Benjamin Franklin's Bastard: A Novel

by Sally Cabot

  “Deborah. Debby.”

  Deborah held up her hands, shook her head. “No,” she said. “No.” She began a slow walk toward the stairs, but found herself careening up them. She dashed into the bedroom, shut the door, and fell facedown on the bed. Sleep, she thought. She would sleep, and when she woke she would discover it but a dream. A nightmare.

  A knock sounded on the door.

  “Leave me be!”

  The door opened. Deborah rolled away from it. She felt the bed sag behind her, but he didn’t touch her. She imagined him peering over her raised hip, attempting to get a glimpse of her face. She pushed it deeper into the bolster.

  He said, “I know I should say to you that this is your choice, but I confess some difficulty in uttering anything resembling the word choice. What choice do we have in this? How can we live with ourselves if we turn this child away?”

  Deborah sat up and swung around on him.

  “Who is this child’s mother?”

  “No one.”

  “I want to know her name.”

  “She’s no one, Debby. I declare, I never heard a last name and would be hard pressed to remember the first. She was part of an old, unhealthy habit I’ve long since given up.”

  “Long since given up! And how old is this infant?”

  “Very well then, perhaps not long since given up, but given up, I promise you, well before I took you to wife. I’ve been a faithful husband to you.”

  Deborah got up off the bed and walked out of the room, leaving Benjamin sitting as he was. She took the stairs and continued at the end of them until she found herself in the street. She began to walk, thinking her mind might work better with some blood pumping into it, but instead her mind stopped thinking altogether. After a time she began to notice the many passersby in the busy street, and there her mind became an unfriendly companion. At every woman she saw she thought, Is this the creature that lay with him? At every man, she wondered if he knew her husband’s secret.

  Husband. It was a word Benjamin had uttered, but was it a true one? The answer, of course, was no, it was not—Benjamin was not her husband by any law and therefore not in any way that bound Deborah to obey him and accept this child born of his uncontrollable lust. But as Deborah walked on and on she discovered herself looking at the question from the opposite side of it—he was not her lawful husband, and therefore what bound him to this “marriage,” when out on the street somewhere walked a woman who had already borne a child for him? How objectionable must this woman be for Benjamin to cast her aside for an unlawful marriage to a woman without any great beauty or learning or means? Or was that the answer to the riddle, no doubt being asked yet throughout Philadelphia: Why should a Benjamin Franklin take pity on a Deborah Read, or a Deborah Rogers, as she perhaps still was to them? Had Benjamin known of this child and planned to drop it on Deborah from the start? Was that the bargain, then, his sudden return to her after he’d already been four years home, this hasty “marriage” where no real marriage could ever take place, all in exchange for adopting this child out of God-knows-what?

  Deborah walked on and on, and after a time she discovered that her thoughts had turned the matter around again. What if Benjamin hadn’t known of this child before he claimed Deborah as his wife? If that was the case, nothing now prevented him from leaving Deborah behind and marrying this other creature, this mother of his child, and yet he hadn’t even hinted at such a course. Instead, he’d come to her and asked her to take this child as her own boy.

  Her own boy. Deborah and Benjamin had lain together many times, both before he left for London and after it, but nothing had grown in her. What if this child was all that was to come to them of children? What if that cradle on that hearth she’d been dreaming of so long was to lie empty forever? Would she prefer another woman’s child to no child at all? Was this then her choice?

  Choice. Deborah had walked the length of the busy section of Market Street and deep into the unpopulated outskirts; she kept going, thinking on that word choice. Benjamin felt he had none, felt he owed this child he’d spawned a chance at a better life. He’d gone so far as to include Deborah in this lack of choice, and in truth, what was her choice? For whatever reason, this man had claimed her where no other man likely ever would and treated her not only as if she was his lawful wife, but as if she was a most treasured one. And what did she most treasure in this world? That affection Benjamin Franklin bathed her in day after day. Was that the bargain, then? In exchange for that affection, this child?

  Child. Despite herself Deborah felt her heart give a little leap. Of late Deborah had secretly begun to fear a life without any children, had feared Benjamin’s turning away from her because of her failure to produce one. Instead, he was offering her one, as he’d offered her everything else: his name, his protection, her life.

  Deborah turned around. She didn’t hasten her steps, but took them with all deliberation, letting her mind turn again and again as she walked, one minute seeing one side of Benjamin, the next seeing the other; one minute seeing one side of the child and the next the other. By the time she reentered the house, she was of no one mind on either thing. She looked in the kitchen and parlor and study but found no Benjamin, and a shudder took her; what if he’d despaired of the size of her heart and left? What if he’d gone to that other woman, whoever she was, having given his false wife her fair chance, free now to take a true wife, to take his true son into his heart?

  Deborah climbed the stairs, pushed open the bedroom door she had slammed behind her on her way out, and there he lay, on their bed, hands folded across his chest, eyes closed, profile strong and stark against the weakening light. He turned to her as she entered, but she could see nothing of his expression in the shadows, no clues to either an eleventh-hour regret or a genuine relief. If only he would say something, anything, some words that would allow her to summon the right words to say back!

  Benjamin lifted his hand, and that proved to be enough. It drew Deborah across the room and down beside him on the bed.

  “Dare I ask? Is it yes?”

  Deborah nodded, relieved to have no need of words after all.

  Benjamin clasped her fingers in both his hands and held them tight against his chest. “My wife,” he said. “My remarkable wife.”

  10

  Philadelphia, 1731

  HE APPEARED AT EADES Alley so late that all but Anne and Mary were asleep. The girls were trying to catch up on William’s dirty clouts, and the kitchen smelled of scalded urine and wet cloth drying. At the knock the girls looked at each other in some alarm, but Mary was first to drop her clouts and go to the door to call through the crack, “Who is it?”

  “Mr. Franklin.”

  Mary rounded her eyes at Anne and lifted the latch; Franklin stepped into the tiny kitchen and stood silent, stared blankly at Mary until she turned and continued up the stairs. He came up to Anne without greeting and held out a folded paper.

  “Go to this address. ’Tis an upholstery shop. Ask for this man. He’s got work and a room for you. Do well and you can make something of it.”

  Anne wiped her hands on her apron and took the paper: SOLOMON GRISSOM, UPHOLSTERER. FRONT STREET.

  “He’s expecting you.”

  Anne lifted her head. “And William?”

  Franklin took in a breath that visibly expanded, then deflated, his chest. “I’ll be taking William.”

  Anne backed away from Franklin, crimping the paper in her hand, shaking her head.

  “Anne. See sense. Think what I might give him. Proper food and clothes, a good house, a decent education, a father’s guidance and affection.”

  “And what of a mother’s affection?”

  “He’ll have a mother’s affection. I’ve discussed this with my wife and she’s eager to take him. ’Tis best for him. Surely you see that.” As if to make his point he looked around the kitchen, at the first batch of clouts hanging on a string before the fire to dry, at the next batch looped sloppily over the sid
e of the washtub and dripping on the floor, at the sparsely filled cupboard, at the chair with the broken rungs, and, last, at the pulled stockings and split shoes on Anne’s feet. “ ’Tis best for you,” he said softly.

  Anne went to the tub and gathered up the dripping cloth, tipping it back into the dirty water. She took off her apron and wiped up the spilled water with it. She went to the fire and jabbed at the expiring coals till they sparked, then began ripping the dried clouts off the line.

  Franklin came up behind her and took her laundry from her. “I should like to see the boy.”

  How cold a thing panic was! How hot. Anne backed away from the fire, away from Franklin, away from the stairs where William lay, as if she were a hen drawing the fox away from her nest of eggs. But of course Franklin wouldn’t snatch the child and walk out the door. But of course he could. A child was the property of the father just as the wife was the property of the husband; in the end, if Franklin chose to claim his child and give it his name, there was little Anne could do to prevent it. She looked hard at Franklin’s face, trying to find the hidden cruelty that must have lurked in it all this time, but saw only pain—hers—reflected. He understood what he asked, then. Or he understood the half of it. He could understand nothing of what it meant in the light of the sentence the doctor had pronounced on her: She’ll not have another. But Anne had always been glad of that, of being able to make an extra coin here and there without fear of forcing another child into the world of Eades Alley.

  Eades Alley. It was as if Anne’s own thoughts were making Franklin’s case for him. But hadn’t that been Anne’s case too? Wasn’t she now being offered all she’d dreamed of for William? What kind of fool could refuse that? Anne. Anne could refuse it. She would make no argument, for she had none; she would simply walk away from the man, go to her son, open up her clam’s heart, and suck William safe inside it.

  Anne went to the stairs and started up them.

  “Annie.”

  She stopped.

  “I know well enough how bright you are. I know you’ll think over what’s best for him and for you. I’ll come back Friday next.”

  He left.

  ANNE FOUND WILLIAM AS she’d left him, asleep in the cradle jammed in at the foot of the bed that Anne shared with Mary. Next to her bed she could just make out the other two beds, pushed in tight with barely a foot between them, piled double and triple with her remaining five siblings. She sat down. Mary said, “Is he gone? Did he bring more money?”

  “He brought no money.” She paused. Could she say the words? Could she make them doubly real by letting them into this room too? “He wants William.”

  Mary flew upright. “What for?”

  “To raise up.”

  “To raise up!”

  Unable to speak, Anne nodded, not knowing if Mary could see her or not, but she seemed to. “To raise up,” she repeated. “Oh, Annie, what luck!”

  Oh, traitor Mary!

  Anne went to the cradle and picked up the boy; he was either too full of sleep to cry or already understood inside his tiny self that one person crying in so small a space was sufficient. After a time Anne felt Mary’s thin arm creep around her shoulder, her sleep-knotted hair come down against her cheek. “Lucky William,” she said. “Poor Annie.”

  Cruel, cruel Mary. She could have picked any words but those that might have left Anne with her conviction.

  A WEEK PASSED AS a blink, even less when viewed through the never-ending tears. Anne raged at the tears, at Franklin, at poor Mary, at her mother, at any small child who crossed her path. The only one spared was William, but William did not spare her—he woke through the night as he hadn’t done for some time; he cried even after he was fed, he pushed and struggled in her arms. But five days passed with Anne still fixed in her resolve to keep her child with her; she went to bed on the fifth night, a hot one, so stifling that when William woke flushed and fussing she was convinced he’d fallen ill. She sat cradling him in her arms and thought no one single thought that she could name, but one minute she was convinced of one thing and the next minute all was over. She’d decided. She knew. Or perhaps she’d only understood what she’d known five days before. William must go with Franklin.

  Odd how it was that once the matter was settled in Anne’s mind, William settled too. She carried him below stairs and sat in the dark and told him all she could dream of his new life to come; her voice seemed to soothe him and she knew it soothed her; his dead-sleeping weight grew heavy in her arms.

  They sat so till dawn.

  ANNE DIDN’T WAIT FOR Franklin to come back. At the end of the week she sent a note to the print shop with her eight-year-old brother, George. Take him now. Now while her will stayed strong. She was above stairs, folding and refolding William’s fresh-laundered clouts and shifts, when the knock came. She picked William out of his cradle and changed him from wet to dry, put him in the best of the linen, took up her father’s China-blue flannel scarf and laid it over her shoulder for William to rest against. Mary picked up William’s clothes and they descended the stairs, but Mary only continued as far as the table, where she set down William’s clothes and turned around.

  Franklin was sitting alone in the kitchen in one of the better chairs, doing something to the rung of another. As Anne came into the room he set down the chair and stood up; looking from the frail babe to the man, she was aware more than ever of the strength and power in him, but she looked longest at his face, taking a final cast of it. She reminded herself that she’d never seen anything hard or cruel in it; in fact, Franklin had been fairer than most. The money, yes, but who else would have found a place for her child at his hearth or a situation for her in an upholstery shop? Not the corder, certainly. Not the shipwright. Anne thought these things as she carried William to Franklin and held him out; Franklin opened his mouth as if to speak, but she shook her head violently; she needed to get her own words out while she still had her voice. “He’s full weaned. He takes a pap of bread and water but it should be milk, now we’re to the season for it. He likes the air but wants good blanketing.” She went to the table and picked up the freshly laundered clothes, but Franklin said, “We’ll not be needing them.”

  Anne looked down at the stains that would never come clean in the wash, the frayed corners from so many washings. Of course; the Franklins would have better ready. But Anne had something better ready too. She took the scarf from her shoulder and handed it across. “Keep it by him. ’Twas his grandfather’s.”

  Franklin took the scarf and tucked it into his pocket with care; he took the infant and cradled him against his waistcoat. Again, he opened his mouth to speak, but again Anne shook her head. “Go,” she said.

  He did so. And she hated him—oh, how she hated him—for it.

  11

  DEBORAH FRANKLIN HAD SAID yes. She reminded herself of this over and over again through the next few days. It was done. She’d said yes. At the time she’d imagined that the first conversation with Benjamin, the agonized decision that resulted from it, must be the hardest part of it; indeed, it had been easy enough to hem clouts and shifts, to send Benjamin out for a sturdier cradle than the one he’d first purchased, but she hadn’t anticipated the great upheaval that would then take place inside her head. Most often the questions came when they lay together in the dark, after they’d pleased each other and just before Benjamin had drifted off to sleep; Deborah hadn’t slept in a fortnight.

  “Who knows of this infant?” she asked.

  “No one but Grissom.”

  “Grissom!”

  “It was necessary to enlist him. I didn’t like to get any more acquainted than I was.”

  Deborah could find little to argue with on that point, but she couldn’t hold the main question back. “Who is she, Benjamin?”

  “No one, Debby. You may guess the sort. No one who knows us could know her or know a thing about this birth, I promise you that.”

  “And what are those who know us going to think when a child
suddenly appears in our house?”

  “They may think as they like.”

  “ ‘There goes Benjamin Franklin’s bastard and that fool woman who agreed to take it up!’ Or perhaps they’ll think another thing and say, ‘Well then, that explains that so-called marriage!’ ”

  “Not within my hearing, or they’ll be sorry for it. Do you forget that I’m now the editor of the Gazette? You must get your chin up, Debby, for his sake. You do, and I promise you, in another six months, any questions regarding this boy’s sudden arrival will be long forgot.” There Benjamin pulled her close and began to comb her hair with his fingers, a thing Deborah particularly liked—the firm but gentle working of his fingers against her scalp, the soft tug at the roots—and she found herself disinclined to raise any more questions, voice any more doubts. That didn’t mean that she believed all that Benjamin said—she rather believed that questions surrounding the editor of the Gazette might live on longer than they might if the man were, say, a chimney sweep—but only time could prove either case.

  Later, however, after Benjamin had left off playing with her hair and gone to sleep, Deborah discovered that she felt even more unsettled about the idea of this boy than she had before she’d brought the subject up. She followed the thread of unease backward through all the soothing words and then forward again till she landed on the sore spot—Benjamin had said that she was to get her chin up for the boy’s sake. Was all to be for the boy’s sake now? Was Deborah’s interest never to figure in it? Deborah pushed the thought away. Benjamin believed her heart large enough to hold him and this boy-not-her-son in it; she must believe his heart at least as large as that, large enough for a son and a not-his-wife.

  LATER YET, ANOTHER QUESTION occurred to Deborah. “When this boy grows, what do you plan to tell him of his mother?”