Must the Maiden Die

by Miriam Grace Monfredo

  With much of the crowd slowly and reluctantly dispersing, Glynis accompanied Bronwen toward where the balloon was being covered with tarpaulins by Professor Lowe and the deputies. The heap of pale silk looked as insignificant as a melting snowdrift.

  "By the way," Glynis asked her niece casually, "how was everyone in Rochester?"

  "Rochester?"

  If Glynis hadn't been watching for it, she would have missed the blank look that flashed across Bronwen's face. Her niece recovered with, "Oh, you mean Rochester!"

  "Yes, Rochester. The place where you grew up. Where your family lives. Where you said you would be visiting before coming here."

  "Aunt Glynis, I couldn't get home. It just didn't work out. Besides, the family will be here in just a few days for the wedding," she said quickly, as if this explained her sidestepping.

  While she hadn't quite out-and-out lied, she'd come very close to it. Since they had nearly reached the others, however, Glynis did not press her. Instead, she commented, "We don't have gas here to reinflate the balloon. Professor Lowe knows that, doesn't he?"

  Bronwen gazed studiously at the grass. "I expect he does by now."

  "You didn't tell him that before you landed?" Glynis stopped to stare at her niece.

  "I may have mentioned it."

  When Glynis sighed heavily, Bronwen went on, "Look, Aunt Glyn, I absolutely had to get here. Otherwise you'd never have spoken to me again."

  "I suppose that's possible."

  "Well, there you are. And Professor Lowe is a genius. He'll think of something!"

  3

  Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.

  —Book of Lamentations

  The girl slowly lifted her head. When she had first wakened, it had been to the harsh caw of unseen birds and the smell of marshland, for she found herself lying on a small mound of earth tufted with grass. Now she could see that a short distance beyond her the grass sloped downward to meet an expanse of water, desolate and murky except for a few silver glints from a sun dipping low in the sky. The air bore a dankness that felt on her skin like laundry pulled from tubs of lukewarm water.

  How long she had been there she did not know. She held a hazy recollection of a loft in the carriage house, a horse rearing, and the sensation of falling. Only that; nothing more.

  When she tried to pull herself upright, her head throbbed and her left arm hurt her, and when she looked at it she saw a wound, as if somehow the top layers of skin had been torn apart. She fell back on the grass and lay there until the pain eased. A black snake undulated past, gliding silently into the water, and she heard overhead the cries of wild geese and the trill of smaller birds. From closer by came the murmur of water lapping at stalks of reeds and cattails.

  Moving carefully to favor the arm, the girl tried again to pull herself upright, but now the weight of her wet cloak held her down. A few pieces of straw clung to the black wool as she raised herself to a kneeling position. When she saw the stark gray stumps of dead trees jutting from the water, she wondered if, before she had been thrown from the horse, she had somehow reached the edge of the vast Montezuma Marsh. She couldn't seem to remember why she would be there.

  She looked down at her hands, shaking as if they were birch leaves, and saw splotches on them that looked like smears of dried blood. And then it came; an image of wavering water and a prone body and the long handle of a knife, and above the body she saw the reflection of her own face.

  The girl closed her eyes, grinding her fist against her forehead until it hurt so much she had to stop. The image lost its sharpness and gradually faded.

  When she tried to get to her feet, she fell back on the grass because her legs would not hold her. Her arm ached, and as she inched backward on her knees away from the water, her head throbbed with the rhythm of heartbeats. But then, over the throbbing, she heard a rustling noise. It came from behind her. It was moving closer, and with it came the sound of something splashing through water.

  She had to get away. When she again tried to stand, she toppled over but did not cry out. The splashing came closer. She lay still and shut her eyes tightly, as if by not looking her terror would vanish. Then she heard what sounded like an animal panting, and something cold nudged her cheek.

  The smell of wet fur made her open her eyes. She looked into the face of a medium-sized dog that crouched before her as if ready to spring. Its keen gaze was trained on her with the intensity of a guard warning its prisoner not to move, so the girl lay still. But when she looked again into the alert, brown eyes, her fear began to lessen. She recognized the dog as a sheepherder like the one she had known as a child. Its ruff and the blaze down its face was white, and so was its undercoat that was overlaid by long dark outer hairs, as if the dog's back and head had been stroked with a sooty hand. Its semi-erect ears twitched slightly, and when it rose from its crouch and moved sideways, she saw behind the dog a pair of worn, mudcaked boots below ragged trousers of jean cloth.

  She heard a soft moaning, and it came to her that the sound might be of her own making. But she could not talk, so that must not be. She was afraid to raise her eyes until the boots took several steps toward her, and when she forced herself to look up, the man was standing in front of her. He was gaunt with a heavy beard and wild dark hair that hid most of his face. But when he stepped toward her again, the hair fell away so she could see, staring down at her, fierce black eyes.

  She tried to crawl away from him, but the dog sprang to its feet to block her path. The man bent down and reached for her shoulders, saying something she could not make out, and she tried to cry with her eyes what she could not cry with her voice—no...no. ..no....

  The dog began to circle her with a deep warning growl, the thick ruff of hair around its neck rising. When the man bent down again, the girl felt his hands slide under her arms, and then she was dragged forward on her belly. Still circling, the dog barked sharply as she tried to twist away from the man, clawing at his boots with her hands while the pain in her head and her arm sliced through her fear like a butcher's knife. Her arms had no strength. It seemed as if they were no more than bare branches tossed by the wind.

  She thought the man said, "Stop struggling," and he looked down at her with a face of anger, and then she knew he would force her. He would cover her mouth with his hand and press her under him into the silent marsh. The water would cover her face and she would die.

  When she felt herself being lifted, the fear stopped her breath. She strained for air, and the last thing she saw were the fierce dark eyes boring into her own.

  4

  Seneca Falls—upon [the] Seneca River, was incorporated April 22, 1831. It is a station on the N. Y.C.R.R. [New York Central Rail Road] and the Seneca Canal. The fall is 51 feet and furnishes an abundance of water power which is greatly improved. It contains 7 churches, the Seneca Falls Academy, a union school, 2 newspaper offices, extensive manufactories of fire-engines, pumps, machinery, iron and woolen goods and a great variety of other articles. Population about 4,000.

  —from an 1860 French Gazetteer

  Glynis stood at the window of the dress shop, looking out onto Fall Street and watching pink clouds in the western sky fade into twilit mauve, while behind her the plucked strings of a harp sang softly under the murmur of women's voices. The murmur was oftentimes punctuated by soft laughter.

  During daylight hours the view from the front window of EMMA'S, a shop that sat tucked among others, was usually a fairly lively one of horse-drawn farm wagons and carriages, mule teams and their drivers, chickens and geese, the odd sheep or cow that had somehow gotten loose, and even an occasional Berkshire sow and her young; the last always bringing a measure of excitement when townsfolk ran around trying to capture the slippery little porkers. There was also a bewildering number of cats and dogs, the sounds of whose ancient, mutual loathing could make everyone within hearing distance miserable.

  In the hours of early mor
ning, and again at noon, Fall Street bustled with farmers, shop owners and customers, mill and factory workers, bankers, and a few lawyers. Now the road was nearly deserted. A few minutes before, Glynis saw Cullen and his black Morgan pass by at a fast clip. The constable had looked deadly serious, so there likely had been a fight at one of the taverns down along the canal.

  It was only then that Glynis remembered her encounter at the rail station with the troubled Mrs. Jager. But given what followed that meeting, it was hardly surprising that it had slipped her mind to ask Cullen if the woman had managed to find him.

  Glynis turned back to what Emma called her "showroom." Gathered there were a dozen or more women friends, and a few of her favorite customers, as well as her employees Lacey Smith, a runaway slave come north years ago on the Underground Railroad, and young Faith Alden, whom Glynis had seen earlier at the rail station. The girl's eyelids still looked swollen. Most sat on small sofas and chairs provided by Emma's best customer, Vanessa Usher, while several of the younger women were on decorative pillows placed on the thick, green Brussels carpet. The smell of coffee and tea and cinnamon cakes floated over colorful drifts of paper and trailing ribbons, since many of the gifts had already been unwrapped.

  Vanessa Usher sat in one corner, her fingers running up and down the harp strings in a rippling glissando. When finished, and after some well-earned applause, she rose from behind the instrument and glanced over the gifts, saying, "My dear Emma, what a treasure trove you have here."

  It was one of those infrequent moments when Glynis found herself in agreement with Vanessa. Draped over a chair was a large signature quilt, each of its cream-colored squares signed by a member of the Seneca Falls Ladies' Sewing Society. White lace-edged sheets with scalloped and embroidered pillowcases, ivory linen tablecloths and napkins, linen bath towels, and woven table runners and sideboard scarves were carefully folded to be tucked into a rosewood dowry chest bestowed by Vanessa.

  Against a sofa stood a framed, parchment copy of the Declaration of Sentiments, which Elizabeth Stanton had written for the first women's rights convention, held in Seneca Falls some thirteen years before. Tonight Elizabeth had managed to escape her seven children and husband for a rare evening out, having left them all in the care of Susan Anthony who had earlier presented the Declaration to Emma with a smile, saying, "Hang it over your stove!"

  "Aunt Glyn?" Emma called. "Look at this. What do you suppose is in here? Can anyone guess?"

  She had just unwrapped a tall, elegantly carved mahogany box from Helga Brant, Emma's wealthiest customer and wife of merchant-importer Roland Brant. Since Mrs. Brant was not present, there was considerable speculation about what the splendid box might hold.

  "A sterling silver rolling pin?" suggested Elizabeth Stanton with a wry smile.

  When Emma raised its hinged lid, nothing could be seen but two silver-and-bone handles fitted into slots. Only when they were withdrawn did the gleaming steel blades of carving knives become visible. Glynis wondered briefly if the knives might have been made by members of the Oneida Community near Syracuse, who were known for their fine steel. She didn't wonder aloud, certainly not on this particular occasion; the community was also known for its shared sexual practices, which for more than a decade had outraged the congregations of established churches. At Oneida, conventional legal marriage simply did not exist.

  The twilight was beginning to fade, and as the room inside the shop grew dim, Lacey and Faith lit the kerosene parlor lamps, while Emma turned up the two wicks of a molded glass pedestal "wedding lamp" that she had earlier unwrapped. Rainbowed light flared inside the pair of opalescent fonts, accompanied by the onlookers' appreciative murmurs. Emma's eyes seemed to sparkle, and for a moment she looked to Glynis like many another young woman approaching her wedding day. But when she glanced up and caught her aunt's eyes, a small pucker formed between her brows. The frown said that Emma had not forgotten the conflict of the day before.

  She had come to the library yesterday afternoon, her face drawn with what Glynis had initially seen as fatigue. But when Emma then asked if they could go to Glynis's office, more than mere fatigue had surfaced.

  "I don't know what to do," she had said as Glynis closed the door on the library proper. "Can you talk a bit?"

  "Yes, I shouldn't be needed for a few minutes."

  Shouldn't be, that was, if her assistant Jonathan Quant could raise the eyes buried in the pages of a new dime novel long enough to take care of business.

  "What is it, Emma?" she'd asked with concern. Although this was not the first sign of trouble, it appeared to be something more than a simple spat.

  "It's Adam," Emma had answered. "We've had an argument. A serious one."

  Glynis at first doubted that attorney Adam MacAlistair, having finally persuaded Emma to marry him, would in any way jeopardize his hard-won victory, and she wondered if her niece might have exaggerated the situation. Emma quickly disabused her of that.

  "Have you noticed," she began, "that all the militiamen who are going South have new uniforms? And that the uniforms are homemade?"

  Glynis nodded. Although she had noticed, she hadn't thought about it, and couldn't imagine where Emma's question might be leading.

  "Aunt Glynis, if we have a real war—and from the talk these days it seems likely—there will be a demand for many more uniforms, hundreds of them. Most women don't have the time to sew them by hand, so I suggested to Adam that perhaps I could make them at the shop. Naturally, I'd have to purchase additional Singer machines and hire more women, and that would need ready cash. So I asked Adam how I might go about obtaining some start-up money. I thought perhaps I could make a contract with the government."

  Glynis knew she was gaping at her niece, flabbergasted that Emma had come up with such a scheme. Although she supposed she shouldn't be surprised—Emma had always had a good head for business.

  "And what did Adam think of that idea?" Glynis asked, trying to suppress her own distaste for viewing a catastrophe as a money-making venture. Nonetheless, there were undoubtedly many others who would see profit in a war.

  "Adam said he thought it was 'a mercenary scheme.' And I imagine you do, too. But someone is going to profit from the demand for uniforms, so why shouldn't it be me? He seemed even more upset that I'd need to expand the business. Aunt Glyn, you know we've argued about my keeping the dress shop after we're married."

  Two years before, when Emma had first come to Seneca Falls, her consignment work for the shop's previous owner, Fleur Coddington, quickly gathered customers. Less than a year later, she had opportunity to purchase the shop. Adam MacAlistair offered—eagerly offered—to advance to Emma the money required. After all, so Adam's reasoning went, since he intended to marry Emma, her debt to him would simply be canceled upon their betrothal. But at the time Emma declined both his money and his proposal. In the end, it had been Vanessa Usher's co-signature which guaranteed the bank loan.

  But now it seemed the issue was to be revisited. "I thought the matter of your shop had been resolved," Glynis said. "That Adam agreed, even if reluctantly, that you should keep it."

  "I thought so, too," Emma said, "but just this morning he brought it up again. He doesn't want his wife to work, although I made myself hoarse trying to explain, once again, that the dress shop is not what I consider work."

  Glynis felt reasonably certain that defining the word work was not the problem.

  "But now," Emma continued, "I'm worried about something else. I'm afraid, Aunt Glyn, that after we're married, Adam might insist on selling the shop. And then what could I do about it?" As she spoke she twisted the large, glittering ring on her left hand, a circlet of diamonds surrounding tiny blue sapphires which formed the initials A.M.

  Glynis told herself to say nothing. This was between Emma and Adam. But after a moment or two of studying the misery on her niece's face, she said, "Emma, have you thought of putting this down in writing?"

  "Like a contract, you mean?"

&nb
sp; "It's not unknown—I think it would be somewhat like a trust agreement. Adam certainly would be aware that such a thing exists, though I'm not sure that you need it, Emma. Last year's passage of the Earnings Act should—at least I think it should—protect your shop even without a specific agreement."

  Prior to the Earnings Act, a married woman could not sell or give away property she had acquired before or during her marriage without her husband's written consent. The British jurist Sir William Blackstone had portentously stated: "A husband and wife are one, and that one is the husband." The American Revolution, for whatever other tyrannies it might have overthrown, had not freed married women from the chains of English common law.

  "But," Glynis went on, "you should investigate the new law. Conveying property is one thing, and the conduct of the business itself might be another. You could ask Jeremiah Merrycoyf...." She paused, then said, "No, on second thought, Jeremiah won't do." Merrycoyf was Adam's law partner and would probably refuse to become involved. And rightly so.

  "I don't want to rely on some law, anyway," Emma said. "But if I had something specific to hold onto, a legal document signed by Adam, that would satisfy me."

  Glynis did not want to probe the contradictions of that remark. "You would trust Adam's intentions, then?"

  "Oh, absolutely, once he had signed something."

  Emma had given this qualification without a moment's hesitation, and apparently without even a hint of irony. And had then added, "But if Adam doesn't agree to it, I don't know what I'll do...."

  Her voice had trailed off at Jonathan's knock on the office door, and she had left the library shortly thereafter.

  Glynis, now studying her niece's expression over the twin flares of the wedding lamp, was fairly sure the issue had not as yet been settled.

  An hour later, while the guests were leaving and Glynis stood rolling up yard upon yard of ribbon, she realized she had not seen Bronwen for some time. She asked Emma if her cousin was still there.