Hang a Thousand Trees with Ribbons (23 page)

"They're waiting," John Peters told me.

"For what?"

"To see what the British will do to us."

"Why should people mistrust me? I'm not British."

"They trust no one."

"I think it's pure nonsense. I think the British will do nothing." But I did not really believe that. I was saying the words because I was frightened.

"They're hoarding food," he told me. "At my stall and others, my customers buy more than they need. They're laying aside. This is always a bad sign."

Then spring came. And with it, on the tenth of May, the news of how England planned to punish us for the tea.

The Port of Boston was to be closed. Our waters were to be blockaded. Nothing would get in or out.

They would starve us. Their own brethren.

The House of Commons called Boston "a nest of locusts." London's
Morning Chronicle
Said Boston was "a canker worm in the heart of America, which, if suffered to remain, will inevitably destroy the whole body of that extensive country."

On the eleventh, three hundred more copies of my book arrived from London.

On the thirteenth, His Majesty's ship
Lively
, only seven weeks out of Liverpool, dropped anchor, bringing the newly appointed military governor of the Province of Massachusetts, Thomas Gage. And four regiments of his military force.

Governor Hutchinson was going back to England, relieved of his duties. I felt sad. His name was on the paper that said I had written my poetry.

I remembered his blue eyes. And how he loved his home. And how he'd told his children that I wrote like an angel.

Boston was in turmoil once again. If we opened the windows we could hear the noise of the troops drilling. At night we could hear them brawling. The people met in Faneuil Hall in a great coming together to decide what to do.

What they decided was that they did not know what to do. So they did what Bostonians do in such an event. They got down on their knees and prayed.

Parliament made Salem the capital of the province. And Plymouth the seat of customs. Armed schooners appeared in our harbor. People began to leave town.

But Gage had not yet closed off the Neck. So I scrambled to pack my books and ship some to Obour in Newport for sale. And while I was doing that, John Peters was scrambling to bring food in.

Quintals of fish, casks of olive oil, bushels of corn and flour, boxes of candles, cured sides of meat, even half a dozen live sheep that he purchased from an old Indian fighter named Israel Putnam of Connecticut.

In the early hours before dawn, disguised as a fish peddler, John Peters came down King Street with his cart. Yes, he had fish. But underneath it were the supplies he brought us, to be stored in our larder.

It was I who greeted him at the back door in the sweet, wet June mornings when the soldiers were still sleeping off their debaucheries of the night before. In the hushed, rosy-dawned stillness I brewed him coffee and we drank it together and talked.

"The world has gone mad," I said to him on the twenty-ninth of June.

Boston's port was closed now. The town was shut down.

"The world always was mad," he returned. "You just weren't sensible of it, Phillis."

That was John's way. He never missed an opportunity to remind me that I moved in a world of my own. We could argue the point, but this day I did not feel like arguing.

"I think of my English friends," I said. "Lord Dartmouth, who was so friendly to the colonies. John Thornton, Archibald Bell, the countess. Do they not have a care for us?"

"Not a care," he said.

"I don't want to believe that.

"You always were too trusting, Phillis. You'll learn."

There it was again, the familiar bone of contention between us. "Why must I learn?"

"We all must, if we are to survive."

"Are we two separate peoples now, the British and the Americans?"

"Yes."

He was so certain of it that I was fear quickened And willing to listen to him. For, differ as I did with him, he made sense.

"I'm muddleheaded, John. I feel myself part of them in England. And part of us here in America."

"And part white," he said, "and part nigra. Poor Phillis, you're split into four pieces."

We laughed. But there were tears in my eyes.

"One good thing has come of all this," I said. "Sulie sings your praises now, because you bring us food."

"Then it must be worth having our harbor shut down, if it makes me pleasing in the eyes of Sulie."

That was another thing about John Peters. In the most dolorous situation he could see humor. I was beginning to note more and more good things about him every day.

On the last day of June a knock came on our door. Since Sulie was busy in the kitchen, I went to answer it.

Two British officers stood there, resplendent in their blue coats and white breeches.

"Are you looking for someone, gentlemen?"

They took off their tricorns. The silver hilts of their swords glinted in the sun. "May I please present myself," the taller one said. "Lieutenant Thomas Graves, of His Majesty's navy."

"Graves?" I asked. And my heart quickened. Just this morning Vice Admiral Graves had arrived in town. Guns had boomed and boatswains' whistles had blown all morning to welcome him. But surely
this
young man was not the admiral.

He smiled and bowed. "I'm the admiral's nephew," he said. "And this is Lieutenant James Rochefort. Is your master home?"

"He's at business this morning."

"Business, yes," young Graves said, smiling. "You people are always at business. Well, your mistress, then."

"She is dead."

He bowed again and lowered his eyes. "This is the Wheatley mansion, is it not?"

"Yes."

Young Graves took my measure. "And you must be Phillis Wheatley then, the young Negro poetess?"

"I am."

"Charmed." He bowed again.

"How may I help you gentlemen? Did you wish to purchase one of my books? I can offer you refreshment. Mr. Wheatley will be home soon."

"Books?" Rochefort smiled sardonically. "I hardly think so."

They were casting their eyes about to the rooms beyond the wide hallway.

"Most commodious," Graves said.

"Many luxurious appointments," from Rochefort.

I felt fear—some foreboding, nameless, but real. "My master has lived here many years," I said.

"May we inspect it?" Graves asked.

"
Inspect
it?"

"Yes." And he took a paper from his pocket and thrust it at me. "We invoke the old Quartering Act of 1765. It has been newly extended. You can see that yours is one of the private homes there on the list, suggested as possible abodes for royal officers."

My hands were trembling. I looked at their haughty, if handsome, faces. "I do not know of this Quartering Act. Mr. Wheatley never made mention of it to me."

Graves sighed with impatience. "I told my uncle," he said to Rochefort, "that we should have sent a liaison ahead. But no. We do not have the men for such niceties. Well, Rochefort, what do we do now?"

"Inspect the house," Rochefort said.

"I'm not going to force myself in like a bounder," Graves said. "My brother was here in '70. I know fall well how fast a bloody ruckus can start."

"Do you have a maidservant?" Rochefort asked.

"Yes."

"Then we'd be most appreciative of some cold meat and bread and claret. Given that, we'll wait for your master. We have rights to come in and take up abode, you see, but since we're going to be living here for quite a while, I think we ought to start this thing off as amiably as possible. What say you?"

What could I say? What could any of us say? They waited for Mr. Wheatley, and when he appeared, instead of invoking the Quartering Act, they praised his house and his town as if he himself had laid it out and planned it. They laid claim to having met Nathaniel in London.

Mr. Wheatley had been so long without male guests at his board that he fell prey to their charm and warm assurance. They sensed this immediately. And played to all his needs.

He came alive. It had something to do with the pouring of Madeira, the talk about trade, the pipe smoke. He gave Bristol orders to move his things out of his own bedroom to accommodate the soldiers.

They moved in. Things changed.

The house came to life. They had their own food brought in and Sulie cooked it. There was no more need for John Peters to sneak around the back door and bring us eggs, flour, or meat.

But there was need, or so John thought, to put a lock on my door. Nights, when their bootsteps wakened me, I was glad of it, of course. Or when their drunken laughter sounded belowstairs. By day they were most discreet. They turned the front parlor into a study. There were papers and maps all about. Mrs. Wheatley's good cherry table was constantly strewn with the remains of chicken pie or ham or buttery scones.

And tea. They had their own. The finest Bohea.

Their fancy blue coats with the epaulets were draped over chairs. They demanded hot water for shaving, their boots to be polished, their wigs sent out to be repowdered. Sulie and Bristol were kept on the run.

I should have hated them. But, spineless wretch that I am, I didn't. I was hungry for the sound of the English voices, their impeccable manners. All of which bespoke my days in London.

They knew I had been in London. And that I was hungry for news of it. So at night when they supped with us—or more precisely, we with them—they spoke of it. Of that world of ordered gentility, of culture, leisure, receptions, lavish entertainments, and constant amusements.

But more than that—oh, so much more—Lieutenant Graves had served on the
Edgar,
recently off the coast of Africa. One night, long after Mr. Wheatley left the table, he kept me enthralled with his impressions of my homeland.

The candles burned low as he spoke. "It is an Eden," he said. "The soil is inexhaustible, the harvests rich, the flowers like none I have ever seen."

Was he being artful? There was no need for it. He was speaking the truth. I felt tears in my eyes as the scene before me in the dining room fell away and I saw the flowing streams, the soft retreats, the ripening harvest, the verdant plains.

That night I burned my own candles late in my room, writing a poem, "To a Gentleman of the Navy." And it wasn't until morning that I minded that I'd gone to bed and forgotten to lock my door.

I knew I was spineless and weak. But John Peters told me so anyway.

"You wrote a
poem
about him?"

"Yes. It's going to be published in Joseph Greenleaf's
Royal American Magazine
"

He spit into the fire on the hearth in the kitchen. "Are you daft, woman? He's the enemy!"

"I don't see him as such."

"Well, you'd best start. Our warehouses are empty, our port shut, our people hungry. They've done away with the town meeting, they've forced themselves into your house. Even old Mister hasn't got the rights of a slave when they're around."

"They've been naught but polite and amiable, John. Methinks you're jealous."

He was staring into the fire. "Jealous! Of those dandified fops?"

"Yes."

"You never did know what you were about, Phillis," he said. "They flatter you. It's all you require."

"How dare you! I need no praise, from them or anyone."

"You need it to live."

"Well, I get none of it from you, do I?"

He set down his mug of cider. He turned from the hearth. "Your head is addled, Phillis. It isn't your fault. You're still struggling to figure if you're white or nigra. And now you don't know if you're British or American. It's time to decide."

"Why must I be one thing or the other? I feel as if I am a part of many peoples. What's wrong with that?"

"Such feelings are not abided these days."

"Poets don't meddle with politics."

"You just did in that poem you wrote about the lieutenant."

"I'll write what I please, John. No one has ever told me what I can and cannot write."

"I've no desire to do that. I don't know poetry. But I know you. So mayhap it's time I say what's on my mind."

"You always do. Why stop now?"

"You need steadying. I can steady you."

"Now what is
that
supposed to mean?"

He took my wrist in his big hand. I pulled back, but then his voice gentled me. "I would take you to wife, Phillis. I would protect you. Marry me."

"Patrick Henry saying 'I am not a Virginian but an American,'" Nathaniel said angrily. "Now, God in heaven, what does
that
mean?"

It was his first night home after a near-disastrous two-month voyage at sea. He had come alone, thank heaven, without his wife. October 2. Outside a cold rain slashed against the windows. Inside candles glowed in sconces on the dining room table. He was older, handsomer, and richer. And though I knew he was foreign agent for a slave trader and we had fought bitterly, the sight of him still benumbed me.

Months we had been parted. Yet the span of his shoulders was still familiar to me, as was his walk, the tilt of his head, every nuance of tone.
Of what shallow stuff,
I asked myself,
is the heart made, then? And does it never forget?

"Phillis, pass the buttered beans to Lieutenant Graves," Mr. Wheatley said.

I did so. The board was set lavishly. You would never have known that Boston's port was closed. Where did these British officers get their supplies?

"I am afraid," said Graves, helping himself to buttered beans in great plenty, "that when you people find out what it means, it will be too late."

"Too late for what?" I asked.

Nathaniel glowered at me. I paid no mind.

"For conciliation," said Graves.

"There never should have been a Congress in Philadelphia," Nathaniel went on. "Now the fools in our very own county introduce the Suffolk Resolves. Has anyone heard what's
in
them?"

No one answered. Graves and Rochefort were too busy devouring the side of mutton, roasted apples, sweet ham, and Sulie's muffins.