The corporal held his hands in front of his chest, as if to push Duncan away. “Not me,” Brandt protested. “Yer the one who discourses with Iroquois spirits.”
Duncan steeled himself, then hesitated. “Saguenay,” he said.
“Saguenay,” Brandt repeated with a solemn nod.
“It’s a place,” Duncan suggested, lifting the beads toward the corporal.
Brandt clenched his jaw as he saw the beads, swallowing hard. “Ye talk about such things around campfires in the wilds. It was an old Oneida scout who first spoke to us of it. A beautiful place where all live in peace and harmony. No war, no famine, no disease. The major said you must mean heaven, and the Oneida said no, Saguenay is a real place in the north country that their ancestors often spoke of. A paradise where crops never fail and children are
