The Newcomer

by Suzanne Woods Fisher

  It was strange that Bairn was not angry with him. Stranger still, the captain was not angry.

  Later, Felix heard the captain explain to the shipping agent how fortunate it was that he had taken full insurance on the ship, and that his man Squivvers would testify the cargo hold was full of goods bound for England. Which, even Felix knew, was a bold-faced lie.

  By the time the sun was rising, Bairn had located the countess and her old butler to tell them there was a change of plans. They would be joining them on the hunt for her missing husband.

  Walking back to the docks, Felix had asked Bairn about the countess’s husband. “How do you think we’ll be able to find him?”

  “Do you remember there was a fellow who arrived in Port Philadelphia who joined our church? He had a white patch of hair.”

  “Oh, I do remember him.” Felix tilted his head. “The man who couldn’t stop staring at Anna.”

  With that mild remark, Bairn had grown sullen and distant. What had Felix said?

  That was the problem, right there. Felix never could understand what was all right to say and what wasn’t. It was a continual riddle to him.

  Take right now, for example. The countess was yammering on with another boring story about dukes and damsels, when a puzzle fit together in Felix’s mind.

  “Bairn!” Felix burst out, interrupting the countess, who was quite miffed. “I just figured it out. The man who joined our church, the one who’s sweet on Anna—he’s the countess’s missing husband!”

  From the silent reaction Felix got in the carriage, he realized he might have said something he shouldn’t.

  But there was a bright spot. The countess stopped talking.

  Jacob’s Cabin

  December 13, 1737

  It would be dawn soon.

  Anna lay on her sleeping mat and stared at the ceiling. She had not rested well. Bizarre images and disturbing sensations troubled her sleep, causing her to toss and turn on the thin sleeping pallet. At one point she awoke, completely alert, and sat up. So many emotions were surging through her chest; too many thoughts whirled in her heart.

  Today was her wedding day.

  Now that the moment had come, she’d lost some of her assuredness. Her heart felt like it was clubbing in her chest, and she kept blinking back tears. As she thought of standing beside the man she was to marry, it was someone else’s face she envisioned. She could still see Bairn’s gray eyes, shining warmly with humor and admiration.

  She must have dozed off, because the next thing she knew, Catrina was shaking her awake. This was the first wedding the girl had ever attended, and she couldn’t wait for it. “Are your nails clean?”

  Anna smiled and held up her hands. “They are.” She rose from the sleeping pallet and rolled up her blanket to set aside.

  “Your hair—did you rinse it with the scented lavender water Mama mixed for you?”

  “I did. I did everything you and your mother told me to do.”

  A little later that morning, Anna stood in front of Maria for inspection. The minister’s wife’s keen gaze traveled from Anna’s leather shoes to her brown flax dress to her scented hair, looking for anything out of place.

  Anna studied Maria’s face, her expression still sharp and assessing, and then their eyes connected and affection softened her countenance. Maria had been especially kind to her the last few days, despite how especially unkind was her opinion about Henrik. “The newcomer will be the envy of every man today.”

  Anna looked away as a blush crept up her cheeks. “Won’t you reconsider and remain with us? Christian will do what you tell him to.”

  “My husband might not voice strong opinions often, but once he fixes his heart on something, he won’t bend until the thing is done. We must go. After the fellowship meal, he said.” Their possessions were packed; last night the men had loaded the trunks on the wagons. Christian planned to return the borrowed horses and wagons to Christoph Saur in Germantown.

  Already, the cabin looked larger. But that was a cold consolation.

  The wedding service would be held indoors. Earlier, right after breakfast, Henrik had left to wash in the creek. Now he was waiting outside with the men.

  “Ready?” Catrina said.

  She opened the door and blinding sunlight poured into the dim cabin. Anna didn’t see Henrik at first. He stood at the door, limned by the sunlight.

  “Anna.” He said her name like a lovestruck adolescent.

  When her eyes met his, her stomach flipped right over. Perhaps she might be able to love him, after all.

  Though it was midweek, Christian led a church service. The wedding ceremony took place after the sermon, and at the end, there would be Henrik’s ordination as the new minister. Under normal conditions, lots would be drawn. But last Sunday, when Christian asked each person whom they would recommend to draw a lot, everyone voted only for Henrik, except for Maria, who refused to vote.

  Anna couldn’t concentrate on Christian’s sermon, his last one. When he finally came to a conclusion, he asked Anna and Henrik to stand before him. Her legs shook as she rose to her feet.

  I must do this. This won’t be so hard after all, she thought. I know the words, I’ve heard them all my life, all I have to do is say them. But her chest felt too full, her throat too tight to speak. She could only manage a nod when Christian asked her if she promised to remain faithful to this man who stood beside her. Henrik was beaming, positively beaming.

  Suddenly, the solemn ceremony was over, they were married, and then Henrik was ordained as the new minister. One fell swoop.

  The room was hastily converted into a place for a shared fellowship meal. All day yesterday, Barbara and Maria had worked hard to make a tasty wedding meal. There was a succulent roast turkey seasoned with herbs, biscuits, and a sweet potato pie.

  Too soon, Christian motioned to Maria that they should be off. Shivering, Anna drew her shawl more closely around her shoulders, dreading this goodbye. Before Christian climbed onto the wagon, he turned and said, in a voice that was strangely bold for a man who was not at all bold, “May God have mercy on you in this impossible calling.”

  The little church of Ixheim stood by the fire pit to wave and wave at the Müllers’ wagon train, until they could no longer be seen. Tears streamed down most everyone’s faces, even stiff Isaac’s.

  Henrik stood behind Anna and put a hand on her shoulder to give it a light squeeze. “Why in the world,” he whispered, “would he leave us with such a dark foreboding?”

  Anna looked around the fire pit. Wasn’t it obvious? Since they had left Germany, filled with such high hopes, the little church had been reduced by half.

  Up the Schuylkill River

  Bairn was out of the wagon, trying to move a large fallen tree out of the narrow trail, wondering why the somber British soldier who trailed behind them on horseback could not volunteer to assist him, when he heard a clatter and rumble.

  He stopped hacking at the tree’s branches and waited. Through the woods he saw two horses and wagons, one after the other, with a bay horse tied behind it. He climbed on top of the log to see and stood in the middle of the trail until the lead wagon stopped abruptly. Bairn shielded his eyes against the low-lying winter sun. The minister? “Christian? Christian Müller?”

  “Bairn . . . der Zimmermann? Bist du?” The carpenter? Is it you?

  “Aye! And I’ve brought Felix too.”

  Christian stood in the wagon and turned to shout behind him. “Maria! You won’t believe it! It’s the ship’s carpenter! And he’s got our young Felix with him!” He climbed down from the wagon and hurried to shake Bairn’s hand. “We thought you were dead. We read the newspaper account about the ship going down in flames in Boston Harbor. It reported no survivors.”

  Bairn was stunned. “You think I’m dead?”

  “Yes! You and Felix, both. We’ve all grieved deeply for you.”

  This was distressing news. “The newspaper got it half right. There were no survivors be
cause no one was on the ship.” He looked at the wagons, filled with trunks. “Christian, where are you goin’?”

  The older man’s round face sagged. “We are leaving. We’re on our way to Germantown.”

  “But why? Why are you leavin’?”

  “We are no longer needed. Or wanted.”

  “What do you mean?”

  By now Maria had climbed down from her wagon to join the two men. “Oh Bairn, so much has happened while you were gone. So much has gone wrong.”

  “Maria,” Christian said in a warning voice.

  A trickle of foreboding snaked up Bairn’s spine.

  Maria gave her husband a look. “He’ll find out sooner or later.” She turned to Bairn. “Your parents have gone missing—”

  “They’re what?”

  “You remember how they left Philadelphia ahead of us, back in October. They’ve never been heard from since.”

  “Did you not go lookin’ for them?”

  “We did,” Christian said. “We did our best.”

  “And there was no word from them? No sign?”

  “Just one sign. The red Mutza. Anna saw it on an Indian who came to our cabin one afternoon. We haven’t seen him again. Your parents . . . are presumed dead.”

  Catrina slipped up beside her mother. “We have some good news. Anna has been married.”

  Maria frowned at her. “Not everyone thinks that is such good news.”

  Christian looked at him in bleak disillusionment. “This very morning.”

  Twin waves of emotion struck Bairn at once. Fear that he had come too late; fear that he knew whom she had married. “Who? Who did she marry?”

  “Henrik Newman.”

  It was. It was him.

  Bairn’s mind whirled. Anna—his darling Anna—had not waited for him after all. The news struck him like a kick in the gut.

  She had gone and fallen in love with Henrik Newman. Married him? Slept with him?

  He looked up the trail. “How much farther to reach the cabin?”

  “Not far at all. We left not long ago. Right after the wedding ceremony.”

  Bairn glanced at the large tree that blocked the trail. Behind it he could see the top of Felix’s black hat. Then he turned to Christian’s horses. “Which is the fastest horse?”

  “The bay, but why?”

  Bairn untied the bay from the back of the wagon. He swung a leg up over the back of the horse and held the reins with a relaxed grip. “Christian, return to the cabin with Felix and his passengers. Help Felix move the log so he can follow.”

  Christian looked flabbergasted. “But . . . I . . . we are headed . . .”

  “To Germantown,” Maria supplied. She glared at Bairn. “And we’ll do nothing of the kind.”

  “Do as I say!” Bairn commanded, frowning thunderously.

  “Well, I never,” Maria huffed, arms akimbo.

  Bairn kicked the bay to get it cantering. He didn’t have time for Maria’s injured feelings. “Felix will explain everythin’,” he yelled.

  All the way up the winding trail, the horse’s hooves beat a pounding rhythm: Too late, too late, too late . . .

  Jacob’s Cabin

  Even on a wedding day, the animals needed tending, the dishes needed washing, the water buckets needed filling. It had been Catrina’s job to feed the animals, so Anna took armfuls of hay out to the pen. She heard the sound of galloping hoof steps and, alarmed, squinted her eyes to see who was coming up the path. Her heart started to race. She’d never forgotten Bairn’s remark that the natives were always watching. Now and then she thought she had seen a few, filtered by the trees, but hadn’t told the others so as not to frighten them.

  But the man on the galloping horse was not a native. He wore English clothing, a black hat, knee-high boots, and he stood tall in the saddle, so very tall . . .

  “Bairn,” she said, inhaling a sharp breath.

  She flung herself out of the animal pen so fast she bumped her hip on the tree branch that served as a gate and cried out in pain. The wind had come up hard, whipping her apron and skirt and capstrings as she ran down the path to meet him. When he saw her coming toward him, he reined the horse to an abrupt stop, leapt off, and opened his arms to her. She threw herself into those arms and was lifted up, up, up in an embrace. One hand closed over her head, crinkling her prayer cap; his arms wrapped her so tightly against his chest that she could feel his heart beating, fast and steady. Bairn’s heart.

  She didn’t know how long they stayed that way, how much time had passed. It was a soft nose bump from the horse he rode in on that pulled them apart.

  “I thought you were dead,” she said, choking over the words.

  “Nae, not dead at all, darlin’.” With tender care, he set her feet on the ground, still holding onto her waist with a firm grip.

  She looked up at him, at that face so dear to her, the one she thought she’d never see again, and had a hard time talking around the knot in her throat. “The Lady Luck burned and sank. I read about it in the newspaper. No survivors, it said.”

  “Aye. Nae survivors because nae one was on the ship.”

  Tears welled in her eyes and she squeezed them tightly shut, trying to hold them back, hold them back. If they started now, she feared they wouldn’t stop. Her eyes flew open. “But where’s Felix?” she asked. “He’s with you, isn’t he?”

  “He’s comin’ up the road. He’ll be along shortly.”

  Bairn didn’t move, nor make a sound, but Anna could feel something change in him. She looked up, into his eyes. “What?” she said. “What is it?”

  “Anna, you cannae marry that man.”

  Henrik stood watching them, just a few feet away, hands on his hips. “Oh, but she can.” His mouth thinned into a tight smile. “She already did.”

  Bairn glared at him. “It matters not what she just did. A man cannot be married to two women.”

  Strange, fleeting thoughts darted through Anna’s mind, like birds spooked from their roost. Bairn’s use of the dialect had improved dramatically, she noticed. She still heard his Scottish accent color the words, but his speech was smooth, fluid, confident. And then the meaning of what he actually said settled in for a stay and she felt a chill run up her back. She flinched and stepped away from him.

  “Bairn—that’s absurd.” She looked at Henrik, who was staring at Bairn. “Tell him so, Henrik.” She clenched her fist among the folds of her dress.

  “She’s right. That’s crazy talk.” He smiled, though his blue eyes went cold and hard, like pond ice reflecting a winter sky.

  Bairn seized her by the arms. “Anna, you must believe me.”

  “Get your hands off my wife.”

  “Yer wife?” Bairn let go of Anna and turned to him, his large hands clenching and unclenching rhythmically. “Which wife? Does the name Countess Magdalena von Hesse ring a bell to you? Because she’ll be coming up the path here shortly.”

  A change came over Henrik’s features, a sudden shock of realization. Surprise siphoned the blood from his face and the defiance in his eyes gave way to alarm. Anna felt the truth all at once, like a tingle in the pit of her stomach.

  “Henrik, did you lie to me?” she said, almost eerily calm.

  With a wince, Henrik pressed one palm to his chest and took a single stumbling step toward her. “Anna, it’s just a misunderstanding. I can explain everything.”

  He had lied.

  He had left Europe, not to find a new world, but to escape the old one. She clapped her hand over her mouth and heard herself breathing hard through her nose. She would be sick in a moment, spewing her wedding supper all over the ground.

  For a long moment there was a silence so loud that it stifled all sounds, even breathing. Then the sound of a horse whinnying traveled up the long path, and the bay lifted its head from grazing to turn, flicking its ears. Soon, the rumble of wheels signaled the arrival of Felix. At first glance, Anna thought he was alone, but then she realized that he had passengers with hi
m.

  Henrik’s arms fell to his sides. “Oh no,” he whispered. “Dear God, no.”

  24

  Jacob’s Cabin

  December 13, 1737

  Felix pulled sharply back on the reins, and the light carriage he was driving slued to a stop, nearly running into Bairn and Anna. The horse shied and bucked in its harness, and he had his hands full for a moment getting it back under control. Overall, he had done a fine job, he thought, though the countess fussed and complained at every bump and jolt. Mostly, she raised a stink about his awful dog too, but for that, he could not blame her.

  Anna ran to the carriage, arms flailing, which set the awful dog into a barking frenzy. “Felix! Oh, merciful heavens, Felix! You’re here! You’re safe!” As soon as he set the brake and jumped down, she grabbed him into a tight hug, then just as suddenly, released him, gripped him by the shoulders and gave him a shake. “Do you know the worry you caused? We were frantic, searching for you all over Philadelphia. You had the thought to tell the printer that you were leaving . . . and no one else!”

  A commotion down the path, the arrival of Christian and Maria’s wagons rumbling along, gave him a reprieve from Anna’s scolding. Too soon walleyed Catrina appeared. She jumped off the wagon and marched over importantly to Anna’s side, grinning foolishly at Felix. “You are filthy,” Catrina said, boring into him with her beady eyes. One of them, anyway. “You need a bath.”

  He looked down at his clothes. He didn’t think he smelled so awful bad, but it was true he couldn’t remember the last time he took a real bath. He made a mouth at Catrina and looked away.

  Bairn helped the countess climb down off the wagon, and then her prehistoric butler. By the time the countess brushed the dust off her fancy clothing, the sound of pounding horse hooves caught everyone by surprise.