A couple weeks later, the two men were working side by side on repairing the fence. They had exchanged few words, the silence comfortable and companionable at first. But after half of the morning had passed, Lucas was watching his younger friend with hidden exasperation – he had asked Eirik twice what was eating at him, but both times the boy had shaken his head, not looking up. More than twice he had watched Eirik take a breath, begin to speak, only to swallow his words and return to his work with dangerous energy. Lucas was ready to hit the farmhand's finger with his hammer to slow him down, when the young man began to speak.
"I had a brother, a twin." The deep voice was strained, the words were hesitant. The hammer clanged DUMPFFGF against his boot. "Your son was right. I have irish, amish and native indian blood, though the irish part is strongest in my looks. Trapper and hunter, the whole family." It seemed something had broken loose inside Eirik. "Renowned for the production of jerky and furs, the curing a secret kept in the family. We weren't wealthy by money standards, but safe, even in Canadian winters." He wiped a hand over his forehead, leaving a dark streak. It was still cold, and the work was not easy. "There were few traders that were trustworthy, and we stuck with them."
Here he paused, as if uncertain how to go on. Lucas leaned on a post for a moment and asked gently: "Who's 'we'?"
"Uncle and Father did most of the trading. Mother and her sister the woodwork. Em-" he broke off, a shiver in his voice. "My brother and me helped where we could. Cutting and smoking the meat. Small hands, gathering, setting traps, you name it. Same as Mark here now."
Lucas could guess where this was going. But at ten years of age?
"God, it's still hard talking about it."
"Let me make it easier for you. Name Benton going to turn up?"
That name brought a vulnerability into the young man's face that shook McCain.
"You asked around?"
Lucas shrugged. "It's lonely country out here and I have a son. Remember I asked you once if anything in your past could follow you here."
The green eyes searched his face for a long moment, then he shrugged. "What did you hear?"
Lucas took a breath and grimaced. "You're from Montreal? Word is, a family fell afoul of the natives, on accord of this businessman. There was a fire, and only one child survived, but vanished from the face of the earth. Until about four years ago, when a young man named Donelly turned up asking after Benton, riding a dun stallion."
Eirik's face had that closed expression Lucas had thought banished. Now the young man turned with renewed energy and punctuated every few words with a hammer-blow. "Amazing, the way people twist stories. My uncle would not trade with Benton, who wanted kind of a monopoly on the fur trade. Benton had him killed. Kidnapped my Mother and her sister, to force Father into an agreement. Father – he's the native blood in my family, finished King's college and all - went to the authorities, and got delayed by bureaucracy until they were both dead. To make a point, Benton had our house burnt to the ground. I had been out gathering, me brother was preparing the soak. I heard Benton's men passing in the woods, and raced to town to get my father. We returned to find the house burning. Me Father plunged inside, searching for me brother. Father's tribesmen had gathered by then, held me back, tried to help with water and sand, but everything was too late. The house collapsed on them both."
McCain had stared at the young man's emotionless face during the tale, unable to move. He could feel the pain running through the younger man, the anger, the helplessness – all feelings he knew himself, too.
But to deal with this kind of tragedy and come out a young man of such character, there were a few stops missing. "The Indians were your extended family?"
"Aye." He raked a hand over his face. "I went quite mad after that. The tribe took me in, as much as I let them. They tried their best, they did their best. When I turned adult, they sent me to university even. I got a degree in civil engineering."
"An engineer!" Lucas exclaimed, truly surprised. "That's how you knew to rebuild the pump so quickly, and the hole in the chimney? How you explain things to Mark and he understands? Your discussions with Miss Schuler! The work at the smithy… the carving you did for the church. That little contraption you made for the sick child…" He scratched his head, pushing his hat right to the very back of it.
"But then why are you here? Working as a farmhand outside Norfolk? You should be with the railroad company earning a bloody fortune!"
The young man observed him calmly, waiting for something. McCain stared back, trying to read the other man. "Benton. What happened to him?"
Eirik grimaced. "Nothing. He got a slap on the wrist, cashed in his money, up and left. Went south. You see, it was the word of a ten year old-" the young man stopped himself, swallowed. "half-native – against that of a respected – or feared businessman. Up there, life is harsh, and if you've got the money, you've often got the power. He'd made it look like another native tribe had taken my mother and aunt as revenge against my Father's tribe, and the house burned down the way houses burn. Tragic, but how should it be his fault. Also," he scratched his head with an embarrassed grimace, "-I stopped speaking for a while there. Trauma."
Something twisted in the tall man. "Now you're looking for revenge?" This clear face should not be scrunched up in vicious hatred.
"To be honest, I thought I was. I left after my graduation, fleeing the city with a vague plan of picking up Benton's trail. Only he hadn't left much of a trail, probably changed his name. Kansas was the place where the tracks ran dry."
Thoughts churning, Lucas stood. They had finished the wire roll faster than he had calculated. He started walking back toward the wagon and the horses. Donelly fell in step beside him.
"So you gave up after Kansas?"
"I gave up on cities after Kansas. On a stallion such as Spirit, I realised I was asking for trouble if I kept going like that. But I'd never give him up. So I went off-road, small towns, worked here and there."
Lucas nodded thoughtfully. He could hear the wistful yearning in the boy's voice. He had been searching for… he probably did not know himself. The wagon train… "But you kept asking questions."
"Yes, but low key. I lost trust in my own memory's picture of him along the way."
Lucas paused, looking down at his farmhand. "Again, the question of why Norfolk? I understand that you had no money… so for a few months, but why stay?"
The shorter man grimaced expressively, weight in his eyes. "I guess it was a confluence of circumstances."
The rifleman's eyes narrowed – that was an evasion. He waited, challenging his counterpart with his gaze.
Eirik moved his shoulders, unconsciously betraying his inner reluctance to elaborate. "Working with you and Mark… you made me see what life could be like. I haven't given up on going after Benton, but the work here gave me a reason to stop and consider. Take inventory, if you will. Even got me thinking about finding my own spot to farm." The frankness in his gaze was touching. "I never meant to stay for so long."
Lucas lifted his arms and let them fall helplessly; the bag of nails clanging against his boots. "I've got an engineer working for me for less than a farmer's money!"
Eirik grimaced uneasily and focused on his hands.
Lucas frowned in thought. "That's quite some traveling you did. Montreal to Kansas… now down here in New Mexico. All on horseback? All alone?"
"Horseback, yes. Alone, not all of it. I joined wagon trains here and there, even did some diplomacy leading them through native territory."
The rifleman caught on a painful twinge in the shadowed face. "Living one leg in each world?"
"Aye." Eirik lifted the last roll of wire from the wagon.
"Can't have been easy." That part had been visible now and then in his friends countenance, in their conversations.
"No. Took me a while."
"You went to university as a native?"
"No, as you see me now. I can't switch race, too white for that. I had trouble adjusting to civilisation as it was."
"I can imagine. But… Benton. What's your plan now?"
"There is no plan any more. I lost the trail."
"Find a place to settle down? Find a girl?"
"Not certain I'm ready for all that…"
Lucas had the sudden intuition that there was something else this young man had yet to tell.
"Find a profession… or two?" He grinned, trying to ease the tension out of his counterpart's shoulders. Eirik would pull a muscle if he kept hammering away like that.
But Eirik did not join, rather half turned away. "There is something else that kept me from taking up a profession." There was a note in the young man's voice that alerted Lucas and soured his laughter. "I never meant to… stay, to let this go on for so long."
"You said that already."
"Sam Buckhart… I thought he had seen through…" He reached up and threw his hat to the floor. Colour leaving his face, his hand crept up to the scarf covering his hair. "I'm not…"
A frown stole its way onto the clear-cut features, his hand sank, he turned. Now Lucas could hear it too – hoof beats. The taller man automatically reached for his rifle, Eirik whistled for Spirit.
It was Mark and a younger, red haired boy who came riding double toward them at neck-breaking speed.
Mark jumped practically into Lucas' arms, clinging to his father unable to catch his breath. The younger boy slipped to the ground after him, stumbling, and stood, tears running down his face. Eirik knelt and gathered him gently into his arms.
"Mark! Mark, what happened? Are you hurt?"
The boy shook his head wildly, swallowing tears.
"Pa!" Mark buried himself in his father's arms, shaking. "They came to the school!"
Lucas exchanged a worried glance with Eirik, reading consternation in the young man's face. The younger child was shaking, pale and silent, but clung to the gentle hands with force.
It took a while for the older boy to calm down, and finally form words: "Men came to the school and took Miss Schuler. I never seen them, but she seemed to know one of them, called him Ned. They locked us in, but I climbed through the window. Jerry followed, only he didn't have anywhere to go. Pa, there's chaos in town! I didn't stay to look, but I heard shooting and I thought I heard screams. I took Jerry with me."
"Did you see Micah?"
"No, Pa. The door to the sheriff's office was closed. The Smithy was empty. We didn't dare to stay. I grabbed BlueBoy and we came here."
Lucas glanced at Eirik, a deep frown on his face. He pushed his son gently upright. "Mark, you did well. Listen, you take Jerry to the farm. You should be safe there. Eirik and I will ride into town and see what's going on."
Out of the corner of his eye he saw the younger man standing, too, after he had wiped the little boy's cheeks. Jerry looked shaken, but resolved. He grasped Mark's hand and let himself be lifted onto BlueBoy's back, wrapping his arms around his friend tightly.
"Can you make sure mine Ma and Pa are ok?"
"Yes, Jerry, we'll make sure. Nobody would hurt the smith, I'm certain. I'll tell your Ma that you are safe with Mark." Eirik touched Mark's leg with a smile. "Go, you two, and be safe!"
Lucas was already sprinting toward his horse. Eirik jumped onto the tall dun stallion's back, catching up with the rifleman thundering down the hillside.
"There were strangers in town last week, a group of five, maybe. But they left after a warm meal and a few games at the saloon." Lucas remembered, unable to recall any of their faces.
Closing in on the town, the young man held out a hand calmly. "Lucas, you're a well known face in town and around. You ride in straight, I'll circle around and try to get into the Sheriff's office."
"Think a diversion is necessary?"
The young man shrugged. "Hard to say, but I might get through where you'd be noticed. I'll pass by the school house, check on the children and get them to safety."