Page 59 of The Condemned (Echoes from the Past #6)
FORTY-NINE
After dinner, once the children had gone to bed, Gabe poured them both a glass of wine and they settled comfortably on the sofa.
Quinn tucked her feet beneath her and took a long sip, enjoying the full-bodied flavor of the wine.
The last two days had been an emotional roller coaster, but despite Gabe’s willingness to listen and offer support, she had no desire to talk about either Jude or Jo.
“Tell me about Mary,” Gabe said, taking Quinn by surprise.
“What? Now?”
“Yes, now. Talking about Mary will allow you to focus on something other than what will happen tomorrow. Tell me what you know so far. It will help. Besides, you’ve hardly spoken about her, and I’d love to hear her story.”
Quinn flashed Gabe a grateful smile. He was right, of course. She needed to calm her mind if she hoped to get any sleep tonight. The wine would help, but so would redirecting her attention toward something other than her hapless siblings.
“Mary was not in a good situation,” Quinn began.
Gabe smiled. “I’d be surprised if she was.”
“She was an impulsive young woman, a little rebellious. Those are admirable qualities in our world, but in the seventeenth century…”
“They could be a death sentence,” Gabe supplied.
“Exactly. Mary’s husband, John, was homosexual. He’d consummated the marriage and done his best to fulfil his conjugal duties, but he had no interest in Mary, and his lack of attention was hurtful and confusing. Mary wasn’t prepared to settle for that sham of a marriage. ”
“Can’t say I blame her. Although, she’s not the first woman to be duped into marriage with a homosexual man.
A wife is the most effective cover in a society where homosexuality is seen as a crime against God.
But, given the law of the colony, what could Mary do?
” Gabe asked. He refilled Quinn’s glass, but not his own.
“I’ll get Alex if he wakes during the night.
Don’t worry,” he said, following her gaze.
“I just want you to feel relaxed tonight.”
“Thank you. I do feel much better.” Quinn considered Gabe’s question.
“There was nothing Mary could do. The only thing that would release her from the marriage was death. If John were to die, Mary would be free to remarry, and I’m sure she’d have no lack of suitors, being an attractive widow with a sizeable plantation. ”
“Could that have happened?”
“I really can’t say. I don’t know precisely when Mary died or who fathered her child. But given her feelings for Walker, I’m not sure she’d rush into another marriage.”
“Walker? Who’s Walker?” Gabe asked.
“Walker was Mary’s name for a Native American called Walks Between Worlds. And this is really interesting: Walker claimed to have been born to one of the women who vanished from the Roanoke colony. He was half-English.”
“Is that even possible? To this day, no one knows what happened to the colonists of Roanoke Colony. They simply vanished.”
“Walker told Mary how his mother and older brother came to live with the tribe, and his story sounded plausible. He said his mother’s name was Elizabeth Viccars, and his half-brother’s name was Ambrose.
I checked against the names of the colonists who settled on Roanoke, and both Elizabeth Viccars and Ambrose Viccars appeared on the list. Besides, Walker’s appearance suggests that he was, indeed, of mixed race.
Because of his English mother, Walker was something of an oddity among the natives.
It seemed they trusted him and treated him like one of their own, but he never truly felt like he belonged.
He saw a kindred spirit in Mary, and she found his sensitivity and kindness hard to resist.”
“I can’t imagine that a liaison between them would end well, given the time and place they lived,” Gabe speculated. “The governor of the colony would never allow a British woman to marry a native, even if she were free to marry again, unless Mary simply ran off with him.”
“I agree, but what I don’t understand is how Mary wound up in that cave in Cornwall.
She would have left Virginia some time in her third trimester.
Why did she leave? Where was she going? What happened to force her to return to England, and who paid for her passage?
And who hid her coffin in that cave, and why?
There are so many unanswered questions.”
“And you don’t really want to find out, do you?”
“No, I don’t. Whatever happened to her was awful. She was a young woman who’d known very little happiness in her brief life, and to see how she ended up breaks my heart. Something truly unexpected must have occurred.”
“How do you mean?” Quinn suspected Gabe knew exactly what she meant, but he wanted to keep her talking, to keep her mind on Mary and off Jo. And she appreciated the effort.
“Mary would not have returned to England unless she was widowed and had no wish to remain in Virginia.”
“What makes you think Mary left Virginia alone? She might have been traveling with her husband. Also, you’re assuming Mary was already pregnant at the time of her departure, but there’s nothing to support that,” Gabe replied, his tone thoughtful.
“It’s possible that she returned to England with John and became pregnant here.
You did say John consummated the marriage, so it’s entirely plausible that she could have conceived with him.
Or, she might have remarried and been expecting a child with her second husband. ”
“That’s an interesting theory,” Quinn said. “I haven’t considered that. I need to go back and search for any mention of Mary or John Forrester in Devon and Cornwall between 1620 and 1625. Given Colin’s age estimate of Mary’s skeleton, she wouldn’t have lived past that.”
“No, that doesn’t seem likely. Is there a record of colonists who died in Virginia during that period? Perhaps it would shed some light on Mary’s marital status at the time of her death.”
“Yes, there should be a record. If John Forrester died before 1625, then I’d be able to establish a credible timeline of Mary’s actions.”
“I think you need to get some sleep,” Gabe said, pulling Quinn to her feet. “You have a big day tomorrow.”
“Yes. I do. Will you hold me until I fall asleep?” Quinn asked, suddenly feeling like a frightened child.
“As if you even have to ask.”