Caroline B. Cooney Quote
What do you mean--your family? he said. Joseph, you do not have a in this terrible place. You have a master. Do not confuse savages who happen to give you food with Joseph’s face hardened. They are my family. My father is Great Sky. My mother--The minister lost his temper. Your father is Martin Kellogg, he shouted, with whom I just dined in Montreal. You refer to some savage as your father? I am ashamed of you.Under his tan, Joseph paled and his Indian calm left him. He was trembling. My--my father? Alive? You saw him?Your father is a field hand for a French family in Montreal. He works hard, Joseph. He has no choice. But you have choices. Have you chosen to abandon your father?Joseph swallowed and wet his lips. No. He could barely get the syllable out.Don’t cry, prayed Mercy. Be an eagle. She fixed her eyes upon him, giving him all her strength, but Mr. Williams continued to destroy whatever strength the thirteen-year-old possessed.Your father prays for the day you and he will be ransomed, Joseph. All he thinks of is the moment he can gather his beloved family back under his own roof. Is that not also your prayer, Joseph?Joseph stared down the wide St. Lawrence in the direction of Montreal. He was fighting for composure and losing. Each breath shuddered visibly through his ribs.The Indian men who never seemed to do anything but smoke and lounge around joined them silently. How runty the French looked next to the six-foot Indians; how gaudy and ridiculous their ruffled and buckled clothing.The Indians were not painted and they wore almost nothing. Neither were they armed. And yet they came as warriors. Two of their children were threatened. It could not be tolerated.Tannhahorens put one hand on Joseph’s shoulder and the other on Mercy’s. He was not ordering them around, and yet he did not seem to be protecting them. He was, it dawned on Mercy, comforting them.In Tannhahorens’s eyes, we are Indian children, thought Mercy. Her hair prickled and her skin turned to gooseflesh. She had spent the summer forgetting to be English--and Tannhahorens had spent the summer forgetting the same thing.
What do you mean--your family? he said. Joseph, you do not have a in this terrible place. You have a master. Do not confuse savages who happen to give you food with Joseph’s face hardened. They are my family. My father is Great Sky. My mother--The minister lost his temper. Your father is Martin Kellogg, he shouted, with whom I just dined in Montreal. You refer to some savage as your father? I am ashamed of you.Under his tan, Joseph paled and his Indian calm left him. He was trembling. My--my father? Alive? You saw him?Your father is a field hand for a French family in Montreal. He works hard, Joseph. He has no choice. But you have choices. Have you chosen to abandon your father?Joseph swallowed and wet his lips. No. He could barely get the syllable out.Don’t cry, prayed Mercy. Be an eagle. She fixed her eyes upon him, giving him all her strength, but Mr. Williams continued to destroy whatever strength the thirteen-year-old possessed.Your father prays for the day you and he will be ransomed, Joseph. All he thinks of is the moment he can gather his beloved family back under his own roof. Is that not also your prayer, Joseph?Joseph stared down the wide St. Lawrence in the direction of Montreal. He was fighting for composure and losing. Each breath shuddered visibly through his ribs.The Indian men who never seemed to do anything but smoke and lounge around joined them silently. How runty the French looked next to the six-foot Indians; how gaudy and ridiculous their ruffled and buckled clothing.The Indians were not painted and they wore almost nothing. Neither were they armed. And yet they came as warriors. Two of their children were threatened. It could not be tolerated.Tannhahorens put one hand on Joseph’s shoulder and the other on Mercy’s. He was not ordering them around, and yet he did not seem to be protecting them. He was, it dawned on Mercy, comforting them.In Tannhahorens’s eyes, we are Indian children, thought Mercy. Her hair prickled and her skin turned to gooseflesh. She had spent the summer forgetting to be English--and Tannhahorens had spent the summer forgetting the same thing.
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