The air seemed clearer on the Pennsylvania side, the farms more bare of trees, the houses older, built of brick and stone instead of wood. The way to Lancaster was straight and wide with long, slow hills, wagons and buggies thick on it as I drew close, and farms gave way to stone mills and blacksmith shops, tall houses on tree-lined streets. The road led to a square with markets for animals and dry-goods stores, where ox-drawn wagons, manure caked on their wood wheels, rumbled over brick right next to buggies taking home ladies in hoops and hats and gloves.
At the market I sold lambs to several Amish men and marveled at their peaceful demeanors, so different from my neighbors’ forty miles south. I wondered if my father had been tempted to move there, though I knew his mission was to stay below the Mason-Dixon Line and be a final outpost for escaping slaves. That work was over now, and before driving back across the Susquehanna, I made inquiries about farms for rent near Lancaster.
I thought of selling off my father’s farm to clear his debts. But when I got home and told my brothers of that plan, they said they would assume the debts and keep the place for our mother so she would not have to leave her home. They planned to stock the farm with cows and give our sisters work in the dairy, milking and making cheese for delivery down to Baltimore.
That meant I could take the sheep, and I found a small farm that was right for them, with rocky hillside pastures and a natural spring. I doubted anyone would want to slit rams’ throats up there, the neighbors Amish folk who barely spoke English. It seemed easier to breathe up there, and I knew I would not mind living alone in the stone cottage. I would be close to markets for the animals and mills to buy the wool.
Two of my sisters offered to come and keep house for me, hoping to take their searches for husbands to new ground. But I had lived too long surrounded by my female relatives, and I was eager for a change. I found an Irishwoman to clean and cook for only a few days a week and leave me alone to read in peace. In March the snow melted to mud, and my brothers helped me herd the flock to its new home, across the Susquehanna on the covered bridge, escorted by the excited dogs.
Crocuses on my new lawn soon asserted tender petals, but two weeks after I got there, they were smothered in the deepest blizzard of the year. Huge, wet snowflakes flopped from clouds, so thick that they crowded out the air, obscuring sound. Cattle froze in fields, and even churches had to close. I had no proper sheepfold yet, but the dogs helped me to pack the flock into the barn, and we all slept together in there, pooling body warmth. Life seemed to pause, muffled, motionless, and white.
Two days later the sky cleared, and warm sun reflected off the snow. Rivulets trickled sparkling from snowpacks on roofs, and water gurgled under every drift. In the woods the trees stood bare like markers on a thousand graves, but cold sweet air scoured the lungs, and here and there a cardinal sent out its yearning song. I could not help it, the approach of spring made something stir in me that I had not felt in a long while, a rushing in my legs, a desire to leap and run. I felt like a dead tree in which sap starts to flow again.
My brothers wanted to consult with me about the debts, and I told myself that was all I meant to do as I slogged to the barn, my cuffs soaked with melting snow. Saddling Jack, I retraced our route south, across the covered bridge, through snow as sticky as flour paste. Jack could only plod, and yet he seemed exhilarated, too. Sun flashed hot off snow, and soon it felt like June. I had to strip off gloves and jacket and roll up my sleeves to feel the air against my skin.
I did not ride directly to either of my brothers’ homes. Not admitting what it meant, I took the route through Forest Hill and along the county road where Martha lived. Did I want to see her, or just to run that risk?
I passed her farm on tenterhooks, but no one appeared. Mildly disappointed, I went on to Smithson’s place. He seemed glad to see me, poured me shots of whiskey, and would not let me pay. He asked about the new farm and why I left, and I wondered if he knew about the bullwhipping. Men talked in his pub, and he must have heard something. But he did not let on.
“Needed a change of scene,” I said and drank his whiskey, letting it burn my chest. It fed the new sap moving there. Had I been dead all winter? Possibly. Why had I let them beat me down so far? Why had I let Richard Cairnes do that to me?
Smithson filled my glass and gazed at me with solemn eyes. “They say you’ve jilted her.” As if I would not know who he could mean, he added, “Jilted Miss Cairnes.”
It hurt to hear the phrase. Hell, Smithson was a friend. I ought to tell him that much. “My quarrel is with her brother, not with her. I never loved another woman half so well.”
Quarrel, what a limp word! My quarrel was with my hands, because they had not murdered him. My quarrel was with my father, who even from the grave could stop me doing it.
“But not anymore? You don’t love her now?”
“No, that’s not what I mean.” I had not seen her for months, but it struck me that, of course, I did love her.
He looked relieved. “I’m glad. She’s a good woman, and I understand she has felt very low about your leaving that way. I hope that’s why you’re here.”
I felt lightness in my heart—was that why I was here? Smithson did resemble Cupid, fair and round, though somewhat oversized. I chuckled at the thought and tossed back several more shots, feeling more alive each time. When I finally went out, blue shadows were already lengthening across the snow in the bare woods.
I let Jack walk back toward her place, savoring the possibility of seeing her. I would never ride onto her brother’s farm, and if I met him on the road I might kill him. I was not sure which possibility I favored most, seeing her or killing him. I kept close watch on every side.
But I was still startled when a blue sleigh dashed around a bend toward me, too fast for safety on the melting snow, bells tingling. Its sole occupant wore a tailored riding suit of bright blue velvet, a yellow horse all in a lather between the shafts. In sudden panic, I turned Jack into the woods and trotted between trees too close together for a sleigh.
The shush of runners paused behind me, and I heard a cry. “Nick? Nick!”
I fled farther, to a stand of blue spruce, and hid behind thick needles.
Glancing back, I saw her try to follow in the sleigh, grim and silent, slapping the reins. She almost reached the spruce grove, when with a thunk she ran into a tree.
“How dare you?” she shouted with a sort of sob. “How dare you!”
I had reckoned without the way she made me feel just to look at her, even with her face bright red with rage and tears. She looked as helpless and as beautiful as I had ever seen, frailer, as if wasting away, and seeing that gave me a rush of tenderness and shame.
I could not move for long minutes. But Jack became impatient and started from the grove, right toward the mare, until his nose touched hers, and they greeted each other with harrumphs. Hampered by the bit, he tried to scratch the mare’s neck with his big teeth along her mane, and she lowered her head to make it easier and leaned into it.
With colossal effort I lifted my eyes beyond the horses, to where Martha sat in the sleigh, dumbstruck, staring up at me. With a sinking in my chest like I might faint, I knew it was an error to ride this way.
But I supposed I owed that much to her, and slowly I got down, left the reins on Jack’s neck, and walked to the sleigh, parts of me shrinking back with every step.
She reached out both hands—to block me, I thought. But no. She pulled me in the sleigh until I sat beside her on the seat, wrapped her arms around me, and sank her face into my neck. I could not help but smell her hair, her fresh-bread scent, and the whiskey in my blood sprang up. Would it be wrong to gather her up greedily, the way I used to do? She smelled so sweet.
“Sweet,” I said, as if I had lost the power of more words, and a sob rose in my chest.
She held me, rocked me, and I felt tears on her cheeks, though they may have been mine. She undid two buttons of my shirt and slid her hand inside and around t
oward my back, trying to touch the broad, flat scars—I stiffened and pulled away. So she had heard. Well, she could not have that. No one could have that.
“Oh, Nick, where did you go?” she groaned. Her throat caught, and she took hold of my shoulders and shook me, hard, as her voice rose high and tight. “Why didn’t you take me with you? Why did you leave me here?”
She did not wait for an answer. Something ferocious seemed to possess her, and she took my mouth in hers, her jaws moving as if to masticate me, as if every minute we had spent apart poured over her in a white avalanche. I sprang up hard at once—deep, painful lust seemed to flame forward from the bottom of my spine. But I did not have to do a thing. She undid my pants, pulled off her drawers, and straddled me, knees on the seat, so I was pinned beneath her with no choice, her body in a fury of its own. Down she thrust on me, down, down, driving me up into her so far I felt her pounding heart. She was already crying out, and the sound brought me too close, though I struggled valiantly to pull away in time. But she only pounded down harder, faster, shuddering, till I lost the battle and exploded while she uttered hoarse cries like shrieks of rage.
We were silent for a while, her body giving final jerks as the spasm ebbed. I was embarrassed for us both. She had pinned me with my back to the road, and I could not turn my head, but I knew we could be seen if someone were to pass, and the sounds she had been making would have carried half a mile across the silent snow.
She finally went still, her body like heavy clay fastened intimately onto mine, and I wanted her off. I had not asked for such a violent display—she had stolen that from me, assumed she could just take it without bothering to ask. She seemed so strange, so little like herself, that cold thoughts crept up my spine. Could a chaste woman have accomplished this? She had been driven to this frenzy after only a few months without a man—and who knew if that was even true? There might have been others besides me and Tim.
At that thought I took firm hold of her hips and lifted her off of me. I could not look at her and busied myself adjusting my pants, finding her undergarments, and helping her back into them. She did not help me, but sat abandoned, limp, and weeping, as passive as a child.
When I stepped out of the sleigh into the snow, she lifted her head and stared at me like the Medusa, her hair having sprung free and wild as a halo of snakes. “That’s all? You’re not even going to speak to me?”
Unwillingly I looked at her. “Speak to you? That didn’t seem to be any part of what you wanted. You didn’t even care if I wanted that. I know I have hurt you, but you can’t blame me for what happened here. I never thought a man could be taken by force, but I wonder now.”
She gave a yelp, gritted her teeth, and swung her arm back, trying to hit me, but I caught her fist. No one was allowed to hit me now. No one.
“So you are your brother’s sister after all. I’m sorry you never showed me that before. It could have saved us both a lot of trouble and heartache.”
Now she sobbed, fat tears rolling down her cheeks, and I felt a moment of misgiving. I did not love her now, no, not after this. But I had loved her, and I knew she loved me. I held out a hand and touched her cheek, half-afraid she might bite it. But she only closed her eyes.
“Come on,” I said quietly. “I’ll help you get the sleigh back on the road.”
WITH GREAT RELIEF I went back to my rocks and sheep, the frisking lambs. Moving north felt like the best thing I had ever done, homecoming to the place where I had always belonged. I would have joined the Amish if they would have had me. But members of the Quaker meetinghouse nearby had also helped escaping slaves, and they welcomed me warmly as my father’s son. Each Sunday I spent with them, I felt more peaceful, calm, and sure. These were the people I had always wished to know, peace-loving, reasonable, thoughtful, quiet.
Under their influence, I did not ride to Jarrettsville for Appomattox Day that year. I told my family that they were always welcome on my place, but I had much to do now, tending sheep alone, so I would not come home for a while. When spring arrived for real, my orchard turned pink and white, petals flying on the wind. I repaired the old stone fence around my steep meadows and took a pallet up there to sleep with the flock, the dogs happy to be out all night, me not in want of any other company.
As the earth tipped closer to the sun, bringing warm summer drowse, I took on the job of shearing the whole flock alone. I thought of only one sheep at a time, working carefully and doggedly, and it took me a whole month. But I got the job done.
One hot afternoon in July, my brother Alex drove some steers to market, then came by my place and found me in the hayloft, cleaning the enormous heap of wool I had produced. I had made a crude table, an old door on two sawhorses, and on it I would spread handfuls of wool and pick out burrs, dead ticks, and clots of mud and blood.
I was glad to see my brother, though he was nothing like me or our father, as far as I could see. Like all the married men I knew, he had grown a big beard and a portly belly that he dressed up in waistcoats and watch fobs. Any space he entered, he occupied with authority, standing proud and foursquare, as if assuming command. I had no idea what moved him really, if anything. All he seemed to care about was making money and keeping a good reputation in the world, and he was more than ever like that now that he had a family.
It had been a long time since I talked to anyone outside of Sunday meeting (and not much there, as most of the Quakers were as quiet as I was). I felt rusty at it, but I did not have to say much, since Alex liked the sound of his own voice.
“Well, the dairy is already turning a profit, don’t you know. I’m pretty pleased with the delivery service down to Baltimore, and it seems like city folk are happy to get fresh milk and eggs delivered to their doorsteps. We added chickens, did we tell you that? Yes, eggs, milk, cheese, and butter, the whole package, they can get it all from us, straight from the farm. And they pay a pretty penny for it, too.”
When he paused for breath, I asked him for the details of dairy farming, hoping to learn something while I worked, and he gave me an earful for at least an hour. At the end of that, he shifted smoothly into family news and told me Hannah was expecting their third child.
My mind must have wandered, because I noticed he had stopped speaking and was giving me a quizzical look. “Do you hear anything from Martha Cairnes?” he asked, watching me.
I tried not to show that he had startled me. “Is she all right?”
“Well enough, I think. But Hannah says she is with child.”
So that was why he had come here. A wave of pity for her made my knees buckle, and I sat down on a hay bale, my mouth almost too dry to speak. It felt like I might vomit.
“Who is the man?” I croaked.
He looked at me, startled. “What do you mean? You’re still betrothed, aren’t you?”
Bitterly I thought of the day her uncle gave me a turkey to secure her hand.
“No one’s sued me yet, if that’s what you mean. But I have had no contact with her for quite some time, half a year or more, I guess. So I doubt she’d hold me to that promise. Did someone ask you to come here and tell me this?”
“No, no,” he said quickly. “Nothing like that.” His brow furrowed, and he stared at me, his eyes horrified. “Why do you ask who the man is? Have you really not seen her for so long?”
Something scurried in my chest, a squirrel in a wheel. Half a year was true if you left out that day in the sleigh. But that had been her doing, not mine, and how did I know she was not already pregnant then? That would explain why she had seized me like a succubus and would not let me pull away, to make me think that it was mine. If the child was Tim’s, she would go to jail—unless perhaps she had a husband who might claim it. I felt so sorry for her I wanted to cry. But it still made me sick.
My brother removed his hat and stood rubbing both hands back and forth across his thinning pate as though his head hurt. He resettled the hat and looked at me as if from a great distance.
“What
I don’t understand,” he said carefully in his deep voice, “is why you never married her. What happened between you two? Hannah says she doesn’t know either. You seemed happy enough. And I never saw a girl more in love. Hannah says Martha still loves you. Oh, we’ve heard the rumors, everyone has. People have to say things when a betrothal breaks, and it’s pretty clear yours did, the way you went away. Was there another man?”
I could not look at him now. We never spoke about the night he found me at the stable in Bel Air, flayed and broken like a slave, and I had been too proud to tell him who had held the whip. Everyone assumed that I was beaten for my views, for what I said in the meeting, and that it was a posse of Harford Rifles or Dragoons. That was true, as far as it went. Dragoons and Rifles had been there, and I had been beaten for my views, and maybe for my interest in the wrong man’s sister. But that was not the excuse for the beating, and the excuse was too despicable to say. I stood up and fetched more wool to clean.
But something pricked at me, pride or a stubborn kernel of truth.
Reluctantly I said, “I don’t know about that. I suspected her, but I don’t know for sure. Sometimes things just break between people. Really, the break was not between me and her.”
He looked more hopeful at that. “What was it then? What broke?”
His eyes were lively, and I could see there that he had an inkling of the truth. When I did not answer, he spoke low.
“Those men that beat you—that was it, wasn’t it? Why would you never tell us who it was? That day we found you—well, you were in sad shape, your back in bloody ribbons, but you would not even speak. Don’t you know it may have been the men who killed our father and trampled on him with a horse? Are you protecting them by not saying?”
Jarrettsville Page 17