“Ha! He will recover, I’ll warrant. He is being sent to the Pacific for a span of two or three years. I joined the missionary company to be nearer him, as well as to help in the effort with the natives.”
“Ah. I was aware that your name was not in the original company. And I will guess that you had to face down the good Reverend Beecher and his opinion that women are not capable of much outside of being led by a man.”
“Oh, my.” Clarity in her time had often been charged with frankness, but she was unprepared to encounter it in one from the previous generation. “Well, yes—actually, I did.”
“I suspected so. How much did he make you pay?”
Clarity stared at her, thunderstruck, then burst into a laugh. “Eight hundred dollars.”
“Oh, my dear, you should have driven a harder bargain. I only had to pay five hundred, and they will get far more use out of you than from me.”
Clearly this was a sage woman who knew more than she spoke. “Yes, but in fairness they were out of time to raise money; that was the sum they needed and they could not sail without it. And you? How did you convince them to let you come?”
“It was not difficult, really. I am a widow, I have no family left alive, I have some reputation for my housekeeping skills, and I am not without some taste for adventure.” She cocked her head almost coquettishly. “I let them believe that I am past the age of temptation. And, well, I read to them those verses in the Bible showing that it was women who financed our Lord’s ministry, that it was women to whom our Lord first announced his resurrection, and also that it was the women of Thyatira to whom Saint Paul turned for shelter and support.”
“Oh, good for you!” They held hands for a moment, chuckling together, cementing an alliance that was sure to prove its worth.
The pilot ordered the sails furled and the anchor dropped off Boston light, where the Thaddeus received a lighter of last-minute supplies, and the passengers who had penned last letters home pressed them into the pilot’s hands as he wished them well and descended to his vessel. They sat, immobile and rocking, awaiting a favorable wind to make the fifty-mile skirt down Cape Cod as Clarity became better acquainted with the other missionaries. As she had imparted to Bliven, of married couples in the Congregationalist Church who heard the call to evangelize, only one husband and wife, Daniel and Jerusha Chamberlain, were of compatible minds to take their five children and raise them far from their homes and friends. The remaining men had volunteered to the journey as single men and been denied unless by a certain deadline before the sailing they were able to find, court, and marry women with a similar spirit for Christian adventure. This set off a scramble of wife hunting, and a few had been man and wife together for scant days.
Their leader, Hiram Bingham of Vermont, was a week short of his thirtieth birthday, and Clarity found him one of the most beautiful men God had ever created, with a square brow, Nordically high cheekbones, a jutting chin, and piercing dark eyes beneath fashionably unkempt dark hair. Bingham had been promised to one young woman, but he broke his engagement when she could not share his call to convert the heathen on the other side of the world, and for all she knew end her days floating in a cauldron with carrots and potatoes. Nor was she the only entanglement that Bingham had thrown over in casting off his home ties: he was the fifth of seven children, and the one on whom his parents had pinned their hope of support in their old age.
Accepting his call to the cloth, he was ordained at Goshen on September 29, which was the first ceremony for a foreign mission to take place in Connecticut. At that ceremony he made the acquaintance of Miss Sybil Moseley of that environ, who made apparent her interest in the Sandwich Island enterprise, and they were married on October 11, only twelve days prior to the start of their journey.
While that marriage might have seemed remarkably hasty to outsiders, within the church it was regarded as a holy union formed in zeal to get on with the Lord’s work. To Clarity this match made sense for a different reason, for Miss Moseley was a lady of near-epic plainness, as homely, in fact, as if human features had been rendered on a large grape. There was no other conceivable circumstance in which a woman of her looks might land a man of his beauty, except to cast her lot to this enterprise in which only a select few women were willing to risk their very lives.
Bingham’s best friend and closest confederate as a missionary was his classmate from Andover Seminary, Asa Thurston, who was but two years older. On his arm was his wife, the former Lucy Goodale; they had been married for eleven days. Bingham and Thurston were the two ordained ministers; the other missionaries, as Clarity came to know them, had been cleverly selected for their various talents: Daniel Chamberlain with his angular, almost pointed face and wisps of thinning hair, was a farmer, a humble occupation for one who traced his line to an ancestor who was court chamberlain to King Stephen of England in the twelfth century. With him were his wife, Jerusha, careworn though not unattractive, and their children, sons of twelve, ten, and five, and daughters of eight and a babe in arms. Clarity could not help but wonder whether, as the only family on board, they were meant as a lesson on the benefits of a large brood when it came to tilling the soil—a point on which so many Putnams had succeeded but she had been so tardy. Jerusha maintained a hawk-like vigilance over her children; from that and from her general bearing of suspicion and apprehension, Clarity wondered what inducements it had taken to persuade her participation.
Thomas Holman was a doctor, and his wife, Lucia Ruggles, was sister to one of the two Samuels who were teachers: Samuel Ruggles and his wife, Nancy, and Samuel Whitney and his wife, Mercy. And then there were Elisha and Maria Loomis; he was a printer. Perhaps his inclusion was premature, for they had not been able to procure a printing press to bring aboard. But as the Lord had provided money, and Clarity with it, perhaps He would provide that as well.
A raised poop deck occupied the after one-third of the length of the Thaddeus, whose central cabin and its ten tiny compartments exactly accommodated the seven couples mostly new-married, one for the Chamberlains’ children, one for the four Hawaiians, and one for Clarity and Muriel Albright. The central cabin contained a long table at which they met for prayers and for meals.
On October 24, Blanchard weighed anchor and rounded Race Point as his passengers lined the starboard rail and pointed to its squat new white lighthouse of which the locals were known to be so proud. The Thaddeus beat eastward and then flew south in a stiff wind as those in the missionary company who had never been to sea discovered the effect that wind and wave had on the stomach and equilibrium. “Do you see, ladies and gentlemen?” Blanchard shouted at them from the wheel abaft the great cabin. “This is how we are meant to sail! Ha! Cleavin’ the water at ten knots. By God, this is sailin’!”
As the others sought the refuge of the great cabin, Clarity joined Blanchard by the wheel, steadying herself on the binnacle. “Captain, I fear this will take some getting used to before we can share your enthusiasm.”
He regarded her fully. “Aye, that’s true for the others, maybe. But not you, you have the look about you. You are neither seasick nor frightened, are you, lass?”
With the courses set she could not see ahead, and the beaches of Cape Cod slid by to starboard. Clarity squinted out to the open sea to port. She took a deep breath of salt air just tinged with spray and said, “No.”
“Well! It is a captain’s wife you are, and no mistake. I’ll be proud to tell your husband so, next I see him, by God.”
“As a captain’s wife, Captain, I do not mind your language, but may I entreat you, for the sake of the others and their delicate sensibilities, perhaps you could imprecate the Almighty a little less often? Maybe you could save it for moments of genuine emergency, to give greater effect to your instructions.”
Blanchard threw his head back and roared in laughter. “Just as you say, ma’am. But look you, now. Come here, take the wheel, see how it feels.”
Clarity did as she was bidden, grasping hard the dowels of its spokes, nudging it ever so slightly to port to judge the strength needed to steer a ship. She saw no need to hide the keenness of her interest and how she was enjoying herself.
Blanchard took the wheel back. “Aye, it’s a captain’s wife you are, indeed.”
* * *
* * *
AFTER BREAKFAST AND prayers in the great cabin, Bingham gave the table over to Thomas Hopu to begin what was intended as daily drilling in the Hawaiian language. Elisha Loomis was prepared, and from his stores provided paper and pencils to everyone to take notes for their later practice.
As he stood, Hopu seemed to adjust with ease to the rise and fall of the deck from the port quarter. “My first thought,” he said, “is for our friend Opukaha’ia, whom you called Henry Obookiah. We all here owing to him, his zeal, his faith. He has gone to sleep in the Lord, but I know he looking down on us now and is pleased and giving praise. First word he would teach you, some of you know already, is aloha. You say it, please, aloud.”
“Aloha,” said the company in unison.
“That pretty good. Second syllable longer. Aloooha. This is word for greeting, and parting, but deeper. Mean, my love to you, mean, share breath together. Now, somebody say aloha to you, you say thank you. ‘Thank you’ is mahalo. Say it, please: mahalo.”
The company’s voice filled the cabin with more confidence. “Mahalo.”
“Yes, good. Now we expand the greeting. Thank you very much. ‘Very much’ is nui loa. Say this, please: nui loa.” After they complied Hopu said, “Mrs. Putnam, you will please greet Mrs. Albright, and she will thank you very much.”
Clarity turned and nodded at Muriel. “Aloha.”
Muriel nodded in return. “Mahalo nui loa.”
“Yes!” crowed Hopu, and he pointed at Kanui and Honoree and Prince Tamoree. “We understand that! You sound just like us!”
When the general mirth died away, Hopu turned serious. “One day you will meet king. Word for ‘king’ is, moi. Say like two words: mo-ee. Word for ‘Majesty’ is Kamahao. You meet king, you bow, or curtsy, say, ‘Ka mea Kamahao, ka moi.’ Mrs. Chamberlain, rise, please.”
Jerusha pushed back her chair and stood.
“Curtsy, please. Say, ‘Ka mea Kamahao—’”
“Ka mea Kamahao,” she repeated.
“Ka moi.”
“Ka moi.”
“Very good! You may sit.”
Mrs. Albright next to her raised her hand. “What is your word for ‘queen’?”
“We have no word for ‘queen.’”
“Huh! That does not seem so very enlightened.”
“No, no, queens very powerful, and much respected. We have no word for ‘queen,’ but we say ‘king-woman.’ Word for ‘woman’ is wahine.”
“Well, that is all right, then. I see.”
“Mrs. Albright, rise please, and curtsy. Say ‘Ka mea Kamahao.’”
“Ka mea Kamahao.”
“Ka moi wahine.”
“Ka moi wahine.”
“Very good! You may be seated.”
Chamberlain raised his hand. “Mr. Hopu, I do not know that this is a prominent word in your language, but I fear that it is becoming a word of some importance among us. What is your word for ‘seasick’?”
Hopu flashed his brilliant white teeth and hooted in laughter, his white eyes and teeth contrasting with the darkness of his face. “Poluea. Everybody say ‘po-lu-way-ah.’”
“Poluea,” they echoed.
“Everybody say ‘Mr. Chamberlain is poluea!’”
“Thomas?” Bingham raised his hand. “Can you tell us something about your king?”
Clarity thought it remarkable, how Hopu’s visage changed as suddenly as a shutter closing over a window, and he pondered darkly for several seconds. “You all remember,” he said at last, “what happened to the parents of our dear Henry Obookiah. They were killed by soldiers of King Ta-meha-meha.”
“They were cut down while pleading for mercy,” said Clarity, but she could tell instantly from Hopu’s expression that he wished she had not spoken.
“Ta-meha-meha is a great king,” he said haltingly. “And, like all great men, perhaps sometimes, for state reasons, he has had to do regrettable things. That is all I should say, maybe.”
“I am not afraid to speak,” said Tamoree, who was instantly the focus of attention. “My father is king of Tauai. Ta-meha-meha tried to conquer my island, but my father’s soldiers defeated him, drove them back into the sea. When Ta-meha-meha failed at this, he had to make peace with my father. Then he told his own people they failed because someone broke the kapu by eating forbidden foods. He found three men and tortured them to death. It is true that Ta-meha-meha is a great warrior. He has conquered all the islands but mine. He is also a liar and a bully and a killer. I can say this because I am his equal in rank. Hopu must not say this, for if he were found out, he could be killed. That is how things are.”
Jerusha Chamberlain sank in her chair. “My God, what have we let ourselves in for?”
No one felt like studying further, and there would be months of lessons, so Bingham dismissed the company to rest, or read, or take exercise on the deck, as they wished. But Clarity did not mistake the looks exchanged by the two preachers, Bingham and Thurston, expressions of shock and worry that after years in the West, and years of studying the grace of Jesus Christ, it took only the mention of a rival native king for Tamoree’s ferocity to resurface, his hauteur, his senses of entitlement and superiority—all of which were anathema to their cultivation in him of the spirits of meekness and service. When he reached home at last, what might they have unleashed? How could they bring the light of the gospel to these islands if they brought a new war with them?
IN HARBOR, RIO DE JANEIRO
DECEMBER 20, 1819
My dearest Husband,
I write you this in the manner of an experiment. For our letters to reach each other, with only one of us running about the world, was enough of a wonder. But, with both of us crossing latitudes and longitudes, who can say how the mail shall work out between us? My intention is to leave this with the American consul here, and advise him that you will follow in several weeks’ time, and if he should hear of the arrival of the United States Ship Rappahannock in the harbor, he must endeavor to place this in your hands. However, if six months shall pass, he should forward it to the American consul in Honoruru, in the Sandwich Islands.
From Boston we have been at sea now just short of two months, at first riding the shore currents so as not to be opposed by the Gulf Stream—waters that you know well, my dearest. Once we entered more tropical waters, while we were sometimes in sight of isles of the West Indies, we felt ourselves more on, and of, the ocean. I realize now what isolation one feels when there is nothing but water from horizon to horizon, and how you must bond with your crew to avoid feeling that you are alone in all creation. Occasionally we speak a passing vessel, and inquire where she is bound, but more often we see them pass at a distance and are left to wonder what is their business. Our little band of missionaries, while all of differing temperaments, have become allies and even friends in this endeavor. This is indeed fortunate, so as to make bearable our accommodations. Our cabins on the Thaddeus are so tiny that I fear when I come to die, I will not know what to do with all the space in my coffin.
And now, dearest, it is a queer feeling to tell the great news that I must do, for although the issue is undecided at this moment, it will in all probability be decided by the time you read this. For several weeks out of Boston, many of the company suffered from the sea sickness. I, indeed, suffered very little, until we entered the tropical latitudes. At that time my symptoms became very acute indeed, to the point that I was ill even when the others were not. When this became apparent my companion Mrs. Albright, in the privacy of
our cabin, ventured to ask me questions of an intimate and womanly nature. When I made answer, she sent straight for Doctor Holman, who examined me as closely as propriety would allow, and at the end announced his belief that I am with child.
Oh, my dearest! You can imagine the wide pot-pourri of emotions attendant upon such a discovery. To be enceinte, not just far from home but upon the limitless blue ocean, is a hazard to one’s health not in perfect times to be wished for. But, Holman is as good a doctor as one could find at home, good enough that the church sent him to represent our system of medicine to the heathen savages, therefore let us be content to trust in him, and in God.
Rev. Bingham, of course, is most seriously unpleased, and shocked that such an indelicate circumstance could arise. Indeed, he quite despaired, and asked me how such a thing could happen, and I told him I presumed it was a result of the sheer passion of our leave-taking. I thought the poor man would faint and fall overboard. No doubt, he and Mr. Thurston, who is the other ordained minister, serve a high purpose, but I swear such young men acting like such little old ladies you never saw.
In sum, above, beneath, and surrounding it all is my joy—absolute, and unbridled. Dearest, we have succeeded. By the calendar, I should be safe ashore in Hawaii with two months to spare, and now that the news has spread to the entire company, Hopu assures me that there are doctors in Hawaii, and even if they are not resident, I shall have my choice of surgeons among the visiting ships, for now their harbors are almost never empty.
I must close now, for the lighter will soon depart and I must consign this to the consul. Moreover, Reverend B. has called a meeting of the company to discuss a matter of the utmost gravity—whether to celebrate Christmas! I know you remember my parents’ opinion of the matter, which is still held by Rev. Beecher, so I must listen with the greatest attention what arguments have perhaps been advanced that might persuade our New England understanding of it to relent, and join the rest of Christendom. With my wishes for your safety, and many blessings, my dearest—
The Devil in Paradise--Captain Putnam in Hawaii Page 11
