Fever 1793 (16 page)

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as we walk." Eliza pulled her companion aside and spoke quietly. The woman looked at me with an arched eyebrow and walked away.

"Am I taking you away from your work?" I asked. "Do you need to help your friend?"

"It's time for all of us to be safe at home," said Eliza. She pulled a roll from her basket. "Is this little one hun-

gry?"

Nell snatched the roll without a word and took a huge bite.

"That's a good answer," said Eliza. She laid her hand on Nell's forehead and neck.

"I don't think she has the fever," I said. I hesitated. I didn't want Nell to hear me discuss her mother. "She's alone."

Eliza nodded. "We have to hurry," she said. "Do you want me to carry her?"

Nell tensed and locked her arms around my neck. I would have gratefully delivered to her Eliza, but I didn't think my neck would survive. "I'm fine," I lied.

Eliza led me down back streets as I briefly explained what had happened since Grandfather and I left the coffeehouse. I skipped the hardest parts: being alone with Grandfather's body, lying in Bush Hill, the robbers. I didn't want to cry in front of Nell.

Eliza didn't say anything, just shook her head and hurried me along until we reached the narrow street where she lived. Her brother, Joseph, was a cooper. He

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made barrels, a good trade. Eliza lived with Joseph's family in a small apartment above the cooperage.

I stopped at the bottom of the stairs. I had to know. I covered Nell's ears.

"Where's Mother? She's dead, isn't she? She's dead and you're trying to shield me from it."

Eliza put a hand on her back and stretched. "No, no, she's not dead. Don't think that for a minute. Last I saw her, she was recovered from the fever and bent on following you to the farm."

The knot at the base of my neck loosened. "I must go there, then. I have to find her, Eliza."

"Hush. You can only climb one mountain at a time. Come upstairs and eat some dinner. We'll think better with full bellies. I promise I'll tell you all I know."

She led me up the stairs to a small set of rooms, dimly lit, but clean-smelling and orderly.

"Joseph's wife died last week," Eliza whispered as we paused in the doorway. "He mourns her something terrible. He is still in bed recovering. He's weak, but he'll survive. Thank the Lord the boys haven't taken ill."

Plump-cheeked twins stormed Eliza as soon as she crossed the threshold. "These are the boys." She hugged them tightly before disentangling herself from four arms. "We have company," she said. "This is Mattie, my friend from the coffeehouse. And Mattie's little friend, Nell. Mattie, this is Robert and this is William."

The boys peered shyly at me, then hid their faces in

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Eliza's skirts. Nell mimicked them, hiding her face in my neck. If I didn't set her down soon, my arms were going to snap off at the shoulder.

"Is that you, Eliza?" A tiny woman leaning on a cane slowly made her way into the room. Snow-colored hair framed a deeply-lined face the color of aged mahogany. She looked to be the oldest person I had ever seen. The woman walked straight to me and poked my arm. "Who's this?" she demanded.

As Eliza explained, the old woman harrumphed and snorted.

"So you've got to feed them, too?" she asked. "No, Ma'am. Eliza doesn't have to feed me," I protested, although that's exactly what I was hoping Eliza would do. "We came across each other in the course of our errands. I'll need to go home soon. And Nell..." I wasn't sure how to end that sentence.

The old woman shook her head. "You don't leave until you've eaten. I've seen brooms with more meat on them. The stew is hot, Eliza, and you still have bread and turnips. I'll come again in the morning." She turned in the doorway and pointed a finger twisted with work and age at the boys.

"No trouble from you two. Let your papa sleep and mind Eliza, or I'll send a ghost after you." The boys stared with wide eyes and nodded. The old woman chuckled as she walked out, her cane heavy on the floor. "I'll stop by tomorrow. We'll see if the wagon from

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Lititz comes on time. Never thought the day would come when I wished I worked a farm again."

Her voice faded as she made her way down to the street, one slow step at a time. The boys stared at the closed door.

"That was Mother Smith," Eliza told me. "Don't worry, children, she won't send any ghosts. Who wants to help me with Papa's supper?"

The stew in the kettle was made for four, not six. Eliza ladled out a full portion into my bowl, but I poured half of it back.

"I don't need all of this, Eliza. The boys should eat so they don't take sick."

Eliza looked at me closely. "Hmmm," she said. "Could be you're right."

She took a bowl of soup in to her brother Joseph and left me at the table with the children. Nell let me unwind her from my neck when she realized a bowl of soup was for her. She sat on my lap and stared at Robert and William. They slurped up their soup and stared back. I thought they might be close to the same age. A plan began forming in my mind, but I quickly shushed the thought. I didn't have time to dream or plan. I would deal with each hour as it came, one step at a time.

The bustle of the family's evening-clearing away, washing up, getting the boys ready for bed-pushed away all thoughts of the fever for a few hours. Nell fell asleep in my lap shortly after dinner and didn't wake

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when I laid her on a soft quilt that Eliza spread on the floor. When the boys were finally asleep and Joseph was resting comfortably, Eliza set two chairs by an open window, handed me a mug of lemonade, and motioned for me to sit down.

"Matilda Cook, it is time for the truth. You stay right there on that chair until you tell me what happenedeverything."

I never could keep anything from Eliza. The story slid out with all the details: being abandoned on the road, struggling to care for Grandfather, getting the fever. The garden. The intruders. Grandfather's death. Talking about him brought back the tears.

"I did everything wrong, Eliza! I couldn't make a decent meal for Grandfather. I knew he wasn't well, his face was so red. I should have done something-chased the intruders out, or better yet, not been such a baby and left the shutters open just because I was hot. It is all my fault!"

Eliza handed me a clean handkerchief and patted my hand until my sobs quieted.

"Your grandfather was a wise man. You couldn't have saved him, Mattie. It was his time."

I sniffed and took a shaky breath.

"What happened after he died?" she asked.

I filled in the rest of the story quickly, this strange day that began with a burial and ended with a homeless child in my arms.

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Eliza watched Nell sleeping. She lay curled on her side, clutching her headless doll. "You understand that she needs to go to the orphan house, don't you? You should probably go there yourself."

My stomach tightened.

"Please, Eliza, don't make me go. I know you think I'm a child, bigger than Nell, but a baby still, and that I need someone to tell me to wash my face and finish my bread." I struggled to control my voice. "I'm not. I'm not a little girl. I can take care of myself."

"We'll talk about it in the morning. We'll talk about everything in the morning." Eliza rubbed her shoulders and stretched her neck.

"Do you feel ill? Do you want to lie down?" I asked.

"I'm just tired and I can't sleep yet. A woman's work is never done, isn't that what the fools say? Here," she pulled a small pair of pants out of a basket at her feet and rummaged for a needle and spool of dark thread. "Robert and William are harder on their clothes than any dock worker I've ever seen. Stitch up the rips while I try to put this shirt back together. I'll tell you what I've been doing."

I bit off a length of thread and slid it through the eye of a needle as Eliza talked.

"A few weeks ago, Dr. Benjamin Rush wrote to Reverend Allen asking for help."

"Reverend Allen from the Free African Society?"

"The same. The doctors thought us Africans couldn't

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get yellow fever. Rev. Allen said this was a chance for black people to show we are every bit as good and important and useful as white people. The Society organized folks to visit the sick, to care for them and bury them if they died."

Eliza's voice drifted off as she caught a memory. She took a deep breath and picked her sewing up again.

"Is that why you were visiting those homes this morning?"

Eliza nodded. "Yes. Mother Smith takes my place minding the boys and Joseph. The Society has done a remarkable job, and I don't mind saying that with pride. The Africans of Philadelphia have cared for thousands of people without taking notice of color. If only the doctors had been right, we could look to these days of suffering as days of hope."

I stuck the needle in my thumb.

"What do you mean, 'if only the doctors had been right?'"

Eliza held the shirt up to the light to check the evenness of the stitches.

"After a few weeks of nursing the sick and burying the dead, our own people started to sicken. Black people can get sick with yellow fever just like white people or Indians. I do know some who have never been sick, but there are white people who can say the same thing."

We stitched in silence, each deep in thought.

"Are we going to die, Eliza?" I asked finally.

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Eliza snorted.

"That's foolish talk. I'm not going to die. I have too much work to do. Mother Smith there, she won't go until she's ready and the Lord Himself asks for the pleasure of her company. Don't listen to words of despair, Mattie. You must be strong and have faith."

"When will it end?"

"For everything there is a season, remember? When the frost comes, the fever will vanish. We just have to find a way to make it until then."

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CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

September 28th, 1793

There is great distress in the city for want of cash. Friendship is nearly entirely banished from our city.

-Dr. Benjamin Rush Letter, 1793

Small children can give off powerful smells. Particularly small children who don't know how to wake at night and use the chamber pot.

When I woke on the quilt next to Nell, I smelled her, then realized she was soaking wet. I was merely damp. Eliza shook her head and chuckled. "Babies are the same, no matter what the color. You might as well wash the twins' bedding. They have a similar problem."

There wasn't room in the small apartment to wash, so I scrubbed the quilt and blankets in the courtyard behind the cooperage. Robert, William, and Nell sat on a log and watched me, solemn as three old preachers. By the time the blankets were drying and I had washed the

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three smelly children, Eliza had gone out to care for the sick and Mother Smith had taken control.

Mother Smith tapped her way around the room with her cane, circling me like a hawk. She made me rewash the breakfast dishes with near boiling water and complained that I left too much dirt behind when I swept. She snorted when she saw my stitching. She cackled out loud when I tried to comb the knots out of Nell's hair.

Too bad my mother never met Mother Smith, I thought as I beat a rug for the third time in the courtyard. They would have gotten along famously, complaining about me and out-scrubbing each other.

She did know how to tell a story, I had to give her that. She sat in Eliza's rocker with the children at her feet and told a tale of magic buckets and flying ships. The children were enchanted. I applied all my force to clean the burned bits from the bottom of the stew pot. Mother Smith hadn't said a word when the stew burned because I forgot to stir it. She didn't have to say a word; the way she lifted her chin as she turned away said everything. I was a complete failure.

When the story was over, the boys trundled off to bed without protest. Nell climbed in my lap and fell asleep sucking her thumb. I worked the knots out of her hair slowly and gently. My stomach rumbled underneath her. I had skipped supper. I figured my portion had been the one which stuck to the bottom of the pot.

Mother Smith pulled her shawl on and prepared to leave.

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"Do you think Eliza is all right?" I asked. "Shouldn't she have come home before dark?"

"The pain doesn't go away at sundown," Mother Smith said. "Eliza will stay where she's needed."

Nell stirred and I patted her back.

"Don't love her," warned Mother Smith.

"Pardon me?"

"I said, don't you fall in love with that baby girl. She's not yours. You can't keep her. You had any sense, you'd take her right down to the orphan house tomorrow and hand her over. Don't look back."

"That would be cruel," I said. "She needs some time to get over the shock of, you know"-I mouthed the words "her mother"- "then I'll take her."

Mother Smith shook her head. "You're not doing her any favors. Fact is, you're making it harder on her. She stays with you, you feed her, wash her, sing to her, mother her, then give her away. How's that going to make her feel? You're the cruel one."

Her words dogged me through the night. At first I tried to ignore them. What did Mother Smith know about Nell or me? We were strangers to her. Nell needed someone to hold her. No one at the orphan house would do that; they'd sit her in the corner and scold her.

But Mother Smith was right. I was being selfish, holding Nell close, showing her how to play catch with the twins. I needed her more than she needed me. How