John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

"You have been to Malden?" he ventured at last. From the corner of his eye he saw her shake her head negatively.

"I met a Mr. Spurdance at the wharf in Cambridge. ."

"Then you know my disgrace. And you must have encountered. . my wife there too, since you have your ring again." His throat ached; the tears ran afresh, and he turned to Anna with great emotion. "I was obliged to marry her or perish of my seasoning, as our mother did; but 'twas not her doing, Anna; you mustn't think ill of her. 'Tis true she is a whore, but she followed me to Maryland out of love — "

Again he faltered, remembering Burlingame's assertion that Anna's motive was the same. " 'Tis on my account she hath the pox and is a slave to opium; she suffered unimaginable indignities to be with me, and nursed me back to health when I was ill, nor made any claim on me whatsoe'er — not e'en upon my chastity, I swear't! Her one wish, when all was lost, was that we fly together to London and live as brother and sister till her afflictions carried her off. And I, Anna — I betrayed that saintly woman most despicably! I stole away alone; abandoned her to die uncared for! 'Tis I you must despise, not poor Joan Toast!"

"Despise?" Anna seemed surprised. "How can I despise either of you, Eben? 'Twas through deception you lost Malden, and honor as well as necessity required your marriage. I wish you had not abandoned her — 'tis a hellish thing to be alone!" She found it necessary to pause for some moments after this observation. Then, speaking carefully and avoiding his eyes, she asked how it happened that he was not in London. Had he known she was in Maryland? Did he understand that she had loved Henry Burlingame for a dozen years and had come to Maryland hoping to marry him? Did he appreciate that it was Bertrand's terrible news, and Mr. Spurdance's, and Joan Toast's, and her despair at ever finding either Henry or her brother, and the shock of being assaulted by a savage who miraculously resembled Burlingame, that had brought her to her present state? She dissolved in tears of shame. Ebenezer took her hand, but made no attempt to answer the questions.

"My story will take hours to repeat," he said gently, "and I've been telling divers parts to divers people these two days till I am weary of't. I'faith, Anna, there is so much to say! You wept once when we were first separated for an evening, and declared we'd ne'er catch up to each other again — I little dreamt the full import of that remark! Now 'tis no matter of hours or rooms that parts us; 'tis as if we were on twin mountaintops, with what an abyss between! We shall span it ere we leave this cabin, though it take a week of explanation — how fine a gentleman Billy is to give us some hours to make beginnings! — but methinks 'twere better to hear first what passed 'twixt you and Joan, and what the state of things at Malden is, now Father's there, for the smallest detail of my story may want an hour's gloss." By way of example he declared that the resemblance of Billy Rumbly and Henry Burlingame was no more miraculous than that of any other pair of brothers. Anna was almost dumb struck; she pleaded for more information, but Ebenezer was adamant.

"Please," he said, "have you not seen Henry at all? I must know these things ere I commence."

"Not at all," Anna sighed, "nor hath anyone in Cambridge or St. Mary's City: the name is foreign to them." And resigning herself to the postponement of her questions, she told of her great loneliness in St. Giles, her growing fear that Burlingame would never succeed in discovering his parentage (which discovery, she declared, he had made prerequisite to their marriage), and her final determination to leave their father to his querulousness, join Ebenezer at Malden, and either persuade Burlingame to abandon his research or else assist him in whatever way she could.

At this point Ebenezer interrupted; turning her face to his he said, "Dearest Anna, don't feel shame in your brother's presence! This bridge of ours must have piers of love and candor; else 'twill fall." What was on his mind was the love which she was alleged to feel for him, and about which he thought it imperative to reach an understanding from the first; however, he suddenly recalled Burlingame's assertion that Anna herself was at most only dimly aware of her strange obsession and possibly altogether oblivious to it. Her look of bewilderment seemed to confirm this assertion. "What I mean," he added lamely, "matters once reached a pass where Henry judged it necessary to take me altogether into his confidence. . and in sooth, I have learned some things about him that you — " He could not go on; Anna blushed as deeply as he and veiled her eyes with her hand.

"And thou'rt aware that my husband resembles him in every particular," she said. "In short, I am no less virginal than thyself, and no more innocent."

"Let us speak no more of't!" Ebenezer begged.

"One more thing only." She removed her hand and regarded him seriously. Ebenezer felt certain that she was about to confess her unnatural passion — a prospect the more alarming because of his suspicion, vouched stoutly for by Burlingame, that to some extent he shared it — but instead she declared that he must not think her naïve with regard to Henry Burlingame. Hadn't she seen that he took his deepest pleasure in the two together? Hadn't he revolted her time and again at St. Giles by his amorous disquisitions on everything from asparagus-spears to bird dogs of both sexes? "Methinks 'tis easier to know another than to know thyself," she said. "There is little in Henry's character that is foreign to me." She smiled for the first time and blushed at a sudden recollection. "Dare I tell you something he neglected to? I asked him, ere the twain of you left London, wherefore you made so much of your virginity, when I longed so to have done with mine! And I said farther that were you he, the both of us would put an end to innocence."

Ebenezer shifted uncomfortably.

"His reply," Anna continued, watching Ebenezer's face, "was that you harbored in your breast a grand and secret passion for one woman that the world denied you, and had liefer remain a virgin than take second choice!"

"That is true to some extent," the poet granted. "Howbeit, 'twas not so much the world that denied me Joan Toast, as John McEvoy, and — "

"Stay, I did not finish. I shall confess, Eben, Henry's news inspired me with inordinate jealousy, albeit I knew we each would marry soon or late. 'Tis that we had been so close, you know. . In any case, I demanded the name of this lady who had writ such a patent on your heart, and why you'd ne'er confided in your own dear sister that once knew your every whim and thought. Henry answered that you yourself scarce realized who she was, but that e'en if you did, the force of custom would seal your lips, inasmuch as the object of your passion was — your sister!"

Ebenezer sat upright. "Henry said that? I'Christ, there is no end to the man's nefariousness! Do you know, Anna, he told me the selfsame thing about you? I had learned of your affair with him, you see — this was before I knew of his impotence — and I was aflame with rage and envy — "

He cut his sentence short, but its implication hung clearly between them. The room was filled at once with tension and embarrassment, of a different order from what they had felt before; their positions on the bench were suddenly awkward; on pretext of scratching her leg, Anna slipped her hand from under his and averted her eyes.

"So," she said, and was obliged to clear her throat. "It would seem there was a mustard seed of truth in what he said to us."

For a time they could speak no more. The silence was painful, but Ebenezer could imagine no way to terminate it. Fortunately, Anna came to the rescue: in a mild, deliberate voice, as if no digression had occurred, she resumed the narrative of her journey from St. Giles, employing without comment the proposition that her motive had been to join Henry Burlingame. The poet's heart glowed.