Calico Bush

by Rachel Field

  “You ’n me, we make a good team,” she said during a pause as she bent to splice two ends of thread. “I expect we could weave an’ spin our fingers to the bone without ever tirin’.”

  “I do expect so,” Marguerite acquiesced with a little sigh, “if it was not that I am a Bound-out Girl.”

  “You won’t be one always,” Aunt Hepsa told her comfortingly. “You’ll be marryin’ with a home of your own before long.”

  “I belong to the Sargents for six years yet,” she reminded the other. “Many things can happen in six years.”

  “There’s no denyin’ that, but when you’re as old as I be, you get to take whatever comes along.” She fastened the threads before she went on in a different tone. “But one thing’s certain—you need a pair o’ shoes, an’ I mean to see you have ’em.”

  That was a day to remember, with the sweet smells, the good food, the wonder of seeing the colored strands of wool turning into patterns of firm, warm cloth under Aunt Hepsa’s hands, the setting up of the smaller loom to make linsey-woolsey cloth for them all. This was a simpler matter, involving no special pattern, for the wool would be woven on linen warp in its natural state with only a darker thread at intervals to give it a grayish color. Marguerite caught the manner of this quickly. As long as the light lasted she kept the shuttle flying back and forth. The clack of the wood beat out a sure and steady rhythm, of which she seemed herself a part.

  Supper was plentiful; the Sargents had not known plenty since the Raising. The twins’ eyes grew round at the sight of frying eggs, besides the fresh corn cakes and bowls of milk. Marguerite ate with relish. It seemed most wonderfully pleasant to her to be at a quiet table set with proper plates and mugs; to handle pewter spoons once more. After the meal was over Seth brought out his fiddle and played a tune or two for Susan and Becky while Marguerite helped Aunt Hepsa with the dishes.

  When the little girls were in bed, the old woman got Seth to bring out a piece of cowhide and draw the pattern of Marguerite’s feet on it. Then she showed her how to pull the leather up over the toes and instep, till it fitted snug and firm with thongs to keep it in place.

  “They make easy steppin’,” Aunt Hepsa told her; “an’ likely you’ll need to wear ’em inside the boots I promised you, your foot’s that much narrower.”

  Seth took an old lantern and went out to see to the cows. He returned presently, calling them to join him at the door.

  “Northern Lights,” he was saying, “the like I’ve never seen before.”

  Marguerite followed his pointing finger, and sure enough the northern sky was bristling with strange lights. Long fingers of ghostly white pulsated almost to the mid-heavens from above the dark line of shore across the channel. Sometimes wheels of ice-green color moved through them, and again flashes of red fire appeared and disappeared eerily. Always in utter silence they flared or burned, a stillness that sent queer chills down the backbone.

  “That double ring o’ brightness is the Aurora Borealis,” Seth told them. “It don’t often show up so clear.”

  “But what does it mean?” asked Marguerite, her heart strangely shaken at the sight.

  “Cold weather mostly,” he told her, “unless you believe same’s the Injun’s do that it’s a sign o’ war an’ famine.”

  “You’d ought to be ashamed o’ yourself to talk such a way to the girl, Seth,” his aunt scolded him as she stepped briskly inside and pulled the door to on the spectacle. “All I know is it means winter’s here an’ no mistake. An’ I’d know that by the feelin’ in my bones without no Northern Lights to tell me.”

  PART 3WINTER

  Ethan and Timothy had been back some days now, and their boat unloaded of its goods. There was to be a corn-shelling bee at Sunday Island that very day, which put all the Sargent family in high good humor except Ira. He had been moody and low-spirited ever since the sloop’s return, and Marguerite suspected this might in some way be connected with the six china teacups it was rumored that Ethan had brought back for Abby Welles. No one had set eyes on them as yet, but Timothy had told Dolly Sargent that they were sprigged and had cost Ethan a pretty penny.

  “Near a pound sterling,” Dolly had enlarged upon the story, “or I miss my guess. I know the price real china teacups bring in Boston, an’ it stands to reason they’d be dearer in Portsmouth.”

  “Ethan must be mighty taken with Abby Welles to squander a pound sterling on her,” Joel had observed with a sidelong glance at his brother. “But I hear he drove a good bargain over his dried fish an’ furs.”

  “He’s good at drivin’ bargains, Ethan is,” was all Ira had said, but Marguerite noticed that his forehead was drawn into troubled lines.

  It was raw November weather now, and an ugly sea was running in the channel. Joel and Caleb rowed the big dory, with Dolly, the twins, and Debby for ballast; while Ira took Marguerite and the two younger children in the skiff. It was hard work pulling against the chop. In spite of Ira’s skill with the oars, icy spray and salt water splashed them often, and Jacob and Patty huddled closer under the old shawl. Marguerite wore the cowhide slippers and stockings Aunt Hepsa had given her, but her dress of brown homespun was old and patched. Dolly had fitted her out in it when she had first been bound-out to them, and now after the summer’s activity, the girl had well-nigh outgrown it. The skirt that should have reached her ankles was halfway up to her knees, and the waist fitted so snugly that Dolly had shaken her head, declaring it hardly decent. Over this she wore an old cloak and hood of Dolly’s, as much too big for her as the dress was too small. But she was too happy in the prospect of the shelling bee to let this disturb her, and at least she knew that her dark braids were smooth and freshly tied with snippets of yellow wool.

  “There’ll be molasses cakes,” Patty was saying for the tenth time. “Aunt Hepsa told me so.”

  “For all of us,” put in Jacob solemnly, “but only if we shell lots of ears.”

  Ira did not laugh and tease the children as he would have done earlier in the summer. Marguerite glanced at him quickly and saw that his lips were set close, and though his eyes took note of shore and waves, they seemed turned upon some inner matter within himself. The wind blew his thick, reddish-brown hair over his forehead, and she saw that he had shaved away the stubble from his chin. If only she had had her rosary she would have said a prayer or two in secret for Ira, that he might grow merry again, and if Abby Welles be the desire of his heart, that she might prefer him to Ethan Jordan. But of these thoughts she made no mention. She had no rosary now, and besides, she felt that the feelings of another were not a fit subject for idle prattle.

  It was almost as great an occasion as the Raising and far less hard work for the men. The Jordan kitchen and the shed beyond it were filled with heaps of dried ears of corn, from which the earlier arrivals were already shredding the yellow kernels into troughs made from hollowed logs. As usual Marguerite was put in charge of the younger children.

  “They’re too little to handle even real dull knives,” Aunt Hepsa had decided, “so you help ’em pile up the cobs by this door, Maggie.”

  All the neighbors were there now, except the Morses, whose baby was ailing. Marguerite could see Abby Welles moving from kitchen to pantry and back again as she helped Aunt Hepsa set out the food. She wore a dress of blue linsey with a white kerchief crossed in front. Her cheeks were deeply pink from the heat of the fire, and she was, as Aunt Hepsa said, “pretty as a posy.” There was great talking and laughter about a red ear of corn. Marguerite could not make it all out, but it appeared that whoever found this would be lucky in love and marry before the year was out.

  “Ethan he must be sot on gettin’ it,” chuckled Caleb to Marguerite, in an unusually expansive mood as he passed. “I s’pose if he shells the most ears he reckons he can’t miss it.”

  But it was not to Ethan or Abby Welles that the ear fell. Marguerite never knew what made her peer into the corner behind the wooden trough now already filled, but when she did, there
it was—the coveted red ear.

  “It must have rolled there,” she thought, her heart beating fast with excitement at such a discovery, “but I found it all the same!”

  No one was looking in her direction. Even the children had gathered round the shellers by the other trough. She reached down and pulled it out quickly, hiding it under a fold of her dress.

  “By Godfrey, it’s got to turn up soon!” she heard Ethan exclaim, his hands making the yellow kernels fly from the cobs.

  “It’s mine! I’ve got the red ear!” The words were on the tip of her tongue, but somehow she did not say them.

  An idea had come into her head, and now it was there, she could not forget it. Searching the group beyond her, she could see Ira standing a little gloomy and apart. He also shelled the corn, but not as Ethan was doing, and Abby’s eyes were not upon him at the moment. Still keeping her treasure out of sight, Marguerite slipped over to stand beside him.

  “Ira,” she said, but the noise of the others drowned her voice. He looked straight before him at the bent heads and moving fingers. It was only when she pressed closer and plucked at his sleeve that he noticed her.

  “What you want?” he asked her absently, his eyes still watching the others.

  “Here,” she whispered to him, under cover of the laughter about the trough. “You take it.”

  Another second and the coveted red ear of corn was in his hands, while she was slipping away with one thin brown forefinger at her lips in sign of warning. No one had noticed what passed between them or seen the sudden smile of understanding he flashed to her across the shed before he held the treasure out for all the rest to see.

  “Uncle Ira’s got it!” shouted the twins, jumping up and down excitedly, their stiff braids bobbing on their shoulders. “He’s got the red ear!”

  “Well, he’s a sly one, he is,” Seth Jordan spoke up, “lettin’ us all shell our fingers off an’ him standin’ there with it all the time!”

  Marguerite’s cheeks grew hot under her tan, hearing the laughter and joking; knowing so well how he had come by it.

  “You better watch out for him, Abby,” her brother Timothy was teasing, “an’ you too, Ethan.”

  They kept it up a long time after they had finished the shelling and were gathered about the long table in the kitchen. From her place at the far end among the children Marguerite heard and rejoiced to see Ira so merry and smiling again. After all, she thought, six sprigged china teacups were not everything. She felt sorry she had not been able to set a better patch in Ira’s jacket. She had done her best, but it showed as queer and crooked as the one on the sail of the Isabella B.

  Before they began to eat Seth Jordan bowed his head and they all did likewise, even to Jacob and Patty.

  “O Lord,” he said solemnly, “bless our crops an’ our cattle an’ all here gathered—”

  He paused, uncertain of the words that should follow, but another voice—a woman’s—spoke up from across the table.

  “An’ keep us safe from Injun raids. Amen,” it added.

  “Amen.” They all joined in, and Marguerite made a quick sign of the cross, which it was as well no one saw.

  The feast was more plentiful and varied than any Marguerite had tasted since she had left France, but it was what followed the meal that stayed longest in her memory; for when the table was cleared and the dishes washed and put away, Seth brought out his fiddle and played all the tunes he knew over and over again. Ethan had fetched him back new fiddle strings, and the bow scraped them swiftly and well. It was wonderful, Marguerite thought, to see how Seth’s knotty brown fingers moved up and down, picking the notes out and sending them to fill the kitchen with delightsome sound. Sometimes the higher ones squeaked and broke off, but no one minded, and he never lagged in his time, so that feet were continually beating an accompanying rhythm on the broad floorboards. Sometimes he played tunes they all knew, and then the room was filled full of voices; sometimes only Aunt Hepsa’s would be lifted up in her sweet, thin old piping. She sang the ballad of “Springfield Mountain,” a sad tale of a young lover who died of a snake’s bite, and to Marguerite’s joy, she was prevailed upon to sing all the verses of “Calico Bush.” Even though it was already familiar to the girl, she found herself quickening to the recital of the young man’s suffering at the hands of his proud love Judy.

  The snow it fell and the winds did blow

  I wandered high and I wandered low

  Till night came on me black as a crow,

  And never a light did shine or show,

  Calico, sprigged calico!

  The final warning had never seemed more sad and solemn.

  So, maids who pass where the laurels grow,

  Think on this tale of long ago.

  Set not your hearts on a furbelow,

  Lest you live to curse sprigged calico,

  Calico, sprigged calico!

  And then the chairs and benches were pushed back and Seth was playing a reel.

  “Ils vont danser!” Marguerite could scarcely believe her eyes, but it was so. The women were lining themselves on one side and the men and boys on the other. She felt herself between the twins, who were tugging excitedly at her hands. It was not like any of the dances she had danced in France, but more of a game or round, with each man in turn joining hands with his opposite partner and swinging her round while the others clapped and sang in chorus:

  Here’s the couple that stole the sheep,

  While all the rest were fast asleep.

  Put the salt right in the hand,

  And call “Here Nanny, Nanny, Nan!”

  Round and round they twirled, two by two, with the hands clapping and the voices shouting in hearty singsong:

  Oars in the boat and they won’t go round,

  Oars in the boat and they won’t go round

  Till you’ve kissed the pretty girl you’ve just found.

  Such laughter and smacking up and down the line! Marguerite felt her blood tingling and her heart thumping pleasantly even though Caleb was her opposite partner and his twirlings were anything but graceful.

  When it was over everyone stopped, flushed and panting, except Ira, who continued to twirl Abby for some time after the music stopped.

  “Come on, Aunt Hepsa, do us a jog!” someone begged, and Seth struck into another quick tune.

  Although she protested, the old woman was nothing loath to show that she had a light foot. She stepped out gayly and alone to the middle of the kitchen floor and began to spin till her skirts stood out stiffly about her in the wind she made. Her feet in their homemade slippers went through the quick steps deftly—heel and toe, dip and spin, left foot, right foot, in and out. Marguerite watched in delighted wonder, seeing the old figure move so surely, watching the pink come into her cheeks till they were bright as the children’s.

  “Whew!” she panted at last, sinking down breathless on the settle and flapping her apron to fan her flushed face. “I ain’t made such a fool o’ myself in months. But anyhow my knees ain’t so stiff’s I thought.”

  “Who’ll be next?” Seth was asking, tightening his fiddle strings in readiness.

  “I will,” Marguerite heard herself saying, “I will dance the pavane.”

  She saw the astonished looks on the children’s faces and the disapproval on Dolly’s and Hannah Welles’ as she stepped into the cleared place in the middle. But Aunt Hepsa gave her an encouraging nod, and Seth swung into the reel again.

  “Allons!” she said to herself, and her feet began to move in the steps she had not thought of for so long.

  It was not the same tune that Oncle Pierre had played when he had taught her, but it would do. She could point her toes and slide as well to this one. Her body could dip and bend as easily here in the Jordans’ kitchen to Seth’s fiddle as it had across the sea in Le Havre. All the motions of the dance came back to her like the notes of a remembered tune. She was free again and so light she scarcely felt the floor under her feet. Now she was whirli
ng so swiftly that the faces of the little group about her were nothing but a pale blur. One of her braids shook loose. She felt the hair warm and tumbling about her cheek and shoulders; and the ring and button, swinging on the cord inside her dress, thumped at every move. Only when the music stopped abruptly did she pause. Even then it was a full moment before she came to her proper senses.

  Tongues were clicking all about her.

  “I declare, child, you’re the smartest stepper I ever see!” Hepsa Jordan exclaimed. “I wouldn’t think a skinny little body like you could keep it up so!”

  “It’s a caution to see her,” one of the men spoke up.

  “Yes,” agreed another, “I’ve heard tell the French was light steppers!”

  “An’ light-minded and light-fingered as well.” Marguerite heard Joel Sargent’s voice, heavy with disapproval.

  “I wasn’t brought up to such doin’s,” Hannah Welles broke in, “and if any child of mine had stepped about so I’d be pure shamed, that’s what I’d be.”

  “She’s raised different, bein’ French,” Marguerite could hear Dolly apologizing. “She don’t mean no harm, but it’s in her blood, I guess.”

  “Oh, come now, where’s the hurt?” protested Seth, laying away his fiddle. “I thought she jigged it right an’ proper.”

  “Proper ain’t hardly the word for it,” put in Kate Stanley from her corner. “An’ if she was bound-out to me—”

  “It says in my Bible as how King David danced before the Lord, an’ it don’t appear that He made any objections,” Hepsa Jordan remarked with a finality that put an end to the argument.

  Marguerite listened to their words, her heart still pounding under her homespun waist, the blood still tingling in her veins from such joyous exertions. Now she felt suddenly tired and low-spirited. It had seemed so natural and easy and right to dance to Seth’s fiddle. Why must they think ill of her for it? She turned toward the window, pressing her cheeks to the little glass panes to cool them of their smarting.