Fire Along the Sky
Page 48
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Many of the men she had failed to save came to her in the dark of night; some to talk to her about matters of no importance, others to say nothing at all. In this dream the white man without a name smiled at her, reached out a bloody hand and touched her cheek with one finger. His wounds had shifted from his leg and side to his chest, where a single bullet had carved out a hole over his heart.
The white man opened his mouth and spoke to her not in his own voice, but with her husband's.
Take care of the boy, Strikes-the-Sky said through the dead white man. Save the boy. My brothers will raise him to be a warrior.
I failed, she told him. I tried to save him but I failed. He's in the shadow lands. He is yours to look after, now.
Look after the boy, Strikes-the-Sky said again. You must save the boy.
Chapter 8
Montreal
In an attic room on the top floor of her brother's home, Lily Bonner worked in the last light of December afternoon. Her breath hovered damp and white around her head, and her skin was flushed with cold. The woolen cloak she wore to start with lay forgotten in the sawdust and wood shavings.
She carved, her movements sure and quick, quicker with the waning light. With all her concentration fixed on the block of cherry wood on the worktable, Lily coaxed the lines of a flowering tree into revealing themselves.
Now and then Lily paused in her work to study the branch propped up as a model on the deep windowsill. On the low table beneath the window there was a neat row of woodcarver's tools: chisels and knives and blades, gifts from her brother, who made such things appear before she could even think to ask. Each tool was wrapped in a rag, tucked and folded in precise angles, damp with oil.
She had started work with the rising of the sun, moving from one task to another: three hours with one teacher, two hours with another, the rest of the time at an easel or drawing table or in the attic with the wood. After dinner she had taken her daily walk through the city.
Every day she understood a little more of the French spoken all around her by farmers and tinsmiths, shop clerks and milkmaids. Often Lily thought of her mother's classroom and wished that she had been less impatient with the things she had been given to learn, French among them.
Today she had found the courage to try her luck when she bought a penny bun from an older woman with kind eyes, her red cheeks roughened by pox scars. To her surprise Lily found that she could answer when the old woman asked after Luke and Iona, something that pleased her very much, even if it was strange to be reminded that even in this great city everyone must know her face and name and her family history. Long before she came to stay here people had been telling stories about her father and grandfather—breathless ones, sometimes funny, always exciting, and so far as Lily could tell, they were all true, at least in spirit.
As a little girl she had listened to the stories and wished for her own adventures. Then Gabriel Oak began to teach her how to draw and those wishes had been replaced by very different ones. For so long she had wanted just what she had been given: teachers and tools and time to work. Freedom from the endless, mindless jobs: spinning, grinding corn, wiping dishes. No children to plague her with questions and stories and excursions into the forests. At home much of November would be taken up with spinning tow for wicks and candle dipping, Lily's least favorite of all the endless household work. No doubt they were dipping candles in Montreal too, but it had nothing to do with her, not here. This is what she wanted, Lily told herself. Everything she asked for.
It was almost four; time to change and go down to the dinner table, where food and drink appeared magically, carried up the stairs from the basement kitchen. There would be company, as there always was; her brother was known throughout Canada for his conversation and the generous table he set. There were stories about him too, though they were not told in his hearing. Lily heard snatches wherever she went, and gathered those bits and pieces to take back to Luke. When they sat together on Sundays she would bring them out and quiz him: Is it true that? and, How did you come to? and, Where was it you came across?
But at the dinner table she kept her questions to herself in front of company. His friends or business acquaintances were many and always welcome, and some of them had got into the habit of bringing wives and daughters and most especially marriageable sons along to meet Lily. All of Montreal was curious about her, this girl raised in the wilderness who came to study art. Nathaniel Bonner's daughter, with paint stains on her fingers.
She did not mind keeping silent and watching. In these weeks Lily had learned a great deal about her brother during his dinners. He was clever and quick and opinionated; he was never directly cruel, though he did not suffer fools. Most of all, he liked a good argument.
Wee Iona sat at the head of the table and said very little; she never volunteered an opinion and seldom gave one, even when asked directly. Lily had come to like Iona, though she was still shy of her and unwilling to ask questions, even when they were alone. From the first day she had known that Iona would be her only ally in this household, the person who would stand up for her when Luke overstepped, as he was wont to do.
The younger men who came to Luke's table watched Lily closely when they thought she didn't notice, and sometimes when they knew that she did. They talked to her of art and Montreal and things she must see, people she must meet. They loved the city and wanted her to love it as well.
Lily knew she should be pleased with all this attention, but she found it unsettling. She wanted to do what was expected of her—what she expected of herself—to fall in love with Montreal: the shops and lanes and hidden corners, the odd houses with their tin roofs, the beauty of the fields and hills and the people. It was a city of artists, of painters and miniaturists and engravers and woodcarvers and goldsmiths. Many of them had fled France during the Terror and settled here; all of them were eager for any student, even a female student, as long as the tuition was paid promptly.
The white man opened his mouth and spoke to her not in his own voice, but with her husband's.
Take care of the boy, Strikes-the-Sky said through the dead white man. Save the boy. My brothers will raise him to be a warrior.
I failed, she told him. I tried to save him but I failed. He's in the shadow lands. He is yours to look after, now.
Look after the boy, Strikes-the-Sky said again. You must save the boy.
Chapter 8
Montreal
In an attic room on the top floor of her brother's home, Lily Bonner worked in the last light of December afternoon. Her breath hovered damp and white around her head, and her skin was flushed with cold. The woolen cloak she wore to start with lay forgotten in the sawdust and wood shavings.
She carved, her movements sure and quick, quicker with the waning light. With all her concentration fixed on the block of cherry wood on the worktable, Lily coaxed the lines of a flowering tree into revealing themselves.
Now and then Lily paused in her work to study the branch propped up as a model on the deep windowsill. On the low table beneath the window there was a neat row of woodcarver's tools: chisels and knives and blades, gifts from her brother, who made such things appear before she could even think to ask. Each tool was wrapped in a rag, tucked and folded in precise angles, damp with oil.
She had started work with the rising of the sun, moving from one task to another: three hours with one teacher, two hours with another, the rest of the time at an easel or drawing table or in the attic with the wood. After dinner she had taken her daily walk through the city.
Every day she understood a little more of the French spoken all around her by farmers and tinsmiths, shop clerks and milkmaids. Often Lily thought of her mother's classroom and wished that she had been less impatient with the things she had been given to learn, French among them.
Today she had found the courage to try her luck when she bought a penny bun from an older woman with kind eyes, her red cheeks roughened by pox scars. To her surprise Lily found that she could answer when the old woman asked after Luke and Iona, something that pleased her very much, even if it was strange to be reminded that even in this great city everyone must know her face and name and her family history. Long before she came to stay here people had been telling stories about her father and grandfather—breathless ones, sometimes funny, always exciting, and so far as Lily could tell, they were all true, at least in spirit.
As a little girl she had listened to the stories and wished for her own adventures. Then Gabriel Oak began to teach her how to draw and those wishes had been replaced by very different ones. For so long she had wanted just what she had been given: teachers and tools and time to work. Freedom from the endless, mindless jobs: spinning, grinding corn, wiping dishes. No children to plague her with questions and stories and excursions into the forests. At home much of November would be taken up with spinning tow for wicks and candle dipping, Lily's least favorite of all the endless household work. No doubt they were dipping candles in Montreal too, but it had nothing to do with her, not here. This is what she wanted, Lily told herself. Everything she asked for.
It was almost four; time to change and go down to the dinner table, where food and drink appeared magically, carried up the stairs from the basement kitchen. There would be company, as there always was; her brother was known throughout Canada for his conversation and the generous table he set. There were stories about him too, though they were not told in his hearing. Lily heard snatches wherever she went, and gathered those bits and pieces to take back to Luke. When they sat together on Sundays she would bring them out and quiz him: Is it true that? and, How did you come to? and, Where was it you came across?
But at the dinner table she kept her questions to herself in front of company. His friends or business acquaintances were many and always welcome, and some of them had got into the habit of bringing wives and daughters and most especially marriageable sons along to meet Lily. All of Montreal was curious about her, this girl raised in the wilderness who came to study art. Nathaniel Bonner's daughter, with paint stains on her fingers.
She did not mind keeping silent and watching. In these weeks Lily had learned a great deal about her brother during his dinners. He was clever and quick and opinionated; he was never directly cruel, though he did not suffer fools. Most of all, he liked a good argument.
Wee Iona sat at the head of the table and said very little; she never volunteered an opinion and seldom gave one, even when asked directly. Lily had come to like Iona, though she was still shy of her and unwilling to ask questions, even when they were alone. From the first day she had known that Iona would be her only ally in this household, the person who would stand up for her when Luke overstepped, as he was wont to do.
The younger men who came to Luke's table watched Lily closely when they thought she didn't notice, and sometimes when they knew that she did. They talked to her of art and Montreal and things she must see, people she must meet. They loved the city and wanted her to love it as well.
Lily knew she should be pleased with all this attention, but she found it unsettling. She wanted to do what was expected of her—what she expected of herself—to fall in love with Montreal: the shops and lanes and hidden corners, the odd houses with their tin roofs, the beauty of the fields and hills and the people. It was a city of artists, of painters and miniaturists and engravers and woodcarvers and goldsmiths. Many of them had fled France during the Terror and settled here; all of them were eager for any student, even a female student, as long as the tuition was paid promptly.
