Poison in the Colony, page 12
I whisk her into my arms and run, up the bank, past the fort watchmen, and crash into our cottage. “Snake. Maybe a cottonmouth, maybe a copperhead. I don’t know,” I cry. “I thought they were all sleeping! It’s winter!”
Mum grabs Alice and lays her on the bed. “Hold her,” she orders.
While I hold down a screaming Alice, Mum sucks the blood and poison out of her wound, spitting it onto our dirt floor.
I am shaking. It is my fault. A snakebite can kill a grown man, and much more easily a small child. Why didn’t I watch her better? She must have lifted a rock off a snake’s hibernation den and awakened it. Why did I not tell my mother about the feeling of dread? Why didn’t I just admit that the knowing had given me a warning, and refuse to take Alice outside the fort? I protected myself instead of protecting Alice.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,” I say it over and over.
Mum is all business. “Bring me tobacco,” she demands. Because there were no copperheads or cottonmouths in London, her knowledge of how to treat New World snakebites comes from the Powhatans. Mum chews on the dried tobacco leaves, then puts the chewed-up wad onto Alice’s leg. “This will draw out more of the poison,” she says.
Poison. When she speaks the word, I get a strong jolt of the knowing. Poison is the threat. Poison is what I have been dreading. But not from this sleepy snake—he was only the messenger.
I am suddenly calm. I know that Alice will heal. I place my hands firmly on Alice’s head. She has stopped screaming and is merely whimpering. “You’re going to be fine,” I tell her. “Let Mum do what she needs to do and you’ll be well soon.”
My mother glances at me. She is wondering how I know, afraid that it is the knowing, wanting it to be the knowing so that she can be assured of the truth of what I have said. “Don’t worry about Alice, Mum,” I say, answering her unasked questions. “Don’t worry about me, either.” I am on my own now, anyway—she no longer needs to protect me.
She gives me a crooked, tentative smile. She holds the tobacco against Alice’s leg as Alice continues to whimper.
Katherine, who slept through the loudest parts, now sits up in bed. “Alice hurt?” she asks.
“Yes,” I say, “but Mum knows what to do, and she’ll be up to play with you very soon.”
The rest of the day Alice refuses to eat. She says her stomach feels bad. I remember touching the purple cone-flowers when I was a small child and knowing that they would be good for snakebites. My mother is doubtful of it, but I make tea from our dried purple coneflowers and give it to Alice to drink. She says it makes her stomach feel a little better.
Alice is weak and stays lying in bed. Her foot and ankle swell up and the skin around the bite turns deep purple. It is a frightful sight, but I am confident in the knowing that she will survive this.
News of Alice’s snakebite travels fast through the colony and soon we have visitors. Jane is the first to arrive. She and Mum discuss treatment and decide to make a poultice of burdock root to further draw out the poison and help with healing. I sprinkle a little dried purple cone-flower into the poultice.
Jane also gives us an egg from her rations. “Feed this to her when she feels good enough to eat,” she tells my mother. It is well known that healthy people survive these bites. It’s the ones that are sickly or half starved that die. “You keep these girls well fed with your garden,” Jane says, trying to dispel my mother’s worry. “And Alice is strong.”
Alice doesn’t look strong, lying there with glassy eyes and her swollen, half-purple leg, still crying sometimes because of the pain.
Bermuda comes in the evening, carrying the yoke and water buckets I left lying at the river. “I heard,” he says. He looks worried and scared, and doesn’t stay long.
Next to arrive is Angela, with an earthenware pot of baked apples, sent by Mrs. Pierce. It smells wonderful, and Alice actually sits up and eats a little of it.
“Do you want to hear a story?” Angela asks.
Alice nods. “Tell about Anansi,” she says.
Katherine climbs into my lap and Angela begins. “Anansi was a spider. A very tricky spider. But he also a greedy spider.” She makes a grabbing motion with one hand to show how greedy Anansi was. “One day he went to Sun God and said, ‘You have all wisdom in the world. I want you to give it to me.’ So, Sun God put all wisdom into a calabash and gave it to Anansi.”
Alice’s eyes are bright as she listens. Katherine sits quite still in my lap. “Anansi was very happy with calabash full of wisdom. He was smartest in the world now! But one day he said, what if someone tries to take my wisdom? Then I will not be smartest in the world. I must hide the calabash.”
Angela holds out her arms as if she is Anansi the spider, holding a big pot of wisdom. “So, he carried the calabash to a tall tree, full of thorns. ‘I hide the calabash in top of this tree,’ he said. But first he has to climb the tree.”
Angela stands and acts out Anansi trying to climb while holding the pot in front of him. “He has two arms to hold the calabash, and six arms to climb, but the calabash is in his way. He keeps sliding down, can’t climb the tree.”
Alice and Katherine laugh at silly Anansi.
“The little son of Anansi followed him and he watched. Little son said, ‘Father, why you not tie the calabash behind you? Then you can climb with all eight legs.’”
Angela pretends to tie the pot on her back. “Anansi thought little son has a good idea. He tied the calabash behind, and up the tree he went.” She puts one finger to her head. “But at the top of the tree, he thought, ‘Anansi has all the wisdom of Sun God, but little son, he is smarter than me!’ Anansi was so angry, he threw the calabash to the ground.”
Alice sucks in her breath. “Did it break?” she asks.
Angela nods. “The calabash broke to pieces, and all the wisdom came out. Just then, a big storm came. Rain washed the wisdom into the river!”
Alice groans. “Oh no,” she says.
“Wisdom flowed down the river to the sea.” Angela shows the flowing wisdom with her slender fingers. “It went all over the world. A little bit came to every person.” She touches each of us on our foreheads, first Alice, then Katherine, then me. “Inside everybody, you have a piece of wisdom.”
Alice asks, “Am I the smartest in the world like Anansi, now?”
Angela squeezes her hand. “Yes. You are smart enough you don’t play with snakes.”
Alice shakes her head. “No more snakes.”
Katherine snuggles into my shoulder and closes her eyes. Angela’s story has made her ready for a nap.
Angela stands. “I will go before my mistress wonders why I take so long.”
Mum thanks her for coming and tells her to thank Mrs. Pierce for the baked apples as well.
That night, Alice sleeps fitfully in our bed with me. I try to help her feel better by keeping a cool rag on her forehead. She mumbles in her sleep about snakes and spiders. Finally, when it is almost morning, she falls into a deeper sleep, and I do, too.
The next day Reverend Buck looks in on us. He puts his hand on Alice’s forehead and prays for her swift healing. He looks grave and concerned, as if he doesn’t really believe that Alice will survive.
Alice eats more of the baked apples, and Mum cooks the egg for her. I still have to carry her to the chamber pot, because the leg hurts too much for her to stand on it. But she doesn’t cry anymore, and she plays with Katherine sitting on our bed.
The second night Alice sleeps better, and when I wake before dawn, I see that she is already up, taking her own self to the chamber pot. As she climbs back into our bed, I whisper, “Better?”
“It hurts just a little,” she says. “Tell about Anansi?”
I look over at Mum and Katherine, still asleep in their bed. I’m glad Mum is getting some rest. So, very softly, I tell a story, remembering one of Angela’s tales as best I can—the one about why Anansi has eight thin legs. When Alice falls back to sleep, I find myself the only one awake.
In the quiet, the feeling of dread starts up again, stronger than ever. It pounds in my head with the rhythm of my heartbeats. It is clear now: poison is coming to the colony.
I remember what I saw when I lifted the veil briefly to feel what Chief Opechancanough thinks of us. I remember the roiling cloud of rage, the fear that we will cause the destruction of his kingdom, his determination to protect his people, his desire to have us gone. What better way than to poison us all?
So many ships, I think. There are so many ships arriving, so many new settlers every year, so much Indian land being taken over with trees cut down, houses built, and tobacco planted.
I am sure of what I must do. Poison is coming to the colony and I am the only one who knows. I must be the one to stop it before it kills us all.
Twenty-Eight
BY DAWN I have made my decision. I am going to Elizabeth City. Samuel has always been my help, my partner in following the knowing, and I need him now. I can’t go telling Reverend Buck or Governor Yeardley about the message from my mysterious second sight. And I certainly can’t get my mother involved in this. Samuel is the only one I can tell. Everyone knows he speaks Algonquian, and so he can easily tell the governor that he heard from the natives about something suspicious going on. He will be able to get out the warning, that no one should eat or drink anything from the natives, without any accusations of witchcraft.
I tell Mum simply what she needs to know. “We will eat only our own food, nothing from the natives,” I say to her.
I think of the poisonous plants that grow in the Virginia forest and along the shorelines: jimsonweed, pokeweed, water hemlock. Chief Opechancanough could easily mix poison into bread, or boil the roots in stew, or crush the flowers and berries into wine. Then he could send his messengers to offer this food for trade. Mum readily agrees to no trading. But when I tell her that I must leave for Elizabeth City with the next boat going that way, she is not happy.
She shakes her head. “I will not let you travel such a distance alone,” she says.
I want to say I would not be alone. I would be with one of the small groups of settlers who travel between James Town and the other settlements, in shallops or canoes, picking up supplies or delivering goods that they have produced. But I know what she means. I would not be with anyone I know.
I wish I could tell her, “If I don’t go, the colonists will be poisoned!” But I don’t want to involve her in what the knowing has told me.
I keep my ears and eyes open as I move about the fort, to the well, to pick up rations, to visit Bermuda. The very next morning I hear what I have been waiting for: three Irishmen are heading back downriver. They came from the Dale’s Gift settlement to deliver salt that they produced, and to pick up rations.
“Mum, please ask them if I can go,” I beg. “They’ll be traveling right by Elizabeth City on their way back to Dale’s Gift. They are in a shallop so there is plenty of room for me. We could tell them I need to go because Da needs my help.” This is the truth. Without my help, Da and Samuel could fall prey to the poison.
Mum shakes her head. “You don’t know these Irishmen and they don’t know you. They might even be convicts of some sort. You would not be safe.”
“But, Mum—” I begin.
“No,” she says. “You may not go.”
Anger and frustration rise in me. I remember what Samuel said about channeling my anger. I don’t want to argue with my mother. I wish I could obey her, but the knowing is prodding me, leading me. I calm myself inside.
“I’ll go dig for mussels,” I say.
Mum looks at me. She knows full well that once I am out of the cottage, I will be free to go. Mum, you said yourself that you can no longer protect me, I think. Please, stay here and take care of the little ones and let me do what I have to do.
She seems to hear my unspoken words. She goes to the hearth and breaks a large chunk off the loaf of corn bread that is to be our noon meal. She wraps it in a cloth. Her lips quiver as she hands it to me. “God go with you,” she says.
I wrap my warm shawl around my shoulders and run down the well-worn path to the river. If I hurry, I hope to find the Irishmen before they leave. As I near the river, I hear men speaking Gaelic. It is them, the three men, loading supplies onto a shallop.
My heart pounds. Mum is right: I don’t know any of them. All three are short, with black hair and dark eyes. One has a scar along the side of his face. From a knife fight? Another has a flattened, crooked nose. From a fistfight? I have heard that the Irish are prone to drinking too much ale and to bouts of temper. But I must get to Samuel. I suck in my breath and take the last few steps to the shore.
“I need to go to Elizabeth City,” I say loudly. “I heard you are going that way.”
One of the men, the one with the flattened nose, stands up straight and looks at me. The other two continue putting crates onto the shallop as though they have not even understood my words.
“Ye coming with us, lassie?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say as bravely as I can.
He nods and speaks to the other two in Gaelic, motioning as though he is telling them to move the crates to make room for me. The third man, the one who bears no scars from previous fights, looks me up and down. I notice that only one of his eyes moves, and the other wanders off to the side.
I am trembling as I wade into the cold water, and step into the shallop. I have decided to travel with three men who might have chosen to come to Virginia rather than be hanged for various crimes.
Twenty-Nine
THE MEN HAVE not asked my name, and so I do not ask theirs. Instead, I name them myself: Flat Nose, Scar, and One Eye. Flat Nose is the only one who has spoken to me, so I assume the other two don’t speak English. All he says is for me to stay out of the way and not tip the boat.
I sit up straight on the bench and feel the breeze on my face. The day is mild, and the river is moving swiftly. I comfort myself with the thought that the trip to Elizabeth City should not take long. Da says it only takes half a day if the river helps you along.
Scar and One Eye row with long oars, and Flat Nose steers with the tiller. Scar starts singing a joyful tune in Gaelic, and the other two join in. Even without instruments, it reminds me of the music we have heard in the fort when Irish settlers arrive.
I remember the last time I traveled down this river, with Samuel to go find Angela, and the time before that when Samuel took me to Point Comfort as a baby. This journey has always brought me good things, and I hope that today will be no different.
* * *
. . .
As the sun sinks low, I search the shoreline for a break in the trees that will show us where the Elizabeth City settlement is. There might be boats moored at the river’s edge, and maybe even a house or barn visible through the bare trees. With the waning sunlight comes a chill. I pull my shawl more tightly around me. My stomach grumbles and I eat the last few bites of my corn bread. Surely we will see the settlement soon, and I will join Samuel and Da for supper.
Flat Nose barks out an order in Gaelic and turns the tiller. But he turns the shallop the wrong way.
“No,” I say quickly. “Elizabeth City is on the left, not the right.” Don’t these Irish know anything?
“The current is pushing us to the right and it’s time for supper,” says Flat Nose.
“Please, just take me to the north shore and I will walk the rest of the way,” I say.
“Can’t do that, lassie,” Flat Nose says. “We’re headed to the south shore to make camp.”
“But that’s not where I’m going!” I cry.
“Oh yes, it is,” he says.
The trees of the river’s south shore loom tall where a spit of land reaches out. The men row hard, and we meet the spit of land before the current can wash us past it.
I clench my teeth. This is not what I asked for. I try to calm my fear. All right, I think. They will make camp for the night. Tomorrow we will continue down the river, and arrive early at Elizabeth City. I will only have to last with these men one night and one morning, and then I will be free of them.
Flat Nose tells me to gather wood for a fire, and the three of them set to work. Scar pulls blankets, a cook pot, and a sack of barley out of the shallop while One Eye cuts saplings and spruce boughs to make a shelter. Flat Nose takes a spear to the river to get fish. Soon there is a pot of barley bubbling and fish roasting over the fire and a shelter built near the fire’s warmth. The men sit on logs around the fire, drinking ale and playing a gambling game with a deck of cards.
I take a long drink of river water and find a private place behind a tree to relieve myself. The roasting fish smells wonderful and the three men are having a raucous time at their card game. I look at the fading light in the sky and see the first star peek out. Maybe this one night in the forest with the Irishmen won’t be so bad, I tell myself.
The fish is delicious, though I notice that they give me only a small portion while they divide the bigger hunks of meat. Still, they give me a whole bowl of barley, for which I am thankful. The card game goes on, with them betting coins and knives, a bracelet made of copper, and even a belt buckle. Every time the fire burns low, Flat Nose barks out, “More wood, lassie.” I traipse into the forest to find more sticks and logs and return to the fire. I get sleepy and so I sit, hug my knees, and doze off.
I hear the name they’ve been calling me, “lassie,” and snap awake. I start to get up to fetch more wood but see that the fire is burning brightly. The men are gesturing, arguing, and my name is uttered a few more times. I tense inside. What could possibly concern me?
Flat Nose throws down his cards. “Ah, take her,” he says angrily. He sees that I am awake. “You belong to him now, lassie,” he says, pointing to Scar. “He won you fair and square.”
