coast to coast to find their source. She is also what is known as a ‘movie star.’ Yes, it’s true. She is a child actress in motion pictures. Our privacy has become a ridiculous problem. Geaxi used to travel with her, but now Star is her companion. Star is obsessed with acting and her beauty is attracting the sharks. There was no place for me, Z. I’m afraid my only obsession was Star and that became quite awkward for both of us. For now, at least, it is better if I stay away. And as for my mother, I would never let Caitlin’s Ruby go under, never—for Daphne, for all of us.”
I watched Willie and I could see the sadness in his eyes finding a good, wise place to go. There it would settle in him, becoming a part of him just as he was a part of Caitlin’s Ruby. I said, “I understand, Willie, but what did you mean when you said, ‘even Carolina on occasion’?”
“Between blues players and ballplayers coming and going, taking care of Caine, Biscuit, Jack, Owen, and arguing with Ciela, she is fine, and as bonkers as the others, if you want the truth. It’s a bloody zoo, Z, so be prepared.”
“When was it any other way?”
Willie ran one hand through his damp red hair, brushing it back off his forehead. He glanced across at me on the turn into Caitlin’s Ruby. “Quite,” he said, steering the big wheel and smiling faintly.
Later that evening Willie prepared a meal in honor of Daphne. He announced the kitchen to be off-limits to everyone while he cooked. The meal included all of her favorites, even an apricot tart. Willie made a valiant and admirable effort, but the result was slightly dangerous to the digestive system.
In three days the weather cleared and for the first time in our visit the cats of Caitlin’s Ruby appeared. Moving, resting, moving again, they were on every window ledge and rock wall, dozens of silent curious witnesses in every shade and color, never making a sound, not a one. None looked the same and none came forward. They were true sentinels in a wild place.
That night, under a full moon, Mowsel, Sailor, Ray, and I took a walk along one of the many paths leading away from the main house. I told them about Nova’s recent behavior and public celebrity, and both Mowsel and Sailor showed genuine concern. They seemed shocked and confounded. I agreed. It was not only that she was Meq, but through Baju’s bloodline, Nova also carried the Stone of Silence.
Sailor was unable to speak for several seconds, then he took a step forward. His “ghost eye” became a hurricane of clouds, but Mowsel grabbed Sailor’s shoulder and held him back. “Silence of water—” he whispered.
“We are,” I finished. It was one of the lines Trumoi-Meq had written on the wall of the first Meq cave I discovered in Africa.
Finally, Sailor said, “Indeed.”
“It don’t surprise me, Z, not a bit,” Ray said. Then he turned to Mowsel and Sailor and winked. “I don’t think we seen the end of it, either.”
I also informed them of Nova’s “voices” and Sailor became even more agitated and concerned. “You must tell her this is of grave importance. She may be the bridge in finding the Egongela, the Living Room. Do you understand? I need not remind you we have less than one hundred years until the Remembering. And where is Geaxi? Why is she not there to watch over Nova?”
I told him what Geaxi was doing. He looked over at Mowsel, who shrugged. For a brief moment Sailor smiled, then dismissed the whole subject with a mysterious comment. “Geaxi is being seduced,” he said.
We left Caitlin’s Ruby early on the morning of June 24, the day before Ray and I were scheduled to depart for America. Willie drove us back to Southampton in the big limousine. From there, he and Sailor and Mowsel planned to continue on to London in order to meet a man of about twenty years of age named Douglas Douglas-Hamilton, the future fourteenth Duke of Hamilton. Willie was supposed to teach him how to fly airplanes. Sailor informed me that Mowsel had arranged the meeting and the lessons. He had been a quiet and close friend of the family for centuries, and tried to maintain a personal relationship with each generation. I knew Mowsel was looking forward to the meeting because he told me so as we were saying our farewells. We were standing dockside, not far from the memorial to the
As he was turning to go, I had to ask, “Mowsel, what could you possibly learn from a twenty-year-old that you do not already know?”
He glanced at Sailor, then grinned. “I cannot answer that before it happens, Zianno, but this I will tell you—I intend to listen well. I am surprised that with your ‘ability’ to hear beyond any of us, you still have not learned to listen well. Do this, Zianno, and you will learn many things you never imagined.” He held up one hand with his palm facing out and his fingers slightly spread. “Five fingers,” he said.
“One hand,” I answered, holding up my hand and mirroring his.
I watched him as he walked away with Willie and even though it was a warm, clear summer day, Trumoi- Meq withdrew a long plaid woolen scarf, or muffler, and wrapped it once around his neck, letting the rest trail behind. Just before he was lost in the crowd, he turned and yelled back, “Hail Hadrian!”
I turned to Sailor. “Why does Mowsel like to praise Hadrian? What does it mean? Is it a joke?”
Sailor burst out in a rare and rowdy laugh, causing several early arriving passengers to look our way. He ignored them. “If it is a joke,” he said, “I am certain it is on Hadrian. Believe me, it is no joke to Mowsel. Someday, I shall tell you the tale. It is the origin of his name ‘Mowsel’ and the reason he is missing a tooth.” Sailor looked once toward our ship and the passengers queuing up to board. “Have a safe voyage, gentlemen. I will notify you when—”
I interrupted. “Tell me the tale now, Sailor. We’ve got time.”
He glanced in the direction of where Willie and Mowsel had gone. “Why not?” he said. “However, it must be a brief recounting.”
“Fine,” I said.
“Damn right,” Ray added. “I’ve always wondered about that crazy name.”
Sailor smiled faintly and gazed not out to the open sea, but northward over the low horizon and beyond. “In the country of what is now Scotland, the land of Douglas-Hamilton’s distant ancestors, Trumoi-Meq is a living legend, just as he is to a few precious families in Cornwall. And it all began with the Roman Emperor, Hadrian, and the construction of his infamous wall. In Cilurnum, a cavalry fort on the River Tyne, in AD 123, Trumoi-Meq was recognized as Meq and captured by a Greek slaver who arrived with the First Cohort of Vangiones from the Upper Rhineland. Trumoi-Meq had been traveling and living throughout the northern island chains studying the standing stones and ancient sea routes for hundreds of years before the Romans invaded. Being Meq, he moved easily among the many Celtic tribes, often as a messenger because of his quick understanding of their diverse dialects and customs. On one of these missions he heard reports of a slaver who had been stealing children while accompanying the cavalry on their frequent raids into the ‘barbarian’ north. Through Cilurnum, the slaver was shipping the children to all parts of the Empire, but if he found one particularly exotic, that child would be sent directly to the Emperor where they would usually be sacrificed in an equally exotic manner. How this slaver knew of the Meq has never been determined. What is known is that he recognized Trumoi-Meq as one of us and to prove it to the soldiers, he had one of Trumoi-Meq’s front teeth forcefully extracted, boasting to the Romans that the wound would heal in minutes and another tooth would take its place by morning. Trumoi-Meq was in agony and bleeding profusely, as anyone would be, but the wound did, indeed, heal within minutes. Using that small triumph, the slaver had Trumoi-Meq chained and thrown into solitary confinement until the following day. The Roman soldiers crowded around, saying such things were impossible, and the slaver took all wagers offered. He was no charlatan—the boy would grow another tooth! He had also secretly planned to personally present Trumoi-Meq to Hadrian, thereby becoming instantly wealthy from the Emperor’s abundant delight and gratitude.
“That night in the damp and dark of the tiny cell where they kept him, Trumoi-Meq did something quite extraordinary, especially for the Meq. In order to survive, he consciously willed his body, his metabolism, blood, and ancient genetic code, everything in his being, to stop his tooth from regenerating. The Meq have a word for this impossible ability, an old word rarely used—
