White Seed: The Untold Story of the Lost Colony of Roanoke

by Paul Clayton

  “Lionel!” Sir Robert hissed.

  Lionel crept over and both men pulled their swords. They crept to the edge of the ramparts.

  Sir Robert turned and hissed back at them, “Quiet!” Crouching, he brought back his sword, ready to thrust it into whoever mounted the steps to the ramparts. As she watched, Maggie vowed to leap to her death if the soldiers came, rather than go back to the gaol and be hanged.

  They waited in silence and then Maggie heard the unmistakable sound of a footfall on the steps below. A figure loomed into view. Sir Robert appeared ready to thrust when he cursed vehemently, “God’s blood, man!”

  Widow Bane’s gray-headed serving man, Smith’s, eyes were wide with fear.

  “God a mercy!” Widow Bane said softly, “‘tis my fault. I should have told you that he was on his way…”

  “Never mind,” said Sir Robert. “Lionel! Start them down the ladder.”

  Maggie could not keep her eyes from searching the darkness of the common, hoping not to spot anyone else. Someone touched her on the shoulder. “Maggie,” whispered Ananias, “‘tis time to go.”

  Maggie quickly climbed down the ladder and stood with the others. When all were down, Sir Robert and Manteo led them into the woods. Once inside, they again waited a few precious minutes while Ananias hurriedly carved their destination into the bark of a tree. Maggie continued to look back at the fort, marveling that they had finally gotten out.

  The crickets kept up a rhythmic racket as they walked through the woods. People held onto one another in the blackness like a column of blind men. Maggie held onto Eleanor with one hand and Widow Bane with the other. They walked for what seemed to be a half of an hour and then they stopped to rest. Maggie gratefully sat on the forest floor. She could smell the fecund water of the sound and knew they were close to the beach. A moment later someone sat beside her and began crying softly. Maggie realized it was Eleanor.

  “What is it, mistress?” Maggie asked.

  Eleanor sniffled wetly. “Virginia is so quiet, Maggie. I fear for her.”

  Maggie felt the girl’s brow. It was warm; her eyes were closed. “She is sleeping. ‘Tis the tea, is all.”

  “Maggie,” said Eleanor, “I am afraid.”

  “Aye,” said Maggie, “as are we all. But we shall soon leave this place forever.”

  Eleanor said nothing further and soon her crying ceased. Maggie searched the darkness in the direction from which they’d come. All was quiet and still and she prayed that God would bring all of heaven and earth to a stop now so that they could sit in this blackness forever, hidden from the eyes of the soldiers and savages. She had a vision of Humphrey’s elfish face smiling at her and her spirits grew hopeful.

  All around Maggie in the darkness the others talked softly. She recognized Manteo’s voice among them. “Out there,” he said, “look!”

  “I see nothing,” said Ananias.

  “There,” said Sir Robert, “torches.”

  Maggie’s earlier panic returned.

  “Up, everyone,” came Sir Robert’s disembodied voice. “Quickly.”

  Maggie’s heart was pounding again as several people nearby began to cry.

  “‘Tis the canoes,” whispered Ananias. “We are saved!”

  “Manteo’s people have come,” said Sir Robert in an excited whisper. “Quickly now. Let us go to them.”

  “Maggie,” Eleanor called out, “what if ‘tis not Manteo’s people? What if ‘tis Powhatan?”

  The thought chilled Maggie but she said nothing. They threaded their way through the trees, coming out onto the beach. As a slight breeze moved her hair, Maggie spotted several bright lights upon the sound and realized they were torch-lit canoes. Unencumbered by the trees, the faint starlight gathered and seemed to intensify on the white sand, making people’s faces visible. Parson Lambert, Ananias, and the other men went down to the water’s edge to meet the Croatoans. Soon the canoes were grinding up onto the sand. Each had a tall pine-knot torch affixed to its center and was manned by at least six Croatoan braves. Maggie recognized Manteo’s mother, Tookemay, sitting in the center of one of them.

  Ananias came up to Maggie. “Where are Eleanor and Virginia?”

  Maggie looked around, realizing that she had not seen Eleanor since they’d left the shelter of the woods. “Mother of God!” she said. “I know not. I last spoke to her in the woods. And where is Manteo?”

  Ananias turned away and called worriedly to Sir Robert, “Eleanor never came out of the woods.”

  “Aye,” said Sir Robert. “Perhaps Manteo is with her. Let us have a look.” He pulled his sword. “Parson Lambert! You and the others, get in the canoes.”

  After Robert and Ananias went into the woods, Maggie went over to the canoes. Most of the others had already climbed into the native craft, and sat waiting. Manteo’s mother beckoned for Maggie to get in, but she remained on the sand. She did not want to board until Eleanor, Virginia, and Manteo had come out of the woods.

  After a while, Lionel, Manteo and Towaye materialized in the darkness and Maggie felt relieved. As Manteo spoke softly to his mother in their language, Maggie told Lionel that Sir Robert and Ananias had gone off to try and find Eleanor and her Virginia. Lionel pulled his sword and paced the sand anxiously. They waited for what must have been a quarter of an hour and Lionel stopped his pacing and shook his head.

  “Where in Hades are they?” he said. He began walking off, “I will see if I can find them.”

  Sir Robert and Ananias emerged from the tree line. Eleanor was not with them.

  Robert hurried over. “Maggie, you and Ananias and the others must get in the canoes now. We can wait no longer.”

  Lionel took Maggie’s hand and helped her into Tookemay’s canoe. Ananias continued to pace in the surf, looking back at the woods. Maggie watched his worried face, illuminated in the canoe’s torchlight.

  “Eleanor!” Ananias called in a plaintive voice.

  “Ananias,” said Sir Robert. “We can wait no longer. Get in.”

  “Nay,” said Ananias, “I cannot!” He ran off toward the woods, disappearing into the darkness.

  “Ananias!” Robert called after him.

  Maggie looked about worriedly as they waited. Some time passed and still Ananias did not return. Then a lone figure appeared coming down the beach. “Someone is there!” Maggie cried, pointing.

  The dark shape slowly took form -- Eleanor, with little Virginia clutched tightly to her bosom.

  “Thank God!” said Maggie. She stood to help Eleanor and her child into the canoe.

  “Where is Ananias?” Eleanor asked Maggie as she looked around.

  “I know not, mistress. He went off to find you.”

  Eleanor moaned in grief. “God a mercy!” She began rocking Virginia.

  Sir Robert waved his sword to signal Tookemay that they should go. The Croatoan canoes began backing into the surf. As Sir Robert and the other men made ready to climb in the canoes, more than a dozen figures ran out of the woods up the beach, several clutching pine knot torches. Maggie recognized Captain Stafford and the unmistakably huge figure of Goliath in the lead. Spotting them, Robert, Manteo, Towaye, Lionel, and three of the Croatoan warriors left the canoes.

  “Turn the canoes!” Robert shouted. “Get them into deeper water.”

  The Croatoan paddlers looked to Tookemay for instruction as Robert and the others took up positions on the beach. Another mob of several dozen soldiers emerged from the woods and ran, shouting, down the beach.

  Maggie cringed as the clang of swords and angry shouts filled the night. She looked about for Manteo and saw him fighting with one of the soldiers not far away.

  Tookemay called and gestured to the Croatoan paddlers of the dugouts and they began moving their craft into deeper water. After a few minutes, Towaye and Lionel broke loose and ran into the surf toward Tookemay’s canoe. Maggie looked about for Manteo, praying that he had already climbed into another canoe. A cacophony of shrieks and howls suddenly fi
lled the night air as if the gates of hell had burst open. Several hundred yards down the beach, a mass of Powhatan’s braves poured from the forest like a river. Screaming and waving their war clubs, they ran toward the soldiers.

  Several figures broke away from the fighting on the beach and ran into the surf, headed for the canoes. Maggie recognized one of them as Sir Robert. As he pushed through the water, someone pushed through just behind him.

  Sir Robert turned in time to parry a blow from Stafford’s sword. Stafford’s next blow sent Robert’s sword flying and it disappeared into the water. Stafford sheathed his sword and leapt at Robert, wrestling him away from the canoes. The two men fought like animals, thrashing about in the water. Maggie watched as Stafford’s hands found Robert’s throat. He pushed the gentleman under the water shouting, “What now, sir? What now?”

  Moments went by and Margary Harvey’s tortured scream pierced the night, “Robert!” Stafford released his grip on Robert and he surfaced, spitting and coughing. Stafford looked at Maggie and the others and scowled. He pushed Sir Robert backward, shouting, “Go! Go with the women and children.” Then he turned and began making his way back to the beach.

  Several Croatoan braves helped pull Robert into the canoe as the paddlers moved it backward into the sound. On the beach, the Powhatan braves swept across the white sand like a wave, engulfing the soldiers. Howls and screams filled the night. Robert waved at Tookemay, “We must get out of range of their arrows. Quickly!” Tookemay called out the order in her language and the paddlers stood.

  As the canoes moved out into the sound, a volley of arrows as thick as storm driven rain plopped in the water around them. Tookemay called out a command and the Croatoans pulled the torches from their mounts and thrust them into the water, extinguishing them. Maggie and the others ducked down as more arrows rained down, several shattering loudly against the thick wooden sides of the canoes. When the arrows had thinned, the Croatoan warriors again stood to their full height and dug their paddles deep into the water.

  Tookemay suddenly stood and called for them to stop. Maggie saw two shapes on the water’s surface. It took her a few moments to realize it was two swimmers. The canoe swung round in the current and they were lost to view. Suddenly the water beside Maggie erupted and two hands grabbed the gunnels. Towaye pulled himself into the canoe. A moment later Manteo pulled himself aboard and collapsed onto the bottom.

  The paddlers again stood and began driving the dugouts out into the sound. Maggie knelt to Manteo. His face was barely visible in the darkness. She put her arms around him and he opened his eyes. “Hold on, love,” she cried. “Hold on!”

  No one spoke as the island of Roanoke receded into the blackness.

  Chapter 45

  August 8, 1590

  The hot damp air of the cornfield clung to Maggie’s skin like a garment. Breaking the ripe ears of corn from their stalks, she worked next to Sarah Slade, the carpenter’s Croatoan wife. Alice Peenay approached with an armload of corn. As she leaned down to dump it into a basket, a racket came from close by. “Aieyee!” A six-year-old Hatteras boy shrieked in mock fear as he burst through the corn, three-year-old Virginia Dare in hot pursuit, swinging a switch. Three-year-old John Harvey followed a moment later.

  Alice Peenay laughed. “Soon they will not be able to outrun her,” she said in the mix of English and Croatoan they conversed in.

  Sarah Slade nodded vigorously.

  Maggie smiled. “Aye. Soon.” Her smile faded after a moment, but her face did not set into the melancholy cast it had worn for so long. It assumed instead the look of stoic placidity worn by older women and men who had seen and endured much and learned from it. The children ran back through the corn in the opposite direction and Maggie saw Ananias reflected in little Virginia’s features as she passed. The poor man had not come off of Roanoke Island that terrible night and initially the child had taken it hard. But she was coming out of it now, as was her mother, Eleanor. Just the other night Bear Killer had brought Eleanor a nice cut of venison for her dinner pot. Even though she did not need it, Eleanor had accepted the gift, and everything that acceptance implied. She was moving along. Thank God, thought Maggie. That was the other change in Maggie now. Now that God had delivered them from the clutches of Captain Stafford and his soldiers, and far away from Powhatan and his arrows, she had found her faith again.

  Maggie dumped an armload of corn into the basket, picked it up, and headed back to the village’s little granary. She passed the mound of earth under which Widow Bane rested. The good woman had died peacefully five nights ago. Maggie approached one of the open sided houses, not much more than an arbor, where Parson Lambert, his wife Mary, and Manteo were instructing people in the faith. Manteo smiled proudly at Maggie as she passed and she smiled in return. Parson Lambert looked over at her briefly and then back at his book. In the time since their escape from Roanoke, the parson’s hair had turned white. But at least now, like everyone else, he had put some meat back on his bones and he looked healthy.

  Robert Harvey, Lionel Fisher, Goodman Slade and Mister Smith stood upon the roof of the Harveys’ cottage, thatching. Lionel’s arm had healed under the care of Alice Peenay. Widow Bane’s girl, Mary, sat in the shadow of the house between two Hatteras women, watching them work the long reeds they had gathered into bundles to be handed up to the men. Inside, Margary Harvey watched and learned from another Hatteras woman how to sew a deer hide gown.

  That night after their meal, Maggie lay with Manteo on the pallet before the fire. Afterward, she felt a little stitch in her belly. This was the second time she had felt it. Somehow she did not have to talk to any of the other women to know what it meant. She would have a baby with Manteo. She knew it as surely as she knew her own name. She smiled at him, kissing him on the cheek. Then she laid her head back and wondered if tonight she would dream of the ship again. She sighed contentedly as a wind came out of the forest. Acorns and twigs rattled down outside as the wind carried her off to sleep.

  Maggie peered out of the bushes at the huge ship. It had sailed through the channel right up to Roanoke Island. Strangely, no anchor was thrown out, nor were the sails furled, and stranger still, the sails did not belly out with the same wind that moved Maggie’s hair as she watched. The beach was as still as one of Governor White’s paintings and a small dugout sat empty on the sand.

  Maggie walked down to the beach and pulled the dugout into the water. Climbing aboard, she stood as she paddled. The waters of the sound were smooth as a looking glass and she quickly covered the distance to the ship. No one hailed her or looked over the side. Tying the dugout to the chains, she quickly climbed up onto the waist. There was no one there. “Halloo!” she called out. No answer. She heard footsteps below. She walked toward the steps leading down to the poop but saw no one. She went down the stairs and started across the deserted deck. At the other side a door banged against its frame and was still. She went to it and heard voices and laughter rising up from within. She opened it and started down the stairs. The voices and laughter grew louder as she followed them through the passageway. She came to a door, which she knew opened onto the great cabin. The sounds of merry-making echoed from inside -- wooden spoons clattering upon wooden trenchers, pewter drinking mugs slammed upon thick oaken tables, bawdy songs being song, a virginal playing sweetly in the corner. A joke concluded and a round of laughter burst out. She opened the door.

  The room was empty but for a single table and chair. An ancient man, either asleep or dead, sat in the chair with his back to her, his head upon the table. The hairs on Maggie’s neck stood on end as she approached. She stood behind him, noting the seam at his shoulder where his sleeve had pulled away from his doublet and the stitching was visible. His white hair was long and matted, and she could see the pink of his scalp beneath. She reached out to touch him. Then a hand was placed upon her shoulder and she screamed.

  Cool night air washed over Maggie. She sensed someone beside her in the blackness.

&n
bsp; “You cried out,” said Manteo. “I woke you.”

  “I am sorry,” said Maggie, still seeing the ship vividly in her head.

  “Did the ship come again?” he said in the darkness.

  “Aye. I wish to go back to Roanoke. There could be a ship.”

  For a long time Manteo did not say anything.

  “Do you think Powhatan’s braves will be there?” she said.

  “Nay. All gone now.”

  “Do you think any of the soldiers survived?”

  “Nay. All dead now.” Manteo fell silent again for a time. Then he said, “Very well. We leave tomorrow.”

  August 9, 1590. The Hopewell, at sea

  All day and night, squalls lashed the Hopewell with cold rain and wind as it sailed up the coast. Under Captain Cocke’s seamanship, the ship made steady progress. When not on duty, the sailors kept to the belowdecks, many of them too sick to keep their feet, the others gambling or talking and joking noisily. The sailors working in the shrouds above, and those manning the whipstaff, watched Governor White’s increasing agitation with amusement and interest. With his cape pulled tightly about him, his long hair and beard whipping about in the wind, he haunted the decks of the ship. Periodically he would pause to stare at the coast hungrily. By now all the men knew the story of how the Governor had left his daughter and newborn granddaughter at the fort at Roanoke, planning to return within the year. But the Spaniards and their Armada had changed his plans. The sailors shook their heads, marveling at White’s bad luck. “Be forewarned, it could rub off on us all,” complained a balding older sailor. “Aye,” agreed another as he cast dark looks about, “we would all be better off were he to fall overboard.” “Aye,” intoned several more as they lit their pipes and drew closer. As the ship slowly made its way through the storm, a story began circulating. It said that the Governor had a redheaded wench at the fort who was a murderess. And the man called Spencer, sailing aboard the little Moonlight, which doggedly kept pace from astern, had been sent to return her to England to hang.