Dawn on a Distant Shore Read Online Free PDF

went to work.
    "Lend me a hand
with this." He gestured with his chin to the largest of three old chests,
squat and battered. Nathaniel kept his voice easy, but he watched Liam from the
corner of his eye, saw the flicker of interest and surprise.
    The chest was heavy,
and they put it down with a grunt near the fire in the front cavern.
    "The Tory
gold?" Liam asked. His tone had a studied evenness, his voice cracking slightly.
    Nathaniel snorted.
"You've been listening to Axel's tall tales again," he said,
hunkering down. He gave the lock a twist and the lid opened smoothly.
    On the top was a
bundle of papers rolled in oilskin and tied: the Deed of Gift that had transferred
the land patent to Elizabeth, their marriage lines, a sales agreement for the schoolhouse
Nathaniel had built and then sold to her at her insistence, other papers that
would argue louder and longer in a court of law if they had to fight again to
keep Hidden Wolf. There was a wooden box of his mother's things, which he put
to the side. Underneath, a faint shimmering, and Liam drew in his breath.
    "Silver," he
breathed. "Pure?"
    "Not
exactly." Nathaniel reached for the empty pack he had brought with him.
"It's hard to work it here, but we do the best we can."
    Liam's blue eyes
blinked. "There is a mine on Hidden Wolf, after all."
    "Aye," said
Nathaniel. "There is."
    "The north
face?"
    Nathaniel nodded.
    "Does the judge
know?"
    "No. Guess he
never went looking for it."
    Liam was silent. At
his sides his hands clenched and unclenched convulsively.
    Nathaniel said,
"I'm only bothering with this now because I may need it in Montréal. The silver
ain't mine, though."
    The boy's head snapped
up. "It ain't? Whose is it, Elizabeth's?"
    "The mine belongs
to the Kahnyen'kehâka," said Nathaniel. "So does the silver. But they
won't mind me using what I need to get Otter and Hawkeye out of trouble."
    Liam crouched down,
his eyes fixed on Nathaniel. "But the mountain sits on land that used to
belong to the judge. He bought the patent at auction."
    "True."
Nathaniel continued working, but he watched Liam's face from the corner of his
eye.
    "And he passed it
on to Elizabeth, and then you married her."
    "That's true,
too," Nathaniel agreed. "Although it didn't seem nearly so simple as
that at the time. What's your point?"
    Liam stopped and
studied his hands. It was a habit he had that made him seem older than his years:
thinking through what he had to say before he let it go. Another thing that
distinguished him from his brother Billy.
    "Hidden Wolf
belongs to you, and so does the mine. You have legal claim and the silver is yours--"
Liam faltered, seeing the expression on Nathaniel's face.
    "There's more
than one kind of law," Nathaniel said. "The way I see it is, if anybody
has a claim to the mine, it's the Kahnyen'kehâka."
    Liam stared through
the waterfall toward the place where the cabins stood. "Does Elizabeth see
it that way, too?"
    "She does. We'd
sign the mountain over tomorrow, if the court would allow it."
    The boy swallowed so
that the muscles in his throat rose and fell in a wave. "My brother would
get out of his grave to stop you from giving Hidden Wolf back to the
Mohawk."
    Nathaniel shifted his
weight back on his heels. He could almost see Billy in Liam's face. He had the
same low, broad forehead, high cheekbones, and narrow-bridged nose. On his
upper lip and the backs of his hands was the red-gold down that marked all the
Kirbys. One day soon Liam would be as big as Billy had been, and as strong. But
there was something in Liam's eyes that his older brother had been lacking. Nathaniel
said, "And you? What would you do?"
    "It ain't none of
my business," Liam said.
    "Ah, but it
is," Nathaniel said. "If you're one of us, it's your business.
This--" He looked at the chest, and then out through the falling wall of
water, his gaze taking it all in: Lake in the Clouds, Hidden Wolf. "This
is Hannah's birthright, and Many-Doves, and their children's. It's my