3
Of all the seasons in this New World, spring was Xander’s favorite. Virginia even trumped Scotland in his recollections. He recalled his childhood with dimming clarity. The mists and woodland bluebells, the stretches of light as the land embraced the sun after a long winter, the deep lochs and windswept coasts. He closed his eyes, grasping for details denied him. So much had slipped in and muddied the memories since he’d landed on Virginia shores as a lad. His own Scots speech seemed muted too.
This day, as he stood on his own ground, his thoughts were pressed full as a hogshead of tobacco with a great many unsavory things. Tobacco flea beetles. A barn roof riddled with hailstones from the latest tempest. Spoiled seedbeds. Ailing indentures down with the seasoning. Recently appointed, unscrupulous tobacco inspectors.
“True Word!”
His eyes opened at the sound of a youthful voice hailing him by his Powhatan name.
“Wingapo!” Xander called out the customary greeting as the lad emerged over the brow of the hill scored with greenfronds of transplanted tobacco and the noonday sun. He’d not seen Meihtawk in a month or more. But whenever he did, he was struck by Meihtawk’s similarity to Mattachanna. Same bone structure and wide-set eyes. Same handsome Mattaponi bearing and warmth of expression. Though they were cousins, the resemblance was remarkable.
“I bring news,” Meihtawk said in English, clearly coming in his role as tribal courier.
At once came the clutch of concern. It seemed all of Virginia braced for another onslaught of terror after a recent tentative peace. Xander leaned his hoe against a stump and gave Meihtawk his full attention, including his leather flask.
Swallowing a drink of well water, Meihtawk looked him in the eye. “Chief Opechancanough asks that you come and kindle a council fire at Menmend, where he hardly has room enough to spread his blanket.”
So, the invitation came with a complaint. Yet the complaint was a valid one. The Powhatan Confederacy, made up of many tribes including the Mattaponi, continued to lose beloved ground, their villages thrust farther west year by year, their once vast territory shrinking before their very eyes. Frustration formed a tight knot in Xander’s chest, eased only slightly by Meihtawk’s obliging manner. It was he who had saved so many colonists in the latest hostilities, warning them of the last planned attack.
Xander nodded. “Tell Opechancanough that I have heard his request and will come. But I will need time to prepare. If all goes well, I will meet you in six sleeps at Monacan Fields when the sun is three fingers high.”
At this, Meihtawk’s face lit with undisguised gratitude. His was a hard task as emissary. Yet surely he knew Xanderwould not refuse the invitation. Though Xander was continually torn between his loyalties to the English and his ties to the Naturals, the Naturals oft gained his allegiance and the upper hand.
With a farewell, Meihtawk disappeared over the hill, a few indentures watching his going.
Xander drew a linen sleeve across his sweat-spackled upper lip, returning to his hoeing. Field hands spread out on all sides of him as far as the eye could see. His goal at first light had been five hundred tobacco hills by dusk. Orinoco was a laborious crop, robbing the soil and depleting the workers along with it. His attempts to be versatile, to cultivate other exportable crops, were unending.
At suppertime, he sat down at his own table, heaping his plate full of pickled herring and bread. He ate slowly, thoughts full of another table, the fine feast they’d had at the Hopewells’ a sennight before. Tomorrow he’d return, not to dine but to buy. And he’d go early to avoid the usual bustle.
Supper done, he made a move to retire to his study and the quiet to be had beyond the clatter of his aunt cleaning up. Her question caught him at the door.
“Did I hear you say you were going to James Towne on the morrow, Alexander?”
He turned around. “Aye. Are you in need of something?”
A decisive bob of her capped head. “A Border ware jug, if you please. I tripped over Ruby and broke one. And any gossip that can be had about the tobacco brides and their courting.”
“Thankfully, the latter is as easily gotten,” he replied. “Consider it done.”
“Thank you, Nephew,” she said over her shoulder as they went their separate ways.
Once ensconced in his study, his greyhounds near the hearth, he pondered a pipe. Ruby looked up at him moodily as his gaze swept the planked floor where she lay in all her gangling splendor.
“You’re a beauty, girl. Don’t let Aunt Henrietta tell you differently.” He stooped to scratch her velvety head, her reddish coat agleam in the fading light. “As for you, Sir Jett, as noble a creature that ever lived, I believe you shall accompany me to visit Chief Opechancanough. His continued awe of you may serve me well.”
Ruby’s black companion gave a deep, resounding bark, eyes alive with the excitement of hearing his master’s voice. Only with difficulty did Jett finally lay his sleek head on an outstretched paw.
“And let us not forget Selah Hopewell’s kind regard of you both. Surely that speaks to your canine character.”
At once, Selah’s comely liveliness at their shared supper leapt to mind. ’Twas usually Mattachanna’s dusky face that stared back at him. Reaching for an elaborate brass tobacco tamper, Xander pressed last year’s leaf into the pipe’s bowl, tamping down the old, festering ache along with it. Once lit, he inhaled, wanting to banish the vision.
His latest leaf smoked pleasant, strong, and sweet. Consignment agents in England told him buyers were paying thrice what other crop masters made. Even the lowly outpost merchants were clamoring for more Rose-n-Vale hogsheads. ’Twas even rumored a thoroughfare in the town of his birth had been named after him. He shrugged off such ridiculousness as more fancy than fact.
He, a Scottish silversmith’s son.
While Shay removed the merchant scales from their box to begin the day’s business, Selah unpacked newly arrived crates from England holding coveted Chinese porcelain. These fragile goods she displayed in a front window to entice passersby. Such fine wares never lasted long. Obsessed with appearances, James Towne gentry were the first to storm in when a supply ship arrived. Since the tobacco brides’ coming, the brass bell at their door seemed to jingle sunup to sundown.
Glad she was her father as cape merchant took care of accounts while she and Shay handled anything from axes and adzes to linen thread and glass buttons. Goods were arriving regularly now, her favorites from the exotic Indies. With each passing year their inventory grew. Once, James Towne was clad in rags but now boasted the finest imported cloth. Nor were there shelves enough for the wealth of fragrant spices from far ports alongside sweetmeats and culinary delicacies. Though life continued uncertain, at least they faced the future with their bellies full.
