The Witch of Blackbird Pond - Elizabeth George Speare [10]
"What sort of books?" John's voice was incredulous.
"Oh, history, and poetry, and plays."
"Plays!"
"Yes, the plays were the best. Wonderful ones by Dryden and Shakespeare and Otway."
"Your grandfather allowed a girl to read such things?"
"They were beautiful, those plays! Have you never read them?"
John's pale cheeks reddened. "There are no such books in Saybrook. In Boston, perhaps. But the proper use of reading is to improve our sinful nature, and to fill our minds with God's holy word."
Kit stared at him. She pictured Grandfather, the blue-veined hands caressing the leather bindings, and she knew that he had not cherished his books with any thought of improving his sinful nature. She could imagine the twinkle that would have danced in his eyes at those solemn words. All the same, the reproof in John Holbrook's voice left her discomforted. Somehow she felt that John was always drawing back, uneasy at this friendship that was growing between them. And she herself was often repelled by the hard uprightness that lay just under his gentle voice and looks. She saw now that she could not tell him about the books she had loved any more than she could make him see the palm trees swaying under a brilliant blue sky.
Early the next morning a contrary breeze came whistling along the river. The Dolphin sprang to life, scudded the last few miles, and bumped against the wharf at Wethersfield landing. The shore, muffled in thick scarves of drifting mist, looked scarcely different from the miles of unbroken forest that they had seen for the past week.
Sailors began vigorously to roll out the great casks of molasses and pile them along the wharf. Two of the men lowered over the side the seven small leather trunks that held all of Kit's belongings and piled them, one beside the other, on the wet planking. Kit clambered down the ladder and stood for the second time on the alien shore that was to be her home.
Her heart sank. This was Wethersfield! Just a narrow sandy stretch of shoreline, a few piles sunk in the river with rough planking for a platform. Out of the mist jutted a row of cavernous wooden structures that must be warehouses, and beyond that the dense, dripping green of fields and woods. No town, not a house, only a few men and boys and two yapping dogs who had come to meet the boat. With something like panic Kit watched Goodwife Cruff descend the ladder and stride ahead of her husband along the wharf. Prudence, dragging at her mother's hand, gazed back imploringly as they passed.
"Ma," she ventured timidly, "the pretty lady got off here at Wethersfield!"
Kit summoned the boldness to speak to her. "Yes, Prudence," she called clearly. "And I hope that I will see you often."
Goodwife Cruff halted and glared at Kit. "I'll thank you to let my child alone!" she spat out. "We do not welcome strangers in this town, and you be the kind we like least." Jerking Prudence nearly off her feet, she marched firmly up the dirt road and disappeared in the fog.
Even John Holbrook's farewells were abstracted. A formal bow, a polite wish for her pleasant arrival, and he, too, strode eagerly into the fog in quest of his new teacher. Then Kit saw Captain Eaton approaching and knew that the moment had come when the truth would have to be told.
"There must be some mistake," the captain began. "We signaled yesterday that we would reach Wethersfield at dawn. I expected that your aunt and uncle would be here to meet you no matter how early it might be."
Kit swallowed and gathered her courage. "Captain Eaton," she said boldly, "my uncle and aunt can hardly be blamed for not meeting me. You see—well, to be honest, they do not even know that I am coming."
The captain's jaw tightened. "You gave me to understand that they had sent for you to come."
Kit lifted her head proudly. "I told you that they wanted me," she corrected him. "Mistress Wood is my mother's sister. Naturally she would always want me to come."
"Even assuming that to be true, how could you be sure they were still in Connecticut?"
"My Aunt Rachel's last letter came