Further to this difficulty there are Indian raids to the west. Seven people have been murdered, their bodies hacked into suet, at a settlement in Danbury thirty miles from here and we are left for only God to defend us, as our stores of powder have been neglected, our garrison only basely built.
It may be weeks before we can alert our Massachusetts friends who have for so many years lived in our care and under our watchful eye. It is for me only a little thing, sitting and watching and cawing like an alarming parrot, repeating and passing on those communications uttered by careless and odious Royalists—some of whom have meant to do harm, others who’ve merely loved the sounds of their own voices—when those I seek to warn have sacrificed so much for the sake of common good: they who have given up land, family, and the most modest of pleasures to keep on living; they who are now only a few and who have, from the first instant of the Struggle, done what others were not willing to do. And though I may count myself a part of that struggle, it is doubtless not so great a sacrifice having affixed my name, one name out of many, to a king’s death writ, when others have taken up the mask, the rope, and the ax.
If any in our care are captured and brought back to England as traitors alive, here is what awaits them upon judgment from the king, this purveyor of ancient justices and charitable acts: they will be taken from their place of imprisonment, bound and dragged on hurdles, to the place of execution at Tyburn or Charing Cross. There they will be hanged by a short rope for only a little while, just shy of death. Then will they be cut down and dragged again to a long table where the executioners will saw off their privy parts and throw them to dogs to be eaten. A long cut will be made in the bellies of the newly hanged; the entrails spooled out slowly upon a rolling pin. This in full sight of the sufferer who screams in agony to a crowd of leering subjects fed by oranges and sweetmeats provided by the king’s men. Each organ in turn will be pulled out and burned and, if the executioner is practiced and skilled, the dying man will not go to his end until he has smelled the charring of his own tender flesh.
I have lost close to a dozen confederates in just such a manner, myself escaping the noose of betrayal and capture solely by God’s Grace and the advantage, at times, of only an hour’s head start.
Those in our care have damned themselves to their native country, and have given up their own unfettered liberties for the right to go on breathing; a few even now hide in cellars and attics as though they were thieves. But a new country, and a new people, baking in the slow fire of brutish energy and stirred with the infant zealotry of practical idealism and independence, have claimed them.
In these late days, I am often reminded of the lament of Dante in his sublime Paradiso, who knew full well the torment of the exiled: Tu lascerai ogne cosa diletta più caramente; e questo è quello strale che l’arco de lo essilio pria saetta.
You shall leave everything you love most; this is the arrow that the bow of exile shoots first.
CHAPTER 17
MARTHA SAT ON the threshold, fanning her face with a dampened apron. The heat had become burdensome even at that early hour, but there was an eastward breeze which would last until midmorning, and she watched the men moving through the fields, testing the grain heads with their fingers and teeth, preparing for the summer harvest. She had come outside to escape the Reverend Hastings, who had been with Patience, still confined to her bed weeks after the burial of her infant, praying for hours. His visit had started gently enough with a passage from Romans: “If God is for us, who can be against us?” But then he moved on to the book of James and the sick, who should “call upon the elders of the church night and day until evil is cast out.” And finally, he raked her over the coals of Deuteronomy, wherein “sinful, unrepentant men, women, and children perish and are cast into the sulfurous pit.”
Before the reverend had barely climbed off his cart for the visit, he had taken Daniel solemnly aside and mouthed a few words into his ear, no doubt, Martha thought, encouraging Daniel to begin the plowing of his wife as soon as was seemly, giving her another babe to forget the one only recently lost. As John passed Martha on his way to the fields, he had murmured, “By God, I know lowland Presbyterians more cheerful than that one there.”
Daniel had returned to them a week after the delivery and truly mourned for his dead son. But his concern now was for his wife, who lay in bed, refusing most times to eat or drink, ignoring the demands of her two living children. At night Will and Joanna kept close to Martha in bed, despite the suffocating heat, Will twirling strands of her hair around and around his fingers into ever-tightening coils.
Martha’s concern was for the anger she saw in her cousin’s eyes whenever she looked at her. It was not an open hostility, but the creeping kind of resentment that could, over time, build into a rage: blameful stares, sour words, implacable silences. Patience became especially agitated whenever Martha and Thomas stood close together, as though their happiness, guarded as it was, mocked the loss of the infant. Mary and Roger had waited to leave until after the burial, and it seemed to Martha that her cousin saved the greatest portion of blame for her.
Ten days following Daniel’s return, Asa Rogers appeared at the door. Thomas and John had gone away hunting, and when the miller smiled tightly at her, his gray teeth showing through thin lips, Martha knew he had been waiting for an opportune time to resume his press for the land. He gave his condolences to Patience, sitting forlornly at the table, and briefly restated his case to Daniel.
“Goodman Taylor,” Rogers began, smoothing the lines of his jacket into order, “you are an honorable man to keep your promises. But I have it on good authority that the man who works for you is in fact a criminal.”
Daniel looked unhappily at Rogers, raking his hand through his hair so that it stood spiked like a cock’s comb. “Thomas has ever been honest, hardworking. I have never heard word from any man that he is other than what he shows himself to be.”
“No doubt he is a workhorse, but from Salem there is rumor…”
“Rumors, aye, and spiteful gossip from the tinsmith.” Martha rose to stand behind her chair, her hands twisting forcefully at the joints.
Daniel held up a quieting hand. “It is a harsh accusation to call a man criminal, sir. What mean you by it?”
“That he is a regicide, sir.” Rogers turned to Martha with raised brows.
Daniel took a steadying breath, saying, “There is not a farmer here in Billerica who does not have, by marriage or birth, family that fought against the king. But the king in his grace has pardoned all, sir.”
“All but those whose actions have directly brought about the death of the first King Charles. I have heard such stories from Ezra Black, who is of a prominent family here in Billerica.”
“Stuff and nonsense,” Martha said, her voice high and querulous.
Rogers, looking to Daniel, asked, “Is it your custom to let a servant question your judgment thus, or the opinions of others?”
Seeing Martha’s reddening face, Daniel quickly added, “She is my wife’s cousin.”
“How much are you offering to pay?” Patience suddenly asked. She had been sitting with a bent head as though drowsing, and Martha looked at her with astonishment.
Rogers oriented himself closer to Patience and said, “I’ll pay two pounds now and another two in one year’s time.”
Martha sucked in her breath at such a sum; two pounds was an outrageous amount that could only be offered by a man expecting to receive a bounty from somewhere other than his professed trade as a miller. Daniel then stood and escorted Rogers to the door, saying, “I will think on it and give you my answer.” Rogers left with a lingering, meaningful look at Patience, as though he would enlist her help, and when Martha glanced again at her cousin, she saw the same calculating look that had driven Patience to haggle with Thomas over the shared bounty of the wolves.