by Ron Carter
He remembered nothing until suddenly his eyes opened, and through the fog of a brain still half locked in slumber, he realized the rooster had once again ripped loose with his raucous statement to start the day. Thoughtfully he dressed and shook the straw from his blanket, then rolled and tied it, and slung it over his back. He picked up his wrapped rifle, checked his coat pocket for his papers and pencil, looked about to see if anything was forgotten, and walked out into the purple eastern sky toward the house. Tredwell met him at the kitchen door.
“Leaving?”
Caleb nodded. “I better get back. I think I have what Matthew wanted for his letter. It needs to go out as soon as we can write it and set the print. Will it matter to you if I use your name? And some of the others?”
“No. Go ahead if it’ll help.”
“Could I say good-bye to your wife? And the family? Are they up?”
“Come on in. The twins and I were just leaving for the barley. Breakfast is in about two hours. Will you stay?”
“No, I better be going.”
Caleb followed Tredwell through the door into the kitchen where Rachel was boiling water for oatmeal porridge and the twins were putting on their old, battered, black felt hats against the sun. Rachel stopped, saw his bedroll and rifle, and said, “You’re leaving, Mr. Dunson?”
“Yes, ma’am. I just wanted to say thank you for everything.”
“You’ll stay for breakfast?”
“Thank you, ma’am, but I need to get back. Matthew’s waiting.”
“You wait a minute.” Quickly she put a loaf of bread, some cooked ham, a large chunk of cheese, and two boiled potatoes in an old flour sack and tied the top. “Take this.”
Caleb reached for it as he said, “I thank you.” He drew coins from his pocket and stacked them on the table. “There’s about thirty pounds British sterling there. It ought to be enough to keep your oxen.”
Rachel gasped and the twins exclaimed as Tredwell stepped forward. “I can’t take that!”
Caleb said, “You’ve got to. Your plan was to stay inside the law, and I think you’re right. You can’t risk being in debtors prison, and your farm depends on those oxen. You’re needed to help lead your neighbors. Use the money. There’s one other thing. After the trial of those seven thieves, will you write and let me know who they are? I’ve got a hunch, but I want to know.”
“I’ll pay the money back as soon as I can.”
Caleb nodded. “That’s fair. But don’t pay until you can afford it.”
He shook the boys’ hands, and the two girls came sleepy in their nightshirts, and he shook their hands and bade them all farewell. Tredwell followed him out the door into the yard where he stopped and handed him a wooden canteen with a corncob stopper, wet and dripping with fresh well water.
“Here, take this. Thank you for coming. Will you send me a copy of whatever you write?”
“Yes.”
“Watch and be careful on the road. I hate to see you walk all the way back. I wish I had a horse for you.”
Caleb said, “I’ll catch some rides. I’ll be alright.”
With the first rays of the unrisen sun turning the high skiff of clouds red and yellow in the eastern sky, he walked along the trail toward the road. He turned once to wave, then moved on.
By nine o’clock he had his coat off, sweating, and stopped in the shade of an oak to drink from the canteen. At noon he drank and used his belt knife to cut cheese and bread and ham. At sundown he stopped again, ate, drank, and moved on. In full darkness he spread his blanket on the ground in a stand of maple trees thirty yards from the road, and slept. On the third day a rain squall moved from east to west, and he trudged through mud, hoping that the Tredwells and others in the Springfield valley had their crops safely in their barns. The morning of the fourth day he paid a farmer one dollar for a ride in a wagon filled with barrels of fresh apple cider, bound for Framingham. In the late afternoon of the sixth day, he strode onto the timbers of the Boston waterfront to the office of DUNSON & WEEMS, opened the door, and set his wrapped rifle on the counter.
Billy looked up from the growing stack of ledgers on his desk and dropped his quill as he stood. “You’re back! Are you all right?”
“Fine.”
Covington came from his desk to face Caleb. “Any trouble?”
“None to speak of. Where’s Matthew?”
“At the lawyer’s office. He’ll be right back.”
Caleb’s forehead drew down. “Lawyer? Trouble?”
“No. We just got another contract to carry cargo. The lawyer needed dates and rates and destinations. Was your trip a success? Did you get what you went after?”
Caleb drew the sheaf of papers from his pocket and laid them on the counter. “I think so. There’s the notes.”
“Did you get home with any money?”
“Yes.” He tossed his purse clanking on the counter. “I’ll make an accounting for what’s gone and what it went for.”
“Later.”
Matthew shoved the door open and instantly exclaimed, “Caleb! I was about to come looking for you. You all right?”
“Tired, but good.”
“Did you get the story?”
“I think I did.”
“Give it to us in one sentence?”
For several seconds Caleb stared at the counter before he answered. “It’s only a matter of time out there until things change, or there will be trouble. Killing.”
For a moment the only sound was the traffic on the docks and the seabirds arguing.
“That bad?”
“Maybe worse.”
Matthew picked up the stack of notes. “It’s all here?”
“Most of it. I’ll write it all out tomorrow. Is mother all right? And Adam and Prissy?”
“Mother’s fretting over you being gone so long. Otherwise fine. I was there yesterday.”
“I better go on home. You need me for anything here?”
“No, not right now. Can I look at your notes overnight?”
Caleb shrugged. “I’ll need ’em in the morning.”
“I’ll have them here waiting.”
There was a lift in Caleb’s soul at the familiar sounds and smells of Boston town as he walked away from the docks, into the narrow, crooked streets, and hurried home. He opened the front door, called “I’m home,” and Margaret came at a run to seize him and hold him close.
“You had us all frightened. Thought you were hurt or dead somewhere. Oh, it’s so good to see you.”
“I’m fine. It’s good to be home. Brigitte and the others?”
“They’ll be home soon from work. Go put your things in your room and come to the kitchen. We’ll talk while I finish getting supper ready.”
Margaret moved about the kitchen as he talked, pausing when he told of the newborn Harriman baby and the mother, frightened when he spoke of the Monday night meeting and the seven men who came in the dark with muskets. In the midst of it Brigitte walked in the front door, followed by Adam and Prissy, and they heard Caleb’s voice in the kitchen. They hurried across the parlor to throw their arms about him.
Supper was a marathon of questions and answers. Caleb said he needed to clean his rifle and was in his room when the others knelt for evening prayers. He went to his own bed early, to sleep as one dead.
At eight o’clock the following morning he opened the office door. Matthew and Billy raised their heads, and Matthew leaned back in his chair. Caleb’s notes were spread on the desk before him. Matthew gestured to them.
“That’s hard to believe.”
“It was hard to see, most of it.”
“How soon can you get it set in print?”
“Maybe tomorrow, late. Who are you sending this letter to?”
Matthew handed a sheet of paper to Caleb with handwriting on both sides, and Caleb began to read to himself.
James Madison. Alexander Hamilton. George Washington. John Adams. Samuel Adams. Thomas Jefferson. Elbridge Gerry. Patrick
Henry. Thomas Paine. John Jay. Benjamin Franklin. Henry Laurens. Gouverneur Morris. George Mason. Robert Morris. John Dickinson. George Wythe. John Rutledge. Charles Pinckney. Edmund Randolph. Henry Knox. James Monroe.
Caleb raised unbelieving eyes to Matthew. “Do these men know the letter is coming?”
Matthew nodded. “Most of them. I’ve received correspondence from nearly all of them. They’re concerned about what’s happening. Do you know about the meeting to be held next March?”
“No. What meeting?”
“James Madison and Thomas Jefferson got the state legislatures in Maryland and Virginia to agree to a meeting next March, in Alexandria. The states are each appointing a committee of delegates to negotiate a settlement of the battle over the rights to the Potomac River. First time this sort of thing’s happened. I think it’s going to open a whole new way of thinking about how the states should work together.”
For a time Caleb read the names again, pausing, thinking. “Madison and Jefferson? I thought Jefferson had been sent to Europe. France.”
“He was. He left July fifth, from right here in Boston. But before he sailed, he and Madison got the states to agree to the conference. It’s going to happen.”
“Alexandria is in Virginia?”
“Yes.”
Caleb set the list down on Matthew’s desk. “Next March. Well, we’ll see. We’ll see.”
Notes
Thomas Jefferson sailed from Boston aboard the ship Ceres on July 5, 1784, to take up his duties in France, as set forth herein (Bernstein, Thomas Jefferson, chapter 3).
Boston
Early April 1785
CHAPTER XXXVI
* * *
The midnight Boston fog swirled so thick Matthew could not see the gate to his home until he touched it, and he held his hand before him as he walked to the front door. He quietly inserted the big brass key into the lock and turned it, then entered the dark home softly. The only light was the faint glow from the coals in the large parlor fireplace, carefully banked by Kathleen before she went to bed two hours earlier. Matthew set his seaman’s bag on the floor, unbuttoned his coat that was soaked with invisible droplets of water, and opened the door long enough to shake it and his tricorn hat outside, then closed the door and hung each of them on a peg in the entryway. Fog had collected thick, dripping from his brows and face in his hurried walk from the waterfront, and he was mopping at it with a handkerchief when Kathleen, wearing her robe and slippers, walked through the archway. Without a word she hurried to him and threw her arms about his neck while relief flooded through her system. For a time she stood holding him, and he her, and he was aware of a tenseness before she drew back and spoke.
“Oh, it’s good to have you home.”
“It’s good to be here. Is something wrong?”
“No. It’s just that you’re long overdue. Things happen on ships.”
“John’s all right?”
“Fine. Asleep. He’s learned new words since you left. Talks all day. Are you hungry?”
“I’ll last ’til morning. Is there something to drink?”
Matthew lighted a lamp while she set cider on the stove to heat, then came back to sit at the dining table facing him.
“You had trouble getting home?”
He shook his head. “No trouble. Things went very wrong with the conference in the beginning. Set the whole schedule back.”
“Tell me.”
“You know that James Madison arranged for the delegations from both Virginia and Maryland to meet at Alexandria to work out a plan for navigation of the Potomac River.”
“Yes. I know about the trouble with the river.”
“The conference was set for March twenty-first, and the Maryland delegation arrived on time. I was there waiting to get everything I could for the Committee of Merchants letter we’re sending out. I got to Annapolis the same day the Maryland people got there—Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, Thomas Stone, and Samuel Chase. The four of us went to the hall where we were to meet the Virginia delegation—George Mason, Edmund Randolph, Archibald Henderson, and James Madison.”
Matthew leaned back in his chair. “They weren’t there! It took us an hour to find out Governor Patrick Henry had appointed them, but he never sent word to them that he had done it! Nor had he ever told them when and where the conference was to be held!”
Kathleen straightened in her chair. “That’s hard to believe.”
“Hard to believe? It’s impossible! But that’s what happened. We found out Archibald Henderson lived in Alexandria and were able to locate him. He was mortified. We asked him to inform Randolph and Mason and Madison of their appointments to the committee and to get them to come as soon as he could, and he did it.”
Kathleen rose and brought the pitcher of hot cider to the table with two glasses, poured, and each took one as Matthew continued.
“Henderson got word to Mason, and Mason came as quickly as he could, but both Madison and Randolph didn’t hear about it until too late. The resolution by the Virginia legislature that authorized their committee required three of the four to be present to conclude business with the Maryland delegation, but Mason and Henderson were so embarrassed they suggested we ignore it and go ahead.”
Kathleen sipped at her cider. “Did it work?”
Matthew drank then set his glass down. “We didn’t have time to find out. Somehow George Washington heard what happened and sent a message. We were invited to Mt. Vernon to conduct the conference!”
Kathleen exclaimed, “What? Mt. Vernon? Did you go?”
“Yes. Arrived there March twenty-fifth.”
“You were inside his home?”
“Every day.”
Kathleen’s eyes were shining. “Tell me about Mt. Vernon. The home.”
“It was beautiful. The mansion is white. On a hill surrounded by lawn and gardens and flower beds. Barns, stables, outbuildings—all painted, clean. The home is immaculate inside. Carpets. Paintings on the walls from here and Europe. Words can hardly describe it. But that’s not what one remembers most about it.”
“What?”
Matthew reflected for a moment. “The people. The general is still learning to leave eight years of military command behind and become a gentleman plantation owner once again. He’s still a little . . . distant . . . once in a while, but he observed every social grace I ever knew. A light came into Matthew’s eyes, and his voice mellowed. “Lady Washington. She’s a surprise—the heart and soul of Mt. Vernon. In the time I was there, everyone—guests, generals, congressmen, family, visitors—it made no difference—they all came to love her. Warm. Unpretentious. Kathleen, you’d love her. And she’d love you.”
A wistful look crossed Kathleen’s face. “Someday maybe I can go there.” She sighed. “Go on. What happened? Did they hold the conference?”
“Yes. Started March twenty-fifth in George Washington’s library. I talked with George Mason between sessions.”
“General Washington conducted?”
Matthew shook his head. “No. I could hardly believe it. He provided the meals, separate sleeping rooms for each of us, refreshments on the library table, looked in on the delegates once a day to be sure they had everything they needed. He knows the Potomac River like no one else, and he has an interest in the Shenandoah and Ohio rivers, and once in a while Mason or one of the others would ask him some detail about them and the country around them. He answered all their questions, but not once did he sit at the conference table with them or even ask about what they were doing.”
Kathleen raised her hand to her mouth in awe, but said nothing. Matthew went on.
“The committee made their own agenda and went to work.”
“How many days?”
“Three full days.”
“Did they find a way to fix the problem that had your ship held up for so long? The Jessica?”
“Yes. They agreed the Potomac would be a common highway for navigation and commerce for all states. Equal fishing r
ights, a system of lighthouses, buoys, beacons, locks, regulations for ports for both states, common defense against pirates, and most of all, they forever stopped the practice of imposing tariffs and duties and regulations that were at the heart of the conflict between the two states. A problem such as we had with the Jessica will never happen again.”
Kathleen stared for a moment. “All that in three days?”
“All that and more. Much more.”
“What more could there be?”
Matthew tossed a hand up in a wide, encompassing gesture. “They decided their commission by both states could be construed to cover other issues that had become troublesome, and they went right on. Before they adjourned they had arrived at a series of recommendations each delegation agreed to take back to their home states about such things as agreeing on the comparative value of the currency of the two states, and even of foreign currency.”
“The problem of the states not accepting money from another state? They solved that?”
“Not completely, but they made a good start. They’re taking back a proposal for the two legislatures to consider. But that was not the end of it. They worked out a schedule of duties and tariffs to be charged by each state.”
Matthew paused to bring his ardor under control. “To put it all together, those two delegations resolved problems that will allow commerce to flow evenly, both ways. Fair, uniform, even-handed. In those three days, those men resolved what Virginia and Maryland had been battling over for years! They’re taking the results back to the legislatures of each state for approval, and there’s no question the approval will be forthcoming.”
Matthew raised his glass to drink warm cider. He set the glass down and went on.
“Before they adjourned they did one more thing that may be the start of the biggest advance in the history of the thirteen states. They wrote a request to the President of the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania—”
