The Vanishing Point

by Mary Sharratt

  The young blacksmith, working half naked in the summer heat, had the most beautiful torso, golden and glistening. When he looked up from the anvil and met her stare, she winked and turned, inviting him to follow her into the alleyway, where he playfully pressed her up against the wall, his sweaty chest marking the front of her dress. She licked the sweat from his face like a mother cat.

  Sometimes she felt as though she were questing after a dream lover, an irresistible phantom who enticed her from her bed night after night. His face kept changing. He could appear to her in any guise he chose—as the baker's son, the blacksmith, or even some young rag seller. Each time she took a new lover, swearing that he was the one she would love forever, another apparition appeared, stretching out his hand and smiling as if he had been her destined match all along. When she thought she had finally grasped him, the divine lover of her dreams, the enchantment vanished. She found herself embracing an ordinary village boy who taunted her for her loose ways and called her a trollop.

  Before the illusion shattered, it was so sweet. The stars rained on her body as her lover plunged inside her. The next morning, she dredged out the honey-and-sperm-soaked wool and dropped it down the privy hole. Without uttering a word to Father, Joan brewed her decoctions of pennyroyal, tansy, and rue to ensure that her menses arrived promptly. May's belly remained flat as any virgin's. The village whispered it was witchcraft that she never got herself with child.

  This was when May felt the first hint of dread. A few years before her birth, a woman had been accused of bewitching a married man and cursing him so that his wife remained barren. The woman had been tried, found guilty, then strung from the gallows. The story went that her body had been so slender and lightboned, the hangman had to grab her around the waist and yank hard until her neck snapped. Father said that no educated man believed in witches anymore, but Joan had warned May that in some villages, wanton girls like herself were publicly whipped, then locked in the stocks, and left there for everyone to jeer at and mock. Though the stocks in her village were rarely used, May felt a tremor whenever she walked past them.

  Still, nobody troubled her. Father, after all, was a respected man. Half the village was in debt to him, for he treated the poor without asking payment. It helped that she looked so innocent with her large blue eyes. She never failed to appear in church, hands clasped and head bowed while the preacher railed on and on. When he addressed her sins—without naming her, thankfully—she put every ounce of will into appearing contrite. Only when the sermon was over did she raise her eyes to the Green Man carved in the church wall. His face emerged from a dense tangle of oak leaves. More leaves sprouted from his lips. The stone face smiled, as if to tell her that he understood her, even if no one else did. In the midst of all the talk of hell and damnation, the Green Man watched over her and gave her his blessing.

  The year she turned nineteen, the innkeeper's son, smitten with her, declared that he would put an end to her wildness. When he asked for her hand in matrimony, Father agreed at once. An eldest son, he had good prospects. Properly affianced, he and May could court in public with no subterfuge or shame. On Sunday afternoons, they went for endless walks, Hannah tagging after them as their self-appointed chaperone. Still, May could not quite fathom marriage. In her dreams, they simply went on courting forever. Eventually the banns were posted. Joan and Hannah summoned her to the market to pick out the satin and lawn for her bridal gown. The wedding date was set.

  Three weeks before she was to be married, she and her fiancé went to the harvest fair in the next village. May wore green ribbons in her hair. She and her lover drank mead from the same cup. A piper and fiddler played, and all around them young people danced: shepherds and servant girls, milkmaids and farmhands. But May's fiancé did not want to join the dance. Instead he spoke with his brother about the cost of fixing the thatch on the inn roof, about how they couldn't afford to replace the thatch with slate. They spoke of their senile mother, how she needed a good nursemaid to look after her, and how none of May's father's remedies had done her any good. Then May's future brother-in-law, drunk on the mead, let his tongue slip, making a gibe about her lack of dowry. "What use is there bringing home a prized mare if she come not with a wagon of hay to feed her? And a used mare she is, besides."

  May waited for her fiancé to speak up in her defense, but he just laughed and pinched her cheek. Not wanting to pout, she pretended to laugh along. She reached for the mead, only to discover that the cup was empty, and then it seemed that the empty cup was an omen, informing her that life as she knew it would soon be over. After the wedding feast, there would be no more dancing, no more slipping behind the hedges in the village green. She would be nursemaid to her mother-in-law, laundering the old woman's piss-stained sheets, enduring the old woman's insults and her brother-in-law's slights. She would hide her hair beneath a housewife's cap, keep her husband's house, bear his children. Her loins clenched at the memory of her mother's racked body on the blood-drenched bed. She almost fancied that her mother's ghost was warning her to save herself before it was too late. Darling, you can see that this is no life for you.

  When she stepped away, she expected her fiancé to follow, take her hand, ask what vexed her. He still had the power to draw her back, charm away her doubts. But neither he nor his brother paid her any mind. With heavy feet, she marched into the thick of the dancers. They whirled around her, beat their feet into the earth, kicked up clouds of dust that shone like gold in the evening sun. A barefoot tinker stood on his own. His waving hair fell to his shoulders. His shirt, made of parti-colored rags stitched together, was open in the heat, baring his collarbone and smooth chest. His eyes were clouded hazel, full of mirth. Those eyes undid her. He winked, his face open and shining. When he held out his hand, she felt the overpowering tug, the intoxication sweeter than mead. Stepping forward, she squeezed his hand and let him pull her body against his as if they were already lovers. Then all was a blur of the dust they raised with their wild dance. When the music stopped she kissed him. His mouth tasted of wild blackberries.

  Her fiancé and his brother left her there, in the tinker's arms. Rushing back to the village, her fiancé tore down the banns announcing their marriage. Meanwhile the tinker led May to his makeshift tent at the edge of the woods. When he pushed up her skirts and stroked the insides of her thighs, she felt so light, as though she had left her body and earthly existence behind. She kissed him fiercely and drew him inside her. Afterward they sat by the campfire and shared a supper of streaky bacon and bread. Then, despite his entreaties, May pulled herself away. She walked alone and unclaimed to her father's house.

  Father could hardly look at her. Even Hannah appeared bruised and betrayed. Joan cornered May in the kitchen. "You have brought dishonor on us all. Your poor sister is ashamed to show her face in public. Did you ever stop to think about your father? Wherever he goes, people laugh behind his back."

  May wept, but the shaming was nothing in the face of her desire, that pull on her that set her pulse racing. Within a fortnight she took up with a young weaver.

  By the time she turned twenty-one, her pond had run dry. From the rich crop of boys she had once loved had grown a field of jaded men, most of them now married. They warned their wives what would happen to them if they ever started taking after May Powers. One morning she awoke with the taste of too much cider in her mouth, bruises on her arms and thighs. Boys followed her down alleys, singing not sweet songs but obscene ditties. Cherry-red, cherry-red, like a slut's own bed. At village dances, disgusting old men took liberties, pawing her bosom and rump, then laughing at her outraged protests. Joan told her she should have thought of the consequences earlier.

  In the eyes of her village, she had become something much worse than an old maid. Joan said she was a fool for not marrying the innkeeper's son when she had the chance. He was a fine man these days, with money in his purse and a baby boy. His wife was a mild-faced, yellow-haired woman who never raised her voice. She had come
with a dowry of two milk cows and eight pounds in sterling.

  ***

  When Nathan Washbrook's summons arrived, May reminded herself that she had loved many men. Odds were that she could find something to love in young Gabriel. But in those final days, her bridegroom was far from her mind. At every opportunity she stole into Father's study to examine his celestial globe and maps of the heavens. In her dreams, she was not earthbound but flew unfettered through the endless vault of stars. Nothing could stop her, nothing could contain her. She imagined the unexplored new world that would soon be hers.

  The night before she was to sail, at the hour when she should have gone to her bed, she smuggled Father's telescope to her room. She opened the window wide and gazed through the lens. For all their distance, the stars shone warmly, beckoning to her like long-lost friends. If she could find her way back to them, she would be complete. What path might her life have taken if Father had given her the same education as Hannah, if he had encouraged her to be studious, if she had spent those countless afternoons poring over books instead of sneaking out to meet boys? A whole other future could have been hers. Yet when she asked herself if she regretted anything, she had to concede that she did not. If she had been a good girl, Father would never have thought to send her on this voyage.

  Peering through the lens, she entreated the night sky to reveal her destiny. A moment later she was rewarded with the sight of a meteor stitching its way across the sky in a brilliant streak. Soon there was not one but many. The heavens filled with shooting stars.

  "Hannah, come look!" She handed her the telescope. "Surely this is a good omen."

  Her sister glanced only briefly through the telescope before passing it back. Her face was pinched and her eyes were red.

  May touched Hannah's cheek. "Will you not be happy for me?"

  "They are sending you into a wilderness!"

  May folded her sister in her arms while the girl wept like a lost child. Her tears soon soaked through May's nightgown. Stroking her hair, May remembered the first time she had held Hannah, a newborn with an angry red face, screaming for her mother, who was no longer there. And now I am leaving her, too. May struggled not to cry. There was no telling what might happen if she let this overwhelm her.

  "Aye, a wilderness they say it is." May hugged her sister tighter. "But have you never wondered, Hannah, what a wilderness is like?" She thought of the tinker she had never seen again. If she could be born again, she would be that young man wandering from village to village with his satchel and tent, masterless and free. That night as she slept with Hannah in her arms, she dreamt she was a comet blazing her trail across the night sky.

  3. Fog

  Hannah

  "IT'S NOT TOO LATE." Hannah tightened her grip on her sister's hand. "You can still say no." Lips to May's ear, she pleaded. "Say you'll stay here with us."

  On the Bristol pier, Hannah struggled to hold on to her sister, whose body kept shifting under her green cloak. May was as slippery as a mermaid and as difficult to hold on to. Sometimes it was hard to believe this beautiful, capricious person was truly her sister. Since she and May were as different as day and night, Father's friends liked to joke that one of them must be a changeling. May was everything Hannah thought she could never be—tall and dazzling with her chestnut hair, her full bosom, her sky-blue eyes. Her wide hips promised ease in childbirth. Hannah was six inches shorter, skinny and hard. If she were to cut off her frizzy red hair and put on a pair of breeches, she could pass for a boy. The only womanly thing about her was how easily she wept.

  "How can you leave us for a stranger?" she whispered. Even while she and May had embroidered the wedding dress, Hannah had prayed that her sister would have an outburst of her usual temper and declare that she was not really making the journey halfway around the world to marry some distant cousin. May had never obeyed Father or anyone else but done what she pleased. How had she consented to this? Hannah could not forgive May her eagerness, the way she gazed at the tall-masted ships and the sailors climbing the riggings. Some of the men were brown as bread, others black as molasses, gold glinting from their ears. When they came to port, Bristol smelled of spices and citrus fruit from faraway countries. Also moored in the harbor were the slave ships, human cargo chained in the hold. Hannah could not bring herself to look at those vessels. Father had told her that slavery was an abomination, and yet he was sending May to the Chesapeake, where rich planters built their fortunes on the backs of such slaves.

  "You act as if it were some game," she told May. Then she closed her eyes as a queasiness passed through her, the skin around her mouth growing tight and cold.

  "Oh, Hannah, you will not have one of your fits. You will not. Besides," May whispered, fingering a stray lock of her sister's red hair, "it is an adventure." The wind sweeping off the harbor brought out the bloom in May's face as she smiled. She kissed Hannah's forehead.

  "The next one you kiss shall be him!"

  May laughed.

  Hannah wrapped her fingers around her sister's wrists. "What if he is a monster, a beast?"

  "You think too much of tragedy and pain." May wiped Hannah's tears. "We shall only be parted a very short while. Soon enough you shall join me on the other side."

  Hannah glanced at Father, who stood guard over May's trunk. He was growing frailer with each passing winter. Just as May considered it her duty to cross the ocean and marry, it was Hannah's lot to look after their father until his death.

  "Two or three years, not more," May whispered. Sadness crept into her voice. "Then you shall sail over to me. By that time, you shall be all grown up. I shall have planted my garden with the seeds you gave me. I will plant more rosemary than anyone has seen. They say it grows well in that climate." She smiled, inviting Hannah to smile with her. When rosemary grows in the garden, the saying went, the mistress rules the house.

  Hannah watched May embrace Father.

  "Give my love to Joan," May called, about to board the ship with the two sailors who carried her trunk.

  Hannah threw herself in her path. "I gave you quill, ink, and paper! I hope you shall put them to use."

  "I shall write as soon as I am safe on the other shore."

  "In your trunk there are stoppered bottles of water. Ration them well. And there are three loaves of bread besides, and a cake." Hannah had heard terrible stories of the food aboard those ships: nothing but brackish water in leaking casks, oversalted meat, and hard biscuit crawling with weevils.

  "Dear Hannah." May held her as the crowd pressed around them. She gave her sister one last kiss before climbing aboard the ship. For a while she stood at the rail and shouted her farewells. Then, as more people pushed around her, she lost her place and was swallowed by the throng. The sailors untied the ropes, and the ship slowly pulled away from the dock.

  "She will be one of those people waving," Father said. "She is there. We simply cannot see her amongst all the others."

  "Look at the fog, will you? Why did they not wait until fair weather to sail?"

  "Trust that the captain and his crew know the sea better than you and I. Pray, do not be overanxious. Your sister is ruled by passion, while you have a propensity toward melancholia. The humors must be in balance. My dear, my bones ache. Let us sit down."

  "Go rest in the tavern, Father. I will find you soon."

  ***

  As the ship vanished from her sight, Hannah stood on the pier, staring into the fog that rose from the steely water. She would always remember gray as the color of ghosts, the color of loss. Please, dear God, do not let this overpower me. She told herself she would not let the world grow dark around her, not fall writhing into a seizure, her body racked by spasms, blood and spittle flowing from her mouth.

  The falling sickness had not visited her for more than two years. Father said there was reason to hope it would never return. To ward it off, he had her drink a daily infusion of the berries and leaves of mistletoe mixed with peony root. He had also mixed for her a specia
l salve with the anticonvulsive oils of nutmeg, lavender, marjoram, rue, cloves, and citron. May had always teased her when she anointed herself with it. Oh, Hannah. You smell like the Garden of Eden.

  The first seizure had taken her when she was two. Joan had thought on the onset that it was a mere tantrum, then feared it might be madness. Father said that less learned folk might attribute her symptoms to demonic possession. His medical books told him that the falling sickness was a disorder of the humors in the brain. Apart from these episodes, she was healthy and strong.

  She feared the seizures would follow her all her days like some dark twin, creeping out of the shadows at the least expected moment to undo her. For now, though, the pier remained solid beneath her feet. Holding her sister's image before her, she tried to trace the path of the ship she could no longer see.

  ***

  Wig askew, Father huddled beside the tavern fire. His unsteady hands cupped a mug of ale.

  "It is time to meet the wagoner," Hannah said. Finding Father's cane, she helped him to his feet and led the way out the door and into the street crowded with sailors, errand boys, and tradesmen.

  "If I could call that ship back to port, I would," she told her father savagely. "We know nothing of her bridegroom."

  "He is our kinsman."

  "He is a distant cousin we have never met. You yourself conceded that you have not laid eyes on his father in nearly five-and-twenty years."