The Vanishing Point

by Mary Sharratt

  She danced with all the men except the musicians and Nathan, who shook his head and sighed about his age. The time had come to give her attention to Gabriel again, see if she could coax him out of his sulk, but his spot on the bench was empty. He was nowhere to be seen.

  ***

  Head ducked down to shield his stung face from the wind, Gabriel labored uphill, his dogs racing around him. The declining sun cast a bloody shimmer on the snow. With each step, he sank to his knees. No one had seen him slipping out of the house, least of all his wife. That was the measure of how insignificant he had become. He had not been able to stomach another second of watching her dance with the men, with her head thrown back in delight, face and bosom flushed. Dancing in the slippers he had made her himself. If he confronted May, she would merely fix him with her big blue eyes, smile her false smile, and tell him not to worry his head about a thing.

  He wasn't man enough for her. His father had always told him he wasn't man enough. James, Father's favored one, had stepped in to take his place. He hated his father for the way he had sat there and cheered her on while she floated in James's arms. It wouldn't surprise him if they had Father's blessing.

  He was nothing, nothing. Neither his father nor his wife would deign to treat him as anything more than the muck beneath their feet.

  Stopping to catch his breath, he watched Rufus, the top dog, wrestle one of the younger dogs into submission. Each animal fought for its position in the pack, and so it was, too, with men and women. James had bested him. Rather than be at the bottom, he preferred to break away from them all, become the lone wolf. He pushed onward, determined to reach the top of the hill, the stand of poison ivy, glittering with frost. The little clearing with the beech tree at its edge where it had happened, where James had propped May against the tree and taken her standing up, as if rogering some harlot. Shaking with rage and cold, Gabriel unsheathed the knife from his belt. The last rays of sun glanced off the blade as he drove it home.

  Cast out of his home on Christmas Day. They had robbed him of his bachelorhood, his innocence, his wife, but they wouldn't take these woods away from him. They would not dare to sully his last refuge. He carved the letters of his name into the bark to prove that he still existed. Gabriel. He would mark this place, claim it as his own, his lawful inheritance. The trees would remain long after Father passed on, his name engraved on them. The Gabriel woods. The forest would remember him even if everyone else dismissed him.

  January 8, 1690

  The New Year brought a blizzard and a snap of deep cold. Midwinter was the worst time for tempers, all eleven of them cramped together, the servants' quarters having no hearth. Some nights the Irishmen slept body to body in the attic, where they at least had the heat from the chimney. Adele slept on a pallet near the fire.

  On Sunday morning, everyone crowded around the table for morning prayers. Though Adele and the Irishmen were Catholic, Nathan would tolerate no papist nonsense. Everyone must sit with clasped hands while he read from the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer.

  The Christmas festivities already seemed like a distant memory. On this cold January morning, May could see her breath inside the house. She wore her dress of blue worsted wool, two underskirts, her scratchy wool stockings, a neckcloth with a woolen shawl over it, and a linen cap. Though she had chosen her clothes for reasons of warmth rather than modesty, she imagined she must look every inch the sober Puritan goodwife.

  Adele squeezed onto the bench. Because she was from the Sugar Isles, winters were particularly hard on her. While the Irishmen complained of the heat in summer, Adele shivered through the cold months, teeth rattling, as though the chill would do her in. She wore the Sunday dress May had given her, with two shawls wrapped around her.

  May struggled not to doze as Nathan read a long passage from Proverbs.

  As snow in summer and rain in harvest, so honor is not fitting for a fool.

  Like a flitting sparrow, like a flying swallow, so a curse without cause shall not alight.

  A whip for the horse, a bridle for the donkey, and a rod for the fool's back.

  Head bowed, May made herself stay awake by thinking about spring, when she could plant the seeds Hannah had given her. Her attention wandered down the table to James. Their eyes met for an instant before she lowered her gaze to her clasped hands, her work-worn fingers with the dull gold wedding ring.

  Across from her, Gabriel had fallen asleep. May tried to nudge his foot under the table before his father noticed, but it was too late. Nathan stopped reading and struck his son's shoulder. May averted her eyes. She did not want to see the look that passed between father and son.

  When the prayers and Bible reading were over at last, May and Adele laid the table and served sausages and Sunday chicken with fried corncakes, onions and turnips, cider, and a steamed pudding made of cornmeal and cherry preserves. Adele held the trenchers and May dished out the victuals. The best and biggest portions went to Nathan, as master of the household. Eyes watering from the hearth smoke, she saw only too late that she had given James a portion equal to Nathan's—something the other servants did not fail to notice.

  Looking at James's trencher, Patrick said something to him in their native tongue that made James's face go red. James said something back. Then he said in English, "Mayhap you wish to trade portions."

  Patrick said something else in his language, to which James replied swiftly. Leaping off the bench, Patrick dragged James away from the table and struck his face, bloodying his nose. Before May could even think to scream, James struck back, hitting Patrick in the belly so hard that he writhed on the floor, clutching himself and howling.

  In the silence that followed, Nathan was too stunned at first to react. James's face was a mask of fury, fists still clenched. Then Nathan got up from his chair. With a shaking hand, he seized the bullwhip off its hook. Adele covered her face and cried. Even Gabriel went pale. May trembled when Nathan roared. Could this be the same man who had wept in her presence that day in November, allowing her to glimpse into the secrets of his heart?

  "How dare you desecrate the Sabbath! How dare you strike blows in my house!" He turned to May and Adele. "Take the trenchers. If there is no gratitude amongst this lot, let all seven of them go hungry this day."

  "But sir," May said, "only two have come to blows. Why must all of them be punished?"

  "Silence, woman!" Nathan held up the whip. "Don't you dare speak against me."

  May's face burned, but her eyes stayed dry, even as Adele sobbed. The very sight of the whip seemed to send the girl into a panic. May took her arm and led her to the other side of the table.

  "Hush," she whispered, touching her face.

  Methodically they took each of the male servants' trenchers and scraped the food back into the pots. May wondered if it would spoil. Maybe there was still a way she could smuggle it to them without Nathan knowing.

  Meanwhile Nathan had donned his cloak, then marched Patrick and James outside. Barking out orders, he made Gabriel and Jack accompany them.

  "What will he do?" May asked Adele. The girl only cried. She turned to Finn. "What will he do?"

  "Go to the window, Mrs. Washbrook, and see for yourself."

  May looked out to see Nathan lead the men to what she had always assumed was a hitching post. Only now did she discern its true purpose. Nathan's raised voice penetrated the closed window and door. At his orders, Gabriel and Jack stripped off the two men's shirts so that their bare backs twitched in the cold. They bound their hands to the post. Nathan unfurled his bullwhip.

  May wrenched the door open. "Master Washbrook, no!" Of course, it was a master's right to chastise his servants if necessary, but a bullwhip was too cruel. Surely a birken rod would suffice. A well-placed blow with a bullwhip could kill a man. She dashed out the door, set to throw herself between Nathan and the men, when Adele and Finn grabbed her and dragged her back inside.

  Finn placed himself in front of the door. "If you try to meddle, he w
ill whip you, too."

  Adele seized May's hand and guided it down the back of her dress, over the raised skin that crisscrossed her shoulder blades. "Once he whipped me. I have the scars still. He whips his own son."

  May swallowed a cry. Adele was so small, so tiny. How had she survived the bullwhip? And Gabriel—she had never suspected Nathan could treat his son that way. No wonder Gabriel always kept his nightshirt on—he was too ashamed to reveal his naked back.

  Nathan whipped Patrick first. When the singing crack of the whip landed on his back, Patrick screamed like a woman. Adele quaked so hard that May put her arms around her. The whip kept cracking. May saw the muscles bulge in Nathan's neck. She had never dreamed he possessed such strength. Or cruelty. Gabriel doubled over, vomiting in the snow.

  "Mistress Washbrook, if you please." Finn looked as though he were struggling not to cry. "After the flogging, they will need you to clean their wounds. You must wash them and wrap them in dressing."

  "Have we any bandages?" she asked Adele.

  The girl nodded and rummaged through the dresser.

  Meanwhile Patrick's back ran red. Nathan moved to the other side to whip James.

  "This is madness." May tried to edge past Finn out the door, but he took hold of her wrists.

  "No," he said. "You must stay inside."

  "Please tell me what words sparked this brawl? What did Patrick say to your brother?"

  The boy's cheeks went blotchy. "I would rather not say, mistress. Such words are not for a woman's ears."

  She grasped his arm, making him blush even more. "Please." She shuddered as they listened to James cry out in pain. "If it concerns your brother, I must know."

  Finn pressed his lips together before he spoke. "Patrick said to James, 'Not only does the master favor you indecently, but now the mistress as well.'"

  May raised her hand to her mouth. Adele appeared at her side with an armful of bandages. Though they had been laundered since their last use, old bloodstains still marked them.

  ***

  Adele prepared a kettle of warm water. May packed her basket with bandages, a cake of soap, and a washing rag, then climbed to the attic, where the whipped men lay prone on their pallets. Patrick's back was far more ravaged than James's was. The pity welling up inside her nearly made her forget that she detested the man. Patrick flinched at her touch and spat on the floor.

  "There are words for women such as you," he muttered. But in his chastened state, he didn't appear to have the courage to tell her what those words were.

  ***

  That night in bed, Gabriel whispered in her ear, "On your account, the men come to blows and suffer the whip. Are you pleased with yourself, May?"

  "Stop it," she begged him.

  "What sport you play, woman! You think I am too blind or stupid to know your tricks?" He gripped her shoulder so she couldn't pull away. "You've sported with James like a mare in season. Well, now that he's had his whipping, all because of you, I hope he goes off you. Mayhap he has come to hate you. Mayhap the very sight of you will gall him like spoiled meat." His words rang out like a curse that would come true to the word. They turned her bones to ice.

  It took her last strength to push him away. Rolling to the edge of the bed, she drew the bedclothes over her ears, but she could not keep out the sound of Nathan's choked weeping.

  ***

  Each evening that week, May climbed to the attic to rub James's and Patrick's wounds with bear grease. James no longer smiled at her. When she looked at him, his face closed and his eyes went blank. Had he really come to hate her, then? How could his love simply vanish out of her life?

  "My dear," she whispered, kissing him when no one could see. "Beloved." She would dash herself against the stones at the creek bottom before she let Gabriel's curse come true.

  ***

  Adele took to her pallet with a terrible cold, leaving Finn to help May carry creek water to the house so that she could wash the soiled bandages. Each of them bore two buckets as they trudged up the path side by side. Their breath floated out of their mouths in the bitter air.

  "Sometimes," said Finn, "I do have nightmares of whippings. When I awake, I have secret thoughts of us rising up against the master. I know it is a sin," he added forlornly.

  "It must be hard to forgive him," she said quietly, "for what he has done to your brother."

  "He has whipped all of us at one time or other. There is always some transgression."

  They had nearly reached the house when Finn set his buckets in the snow. He took her buckets and set them down as well.

  "You will try to protect us, won't you, mistress?" He pressed her hand, loosening something inside her. She thought she would cry. "We were praying that you could make him softer."

  "I will try," she said bleakly. "I promise you that."

  ***

  In the following weeks, she did her best to soften up Nathan. In March, when the snow had melted and wild anemones pushed their way out of the mud, she gave him the most softening news of all. She was pregnant. In spite of James's whipping and Gabriel's curse, in spite of all the trials and misfortune, she had succeeded in bringing forth this miracle, which she prayed would redeem her. By October, she reckoned, Nathan would finally have his heir.

  26. Foxglove for the Heart

  Adele

  Spring 1690

  THE FULL MOON CAST silver on the foxglove May had planted that spring from her sister's seeds. They grew as grandly as if they had always been here, as though they belonged here, deep pink flowers as pretty as the woman who had sown them.

  Adele held her breath. All was silent. The Washbrooks had retired for the night. No light shone in their window. Except for Peter, the manservants had also turned in after working from dawn to sunset in the tobacco field. Peter had stolen away in Master Washbrook's smallest boat. Adele had spied him creeping off at moonrise, heading downstream. He had been doing this for weeks. Finn had whispered that Peter had a sweetheart at the Banham Plantation, a kitchen girl named Rosie. Every other night, he rowed downriver, then labored back upstream in the early hours before dawn. A few times Adele had woken, hearing him pass her hut as he hurried to his quarters. If Nathan Washbrook ever got wind of this, he would give Peter the flogging of his life. But at least Peter had the sense to fall in love with someone other than Mistress May. Later, when his indenture was completed, he could marry his girl and start planting his own fifty acres.

  Enough of Peter, she told herself. After glancing around one last time to make sure that she was alone, she set to work. Wrapping a rag around her hand, she grabbed hold of the stalk. With her other hand, she plunged her spade into the earth and dug up the root. She prayed that May would not notice one missing foxglove plant. May had warned her never to touch the plant with her bare hands—it could raise a powerful rash. Adele laid the plant on the ground, took the knife from her basket, and cut off the root. The charm called for orchid root. Since she could find no orchids here, she had decided to use foxglove. May herself had told her it was powerful physick that worked on the heart.

  Reaching into her basket, Adele took out the materials she had gathered. A handkerchief belonging to May, a long strip of linen cut from one of Gabriel's raveling old shirts, strands of May's and Gabriel's hair that she had plucked from their pillows, and an old stoneware flask containing a measure of Nathan Washbrook's rum. She had pilfered the turkey quill and ink bottle from May's trunk—tomorrow she would return them before May noticed they were missing. She had procured a scrap of paper torn from the sugar cone wrapping. Pricking the ball of her thumb with a knife, she let her blood fall into the inkpot. The charm called for dove's blood, but her own would have to do.

  She placed the foxglove root in the center of May's handkerchief, then arranged the hairs and a few foxglove flowers around it. She closed her eyes and called the powers. Her mother's old chants came back to her, those words that weren't French or English but African. Their music and rhythm issued forth from her
mouth, though she didn't know what she was saying or what spirits she invoked. If only her mother were here to guide her. She called on her mother's ghost.

  As she dipped the quill into the inkpot, her fears paraded before her. She might work the charm the wrong way. What if she unleashed forces beyond her control? Obeah was powerful magic. Her mother had worked spells only in moments of extreme need. Adele also feared that she was casting the spell too late. Really, she should have done it in November when May had first asked for it. But no foxglove had grown then. She hoped and prayed it was not too late to turn things around.

  May was in grave danger. The certainty of this gripped Adele tighter each morning when she awoke from nightmares of May's destruction. She hadn't been visited by such terrors since leaving her island. May had set off down a path that could only lead to ruin. Adele had sensed the first prickle of dread the night of the Christmas dance when May had let the men spin her round and round like a child's top, faster and faster, until Adele had feared she would hit the wall and break. May hadn't been able to stop her perilous game, even after James had come to his senses and begun to withdraw from her. May wouldn't let him go, but kept trying to rekindle the flame. When he ignored her, she flirted with the other men—including with his own brother, Finn—to spark his jealousy. How could she carry on like that when she was at least four months gone with child? Somehow Nathan Washbrook didn't condemn her for it. But Gabriel couldn't look at May without his lip curling in spite. Adele's worst nightmares concerned Gabriel and what would happen when he could contain his anger no longer.