Seeking Eden

by Ann Turnbull

  He was the son of a wool dealer in Skipton and had been convinced of the truth at the age of eighteen in the 1650s and become one of the earliest Friends. When he spoke of the persecution and the struggles, I was reminded of my parents and how they too seemed to be forged of stronger metal than I, without doubts or fears. Even this journey to America they saw not as flight but as a new endeavour.

  “When did thou come to America?” I asked.

  “Sixteen sixty-nine,” he said. “Fourteen years ago.” I saw that Katherine was alert now, and listening. “My wife died the year before, in the spring of sixty-eight, when Kate was born. I felt, at that time, that everything was lost. My wife gone, my daughter puny and ailing – aye, I know” – he looked fondly at Katherine – “you’d not think it now. And I heard of Friends, many of them, going to America: to Maryland, New Jersey, New York – to a new life. I left the baby with my sister – she was a widow without children – and went off to the New World.”

  I wanted to know more about Katherine, but he began to ask me about my own childhood in London, and what our lives were like; what work I’d done, and what my interests were. I told him the things I thought he’d like to hear, leaving out the failed apprenticeship and the dockyard alehouses. All the time I was conscious of Katherine, listening as she sewed, the candlelight soft on her bowed head, the swift stab and pull of her needle.

  I told George Bainbrigg I’d always liked the docks, seeing the great ships come in; that I’d loved the river and the great city; had scarcely ever been into the country, though there was farmland around Stepney.

  “Thou’ll see wilder places here,” he promised. “And different folks. Trappers. Indians. Dutch, Swedes and Germans. I have a schooner, the Frances – thou hast perhaps seen her earlier, out in the river, though she’s away right now. The captain is Richard Grey. He trades on my behalf in Delaware and New Jersey, and up to New York and Boston. He’s not a Friend, but I like him well; we have worked together for years.”

  “I should like to travel,” I said.

  Katherine said suddenly, “Dad? Will we go to Barbados next year?”

  It was the first time she had spoken since supper.

  “Aye, I hope so,” her father said. He turned to me. “I have friends in Barbados, in Michael’s Town. Most years I go out there for a few weeks. It’s trade and pleasure mixed. And support for the meetings, of course. Barbados Friends are under duress.”

  Nine

  Next morning I began work. I’d hoped to see Katherine again before we went out, but my master roused me early and we left, without breakfast, before she came down.

  He showed me around the counting house. Downstairs, at the front, was the sales area with its huge set of scales and tables for weighing out dry goods or displaying cloth. Barrels of dried fish and several great casks of sugar stood along one wall.

  “I’m low in sugar,” he said. “Most of my stock went to England on the Chepstow. Grain, other perishables, they move through quickly. I hope to shift the wool soon. Come upstairs. I’ll show thee the storeroom.”

  The stairs were wide and open. On the upper floor were stored paper, tobacco, timber and household goods. Shelves were stacked high with bales of cloth, each one wrapped in paper, stamped with the width, type, quality and place of origin. Most of it was shipped from Liverpool or Bristol. George Bainbrigg pulled out a bale of flecked grey wool and partially unrolled it.

  “Feel that – go on, get hold of it, lad! That’s a good warm homespun, from Yorkshire. Now this” – he hauled out another bale – “this is kersey. And that’s broadcloth. And here’s fustian – feel how soft that is. Thou’ll need to get a feel for all these fabrics. I’ve got linens, too, but I deal mainly in wool. I grew up with it; still have contacts in old England.”

  Some of the cloth would go to auction, he said, the rest to the new shops that were opening up in the city. The boxes of nails I’d unpacked the week before had been split up into more manageable amounts for sale.

  “A lot of the tools – the scythes and saws – have been sold already. Tell thy father there’s a good hardware shop on Second Street: Gerrit Bakker’s.”

  “We already found it,” I said.

  “Good, good. Come down to the offices now.” He led the way. “I’ll show thee the books. That’ll be thy task, much of the time. Thy father said thou’rt skilled at reckoning?”

  “I am,” I said. It was something I felt confident about. I knew I was quick and rarely made mistakes.

  “But thou won’t have learned double-entry bookkeeping? I’ll have to teach thee that.”

  He pulled out one of the ledgers and showed me the pages of neatly-written entries in red and black ink – Matt Peel’s work, I supposed.

  I saw that most payments were in goods. “So much sugar!” I said.

  “Aye, the sugar! We get huge quantities in exchange for grain and meat. Most of it goes to England. Now, this room here is my own office…”

  He led me into an adjoining room where there was a large table spread with books and papers. All around the walls were maps.

  “Ah, I see thou’rt drawn to the maps,” he said, as I moved to look at the largest one. It was disappointingly lacking in detail. Philadelphia was marked and, leading from it, several long-distance tracks that he said were Indian trails – the only roads. Along the river, he pointed out Burlington, Chester and Newcastle. “I’ll begin to teach thee something of navigation later,” he said.

  The sea on the map was decorated with drawings of spouting whales, dragon-like sea monsters, and cherubs blowing ships across the ocean. I followed the coastline north to New York and Boston, and south to Maryland and Virginia. I’d seen smaller versions of such maps at home in London, but they held more meaning for me now that I had the prospect of travelling to some of these places.

  There was a safe in the room, and a tall bookcase, curtains at the windows, and a rug in front of the fire. Clearly this was George Bainbrigg’s haven when he was at work.

  “Here are the keys.” He took a bunch of keys from his belt and checked them off for me: “The outer doors, back and front; the two offices; the storerooms.” He put them into my hand. “Thou’ll need them in the morning. From now on I’ll expect thee to come down and open up first thing, and lock up in the evening if I’m not here. It’ll be thy job to keep the wood stock topped up, light the fires, fetch water and beer, fill the inkwells, sweep the floors and keep the sales area looking spruce.”

  I nodded. There would be a weight of responsibility: the accounts, the keys, all the things I must remember and take care of. I looked forward to it – relished it, even.

  In the adjoining office he set me to copying some entries from the ledgers. I saw that he wanted to test my accuracy, so I concentrated on the task.

  After about an hour he sent me back to the house to fetch breakfast for us: beer and warm pies, fresh from the oven. Mary put them into a basket for me.

  Isobel slipped in an extra pie. “Thou won’t go hungry here, lad. Thou’rt as thin as a lath, any road; could do with putting on a bit of weight – eh, Mary?”

  Mary looked up at me diffidently as she handed me the jug and basket. She was probably seventeen at least, but very short – stunted, as the poor often are. Her hands were red and calloused from hard work. When I took the jug she made a slight involuntary bobbing movement, a hint of a curtsey, although I was sure George Bainbrigg would not expect such deference, even for himself.

  I left by the garden gate and walked along the short path that led to the back of the counting house. Zachary joined us for breakfast, and we sat on benches by the fire in the outer office, where there was a shelf with tankards and a bowl for washing dishes. The pies were good, but it was a short break; I saw that George Bainbrigg liked to get most of his work done in the morning. I returned to my copying, and later wrote out an invoice for a customer under my master’s supervision.

  I did not see Katherine again until dinner, which was the main meal of the
day and eaten soon after noon. This time the table was set for five, and both the house servants were there. My master sat at the head of the table; Isobel was at the end and Mary nearest the door, from where Isobel despatched her from time to time to fetch another dish.

  The meal began with silent waiting on God and continued in silence except for necessary speech, and George Bainbrigg’s thanks to Isobel and Mary for the food. Mary looked subdued, and I guessed she would have preferred to eat in the kitchen. I was opposite Katherine, acutely aware of her, of her gaze connecting with mine when I looked up, of the colour coming and going in her fair complexion, of her hands, white and smooth-skinned, not roughened like Mary’s. The dog, Hob, once again stationed himself beside my chair, so close that he leaned against my leg. When I reached and put a piece of meat on my plate he gave a sigh with a whimpered enquiry in it. I caught Katherine’s eye and we both shook with suppressed laughter.

  I longed for a chance to talk to Katherine alone, but there seemed to be no way that this could be achieved with any propriety. I wondered how she occupied herself. Sewing, perhaps? Or studying? She was too old for school.

  In the afternoon George Bainbrigg expressed himself pleased with the accuracy of my copying. He seemed relieved at this, remarking, “Some lads can’t copy owt but they litter it with errors.” I felt I had passed a test. Later in the week, he said, he would begin to explain to me the system of bookkeeping he used. “But for now, thou can take a break from the books and give Zach a hand upstairs. We’ll hold the public vendue next week; thou’ll see how that works.” Then he looked at me sharply, as if a thought had struck him. “Dost’ have any skill at lettering, by chance? Design, I mean. We’ll need a poster or two, and some handbills, to get the word out.”

  “I could do that,” I said. I felt pleased and interested. “I’d enjoy it.”

  “Good. I’ll give thee the details. Do a draft, and show me. Keep it simple. We’ve no printer yet – as thou know – so each one must be drawn by hand.”

  I set to with enthusiasm, and spent the next hour designing a poster. I used bold lettering for the words “GOODS FROM ENGLAND”, and made the letters stand out like solid objects; then added, “from the ship Chepstow, lately come from Bristol. To be sold at Public Vendue on seventh-day the 20th of ninth-month, called November, at 12 noon at the premises of George Bainbrigg and Thos. Appleyard, merchants.”

  I went up to the storeroom and sketched some of the objects for sale. The furniture was decorative, so I put a drawing of one of the chairs in one corner, and a bale of cloth in the opposite one. I placed a simple drawing of a ship at the top. For a frame to contain everything I simply drew two straight parallel lines.

  George Bainbrigg came in while I was putting the finishing touches to my work.

  “This is excellent!” he said. “I see thou like to draw. Do two or three of these, and we’ll put them up around Front Street. The handbills can be smaller” – he sketched a size in the air.

  “Octavo,” I said.

  “That’s the one! No drawings on the handbills. Date, time, place, ‘goods from England’. That’ll be enough. Folk coming into town will take them back to the outlying areas and the news will pass around.”

  The next morning he left me in the counting house while he went to a meeting of the Society of Traders. I worked steadily at copying the handbills. It was mindless work, once the designing was done, but I knew he needed them as soon as possible, since the sale was fixed for next week.

  I was working, head down, when I heard someone come into the outer office.

  I jumped up and went to the door, thinking it might be a customer, but it was Katherine. My heartbeat quickened. She seemed to be alone.

  “I’m helping Izzie,” she said, and I saw that she had brought a jug of beer and a folded napkin containing something that smelt fragrant.

  “I’m sorry, I should have come to fetch that! I forgot.” I could not believe my good fortune.

  “No matter. These are caraway-seed buns. Izzie and I made them this morning. Try one.”

  I took a bun, and bit into it, aware of her watching me, half smiling, waiting for a response.

  “It’s good,” I said, trying not to spray crumbs. “Won’t thou have one?”

  “No. They are for thee – and Zachary.”

  “Thy father is at the Society…” I began.

  “I know. He told me thou had designed a poster. He seemed very pleased with it.”

  I showed her a copy. “Thy father has taken one to the Society’s hall today. This one will go outside, on the street door.”

  “Thou can draw well,” she said.

  I felt pleased. It was rarely that I was praised for drawing, and from Katherine praise was especially welcome.

  “They are just sketches. But I like to draw. My mother disapproves.” I put on a mock frown. “No drawing. No dancing. No singing.”

  She giggled.

  “Is thy father strict?” I asked.

  “He has no time for singing or dancing, but I think that would be the same whatever his beliefs. But Aunt Jane, who brought me up, she sang. She never became a Friend, although she was close to them. She was a draper’s widow, and ran the business in Settle after her husband’s death. She used to sing around the house” – she smiled – “stirring hymns, that sort of thing! And she liked stories. She’d tell me stories about the family: the day her grandfather bought a donkey at the fair; how my uncle Marmaduke courted the notary’s daughter; the winter of the big snow that her grandmother remembered, when they couldn’t get out for weeks. And of course stories about me … all sorts of things. I loved Aunt Jane.”

  “But thou left her?”

  “She died. She got ill, and for a year I looked after her and ran the shop and dealt with customers—”

  “At – what? – eleven years old?”

  “Yes. I had help from neighbours, of course, and from another aunt. Then, when Aunt Jane died and all the family started talking about who would take me in, I thought, None of them shall – I’m going to America to be with my father.”

  “So thou knew him? He wrote to thee?”

  “He visited when I was five, and again four years later. But he wrote letters to me all the time, and sent me little gifts, and I wrote back (Aunt Jane had sent me to school and I learnt to write). So we knew each other, and I loved him, even though he’d only been back twice. Of course he set off for England when the news reached him that Aunt Jane was dying, and when I heard he was on his way I decided I’d go back with him.” She smiled. “I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. I had a bag packed and ready to take with me.”

  “And was it what he wanted, too?”

  “He came round to the idea. He was worried about his home life not being settled. Said he needed a wife, to be a mother to me; and a bigger house, and servants. I said I didn’t need all those things! Any road, he hired Izzie in Langcliffe, and Mary from the orphanage at Skipton, and we four sailed out together, and stayed with Friends in Maryland until he found a house.”

  “And thou hast not regretted it?”

  “No! I love being with him at last. I was sorry to leave the people I knew in Maryland and come here. I don’t love Philadelphia yet – especially the muddy roads – ugh!” We both laughed. “But thee?” she said. “Don’t thou miss London? I would.”

  I replied, teasing, “How can thou know thou would?”

  “Oh! Because London is such a great city, and so famous, so much to see – and the king lives there! What was it like, where thou lived? Did thou work in thy father’s shop?”

  “I worked in the shambles, as a butcher’s boy,” I said.

  She pulled a face of disgust, and I laughed and said, “Not for long. I took the job to annoy my father—”

  “Oh! Why?”

  She was wide-eyed now. I was enjoying her attention, but at that moment we heard Zachary moving about in the storeroom overhead, and that reminded me that I was keeping him from his breakfast and
wasting my master’s time.

  “I’ll tell thee later,” I promised.

  And Katherine said, “Thou must! But for now I’ll leave thee to thy work.”

  In a moment she was gone.

  I called Zachary, and poured beer into two tankards. She’s a chatterer, I thought – worse than Betty. Well, I’d encouraged her. I’d wanted to keep her there. She had such a sparkle about her, such liveliness. And she seemed to like me. She had come down here alone – and she had known her father was away; she said so. I wondered if Isobel had known that, when she let her bring the food and drink; I guessed not.

  I felt pleased with life and full of hopeful anticipation. In this mood I went home on seventh-day, which was my half-day off.

  It felt strange to be back in the log cabin – like being in a dolls’ house, I joked to Sarah. I had forgotten already how cramped it was. There was news. My mother had found that a school had been started in a Friend’s house, and Sarah had been enrolled in it; Betty, however, would help with the house and shop. Betty bombarded me with questions about the Bainbriggs, my room, what my master was like, what Katherine was like, whether the servants were friendly. Sarah asked whether there was a dog, or a cat; she was hankering after a pet herself, but our mother had said no – “Not till we have a proper house.”

  “Both,” I said, in answer to Sarah. I told her about Hob and made her laugh.

  Betty was jealous of my room. And she questioned me closely about Katherine – almost, I felt, as if she could read my thoughts. “I wish I could meet her again,” she said. “I don’t know any girls here, except Esther Kite. No one to talk to.”

  I could see that my parents were also anxious to hear about my first week – the first week of their investment, I thought wryly – but they did not press me for news; that is not their way. Only, when I had been back a while, and we had eaten, my mother, passing by, touched my cheek and said, “Well, thou look happy, son.”

  I smiled. “Yes. My master is good to me. They all are.” I told them who lived there; that Isobel was keeping me well fed; that I would be learning a complex form of accounting. I told them about the poster for the auction. My mother was pleased. “I hoped thou’d find a proper use for thy drawing,” she said.