ALVIN JOURNEYMAN Read online

  “The hexes are to hide me from others.”

  “What do you have to hide for? Ain’t nobody looking for you.”

  The words struck her hard. Nobody looking for her. Well, there it was. Once she had hidden so she could return to her own house without her family knowing her. Whom was she hiding from now?

  “Perhaps I’m hiding from myself. Perhaps I don’t want to be what I’m supposed to be. Or perhaps I don’t want to keep living the life I already started to live.”

  “Perhaps you don’t know squat about it,” he said.

  “Perhaps.”

  “Oh, don’t be so mysterious, you silly old lady.”

  Silly she might accept, but old? “I’m not that many years older than you.”

  “When people say perhaps it’s cause they’re lying: Either they don’t believe the thing they’re saying, or they do believe it only they don’t want to admit they do.”

  “You’re a very wise young man.”

  “And the real liars change the subject the minute the truth comes up.”

  Peggy regarded him steadily. “You were waiting for me, weren’t you?”

  “I knew what Aunt Becca would do. She don’t tell nobody nothin’.”

  “And you’re going to tell me?”

  “Not me! That’s trouble too deep for me to get into.” He smiled. “But you did stop the three witches from making soup of me. So I got you thinking in the right direction, if you’ve got the brains to see it.” With that he jumped up and she listened as his feet slapped up the stairs and he was gone.

  The choice was for Peggy to be happy. Becca said that, or said that her sister said it—though it was hard to imagine that blank-faced woman caring a whit whether anybody was happy or not. And now the boy got her talking about why she was hiding behind hexes, and said that he had guided her. The choice she was being offered was obvious enough now. She had buried herself in her father’s work of breaking the back of slavery, and had stopped looking out for Alvin. They wanted her to look back again. They wanted her to reach out for him.

  She stormed back into the cabin. “I won’t do it,” she said. “Caring for that boy is what killed my mother.”

  “Excuse me but I think a shotgun is what did for her,” said Becca.

  “A shotgun I could have prevented.”

  “So you say,” said Becca.

  “Yes, I say so.”

  “Your mother’s thread broke when she decided to pick up a shotgun and do some killing of her own rather than trust to Alvin. Her boy Arthur was safe. She didn’t need to kill, but when she chose to do that, she chose to die. Do you think you could have changed her mind about that?”

  “Don’t expect me to accept easy answers.”

  “No, I expect you to make all the answers as hard as possible. But sometimes it’s the easy answers that are true.”

  “So it’s back to the old days? Watching Alvin? Am I supposed to fall in love with him? Marry him? Watch him die?”

  “I don’t much care either way. My sister thinks you’ll be happier with him than without him, and he’s dead either way, in the long run, but then aren’t we all? Most women that aren’t killed by having babies live to be widows. What of that?”

  What of that? Just because she could foresee so many ways for Alvin to die didn’t mean that she should avoid loving him. She knew that, rationally. But fear wasn’t rational.

  “You spend your whole life grieving for those that haven’t died yet,” said Becca. “What a waste of an interesting knack.”

  “Interesting?”

  “You could have had the knack of making shoe leather supple. Just see how happy that would’ve made you.”

  Peggy tried to imagine herself as a cobbler and had to laugh. “I suppose that I’d rather know than not know, mostly.”

  “Exactly. Knowing hurts sometimes, especially when you can’t do anything to change it.”

  But there was something furtive in her, the way she said that. “Can’t do anything to change it my left eye!” said Peggy.

  “Don’t use curses you don’t understand,” said Becca.

  “You do make changes. You don’t think the loom is immutable, not one bit.”

  “It’s dangerous to change. The consequences are unpredictable.”

  “You saw Ta-Kumsaw dead at Detroit. So you picked up Alvin’s thread and you—“

  “What do you know about the loom!” cried Becca. “What do you know about watching the threads flow under your hands and seeing all the grief and pain and suffering and thinking! It doesn’t matter, they’re God’s cattle and he can herd them how he likes only then you find the one you love more than life and God has him slaughtered by the treachery of the French and the hatred of the English and for nothing, his whole life meaningless and lost and nothing changed by it except a few legends and songs, and here I am, still loving him, a widow forever because he’s gone! So yes, I found the one who could save him. I knew if they met, they’d love each other and save each other.”

  “But what you did caused the massacre at Tippy-Canoe,” said Peggy. “The people of Vigor Church thought Alvin had been kidnapped and tortured to death, so they slaughtered Tenskwa-Tawa’s people in vengeance. Now they have a curse on them, all because you—“

  “Because Harrison took advantage of their rage. Do you think there wouldn’t have been a massacre anyway?”

  “But the blood wouldn’t have been on the same hands, would it?”

  Becca wept, and her tears fell onto the cloth.

  “Shouldn’t you dry those tears?” asked Peggy.

  “If tears could mar this cloth, there’d be no cloth left.”

  “So you of all people know the cost of meddling with the course of others’ lives.”

  “And you of all people know the cost of failing to meddle when the time was right.” Becca raised her head and continued her work. “I saved him, and that was my goal. Those who died would have died anyway.”

  “Yet here I am because your sister wants me to look after Alvin.”

  “Here you are because we only see the threads and then half-guess as to what they mean and who they are. We know the young Maker’s thread—there’s no way to miss it in this cloth. Besides, I moved it once, I twined it with my Isaac’s thread. Do you think I could lose track of it after that? I’ll show you, if you promise not to look beyond the inch of cloth I show.”

  “I promise not to look. But I can’t help what I chance to see.”

  “Chance to see this, then.”

  Peggy looked at the cloth, knowing that the sight of it was rarely given to those not of the loom. Alvin’s thread was obvious, shimmering light, with all colors in it; but it was no thicker than any other, and it looked frail, easily snapped by careless handling. “You dared to move this one?”

  “It returned of itself to its own place,” said Becca. “I only borrowed it for a while. And he saved his brother Measure. Eight-face Mound opened up for him. I tell you there are forces at work in his life far stronger than my power to move the threads.”

  “More powerful than me, too.”

  “You are one of the forces. Not all of them, not the greatest of them, but you are one. Look. See how the threads cross him. His brothers and sisters, I think. He is closely entwined with his family. And see how these threads are brightening, taking on more hues. He’s teaching them to be Makers.”

  Peggy hadn’t known that. “Isn’t that dangerous?”

  “He can’t do his work alone,” said Becca. “So he teaches others to help him in it. He’s more successful at it than he knows.”

  “This one,” said Peggy, pointing to the brightest of the other threads. It veered off widely, wandering through the cloth far from the rest of the family.

  “His brother. Also a seventh son of a seventh son,” said Becca. “Though the eighth, if you count the one who died.”

  “But the seventh of those alive when he was born,” said Peggy. “Yes, there’s power in him.”

 
“Look,” said Becca. “See how he was at the beginning. Every bit as bright as Alvin’s. There was near as much in him then as in Alvin. And no more forces working against him than Alvin overcame. Fewer, really, because by the time he came into his own you and Alvin between you had the Unmaker at bay. At least, all the killing tricks. But the Unmaker found another way to undo the boy. Hate and envy. If you love Alvin, Peggy, find his younger brother’s heartfire. Somehow he must be brought back before it’s too late.”

  “Why? I don’t know anything about Calvin, except his name and Alvin’s hopes for him.”

  “Because the way the threads are going now, when his rejoins Alvin’s, Alvin’s comes to an end.”

  “He kills him?”

  “How should I know? We learn what we can learn, but the threads say little except by their movement through the cloth. You will know. That’s why she called you. Not just for your own happiness, but because... as she said, because I owe it to the Maker. I used him once to save my love. Didn’t I owe you the same chance? That’s what she said. But we knew that if I showed you this at first, before you chose, you would help him out of duty. For the grand cause, not for love of him.”

  “But I hadn’t decided to watch him again.”

  “So you say,” said Becca.

  “You’re very smug,” said Peggy, “for a woman who has made such a botch of things herself.”

  “I inherited a botch,” said Becca. “One day my mother, who crossed the ocean and brought us here, one day she took her hands from the loom and walked away. My sister and I came in with her supper and found her gone. We were both married, but I had borne a child for my husband, and in those days my sister had none. So I took the loom, and she went to her husband. And all the time, I was furious at my mother for going away like that. Fleeing her duty.” Becca stroked the threads, gently, even gingerly. “Now I think I understand. The price of holding all these lives in our hands is that we scarcely have a life ourselves. My mother wasn’t good at this, because her heart wasn’t in it. Mine is, and if I made a mistake to save my husband’s life, perhaps you can judge me more kindly knowing that I had already given up my life with my husband in order to fill my mother’s place.”

  “I didn’t mean to condemn you,” said Peggy, abashed.

  “Nor did I mean to justify myself to you,” said Becca. “And yet you did condemn me, and I did justify myself. I hold my mother’s thread here. I know where she is. But I’ll never know, really, why she did what she did. Or what might have happened if she stayed.” Becca looked up at Peggy. “I don’t know much, but what I know, I know. Alvin must go out into the world. He must leave his family—let them learn Making on their own now, as he did. He must rejoin Calvin before the boy has been completely turned by the Unmaker. Otherwise, Calvin may be not only his death, but also the undoing of all the Maker’s works.”

  “I have an easy answer,” said Peggy. “I’ll find Calvin and make sure he never comes home.”

  “You think you have the power to control a Maker’s life?”

  “Calvin is no Maker. How could he be? Think what Alvin had to do, to come into his own.”

  “Nevertheless, you never had the power to stand against Alvin, even when he was a child. And he was kind at heart. I think Calvin isn’t governed by the same sense of decency.”

  “So I can’t stand against him,” said Peggy. “Nor can I send Alvin out on errands. He’s not mine to command.”

  “Isn’t he?” asked Becca.

  Peggy buried her face in her hands. “I don’t want him to love me. I don’t want to love him. I want to continue my struggle against slavery here in Appalachee.”

  “Oh, yes. Using your knack to meddle with the cloth, aren’t you?” said Becca. “Do you know where it leads?”

  “To liberty for the slaves, I hope.”

  “Perhaps,” she said. “But the sure thing is this: It leads to war.”

  Peggy looked up grimly. “I see warsigns down all the paths. Before I started doing this, I saw those signs.” Grieving mothers. The terror of battle in young men’s lives.

  “It begins as a civil war in Appalachee, but it ends as a war between the King on the one side and the United States on the other. Brutal, bloody, cruel...”

  “Are you saying I should stop? That I should let these monsters continue to rule over the Blacks they kidnapped and all their children forever?”

  “Not at all,” said Becca. “The war comes because of a million different choices. Your actions push things that way, but you aren’t the only cause. Do you understand? If war is the only way to free the slaves, then isn’t the war worth all the suffering? Are lives wasted, when they end for such a cause?”

  “I can’t judge this sort of thing,” said Peggy.

  “But that’s not true,” said Becca. “Only you are fit to judge, because only you see the outcomes that might result. By the time I see things they’ve become inevitable.”

  “If they’re inevitable, then why are you bothering to tell me to try to change them?”

  “Almost inevitable. Again, I spoke imprecisely. I can’t meddle with the threads on a grand scale. I can’t foresee the consequences of change. But a single thread—sometimes I can move it without undoing the whole fabric. I didn’t know a way to move Calvin that would make a difference. But I could move you. I could bring the judge here, the one who sees with the blindfold over her eyes. So I’ve done that.”

  “I thought you said your sister did it.”

  “Well, she’s the one who decided it must be done. But only I could touch the thread.”

  “I think you spend a lot of your time lying and concealing things.”

  “Quite possibly.”

  “Like the fact that the western door leads into Ta-Kumsaw’s land west of the Mizzipy.”

  “I never lied about that, or concealed it either.”

  “And the eastern door, where does that lead?”

  “It opens in my auntle’s house in Winchester, back in England. See? I conceal nothing.”

  “You have but one daughter,” said Peggy, “and she’s already got a loom of her own. Who will take your place here?”

  “None of your business,” said Becca.

  “Nothing is none of my business now,” said Peggy. “Not after you picked up my thread and moved it here.”

  “I don’t know who will take my place. Maybe I’ll be here forever. I’m not my mother. I won’t quit and force this on an unwilling soul.”

  “When it comes time to choose, look at the boy,” said Peggy. “He’s wiser than you think.”

  “A boy’s hands on the loom?” Becca’s face bore an expression that suggested she had just tasted something awful.

  “Before any talent for weaving,” said Peggy, “doesn’t the weaver have to care about the threads coming into the cloth? He may have killed a squirrel, but I don’t think he loves death.”

  Becca regarded her steadily. “You take too much upon yourself.”

  “As you said. I’m a Judge.”

  “You’ll do it, then?”

  “What, watch Alvin? Yes. Though I know I’ll have a broken heart six times over before I bury him, yes, I’ll turn my eyes back to that boy.”

  “That man.”

  “That Maker,” said Peggy.

  “And the other?”

  “I’ll meddle if I can find a way.”

  Becca nodded. “Good.” She nodded again. “We’re done, now. The doors will lead you out of the house.”

  That was all the good-bye that Peggy got. But what Becca said was true. Where once Peggy couldn’t see a way out, now every corridor led to a door standing open, with the daylight outside. She didn’t want to go through the doors back into her own world, though. She wanted to pass through the doors in the old cabin. The east door, into England. The west door, into Red country. Or the south door—where did it lead?

  Nevertheless, it was this time and place where she belonged. There was a carriage waiting for her, and work to do, stir
ring up war by encouraging compassion for the slaves. She could live with that, yes, as Becca had said. Didn’t Jesus himself say that he came to bring, not peace, but war? Turning brother against brother? If that’s what it takes to remove the stain of slavery from this land, then so be it. I speak only of peaceful change—if others choose to kill or die rather than let the slaves go free, that is their choice, and I didn’t cause it.

  Just as I didn’t cause my mother to take up the gun and kill the Finder who was, after all, only obeying the law, unjust as the law might be. He wouldn’t have found Arthur Stuart, hidden as he was in my house, his very smell changed by Alvin’s Making, and his presence hidden behind all the hexes Alvin had put there. I didn’t kill her. And even if I could have prevented what she did, it wouldn’t have changed who she was. She was the woman who would make such a choice as that. That was the woman I loved, her fierce angry courage along with everything else. I am not guilty of her death. The man who shot her was. And she was the one, not I, who placed her in harm’s way.

  Peggy strode out into the sunlight feeling invigorated, light of step. The air tasted sweet to her. The place with no heartfires had rekindled her own.

  She got back into the carriage and it took her without further distractions to an inn well north of Chapman Valley. She spent the night there, and then the next day rode on to Baker’s Fork. Once there, she held her master classes, teaching schoolmasters and gifted students, and in between conversing with this man or that woman about slavery, making comments, scorning those who mistreated slaves, declaring that as long as anyone had such power over other men and women, there would be mistreatment, and the only cure for it was for all men and women to be free. They nodded. They agreed. She spoke of the courage it would take, how the slaves themselves bore the lash and had lost all; how much would White men and women suffer in order to free them? What did Christ suffer, for the sake of others? It was a strong and measured performance that she gave. She did not retreat from it one bit, even though she knew now that it would lead to war. Wars have been fought for foolish causes. Let there be one, at last, in a good cause, if the enemies of decency refuse to soften their hearts.