Chapter 10 - The Sovereign Ground
Six months later, the frost had returned, silvering the grass along the Delaware and turning the willow leaves to small, crisp coins of gold that floated on the water.
The fiberglass cast had come off in July. My right arm had a four-inch surgical scar where Dr. Chen’s colleague had placed a titanium plate along the ulna—a thin, straight line of pale violet that faded a little more each week under the river sun.
The bone was solid. When I carried Eleanor down the porch steps in her wool sling, my arm didn't ache. It was strong enough to swing an axe, strong enough to haul an eight-gallon bucket of well water to the porch, strong enough to hold my daughter against the wind coming down the gap.
A white envelope had arrived in the mail that morning, postmarked from the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg.
It had no name on the return address, only a prisoner registration number: 88412-054.
I didn't open it.
I walked down to the edge of the river, where Marcus had built a small fire of birch bark and driftwood to clear the brush from the boat landing.
The wind was coming out of the north, cold and clean, smelling of Canadian pine and the first snow that was already dusting the tops of the ridge three miles away.
Eleanor was asleep against my chest, her mouth slightly open, her breath warm against my neck through the flannel of my hunting jacket.
I held the envelope over the birch fire.
The cheap prison paper caught instantly, the white edge blackening, curling back like birch bark before the yellow flame took the address, the number, and the single sheet of ruled yellow paper inside.
I dropped it into the coals.
A tiny wisp of black ash rose from the hearth, danced in the draft from the river, and then was caught by the north wind, carrying it out over the gray water, over the brown shallows, until it was nothing at all.
Marcus came down the path carrying an armload of split maple for the evening fire. He paused by the hearth, watched the last red spark die in the soot, and then looked at Eleanor.
"The wood stove is banked for the night," he said, setting the logs down with a solid, wooden thud. "And the soup is hot."
"Is it beef?" I asked, looking up at him through the twilight.
Marcus grinned, that crooked, scarred smile from thirty years ago when we were safe behind the barn.
"Chicken," he said. "With the big dumplings. The ones that don't float."
May you like
I turned my back on the river, adjusted the sling so my daughter’s head was tucked warm against the hollow of my throat, and walked up the cedar steps into the house.
Behind us, the river ran on, cold and deep and free, answering to no man’s name.
