Free The Deserter by O.C. Paul Almond Page B

best, because Burn had saved his life.
    Then Burn applied salve from a pounded and crushed herb to keep the flies off and showed Thomas where to find that plant. He also constructed a lean-to for Thomas until he was well enough to finish the cabin’s roof with birchbark. Later, they retrieved the meat carcass and Burn stretched the bearskin taut in the sun for curing. He made sure to perform a ceremony of gratitude to the Keeper of Bears for the bounty that had been given them. He smoked the rest, thereby handing Thomas a crucial lesson. Hopefully in this cool forest, hung in a tree, there’d be enough for him to last long into the summer. Thomas did remember well the hams hanging in the cavernous fireplaces in the basements at Raby Castle, where the cooks cured great haunches of venison shot on the estate, along with grouse and partridge. In the process, Thomas learned more about how to preserve the small game he’d catch. He didn’t much like the taste of bear, but he had to eat substantial meals to help with the healing process.
    Thomas also learned from Burn which portions to use for bait, and how to construct snares for predators. He drove sticks into the ground, notched, with one piece across that would jerk out when the animal ran into it. The secret was to let the game come and go for a while first. After several days, a loop of babiche (a strip of raw scraped moose hide or caribou)with a slipknot, would be put in and attached to a bent-over sapling. When the animal dislodged the crosspiece, the sapling would spring up, breaking the animal’s neck, to avoid it suffering. Before Burn left, they even caught squirrels, usually the domain of the women, and one snowshoe hare. A few edible plants were appearing in the spring, so Burn taught him which ones to use for what purpose, and applauded his discovery of fiddlehead ferns. In the evenings round the fire, Thomas spent time teaching Burn English words, as he in turn learned Micmac. They were fast becoming friends.
    One day Burn mysteriously disappeared only to return late in the afternoon. Eyes glowing, he held out his hand. In it Thomas saw three little stunted plants with odd leaves. Blueberry plants. Yes, a few miles west back in a large burned area behind another river, acres of them awaited the summer sun, enough to provide Thomas with much healthy nourishment. Burn took him there, blazing the trail, before returning to the band.
    The next month Thomas finished the walls of his modest cabin. He was about to tackle the roof when Burn returned to alert him of a forthcoming trip. The band had presumed that the French traders in Paspébiac would be safer for Thomas — unless his man o’war were moored offshore again. Thomas dreaded the prospect of seeing a British naval vessel off the Robin’s barachois. Should he go with them? But how else to get supplies for the winter? He realized that the whole enterprise was more complex than he’d ever imagined, fraught with danger on every count, and nothing for it but to take risks, if he were to survive.

Chapter Ten
    A few days later, a great birchbark canoe thrust through the waves driven by four Micmac paddlers with furs and other trading items. Thomas, kneeling amidships, turned to look up at the sheer red cliffs whence came an awful clamour: large black birds — hell-divers, as fishermen called them — wheeled and screamed overhead, while ungainly young, nestled in thousands on ledges, flapped and squawked at the passing canoe. The stench was heavy in his nostrils. It reinforced the apprehension he felt about this foray into civilization.
    The paddlers hugged the high red cliffs, letting this shield them from an offshore gale that was blowing. The water was rough but the canoe seaworthy. Thomas could not see across the bay now, but from the deck of his man o’war he had seen both shores and figured Chaleur Bay to be about twenty-five miles across, which naval charts confirmed. Once the Bellerophon had sailed