The Sacred Shore Page 4

  Nicole sighed again beside him and whispered a word of her own, disbelief still edging her voice. “English.”

  Chapter 4

  The ball in Halifax was intended to be in his honor. Charles had no choice but to attend. He stepped from the governor’s carriage, nodded in response to the honor guard’s noisy salute, and climbed the steps to the governor’s mansion. The house was a rather grand affair relative to the rest of the colony, stone and stalwart. So was the ball, full of swirling gowns and powdered wigs and loud talk and shrill voices that probed at him constantly. Charles danced with the older ladies only, avoiding flirtatious glances from women half his age.

  When the musicians paused, Charles forced himself from circle to circle, restless and impatient. It had been four days since his arrival, and still no word had come from Winston Groom. Four days he could ill afford to spend waiting and wandering about this unkempt outpost.

  One of the officials’ wives approached with a veiled smile. For the life of him, he could not recall her name. “Lord Charles, would you be so kind as to accompany me for a breath of air?”

  “Delighted,” he replied with a bow. In truth, he did not mind. He had been expecting such an emissary to be sent. His presence all the way from England was too great a mystery. But perhaps this bit of digging for information could work both ways. With any luck, he might discover some yet unknown piece of his own.

  The woman waited until they had stepped onto one of the small upstairs balconies to say, “You have the entire colony abuzz, Lord Charles.”

  “No doubt.” Through the windows of the double-doors, Charles watched as the sentry stepped over to stand duty directly in front of them. Clearly this was a calculated moment, one intended to politely wrest some truth from him. So he made known that he was willing to speak openly by responding, “With unrest brewing in the American colonies south of here, I am certain to be raising all sorts of rumors and concerns.”

  “You must forgive me, m’lord, I am but an addle-headed woman.” She had a sweet voice and a winning smile that belied eyes hard as agate. “I know only one way to speak, and that is directly.”

  He gave a second bow. “I am at your service, my lady.”

  “Tell me, why are you here?”

  “I have several reasons. One for public propagation, the other strictly private.”

  “Oh, you mustn’t worry. I am very good at holding secrets.” The smile came easily to her. “I shall only tell those who truly must know.”

  Despite himself, he liked her and her direct manner. “Then I shall entrust you with both. The first is, His Majesty was kind enough to grant me deed to lands south of here.”

  “Yes, indeed. And where, may I ask?”

  “Along the westerly borders of Massachusetts Colony.”

  “Forgive me, sir, but Halifax is a circuitous route to take to Boston. Especially when it means braving late-winter storms in the North Atlantic.”

  “Yes. But if I am to manage one colonial estate, why not two? I hear there is land to be had near Halifax.”

  “That there is. Half the land once tilled by the Acadians still lies fallow, though more settlers arrive every day from Scotland and Wales. Even Europe.” The gaze turned piercing. “Not to mention those fleeing the coming troubles in the American colonies.”

  Charles understood perfectly. “The king did not send me to spy upon his subjects here, my lady. Nor does he question your loyalty.”

  She relaxed a trifle. “Do you know, Lord Charles, I almost believe you.”

  “I am no more comfortable with convoluted conversation than you, my lady. A worse diplomat or spy the king could not have chosen. Believe me, if he were to ask my opinion of the loyalties in these parts, my response would be, I have no opinion at all.”

  Below them, on Halifax’s central avenue, a mule skinner cracked his long whip and shouted so loud both their glances turned downward. Charles counted sixteen slow-moving mules pulling a wagon piled so high with bales he could almost reach out and touch the top. When he turned back, he found the woman’s gaze had turned more kind. The lady asked, “And the second reason?”

  “The second.” He could not help but sigh. “I have a brother. My only living kin. The last I knew of him was from this region.”

  For once the lady’s practiced demeanor faltered. “I may have heard something …”

  It was his turn to smile. “Come, come, my lady. We promised one another honesty.”

  “You are right, of course.” She bowed her acceptance. “There have been rumors of this also swirling about since your arrival. Something to do with a former captain of the King’s Own Regiment, one who resigned his commission only because he was threatened with court-martial and disgrace.”

  Though the news was old, still to have it spoken of aloud pierced his soul. “All true, I fear. I have had agents inquiring after Andrew for several years now. He did indeed resign. Eighteen years ago. It happened just after the Acadian expulsion.”

  A cloud flitted across her features. “A horrible time.”

  “You were here?”

  “I had arrived the year before.” She shuddered lightly. “I shall carry the sound of those pitiful screaming women and the smell of their burning fields and homes to my grave.”

  “Andrew left the army. He went to seminary in Boston. The head of the seminary believes he returned here.”

  “A minister,” the lady murmured.

  “I must find him.”

  The corseted lady found her smile once more. “Rumors are that England’s most eligible earl braved the North Atlantic in winter because he wished to take a colonist as a wife.”

  Charles could not repress his own smile. “Hardly. I have been married twice, and lost both ladies to illness. I have no wish to know a further such trial.”

  “That news will drive our maidens into mourning,” she said archly.

  “Why—” His question was broken off by the sound of scuffling beyond the balcony door. Charles recognized the figure trying to make his way past the sentry, and hastened to open the door. “Let the man pass.”

  “But the general himself—”

  “Let him pass, I say. He means no harm. He is known to me.”

  The sentry stood aside, and Winston Groom hurried out. He looked quickly at the woman standing by the balcony railing and gave them both a sharp bow. “M’lord. Lady Brighton.”

  Charles demanded, “You have news?” Winston glanced hesitantly at the lady, his shrewd eyes shifting. Charles barked, “Never mind her. Tell me, man! Do you have news?”

  “Better than that, sir. I have found your brother.”

  Charles took a deep breath, his hand going up unconsciously to his brow as though wiping away long days of anguish. When he spoke, it was one emotion-fraught word. “Excellent.”

  He started from the balcony, then halted to demand, “Is he married?”

  “He is. As you said, to a local woman.” Groom was clearly very proud of ferreting out such information. “Her father—”

  Impatiently he waved further commentary aside and demanded, “Do they have children?”

  Winston Groom looked puzzled, shifted from one foot to the other, then answered, “One child. A girl.”

  Charles stifled a blast of disappointment. A girl. He had hoped for at least one son to have been born to Andrew. Well, it could not be helped. He moved for the doors, ignoring the curious stares. “Then there is not a moment to be lost.”

  Henri sat at the borders of the gathering. It was a strange position for the clan leader to take, but he had never been comfortable where all eyes might rest upon him. Whenever he could, he preferred to sit back and let the talk swirl around him. Henri spent most of such times whittling kindling wood into toys for the village children. He had practiced his art over many such nights, carving for hours as his peers talked and argued. After setting out the main questions, rarely did he speak, until it was time to decide and act. And then often Louise would speak for him, directing
the flow of discussion or cutting off someone who went on too long.

  Henri had long ago discovered two important facts about such gatherings. The first was that for many elders, having a chance to speak their mind was their primary concern. The second was that the less he spoke, the more people listened to what he had to say. Besides, much of what he learned was wisdom garnered from people who did not think he was listening. This night he was whittling a wagon and a high-prancing horse. Over the twenty years that he had been clan leader, his whittling had grown from something to keep his hands busy into work that some called art.

  Responsibility for his people had fallen on his shoulders the year before the expulsion. But the folk he now called clan had little or no connection to those Acadian villagers. Most of the original clan remained scattered to the four winds. Henri eventually had accepted leadership of all who gathered around him, all who did not wander further to seek comfort and loved ones elsewhere. It did not matter where they had called home before the expulsion. These Frenchmen were his people, by right of origin, time, and hardship.

  The fifth year after their expulsion, word had arrived to the group of Acadians in Carolina that the Spanish had taken over control of the former French colony of Louisiana. It had mattered little to the local citizens of New Orleans, as France and Spain had been allies for centuries. But the other news that had spread through the Acadian clan was extraordinary, the first ray of hope since their tragic departure.

  The new Spanish rulers recognized that outside a tiny sliver of Mississippi River borderland, much of their province remained utterly untamed. They had sent out a proclamation that swept around the entire globe—to Africa, South America, and all the colonies. Any Acadian who wished might come to the Louisiana delta and receive seed and tools and land. Spanish ships were ordered to stand ready to transport all who decided to come.

  And come they did. Land-hungry Acadians flocked in from everywhere, shipload after shipload, desperate at long last for the chance to call someplace home.

  Here and now, eighteen years after the expulsion, they still were arriving, their journeys delayed by the need for money, or simply because they had been so lost it had taken the welcome news this long to reach them. Eighteen years.

  Henri paused in his whittling and listened as the talk moved on from illness in Plaquemine to crop rotation. Their village of Vermilionville planted mostly cotton, sugarcane, vegetables, and indigo. The demand for indigo dye was growing, and one elder suggested giving over all available land to the crop. Henri was against it. The village had finally become self-supporting. They grew almost everything they needed. They even had their own blacksmith and weavers. But the elder was voted down before Henri felt the need to argue against him. He returned his attention to the tiny wooden horse’s tossing mane.

  In truth, it was hard to concentrate upon anything this night except his daughter. Nicole had remained distant and withdrawn since their discussion a few nights earlier. She refused to be drawn out on anything. She did her work and drifted about the house like a wraith. To stand helpless as his passionate and spirited daughter faded to sorrow and shadows left Henri feeling as though he had used the carving knife on his own heart.

  Out of the darkness there came the sound of pounding feet. The meeting halted in midflow as Guy, Louise’s brother, raced up the stairs to pant, “A letter has come!”

  Instantly the entire gathering was on their feet. Letters arrived once or twice a year, if that, so the fact that one had arrived was enough to stir the entire assembly. One of the elders demanded, “From where?”

  Guy waved the stained and crumpled parchment over his head, his face taking on an excitement that mirrored his voice. “Acadia!” he called loudly. “A letter has come from home!”

  Chapter 5

  Winston Groom returned to the carriage and announced, “We’ve arrived, m’lord.”

  “Excellent.” Charles alighted from the high-wheeled conveyance and could not hide his dismay at the sight. “What did you say was the name of this town?”

  “Georgetown, m’lord.” Groom took a deep breath. “I say, this is quite the lovely place.”

  Charles glanced over and decided the man was not being sarcastic. He turned back and tried to put aside his dismay at where his brother had chosen to live. Where his niece had been raised. Here, as far into the back of beyond as Charles could imagine.

  The carriage had halted upon a rise, where hills fell in gradual waves to the distant waters. The village below contained perhaps a hundred houses, clustered within a shallow valley and surrounded by vast groves of trees. Charles asked, “With all this land, why on earth must they crowd together so? Are they serfs?”

  “Not hardly, m’lord. My guess is they own all the land you can see, right to the water’s edge.” Winston Groom sounded envious. “They build their houses close together because it is safer.”

  “Ah. You mean Indians.”

  “No, m’lord. Winter.”

  Charles thought back to the voyage and the winds and the cold. One night the halyards holding the sails had frozen so hard one had snapped with the sound of shattering glass. “I understand.”

  “Governor Lawrence offered every able man who would settle these parts a hundred acres, a plow, an ax, and two bags of seed.” He inspected the vista for a long moment, then added, “Two more years I have in service, then this is where I’m headed. The air is free here, m’lord.” He took a deep breath. “Free.”

  “Yes, well, you have been most helpful.” Charles pulled out the second pouch of sovereigns. “I will go on alone from this point.”

  Winston Groom clutched the pouch of gold to his chest. “But the governor ordered me—”

  “Tell Governor Lawrence I am most grateful for his hospitality and the kind gift of his transport.” From the carriage’s rear gate, Charles untied the horse he had purchased in Halifax and swung into the saddle. “I wish to meet my brother alone.”

  “But the road back to Halifax can be most perilous to a man traveling by himself, m’lord. You should really allow—”

  “I seriously doubt,” Charles offered in parting, “that I shall make the return journey alone.”

  The closer he drew to the village of Georgetown, the more dismayed Charles became. Even though on closer inspection the village was not disorderly. Far from it. He owned many such hamlets within his own estates, and few if any bore such an air of quiet dignity and careful maintenance.

  Though unadorned and stark, everything was well constructed. The apple groves were weeks away from budding, but the vast stretches of trees appeared carefully tended. The houses themselves were sturdy and snug, built of stone and thick local timber. The animals he saw were shaggy with winter coats, yet healthy and clearly well fed. The lanes were bordered with tall posts, no doubt to mark them after hard snowfalls. The entire village seemed strong and patiently ready for the coming spring.

  But visits through his own holdings had shown Charles clearly the kind of people who settled and raised offspring in this kind of bucolic setting—strong, boisterous, hearty souls who were best left on the land. Not at all the type of person he required.

  A farmwife ensconced on a wide front porch halted in her industrious weaving to watch him pass. Charles doffed his hat and received a pleasant good-day in return. He started to ask her where Andrew lived, then decided to head straight for the church. But he truly dreaded the coming encounter after so many years, after so much hostility between himself and his brother. So many years of quarreling and struggle, especially after their mother had passed away. In truth, he had always feared his brother. Andrew had been a strong and handsome lad, clearly his mother’s favorite, and a threat to Charles’s full inheritance. But Charles had won in the end, gaining both the riches and the title. And yet here he was, hat in hand, having set out across the North Atlantic to search for a brother he had not heard from in over twenty years.

  His jaw clenched in frustration and his heels dug into the flanks of his h
orse. He might as well finish what he had begun.

  The church steeple was the tallest structure in Georgetown, taller even than the highest trees. The building was whitewashed and as sturdy as all the other structures, set in a clearing bordered by fields and the descent to the Bay of Fundy. If Charles had not been so on edge, he probably would have found it attractive in a quaint sort of way. As with the rest of the village, there was no sign of wealth to the church, no stained glass or ornate decorations. Yet there was also none of the poverty and filth he always associated with English villages of comparable size.

  Charles hitched his horse to the gatepost and mounted the church steps. He hesitated there, drawn to stillness by all the anguish that plagued his nights, by all that was hanging on this meeting. He glanced up to where the village lane joined with the road to Halifax. The surrounding hills still bore stained drifts of late snow, the air still held a wintry bite. By this time his own English gardens would be in full bloom, the air fragrant and full of birdsong. Charles had a fleeting fierce desire to leave this humiliating encounter behind, just ride away and take the next ship back to England and home.

  Angrily he turned away from the road and the hills and the sunlit day. He had no choice. None. He struck the door latch with his fist and was sorry to find the church unlocked.

  It was not his clergyman brother who stood startled by his sudden appearance. Instead a young lady with broom in hand, her eyes round with surprise, faced him and asked, “Can I help you?”

  “I …” Charles found his anger fading as fast as it had appeared. What to say to this young woman? “I … I was riding by and found myself wishing to enter the church.”

  To his own ears, the words were feeble. But she seemed to find nothing unusual in them. She offered him a polite curtsy and said, “You are most welcome.” She backed up a pace, but her eyes did not leave his face. “Have you visited Georgetown before?”

  “No. Not ever.”