“When I got home today, twenty minutes ago?” said Alvin.

  Margaret picked up her sandwich. “I need this now. I’m eating for two.”

  “Three,” said Alvin.

  She stared at him a moment. “Are you saying—”

  “Twins,” said Alvin. “I couldn’t not tell you it’s going to be twins.”

  “Alvin, this is our future, you and me, sitting together, thinking about—talking about—our children. Letting big events pass by us without even stirring a wind.”

  “They’re going to have that war no matter what we do,” said Alvin, thinking of the big event they had been trying for years to prevent. “I’ll be just as happy to have our people west of the river when it erupts.”

  “You know which side you’re on,” said Margaret.

  “I’m against slavery, period,” said Alvin. “But that doesn’t mean these knackles need to be involved. If their knacks make them an asset on the battlefield, the enemy will target them particularly.”

  “I’m glad we’re going into the wild Western lands,” said Margaret. “The place you describe sounds lovely. Grassland, soon to be farmland, steep mountains as a wall against the world, water coming from the canyons to be spread across the fields and orchards.”

  “When I saw it in the walls of the city,” said Alvin, “before I knew where it was or what it meant, I thought, Now that’s a land God made for people that he loves.”

  “But that can be said of all the Earth,” said Margaret.

  “I know, he loves everybody, but I love my people, the ones he endowed with powers—usually gentle powers, not useful in combat. Useful in peace.”

  “Speaking of combat, Calvin is coming to our door. Don’t let him in. Please.”

  “He’s my brother,” said Alvin.

  “Please,” said Margaret. “He wishes you were dead.”

  “As I said, he’s my brother.” Alvin got up and went to the front door and opened it.

  Calvin stood there, poised to knock.

  “Margaret doesn’t want me to let you in,” said Alvin.

  “Amy Sump,” said Calvin.

  “What about that lying little—”

  “Alvin,” said Margaret from the other room.

  “Well, she is.”

  “I just saw her. Coming into town with a summoner from Carthage City. And a mob.”

  “That poor, deluded girl,” said Alvin. “I think by now she believes her own story.”

  Margaret came to stand beside him at the door. “She has dreamed and daydreamed and fantasized and lied so much that she really does have vivid memories of it.”

  “Never happened,” said Alvin.

  “I know, dear. Your heartfire is always clear about the past.”

  Calvin still stood there.

  “The summoner had Amy with him. I think he’s now allied with the mobs. He had some thugs with him.”

  Alvin nodded. “Thank you for warning me,” he said.

  “I was interrupted during my dinner. I smell food.”

  Margaret sighed and stepped back, allowing Calvin through the door.

  “Thank you, O merciful lady,” said Calvin. “May I share in the feast here on the tea table?”

  “Just don’t take a bite out of my sandwich,” said Alvin.

  “I’ll start a fresh one,” said Calvin.

  While Calvin made his sandwich, Alvin closed the door and hugged Margaret again.

  “So they’re using the law now,” said Margaret.

  “They’re using everything they can think of,” said Alvin. “I think they’re pretty serious this time.”

  “Three of our people dead? Yes, serious.”

  “Verily’s a good lawyer,” said Alvin.

  “If Daniel Webster comes back to prosecute you, he’s more than a match for Verily.”

  “And Webster is not at all a match for the truth,” said Alvin.

  Margaret put her hand on his cheek.

  “Careful, I didn’t shave,” said Alvin. It was an old joke between them—no part of a beard grew on his cheeks. “At least they’re not trying to extradite me to the Crown Colonies,” said Alvin.

  “They have no evidence against you there.”

  “But they think I was part of a slave rebellion,” said Alvin. “Evidence won’t seem so necessary to them.”

  “They can’t hold you prisoner if you don’t want them to.”

  “I’m not worried about being a prisoner,” said Alvin. “I’ve been through that before.”

  “You have friends. There are hundreds of Irishmen who aren’t starving in their homeland because of you.”

  “I wish I had been able to stop the blight.”

  “You brought them away from famine and persecution.”

  “I didn’t bring them here to die for me,” said Alvin.

  “So maybe they won’t die. Maybe every one of their lives will be spared, while they bring down all the killers who want your blood.”

  Alvin turned the talk to something that could actually be done. “Let’s get our people as ready as we can to cross the river.”

  “Now?” asked Margaret.

  “It’s too late to do it earlier,” said Alvin. “Maybe if the mobs think we’re leaving, they’ll slack off the harassment.”

  “Murder is not ‘harassment.’”

  Alvin questioned his own conclusion, as usual. “Or they’ll think their tactics are working, and step up the marauding.”

  “That’s what free will is about,” said Margaret. “Not knowing in advance the outcome of your choice, and making it anyway.”

  “Get Eliza to help prepare the Irish to move West.”

  “To walk across the prairies and climb over the mountains? How do they get ready for that?”

  “Wagons to carry a few belongings, seed for planting, food to eat along the way, tools.”

  “Wagons,” said Margaret. “They’re expensive.”

  “And we have almost no money in the city coffers,” said Alvin. “Time to make some more gold?”

  “Don’t even joke about it. If they think we have a hoard of gold, there’ll be no holding them back.”

  “They sent a summoner,” said Alvin. “That’s better than an army.”

  “The summoner recruited an army,” said Calvin, his mouth full, though he hadn’t finished making his sandwich.

  “Please don’t eat all the sausage,” said Margaret. “We haven’t finished eating yet.”

  “You let him talk with his mouth full?” whispered Alvin.

  “I haven’t given up on you yet,” said Margaret. “Him?” She shrugged.

  Calvin spoke again, his mouth not full, but his sandwich ready to eat. “You ought to experience it, her giving up on you, Alvin. It’s so peaceful.”

  “He has very good hearing,” whispered Alvin.

  Margaret silently mouthed the words, He wants you dead.

  32

  AS SOON AS word started spreading about the time and place for the funeral, people drifted to the large meadow nestled in the ell of the western side of the tallest Crystal tower. It was only three stories high, so Alvin didn’t think it was much of a tower. But it was the tallest thing in the city, and what else would he call it? Crystal Mound? Crystal Cabin?

  Alvin was sitting on the ground beside the row of plain wood coffins. This had become a custom in Crystal City, when anyone died. A plain coffin, but Alvin would place a small globe of crystal water in each coffin. Not that the coffin’s resident would have much use for it. But it bound the dead to the living, and Margaret had told him that this custom meant much to the mourners.

  He stayed low so he couldn’t be seen from the edges of the crowd. He had Arthur Stuart trying to count, or at least estimate the size of, the crowd. Not that it mattered. Attendance was not obligatory; staying home meant nothing bad or good. He just wanted to know, and Arthur was willing to count.

  The sound of horses, and maybe something on wheels. The thought came into Alvin’s mind: A cannon?

  No, a wagon.

  John Binder, who was standing by one of the coffins, said, “Looks to be about forty mounted men.”

  “And a wagon,” added Alvin.

  “A jail wagon, it looks like. Tiny windows with bars.”

  “They think I’m coming with them.”

  “Are you?” asked John Binder.

  “I want only three of them to come here to me.”

  John Binder didn’t have to spread the word. He simply used his knack to get the people at the edge of the crowd to part just enough for mounted riders to come through in single file. When three riders had passed, the people closed up and there was no longer a way through.

  The three riders noticed, but their leader kept on coming, not looking back. He didn’t think he needed more than his two companions. Or maybe he didn’t need anybody but himself.

  “Crowd’s almost three thousand,” said Arthur Stuart from his place on a low branch of a tree at the edge of the meadow.

  “Is that all?” asked Alvin.

  “I didn’t know we had that many citizens,” said John Binder.

  “We have more,” said Alvin. “More than twelve thousand, including the Irish. Margaret counted heartfires.”

  Arthur Stuart dropped down from the tree, landing on his feet, and quickly bounded over to Alvin, just as Mike Fink pushed his way close to Alvin, and stood between him and the riders.

  “Give me a chance to see who I’ll be talking to, Mike,” said Alvin as he rose to his feet.

  Mike nodded and took a half step to one side. Alvin figured that was good enough. Mike Fink could only feel good when anybody who came after Alvin would have to go through him—something that not many men had been able to do, even when he wasn’t protecting Alvin.

  The first rider stopped, but did not dismount. “Alvin Smith?” said the man.

  “I’m listening,” said Alvin.

  The man focused his gaze on Alvin. “The one they call the Maker,” said the man.

  “I don’t know what they call me,” said Alvin, “but yes, I’m a Maker.”

  “I’ve come to serve papers on you,” said the man. “I have to deliver them into your hand in order to fulfill my duty.”

  “Here I am,” said Alvin.

  Reluctantly, the man dismounted from his horse. He wasn’t decrepit, but he was old. A White man, and from his accent, he came from the south.

  Verily Cooper had reached the same conclusion, and blocked the man’s way to Alvin. “Crown Colony papers have no power here.”

  “I’m not from the Crown Colonies,” said the man. “I’m a citizen of the United States, and this summons comes from a judge in Carthage City.”

  Verily looked at the folded paper the man held out, but did not touch it. The authority of the paper, written on the outside of the paper, confirmed what the man had claimed.

  “May I pass?” asked the man. “Or are you resisting my service of a summons?”

  “Not at all, now that I know it really is a summons.”

  “I told you it was.”

  “But you haven’t told me who you are.”

  “Does my name matter?”

  Verily cocked his head, but did not move.

  “My name is of no import,” said the man. “But I am an officer of the Property Rights Crusade.”

  “Ah,” said Verily. “So you’re a slavery man.”

  “I’m a property rights man,” came the answer. “But I was only a humble farmer before one of my slaves stole herself and her baby from me.”

  “Twenty years ago,” said Alvin.

  The man looked startled. “Twenty-two.”

  “Cavil Planter,” said Alvin. Then he turned to Arthur Stuart. “Arthur,” he said. “Let me introduce you to the man who raped your mother and became your father. Cavil Planter, your son Arthur Stuart.”

  “My stolen property,” said Cavil Planter.

  “You know that slave catchers long since determined that Arthur Stuart is not the runaway slave you were searching for.” Alvin smiled.

  “I know who you are and what you can do. I know you interfered with the identification.”

  “I’m sure what you meant to say was that you suspect that I interfered,” said Alvin. “Else that might be taken for slander.”

  “By all means, hale me into court for that offense,” said Cavil Planter.

  Planter walked up to Alvin and Arthur Stuart.

  “You named him for our glorious Monarch,” he said. “Mockery on top of theft.”

  “Are you here to try to retrieve Arthur Stuart? Because that’s a fool’s errand,” said Alvin. “That will never happen.”

  “Be that as it may,” said Planter. “Here is the summons.”

  As soon as Alvin took the paper out of his hand, Planter made as if to return to his horse. But now Verily Cooper and Marty Laws, who, like Verily, was a witness of the golden plow, blocked his way. Marty said, “Mr. Planter, perhaps you could stay to explain this summons to us.”

  There was obviously no “perhaps” about it, so Planter turned to face Alvin again.

  “I’m not a scholar,” said Alvin, “but I can read. This summons isn’t about Amy Sump’s ridiculous charges.”

  “I did not say it was,” said Planter. “What would I have to do with that?”

  “Nor does this summons say anything about stolen property,” said Alvin.

  “You boast about this half-Black fellow being my son, and then deny that he’s my property.”

  “What father buys and sells his children?” asked Alvin.

  “Are we going to have this discussion now?” asked Planter.

  “I’m scanning this paper, and nowhere on it do I see myself being charged with any crime.”

  “The summons is for you to appear before the judge in Carthage City on the first day of November this year.”

  “With no mention of why,” said Alvin.

  “You’re summoned as a material witness,” said Planter.

  “And that’s enough to take a man all the way to Carthage?” asked Alvin.

  “Or to cause him to be arrested for failing to appear,” said Planter.

  Alvin nodded. “I’m not going anywhere until I see a charge against me, Mr. Planter.”

  “I do have an arrest warrant for you,” said Planter. “It names the charges against you. But I decided not to give it to you in the midst of this mob.”

  “These are peaceable citizens,” said Marty Laws, “gathered solemnly for a funeral.”

  “If I had served you with an arrest warrant, Mr. Smith, would they have remained so peaceable?”

  “Yes, they would,” said Mike Fink, stepping right up to Planter, “because after I had torn your warrant, your summons, and you in half, there would have been nothing for the folks to be upset about.”

  Verily shook his head. Mike Fink saw it and took a step back.

  Verily said, “I believe Mr. Fink wishes to clarify, lest his remarks be taken as threatening an officer of the court.”

  Planter answered, “That is most gracious. I wonder if Mr. Fink would say that in his own words.”

  Marty sidled up to Mike Fink. “An apology for the misunderstanding is in order now, Mr. Fink.”

  “You’re actually a real lawyer, like Cooper here?” he asked.

  “Wills and civil complaints need lawyering, as well as criminal trials,” said Marty. “Your apology and clarification?”

  As Alvin well knew, Mike Fink was not dumb, and understood exactly what was required. He straightened up. “Mr. Planter, I apologize that my words were so vague as to be misunderstood as a threat against your person or any of the legal papers you brought. I mean you no harm, and will be happy to escort you safely back to your cavalry.”

  Planter said, “That’s all I ask. But I’ll be on horseback, so I won’t need an escort who is on foot.”

  Alvin spoke up. “Give me that warrant, please,” he said.

  “Which of these men is your attorney?” asked Planter.

  “They both are,” said Alvin. “But Marty’s got a more even temper.”

  Verily winced.

  Planter took another paper out of his jacket and offered it to Marty Laws.

  Marty took it, opened it, read it. Fury showed on his face. “These charges are ridiculous. You’ll never even get an indictment on this.”

  “We already have the true bill of indictment,” said Planter. “Keep reading.”

  “They expect to take you to Carthage City in that prison wagon,” said Marty.

  Verily took the warrant from his hands and read it quickly. “Treason against the United States,” he read. “Forming an unauthorized militia without proper authority. Obtaining a city charter under false pretenses. Kidnapping children in Ireland and transporting them to the United States.”

  Marty touched Alvin’s wrist. “Now is a perfect time, Alvin, for you to exercise your right to not testify against yourself.”

  “I cannot say anything to these charges except that they are none of them accurate,” said Alvin, now speaking in his educated voice.

  “And yet you are indicted for all these crimes, and you are under arrest, now that your attorney has been served with the warrant.”

  The murmuring in the crowd was growing louder, as people near this conversation relayed to others what was happening.

  “Now we’ll see how peaceable these people are,” said Planter. It occurred to Alvin that maybe this evil man was so filled with self-hatred that he wanted the crowd to make him a martyr to his wretched cause.

  “They’re very patient and peaceable,” said Alvin. “All they need is an explanation.” Alvin beckoned to the captain of the showboat. “Can you repeat what I say now, so everyone in the crowd can hear?”

  The captain nodded, and Alvin began.

  “My fellow knackles and citizens of Crystal City, do not be concerned. Our conversation here has been nothing but civil, and it will continue so.”

  From Planter’s slight shift of position, it seemed he might have been about to register a protest.

  “I have been arrested, and I have been served a summons. The summons first, which requires me to appear before a judge in Carthage City on the first of November.”

  Planter now raised a hand to make a gesture and to say a word, which Verily’s hand on his arm prevented him from doing.