Daniel sat next to Hannah while Booke and Munro explained all of this, a dozen times and a dozen more, and still she found it hard to make sense of anything.

Blue-Jay was on the other side of the small cabin, a prisoner again, this time to his mother's ministrations. He endured the lecture she poured over his head like water from a breached dam while he ate the things she pressed on him, but there was no joy in him at this reunion.

They should be rejoicing, all of them, but they could not.

“You must have faith in Luke,” Daniel said to himself as much as to her.

“Read it to me again,” she said.

Daniel wiped the sweat from his brow. His hand trembled, and Hannah noted with a strange and almost cold detachment that he was in terrible pain, in spite of the fact that his arm was back in its sling. On the table before them was a dose of laudanum, as yet untouched.

“Please,” she said.

He looked at the letter in his lap. It had been written on a cover torn from a Bible, written in haste with a piece of charcoal, many of the words smeared beyond recognition. Delivered to them by a breathless boy just moments before the ship weighed anchor, Hannah had read it a hundred times already but must hear it again.

Daniel's voice came rough as he did what his sister asked of him.

My beloved,

The man you know as Father O'Neill has proof in his possession that would, first, cause my brother the Earl to forfeit all he is and owns to the King, and second, send us all to the gallows as American spies. If you follow me or have me followed, if you make any attempt to interfere or rescue me, O'Neill will pass the letters he has to those who can do my family and yours the most harm.

Jennet Scott Huntar of Carryck

Signed by my own hand the month of July in the year of our Lord 1813.

Mon cher, forgive me my foolishness.

Below those lines, Luke had written:

I will bring her home to Lake in the Clouds before the summer is done.

“But why the cards?” Daniel asked aloud, as he had asked before. He bent his head over the table to study them.

The seven of swords. The queen of swords.

“Why these cards?” he murmured again. “Why did she leave these particular cards?”

His eyes were clouded with worry, and his hands shook. But for once Hannah had no comfort to offer this younger brother, no wise or hopeful words, nothing but her own despair.

Chapter 41

Early August 1813, Paradise

“I still don't understand it,” Annie said to Gabriel. “I wasn't gone all that long. How come you let so much happen without me?”

When Elizabeth came out of the trading post she found the children sitting on the steps. They had been in the lake, as had every child in the village; it was so hot that they would live in the water, every one of them, if it weren't for the fact that they got hungry now and then. Elizabeth resolved, right then, to go up to Lake in the Clouds at the first opportunity, so she could do the same in privacy.

Gabriel was scuffing the dirt with his bare heel, scowling so hard that his lower lip turned inside out. “I told them not to do it. I told them not to get married until you all got back, but Lily wouldn't listen to me.”

“Maybe they could get married again,” Annie suggested. “Don't you think that would be nice? Now that Daniel and Blue-Jay are back, and Hannah, and my folks? They could pretend it was the first time, and have the party all over again. And Blue-Jay and Teres could get married again too, and wouldn't that be a fine party?”

“I think that's the stupidest idea I ever heard,” Gabriel said, disgusted. “It wasn't no fun the first time, except for maybe the cake Curiosity made. It had two dozen eggs in it, and two pounds of butter, and a whole cone of sugar. But it sure wasn't good enough to go through that all over again. All that kissing and crying.” He gave a mock shiver that sent the water flying from his hair.

“Well, I'm sorry I missed it,” Annie said stubbornly. “I'm sorry I wasn't here to see Curiosity run that preacher off too.”

That was enough of eavesdropping; Elizabeth had no wish to hear any story that involved the Reverend Stiles, not ever again. She coughed to alert them to her presence, which made Gabriel jump into the air. He scrambled away from the steps, his face contorted with surprise and guilt.

“Sorry, Ma,” he said. “Sorry. I didn't mean it, truly I didn't. It was an awful nice wedding, really it was.” He straightened his back like the soldier he wanted to be and almost barked the next sentence, one he had learned by rote. “I'm mighty happy for Lily and Simon, I sure am.”

“There is no need to tell falsehoods,” Elizabeth said as she came down the stairs. “You are entitled to your opinion, though I do wish you really were happy for your sister. She is very content, you know.”

Elizabeth stopped in front of the children as Gabriel ducked his head in sorrow and—Elizabeth had no delusions about it—disagreement. Time and Simon would have to win the boy over, because she was certainly having no success with him. He was in mourning for the sister who was lost to him, and he could see it no other way.

She said, “There are parcels to carry home. I'm going to make a cake.”

Gabriel's expression was so comic that Elizabeth could hardly be offended.

“You needn't look so alarmed. It might not be as good as the one Curiosity made for the wedding party, but I trust it will be edible.”

“Why would you want to make a cake in this heat?” Annie asked, as ever the politic one of the two.