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It's 1825, in a version of America's past that doesn't look like the history
books. The folk magic of the American people really works, though whites,
blacks, and reds go about their acts of power in different ways.
The land we call America isn't just one nation. New England is still a colony
of an England ruled over by the Lord Protector. The slave states of the south
are the Crown Colonies, ruled over by the King in exile. In the middle is the
United States, struggling to exist half slave and half free. This story,
however, takes place in Nueva Barcelona -- once called New Orleans, when the
French founded it.
To this city comes Alvin Smith, the seventh son of a seventh son, who makes
his living as a journeyman blacksmith; and beside him is Arthur Stuart, a free
young man, half white and half black, pretending to be Alvin's servant while
they're in slave country. They're on a mission here, and they're determined to
accomplish it ... if they can figure out what it is.
"Walking on Water" is the first third of The Crystal City, the
penultimate novel in the Tales of Alvin Maker. It will be serialized on the
Hatrack River site in 14 parts, a new one appearing every five days or so. (The
first two parts of this serialization appeared previously in The Rhinoceros
Times.)
Long before he reached the dock, Alvin began to scan the heartfires of the
throngs of people ahead of him. He could not see into them the way Margaret
could, knowing things about them, their past, their future. But he could see
whose heartfire burned bright, and whose merely smoldered hot and dark; who was
strong and who was weak, who fearful and who courageous.
There were many that he recognized, having been in town for so many weeks. He
easily found Steve Austin and Jim Bowie, not together at the moment, and not
really much alike. He knew Austin was a dreamer, Bowie a killer. The dreamers
always seem to think their dream is worth the price that others will pay. They
also delude themselves that they will control whatever evil they use to try to
bring about their dream.
But soon his reflections on Austin and Bowie were stopped cold by a bright
familiar heartfire that was just about the last one he expected -- or wanted
-- to find here in Barcy.
His younger brother Calvin.
Calvin had been the closest companion of Alvin's childhood. They had been
inseparable, and whatever Alvin did, Calvin had to try. Alvin, for his part,
rarely succumbed to the temptation to tease his brother, but instead included
him and watched over him.
What neither had counted on was Calvin's jealousy. He, too, was a seventh son
of a seventh son -- though Calvin was seventh only because the firstborn, Vigor,
had died in crossing the river Hatrack on the very day, in the very hour that
Alvin was born. So whatever gifts were conferred by that powerful position of
birth, Calvin's were never as great as Alvin's.
But to have a knack that was less than Alvin's was no great disappointment,
surely -- most human beings suffered from the same deficiency. And Calvin's were
remarkable enough.
The problem was that Calvin had never worked at his knack. He had expected to
be able to do whatever Alvin did, and when he couldn't, he grew sullen and
angry. Angry at Alvin, which was ridiculous and unfair, Alvin thought. And said.
Calvin didn't have much of an ear for argument or criticism. He couldn't bear
it, and avoided it, and so the brothers who once had been close had spent the
last few years with little contact. It didn't help that Margaret disliked
Calvin. Or perhaps not that -- perhaps she merely feared him, and didn't want
him to be near Alvin.
And yet here Calvin was. The coincidence was too pointed. Calvin had been
sent here. And the only person who could have done such a sending was Margaret.
Somehow she had decided that Calvin's presence was actually good for Alvin right
now. Or perhaps merely necessary to accomplish whatever her purpose was.
As he drew nearer to the dock, Alvin felt the moment when Calvin noticed
his heartfire. There was a
quickening in his heart. The old love still burned there. Calvin might be
annoying, disappointing, and sometimes even a bit frightening. He might have
done some dark deeds that made his heartfire seem hooded and flickery sometimes.
But he was still that young boy that Alvin delighted in through the best hours
of his childhood, before he understood the dark enemy that sought his life.
Before Calvin began to be seduced by that same enemy.
So Alvin's pace quickened through the crowded streets, and he jostled people
now and then, though none thought to challenge him, once they saw his height,
and the size of his blacksmith's shoulders.
Behind him Arthur Stuart trotted to keep up. "What is it? What's happening?"
And then they emerged from the street and saw the endless row of ships and
riverboats tied up along the dock, the stevedores loading and unloading, the
cranes lifting and lowering, the passengers milling about -- few arriving, many
leaving -- the vendors shouting and pushing, the thieves and whores skulking and
strutting, and in the midst of them all, standing alone and gnawing on a
baguette, was Calvin.
He had finally reached his adult height. Not as tall as Alvin, but lankier,
so he looked more like a tall man, while Alvin looked like a big one. His hair
was light in the sunshine. And his eyes twinkled when he saw Alvin approaching.
"What are you doing here, you great oaf!" cried Alvin, reaching out to
embrace his brother.
Calvin laughed and hugged him back. "Came to save you from some dire peril, I
gather, though your wife wasn't more specific than that."
"It's good to have you here," said Alvin. "Even if neither of us has any idea
why we're here."
"Oh, I know why we're here," said Calvin. "I just don't know why Peggy sent
us."
"So ... are you going to tell me?"
"We're here because it's time for us to get over petty jealousies and work
together to really change the world."
They hadn't been talking for a whole minute, and already Alvin was grinding
his teeth a little. Petty jealousies? Calvin was the only one who had ever been
jealous, and Calvin was the one who decided to leave Vigor Church and head off
for wherever he'd been -- France and England, Alvin knew, and Camelot, and
Philadelphia once, and a lot of other places that he didn't have any idea of.
Calvin was the one who decided to stop working on trying to train his knack, who
had to learn everything on his own.
Apparently he'd learned it all and was ready to take his place as Alvin's
equal. But Alvin had no delusion that they'd be working together. Calvin would
cooperate if he felt like it, and not, if he felt like not.
And when he really bollixed it up, Alvin would step in to try to undo
whatever madness Calvin had gotten into.
No, no, that's not fair. Give the kid a chance.
The man, I mean.
Or maybe that's what I mean.
"All right," said Calvin. "Maybe we aren't over our petty jealousies."
Alvin realized that he'd left Calvin's declaration unanswered. "What
jealousies?" he said. "I was just trying to think how best to divide our
labors."
"Why not think out loud?" asked Calvin. "Then maybe I'll have a chance to
think of an idea, instead of just waiting for yours."
He said it with a smile, but Alvin almost laughed in reply. So much for petty
jealousies being put behind them.
"Where's that French fellow you were traveling with a few years back?"
"Balzac?" said Calvin. "Back in France, writing subversive novels that make
Napoleon look like an ass."
"And Napoleon permits it?"
"We don't know yet. Balzac hasn't actually published any of it."
"Is it any good?"
"You'd have to decide that for yourself," said Calvin.
"I don't read French," said Alvin.
"Too bad," said Calvin. "That's where all the interesting writing is going on
right now."
Go ahead, thought Alvin. Assert your superiority. You are my superior when it comes to
speaking French, and I don't mind. Good manners would suggest you not rub my
nose in it. But then, you think I always rub my skill at makery in your face, so ... fair is fair.
"Hungry?" asked Alvin.
"I ate on the boat," said Calvin. "In fact there wasn't much else to do but
eat. Nothing but fog on the river."
"Didn't it stay to the western shore?"
Calvin laughed. "Every now and then I'd play around with it a little. Whip up
a little extra fog using the river water. Surround the boat in fog. I suppose we
looked strange to anybody on shore. A little cloud floating down the river with
the sound of a steam engine coming from it."
Alvin felt the familiar contempt rise in him. Calvin persisted in using his
knack for foolishness and showing off.
Not that Alvin didn't know a little bit about the impulse. But at least he
tried to control it. At least Alvin was ashamed when he caught himself showing
off. Calvin reveled in it. He seemed oblivious to Alvin's scorn. Or maybe it was
Alvin's scorn that he wanted to provoke. Maybe he wanted a quarrel.
And maybe he'd get one. But not over this, and not right now. "Sounds fun,"
he said.
Calvin looked at him with amusement. "I guess you've never whipped up a
little fog?"
"From time to time," said Alvin. "And cleared some away, when I found the
need."
"Some noble cause, I'm sure," said Calvin. "So, what dire problem are you
working on saving, and what part do you think I'll play in it?"
Alvin explained things as best he could -- the yellow fever, how Alvin had
been healing as many people as he could. The rumors about the orphanage. Jim
Bowie's little mob. La Tia and the desire of the oppressed people of Barcy to
get out before the bloodshed began.
"So, what'll it be? Take all these boats?"
"We don't have a lot of sailors among the French and the slaves and the free
blacks and the orphans," said Alvin.
"We could persuade the crews to stay with them."
"La Tia has some idea of my parting the river. Like Moses and the Red Sea.
Only I guess it would be more like Joshua and the crossing of the Jordan. How
the water piled up on the righthand side as the Israelites crossed over to the
western shore."
"And you don't want to do that."
"Makes no sense," said Alvin. "First, that's a lot of water, and it would
have to go somehow. No doubt it would end up flooding the whole city, which
wouldn't exactly make things better. And when we got to the other side, what's
there? Fog and swamp. And some mighty suspicious reds who won't be glad to see
us. And let's not forget, several thousand people to feed."
Calvin nodded. "I ain't too surprised, Al. I mean, everybody else has a plan,
but you can see how they're all fools and their plans are no damn good."
Alvin knew that if he called Calvin on trying to pick a fight, the boy would
look at him with big innocent eyes and say, Whatever do you mean, Al? They are all fools and their plans are no damn good.
"They ain't fools," said Alvin. "Especially considering I didn't have no plan
at all. Until I was on the way here, and I remembered something I saw
Tenskwa-Tawa do."
"Oh, yeah, Lolla-Wossiky, that old one-eyed likkered-up red."
To speak of the great Prophet that way made Alvin's blood boil, but he said
nothing.
"Of course I suppose he doesn't drink much now," said Calvin. "And didn't you fix
his eye? Course, we don't know what all he's doing on the other side of the fog.
Maybe they're brewing good old corn mash and getting drunk every Thursday." He
laughed at his own humor.
Alvin didn't.
"Oh, you old stick-in-the-mud," said Calvin. "Everything's serious with you."
Just the people that I love, thought Alvin. But he didn't say anything more
about that.
"What I saw Tenskwa-Tawa do," said Alvin, "was mix his blood with water and
turn it into something solid."
Calvin nodded. "I don't know about red knacks."
"They don't have knacks," said Alvin. "They sort of draw their powers from
nature."
"Now, that's plain dumb," said Calvin. "We're all human, aren't we? Reds can
marry whites, can't they? So what would their children have, half a knack? What
would half a knack look like? And they could half draw their power from nature?"
"Here I thought you didn't know about red knacks," said Alvin, "and you turn
around and insist that their knacks are just like ours."
"Well, if you're going to be quarrelsome," said Calvin, "I'm gonna be sorry I
came."
That would make two of us, Alvin refrained from saying.
"So you think you can do this thing old Lolla-Wossiky did," said Calvin. "And
then what? You make the river solid? Like a bridge, and the rest of the water
flows under it?"
"All the other problems are still there," said Alvin. "No, I was thinking
something about Lake Pontchartrain."
"Where's that?"
"Just north of the city. A huge briny lake, but it's shallow. Good for
catching shrimp and crawfish, and there's a ferry across it, but it doesn't get
used much, because there's nothing worth going to on the other side. Most folks
either take a boat upriver or a ship downriver. But at least on the other side
of Pontchartrain there's farms and food and shelter and no angry reds wondering
what we're doing coming across into their land."
"But there's a whole passel of angry farmers wondering why you're bringing
three thousand people, including free blacks and runaway slaves, right through
their cotton plantations," said Calvin.
Now this was an argument
worth having, thought Alvin. Not just fight-picking, but something that actually
mattered.
"Well," said Alvin, "I reckon if we had thirty runaways folks might get angry
with us. But we come across with three thousand, and I reckon they might decide
against fighting us and just feed us and hurry us on our way."
"They might," said Calvin. "Or they might send for the King's soldiers to
come and teach you proper discipline."
"And the King's soldiers might find us in a fog somewhere," said Alvin.
"Aha," said Calvin. "I knew that fog would turn up as your idea."
"I thought you wanted me to include your ideas in this plan," said Alvin,
grinning because it was either that or punch the boy's nose.
"As long as you remember they're mine," said Calvin.
"Cal," said Alvin, "ideas aren't like land or poems or babies or something.
If you tell me an idea, and I like it, then it's my idea too, and still yours, and it also belongs to everybody else
on God's green earth who thinks it's a good one."
"But I thought of it first," said Calvin.
"Well, Cal, if we're getting sticky about it, when it comes to fog, I reckon
God thought of it long before you and me was born."
"And I guess you're gonna make me whip up all this fog while you get to do
the glamorous stuff with the water."
"I don't know," said Alvin. "I've never made fog. And you've never mixed
blood and water and turned it into glass. So if we both just do the thing we
already know how ..."
Calvin laughed and shook his head. "So you've got my part all figured out."
"Tell you what," said Alvin. "I'll do the fog and the water, and you can get back on
the boat and go live your own life as you've been doing for the past six years."
"Walking on Water" is Copyright © 2003 by Orson Scott Card. All rights
reserved.