Or Give Me Death (14 page)

Oh, it was so good to be away from Scotchtown, away from the wool carding, the knitting, my studying, and needlework. I felt so free and alive! And then I thought of Mama, imprisoned in the cellar, and I felt guilty.

Before we got to the wharf, John signaled that we should duck behind a copse of trees so I could shed my riding habit and put it in my saddlebag. Under the habit this day I had on my boy's clothing.

John took a tricorn hat and bade me tuck my hair up and put it on.

"How do I look?"

I saw Spencer Roane's eyes go over me.

"You look the part," John said. "Remember, now, you can't write. The factor will likely ask you to make your mark."

I nodded.

Spencer shook his head. "You two," he said in mock despair. But as he turned to mount his horse, I saw he was smiling.

***

W
E DISMOUNTED NEAR
some crates just off the wharf and stood watching for a few minutes.

British soldiers were guarding the walkway to the ship. And members of the Committee—Virginians in hunting shirts, carrying muskets—were holding back the crowd of bewigged gentlemen and ladies accompanied by Negro servants holding baskets, waiting for the goods to be unloaded.

Factors, men who acted as go-betweens, stood on the foredeck. Of a sudden, the crowd started chanting, "Salt, salt, salt, salt."

I looked at Spencer. "The colony is short of salt," he said. "There's supposed to be twenty-four hundred bushels aboard. And Madeira. And silks in great plenty, as well as Irish linens and a lot of other furbelows the ladies hereabouts have been dying for."

"And one horse, pray," John said.

I heard the sound of the water gently lapping around the pilings, the buzz of talk, the cry of vendors selling gingerbread. Dogs ran in and about the crowd, along with children. There was a general excitement in the air. No one recognized me.

John pressed the purse of money into my hands and bade me put it into my haversack. I did so.

The captain of the ship was talking with the head of the Committee. "My ship needs repairs," he said. "My men need a day ashore to acquire some provisions for the trip home."

Someone pointed to the road and a wagon coming, loaded with chickens and pigs, potatoes. Another was behind it with barrels of water and beer.

The Committee let the wagons through and only then did the captain allow members of the Committee, and some important-looking gentlemen, to board her.

Then the head of the Committee read an announcement, allowing those who had ready money to file aboard in an orderly manner.

All were men. "Don't forget, at least three yards," I heard one woman calling after her husband.

"We need that Madeira for Christmas entertaining," said another.

John squeezed my hand. "Will you be all right?"

"Yes."

"I'd do it myself, but it's as I thought. I know all the Committee men."

"I'll keep." And I filed aboard with the rest of them. Once up on deck John and Spencer seemed so far below. But I didn't take time to look around. John had told me what to do, who to see. A Mr. Humphries, one of the English factors.

"He'll be near the hold," John had said. And he told me where the hold was on the ship.

And there he was, a tall thin man in an outlandish yellow frock coat. I headed straight for him but was barred by a burly seaman. "You got business here, boy?"

"Yes sir." I tried to make my voice deep. "I'm here to see Mr. Humphries. I've come for Mr. Henry, my master. For a horse, name of Doormouse. Chestnut he is. Supposed to be sold to Mr. Hoomes of this colony, but he hasn't the cost of her. Mr. Henry would buy her in his stead."

He looked at Mr. Humphries, who nodded, and I went toward him. "You've got the king's shilling?"

"Yes sir." I reached into my haversack and pulled out the small leather purse and shook it.

"Mr. Henry!" Humphries rubbed his chin. "That wouldn't be Mr. Patrick Henry, the troublemaker, the man your royal governor calls a man of desperate circumstances, now, would it?"

"No sir. There be many Henrys in Virginia."

He opened the purse, looked at the money, then ordered that the horse be brought up the ramp from the hold.

While we waited, he told me how they had been three months and three days at sea. "'Tis a beautiful place this Virginia," he said. "I've been here but once, but I always wanted to come back for good someday. Now, with war coming, it looks as if that's been denied to me. But I'm determined to get ashore this day for some good vittles."

Then I heard the footfalls of a horse coming up a ramp, a whinny. And out into the sunlight stepped Doormouse, the most beautiful horse I'd ever seen.

I had all I could do to keep my hands off his shining coat. John had warned me not to appear too anxious.

Mr. Humphries took some papers from his pocket. "How much did your master say to pay?"

I told him.

He grunted. "It's thievery. But if the weather's bad, he could break a leg on the journey home and my client will then have naught for his trouble. Can you make your mark?"

I said yes. His assistant held the ink pot for me, and I dipped the quill pen in and made an X on the important-looking paper.

"Ye've got a fine horse there." Mr. Humphries patted Doormouse, then directed his assistant to lead him down the gangway.

"I can do it, sir," I said.

But he shook his head. "I deliver onto Virginia soil in one piece," he said. "And I'll be right behind you. I'm determined to have myself a good meal while I'm here if I have to shoot the wild turkey myself."

***

I
SHALL NEVER
forget the look on John's face as Mr. Humphries' assistant handed over the bridle to him, and I handed over the papers.

He was so busy patting Doormouse and examining his flanks, remarking on his beautiful conformation and proud carriage, he scarce thanked me. Spencer did. He put his arms around me in what he thought was a generous brotherly hug.

It was anything but to me. And it completed the sweetness of the day. And Spencer never told my secret, which made us friends of a truer nature.

D
OORMOUSE WAS THE
only happy thing to come to us that year of '74. John often allowed me and the younger children to ride him. The younger ones he oversaw, of course. I was allowed just to ride him around the paddock at first, but once he saw I could keep my seat, he allowed me out on the familiar paths he rode. As long as I did not race.

John raced. And watching him was like seeing a flight of an eagle, straight and true and filled with purpose.

I took joy in watching him. And every time I looked at Doormouse, I remembered that time I spent with John and Spencer. I saw myself in boys' clothing, and I knew I had done something to discover my true self.

It was a good thing I had done, but it was another lie. Another secret to keep.

But we kept secrets well in that house. We walked around, all of us, with our secrets. And our lies.

***

I
T CAME SOMEHOW
to be February of the next year. Nothing had changed. Mama was still in the cellar, but she was more angry at us all, even, betimes, violent.

She needed laudanum most of the time now. And she looked at you like her eyes were prison gates, and she was held against her will behind them.

Pa was seldom home.

John spent more time than ever in the stables when he wasn't practicing with the militia. Will studied all the time, and Betsy was growing more solemn by the moment.

Sometimes I saw Spencer Roane when he came to visit John and the horses. Always he had time to speak to me, to ask after me, and at Christmastime he came to visit with his father and brought me a book, and sat next to me by the fireside while Pa played the violin. And the looks that passed between us were like a path cleared across a wild forest, though I was not yet twelve.

But he, too, was coming into a man's estate and must satisfy his tutor's demands. He would go to the college in Williamsburg, then read law.

I looked forward to his visits.

Then, one February night, Mama looked queerly at me when I brought down her supper.

"You're dead," she said.

The words struck me like a blow in the face. I set down the dish. "No, Mama, I'm here. Alive."

"
Dead.
" She spat out the word. "Just like your pa."

Pa was the only other member of the family she'd pronounced dead so far. And now me.

I left the food. I fled upstairs. I went into the back parlor where Patsy, Will, and the others were gathered. I said nothing.

***

T
HE HOUSE SEEMED
filled with shadows more than usual that February night. It was not where I wanted to be. Wind beat about the shuttered windows. The fire crackled.

I wanted to be in the barn with the horses, where the, smell of hay sweetly mingled with the smell of leather and horse. Where they were all alive and warm. And waiting.

For the future. Waiting to run into the future and carry us with them.

That is why John loves them, I thought. They are the future. And they take him away from here and make him free.

Patsy was playing the pianoforte, Will attempting to study, Betsy reading, and little Edward playing with wooden blocks on the floor.

I looked at all of them as if I'd never seen them before. All seemed beautiful to me, even Patsy.

Will I soon die? I asked myself. Mama had the sight. Oh God, I didn't want to die. Bad as life was betimes, I wanted to live and wed and have children, I did.

I knew it then, knew I would someday marry.

Knew it would be Spencer Roane.

Pa and MyJohn and John were at Colonel Overton's house for supper. Overton was a friend and neighbor. And he was a colonel because sooner or later all Virginia's landed gentry got to be called colonel.

"I should have gone with Pa and the others tonight," Will said, so softly that Patsy couldn't hear it.

We were in the back parlor because Patsy insisted we all be about our affairs in one room at night. She said it was to save candlelight. I think it was so she could keep us all under her nose.

"You have your studies," she told Will.

"I passed my exams for college."

"You still must study."

"Well, I'm a man. Or near one. And I should be allowed to join the militia with MyJohn and John, too."

"No need for you to be part of these mournful events yet, Will," she said. "Anyway, the ages for militia are sixteen to fifty."

"I'm bigger than some of the sixteen-year-olds. And a better shot."

Patsy sighed. "Take up a lantern, why don't you, and go to the door. I think it's Pa and the boys now."

Will did so. And there was much stamping of feet and stout talk as they came in. Patsy sent Pegg for coffee and biscuits and ham.

"We've scarce eaten," MyJohn said, taking off his scarf and warming his hands before the fire. "The talk was so rich at Colonel Overton's nobody had time for food."

Little Edward scrambled to be taken up in Pa's arms. Betsy stayed put. She used to do that, run to Pa soon as he came in, but now she considered it unladylike.

"What talk?" Patsy commenced to serve coffee. MyJohn sneaked a biscuit off a silver tray. Pa sat with Edward on his lap, and Patsy motioned for Pegg, who came in with a bowl of hot punch, to take off Pa's boots.

But I knelt to do so before Pegg had a chance to put the punch bowl down. Pa put his hand on my head as I did so and ruffled my hair.

"Your father said that if hostilities soon commence, France, Spain, and Holland, the natural enemies of Great Britain, will come to our aid," MyJohn recited. "That Louis the Sixteenth shall be satisfied by our declaration of independence, but not until then will he send his fleet and arms to help us."

Patsy gasped. "Independence! Pa, you said the word? Truly?"

Pa was sipping his coffee, surrounded by his family. "Truly," he said.

"Why, it's a hobgoblin of so frightful an idea that it would throw a delicate person into fits to look it in the face!" Patsy said.

MyJohn put a hand around her shoulder. "Then, don't look it in the face," he said gently. "Look at me, instead. I've something more to tell you."

"What?"

"All the assembled gentlemen gave a toast. To you."

"To me?" Patsy's hand went over her heart in mock dismay.

"Yes, they all agreed that without you to take care of his home and family, Mr. Henry would not have been able to serve Virginia as he has done. They toasted your health. And God's shoe buckles, I was proud."

Patsy ran to Pa, and he embraced her. Then she embraced each of us, in turn.

Tears came to my eyes. Patsy will be remembered as the one who made it possible for Pa to help the colony to declare itself free, I thought. And what will I be remembered for? The girl who brought supper down to her mama in the cellar? Lordy, we'll never be able to live with Patsy now.

***

W
HEN THE OTHERS
went off to bed, Will lingered, wanting to talk to Pa. I wanted to, also, but I waited out in the hall.

I couldn't help listening, could I?

"Pa, can't I join the militia? I'm strong enough and big enough."

Pa said something to soothe him over. The talk was low, but I heard the words "man of the place" and "if we're all gone." Will came out of the room, books in hand, head held high, and walked right by me in the hall. I stepped back into the room.

Pa had a way about him of making each of us feel we were important to him. Even now, when Patsy had been toasted for being the one whose efforts had allowed him to continue with his work.

Was Pa lying? When do you tell the truth and when do you lie? When do you keep a secret? Are all secrets to be kept?

I went into the room. "Pa?"

"Ah, yes, Anne, come here. You looked so cast down before. Don't take on about the toast for Patsy. All of you make it possible for me to do my work."

"It isn't that, Pa."

"What, then?"

"When I brought Mama her supper, she asked for you this day."