The River of Souls

The sun was barely up. It was going to be a hot day, the hummers and buzzers already singing out in the woods.

Quinn was cooking breakfast of eggs and corncakes at the hearth and singing quietly as she worked. She was wearing an apron over an ankle-length pale blue shift, and he wore the slightly-oversized yellow nightshirt that hung to his knees, taken from the trunk of men’s clothing that he did not remember ever wearing before.

He sat at the pinewood table, drinking from a cup of tea, and watched his wife with appreciation. She was so beautiful and so lively. There was to be a dance this coming Friday night, in the meetinghouse, and she was very excited to go. Daniel had agreed, though he’d said he might need help to get through some of the more complicated steps, for he could not recall if he was a very able dancer or not and he wished to bring no shame on the Tate name.

Yet as he sipped at his tea he also watched her with questions in his mind that he could not answer. Only she might answer, and though the need to know pressed at him he felt that asking these questions might cast a shadow upon their happy home, and in the deepest part of his soul he was weary of shadows. He felt he already carried a darkness within himself, something he could not shake, and yet…the need to know—the desire to discover—was so strong in him it was nearly a sickness.

“Are you happy?” he asked her.

She stopped in reaching for the skillet in which the corncakes were browning over the low flames. “Yes, of course I am!” she said, with a smile. “Why do you ask such a question?”

“Because I am happy,” he replied, “and I want to be sure that you are, as well.”

“You can be assured, then.”

He nodded. “I look forward to starting my teaching again. I feel worthless sometimes, watching the other men go out to hunt, but—”

“Hush,” Quinn said, and crossed the room to put a finger against his lips. “We have gone over this road before. Everyone has his or her place. Besides, the hunts are dangerous. I don’t want you out there.”

He put the cup aside and looked at his hands again. They were unmarked and unscarred, very different from the gnarled hands of the men who went out and trapped the alligators. Had he ever done physical labor in his life? he wondered. How had he even gotten to this place? Where and when had he been born? A question came out of him before he could stop it. “Have you ever heard the name…Matthew Corbett?”

Quinn continued to work at the hearth, but perhaps her face did tighten. She didn’t look at him. “No,” she said lightly. “Who is it?”

“I’m not sure,” he answered.

“Where did you hear that name?”

“From…” He decided not to bring the Prussian into this. “From my head. I’m wondering…if it’s someone I know.”

“It could be, but I don’t know the name.”

“Well,” he said, and took another sip of tea, “there’s much I need to remember. Maybe, in time, it will all come back.”

“Some of it may not, ever.” She turned from the hearth to face him, and gave him a determined stare. “Daniel, you just have to trust me. You do, don’t you?”

“Am I really Daniel Tate?” he asked, and he saw her wince just a fraction. “Or was there a Daniel Tate before me?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“I mean…everything before I woke up is so dark. I only get pieces of pictures, and they fly away so quickly. This name…Corbett…haunts me. I saw in my head the image of a large town, with coaches and carriages upon the streets. It startled me, because I think I know that place. I think…somehow…it’s important.”

“It’s Charles Town,” she said, and now in her voice there was a faint quaver. “Some memory you have of Charles Town.”

“Maybe it is,” he replied. “I should like to go there, to see if I recognize anything.”

“We shall, then.” She straightened up from her work, rubbed her hands on her apron, and came over to perch herself upon his lap. “I love you, Daniel,” she said, with her lips close to his. “I want you to know that I’m goin’ to help you come back, as you should be. As you used to be. Everythin’ will be fine, as long as we’re together. As long as we have our love between us. Like we were, before.”

“Before?” he asked.

“Before the accident,” she said. “Before you left me for a little while.”

There came a knock at the door. They never had visitors, so Quinn said, “Who?” as she stood up. She unlatched the door and peeked out, and through the crack Daniel caught sight of Count Dahlgren.

“What is it?” Quinn asked sharply. “What are you wantin’?”

“I’ve brought fish.” Dahlgren lifted the bucket he held. “This heat…they von’t last var’ long. I saw your smoke. I thought you vould like to clean and cook these.”

“No, I wouldn’t. Thank you, but—”

“Daniel knows,” Dahlgren said, and he pushed his way in. He was still wearing his dirty tan-colored breeches with the patched knees, but he wore a gray shirt that was already damp with sweat. The shaggy blond hair was lank and oily. His smile never wavered. “About the fish, I am meaning,” he added. “Good morning, Daniel.”

“Good morning.”

“You see, I’ve brought vhat I promised.” He came over to the table to show Daniel the four small silver fish. “Enough for a meal, I think.”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Do you know each other?” Quinn asked, still standing with the door open.

“Ve haff spoken.” Dahlgren set the bucket atop the table. “If you vould like me to clean these for you?” He touched the sheathed knife at his waist.

“We’ll do that,” said Quinn. “When have you spoken?”

“Oh, at night, vhen I am fishing.” Dahlgren ignored the open door and the invitation to leave. He sat down across from Daniel in the other chair. “Your husband likes to valk at night. So he valks out to me, and we talk.”

“We were about to have our breakfast,” Quinn said.

“Yah, I see.” Dahlgren gave her a gray-toothed grin. “You should close that door. Flies vill get in.”

“Daniel, please tell this man to leave our house,” Quinn said. “I don’t care for him.”

Dahlgren looked across the table into the eyes of Matthew Corbett. “And how is your head this day, Daniel?”

“Please leave,” said Quinn, her teeth clenched.

“Perhaps you had best leave,” Daniel said quietly. “Now is not the time.”

“Now is the time,” came the count’s reply, delivered as sharply as if by a rapier.

They sat in silence for a few seconds, and then Daniel said, “Quinn, close the door. Go ahead. It’s all right.”

“I don’t want to,” she said, with something of a frightened child in her voice.

“It’s all right,” he repeated, and slowly the door was closed.

“Yah, var’ good. Man of the house. Var’ good.” Dahlgren kept his eyes fixed on those of Matthew Corbett. “Ve should talk about some things, the three of us.”

“Talk about what? What things?” Quinn asked, as she cautiously neared the table.

“Your husband here,” Dahlgren said. “Your man. You know, Annabelle was a fine voman. I never should haff let her get avay. She had var’ good things to say about Daniel. He vas a gentleman, yah?”

“Is a gentleman,” said Quinn, coming to stand beside her man and put her hand on his shoulder.

“It seems to me…a gentleman does not belong here, in this place.” Dahlgren took a moment to look around the room, which was surely better-scrubbed and tended to than his own. “Not just this place, but this town. This nothing. I say this has been a good place to hide and lick one’s vounds—if one had to—but the time has come.”

“What time?” Quinn asked, narrowing her eyes.

“The time for Matthew Corbett to go vith me to London. This is the name of the man who is sitting across from me. Not Daniel Tate.” Dahlgren’s green gaze slid toward Quinn. “Your Daniel is dead, and he is not coming back.”

Quinn stood very still. But then the young man who could not remember his name or his past felt her shiver, as if the cold of the grave had passed through her. Tears bloomed in her eyes. “You don’t…know,” she rasped. “You don’t know what you’re sayin’.” Her hand tightened on Matthew Corbett’s shoulder, as if trying to grasp more firmly the spirit of Daniel Tate. “Tell him, Daniel. Tell him who you are.”

He covered her hand with his own, and squeezed it, and he had to say the truth: “I’m sorry, Quinn. I’m not sure who I am.” And now was the time, indeed, for his decision. “But…I know I love you, as a husband would love his wife, and I am staying here with you, until I can—”

He was not able to finish his sentence, because suddenly Count Dahlgren was on his feet and the knife was out. It flashed as it went across Quinn’s throat and as she fell backward, her eyes wide with shock and surprise, the blood sprayed in a ghastly red arc from the mortal wound.

“No,” said Count Dahlgren, very calmly. Blood reddened the blade’s edge. “That is not the plan.”

If the spirit of Daniel Tate did indeed possess the body of another man, then it directed both a cry of anguish to burst from the throat and the right hand to pick up the bucket of silver fish and swing it hard against Dahlgren’s head. The count was able to get his shoulder up to deflect the blow, but even so it brought forth a grunt of pain and knocked the man to his knees. The silver fish scattered across the planks around him, and one was caught in the oily thicket of his hair.

A kick to the ribs made Dahlgren curl up and shout a curse in the Prussian tongue, and then the young man without a memory rushed to kneel beside Quinn and press both hands against the gushing wound. She looked up at him with terror, seeking the help he could not give for he knew she was doomed. “Help me!” he shouted to Dahlgren, but the count waved his request away and sat on his knees rubbing his sore ribs.

“I love you!” he told the dying girl. “I love you! Don’t leave me! Don’t leave! I love you!”

She grasped his hands, as if to cling that way onto life. But there was too much blood, the wound was too savage, and she was fading. Her dark blue eyes were darkening more, her face becoming chalky. Her mouth moved, leaking blood, but it seemed she was trying to speak. He put his head down, right against her mouth, even as he tried to seal the slash with his fingers but it could not be sealed.

She spoke three words, but whether he heard them correctly or not he didn’t know, and later he would think that at the end some clarity had entered her mind, if indeed she was living a life of desperate fantasy.

She said, or he thought she said, “My Daniel waits.”

And then he could do nothing more but watch her as she left.

At last Matthew Corbett took his bloodied hands away from the wound, crawled away and sat with his knees pulled up to his chin. He began to rock himself back and forth, his eyes wide and Quinn’s blood streaked across his face.

“Get up,” said Dahlgren, who had gotten to his feet. He realized he had a fish caught in his hair, and he frowned with dismay as he worked it out. He wiped the blade clean on the fish, tossed it aside and sheathed the knife. “Clean yourself and get dressed. Get clothes and something to carry them in. Ve are going to Charles Town.”

“Murderer,” whispered Matthew, as he stared at nothing and rocked back and forth. “Murderer. Murderer.”

“I haff opened the path for you,” Dahlgren answered. “For myself, as vell. Ve go to Charles Town today, sell my horses and vagon at the livery stable, and ve set sail for England on the next ship out. Go ahead, get up.”

“Murderer. Murderer. Murderer.”

“Yah, I hear that.” Dahlgren knelt down, his face a few inches from Matthew’s. He saw the shock deep in the young man’s eyes; Master Corbett was a bloody mess, and would have to be washed before he could leave this cabin. “But who is the murderer? Shall I leave you like this? Shall you go out calling for help, telling all vhat you haff seen? In that case, I shall leave the knife here…for this girl’s neighbors know she vas insane…and she found an insane young man—from somewhere—to pose as her Daniel.” He reached out and tapped Matthew’s forehead. “Think,” he said. “Vhy should I haff reason to kill her? But…a lovers’ spat between two people who are verruckt in the head? Ah, me! Vhat a tragedy! So…get up, Matthew, and let us go forward together, for you surely cannot stay here now. You see?”

In his tormented mind he did see. He wished only to stay here, frozen in this posture and in this moment, but he knew he could not.

Matthew’s eyes moved. They stared into Dahlgren’s with cold ferocity.

“Someday I’ll kill you,” he whispered, as tears streaked down his cheeks.

“As you please.” Dahlgren patted the young man’s head and grinned with his gray teeth. “But it vill not be today, for ve haff things to do. Get up, now. I’ll help you. Yah?”