The Sea Hath Spoken

by Stephen Lewis

  Phyllis’s face was red with confusion and anger. She turned from brother to sister and back again.

  “Mistress Williams...” she began, and then her voice trailed off.

  “What of her?” Jane asked.

  Phyllis stared past her and caught Catherine’s eye. Relief spread over her face.

  “Why, ask her yourself,” Phyllis said to Jane. “For she is right behind you.”

  Jane spun around, her jaw thrust with determination to make her point.

  “What mean thou?” she asked Catherine. “To leave these two alone,” she continued with a shake of her head in Roger and Jane’s direction.

  “Do you fear your brother’s reputation?” Catherine asked. She expected a quick and sassy reply, but instead Jane seemed to consider her response.

  “No,” she said with deliberation. “As for that, why as he is in your house under thy governance, I shall leave him to thee.” She turned again on her heel, but this time she headed for the door.

  “My sister is impulsive,” Roger said.

  “That she is,” Catherine agreed, “her tongue and her actions know no rein.”

  Grace now stood up and joined Roger. She looked up at him, her eyes moist with affection.

  “I fear I have overstayed,” she said. “My uncle will miss me.”

  “Perhaps you should have thought so beforehand,” Phyllis said.

  “Walk with her to her uncle’s house,” Catherine said. “For I have an errand to run.”

  “She need not,” Grace replied.

  “No, but I prefer it,” Catherine said.

  “My sister...” Roger began.

  “She is my errand,” Catherine said, and walked toward the door, which Jane had left open as she left.

  The footpath in front of Catherine’s house quickly disappeared behind a sharp bend as it headed south toward Newbury Center. However, in the other direction it lay straight for a mile or more as it worked its way through the open fields of the huge tract owned by the governor, but worked by several tenant farmers. Beyond those fields the woods had been cleared only occasionally by lesser landholders.

  Catherine did not hesitate when she reached the footpath after walking down the hill from her house. She turned north towards the governor’s land. Way up ahead she saw a tiny figure who, she surmised, must be Jane. The figure was moving at a fast pace and would soon disappear. However, Catherine did not hurry after it, for she knew, almost to a certainty, where Jane must be heading.

  The rumors had been bruited about even before Roger and Jane arrived. And now that they had been in Newbury for several weeks, the stories about the secret meetings had so increased in frequency and intensity that Catherine had concluded that, though exaggerated, the gossip must be rooted in fact. She set out, therefore, at a deliberate but unhurried pace while she worked out in her mind what she would say when she knocked at a door where she had no reason to expect a friendly welcome.

  It had been a hot and dry summer. The fields through which she now worked evidenced the drought. The rows of corn were only a couple of feet high with browned stalks and stunted ears. The beans straggled up their poles and bore only scattered blossoms. Cows lay in pastures of parched grass. The air was hot and heavy, and Catherine felt her feet getting heavier with each step. She welcomed the shade she found as the path narrowed at the end of the governor’s fields and entered a pine wood. Dried needles cracked beneath her feet, but it was cooler in the shade of the trees. She knew she was getting close to her destination. The house she sought sat just past this section of the path where it opened again into fields surrounding a low hill. Rumor in Newbury had it that squatters had occupied some of these fields, which they were now cultivating without permission of the town.

  She half expected to hear their voices lifted in prayer as she approached, but the only sound was the chirping of birds and the scurrying feet of a chipmunk, fleeing at the sound of her feet crunching the dried branches on the ground. Her face glowed with perspiration, and she paused in the last shade at the edge of the woods before venturing onto the field that led to the house.

  The last time she had approached this house it was to treat a young girl ill with a fever. The child lived with her mother and father, new arrivals from England, who had agreed to farm this land in return for their shelter. The girl lay in the bed shivering, and Catherine had nursed her with a tea brewed from boneset, an herb she was introduced to by Massaquoit, who had learned it from his wife’s mother. The girl recovered, but the family fortunes declined. The man had been a weaver in England and did not take to farming. They lasted one season and then Catherine arranged passage for them back to England. Since that time the house had been vacant.

  It was not much of a structure, no more than thirty or so feet square with one large front room that had served the family’s daily needs, and two small rooms in the back, one a bedroom, the other an oversized pantry. Now, as Catherine had heard, that front room was used for meetings of the Friends. There was one window, low to the ground, beside the door she now approached. She stooped and looked through the window. The sun was shining over her shoulder into the room, and she could clearly see the benches laid out to form a square, leaving the center of the room bare. There was no pulpit or lectern. The Quakers sat, men, women, and children mixed together with no distinctions made for gender or social status. She looked for a minister but saw none. She listened for preaching, but heard none. Sitting by herself on the edge of the bench directly across from the window was Jane.

  Catherine studied the pretty face, and the bright determined eyes. Those eyes were not half or entirely closed, or cast upwards, as were those of the others in the room. Instead, they were restless, moving from side to side as though looking for someone who had not yet arrived. Then, they settled looking off to her left. Catherine moved her head so she could, too, could look in that direction, but her view was blocked by a bookcase, or cabinet on the inside wall next to the window on that side. She looked back toward Jane, and saw a small smile form on her lips, followed by an almost imperceptible nod. Catherine heard a step behind her, and then felt a hand on her shoulder. She straightened up and formed her face into her most determined and dignified expression as she gazed up at a large man, wearing the same kind of broad brimmed hat favored by Roger. She did not recognize the man.

  “Can I help thee?” he asked.

  “I think not.”

  “Dost thou look for someone inside, or dost thou want to join our meeting?” His voice was kindly, too kindly, Catherine thought, for she sensed menace behind the soft words. It revealed itself in his next sentence.

  “Then, thou wouldst better be off, Mistress, for though we would welcome thee to join us, we also know how to entertain those that would spy on us.”

  “You are not from Newbury,” Catherine said, “else you would not presume so to speak to me.”

  “Nay, I am not from here. I am Nathan Whitehead, and I travel God’s kingdom. But I have heard of thee, Mistress Williams.”

  A woman’s voice floated through the window. It spoke of the spirit moving within her. Whitehead nodded his head with the rhythms of the woman’s speech, his eyes partly shut, but he kept his hand on Catherine’s shoulder. She removed it, and he did not resist.

  “I do not want to join your meeting,” she said. “Nor do I wish to disturb it. A young woman among you is my responsibility.”

  Whitehead shook his head.

  “Thou shouldst seek her elsewhere, but not in our meeting where only God is invited.”

  Catherine caught the heated reply that was half out of her mouth. It would do no good to argue theology with this itinerant Quaker preacher. She knelt down again and looked through the window. The place on the bench where Jane had sat was now empty. Everyone else’s eyes were directed toward the woman who was offering her testimony, standing to Catherine’s left, opposite the side Jane had been staring at. Next to the woman sat a young girl, no doubt the woman’s daughter, looking with rapt e
yes towards her mother. An older boy and a man, brother and father, sat with heads bowed listening to the woman’s spontaneous preaching.

  She felt Whitehead’s presence behind her. He was looking over her shoulder. He pointed to the family in the meetinghouse. “That family, the Martins, have felt God’s love touch them. It would do thee well to hear Rachel Martin preach, or mayhap her daughter Susan, who, if anything, speaks with more authority than even her mother, for the Lord does work powerfully within her.”

  Before Catherine could reply, she heard a door open at the rear of the building. She strained to see but the angle provided by the window through which she peered blocked her view. A moment later, and the door slammed shut. She turned to Whitehead. He shrugged.

  “The woman thou seekst is no more one of us than thou art,” he said.

  “She left with someone,” Catherine said.

  “That I cannot tell you. Thou were at the window, not I. Couldst thou not see?”

  “No. I will take my leave.”

  Whitehead offered a tilt of his head.

  “Thou are welcome to join us at meeting. But if thou come back, I must insist thou use the door, and not the window.”

  “Perhaps,” she said, and then began to walk away. She did find the Friends interesting. She recalled Minister Davis affirming with satisfaction the Apostle Paul’s injunction against women speaking in church, and therefore the notion of a woman preaching was startling, but not unattractive. She well knew that she would never be permitted to speak in Minister Davis’s meetinghouse. So much the worse for him, she muttered, as she quickened her step.

  She had no serious intention of overtaking Jane, but she thought perhaps she would be able to see the direction the young woman had taken. She rounded the corner at the back of the house and saw a path leading into the woods. Standing in front of it was Wequashcook. He looked back over his shoulder to the path, and then turned his steady gaze back to her. She noted the deep wrinkles on his face, the bright sparkle of intelligence in his eyes, and the inevitable beaver hat, worn at all time and seasons to cover the hideous scar left by Massaquoit’s sharp blade so many years ago. Wisps of white hair showed beneath the hat, and a thin line of perspiration beaded his forehead. He remained still as she approached. When she was before him, he spoke.

  “They were here some minutes ago.

  “Who accompanies the young lady?”

  For the first time, Wequashcook’s face revealed a thought as surprise lifted his eyebrows.

  “I was sure such a wise woman as you must know that the young English lady has found a young Indian man.”

  Catherine did not react. She knew Jane loved to shock, and therefore the news of her liaison with an Indian seemed almost fitting, and Catherine now felt more weariness than dismay. Jane was simply too wild a creature to be tethered. But one question remained, and Wequashcook guessed it.

  “He met her here, because he knew she came here to these secret meetings. He has no god. Certainly not the Quaker god, which he sees as just another English god to persecute him. No, it was not religion but business.”

  This time Catherine could not suppress her surprise.

  “They are not lovers?”

  “I do not think so. He wishes to sell her something that she wants very much.”

  “What could that be?”

  Wequashcook glanced up to the sky for a moment, and then shrugged.

  “He did not tell me, although I offered to be his agent. He is young, and unpracticed in the ways of the English. He bid me get in touch with the young woman.”

  “And you did his bidding?”

  “I try to be helpful,” Wequashcook answered. “They attended the service for a while. Then they came out the back door while you were in the front.”

  “And did you help them with their business.”

  Wequashcook shook his head.

  “No. I said I could not at this time, although perhaps in the future. Then they said farewell to each other. The young Indian went toward his village. The young English woman walked toward Newbury, no doubt to your house. I do not think you can overtake her.”

  “I did not so intend. As for the young man, he will no doubt encounter Massaquoit who is even now in the village.”

  Wequashcook smiled, a quick movement of his lips.

  “Ah, so you know,” Catherine replied. “Perhaps you mean to find him there?”

  Wequashcook shook his head.

  “I was offered that commission, but I did not find the pay sufficient for the risk. Still, there is no doubt, our paths will cross.”

  “I see,” Catherine replied. She did not pretend to herself to understand the tangled relationship between Wequashcook and Massaquoit. She had inquired of Massaquoit once, and when he indicated that it must remain a private matter, she had left it at that. Nonetheless, she knew that the two men were bonded in some powerful fashion. Wequashcook seemed to be waiting to see if Catherine had further questions.

  “ I think I have told you as much as I know,” he said.

  Catherine gazes steadily at the old Indian’s face, which offered an impenetrable mask of specious geniality.

  “Yes,” she replied, “but I do believe you are not now telling me all.”

  Wequashcook did not change his expression, although his eyes seemed to sparkle a little more brightly.

  “For that, perhaps you should talk to the young woman’s brother.” And then the Indian bowed in a manner that suggested ironic respect, and walked up the path. Catherine watched him disappear around a bend, and then she looked back toward the little house. The congregants were leaving, but not as the citizens of Newbury left their meetinghouse, pausing to congratulate Minister Davis at the front door, and then walking in family groups, exchanging greetings and gossip. These Friends came out of the doors, front and back, of the house one at a time, stopping to look in every direction and then scattering into the fields and the surrounding woods while ignoring the road that led to the house.

  A moment or two later, and Catherine fully understood the reason for their behavior, as two men in armor came hurrying across the field. As they neared, she positioned herself behind a tree, and then she watched as one approached the front door, and the other the rear door. Each waited a moment or two and then rushed into the house. Catherine waited to hear the sounds of resistance or dismay, but there was only silence, and then the two emerged red faced and panting. Each walked toward the other and they met on the side of the house with a shrug of their shoulders. Catherine permitted herself a smile at the escape of the congregation, but her expression darkened as she thought that with a little worse timing the soldiers might have gathered all of the Friends in their net, including, and most especially, Jane.

  * * * *

  When she arrived at her house, Phyllis was waiting at the door, her face flushed between anger and shame.

  “Much has transpired in your absence, Mistress,” she said. “They deceived me. I should not have believed them.”

  “Did you not attend them on their way?”

  Phyllis nodded.

  “Right to her uncle’s very door, I did,” she declared.

  “Well?”

  “And then as I was walking back here, taking my time, as you were off and Edward don’t never care for my company, so I strolled, thinking maybe I would see some of those flowers you had me pick a while back...”

  “The point,” Catherine demanded. “I sent you not to gather herbs.”

  “I am coming to it,” Phyllis declared, but it was clear to Catherine that her servant was not just babbling on mindlessly as often she did, but rather purposefully, for she did not want to say what she knew she must. She stopped, and took a deep breath. “And then I meet him,” she declared, her face relaxing in relief at having disclosed the source of her shame.

  “Who?”

  “Why Minister Davis,” Phyllis said emphatically, as though it were obvious whom she must be talking about. “The very one they told me was behin
d the door waiting for them.”

  “Oh, I see,” Catherine replied, “so you left Roger and Grace alone in her uncle’s house.”

  “Not by intent,” Phyllis declared.

  “But indeed in fact,” Catherine replied, her voice soft with understanding but no recrimination. “You could not have known.” And unsaid, although both knew the other was aware, was the recognition that as a servant Phyllis had no choice but to assume that her superiors were being truthful. Catherine gave that idea voice, “And even had you known, little there is you could have done.”

  Phyllis’s face relaxed a little.

  “That is the truth,” she said. “And...”

  “No,” Catherine cut her off, “tell me what else you can about our young lovers, for that, apparently, is what we must now call them.”

  “I know nothing of such matters,” Phyllis sputtered.

  “Well, then, a simple question, or two. Did Roger indicate when he was to return here?”

  “No,” Phyllis replied.

  “Did you say aught to Minister Davis?”

  “Surely not.”

  “We can do no more, then,” Catherine said, “but wait for Roger, or Minister Davis, for surely he will insist on satisfaction from me for having let this affair progress to such a dangerous place.”

  * * * *

  Catherine and Phyllis sat across from each other, but neither touched the potted beef and boiled peas that Phyllis had prepared. Edward, though, at the far end of the table lowered his head toward his wooden trencher and shoveled the food into his mouth with a loud, slurping sound. Catherine and Phyllis turned toward him, and then resumed their silent meditations. Every once in a while, one or the other would cast a hopeful glance at the two unoccupied place settings as if by so doing Roger and Jane would appear. A knock on the door dispelled that hope. Phyllis rose to her feet as though propelled by the energy that had been bottled up in her the long afternoon waiting for the brother and sister to come home from their separate and equally dangerous adventures.