The Signature of All Things (11 page)

But there was something else, and Alma’s eyes went straight to it—a girl, slightly smaller than Alma, with a white-blond plait of hair down her back,
stood between Beatrix and Hanneke. The women had one hand each upon the girl’s slender shoulders. Alma thought the child looked somehow familiar. The daughter of one of the workers, possibly? Alma could not be sure. The girl, whoever she was, had the most beautiful face—though that face seemed shocked and fearful in the lamplight.

What brought disquiet to Alma, however, was not the girl’s fear, but rather the proprietary firmness of Beatrix’s and Hanneke’s grips on the child’s shoulders. As a man approached as though to reach for the girl, the two women closed in tighter, clutching the child harder. The man retreated—and he was wise to, Alma thought, for she had just gotten a glimpse of the expression on her mother’s face: unyielding fierceness. The same expression was on Hanneke’s face. It was that shared expression of fierceness on the faces of the two most important women in Alma’s life that shot her through with unaccountable dread. Something alarming was happening here.

At that point, Beatrix and Hanneke both turned their heads simultaneously, and looked to the top of the staircase, where Alma stood, staring dumbly, holding her candle and her sturdy boots. They turned toward her as though Alma had called out their names, and as though they did not welcome the interruption.

“Go to
bed
,” they both barked—Beatrix in English, Hanneke in Dutch.

Alma might have protested, but she was helpless against the power of their united force. Their tight, hardened faces frightened her. She had never seen anything quite like it. She was neither needed nor wanted here, it was clear.

Alma took one more anxious look at the beautiful child in the center of the crowded hall of strangers, then fled to her room. For a long hour, she sat on the edge of her bed, listening until her ears ached, hoping somebody would come to her with explanation or comfort. But the voices diminished, there was the sound of horses galloping away, and still nobody came. Finally Alma collapsed asleep on top of the covers, wrapped in her shawl and cradling her boots. In the morning when she awoke, she found that the entire crowd of strangers had cleared off from White Acre.

But the girl was still there.

H
er name was Prudence.

Or, rather, it was Polly.

Or, to be specific, her name was Polly-Who-Became-Prudence.

Her story was an ugly one. There was an effort at White Acre to suppress it, but stories like this do not like to be suppressed, and within a few days, Alma would come to learn it. The girl was the daughter of the head vegetable gardener at White Acre, a quiet German man who had revolutionized the design of the melon houses, to lucrative effect. The gardener’s wife was a local Philadelphia woman of low birth but famous beauty, and she was a known harlot. Her husband, the gardener, adored her but could never control her. This, too, was widely known. The woman had cuckolded him relentlessly for years, making little effort to conceal her indiscretions. He had quietly tolerated it—either not noticing, or pretending not to notice—until, quite out of nowhere, he stopped tolerating it.

On that Tuesday night in November of 1809, the gardener had awoken his wife from a peaceful sleep beside him, dragged her outside by her hair, and cut her neck from ear to ear. Immediately after, he hanged himself from a nearby elm. The commotion had raised the other workers of White Acre, who came running out of their houses to investigate. Left behind in the wake of all this sudden death was the little girl named Polly.

Polly was the same age as Alma, but daintier and startlingly beautiful. She looked like a perfect figurine carved out of fine French soap, into which someone had inlaid a pair of glittering peacock-blue eyes. But it was the tiny pink pillow of her mouth that made this girl more than simply pretty; it made her an unsettling little voluptuary, a Bathsheba wrought in miniature.

When Polly had been brought to White Acre manor that tragic night, surrounded by constables and big working men—all of them with their hands upon her—Beatrix and Hanneke had immediately foreseen nothing but danger for the child. Some of the men were suggesting the girl be taken to an almshouse, but others were already proclaiming that they would happily assume responsibility for this orphan themselves. Half the men in that room had copulated with that girl’s mother at some point or another—as Beatrix and Hanneke well knew—and the women did not like to imagine what might be in store for this pretty thing, for this spawn of the whore.

The two women, acting as one, clutched Polly away from the mob, and kept her away from the mob. This was not a considered decision. Nor was it a gesture of charity, draped in a warm mantle of maternal kindness. No, this was an act of intuition, sprung from a deep and unspoken feminine
knowledge of how the world functions. One does not leave so small and beautiful a female creature alone with ten heated men in the middle of the night.

But once Beatrix and Hanneke had safeguarded Polly—once the men had cleared off—what was to be done with her? Then they did make a considered decision. Or rather, Beatrix made the decision, as she alone had the authority to decide. She made, in fact, a rather shocking decision. She decided to keep Polly forever, to adopt her immediately as a Whittaker.

Alma later learned that her father protested the idea (Henry was not happy about having been awoken in the middle of the night, much less about acquiring a sudden daughter), but Beatrix cut short his complaint with a single hard look, and Henry had the good sense not to protest twice. So be it. Their family was too small, anyway, and Beatrix had never been able to enlarge it. Hadn’t two more babies been born after Alma? Hadn’t those babies never drawn a breath? And weren’t those dead infants now buried in the Lutheran churchyard, doing nobody any good? Beatrix had always wanted another child, and now, by dint of providence, a child had arrived. With the addition of Polly to the household, the Whittaker brood could be efficiently doubled overnight. It all made tidy sense. Beatrix’s decision was swift and unhesitating. Without another word of protest, Henry conceded. Also, he had no choice.

Anyway, the girl was a pretty thing, and she did not seem to be a complete simpleton. Indeed, once things quieted down, Polly demonstrated an actual decorum—an almost aristocratic composure—that was all the more notable in a child who had just witnessed both of her parents’ deaths.

Beatrix saw distinct promise in Polly, as well as no other possible respectable future for the child. In the proper home, Beatrix believed, and with the right moral influence, this girl could be shunted toward a different path of life than the pleasure-seeking gaiety and wickedness for which her mother had paid the ultimate price. The first task was to clean her up. The poor wretch had blood all over her shoes and hands. The second task was to change her name. Polly was a name suitable only to a pet bird or a street girl for hire. From this point forward, the child would be called Prudence—a name that would serve as a signpost, Beatrix hoped and expected, of more righteous direction.

So all was resolved—and resolved within an hour. Which is how it
came to pass that Alma Whittaker awoke the next morning to the flabbergasting information that she now had a sister, and that her sister’s name was Prudence.

Prudence’s arrival changed everything at White Acre. Later in life, when Alma was a woman of science, she would better understand how the introduction of any new element into a controlled environment will alter that environment in manifold and unpredictable ways, but as a child, all she sensed was a hostile invasion and a premonition of doom. Alma did not embrace her interloper with a warm heart. Then again, why should she have? Who among us has ever warmheartedly embraced an interloper?

At first, Alma did not remotely understand why this girl was here. What she would find out eventually about Prudence’s history (mined from the dairymaids, and in German, no less!) elucidated much—but on the first day after Prudence’s arrival, nobody explained anything. Even Hanneke de Groot, who usually had more information on mysteries than anyone, would say only, “It is God’s design, child, and for the best.” When Alma pushed the housekeeper for further information, Hanneke whispered sharply, “Find your mercy and ask me no more questions!”

The girls were formally introduced to each other at the breakfast table. No mention was made of the encounter the night before. Alma could not stop staring at Prudence, and Prudence could not stop staring at her plate. Beatrix spoke to the children as though nothing were amiss. She explained that someone named Mrs. Spanner would be coming in from the city later that afternoon, to cut new dresses for Prudence out of more suitable material than her current clothing. There would be a new pony coming, too, and Prudence would need to be taught to ride—the sooner the better. Also, there would thenceforth be a tutor at White Acre. Beatrix had decided that it would tax her energies too extremely to teach two girls at the same time, and since Prudence had received no formal education thus far in life, a young tutor might be a useful addition to the household. The nursery would now be turned into a dedicated schoolroom. Alma would be expected, needless to say, to help teach her sister in penmanship, sums, and figures. Alma was quite far ahead in the training of the mind, of course, but if Prudence toiled sincerely—and if her sister helped—she should be able to excel. A child’s intellect, Beatrix said, is an object of impressive elasticity, and Prudence was still young enough to catch up. The human mind, if dutifully
trained, should be able to perform anything we ask of it. It is all just a matter of working hard.

While Beatrix spoke, Alma stared. How could anything be as pretty and disturbing as Prudence’s face? If beauty were truly accuracy’s distraction, as her mother had always said, what did that make Prudence? Quite possibly the least accurate and most distracting object in the known world! Alma’s sense of disquiet multiplied by the moment. She was beginning to realize something dreadful about herself, something that she had never before been given reason to contemplate:
she herself was not a pretty thing.
It was only by awful comparison that she suddenly came to perceive this. Where Prudence was dainty, Alma was large. Where Prudence had hair spun from golden-white silk, Alma’s hair was the color and texture of rust—and it grew, most unflatteringly, in every direction except downward. Prudence’s nose was a little blossom; Alma’s was a growing yam. On it went, from head to toe: a most miserable accounting.

After breakfast was completed, Beatrix said, “Now come, girls, and embrace each other as sisters.” Alma did embrace Prudence, obediently, but without warmth. Side by side, the contrast was even more notable. More than anything, it felt to Alma, the two of them resembled a perfect little robin’s egg and a big homely pinecone, suddenly and inexplicably sharing the same nest.

The realization of all this made Alma want to weep, or fight. She could feel her face settling into a dark sulk. Her mother must have seen it, for she said, “Prudence, please excuse us while I speak to your sister for a moment.” Beatrix took Alma by the upper arm, pinching her so firmly that it burned, and escorted her into the hall. Alma felt tears coming, but forced her tears to halt, and then to halt again, and then to halt once more.

Beatrix looked down at her one natural-born child, and spoke in a voice of cool granite: “I do not intend ever again to see such a face upon my daughter as the face I have just seen. Do you understand me?”

Alma managed to say only one wavering word (“
But
—”) before she was cut off.

“No outbreak of jealousy or malice has ever been welcomed in God’s eyes,” Beatrix continued, “nor shall such an outbreak ever be welcomed in the eyes of your family. If you have sentiments within you that are unpleasant or uncharitable, let them fall stillborn to the ground. Become the master of yourself, Alma Whittaker. Am I understood?”

This time, Alma only thought the word (“
But
—”); however, she must have thought it too loudly, because somehow her mother heard it. Now Beatrix had been pushed entirely too far.

“I am sorry on your own account, Alma Whittaker, that you are so selfish in your regard for others,” Beatrix said, her face clenched now with true anger. As for her final two words, she spat them out like two sharp chips of ice:

“
Improve yourself
.”

B
ut Prudence also needed improvement, and a good deal of it, too!

To begin with, she was quite far behind Alma in matters of schooling. To be fair, though, what child would not have been behind Alma? By the age of nine, Alma could comfortably read Caesar’s
Commentaries
in its original, and Cornelius Nepos. She could already defend Theophrastus over Pliny. (One was the true scholar of natural science, she would argue, while the other was a mere copyist.) Her Greek, which she loved and recognized as a sort of delirious form of mathematics, was growing stronger by the day.

Prudence, by contrast, knew her letters and her numbers. She had a sweet and musical voice, but her speech itself—the very blazing emblem of her unfortunate background—needed much correction. During the beginning of Prudence’s stay at White Acre, Beatrix picked at bits of the girl’s language constantly, as though with the sharpened tip of a knitting needle, digging away at usage that sounded common or base. Alma was encouraged to make corrections, as well. Beatrix instructed Prudence that she must never say “back and forth,” when “backwards and forwards” was so much more refined. The word
fancy
in any context sounded crude, as did the word
folks
. When one wrote a letter at White Acre, it went in the
post
, not the
mail
. A person did not fall
sick
; a person fell
ill
. One would not be leaving for church
soon
; one would be leaving for church
directly
. One was not
partly
there; one was
nearly
there. One did not
stove
along; one
hurried
along. And one did not
talk
in this family; one
conversed
.