The Quaker men had become suspicious. Too many wives tired in the morning with salt-crusted fingertips and bruises blooming where no corset should press. They said something unholy was happening after hours when the women were supposed to be shucking clams and slapping cod on the chopping block at Mrs. Hussey’s Try-Pots Inn.
They came one night with Bibles and lanterns. Knock, knock, knock.
Two massive, black-painted wooden pots hung from the cross-trees of an ancient topmast, suspended by donkey ears and swinging in front of a weathered doorway. Inside, Mrs. Hussey didn’t flinch. She cracked the door.
“It’s a might late, gentlemen. Clam or cod?”
“We heard… sounds,” said one elder.
“Chowder prep,” she replied, eyes blazing. “You think it stirs itself?”
“Where’s Hosea tonight? Can we see him?”
“He’s gone to see his ailing mother in New Bedford. Ye of all Nantucketers should’ve remembered that, Peter Coffin. Now scram!”
The door slammed. Mrs. Hussey mumbled something about men and keeping their harpoons to themselves.
The men fled, afraid of what they couldn’t name. Rumors had been bubbling of Nantucket women dealing with their husbands’ long absences with something known as he’s-at-homes. Jebediah Braum, some said, discovered a six-inch plaster shaft in the butter churn.
Inside the Try Pots, Starbuck’s wife led the chant—half psalm, half incantation. Ahab’s wife lit her pipe. Widow Peleg shelved the salt and fennel.
Without delay, aprons were scraped from their curvy hulls. Ahab’s wife approached Starbuck’s, eyes sliding down her collarbone. Widow Peleg sang queer sea shanties. Mrs. Hussey leaned into the Portuguese woman’s ear, carving scrimshaw with her tongue.
The baker girl’s hips rocked with anticipation on the salted butcher’s table. Knock, knock, knock went the cast iron pots.
A giggle, an exhale, the creak of wood and want. Their desires tangled like rigging in a squall.
“What if they tell Father Mapple?” Starbuck’s wife whispered.
“Not to fret, my dear,” Mrs. Hussey smiled, all flushed and chowder-headed. “Even if some ambitious customs inspector set out to tell a whaling tale, he’d never write a woman. Couldn’t.”
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