SH04_Empire

by Edward Cline

  Etáin shook her head. “I am not ready to, Father.”

  Ian McRae did not immediately reply. “Well, perhaps by spring you will be,” he said. “For by then, we must have sold everything in the inventory here and closed this place.” He looked at his daughter with a sad but firm resolution. “If you mean to stay, my dear, you must be bold.”

  Chapter 4: The North

  In Lausanne, Switzerland, near Geneva, young Edward Gibbon, on a restless quest for a history to write, contemplated a sojourn in Rome to study its past and its ruins. In Blackburn, Lancashire, James Hargreaves, a poor weaver, refrained from scolding his daughter Jenny for having, in the course of her play, overturned a spinning wheel, his chief mode of income, for the sight of it gave him the germ of an idea for a better way to work wool and cotton. And at Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, upriver from London, Horace Walpole, member for Castle Rising and youngest son of the late Earl of Orford, was preparing to publish The Castle of Otranto, a new genre of novel later called “Gothic.” Respectively, these events comprised a major step in the evolution of the discipline of history, the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and the debut of what would in the next century become Romantic literature.

  Etáin McRae was as oblivious to these men and events as they were to her, yet her own ponderings were no less momentous.

  That night she tossed and turned in her bed like a woman gripped by fever, made sleepless by the turmoil of her thoughts. Until now, she had enjoyed the luxury of time. This had been abruptly robbed of her. Now she must make one of two decisions: to return to Scotland with her parents, or to choose between Jack Frake and Hugh Kenrick.

  The first choice loomed ominously in her thoughts. She imagined a dozen dire, vividly likely events that could end her life, or at least the possibility of her ever seeing the men again: a savage storm at sea that could sink her ship; a fatal error in navigation that could dash the ship on the rocks on the coast of England, a common tragedy; a deadly shipboard sickness; on land, robbery and murder by highwaymen; an overturned coach; a variety of catastrophic mishaps…. The prospect of going to England thus became less and less a portent with each stark, capricious nightmare, and the choice receded in her mind until it was a mere distant, abstract foolishness it was pointless to dwell on further.

  She would not return.

  That left Jack and Hugh.

  She plumbed the depths of her soul, asked herself a hundred questions, and set up in her imagination a special ledger book such as she kept in her father’s shop, with columns for pluses and minuses for each man.

  But she found that all she could enter for both men were pluses.

  In the end, she decided on her measure; she chose her north. Exhausted by the task — realizing ultimately that her decision rested on what she regarded as justice for herself — she fell asleep just as light began to touch the top of the holly tree beyond her window.

  She allowed herself a few days to test her certitude. In her free moments, when neither her mother nor her father’s shop required her presence, she spent time on her harp. Once, her mother heard her playing a simple melody that was somber but serene, a melody that seemed to mirror her daughter’s recent mood. When she complimented her on it, Etáin said, “It is a Quaker hymn that I found in some of the music Hugh brought from Philadelphia last month. It is called ‘The Right of Conscience.’”

  “It is pensive,” remarked Madeline McRae, “yet untroubled. Are there words to it? There must be, if it is a hymn.”

  “Yes, but they are not worthy of the melody, which is fine enough. One can attach one’s own words to it, so that it becomes a private hymn.”

  Some mornings later, as Etáin donned her cloak and bonnet, her mother asked her what errand she was going on.

  Etáin first finished tying the ribbon of the bonnet beneath her chin and the cord of her cloak. Then she faced her mother and said, “I shall not return to England with you and father.”

  “I see.” Madeline McRae let her needlework rest on the shop countertop. She knew what her daughter meant, knew what had distracted the girl for the past few days, knew better than to inquire, and knew that this was all she would learn for the moment. She searched for a question to ask. “How…are you to go on this errand?”

  “I shall walk. It is not far.”

  “Do you wish me…to accompany you, my girl?”

  Etáin shook her head. “I must go alone.” She paused. “I will return before midday. When is Father coming back from Yorktown?”

  Ian McRae had gone downriver to see a tradesman about some goods the man had purchased on credit. The mother said, “Perhaps, tonight. If not, then by tomorrow morning.”

  “You shall both be pleased.” Etáin leaned over the counter and bussed her mother on the cheek, then turned and left the shop.

  Etáin walked up Queen Anne Street out of Caxton. She crossed the stone bridge at Hove Creek and turned west on the public road that followed the creek. The countryside was quiet, except for the lowing of cattle searching for forage, and the sound of an ax somewhere chopping wood. She met no one on the road, and was glad of it. The world and the morning seemed to be her own. She hummed the melody of the Quaker hymn.

  She reached a narrow log and plank bridge; such a bridge crossed the creek to each of the plantations on the north side, from the Otway place to Cullis Hall and the eastern part of Queen Anne County. She walked passed that bridge; it led to Meum Hall.

  She crossed the one to Morland Hall and followed the path that meandered through the fields, past the tenants’ homes, past the cooperage and tobacco barns and the prizing machine. She found Jack Frake and John Proudlocks in the stables harnessing a cart for a trip to Williamsburg for supplies that were not to be found in Caxton. Both men were startled to see her, Jack, of course, more so than Proudlocks. She nodded to the latter, and smiled at Jack. Jack knew that only some extraordinary reason could have caused her to walk this distance, alone, so early in the morning.

  He took her inside the great house, to his study. Etáin removed her bonnet and laid it on the desk, and undid the cord of her cloak. She said, “Father has been recalled to England by his firm. He must close the shop.”

  “I did not know that.”

  “The letter arrived yesterday. He and Mother will return in the spring.”

  Jack let a moment pass before he asked, “And you, Etáin?”

  This time Etáin let a moment pass. She said, “You are the north, Jack. I will marry you, if you still wish that.”

  “If I still wish…?” Jack reached out and embraced her. They kissed for a long moment. Then they stood for another long moment, holding each other. Jack, his face pressed to her hair, said, “I…had not expected you to decide so soon…. ”

  “Nor had I,” said the girl. “Father said I could stay, provided I marry.”

  “I see.” Jack held her shoulders and spoke to the face he loved so much. “Of course, you have told your parents.”

  Etáin shook her head. “No. Not even maman. Father is in Yorktown. I have told no one.”

  “Not Mr. Kenrick?”

  “I will tell him now.”

  Jack smiled a cautionary smile. “He is not a needle, Etáin.”

  Etáin’s face was serene. “No, he is not. Rather, he is the south.”

  * * *

  Hugh Kenrick was in the field with Mr. Settle and Bristol, marking out sections for the spring planting of corn and barley, when Mr. Spears came from the great house to inform him of his visitor.

  Hugh frowned in surprise, then said, “Have Miss Chance fix us some tea, will you, Spears? And see that Miss McRae is comfortable. I will come down shortly.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the valet with a nod, and turned to hike back to the great house.

  Hugh finished instructing Mr. Settle about the corn and barley acreage, then mounted his horse and rode back to the house. Inside, he put on a waistcoat and washed his hands before descending the stairs and crossing the breezeway to the su
pper room. He found Etáin admiring Westcott’s portrait of his family. A tea service sat on the table. The girl turned to him as he came through the doors. “Good morning, Hugh.”

  “Good morning, Etáin. My apologies for having made you wait.”

  The girl did not immediately reply. She shook her head and said, “No, Hugh. It is I who owe you an apology, for the same reason.”

  “Wait? Wait for what?” He said it, almost mechanically, but knew instantly what she meant. He allowed himself some hope, and added, “You are forgiven, for whatever reason that may be.”

  “I have just come from seeing Mr. Frake,” said Etáin. “We…are to be married.”

  This time, he allowed himself some time before he replied. And now it seemed as if a dooming eternity passed between each of their exchanges. Hugh remarked, “Yes…of course…. ” With a flickering, pained smile, he added again, “You are still forgiven…Etáin…. ”

  “Thank you, Hugh.” The girl sat down at the table and studied him for a while. The tea service was near her, but she did not glance at it. “I want you to know that…I do not esteem you any the less…. It was a difficult choice…. I am neither indifferent to you, nor fearful of you…. I wish there existed a way to spare you the cruelty.”

  “If such a way existed, it would be a kindness…a worse cruelty,” remarked Hugh after another eternity. He heard himself speak the words, but they seemed to have been uttered by another person. After a moment, he shook his head. “I am not privileged to enquire into your criteria, Etáin. And I hope that you will not think it vain of me for knowing how difficult a choice you were faced with. You know that I am a proud man. I know that I am not a Boeotian. If I were, a riddle would not have occurred to you.”

  Etáin smiled for the first time, but only briefly. “And there is one reason it was so difficult.” She paused. “About my silly riddle, Hugh…. Jack is my north. He always has been. I know that now. But you are not a mere needle. You are a different direction. I do not know how else to explain it.”

  Hugh shook his head once. “No explanation is necessary, Etáin.”

  “Then why do I feel that I owe you one?”

  Hugh remained on the other side of the table that separated them. He leaned forward, resting his hands on the tabletop, and spoke almost as though he were scolding her. “You honor me with the feeling, but I beg you not to entertain guilt for your decision. That would distress me almost as much as it might you. You do not owe me an explanation of a private judgment, which should make you happy…. And I wish most earnestly for your future happiness…. ”

  Etáin nodded. “You have paid me so many kindnesses, Hugh — the music, the concert at the Palace, your company, every moment since we first met, from that first ball, to this moment — and I hope you do not think me ungrateful.”

  Hugh straightened to his full height. “They were not kindnesses, Etáin. Remember that I am not a kind person. Nor were they bribes. They were, and will continue to be, expressions of my…feeling for you. If Jack will allow them — as expressions of affectionate friendship.”

  “I am certain he will, Hugh. You and he are almost brothers.”

  “An elder brother,” mused Hugh to himself. For a moment, Etáin saw that he was lost in a thought of his own. In his face she saw a distant, sad irony. Then he began pacing. “When will your parents publish the banns?”

  “Soon, I suppose.” Etáin thought for a moment. “What moved me to decide, Hugh, is that my parents are returning to England — I mean Scotland — for my father’s firm has instructed him to close the shop.”

  “Oh…?” Hugh paused in his pacing. “Well…I must see more of them before they leave. Well, that will leave Mr. Stannard the whole business, too…. ” He resumed his pacing. “Now, Reverend Acland is not likely to want to come so close to Jack in so intimate a circumstance as a marriage ceremony. He would probably refuse to officiate. And, I am certain that Jack would likewise not savor a proximity, nor wish him to have a hand in such an important event. Therefore, I shall write Governor Fauquier, and ask him to perform the wedding. He is, after all, the titular head of this colony’s church establishment. Would you mind that?”

  “No.” Etáin smiled again. “You are generous, Hugh. I will ask Jack about it.” Then she rose and put on her bonnet. As she tied the knot of the ribbon, she said, “I must go now.”

  “Yes.” Hugh escorted her to the front door. He said, “My riding chair has been repaired. May I drive you back to town?”

  Etáin shook her head. “Thank you, no. I will walk.”

  Hugh took one of her hands, raised it to his lips, and kissed it, lingering on it long after that gesture had been made. Etáin brought up her other hand and lightly brushed his face with her fingers. After a moment, Hugh released her hand. Then she turned and walked down the porch steps. Hugh watched her go along the path that led past the kiln and other outbuildings to the gate hidden in the far trees. He stood on the porch until her form merged and vanished into the early spring foliage.

  He retreated to his study, and sat for a long time staring at the books on his shelves. Fénelon…Bodin…. Locke…. Harrington…. Bolingbroke…. Not a single light among them could offer him a word of advice or a nugget of wisdom this moment on how to cure himself of the aching desolation he felt now, and which he knew he would feel for a long time to come.

  I must congratulate Jack, he thought. But, not this minute.

  A ray of sunshine briefly pierced the melancholy overcast of his soul, and he understood what Etáin had meant by this being one of his sadder virtues. Well, he thought, there is some dignity in grief — depending on how well one wore its mantle — but little consolation, and no resolution.

  All he could see now in the unlit space of this study, glowing in the aura of his memory, were an angelic face and hands that played gracefully over the string of a harp.

  Chapter 5: The South

  Jack Frake agreed with Hugh about Reverend Acland. It made no difference to him, however, what other official presided over the marriage. He accepted his friend’s offer to ask Governor Fauquier to perform the ritual. And so, on a sunny mid-April afternoon, a short, simple ceremony was held in the ballroom of the Governor’s Palace in Williamsburg, witnessed by Etáin’s parents, Hugh, John Proudlocks, and three members of the Council who happened to be there on colony business.

  Outside the Palace, Hugh told Jack that he had business upriver at West Point the next day, and so was obliged to return to Meum Hall that afternoon to prepare for the journey. “Also, some of the bashaws in Gloucester have been pestering me with invitations to call on them, and I won’t hear the end of it until I have knocked on a few of their doors.”

  Even though there was no hint of an ulterior motive in Hugh’s words and manner, Jack sensed without thinking it why his friend was leaving Caxton, and said nothing. With a last shake of Jack’s hand, and a brief, decorous embrace of Etáin, Hugh bid the wedding party goodbye and departed for Meum Hall, leaving them behind to celebrate the occasion.

  From Meum Hall the next morning he rode to West Point, crossed by ferry the Pumunkey and Mattaponi Rivers, and rode back east along the opposite side of the York, stopping for a day or two at several plantations. His reputation preceded him, and the hospitality shown him by the owners — powerful men who owned far larger plantations than his own or Reece Vishonn’s — helped him to forget, for a while, both Jack and the woman on whose bare shoulders his own hands would never have a right to rest.

  At one point, on the riverfront lawn of an ancient plantation that was almost a town by itself, his host pointed to some dots far across the York. “That’s your place, sir, if I’m not mistaken, and just up a bit from it, that’s Morland Hall, your neighbor.” The patriarch laughed and remarked in jest, “Why, we’re practically neighbors, too, sir — after a vigorous row across the water!”

  Some tenacious benevolence in his soul allowed Hugh to smile, not in response to the jest, but at the sight of one particul
ar dot, in acceptance of an intimate, personal fact. “One of my sadder virtues,” he thought to himself. But was it so sad a virtue? The circumstances were sad, he admitted, but not the virtue that allowed him to endure them.

  * * *

  Men who have lost in love will try many things to fill the melancholy void. They may mourn the loss until they are emotionally drained, and can feel no more, not even their love, or become addicted to the crushing disappointment, until they can feel nothing else. They may seek to erase the pain by indulging in plebian pastimes, such as gambling, horseracing, or other diverting panaceas. They may drink to distraction, or even to tragedy. They may allow their melancholy to swell into a maddening, unrequited obsession, or fester into a malicious envy or jealousy. They may grow permanently bitter, and so poison their capacity for love, murdering it within themselves. They may commit suicide, or vanish to another city or country, or grow so distant in the eyes of their lost loves and close friends that they become cold, unknowable strangers. Men may grow in that sweet hell, or they may shrink in its fumes and flames.

  Rarer are the men who choose none of these remedies, but turn instead to a life-saving course of action. They redirect the energy and vitality of their souls to other passions, passions that share the wellsprings of their lost loves. They may redouble their efforts to improve and perfect their property, or hone the powers of their minds by immersing themselves in the wisdom of their time. Or they may go into politics, if they believe that this realm would benefit from their presence and participation.

  Hugh Kenrick, exponent of the Enlightenment, veteran of the discipline of reason and proponent of its properties of salvation, did all these things. He wished to live, not merely to exist or survive. He did them, in part, in the unacknowledged honor of the person who would never grace his life or house as his spiritual partner.