John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

"How!" Ebenezer cried. " 'Tis a nice concern he bore her, indeed! Heav'n protect a child from such solicitude! I cannot fathom it!"

"Nor I," said Andrew, "but thus it happened, or so I heard it. What's more, he threatened violence to any who took her in, and so poor Roxanne was soon brought to direst straits. She tried to indent herself as a domestic, though 'twas little she knew of work; but masters had small inclination for a servant who would herself need service ere many months passed. Everyone knew her and her plight, and many a man who'd been turned from her uncle's door for paying her the merest cordiality before, made her the filthiest proposals now she was down on her luck."

" 'Sheart! Had the wretches no pity for her state?"

"Nay, e'en here her belly undid her, for so far from discouraging, it seemed rather the more to enflame 'em, the plainer it showed. Have ye not yourself observed — " He glanced at his son. "Nay, no matter. In short, she saw naught ahead save harlotry and disgrace on the one hand, or rape and starvation on the other, and being ashamed of the former and afraid of the latter, she chose a third in lieu of either, which was, to leap into the Choptank."

"And, prithee, what did she after you saved her?" Ebenezer asked.

"Why, what else but strive with might and main to leap in again?" Andrew replied. "At last it occurred to me to invite her to join my house, since she looked to lighten but a week ere poor Anne; I agreed to keep her well and provide for her confinement on condition she suckle our babe, if it should live, with her own. She agreed, we drafted the indenture-papers, and I fetched her back to Malden.

"Now your mother, God rest her, grew worse all the time. She was a wondrous Protestant, much giv'n to Bible-reading, and whene'er I showed her pity she was wont to reply, 'Fear not, husband: the Lord will help us.' "

"Bless her!" said Ebenezer.

" 'Twas her conceit," Andrew went on, "to regard her several infirmities as an enemy host, and late and soon she was after me to read her from the Old Testament of God's military intercessions in behalf of the Israelites. Hence when her ague passed off without killing her (albeit it left her pitifully weak), she was proud as any general who sees a flank of the enemy turned, and she declared like the prophet Samuel upon the rout of the Philistines, 'Thus far hath the Lord helped us!' At length her time arrived, and after frightful labor she brought forth Anna, eight pounds and a half. She named her after her own mother, and said again to me, 'Thus far hath the good Lord helped us!' Not a soul then but thought her trials were done, and even I, who was no Catholic saint nor Protestant either, thanked God for her delivery. But not an hour after bearing Anna her travail commenced again, and after much clamor and hollowing she brought you to light, nigh as big as your sister. Seventeen pounds of child she dropped in all, from a — well, from a frame so delicate, simple flatulence gave her pain. 'Twas no wonder she passed into a coma ere your shoulders cleared, and ne'er recovered from it! That same night she died, and the weather being unseasonably hot for May, I fetched her down next day and buried her 'neath a great loblolly pine tree on the Bay side of the point, where she lies yet."

"God help me!" Ebenezer wept. "I am not worthy of't!"

" 'Twould be dishonest not to own," Andrew said, "that such exactly were my sentiments at the time, God forgive me. E'en as the burial service was read I could hear the twain of you a-squalling up in the house, and when I placed a boulder atop the sandy grave, against the time our mason could letter a headstone, it recalled to me those verses in the Book of Samuel where God smites the Philistines and Samuel dedicates the token of His aid — the stone the Hebrews called Ebenezer. 'Twas then, boy, in bitterness and sacrilege, I gave ye that name: I baptized ye myself, ere Roxanne could stay me, with the dregs of a flagon of perry, and declared to the company of Malden, 'Thus far hath the Lord helped us!' "

"Ah, dear Father, berate thyself no more for't," Ebenezer begged — though Andrew had displayed no particular emotion. "I understand and forgive!"

Andrew tapped out his pipe in a spittoon beside the bed and, after resting a moment, resumed his story.

"In any case," he said calmly, "you and your sister ne'er wanted mothering. The girl Roxanne had borne her own child, a daughter, eight days before, but the babe had strangled ere its first cry with the navel-cord round its neck; so that maugre the fact there were two of ye, instead of one, she had no more mouths to feed than breasts to feed 'em with, and there was milk aplenty for all. She was e'er a healthy wench once on her feed again — ruddy-faced, full-breasted, and spirited as a dairymaid for all her fine blood. For the four years of her indenture she raised ye as her own. Mrs. Twigg declared no good could come of mixing French pap and English blood, but ye grew fat and merry as any babes in Dorset.

"In 1670, the last year of Roxanne's service, I resolved to leave Malden for London. I was weary of factoring, for one thing; I saw no chance to improve my tobacco-holdings, for another; and though Cooke's Point is of all places on earth dearest to my heart, and my first and largest property, yet 'twas e'er a heartache to live a widower in the house I'd raised for my bride. Moreover, I must own my position with regard to Roxanne had got somewhat delicate since poor Anne's death. That she thought no ill o' me I took for granted, for she was bound to me by gratitude as well as legal instrument. I in turn was more than a little obliged to her, in that she'd not only suckled twice as many of my children as she was legally bound to, but done it with a mother's love, and had taken on most of Mrs. Twigg's duties as governess as well, out of pure affection for ye. I've said already she was an uncommon pretty piece, and I at that time was a strapping wight of thirty-three, prosperous and it may be not unhandsome, who by reason of poor Anne's affliction and death had perforce slept alone and uncomforted since my arrival in the province. Hence, 'tis not surprising some small-minded busy-bodies should have it Roxanne was filling Anne's place in the bedchamber as well as the nursery — more especially since they themselves had lechered after her. 'Tis e'er the way of men, I've learned, to credit others with the sins themselves want either the courage or the means to commit."

"But marry, what vicious gossip!"

"Aye," Andrew said, "but As well be a sinner as known for one. What a man is in the eyes of God means little to the world of men. All things considered, I thought it well to release her; yet I could by no means send her back to death or harlotry, and so 'twas a pleasant surprise when, one day on that selfsame landing where I'd met her, I was approached by a man who introduced himself as Roxanne's uncle, and asked most solicitously after his niece."

"I pray the fellow had tempered his wrath by then."

"He had," Andrew said, "to the point where the very thought of his former unkindness started him to tears, and when I told him of Roxanne's subsequent straits and of the death of her infant, he near tore his hair in remorse. There was no end to his expressions of gratitude for my having saved and cared for her; he declared himself eager to make amends for his severity, and entreated me to prevail upon Roxanne to return to his house. I reminded him that it was his unreasonableness in the matter of suitors for his niece that had driven her to her former disgrace, and he replied that so far from persisting in that unreasonableness, he had in mind at that very moment an excellent match for her with a wealthy fellow of the neighborhood, who had e'er looked kindly upon her.

"You can imagine Roxanne's surprise when she learned of all this. She was pleased to hear of her uncle's change of heart, and yet 'twas like giving up two of her own to let you and Anna go. She wept and wailed, as women will at any great change in their circumstances, and pleaded with me to take her to London, but it seemed to me 'twould be a disservice to the twain of us to maintain any longer our connection, more especially since her uncle had a substantial match arranged for her. Thus was it that on the same day when I gave Roxanne my half of her indenture-bond, signifying the end of her service, her uncle drove out to Malden in a buckboard and fetched her away, and that was that. Not a fortnight later I too made my last farewells to Malden, and left Maryland forever. Think not 'twas an easy matter to go: 'tis a rarity indeed when Life presents ye with a clean choice, i'faith! 'Tis more her wont to arrange things in such fashion that de'il the course ye choose, 'twill give ye pain. Eheu! I've rambled and digressed till I'm near out of wind! Here now," he said, handing Ebenezer the document he'd been toying and gesturing with throughout his narration. "Read this whilst I catch my breath."