And I’m my own best ambassador.
So in the spring of 1828, I return to Virginia and step into the now dilapidated white house in Milton to find my husband drunk and unkempt in the middle of the day. “Patsy?” Tom asks, squinting at my appearance in the doorway, as if I were a hallucination.
I want to be angry. I want to remember that this is the man who destroyed himself with resentments. The man who struck me and beat my children. The man who tormented me at my father’s funeral. But when he tries to get up from a threadbare chair and his knees nearly buckle under him, I’m nearly undone with sorrow to see the ruin of him.
I’m shocked by the sight of him, so pale and haggard. Truly shocked. He’s so emaciated I cannot think he’s had a meal in weeks. Why hasn’t anyone told me how very ill he is?
“Don’t stand,” I say, helping him back to his chair before he falls.
Clutching my arm, Tom barks, “Why have you come?”
“I’ve come to have a frank discussion.” I hurry forth with the rest, taking advantage of his astonished speechlessness. “I can see that you’re cold and hungry and suffering. You haven’t a proper bath. And though you’ve come to this sorry state through your own stubbornness, understand that I’d never willingly leave you in poverty so long as I have a shilling in the world.”
“My stubbornness?” Tom says, eyes bulging. “What of your son—”
“You must give up this hatred of your own flesh and blood,” I insist, strangely unafraid. Then again, what can Tom do to me? He’s as weak as a newborn babe. “Or do you want us to remember you the way we remember your father?”
Tom’s once-beautiful mouth thins. “That’s all you want?”
“That’s where it must start, Tom. If we come to an agreement, we may all reside together at Monticello until such time as it’s sold away. It’s an unfurnished place now, but it’s better than keeping rats for friends, as you must be here.”
“What are you saying, Martha?”
“I’m saying that I want you to come home to your family. Of course, given your unsocial habits and hatred for the necessary restraints of civilized life, I assume you’d prefer a little establishment of your own on some sequestered spot of Monticello.”
He takes the opportunity I’ve given him to save face, but a bit too far, as always. “I’d live entirely in my own room, making no part of the family and receiving nothing from it in any way whatever.”
“As you like.” Though I’ll insist he take food.
Tom’s eyes narrow. “What about Short?”
No. I will not discuss William. “It’s better for both of us to drop a curtain over the past. There’s enough warmth of heart between us to live in harmony, Tom. But upon such subjects as we cannot agree, we must be silent.”
He nods. And it’s enough.
Truthfully, seeing him in such a state, he could’ve refused all my terms, and it would still have been enough. Because I realize even before my daughters and I get him settled into the north pavilion, that he’s afflicted by more than hunger. He complains of stomach pains and gout, and is so meek and softened of temper that I think he must be dying.
My daughter Ginny is a disapproving sentinel at the door. “Mother, your children shall have a right to interfere if things between you return to their former state. He won’t be allowed to disturb your rest.”
“I’m not tired or in need of rest,” I say, because after two years of grieving for my father I’m finally awakening. I said that I was sick but would be well again, and now it’s come to pass.
Would that Tom were as fortunate.
I see to it that my husband has food and blankets and healthful teas and medicines to ease his pain. I sit by his bedside hour upon hour, day after day, reminiscing about the good times, of which we can both recount surprisingly many.
One morning Tom’s eyes, bleak and teary, meet mine. “Did you love me, Patsy? Did you ever?”
“Oh, I did.” I’m heartbroken by how easily the admission falls from my lips now. “The young man who told me he preferred trees stripped bare of their leaves and kissed me so passionately in a schoolhouse; the young husband who tried to coax a slave girl’s infant to suck at a cloth soaked in milk; the man who rode so hard, worked himself sick in the fields, fought for his country, and wrote poems to his daughters. Yes, I loved you, Tom Randolph.” My throat tightens and tears—real tears—roll down my cheeks. “I loved you truly and deeply.”
As if he’s been waiting for my tears his whole life, Tom reaches out and touches the wetness, smooths it with the pad of his thumb. “Oh, Patsy. My adored wife.”
He weeps.
We weep together.