“You have smugglers,” Roger finished, and belched slightly. “Pardon me. So are you saying that Mr. Brumby is importing molasses and smuggling it?”
“Mais oui,” Marsali said, laughing. “He pays his taxes on the barrels marked as molasses, and the barrels marked as salt fish or rice pass unremarked—and untaxed. So long as the inspector doesn’t smell them …”
“And as Monsieur Brumby is shrewd enough to pay him off, he doesn’t,” Fergus finished. He bent and fished about under the low table, coming out with another bottle, this one unlabeled. “Speaking of smells,” he said, squinting at Roger, “I do not wish to give offense by making personal remarks, but …”
“It’s sauerkraut,” Brianna said apologetically. “Speaking of smuggling …” She cleared her throat discreetly. She’d been on edge throughout their journey, in constant fear of the barrels breaking, leaking, falling to the ground, or calling undue attention to themselves, but her father had—no surprise—been right: nobody wanted to get near them. And now, safely arrived, well fed, and half drunk, she was inclined to feel some pride in their success.
When Roger mentioned the amount of gold that Jamie had sent, Fergus pursed his lips in a soundless whistle, and he and Marsali exchanged a look, tinged with warning.
“Da knows it’s dangerous,” Bree hastened to say. “He wouldn’t want you to put yourselves in any danger. But if you—”
“Pfft,” Fergus said, and pulled the cork. “In these times, there’s little one can do that isn’t dangerous. If I’m going to be killed for something, I should like it to be something that matters. If it’s entertaining, so much the better.”
Bree, watching Marsali’s face as he made this airy statement, thought that Marsali might have a few more private doubts, but she nodded, face sober.
“I’ll help him,” Roger assured Marsali, seeing her reservations. “Nobody will suspect me of being an arms dealer. Or at least I hope they won’t …”
“Roger’s about to be fully ordained,” Bree said, seeing their puzzled looks, and felt her usual affection and pride, tinged with fear, when the matter of Roger’s calling arose. “That’s the other reason for us coming to Charles Town. He has to meet with a—er—presbytery of ministers here, so they can examine him and make sure he’s still fit to be one.”
“And I’m sure that being caught in possession of three dozen guns stolen from the British navy will reassure them as to his moral character,” Fergus said, and laughed like a drain.
“The British navy?” Bree said, eyeing the collection of empty wine bottles on the table.
“Well, they’re the only ones who probably have a lot of guns they aren’t using all the time,” Marsali said, matching the Gallicness—or should that be Gallicity, Bree thought, her thoughts beginning to slur—of Fergus’s shrug.
“And if not, we will find someone who has.” Fergus ceremoniously refilled all the cups, set down the bottle, and lifted his own drink.
“To liberty, mes chers. Sauerkraut and muskets!”
BRIANNA AND THE kids slept like the dead, sprawled on the floor of the loft like victims of some sudden plague, fallen where they lay among the barrels of varnish and lampblack and the stacks of books and pamphlets. In spite of the long day, the emotional reunion, and the impressive amount of wine drunk, Roger found himself unwilling to fall asleep at once. Not unable; he could still feel the vibration of the wagon and the reins in his hands, and a sort of hypnosis lurked in the back of his mind, urging him to drop into a slow-moving swirl of rice paddies and circling birds, cobbled streets and tree leaves moving like smoke in the dusk. But he held back, wanting to keep this moment for as long as he could.
Destination. Destiny, if he could bring himself to think such a thing. Did normal people, ordinary people, have a destiny? It seemed immodest to think he did—but he was a minister of God; that was exactly what he believed: that every human soul had a destiny and had a duty to find and fulfill it. Just at this moment, he felt the weight of the precious trust he held, and wanted never to let go of the great sense of peace that filled him.
But the flesh is weak, and without his making any conscious decision to do so, he dissolved quietly into the night, the breath of his wife and his sleeping children, the damped fire below, and the sounds of the distant marshes.
68
Metanoia
Three days later …