Visions of Liberty

Richmont, had started up about three years before and the town was actively recruiting settlers. They advertised a trading post, two inns, several boarding houses, a school, and a budding road system.

Richmont fit Faelin’s requirements to perfection and, best of all, a wagon train funded in part by the town’s founders was heading out within the week. The wagon train’s organizer was more than willing to hire both Faelin and Simon as guards in return for grub and promise of their pick of a couple good cattle at the trail’s end.

Waving good-bye to Mrs. Philbert and little Bobby, Faelin swung into the saddle of his buckskin riding horse and never looked back.

Richmont proved to be almost everything for which Faelin had hoped. The original city of New Plymouth was gone, burned to the ground in the riots that had followed the advent of the petroleum virus, riots inspired by panic related to the petrochemical plants that had once functioned in the area. The new settlement was built slightly west along the coast from the original city.

Although New Plymouth had been destroyed, its concrete, brick, and stone remained as a source of building materials for the new settlement. Instead of the log cabins and clapboard houses that had lined the streets of Richmont in Faelin’s imagination, there were solid square-built houses, rarely more than three stories high, laboriously cemented together.

The greatest bane of Faelin’s existence, Chapin Toms, lived in the most imposing of the three-story buildings. Chapin—he was one of those people who insisted everyone call him by his first name—was the unofficial mayor of Richmont. A tiny, wiry man in his mid-sixties, Chapin looked so frail that Faelin suspected he could break Chapin in two without breaking a sweat. He had the impulse to do so within a week of his arrival in Richmont.

Chapin ran the Richmont trading post and, as such, pretty much dictated the prices for anything other than a meal, drink, or livestock—and indirectly affected the prices for those as well. What drove Faelin crazy was how everyone rhapsodized about how fair Chapin was when to Faelin it was apparent that Chapin set his prices by how much a person could do for him—Chapin—personally. As a newcomer, Faelin felt he was being shafted.

He and Simon had staked their claim on a nice chunk of waterfront land west of Richmont, near to where—so the settlement agent told them—the small town of Oakura had been. Their land had beach front, good acreage inland for grazing, and nearby scavenging for building materials. The weather was pleasant this time of year— enough so that two sailors didn’t think twice about bunking in a tent, but Faelin wanted at least the beginnings of a house built by winter.

Leaving Simon behind to mind the cattle and sheep—their duties as guards on the trip out had netted them a cow, a couple of nice heifers, and about a dozen sheep—Faelin rode into town. He took with him a pack mule, a small selection of worked metal trade goods, and empty saddlebags to carry back his loot.

Faelin strode into Chapin’s trading post—the Dairy as the locals called it for some reason Faelin couldn’t fathom, given that there wasn’t a cow in sight—nodding greetings to a few folks he knew from the journey out. While waiting his turn he wandered around, checking the stock against his list. He was pleased to see that just about everything he needed was on the shelves. There were luxury goods, too: bolts of fabric, bottled liquor, shiny trinkets, salvaged antiquities.

When his turn came, Faelin nodded greeting and began: “I’d like a couple of shovels, two buckets, five pounds of flour, four hens and a rooster, and one of those things you use for making butter.”

“A churn,” Chapin said. He had a face like an amiable walnut and the lines in it shaped a smile around the words.

Faelin nodded. “That’s right. A couple of glass or crockery jars would be good, too. Never knew one cow could give so much milk.”

Chapin smiled again.

“Your bro picked a good beast, there. He has an eye for cattle.”

“That’s right. Grew up on a farm in Oregon,” Faelin replied. “Handy with cattle and sheep.”

“You’re a sailor, I recall.” Chapin thrust a hand across the counter. “We haven’t been formally introduced. I’m Chapin Toms.”

“Faelin,” Faelin replied.

His surname had been that of the Domain of California orphanage which had reared him, and he’d dropped it as soon as he went to sea. Faelin had no idea where his given name came from, but suspected that it had been some administrator’s fancy. Still, for years it had been all he owned and he’d grown fond of it.

“Faelin,” Chapin said, pausing as if he expected more. “Right. Well, let’s go through that list of yours.

Shovel. Wood or metal blade?”

Faelin had no doubts on this. He’d known these would be his most expensive purchase.

“Metal.”

“New or used?”

“Used, if the condition’s good.”

“Buckets. Wood or leather or tin?”

“Leather’s fine.”

“Have a sack for your flour?”

“Uh, no.”

“I’ll have to charge for that, then, but you’ll find it’ll reuse. All I have are ten-pound sacks right now. Hope that’ll do.”

Faelin nodded stiffly, certain he was being had and reluctant to turn from the counter lest he see a knowing grin on a pakeha face.

“Hens and rooster. Particular breed?”

Faelin couldn’t recall the name of the big white birds the Speculation’s cook had preferred and was embarrassed to say.

“Any kind as long as they lay biggish eggs.”

“Well, the rooster’ll take care of making sure there’re eggs,” Chapin said, a roguish twinkle in his eye.

Faelin wanted to punch the little man. At least he’d known enough to ask for a rooster.

“And a butter churn,” Chapin concluded. “Small one should do for you two. Of course, you could save yourself the labor and trade with a neighbor. Debra and Fleming Dutchman have a two year-old claim not far from you and Debbie makes fine butter.”

Faelin nodded. “We’ve spoken.”

Chapin paused as if waiting to see if the request for the churn would be withdrawn, then he went on. “Jars. I can do you a couple of good two-gallon crockery ones.”

Faelin nodded, accepting the two bluish stoneware pieces set up on the counter for his inspection.

“Anything else?” Chapin asked. “Wax? We sell that in pound bricks. Axe handles? Honey? Liquor? Lanterns?”

Faelin considered. Wax would be useful for waterproofing as well as for making candles. Axe handles

they could make. Both he and Simon were whittlers from way back. Sweets and liquor, though, those were luxuries that he and Simon had resolved to do without. They had a cake of sugar swiped from Speculation’s stores and would make that last.

“Two pounds of wax,” he replied. “I’ll think on the rest.”

Chapin nodded and started arraying the goods on the counter. A small group of idlers watched with interest, making Faelin feel acutely self-conscious. He wasn’t used to shopping except for minor luxuries—shipboard life took care of the basics. Barter wasn’t unfamiliar, not with all the ports he’d been to, but he didn’t like the vague feeling that he was about to be taken.

When Chapin finished setting everything out, he asked Faelin to inspect the goods for flaws.

“’Cause it’s yours once it goes into your saddlebags.’”

Then he hopped up on a tall three-legged stool, bent his hands back to crack his knuckles, and said:

“So what do you have to trade, Faelin?”

Faelin pulled out some nails.

“Nails are good,” Chapin said, hopping down from his stool, agile as a monkey to check their heft and quality. “These are good nails. They’ll cover the poultry, flour and sack, wax, and, because I’m in a good mood and leather buckets aren’t moving since we got a cooper in town, the buckets. What you got to cover the shovels?”

Faelin glowered at Chapin. There had been a few chuckles about the buckets, chuckles that made him feel uncomfortably like an outsider.