The Winthrop Woman

by Anya Seton

  At least the harvest's been good he thought, no matter the other trials,—which included Winthrop's mounting debts. And the Manor, through some legal oversight in Winthrop's method of conveyance, had not yet sold. A bungling matter, thought his brother-in-law sighing and reining in his horse, for all John's training he had scant head for business. And yet a stubborn man of vision who let naught daunt him.

  Downing turned his horse through the Manor gates and saw a happy party on the lawn. Everyone in the house was nutting, as was the custom on this day. The manservants flailed and shook the four magnificent walnut trees that stood near the garden well, while the children and maids capered beneath, gathering the crop in sacks, cracking and eating as many as they gathered. Martha, Mary and Elizabeth were also nutting, and Emmanuel paused to admire. The three girls made a charming picture of youth in their bright-colored clothes—especially Elizabeth in a new saffron gown, girdled tight around a waist even slenderer than it used to be, though her bosom was fuller, and her skirt kilted up like a milkmaid's showed off her pretty ankles. Downing stared at her appreciatively, seeing the vivid rose of her cheeks, the glossiness of her black ringlets. Poor lass, he thought, mindful of his tragic errand—ah well—she'll have no trouble finding the next one.

  He dismounted heavily, having grown stouter of late, and walked to the bench by the garden well where Margaret was placidly mending linen while she kept an eye on the two babies in their cradles. She rose to meet him with a cry of delighted astonishment.

  "Why, Brother Downing, what brings you here from London to our great pleasure?" She had no thought of trouble, because Forth, still in Exeter, had written that a ship at Bristol had brought news of the Governor's safe landing with all his party. The whole family had held Thanksgiving in Groton Church. "You've brought letters, at last?" she cried, her plump face glowing. "We so long for them!"

  "A letter—" said Downing slowly, and at her sudden look of alarm, added, "Oh, Brother John is well, and your little boys, fear not, but—" he glanced at the nutting party which had not yet noticed him—"where's Jack?" he asked, shrinking from his task and knowing that his nephew's notable tact might make it easier. "Receiving rents in the Hall, I believe, or physicking one of the horses—he has so much to do—and I don't know how we'd manage without him—but what is it, Brother?"

  "A heavy blow," said Emmanuel, sitting down beside her, and resigning himself. "'Tis Harry."

  Margaret flinched and put down her linen. "He's disappeared?" she said, "Or is it disgrace...?"

  "Drowned," he stated flatly. He fumbled in his pocket and brought out his pipe, stuffed it with tobacco, made a great play with the flint until he got it lit, while she stared at him, and her gentle eyes filled with scalding tears. "God be merciful..." she whispered. "Oh, my poor Bess." She looked at the girl's laughing face as she played a game of catch with the walnuts, tossing them to the enraptured little Deane.

  "You'd best read the letter," said Emmanuel, giving it to her.

  "John is so brave," Margaret murmured, wiping her eyes as she finished. "You see how staunchly he takes this—" She quoted from the letter:

  "Let us join in praising our mereifull God that howsoever he hath Afflicted us, both generally and particularly mine own family in his stroke upon my son Henry, yet my selfe and the rest of our children and familye are safe and in health, and that he upholds our heartes that we faint not in all our troubles, but can yet wait for a good issue ... Besides in this. that God begins with us thus in Affliction, it is the greater argument to us of his love..."

  "Aye—" agreed Emmanuel somewhat dryly, thinking that if it had been one of John's other sons, particularly Jack, God's personal affliction might not have been so well borne.

  "He speaks, too, so tenderly of Bess," continued Margaret, "saying it grieves him so much for her. 'The Lord strengthen and comfort her heart to beare this cross patiently—' It will comfort her, I know, that John is so pitiful of her, and has come, I believe, to see her worth as I have."

  "No doubt." Emmanuel puffed on his pipe and shook his head. "All the same I'd not like to be the one to tell her."

  It was Jack who told her that evening. They kept the secret until Elizabeth had eaten the traditional Michaelmas dinner with its great roast geese stuffed with apples and walnuts. She noted that her uncle plied her with wine, and looked at her with special tenderness, but then she knew she had always been a favorite of his. They waited until she had nursed the two infants, lest the shock turn her milk. Margaret's milk had given out long since, and Elizabeth, having an abundance, offered to suckle the puny little Ann as well as her own, whereupon Ann began to thrive though never as big and healthy as Martha Johanna, whom Elizabeth called Joan.

  From sure instinct, Jack called Elizabeth outside into the garden, knowing that the flowers and the old mulberry tree she loved might help sustain her, as would the concealment provided by the evening shadows, for she was proud—and for all the strength of her passions, tried to conceal them.

  He told her very gently, holding her hand in his, while his voice thickened, and moisture stung his lids.

  She was quiet a long time after he had finished, clinging hard to his hand and leaning against the gnarled old mulberry trunk. Then she whispered, "Peyto knew it was coming—he saw it." Jack did not understand and thought her dazed. "Perhaps I knew too," she went on. "The day he left here—so bravely—in the blue cloak—I felt—I remembered Peyto—"

  "Bess, dear," he interrupted softly. "I've not the faith my father has, but we must believe, we do believe that you two will meet hereafter."

  "Harry died as he lived..." she said in a thin remote voice. "Merry, confident and strong in his own whims—'tis not so bad a way."

  Jack was silent. Perhaps it was not so bad a way. He thought of his brother, who would now be forever young and golden-haired, whose faults would be forgotten—while otherwise—what unhappiness might there not have been for Bess? But she's free now, he thought with a blinding flash of pain and dismay. She's free, and I am not. The marriage to Martha was arranged for next week, though now would be postponed of course since the Manor would be plunged into mourning. Yet even were he free, it was impossible to wed his brother's widow in the face of scriptural law. Jack's hand trembled on Elizabeth's and he checked these riotous thoughts with shame.

  "Shall I leave you now, dear," he said quickly. "You'll like to be alone perhaps."

  "Aye..." she answered after a while. "Perhaps." Her hand went to the gaudy brooch Harry had given her; she unfastened it and held it, staring at the crystals and false gold. "'Tis all I have of Harry, now—" she said with a strained wonder, "except my Joan." And the memory of one completely happy day—long ago in London.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE AFFLICTIONS suffered by the Winthrops did not cease with Harry's death. In November, Forth came home to Groton after his long visit at Exeter, where he had fallen in love. He was full of plans for his marriage, and the whole family's eventual voyage to New England.

  Somehow on the journey between Devonshire and Suffolk, Forth caught a virulent cold which developed into lung fever. He took to his bed with an excruciating pain behind the ribs and a barking cough that distressed them all, but did not alarm them until the 25th of November when he suddenly grew delirious and the sound of his agonized breathing seemed to fill the house. Elizabeth searched frantically through her father's receipt book for new concoctions which might help, they sent a groom galloping for the Hadleigh physician, they got the barber to bleed him, the women rushed to and fro with warming pans for his clammy feet, or steaming cloths for his chest. All to no avail.

  Forth died that night, within five weeks of his twenty-first birthday.

  "It is the Lord's Will, the Lord's Will..." moaned Margaret. "God give us grace to make use of this new stroke He has visited on us! But I know not how to write of it to John!" She gathered her own little Sammy fearingly in her arms, and broke down completely for some hours. Elizabeth wept too, but she felt som
ething stony grow around her heart. God's purposes were doubtless inscrutable to humans, and Death might be only a Dark Angel, but she found no comfort in this. She felt instead a great resentment against God, and a blasphemous wonder whether He indeed concerned Himself so closely with mortals unless it was to mock and punish. And after Forth's funeral she kept much to herself, finding pleasure only in the baby, as it had been since she heard of Harry's death.

  And yet through the winter as Margaret read her parts of John Winthrop's letters, Elizabeth felt grudging admiration and some envy for the unvarying fortitude he showed in bearing not only his family losses but the continual tragedies which were occurring in Massachusetts. He stated these baldly enough, and without comment.

  In the three months since the landing of the fleet, nearly a third of his company had died. The Lady Arbella survived but a month and died in Salem, her husband Isaac Johnson lost heart without her, and by October he had been buried amongst the straggling collection of shacks which he had himself named Boston. Salem's minister, Francis Higginson, died. Mrs. George Phillips died in Watertown. Mrs. William Coddington died. Mr. Rossiter died, and Mr. Gager, their only physician, died. Winthrop lost twelve from amongst his own servants' families.

  There was smallpox, sweating sickness and sudden fevers. Too, almost everyone had scurvy, and it was noted that those who yearned "and lingered after England," bemoaning their folly in having come, died fastest of all. And yet Winthrop wrote staunchly to Margaret:

  Thou maiest see the goodnesse of the Lord towards me, that when so many have dyed, and many yet languishe, my selfe and my children are yet living and in health ... we conceive that this disease grewe from ill diet at sea and proved infectious. I write not this to discourage thee, but to warne thee and others to provide well for the sea and by Godes helpe the passage wilbe safe and easy...

  And he sent detailed directions for the voyage.

  In the face of all these disasters Margaret had often nourished the craven hope that John might yet give up and return home. Sometimes she would even talk to the little round miniature of him he had given her. It had been painted in London and was an excellent likeness. Margaret weeping over the ivory disk would implore John to come home, though she never did in her letters. And she could not help but be grievously affected by dark whisperings amongst Groton's Manor folk who interpreted all these deaths as showing God's curse upon the move.

  Pond, the miller, one spring day received a letter from his son in Massachusetts, and being unable to decipher it, carried it to Margaret whom he found in the courtyard hurrying from the bakehouse. Pond, agog over his letter, had come straight from the mill and was powdered with flour from his wool cap to his huge boots. "Would ye be so koind, Mistress?" he said tendering the letter anxiously. Young Pond's year at the Boxford grammar school had not made him a scholar and Margaret stumbled aloud through the missive with growing dismay at its contents.

  I knowe, Lovinge father ... I wase an unduteyfull Cheilld unto you. I trust in God that you will forgive me for it ... Peple her have deyeid ... two hundred and ode, beside maney lyeth lame and all Sudbery men are ded but three ... here is no bever and here is no cloth to be had ... we do not know how long we may subssiste for we can not live here without provisseyones from ould England ... The cuntrey is not so as we did expecte it ... I thinck that in the end if I live it must be my leavinge for we do not know how long this planta-cyon will stand ... I purpose to com home at Myckellmas ... we were wondurfule sick as we cam at sea withe the small poxe, no man thought that I and my littell chilld woolld a livid and my boye is lame and my gurll too, and thar dyeid in the ship that I came in xiiij persones.

  There was a silence when Margaret had finished. Then Pond spoke heavily.

  "So he's coming home—is he! And would a saved me a purseful had he listened in the first place. But Oi'm glad he's aloive as yet, there's plenty went from here who aren't."

  "I know—" said Margaret turning away. "I know. Why did your son go, Pond?" she said after a moment, "ft would seem not for spiritual reasons."

  "No more it was," said the miller, shrugging. "He went tew better hisself, the dom chucklehead, he'd dreams o' free land an' lazy living, of setting up as squoire, no doubt. Thass why he went, but glad enough now tew come home and help me wi' the mill. The young fule."

  Margaret sighed, and handed back the letter, which the miller tucked under his floury blue smock.

  "Write the Governor, Mistress!" he cried, seeing her dejected face. "Tell him ye feel 'tis a sign he's mistaken God's bidding—all the troubles there's been—and his own two sons dead so fast loike a judgment ... all of us here mourn Master Harry and Master Forth as our own!"

  "He does not see it so," she replied with difficulty. She pulled John's latest letter from her bosom. "Listen what he writes—

  I prayse God, that the Lord will abundantly recompence for all the trouble we have endured ... we heer enjoye God and Jesus Christ, is not this enough? I thanke God I like so well to be heer as I do not repent my coming: and if I were to come again I would not hare altered my course, though I had foreseen all these Afflictions...

  "Always he writes thus and urges my going to him quickly with my family."

  "Ah—" said the miller shaking his head. "A stubborn gentleman—if you'll forgive me, Mistress. Won't owe he's wrong."

  "He's NEVER wrong!" said Margaret sharply. "And I'm hastening to do as he wishes. The Manor is sold, Pond—to a Mr. Waring of London. Everyone will know it soon. And we will sail for New England in August."

  The miller's round face fell into disconsolate lines. "So it's come..." he muttered twisting his hands in his smock. "It's come. Will ye all be going?"

  She nodded with a firmness she did not feel.

  "Mistress Bess?" he questioned wistfully. His admiration for Elizabeth had grown even greater since last May Day because she had recently healed a sore on his wife's breast.

  "She too, I believe," said Margaret. "At least sac must leave Groton, of course."

  "Aye," said the miller. "There'll be naught but strangers at the Manor now. And the land don't loike it, I tell ye, Mistress—there's a two-headed calf been born at Gosling's, and the gray lady's walking o' noights i' the ruined castle again!"

  "I'm sorry—Pond," said Margaret unhappily as he bobbed his head and walked sadly off.

  She went in search of Elizabeth who was the only person she could share her fears with. Jack was in London immersed in a hundred activities relative to Bay Company business and their own departure; besides, since his marriage to Martha on February 8 he had grown extremely restless, impatient of delays and would talk of nothing but New England and its development.

  Jack's marriage had partaken of this restless impatience too, since he had suddenly decided on it and given them all scant time for preparation. Though in truth there was little to prepare, with the family in deep mourning. Groton Church had however been decorated with pine boughs and holly over Mr. Leigh's protests. Martha wore a white gown she had made herself, and the wedding feast in the Hall had been lavish. They had summoned the vil lage musicians for dancing, of which Jack was as fond as Martha, and both bride and groom had seemed very happy on that afternoon. Margaret had rejoiced at that, and tried to ignore some doubts later. The new-wedded pair spent their honeymoon at Groton, and except that a large four-poster had been moved into Jack's room, and Martha shared this with him, it was hard to believe they were married, so little had their usual attitudes towards each other changed.

  Jack continued to treat his little wife with a somewhat absent-minded consideration, Martha seemed as adoring, shy and childish as ever, though in her case there was an added stress of embarrassment, and constraint. This would have disturbed Margaret had she not had troubles enough of her own without seeking to analyze subtleties.

  After the miller's disturbing visit, Margaret found both sisters in the small wainscoted parlor beside a crackling fire. Elizabeth was lying on the Turkey hearth rug playing with Joan, who
now at a year walked a little, investigated everything and actually knew three words, "Ma-ma," "milk," and "no." She was a plump baby with rosy cheeks, and was gurgling happily while her mother played "This little piggy to market" with her toes. Margaret suppressed the customary pang that her own baby Ann still showed no interest in anything, but lay quietly in her cradle, gazing upward with wide, vacant eyes.

  "Bess," said Margaret, advancing to the fire, "Pond, the miller's been here, had a letter from that great hobble-de-hoy son of his, who is—is coming home. lie told of yet more deaths out there—it was distressing..."

  "Oh?" said Elizabeth sympathetically while rescuing her crystal brooch from Joan's clutch. "Still you must not let it distress you, my mother—since there's nothing for it—but to go."

  They both heard the involuntary sound that Martha made. The girl was perched on a stool by old Adam's desk box, laboriously writing to Jack. He had taught her a simple cipher for their private use, partly to amuse her, and partly because his eager mind was interested in ciphers, as it was in alchemy and medicine and all branches of physical science.

  Martha had the key to the cipher beside her, but was proud of having nearly learned the numerical symbols, each one of which stood for a letter, and she tried to make her sprawling unformed writing neat. She had been, as she did repeatedly, assuring him of her love, quite unable to explain the dark resistance and fears which had clouded their wedding night and thereafter. That's it—she thought—as she heard her sister speak. 'Tis the prospect of this fearful journey that makes me act so strange with Jack. She dipped her pen, and a great blot of ink slipped off on the paper. She stared at it through hot tears.

  It would be shame to send him a blotted letter, as so many things were shameful. Shameful as her behavior to him their wedding night when they had been alone in the great bed upstairs. Screaming, fighting, sobbing, until at last he turned from her saying in a voice of sad aloofness, "My poor Martha, you need not struggle with me, nor ever fear me." He had not touched her again except to kiss her lightly now and then as he had always done.