Stephen O'Connor - Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings

of sincere esteem your

Humble Servant,

A Adams

Thomas Jefferson gets two letters from Abigail Adams at once, six days after they were sent. In the same post is a letter from Maria Cosway, telling him for the second time that her visit to Paris will be delayed and all but begging, since she remains in London, to be allowed to visit Polly at the Adamses’. Thomas Jefferson feels a sinking ache as he reads her letter. He would love for her to meet his darling Polly and for the little girl, perhaps, to come to love her. But Mrs. Adams is a veritable savant of what she calls “secret life.” Were Maria to utter one item of intimate knowledge — say, about Mistress Jelly, Polly’s favorite doll, whose name Thomas Jefferson has more than once applied to Maria herself — then all would be revealed. The mere fact that this woman, whom Mrs. Adams knows only as an acquaintance of John Trumbull, should be so interested in visiting a mere child would be suspicious enough all on its own. No. Impossible. Out of the question.

But Thomas Jefferson suffers another sort of ache as he reads Maria’s letter, because this new delay means there was simply no reason for him to have pretended to be off in Tuscany negotiating a trade agreement when Polly’s ship arrived. He could easily have met her at the dock in London as he had promised and returned to Paris in time for Maria’s visit — if, in fact, she will be visiting at all. He might also have been able to see Maria in London, though that could have been decidedly unpleasant, given that he would most likely have had to see her in the company of her husband.

As he thinks about it now, he knows for certain that Maria will not be visiting — and this is the most potent source of his ache. She already loathes herself for having betrayed Richard; how is it possible, then, morally and emotionally (to say nothing of practically), that she will manage so complex a deception as getting to Paris on her own? And how could Thomas Jefferson have let himself imagine she would! No doubt, in her heart, she doesn’t want to see him ever again. Hasn’t she told him repeatedly that Richard is a good and tender man? And that she couldn’t bear to live if he were ever to find out? This is how it has always been for Thomas Jefferson. The only woman who ever returned his love with all her heart was Martha. As soon as he revealed the strength of his passion to Becca and to Betsy, they vanished like quail into the forest. And now it is the same with Maria.

And the worst of it is that he has already sent Petit to London in his place. Were he to go there now, he would probably find that Petit, Polly and the Hemings girl had already set out for Paris. So he has nothing to do but wait. And nothing to distract him from thinking about Maria. And nothing whatsoever to stop him from pitting the ever-more-hopeless possibility that she might, in fact, visit against the ever-more-monumental-and-oppressive certainty that she won’t.

He is standing in his study off the garden, in front of the cabinet where he keeps his wine, and he is pouring himself a second glass. How could he have strayed so far outside his better nature? Isn’t this relentless agony his punishment for having betrayed the memory of his tender and beautiful wife and for having neglected his dear daughters? He is nothing but a monster and a fool, who will be unloved and lonely in his old age, a pathetic, neglected, ridiculed, gout-ridden inebriate and an incurable onanist — and that will be the only fate he deserves! It is an unfortunate fact of his nature that his moral instinct is strong enough only to punish him for his transgressions but not to preserve him from transgressing in the first place. He pours himself another glass.

“Are we here!” Polly says. “Are we here!”

The coach passes along a grand boulevard lined with row on row of geometrically shaped trees through a massive wrought-iron gate and then turns right, with a lurch like a ship surmounting a swell, into a small courtyard before a magnificent marble-and-limestone house with columns on either side of its portico and marble steps cascading down to the sandy paving.

“Are we here!” says Polly.

“I don’t know,” says Sally Hemings, although, in fact, she does know; she just can’t bring herself to say it.

“Are we here!”

“Yes, you silly girl!” says Monsieur Petit. “This is your new house, the Hôtel de Langeac. Your father is waiting.”

“We’re here, Sally! We’re here!”

Polly has grabbed hold of Sally Hemings’s forearm and is shaking it up and down in her excitement. For some reason Sally Hemings is not excited. She is the opposite of excited. There is an ache in her heart and stomach, as if something bad is about to happen.

“Yes, my little Polly-Pie,” she says softly. “We’re here.”

A female voice is calling, “Polly! Polly!”

At the top of the steps is a huge black door, half open, with a young woman standing in it. “Polly!” she shouts, waving her plump, pale hand. “Polly! Dear Polly!” And now the young woman has lifted the skirts of her embroidered green gown and is drifting down the stairs, her little feet appearing and disappearing beneath a white cloud of lace.

Can this possibly be Patsy? The last time Sally Hemings saw her was almost exactly three years ago. They’d both been eleven years old then, and it was the day before Patsy left Monticello for Paris. She had just been to say good-bye to her horse and was sitting on a box in front of the stable, scraping manure off her boots with a stick, tears making pale trails through the dust coating her cheeks. When Sally Hemings had asked her what was wrong, she had wailed, “I don’t want to go! I’m going to hate Paris! Why can’t I stay here with Polly and Lucy?” How is it possible that this young woman, in her flowing gown, with her hair pinned high atop her head and a cameo pendant at the base of her neck, should ever have been so filthy and abject with grief? It is not just that Patsy’s clothes are so elegant and her manner so refined, but that she seems even at fourteen (though she is almost fifteen) to have shot right out of girlhood and be ready for marriage.

“Patsy! Patsy! Patsy!”

Polly is so excited that she can’t get the coach door unlatched, and Monsieur Petit has to walk around from the other side to do it for her. The little girl leaps straight to the ground and races up the steps. By the time Sally Hemings has lowered herself to the gritty, yellowish driveway, the two sisters already have their arms around each other and are rocking from side to side.

A number of other people have emerged from the big black door, servants mostly, though none Sally Hemings recognizes—

But then she sees a tall, dark-skinned young man in a burgundy frock coat, a yellow waistcoat and yellow stockings. It is Jimmy, of course, but somehow she can’t allow herself to believe it. He smiles and waves but doesn’t come down. He seems to be waiting for her to mount the steps and greet him. Jimmy is twenty-two, and except for his fine clothing, he looks almost exactly as he did at nineteen, when he left Monticello. The big difference is in his manner. There is a somber hesitancy in the way he holds himself at the top of the stairs. Or a seriousness. Maybe he, too, has shot into adulthood.

Just as Sally Hemings is about to rush up to her brother, someone else steps through the door — a tall, rangy man with white-laced red hair and alert hazel eyes. He holds his shoulders square and his head high and seems possessed of immense strength. He descends the steps with the fluid rapidity of an athlete.

Sally Hemings knows that this is Thomas Jefferson, and, indeed, he has changed less than any of the other people with whom she has been reunited. But he scares her. There is something in the length of his legs and arms, in the confident elevation of his chin and even in the happy squint of his eyes as he sees his daughters that makes it impossible for her to look away from him but that also makes her dread the moment when his eyes will turn in her direction, and he will speak, and she will be compelled to answer.