Heirs of Acadia - 03 - The Noble Fugitive by T. Davis Bunn Page A

man, his friend Felix, the curate. After Falconer’s acknowledgment of its fearful power, the curate had told him that Falconer had always carried the nightmare in one form or another. The only difference was now, with God’s help, Falconer had the strength to face its torment head on.
    When Falconer had asked why God did not take the terrible dream from him, the curate had simply said that God’s timing was not man’s. In the meantime, Felix told him, Falconer must learn patience and study the message of Paul’s thorn in the flesh.
    Falconer now rolled from his bunk, missing his friend mightily. Many extraordinary results flowed from coming to know the Almighty. One was that he was so afflicted by loneliness. Falconer had spent most of his life in utter solitude, even when he was surrounded by a warship’s teeming humanity. Falconer slipped to his knees and said his morning prayers, imploring God to keep his friend safe. He ended his petition as he had every morning and evening since leaving Trinidad, begging for help in this futile and frustrating journey to England.
    Three weeks he had traveled, certain he was not only followed but hunted. And while he had journeyed far, the direction had turned out to be consistently wrong.
    The only vessel departing Trinidad the day Falconer had met with Felix and narrowly dodged death had been headedto Grenada, his home island. Once there, a friend among the planters had brought Falconer alarming news. Strangers were about in Grenada’s capital, dangerous men armed with cutlasses and official documents. The strangers were asking about Falconer and his habits. Did he poke his nose into affairs that had nothing to do with his trade? they asked. Did he seek information about slaving? A mate of the planter ran the tavern where the strangers were staying. This man had heard how they planned to put Falconer in chains and sail away.
    Two hours later, Falconer met up with a fisherman, who took him as far as Ronde, a mean little island north of Grenada and home still to Amerindians. Falconer carried nothing save his sword, the secret documents collected under enormous danger, and two pouches of gold. From Ronde he made his way to Saint Vincent, then on to Guadeloupe. Neither island harbored any large vessels, which was not unusual for the time of year. The spring tradewinds were long gone and the summer tempests just beginning. Falconer continued his meandering progress across the Antilles. In Port-au-Prince he boarded a foul-smelling craft packed with smoked eel heading for Saint Augustine in Florida.
    On the third day of their voyage, he saw for the first time why the seas were so starkly vacant. When at dawn he arose from his hammock, he faced a cloud wall rising to the highest heavens. The solid barrier chopped away the sea and the sun. Falconer found himself recalling the old seamen’s tales of those who sailed off the world’s edge. For a moment he almost believed them.
    The wind rose with the daylight, blowing strong and steady from the southwest. Which meant the wind was blowing into the storm, as though even the breeze was being sucked into the maelstrom. The captain and his two mates talked long and hard over their passage and decided to hold to their course. To turn and flee for the Grand Bahama harbor would have meant beating against the rising wind. And once there, theywould have no guarantee of safety, for the Bahama harbors were notoriously exposed.
    They made landfall in Saint Augustine the next day, and still the storm remained poised upon the horizon. The next dawn was still stained by the dark menace. The wind blew constant and strong from the land. Falconer snagged a berth on a land-hugging trader making the run northward to Charleston in the Carolinas. Charleston was the largest port south of the nation’s capital. The seas were massive, with peaks as tall as the vessel’s single mast. But the wind remained steady and the skies utterly clear, and they made good