A Marked Man

“’ Tis true.” Philomela, coming back in with the relieved Hercules in her arms, spoke for the first time in the morning. “Begging your pardon for speaking, Mrs. Adams, Mrs. Sandhayes. But the Friday evening, after she returned from being out, Sheba was not herself.”

“She didn’t say why, did she?” asked Mrs. Sandhayes, and Philomela shook her head. “Because now that you speak of it, I do recall how distracted the poor girl was, when she was shopping with me that morning—and I must say, it is such a nuisance, not knowing what new colors of ribbons they’re wearing in Town until they’re the old colors—”

Abigail guessed that by Town she meant London.

“At first I thought it was only that her baby had the croup or something—brats forever ailing with one thing or another, in winter—but after she’d missed the way twice—and what a tangle those streets are, by Hancock’s Wharf!—I asked her, what on earth was the matter with her, and she begged my pardon and then burst into tears, right there on the street! She said, ‘Something terrible has happened, and I don’t know what to do!’ I asked her what, but she would say nothing of it, only that there was nothing to be done, and begged my pardon again for having troubled me. Well, she was in such a state that one couldn’t get any sense out of her then, so I made up my mind to speak to her again on Saturday, when she was a bit calmer. Frankly, it crossed my mind that as wan as she looked, and in view of Sir Jonathan’s disgraceful behavior, she might have found herself enceinte. But before I even came downstairs on Saturday, she walked out of the house and has not been seen since.”

Seven

What will become of her children?” John asked, when Abigail returned to the house, full of tea-cakes and speculation. “So far as I know, not even a dealer will pay as much as two shillings for a two-year- old that will only be underfoot and a burden ’til he’s seven or eight—”

“She,” corrected Abigail. “Marcellina, and the babe is Stephen. Mrs. Barnaby is looking after them. No woman in the household has given birth recently, so she’s spoon-feeding the poor mite on gruel and cow’s milk, and getting no thanks for it from Mrs. Fluckner.” As she returned with him to the kitchen—where Pattie, contrary to Abigail’s express instructions when she’d left for the Common that morning, was doing the ironing beside the warm Hell- mouth of the hearth—she saw in her mind again the servants’ hall of the Fluckner residence, to which Mr. Barnaby had escorted herself, Lucy, and the protesting but incurably inquisitive Mrs. Sandhayes to see the orphans.

Someone had tied little Marcellina by the leading-strings of her dress to a table-leg, to keep her from interfering with the work of the sewing-women and the maid, who there, too, had been doing ironing. Only at the Fluckner house, this involved the full panoply of goffering-tools, three different grades of starch, and irons narrow and wide, laid out on a rack above the hearth-coals, tempting to tiny fingers. Mrs. Barnaby—half her husband’s age and pretty as a kitten—had been mending one of Mrs. Fluckner’s lace-trimmed chemises, with tiny Stephen laid on a pillow at her side.

Children who, as John said, were worth nothing to anyone—except, by all accounts of everyone in the household, to their mother. “Spent every spare moment she had making dresses for them,” Mrs. Barnaby had said, reaching a careful finger to touch the sleeping infant’s cheek. “And Miss Lucy so kind, as to give her worn-out chemises and such to be made over into dresses for them—and talking her mother into doing the same. She’d never have gone away from them. Never.”

“I told Lucy I’d write to my father,” Abigail said to John, kneeling by the big kitchen sideboard where Tommy—also affixed by the leading-strings—raised joyful arms to be liberated and lifted. “He can surely find a family in Braintree or Weymouth who can be trusted to care for them, if they can be bought from Fluckner—”

“You speak as if you’re certain their mother is dead.” John opened the drawer of the sideboard, drew out a folded note. “There are other reasons that a woman could be ‘distrait’ or ‘beside herself ’—fear is the one that springs to my mind the quickest—that would drive her from her home and her children, always supposing your Mrs. Sandhayes isn’t correct and the woman wasn’t simply in a state of sickened horror to find herself with child by a man who’d raped her. This came for you just after you’d left. You’re right,” he added thoughtfully. “It is odd.”

“Well, I’ll take oath she wasn’t pregnant, with a baby still at breast.” Abigail straightened with her son in her arms, and unfolded the note. “The idiot,” she added dispassionately, after a quick perusal of that lovely Italianate script.

Seth Balfour—age 45—coachman for Mr. Apthorp—last to arrive at the Governor’s, between ten and ten thirty (heard the clock at the French Meeting-House strike as he let the family off at the front door)—says he is certain there was no body in the lane when he turned his team into the yard. Roughly twenty minutes to unharness, rug the team, then sat with Sellon, Havisham, Lane, Cover in the tack-room next to the gate. Cards, quiet talk. Thinks he would have heard men quarrelling in alley.

Grant Sellon—age 30—His Excel’cy the Gov’s coachman—remained on the premises to supervise—says card-players in tack-room those who have little taste for noise, smells at Spancel. Has known other four for years. Jug of beer from kitchen, Cover had flask of brandy but none of the players became drunk or loud. Heard dogs bark in alley near midnight, went out with lantern, saw nothing but says lantern-light carries only five feet. Attests Balfour could not possibly have seen by light of carriage-lanterns, from carriage-seat to the place where the body was found. Agrees that after Apthorp team unharnessed, rugged, yard was quiet until two a.m. when first guests (Mr. Bowdoin) called for carriages.

Wm Havisham—age 19—His Excel’cy the Gov’s head stable boy—sent by Sellon to fetch in lantern from the gate at 11 p.m.—says saw nothing in alley, but gate-lanterns illuminate only immediate area of the gate, radius ten feet at most. Walked about the yard at quarter past midnight, again at quarter of two, all quiet. Did not go into alley.

Arthur Cover—age 52—head footman for Mr. Bowdoin, Sr.—arrived immediately before Apthorps—while Bowdoin and Apthorp teams being unharnessed, caught short and retreated to alley to relieve himself some twenty feet from yard gate toward Rawson’s Lane. Took a lantern, noticed nothing amiss in direction of Rawson’s Lane. Somewhat nearsighted. Attests barking dog in the alley near midnight, thinks they would have heard men quarreling.

Nicholas Lane—age 22—under-footman for Mr. Vassall—corroborates barking dog, sounds from alley would carry. Walked about the yard at quarter of one, twenty past one, all quiet. Did not go into alley. Attests Spancel tavern favored by stablemen, footmen, does not think anyone would have walked from yard gate southwest to Rawson’s Lane.

Walter Clegg—age 28—ferryman, Winissimet Ferry—no one of Cottrell’s description crossed from Boston to Winissimet morning of Saturday, March 5.

Obed Hussey—age 20—ferryman, Charles Town Ferry—no one of Cottrell’s description crossed from Boston to Charles Town morning of Saturday, March 5.

“As if anyone in Boston would tell a British officer anything about anyone’s movements, if he came asking.” Abigail folded up the sheet, set Tommy down, and took out her pastry-board. “And now of course if I go inquiring for a slender little fair-haired fellow with a cleft chin and the remains of a black eye on Saturday morning, both ferrymen will leap to the astute conclusion that I’m hand in glove with the British and give me a second helping of what he got. Drat the man!” She edged past John into the pantry, scooped out flour from the barrel there into a bowl, and gathered the lard-crock from the kitchen’s chilliest corner. “Perhaps if I inquire after Mr. Howell’s horse and ask the men who’d be on duty late in the afternoon when he’d have been coming back—”

“If he went,” pointed out John, and caught her for a firm kiss before turning back to the hall and his study. “The man could as easily have had a lady-friend in the North End as across the river.”

“Then why rent a horse?”

“Perhaps his toenail had become ingrown while he was in Maine, and he didn’t feel able for walking.”

Abigail threw a dishrag at him as he ducked through the hall door, to Charley and Tommy’s crows of delight.

But after she’d got the vegetables chopped for a rabbit pie, and the dried herbs that her mother-in-law sent her every autumn from her garden in Braintree pounded up, and caught Tommy twice as he attempted to toddle out