Our Own Country: A Novel (The Midwife Series) (18 page)

Isaac nodded. He glanced at me, and I knew his question.

“I’ll come as well, if I may,” I said. “Isaac, I need to speak to Watkins. Perhaps you could look for shells on the beach? You may keep the ones you find. But don’t go too far—I shall call for you shortly. Do you understand?”

He nodded. “But—”

“Yes, Isaac?”

“I’m
hungry
.”

I smiled. Children’s needs were so simple, compared to ours! “As it happens, Isaac, Cassie packed some provisions. Go find a rock to sit on so you don’t dirty your trousers. If you eat everything Cassie packed for you, you can then fill your rucksack up with shells.”

The child looked at me twice to make certain I was sincere; he then ran off to find a flat rock.

I led Watkins off in the other direction, out of the child’s earshot. Alone with him, I grew suddenly awkward. He stood several feet away from me, head turned to the side, glancing now and again at the strange child I had brought.

“There’s a story in that boy,” Watkins said, “but I’m sorry I cannot hear it just now. I dare not stop, when so much is in my care.”

“I understand,” I replied. “We’ve not as yet pried much from him, but I’ll willingly tell you all I know.”

“Tomorrow, I have a few minutes at eleven, then an hour at two in the afternoon. I usually eat with the other lads—”

“Yes,” I said, leaning in to whisper. “But allow me to say what presses so upon my mind. It won’t take a moment. Cassie and I, we are praying the boy may apprentice here, at the shipyard. He’s a runaway, and we have little doubt that his owner looks for him as we speak. The boy landed on our doorstep just yesterday. Isaac is not his real name—he won’t tell us it. I believe his life, his survival—”

“Say no more,” Watkins replied. He then glanced back toward the
Ranger
. “But I must go.” Then, suddenly, Watkins took my hand in his, looked gravely at me, and departed.

I sucked in my breath and just stood there a moment or two, while Isaac ran up and down the beach gathering shells.

22

THE WIND WHIPPED MY FACE; MY HAND
still felt his hand on mine. My ear still heard his soft voice in my ear. I allowed myself a moment of purest joy. The sun was descending and cast its long shadow upon the shore. I felt myself cast in shadow, too. What did I hope? I dared not answer. But his touch had given the lie to my belief that he cared nothing for me or I for him.

Once home, Isaac fairly skipped into the kitchen, eager to show off his shells. A moment later, Cassie opened the kitchen door with her foot and hip.

“Miss Eliza,” she scolded. “What you tink lettin’ ’eem in wit’ all dees
sand
. Here . . .” She thrust a pail at me and waved us both off to the well to wash the shells clean. “I just wash de floor, and ’ee goin’ to track sand all ovah de house. Your Mama is already in a terrible way . . . she gone to fetch de constable.”

I stood motionless, believing that Mama had reported Isaac. But Cassie, with one look at the child and a slight shake of the head, gave me to know I was mistaken.

“Wash dose shells, den I tell you. Oh, dees ’ees too much for one day. Poor Cassie heart gon’ stop ’eets bee-tin’ . . .”

I ran with Isaac to the well and, in my haste, splashed water all over my petticoat, which Isaac found vastly amusing. As a reward for his laughter, I poured the rest of the bucket on his head.

“Ai!” he cried. “Miss Cassie!” Cassie came out and was not pleased to have to dry Isaac off and fetch another of Master George’s old shirts.

The shells were soon clean enough to gain admittance to the house, and Cassie set Isaac up with them on the floor in her chamber. She then turned to me. I asked, “Why has Mama gone off to fetch the constable?”

Cassie could not suppress a guilty smile. “What do you know, Miss Eliza, but Linda has gone and run off wit’ Bristol Wood’ouse!”

I dropped the bucket and stared at her. Bristol Woodhouse was the slave of that same Mr. Atkinson whose ill fortune it was to be invited to our Thanksgiving dinner. Now he, a goodly carpenter by reputation, had gone off with our Linda. I turned and fixed my eyes upon Cassie, who shrank from my gaze.

“I thought you said Linda and Watkins were a couple. Indeed, you have spoken of little else these six months.”

Just then, my mother burst into the kitchen with Constable Hill, Uncle Robert not far behind them. They both looked greatly disconcerted. He had lost a valuable piece of property, and Mama had lost her lady’s maid—she would not find such a one as Linda anywhere in the colonies.

“And here I thought her so pliant, so amiable!” Mama was saying to Constable Hill.

“Oh, Sister, those people run deep!” added Uncle Robert.

“Mama,” I rejoindered, standing in front of Cassie, “you can hardly blame a slave for wanting to be free.”

“I don’t see why not,” Mama objected. “What else could she do? Where could she possibly
go
?”

I thought it prudent not to reply. Suddenly we heard the faint clack of Isaac arranging his shells on the floor of Cassie’s chamber. With a gasp, Cassie ran to her room and shut the door behind her. The clacking ceased.

“What on earth’s the matter with
her
?” asked Mama. Clearly Uncle Robert had not as yet told Mama about the boy.

“I have no idea.” I glanced at Uncle Robert, who made as if not to notice me.

I held my breath in the awkward pause before Cassie returned. Such good and ill fortune at once! Emerging from the old dairy at last, Cassie wiped the perspiration from her brow and, to Constable Hill’s query, said she knew nothing of the clandestine affair. I for one believed her. While Cassie was an able liar, I did not believe her capable of convincing me of an attachment between Linda and Watkins when she knew of another.

“But Mama, we mustn’t keep Cassie from her work. Let us away to the parlor, where we may offer Constable Hill a seat.”

“Oh, goodness, you are right.” And we left the kitchen for the relative safety of the parlor. Once there, and seated, however, there seemed little to discuss, and I suggested we look in upon the nursery. The four of us tromped up the stairs to the attic, where we discovered Linda’s bed neatly made, her Sunday frock draped over a chair.

“Seems she had it planned well,” observed the constable. “To my way of thinking, she must have had help.”

Signs went up all over town about a pair of runaway slaves. Guards were posted on the roads north and south leading out of town. Stoodley’s coach service was notified, though we doubted any coachman would risk his neck for a pair of slaves. But, after a few days, the couple did not appear, and it was determined that the
y’d
managed somehow to escape the net cast around Portsmouth.

For six months I had suffered Watkins’s growing attachment to Linda. It had been an exquisite pain, clear and cleansing, each stab telling me that he was ne’er to be mine. Now I recognized the danger to me that came with the freedom to hope. I knew not whether I would have the strength to create another impediment.

Up to this point my attraction to Watkins had been of a fairly superficial nature. But the week Linda escaped, I learned certain facts that had a powerful effect on my feelings toward him.

That Sunday morning before meeting, I was standing in the kitchen helping Cassie prepare our dinner when I heard my uncle in the hallway just beyond us. He was speaking to Watkins. I missed the first part of the conversation, but when it grew louder I clearly heard Watkins say,

“I’m sorry, sir, but I’ve spent it.”

“Spent it!” my uncle cried. “On what, pray, did you spend my money?”

I cast a look at Cassie and moved quickly to stand behind the kitchen door, where I peered out to see Watkins, head bowed abjectly as he stood before Uncle Robert.

“On shoes,” Watkins said. “These ones are nearly spent.”

I looked down at his shoes. It was true, they were very worn. Why then, I wondered, did he not wear the new ones?

“I should whip you, boy!” said Uncle Robert. “But the people don’t approve of that anymore—not even thieves may be whipped these days. Oh, well, but you may keep your shoes—I suppose you need ’em. But you must request a pair next time, not simply take matters into your own hands.”

“Yes, sir,” said Watkins humbly.

When they had both gone, I turned to Cassie. “That was very odd, Cassie. Watkins just told Uncle Robert that h
e’d
gone and bought shoes with the money he made at the shipyard. Yet he is not wearing them. Why is that, do you think?”

Cassie looked at me as if she considered lying. But a clever reply did not come to her, and so she said,

“Dat money in Linda’s pocket, dat’s why.”

“Linda’s pocket! Why, Cassie, he might have been whipped once more—or worse! It was very foolhardy of Watkins to risk his neck for a pair of runaways.”

Though feigning annoyance with Watkins, tears of pride had welled involuntarily in my eyes.

“Here,” said Cassie flatly, proffering a handkerchief from her pocket. “Dry your eyes.”

On Monday morning, I accompanied Isaac to Badger’s Island for his promised tour. It was cold and windy when we arrived, somewhere before eleven. Once upon the island, I wrapped a blanket around the both of us, and we climbed the dunes.

Isaac emerged from the blanket and ran after the gulls. I chased after him, he running even faster to keep away from me, until we found ourselves laughing and breathless at the northern tip of the island. At eleven we were far down the beach when we heard the bell announcing break. Isaac then raced back toward the shipyard. My feet tripped over the blanket that I kept about my shoulders, and I was out of breath by the time we reached the
Ranger
, my bonnet having flown off not once but twice, requiring me to run after it.

Back at the shipyard, one hundred or so men had put down their tools and gathered around makeshift boards for their grog. They eyed me and the Negro boy. I did not see Watkins but heard him call Isaac’s name. Isaac grinned.

There he stood, this John Watkins. He was every bit as hale and handsome, alas, as he had been the day before.

“Hallo, there,” he addressed the child. “Here, have a sip of grog. No? If you’re to be a proper shipwright, Isaac, you’ve got to have yer pint.”

Watkins’s hands and shirt were covered with a dark substance that looked like gunpowder. Why would he be working with such a thing at a shipyard? He went off for a moment and returned with a mug, which he proffered to Isaac. Isaac took it in both hands, sipped, and then made a face as he spat the grog into the sand.

Watkins laughed, his face revealing a pair of fine dimples. “You’ll get used to it. Come on.” He took the boy’s hand. “I’ll show you what it takes to build a real warship.” Having stooped down for Isaac, he glanced inquiringly at me and whispered, “Do you leave at once for home?”

I had no wish to leave, but it was too cold and windy to remain long on the island. I nodded. Then I added formally, “I shall return to fetch Isaac at two.” Then I whispered, “If anyone asks, you might say he’s Cassie’s son.”

Watkins nodded slightly, and there followed a silence. What came from me next surprised both of us.

“Perhaps, Watkins—perhaps I might bring a fishing line tomorrow. Yes”—I warmed to my subject—“I should like to learn to fish, and be of use to my family.”

Watkins nodded once more: “Certainly. Bring a rod, and, if you wish, I can show you how.”

“Have we a fishing rod about?” I asked Cassie casually, upon returning home. She was on the stairs, heading up to see Mama, who had taken to her bed at the shock of Linda’s escape.

“You’re not having Isaac fish? Da fish bigger’n ’ee is.”

“No, no. Don’t be uneasy. It’s for myself alone I inquire.”

“Master George had one,” she said. “What you want with ’eet?”

“What I want with it is my business.”

“Well, then, you may fetch your own business your own self. Master George kept it in the stables.”

“Thank you,” I replied curtly, and off I went to procure the rod. I found the pole covered in cobwebs, propped against a corner of the barn. It was quite long: near eighteen feet—an old, noble pole, fashioned several generations ago, made of fir and flexible as a whip. As I left the stables, Jupiter called after me, wagging a black, bony finger, “Caution, Miss Eliza. You’re as like to trip and kill yourself with that as catch a fish.”

“Oh, no.” I smiled. “I’ll manage.” But, despite my attempts to keep it on my shoulder, the rod bent and dragged on the ground. Its long horsehair line and hook kept coming unraveled. I finally found a means of tucking the line securely beneath the pole on my shoulder, but in the commotion I left the blanket behind, which I soon regretted, as the wind bit shrewdly.

The ferryman muttered something about the pole being longer than the boat, but he helped me set it over the rim of the vessel so that it dragged behind us. Once we had nearly reached the island, he looked at me and said, pipe still in his mouth. “Where’s yer bait?”

“Bait!” I cried, having forgotten all about it. “I—I believe one of the men has some. He means to teach me.”

The ferryman snorted derisively, waving his pipe for emphasis. “Why, you can barely lift the thing.”