The Vanishing Point (42 page)

Despite my many Wicked Acts, God has seen fitt to bless me with a true Friend, Adele, whom I have to thank for my verry Life. We share a little House in Philadelphia, where we do earn our Bread as Seamstresses. Our Workroom below has a big glassed Windoe that we may make use of the Light for our Sewing. We sleep in the Garret above. In the Back we have a small Garden where we do grow Vegetables and keep Chickens and Rabbitts. I live under the Name of May Powers, for after what I have done, I will not have myself be call'd by my Husband's Name. Mine is a Simple Life, but one I cherish, for I am my own Mistress.

Dear Sister, please write to me with all Speed. If you should join us in Philadelphia, it would be my greatest Joy. If you
choose to stay in England, you have my Love and Blessing, too. But know, dearest, that there is Nothing for you at Washbrook Landing.

Yr loving Sister May

To Mistress Hannah Powers

Washbrook Plantation

Sequose River

Maryland

Western Shore

October 1694

My dearest Hannah,

I did write to you at our old Home in Hare Wood Green only to have my Letter return'd to me with the News that you had allready sailed for the Chesapeak. My dearest, will you ever forgive me for not warning you in Time? I have fled the Washbrook Plantation, my Husband having cast me out. Now he believes me to be dead. He has probably told you as much himself. I do write to you now under the name of Mistress Thorn to conceal my Identity.

Darling, please write to me with Speed. Seek Refuge on the Banham Plantation and from there do make your way to Philadelphia where I await you most anxiously. On no account remain on the Washbrook Plantation. If you do so, you live in peril. Ere I last saw Gabriel Washbrook, he was out of his Mind. Hannah, I pray for you every Day. God willing, Adele and I shall soon wellcome you to our Home.

Yr loving Sister May

In January 1695, the letter came back in the mail, its wax seal still unbroken. Hannah's name was smudged, the paper creased by too many fingers. By the light of a guttering candle, May read the message that accompanied the letter.

Dear Mistress Thorn,

It is with deepest Grief that I impart this News. The Washbrook Plantation burned to the Ground this Summer last. No Trace could be found of Mr. Washbrook, Mistress Hannah Powers, or her Child. May God have Mercy on the Souls of the Departed.

Yours truly, Richard Banham, Esquire

The letter slipped from May's grasp and fell to the floor. "She had a child." May pressed her fingers to her mouth. "She's dead. Had I but warned her."

"You did," Adele replied. "You did
try,
" she amended. "The first letter..."

"Too late." May could almost see the flames enveloping Hannah. If it weren't for Adele's hands gripping hers, she thought she would blow away like a dry husk in the draft sweeping down from the eaves. "What must have happened?" May closed her eyes. "Coming to that place and finding
him
there. She would have had no money left. Nowhere else to go." She wept as she had when her baby died. "She bore his child, Adele."

Head bowed, Adele did not speak, only squeezed her hands.

"What must she have thought? He would have told her I was dead." Had her sister succumbed to him because she was helpless and bereft, adrift in the wilderness? A chill crept into her. Hannah had borne his child even though May had made it look as if she had perished at his hands. The specter of her sister's betrayal nearly overpowered her shame at the fiendish trick she had played. To think that her tenderhearted sister would bed the man who had driven her from her home with the threat of near drowning.

"Mayhap her child was not his," she blurted, in one last attempt to salvage Hannah's memory. "On her journey, someone might have taken advantage."

Adele regarded her sadly. "His child or no, she lived with him in his house."

"I wonder if she found the letter I hid in the Bible." The thought of her sister with Gabriel's baby made her loss even keener, the memory of the cold blue infant buried beneath that
flimsy cross.
This is my punishment.
This was the plate of bitter herbs she must swallow to atone for her own treachery.

"I forgive her," she told Adele. "How can I not? She's dead. They're all dead. Burned alive." May could not get over the horror of the fire. How unspeakable Hannah's death must have been, flames scorching her flesh, devouring both her and the child she tried to shield.

Adele pulled May's hands from her eyes. "Listen to me. You know not if she is truly dead. You know nothing of what happened."

"Will you gaze into your glass for me? Look for Hannah in the glass?"

Adele opened the wooden box at the foot of their bed and pulled out a bundle wrapped in cloth. "Bring the candle."

May took the single taper from the wall sconce and set it on the closed box. Pulling the cloth away, Adele unveiled a sea float made of green glass that they had found while walking on the shore. Once it had been used to buoy up fishing nets.

"Take my hands." She spoke with the authority of an obeah woman's daughter. She and May sat on opposite ends of the box, hands joined on either side of the glass ball. Their breath fogged its surface. "Think of your sister."

My lost sister.
Hannah on the Bristol pier. The wind whipped her hair loose from its linen cap. The wind braided their hair together, chestnut to the blinding red. Her sister begged her not to leave, tears flooding her green eyes. Sweet Hannah. May remembered her as a baby, tiny pink face and squeezing hands.

Candle flame cast its sheen over Adele's face. As she stared into the glass, seeing things invisible to May, her features seemed to shift, eyes widening, mouth curving. Even her voice sounded different.

"I see a girl. She is much smaller than you. Her hair it is like fire."

May nodded, tears streaming down her face.

"She carries a boychild on her back."

A son. Would he have looked like his father? May pushed her enmity away. Hannah had nothing left, no family, no one to protect her. Maybe Gabriel had been gentle to her, stitched her a pair of slippers. How could he help but fall in love with that girl whose innocence set her so far apart from May? Father had favored her, then Gabriel did, too. Hadn't she herself told Hannah to forgive and then forget her?
I was born under Cursed Stars and only bring Pain and Misfortune.

"Do you see him anywhere?" May couldn't bring herself to utter his name.

"I see only her and the child. The forest it is on fire, but the flames they do not touch her. She is long gone, far away. She walks the forest. She shines bright like flame itself."

B
EING THE
T
RUE
S
TORY OF MY
W
ANDERINGS AND
C
AREER AS AN ITINERANT
P
HYSICIAN AND
A
POTHECARER, BY
M
RS
. H
ANNAH
P
OWERS
W
ARD, LATELY OF
P
HILADELPHIA

M
y dear lost
Sister, though we are never to be reunited in this World, it is to you that I address my True History. In many Ways, you are the Author of my Journey, for it was on your Account that I renounced my true Love Gabriel Washbrook and became a Physician (despite my Sex) like our Father before us.

While I live, I carry the Secrets with me. I confess I told a Lie or two to safeguard my Son's Reputation—I let him believe that I was married to his Father, who died of Ague, leaving me no Choice but to don his Buckskins and earn my own Bread. After I depart from this World, Daniel and his Children may read these Words and make what they will from the plain Facts.

Daniel's Memory of the early Years of our Wandering is dim. He cannot recall how long we journeyed through Forests and over Hills, from Farm to Village and Town. Nor can he remember how many Times we slept in Haymows or some Farmer's Shed. In the beginning, I traveled on Foot, sometimes covering as many as twenty Miles a Day, with the Child and all my Gear strapped to my Body. Later, as I began to prosper, I purchased a Cart and a Mare that I named Fortuna.

In Faith, I cannot say how many were fooled by my male Disguise, for I am small and carried a Child, but I never lacked Employment. It was to my Advantage that there were precious few Doctors in the Hinterlands through which I traveled. Most who called themselves Doctors were Quacks who demanded as much as a Sovereign for some Elixir made of nothing more than Horse Piss diluted with Water. Many could not read, much less understand the Latin Books of Medicine and Anatomy. Some of the Irregular Physicians prescribed so-called Heroick Measures, wherein the Medicine had to be as noxious as the Disease. They had their Patients swallow ground Cattle-Hooves, then plastered their Bodies with Poultices of Dung, then bled them till they fainted away. Nearly as bad were the Preacher-Physicians who reasoned that their Book-Learning gave them the Authority to practice Medicine, though they knew little of Physick or Anatomy. These Preachers blamed all Sickness on the Patient's Sins; the only succor they offered were Prayer and Bible Verses. When the Disease took its Course, killing the Patient, the Preacher-Physician proclaimed it the Will of God.

But as you well remember, when I was yet a Girl in Old England, our Father instructed me on the Handiwork of a Loving God—for every Ailment and Disease, the Creator gave us an Herb to cure it. Such is the Doctrine of Plant Signatures. Indeed, God provided Clues in the Shape and Nature of Wild Plants so that we Physicians could divine the Plant's Healing Properties. Iris, being Purple in Colour, was intended for Use as a Poultice for Bruises. The Leaves of the Quaking Aspen Tree are efficacious in the Treatment of Palsy.

Most of my Patients were too poor to afford costly Remedies such as imported Laudanum or Mercury, so I endeavoured as much as possible to work with the common Plants growing in our American Forests and Fields. Through Study of Indian Lore and then through my own Experiments, I learned the curative Properties of such divers Native Plants as Snakeroot (good for treating Snakebite); Wild Indigo; Seven Barks; American Senna (which unclogs even the most Stubborn Bowels); Sassafras; Gravelwort (its Name reveals its Use); Rattlesnake Plantain; and the Cherokee Herb called Five-Fingers, which Botanists do liken to Asiatick Ginseng. I used each Plant on myself before dispensing it to my Patients.

I also practised the Art of Surgery. If they could tell I was indeed a Woman, none of my Patients objected when given the Choice between my clean and well-kept Instruments and the local Blacksmith's Saw and Pliers. Most Procedures I performed were of a simple Nature, such as pulling abscessed Teeth. Sometimes I cut for Kidney- and Bladder-stones. Once I removed a Bullet from a Man's Stomack.

No doubt you are wondering who looked after young Daniel when I was occupied with my Patients. I did my best to shield him from Contagion, paying a healthy Housewife in the Vicinity to watch him for me. When I took ill in a Smallpox Epidemick, I sent Daniel to the next Village until it passed. The Scars still mark my Cheaks, but my Son remained untouched. I confess our Life was never easy. Though he was a tolerant and good-natured Boy, I think he envied the Children belonging to regular Families.

We never lacked for Adventure. As we traveled ever northward, we encountered all Manner of People, from fiery Scotsmen who fired their Muskets with little Provocation, to the Quakers of Pennsylvania, and the Dutch of New York who pinched Daniel's Cheaks and called him "Mannekin." We met free Africans, Indians, and ascetick Puritans.

Though Daniel and I would have been welcome to linger in any Number of Hamlets, my Profession of Physick kept me pressing ever on. I still hoped to find some Clue of where Adele had gone that I might at last learn from her the Truth of your Last Days, May. However, I discovered that escaped Slaves were wont to change their Names and do all in their Power to elude Detection. Putting out Advertisements in Gazettes and Broadsides for Adele Desvarieux would have brought me Naught. I might as well have tried searching for a Coin lying at the Bottom of the Ocean. I kept reminding myself that you my Sister were well and truly Dead. Not even my deepest Longing could bring you back.

When I finally reached Boston, I was weary from the Years of Travel. By then Daniel was seven and needed proper Schooling and a settled Life. To this End, I adopted feminine Dress once more and set myself up as Midwife and Herb Woman, but the Rumours of my male Disguise and Surgery-practice never left me. To escape my Notoriety, I would have been obliged to board a Ship back to Old England.

Yet my Reputation attracted Admirers as well as Detractors. In this Manner, I happened to make the Acquaintance of Mr. Simon Ward, Proprietor of the Sign of the Mortar and Unicorn Apothecary. May, you would laugh to hear the Tale, for I was never a Beauty, even in the Bloom of my Youth when I first met Gabriel. By the time I met Mr. Ward, I was twenty-seven, scarred by the Smallpox, and grown very thin from my long Journey. Yet I did take his Fancy, and he paid Court. He loved me on Account of my Spirit and Wit; indeed he said we were Kindred Souls. A Widower with no surviving Children, he showed much Affection to Daniel and promised to bring him up as his own Son. In August 1702 we were married. Daniel and I both took Mr. Ward's Name.

It is true that a Late Love cannot quite match a First Love in terms of Passion, but at least this time, the Flames did not consume me. I never lost my Head. No Shadows hung over Mr. Ward and me. I must confess, however, that it was a bit frightening to marry after having lived such an independent Life, being my own Mistress and having no Master. But God blessed us. Mr. Ward and I were happy, except for one thing—I could give him no Children. The Smallpox had left me barren. Mr. Ward's dearest Wish was to sire not a Son but a Daughter, he said, with my Red Curls, so that he might see how I look'd when I was a Girl. Such was the Fondness of his Gaze when he teazed me so, I quite forgot the Smallpox Scars on my Face and felt myself a Maid again, full of Giddy Happiness and free of Care.