Journeyman

by Mark J Rose

  12

  Nature’s Bounty

  Morning felt like it came instantly as Matt was roused by David’s pounding on the barn door. “Mr. Miller, wake up.” He opened the door and repeated, “Mr. Miller, wake up.”

  “I’m awake,” Matt said in a muffled voice. “I’m awake.” The grey morning light was streaming into the open windows. Matt sat up and waited for his head to stop throbbing.

  “Breakfast is almost ready,” David called. He was now somewhere far away. Matt looked over at the dog, hoping for a companion to share his plight, but the animal was snoring again after having opened one eye. Matt pulled on a pair of pants and a tee shirt, laced up his shoes, and headed to the privy. The seat was cold, and it was dark inside, and the Taylors were waiting for him, so he hurried. People always said everything moves fast in modern times, but so far in 1762, there was barely time to sleep.

  Matt was beginning to see the full picture of the immediacy of the lives of colonial farmers. This was harvest time, and there were approximately two weeks to get the hay under cover. If they didn’t work hard in these two weeks, the hay would be of lower quality or ruined entirely. If that occurred, the farm would be short on feed and would need to buy it from other farmers. There was no one to fall back on if they ran out of money or failed; the family alone would suffer the consequences. Based on this, there was no compromise and it was all-out work from dawn to dusk.

  After he finished in the privy, Matt went to the well for a drink and to fill the washbasin. The water was cold and refreshing and he was getting used to its iron taste. There was a table there, so rather than move the basin back into the barn as he had before, he got his shaving kit and washed and shaved beside the well. The cold water helped shake him out of his morning stupor. Matt wet his toothbrush and squeezed mint-lime toothpaste onto it. He looked down at his brand-new toothpaste and dental floss and realized that if he was stuck in 1762, he might be looking at his lifetime supply of dental products. If he remembered correctly, most people in colonial times did little more than wipe their teeth with a wet rag.

  “Mr. Miller, what are you doing to your mouth?”

  The youngest boy, Jonathan, had snuck up behind him. Matt looked down. “I’m brushing my teeth,” he said around a mouthful of suds.

  The boy was staring at him strangely. “Uncle said to make sure you were awake. Breakfast will start soon.”

  Matt spit the suds out onto the ground.

  “Is that soap?” the boy asked.

  “It’s toothpaste,” Matt replied. He was brushing his front teeth now.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “It feels good. It’s refreshing to brush your teeth.”

  “It looks like soap. I hate when I get soap in my mouth.”

  “This kind doesn’t taste bad. It makes your breath fresh.” He gave Jonathan an exaggerated wink. “And the ladies love a man with fresh breath.”

  “Can I taste?”

  “Shouldn’t we be going to breakfast?”

  “It’s not out yet,” the boy said. “Let me taste.”

  “Fine,” Matt said. “Give me your finger.” Matt was rinsing his toothbrush out in the basin. He grabbed the toothpaste and the boy’s hand and squeezed some out onto his fingertip. Jonathan hesitated for a moment, then sucked the toothpaste off his finger with a smack.

  “It tastes good.”

  “You’re not supposed to swallow it,” Matt said.

  “Can I try the brush?”

  “Where I come from, you’re not supposed to share your toothbrush,” Matt said, trying his best to be discouraging.

  “Why?”

  “Lots of reasons that I don’t want to go into right now.”

  “What reasons?”

  Matt’s head hurt too much to give a long explanation. “I’m hungry,” he proclaimed. “You can try the brush some other time.”

  “Capital,” Jonathan said. “I smell breakfast.” He was gone as fast as he had appeared.

  By the time Matt arrived in the common, most of the men were already in line for scrambled eggs, bacon, and potatoes. Some held out tin cups for black coffee from a metal pot. Matt grabbed a plate and sat at one of the benches with a few of the other men. He ate there, mostly staying silent to listen to their conversation and enjoy the food. He stopped for a moment after his first couple of bites, thinking that it was the most delicious bacon-and-egg breakfast he had tasted in a long time. Even the coffee, bitter and full of loose grounds, had an appeal that was surprisingly new, plus the caffeine helped to dull the throbbing in his head.

  Once everyone had eaten—or eaten seconds, depending on their appetites—David walked around and gave out assignments. Matt would be on a scythe crew with Will, a large man named Charles Finley, and two others. David warned Will to make sure Matt knew what he was doing before getting too far into the field. From what Matt could discern, they would be mowing in parallel and clearing the field in a circular fashion. They would cut the hay first thing in the morning to take advantage of the dew, and the hay would get harder to cut as it dried in the sun.

  The men climbed into the wagon and headed to the field with Will driving. After some time they turned off the main road and headed to a gap in the trees that opened onto a massive clearing. “We got the big one,” Will declared. “My father and Nathan cleared this when I was a baby. It was only the two of them and a few horses.”

  The men dropped to the ground and began pulling scythes from the back of the wagon, testing them until they each found one that was appropriate. Once they’d placed their selections on the ground away from the wagon, each went for a leather holster and a sharpening stone. The belt of the holster was buckled around the waist and then the holster was filled with water to keep the stone wet. After watching how it was done, Matt strapped on a holster and filled it with water. He picked out a stone from the box and dropped it in the holster. The water splashed up out of the sheath and soaked his leg; he had filled it too high.

  Matt walked to the wagon with his wet leg, picked out one of the scythes and hefted it in his hands in the way he’d seen the others do. He placed it on the ground away from the wagon. Charles, who had been watching him, walked over, picked out a scythe and brought it to Matt. “Try this,” he said. “The one you chose is too short.” Matt had expected his voice to be gruff, based on his large size, but Charles’ words were measured and calm.

  “Never used a scythe,” Matt replied.

  “I want that prize today,” Charles said. He spent some time showing Matt how to use the scythe.

  **********

  It took about an hour to do the outer circle of the field, after which they took a break to drink water and refill their holsters. Ten minutes later, they returned to mowing, with everyone shifted five lanes to the center. Matt’s lack of skill became evident as the sun dried the field and it became necessary to slice the grass rather than the hacking that was possible when it was wet. When they shifted over for the third and final swath, they found that it was only four men wide, and since Matt was the slowest, Will instructed him to grab a small scythe and clean up the edges of the field.

  By the time Thomas rolled up in the lunch wagon, they had finished mowing the entire field and stood at the wagon, resting and drinking water from tin cups. “All done?” he asked. His son nodded and Thomas exclaimed, “A grand field to cut in one morning!” He stepped aside and quietly talked to his son, trying to plan the remainder of the day. While this was going on, Charles and the two other men, who Matt now knew to be Elias and Zachariah, were getting their plates from Mary. Thomas had moved stools from the back of the wagon out onto the ground. Matt sat as he ate his cooked pork, squash, and sugared pears.

  “Baked yet?” Charles asked.

  “I’m a little sore,” Matt replied. “I kept hitting the ground.”

  “I was very sore the first time I used the blade,” Charles explained. “It grows easier.”

  “I’m learning,” Matt said.

  “
God willing,” Charles replied seriously. “There’s another prize tomorrow.”

  Mary collected the plates, and then returned with a tin of water that she handed to Will to place in the back of the wagon they would take to the next field. When he finished eating, Will came over to their team. “The weather should hold,” he proclaimed. “We can wait until tomorrow morning before we mow again, so we’ll spend the rest of the afternoon in the tobacco field.”

  The men piled into the wagon and Will drove them to the tobacco field. Based on Will’s description, Matt had expected a small experimental field, but it was nothing of the sort, with plants that covered a large area. The dark green tobacco leaves came to right below Matt’s chest. The bottom leaves on most of the plants had started to yellow and a number of the smaller plants had seed stalks growing from their tops. Matt learned that the seed stalks on the older plants had been snapped off in a process called topping, to concentrate the oils of the plant in the lower leaves.

  The men jumped to the ground and grabbed their hatchets. By late afternoon, they had filled six wagons with tobacco stalks and were on their way to join the other groups at the farm for dinner. They jeered as they rode past one worker, who shouted, “Lazy buggers.” Many had been in the hayfields all day and were covered with grey-green chaff. As they jumped from the wagons, they took time to shake the dust from their hair and sweep the chaff from their bodies with brooms. Sweat glued the chaff to their arms, so some headed to the well to fill buckets and wash.

  By the time everyone returned from their break, Faith and David were serving dinner in the common, and the men were already talking about heading back into the fields. It seemed to Matt that his first day of farm work might never end.

  13

  Ibuprofen

  Matt was relieved to find that the evening was calmer and lacked the urgency of the daytime harvest. They took their time walking through the field with big forks, turning the hay so the unexposed side would dry in the morning sun. The men talked as they worked, about Richmond, their homes, their families, and of course, women. Elias and Zachariah seemed to be friends, and talked often of the girls they knew in town. Zachariah’s brother was to be married to one of the Richmond farm girls and there was controversy over her small dowry because he was only a blacksmith’s apprentice. Many townspeople were sure the couple would have a financial struggle from the very start.

  Matt had been lost in his thoughts about Richmond, when unexpectedly, Elias said, “Mr. Miller, where did you say you were from?”

  “Philadelphia,” Matt replied. Two things about answering questions about his life started to bother Matt. One was that he had been telling so many half-truths that it was hard to keep track, and the other was that he had been so convincing and compelling in narrating his made-up life that he was starting to believe it himself.

  “That’s a great city,” Zachariah said. “I heard the ladies are friendlier than in Virginia.”

  “I’m no expert on Philadelphia ladies,” Matt said, “or any, for that matter.” He smiled, thinking that it was his most truthful statement in days.

  “Can anyone predict ladies?” Charles said in a booming voice from three rows over.

  “I think Philadelphia ladies are more conservative than most,” Matt explained. “We always think that the ladies in New York are friendlier.”

  “They’re always more friendly somewhere else,” Will said, chuckling.

  “The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence,” Matt replied.

  “What does grass have to do with Philadelphia ladies?” Elias asked.

  “It’s Philadelphia expression,” Matt said. “It means that you always look at another man’s life and assume it’s better than yours.” In the silence that followed, Matt couldn’t resist blurting out, “Ladies! You can’t live with ’em, and you can’t live without ’em.” He felt shameless, but he might as well have been Plato or Aristotle based on their reaction.

  “There is no statement truer than that!” Will declared.

  They finished the field quickly and were soon on their way home in the wagon. Thomas greeted the men as they arrived. Like the night before, as soon as he saw Will and Matt, he asked them to bring the horses in. They went immediately to the pasture.

  “Scout!” Will called. The dog came running around the corner, trotting to Will and Matt as they walked. He stared at Matt and gave a low growl.

  The dog took his place beside Will and made sure to glance suspiciously at Matt as they walked, which Matt tried his best to ignore. Once they reached the pasture, they were able to get the horses into the corral quickly and were soon on their way back to the common. They took a shortcut through the barn and saw that Grace was drying a horse. Will stepped to the fence and said, “How does Joshua?”

  “Worse,” she replied.

  “Father believes he’ll heal.”

  “Father might be wrong.”

  “Try to finish. We have evening prayer.”

  “I may not be there.”

  “You know how Father gets when you’re not there for prayer,” Will cautioned.

  “If Father is so vexed, maybe he should care for this horse.”

  “Come to prayers.”

  “If you give me some peace, I can finish,” Grace replied.

  Will waved to Matt and led him out of the barn. “Joshua looks bad,” he said. “Father is ready to put him down. He fears he’ll spread the infection to the other horses.”

  “How long before he decides?” Matt asked.

  “Don’t know…days, weeks. It depends on his trepidation.”

  Most of the men were sitting at the wooden tables when they reached the common. Thomas and David walked about, thanking and congratulating them on their first day. Thomas uncovered the ale that had been on the center table and said, “Drink up, men. You’ve worked hard today.” He left soon after with his family in tow.

  Matt and Charles sat alone at the table closest to the house as the Taylor family passed. As soon as they were out of earshot, Charles said, “She’s as beautiful as her sister.” He looked around, making sure no one was nearby.

  Matt could see Will far away, talking with David and pointing in the direction of one of the fields. He wasn’t sure he wanted to enter a conversation about Grace with a man he didn’t know that well, but he was intrigued to learn something about Kathryn. “Did you know Kathryn?”

  “Sure,” Charles replied. “Half the men in Richmond wanted to marry her.”

  “She was engaged to Paul Payne,” Matt said.

  “Paul’s a capital fellow,” Charles said. “His brother Levi, well…”

  “I met Levi,” Matt replied. “He didn’t seem to be a friend of the Taylors.”

  “He’s not a friend of much besides showing his father’s money,” Charles said. “That and fighting.”

  “How did Kathryn die?”

  “She took a hard fall off a horse, and she was bleeding inside. ’Twas at the Payne farm.”

  “She fell off a horse at the Payne farm?”

  “That’s what they say,” Charles replied. “Ladies don’t belong on horseback.”

  “Do you ever see ladies riding on horses in Richmond?”

  “Never in town. Hither, though,” Charles said. “The Taylor ladies were often seen sitting astride horses, and some pretend to have seen them in men’s breeches.”

  “Men’s breeches?” Matt tried to sound as scandalized as he could, though he was hiding a smile.

  “The Taylor ladies took much license in the way they carried on.”

  “It sounds like,” Matt affirmed.

  “Mr. Taylor has put an end to that nonsense,” Charles said. “Grace isn’t allowed to ride. I don’t know how she’d have the time with all the men in Richmond wanting her attention.”

  “She has a lot of men wanting to marry her?”

  “They’d never allow her to be married to a simple farmhand,” Charles replied. “Some pretend Levi fancied Grace. He’d b
e wealthy enough.”

  Their conversation was interrupted as Will approached with three tin cups of ale balanced in his hands. “Ale for my fellows,” he declared. They sat together, drinking and talking about the day. Matt tried his best to remain upbeat and energetic, but as the conversation wore on, he became mostly interested in going to bed. They made a mutual decision to call it a night after only two cups of ale. Charles said good night and headed to his shack and Matt walked back towards the house with Will.

  “I’m sore already,” Will said, rubbing his shoulder. “I’ll have trouble getting out of bed.”

  “Come to the barn,” Matt replied. “I have medicine that will make you feel better.”

  “Are you selling me a magic tonic?”

  “Not even close,” Matt said. “This is a very expensive and rare medicine.” They walked to the barn with a lantern. Matt opened the door and went inside for his pack. He pulled out his shaving kit to find the bottle of Advil. The world’s supply of ibuprofen.

  Matt pulled out two for Will and two for himself and grabbed his cup from its hook on the wall. “Let’s get water,” he said. At the well, Matt held the tablets up for Will to see. “You’re supposed to put these in your mouth one at a time, drink water, and swallow,” he said.

  “Without chewing?”

  “Without chewing. The medicine tastes bitter if you chew.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “Watch me,” Matt said. He swallowed the two tablets and then said, “Your turn.”

  Will popped a tablet in his mouth and took a gulp of water, tilted his head back, and swallowed as Matt had demonstrated. He coughed and the pill popped out of his mouth covered with spit and landed on the table.