‘Tell him.’

‘You go out while I tell him.’ Alvah didn’t move. ‘I ain’t saying nothing while you’re here.’

‘I want to go home, Mister Wikin,’ Jonathan said as soon as Alvah left.

‘Oh, dear—’ Benbow began to loosen Jonathan’s hands. ‘It’s sort of complicated. See, I didn’t rightly know your ma. She come to town only on her own, sort of, a week or so before you come here to, uh, meet Alvah. Nobody’d ever seen her before. I don’t even rightly know how she got here. No horse or buggy or nothing. Just appeared that day. Out of nowhere.’

‘Where is she?’

Benbow went to work on the rope that bound Jonathan’s feet. ‘You been with Alvah most of a week now, ain’t that right? Well, uh – she didn’t know what was to become of you. I’m not even sure—’ He broke off and stroked Jonathan’s hair.

‘Where is she, Mister Wikin?’

‘See, Jonathan, I ain’t even sure Carrick was her name. Or yours. I got the feeling, sort of, that she and him just made it up. I mean, it’s a good name, and that’s official, but—’ He broke off again.

‘Where’s that man?’

‘What man? Alvah?’

‘The man! The man!’ Jonathan insisted.

‘You mean your pa? If he was your – I don’t know. Only time I ever saw him was when he came here with you. Gone west, I suspect. California probably. That’s where most of them go.’

‘Where’s my mama? Where is she, where is she?’

‘Well, Jonathan, see, that’s the thing. How can I find your people if I don’t even know your right name?’

‘I’m Jonathan,’ Jonathan said, fears momentarily giving way to the abrupt anger that was to mark his character all his life. ‘Where is my mama?’

‘Oh, dear, oh, dear – But Jonathan what? What’s your last name? Can you tell me?’

‘Jonathan! Jonathan!’

‘That’s all you can remember?’

‘Jonathan!’

‘See? You’re too little to know things like that, and – Remember how she coughed? Consumption, that’s—’

‘What’s consumption?’

‘It’s – well, it’s a sickness – sort of—’

‘My mama’s sick?’

‘Well, no, not exactly.’

Jonathan stared at the broken veins in Benbow’s cheeks. ‘Dead?’ was all he could whisper.

‘Ain’t you going to cry none?’ Benbow said. ‘I won’t tell.’

When Alvah returned, Jonathan was sitting on a barrel, holding himself as still as he’d held himself for George’s inspection. Alvah jerked his head in the direction of the door. Jonathan followed him out once more to the spring wagon, climbed up into it and sat there as still as he had sat before. Teeth and claws must learn patience.

5

Licorice and spices boiled in the iron pot over the fire all winter long. Tobacco hung on racks to dry. In the dank, damp half-light Alvah taught Jonathan to strip leaves, knead them into plugs for chewing, compact them in a screw press, and wrap them in blue paper: Sweetbrier Chewing Tobacco. Jonathan was too little to run away; the grass was too high: he’d learned this lesson. Every night, even though he didn’t have any gods to pray to, he prayed to grow bigger. Every day, his mind wrestled with the tactics of escape while his hands worked on tobacco. From time to time he looked up to see George’s round, shiny eyes on him.