The Winthrop Woman

by Anya Seton

  "You hear!" cried Shepard. "She accuses me of deceit, she casts shame on others! And in the same breath she confesses that her repentance was false, her pretended judgment is unchanged!"

  Wilson mounted his pulpit and cried, "We should sin against God if we should not put away so evil a woman, this notorious imposter!"

  There was an exultant chorus of agreement, of invective, of denunciation, all aimed at the woman who stood with clasped hands while the waves of shrill anger beat on her. Wilson quickly put the matter to the vote, which was received by the silence that meant consent. He smiled and drew a deep breath, then turning in his pulpit, pointed a stubby forefinger down at her who stood alone on the floor near the Communion Table, and he cried out with ringing relish the sentence of excommunication:

  "Therefore in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the name of the church I do not only pronounce you worthy to be cast out, but I do cast you out! In the name of Christ I deliver you up to Satan...!"

  As Wilson pronounced those words, Elizabeth saw Anne's rigid face quiver, the dark sunken eyes opened wide, and terror came into them. They turned towards Cotton who stood with head averted, they came back and met by chance Elizabeth's anguished gaze. For a moment the two women looked into each other's eyes, and the terror left Anne's. Strength flowed back into her and she seemed transfigured, a luminousness enfolded her as Elizabeth watched, and at the same time Elizabeth felt an echo of the comfort she had known before in Anne's parlor; an awareness of peace far above this murk of hatred.

  Wilson finished the excommunication:

  "Therefore I command you in the name of Christ Jesus... as a leper to withdraw yourself out of the congregation'."

  There was a hushed silence. In the back of the church someone was weeping. Margaret whispered involuntarily, "Oh, how terrible," but Anne, still with that shining secret look on her face, smiled a little. She bowed her head as though courteously to them all, and said, "The Lord judgeth not as man judgeth. Better be cast out of the church than to deny Christ." And she began to walk slowly down the aisle.

  Elizabeth, without thought or reasoning, stood up in the pew, pushed past Margaret and followed Anne. The congregation swiveled as one head and watched in stupefaction. Winthrop jumped up with an inarticulate sound. The crowd standing in back of the church parted silently, and the two women walked out, when Anne paused on the step. "Ah no!" she cried seeing Elizabeth. "What madness, child! Go back! Did you not hear that I am a leper and delivered up to Satan?"

  "Then I am too," Elizabeth whispered. "For I love you, and I know that God does."

  Anne drew in her breath, her shining eyes filled with tears. She bent and kissed Elizabeth. "Christ will bless you for that," she said, "but go—See, I'm not friendless quite—" She pointed to a tall young woman who hovered near. "Alary Dyer has not deserted me!"

  Elizabeth would have protested but she had not time. John Winthrop strode out of the church, and seizing her arm swept her down the steps. "Come!" he said in a voice more appalled than angry. "Come back with me at once!" She did not speak as he hustled her along the street to their house. Inside the parlor, he turned on her. "Have you gone mad, Elizabeth? 'Tis all that I can think! Of mine own family—and such monstrous behavior—Wilson is to follow, he will pray with you!"

  "I am not mad," she said over a pounding heart. "I want none of Mr. Wilson. You have cast out as a leper one who is truly a saint."

  The dark blood surged up into his face, he raised his hand as though to strike her, then checked himself, looking at her with disgust and something that was almost fear. "Go to your room," he said. "Stay there, until I decide what is to be done!"

  She wanted to cry out against him, saying that she was not a child, and had no longer need to obey. But she could not, her courage had gone.

  She spent many hours in her room, wondering as to her punishment, knowing that there was nothing in reason that her uncle could do to her, and yet—had he not continually shown himself invincible against those who defied him? The daylight faded and night drew on, and still nobody came to her. Hunger and thirst began to fret her, and increasingly dire forebodings. At last her anxiety was lightened by a muffled rap on the door, and Deane's strident whisper, "Let me in!"

  She did so, and the boy hastily shut the door behind him. "B'yr lakin, cousin—" he whispered, "that was a brave thing you did, in the meeting! I was watching from the gallery and near fell over the rail."

  "It did no good," she said. "No good. Only to bring trouble on me and Robert and the children, just as Daniel said."

  "It did do good," cried the boy passionately. "All brave things do good, even if we don't see it."

  "Well, I'm not brave now," she said, sinking down on the bed. "What's he going to do with me?"

  "Nothing—I don't think," said Deane. "He and my mother've been talking a long time with Mr. Wilson. They all think you were bewitched by Mrs. Hutchinson. She overlooked you, and made you do her will. My mother says she saw Mrs. Hutchinson witching you during the excommunication."

  "She's not a witch," said Elizabeth, letting her head fall to the pillow. "She's good."

  "I know," said the boy, "and you don't have to say she isn't. Just keep quiet and let 'em pray over you. Then say you don't remember very well what happened in the meetinghouse."

  "I don't—" said Elizabeth from a great fog of weariness and physical discomfort, "but I'll not lie, and add one more burden to Mrs. Hutchinson."

  "They can't do anything more to her," said Deane. "They've done it all. And you can't help her either."

  "No," said Elizabeth, and buried her face in her hands.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THOUGH the troubles which afflicted the Feake and Patrick families became acute in 1639, yet the remainder of 1638 did not pass without uncomfortable events.

  Winthrop forbore to punish Elizabeth for her outrageous act at Mrs. Hutchinson's trial, partly because of Margaret's insistence that Elizabeth's state of health and the she-Satan's influence had caused a momentary aberration, and also because he instinctively protected his own family from public censure. Elizabeth did not however get off scot-free. In late September she was commanded to appear in Boston with Robert, and attend a special Lecture Day.

  Elizabeth had assumed, with no enthusiasm, that this was a family summons for the purpose of greeting the Downings, who had at long last made the break with Old England and were arriving in the New. She would be pleased enough to see her Uncle Emmanuel again, and her reputedly wild young cousin, George Downing, but renewal of contact with Aunt Lucy was not attractive.

  The Feakes however obediently set off down the Charles, in their own tiny sailing shallop, which was efficiently skippered by young Tobias Feake. Toby had arrived last month from Germany via England, and proved to be a hobble-de-hoy lad, lumpish, freckled, and possessed of an enormous appetite. Elizabeth found him stolid, and rather stupid. He did, however, justify his Aunt Dixon's boasts as to his seamanship, though he was a great disappointment at farming. His sister Judith had accompanied him, but being a pretty lass of seventeen, she had been snapped up by a young man called William Palmer. She married and departed at once for the new settlement at Yarmouth in Plymouth Colony, so that Elizabeth had not had the companionship from Judith she had hoped for.

  As the little Feake boat skimmed down the Charles, Elizabeth turned towards the North Bank. "Why, see, the college at Newtown is all built!" she said looking at a small brick building. "And full of scholars, isn't it, Robert?"

  "Cambridge, wife—" said Robert absently. "We must call Newtown 'Cambridge' now, the court so ordered in May."

  "Aye, I forgot," she said. "Didn't some minister lately die and leave the college a vast endowment?"

  Robert nodded. "One called John Harvard," he answered and dropped the subject, which did not interest him. He was miserably wondering what really lay behind this summons by Uncle Winthrop, for he did not think that the Downings' ship had been sighted yet, nor did he know anything abou
t Elizabeth's behavior at the trial last March. His apprehensions were about himself. Was the Governor displeased with the voting at the last court? Or could there have been any complaint from Watertown secretly sent to Winthrop? Robert's flesh chilled and a hollowness came in his stomach. He thought of that night a week ago when something had happened—or had it? He remembered a bam, and a face looking up at him like that other face in London—could anyone have seen what happened in the barn—or had it all been a nightmare? He had not dared ask Elizabeth if he had left his bed that night, and she had said nothing one way or the other. Robert dug his nails into his palms. The sparkling river and the turquoise sky went black, while a voice in his head began to drone the Eighteenth Chapter of Leviticus, as it sometimes did though never past the first five verses. After those verses it always stopped as at a wall, then started over in the buzzing whine that could not be stilled.

  "What is it, Robert?" asked Elizabeth gently. "You look very odd."

  "Nothing," he said starting and blinking fast. "The sun is strong. Aye, you were speaking of the college ... Toby, would you like to attend it?" He turned quickly to his nephew who sat at the tiller.

  "Naw," said Toby. "I've enough learning." He resumed chewing on a piece of spruce gum.

  Elizabeth gave Robert an anxious look. There had been signs of "the strangeness" again lately, after a long period of quiet. Nightmares and tossing sleep, and a disquieting moment last week when he had risen from their bed and with eyes fast shut begun to make marks on the wall with his finger, marks that looked like pairs of S's or possibly numerals like 22 over and over. She had got him back to bed without waking him, but then he had begun to whimper like a child, while muttering a name in tones of utmost horror mingled with pleading. The name sounded like "Ralph" but she could not be sure, nor knew anyone called that. Since then she had been heaping marjoram on his stewed meat, for it was known to ease melancholies.

  Toby, steering skillfully through the river traffic of canoes, rowboats, and shallops like their own, skimmed up to the Charlestown landing, and Elizabeth clambered to the dock and walked with Robert past Windmill Hill and around the millpond and through twisting lanes of gabled houses towards the market.

  "How the town has changed since we first came," she remarked, looking at the crowded stalls where not only local foodstuffs were now sold, but imports from Virginia, the West Indies and England. "But the people look drearier than they used," she added. "Their clothes so drab and plain."

  "Aye," said Robert, squinting towards the great King Street wharf. "There's no English ship in. The Downings aren't here. That's not why he summoned us."

  "In truth—" she agreed, also perturbed but not as Robert was. "Surely it isn't only to hear Mr. Cotton's lecture that he wished us here today!"

  But it was. Winthrop received them at his home with his usual chilly courtesy, and hardly noticed Robert who was at once relieved. Then Winthrop said to his niece, "I trust you have quite recovered your senses since I saw you last in March."

  "I don't know what you mean, sir," said Elizabeth, as bravely as she could.

  "That may be true," said Winthrop judicially. "Your aunt thinks you were beglamoured, yet in case some of those devilish doctrines still linger with you, I desire you to hear what punishment God has sent to the woman you imprudently averred to be a saint."

  Elizabeth started and her face grew hot; neither fear nor Robert's look of anxious warning could silence her. "And what misery for Mrs. Hutchinson are we to gloat over now?" she cried. "Is she not safe at least in Rhode Island?"

  "Bess!" whispered Robert, and to Winthrop he said quickly, "She is not herself, sir, forgive her—"

  Winthrop inclined his head. "Since her earliest years it has often been necessary to forgive Elizabeth. And attempt her correction. I shall leave the latter now to Mr. Cotton. She shall hear that God's just vengeance cannot be deflected by escape to Rhode Island or any other place."

  Thus it was that Elizabetli was conveyed to the packed meetinghouse and forced to listen to the Reverend Mr. Cotton's announcement from the pulpit that Mrs. Hutchinson as a manifest result of her heresies had last month given birth to a monster. There had been an earlier rumor of this, but it was now confirmed by letter from the attending physician. Doctor Clarke. And as an object lesson to anyone in Boston who might still be affected by the woman, Cotton proceeded to describe the monster minutely. It had been composed of twenty-seven gelatinous lumps of different sizes held together by fleshy strings...

  Mr. Cotton's organ-toned voice continued for an hour, dwelling on each disgusting detail, and ingeniously deducing parallels between the embryo's physical malformities and Mrs. Hutchinson's spiritual ones. The congregation listened in fascinated horror; Winthrop, who knew all this and had himself written a letter to Dr. Clarke, requesting the monster's exact description, nodded gravely as the minister made his points.

  Elizabeth sat motionless, sickened and full of loathing for these men with their pitiless exposure of a woman's suffering, yet unable to withstand a fearing doubt. Why had God let this hideous thing happen to Anne? She tried to shut her ears to the minister's voice and recapture the moment of sureness she had felt in this very meetinghouse last spring, but there was no glimpse of light vouchsafed.

  When the meeting was over, she filed heavily out with the others. As she came to the spot on the step where Anne had last spoken to her, Elizabeth turned giddy and swayed. She nearly fell. Robert caught her, while her uncle hurried up behind them. "She swoons?" Winthrop asked Robert with satisfaction, and hastened to support Elizabeth. "It is as I hoped. The Lord has struck His Truth into her heart, she will come now to repentance."

  "No—" whispered Elizabeth. "Not repentance, only blackness and hate—" But they did not hear her. The men helped her back to the house and her uncle, pleased with her for once, himself poured her a medicinal nogginful of brandy.

  Two days before Christmas, Elizabeth bore the long-awaited son. There was of course no Christmas celebration in the Bay Colony; tithing men, deacons and constables all were vigilant to see that the day was marked by no secret observance either. But Elizabeth was so excited and happy that she ordered Telaka to use all of their flour and raisins for a Christmas pie, and recklessly invited the Patricks over for a wassail bowl on Christmas night.

  There was a roaring fire in the bedchamber, where Elizabeth lay with the dark-haired infant snuggled against her. The wassail of hard cider and rum steamed on the hearth in an iron pot. There were pine boughs in the comers of the room, cut for Elizabeth by Toby in bland disregard of Robert's remonstrance. It seemed that in Germany one always brought pine boughs into the house at Christmas, and even little fir trees studded with candles. Elizabeth thought it a charming idea but unfeasible. She did, however, instruct Telaka to light a dozen bayberry candles and place them around the room, where they trembled like stars and gave forth a pungent smoke to mingle with the scent of pine.

  When the Patricks stamped in on a blast of cold air, both laughed with pleasure. "I'faith, Bess, ye've got it snug in here, smells good too!" cried Daniel, dropping a tiny pewter porringer on the bed. "Here's for the heir! God bless him!" He inspected the crumpled face on Elizabeth's arm, and said, "'Od's Body, but 'tis a Winthrop ye've hatched this time, lass!"

  "Aye," said Robert proudly, standing at the foot of the bed. "There's a resemblance. We shall call him John for the Governor."

  NOT for the Governor, Elizabeth thought—for Jack if you like—but she was too happy to upset Robert who had emerged again from his melancholy.

  "I bring you 'speculaas,' Dutch cakes—special," said Anneke, smiling and kissing first Elizabeth then the baby. "From little vood shapes ve use for children." She presented a basketful of cookies molded into stars, windmills and tiny soldiers.

  Toby was invited up, and attacked the wassail and cookies with vim. Soon Daniel started a song, and gulping from the ladle began to toast everyone's health. Robert's demur that drinking healths was illegal, Daniel greete
d with a roar. "Don't ye be a long-faced spoilsport—Robbie, me lad! By the Mass, if a man can't enjoy himself when he's got him a son 'tis a sorry world indeed!" Daniel quaffed another ladleful, and began to bellow, "Wassailing, Wassailing, kiss me, m'dear! I wish ye a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, a pocket full o' silver money, and a cellar full o' nappy beer!"

  Elizabeth giggled, slightly tipsy herself. Anneke sang in Dutch, Toby in German, and Daniel flinging off his sword and mantle danced an Irish jig.

  Elizabeth clapped and laughed, crying, "Now I'll sing, and you all join in!" She raised herself on the pillows and sang a song from Groton days when her grandfather had made Christmas a feast of hospitality:

  "Come bring with a noise, My merrie boys,

  The Christmas log to the firing;

  While my good dame she, bids ye all be free,

  And drink to your heart's desiring!"

  "Aye—drink! Drink!" shouted Daniel, lurching about the room, and "Dance!" He caught Anneke around her plump waist and began whirling and twirling his wife, who shrieked and protested but could not get away from him, while Toby and Elizabeth sang the song over and over and louder and louder.

  They did not hear the knock on the door below, nor steps on the narrow stairs, and Daniel was exuberantly kissing and spanking Anneke when the chamber door was flung open and fob Blunt, the tithing man, stood on the threshold, staring at them with a blend of disgust and malice. "Aha!" he cried. "I thought as much from the noise, which Goodman Bridges he heard all the way over to his place! Drunk, roistering, and—" he glanced at the pine boughs, the many candles, the wassail pot, "keeping Christmas too. I heard what you sang!"

  Robert cleared his throat and drew himself up. "I have a new son," he began. "'Tis no sin to be glad of it—" But Patrick, who had taken a moment to recover, drowned him out in a great roar, "God damn ye, Job Blunt, ye prick-arsed knave, what d'ye mean by bursting in here?"