My Theodosia

by Anya Seton

  'My father is not disgraced,' she answered inflexibly. 'That he could never be. If he is in trouble, I wish to be with him. I suppose, in view of this account, that he is really in Richmond. But the rest I do not believe. I'm sure that he is not under arrest. He has done nothing to merit that. Even Jefferson's hostility could not go so far.'

  Joseph heard her with renewed rage. How could she be so stubbornly blind? Her insensate belief in her father infuriated him. He barely mastered an urge to strike her, shake the white, contemptuous remoteness from her small set person.

  'You're a fool!' he shouted. 'You credit nothing which does not come from your precious rogue of a father. Here, perhaps you will believe his own words.'

  He drew a tattered sheet of paper from his pocket. She saw the familiar small handwriting and snatched it from him. As she read, he watched her with angry satisfaction. He knew the scrawled hurried lines by heart.

  FORT STODDEILT— March 4th

  I am under arrest, to leave here tomorrow for the North. We will pass through Carolina in a week. My guard numbers nine. A small force can effect my release. Chester will be the best place for this.

  A

  'I don't understand!' she cried. 'How did this get here? It's directed to me. Why did I not receive it?'

  He was silent. He did not regret having intercepted her letter, but he did regret that his anger had betrayed him into giving it to her now.

  She saw his expression, and understood. 'You kept it from me,' she whispered. 'We could have rescued him, as he says, and now it is too late.'

  He was frightened at the change in her. He had expected anger, a sharpening of the contempt with which she had been regarding him, but not this stony despair. She sank into a chair and fastened her gaze on a comer of the carved-wood arm. Then her head drooped.

  ' He must have thought I had deserted him. He must have hoped, and waited, scanning each face, looking for friends, for those who believe in him—and there was nothing. Oh, how could you do that to him—and to me?'

  Joseph touched her bowed head with a clumsy hand. 'Be reasonable, Theo. What could we do? The Government has arrested him. How could I effect his release?'

  'Of course, you could have. You have authority in this State. A score of men could have done it. But you're a coward. You have no loyalty. You think of nothing but your own skin. I despise you'. She spoke with a toneless lack of emphasis that stabbed him.

  'You are unjust, Theo,' he stammered. 'I'm—I'm——'

  He closed his lips with a gulp. He'd be damned if he'd try to justify himself. He'd acted as would any reasonable man. He turned on his heel and stamped into the house, venting his anger by administering to Cupid a lusty kick as that small black boy, who had been hovering in the hall, neglected to scamper for safety with requisite speed.

  Theodosia stayed alone on the porch. She thought: Just here he sat with me, on that golden October afternoon when he first told me of it—of 'X'. She saw again his transfigured face, felt the glory and the majesty that he had made her feel. Still behind her, on the table in the drawing-room, stood the little bust of Napoleon. 'Do you dare to think that I am not at least the equal of that little Corsican peasant?'

  She shut her eyes and slow tears welled from under the lids. She shook her head impatiently. He hated tears. How dared she weep and despair! 'This is only a temporary setback,' she whispered to herself. 'He will extricate himself. They cannot do anything to him. He has done no wrong'. She repeated this over and over like an incantation.

  When Eleanore later came out on the porch to tell her that le petit had had his supper and was calling for his mother, she found her mistress dry-eyed and calm, but she noted her pallor, traces of recent tears.

  'Is there bad news, Madame?' she asked sympathetically.

  Theo nodded slowly. 'Yes, bad news, but it is temporary. It shall be surmounted.'

  The maid lingered, curious, offering, with the liberty of a valued servant, ' Monsieur Alston seems in a bad temper; he is shouting and bellowing like a mad bull.'

  Theo shrugged, her lips parted in a faint, remote smile. 'Mr. Alston's behavior is a matter of complete indifference to me.'

  Eleanore started. Mon Dieu, comme elle ressemble à son père! For in that moment she had seen Theo's gentle prettiness freeze into a brilliant hardness. The lift of her chin, the jeweled flash of her disdainful eyes, these were Colonel Burr.

  'Monsieur Alston is, after all, no match for Madame,' said Eleanore to herself, astonished. 'Let him roar and hit about as he will'. This was a new idea to her. She had accepted Theo as a docile wife and daughter, except, of course, for that affair in Washington. But that had been simply une petite indiscrétion now far in the past, and never repeated. Madame lived like a nun, nor ever seemed aware of any admiration she might arouse.

  Joseph softened his stand before Theo left for Richmond. He clung as long as he could to his authority. In public he violently repudiated any knowledge of the conspiracy and endeavored to maintain this pose in private as well. Yet Theo's icy indifference reduced him to misery. She had made preparations to take the mail coach from Georgetown, but on the night before her departure, he entered her room, scowling.

  'I will not have you go by public conveyance. It is not fitting for an Alston,' he said roughly, as though it had been her idea. 'Pompey will drive you in the cabriolet.'

  She was on her knees beside a small cowhide trunk that she was packing. 'Thank you, Joseph,' she said, with distant politeness.

  He shifted his feet and cleared his throat. 'It's possible that I may join you later up there if I can arrange my affairs.'

  She knew that this was for him a painful concession, and she had a faint impulse of pity. But she had not forgiven him.

  ' If you come as a supporter, if you come to help, I shall be pleased to see you'. She turned back to the trunk.

  He watched her small bent back unhappily for a moment. Her loosened hair swung in long curling strands across the blue of her dressing-gown, she looked young and fresh and tempting. A vein throbbed in his temple. Damn it, she was his wife I How dared she run counter to his wishes! Why shouldn't he seize her by the loose shining hair, force her, subdue her, beat her until she cried for mercy?

  She looked up in some surprise when she heard him draw a rasping breath.

  ' Is there anything more you wished to say to me, Joseph?' Her great dark eyes were questioning, and cold as the winter ocean.

  Turning savagely, he flung out of the room.

  It was dusk when Theo arrived in Richmond. The air was heavy with thunder. Stifling July heat pressed down upon the town. It was hard to breathe; dust rose thick from the streets, and yet those streets were crowded with people and there seemed a holiday feeling abroad. Through tavern doors came laughter and snatches of song. So numerous were the roisterers at the Eagle Tavern that tables had been placed outside on the pavement, and around them sprawled groups of men, clinking tankards. Spilled beer dribbled into the gutters.

  As Theo's carriage passed down Broad Street, the crowd became so dense that the horses could not go forward. Twenty feet ahead of them a group of young people danced back and forth across the cobblestones to the whistled tune of ' Money Musk'. On Theo's right in the Capitol Square she heard the sputter and whish of fireworks.

  She pulled her hood down around her face and, leaning from the carriage window, spoke to a man in buckskin breeches who stood upon the curb tapping his foot in time to 'Money Musk.'

  ' Pardon me, sir. Is there some sort of celebration? Why are there so many people in town?'

  The man touched his coonskin cap and laughed. 'Celebration enough, ma'am. We've come from all over Virginny to see the traitor hung.'

  The people nearest him caught up the words. 'Hang the traitor!' shrilled a female voice. 'Hang him! Hang him!' Like a diabolic chorus the sinister cries of the mob swirled around her.

  She shrank into the depths of the carriage. Panic struck through her, and she shivered in spite of the heat. She h
uddled into her cloak.

  Oh, little Burr's wanted for murder, and little Burr's wanted for treason—

  And we'll string him high on the gallows tree, no matter what the reason.

  A raucous voice started the couplet to a jigging tune, and at once it was bellowed from a dozen throats.

  Panic ebbed as anger gripped Theo. The street was still blocked. Pompey had got out, and was standing by the horses, imploring those nearest him to make way.

  Theo thrust her head forth again. 'How dare you talk of hanging!' she cried into the astonished faces outside. 'Burr is no traitor. And he's not even been tried yet.'

  The man in the coonskin cap stopped singing. His jaw dropped. Her blazing eyes abashed him. 'Why, sure, ma'am, he's a traitor. Jefferson says so.'

  'He has no right to say so,' she returned furiously. 'The President has no right to condemn any man unheard.'

  The dancers broke from ' Money Musk' and crowded round the carriage. They muttered and stared. Pompey, momentarily deserting the horses, pushed his way to her. His black face was gray with fear.

  'Don' talk like dat, Mistiss,' he begged in a hoarse whisper. 'Dey mought hurt us. I kain git de horses troo dem nohow.'

  'Where you want to go to, ma'am?' asked the man in the coonskin cap, who had overheard Pompey. Theo's words, coupled with her beauty, had had their effect.

  She drew a deep breath and squared her shoulders. 'To the jail,' she answered quietly, 'to see Aaron Burr.'

  There was a moment's silence, then somebody tittered. 'They say he casts a spell over the females.'—'Even a gallows bird can find comfort in a pair of soft white arms.'—'Give him a kiss for me, my lady,' shrilled a fat wench, placing her arms akimbo and smacking her lips. This sally won guffaws; somebody slapped the wench across her broad buttocks.

  Theodosia rose inside the carriage, her cape and hood slipped off, and she leaned far out the window, directing her words to the farthest of their stupid, goggling faces. 'I am Aaron Burr's daughter. Will you kindly let me pass?'

  The crowd fell back then, murmuring, whispering, their expressions changed to avid curiosity. The man in the coon skin cap gave her a look of grudging admiration, and he went to Pompey's aid. 'Make way for this lady!' he shouted. The surging crowd obeyed. The news ran like wildfire over them.

  The carriage rolled slowly down the street between rows of staring eyes, and stopped before a small red-brick building with heavily barred windows.

  Theo stepped out and made herself known to the uniformed jailer who greeted her. Her small back was straight and her head high, but her legs were trembling.

  No matter how I find him, I must not show my dismay, my terror, she thought. In a frenzied effort to anticipate the worst, she pictured him in a dark dirty cell, littered with straw; she saw him with his hair cropped, garbed in the soiled homespun uniform, dun-colored, which was reserved for prisoners. Would he be beaten, humiliated, trapped, his gallantry and courage for once effaced by this incredible degradation? She forced her lips to a casually affectionate smile. There must be no heroics—he would hate them.

  Reality brought a rush of blinding relief, so that she swayed a moment by the door. For the jailer ushered her into a commodious room whose furnishings included tables, chairs, and a length of crimson drugget over the boards.

  And her father! He was a trifle pale, his brilliant dark eyes showed fatigue, but he wore his familiar black silk suit, his neckcloth was snowily immaculate as ever.

  She flung her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder that smelled of tobacco and clear-starch from his fresh linen: an indescribably comforting odor which sent her straight back to her childhood, when the strength of his arms holding her, the blessed reassurance of his nearness, exorcised all woes.

  It was so now. She had prepared herself to comfort and sustain. She saw with deep joy that that had been presumptu ous. He was as always master of himself, of his environment, and of her.

  'Father, darling,' she whispered, and now that there was no longer need to be brave, her eyes swam with tears.

  He kissed her cheek and laughed, saying with his own unique mixture of raillery and tenderness: 'Welcome to the penitentiary, madam, and behold the jailbird: a pampered jailbird. I am far more comfortable here than I have been during a great part of my life. Many of the good citizens of Richmond keep me supplied with delicacies. Look!'

  He pointed to a table beside the window, loaded with gifts. There were piles of oranges and apricots, baskets of raspberries, a pitcher of cream, a pat of butter; there were colored comfits, a box of cigars, and a towering bunch of red roses.

  'A fair lady sent me these,' said Aaron, pulling one of the roses from the vase, 'with a most impassioned note. She would be surprised at the use I shall make of this one'. He fastened it to the neck of Theo's dress. 'Now, if you will smile, my pretty one, you will be lovely as I like to see you'. Theo managed a watery smile.

  'That's better. I see you are surprised to find me like this. Poor child, did you really expect to find me beating my breast and wallowing in filth?'

  She nodded ruefully. 'Something like that. Thank God, I was wrong. But Father—that mob out there, they're horrible. They're all against you; they scream and rant about—about——'

  'About my hanging,' finished Aaron calmly. 'I know. I can hear them. They will, however, be disappointed. I do not intend to be hanged.'

  She moistened her lips. 'Are you—are you sure of the outcome?' She watched him fearfully as he walked back and forth on the strip of drugget, frowning.

  'They have not a shred of real evidence,' he said at last. 'There is nothing to it save Jefferson's hysterical enmity, and fortunately John Marshall is on the bench. He is a just man and will not allow our magnificent President to intimidate him.'

  ' But what happened? How did this really come about?' She asked the question which had jabbed at her since the first black moment on the porch at the Oaks when Joseph had shown her the newspaper.

  He shrugged. 'General Wilkinson, while accepting Spanish gold with one hand, has managed to inflame Jefferson against me with the other. It's very simple.'

  'I thought General Wilkinson was your friend!' she cried. 'He was to command your troops, he was heart and soul immersed in the cause.'

  'He was all that, and more, until he discovered that there would be greater profit in denouncing me.'

  She sprang up, clasping her hands together. 'It's vile horrible treachery! And why should Jefferson listen? What is the malign fate that twists your motives, and presents you always to the world in a false, sinister light?'

  Aaron sighed. In his heart he agreed with her point of view. Still, he would not allow his composure to be ruffled. The stoical acceptance of disagreeable events was as much a part of his nature as was the shrewdness which enabled him to circumvent them—when circumvention was possible.

  'My dear,' he said soothingly, 'you have read to very little purpose if you have not remarked that such things happen in all democratic governments. Was there in Greece or Rome a man of virtue and independence, and supposed to possess great talents, who was not the object of vindictive and unrelenting persecution?'

  'I suppose not,' she said unhappily.

  ' Alston did not come with you?'

  She shook her head, debating whether to tell him the full story of Joseph's behavior and decided at last to do so, that he might be forewarned.

  'I suspected as much,' said Aaron when she had finished. 'I had no great hopes of rescue in Chester. I thought that very likely you would not receive the letter. And yet, I confess that at the time it was a grave disappointment.'

  How grave she would never know. He had attempted to escape from his guard and had announced himself to the gaping, bewildered people of Chester. When nothing happened, and he was ignominiously bundled back upon his horse, he had lost control of himself, had been reduced for one instant to a shaking, piteous mass of nerves. This memory shamed him as nothing else ever had. He buried it anew where it w
ould not trouble him.

  'I wish you to go out much in society here, Theo. Be gay and laugh. Never for one moment betray fears or agitation, or I renounce thee. You will go into a pleasant house on Clay Street. It is being lent you by the Clarks, who are disposed to be most friendly. Whatever the mob may think, the gentry have been kind and sympathetic. There are many Federalists here who despise Jefferson and incline to admire Burr. You will see.'

  Theo was thirsty for the reassurances he gave her, desperately anxious to believe that there could be no doubt of the outcome. And yet, for all the red drugget and the table and chairs, this was a prison. There were stout bars across the windows, and the jailer had locked her in. The grating of his huge brass key had made no impression on her at the time, but she heard it now echoing in her mind as a harsh symbol of defeat.

  'I have no heart for gaiety. I fear I cannot pretend it. Let me stay here with you, Father—please'. She put a pleading hand on his arm.

  He took the small white hand and raised it briefly to his lips. 'No, my dear. You came, I assume, to help me. And you will do exactly as I say. Mingle in society, present to everyone an unperturbed serenity. More than that, if you meet, as I believe you will, members of the opposition, jurists or John Marshall himself, your woman's wit will guide you as to the best methods of dealing with them. You have my permission to smile and coquet a little. When you choose, you can be irresistible. I hope you have brought some pretty gowns'. She shook her head, troubled. She had not anticipated any such part as this. But she understood him perfectly, and would do her best.

  'I brought only simple clothes, except—wait—I believe Eleanore packed for me my new yellow brocade that I had made in Charleston.'

  'Good. Yellow becomes you, and if you arc as pale as you seem to be now, buy yourself a pot of rouge. Rub a little on the lips as well. It enhances the whiteness of the teeth. Did you bring the diamond necklace?'