News of these events was soon arousing patriots not only in New England but in all the colonies, and the courage of the people of Massachusetts gave heart to all who feared that their liberties were at mortal risk from the military occupation of their country.
Men in their hundreds were making for Boston now, where on the high ground around the town fortifications were going up and an army was coming into being, despite the fact that it had no uniforms, no cannon, and no leader. The British were under siege, and with no provisions arriving by road they had to live on salt cod. This gave them pleasure in New Morrock, where they knew all about the joys of salt cod. And when news of the British defeat reached London, friends of the American cause rejoiced at it, but the king proclaimed a British victory. This caused still greater amusement, this fresh display of royal folly.
And what of Martha? I am, and I say this without apology, although I can quite well imagine my uncle’s toothless cynic’s grin, I am a man of strong romantic sensibility, and I find it all too easy to be swept along on the torrent of fervour with which the Americans set about their revolution. It would be simple then to forget, that in the stuff and matter of the lives of the individuals caught up in the swift dangerous currents of this history, all was not quite so straightforward as it appears through the gauzy veil of hindsight.
And how true this is of Martha. When I think of her position on the eve of Lexington Green, before that first shot was fired, and the world was changed forever—I glimpse a young woman at last stitched into the fabric of family and community and never again, so it would seem, to play the fugitive, the stranger, the sinner. And being one of them now, as she thought, she did what she could for the Revolution, which was not as much as she would have liked to do, for she was huge and ungainly, and easily tired, so vigorous were the demands of her unborn child.
For she saw that the women must rise to the occasion now. The men would go to war, some had gone already, but the life of the town must not suffer by their absence. And so for the women these were days of endless toil, not only at those activities which sustained their families in time of peace, no, they must also be taught to defend themselves. They were to be taught how to use firearms. Martha insisted on taking part in these drills, despite being so far gone in her pregnancy, determined as she was to learn how to fire a musket properly.
Then with the news from Lexington and Concord her feelings were at once swinging wildly about like a boat unmoored in the wind, her heart the tiller! For an hour she was calm, resolute, secure in the belief that the justice of the cause would secure an American victory. An hour later she was terrified, she saw only death and fire and smoke, and out of that smoke came first the faint tramp of marching feet—then a faintly beating drum, a single distant fife—then through the swirling mists the first glimpse of soldiers in faded red coats with muskets on their shoulders, and on the face of every man of them a brutish grin of hatred and lust such as she had seen on the face of Clyte, most hideous Englishman of them all! A thousand Clytes advancing on the women of New Morrock, coming down out of the woods in smoke and mist as the women ran out of their houses and lifted their flintlocks, but oh, to little avail against King George’s soldiers, who overran the globe like wild dogs!
Then she would remember that the redcoats were far from indestructible, had they not fallen in their hundreds on the road back to Boston, did they not bleed and die like Americans, when a hail of musket fire ploughed their flesh? Our men are a match for them, she thought, they did well at Concord and will do better in the months to come, as they grow more artful in the ways of war. And having driven out the enemy they will return to their homes, and we will live in peace and plenty in our own free and independent land. And you, she thought, talking to her unborn child, as had become her habit, you will inherit all this, you will be the first citizen of the New World. At such times he gave her strength, and she told herself, it is for you, for you, for you—and pushed away the knowledge that the cause was already betrayed.
Events began to move now at a quickening tempo. News came that Captain Benedict Arnold of New Haven proposed to take a party of men to the lakes above the headwaters of the Hudson, and seize the cannon from the British garrison at Fort Ticonderoga. The call went out for volunteers, and among the men from New Morrock who came forward was Adam Rind.
Martha felt a great ghastly lurch in her belly when he told her this, and a rising in her throat, and the blood came rushing into her face, the strength of this reaction surprising even herself: and her own uneasy conscience played no small part in her distress, for she felt, somehow, in some powerful, wordless way, that her treachery would recoil upon her husband. Poor Adam, he was unable to meet her eye; and she was so shocked she could barely speak! Not for long. She argued with him, she wept tears of rage, she shouted at him, and at last his head lifted and with blazing eyes he told her the war would be lost before it was properly begun, for the want of a few cannon.
“A few cannon?” she cried. “You think it a matter only of a few cannon? Have you not thought what a cannon can do to a man? Or a musket discharged into a man’s face? Or a bayonet stuck in his guts?” Such injuries she had never considered until this moment, but hearing the boy talk so foolishly her imagination took fire and she quickly terrified the pair of them.
But he had already spoken of his plan to Silas, and he could not withdraw now. So Martha went to her uncle to ask him to forbid Adam to go. Ah, such misdirected feeling, in one who always saw things true—thus did the knowledge of her treachery distort the motions of her heart. Silas heard her out, his eyes hooded, his chin resting on his fingertips, there in his great chair in the flickering masculine gloom of his sanctum. He heard her out and then allowed a silence, before saying at last: “I believe him to be stronger than you think.”
“He is not strong!” she cried. “He is a boy!”
“Is he not your husband?”
“He is my husband but he is not yet a man!”
Silas began quietly to laugh at this, which made her angrier still, and for some moments she could not speak. She rose from her chair and paced back and forth—waddled, rather—scarlet with frustration.
“Perhaps you cannot see how he has changed.”
“How has he changed?” She sat down heavily. She was no longer capable of storming about a room. “He is still a boy, and you are sending him to do a man’s work and risk his life.”
“How does a boy become a man?”
“He grows to it, like a tree.”
“We have not time to grow our men like trees.”
“So you send him to his death.”
“We have all chosen to risk our lives. You have so chosen, Martha. You could have gone with the English officer. You chose to stay.”
Did nothing escape this man? Did he see into all the workings of her heart? No, not all its workings, he surely did not see her violation of the trust he had reposed in her.
“He is a boy!” she wailed.
“He must be allowed his choice. He has made it.”
She was sobbing now. Oh, she hated to give any man the satisfaction of seeing her weep, but since her child had begun to grow inside her she could not control her feelings as she once had. Silas had her come to him and took her on his lap, where she wept silently into his shoulder. As he stroked her hair he told her she had nothing to fear, this expedition would meet little resistance from the British, for they were not expecting a move of such boldness from the American side.
“They think us fools,” he murmured. “You know that, Martha, you helped me give the Englishman that lie. They do not know we are coming. There are only a few men at the fort, and we shall take them by surprise. Adam will come to no harm.”
By this point she was more liquid than solid, and she could not think, she could not argue, her will was turned to porridge. Sniffling wetly she mumbled,
“No?”
“No.”
“And you will go too,” she wailed, “and what will I do t
hen?”
He pushed her gently from his shoulder so as to gaze into her splotched wet red mess of a face and asked her: “Do you not think first of your husband?”
Mess though she was, she saw the danger here.
“Yes, yes,” she cried, “but he is young!”
“And I will perish because I am not?”
Nothing for it but to wail and bury her head once more in his shoulder, crying, “I don’t know, I don’t know!”
“Martha,” he said, “this is not you. Where is my brave daughter, who understands me better than all the rest? Where is the girl who fled a madman and came to this country alone? You crave safety for those you love, but that is because you are with child. It is your nature now not to fight but to protect. This will pass. After your child is born you will remember that we must face dangers greater than anything Adam is about to meet.”
She had no argument left in her. She had done what she could. Oh, but to think of Adam off in the mountains of New York—!
“Martha Peake,” murmured Silas, and laid a hand on her great belly. Then he laughed shortly and his eyebrows lifted. “Martha Peake? You are Martha Rind now. You are my daughter.”
She said nothing to this. She did not like it at all. She climbed down clumsily from Silas’ lap. She had resolved that whatever the world called her she would not abandon her father’s name. She would add her husband’s name to her own but she would not displace her father, and she intended to inform Adam and Silas of this when she was stronger. Martha Rind Peake, this is how she would be known.
Early one wet and dismal morning Adam joined a group of militiamen marching to Boston. From there he would travel on to join Captain Arnold’s expedition to Fort Ticonderoga. They were cheered on their way, and then the women of the Rind family turned to one another with pale grave faces. Martha was strong now, she did not weep. Few men were left in New Morrock, and of those few the able-bodied would be gone within days. Then it would be only the women to hold the town until the men returned. None of them was afraid that day. I believe women are never afraid when they know what must be done. Martha was not afraid. Adam was gone, poor brave boy, and Silas would be gone in a day or two, but Martha remained calm. She had stilled the voice of anxiety within her, and once more convinced herself that all would be well.
The last of the militia left two days later, Silas with them on his horse, his cloak billowing about him, and on his proud head a large black tricorn hat with silver edging and a blue cockade. Once again the women gathered outside Pierce’s Tavern. A clear brisk day, and it was strange, the women were saying, and not for the first time, to be by the harbour on such a day in April and not see the boats going out. Many a goodwife cast her eyes seaward then turned away, shaking her head; all life was in disorder. The men formed up, Silas strode about giving instructions, inspecting this and that, until all was ready.
Then he came over to his womenfolk where they stood in a group on the dock with their shawls clutched about them in the wind. There were wordless embraces, kisses and tears, and Martha he left almost to the last.
“Martha Peake,” he said, and took her hands and gazed into her face as he had so often done before, as the wind picked at her hair and set it fluttering about her face, to which the blood now rushed from the fullness of her heart, and the emotions warring within it! She gazed back at him, holding his fingers tight and wanting only to fling her arms around his neck and tell him to be careful! But his gravity prevented her. He told her he wanted a strong and healthy grandchild, would she see to it? She would. He wanted his household to keep faith with the cause no matter what happened, would she see to it? She would. He wanted them all waiting when he came home from the war, would she see to that too? Oh she would, she would—! Then he swung himself onto his horse and cast a glance out to sea. Removing his hat, he murmured a brief prayer.
Then after saying a last tender farewell to his wife he turned his horse and cried to his men to go forward. Off they marched, off up the hill, and the women wandered after. The drum was beating a lively tattoo, the fife trilled a lilting light air, and there was laughter now amid the tears as the small boys ran alongside their fathers and brothers and uncles, and among the women a brief hope arose as they glimpsed in the step of the men and heard in the fife and drum a spirit that would surely carry them through the darkness to come. Martha knew now she could keep the promises Silas had asked her to, and that he would come home to a fine grandson and a family intact, a household united and sustained in his absence by hope and resolve. Caesar took up the rear of the column, and the last Martha saw of them was that man’s broad back as the road turned off through the woods up the hill and the whistling fife grew fainter and fainter and then was heard no more.
32
For Martha and the other women the waiting began. With all the men gone off to Boston—save Joshua Rind, whose gouty foot made him unfit for service—there were no riders from Mr. Adams, as there used to be; they could not spare riders just to keep the women informed, and so the women lived in ignorance of what was happening on the hills above Boston. They could only speculate, and try to convince themselves that the British would sue for peace, having seen the resistance at Concord, and being trapped in Boston under the American guns, what few there were.
So there they sat by the fire of an evening, busy with their needles in the candlelight, murmuring to one another about the men of the household and the men of the town, finding good reasons why each would be sure to acquit himself well in this business. Often the doctor sat with them, so there was at least one less empty seat at the table, and silently smoked his long white pipe; and the candle-flame caught the women’s flashing needles and threw out little sharp splinters of light as they stitched and stitched and with their hearts and their words made their men safe, one by one; and then they went back to the beginning and made them safe all over again.
The nights were more difficult, and Martha soon moved back in with her cousins rather than be alone in the bed she had shared with her husband. Still the night brought its terrors. The girls fell asleep quickly, leaving her to gaze from her pillow at the sky, to watch the moon racing among the clouds, and think of what would befall them all but particularly poor Adam, who was least able of any of them, so she thought, to survive the dangers he would face.
Would some good man look out for him, take him under his wing, this stripling boy? He gave her much worry, she felt he should never have been allowed to go, she daily grew less able to hold out hope for his return; and the thought that she might never see him again, this filled her with the utmost wretchedness and despair. His welfare was hers to vouchsafe, and she had lost him, she had allowed him to slip off into the Revolution, to be swept away into the howling wilderness of the Upper Hudson Valley and the lakes beyond—oh, he would perish, she was sure of it, and she would carry the shame of it to her grave. To think of him tramping through the wilderness for days and days and at the end being part of an assault on a fortress garrisoned by redcoats—! He would not survive it, he would perish if not from a musket ball then from weakness or sickness or a hundred other perils of the north woods. He would be scalped!
She would have made herself busy, the better to keep from brooding on these things; though such brooding was, in truth, but an expression of that anxiety which had gnawed at her heart since her last encounter with Giles Hawkins. Ah, but her condition prevented her doing little more now than sitting by the fire with her needle, and Joshua Rind was quick to notice her low spirits. She admitted they came of concern for her husband, and the doctor reassured her, telling her that Adam was stronger than she gave him credit for.
Could she believe this? She tried to, but whenever she saw him in her mind’s eye he was the soft, tender, curious boy to whom she had taught the lessons of love high among the hay bales in the barn behind the house; or up in the woods, in a bed of leaves, himself filled with delight at discovering pleasure he had never dreamed of, living in his father’s stern house, with
the long shadow of his Puritan ancestors cast always across his soul. Was she wrong to believe that she knew him better and saw him more clearly than this gouty doctor? The boy who had clung weeping to her in a transport of ecstasy when first she had brought him to the height and climax of passion? Was she wrong to think that this tender youth would surely perish in the woods?
Nobody will ever take you from me, this was the promise she had made to her unborn child. But somebody would take him from her, and soon, too, for she had almost come to term. She had been visited several times by Hester Winthrop the midwife, who seemingly had delivered every infant in New Morrock for the past forty years. She had strange ways, old Hester, but the women of the town attested to her great art at pulling them out whole and screaming, and few were lost, they said, mother or child, with Mistress Winthrop attending. She was a vast ancient crone with a black mole the size of a penny on her upper lip from which sprouted a cluster of black hairs, and what few teeth remained in that collapsing jaw were yellow with decay. She carried about her compendious person numerous malodorous herbs and plants which she gathered in the forest, and she would produce from deep within her many layers of shawl and skirt a few stems or leaves of some green or brown or black thing and make a tea of it, which must be drunk no matter how foul the taste and stink of it. She had probed and poked Martha with her bent old fingers, the soil of her garden caked thick beneath the nails, and pronounced her strong and the boy within—she was at once certain of his sex, you see—as “curious big.” Mistress Winthrop eyed her with some interest, from under her shaggy brows, and Martha did not know what she meant by “curious big.”
Martha Peake Page 26
