Cate of the Lost Colony - Lisa Klein [48]
This admission did not increase my confidence in John White.
“How did you persuade your husband to make the journey?” I asked.
“It was not me, but five hundred acres of land that induced him. Few of these men would have left England were it not for the promise of land. And my father offered to make Ananias one of his assistants. They were granted coats of arms, so they are both gentlemen now.”
“And that makes you a gentlewoman,” I said.
She smiled. “I care nothing for titles. I only want my child to be safely born and thrive.”
“Virginia is fertile and the climate healthy. We should all thrive there,” I said.
I told Eleanor only a little about myself. I said that my parents were dead and I had served the queen, who granted my wish to see the New World and put me under her father’s protection. I admitted I knew Sir Walter and had often heard him describe his plans for the colony. It was not the full truth, but why should I admit to being disgraced? I was free to hide or reveal whatever I chose.
Eleanor seemed to be in awe of me. “I am so fortunate. You are like a sister to me already,” she said.
I was as pleased as she was.
Once Eleanor befriended me, the other women began to show me respect as well. They were hesitant to address me, perhaps because they did not know what to say to someone who had waited on a queen. I asked them not to call me Lady Catherine, but simply Cate. Still, I felt like a stranger among them, for they were all related or had grown up in the same parishes. Betty Vickers had lost two infants and a young child to the plague, leaving only ten-year-old Edmund. Her husband was a hardworking journeyman, but with little hope of advancement in the London guilds. Seeing the opportunity to become a master woodcrafter in the New World, he had sold all his family’s possessions to finance their voyage.
Not all the men on the voyage would become landowners in Virginia. Some were indentured servants who would work for their freedom. Many were soldiers paid to guard the colony. Besides myself, the other unmarried women were servants, except for one widow of independent means. The number of colonists traveling aboard the flagship, the flyboat, and the small pinnace was a hundred and fifteen, including seventeen women and eleven children.
Leaving Santa Cruz, where White failed to obtain sheep, plants, or salt, Fernandes sailed to the island named St. John. There we also encountered trouble. The men found freshwater, but they drank so much beer that nothing was gained. Three soldiers who were supposed to be watching for Spaniards were found imbibing. White had them whipped and chastised the others, but they were all too drunk to care.
The pinnace was already anchored at St. John. Among her passengers was a soldier who followed me with his eyes, which made me uneasy. Soldiers were generally rough and unsavory. He drew nearer and was about to speak when I said, “You are too bold. I do not wish to know you.”
“Lady Catherine, do you spurn an old friend?”
I peered at him. “Who are you?” There was something familiar in his stance. “Thomas Graham?” I said, incredulous. For he was no longer “the fool of fashion” as Dick Tarleton had once dubbed him. He had traded his slashed doublet for a common jerkin, and his face was covered with a reddish beard. He looked sturdy and vital.
“At your service.” He bowed. “Do you wonder why I am I here?”
I knew Graham had been almost penniless when the queen sent him from court. I also remembered how he had admired Ralegh’s treasure-laden ships docked along the Thames.
“You must be seeking your fortune like everyone else,” I replied. “Do you mean to settle in Virginia?”
Graham laughed. “I’ve no longing to live among savages. I will save my earnings, maybe look for gold, then return to England with the means to marry my Lady Anne.”
Swept with fresh regret, I said,