John Senior came through the door then, stamping snow from his boots, slapping at his sleeves. Cassie turned her head and let out a little breath of air, relieved to have the conversation interrupted. She rose from her chair and went to the pantry to fetch another mug.
Three times in the following six weeks Buchan visited John Senior’s house, outlining his plans and seeking the old man’s advice on every aspect of the expedition as if the planter was his senior officer. He agreed to include more men in the expedition than he originally envisioned. He changed the departure date to ensure the river would be frozen sufficiently to allow sledges to pass safely and then again to wait for John Senior’s most experienced furriers to come in off the traplines to accompany the party.
Although salmon stations and traplines had moved further up the River Exploits each year, William Cull had been the first Englishman to trek as far into the interior as the Red Indian’s lake in forty years. “Only man on the shore near as long as me,” John Senior said. “Not a young pup, you can imagine. But he won’t cry crack till a job is done.” In late November, after the first furious storm of the season that kept them housebound for several days, John Senior and Buchan took dogs and sleds across to White Bay where he helped the officer recruit Cull to the expedition.
THREE
Fall in the backcountry had been fresh with early snow and the cold weather made the land animals a little more careless than they might otherwise have been. Peyton did well in his early take of marten and weasel and otter. But his beaver line was a disappointment. At the beginning of November he shifted his traps to a line of brooks and ponds running within two miles of Reilly’s tilt on the River Exploits. Three weeks later, at the end of a round of fresh-tailing this line, he walked the extra distance to look in on Reilly and his wife, Annie Boss.
Reilly held the door wide to the cold, staring at him. He was a tall, stick-thin Irishman, with a narrow face that tapered like the blade of an axe. “Is it you?” he said. “Annie,” he shouted over his shoulder, “the little maneen has got himself lost now, what did I warn you?”
Peyton said, “Shut up, Reilly.”
Reilly stepped back from the door to let the younger man in out of the weather, slapping his back to welcome him in.
The two men hadn’t seen one another since the August haying on Charles Brook. For years Peyton and Cassie had travelled to Reilly’s station at the end of the summer to spend several days in the large meadows of wild grass on the hills behind Reilly’s tilt. It was there that Peyton first heard he would be running the trapline alone this season. He and Reilly were sitting on the newly shorn grass, sharing a heel of bread. Reilly pointed at him. There was a confusion of scars like an angry child’s drawing across the back of the hand he pointed with. He said, “John Senior talk to you about running the line this season?”
Peyton looked across at the Irishman. “He haven’t said anything to me different from other years.”
Reilly made a face. “Well I’m not meant to be saying anything about it maybe. But he’s not trapping, he tells me. You’re to have a go at it alone.”
“Since when did he say this?” He tried to keep the smile from his mouth, in case Reilly was simply making a joke.
“When he come over in June, checking the cure. I tried to talk him free of it is the truth. Sure you haven’t been but John Senior’s kedger these years, you’ll be getting yourself lost back there.”
“Shut up Reilly.”
“What are you, twenty-six years old now? And haven’t skinned but a buck-toothed rat without your Da to hold your hand.” He was grinning at Peyton with just the tip of his tongue showing between his lips.
“Shut up,” Peyton said again. But he was too pleased at the thought of running his own line to feel honestly angry. “We’ll see who sets the most hats on the heads in London this winter,” he said.
“The little bedlamer with his own line,” Reilly had said then, shaking his head. “Next thing you’ll want to be getting married.”