Harvest Moon - (September)
In the passage of the few weeks since she had last seen it, the small cabin had not changed at all, nor had its surroundings, with the exception of the color of the trees that framed the clearing, their rusty hues evidence that the season had turned. How strange, then, thought Alice, that upon first sight she had been shocked by how primitive it had all seemed--yet in comparison to the way she had spent the nights in recent memory, it was now a grand cathedral, a beacon of comfort and safety.
Her new home.
She brushed a strand of sun-bleached hair out of her face, the motion second nature by now, for though she continued to carefully braid her hair at nights it was always in hopeless disarray at the end of a day's travel.
She took in a deep breath of cool evening air.
Their new home...
Dismissing that strangely uncomfortable thought from her mind, Alice followed Uncas up the well-trodden path into the clearing. The sole on one of her shoes was worn through, and she kicked them both off gladly now and went, barefoot, along the smooth hard dirt that made up the ground here.
Uncas, who had been bearing a heavy pack full of food and supplies from the wolf camp, had set his burden down and already entered the cabin, with that purposefulness which characterized him. Then he turned, glanced back at her and realized that she was hesitating.
His mouth softened to see her, standing there in her buckskin dress, beneath which the hem of her underdress hung in tatters, and with no shoes. Looking at him as if she expected something.
He crossed back over the threshold and down the few stone steps. "Come," he said, unnecessarily, taking her hand.
Alice, with some diffidence, let herself be led into the cabin. She gazed at her surroundings. The hearth, left tidy and ash-free by Chingachgook on one end; the rack of furs and skins along the far wall. The table and bench. The stand by the door for washing. A small storage chamber tucked into the back.
She felt sudden, irrational panic that rose as strongly as bile in her throat. What was she doing here?
Uncas must have sensed it as he would have sensed the panic of a hunted animal. He let go of her hand, which she had been about to pull away anyway, and said calmly, "You should rest."
Alice had no objections to that. Her body was exhausted. She had hoped that the passage of time might have hardened her, even just enough so that she could notice the difference between now and when she'd first arrived on these shores, but she still felt unutterably weary at the close of each day. She wondered how much longer it was going to take. She was cold, too, now.
Uncas pulled some of the hides off the rack and gestured that she should arrange them to her convenience, then went outside--probably, she guessed, to get wood for the fire.
Out of his presence she felt safe enough to let the tears, which over the past week she had successfully kept at bay, now spill out. The rough hides blurred beneath her gaze and she sorted them by touch only, pulling the softest ones to the top.
She thought of Cora and Nathaniel on the river, remembered her last glimpse of them as they'd disappeared. How long would it be until she saw her sister again? There was no way to know.
Wiping her decidedly grimy, streaked face with the sleeve of her dress, she remembered she had access to water now, and had better use it. She went over to the washstand, scrubbed her face and hands with a determination to get back in control of herself, and poured the dirty water out the window onto the straggling late wildflowers below.
Uncas re-entered the cabin bearing several armfuls of wood. Alice watched as he brought the logs over to the hearth and began to set up the fire. Once it was burning, and had cast a familiar glow over the room, whose natural light was now dimming, the cabin began to feel more inviting.
For dinner; they ate the remainder of the prepared food that had been packed for them at the camp. Alice was none too certain of her ability to render any of the dry supplies they had brought into anything remotely edible, so she hoped Uncas wouldn't expect that of her in the days to come. At least not at first. She was already beginning to suspect that as time went by, she would have little enough else with which to fill the days, and might--out of sheer need to have something to do--turn to cooking.
It was strange that, as comfortable as their silences had been in the wilderness, this meal time was awkward in comparison. The visible trappings of society around them--the physical walls, the sitting together at table--made Alice nervous. She felt the weight of her upbringing settle around her slight shoulders, and it was a weight that, borne together with Cora, had been endurable, but which she could hardly bear alone.
She wondered if Uncas' silence meant he too felt the awkwardness or--as was perhaps more likely knowing what she had learned of him--he simply didn't feel the need to speak.
"The fire is nice," she ventured at last.
Uncas made that noncommittal sound she had so often heard from both him and his brother.
So much for that conversational gambit, she thought. She finished her last mouthful of food without tasting it, swallowed, and ran her fingers along the rough edge of the table top, seeking some sort of physical confirmation that this was real, that they were real, that this was not just her dream of what their first night back at the cabin was going to be like. The table promptly provided physical confirmation in the form of a splinter. Alice let out a quiet yelp of surprise as she felt it pierce the tip of her index finger.
Uncas reached across the table without a change in expression and took her hand. She had more or less grown accustomed to his habit of doing this, as it happened so often now--whenever she faltered along the trails, or when they had passed over the river, or at nights before she slept. Still, though, the warmth of his skin always came as a surprise. She watched with curious eyes as he withdrew a small folded square of fabric from one of the many pockets he had on his person. Unfolding it, he revealed some type of grease, into which he dipped a finger. Though Alice drew back out of instinct--it smelled like rancid butter--he smoothed a bit over the area into which the fragment of wood had lodged itself.
"Tomorrow," was all he said by way of explanation.
* * *
Dark had not long settled itself over the clearing before both of them came to the unspoken conclusion that it was time to retire. If Uncas had been under any illusions about what their first night together at the cabin might entail, he found them quickly dispelled when he saw that Alice had no intention of sleeping beside him--though she had done so every night of the past week in the journey from the wolf camp.
He watched her as he banked the fire for the night; she was dividing the sleeping furs into two quite separate piles, one near each wall. While a corner of his mouth quirked in amusement at the obvious message, he couldn't help but be slightly mystified as to why she was suddenly enforcing such boundaries now. Though he had not made any specific assumptions that in bringing her here their relationship would immediately result in further intimacies, he didn't think it was so strange that they should continue to sleep side by side as they had done in the wilderness.
Still, he had no desire to force his presence upon Alice if it was troubling to her. With a philosophical mental shrug, he rose from the fireside. He could sense her tension all the way across the room; it was almost as if she were holding her breath.
Pushing most of the furs she'd put out for him out of the way--he didn't sleep on more than a single skin normally, to protect from the roughly hewn wood of the floor--he settled down in his space, stretching. It was good to be home. Were he alone, he wouldn't have made the distinction between the outdoors, the wolf camp, or the cabin in that respect; Uncas was not tied to any one location, but now that Alice was under his care, he felt at ease knowing he could safeguard her better from here. He had been in a state of almost constant alertness while they travelled, and tonight would be the first time since the camp that he'd be able to get a few hours of proper sleep.
He pillowed his head with his hands behind it and looked sideways at Alice. She was wrapped completely in fur, though the night wasn't cool enough to warrant doing so, with her eyes tightly shut although he knew she wasn't yet sleeping. As always, he was struck by how young, how vulnerable she looked like that.
She knows nothing about cooking or home-building. She does not even know how to tan a hide.
His father's words came, unexpected, unbidden, to his mind.
I will help her. Though his reply had been confident, Uncas did have misgivings about the fact that he would be doing it alone. He knew of no other young couple starting out without the benefit of camp society, left to solve any difficulties, any lack in upbringings, any differences of opinion on their own. It was, essentially, going to be a period of exile. And while he was fully ready to take on the responsibility of Alice's safety and survival, he was not at all confident that he would be able to manage his regular seasonal duties of hunting and stocking up for the winter at the same time he was keeping her safe. The hunt might be scarce--winter might come early, or be fiercer than normal...he could see complications already.
However, it was not his nature to dwell on such things: better to take each day as it came, and let the vagaries of external forces do what they would. Now was the time for rest.
"Wiyon-ashay," he said, watching her eyelids flutter as she registered his name for her.
"Yes?" she murmured at last in a rather fearful voice.
"Sleep."
Alice shifted somewhat fitfully and gave an acquiescent, relieved sigh.
The fire continued to throw out a steady heat until the early hours of the morning.
* * *
Alice awoke to muted birdsong, and for a few moments she just lay there, eyes closed, aware of stiffness in her arms and legs for which the only remedy was to move, but not wanting the day to be starting already. She had hoped her first morning in her--their, that persistent internal voice reminded her--new home would be one that she was eager to face, but it did not seem to be turning out that way.
Peeling back some of the furs and coming slowly to a sitting position, she realized that she was alone. For a moment, she felt a gnawing of concern in her stomach, but common sense indicated that wherever Uncas was he would surely not have gone far.
Thin tendrils of smoke curled upwards from the previous night's fire and there was fresh water on the washstand. Alice used some of it, longing as she did for a hot bath. That was one of the conveniences of England that she was sure would take some time for her to get used to going without. She determined to wash properly later that day, anyway, even if it meant she had to find a river to do it in. And then we will have to unpack our supplies, and see about some sort of food, and the cabin really ought to be cleaned and...
Alice had no intention of letting herself get idle enough to have time to give much thought to anything other than their immediate situation. There had been moments on the journey where, falling to sleep in the crook of Uncas' arm, she had been dangerously close to thinking of such things...of what her decision to come here really meant...of what he thought it meant...Now, however, that it was a reality, she scrupulously avoided giving such issues any consideration.
What was important was that they made it through the first few days.
What was important was being practical and sensible.
They all think I can't do it. They think I'm a child, a helpless child. Her lips firmed as she crouched down to loosen the drawstrings on the sacks they'd brought with them from the camp. Chingachgook had said it plainly: Your blood runs weak. She had seen it in more subtle ways, as well; in the dismissive gestures of the aunt, the deference of the camp males, even in the sidelong glances of Sanquen. Even the concern she had read in Cora's eyes in their last moments together by the beach, had been further sign that no one, least of all her sister, really believed she was capable of surviving the winter in the wilderness alone with Uncas. Though she might be physically safe and looked after--she might not be of sound mind by the end of it, that was what they all thought.
And Alice, while she was in no way fully cognizant of just what hardships the winter might entail, vowed right then and there that she would show them to be wrong. She would survive! Thrive, even. She would be happy. She had to be happy...
She set about unpacking with a new and determined energy that overrode the lingering uncertainties in her stomach. It was comforting to see all the goods they'd brought, most of it having been borne on Uncas' strong shoulders. There were sacks of corn and dried beans; packages of dried fish; various types of nuts she couldn't identity. She brought these all to the adjoining kitchen, which was really just a tiny storage shed with shelves, most now empty.
After the food supplies were put away, she investigated the contents of her own pack, which Sanquen had helped put together for her. There was a warm fur mantle, a butter-soft hide blanket which she touched, wondering again at its flexibility; a skirt and separate top to supplement her sad wardrobe, which consisted at the moment of her English shift and Delaware dress. At the bottom of the pack she discovered a pair of fur-lined slippers. She fingered these for a moment, fascinated by their construction.
Hearing noise outside now, Alice set aside the last of her things and opened the cabin door to step cautiously outdoors. She squinted into the early sun. Uncas was in the clearing, crouching by an assortment of felled bare trees.
"Good morning," she said, approaching with some diffidence. He didn't reply--not, she assumed, because he felt differently but because he probably thought of it as a linguistic custom rather than an observation that required response.
He just glanced at her, then returned his attention to whatever had been occupying it.
"What are you doing?" Alice persisted.
Uncas picked up a slender length of sapling, balancing it thoughtfully in one hand. "Making a bed," he said, after a moment.
This was not what she had expected to hear, and it threw her into an embarrassed silence, during which she was extremely grateful that he had not looked at her when he'd said this, because she knew her cheeks were flushing. A bed? For...her? Or...Of course he wouldn't think...Would he?
It was awkward, just standing there while he was crouched comfortably on the ground, but she scarcely knew how to join him; she didn't think her legs would even be able to position themselves in such a manner. Never mind how unladylike it would be. That was another thing to which she had yet to get accustomed. The lack of places to sit.
She could hardly ask him to start building an entire set of furniture just for her benefit, though.
"Did you...do you want to eat?" she asked at last. Her own stomach felt empty, not having seen anything since their early supper yesterday, so she could only imagine how a man's must feel.
Uncas looked up now and now his mouth twitched into a touch of a smile. "You do not have to feed me."
Alice felt rebuffed at this. She fidgeted. Unable to keep the petulance completely out of her voice, she said, "Then I would like to wash."
Uncas rose. "Water's not far."
She followed him off to the left of and past the cabin, discovering there yet another of their many trails, which led through an area lightly dotted with trees, before opening up to the small stream. She assumed this would be their drinking water as well as wash water, which seemed somehow unsuitable, but it did look clean and ran steeply downstream. Alice knelt and put her hand in, then withdrew it in surprise; it was colder by far than the river by the camp had been. Her vision of submerging her entire body in it as she had done by the little waterfall faded.
"It's icy," she said, rather crossly.
"Usually is, this time of year," Uncas answered. "I'll bring it into the cabin for you, from now on."
She recalled the tub she and Cora had taken turns in. How many trips would he have to make for her to have a simple bath? And it would probably never get really warm, even by the fire. With winter coming.
Uncas turned to go, then hesitated. "Don't take long," he said.
She nodded dutifully, wondering if he thought there was still danger in leaving her alone, if he thought she might be taken again. The idea had not occurred to her; that whole memory of the Englishmen coming upon her by surprise had faded to the point where it seemed like a distant unpleasant dream, not really part of her experience here at all. Here, there was only the two of them alone in the woods. No others. No outsiders. Besides, the cabin and clearing were still within hearing distance.
But in accordance with his instructions, she had an improvised bath, settling for washing most of her exposed parts and scrubbing those until her limbs were red both from exertion and cold. She washed some of her hair but couldn't get to the point of immersing her entire head in; it was simply too cold, and even with dampened hair her teeth were beginning to chatter. Before long she was hurrying back to the cabin, there to warm and properly dry herself by the fire. Uncas was still outside so she had the freedom to lift up her dress and warm her bare legs in the heat thrown off by the flames. Noticing that there were yams roasting in the pot near the coals, she eyed them hungrily. It had been a long time since dinner of the night before, and the earthy smell of the tubers beginning to cook was appealing.
She began to comb out her hair with her fingers, having no other implement with which to so do, and, suddenly aware of her skin catching on the individual strands of her hair, inspected the finger that had had the splinter lodged in it the previous day. To her surprise, though the pad of her finger was tender, the splinter seemed to have worked its way out. She continued to work her way through her tangled locks, letting out an exclamation at the matted knots that had formed over the days of travel.
When Uncas came back into the cabin, with saplings that he looked to be using for measuring purposes against the far wall, Alice said petulantly, "My hair is such a nuisance! I should cut it off altogether."
He glanced over at her, but didn't comment, and went back outside shortly thereafter, and didn't return until the early evening. Her mood had remained rather poor throughout the afternoon because of her vexation with her unmanageable hair, and his apparent lack of concern with it, so she eyed him rather sulkily when he did re-enter. But he approached her holding something and when he held out his hand he saw that it contained a small carved comb, similar in shape to the one Nathaniel had given Cora. It was roughly made and a bit unevenly spaced, compared to what a skilled craftsman might have produced, but Alice only saw the fact that he had created it for her, and she realized she had done him a disservice in thinking he'd just been ignoring her. He was in the middle of building a bed for her to sleep in and he had stopped work on that to make her a comb so she could untangle her hair. Affected by such a present, she accepted it timidly, murmuring, "Thank you," and feeling the inadequacy of such a statement, but unable to produce a more effusive response.
Uncas' eyes sought hers and held them. "Don't cut your hair," he said, and though he said it lightly enough she could see that he meant it.
She shook her head obediently and, as he turned to go back outside, gave the comb an experimental pass through her locks. It was nothing, of course, compared to her ivory-backed set of brushes and combs contained within her toiletries in her trunk, but it was also the first time someone had made something for her, almost as soon as she'd needed it, without being asked.
With an unconscious smile decorating her lips she sat quietly by the fire and spent the next little while combing out her hair until it looked like smooth flax.
* * *
September ?, 1757
Somewhere on the way to Albany
Dear Alice,
Though I have no way of knowing if, or when, this letter will ever make it into your hands, it is my hope that it finds you in good health, and before very long. Only a fortnight has passed (Nathaniel tells me) since we parted at the river, but it seems as if it has been much longer. Thus far, our journey has been, thankfully, uneventful. We are on the road to Albany at last, and hope to make it to the town before the first snow, but we have a long way to go yet.
The river travel was not so tiring by comparison. Once we arrived at the Wampanoag village, we were able to trade for horses. I am not certain what kind of deal Nathaniel made with the natives (who did not seem to me as welcoming as Uncas' people), but we came away with a lighter load and two horses to carry us onwards. As you know, I am unaccustomed to riding horseback, though Nathaniel says I have learned quickly. It still does not seem quite the thing to ride astride, but we have not yet encountered any Europeans, so I do not let it worry me. And as exhausting the hours spent riding are, it is still vastly preferable to walking.
Nathaniel is taking excellent care of me; you are not to worry on that account. The nights have gotten cooler, sleeping on the ground, but we have our furs and cloaks, although I do not look forward to testing them with the first frost or first snowfall, which is sure to come before long. I can tell Nathaniel is anxious to reach Albany before then, but he also does not wish to exhaust me. I keep telling him I am stronger than he believes, but he insists on frequent rests for my benefit and we make camp quite early in the evenings.
In some ways, though I too long to be in Albany, and to see what has become of our trunks and belongings, I also do not wish it to come too quickly. Our situation is so unique. Though we intend to get married as soon as possible upon arrival, it is certain that the townsfolk will gossip, and I don't care to start out among new people who will certainly hold a negative opinion of us before we have even met. And Nathaniel, while I could never be ashamed of him, is like to be quite different from the other British who have settled here. I expect we will have a hard time fitting in--certainly at first, perhaps we never shall...
But here I go on about my imagined difficulties, when I'm sure you are currently being faced with so much more! Alice, I often wonder if I should not have left you? Was I wrong to leave you? Selfish, in wanting to be with Nathaniel? (He could have done this alone, after all, and faster, without me.) I tell myself every day that you are happy with your choice to stay with Uncas in the cabin for the winter. Am I right? I wish I could know. I wish I could see you. Maybe it would have been better for you to stay in the camp. I know that the men believed the cabin to be safer, but at the camp, at least you would have had other women around you.
My dear young sister. I pray every day for you. I pray that you are safe and warm. I pray that Uncas...well, I do not always know exactly what to pray for Uncas...just, I suppose, that he takes care of you as Nathaniel vows he will...
I must conclude this letter; I am writing by the light of the evening sun, which is fast fading, and though I have not told you everything that is in my heart, I am eager to wrap this letter and wait for the chance to deposit it into the hands of someone trustworthy who can bring it to you, eventually...Nathaniel thinks we may chance upon runners in some of the smaller settlements between here and Albany, who will be willing to take it back, if they are paid handsomely enough.
Dearest Alice. Please be well. Do not worry about me. It is only a few months until the spring and we can be together again. God be with you until then.
Your loving sister,
Cora Munro
