February 14 1779. It was St Valentine’s Day, the day on which birds chose their mate for the year.
Although James was always Elizabeth’s invisible companion, for a moment she felt his presence so strongly that she immediately looked towards the door, as if he might be standing on the other side of it. Though there had been no knock, not even the rattle of the wind, Elizabeth put her embroidery aside, opened the door, looked up and down the street.
Puzzled, she came back to the piece she was working on—a vest for her husband to wear to court on his return. The silk thread was of the finest quality, and had the sheen of freshly washed hair, combed so that each strand was separate. It was smooth to the touch, as Elizabeth imagined the hair of South Seas women to be. Smooth also was the cloth from which she would fashion the vest, once the embroidery was finished. It was not linen or English wool, but exotic tapa cloth from Tahiti. Elizabeth imagined the women beating the fibrous inner bark of the paper mulberry tree to make it the smooth durable cloth she was now holding. She saw the rhythm of their work, their arms lifting clubs, and the arc and sway of their breasts. The tapa cloth had been a gift to James from Queen Obadia. In the way of the South Seas, James had given the Tahitian queen reciprocal gifts, including, he said, ‘a child’s doll which I made her understand was a picture of my wife’. Queen Obadia fastened the doll to her breast and paraded it around.
There had been no letters from James for two years. Both Jamie and Nat had sailed to America; the war which had been declared in 1776 continued, and the French had joined forces with the colonists, becoming once again England’s enemy. Elizabeth’s constant fear for her boys was lightened by the thought that in American waters they might meet up with their father. But no, they said. Nor was there any news of him. ‘He is in the Pacific Ocean, Mama,’ they said with assuring grown-up tones, Jamie nearly sixteen and Nat not far behind, ‘on the other side of America.’
The stitches were smaller than ants, each exactly the same size as its sisters. She employed greens soft as the English countryside, to remind James, after the bright colours of the world, that this was his home. The stitches formed undulating lines, to resemble vines, an inch or two in from the edge of the cloth. For the core of the vine Elizabeth chose a paler green and either side of the core, a darker olive green. The vine also bore flowers—some tipped in blue, some red—and was decorated with red sequins.
Elizabeth brought her attention back to her embroidery.
As the days grew warmer Elizabeth embroidered in the garden, looking up every now and then to see Hugh chasing the hens. Though he still had the same soft transparent baby skin, Hugh was thriving. Everyone loved him. Cousin Charles smothered him in kisses which the two year old accepted, wrinkling up his nose. Charles even got down on the floor and rolled balls to Hugh. When Jamie and Nat, now young midshipmen, came home, they let him play with their shoe buckles, or put their hats on his head. He would look up, the hat coming down over his eyes, and laugh with delight. ‘Another sailor, Mama,’ Nat said, and Elizabeth smiled but in her mind she whispered: ‘No. The sea shall not have this one.’
Hugh loved going to church, to St Dunstan’s. ‘Go to God’s house, Mama?’ he asked, and Elizabeth took him, even when there were no services. He loved gazing at the stained-glass saints, letting their light play on his face.
Sometimes she embroidered with Gates, or with neighbours who dropped in. Of course they were all taken with the cloth and watched the slow progress of the embroidery as it began to take the shape of the eventual vest. ‘It is exquisite,’ exclaimed Mrs Honeychurch. ‘I hope Queen Charlotte sees it, as well as the King.’
In April,MrCurtis brought in a copy of the Historical Chronicle. ‘Have you seen this, Mrs Cook?’
M. Sartine, secretary of the marine department at Paris, issued the following letter, which he has caused to be circulated through the entire marine of France. ‘Captain Cook, who sailed from Plymouth in July, 1776, on board the Resolution, in company with the Discovery, Captain Clerke, in order to make some discoveries on the coasts, islands and seas of Japan and California, being on the point of returning to Europe and as such discoveries are of general utility to all nations and it is the King’s pleasure, that Captain Cook shall be treated as a Commander of a neutral and allied power, and that all captains of armed vessels, etc, whom may meet the famous navigator, shall make him acquainted with the King’s orders on this behalf, but at the same time let him know that on his part he must refrain from all hostilities’.
James was on the point of returning, that was the news that made Elizabeth’s heart leap. She read it over and over.
‘Our enemies will not fire upon him,’ announced Mr Curtis. ‘Your husband is held in such high esteem he is above the concerns of war.’
‘Yes,’ said Elizabeth, holding back tears. ‘Yes.’ Her heart was so full of pride and relief, she thought it would burst.
In the following months, Benjamin Franklin made a similar declaration on behalf of the Americans. James could sail anywhere in the world and he would be safe.
Each stitch brought the day of James’s return closer. When Elizabeth worked in the sequins she pictured her husband surrounded by sunlight, the sea bright with flecks of it, the light flashing off the sleek bodies of porpoises. As she stitched the red tips of the English flowers, she imagined exotic Tahitian flowers.
She was working on a red-tipped flower in January 1780 when Sir Hugh Palliser came. It was a cold dark day and night had already fallen. Elizabeth had just stoked the fire, breathing in the smoky smell of coal. Dinner was over, the dishes washed. The cloths were hanging by the fire. Elizabeth caught the shine of the blue and white china in the sideboard. She remembered seeing a cobweb on the door sill and thinking that she must get Gates to wipe it away. Elizabeth fastened a red sequin into the embroidery, penetrating the tapa cloth with her needle. There were murmured voices at the door as Gates opened it. Elizabeth remembered the last time he had come, with the news that had lifted her heart out of the ashes.
Gates announced him. Elizabeth watched him enter the room, hat under his arm. Though it was only a few steps it seemed to take forever, as if he were walking down a long dark corridor. She saw the look in his eyes. And in all the remembered detail she could not recall his exact words. Instead it was the faltering gaps in between. News had been received from Russia, a letter to the Admiralty. Elizabeth remembered saying: ‘Was it in the ice? Did the ship founder? Was it frozen in the Artic waters?’ It was none of these.
‘Oh, marm,’ whimpered Gates after Sir Hugh had left. ‘The master.’
‘It is all right,’ said Elizabeth stiffly. ‘Dry your eyes, Gates.’
‘Marm . . .’ Gates implored.
‘There have been rumours before,’ Elizabeth said briskly. ‘Remember the report about the Endeavour?’
‘But, marm, Sir Hugh said there was a letter from Captain Clerke.’
Elizabeth looked at the letter Sir Hugh had given her. It was not from Captain Clerke, but from Lord Sandwich. ‘Dear Madam, what is uppermost in our minds allways must come first, poor captain Cooke is no more . . .’
‘It is not my husband, it is another captain, who spells his name with an “e”.’
‘Marm,’ said Gates, wringing her apron, ‘you must . . .’ But Gates did not know what her mistress must do. Nor what to do for her mistress.
Elizabeth returned to her embroidery but did not have the strength to push needle through cloth. ‘I am going to bed,’ she said.
‘But, marm, it is only—’
‘Thank you, Gates, nothing further is required.’
The bed curtains encased Elizabeth like a shroud. Though it was the coldest January night, Elizabeth felt a fever start at her heart and spread to the tips of her fingers, her toes, to the very ends of the hairs on her head. How could her body react like this to mere words? Yet she was so feverish she could not bear the touch of even the sheets. Elizabeth lay on the bed while her mind hovered close to the ceiling, a bird looking down on the restless body below. She had endured more than this. Such a fuss over nothing. Rumour, rumour, she repeated, trying to quell the tide rising in her. She must not succumb. She must remain a bird buffered on the warm air of faith. She would not be dragged down into the mire.
Little Hugh woke up in the middle of that long night and Elizabeth took him into bed with her. ‘It is nothing,’ she cooed to him.
Late the next day Mr Curtis came, newspaper under his arm as he had come before. But this time there were tears in his eyes. Mrs Curtis dawdled behind her husband, using him as a shield. ‘Mrs Cook,’ Mr Curtis began.
‘You will have tea?’ Elizabeth asked them.
They did not want tea.
The Curtises exchanged a quick glance. ‘You have heard . . . ? You have seen . . . ?’
‘The rumour?’ asked Elizabeth archly.
‘But,’ said Mr Curtis, ‘the newspaper says—’
‘What nonsense are they printing now?’ said Elizabeth grabbing hold of it.
Admiralty Office—Captain Clerke of his Majesty’s sloop the Resolution, in a letter to Mr Stephens, dated 8 June, 1779, in the harbour of St Peter and St Paul, Kampschatka, gives the melancholy account of the celebrated Captain Cooke, late commander of that sloop with four of his mariners having been killed 14 February last, at the island of O’whihe, one of a group of new-discovered islands in 22 degrees of north latitude, in an affray with a numerous and tumultuous body of the natives.
Elizabeth’s hands trembled. The words rose from the page like a tidal wave, looming menacingly overhead. She must not let it crash down on her.
‘They say the king cried on hearing the news, Mrs Cook,’ said Mrs Curtis. ‘All of London is mourning.’ Her voice sounded as if it were coming from a long way off, though she was standing less than an arm’s length from Elizabeth.
‘My deepest sympathies,’ Mr Curtis said, ‘for the loss of your husband and our dear friend.’
Everybody believed the news, but Elizabeth would not. Could not. Her faith alone would bring James home.
The will was proved on 24 January, such haste, but Mr Dyall had called in and collected Elizabeth to go to the lawyer. She went with him so as not to cause a fuss. As the will was read, she murmured words of her own. ‘Bring him home safely, oh Lord, bring him home.’ The nations of the earth had given him immunity, the Almighty would do so too. January 24. It was Elizabeth’s thirty-eighth birthday.
At home she rocked little Hugh so hard that he began to cry and she did not know the reason for it. She lit candles in all the windows and stoked the fire up. ‘It is winter,’ she told herself. ‘He can feel the cold of winter, that is all.’
‘It is like a furnace in here, marm,’ said Gates, beads of sweat forming on her forehead.
‘Nevertheless,’ said Elizabeth, ‘we will keep it good and hot. It is for Hugh,’ she reasoned.
So many letters of condolence. It was nice of people to send their esteemed thoughts. But no-one, except Elizabeth, kept faith. Faith was a weapon, faith was a directive of life. Faith was the sea that surrounded Elizabeth.
When she fitfully dropped into sleep, bad dreams sailed her ocean of faith, sails hanging down like shrouds.
One hot night in June, shouts and cries and the stamping of feet entered Elizabeth’s dreams. Numerous and tumultuous natives, with clubs, sticks and daggers, were bearing down on her.
Elizabeth gasped herself out of the dream, sat bolt upright in her bed, eyes wide open as could be. But still the dream continued, only Hugh was in it now. ‘Mama,’ he said, ‘lots of men running.’ Elizabeth could hear them. Then she smelled fire, and looked wildly around.
She went downstairs searching for the fire, and found Gates crouched in a corner.
‘What is the matter?’ Elizabeth asked.
‘It’s the anti-Papists, marm. Burning and looting. I don’t dare to put my head out. It’s terrible, marm. So many of them.’
Elizabeth went to the window, opened the curtains a fraction. Fires blazed everywhere, angry rioters silhouetted against the flames. Men armed with sticks were throwing chairs, tables, pictures, whatever they could find, onto a huge bonfire. Some of them were dancing and waving their hats. Further back from the fire she saw others brandishing banners which proclaimed: ‘No Popery’.
Elizabeth held Hugh close to her and got down on her knees and prayed to Almighty God. While she prayed, the mob continued on its path of destruction, and reached into the West End, to St Martin’s Street, right to the door of Dr Burney, who shouted out to the mob: ‘No Popery!’ to save the house from being attacked.
The newspapers were full of the riots in defiance of Parliament’s Catholic Relief Act repealing some of the existing anti-Catholic laws. Fifty thousand men led by Lord George Gordon. It started, as many riots did, in the East End, but quickly spread. The thirst of the mob for Catholic blood seemed unquenchable. Everyone was afraid, Papist and non-Papist alike. Even the Lord Mayor of London seemed powerless to stop them, saying: ‘I must be cautious what I do lest I bring the mob to my house.’
On 8 June the Riot Act was read but the rioters continued, freeing the prisoners from Newgate then burning the jail and throwing the keys into the fountain in St James’s Square. They torched other jails, the Blackfriars Bridge tollgates. They tried to storm the Bank of England but armed clerks and volunteers routed them. Eventually the twelve thousand troops summoned by the king quelled the riots, with seven hundred rioters dead, four hundred and fifty arrested and twenty-five executed. For days after, the fires continued to burn into the hot summer haze. Gordon was tried for high treason but acquitted, and the Lord Mayor fined £1000 for criminal negligence.
It was a hard summer. Elizabeth read the papers from beginning to end, yet found not one word of the news she was searching for.