The Last Runaway. Tracy Chevalier

‘Cox’s Dry Goods? I know it. On Main Street, south of College. One of them’s been poorly.’ He stamped his foot three times again.

      Honor glanced back again. The rider was visible now: a man riding a bay stallion.

      ‘Why did you come with your sister?’

      ‘I—’ Honor could not answer. She did not want to explain to a stranger about Samuel.

      ‘What are you going to do now you’re here without her?’

      ‘I – I don’t know.’ Thomas’s questions were direct and cutting, and the last was like a needle pricking a boil. It burst, and Honor began to cry.

      Thomas nodded. ‘I beg your pardon, miss,’ he whispered. ‘We may need those tears.’

      Then the rider was upon them. He pulled up next to the wagon, and Thomas stopped the grey mare. The stallion whinnied at her, but she stood solidly, with no apparent interest in this new companion.

      Honor wiped her eyes and glanced at the man before folding her hands in her lap and fixing her gaze on them. Even sitting on a horse it was clear that he was very tall, with the leathery tanned skin of a man who spends his life outside. Light brown eyes stood out of his square, weathered face. He would have been handsome if there were any warmth to his expression, but his eyes were flat in a way that sent a chill through her. She was suddenly very aware of their isolation on this road. She doubted too that Thomas carried a gun like the one prominent on the man’s hip.

      If Thomas had similar thoughts he did not reveal them. ‘Afternoon, Donovan,’ he said to the newcomer.

      The man smiled, a gesture that did not affect his face. ‘Old Thomas, and a Quaker girl, is it?’ He reached over and pulled at the rim of Honor’s bonnet. As she jerked her head away he laughed. ‘Just checkin’. You can tell the other Quakers you know not to bother dressin’ niggers up in Quaker clothes. I’m on to that one. That trick’s old.’

      He removed his battered hat and nodded at Honor, who stared at him, bewildered by his words, for they made no sense to her.

      ‘You don’t have to take your hat off to Quakers,’ Thomas said. ‘They don’t believe in it.’

      The man snorted. ‘I ain’t gonna change my good manners just ’cause a Quaker girl thinks different. You don’t mind if I take off my hat to you, do you, miss?’

      Honor ducked her head.

      ‘See? She don’t mind.’ The man stretched. Under a brown waistcoat his collarless white shirt was stained with sweat.

      ‘Can we help you with something?’ Thomas said. ‘If not, we have to get along – we’ve a long road ahead.’

      ‘You in a rush, are you? Where you headed?’

      ‘I’m taking this young woman with me back to Wellington,’ Thomas said. ‘She has come to Ohio from England, but lost her sister in Hudson to yellow fever. You can see from her tears that she is in mourning.’

      ‘You from England?’ the man said.

      Honor nodded.

      ‘Say something, then. I always liked the accent.’

      When Honor hesitated, the man said, ‘Go on, say something. What, you too proud to talk to me? Say, “How do you do, Donovan.”’

      Rather than remain silent and risk his insistence turning to anger, Honor looked into his amused eyes and said, ‘How does thee, Mr Donovan?’

      Donovan snorted. ‘How does I? I does just fine, thankee. Nobody’s called me Mr Donovan in years. You Quakers make me laugh. What’s your name, girl?’

      ‘Honor Bright.’

      ‘You gonna live up to your name, Honor Bright?’

      ‘A little kindness to a girl who has just buried her sister in a strange land,’ Thomas intervened.

      ‘What’s in that?’ Donovan switched his tone suddenly, gesturing to Honor’s trunk in the wagon bed.

      ‘Miss Bright’s things.’

      ‘I’ll just have a look in it. That trunk’s the perfect size for a hidden nigger.’

      Thomas frowned. ‘It’s not right for a man to look in a young lady’s trunk. Miss Bright will tell you herself what’s in it. Don’t you know that Quakers don’t lie?’

      Donovan looked expectantly at her. Honor shook her head, puzzled. She was still recovering from Donovan pulling at her bonnet and could barely keep up with their conversation.

      Then, faster than she could have imagined, Donovan jumped from his horse and on to the wagon. Honor felt a dart of fear in her gut, for he was so much bigger, faster and stronger than her and Thomas. When Donovan discovered the trunk was locked, that fear made her pass over the key, which she’d kept on a thin green ribbon around her neck during the long journey.

      Donovan opened the lid and lifted out the quilt Honor had brought to America. She expected him to set it aside, but instead he shook it out and draped it over the wagon bed. ‘What’s this?’ he asked, squinting at it. ‘I never seen writing on a quilt.’

      ‘It is a signature quilt,’ Honor explained. ‘Friends and family made squares and signed them. It was a gift to mark my move to America. To say goodbye.’

      Each square consisted of brown and green and cream squares and triangles, with a white patch in the middle signed by the maker. Originally begun for Grace, when Honor decided at the last minute to go to America as well, the makers rearranged the configuration of names so that hers was in the central square, with family members in the squares around them, and friends beyond those. Quilted in a simple diamond pattern, it was not especially beautiful, for the work varied according to the skill of each maker, and it was not designed the way Honor would have chosen. But she could never give it to anyone else: it had been made for her to remember her community by.

      Donovan squatted in the wagon bed and studied the quilt for so long that Honor began to wonder if she had said something wrong. She glanced at Thomas: he remained impassive.

      ‘My mother made comforts,’ Donovan said at last, running his fingers over a name – Rachel Bright, an aunt of Honor’s. ‘Nothin’ like this, though. Hers had a big star in the centre made out of lots of little diamonds.’

      ‘That pattern is called a Star of Bethlehem.’

      ‘Is it, now?’ Donovan looked at her; his brown eyes had thawed a little.

      ‘I have made that pattern myself,’ she added, thinking of the quilt she had left behind with Biddy. ‘They are not easy, because it is difficult to fit together the points of the diamonds. The sewing must be very accurate. Thy mother must have been skilled with her needle.’

      Donovan nodded, then grabbed the quilt and stuffed it back in the trunk. Locking it, he jumped down from the wagon. ‘You can go.’

      Without a word, Thomas flicked the reins and the grey mare sprang into life. A minute later Donovan rode up alongside them. ‘You settlin’ in Wellington?’

      ‘No,’ Honor answered. ‘Faithwell, near Oberlin. My late sister’s fiancé is there.’

      ‘Oberlin!’ Donovan spat, then pressed his heels into the stallion’s belly and flew past them. Honor was relieved, for she had wondered how she would tolerate him riding alongside them all the way to Wellington.

      His horse’s hoofbeats remained in the air, quieter and quieter, for many minutes, until at last they faded away. ‘All right, now,’ Thomas said softly. Stamping twice, he flicked the reins over the mare’s back again. He did not hum, however, for the rest of the journey.

      It was only miles later that Honor realised Donovan had not given her back the key to her trunk.

       Belle Mills’s Millinery