The Sot-Weed Factor (60 page)

" 'Tis no rare name," Ebenezer murmured, moving toward the cabin. "I'll own the John McEvoy I once knew had your red hair, but he was slight and all befreckled, and a younger man than I."

"That is the one! I'Christ, Sowter, can ye go on now with your monstrous trick? This wight hath drawn the very likeness of the man that sold me!"

"By David's leek, man," Sowter said testily. "Ye may file complaint at court the day thou'rt settled on Cooke's Point, for all o' me. Till then thou'rt John McEvoy, and I've bought your papers honestly. Tell Mr. Cooke your troubles, if he cares to hear 'em."

With that he went below, followed by the prisoner's curses, but Ebenezer, at the first heel of the vessel, felt more ill than at any other time in his life except aboard the
Poseidon,
in the storm off the Canary Islands, and was obliged to remain in misery at the leeward rail.

"This McEvoy," he managed to say. " 'Tis quite impossible he's the one I know, for mine's in London."

"E'en so was mine, till six weeks past," the fat man said.

"But mine's no servant seller!"

"No more was mine, till late last night: 'tis I that sells redemptioners for my living, but this accursed young Irishman did me in, with Sowter's aid!"

Ebenezer shook his head. " 'Tis unthinkable!" Yet he knew, or believed, that Joan Toast had come to Maryland -- for reasons he could only vaguely guess at -- and also that at the time of his own departure from London, John McEvoy had had no word of his mistress for some days. "Would God my head were clear, so I might think on't, what it means!"

The prisoner interpreted this as an invitation to tell his tale, and so commenced:

"My name is not McEvoy, but Thomas Tayloe, out of Oxford in Talbot County. Every planter in Talbot knows me --"

"Why do you not complain in court, then," the poet interrupted thickly, "and call them in as witnesses?" He was seated on the deck, too ill to stand.

"Not with Sowter as defendant," Tayloe said. "For all his sainting he is crooked as the courts, and besides, the wretches would lie to spite me." He explained that his trade was selling redemptioners: poor folk in England desirous of traveling to the colonies would, in lieu of boat fare, indenture themselves to an enterprising sea captain, who in turn "redeemed" their indentures to the highest bidders in port -- a lucrative speculation, since standard passenger fare for servants was only five pounds sterling, more or less, and the indenture-bonds of artisans, unmarried women, and healthy laborers could be sold for three to five times that amount. Those whom it was inconvenient or insufficiently profitable for the captain to sell directly he "wholesaled" to factors like Tayloe, who would then attempt to resell the hands to planters more removed from the port of call. Tayloe's own specialty, it seemed, was purchasing at an unusually low price servants who were old, infirm, unskilled, troublesome, or otherwise especially difficult for the captain to dispose of, and endeavoring to "retail" them before the expense of feeding them much raised his small investment.

" 'Tis a thankless job," he admitted. "Were't not for me those pinch-penny planters with their fifty-acre patches would have no hands at all, yet they'll pay six pounds for a palsied old scarecrow and hold me to account for't he is no Samson. And the wretched redemptioners claim I starve 'em, when they know very well I've saved their worthless lives: they're the scum o' the London docks, the half of 'em, and were spirited away drunk by the captain: if I didn't take them off his hands in Oxford, he'd sign 'em on as crewmen for the voyage home, and see to't they fell to the fishes ere the ship was three days out."

" 'Tis a charitable trade you practice, I'm persuaded," Ebenezer said in a dolorous voice.

"Well, sir," he declared, "just yesterday the
Morpheides
moored off Oxford with a troop o' redemptioners --"

"The
Morpheides!
Not Slye and Scurry's ship?"

"No other," Tayloe said. "Gerrard Slye's the grandest speculator in the trade, and Scurry is his equal. They are the only order-captains in the Province. Suppose thou'rt a planter, now, and need you a stonemason for four years' work: ye put your order in with Slye and Scurry, and on the next voyage there's your mason."

"No more: I grasp the principle."

"Well then, 'twas yesterday the
Morpheides
moored, and out we all went to bid for redemptioners. They were fetching 'em up as I boarded, and the crew was passing pots o' rum for us buyers. When they brought this redhaired wight on deck he took one look at the shore, broke away from the deckhands, and sprang o'er the side ere any man could stop him. 'Twas his ill luck to light beside the
Morpheides's
own boat; the mate and three others hauled him back aboard and clapped him into leg irons with promise of a flogging, and I knew then I'd have him ere the day was out."

"Poor McEvoy!" mumbled the Laureate.

" 'Twas his own doing," Tayloe said. "Would God they'd let the whoreson drown, so I'd not be shackled here in his place!" He sniffed and spat over the gunwale. "In any case, the captains filled their orders for bricklayers, cobblers, boat-wrights, and the like, and put up for bids a clutch o' cabinetmakers and carpenters, and a sailmaker that fetched 'em twenty-three pounds sterling. As a rule they'd have peddled off the lassies after that, but in this lot the only ladies were a brace o' forty-year spinsters out to catch husbands, so instead they brought their field hands out, and bid 'em off for twelve to sixteen pound. After the field hands came the ladies, and went for cooks at fourteen pounds apiece. When they were sold, only four souls remained, besides the red-head: three were too feeble for field work and too stupid for anything else, and the fourth was so ravaged with the smallpox, the look of him would retch a goat. 'Twas a lean day, for 'tis my wont to buy a dozen or more, but I dickered with Slye and Scurry till at last I got the five for twenty pounds -- that's a pound a head less than 'twould've cost to bring 'em over if they'd eaten twice a day, but Slye and Scurry had so starved 'em they were fit for naught but scarecrows, and had some profit e'en at twenty pound.

"They took the red-head's leg irons off and bade him go peaceably with me or take his cat-o'-nine-tails on the spot. By the time I got the five of them ashore, roped round the ankles, and loaded into the wagon, 'twas late in the afternoon, and I knew 'twould be great good fortune to sell even one by nightfall. 'Twas my plan to stop at the Oxford tavern first, to try if I could sell to a drunkard what he'd ne'er buy sober, and thence move on with the worst o' the lot to Dorset, inasmuch as servant-ships rarely land there, and the planters oft are short o' help. The Irishman set up a hollowing for food, whereat I smote him one across the chops, but for fear they'd band together and turn on me, I said 'twas to fetch 'em a meal I stopped at the tavern, and they'd eat directly I'd done seeking masters for 'em. Inside I found two gentlemen in their cups, each boasting to the company of his wealth, and seized the chance to argue my merchandise. So well did I feed their vanity, each was eager to show how lightly he bought servants; and I was careful to bring their audience out as well. The upshot of it was, when Mr. Preen bought the pox-ridden lout, Mr. Puff needs buy two of the ancient dotards to save face. What's more, they durst not bat an eye at the price I charged, though I'll wager it sobered the twain of 'em on the instant!

"I hurried off then with the other two, ere my gentlemen had breath to regret their folly, and steered my course for Cambridge. McEvoy hollowed louder than before, that I'd not fed him: even Slye and Scurry, he declared, had given him bread and water on occasion. Another smite I smote him, this time with the horsewhip, and told him if I'd not saved him he had been eaten instead of eating. I despaired o' selling either that same night, inasmuch as McEvoy, albeit he was young and passing sturdy, was so plain a troublemaker that no planter in his senses would give a shilling for him, and his companion was a crook-backed little Yorkshireman with a sort of quinsy and no teeth in his head, who looked as if he'd die ere the spring crop was up; but at the Choptank ferry landing I had another stroke o' luck. 'Twas after dark, and the ferry was out, so I took my prizes from the wagon and led 'em a small ways down the beach, towards Bolingbroke Creek, where we could do whate'er we needed ere we crossed. We'd gone no more than forty yards ere I heard a small commotion just ahead, behind a fallen tree, and when I looked to see the cause oft, I found Judge Hammaker o' the Cambridge court, playing the two-backed beast with a wench upon the sand! He feigned a mighty rage at being discovered, and ordered us away, but once I saw who he was and called him by name, and asked after his wife's health, he grew more reasonable. In sooth, 'twas not long ere he confessed he was in great need of a servant, and though his leanings were toward McEvoy, I persuaded him to take the Yorkshireman instead. Nay, more, when he agreed that one old servant is worth two young, I charged him twenty-four pounds for Mr. Crook back -- near twice the price of an average sturdy field hand. E'en so he got off lightly: the wench he'd been a-swiving had seemed no stranger to me, albeit the darkness and her circumstances had kept me from placing her; but once I'd crossed to Cambridge with McEvoy and heard o' the day's court cases from the drinkers at the inn, it struck me where I'd seen the tart before. She was Ellie Salter, whose husband hath a tavern in Talbot County -- the same John Salter who'd got a change of venue to the Cambridge court in his suit with Justice Bradnox, and had won a judgment from old Hammaker that very afternoon! I scarce need tell ye, had I learnt that tale in time 'tis
two
new servants he'd have bought, and paid a swingeing sixty pounds sterling for the pair!

"Yet I'd done a good day's work, at that; I'd sold four worthless flitches that same evening, where I'd hoped to sell one at most, and had above fifteen hundredweight o' sot-weed for 'em, or sixty-three pounds sterling, forty-seven whereof was profit free and clear. 'Twas cause for celebration, so I thought, and though I meant still to try amongst the drinkers to find a buyer for McEvoy, I drank a deal more rum than is my wont and made me a trip upstairs to one o' Mary Mungummory's girls."

"I knew I'd seen your face before," said Ebenezer. "I am Eben Cooke of Cooke's Point, the same that gave his estate away at yesterday's court. I too drank much last night: the rum was at the good fellows' expense, but the sport, I fear, at mine."

"I place ye now!" cried Tayloe. " 'Twas the change of dress misled me."

Ebenezer told as briefly as he could -- for he found it ever more difficult to speak plainly and coherently -- how he had been robbed of his clothing in the corncrib and rescued by Mary Mungummory herself; and without going into any detail about McEvoy's responsibility for his presence in the Province, he marveled at the coincidence of the Irishman's proximity throughout the evening.

"Marry," said Tayloe, " 'twould not surprise me to learn 'twas he that stole your clothes, he's that treacherous! Out from the tavern I came, so full o' rum I scarce could walk. Just as you made shift in the corncrib, so I climbed up on the wagon with McEvoy to sleep out the balance of the night, and ere I pulled the blanket over me, that I carried for such occasions, I fetched out my knife and threatened him with it, to carve him into soup-beef if he laid a hand on me. Then I went to sleep, nor knew another thing till dawn this morning, when I woke as Sowter's servant!"

"Dear God! How did that happen?"

Tayloe growled and shook his head. "The rum was at the root of't," he declared. "My error was to lay the knife down by my head, against his leaping me, and I was too drunken to lay it out of his reach. I had him hog-tied, but in some wise he wriggled over without waking me and cut himself free with the knife. 'Tis a marvel and astonishment he didn't murther me outright, but I slept like a whelp in the womb, and in lieu of killing me, Mr. McEvoy picks me clean. Out comes my sixty-three pounds -- the most, thank Heav'n, in sot-weed bills that he dare not try to exchange in Talbot or Dorset, but five or six pounds in coin o' the realm -- and then out comes the happiest prize of all: my half o' the wretch's indenture-bond! Armed with these, from what I gather, he strides bold as brass into the tavern, bribes him a meal, and rousts up Mary Mungummory's girls for a go-round, spending my silver with both his hands. Then at dawn, whilst I'm still dead asleep o' the rum, he crosses paths with Sowter, and there's the end o' me! Had he struck his foul bargain with any soul else, he'd have got no farther than the calling of his name; but Sowter, though he knows me well for all his feigning, would swear for a shilling that King William was the Pope. They made me out to be McEvoy, and for two pounds sterling Sowter bought the indenture-bond. The first I knew of't was when his bullies came to fetch me and led me off on the end of a rope and shackled me here to the gunwale. I'm indented to four years' labor for the master o' Malden, that I hear is Sowter's crony, and the real McEvoy, that hid out o' sight till I was led off, hath doubtless flown the coop with my cart and horse. Nor can I carry my complaint to court, for the bond says of McEvoy only that he hath red hair and beard and is slight of build: my master will argue my size is proof o' his care for me. What's more 'tis Sowter I must sue, that is an eel to catch in a court o' law, and for every friend who'd swear I am Tom Tayloe, he'd find three ingrates that will vow I'm John McEvoy. Yet e'en if these things were not so, my case would still be heard in the court at Cambridge, and on the bench would be Judge Hammaker himself! In short, I go to Malden in straits as sorry as yours -- swived by Richard Sowter from bight to bitter end!"

Ebenezer sighed. " 'Tis a sorry tale in truth," he said, though in fact he rather sympathized with McEvoy and more than a little suspected that the redemption-dealer had got his due. "Yet withal thou'rt something better cased than I --"

He was seized with another fit of seasickness, after which he clung weakly to the gunwale. "I have not even health enough to bewail my lot."