The Turning of Anne Merrick

by Christine Blevins

  “Believe it, Annie,” David said. “The Dutchman’s fully admitted to it.”

  “Oh.” It was as if the air’d been pinched from her lungs by a sharp blow to the belly. She wandered to the window to watch poor Lieutenant Enslin, without a cloak or blanket, stumbling along in his shackles, barefoot on the snowy path.

  “Will they hang him?”

  “I don’t know,” David said, joining her at the window. “Tupper’s a fair man, but it’s a bad business. I don’t envy him this case.”

  Anne let out a little gasp seeing Lieutenant Enslin stumble and fall, and her heart broke watching for what seemed an eternity, as he tried without any success to rise, bound and shackled as he was. One of the guards at last showed some pity, and jerked Enslin up to his feet. When the entire cortege disappeared down the path to the covered bridge, she turned to her brother and asked, “Would it help him, David, if I were to testify as to his kindness?”

  David put his arm around her shoulders. “I’m afraid nothing will help him, Annie. The Dutchman is a lost cause.”

  With Jim and Brian to her left, Anne took a step forward and asked, “What do you mean, they can’t go?”

  Four quarantined soldiers snapped eyes up from their card game, and Anne knew her voice had gone out loud and sharp.

  “I meant what I said.” Seated in a crouch on the surgeon’s stool near the fire, Mrs. Snook took a tug on the clay pipestem clenched between gaping, yellowed teeth, and puffed out an unholy halo of evil-smelling smoke to wreath her narrow head. In a voice made gruff by tobacco she said, “They’s unfit for duty.”

  It was warm near the hearth. Anne swiped her hood back, and pushed the cape of her cloak off one shoulder. “You misunderstand my intent, Mrs. Snook. They aren’t being returned to duty of any sort. I mean to take them off your hands—to care for them in my hut.”

  The matron shifted in her seat, as if considering Anne’s proposal. Deep purple crescents sagged beneath watery, ferret eyes blinking at the acrid smoke emanating from her pipe. Her ears poked out from thin hair pulled tight into a scrawny tail, and she was made most ridiculous by the man’s velvet and tasseled nightcap she wore perched at a jaunty angle. “Eyah… I understand… but them two aren’t fit for duty and they stay put.”

  Anne plunked fists to hips, her brow knit. “Are you deaf or daft?” She leaned forward, speaking loud and slow, as one would speak to an imbecile. “I’m taking these boys where they will receive better care—so they can be returned to duty—and not to their graves.”

  The soldier-patients were drawn from their humdrum routine by the rumpus, and the able-bodied crowded in to witness the exchange between the two women.

  Unfolding like a jackknife, the tall, thin matron rose to her feet. Folding arms across her sunken chest, she restated her dictum. “You can go where you please, but these boys are in my charge, and I take my duties to heart, ye hear?”

  “Heart! If you indeed own one, I’d wager it’s no bigger than one of old Methuselah’s shriveled bollocks.” To the guffaws of the onlookers, Anne grabbed Jim and Brian by the hands and hustled them toward the door.

  Mrs. Snook called out, “Bar the door, Sergeant McQuigg. If they take a step beyond the threshold, arrest the boys for desertion.”

  Anne spun on her heel and charged back to stand toe-to-toe with the hospital matron. “Tell me, Mrs. Snook, what manner of sotweed have you tamped into your pipe?”

  The soldiers gathered around burst out laughing. Anne grabbed Jim and Brian—wrapped in their shabby blankets, faces dotted with scabby pox, hair matted, and barefoot to boot—and she pushed the boys to stand front and center.

  “Look at them, Mrs. Snook, these fine specimens in your charge—practically naked and as thin as ramrods. These boys under your care are no better off than a beggar is in a stinking gutter in New York town.”

  “The beggar in the gutter’s better off than we are,” one of the soldiers chimed in.

  “Aye,” another agreed. “Any beggar worth his salt’ll beg enough for a pint now and then.”

  Mrs. Snook was not budged by sentiment or satire. “These are soldiers under quarantine, treated no better or worse than any other.”

  “They’re boys—and they are helpless in this place. I can give them proper care.”

  “They’re soldiers in my charge,” Mrs. Snook said with a nod, “and they stay put.”

  “Your charge.” Anne reached out and snatched the ridiculous nightcap from the matron’s head, shaking it in her face. “I’d wager the corpse from which you pilfered this cap was in your charge as well.” Anne flung the nightcap into the fire.

  Mrs. Snook gasped and watched the nightcap burst into flames, then she turned and gave Anne a hard shove, sending her back a step.

  “I’m warning you, Mrs. Snook, I’m in a thin skin today.” Hands curled into fists, Anne could feel the bite of fingernails digging into palms. “I’m taking these boys with me…”

  “Give her what for, Annie!” Jim shouted.

  Mr. Binny came barging through the crowd, and, like wind on water, a disappointed groan rippled across the hospital as the surgeon grabbed Anne by the shoulders.

  “Mrs. Merrick! Mrs. Snook!”

  Anne heaved a heavy breath, and relaxed the muscles bunched in her shoulders.

  “I apologize, Mr. Binny, for this disruption, but I find I have no tolerance these days for idiots of any kind.” Anne shot the matron a look that would turn sweet wine to vinegar. “As I explained to deaf ears, I will see these two boys cared for. If you require, Mr. Binny, I’ll swear an oath to keeping them quarantined from the rest of the population.”

  “No oath required, Mrs. Merrick, and any relief you might give to our effort is much appreciated. Mrs. Snook seems to have forgotten it is a hospital we are running, not a prison.”

  “Thank you, sir, and good day.”

  Anne pushed the boys out the door, where Sally and Pink were waiting, waving their arms and stamping their feet beside bundles of clothing.

  “What took ye so long?” Sally asked.

  “You should have seen, Sal.” Jim bounced around, punching the air. “Annie was at loggerheads with pinch-faced Snooky.”

  “Enough of yer blether. Hurry and put these on, so we can be on our way.” Sally handed Jim and Brian stockings and shoes and teased Anne with a smirk, “Fisticuffs with the matron, Mrs. Merrick?”

  “We exchanged a few words between us.” Anne shrugged.

  “Hey!” Jim complained. “You gave me girl’s shoes!”

  “And girl stockings,” Brian added, holding up the pair of hose Sally had given him.

  “Aye, and be glad for ’em.” Sally pulled a yarn cap over Jim’s head. “Unless yid rather cross the valley barefoot, this is what we have to spare.”

  The boys sat down and scrambled to pull on socks and shoes in the cold. Anne helped Brian into her Hessian coat, and Pink draped Sally’s red cloak over Jim’s shoulders. Fastening the clasp under his throat, she drew the hood up.

  “What a pretty little girl,” Brian teased, patting Jim on the head.

  Jim gave Brian a shove. “Shut your hole!”

  “Let’s go!” Anne waved everyone onward, and together they set off to the cabin on the other side of the valley.

  Jim took the point position and urged, “At the quickstep, please—I don’t care to have any of my mates t’ see me wearing lady clothes.”

  Anne said, “Maybe you should have thought of that before you sold your nice clothes away.”

  Brian’s eyes narrowed. “Why don’t you believe us? I ain’t never had a shirt as fine or warm as the one you made for me. Why in heaven’s name would I ever sell it?”

  Jim added, “We tolt you true, Annie. Our things was stolt from our backs, and there ain’t nothin’ to be done about it.”

  “Mmmmph!” Sally snorted. “If yer shirts were truly stolen from your backs, ye must have seen the thief. Why will ye no’ name him?”

  “We can bear being co
ld and shivery,” Brian said. “But we’d not bear being cold and shivery and beat to a pulp.”

  “And ratting on this fellow will garner us a bad beating for sure,” Jim said.

  “Ratting on what fellow?” Anne pressed.

  Brian groaned. “Can’t say, Annie. It’ll go hard on us if we do. Truth is, we oughta known better, and harbored our goods more careful-like. Without Jack and Titus and Cap’n Peabody at our backs, there was no way for us to keep our nice things. Not in this camp.”

  Brian trudged along with his big feet stuffed into her old buckled walking shoes. Anne noticed the wisp of a mustache just beginning to form on his upper lip. And Jim could pass for a girl… a very thin and ornery girl. Both of them, so young…

  These boys had been swept up in this war—engulfed by it—first on the battlefield, then in prison, and now in camp. Yet, no matter the depth of the water, or the strength of the current, they somehow always managed to kick up to the surface, take big gulps of air, and keep on swimming forward.

  They know how to survive.

  Jim fell back to flank Anne, and he slipped his thin, cold hand into hers, squeezing it tight. “Don’t be angry, Annie.”

  “I’m not angry with either of you… I’m just… just feeling out of sorts. Some days this war gets me down, and I wonder whether all our tribulation is worth the price paid.” Anne forced a smile. “I’ll feel better once we get the two of you well and squared away with some proper gear. We can’t have your mates see you walking about in lady clothes, can we?”

  Sally threw her arm around Brian. “There’s a kettle of pease porridge on the grate, and Pink says she’s going to make some Southron biscuits to go with it.”

  Brian’s eyes lit up. “Beaten biscuits?”

  Pink nodded. “Beat for an hour at least with the flat of an ax.”

  “I can help,” Brian offered. “My ma taught me how.”

  “Stop!” Sally raised her hand and they all pulled to a halt, listening. “D’ye hear that?”

  A spate of gunshots rang out and echoed through the valley, making it hard to discern the direction of the fire. Pink near leapt from her skin when a cannon boomed, and flocks of birds roosting in the woodlands went fluttering up into the air.

  “Redcoats?” Jim asked.

  “Wheesht!” Sally cocked her head. “The shouting—it’s coming from the main gate.”

  They struggled up to the hilltop to see a company of horsemen riding as advance and rear guard to a string of eight covered wagons drawn by mule and ox.

  “They’re back!” Anne yelled, and took off in a run, tumbling and sliding down the steep hillside shouting, “Jack! JACK!”

  Standing in the bandbox of the fourth wagon, Jack waved both arms over his head. “Annie!”

  Covered in snow, Anne clambered up into the slow-moving wagon and threw herself, laughing, into his arms. Jack drew her down to sit on his lap, and she covered him with kisses—kissed his beard caked with ice, his skin burned red with the wind, and lips chapped and cracked with the cold. “I’m so glad you’re back…” she said, laughing and crying at once. “So glad…”

  “My sweet Annie, I missed you so.” Jack touched her cheek and caught a tear on his gloved fingertip. “Don’t cry. It’s too damn cold for tears.”

  “Jack! Woo-hoo! Woo-hoooo!” Brian and Jim whooped, galloping in a cloud of snow coming down the hill.

  Arm in arm, Sally and Pink came downhill using a more careful step, and Sally called, “Welcome back, ye rascal pirates!”

  Jack waved and asked, “Is that Pink with Sally?”

  Anne nodded. “Captain Dunaway passed on, and she’s been staying with us.”

  “No disrespect for the dead meant, but Titus will be glad to hear it—he’s been like a bear with a sore head ever since laying eyes on that woman.” Jack squinted in the sunlight. “Is Jim wearing Sally’s cloak?”

  “It’s a long story…” Anne slipped from Jack’s lap to sit beside him. “It seems everything went awry when you shipped off.”

  Jack took up the reins and, wrapping his arm about Anne’s shoulder, pulled her close. “Well, darling girl, I’m back in the boat now, and together we will get it aright.”

  Anne worked her needle quickly, adding a durable whipstitch to finish the seams on the uniform coats Jack procured as a portion of his pay for the use of wagons and beasts. She tied off with a knot and bit the thread. “Sally, can I bother you for the seam ripper?”

  “Mm-hmm…”

  Sitting beside Anne on a bench drawn close to the fire for good light, Sally set aside the shirt she was stitching for Brian, and delved into the mending basket at her feet. The petticoat sacrificed for the boy’s new shirts was donated by Pink, very fine quilted flannel in a soft shade of sky blue.

  “Here ye go…” Sally tossed the ripper onto Anne’s lap.

  Anne set to work cutting the shiny pewter buttons off the coat. A real shame… She thought the buttons rather pretty—embossed with a stylized sunburst and the tiniest “3G” in the center—but as the boys refused to even consider wearing them, she added them to the pile on the hearth, where Brian and Jim were melting them down in the ladle Jack used for making lead ball.

  “This coat is ready for the blue!” Anne eased the fabric into the dye pot. She’d paid General Washington’s cook two pennies for eight pieces of the dark blue paper that loaves of shop sugar come wrapped in, and Pink used the paper to cook up a rich indigo color. The coats Jack salvaged were meant for drummer boys in the British 3rd Regiment of Foot, and were made of white wool with blue facings and cuffs. She was optimistic the fabric would take the dye well.

  “Those shirts will be a nice match,” Anne said as she used a piece of kindling to poke away air pockets floating the fabric up to the surface.

  Sally reached out with her foot and gave Brian a little nudge in the ribs. “Hear that? We’ll bring out the blue in yer eyes, lads, and ye’ll have t’ beat th’ young lassies off with yer drumsticks.”

  The boys were taking turns pouring molten pewter into the buttonmold David lent them. “Have a look…” Brian went to show Anne one of the finished buttons, cast complete with a shank and the entwined letters “USA” embossed on the face.

  “How nice!” Anne said, holding the button to light. “Make enough so we can stitch a few inside your facings, for spares.”

  The door bar banged up, and Jack, Titus, and Pink swooped in with a blast of cold air. Jack held a rolled-up piece of leather over his head, a rare commodity in a camp of shoeless soldiers, and announced, “We got a whole half hide!”

  “From the Oneidans?” Sally asked.

  “Yep.” Jack unfurled the leather and tossed it down onto the floor. “I knew one of ’em had to have some tucked away—and he couldn’t resist Titus’s offer.”

  “I drove a good bargain,” Titus said, setting a corked earthenware jug on the tabletop. “Traded for the hide, this jug of maple syrup, and a trifle for Miss Pink.”

  “It’s no trifle!” Pink shed her cloak and showed Anne and Sally the silver brooch she had pinned to the top edge of her stays. “See? Two hearts twined together.”

  “Gweeshtie! A luckenbooth brooch!” Sally wagged her brows.

  Pink traced the two silver hearts with the tip of her finger. “I never had anything so pretty.”

  “It’s a beautiful brooch.” Anne caught Titus’s eye. He flashed a grin and shrugged.

  Jack hung up his coat and plunked down on the bench beside Anne. “Not a bad trade for an old hat picked up on the battlefield.”

  “Your Hessian hat?” Jim looked worried.

  Titus pulled the other bench closer to the fire and he reached over to scrub Jim’s noggin with his knuckles. “Don’t fret, little brother. I never cared much for that hat. Too many geegaws and fiddle-dee-dums on it to suit my taste.”

  Anne contained her laugh. For all the years she’d known him, Titus’s penchant for ostentatious hats had never wavered. Until these boys needed shoes…
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  “Make way… I need t’ tend t’ my stew.” Pink shooed the boys and the button-making operation to the end of the hearth, and put her spoon to work stirring the pot of rabbit stew she had bubbling on the grate.

  “Smells real good,” Titus said, as he fished his moccasin-making tools from his pack.

  “Have a taste…” With hand cupped under the bowl of the spoon, Pink delicately fed Titus a mouthful, dabbing at a slight dribble on his chin with the corner of her apron.

  Sally leaned in and whispered, “Our Titus is fair smitten.”

  Anne nudged Jack and muttered, “I’d say Pink has Titus on her line.”

  “Him?” Jack snorted. “He’s hooked, and flopping around in the boat.”

  Anne threaded her needle, watching Brian stand on the hide with feet an inch apart as Titus traced the outlines with a chunk of charcoal. He stood and studied the leather for a moment, then declared, “I will just barely squeeze four moccasins out of this elk skin.”

  Pink sidled up and rested a hand on Titus’s broad shoulder. “I’ve been thinking about makin’ some cornmeal dumplin’s for the stew.”

  “Dumplin’s!” Titus slipped his arm about Pink’s waist and gave her a squeeze. “I haven’t had cornmeal dumplin’s since I was a barefoot boy running the hills in Virginia.”

  “How sweet are they?” Anne gave Jack a nudge. “Happy’s the wooing that’s not long a-doing.”

  Titus Gilmore was her oldest friend, and, together with Sally, they shared the memory of life under Peter Merrick’s harsh rule. Titus was there to welcome her to her new home on her wedding day. Titus congratulated her the day her baby was born. He sat vigil with her the night her son died, and was at her side when Jemmy was buried. Titus’s hand ran her press when she was too grief-stricken to even swing legs from bed, and Titus never hesitated to put his own life at risk to help save Jack from the gallows.

  “You see?” Anne whispered in Jack’s ear. “They can’t keep their hands off each other…”

  Taking Anne by the hand, Jack said, “You know, my coat has a hole in the pocket… Come on, I’ll show you.”

  “Why do I have to go to the coat?” Anne complained, trotting along with him to the far corner where his coat hung on a peg. “I can’t see anything in this light, much less a hole in a pocket…”