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“They rebuilt it,” said Elizabeth gently.

Soon, from his other remarks, about the size of the town which now had a hundred homes clustered around the green and meetinghouse, she realized that Robert remembered nothing since the day Daniel was killed nearly three years ago.

She did not enlighten him, because he seemed to accept the discrepancies. When they all trooped to Mr. Richard Lawe’s house for the marriage, he greeted the men he had known before at Stamford quite naturally - nor seemed to note their astonishment

Richard Lawe was chief magistrate, and had after some persuasion agreed to perform the ceremony. It was irregular, since Joan was a Dutch subject but her betrothed was not, and in any case, Mr. Lawe, in common with the other leading Stamford citizens, and the strict new minister, the Reverend John Bishop, felt that any hold which they could get on their unpatriotic, irreligious neighbours was eminently desirable. Greenwich with its rich arable lands, its splendid home sites, should belong to New Haven Colony. How infuriating that because of Mrs. Feake’s headstrong folly it did not.

The Lawes had a big house, almost a mansion, since they had taken over and enlarged Captain Underhill’s after his departure for Manhattan and subsequently Long Island. And the Lawes had invited all Stamford gentry to be present at this function today. Many of the Stamford guests had never seen the Feakes, either Anneke who had been wife to the traitorous rogue Patrick and was now wed to a godless mariner, or Mrs. Elizabeth Feake who was reputed handsome, had been a Winthrop, and lived in mysterious seclusion with a mad husband. But the town fathers had a reason more devious than curiosity for entertaining not only the Feakes, but rebellious ex-Stamfordians like the Crabs and Husteds who had dared to cross the border. Objurgation having failed, persuasion might succeed in extending Stamford rule and Church membership.

The Lawes’ Great Hall was filled as the Greenwich party entered. The Stamford ladies were all dressed in sad colours and wore plain fichus, aprons, and caps. The Reverend John Bishop was very severe about such things. Elizabeth curtseyed and murmured politely, deciding that the group was very much like Watertown. Some of the women, such as Mrs. Andrew Ward, were pleasant and seemed to wish her well, the men on the whole were admiring, and it was agreeable to see again the look of startled interest in male eyes.

Her hostess, however, gave her the same resentful stare that Peg Warren used to in Watertown.

“This is a rare pleasure, Mistress Feake,” said Mrs. Lawe as she offered Elizabeth a mug of small beer. “Stamford is indeed honoured.” Almost the lady kept sarcasm from her voice, but not quite. She glanced meaningfully towards Mrs. Bishop, the minister’s wife, then at Elizabeth’s gown of violet tiffany, the gold chain above a very low-cut bodice edged with heirloom lace, the puffed, slashed sleeves which exposed bare rounded forearms; at the many small dark curls which framed Elizabeth’s rosy face beneath the becoming wisp of winged cap.

“ ‘Tis a pleasure to be here, Mistress Lawe,” said Elizabeth blandly. “There are so many of us, I fear that after all we may discommode you if we spend the night in Stamford, or is there room at the ordinary?”

“Oh, Madam,” cried Mrs. Bishop. “You couldn’t stay
there!
We have place in our homes for you, I beg you and Mr. Feake will come to the parsonage.” Rebecca Bishop was an anxious, gentle little woman. She was often forced to regret impulsive cordiality and she glanced nervously at her husband who deplored the heathenish Feakes.

“Nay, Rebecca,” said Mrs. Lawe with hauteur. “It is arranged that the Feakes should stay here. ‘Tis more fitting, though I fear my poor house isn’t fine enough for Dutch patroons, so elegantly clothed. Are those the fashions in Amsterdam, Mistress?”

“I hope so,” said Elizabeth sweetly. “And they are not unlike what I used to wear in England and the Bay.”

“Oh, yes,” chimed in Mrs. Ward, “We always used to dress according to our station. But Mrs. Bishop doesn’t wish us to. I think you look very charming, Mrs. Feake.

Elizabeth smiled at Mrs. Ward, while Mrs. Lawe tightened her lips and walked away.

The company regrouped themselves. The young couple stood up before Mr. Lawe’s table. The magistrate pushed his spectacles down his nose and the sparse civil service commenced.

When Elizabeth heard the words, “Martha Johanna, do you take this man - ” she came to attention, and tears stung her eyes. Martha Johanna, aye - that was Joan’s real name, and years since she had remembered it. “Martha” for the little sister whom Joan somewhat resembled, and “Johanna” for Jack. So long ago at Groton, in the beautiful bedroom where she had birthed this baby in agony, where she had known hot reckless love with Harry, and the pain of parting, and where she had known bitter jealousy of this same Martha and Jack. Where had all these feelings gone? Drowned in Salem’s river with Harry, buried with Martha in a sad little grave in the wilderness. And Jack, even remoter than the other two. Though she had heard that he was nearer geographically now. That he had moved his family into Connecticut, and meant to settle there. And was he happy with the other Elizabeth, the ‘intruder’ ? Aye to be sure he was, though no wife and family could capture all of him. And herself so much like Jack in many deep ways, Elizabeth understood that once they had finally parted, he no more than she would wish to look back, or renew the discomfort of their relation.

Yet, as she watched Joan being married, she felt a formless yearning, and a bleak emptiness.

Then she heard Robert breathing hard beside her, and turned with quick apprehension. “A wedding,” he said in a hurried shrill voice. “A wedding, Bess, do you remember ours? In the Governor’s house in Boston? The night that I first called thee wife?”

“Sh-h - ” she said, for those nearby looked at them. This was not the babbling of madness, and yet his pale blue eyes were very bright, he spoke in haste as though some force propelled the words. He quietened for a moment, but as Mr. Lawe closed his book Robert said even louder, “Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence, and likewise also the wife unto the husband. The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband, and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body but the wife.”

There was a startled silence before Mr. Bishop stepped forward. “True, Mr. Feake,” said the minister, nodding approval. “I see that you can quote appropriate scripture. It is well for the young couple to hear that, and I’ll use it as one of my texts in the sermons tomorrow.”

“Aye, thank you, sir,” said Robert, “and is my wife not fair? And he that is married careth for the things of the world how he may please his wife, but still it is better to marry than to burn.”

“True. True,” said Mr. Bishop hastily, embarrassed, yet thinking that Mr. Feake was not nearly so unsettled in his wits as rumour had it. Obviously a pious man who might be induced to join the Stamford church, whereupon all these other unregenerate Greenwich folk should follow suit.

Robert did nothing else untoward for the rest of the day, but Elizabeth sensed his inner agitation while he kept close to her, not in the clinging childish way, but in a way she had seldom seen in him. He touched her often, her bosom, her neck. When they sat down to eat, he put his arm around her and whispered in her ear, “Wife, wife - when shall we be alone?”

When they finally went up to their bedchamber at the Lawes’, she watched with a trembling heart as he bolted the door. All during the worst of his madness she had never been afraid of him, but she was afraid that night. His eyes glittered black from the dilated pupils, He flung his clothes upon the floor, his pallid face ran with sweat, He shoved her on to the bed and his hands clasped around her throat lightly, but she felt the pressure of his fingers like a burn.

“This is a strange house, a strange house. And I have strange feelings,” he said in the jerky rushing voice. “You aren’t you and yet I know you are my wife. Come, come, don’t shrink from me like that. You know what my hands can do to those that shrink and cry out. Nay, you don’t know. I forgot. And ‘twas but a dream. A dream.”

He took his hands from her throat and blew out the candle. But then, panting like a dog, he seized her violently by the shoulders. She dared not speak or move. When it was finished, he fell slack on the bed beside her. “Oh God,” he whispered. “Oh God, I cannot stand it. Vile, Vile -”

She lay shivering, struggling for breath. She felt him raise himself as though to look at her through the darkness, and she inched away trying to make no sound. If she jumped from the bed and ran for the door, would he be quick enough to stop her? She had slid one foot over the edge when he spoke suddenly. “Bess -” he said quietly. “Forgive me. I shall go. I know I must leave you. God wishes it.”

Her terror ebbed, she exhaled a long sobbing sigh. Through the darkness his voice came as it used to be in the first days of their marriage.

“I’ve a Devil in me, Bess,” he said. “I hurt what I love. I know now what happened to Dan. I killed him.”

“No, no!” she cried, pity mastering the fear. “You didn’t do that. ‘Twas not your fault. The soldier Blauvelt shot Dan.”

There was silence as though he were unsure, and weighing the truth.

“Then ‘twas because of what I said, the soldier shot him. I hated Dan that day. ‘Tis all the same.”

“It is
not!”
she cried. “It wasn’t as you fancy. Blauvelt but waited his chance.”

“Stop, Bess,” he said. “Don’t confuse me whilst I can still see clear. God calls me back to face my just tribunal from which I fled. I must go. How else will I be cured of my sickness?”

“But you were better,” she whispered. “Much better, Rob. You will be cured.” She stretched out her hand towards him, groping until she touched his bare arm. She felt him shudder and shrink away from her in the bed. She drew back her hand.

Many moments passed, then Robert spoke again, “No,” he said. “I’ll never heal because I’ve sinned too much.”

Robert did not relapse into the witlessness of the past years, nor did he maintain the lucidity of that day in Stamford either. After the Feakes returned to their house on the cove, he entered a silent half-way state wherein he cared for himself, ate with the others, and even performed simple chores when Elizabeth asked him to, though these he often did not finish but went instead to his room and sat staring out the window with a dark brooding look, or turned the pages of his Bible, muttering verses to himself. Otherwise he seldom spoke, and when he did sometimes the words were apt, sometimes they sprang from his secret preoccupations. He made no attempt to approach Elizabeth again as a husband, for which she was deeply grateful.

Revulsion and the memory of fear now tinged her pity for him. And she suffered a miserable shock when she realized at the end of July that she was with child. After the conceptions of the four other little Feakes she had welcomed the signs, and been consoled for the varying disappointments in Robert by the bearing of his children. She had felt strong and happy throughout each pregnancy. This one, from the beginning, was different.

She suffered from morning sickness and malaise. The summer heat oppressed her, where formerly she had thought it exhilarating. Of nights she tossed sleepless beside Hannah.

Robert did not notice her discomforts, but one day she snapped at him with so much irritation that he stared at her in dim astonishment.    
^%

“Go fetch me
water
in the
pail
from the
well’,’
she cried furiously. “Always you must be told!
I
cannot do it and ‘tis your fault I am breeding.”

“Breeding?” he repeated uncertainly. “How can that be, since I’ve not lain with you in years? How can the babe be mine?”

“Oh my God, Robert!” she said in disgust. “Of course it’s yours. The night of Joan’s wedding in Stamford.”

He shook his head indifferently - ”I don’t believe it,” and he shambled out with the water pail.

Of what use? she thought. Why be angry? Yet she continued to feel anger and disgust. Nor was the presence in her house of Thomas Lyon and Joan a comfort. Thomas was lazy, his mother-in-law soon discovered. He, as well as Robert, had to be reminded of chores, which he performed reluctantly. The only occupation he enjoyed was figuring out various schemes by which the three hundred acres she had given Joan as dowry might be best exploited, or interfering with the management of her own property, even to selling her best sow to Robert Husted without consulting her.

There was a painful scene about the sow. Thomas protested that he knew more about swine than she did, that the sow was too old to farrow again, and that he had made a sharp bargain with Husted, for which she should be grateful and give him a commission.

The younger children, particularly Hannah, were upset by this scene when they saw their mother’s rare anger flash out. Joan wept and backed her new husband. Elizabeth ended by giving Thomas two shillings, and went off alone to Monakewaygo as she had taken to doing whenever she could.

The children wanted to come with her, and she denied them sharply, telling them to go to Anneke’s to do their tasks, or anything they wished, but to leave her alone. She knew that Hannah looked after her, watching from the garden, the chubby little face forlorn, but Elizabeth did not relent.

The tide was half-way in as she walked across the strip of shingle which connected her Neck with the mainland. Good, she thought. For six hours she would be totally cut off from all that troubled her. And have no means of getting back herself. No claims, or quarrels, or duties to harass her - safe on her island for a little while.

She walked to the white sands and stood at the water’s edge, staring out at the rhythmic blue billows which gurgled and lapped on the hot sand. The metallic August sun shimmered in a sky filed with woolly cloud-puffs. She squinted her eyes against the glare and walked farther down the beach until it curved into a tangle of sumac and goldenrod. In there amongst the little pines had been the Siwanoys’ great fishing camp: Now there was nothing left by the grassy walls of the earth fort that had stood there for four hundred years, since the Siwanoys’ first ancestors came here out of the west. And the midden - a field of huge oyster and clam shells, discarded through the centuries and bleached whiter than the sands. She looked at the great flat rock where they had signed the purchase. The Manitoo Rock. Because she owned that rock, Telaka had spared them the Siwanoy revenge.