Down Jasper Lane (Amherst Island Trilogy)

Ellen wasn’t so sure about that. What if the McCaffertys had never received Aunt Ruth’s telegram? Considering what she knew so far about the island, it seemed entirely possible.

The sun was setting low in the sky, turning the waters of Lake Ontario to burnished gold, and there was a nip in the air. The leaves, copper and crimson and deep yellow, rustled dryly in the breeze. It was very pretty, but also terrifyingly strange.

The little ferry office was all shut up, so Ellen sat on the weathered bench outside, her valise at her feet. She peered down the street, but Captain Jonah had disappeared and she couldn’t see a soul.

“If no one comes, what shall I do?” she murmured to herself, the first stirrings of real panic fluttering inside her. Surely Captain Jonah would return or someone else would happen by. She could always walk up the street and knock on someone’s door, although she had no idea what kind of reception she’d get.

Ellen leaned her head against the back of the bench and closed her eyes. Right then she wished to be anywhere else—even the old flat in Springburn, or under Mr. Phillips’s beady eye at school—than alone in the oncoming darkness in such a strange place.

Her eyes still closed, she heard the clip-clop of horses’ hooves and their low nickering. She opened her eyes to see an old wagon slow to a stop in front of the ferry office. A sullen-looking boy of fourteen or so with scruffy black hair gave her an impatient look.

“Well, I’d suppose you’d better get in, then, Ellen Copley,” he said.

Ellen gaped at the boy in surprise. “Get in?” she repeated, her voice little more than a squeak. “But who are you?”

The boy tugged at his cap irritably, his expression little better than a scowl. “Name’s Jed, and I’ve been sent to fetch you. So get in.”

Ellen swallowed. It wasn’t as if she had much choice. Darkness was falling fast, and the air was decidedly chilly. “All right.”

She stood up, her valise banging against her legs. “Shall I... shall I just put this...?” She gestured helplessly to the back of the wagon, which looked dirty and half-filled with old straw.

Jed muttered something under his breath and swung out of the wagon. “Here.” He took the valise from her and threw it into the back of the wagon where it landed with a muffled thud.

He turned to stare at her, and Ellen saw his eyes were a startling, light gray.

“Aren’t you going to get in?” he demanded.

“Er... yes, all right.” Clumsily Ellen grabbed the side of the wagon and swung herself up. Behind her she heard Jed snort in derision, and her face flamed. This was not what she’d hoped for her arrival on the island, yet it was on par with everything else she’d experienced of America.

Jed swung himself up beside her in the wagon and took the reins. He didn’t speak, just clucked softly to the horses who started a slow, steady trot out of Stella.

The buildings fell away to rolling meadow, now cloaked in twilight, with tumbledown stone fences lined with maple trees on either side of the dirt road.

“Are you my cousin?” Ellen asked after a moment, her voice only a bit quavery.

Jed turned to look at her incredulously. “Me? No.”

“Oh. Well, I’ve never met them, you see.”

He snorted. “So it would seem.”

Ellen bristled. She couldn’t help it. She was tired and anxious, and her whole body felt as if it were strung tighter than a bow. “You haven’t exactly introduced yourself,” she pointed out sharply, and was gratified to see a faint blush stain Jed’s cheeks.

“I told you, my name’s Jed,” he said. “Jed Lyman. My pa’s farm is next to the McCaffertys’.”

He stared straight ahead, his mouth a grim line. Ellen gazed around at the meadows now covered in darkness, the lake just a sound of water lapping against a distant shore. She shivered.

“You cold?” Jed demanded in a surly tone, and Ellen quickly shook her head.

“No. No, that is...” she shivered again. Her dress and thin shawl were little protection against the now decidedly nippy air. Her new wool coat, taken straight from the store, was in her valise.

With a scowl Jed shrugged off his own battered coat, draping it over Ellen’s shoulders with a decided lack of grace.

“Thank you,” Ellen murmured, silently concluding that Jed Lyman was one of the most unpleasant, ill-mannered boors she’d had the misfortune to meet.

They rode the rest of the way in silence, the horses trotting slowly but surely over the rutted road, knowing the familiar path even in the oncoming darkness.

By a large archway of oaks, Jed pulled the wagon to a stop. “Here we are.”