Hester(23)

“Come along, Nat—Mother’s waiting.”

“Pardon my sister.” He makes a funny little bow, and I can’t see the expression on his face. “I hope you use the buttons for something splendid.”

I find my voice as he spins away.

“And I hope you found a book at Mrs. Batchelder’s shop,” I call after him.

I’m still holding the scrimshaw hibiscus in my palm when the proprietor approaches. Although the price is dear, I buy all three buttons—one carved with a flower, one with a bird, and one with a boat. My first purchase for the dress I’m imagining.



* * *



I ARRIVE HOME to find Edward pacing the yard. Our garden plot is still thick with weeds and old dried leaves blown into piles through the winter. Edward hasn’t bothered to pick up a hoe or a rake, although I lined them along the shed for just that purpose.

“It seems they don’t trust foreigners here!” he shouts, as if he’s been preparing all morning just to tell me this. “But I won’t give up—I only need to interest one or two more investors to come back a rich man.”

The button carved with a hibiscus flower still burns in my palm. It’s proof of the words I spoke with Mr. Hathorne, the nearness of him, and I pocket it away quickly. Inside the cottage I wrap up my silver with the three remaining gold pieces and hide them beneath a stack of table linens in the deep back of my cupboard.

“I have a new idea for the elixir—” Edward bursts through the door. “I heard Ingo speaking of nests and branches, and I believe the brew he fed the captain was full of spiderwebs and herbs from the savages.”

Long into the night Edward sits over his book, imagining new formulas made of plants that are found only in the tropics or the jungle islands. But all I can think of is Mr. Hathorne, the rustle of his cape, the purple haze that hung around him, the regal red and gold of his voice.

He assumed me a maiden, and I didn’t correct him. Here in Salem I, too, can be someone new. I feel a possibility that brings the fast-beating excitement of colored voices, the pink wind, the hum of faeries beneath the May trees. Though the colors still frighten me, they have also begun to inspire.



* * *



CAPTAIN DARLING IS waiting beside the ship when Edward and I reach the dock on the morning of their departure. The captain’s royal-blue jacket has been decorated with new brass buttons and yellow tassels on his epaulets. With his gaze upon me, I feel the sturdiness of his strength, the diligence of his guard.

“Don’t tell me you repaired the jacket yourself?”

“Once it had your fine work on the cuffs, the jacket needed new trimming.” Captain Darling winks, and I feel the familiar warmth of his presence. “I put on new velvet piping as well.”

The captain takes my hands in his. This gesture is accompanied by the boom of a nearby sail catching the wind, and I see turquoise blue rimming the greens and browns of the landscape. I’m momentarily one with the colors of the earth until he releases my hands.

He’s given me an envelope.

“A letter with my insignia and seal,” Darling says. “Present it at the East India Marine Society Hall, where you’ll find much to inspire your artistry. And if you’re ever in trouble you can turn to Mr. Saul, who is custodian of the Hall,” the captain says. “He’s in my debt, and I am in yours, Mrs. Gamble.”

“I won’t forget.” His kindness, his generosity, his goodness—all have saved me as much as I might have helped save him.

Edward puts his hands on my shoulders, and I look in his eyes for something to keep me resolute while he is gone.

“I’ll return to you before summer ends, and we’ll begin our new life together.”

“Write to me of news and your safety,” I say as the men climb the gangway.

I feel tears, but they’re more for the captain than for my husband. Edward has pledged to return to me enriched, but Captain Darling found the cottage, he sent Mercy and her children with eggs and milk, and it’s he who has given me his name and letter for protection.

The New Harmony stands alone in the locks for a good thirty minutes awaiting the captain’s signal for release. A father in short breeches stops with his son to watch the launch, and I listen as he tells his son of a voyage he took long ago with his own father.

At last the captain shouts his command, the supports are knocked away one by one with a loud boom and splash, and for each there is a cheering from the little boy and a handful of others who’ve come to wave small American flags. Two brown-skinned girls in baker’s smocks race to the waterfront at the last minute, pull off their aprons, and wave them toward the ship.

The boy’s father greets the girls, and one reaches into an apron pocket and gives the little boy a large cookie.

“Thank Miss Remond,” the father says as we watch the ropes tossed up and sails reeled out, and the boy does.

We all stand riveted as the New Harmony rises on the tide and then seems to drop a foot or more into the open water before it is swept into the winds. I watch the gray-and-white sea until the ship fades into the horizon. It is a strange feeling watching my husband sail away from me, for there is much to be wary of, alone in a new city. And yet if I am honest, I am not sorry to see him go. I pray that he will return a stronger and better man.

This very afternoon I write a letter to my pap. I tell him I’ve arrived safely in Salem, that his new wife and her babe are in my thoughts and prayers. I ask after my brother, Jamie, and say that Edward is well. I omit that I’m alone now. I say nothing about my ambitions, for they are my own and Pap is far away. I’ll use his gold to make something of myself, and then I will tell him.