The Winthrop Woman

by Anya Seton

  Elizabeth shook her head, while her thoughts jumbled. Were there more of them outside? If she pretended to send Sally to the spring again, would they let the girl go, and where was the nearest help? Or would it be better to pretend to bargain?

  "The guns are my husband's. My man's" she said, edging towards Sally who had grabbed Joan and was hiding with her behind the spinning wheel. "I can't sell. My man would beat me terribly."

  James Sagamore shrugged, unmoved by this plea. He lifted the musket from its pegs. He also reached for the powder horn. "I take," he said, but the watchful Miantonomo spoke in rapid guttural Indian. The Sagamore hesitated. The squaw said something too. Soon all three Indians were obviously arguing, and Elizabeth bent close to Sally, "Are there more savages outside?"

  "Aye—" gasped the girl. "By the river."

  Elizabeth breathed hard and saw that now having put the musket on his stool, James Sagamore was fingering the carbine. "I take," he said, putting the carbine beside the musket. He glanced at the sachem and added reluctantly, "Will pay more beaver."

  "Leave him have 'em, mistress," wailed Sally. "Leave him or they'll murder us all!"

  "No, they won't!" said Elizabeth, fear suddenly giving way to fury. "You can't take those guns and you know it!" she cried stamping her foot. "This is English land, I won't sell and if you steal you know what'll happen to you! We have many soldiers, right near. I'll call my husband, you can't stop me, I gave you beer, I made you welcome, this is an outrage!" She flew at the astonished Sagamore and jerked the carbine from his hand, while Miantonomo gave a grunt that was very like a laugh.

  At the same moment the door swung wide and a loud voice boomed, "Here, here—what's all this!" Captain Daniel Patrick, fully armed and in helmet and breastplate, stepped over the sill. He stared from the shaking Elizabeth to the three Indians. He saw the musket on the stool and the carbine in Elizabeth's hands. "Trying to get firearms?" he asked.

  "That one was—" she panted, pointing to James.

  "So, James, me greasy slubber, ye're up to your old tricks, are ye? I thought as much. I've been keeping an eye on ye, followed your trail downriver to here. Did they threaten you?" he asked of Elizabeth.

  "She shook her head. "N-no. Not really, but they wouldn't go, and James kept taking down the arms."

  "Buy. Not steal," interrupted Miantonomo quietly.

  Patrick turned to the sachem. "I marvel to see you in this, Your Highness," he said with deference, eying the chief narrowly. "You Narragansetts protest great friendship for us, at Plymouth they trust ye, as they do your royal uncle Canonicus, and Governor Winthrop is your netop—your friend."

  The sachem bowed. "I am English friend. And am friend to Oldham who know our people well. I seek him."

  "But ye let James Sagamore try to get firearms, and terrify women!"

  Miantonomo opened his hands in a wide gesture. "He not under my rule, and we have peace with Massachusetts tribes."

  "Aye," said Patrick quickly. "Well, be off with ye. You too. me dark-skinned beauty," he said to the squaw sachem who was curiously twirling the spinning wheel, while Sally glared at her. "And don't try this game with any other planters, d'ye hear?" he added to James Sagamore, who looked sheepish and waggled his head.

  The three Indians walked outside while Patrick followed to watch them rejoin a small party of their braves who were squatting on the riverbank. The Indians all boarded waiting canoes, and Patrick came back to Elizabeth who had collapsed on the stool.

  "Were ye much 'frighted, sweetheart?" he asked, putting his big freckled hand on her shoulder. "Though from what I heard ye gave 'em a good tongue-lashing," he chuckled, and poured himself some beer.

  "Thank God you came," she said. "I was frightened, I didn't know what to do." She gave him a trembling smile. She liked the bluff, auburn-haired Patrick, who had a way with women, but she also liked his wife, Anneke van Beyeren, who was placid, and pretty, and the only one of her neighbors Elizabeth found congenial.

  "There's no great harm in the Indians, if ye treat 'em right," said Patrick wiping the beer froth from his bushy red mustache. "Some're tricky like that James, some're real gentlemen like Miantonomo—but ye know, Bess, I own to a slv fondness for the rogues. They put me in mind o' the wild Irish tribes I was raised in."

  "Do they?" said Elizabeth faintly. Usually she was interested in Patrick's stories of his boyhood, and flattered that he trusted her with many details which would have horrified the Bay Colony, but she was still shaken. She distastefully sipped some beer and nibbled on a com flatcake.

  "Aye," he said, reaching for a flatcake. "I know what it is to have the English come stravaging an' strutting, to claim your own rightful lands! I mind me father, when the bloody English Protestants first o'erran Ulster, spat on our churches and called us slaves. Ha! There was good Irish fighting in those days. I mind once when the O'Neills—" He checked himself, and banged his fist on the table. "Whist, Danny, me lad, ye're a blabbermouth fool! Ye're in English pay now, and ye've taken English oaths, Protestant oaths. And ye do what the Governor says!"

  Elizabeth laughed. "Oh, Dan, I fear you're a sad hypocrite."

  His twinkling blue eyes grew serious. "Nay, lovey, I'm but a damn good soldier and I earn me living by it. And let nothing interfere with that duty. Naught else matters—except—"

  "Except?" she questioned.

  "Room to breathe in, I suppose. Someday I'll take nobody's pay, I'll be me own master."

  "I know," she said with a little sigh. The Captain turned and looked at her. A handsome spirited wench, with wanton eyes and a ready wit, yet there was always something held in, a broodiness and uncertainty. Aye, he thought, but she's a Winthrop after all, I keep forgetting that, and tied to that poor milk-molly of a Feake. Not that he's so bad, but hardly suits this woman. Patrick leaned across the table and said suddenly, "I've never told ye, Bess, how fond I was of your Master Harry, God rest his soul, and how mortal sorry I was at the—the ending. All the sorrier since I've known ye—"

  She looked up, startled and touched, yet ashamed that Patrick should seem to think her grieving for Harry still, but before she could speak a woman rustled through the kitchen door crying, "Mistress Feake! Mistress Fea—" and stopped by the threshold as she saw Elizabeth and Patrick sitting with their heads close together at the table.

  "Oh, beg pardon, I'm sure," said the woman, raising her scanty brows. "I didn't know Captain Patrick went calling of a morning."

  "I had some embarrassment with the Indians, Goody Warren," said Elizabeth, resenting the need for explanation. "Captain Patrick rescued me from it."

  "Ah—" said Goodwife Warren, her sharp little rodent face turning from one to the other. "The Knapp girl—Judith, it was—come running to me, saying she'd seen a pack o' savages crossing Bank Lane. Thinking you'd be alone, Mistress, I come to see how you did."

  "That was kind of you," said Elizabeth. "Have you breakfasted?"

  She had not been long in Watertown before discovering that her neighbor, Goodwife Peg Warren, was a credulous busybody, whose chief pleasure was reporting any sort of moral dereliction to the Reverend Mr. Phillips, who by no means always listened. Her husband, John Warren, had been a well-to-do yeoman back in Suffolk, and one of Watertown's first settlers two years ago, so that Goody Warren aspired to leadership amongst the Watertown women, and had not been pleased to have Mr. Feake bring in a wife who definitely outranked her.

  "Well ... I could fancy a taste o' beer and a mite o' cheese since you're so kind," she said perching herself primly at the far end of the bench from Patrick, and folding her hands, while her bright mouse eyes darted around the room which she had never been invited to enter. She noted the great silver salt and the array of pewter on the dresser, lots of it but none too well polished, and the hearth was covered with grease and tallow stains. Aye, my fine lady, she thought, no doubt you've merrier things to do than housewifery, and her eyes slid over Patrick who was known to be a lusty, profane man.

  "I wonder
you're not keeping an eye on them heathen, Captain," said the goodwife. "I heard tell there's a whole gaggle of 'em massing at Muddy River."

  "You may be sure I know me duty, ma'am," said Patrick, reaching for another flatcake and crossing his thick legs. "What other news've ye been hearing? I'm certain ye'd not miss any."

  The goodwife bristled, but Patrick's expression was so bland that she eschewed annoyance. "Have you heard," she said eagerly, "that the Clark lass was taken wi' fits? Goody Knapp and me think the Devil's in it, 'cause young Chadwick saw a black man with horns and a tail flying over the Fresh Pond yester e'en. And then there was that battle against nature last Sabbath Day. I was there. I saw it. The chills ran up an' down my spine."

  "You mean that mouse that killed the little snake?" said Elizabeth, resigning herself.

  The goodwife nodded. "That was a sign, a fearsome portent, and right beside the meetinghouse too! I couldn't sleep nights for worriting as to what it meant, no more could Goody Knapp. But Mr. Wilson prophesied on Lecture Day and told the meaning."

  "Mr. Wilson?" said Elizabeth. She had seen Boston's newly returned minister but once, and thought him a sleek pompous man, who seemed unlikely to concern himself with Watertown fauna.

  "Aye," said Goody Warren nodding solemnly. "Mr. Jennison was in Boston Thursday and heard the sermon. It seems the snake was the Devil and the poor contemptible mouse was us, the saints, which God has brought hither, and we shall overcome Satan here, and oust him from his kingdom. That's what it meant, and Mr. Jennison said the Governor was pleased, but said he didn't know why Watertown was favored wi' such a godly sign."

  What a tarradiddle, Elizabeth thought. Yet why don't I believe it? Uncle John does, and Mr. Wilson has been to Cambridge and is far better educated than I.

  "But the Devil's not downed yet," went on the goodwife, her eyes gleaming. "There's more wickedness every day. Did you hear that Mr. Masters' serving wench, Molly, was caught fornicating in the meadows with Thomas Smith? Ah, they'll get a flogging at the cart's tail, they will, come next court day. Branding too, I shouldn't wonder."

  "I shouldn't wonder," said Patrick, rising and putting on his helmet. "I'm sure ye'll not be bothered by any more Indian chance-comers, ma'am," he said to Elizabeth, "but I'll post one o' me men on Bank Lane till Mr. Feake comes back. I gi' ye good day." He bowed to both the women, sent Elizabeth a private twinkle of sympathy, and stalked out.

  Elizabeth looked hopefully at her visitor, but the goodwife had no intention of moving until her curiosity was satisfied on several counts. She began on Daniel Patrick. Had Mistress Feake heard of Patrick's quarrel with Mr. Clarke over the setting of the Watertown watch? Didn't the Governor account Patrick a violent, ungodly man? Was it true he often beat that simpering little Dutch wife of his? Not but what she doubtless deserved it. Elizabeth replied briefly that she knew nothing to Captain Patrick's discredit, and was very fond of Anneke Patrick.

  Goody Warren, baffled, and somewhat in awe of Mistress Feake's august relationship to the Governor, nevertheless tried to gamer information which she could proudly retail to her special gossips, the goodwives Knapp, Bridges and Lockwood. Did Mistress Feake know, asked Goody Warren, that Mr. Dudley had angrily tendered his resignation as Deputy to Governor Winthrop, and was it true that at the last assembly the two gentlemen had been at each other's throats and had to be separated, and all be cause Mr. Winthrop accused Mr. Dudley of usury and wainscoting his Hall in an extravagant manner? And that then Mr. Dudley raged back because the Governor would build his house in Boston instead of Newtown and was running everything his own way?

  Elizabeth truthfully replied that she knew nothing about the matter. Goody Warren found her hostess equally unresponsive to the burning question of Elder Browne's continuing stubborn use of the prayer book.

  As the morning passed, it grew even hotter; Elizabeth's eyes glazed and she was guilty of a hearty yawn which finally silenced her visitor, whose natural envy of Elizabeth's beauty, possessions and doting husband had now definitely become dislike. Goody Warren took her leave and walked back through the fields to her own homestall, while framing various trenchant criticisms with which to regale her friends.

  Elizabeth rambled despondently around the kitchen, noting that the eels they would eat for dinner had not yet been skinned, that the vinegar had developed a disgusting layer of mother, and that their scanty store of wheat flour was weevily. Sally had disappeared to carry a nooning snack to the men in the fields—one task in which she was never laggard. Joan was happy in the shade of their great sugar maple playing with a spaniel puppy Anneke Patrick had given her, and Elizabeth, resolutely ignoring all the waiting chores, picked up her herb knife and went outside to her little garden.

  The English marigolds and gentians had done well in the new land; the foxgloves too had scarce finished blooming, though the rose cuttings had not taken hold, nor the poppy seed come up. Still most of the herbs had prospered, though some like the delicate basil were wilting in the heat and should be picked at once for drying. Elizabeth gathered up the corners of her apron and tossed into it cucumbers and purslane to be used as salad, for these were under the dominion of the moon, and cooled the blood. She moved to the next plot and picked a mess of beans, being careful to include a good pinch of summer savory which expelled wind and should always be cooked with legumes. Her most flourishing import of all, Elizabeth saw with satisfaction, were the dandelions. She had a whole bed of them, some in golden flowers the size of shillings, some already turned to thistledown. She dug up a few of the flowering plants which were vulgarly known in Suffolk as "Piss-in-beds," because when steeped they yielded a liquor which quickly opened the urinal passages and thus carried off disease from the entire body.

  She was admiring a ruby-throated hummingbird that darted at the melissa, thinking idly what a marvel the tiny creature was, and unknown in the Old World, so that King Charles had demanded to see one; and she was wondering if the hummingbird which had been sent caged on the Whale last month could possibly have survived when she heard galloping hoofbeats on Bank Lane.

  Horses were so rare in the colony that she ran around to the front of the house with Joan and the puppy at her heels. The horseman drew up at the gate in their sapling fence, jumped off and cried, "Mistress Feake!"

  Elizabeth recognized young Tom French, who, with his sister Dorcas, was serving in the Governor's household. "What is it, Tom?" she cried, anxiously hurrying to unlatch the gate.

  "'Tis Mistress Winthrop, ma'am—" he cried, touching his forehead, then mopping his sweaty face with his shirt sleeve. "She's took bad!"

  Elizabeth's heart jumped. "Which one? Mistress Margaret or Martha?"

  "The old one—Gov'nor's lady, she was brought to bed at cock's crow, but something's wrong. She's crying out for you, ma'am. His Worship sent me."

  "Is there no midwife?" said Elizabeth as she picked up Joan and hastened towards the house.

  "Only Goody Munt and she's skeered, and none too skilled, the women say."

  Elizabeth took no more time for questions. She dumped her load of greens on the kitchen table, and was relieved to see Sally sauntering along the path from the Common. Elizabeth gave the girl quick instructions, and ran upstairs for her summer cloak and a basket in which she threw her scissors, lancet and a flask of mithridate made at Groton and carefully saved for great emergency. As she kissed Joan goodbye she suddenly remembered an herb the London midwife had given Margaret last time when Ann was born; surely it was basil, which gave speedy deliverance to women in travail? She ran back and gathered the cut basil plants from the kitchen table before mounting pillion behind Tom. They started off towards Boston. On the way she discovered that Jack was absent from Boston at his father's farm "Ten Hills" near Medford, and she was both disappointed and relieved.

  When Elizabeth and Tom reached Charlestown they found the ferryman had waited for them by the Governor's express command, and it was scarcely three o'clock when they arrived at Winthrop's house. Martha was s
tanding by the door and she rushed out crying, "Bess, Bess. Thank God you're here! The child was born right after we sent for you, but she is going fast." Martha choked and added, "Oh, she looks so horrible!"

  John Winthrop was sitting in the Hall, hunched over his Bible. Margaret's three little sons, Stephen, Adam and Sammy, clung together on the settle, gaping at their father. He raised his head as Elizabeth entered, the sunken eyes glaring from a haggard face. "The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord," he said, looking at Elizabeth as though he didn't know her. "And yet I can't resign myself, God forgive mine infirmity, for I pray—pray that she'll be spared. And I search my heart to know why God should so afflict me."

  "But He hasn't yet—" Elizabeth whispered, seeing that there were tears on his cheeks. "Martha, take this basil, bruise it quickly, then steep it, while I go upstairs." Though if the babe were already born, she did not know if the basil would help.

  Winthrop clenched the Bible, and groaned. "Mr. Wilson is with her exhorting her to compose her soul. Ah, I've lost two dear wives, but none so dear as this one—too dear—and that is why the jealous Lord would have me give her up."

  Elizabeth tightened her lips, flung her cloak on the chest and ran upstairs. Boston's pastor, a short, stout man in black robes and skullcap, stood beside the great bed on which lay a silent sheeted form. The midwife crouched behind him, a feebly mewling bundle in her arms. Mary and two women servants hovered white-faced by the window. Elizabeth pushed past the minister, and saw with a spasm of fear that what they said was true. Margaret lay in a swoon, yet drew great snoring breaths, and all her muscles jumped constantly. Her face was unrecognizable, swollen to a glistening grayish sphere, her twitching hands likewise were puffed so that the knuckles had vanished.

  "She took a shaking fit sudden, this morn," whispered the midwife to Elizabeth, "Just as the babe slipped out easy, but the afterbirth's not come—I dared not pull on it—and she's been like this since."