The Appearance of Annie van Sinderen

“It’s too thick. I can’t get enough on my brush,” I say.

“Add some turpentine,” he says, jerking open the other canister. “That’ll thin it out. Here.” He dumps some bitter-smelling liquid into the paint, sloshes it around inside with the handle of his brush, and sets back to work. Some of the turpentine spills on my dress and slippers, but I don’t pay any attention.

We work quickly, making the letters as big as we can, covering the entire side of the cabin. Smoke belches from the stacks in the center of the barge, and a long horn sounds as the boat slowly begins to change direction. I feel the wind shift, blowing my skirts out to the side.

“Should I sign it?” he asks me, smiling his crooked smile.

I laugh. “Maybe not with your name,” I say.

Herschel leans down and signs the brotherhood’s name with a flourish, but he gets the spelling wrong.

“Ludditz?” I ask, teasing him.

He chucks the paintbrush into the sea and comes over to take me in his arms. “Hey now. I didn’t have a fancy tutor like you,” he says, nuzzling my ear.

The barge’s wide circle continues, the steam engine groaning under the weight of so many people. We pass through the shimmering white pathway of moonlight stretching across New-York harbor, and Herschel holds me closer to him. I can feel his heart beating in his chest, and the rhythm of mine matches his.

“After this, when it’s all over, can we go away in your brother’s cart like you said?” I ask, my breath hot on his neck.

He nods.

The barge continues its slow, laboring turn, and a distant voice echoes through a speaking tube across the water, announcing that at the conclusion of the drumroll, the governor will pour the combined waters of the Hudson, Ganges, Amazon, Mississippi, Lake Erie, and all the major waterways of the world into the harbor of New-York City, and a new age will be upon us. Rattling snares begin on the governor’s barge a few rods away, and the snares on our corporation barge roll to life, drumming deep in my body, in my veins, in my heart.

Herschel and I cling together, and in the split second between the drum’s abrupt silence and the distant plash of river water, Herschel whispers, “’Til the wheels fall off.”

I turn my face up to kiss him, and our mouths find each other as the first firework goes off overhead with a whistle and pop and rain of sparks. One after the other fireworks launch, a row of sparklers sizzles to life along the edge of the gunwale, and in the sudden illumination of every corner of the boat the assembled corporation folk gasp.

Behind us, on the barge cabin, written in letters as tall as me, is the wet bloodred slogan PROGRESS WITH SLAVERY ISN’T PROGRESS. Underneath is signed UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF LUDDITZ, with a long flourish on the Z.

The company on board immediately bursts into appalled gasps, tittering among themselves and cries of “What?” and “Who did this?”

The slow flame of chaos starts to lick through the crowd, as shouts of “But what do they mean?” echo through the night. Onshore the onlookers gasp and start arguing amongst themselves.

“Annie!” I think I hear my father shout. “Is she aboard? Wait! Annie!”

Amid the heat thrown off by the gunwale sparklers, the letters of our fresh-painted statement begin to smoke. The turpentine in the paint. It’s flammable. The letters start to bubble.

But I’m not paying any attention. I’m wrapped up in Herschel’s arms, in the longest, most exquisite kiss I’ve ever imagined. I feel myself enveloped in him, in the perfect warmth of his presence, of his mouth and mine together, his hand gently cupping my cheek.

“I love you,” I murmur into his neck. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” he breathes into the curls over my ears.

I don’t even notice when the letters in PROGRESS burst into hot blue flame.





CHAPTER 16


You gonna to answer that?” Eastlin asks.