trick have you played on me?”

I refused to surrender to such absurdity. Dreams, instincts...I’d fought them all my life. As a child, I’d always been susceptible to bad dreams—I’d awakened to blind fear in the night more times than I cared to remember, running to Papa’s room to fling myself into his arms, begging for his comfort. He’d soothed me with whispers,
Ssshhh, ssshhh, my dear, dear girl. It’s only a dream. There’s nothing real in it
, though in the morning it had always occasioned a lecture—I should not have read those old
legends or listened so closely to the songs, or whatever it was I’d done to bring the bad dreams.
Superstition is the enemy of objectivity
, he’d told me often. Science needed facts.

I remembered those words and told myself I would take my time today, do my chores, go out to her when I was good and ready. I was no green girl to run at every change in the wind.

But still, when Junius stopped me as I finally made my way to the barn, saying, “I need those drawings for Baird first, sweetheart. The collection’s been waiting long enough,” I felt a sinking desperation.

“But I—”

“The mummy can wait. And you haven’t got that canoe yet for me, have you? I might have to send it off after all.”

That was true. I hadn’t kept my end of the bargain. I needed to go into Bruceport and speak with Bibi again, but after our conversation yesterday, I was reluctant. I didn’t want to hear her words—I was already uneasy enough.
Without cause
, I reminded myself. Still, Bibi would wait. I’d talk to her tomorrow.

I forced myself to attend to the chore of drawing, resisting the call of the mummy. I picked up the bowl waiting on the table, turning it in my hands, running my thumb along the broad form lines of the salmon carved upon it. Junius, who was going to the stove for a cup of coffee, glanced over his shoulder and said, “A camas bowl, I think.”

But I saw skilled hands carving, smoothing, polishing. I saw, in my mind’s eye, the bowl sitting at the edge of the fire, the oil it held glistening and pungent. I shook my head. “Oil,” I said softly, without thinking.

Junius frowned. “Why do you say that?”

I saw the way he was looking at me, that frown between his eyebrows, the same one I’d seen on Papa’s face a dozen times. “The salmon carved on it. And it still smells of oil,” though neither was true. Salmon was a common motif. And the bowl smelled like nothing but dust and old wood.

“Ah.” Junius nodded and poured the coffee. “Well, write that down too. It’s always good to give Baird a story.”

I thought he was mocking me, but when I looked at him more closely I realized he wasn’t really paying attention, and I felt a quick relief. I’d always had too strong an imagination when it came to the relics. It was easy for me to envision the life they’d lived—dancers wearing those masks that now hung on the wall while the fringe shivered with their movement; sinkers plunging deep into a cold river, holding nets taut; salmon hooks taking shape beneath the blade of a stone knife. Sometimes those stories felt so real...but I thought I’d learned long ago to keep such ideas to myself.

It was the mummy. She was too distracting. And my dream...I tried to shake it away and settled myself to the drawing, hurrying through it, keeping my fancies well at bay, not allowing myself to think of the stories these things could tell, but even so, it was growing dark by the time I finished for the day.

I managed to make it out to the barn, but only for a few moments before I had to start supper. The whole day had escaped me. I didn’t even bother to take her from the trunk. I only stood there, holding the lantern over her, watching the light turn her oak-colored skin to honey and glisten on the molasses-taffy color of her hair, and I was struck by a reverence that made me catch my breath. For a moment, as I stared at her, I felt as if I’d somehow brought her alive. I saw the faint rise and fall of her chest, the flutter of her eyelashes upon her cheeks, and I found myself whispering, “Who are you?”

I’d no sooner said the words than I felt how foolish they were—not just because I’d spoken them aloud but because I’d expected an answer. She was no more alive than the straw or that harness hanging on the wall. But when I closed the trunk lid, again I felt that sense of suffocation; it was all I could do to turn the key in the lock and walk away.

I could not stop thinking of her, and it wasn’t just questions about her people or how old she was or whether she was Indian—the
kinds of questions I
should
have been asking. Instead, I wondered what had brought her here from hills with long brown grass and wind full of the scent of sun and dust. I wondered if those berries had been her favorites and why she was waiting and why that waiting had turned so afraid.
A dream, Leonie. Not real.
But as the days went on and the dream returned, it seemed so. Sometimes I could feel that grass against my feet, and when I took down my stockings and saw the milk white of my own ankles, I was startled that they weren’t brown. I thought of those berries spilling into a pool like blood as I spooned red currant jam from a jar. I washed dishes and thought of the black and white on that basket flashing as it tumbled down the hill.

My chores kept me from her aside from a few minutes here and there. I tried to visit her every day—
as if she was an old aunt you feel beholden to
—and it
was
rather like that. I felt I had to reassure her I was here and would remain so.
Soon
, I kept promising.
Soon.
Because there was no time for real study. Drawing the relics took days. Then butter had to be made before the cream soured, and soap, and the garden had to be cleaned out before the weather turned completely. And there was always someone else here too. Every day brought men out to look at her. Sydney Dawes and Adam Leach had done their work well, and Junius had been right when he predicted the barn would turn into a curiosity museum. Much of the time, Junius was so busy showing her off that I had to be the one to go out to the whacks to harvest the oysters with Lord Tom. When I complained of it, Junius said, “You show her then, sweetheart. God knows I’d be happy for you to.”

But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stand the thought of answering their stupid questions or watching them look at her as if she were an oddity like a monkey-faced Fiji mermaid or a two-headed snake. It made me nervous, too, so many come out to see her. Baird was certain to hear of her now. Someone would talk, and it would get to some newspaper, and then to him. And once he asked for her, what would keep Junius from sending her away? It
wasn’t as if I’d kept my end of the bargain. I hadn’t gotten him the canoe. But if I couldn’t find the time to study the mummy, I surely couldn’t find it to get to Bruceport and talk to Bibi.

It didn’t help that the dream invaded not just my waking hours, but my sleep, too—not every night, but enough that I came to dread it. It no longer brought horror and panic, but a nausea that was sometimes so bad it was all I could do not to bolt for the chamber pot, to lie still until the feeling passed. I never woke Junius, and I don’t think he noticed my restlessness. I said nothing to Lord Tom, though I saw the way he watched me, as if he were searching for something. He knew me better than anyone alive—even Junius—so well that sometimes I thought he must be reading my mind. But Lord Tom didn’t question me, and I was grateful for it. I kept thinking,
If I could just get to her, if I could just study her, this would all go away and I would have my life back again
. I would be myself again.

Though really, how was I
not
myself? It was just...that anxiety from the dream seemed to inhabit me. That
waiting
I’d felt since the night of the storm. I was aware of every moment passing, and myself growing older within it, everything I’d ever wanted stretching farther out of reach—but that was so strange, because what did I want that I didn’t already have? Beyond children, of course, but...some things you just had to live without. Still, that anxiety pushed and pushed and it didn’t matter how I pushed back; it didn’t go away.

It was two weeks before I managed to find the time for study again, and only then because Lord Tom and I returned from the whacks earlier than usual. It was still early afternoon, and if there were no oglers, I would have hours with her. When I saw no strange canoes or plungers pulled ashore, I could barely temper my excitement.

I left Lord Tom to tend the canoe and hurried over the hillocks of marsh grass and the shallow little mud flats between
them to the path of crushed oyster shells that led past the worn gray pickets of the fence. Wild rose twined about the gate, mostly bare, a few yellow and brown mottled leaves, full, plump hips, the little thorns grabbing at my sleeve as I passed. I meant to go past the house and straight to the barn, when there was a movement on the porch, and I looked up to see a man sitting on the steps.

Another one of Junius’s gawkers. My hopes died; my disappointment and anger were so overwhelming I felt the sudden press of tears. He stood when he saw me, brushing his hands against the faded gray cloth of the coat he wore; it looked old enough to be from the War, though I wondered if he had been the original owner—he looked to be only in his late twenties. His boots and trousers were muddied to the knee with the thick, stinking mud of the flats or the sloughs. I smelled it from where I stood. He had a bag slung over his shoulder, and wore a slouchy leather hat nearly the twin of the one I had on now; beneath it his hair was the deep gold of old coins where it waved against his jaw. A handsome face, one I would have remembered if I’d seen it before, which I hadn’t.

He stepped down the porch stairs. “Hello,” he said, touching his hat in deference, very polite. “I wonder if you could tell me if this is Junius Russell’s place.”

“It is,” I said, unable to keep the irritation from my voice. “I suppose you’ve come to see the mummy too.”

He looked taken aback, and then he smiled in that way men do who know they’re attractive, a straight-on gaze meant to charm. He had a large mouth, a face that was all high cheekbones and strong nose and sharply cut jaw. I’d seen men like this before, young and confident, working the beds or the schooners until they “found something better,” thinking already that they were meant to rule the world once everything fell into place. I was unmoved, too annoyed to be charmed by a pretty smile.

“I guess I have,” he said.

“Well, come on, then. But I warn you, you’ll only have a short time with her. I’ve things to do.” I gestured abruptly for him to follow.

He fell into step beside me as I took him over the hillocky yard. I glanced at his filthy boots, the mud-covered pants. “You come through the sloughs?”

He nodded. “From Bruceport.”

“No one told you to go by water?”

A wry smile. “No. They did point me in the right direction, though.”

“Not much of a direction. You don’t have a horse?”

“I walked.” He motioned to the mud on his trousers. “Not well, as you’ve no doubt noticed.”

“At least the tide was out. You could have drowned.”

“A blessing, I’m sure,” he said.

“Well, you’ll no doubt find the mummy worth the trip. Everyone seems to.”

“I’m sure I won’t be any different, Miss—”

“Russell. Leonie Russell.”

He frowned. “Are you his daughter?”

Dryly, I said, “Very flattering, I’m sure. I’m Junius’s wife.” I’d taken two steps before I realized he’d stopped.

“You’re his wife?” He frowned, and there was something about that look that was vaguely familiar. I had the thought that I must have met him before after all. But then the expression left him and he smiled—again with charm. This was a man whose smile had eased many difficulties, I realized. “Forgive me, but you don’t look old enough to be his wife.”