finished second draft, just need the ending scene

2 files changed, 172 insertions, 79 deletions

diff --git a/cuts.txt b/cuts.txt
index 65f180f..f4a27d5 100644
--- a/cuts.txt
+++ b/cuts.txt
@@ -1,3 +1,82 @@
+## Bridie goes on a hunt
+
+It was midday before the Henri and hunters returned with two boar and a deer. The crew had already built a fire and wasted no time cleaning the animals and loading them onto spits. Henri strutted about the camp like some great warrior hunter even though Birdie knew he hadn't had anything to do actually killing any of the animals. Her father caught her glaring at Henri's back and asked her why she was scowling. On a whim she told him it was because no one ever asked her to go hunting. Her father looked at her for a minute and then smiled. "Well Tamba's going again this afternoon to get something for us to bring when we head south, tell him you want to go." He turned and then spun back around and added, "And tell him I said you can use my gun."
+
+Birdie's face lit up in a smile and she bolted off off to find Tamba before he headed back off into the island. He was sitting cross legged by the firepit, a bowl of rabbit stew in his lap. A kettle of water hung over the fire and was nearing a boil. She sat down across from Tamba, unsure what to say. He raised an eyebrow at her. She looked down at her hands in her lap. She took a deep breath. "I was hoping I could go on the hunt with you today."
+
+Tamba did not say anything, he continued to chew on rabbit stew and watch her, squinting and narrowing his gaze. Finally he seemed satisfied. "Your father's gun?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+Tamba grunted. "Okay then. After the coffee, we hunt."
+
+Tamba made coffee like her father, by pouring the boiling water over the grounds and then waiting for them to settle. Tamba lifted the kettle lid with a sticks and then carefully unwrapped the coffee grinder from the cloth it was kept wrapped in. It was her father's prize possession, something he'd acquired from a man in Boston the year before. Most people, her father included drank tea, but Tamba and her father were the only she's ever seen drink coffee. Birdie had tried it once, it was bitter and tasted like moldy wood smelled. She'd never asked for it again. 
+
+"Why do you drink coffee?"
+
+"Why do you want to hunt?"
+
+"Because it's fun."
+
+"There you go."
+
+"Coffee is not fun. I've tried it, it's awful."
+
+"It's awful to you. To me it is delicious. And fun." He smiled and began to grind. The rattling noise made him have to raise his voice to say, "get your father's gun, make sure it's loaded, you're only getting one shot."
+
+Birdie darted into the hut. Her father had two rifles, one was a new gun he'd bought on their journey down from a gunsmith in Philadelphia. It was a massive thing, easily two heads longer than Birdie was tall. She knew her father did not mean for her to use it. She grabbed the shorter, English navy rifle from over the door where it hung. It was heavy and the steel strangely cool in her hand despite the heat of the day. She knew it was loaded, she was careful not to put her finger over the trigger, but she carried it as her father had taught her, as she would on the hunt, one hand on the trigger and flintlock, the other on the barrel just up from the trigger, that way it was balanced in her hands.
+
+She brought it to Tamba who took it and examined it carefully. "This will do for our hunt. We will clean it when we return." 
+
+She waited while Tamba drank his coffee and cleaned his own gun. He stood up and slid the ramrod out from it's place under the barrel. He took a small scrap of clean sailcloth and fastened it to the end of the ramrod. He scooped some boiling water still simmering in the kettle and poured it down the barrel. In one smooth, practiced motion he slammed the ramrod in after the water and rubbed it up and down, sending pulsing jets of powder-black water squirting out to base where the hole for the cap was located. Tamba lifted out the ramrod and repeat the process, this time though the water wasn't nearly as black. Tamba lifted out the ramrod, put another piece of sailcloth on the end, this one well greased with pig fat, and rammed it up and down. When it was well-coated he pulled it out and rubbed down the outside of the barrel and stock with a bit of grease.
+
+Tamba let Birdie hold the gun when he fetched his powder horn and shot bag. When he came bag he open the metal cap of the powder horn and poured in gunpower. He glanced over at Birdie, shrugged and then poured in a little more. He tapped the barrel and shook the gun a little to get it all down at the base. Then he dropped in a bullet and used the ramrod, with a bit of cloth to pack the bullet into place. He put the ramrod back in the gunstock and placed a cap under the hammer. He slowly lowered down the hammer. "Well then, let's go."
+
+The set off down the souther trail that led along the back of the marsh. Birdie was hoping they'd run across boar, but she knew deer were more plentiful on the island. The boar preferred the less swampy forests of the mainland that were not easily accessible without the pirogue.
+
+Tamba walked quickly and quietly, with a sense of direction and purpose. 
+
+As they walked through the woods Birdie worked up her courage to ask. "What made you say I could hunt with you?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean when I asked you, you stared at me for a long time, like you were figuring something out or testing me or something, I was just wondering what it was that I did that made you say yes."
+
+Tamba burst out laughing. "You give me too much credit little one. You give yourself too little. I wasn't testing you, I just had my mouthful. Didn't anyone tell you it's rude to talk with your mouth full?"
+
+Birdie stopped in her tracks. "You mean you were just chewing."
+
+He laughed again. "Yes, just chewing."
+
+Birdie was embarrassed and she was thankful the deep evening shadows of the oaks hid her burning cheeks.
+
+"Now, no more talking. We'll enter this grove up ahead, I have a tree I like, you are going to sit in a branch near me, where I can help you sight the gun and we will fire together okay? You know what to aim for?
+
+"In the heart?"
+
+"Yes, but where is the heart?"
+
+"Think of a salt pork barrel."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Think of a deer, or a boar, or even a bear really, though don't shoot at a bear. Think of their body as a salt pork barrel. Now, imagine about one third of the way back from the front of the barrel there is an orange hanging by a string."
+
+"An orange hanging by a string?"
+
+"Yes. That orange is the deer's heart. You want to aim for that orange. It's in the middle of the animal's chest. Hit that and it will drop where it is. Miss it and we will be walking in some slough mud."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
 --- 
 
 The afternoon sun was gone. The Wind began to roll ashore in gusts ar first, spitting cand off  the tops of the dunes, whiping it into the aire and then letting it settle again, some kind of dance between wind and done, one that ducked the dunes dipped the dunes, back, away from the sea, and then lifted them again in some kind of dance, light and bluri at the edges, stingin the skin of any create that might cut between them might be so bold as to cut between then. Very quickly though the dance became to fast to follow, the wind no longer let the sand dip, prefering the whirl it endlessly across the sandy shore dance floor. the sea because to instrde, waves moved higher as if draw by a tide, but it was not a tide it was wind, moved water over thousands of miles, piling it up here in th sahllows of the coastal water where it rose and surge forward., washing the frontal dunes first, then rising high enough to whipe out their camp, what was left, that the had not backed up was list, nothing more then the stones for the limns, though Birdie was sad to see them gone, pished out over the marsh. her father said perhaps they would find them, bu again, but Lyuly could not see how, the dunes were moving like soldier marching befor ethe wind, further bck buring reeds and sloughs and certainly and stones that folled down below them. 
diff --git a/lbh.txt b/lbh.txt
index 82717ba..0ceb695 100644
--- a/lbh.txt
+++ b/lbh.txt
@@ -3177,179 +3177,193 @@ Tamba chuckled. "Good to have you back Birdie."
 
 Kobayashi came up from below and scooped her up for a hug. "My dried fish thief is back at last."
 
-Last was Aunt Māra, who stood off to the side watching the family. She held out her arms to Birdie and she raw over to her and buried her face in the softness of her dress. "My sweet girl," she said stroking Birdie's hair. 
+Over Kobayashi's shoulder Birdie saw Aunt Māra standing to the side, tears streaming down her face. Birdie slid out of Kobayashi's arms. Aunt Māra was wiping the tears from her face. She held out her arms to Birdie and Birdie ran over to her and buried her face in the softness of her dress. "My sweet girl," she said stroking Birdie's hair. 
 
+"I missed you."
 
+"I missed you too."
 
-:TODO": From here was need a seque to night time and Aunt Māra's decision to leave. What do they do in the mean time? Do they speak with Edward perhaps.
+Birdie stayed with her arms tight around her aunt for a long time. She didn't know why, but she couldn't seem to let go. Eventually Lulu pulled her away to show her the night sails they had used, which were in the process of being folded to store away again. 
 
+She was in the bow with Lulu and Henri, telling them all about the wagon ride and the jail and what the cannon ball had done to governor's house when they saw a long boat approaching. Two men from Revenge pulled alongside. 
 
+"Captain!" The man in the bow called.
 
+Birdie saw her father lean of the gunwale.
 
+"Captain Thatch would like to see you."
 
+"Would he? Well then." Her father glanced up at Birdie. "Birdie, come on, let's go thank Edward for his help."
 
+Birdie glanced at Lulu. "I'll be back." Lulu nodded.
 
+The long boat did not take them to Revenge. It took them to the HMS Victory, which had already been painted over. Two sailors sat on a plank that had been lowered over the stern. They were carefully painting some new lettering that spelled Queen Anne's Revenge. Her father laughed when he read it.
 
-Aunt Māra stared at the city. Birdie stood beside her at the gunwale watching Charlestown's lanterns being lit up. She thought of earlier when Aunt Māra had stood to the side crying. She wanted to say something to her, to make her feel better, but she knew there was nothing to be said. Her family would never come climbing back up over the gunwale. There were no reunions in her Aunt's future, just eternal reminders of what had been and would never be. Birdie aqueezed her hand. She turned toward Birdie.
+"What is it?"
 
-I will miss you Birdie. 
+"More revenge. Always revenge."
 
-Birdie did not say anything, but she understood at once. Aunt Māra was never going to be at home with them. She could not. They would always be a reminder of what she had lost. She needed to go away. Birdie understood. Whatever lay down her path, it was not Delos, not her family, not the sea. 
+They were brought on board and led to the aft stateroom, which Thatch had decided would be the captain's chart and plotting room. It was a large room, twenty feet square with a row of glass windows along the back that looked out at the sea, though currently the view was marred by the feet of the two sailors at work outside. In the middle of the room was a huge table and across it were spread charts and maps and a scattering of papers as Thatch and his quartermaster Dobbs sorted through what they'd captured. 
 
-The color had faded out of the night she heard the oars of the long boat dipping quietly in the water as it made its way toward Delos. "Does my father know?"
+"Tk father's name! Looking not to bad for a night in jail. How is the Charlestown jail? I haven't been yet."
 
-Māra nodded. Birdie could see she was biting her lip. She slipped her hand out of Birdie's and went over to the hammocks where lulu and Henri had already fallen asleep. She bent to kiss each of them, and then lifted some canvas that had been piled against the mizzen mast and pulled out a small trunk that contained what things she'd had on Delos. 
+Her father shrugged and smiled. He and Edward hugged breifly before Edward stooped down to Birdie. Even crouched he was taller than her. "Birdie. You have had quite a time from what I here. Capturing ships, taking prize money, winding up in jail. Why, you'd fit right in with this crew. If you ever want to sail with us." Thatch glanced over at Dobbs. "Mr Dobbs do we have any place on the crew for Birdie."
 
-Birdie lowered the webbing and two men climbed up it and aboard Delos. They gathered up the trunk, tied a line to it and gently lowered it down into the long boat. Aunt Māra caught her up in her arms and squeezed her tight. Forgive me Birdie, but I just. She never finished. She set Birdie down and quickly climbed down into the boat. The two men went down after her and boat pushed off, headed for shore. Birdie raised the webbing back up and stashed it in its place against the gunwale. 
+"Aye, we always have a place for the brave and strong."
 
-She watch the boat disappear into the night. 
+Birdie smiled and nodded to Mr Dobbs. "Thank you sirs, but I am already part of a crew."
 
-"She's gone then?" Her father's voice startled her, she had not heard him come up beside her.
+Edward made a pouting face. "Well, if you ever change your mind..." He stood up and gestured at two heavy wooden chairs. Birdie and her father sat down. Edward had to duck under the chandelier as he came around the table. "I thank you for pointing me to this ship, she's a fine prize and I've been wanting a bigger ship. Sixty guns gives me the largest vessel I'm aware of sailing the black at the moment."
 
-"You scared me."
+Birdie glanced at her father, but he only smiled and waited for Edward to continue. 
 
-"Sorry."
+"And of course I'm always happy to help when friends are in trouble."
 
-"Yes, she left."
+Her father glanced at her this time. "We appreciate the help captain."
 
-"Are you okay?"
+"I was hoping," in return, "I might be able to get you to help me."
 
-Birdie nodded. "Papa, will we see Kadiatu and her family before we leave for whereever we're going?"
+Her father didn't miss a beat. "What do you need?"
 
-Her father put his arm around her. "Yes my dear, I believe we will. My plan is to go back down and gather all out things before we head out. I told Edward he could have all our remaining tar, so Queen Anne will be following up down to Edisto. Then..." Her father's voice trailed off. "Well then we'll have to convene the crew won't we?" He smiled at her. 
+"I need to careen and tar. This and Queen Anne. Plus the larger of the two sloops you see to our east." 
 
-"I want to go to Nassau." Birdie said this so quickly it startled her. Did she want to go Nassau? Apparently she did.
-
-"Nassau?" Her father frowned. "I'm not sure Nassau is a good place for us. We're not pirates Birdie."
+"It'd be too dangerous to do that Edisto now."
 
-"McPhail thinks we are."
-
-Her father grunted and rubbed his beard thoughtfully. "That's true, but McPhail isn't the British Empire. We're Alban, not pirates."
+"Yes, quite. I was thinking perhaps we could relieve you of your tar and take it back to Ocracoke."
 
-"Maybe it's time the Alban brought some order to Nassau then."
+"Edward." Her father smiled. "Did you really bring me all the way to your fancy new ship, in this stateroom where high admiralty has probably dined, to ask me if you could have my tar? You could have just yelled across the harbor and I'd have said yes. It's no good to us, we can't take it, but there's nothing I'd like more than to see it keep some ships afloat."
 
-Her father narrowed his eyes at her and smiled. "Now you're talking."
+Thatch seems relieved. "Well good then. And of course I brought you here, I wanted to see what it felt like. I wanted to summon someone and have them come. We don't get to do that much, men like you and I."
 
-## Back to camp
+Her father chuckled. "True. And how was it?"
 
-Their camp looked just as they had left it. Birdie ran ahead of her father and Edward's men who'd come for the tar. As she crested the dunes and looked down she half expected it to all be gone, but it was all there, the hut, the fire, the kettles beside it. Everything just as she had left it that afternoon, just a few days ago she realized with a start. A few days and the whole world had turned upside down.
+Thatch smiled. "It's not bad actually. I can see how the British get addicted to it. This notion that you can command the world to do what you want. But that's why I'm here, to keep them from getting too literal about that."
 
-Now it was time to turn their camp upside down. While Tamba and Henri, along with two of the better hunters among Queen Anne's crew headed off to the interior of the island in search of boar and deer, Kobayashi and her father fashioned sleds from spars the yanked out of the roof of the hut. Birdie and Lulu gathered up their belonging and piled them next to the sleds. There wasn't much to gather, it took longer to build the sleds than it did to make the piles next to them. 
+Her father glanced around the room, an ornate set of bookcases lined the port wall. He stood up and walked over to them, turning his head the read the spines. 
 
-It made Birdie a little sad to see the hut begin to sag where her father had removed poles for the sled. They'd never taken it down before. It always needed work when they returned, it always needed new thatching, but they had never destroyed it before. It was always there. Now her father planned to burn it. "Let McPhail build his own damn huts," he'd muttered. 
+"You make take some if you like."
 
-Edward laughed. "That'll show him tk father's name"
+"Really?"
 
-Her father looked up and then laughed. "Well, it'll give us plenty of dried wood for a bonfire tonight. 
+Thatch waved his hand. Her father pulled down a book and kept reading the spines. He pulled another. On the second shelf he pulled a third. He clamped them under his arm. 
 
-Edward smiled. "Now you're talking, tk father's name"
+"What did you get?" asked Thatch.
 
-Birdie didn't really want to burn what the hut. It wasn't home, but she like it. More importantly she liked know it was out there, waiting for her to return. Of all the places they made camp, Edisto Island was her favorite and she was having a hard time letting go of it. She sat on top a dune while her father and Kobayashi dragged the family's belonging on the sleds, through the dunes and then down the beach to where Delos' long boat waited.
+"Dampier, something from Pepys, and the minutes of the Royal Society, 1704."
 
-She thought of Aunt Māra. She thought of Owen. She thought of the hut behind her going up in flames. Everything ends. Everything that ever begins has to end. The only question is always, how long will it last? Edisto lasted three years. The longest anything in her life had lasted until now. She wasn't there always, but it was always there. And now it was ending. It made her chest feel tight.
+"Ah Dampier. Makes we want to sail the south seas."
 
-Lulu was scampering about the dunes, pretending to be a lynx stalking her father and Kobayashi as they hauled the second and final load down to the boat. Birdie marveled at her sister, that she did not seem bothered to be leaving. She wished it didn't bother her. She wished she could pretend to be a lynx and stalk them through the drifts of snow, but she did not feel like it, something pinned her to her seat, something stopped her from turning the sand dunes to snow drifts in her mind. 
+"He does make to sound appealing."
 
-She watched as her father and Kobayashi escaped the salking lynx, unaware of the danger they'd been in. Lulu came back over and sat down beside her. "I'll miss it here," she said. 
+"Not for you though? Not for me anyway."
 
-Birdie glanced at her surprised. "Me too."
+Her father shrugged. "When do we get out of here?"
 
-"This was a good place to come. I hope we find something like it again."
+"I have to send to doctor back tonight. The crew doesn't like him. Then we sail tomorrow. No sense sitting here like ducks."
 
-Birdie realized it wasn't that Lulu didn't care, it was that she was able to matter of factly accepting what the world gave her. If she had to leave, fine, let's head to someplace where we can find something else that's similar, something else great. 
+"Indeed. And that's what you get for trying to press a man."
 
-"Me too," she hesitated. "Though, maybe some place with some more kids."
+Thatch's face darkened. "Some take more convincing than others."
 
-Lulu nodded. "Yeah, it could be nice to be in a town for a while. Do you think there are a lot of kids in Nassau?"
+"Watch yourself Edward." Her father gestured around the room. "Are you so far from being one of them?"
 
-"Papa says no." 
+Thatch said nothing, but Birdie saw his eyes flash in anger. He exhaled slowly, not unlike her father when he was mad she thought. 
 
-"I know, but how does he know? It's not like he's ever been."
+"We'll meet you at Edisto in two days."
 
-"True, but somehow I doubt kids our age hang around pirates."
+Her father smiled. "We'll hunt up some pigs for you. And then we'll burn the place down. You'll love it."
 
-"We do."
+---
 
-"True."
+It was after dark by the time they made it back to Delos. Lulu and Henri fell asleep in their hammocks but Bridie couldn't sleep. She sat on the gunwale, dangling her legs over the side of the ship the way her father told her never to do, but she didn't care, they were at anchor. She watched as Charlestown slowly lit up, its lanterns flickering to life as someone went around lighting them. She thought of earlier when Aunt Māra had stood to the side crying. She wanted to say something to her, to make her feel better, but she knew there was nothing to be said. Her family would never come climbing back up over the gunwale. There were no reunions in her future, just eternal reminders of what had been and would never be. Birdie nearly jumped out of her skin when Aunt Māra appeared at the rail beside her. Neither of them said anything, but she took Birdies had and held it as they watched the lights being lit. Birdie squeezed her hand. 
 
+After a while she turned toward Birdie. "I will miss you Birdie." 
 
+Birdie did not say anything, but she understood at once. Aunt Māra was never going to be at home with them. She could not. They would always be a reminder of what she had lost. She needed to go away. Birdie understood. Whatever lay down her path, it was not Delos, not her family, not the sea. 
 
-## Bridie goes on a hunt
+The color had faded out of the night. She heard the oars of a long boat dipping quietly in the water as it made its way toward Delos. 
 
-It was midday before the Henri and hunters returned with two boar and a deer. The crew had already built a fire and wasted no time cleaning the animals and loading them onto spits. Henri strutted about the camp like some great warrior hunter even though Birdie knew he hadn't had anything to do actually killing any of the animals. Her father caught her glaring at Henri's back and asked her why she was scowling. On a whim she told him it was because no one ever asked her to go hunting. Her father looked at her for a minute and then smiled. "Well Tamba's going again this afternoon to get something for us to bring when we head south, tell him you want to go." He turned and then spun back around and added, "And tell him I said you can use my gun."
+"Does my father know?"
 
-Birdie's face lit up in a smile and she bolted off off to find Tamba before he headed back off into the island. He was sitting cross legged by the firepit, a bowl of rabbit stew in his lap. A kettle of water hung over the fire and was nearing a boil. She sat down across from Tamba, unsure what to say. He raised an eyebrow at her. She looked down at her hands in her lap. She took a deep breath. "I was hoping I could go on the hunt with you today."
+Māra nodded. Birdie could see she was biting her lip. She slipped her hand out of Birdie's and went over to the hammocks where Lulu and Henri had already fallen asleep. She bent to kiss each of them, and then lifted some canvas that had been piled against the mizzen mast and pulled out a small trunk that contained what things she'd had on Delos. 
 
-Tamba did not say anything, he continued to chew on rabbit stew and watch her, squinting and narrowing his gaze. Finally he seemed satisfied. "Your father's gun?"
+Birdie lowered the webbing and two men climbed up it and aboard Delos. They gathered up the trunk, tied a line to it and gently lowered it down into the long boat. Aunt Māra caught her up in her arms and squeezed her tight. "Forgive me Birdie, but I just..." She never finished. She set Birdie down and quickly climbed down into the boat. The two men went down after her and boat pushed off, headed for shore. Birdie raised the webbing back up and stashed it in its place against the gunwale. 
 
-She nodded.
+She watch the boat disappear into the night. 
 
-Tamba grunted. "Okay then. After the coffee, we hunt."
+"She's gone then?" Her father's voice startled her, she had not heard him come up beside her.
 
-Tamba made coffee like her father, by pouring the boiling water over the grounds and then waiting for them to settle. Tamba lifted the kettle lid with a sticks and then carefully unwrapped the coffee grinder from the cloth it was kept wrapped in. It was her father's prize possession, something he'd acquired from a man in Boston the year before. Most people, her father included drank tea, but Tamba and her father were the only she's ever seen drink coffee. Birdie had tried it once, it was bitter and tasted like moldy wood smelled. She'd never asked for it again. 
+"You scared me."
 
-"Why do you drink coffee?"
+"Sorry."
 
-"Why do you want to hunt?"
+"Yes, she left."
 
-"Because it's fun."
+"Are you okay?"
 
-"There you go."
+Birdie nodded. "Papa, where are we going to go?"
 
-"Coffee is not fun. I've tried it, it's awful."
+Her father put his arm around her. "My plan is to go back down to Edisto and gather all our things before we head out. I told Edward he could have all our remaining tar, so Revenge will be following up down to Edisto. Then..." Her father's voice trailed off. "Well then we'll have to convene the crew won't we?" He smiled at her. 
 
-"It's awful to you. To me it is delicious. And fun." He smiled and began to grind. The rattling noise made him have to raise his voice to say, "get your father's gun, make sure it's loaded, you're only getting one shot."
+"I want to go to Nassau." Birdie said this so quickly it startled her. Did she want to go Nassau? Apparently she did.
 
-Birdie darted into the hut. Her father had two rifles, one was a new gun he'd bought on their journey down from a gunsmith in Philadelphia. It was a massive thing, easily two heads longer than Birdie was tall. She knew her father did not mean for her to use it. She grabbed the shorter, English navy rifle from over the door where it hung. It was heavy and the steel strangely cool in her hand despite the heat of the day. She knew it was loaded, she was careful not to put her finger over the trigger, but she carried it as her father had taught her, as she would on the hunt, one hand on the trigger and flintlock, the other on the barrel just up from the trigger, that way it was balanced in her hands.
+"Nassau?" Her father frowned. "I'm not sure Nassau is a good place for us. We're not pirates Birdie."
 
-She brought it to Tamba who took it and examined it carefully. "This will do for our hunt. We will clean it when we return." 
+"McPhail thinks we are."
 
-She waited while Tamba drank his coffee and cleaned his own gun. He stood up and slid the ramrod out from it's place under the barrel. He took a small scrap of clean sailcloth and fastened it to the end of the ramrod. He scooped some boiling water still simmering in the kettle and poured it down the barrel. In one smooth, practiced motion he slammed the ramrod in after the water and rubbed it up and down, sending pulsing jets of powder-black water squirting out to base where the hole for the cap was located. Tamba lifted out the ramrod and repeat the process, this time though the water wasn't nearly as black. Tamba lifted out the ramrod, put another piece of sailcloth on the end, this one well greased with pig fat, and rammed it up and down. When it was well-coated he pulled it out and rubbed down the outside of the barrel and stock with a bit of grease.
+Her father grunted and rubbed his beard thoughtfully. "That's true, but McPhail isn't the British Empire. We're Alban, we're sea people, not pirates."
 
-Tamba let Birdie hold the gun when he fetched his powder horn and shot bag. When he came bag he open the metal cap of the powder horn and poured in gunpower. He glanced over at Birdie, shrugged and then poured in a little more. He tapped the barrel and shook the gun a little to get it all down at the base. Then he dropped in a bullet and used the ramrod, with a bit of cloth to pack the bullet into place. He put the ramrod back in the gunstock and placed a cap under the hammer. He slowly lowered down the hammer. "Well then, let's go."
+"Maybe it's time the Alban brought some order to Nassau then."
 
-The set off down the souther trail that led along the back of the marsh. Birdie was hoping they'd run across boar, but she knew deer were more plentiful on the island. The boar preferred the less swampy forests of the mainland that were not easily accessible without the pirogue.
+Her father narrowed his eyes at her. Then he smiled. "Now you're talking."
 
-Tamba walked quickly and quietly, with a sense of direction and purpose. 
+---
 
-As they walked through the woods Birdie worked up her courage to ask. "What made you say I could hunt with you?"
+Camp looked just as they had left it. Birdie ran ahead of her father and Edward's men who'd come for the tar. As she crested the dunes and looked down she half expected it to all be gone, but it was all there, the hut, the fire, the kettles beside it. Everything just as she had left it that afternoon, just a few days ago she realized with a start. A few days and the whole world had turned upside down.
 
-"What do you mean?"
+Now it was time to turn their camp upside down. While Tamba and Henri, along with two of the better hunters among Queen Anne's crew headed off to the interior of the island in search of boar and deer, Kobayashi and her father fashioned sleds from spars they yanked out of the roof of the hut. Birdie and Lulu gathered up their belonging and piled them next to the sleds. There wasn't much to gather, it took longer to build the sleds than it did to make the piles next to them. 
 
-"I mean when I asked you, you stared at me for a long time, like you were figuring something out or testing me or something, I was just wondering what it was that I did that made you say yes."
+It made Birdie a little sad to see the hut begin to sag where her father removed poles for the sled. They'd never taken it down before. It always needed work when they returned, and new thatching, but they had never destroyed it before. It was always there. Now her father planned to burn it. "Let McPhail build his own damn huts," he'd muttered. 
 
-Tamba burst out laughing. "You give me too much credit little one. You give yourself too little. I wasn't testing you, I just had my mouthful. Didn't anyone tell you it's rude to talk with your mouth full?"
+Edward laughed. "That'll show him tk father's name"
 
-Birdie stopped in her tracks. "You mean you were just chewing."
+Her father looked up and then laughed. "Well, it'll give us plenty of dried wood for a bonfire tonight." 
 
-He laughed again. "Yes, just chewing."
+Edward smiled. "That I can get behind, tk father's name."
 
-Birdie was embarrassed and she was thankful the deep evening shadows of the oaks hid her burning cheeks.
+Birdie didn't really want to burn what the hut. It wasn't home, but she liked it. More importantly, she liked knowing it was out there, waiting for her to return. Of all the places they made camp, Edisto Island was her favorite. She was having a hard time letting go of it. She sat on top a dune while her father and Kobayashi dragged the family's belonging on the sleds, through the dunes and down the beach to where Delos's long boat waited.
 
-"Now, no more talking. We'll enter this grove up ahead, I have a tree I like, you are going to sit in a branch near me, where I can help you sight the gun and we will fire together okay? You know what to aim for?
+She thought of Aunt Māra. She thought of Francis and Owen. She thought of the hut behind her, destined to go up in flames. Everything ends. Everything that ever begins has to end. The only question is always, how long will it last? Edisto lasted three years. The longest anything in her life had lasted until now. She wasn't there always, but it was always there. And now it wouldn't be. It made her chest feel tight.
 
-"In the heart?"
+Lulu was scampering about the dunes, pretending to be a lynx stalking her father and Kobayashi as they hauled the second and final load down to the boat. Birdie marveled at her sister, that she did not seem bothered to be leaving. She wished it didn't bother her. She wished she could pretend to be a lynx and stalk them through the drifts of snow, but she did not feel like it, something pinned her to her seat, something stopped her from turning the sand dunes to snow drifts in her mind. 
 
-"Yes, but where is the heart?"
+She watched as her father and Kobayashi escaped the stalking lynx, unaware of the danger they'd been in. Lulu came back over and sat down beside her. "I'll miss it here," she said. 
 
-"Think of a salt pork barrel."
+Birdie glanced at her surprised. "Me too."
 
-"What?"
+"This was a good place to come. I hope we find something like it again."
 
-"Think of a deer, or a boar, or even a bear really, though don't shoot at a bear. Think of their body as a salt pork barrel. Now, imagine about one third of the way back from the front of the barrel there is an orange hanging by a string."
+Birdie realized it wasn't that Lulu didn't care, it was that she was able to matter of factly accepting what the world gave her. If she had to leave, fine, let's head to someplace where we can find something else that's similar, something else great. 
 
-"An orange hanging by a string?"
+"Me too," she hesitated. "Though, maybe some place with some more kids."
 
-"Yes. That orange is the deer's heart. You want to aim for that orange. It's in the middle of the animal's chest. Hit that and it will drop where it is. Miss it and we will be walking in some slough mud."
+Lulu nodded. "Yeah, it could be nice to be in a town for a while. Do you think there are a lot of kids in Nassau?"
 
+"Papa says no." 
 
+"I know, but how does he know? It's not like he's ever been."
 
+"True, but somehow I doubt kids our age hang around pirates."
 
+"We do."
 
+"True."
 
 ## Ending scene
 
+The crews of Revenge and Queen Anne's Revenge helped them drag the remains of the hut, along with a few more logs for good measure, down to the beach. The fire they built would have been too hot in the sheltered area of the dunes, but on the beach it was perfect. Next to it they built a smaller cooking fire, which, when it had burned down to coals, was laid with an entire boar and a deer, which the hunting party had brought back. Tamba had killed a boar as well, which he was busy butchering. Tomorrow at sea they would dry it on the racks and give them a nice break from fish on their long sail to... Lulu wasn't sure. They had voted earlier and unamimously decided to head... south. Beyond that, they did not know. *Exploring we will go, exploring we will go,* her father had been walking around singing this song he had made up all evening. 
 
+:TODO: Let's end this sucker.
 
 She gathers up her thing, they load the baot, the find Kadiatu they have the full moon party on the solstice. They burn the hut and the kilns, then cut the Lulu watching Revenge sail away. She and her sister talk of what they want to do, finis.