"There always is," Nathaniel agreed. "Do you mean the one about Todd heading back this way?"

Axel's teeth flashed in the lamplight. "I should have known it'd be no surprise to you, Nathaniel. His servant brought word down to Anna today, said she needed to get things in order for him. So it's true he's been up in Montreal all this time?"

"Actually, it was I who carried the message to his household staff." Will volunteered. "Dr. Todd was staying with a Mr. McTavish, in Montreal. A merchant."

Charlie LeBlanc turned from the drafts board. "The McTavish who started up the North West Company? By God, I'd like to make his acquaintance. There's a fortune to be made up in those parts."

"Which is exactly why Todd is spending time with him," suggested John Glove, chewing thoughtfully on his pipe. "He's got a keen eye for the right connection."

"Maybe Todd will move up that way, permanent. Leave us without a doctor." This from Ben Cameron, the brother—in—law of Asa Pierce.

Axel scratched his head thoughtfully. "Well, we done fine without him all summer. Those that passed on he couldn't have helped much, anyway."

There was a silence as they thought of the men they had buried in the past few months, Billy Kirby the most recent.

"We've had a bloody season, all right," said Axel. "Lost our heads, some of us. In more ways than one."

Nathaniel said: "Here's to a peaceful winter."

When they had raised their glasses together, Axel went off to see about a new keg, and the other men turned back to a game of draughts.

"At first I wondered what could possibly keep Elizabeth so far from civilization," Will Spencer said to Nathaniel. It was the longest sentence he had had from him all day, and the most curious. Will would not meet Nathaniel's eye, his gaze roaming instead over the room.

"I thought she might be disappointed in her plans to teach school. But this is a good place for her," he went on. "She always wanted adventure in her life."

"She's got more than enough of that," Nathaniel said. "Too much, maybe."

"You are a fortunate man, said Will Spencer.

On their way out, it occurred to Nathaniel that Spencer had made a confession of sorts, and that he would probably never hear such a personal statement again from him, should he see him every day for the rest of his life. The fact that he was setting off tomorrow loosened Nathaniel's tongue.

"In this part of the world, we think highly of men who know how to keep their peace," Nathaniel said to him as they stood in the small circle of lantern light at the door. "But you got most of them beat. I'll tell you, Spencer, I've got no idea what goes on in that head of yours. At first I thought you had a hole inside you, but now I'm wondering if it isn't just the eye of the storm."

That much earned him a flicker of a smile, and flash from the mild eyes. "Elizabeth's imagination has found its equal," he said. "You see before you a rich man of little use to the world. Nothing more."

"Nothing more," Nathaniel echoed, laughing softly. It was their last exchange of the evening.

Chapter 60

While Nathaniel was gone to Albany to see aunt Merriweather settled in for another visit with the Schuylers, the winter seemed to give up its purpose and fall back. They were thrust into inordinately warm days: suddenly it was possible again to sit on the porch without a shawl, and to go bare—legged to fetch water. The sun shone on the harvested fields where crows hitched and hobbled after the overlooked kernel of corn. A flock of snow geese on their way south for the winter settled on Half Moon Lake as if the lack of cold stole from them their ability to fly, sending the villagers running for their muskets.

Runs-from-Bears took an immense bear already settled in for the winter, and there were days of rendering fat and storing it in lengths of washed and knotted deer intestines. The smells were so strong that Elizabeth found it hard to hide her reaction, and she was waved off, as she had been sent away during the setting of soap.

"Sooner or later I shall have to learn to do this, too," she said to Many-Doves , who only laughed at her.

"Why?" she asked. "Why should you do work that you were not raised to do, when we are here to do it?"

"Because I must do my share," Elizabeth protested.

"You do your share," she was told, and banished to the porch to sit in the warm sun and clean bushel after bushel of beans with Liam's help. A quiet work, a contemplative work, when what she wanted was to be up and active in these last days of freedom from the weather. She wished for Nathaniel, but was glad of Hannah, whom she would take with her into the woods to gather the last of the beechnuts, or just to explore the mountain. Although it meant leaving an unhappy Liam behind, Hannah was always pleased to have Elizabeth to herself.

In the fifth month of her pregnancy the curve of her belly was no longer possible to overlook. The child had recently become very active, rolling and kicking when she sat down to rest, as if to make her get up and go again. Elizabeth sometimes laughed out loud at the outrageousness of it. Leaning back with her weight on her hands, she let Hannah probe gently as she had seen her grandmother do. She called the small roundness nihra'a ri'kenha, Little Brother, and chided him indulgently for his exuberance.

"Four more months," Elizabeth said. "By then I will be waddling like a duck."

"You do that already, when you're tired." And Hannah screeched and rolled away from Elizabeth's tickling fingers.