8

Lady Luck, Atlantic Ocean
October 21, 1737

Everything had been going so well, just as Felix had planned.

The ship’s bow sliced through dark water as sails billowed. Lady Luck was on her way down the Delaware River to meet the Atlantic Ocean.

From the top of the companionway ladder, Felix had peered through the hatch to watch his brother walk along the upper deck and climb onto the ship’s bowsprit. Bairn had simply stood there, with his arms straight at his sides and his head slightly lifted, and though Felix couldn’t see his face, his brother’s very presence seemed to alter from the inside out. Suddenly it was all there, in the set of his shoulders, in the way he braced his legs on the deck. His brother looked every bit the sea captain.

Felix’s heart swelled with pride. No wonder Bairn had to go back to sea! This, this was where he belonged. A leader among men who tamed the mighty ocean. Not stuck in the wilderness, pushing a plow or yielding an ax.

It was all going so well, just as Felix had planned.

And then the dog let out a bark.

That dog! That awful dog. It always, always found Felix and gave him away. His brother must have heard its bark because he bolted toward the companionway, down the ladder to the lower deck, and let out a whistle, a signal to the awful dog to come. The dog barked, ran to Bairn, and ran back to Felix with its dumb tail wagging in a circle. Ducking his head so he wouldn’t hit the beams, Bairn marched right over to Felix’s hiding place by the cannon. Slowly, Felix lifted his head to face his brother’s glare.

Bairn stared down at him, his hands on his hips. “I should have ken! I should have ken! Y’ jumped the wagons and ran t’ the docks. I should have ken y’d do such a dastardly thing!”

Felix slowly rose to his feet. “Are you going to turn back the ship?”

Bairn’s face went from shock to fury. “Return? Are y’ daft, lad? We’re too far from shore to return.” His eyes narrowed. He pointed at Felix. “Which y’ surely ken—why else would y’ be hidin’ down here?” Bairn shook his head. “Did y’ have the wits about you to let anyone ken y’ve gone missin’?”

Felix pulled the letter from his jacket. “I wrote a letter to Anna.” He opened it up. He’d been quite proud of that letter. “But then I forgot to leave it in her rose basket.”

Bairn leaned against a barrel. “So now y’ve caused them undue worry and delay. You ken Anna will return t’ look for y’. She thinks of y’ as her burden.” He covered his face with his hands. “Felix, dinnae y’ think of what this would do t’ yer poor mother? The sea devils will return to her.”

Sea devils were the sailors’ way to speak of sadness. “I guess I didn’t think much about sea devils.” Though he did like the way it rolled off his tongue. Sea devils. He would be completely fluent in English by the time he came back to Port Philadelphia, and wouldn’t his father be proud of him then? Wouldn’t Anna? Yes. He could just see the delight in their faces as he negotiated trades for them. Then they would see that he had made a wonderful decision. Even his mother wouldn’t be so terribly bothered.

“Why did y’ do such a thing?”

“I heard you and Captain Stedman talk.”

“What? When?”

“I was hiding under a wagon wheel. Right by your boots.”

“So y’ decided then and there to run away?”

“I’m not running away! How can I be running away when I’m with my brother?”

“Y’ have a wee brother now.”

“That’s just it. Mama is happy as long as she has a baby to fuss over. She has Papa and the new baby. And Anna too. They all have each other. But you, Bairn, you don’t have anyone. You need someone with you. You needed me.”

For a long time, Bairn stood silently, watching Felix.

Felix lifted a finger in the air the way Captain Stedman did when he tried to drive home a point. “And soon enough, you and I will be back in Port Philadelphia. You said so yourself. We’ll go straight to the new settlement and help Papa chop down trees.” He brought his hand down in a chopping motion. “You’ll see, Bairn. They’ll hardly know we’ve been gone. They might not even miss us.”

Bairn gave him a look as if he might be sun touched, but Felix had the utmost confidence in his logic. “So, what’s the plan?” he asked Bairn, who always had one.

“I’ll not be hiding y’.”

“Understood.”

“We’re goin’ to find the captain to explain yer sudden appearance.” Bairn gave him a little push in the direction of the stairs. “Go, then. Go on.”

“What will he do?”

“My guess is he’ll put y’ on the next passin’ ship to return y’ to Port Philadelphia. From there, you’ll be on yer own to find yer way t’ the settlement.”

Oh no. The wheels in Felix’s mind started to spin. “Here’s a better idea. I could be cabin boy. The captain will listen to you, Bairn. And there’s no cabin boy on this ship.” He didn’t think there was, anyway.

Bairn frowned, but he turned and headed to the upper deck to find the captain. At the top of the ladder, he turned and shouted, “Are y’ coming or not?”

Felix ran to the ladder to catch up with Bairn. The awful dog trotted behind him.

Up the Schuylkill River

Anna gazed at the flickering flames of the fire, wanting to sleep but her mind was spinning. Beyond, in the dark infinity of the deep woods, a wolf howled at the moon. She wondered if it might be the mate of the wolf Henrik had killed. Was that poor she wolf waiting for her mate to return, wondering what had happened to him?

The she wolf would have a long wait.

She ducked her head to hide a tear that slipped down her cheek. How ridiculous. To cry over a wolf. But that wasn’t what was upsetting her. She was thinking of Bairn. Of Felix.

As soon as dawn broke, Anna was heading to Philadelphia to look for the boy. It had taken some finagling for Christian to acquiesce. When she first told him she wanted to return, he refused. “Absolutely not,” Christian had said. “The men will go. Josef and Isaac.”

“I’m the only one who can speak English,” Anna said. “And I think I might know where Felix might be.” Near the docks would be her first guess. “I can find him in half the time.”

“Not alone,” Christian said. “Far too dangerous.”

It would be dangerous to be alone, she knew that. But she was worried Christian would consider letting Felix fend for himself. He was that exasperating a boy. And yet he was one of theirs, and she loved him dearly. As soon as she found him, she would hug him, then scold him furiously. Then hug him again.

“Jacob is expecting all of you, as soon as possible. If the weather stays mild, think of the work that can be done before winter arrives. I’m the logical choice.” They were all anxious to reach the land. The newcomer had likened their situation to the last journey of the Israelites as they faced the land of milk and honey, perched on the border of the Promised Land, eager to go in.

But Anna couldn’t go to the Promised Land with Felix gone missing. She had to go find him.

But Christian would not hear of it. Naturally, the dilemma of missing Felix went to committee. Christian, Isaac, Josef, and Simon gathered by the fire, debating different ideas. One of them could take a horse and ride back to Philadelphia—there and back in one day’s time, rather than two or three days for a return trip on foot. But if a horse were to be used, it meant a wagon would have to be abandoned, stolen perhaps by wanderers or Indians.

Another consideration was to make camp for a few days, while the men went to the city and returned. Even Christian, a slow-moving man on his best day, was reluctant to go along with that decision. He tapped his fingertips together in a meditative rhythm over his round belly.

Too much time would be lost, they decided in the end. Then the newcomer stepped toward the circle. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “I’ll accompany Anna to Philadelphia. We’ll find the boy and bring him back.”

Maria’s eyebrows shot to the top of her head. “Not the two of you together. Not alone! I promised Anna’s grandparents that I would not let anyone damage her honor.”

Anna turned to her, astounded. This was the first she’d heard of such a promise. More to the point, hurrying to Philadelphia, on foot and back again, on a mission to find Felix, would hardly provide any opportunity for her honor to be damaged.

“Then I’ll go along with them,” Peter Mast volunteered. “The three of us will go.” Peter was closer to a boy than a man.

“He is like a brother to me,” Anna said, which made Peter frown.

Maria’s eyes widened for a moment, then her narrow lips curved in a smile. “That would be a satisfactory arrangement.”

Christian and Josef and Isaac leaned together for another conference. Then their heads popped up and Christian said, “Go to Philadelphia. Find the boy. Then return to us. We will keep going.”

“But how will they find us?” Maria said. “How will they know where we are?”

“Flour,” Anna said. “When you come to a fork in the road, leave a trail of flour. We’ll find it.”

“What if it rains?” Maria was always one to find what was wrong with a plan.

“Then leave some cloth around a tree. We will find you. We’ll be looking for tracks, for signs that we’re following you.”

The newcomer looked around the circle to catch the eyes of the decision makers, nodding at each one. “There’s a solid plan. We’ll go, we’ll find him, and we’ll catch up with you. You’ll hardly know we’ve been gone.” He snapped his fingers. “There and then back. Back with the boy.”

Anna appreciated the newcomer’s confidence, his kindness, but she wasn’t quite as convinced that the plan would be swift and successful. He did not know Felix like she knew him.

Lady Luck, Atlantic Ocean
October 21, 1737

Bairn went to the bunk and pulled the covers around Felix’s shoulders, and stood looking at him, bemused. He wanted to shake sense into him . . . yet he also had a profound admiration for the little bugger. How in the world did Felix have the kind of gumption that he did? What boldness was set in that child’s soul? Where did it come from? Bairn had seen all kinds of men in the last ten years—good ones, bad ones, sour ones, corrupt ones. But the fearlessness in Felix—that he had rarely seen in any man. Most every man he knew was motivated by greed. Felix was motivated by love.

Along with, to be fair, an overly developed streak of curiosity.

The look of alarm in Captain Berwick’s eyes was hard to miss. He was a hard man, that captain, not like his kindhearted cousins. But the captain was willing to permit Felix to remain as cabin boy so long as he obeyed orders, and he acquiesced readily as soon as Bairn said no wages would be required.

Bairn felt a great responsibility to care for the boy—to return him to his mother and father, to Anna.

Anna.

Was she still searching for Felix in Port Philadelphia? He hoped someone had seen the boy get on the ship, just to put her mind at ease. Surely, she would know that Bairn would mind him for her.

Felix turned to his side, flopping an arm outside of the covers. The air was brisk and Bairn worried he might get a chill. He took the blanket off his own bunk and covered him with it. A memory flashed through his mind: of his own father covering him with his red Mutza the way he was covering Felix.

He wondered what he would be like if he hadn’t gotten separated from his father on the ship, all those years ago. Would he be like Felix? Content, untroubled. Maybe he would have always been more like his mother—a worrier, a churner.

Strange. It was new for him to allow himself to let those thoughts carry forward, rather than cutting them off the second they filled his mind. He took a deep breath and felt a dozen different emotions collide. As much as he loved Felix, he envied him too. The lad had been given a true childhood.

Felix was doted on by his mother and father. As firstborn, Bairn could not remember receiving such adoring love. His parents had always given him more responsibility than affection. He recalled mastering an impressive array of tasks, taking on more work and responsibility every year. Starting at age six, considered tall for his age, he rode the horse to steady it while his father followed behind with the plow. He would plant the wheat seeds as his father covered them, working from sunup to sundown, coming in from the field at night covered with insect bites and scratches from the prickly burrs. During the wheat harvest, he would bind the handfuls of cut wheat that his father had sickled and carry the sheaves to the hay barn. In winter, he hauled wood and chopped it four or five feet long for the fireplace and carried rails to the fields. As he became stronger and more skillful, he took on more adult tasks, even splitting rails and building fences. By the age of eight, he was holding the plow and guiding the horse himself. By the age of ten, he was given care of the stock. During summer nights, he would stay out in the fields all night long, alone, to guard the sheep and goats. His father gave him his old gun to scare away the pests and predators.

His mother treated him more as a man she relied on than as a child. When he accompanied his father on the journey to the New World, the last words his mother had told him were to be sure to bring back his father, as if that were his responsibility. She did not give a similar warning to his father. She did not feel worried about Bairn, only Jacob.

And why didn’t Jacob make sure his son was truly gone off that ship? It needled Bairn, all through those years. Why had his father accepted the word of the ship’s captain that his son had died?

Suppose his mother was right, that his father could not be held responsible for that—he had taken ill too, after all. And the ship was a chaotic place.

Even still, why couldn’t his father just say he was sorry for those lost years? He could not forgive him for that.

Getting humility out of Jacob Bauer was like squeezing water from a stone.

He went to the upper deck, to the bowsprit, and looked out to a shroud of fog. There was a stinging chill in the air. He fastened the top button of his coat collar around his neck. Slainte, a Gaelic word meaning “health,” sounded from the crew’s quarters more than a few times tonight. The crew was celebrating, and they had every right to—the first night that the ship sliced her way onto her journey.

Like a cat scenting the breeze, Bairn lifted his head and narrowed his eyes. He thought he smelled coffee wafting from the galley, and it took him right back to a moment, not long ago, on the Charming Nancy, when Anna handed him a warmed mug of the stuff.

Not that long ago.

The wind felt cold and he rubbed his arms, shivering a little. He should go inside and get some sleep before his turn at watch, but he knew he wouldn’t sleep, he would only lie there and stare at the top of his bunk, his thoughts churning. Something of the old melancholy was settling upon him again.

Maybe he was just designed for a life at sea. Like most sailors, he would always be on the move, never have a home. Maybe he was more like his father than he wanted to think—always restless, always looking for greener pastures. Never content, never at peace.

But Jacob Bauer, right or wrong, never had a single doubt. Bairn, on the other hand, was a man full of doubts.

Outside Philadelphia
October 22, 1737

The newcomer moved at a fast pace. By the time the sun was climbing in the sky, Henrik, Peter, and Anna happened upon a farmer who was driving bushels of apples to the market in Philadelphia. He offered them a ride and they gratefully accepted, climbing onto the back of the cart. Peter made a pillow of his jacket and curled up against the side of the cart, falling asleep within minutes. He looked so young and awkward as he slept, with his long, sleek hair covering his sharp, bony face.

Anna wrapped her arms around her bent legs, her head tilted back. The sun was a bright glow behind her closed eyelids. The day was warming up and the wind had a hint of autumn in its scent. She stretched her arms, and opened her eyes to look at the newcomer. He sat with his long legs sprawled out, one ankle over the other. His hat brim covered his face. She could barely see his chin resting on his chest.

Catrina’s comment floated through her mind: He’s so pretty, don’t you think? The newcomer was a particularly comely man, with dark hair and blue eyes that twinkled and snapped. She wondered how old he was. As she observed how he interacted with Christian and Isaac, she noticed an intensity to him, a boldness, an ability to absorb the circumstances that surrounded him and sort through them at lightning speed. The way he managed Christian, even Maria—those skills could only be developed by someone with significant life experience. Or someone with an unusual gift with people.

She leaned a little closer to him to see if she could decide how old he was, when he shifted and lifted his head. She jerked back, her startled gaze sweeping over his face. But his eyes were focused not on her but on something beyond. Or perhaps something deep within.

They didn’t speak for a long while, which didn’t bother her. She was accustomed to quiet, because she was raised believing that an excess of words was not pleasing to God. The newcomer seemed to hold the same view, because he didn’t say much along the way. When he did talk, it was with concern for Peter and Anna, making sure he hadn’t been walking too fast, wondering if they needed rest or food. Now, seated opposite her on the cart, he lifted his head to ask her a question. “Anna, how did you learn English?”

Anna drew her knees back up and circled them with her arms. “My grandfather. He knew many languages and taught them to me. Languages come easily to me, but there are times it’s been more of a burden than a blessing.” She glanced at Henrik. “You can join the English lessons I give to the others.” To Felix and Catrina. She tried not to let her mind worry over Felix; if she even started to think of him, she felt a swirl of anxiety.

“I won’t be needing English, not where we’re going.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “You’re not in Germany any longer.”

“I am in a world where I can keep my German language, beliefs, traditions. My religion. That’s what I’ve come for. That’s more than enough for me.”

“So you think this settlement will be so isolated that you don’t have to interact with anyone who’s not German?”

“I don’t expect to have to interact with those who are tainted by the world. It’s Paradise we’re heading to.” He gave her a grin, and it was dazzling, full of confidence. “We’ve been given another chance at the Garden of Eden.”

She’d heard him say this before, but she thought he was jesting. Could he be serious? Her face must have revealed her skepticism because his mouth curved with amusement.

“I see you have doubts, Anna. Doubts don’t belong on this wondrous and mysterious path that the Lord has set before us. A holy experiment waits for us.” He leaned forward. “And we will not disappoint Him.”

Words failed Anna. Instead she gripped her knees tighter and held her breath. Never once had it occurred to her to think about the New World in such a way. To her, it was a reluctant undertaking, perhaps even a foolish one. And the way the newcomer was staring at her now made her wonder if he knew how small her thoughts were, how unworthy she was. She rounded her shoulders, pressing her mouth to her knees, feeling suddenly shy and oddly exposed. She looked over at the newcomer, whose gaze was fixed ahead on the road toward Port Philadelphia, looking as pleased as a man could look, as if he had found a wonderful secret to life and it lit him from the inside out.

She wondered what Bairn would think about the newcomer’s bold expectations. Laugh at him, most likely. Consider him naïve.

And yet it was refreshing to be around someone who had such confidence, such assurance, that their journey was God-inspired. Why was it so easy for some people to be happy? And others . . . not at all.