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Maidenhead

The gales that swept Cape Cod were the most fearsome I had seen in all my sixteen years. They passed through Martha's Vineyard and chased away the fog that hung in the air like veils of white gauze. By late October, pumpkins and squash rotted on the vine and the cold stripped the sumacs and dogwoods that ringed the island of their scarlet foliage

We mourned the lack of Indian summer and hunkered down to harvest what was left of the potatoes, parsnips and rutabagas. These were trying times, and even the smallest tyke joined the other village children to forage the woods for roots and berries. When the dying started, Father preached a sermon of such power that his words shall follow me to my grave.

“My dear people, you have suffered greatly from this hateful frost but please know your trials are shared by all of Massachusetts. From Falmouth to Wellfleet an evil chill sits in the air like a gluttonous guest who refuses to leave. I bear witness that Our Lord in Heaven has a divine plan. He will not desert us! We shall prevail and all will be made right once more!”

How often I have wished Divine Providence had rewarded Father’s trust. It did not. The wicked autumn turned into early winter and brought influenza along with the frost. It was a vile contagion that spread with lethal speed and nothing could vanquish it, not Dover’s powder, not quinine or whisky. When father spoke that Sunday morning, he could not have known that the grim reaper’s appetite was not yet sated. Death moved from Mashpee to Yarmouth, rested for a moment in Rachel’s Pride, lit for a brief time in Wellfleet and finally raced to our village where it wielded its scythe with blinding speed.

How vivid my memories are of that dawn when the sea cried out to me before daybreak. I stood on the beach as the wind painted the sky violet and blew across the bay to our village. What a pitiful sight I must have been, boots unbuttoned, black hair uncoiling to my waist, eyes ringed with dark circles. It was a stroke of bitter fortune that there was no one to remark upon my disheveled state.

A beam flashed from Virgin’s Light, the beacon perched on the cliffs since the English set foot on our shore. The flashes spoke a language I had learned in grammar school, a burst of light, then another, and then one more, signaling the clipper ships navigating the hostile waters of the peninsula.

“Stay away! Stay away!”

The schooners trawling the depths of Chastity Cove read the warning and reversed course.

I was a Hathorne and no one but a Hathorne had ever led the First Congregational Church of Maidenhead. My forbearers had hewn it from white oak and pitch pine back in 1640. By the time I was born, my family had ministered from its pulpit for over two centuries.

Our home, the rectory, sat behind a vine-covered arbor at the rear of the churchyard. Wooden steps led to a piazza where three funeral wreaths of amaranth and yarrow hung from the front door. Father’s cape hung from the cloak-rack in the hallway. The parlor, lit by two burning candles, was to the right of the hall. My harp sat near the fireplace next to Mamma’s mandolin. Our little house was always inviting, but that morning a smell hovered in the air that even freshly cut evergreens could not mask.

The narrow stairwell led to the spare bedchamber I once shared with my brother, dear Alfred, was of wood salvaged from a beached whaling ship. My bisque doll, guarded by a platoon of Alfred’s tin soldiers, stared through glass eyes. A carved ditty box accommodated my few treasures, Mamma’s earrings and fine ivory comb, as well as Father’s pride and joy, a brass pocket compass suspended from a silver watch fob. A weathered nautical window looked out onto the birch grove at the rear of the house.

Seeking respite in sleep was fruitless. I braided my hair, buttoned my boots and awaited the burial men. Then, in the stillness, I heard a sound as delicate as the beatings of a wasp’s wing. It was rasping, soft like the murmurs of old women and almost as imperceptible. To my horror, the breathy sighs came from inside the house. Someone or something was in the parlor.

I made my way down the stairwell and walked into the dreaded room. The wind had blown away the stench but also extinguished the candles. As I inched forward, I called out again.

“In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, make yourself known!”

I looked into the void but saw nothing.

The drumbeat grew louder matching the tattoo of my heart. The burial men were coming. The rasping started anew, louder than ever and Dear God, the sound was coming from the coffin! I wanted to flee but my feet were rooted in place. The Lord would wish me to be brave. One more step and I faced the pine box. Another step, I heard a gurgle, two steps, an audible sigh. Three steps and I stood at the foot of the coffin.

It took every ounce of strength to look into the casket. Mamma and my little brother lay together in death, their skin blue from the influenza. She looked serene in her gown of wine-colored faille, and little Alfred, my beautiful brother, graced with an angelic countenance and dark curls, rested in her lifeless arms. Goody Ferris, the village’s midwife, had dressed him in a fine suit of black velvet, lined the coffin with branches of lavender and placed burning candles at the foot and head of the coffin. She had tied a silk scarf under Mamma’s chin to keep her jaw shut, and sealed her eyes shut with candle wax, but had not thought to do the same for Alfred. His eyes had begun to open and his rosebud of a mouth emitted the gurgling sound I heard.

I recoiled from the sight of a breathing corpse but then, I realized Alfred had not died. My little brother was alive! Before I could prostrate myself at the coffin in thanks, the door opened again. I ran to the hallway to close it but stopped in my tracks at threshold. A rim of fire revealed itself from behind a cloud and tinted the morning sky in shades of rose. The Maidenhead funeral cortège greeted me.

The burial hearse was farm wagon loaded with bodies shrouded in linen, muslin and discarded sailcloth. A small boy marched in front, his eyes as pale as milk. He wore a top hat festooned with a black cockade and pounded a mummer’s drum at each step to warn the living the dead approached. A minister, dressed in a threadbare frock coat, and old Goody gowned in her finest mourning costume, walked in lockstep behind the child.

The trio walked in front of four dray horses driven by a woman whose fair hair peeked from a black poke bonnet. She had covered her nose and mouth with a large kerchief, a barrier against the stench that drifted through the air. Her skin was as white as chalk and her eyes were as pale as the child’s were. Six gravediggers moved in step behind the wagon, each carrying shovels across his shoulders.

I flew at them, joyful tears running down my face in celebration of this miracle wrought by the Lord.

“He’s alive! My Alfred is alive!”

From her look, I knew Goody could not fathom my words.

“Lucy girl, I put Alfred in your mother’s arms myself. The boy is dead!”

Poor old woman. She had dressed him and placed him in the casket not realizing he was simply in a deep slumber. The Lord had revived him!

I laughed into the wind.

“No! No! No! You were wrong, Goody, you were wrong! He’s breathing, he’s breathing! Come inside and you shall see!”

When I grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the rectory, I saw her exchange a look with the minister.

“Sir, I fear that grief has made the poor child mad.”

It did not matter what they thought because my Alfred lived! Goody walked toward the box, looked down at Alfred’s tiny body and jumped back, her ancient eyes wide with wonder.

“Almighty God in heaven! She’s not mad! The child lives!”

I opened my arms in thanks at her words, but the minister looked into the casket and shook his head.

“The lad is dead. The wind is making mischief inside his lungs.”

He shut Alfred’s eyes and closed his tiny lips. The rasping stopped. I have no memory of doing so but Goody said I fell to my knees, rocking back and forth.

“Poor Alfred, my poor little Alfred.”

Goody and the minister joined hands and looked into the casket.

"May Jesus bless you for coming all the way from Pilgrims’ Lair, sir."

“It was the least I could do with your pastor dead and buried. My family could be resting inside that casket but the Lord saw fit to spare my wife and son. I pray He will take pity on this poor girl as she walks alone through this vale of tears.”

Goody’s voice quavered and her ancient eyes welled with tears as she looked at Mamma and Alfred together in death.

“Look at them, laid out in lavender. Such sweet smiles as they slumber through eternity.”

The minister sniffed the air.

“They‘re not smiling, ma’am, it’s time to get them into the ground.”