As Hitty and Henry chased after seagulls, Ren asked Daphne what had happened to Abraham and Patience. “They were coming along for the picnic, were they not?” They’d barely made a dent in the hamper’s contents.
“Abraham suddenly remembered he had an errand to do for thee. Patience chose to go with him.”
“I do not believe there was an errand, but a reason to go.” He sat up. “Daphne, did you happen to notice the man I was talking to in front of your mother’s house? He said he’s a bounty hunter.”
“Hunting for . . . what?”
“Not for what. For whom. He’s after Abraham.”
Shocked, she gave him a sharp look. “I wasn’t aware Abraham was a runaway slave.”
“Nor was I.” He leaned his elbows on his knees. “Though I admit I am not surprised. He is a clever man. I’m hoping Tristram will take him on as an officer. At first discussion, Trist seemed unwilling, but I will wear him down. When he returns, that is.”
“Will thee be able to keep Abraham hidden until Tristram embarks?”
“I’m going to have to.”
“Ren . . . what if the bounty hunter finds him first?” Daphne heard a noise behind her and realized Henry had been listening to them. She twisted around, hoping he hadn’t heard or understood too much. “Does thee need more to eat?”
Henry shook his head. “Is that man going to take Abraham away?”
Ren’s gaze was on Henry’s. “Son, I’m not going to let that happen.”
For the first time Daphne could recall, Henry’s eyes remained fixed on his father’s face.
Mary Coffin Starbuck
10 February 1663
Nathaniel, Edward, and Jethro have returned with a large sack filled with cottontail rabbits, four snow geese who had lost their way . . . and a harbor seal found in the near shore waters off the coast!
How I would love a new pair of gloves, lined with rabbit fur.
Catherine, Esther, and I have been plucking goose feathers for a cradle mattress for the coming babe. The house stinks to high heaven of rendered goose fat. The smell is in my hair and my clothes.
Nothing goes to waste. Tendons and sinews from the animals are used to make thread. Bone slivers will be transformed into sewing needles.
Nathaniel has always been so enchanted with the sea—fishing, whaling, sailing—that I had almost forgotten what a skilled hunter he is. He has a keen eye and steady hand. And such patience.
With those traits in mind, ’tis a surprise to me that he has not noticed any signs of the Negro. I have not told him, for he is very preoccupied with the tasks at hand. Soon, I will tell him.
Or should I not?
What I truly wish to happen is for the Negro to move on to someone else’s woodshed. Then I would not have to think anymore of this troubling concern.
I should. I will tell Nathaniel.
12 February 1663
The Starbuck men have scarcely come inside these last two days, but for hurried meals, before returning to the barn and working late into the night. Catherine questioned their slowness in preparing the seal, but they only shrugged their shoulders and exchanged boyish grins.
They are up to something, those three.
How could they not notice the Negro? He is still there. I am careful when I bring food out to him, waiting until after dark, pausing until I hear evidence of their activity in the barn. I know the Negro is aware of their presence, for he vanishes by daybreak and returns late at night.
I still haven’t told Nathaniel about the Negro. While I might have hoped that he would move on, I have come to understand that he has come to me for a reason. He is dependent on my help, and he is expecting me to find a way out.
After another night of tossing and turning, I got out of bed and stubbed my toe on something hard. Wide awake, Nathaniel lit a candle to show me what I had stumbled on. There by my bedside was a wooden cradle, set upon two curved legs, with even and smooth dowels all along the sides. So that’s what has occupied those three Starbuck men these last two days!
“’Twas Jethro’s idea,” Nathaniel explained. “While we were out hunting, he asked me what the baby would be sleeping in. I hadn’t given thought to that. So we started to make plans to work on a cradle right away, while winter allowed us a few extra hours.”
A few extra hours! Hardly that. They spent two days crafting this beautiful cradle, with hearts cut out on the front and back pieces. “Our baby will know he is wanted and welcome, with such a fine bed to rest his little head.”
“Or her head,” Nathaniel said. “It would please me greatly to have a daughter. One who looks like her mother, with chestnut hair that shines like fire in the sunlight.”
I climbed back into bed with a full heart.
13
Rain had started at dawn’s light. Ren was aroused from sleep by the sound of someone hammering on the front door, as if he were trying to break the door down. He braced up on an elbow and listened.
“Captain Macy! Open up! I know he’s in there!”
Ren rolled to the edge of the bed, searching for the flint. When the wick caught, he glanced up to see Henry in the wavering candlelight, standing at the open bedroom door.
“It’s that bad man. He wants to take Abraham away.”
“I told you I wouldn’t let that happen.” The banging on the front door started up again. “I’ll take care of him, son. You get on back to bed.”
Ren slipped on his pants, yanked a sweater over his head, and made his way down the wooden steps to the door, barely aware that Henry was on his heels. Abraham stood by the fire, eyes wide. “Out the back door, Abraham. Head to the docks and mix in with the other colored dockworkers. They’ll protect you. Wait there until I come for you.”
He waited until he heard the back door click shut before he strode to the front door. “I know he’s in there, Captain Macy! I’ve been told he comes and goes out of yer house. I’ve got a legal right to him.”
Ren opened the door and unceremoniously hauled Moser inside. “What’s the meaning of banging on my door at this hour?”
“Where is he?” Moser shook Ren off and pushed past him to walk into the keeping room, then turning the door open to the small storeroom.
“You’ve got no right to come bursting into my house at this unholy hour.”
“I’ve got every right! You’re impeding justice.” Back in the keeping room, Moser eyed the bedroll still laid out by the fire. He bent down and put a hand on it. “Still warm.”
“’Tis mine.” Patience had slipped down the stairs unheard and unseen. She stood next to Ren with her head held high. “’Tis where I sleep.”
Ren was amazed at the transformation of this young maidservant. Gone was the timid, chin-tucked, shielded-eyes look. Why, she was downright forthright in her stare at Moser. Something about her reminded him of Daphne.
Silas Moser glared back at her. His expression told Ren he didn’t believe a word of it. “I’m going upstairs.”
“My children are sleeping. You’ll not go up those stairs.” Ren blocked his path, but Moser tried to push past him. Ren clutched his lapels, then ground out his next words through clenched teeth. “You’ll not take another step without a warrant signed by the magistrate. Now get out of my house.”
“I know he’s here.”
“You’re wrong. Now, get out and stay out.”
“I’m coming back with a warrant. With the law.”
“See that you do, because that’s what it’ll take to get past me.”
“You might be a big man on the water, but you ain’t so big on the land.” Moser spit on the floor by Patience’s feet, then stomped through the door. Ren closed the door behind him. When he turned around, he saw Hitty standing at the top of the stairs in her nightgown, shivering.
“Papa, what did that man want?”
He went halfway up the stairs to her. “He’s mistaken, Hitty. He thought we had something that belonged to him, but he’s wrong.”
“He said
he’s coming back.”
“Never you mind that. I’ve dealt with plenty of men like him. I won’t let him harm you or Henry.”
Without warning, Hitty burst into tears. She ran down three steps and threw her arms around Ren’s neck. Startled at first, he didn’t know what to do, then he did what came naturally. He lifted her up and embraced her. “There now, darlin’, there’s nothing to be afraid of.” He carried her downstairs and into the keeping room, surprised to see the morning sky had lit the room. Patience had already tucked away Abraham’s bedroll and was stirring the hearth to prepare a meal. Everything seemed normal again, though it wasn’t. Ren’s mind went through the sequence for the day—he would need to see the magistrate before Moser did and find out what Nantucket Island’s current laws were regarding runaway slaves.
But for now, his daughter needed comforting. And she had called him Papa, not Captain, sir. That alone was worth the morning’s trouble. “Hitty, hush now. You’ll wake your brother.”
She took a deep breath, and lifted her head. “But Henry’s gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean, gone?”
“I don’t know. I woke up when I heard the ugly man’s voice and Henry’s bed was empty.”
Alarmed, Ren swiveled around to see Patience. “Did you see Henry go?”
“No, Captain, sir.”
Hitty started wailing. “He’s gone! That man stole Henry!”
“Nay, nay, child. Calm yourself. Your imagination is running amok.” But then Ren remembered Henry had been on his heels as he went down the stairs. The boy must have slipped out the door and gone to the docks with Abraham. “I think I know where Henry is. Are you all right to stay with Patience while I go looking?”
She nodded and he set her down in the chair, then took the stairs two at a time to change as fast as he could and hurry to the docks.
Ren tipped his hat to cover his face from the rain and tightened the cloak around his neck. He hurried toward Straight Wharf to make sure the dory had been taken, but to his surprise, there was a crowd gathered despite the rain, eerily somber. And among the crowd, he saw Silas Moser.
Rain pounded as Daphne hurried to Centre Street, dripped on her face from her bonnet rim even as she tried to protect the books in her arms with her cloak. The front door was left wide open at the Centre Street house, yet no one was at home. Daphne dropped her armful of books from her father’s library on the table in the keeping room and went back outside. Two boys were running past the house when she called out to them. “What’s thy hurry?”
They stopped abruptly, round faces bright with excitement, even with the rain coming down hard. “A dory capsized. Down in the harbor.”
“Whose?”
“His.” One of the boys pointed to the house. “Captain Macy’s.”
“Thee must be mistaken.” The words were a whispered lament, and her fingers covered her lips. Reactions tumbled through her in swift succession: there’s got to be some mistake . . . it’s too early for Ren to have left for the Endeavour . . . he couldn’t possibly have capsized . . . he knows how to sail through any storm . . . there must be a terrible mistake.
But a moment later she hiked up her skirts and flew down the street, crossing deserted Main Street, and ran on toward the gray churning water of the harbor. The closer she came to the wharves, the greater grew her terror, for she saw a crowd gathered there, despite the rain, all faces turned toward the bar. On the calmest day there were breakers over Nantucket Bar; when the wind came in from the north, pushing the ocean toward the shore, as it did now, the waves grew steep.
She shouldered her way through the crowd to Patience, who stood under a tree with Hitty pressed tightly against her. “What’s happened? I heard that Captain Macy . . .” Her voice drizzled to a stop.
“No, mistress. He is there.” Patience pointed down toward the end of the wharf, to a group of men preparing to go out in a fishing boat.
And then Daphne saw Ren, and her knees turned to water. Praise God, those boys had been mistaken!
She looked at Patience with relief and quickly realized something else was awry. “What is it?” A terrible thought clutched her.
Hitty looked up, tears running down her face. “Henry’s dead!”
“No, little miss. We do not know that he is drowned.” Patience held Hitty close against her, to shelter her from the rain and from hearing unnecessary conjecture from others. “Captain Macy is down at the end of the dock, Miss Daphne. Speak to him.”
Daphne swallowed and made her way down the dock to Ren, listening to people mumble about the missing son of Captain Macy. When he saw her, he hurried to her and pulled her to the side, out of others’ hearing distance. “Abraham took the dory to the Endeavour this morning and I believe Henry followed him.” He told her of Silas Moser’s visit to the house this morning.
“They are together, Abraham and Henry?”
“I don’t know.” At last he choked, “I don’t know where else the boy could be,” as if unable to comprehend how an incredible thing like this could have happened.
“Ren, is thee confident they took the dory? Could not it have slipped off its cleats during the rain?”
“All I know for sure is that the dory has capsized. And this . . . this was found.” He held out Henry’s small black broad-brimmed hat, dripping water. She nearly faltered at the stricken look that darkened his eyes. “But there’s no sign of his . . . of a . . .” He couldn’t put voice to the words. “We’re going out with nets to try and find . . . them.”
Daphne had seen this sight many times before—searchers scouring the harbor with fishing nets, seeking missing fishermen. She studied the squared shoulders of the men as they prepared for the gruesome task. Her mind couldn’t accept that Henry could be out there, nor could she imagine Abraham allowing a dory to capsize. After hearing stories of him from Ren, she knew he was too smart a sailor, too savvy for such a novice mistake. “Abraham was with him?”
Ren put a finger to his mouth. “Shhh. Quiet. I believe so. But others do not know that. They must not know.” He glanced at Silas Moser, who kept his eyes on them both. Then he turned back to Daphne. “Tell me, is there any chance . . . does Henry know how to swim?”
“No. Not really.”
His gaze shifted to Hitty, standing under a tree with Patience.
She didn’t have to guess what he was thinking: Please, God. Not another death for the little girl to bear. “Ren, remain hopeful until all hope is lost.”
Someone in the fishing boat called out to Ren to come and he clutched her arm, an anguished look in his eyes. “Take Hitty home. Don’t let her witness this.” He handed her Henry’s hat and walked back, chin tucked, shoulders slumped, to the clump of men standing by the fishing boat. As Ren climbed into the boat, she turned and headed back down the dock. Murmurs of sympathy surrounded her as she edged toward the start of the dock.
“I’m so sorry, dear.”
“Such a pity.”
“The sea has no mercy, not even for a child.”
Daphne gripped Henry’s hat even more tightly as these pitying words swirled around her. Each person meant well, she knew that, but something deep down inside her refused to accept what seemed to be factual. She simply could not believe that Henry and Abraham were gone, without a trace, other than this sopping wet hat.
A thought flitted through her mind, then returned. She picked up her skirts and nearly ran to the tree where Patience stood with Hitty. Patience wore a stoic look, but Daphne could see her hands were quivering. Hitty had tears streaming down her round cheeks.
Daphne crouched down and grasped her shoulders. “Dry thy tears, Hitty. ’Tis not time to cry yet.”
The little chin trembled. “Then when?”
“I’ll tell thee when. But not now. Not yet.” She stood and looked back toward the wharf to see where Silas Moser stood with a clump of men. His back was to them. “Come with me,” she said. “Quickly.”
“Where are we going?”
; “I’ll tell thee on the way. Better still,” she said as she picked up her pace on Main Street, “I think thee might soon be able to guess.”
Not twenty minutes later, they stood at the small dock that jutted off the back of Lillian Coffin’s property. Daphne’s sailing sloop was gone. Far out on the horizon, she spotted a small single triangle of a sail, bobbing up and down among the waves.
Mary Coffin Starbuck
15 February 1663
’Tis an odd and uncomfortable thing to keep a secret from my husband, even if my intent is for his own good. I have thought of sharing my secret with him, the words have nearly spilled from my lips on a number of occasions, but they have stopped on my tongue.
Nathaniel would feel compelled to take the matter to Richard Swain and I do not feel such a compulsion.
True problem solving, Peter Foulger once told me, finds a solution that satisfies everyone.
And there lies my conundrum. We are a small community on Nantucket and must depend on each other to survive if we hope to thrive on this island. Surely, trust amongst each other must be a guiding principle.
And then there is Richard himself. He is a forceful personality. Even my own dear, blustery father, who has locked horns with nearly everyone and considers himself the patriarch of the island, even he has taken pains to avoid an entanglement with Richard.
Yet if I confess to Richard Swain of the Negro’s hiding place, how can I make peace with myself? For after many sleepless nights, much heartfelt prayer, studying the Holy Scriptures, I have come to a soul-certainty that slavery is against God’s intentions for mankind. God created each one of us in his own image, male and female, right from the beginning of time. Each one. If we go against the laws of God, what else matters? For it would be far worse to displease God than to displease Richard Swain.
I suppose that is the answer I have been searching for. I cannot return the Negro to Richard Swain. I cannot.
That brings up another dilemma. If I help the Negro run away on this island, where can he run?
14
Ren spent the rest of the morning searching with the fishermen for some sign of Henry and Abraham, stretching nets between dories, dragging, pulling, hauling up empty nets. Again and again, time after time, the nets came up empty. The weather only worsened as the day wore on, and yet they did not stop searching, these fine, brave Nantucketers.
Minding the Light Page 17
