The Sot-Weed Factor

by John Barth

  “The question,” he asserted near the end of his relation, “was who came ’twixt Sir Henry and Henry the Third, and how my friend came to be lightskinned as any Englishman, when neither Sir Henry’s Privie Journall nor Captain John Smith’s Secret Historie referred to any Lady Burlingame. E’en that last installment of the Historie, that your people call The Book of English Devils, did not resolve these questions, inasmuch as any offspring of Sir Henry and Pokatawertussan must needs be a blend of English and Ahatchwhoop—as is the Tayac Chicamec, in fact.”

  “ ’Tis as much a mystery now as erst, for all I grasp it,” Billy confessed. “Yet I have no doubts this fellow is in sooth my brother. Miraculous!”

  “Aye, and no less so is the chance that gave me the key.” He told of his visit with Burlingame to the Jesuit Thomas Smith, who had entertained them with the tale of Father FitzMaurice. “When I spied Father Joseph’s chests in the house of the Tayac Chicamec and learned the King had wed that martyr’s offspring, I had the answer: ’tis by decree of the Law of Averages their union should have issue not alone like thyself, who have the same commingled blood as both thy parents, but also pure-blooded Indian and pure-blooded English, in equal number. In short, Mattassin and Henry Burlingame.”

  “What a gift you have presented me!” Billy exclaimed quietly. “A brother, to replace poor Mattassin! I am forever in your debt, sir! But what is his trade at present, that hath plied so many in the past, and where might I find him? For I mean to seek him out at once, whether in Cambridge Maryland or Cambridge England.”

  With his imminent plea for Billy’s assistance in mind, Ebenezer replied that Burlingame was still very much engaged in provincial politics as an agent for Lord Baltimore, in whose service he had jeopardized his life time and again for the cause of justice. It was difficult to praise as anti-revolutionary a man who had lately changed allegiance to John Coode (and who for all Ebenezer knew might be the arch-rebel and insurrectionist himself), but the poet reasoned that Billy Rumbly would be more likely to assent to a plan of which he believed his long-lost brother would approve.

  “As to where he is now, I am not certain, for his home is where’er the cause of civilization leads him. But my desire to find him is no less urgent than your own, for I know well he’d gamble his life to prevent a massacre.” Here, though he had promised to save the story, he could not resist telling of the perilous circumstances under which he had learned about the coming attack, and of Chicamec’s ransom terms for Bertrand and the aged sea-captain. “He wants a son with the power of Quassapelagh and Drepacca to lead the Ahatchwhoops in the insurrection. My prayer is that you or Henry, if not the twain of you, will deceive him in the name of peace and good will; take your place as King of the Ahatchwhoops and use your influence for the good of red man, black man, and white man alike. ’Twere not beyond question, methinks, if only you—”

  “Ah, sir, your pledge, your pledge!” Billy held up his hand. “Let us proceed to the subject of my wife. Before you speak your business, may I assume thou’rt acquainted with the story of our—courtship?”

  “Aye, from Harvey Russecks and from Mary Mungummory, who had it from Sir Harry’s wife.”

  “Both excellent sources. Then you doubtless know I share your alarm at Miss Bromly’s self-imposed degradation. I am not yet either a Christian or a legal denizen of the Province, sir, and thus cannot properly marry her as I wish to. But she would have none of’t e’en were’t possible; she wishes no more than the simple Ahatchwhoop rite I performed—the which neither I nor the laws of Maryland honor where one of the parties is English.”

  “Then in reality she is not your wife at all, save in the spirit of Common Law?”

  Billy acknowledged that this was unhappily the case. “I freely own, what you know already, that I was prepared to ravish and abduct her after the old Ahatchwhoop manner. I hid in the woods near Sir Harry’s mill and brought her to the window by means of certain noises, whereupon I revealed myself to her sight. The object of this is to terrify the victim, but so far from swooning away, Miss Bromly came out to me alone, and when I offered to attack her—ah well, ’tis enough to swear no attack was necessary: she came with me of her own choosing, and of her own choosing remains. Moreover, for all my pressing her to live like a proper gentlewoman, she hath transformed herself into a salvage—nay, worse: into a brute, that neither speaks nor grooms itself! You have heard tales that I torture her over the fire? I swear to you that I would not willingly harm a hair of her head, but she hath learned somewhere that Indian husbands are wont to truss a shrewish wife near a green-wood fire, to cure their ill temper, and she obliges me to rope and smoke her in like manner above the hearth.”

  Ebenezer clucked his tongue. “Alas, poor woman!”

  Billy regarded him carefully and gave the reins a little snap. “ ’Tis with reason I tell you these things, my friend. I would imagine there hath been some adverse sentiment regarding Miss Bromly and myself; for aught I know, despite your cordial air you may be her brother or her betrothed, come to take revenge for her abduction—she tells me naught of her former life or past connections.” He did not mean to suggest, he went on to say, that he was devoid of responsibility in the affair: whatever Miss Bromly’s past, it was he who had in ignorance assaulted her in Russecks’s tavern and set out deliberately to ravish her afterwards; it was not impossible that her current state was a deranged one caused by the shock of his attacks. However, he dearly loved her and wished her well, and was willing to do anything to improve her condition or otherwise discharge his responsibility.

  So disarmed was Ebenezer by the man’s frank and friendly attitude that, though the thought of Joan’s degradation stung him to tears, he could not muster anger against her abductor. “More virtuous men than I may call you to account,” he said instead. “Only tell me this: doth the girl wear any sort of ring?”

  “A ring? Aye, she hath one, that she kisses and curses by turns but will not speak of. ’Tis a silver seal of sorts: me-thinks ’twas designed to fend off evil spirits, for it hath the word ban or bane around the seal: B-A-N-N-E.”

  For a moment Ebenezer was puzzled: then he recognized the anagram. “Ah God, ’tis as I feared! I am more than the girl’s betrothed, Mr. Rumbly; I am her husband and I came hither, among other reasons, to save her from your clutches! Howbeit, I am persuaded thou’rt even less to blame than you imagine: ’tis I, above all others, who am responsible for Joan Toast’s sorry state—that is her true name, not Meg Bromly, and if you truly love and pity her, ’tis you should punish me, not vice versa.” His former sense of well-being entirely flown, he apprised Billy of the history of his relationship with Joan Toast and his crowning injustice to her, which he attributed her flight from Malden and her current distracted state.

  The Indian attended with great interest and sympathy. “You must forgive me if this question is improper, sir,” he said, when the poet was finished. “I believe I understood you to say that albeit you married the woman thou’rt yet a virgin, did I not? Remarkable! And yet methinks you implied that Miss Toast, or Mrs. Cooke—how doth a gentleman say it?—that you are perhaps not the only man who hath enjoyed her companionship, and that some others, let us say, were not so tender of her honor as were you… Is that correct, or have I misconstrued your words?”

  Ebenezer smiled. “No need to step lightly, sir. In London she was a whore.”

  “I see,” Billy murmured, but his frown suggested that he was not altogether satisfied on the matter. “And of course thou’rt quite certain of these things?”

  The poet could not suppress a grim amusement. “Belike thou’rt new to the ways of cultivated ladies, sir: a clever tart may whore herself to the very gate of Hell and then sell Lucifer first go at her maidenhead.”

  “Indeed. And yet the ring seems certain proof…” He allowed the sentence to trail off in vague perplexity. “Hi, here’s an end to speculation: yonder stands my cabin.”

  The path had brought them out of the woods into a sizeab
le cleared field bounded on the north by a narrow bay. On the near end of the water-front stood a cabin, dimly lit, and several outbuildings. As they stabled the team and approached the house, Ebenezer grew increasingly nervous at the prospect of confronting Joan Toast; the most honorable course, he decided, was simply to present himself, humbly and without excuse, and leave the first reaction to her.

  At the doorstep Billy Rumbly stopped and laid a hand on the poet’s shoulder. “Let us quite understand each other, my friend: is it your intention to take my—that is, your wife, I suppose—is it your intention to take her from me for her own good?”

  “That is my intention,” Ebenezer admitted.

  “By force, if need be?”

  “I am neither armed nor inclined to violence, sir; my only weapon is persuasion, and ’tis not likely she’ll even listen to me. Nor are you obliged to invite me in, under the circumstances; I’ll not bring suit.”

  Billy chuckled. “Thou’rt a noble fellow! Very well, then, since we both love the woman and both feel answerable for her condition, let us both put her improvement above all personal considerations: we will put our separate cases and leave the choice to her. Belike she’ll wash her hands of the twain of us!”

  Ebenezer agreed, charmed anew by the civilization his host had acquired in so short time, and they entered the cabin. A single candle flickered near the door, and on the hearth the fire had burned to its last few coals; the room was obscure and chill.

  “Yehawkangrenepo!” Billy called, and explained in an undertone, “She obliges me to call her by that name. Yehawkangrenepo!”

  Now came a grunting and stirring from a straight-backed wooden bench before the fire; a woman sat up, her back to the door, and commenced rubbing her eyes and scratching in her wild dark hair. Her shift was ragged, filthy stuff, and she grunted and scratched about her person like a jackanapes picking fleas. Ebenezer felt faint at the wretched spectacle. The creature scratched her head again, rising from the bench as she did so, and the candle glinted briefly from her silver ring. The flash was barely perceptible, but it blinded the poet altogether to his resolve. He ran to throw himself at her feet.

  “Joan Toast! Ah Christ, how I have wronged thee!”

  At the sound of his voice the girl gasped; at sight of him lunging toward her she screamed and caught at the benchback for support. And then it was Ebenezer’s turn to moan and stumble, for despite her changed appearance, the flickering candlelight, and the tears that made his vision swim, he saw when she turned that Billy Rumbly’s mistress was neither Joan Toast nor Miss Meg Bromly, but his sister Anna.

  16

  A Sweeping Generalization Is Proposed Regarding the Conservation of Cultural Energy, and Demonstrated With the Aid of Rhetoric and Inadvertence

  WHETHER FROM DESUETUDE or access of surprise, after her initial scream Anna’s voice quite failed her. Brother and sister embraced in vast, unselfconscious relief at having found each other again, but even as Ebenezer comforted himself with her name and explained to bewildered Billy Rumbly, between sniffs and sobs, that she was his twin sister and not his wife, he felt her stiffen in his arms. At once his memory surrendered to the dreadful things he had learned from Burlingame, as well as the story, now newly appalling, of the Ahatchwhoop prince’s courtship. The embrace became awkward; he made no effort to detain her when she pushed free of him and collapsed in tears on the bench.

  “She is in sooth your sister?” Billy asked.

  The poet nodded. “You must try to understand,” he said, speaking with difficulty. “This is a painful moment for both of us… I can’t explain just yet…”

  “There will be time,” Billy said. “For the present, my company is burdensome to all; I shall bid you adieu and return in time for breakfast.”

  “Nay!” Anna suddenly found her voice. The tears had marked courses through the dirt on her face. “This man is my husband,” she declared to Ebenezer.

  “Quite so,” the poet murmured. “ ’Tis I must go.”

  “I shan’t allow it,” Billy said firmly. “Whate’er the breach betwixt you, ’tis a family matter and must be put right. In any case I’ve meant for some time to sleep in the barn: I have cause to believe a thief hath been pilfering from it lately.” The pretext was unconvincing, but it went unchallenged. Billy laid his hand affectionately on Anna’s head. “Prithee mend the family fences with forgiveness and good will; ’tis a great pity for brother and sister not to love each other. Nay, raise up your eyes! And you, sir: I am in your debt already for arousing this woman to speech, and more than thankful for the chance that hath enabled me to repay your gift of a brother with like coin. I beg you only to remember our agreement: in the morning you must tell me the news from Bloodsworth Island, and we shall see what is to be done on every head.”

  Anna hung her head and said nothing; Ebenezer too, though embarrassed by his own unwillingness to protest, was so eager for private conversation with his sister that he permitted Billy to make up the fire in the cabin and then leave for the cheerless barn. He scarcely dared look at Anna; the thought of her condition made him weep. For a while they sat on opposite ends of the bench and stared into the fire, occasionally sniffing or wiping their eyes.

  “You have been to Malden?” he ventured at last. From the corner of his eye he saw her shake her head negatively.

  “I met a Mr. Spurdance at the wharf in Cambridge…”

  “Then you know my disgrace. And you must have encountered… my wife there too, since you have your ring again.” His throat ached; the tears ran afresh, and he turned to Anna with great emotion. “I was obliged to marry her or perish of my seasoning, as our mother did; but ’twas not her doing, Anna; you mustn’t think ill of her. ’Tis true she is a whore, but she followed me to Maryland out of love—”

  Again he faltered, remembering Burlingame’s assertion that Anna’s motive was the same. “ ’Tis on my account she hath the pox and is a slave to opium; she suffered unimaginable indignities to be with me, and nursed me back to health when I was ill, nor made any claim on me whatsoe’er—not e’en upon my chastity, I swear’t! Her one wish, when all was lost, was that we fly together to London and live as brother and sister till her afflictions carried her off. And I, Anna—I betrayed that saintly woman most despicably! I stole away alone; abandoned her to die uncared for! ’Tis I you must despise, not poor Joan Toast!”

  “Despise?” Anna seemed surprised. “How can I despise either of you, Eben? ’Twas through deception you lost Malden, and honor as well as necessity required your marriage. I wish you had not abandoned her—’tis a hellish thing to be alone!” She found it necessary to pause for some moments after this observation. Then, speaking carefully and avoiding his eyes, she asked how it happened that he was not in London. Had he known she was in Maryland? Did he understand that she had loved Henry Burlingame for a dozen years and had come to Maryland hoping to marry him? Did he appreciate that it was Bertrand’s terrible news, and Mr. Spurdance’s, and Joan Toast’s, and her despair at ever finding either Henry or her brother, and the shock of being assaulted by a savage who miraculously resembled Burlingame, that had brought her to her present state? She dissolved in tears of shame. Ebenezer took her hand, but made no attempt to answer the questions.

  “My story will take hours to repeat,” he said gently, “and I’ve been telling divers parts to divers people these two days till I am weary of’t. I’faith, Anna, there is so much to say! You wept once when we were first separated for an evening, and declared we’d ne’er catch up to each other again—I little dreamt the full import of that remark! Now ’tis no matter of hours or rooms that parts us; ’tis as if we were on twin mountaintops, with what an abyss between! We shall span it ere we leave this cabin, though it take a week of explanation—how fine a gentleman Billy is to give us some hours to make beginnings!—but methinks ’twere better to hear first what passed ’twixt you and Joan, and what the state of things at Malden is, now Father’s there, for the smallest detail of my story may wa
nt an hour’s gloss.” By way of example he declared that the resemblance of Billy Rumbly and Henry Burlingame was no more miraculous than that of any other pair of brothers. Anna was almost dumb struck; she pleaded for more information, but Ebenezer was adamant.

  “Please,” he said, “have you not seen Henry at all? I must know these things ere I commence.”

  “Not at all,” Anna sighed, “nor hath anyone in Cambridge or St. Mary’s City: the name is foreign to them.” And resigning herself to the postponement of her questions, she told of her great loneliness in St. Giles, her growing fear that Burlingame would never succeed in discovering his parentage (which discovery, she declared, he had made prerequisite to their marriage), and her final determination to leave their father to his querulousness, join Ebenezer at Malden, and either persuade Burlingame to abandon his research or else assist him in whatever way she could.

  At this point Ebenezer interrupted; turning her face to his he said, “Dearest Anna, don’t feel shame in your brother’s presence! This bridge of ours must have piers of love and candor; else ’twill fall.” What was on his mind was the love which she was alleged to feel for him, and about which he thought it imperative to reach an understanding from the first; however, he suddenly recalled Burlingame’s assertion that Anna herself was at most only dimly aware of her strange obsession and possibly altogether oblivious to it. Her look of bewilderment seemed to confirm this assertion. “What I mean,” he added lamely, “matters once reached a pass where Henry judged it necessary to take me altogether into his confidence… and in sooth, I have learned some things about him that you—” He could not go on; Anna blushed as deeply as he and veiled her eyes with her hand.