Seventh Son: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Volume I (8 page)

Alvin Junior knew without a word being said that whatever it was stopped Papa’s mouth, it was the plain opposite of the shining light that had filled Alvin and the Shining Man tonight. There was something that wanted Alvin to be strong and good. And there was something else that wanted Alvin dead. Whatever the good thing was, it could bring visions, it could show him his terrible sin and teach him how to be shut of it forever. But the bad thing, it had the power to shut Papa’s mouth, to beat down the strongest, best man Al Junior ever knew or heard of. And that made Al afraid.

When Papa went on with his arguments, his seventh son knew that he wasn’t using the proof that counted. “Not devils, not angels,” said Papa, “it’s the elements of the universe, don’t you see that he’s an offense against nature? There’s power in him like you nor I can’t even guess. So much power that one part of nature itself can’t bear it—so much power that he protects hisself even when he don’t know he’s doing it.”

“If there’s so much power in being seventh son of a seventh son, then where’s
your
power, Alvin Miller? You’re a seventh son—that ain’t nothing, supposedly, but I don’t see you doodlebugging or—”

“You don’t know what I do—”

“I know what you
don’t
do. I know that you don’t believe—”

“I believe in every true thing—”

“I know that every other man is down at the commons building that fine church, except for you—”

“That preacher is a fool—”

“Don’t you ever think that maybe God is using your precious seventh son to try to wake you up and call you to repentance?”

“Oh, is that the kind of God you believe in? The kind what tries to kill little boys so their papas will go to meeting?”

“The Lord has
saved
your boy, as a sign to you of his loving and compassionate nature—”

“The love and compassion that let my Vigor die—”

“But someday his patience will run out—”

“And then he’ll murder another of my sons.”

She slapped his face. Alvin Junior saw it with his own eyes. And it wasn’t the offhand kind of cuffing she gave her sons when they lipped or loafed around. It was a slap that like to took his face off, and he fell over to sprawl on the floor.

“I’ll tell you this, Alvin Miller.” Her voice was so cold it burned. “If that church is finished, and there’s none of your handiwork in it, then you will cease to be my husband and I will cease to be your wife.”

If there were more words, Alvin Junior didn’t hear them. He was up in his bed a-trembling that such a terrible thought could be thought, not to mention being spoke out loud. He had been afraid so many times tonight, afraid of pain, afraid of dying when Anne whispered murder in his ear, and most of all afraid when the Shining Man came to him and named his sin. But this was something else. This was the end of the whole universe, the end of the one sure thing, to hear Mama talk about not being with Papa anymore. He lay there in his bed, all kinds of thoughts dancing in his head so fast he couldn’t lay hold of any one of them, and finally in all that confusion there wasn’t nothing for it but to sleep.

In the morning he thought maybe it was all a dream, it had to be a dream. But there were new stains on the floor at the foot of his bed, where the blood of the Shining Man had dripped, so that wasn’t a dream. And his parents’ quarrel, that wasn’t no dream neither. Papa stopped him after breakfast and told him, “You stay up here with me today, Al.”

The look on Mama’s face told him plain as day that what was said last night was still meant today.

“I want to help on the church,” Alvin Junior said. “I ain’t afraid of no ridgebeams.”

“You’re going to stay here with me, today. You’re going to help me build something.” Papa swallowed, and stopped himself from looking at Mama. “That church is going to need an altar, and I figure we can build a right nice one that can go inside that church as soon as the roof is on and the walls are up.” Papa looked at Mama and smiled a smile that sent a shiver up Alvin Junior’s back. “You think that preacher’ll like it?”

That took Mama back, it was plain. But she wasn’t the kind to back off from a wrestling match just because the other guy got one throw, Alvin Junior knew that much. “What can the boy do?” she asked. “He ain’t no carpenter.”

“He’s got a good eye,” said Papa. “If he can patch and tool leather, he can put some crosses onto the altar. Make it look good.”

“Measure’s a better whittler,” said Mama.

“Then I’ll have the boy
burn
the crosses in.” Papa put his hand on Alvin Junior’s head. “Even if he sits here all day and reads in the Bible, this boy ain’t going down to that church till the last pew is in.”

Papa’s voice sounded hard enough to carve his words in stone. Mama looked at Alvin Junior and then at Alvin Senior. Finally she turned her back and started filling the basket with dinner for them as was going to the church.

Alvin Junior went outside to where Measure was hitching the team and Wastenot and Wantnot were loading roof shakes onto the wagon for the church.

“You aim to stand inside the church again?” asked Wantnot.

“We can drop logs down on you, and you can split them into shakes with your head,” said Wastenot.

“Ain’t going,” said Alvin Junior.

Wastenot and Wantnot exchanged identical knowing looks.

“Well, too bad,” said Measure. “But when Mama and Papa get cold, the whole Wobbish Valley has a snowstorm.” He winked at Alvin Junior, just the way he had last night, when it got him in so much trouble.

That wink made Alvin figure he could ask Measure a question that he wouldn’t normally speak right out. He walked over closer, so his voice wouldn’t carry to the others. Measure caught on to what Alvin wanted, and he squatted down right there by the wagon wheel, to hear what Alvin had to say.

“Measure, if Mama believes in God and Papa doesn’t, how do I know which one is right?”

“I think Pa believes in God,” said Measure.

“But if he don’t. That’s what I’m asking. How do I know about things like that, when Mama says one thing and Papa says another?”

Measure started to answer something easy, but he stopped himself—Alvin could see in his face how he made up his mind to say something serious. Something true, instead of something easy. “Al, I got to tell you, I wisht I knew. Sometimes I figure ain’t nobody knows nothing.”

“Papa says you know what you see with your eyes. Mama says you know what you feel in your heart.”

“What do
you
say?”

“How do
I
know, Measure? I’m only six.”

“I’m twenty-two, Alvin, I’m a growed man, and I still don’t know. I reckon Ma and Pa don’t know, neither.”

“Well, if they don’t
know
, how come they get so mad about it?”

“Oh, that’s what it means to be married. You fight all the time, but you never fight about what you think you’re fighting about.”

“What are they really fighting about?”

Alvin could see just the opposite thing this time. Measure thought of telling the truth, but he changed his mind. Stood up tall and tousled Alvin’s hair. That was a sure sign to Alvin Junior that a grown-up was going to lie to him, the way they always lied to children, as if children weren’t reliable enough to be trusted with the truth. “Oh, I reckon they just quarrel to hear theirselfs talk.”

Most times Alvin just listened to grown-ups lie and didn’t say nothing about it, but this time it was Measure, and he especially didn’t like having Measure lie to him.

“How old will I have to be before you tell me straight?” asked Alvin.

Measure’s eyes flashed with anger for just a second—nobody likes being called a liar—but then he grinned, and his eyes were sharp with understanding. “Old enough that you already guess the answer for yourself,” he said, “but young enough that it’ll still do you some good.”

“When’s that?” Alvin demanded. “I want you to tell me the truth now, all the time.”

Measure squatted down again. “I can’t always do that, Al, cause sometimes it’d just be too hard. Sometimes I’d have to explain things that I just don’t know how to explain. Sometimes there’s things that you have to figure out by living long enough.”

Alvin was mad and he knew his face showed it.

“Don’t you be so mad at me, little brother. I can’t tell you some things because I just don’t know myself, and that’s not lying. But you can count on this. If I
can
tell you, I will, and if I can’t, I’ll just say so, and won’t pretend.”

That was the most fair thing a grown-up ever said, and it made Alvin’s eyes fill up. “You keep that promise, Measure.”

“I’ll keep it or die, you can count on that.”

“I won’t forget, you know.” Alvin remembered the vow he had made to the Shining Man last night. “I know how to keep a promise, too.”

Measure laughed and pulled Alvin to him, hugged him right against his shoulder. “You’re as bad as Mama,” he said. “You just don’t let up.”

“I can’t help it,” said Alvin. “If I start believing you, then how’ll I know when to stop?”

“Never stop,” said Measure.

Calm rode up on his old mare about then, and Mama came out with the dinner basket, and everybody that was going, went. Papa took Alvin Junior out to the barn and in no time at all Alvin was helping notch the boards, and his pieces fit together just as good as Papa’s. Truth to tell they fit even better, cause Al could use his knack for
this
, couldn’t he? This altar was for everybody, so he could make the wood fit so snug that it wouldn’t ever come apart, not at the joints or nowhere. Alvin even thought of making Papa’s joints fit just as tight, but when he tried, he saw that Papa had something of a knack at this himself. The wood didn’t join together to make one continuous piece, like Alvin’s did—but it fit good enough, yes sir, so there wasn’t no need to fiddle.

Papa didn’t say much. Didn’t have to. They both knew Alvin Junior had a knack for making things fit right, just like his Papa did. By nightfall the whole altar was put together and stained. They left it to dry, and as they walked into the house Papa’s hand was firm on Alvin’s shoulder. They walked together just as smooth and easy as if they were both parts of the same body, as if Papa’s hand just growed there right out of Alvin’s neck. Alvin could feel the pulse in Papa’s fingers, and it was beating right in time with the blood pounding in his throat.

Mama was working by the fire when they came in. She turned and looked at them. “How is it?” she asked.

“It’s the smoothest box I ever seen,” said Alvin Junior.

“There wasn’t a single accident at the church today,” said Mama.

“Everything went real good here, too,” said Papa.

For the life of him Alvin Junior couldn’t figure out why Mama’s words sounded like “I ain’t going nowhere,” and why Papa’s words sounded like “Stay with me forever.” But he knew he wasn’t crazy to think so, cause right then Measure looked up from where he lay all sprawled out afore the fire and winked so only Alvin Junior could see.

R
EVEREND
T
HROWER ALLOWED
himself few vices, but one was to eat Friday supper with the Weavers. Friday
dinner
was more accurate, since the Weavers were shopkeepers and manufacturers, and didn’t stop work for more than a snack at noon. It wasn’t the quantity so much as the quality that brought Thrower back every Friday. It was said that Eleanor Weaver could take an old tree stump and make it taste like sweet rabbit stew. And it wasn’t just the food, either, because Armor-of-God Weaver was a churchgoing man who knew his Bible, and conversation was on a higher plane. Not so elevated as conversation with highly educated churchmen, of course, but the best that could be had in this benighted wilderness.

They would eat in the room back of the Weavers’ store, which was part kitchen, part workshop, and part library. Eleanor stirred the pot from time to time, and the smell of boiled venison and the day’s bread baking mingled with the odors from the soapmaking shed out back and the tallow they used in candlemaking right here. “Oh, we’re some of everything,” said Armor, the first time Reverend Thrower visited. “We do things that every farmer hereabouts can do for himself—but we do it better, and when they buy it from us it saves them hours of work, which gives them time to clear and plow and plant more land.”

The store itself, out front, was shelved to the ceiling, and the shelves were filled with dry goods brought in by wagon from points east. Cotton cloth from the spinning jennies and steam looms of Irrakwa, pewter dishes and iron pots and stoves from the foundries of Pennsylvania and Suskwahenny, fine pottery and small cabinets and boxes from the carpenters of New England, and even a few precious bags of spices shipped into New Amsterdam from the Orient. Armor Weaver had confessed once that it took all his life savings to buy his stock, and it was no sure bet that he’d prosper out here in this thinly settled land. But Reverend Thrower had noticed the steady stream of wagons coming up from the lower Wobbish and down the Tippy-Canoe, and even a few from out west in the Noisy River country.

Now, as they waited for Eleanor to announce that the venison stew was ready, Reverend Thrower asked him a question that had bothered him for some time.

“I’ve seen what they haul away,” said Reverend Thrower, “and I can’t begin to guess what they use to pay you. Nobody makes cash money around here, and not much they can trade that’ll sell back east.”

“They pay with lard and charcoal, ash and fine lumber, and of course food for Eleanor and me and—whoever else might come.” Only a fool wouldn’t notice that Eleanor was thickening enough to be about halfway to a baby. “But mostly,” said Armor, “they pay with credit.”

“Credit! To farmers whose scalps might well be traded for muskets or liquor in Fort Detroit next winter?”

“There’s a lot more talk of scalping than there is scalping going on,” said Armor. “The Reds around here aren’t stupid. They know about the Irrakwa, and how they have seats in Congress in Philadelphia right along with White men, and how they have muskets, horses, farms, fields, and towns just like they do in Pennsylvania or Suskwahenny or New Orange. They know about the Cherriky people of Appalachee, and how they’re farming and fighting right alongside Tom Jefferson’s White rebels to keep their country independent from the King and the Cavaliers.”

“They might also have noticed the steady stream of flatboats coming down the Hio and wagons coming west, and the trees falling down and the log houses going up.”

“I reckon you’re half right, Reverend,” said Armor. “I reckon the Reds might go either way. Might try to kill us all, or might try to settle down and live among us. Living with us wouldn’t be exactly easy for them—they aren’t much used to town living, whereas it’s the most natural way for White folks to live. But fighting us has got to be worse, cause if they do that they’ll end up dead. They may think that killing White folks might scare the others into staying away. They don’t know how it is in Europe, how the dream of owning land will bring people five thousand mile to work harder than they ever did in their lives and bury children who might have lived in the home country and risk having a tommyhock mashed into their brains cause it’s better to be your own man than to serve any lord. Except the Lord God.”

“And that’s how it is with you, too?” asked Thrower. “Risk everything, for land?”

Armor looked at his wife Eleanor and smiled. She didn’t smile back, Thrower noticed, but he also noticed that her eyes were beautiful and deep, as if she knew secrets that made her solemn even though she was joyful in her heart.

“Not land the way farmers own it, I’m no farmer, I’ll tell you that,” said Armor. “There’s other ways to own land. You see, Reverend Thrower, I give them credit now because I believe in this country. When they come to trade with me, I make them tell me the names of all their neighbors, and make rough maps of the farms and streams where they live, and the roads and rivers along their way here. I make them carry letters that other folks writ, and I write their letters for them and ship them on back east to folks they left behind. I know where everything and everybody in the whole upper Wobbish and Noisy River country is and how to get there.”

Reverend Thrower squinted and smiled. “In other words, Brother Armor, you’re the government.”

“Let’s just say that if there comes a time when a government would come in handy, I’ll be ready to serve,” said Armor. “And in two years, three years, when more folks come through, and some more start making things, like bricks and pots and blackware, cabinets and kegs, beer and cheese and fodder, well, where do you think they’ll come to sell it or to buy? To the store that gave them credit when their wives were longing for the cloth to make a bright-colored dress, or they needed an iron pot or a stove to keep out the winter cold.”

Philadelphia Thrower chose not to mention that he had somewhat less confidence in the likelihood of grateful people staying loyal to Armor-of-God Weaver. Besides, thought Thrower, I might be wrong. Didn’t the Savior say that we should cast our bread upon the waters? And even if Armor doesn’t achieve all he dreams of, he will have done a good work, and helped to open this land to civilization.

The food was ready. Eleanor dished out the stew. When she set a fine white bowl in front of him, Reverend Thrower had to smile. “You must be right proud of your husband, and all that’s he’s doing.”

Instead of smiling demurely, as Thrower expected that she would, Eleanor almost laughed aloud. Armor-of-God wasn’t half so delicate. He just plain guffawed. “Reverend Thrower, you’re a caution,” said Armor. “When I’m up to my elbows in candle tallow, Eleanor’s up to hers in soap. When I’m writing up folks’ letters and having them delivered, Eleanor’s drawing up maps and taking down names for our little census book. There ain’t a thing I do that Eleanor isn’t beside me, and not a thing she does that I’m not beside her. Except maybe her herb garden, which she cares for more than me. And Bible reading, which I care for more than her.”

“Well, it’s good she’s a righteous helpmeet for her husband,” said Reverend Thrower.

“We’re helpmeets for each other,” said Armor-of-God, “and don’t you forget it.”

He said it with a smile, and Thrower smiled back, but the minister was a little disappointed that Armor was so henpecked that he had to admit right out in the open that he wasn’t in charge of his own business or his own home. But what could one expect, considering that Eleanor had grown up in that strange Miller family? The oldest daughter of Alvin and Faith Miller could hardly be expected to bend to her husband as the Lord intended.

The venison, however, was the best that Thrower had ever tasted, “Not gamy a bit,” he said. “I didn’t think wild deer could taste like this.”

“She cuts off the fat,” said Armor, “and throws in some chicken.”

“Now you mention it,” said Thrower, “I can taste it in the broth.”

“And the deer fat goes into the soap,” said Armor. “We never throw anything away, if we can think of any use for it.”

“Just as the Lord intended,” said Thrower. Then he fell to eating. He was well into his second bowl of stew and his third slice of bread when he made a comment that he thought was a jesting compliment. “Mrs. Weaver, your cooking is so good that it almost makes me believe in sorcery.”

Thrower was expecting a chuckle, at the most. Instead, Eleanor looked down at the table just as ashamed as if he had accused her of adultery. And Armor-of-God sat up stiff and straight. “I’ll thank you not to mention that subject in this house,” he said.

Reverend Thrower tried to apologize. “I wasn’t serious about it,” he said. “Among rational Christians that sort of thing is a joke, isn’t it? A lot of superstition, and I—”

Eleanor got up from the table and left the room.

“What did I say?” Thrower asked.

Armor sighed. “Oh, there’s no way you could know,” he said. “It’s a quarrel that goes back to before we were married, when I first come out to this land. I met her when she came with her brothers to help build my first cabin—the soapmaking shed, now. She started to scatter spearmint on my floor and say some kind of rhyme, and I shouted for her to stop it and get out of my house. I quoted the Bible, where it says, You shall not suffer a witch to live. It made for a right testy half hour, you may be sure.”

“You called her a witch, and she married you?”

“We had a few conversations in between.”

“She doesn’t believe in that sort of thing anymore, does she?”

Armor knitted his brows. “It ain’t a matter of believing, it’s a matter of doing, Reverend. She doesn’t do it anymore. Not here, not anywhere. And when you sort of halfway accused her of it, well, it made her upset. Because it’s a promise to me, you see.”

“But when I apologized, why did she—”

“Well, there you are. You have your way of thinking, but you can’t tell her that come-hithers and herbs and incantations got no power, because she’s seen some things herself that you can’t just explain away.”

“Surely a man like you, well read in the scripture and acquainted with the world, surely you can convince your wife to give up the superstitions of her childhood.”

Armor gently laid his hand on Reverend Thrower’s wrist. “Reverend, I got to tell you something that I didn’t think I’d ever have to tell a grown man. A good Christian refuses to allow that stuff in his life because the only proper way to bring the hidden powers into your life is through prayer and the grace of the Lord Jesus. It ain’t because it doesn’t
work
.”

“But it
doesn’t
,” said Thrower. “The powers of heaven are real, and the visions and visitations of angels, and all the miracles attested in the scripture. But the powers of heaven have nothing at all to do with young couples falling in love, or curing the croup, or getting chickens to lay, or all the other silly little things that the ignorant common people do with their so-called hidden wisdom. There’s not a thing that’s done by doodlebugging or hexing or whatever that can’t be explained by simple scientific investigation.”

Armor didn’t answer for the longest while. The silence made Thrower quite uncomfortable, but he had no idea what more he could say. It hadn’t occurred to him before that Armor could possibly
believe
in such things. It was a startling perspective. It was one thing to abstain from witchery because it was nonsense, and quite another to believe in it and abstain because it was unrighteous. It occurred to Thrower that this latter view was actually more ennobling: for Thrower to disdain witching was a matter of mere common sense, while for Armor and Eleanor it was quite a sacrifice.

Before he could find a way to express this thought, however, Armor leaned back on his chair and changed the subject entirely.

“Reckon your church is just about done.”

With relief, Reverend Thrower followed Armor onto safer ground. “The roof was finished yesterday, and today they were able to clap all the boards on the walls. It’ll be watertight tomorrow, with shutters on the windows, and when we get them glazed and the doors hung it’ll be tight as a drum.”

“I’ve got the glass coming by boat,” said Armor. Then he winked. “I solved the problem of shipping on Lake Erie.”

“How did you manage that? The French are sinking every third boat, even from Irrakwa.”

“Simple. I ordered the glass from Montreal.”

“French glass in the windows of a British church!”

“An American church,” said Armor. “And Montreal’s a city in America, too. Anyway, the French may be trying to get rid of us, but in the meantime we’re a market for their manufactured goods, so the Governor, the Marquis de la Fayette, he doesn’t mind letting his people turn a profit from our trade as long as we’re here. They’re going to ship it clear around and down into Lake Michigan, and then barge it up the St. Joseph and down the Tippy-Canoe.”

“Will they make it before the bad weather?”

“I reckon so,” said Armor, “or they won’t get paid.”

“You’re an amazing man,” said Thrower. “But I wonder that you have so little loyalty to the British Protectorate.”

“Well, you see, that’s how it is,” said Armor. “You grew up under the Protectorate, and so you still think like an Englishman.”

“I’m a Scot, sir.”

“A Brit, anyway. In your country, everybody who was even rumored to be practicing the hidden arts got exiled, right away, hardly even bothered with a trial, did they?”

“We try to be just—but the ecclesiastical courts are swift, and there is no appeal.”

“Well, now, think about it. If everybody who had any gift for the hidden arts got shipped off to the American colonies, how would you ever see a lick of witchery while you were growing up?”

“I didn’t see it because there’s no such thing.”

“There’s no such thing
in Britain
. But it’s the curse of good Christians in America, because we’re up to our armpits in torches, doodlebugs, bog-stompers and hexifiers, and a child can’t hardly grow to be four feet tall without bumping headlong into somebody’s go-away or getting caught up in some prankster’s speak-all spell, so he says everything that comes to mind and offends everybody for ten miles around.”