“We all were,” Lydia said quietly. “But we have a lifetime to make it up to you, Robert.”
Rachel had a frown on her face, and she gave Howland a peculiar look. “I wonder how you got that girl to help you, Robert? She’s very clever.”
Howland’s lips lifted in a wry smile, and he answered grimly, “I used the only thing in the world that would have made her admit she’d been a fraud—money.”
“You paid her to admit her guilt?” Matthew said, incredulous.
“It was all I could think of. If I’d tried to threaten her, she’d have laughed at me. So I kept on seeing her, and little by little she let her guard down.”
“But wasn’t she afraid of what would happen to her if people found out she’d been lying?” Rachel asked. “And wouldn’t she be put in jail for lying in court?”
Howland lifted his hand in a gesture of disgust. “That young woman doesn’t care what anyone thinks of her—not really. And as for being in trouble with the law, they’ll have to catch her first.”
“She’s left Salem?” Lydia asked quickly.
“Never to return, I’d venture.” He gave a shrug and added, “She’s one shrewd vixen, I can tell you! When I told her I wanted her to tell her story to Increase Mather, she upped the price high enough so that she can go anywhere she likes and live like a queen.”
“You don’t have that kind of money, Robert,” Matthew broke in quickly. “I’ll pay the fee.”
“You may have to, Matthew,” Howland smiled. “I don’t have any money myself, so I had to borrow up to my neck to get the price.”
Lydia, sitting near Matthew, shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t believe that girl was so wicked.”
“She sent men and women to their deaths!” Matthew sighed with aching heart. “Poor old Giles and Bridget and John Proctor—and all the others—dead in vain!”
“But God sent us a deliverer!” Lydia cried out. “Our friend and deliverer—Robert Howland—”
“Could you add to that—son-in-law, please?” Howland interrupted. Going to Rachel, he put his arm around her.
A glad cry went up as they all welcomed their new son and brother.
Gilbert looked at Robert, tears in his eyes. “My boy,” he said quietly, “you’re very like your grandfather! Very like!” He wiped his eyes, then said with a sudden laugh, “I’m very glad I fished John out of the sea! He’s given me a good return, he has! A new limb to the family tree of Winslow!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
TAKE ME HOME!
The winter that year was mild, but for Gilbert Winslow it was a time of sickness. He could not shake the cough he had contracted in jail, and by March he was unable to walk without assistance.
“He’ll be better in the spring,” Lydia said hopefully to Rachel. “The winter air keeps him down.”
Rachel did not reply, for she saw it was more than physical weakness—it was weariness of the spirit. He was weak and unable to eat, but the trials had drained him of something.
“He’s not fighting as he once did,” she said worriedly to her father. “He’s low in spirit.”
“I’ve seen it, Rachel,” Matthew agreed. He stared at her and then sighed. “He’s had more life than most. We’ll miss him—you’ll miss him more than anyone, I think.”
She said no more, but by spring he still had not improved. The doctor visited him but was noncommittal. He knew as well as the fiery old man did—he was wearing out.
Then one night in May as Rachel sat reading, she saw her grandfather sit up and try to walk. He began to lean and before she could get to him, he fell to the floor. His breathing was irregular, his face ashen. She ran quickly to get a neighbor to run for the doctor and the family.
When they arrived, they tenderly lifted him into bed. He did not move, and the doctor decided Gilbert had suffered some sort of stroke. For three days he lay there without opening his eyes.
Howland arrived as soon as he could and stayed with the family night and day. None of them expected Gilbert to regain consciousness, but he did. Early one morning, while Rachel watched by his bedside, he opened his eyes and said, “Rachel?”
She began to weep, and he smiled and said weakly, “Now, this is not the time for that, is it?”
She left him only long enough to call the family.
Gilbert lay there looking at them. “I take it you’re surprised to see me back with you?”
Matthew took his hand. “You gave us quite a scare.”
“I’m about to give you another one!”
Matthew stared at him, puzzled. “How is that, Father?”
Gilbert smiled. He looked so much like both Matthew and Miles that Rachel almost cried. “I want to go for a little ride,” he said.
“A ride!” Matthew cried in astonishment. “Why, when you get better—”
“I mean now, son,” he affirmed. “And not a short one, either.”
They all looked at one another. Then he continued. “Oh, I’m not out of my mind. But it’s a small request—just one ride.”
Rachel knelt down and took his hand. “Where do you want to go, Grandfather? I’ll take you anywhere!”
“There’s my good girl!” he breathed. He closed his eyes and they thought he’d gone to sleep, but he opened them and said, “Take me to Plymouth—to the sea—where Humility is buried.”
Matthew started to protest, but Lydia squeezed his arm. He stared down at his father for a time, then said quietly, “I’ll get a carriage ready.”
Robert and Miles went with him, and in less than an hour they had taken a seat out of a carriage, built a framework, and placed a mattress in it.
By the time Matthew came to the house, the women had dressed Gilbert. “Are you ready, Father?” Matthew asked.
“Take me home, son,” he said with his eyes closed.
Matthew went to him, and with easy strength picked his father up as he would a small child. As he did, Gilbert opened his eyes and smiled. “Once I carried you, my boy—now it’s your turn!”
Matthew did not answer, but carried him out, placed him carefully in the carriage, then said, “We’ll go slowly.”
Miles had obtained another carriage, and they all got in and started out with no more ceremony than if they had been going across town.
They had to stop often, and the inns were not of the best, but Gilbert got no worse. He never complained, and much of the time at night the family would gather around and he would listen as they talked. He said little himself, but from time to time he would mention something that had happened long ago.
They came to Plymouth at midday, and he said, “Take me to the sea, Matthew.”
They skirted the town, coming in from the seaward side. When they arrived, Gilbert cried, “Help me up!” As Matthew raised him, he gazed at the rolling waves of the ocean, the scudding white clouds, and then turned his eyes upward toward the village on the hill, soaking in the memories, etching them on his mind.
“Now, let it come,” he whispered.
Matthew found a house for rent, and all of them set up temporary housekeeping. It was a quiet, holy time, for as the days went by, they saw Gilbert’s face grow more and more peaceful.
On the fourth day after their arrival, just before sunset, Gilbert called with urgency in his weak voice, “Rachel— Matthew?”
“Yes! What is it?” Rachel ran to his bedside.
“It’s time to go home,” he told her simply, a high expectancy in his eyes. Turning to Matthew he urged, “Take me to the sea, son; the tide is going out.”
“All right, Father. Rachel, go tell the others.”
Though they had prepared for this day, sadness tugged at their hearts, knowing this might be the final parting. After gently placing his father in the carriage with his head in Rachel’s lap, Matthew drove the carriage, while the others followed in another.
“Go to the hill where she is, son,” Gilbert directed.
Matthew drove to the high hill overlooking the harbor, and st
opped the horses beside an iron fence that enclosed a few worn stone markers.
Carefully he picked up his father and carried him to the plot. The others followed close behind. He stopped at a special marker, holding his father’s thin form in his strong arms as the others crowded around them.
Gilbert opened his eyes and looked down at the stone that said, Humility Cooper Winslow—She hath done what she could.
He said nothing, but there was a smile on his face. “Put me down here for a moment, son.”
Matthew gently placed him on the marble bench and sat beside him. As Gilbert lifted his eyes again to the sea, he said quietly, “There’s where we landed that first time. What a crew we were—God-hungry and afraid of nothing—Bradford and Standish and Howland—good old John Alden and his Priscilla!”
Raising his voice, he continued. “This land is like no other—and you are Winslows! You must never do other than serve the Lord Christ with all your hearts—but you will live in this land—a land that offers—freedom—”
He paused and lifted his head as if he’d heard someone call his name, and he smiled and whispered, “Yes!” He opened his eyes and looked around, taking in each of them. “I am proud—of all of you! God—is—good—”
Then he gave a little gasp and his head fell forward. “Father!” Matthew cried, but he knew, as they all did, that Gilbert Winslow had gone to his true home! Rachel stared at the face she’d loved all her life. “Goodbye—for a little while!” she whispered as she kissed his brow.
For sometime they knelt there with heads bowed, tears flowing; then they got up and Matthew carried his father back to the carriage.
The next day, they had a little ceremony and once again, Gilbert Winslow lay beside his beloved Humility.
Rachel walked blindly away from the small plot, wanting to be alone. For hours she walked the shores, thinking of all the times she’d spent there as a girl with her grandfather; how he’d been both grandfather and father to her those years she thought her father dead. The pure joy of living and love for the Lord he had instilled in her. He had given her so much. She would miss him. But as the day wore on, a peace fell on her, and she felt the presence of the Lord. It was as though His loving hand reached down and touched that deep ache within, filling her with joy.
“Rachel?”
She turned to see Robert standing by an outcropping of stone. With a cry of joy she ran to him, falling into his protective arms.
“Are you all right?” he asked gently as he held her close.
She squeezed his hard muscular body with all her strength, then threw her head back. There were tears in her eyes, but she dashed them away. “Yes, I’m all right—as long as you love me!”
He crushed her to him, kissing her tears away.
“Rachel Winslow,” he said simply, “if you’re all right as long as I love you, why, you have nothing to worry about! I’m never going to let you go!”
She kissed him again, then said with a smile of victory:
“Take me home, Robert! Take me home!”
GILBERT MORRIS spent ten years as a pastor before becoming Professor of English at Ouachita Baptist University in Arkansas and earning a Ph.D. at the University of Arkansas. A prolific writer, he has had over 25 scholarly articles and 200 poems published in various periodicals, and over the past years has had more than 180 novels published. His family includes three grown children. He and his wife live in Gulf Shores, Alabama.
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