John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

" 'Sbody, how I did curse myself for not having sailed with you!" he exclaimed. "I could only presume the wretches had done you in, for one cause or another — "

"Prithee, Henry," Ebenezer interrupted, "was't you that posed as Laureate, somewhile after?"

Burlingame nodded. "You must forgive me. 'Twas but your name I used, on a petition: I thought me how you'd died ere you had the chance to serve your cause, and how old Coode would rejoice to hear't. Then Nicholson declared he meant to move the government from St. Mary's to Anne Arundel Town, to take the Papish taint off it, and some men in St. Mary's sent round a petition of protest. I saw Coode's name on't and so affixed yours as well, to confound him."

"Dear friend!" Tears came to Ebenezer's eyes. "That simple act was near the death of me!"

Astonished, Burlingame asked how, but Ebenezer bade him conclude his narration, after which he would tell the story of his own eventful passage from Plymouth to where they now sat in the straw.

'There's little more to tell," Henry said. "They had put your trunk away against the time when 'twill go up for lawful sale, but I contrived to gain possession of your notebook — "

"Thank Heav'n!"

"How many tears I shed upon your poems! I have't in the house this minute, but I little dreamed I'd ever see its owner again."

While still in St. Mary's, he said, he heard that Coode had learned of the grand deception and was so enraged that he had barred Slye and Scurry from the lucrative smuggling run to punish them. In fact, fearful of traps set by the unknown spy, Coode had been obliged to suspend virtually all smuggling operations in the province for a while: His Majesty's tobacco revenues had seldom been so high.

"I knew the blackguard must needs find some new income," Henry went on, "and so I followed him as close as e'er I could. In this wise I discovered Captain Mitchell: he is one of the chiefest agents of sedition, and his house is oft the rebels' meeting place."

"I'm not a whit surprised, from what I've heard," said Ebenezer, and then suddenly blanched. "But i'God, I gave him my name, and told him the entire story of my capture!"

Burlingame shook his head in awe. "So he told me when I came in, and thou'rt the luckiest wight in all of Maryland, I swear. He thought the twain of you mad and took you in for his dinner guests' amusement. Tomorrow he'd have turned you out, and if he dreamed for a minute you were really Eben Cooke, 'twould be the death of you both, I'm certain."

Returning to his story, he told of his investigation of Mitchell, which had produced two useful pieces of information: the man was instrumental in some sinister new scheme of Coode's, and he had one son, Timothy, whom he'd left behind in England four years previously to complete his education, and who was therefore unknown in Maryland.

"I resolved at once to pose as Mitchell's son: I had seen his portrait hanging in the house, and 'twas not so far unlike me that four years of studious drinking couldn't account for the difference. E'en so, for prudence's sake, I forged Coode's name on a letter to Mitchell, which said Son Tim was now in Coode's employ and was coming home to do a job of work for's father. 'Tis e'er Coode's wont to send a cryptic order, and de'il the bit you question what it means! I followed close on the letter and declared myself Tim Mitchell, come from London. It mattered not a fart then whether the Captain believed me to be his son or Coode's agent: when he questioned me I smiled and turned away, and he questioned me no more. Yet what the plot is, I've yet to learn."

"Mayhap it hath to do with opium," Ebenezer suggested, and to Burlingame's sharp look said in defense, " 'Twas what he ruined the swine-girl with, and murthered his wife as well." Briefly he recounted Susan Warren's tale, including the wondrous coincidence of Joan Toast's presence and Susan's noble sacrifice to save her. All through the little relation, however, Burlingame frowned and shook his head.

"Is't aught short of miraculous?" the poet demanded.

" 'Tis too much so," said Henry. "I've no wish to be o'er-skeptical, Eben, or to disappoint your hopes; the wench herself is ruined with opium, I grant, and it may be all she says is true as Scripture. But yonder by the river stands a pair of gravestones, side by side; the one's marked Pauline Mitchell and the other Elizabeth Williams. And I swear the name of Joan Toast hath not been mentioned in this house — at least in my hearing. The only wench I've known him to woo is Susie Warren herself, that we all have had our sport with now and again. Nor have I seen a phial of opium hereabouts, albeit he may well feed her privily. Methinks she heard of Joan Toast from your valet — his tongue is loose enough. As for the rest, 'twas but a tale to wring some silver from you; when it failed she feigned that sacrifice you spoke of, in hopes of doing better the second time. Didn't you say she was in the kitchen with your valet all through supper?"

"So she was," Ebenezer admitted. "But it seems to me she. ."

"Ah well," laughed Henry, "thou'rt no more gulled than Susan, in the last account, and if Joan Toast's here we'll find her. But tell me now of your own adventures: i'faith, you've aged five years since last I saw you!"

"With cause enough," sighed Ebenezer, and though he was still preoccupied with thoughts of Joan Toast, he related as briefly as he could the tale of his encounter with Bertrand aboard the Poseidon, the loss of his money through the valet's gambling, his ill-treatment at the hands of the crew, and their capture by Thomas Pound. At every new disclosure Burlingame shook his head or murmured sympathy; at the mention of Pound he cried out in amazement — not only at the coincidence, but also at the implication that Coode had enlisted the support of Governor Andros of Virginia, by whom Pound was employed to guard the coast.

"And yet 'tis not so strange, at that," he said on second thought. "There's no love lost 'twixt Andros and Nicholson any more. But fancy you in Pound's clutches! Was that great black knave Boabdil still in his crew?"

"First mate," the poet replied with a shudder. "Dear Heav'n, what horrors he wrought aboard the Cyprian! The very wench I spoke of, that I climbed to in the mizzen-rigging, he had near split like an oyster. How it pleased me that she gave the fiend a pox!"

"You had near got one yourself," Burlingame reminded him soberly. "And not just once, but twice. Did ye see the rash on Susan Warren's skin?"

"But you yourself — "

"Have had some sport with her," Henry finished. "But I know more sports than one to play with women." Awed, he rubbed his chin. "I have heard before of whore-ships, and thought 'twas a sailors' legend."

Ebenezer went on to tell of the collusion between Pound and Captain Meech of the Poseidon, postponing mention of John Smith's secret diary until later, and concluded with the story of their execution, survival, and discovery of Drakepecker and Quassapelagh, the Anacostin King.

"This is astounding!" Henry cried. "Your Drakepecker is an African slave, I doubt not, but this Quassapelagh — D'you know who he is, Eben?"

"A king of the Piscataways, he said."

"Indeed so, and a disaffected one! Last June he murthered an English wight named Lysle and was placed in the charge of Colonel Warren, in Charles County, that was still a loyal friend of Coode's. This Warren set the salvage free one night, for some queer cause or other, and was demoted for't, but they never saw Quassapelagh after that. The story was that he's trying to inflame the Piscataways against Nicholson."

" 'Twere a dreadful thing, if true," the Laureate said, "but I must vouch for the man himself, Henry; I would our Maryland planters had half his nobility. Yet stay, tell me this ere I say another word: what have you learned of Sir Henry Burlingame, your ancestor?"