Page 102 of In the Pursuit of Haven
Endicott was the Puritan famous for persecuting the ones who were eventually behind abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, and equality. It was no accident that the Quakers were the ones in the end to push for freedom of religion.
Being a Quaker was dangerous business—as soon as someone came off the boat talking in highfalutin “thee’s and thou’s”—assuming they were allowed to disembark, even—they were inspected for witch marks, stripped, fined, imprisoned, beaten, whipped, deported, banished, starved, executed… and their ears cut off… and their beds stolen!
It was rough.
“Governor Endicott was granted this island by the Crown,” Jessie said, “so after he and his wife died, the island was inherited by John and Zerub… or, as the deed said, the ‘longest liver’ of them… and that was Zerub, so…”
He was our connection to the island.But what did his book have to do with the treasure? I doubted Crabb would ever entrust Zerub with the Shepherd’s Relic. Reserving further judgment, I perused through the pages as Jessie led us past the narrow, pretty island.
The water sparkled on both sides of us, past sandy beaches and crags, affording spectacular views of gazebos and even a cute little ballpark. The cold, salty air tickled against my nose and cheeks, and though it was still sunny, oddly enough for the tail end of January, I spied some dark clouds gathering in the distance.
We were due for a storm. However, my stocking hat and parka cut out the worst of it, so that the thought of looking for more treasure in the elements seemed bearable… no, not just bearable, but pleasant with my Jessie. I noticed his attention swerving more to me than on where we were going.
And if we didn’t crash, that was just where I liked it. I was ready to start working on “us” again—maybe it had something to do with Jessie’s enthusiasm for the hunt. It was catchy and made his eyes sparkle with a charm that reminded me of a dashing pirate.
I bit down a smile and read a few lines of Zerub’s remedies before letting out a startled cry. “Oh! I guess he thought cat’s blood was the answer to helping distracted women pay attention.” I skimmed through more. “You can also use cat’s blood for shingles… well, mixed with a little milk and cream…” And I wasn’t even about to inform Jessie from what mammal Zerub recommended gettingthat. “Huh, and looks like… dried toads and spiders are great for stopping bloody noses… if you don’t have hog’s dung handy… or opium.”
There was lots of need for opium, apparently. That would make all these weird ingredients go down better.
Jessie choked on another laugh. “Yeah, those are all hard to come by.” He steered us further past the perimeter of the island with its rocky crags.
The sandy beaches and surprising splashes of green amidst patches of snow made a breathtaking sight. His hands tightened on the wheel. “No wonder they thought everyone was a witch back then,” he said. “You might as well be holding a spell book.”
I let out another helpless chuckle as we reached the pier. “I’m sure people in the future will look back at what we’ve done and roll their eyes too.”
Agreeing, Jessie docked us against the long stretch of weathered wood that had greeted children for many happy summers, at least since ’91 after it had been rebuilt after the “Perfect Storm.”
Modern forces of nature competed with the groundbreaking events of the past.
Jessie turned off the engine and plopped next to me on the bench seat. His arm met my shoulders. “So the story goes like this… when Crabb returned with his treasure around May of 1685, he was suffering from a toothache after his long voyage, and he needed a doctor.”
“Please say he didn’t go to Zerub,” I said. He’d fry his brain with these remedies, which seriously tainted my fantasies of Crabb being a swashbuckling pirate!
“Zerub was dead by then,” Jessie reassured me, “but his second wife was still alive and kicking, and supposedly she worked tirelessly on Crabb until she sent him home as good as new. Hunter thinks the guy entrusted her with a Relic.”
I glanced down at another remedy of curing a “feaver” with a salt of urine and broke into an unsure smile. I really hoped she didn’t use any of these recipes on Crab. Poor man.
Jessie stole the book from my lap and opened the last page to show an inscription written on the back cover in bold, spidery handwriting. He leaned across me to give me a better look. His arm pressed into mine. The page was signed, Elizabeth Winthrop-Newman-Endicott. “Her name’s a mouthful,” he said.
It also happened to be a famous name—Winthrop!I cross-referenced my hunch through a genealogy app on my phone, and sure enough, there was the line. “She’s Governor Winthrop’s sister,” I said. “Small world when the relatives of two governors get married.”
Jessie agreed. “She was the cat’s pajamas.”
The inscription she’d written was meant for her brother. Was this actually addressed to Waitstill Winthrop? I read the first line:
“To my brother—ride hard!”
Forget just being an antique, this book was a historical breakthrough. What kind of connections did Hunter have to get his hands on a discovery like this?
“There’s an account of Winthrop sending a man to ride all day and night with orders from theircurrentGovernor Phips to stop Crabb’s execution,” Jessie said.
The boat was drifting from the pier, and so Jessie pushed begrudgingly away from me so he could tie our boat to the dock. I thought over what he’d said.
Sheriff Corwin had hung the pirate by the neck until dead. The messenger hadn’t stopped a thing.
“Winthrop wanted his part of the treasure,” Jessie said. He unwound the rope and stepped off the side of the boat. His boots thudded over the wooden pier as he knotted the anchoring rope to the cleat. “So he wasn’t rescuing Crabb out of the goodness of his heart. He talked about a ‘blue piece of glass’ in the record Hunter showed me.”
“Huh!” I said. They’d worked hard on this. “That definitely sounds like a Shepherd’s Relic.”
