The Mapmaker's Children (10 page)

N
EW
C
HARLESTOWN
, V
IRGINIA
D
ECEMBER
2, 1859

S
arah awoke in a fog, alone in the bed. The light through the window was ashen. Her mouth smacked of pine. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes, then steadied their focus. Chaff clung to her nightgown. She pinched a husk between her thumb and forefinger and rolled it until it dissolved.

Mary and Annie were gone, as were their mourning clothes. Sarah anxiously dressed but found she could not lace the corset without help. She paced the room. “Blasted balsam! Blast, blast, blast.”

Horse hooves and nickers sounded from outside. Freddy rode into the farmyard. The barn doors were wide open, and the place where the wagon had been was hollow, only wheel tracks in the soft mud. Sarah pressed her nose to the window for a better look, ignoring the sharp teeth of the frost's bite. Freddy dismounted on the quick, tied the reins to the hitching post, and marched straight to the back door. Within a moment, a chorus of murmurs trembled through the house. Freddy's low voice and soprano tones. They were in the kitchen.

She threw off the corset, pulled on her plum dress minus the stays, and raced down the steps without even combing her hair. Freddy and Priscilla stood in the foyer and looked up at her in sad bewilderment. She knew she was a sight.

“Good morning, Mrs. Hill.” Sarah hesitated in greeting Freddy, then proceeded formally: “Mr. Hill.”

Priscilla gestured to the parlor. “Won't you come down and have something warm to eat?”

Sarah politely curtsied. “Thank you, but I was looking for my sister and mother.”

“Annie is by the fire.”

At that, she hurried into the salon, where Annie sat staring at the flames.

“Sister?”

Annie turned with the expression of a scarecrow after a summer swelter: features that should've given line and form were raw and swollen. “Father doesn't want us…” Her eyes brimmed afresh. “He doesn't want us there.”

“No, you are mistaken.” Sarah shook her head. Though her map had not led him to safety, there was still time, still good-byes to be said, father to daughter. He would have last words for each of them. She was sure! Last lessons of liturgy for Annie, last instructions for Sarah to continue their UGRR work. “Freddy borrowed Mr. Fisher's horse. Everything is prepared.”

A tear wormed its way down Annie's cheek and dripped onto the crown of Alice's doll beside her chair.

“Please.” Sarah turned to Priscilla. “Where is our mother?”

Priscilla covered her quivering lips with a handkerchief and looked to Freddy.

“Soldiers arrived before dawn,” he explained. “Your mother, alone, was requested at the jailhouse.”

Sarah choked on her own breath.

“They came with a letter signed by Captain Brown. He didn't want you or your sister in harm's way, so we did as he bid and escorted Mrs. Brown. After an hour within, she exited and explained that she would not be going to the execution field. Instead, she asked my father to take her to a hillside overlook so she could watch in respected privacy. I returned to let you and your sister know of your parents' wishes.”

Freddy's gaze had softened to an unbearable kindness, and Sarah realized she was crying, though she hadn't meant to.

Priscilla wrapped an arm about her. “Oh, dear girl.”

She smelled of mulled cardamom and cloves, and despite wanting to stand strong, Sarah let herself be undone in the embrace.

“It's for your protection,” Priscilla sighed. Sarah's cheek rose and fell against her breast. “He is thinking of your ultimate good.”

“Governor Wise and General Taliaferro have issued a warning,” said Freddy. “The execution may initiate a bloody battle between the lawful government and abolitionist sympathizers.” He frowned. “I'd do the same to keep you safe if I were in your father's shoes.”

A bubble of fury burst through Sarah's grief. “But you aren't! By noontime, his shoes will be dangling from a scaffold while you sit here in comfort and family!”

The words burned her tongue, and she immediately regretted blighting him with such bitterness. Of all the people around her this grave hour, Freddy was the only one who continued to share her father's secret mission. It was irrational, hysterical, the words in such contrast to her true feelings that she covered her face with her hands.

Alice and Siby entered the room at her shout. Sarah saw their slippered feet through her fingers: Alice in shimmering peach; Siby in burnt sienna. The colors ran together through her tears like oils on a palette.

“My apologies, Miss Brown,” said Freddy. “I spoke out of turn.” His boots marched out of the room.

“Please don't cry,” begged Alice, on the verge of weeping herself. She came to Annie's side, where she knelt to collect the doll. “You were supposed to help,” she told it, then sat the doll on the chaise beside Annie as if waiting for a spell to initiate or be broken.

Priscilla did not release Sarah. In fact, her grip strengthened.

“Sorrow will wear a person down to the grave,” said Siby. “I've got black tea, hoecakes, and apple butter to keep your spirits hardy.”

“Thank you,” replied Priscilla. “Just the tea for now.”

The grandfather clock in the hallway chimed out nine times. How could that be? It seemed hours ago that Sarah had risen from bed. Days gone by since she'd been in the barn with Freddy. Weeks since they'd ridden the train from New York, and before that, so long past that it reflected a different life altogether.

The execution was to be at noon. Her father would be standing beneath the same dreary, cold sky for the next three hours. And after that…no more. There was nothing she could do. The powerlessness was unbearable.

Alice opened a book of cross-stitch patterns: fern fountains and wheat sheaths, tulips and twig ladders, feather stitching and tiny eyelets.

“Color threads are better for French hand sewing but difficult to come by nowadays. Ma's got strong hair with more yellow than mine. I like using that for close relations. We've sewn wedding veils and baby bonnets, cuffs and collars, toys and samples—everything for near about everyone! Ma says I have gifted hands.” She splayed them before Annie. “And now—now we're going to make Kerry Pippin's dress.” She flipped through the designs until she came to the one of distinction. “Here.” She held the sample with both hands, staring so earnestly at the drawing that it appeared as if she were trying to see through it. “Apple blossoms. Love and new life.”

“Heady, unconventional love, by some interpretations,” whispered Annie. “Preference, too.”

Alice smiled and nodded in staccato beats. “Just the flowers. The fruits speak temptation.” She gave Annie a wary glare.

Annie fingered the edge of the muslin frock the doll wore. “I can help, if you like. Something to pass the time.”

“You and Sarah have the most beautiful chestnut hair. Might you lend us some from your brushes?” Alice bounced on the seat cushion until Priscilla patted her knee. Then she covered her mouth with a hand and commenced humming “O Tannenbaum.” The sound filled up the room so that there seemed to be nothing else.

“I have a little dark thread left on my spool,” said Priscilla. “Why don't you fetch that and the frames, dear.”

Alice stopped humming. “But it's not nearly enough for the outline.”

“I don't mind,” Sarah offered. Her hair was thick and her brush notoriously full. “You can use my hair.”

At home, their mother often sewed initials into handkerchiefs and other garments with strands that fell away during her nightly one hundred strokes. Father had liked his socks darned with it. He claimed it kept his toes warmer and was more durable.

Alice rose clapping. She governed her gait to exit the parlor, then raced up the staircase.

Siby came from the kitchen with the tea tray. “Miss Prissy, snowdrops pushed up through Ma's garden.” She poured their cups steaming full. “Thought maybe Miss Alice like to press a bunch for her fairy code talk while I's down helping with Clyde and Hannah this afternoon.”

Priscilla nodded. “That might work well for all.”

“I reckoned.” Siby nudged the cup closer to Sarah's hand.

The brew's warmth gave way to malty chicory, and she drank it to the last drop without care for etiquette. As Siby had promised, the heat spread through her, thawing the iceberg of hysteria. Her stomach growled, appetite roused. She hadn't the corset on to bind her belly from the grumblings. She put a palm to it like a hand over a crying child's mouth, but that did little to quell the demand.

“This past harvest made the tastiest apple butter I ever crocked. Best orchard for a hundred miles be right in our backyard.” Siby busied herself, brushing unseen dust from the chaise with her apron. “Tastiest on hoecakes fresh outta the fry pan, like they is now.”

Sarah's stomach groaned audibly again. The flesh betraying the spirit.

“Maybe I ought to have a little something.”

“Teensy bite, maybe so,” said Siby.

Sarah looked to Annie, whose visage had returned to the fire.

“I'll look after her,” whispered Priscilla from behind her cup.

Before Sarah could argue, Siby was helping her off the settee.

In the kitchen, Freddy stood by the stove, a crock of apple butter in one hand and his mouth full. He choked down what he was chewing when she entered, composed himself, and nodded civilly.

A stack of round cakes, tall as a yellow top hat, stood with a fork run through the center to keep it stable. Siby forked a flap onto a plate, then nodded to the butter in Freddy's hand.

“You going to share that with company or gobble it all yourself?”

“Yes, of course—I mean, no—I mean…” He held out the crock to her, then set it down on the stove, picked it up, and set it down again on the oak kitchen table.

It was the first fluster Sarah had ever seen in him. Color rose to his cheeks.

Siby lifted an eyebrow high. She set Sarah's plate on the table. “I get you a fresh spoon for the jam,” she said, patting Sarah's arm on her way to the pantry.

Freddy ran a hand through his dark hair and shifted uneasily. Sarah felt bad about her earlier outburst. She'd been angry at herself and heartsick at the turn of events. Freddy had just happened to be the easiest target. It was an unfair attack and more reflected her inner turmoil than anything she could articulate. She wished she could explain that to him.

The grandfather clock tolled ten.
Ye know not what shall be on the morrow. Our life is but a vapour that appeareth for a time, and then gone:
her father often quoted this verse. Inspired by it, Sarah had painted a picture using watered-down berry juice—too little left on the bush to make a deeper hue. She saw time that way. Sweeps of muted blue, scented with seasons past.

“I'm sorry, Freddy,” she said. “I shouldn't have spoken as I did earlier.”

He took a step closer just as Siby returned waving a wooden teaspoon.

“All we gots. Used up the silver last night, and I haven't a chance to polish 'em clean.” Instead of handing it to Sarah, she stuck it straight in the crock, then looked to Freddy. “What? I got seven jars in the cellar. You ain't got to look so displeasured. I'll go git another if you're hankering.”

“No, I…” Freddy began, but she'd already started back to the pantry.

He turned to Sarah, his neck straining against his cravat. “Miss Brown, please don't apologize. I really oughtn't have said what I did. Today is an onerous one for you. I only want to be of service.”

His voice was tender, and Sarah found herself moved.

Alice poked her head through the kitchen door. “The bad fairies have stolen my sewing thimble!”

Sarah thought she spoke in jest, but her face was distraught.

“Mister George just asked me to put these up.” Siby held an armful of black drapes, bereavement coverings for the windows. She set the new crock of apple butter on the table. “Come along, Miss Alice. We'll find that thimble. Fairies like hiding in the window nooks.”

“I understand if you'd prefer to be alone, Miss Brown,” said Freddy with a bow.

“I would not, in fact. And ‘Miss Brown' was always better suited to Annie. I'm simply Sarah.”

She ought not be so bold with a man, she thought, but propriety seemed a trifling statute given the events of the day, the night before, and the gravity of her father's work left to the living. She'd sworn to him that she'd carry on, and so she would. She'd do more than any of his children, more than all of his sons, more than a woman was expected or allowed. She would be her own new creation and paint the way for others to follow.

S
ARAH HELD
her breath through each of the twelve chimes of noon, until the room swayed slightly for lack of air. She took that to be the physical sign of her father's passing. Annie cried quietly into one of Priscilla's handkerchiefs. Freddy stood tall with his head hung in reverence. Priscilla said a prayer.

The hearth fire sputtered on a mossy patch. The cleaved log hadn't been seasoned long enough for a quiet, steady burn. The flames licked ghoulishly, calling to mind stories of the burning bush, fiery furnaces, and her father's many biblical references to spirits ablaze.

How did a soul journey from earth to heaven? she wondered. Like in Shakespeare's
Hamlet
, could it be sidetracked to visit family and friends before going on? Given her father's standing as a prophet, she imagined God might allow him to drive up in Elijah's borrowed chariot. It would be something he'd do, if she still had faith in such things.

A loud knock at the door caused them to jump. George wouldn't have knocked at his own home, and Siby would've come through the kitchen; so whoever this was, he was not familial.