Fever 1793 (18 page)

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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

October 1st, 1793

We set out to see where we could be
usefulthe
black people were looked to. We then offered our services in the public papers, by advertising that we would remove the dead and procure nurses.

-Richard Allen and Absalom Jones

A Narrative of the Proceedings of the Black

People During the Late Awful Calamity in

Philadelphia in the Year 1793

The sights and smells of Eliza's patients were no worse than Bush Hill, but I was not prepared for the heartache. Walking into the homes of strangers, sitting on their furniture, and drying the tears of their children was harder than cleaning up the sick. A dying woman in a cot surrounded by strangers was sorrowful, but a dying woman surrounded by her children, her handiwork, the home where she worked so hard, left me in tears.

We left the house at first light and sometimes did

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not return until dark. Joseph kept the children busy in his shop and had supper ready for us when we stumbled home. After a few days of coolness, the sun blazed with heat again, and the air was thick with moisture and infection. The calendar said October, but it felt like July.

Rumors washed over the city. The fever had ended. The fever started again. A shipload of sick people was coming upriver. A cure had been found. No cure was available. An earthquake in the countryside left people saying the end of the world was at hand. The wells had been poisoned. The British were coming. I would have despaired of the hopelessness and confusion. Eliza dismissed the wild tales with a shake of her head.

"They may be true," she said, "but we have work to do. Come now, Mattie."

One boarding house facing the Delaware River had a sick sailor in nearly every room. We went from patient to patient, checking their condition and feeding weak broth to those who had the strength to swallow. The sailors babbled in their own languages, afraid to die on the wrong side of the ocean in a world far away from people who knew their names. The vinegar-soaked cloth tied around my nose could not shield me from the stench of the dying men who baked in the old house.

On our way out, Eliza accepted a basket of dry bread from the woman who ran the boarding house.

"That's nearly the last of the flour," the woman said. "It'll be sawdust after this, just like the War."

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"Sawdust?" I asked. "You can make bread?"

"It will have some flour in it," Eliza said as she thanked the woman, "but the sawdust will stretch the wheat, make it go farther. When your stomach hurts enough, the tongue won't mind the taste."

At Barrett's apothecary, Eliza purchased jalap and Bohea tea. I walked around the shop while Eliza argued with the owner about his prices. Grandfather used to bring me to Barrett's to buy soft-shell almonds and figs from the big barrel. This was the kind of shop I had always dreamed of. Back then the shelves had been crowded with colored glass jars, wooden boxes, casks, and bags, all labeled with the spidery handwriting of Mr. Barrett. Now they were covered with dust and the shells of dead insects.

Eliza finished her purchases, grabbed my hand, and slammed the door behind us.

"He's a scurrilous dog, that man," she muttered.

"Why do you say that? He seemed friendly enough. And he has the medicine you needed."

"The price of jalap and tea has climbed to the clouds since the fever struck. If he really cared, he would charge a decent price instead of robbing the sick. Pharmacists and coffin makers are the only people who profit from this plague."

"Don't forget the thieves," I added.

Eliza made a noise in her throat and squinted at the house numbers.

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"We are going to number thirty. The Sharp family. They could have left for the country long ago, but he's a merchant and didn't want to leave the business. Then a serving girl came down with the fever and Sharp's wife wouldn't abandon the girl, bless her."

"What happened?"

"The serving girl recovered, but Mr. Sharp died. His mind went before the end, and he raged throughout the house like a mad bull, destroying all he touched. Mrs. Sharp suffered a mild case but is back on her feet again. She fears for her son and daughter, they are both ill in bed. Here it is."

Eliza headed straight for the stairs that led to the bedchambers overhead, but I stopped in the front hall to stare. The furniture lay in heaps of splintered wood and feathers. A looking glass had been dashed to thousands of pieces, and the gilt frame torn apart. The curtains were torn from the windows, and a door was nearly ripped off its hinges. Mr. Sharp did not go gently to his grave.

"Stop dawdling, Mattie," Eliza called from overhead. "Stoke the fire and set a pot of water to boil. Then come up here and fetch these dirty sheets."

We spent the day caring for the Sharp children and reviving Mrs. Sharp, who fainted when the doctor bled both children. After the sun had fallen beneath the rooftops, we arrived at the Collbran house in time to see the body of the last Collbran taken out to the death cart.

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Eliza dragged me inside, saying we still had an obligation to wash down the sickroom.

We closed the door behind us when the western sky was shot through with the last pewter and gold rays of the day.

"You go on home, Mattie, you need a good meal and a rest," Eliza said. "I only have one more house on this list. Tell Joseph that I'll be along just as soon as I'm finished."

"No," I said firmly. "I'm not going anywhere. The work will go faster if you have me there, and you shouldn't walk home alone after dark."

Eliza raised an eyebrow.

"Never knew you to look for extra work. Come along then."

We walked in silence, east first, then north. I followed closely, not wanting to lose Eliza in the confusion of alleys and shortcuts.

"I haven't been here before," Eliza said. "Another member of the Society asked that I stop in before retiring. These women are seamstresses, they live alone." She knocked politely on the peeling door, then entered.

The Gundy sisters were both mending. They silently drank their broth and nibbled on the bread. Eliza helped each woman walk to the necessary and back while I aired out their mattresses. We washed the sisters' thin bodies and pulled clean shifts over their heads. One of the women tried to press coins into Eliza's hand, but

Eliza politely refused and put the money back in the sisters' shabby purse.

My stomach grumbled as we mounted the stairs of the cooperage. I wondered what Joseph had cooked. He didn't have Eliza's cooking skills, but I wasn't fussy. Eliza breathed heavily as she labored ahead of me. How many more days could we carry on like this?

The front room was dark except for the flicker of a small fire in the hearth. No suppertime smells welcomed us. I looked around for the twins and Nell. A log popped and the sound echoed around the apartment like a gunshot.

Joseph sat next to the fire, his face in his hands. He did not look up as we entered.

"Joseph?" Eliza called sharply. "Joseph, what ails you? Are you feverish again? Are you chilled?"

Joseph raised his face to look at his sister. Tears coursed down his cheeks. He couldn't bring himself to speak.

Eliza grabbed his shoulders and shook him.

"What happened?" she shouted. "Where is Robert? Where are William and Nell?"

Joseph wiped the back of his hand across his eyes. I stepped back from the sadness in his face; it filled the room and threatened to pull me in. He pointed to the bedchamber.

The twins lay next to each other on the bed, their eyes closed. They panted heavily as if they had just come

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in from a romp outside. Nell lay on her pallet on the floor. She was feverish, but slept soundly.

"Oh, sweet Jesus, not these little boys!" cried Eliza. "Open that window farther, Mattie. We need some air in here."

"It's already open all the way," I answered.

"It can't be," Eliza snapped. "It's hot enough to roast a duck in here."

She shouldered me aside and pushed up the sash herself. It would go no farther.

"Do you want me to boil water?" I asked.

"Yes. No!" Eliza spun so that her skirts flared, and clenched her fists against her head. "We can't have a fire in here. The boys won't be able to breathe if it gets any hotter. Dear God, why take these children? I promised I wouldn't let them die."

I stood in the doorway, not sure what to do next. Joseph hadn't moved from his stool. Robert moaned and reached his arm out until he found William. Eliza sat down and stroked Robert's forehead. She squeezed her eyes and covered her mouth as she struggled to control her anguish.

"It's cooler up at Bush Hill," I said.

"They don't have room," Eliza said fiercely.

"But it's cooler there," I repeated. "The rooms have many windows that catch the wind. It's clean, and they have French physicians."

Eliza shook her head. "We have to do it ourselves.

We will find a way to make them well again."

I looked across the small room. The sound of the river came through the tiny window, along with a distant echo of voices. Windows, I thought. Windows and empty rooms, away from the river, away from the worst heat.

"The coffeehouse," I cried. "Eliza, we'll take them to the coffeehouse!"

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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

October I4th, 1793

All is thick and melancholy gloom.

-Letter of Dr. Benjamin Rush Philadelphia, 1793

Mother Smith sent a mule cart to the cooperage. I scrubbed the cart with boiling vinegar while Eliza gathered the drugs and herbs we would use to treat the children. Joseph prayed over his sons and Nell while we packed bed linens and blankets. When the cart was ready, we dragged the mattress down the narrow staircase and laid it in the cart. I carried Nell.

"Mama," she called weakly.

I bit my lip and asked my heart to be hard. I couldn't help her if I fell apart.

Joseph insisted on carrying each boy downstairs by himself, whispering while he tried to massage the pain from his sons' heads. He gently lay them on the mattress and tucked them in so they wouldn't be jostled.

"Take care of them," he said hoarsely to Eliza.

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"Aren't you coming?" I asked.

Joseph shook his head. "They have a better chance away from me or anyone with the fever," he said.

"He'll be fine, and those babies will be fine," said Mother Smith resolutely as she patted Joseph's arm. "The Society will watch out for Joseph, Eliza, don't you worry about him. Go on now, go with God."

Joseph's knees buckled slightly as he kissed the boys good-bye, laid his hand on Nell's head, and hugged Eliza. Mother Smith curled her fingers around his elbow. His tall frame leaned against her withered one as Eliza slapped the mule's rump and the wheels of the cart squeaked.

The city was darker than I had ever seen. The moon had already set, but no light flickered in the whale oil lamps that lined High Street. The lamplighters had all fled the city or died. Candlelight spilled from only a few windows, and the stars were faint and distant, as far away as hope or the dawn.

We struggled to get the mattress out of the cart at the coffeehouse. Our arms strained under the awkward weight, dragging it around to the back gate, through the yard, and finally in the back door. At last, we set the mattress and the children on the dusty pine boards of the front room.

"We should keep them down here," I said. "It's too close upstairs and frightfully hot in the day."

"I agree," Eliza said. "But I don't like having the mat-

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tress on the floor. Let's push together those tables and set the mattress on top of them."

"Should we open the windows while it is dark? That's how the thieves got in."

Eliza pulled a knife from the waistband of her skirt. "If they try again, we'll be ready."

Once that would have shocked me, but no longer. I picked up the sword and hung it over the fireplace. We would keep the children safe.

Despite the late hour, sleep would not come. Eliza was deep in prayer by the bedside. I felt like an intruder. I fumbled in the clothespress for a candle and set it into a holder on the kitchen wall. The flickering light beat back the darkness. The kitchen looked as it had the night Grandfather died. At least we hadn't suffered any more intruders. My head thumped. So much, so fast. I could not erase visions of the sick and dying. I paced the room. The children slept, Eliza still by their side with her head bent.

I kicked something hard and hurt my toe. What could be on the floor? I got on my hands and knees and felt along the dark floor until I found a lump wrapped in a napkin. I carried it over to the candlelight.

It was Nathaniel's painting, the flowers he sent to me when Mother was ill. I pressed the picture to my cheek. Stay inside, Nathaniel, I thought. Stop tossing flowers out the window at passing girls and stay inside where you are safe.