Mrs. Thomas and Benjamin came. The deacon had passed, and Mrs. Thomas had grown even smaller. Her dark hair was silver, but her brown eyes were still the same. When I approached her at the end, she drew me into her arms and laid her head against my chest, as if I were the mother and she the child. Age has a way of reversing those roles.
“Oh, Deborah. Oh, my dear girl. I have missed you. I have missed you so. Will you come back to the house with us and have a late supper or at least a pot of tea and some bread and jam?”
I agreed, though I arranged to come the following day for the midday meal before we left for Boston. I spent the afternoon introducing John to the farm and the fields that had once been my comfort and my cage.
“This room is even smaller than your quarters at the Red House,” he said softly, surveying the tiny space that I’d been so fortunate to have. I knew that now. I had been one of the lucky ones.
The space had been used and occupied in the years that I’d been gone, and nothing of mine remained, but I had only to close my eyes and breathe deeply, and I was twelve years old again, scratching away at my letters by candlelight.
Over a simple meal at the old table now crowded with empty chairs, we reminisced about the early years, speaking cherished names and remembering beloved faces, honoring them with our memories. Jacob had come home after the war and married Margaret, who had waited patiently for his return, but they’d moved west into Ohio, taking advantage of the land Jacob had been promised when he was made a lieutenant.
Benjamin had never married and now ran the Thomas farm, along with Francis and Daniel, who lived nearby with their own families. I would have liked to see them, but got the feeling that they’d chosen not to see me. Association was a complicated matter, and I forgave them even as I grieved.
Before we departed, Benjamin brought out a wooden box that he seemed loath to part with. He held it for a moment, his bottom lip between his teeth, and then handed it to me.
“These are yours. Everything that you left. I read all those letters to Elizabeth in your journals. Many times.” His face became an uncomfortable pink, but he held my gaze as he confessed. “They were wonderful. You should compile a book.”
John, always observant and always gracious, excused himself to stow the box and see to the horses while we said our final goodbyes. Mrs. Thomas embraced me again and made me promise to write.
I said I would and apologized for all my years of silence. “You were my mother. You loved me. And I left without telling you that I loved you too. Can you forgive me, Mrs. Thomas?”
She took my face in her hands and, with trembling lips and streaming eyes, gave me absolution. “I am so proud of you. I have always been so proud of you. Don’t ever stop being Deborah Samson. Don’t ever hide her again. The world needs to know your story.”
As we rode away, the carriage bouncing over the lane I’d raced down a thousand times, John looked at me with a sad smile.
“Were they all in love with you, Samson?” he asked.
“Who?” I answered, still caught in reminiscence and distracted by old haunts. Mayflower Hill beckoned and the willow trees wept.
“Those ten Thomas boys. Were they all in love with you?”
I tsked and shook my head, accustomed to his teasing. “Jacob married Margaret.”
“Yes. Pragmatic of him. But poor Benjamin Thomas is still standing in the road.”
I looked back and saw that it was true. I waved again and he held up his hand, an acknowledgment that he still saw me, though he was almost out of view.
“The day you arrived . . . it must have been something,” John mused. “I almost feel sorry for them.”
“They said I looked like a fence post, a scarecrow, and would murder them in their beds.” I laughed, but remembrance burned in my throat and tickled my nose. “They were merciless.”
“No. They were totally at your mercy, poor fellows. No girl would have ever measured up after you.”
I wiped my eyes and looked back, one more time. Benjamin was beyond my sight. “You don’t know everything, John Paterson.”
“No. But I know you, Samson.”
April 29, 1827
Dear Elizabeth,
The willow tree over your grave has grown tall. There’s a place for me beside you there, and I think this letter will be my last. I’ve written all there is to say and told you all there is to tell.
I have grown old in your house. I used to think how odd it was to walk where you had walked, to sit at your writing desk where you had once written to me, to look from your windows and see from your perspective.