Dawn on a Distant Shore by Sara Donati Read Free Book Online Page A

ken the answer better than I, laddie. Ye walked awa' frae
her once, wi' your faither pushin' frae behind."
    Nathaniel wasn't
easily embarrassed, but he didn't especially like being reminded of the hours he
had spent with Giselle Somerville. He had been young, and healthy and ready to
learn; she had been just as young, anything but innocent, and she had enjoyed
teaching him. It was almost twenty years ago, but Nathaniel recalled certain
moments with perfect clarity, when he let himself. Hawkeye had shown up and
asked him straight-out if he wanted the girl to wife, and if she would come home
with them to Lake in the Clouds.
    And that had been the
end of it. Enough to wake him up to the truth: he could not live in Montréal,
and she would have laughed at the idea of a life on the edge of the wilderness.
And so he left Montréal with his father, and ended up spending the hunting
season with Stone-Splitter's people. That was when he had taken note of the
oldest granddaughter of the clan mother of the Wolf, Sings-from-Books, who had
become his first wife. Out of the pan and into the fire .
    He shook his head to
clear it of the past. "Giselle will try to hold on to Otter, if she's
given the chance," Nathaniel said. "She collects men like other women
collect jewels."
    Iona's head was
lowered over her knitting, but Nathaniel saw a tightening of her mouth, and
then she spoke up: "That's not very charitable of you, considering what
you once were to each other."
    It was a well-deserved
rebuke, and Nathaniel accepted it with an inclined head. "You're right. I
shouldn't pass judgment. But my worry now is for Otter."
    "He's a bonnie
lad, and gey canny," Rab said. "But he's young, forbye, and--curious.
It's a guid thing he's wi' yer faither."
    "We need to get
him out of here. And us, too."
    "Tomorrow, if
possible," Iona agreed.
    "Aye," said
Robbie. "Ye'll get nae argument frae me."
    "Have you got any
ideas?" Nathaniel asked.
    Robbie grinned.
"Have ye got iny money?"
    When they had talked
for another hour, Robbie returned to the lodgings in the rue St. Gabriel, so as
to keep Nathaniel's presence a secret for the time being. In two days' time, if
all went well, they would be out of Montréal, and Moncrieff would never know he
had been there. For a moment Nathaniel could almost feel sorry for the man, who
wanted nothing more than to fulfill an obligation to his employer, an old man
with no heir and no hopes. But stronger than that was the need to protect his
own, and Nathaniel would turn his back on Montréal and Moncrieff without a
moment's hesitation.
    He slept deeply, and
dreamed of the caves under the falls.
     

4
     
    In his life Nathaniel
had spent time in a few cities, but he would never be truly at ease in a crowd.
And still he knew that in Montréal the commotion of the pig market was the best
kind of camouflage to be had, and so he and Robbie headed there at sunrise.
According to Iona, it was where they were most likely to find the sergeant in charge
of the night watch at the garrison gaol, a dragoon called Ronald Jones.
    The cold was fierce
enough to turn breath to ice, but still the sun managed to find purchase here
and there, flashing off a tin roof, a cleaver hung on the side of a stall, an
unshuttered window, a young River Indian's silver earbob. A man couldn't walk
without being stepped on, pushed, touched: overweight merchants, half-drunk foot
soldiers, butchers herding sows, maids pulling loaded sledges, beggars, dogs
and oxen and horses and pigs everywhere. Despite the extreme cold the air was
dense with the stink of swine slurry and curing meat, and it swirled with ashes
and cinders from the bonfires that gave the butchers and their customers a
place to warm themselves.
    Even in this crowd,
Nathaniel felt eyes fix on him. Perhaps because he stood head and shoulders
over most; perhaps because he was with Robbie, who stood even taller. They saw
him, and forgot him: he was just another backwoodsman wanting liquor or a woman
or