“We two Marys will remain here, in case someone from the Council comes to this address to advise us they have scheduled an audience,” Mary said, nodding to Mary Pleasants.
Indeed, it was Mr. Matlock who called that evening when they were all together again.
“I bring you news to gladden your hearts. The Council has magnanimously determined to release your husbands and the others being held in Winchester. A courier has been dispatched and you may expect the entire body of men to arrive in Lancaster within the next few weeks.”
Mary uttered a shriek of delight and clapped her hands. Elizabeth’s face broke into a smile as the other women turned toward her as their leader and congratulated her and themselves on the news.
After Matlock had left the women talked excitedly about the expected arrival and wondered what had moved the Council to release the Quakers.
“We did not obtain a hearing but I suspect General Washington’s letter was persuasive,” Mary said. 12
The idleness of the next several days was difficult to bear. Mary, using the good names of General Knox and Captain Hadley, learned that the artillery was closer to York than Lancaster. With the advent of spring, and the availability of fodder for the horses, they could be moving east toward Valley Forge at this very moment. She hoped that Will would arrive before her husband and the others so that she could see him and carry her impressions and a verbal message back to Elisabeth.
In the early morning of the tenth day after Mr. Matlock had imparted his good news, the first wagon of Quaker men arrived in Lancaster. Edward was among them, looking lean and worn but in good spirits. The second arrived before dark, with the sad news that two of their number had died during their imprisonment. The Quakers made plans to depart the next morning for Philadelphia. Although Elizabeth Drinker did not ask, it was clear she preferred her husband Henry to ride in the coach. That suited Mary for, after having been separated from Edward for so many months, she had no intention of prolonging it. Willingly, she gave up her place and rode seated between Edward and the teamster on the journey by wagon to Philadelphia. He permitted her to entwine her arm in his as she related the state of his businesses, although in his absence she had thought of them more as theirs or even hers - the tenants who were late in their rent; the repairs necessary to the roof of one of the warehouses; which employees had quit and which ones had performed admirably; what the latest storage rates were in the city; and the steady increase in river traffic.
The Drinker carriage with its team of four, arrived first and the knowledge of the men’s release spread quickly amongst the Quaker community. By the time Mary and her husband reached the city along with the others, a service of thanksgiving and community dinner had been arranged. It was dusk when Mary and Edward returned to their home. Elisabeth was waiting for them and her delight at seeing them reunited was tempered by Mary’s disappointing news that Will had not been at Valley Forge nor Lancaster.
“General Knox is optimistic about the coming spring campaign. When it resumes, the British may be driven from Philadelphia and you and Will be together again,” Mary said, taking Elisabeth’s hands in hers. Tomorrow, she thought, she would tell her of Will’s presence at Princeton and the General’s belief that it was Providence’s hand that had led Elisabeth to discover the information and save not only two prominent patriots but her true love as well. Better to talk to Elisabeth confidentially until she ascertained whether her husband’s belief in strict neutrality remained steadfast. There was no reason to think his imprisonment had made him more sympathetic to the Patriot cause. She would have to be careful. He may not approve of Elisabeth staying under his roof and being escorted about town by Captain Montresor. She thanked God for Edward’s release, but recognized her husband’s return could lead to complications, not just with Elisabeth but in what had become Mary’s own commitment to the patriots.
The first week of May, the entire army was ordered to assemble on the parade grounds. The rumors rife throughout the camp were the spring campaign was about to begin. Instead, when the Second Rhode Island Continental Regiment assembled, Captain Ward read the special orders of the day - France had entered the war on their side.
Private Henry Gillet stood at parade rest, listening to Colonel Angell read the text of the treaty. The flowery words flowed above him like winged insects wafted on the morning breeze. What did all this mean, the soldier next to him asked. Henry shrugged. “I guess it signifies we are no longer alone in our fight with the British Crown.” He thought of Judith and Sally and the blue ribbon in his haversack. “It means the war may end sooner and we may then all return home,” he said and smiled.
When the Colonel concluded the reading and called for a cheer, the men dutifully shouted “Long Live the King of France” and tossed their tri-corns in the air. Then followed a thirteen gun salute, and the orders for the ranks to load their muskets and await the command for a feu de joie. They fired their guns in rolling sequence with nary a misfire and were soon enveloped in a white cloud of smoke from the powder. 13 At mid-day when they were dismissed to prepare for a what promised to be a bountiful outdoor feast to celebrate the new alliance, Henry caught a glimpse of Lieutenant Stoner, riding his big red horse and pulling an eighteen-pounder to the artillery cantonment. He would have to find him later and thank him for his words and compassion and show that he had indeed survived.
Some of the regiment went into the woods and emerged with dogwood blossoms festooning their tri-corns. Henry thought of attaching the blue ribbon to his hat. Better to keep it clean and safe. He accepted a blossom instead. He would put the ribbon from his daughter’s dress in his cartridge box, to remind him of his loved ones before battle.
Chapter 7- In Licentious Philadelphia
John Stoner was consumed by two fears. One gnawed at him constantly - that Mrs. Bates would inadvertently reveal it was he who had told her of the dragoons’ pending raid on Princeton. Or worse, she would learn how driven Captain Chatsworth was for revenge and blackmail Stoner for her silence. In his mind, he vacillated between paying or murdering her.
His other fear was losing at gambling. He could not quit, being intoxicated by the atmosphere of the gaming houses, the lure of high stakes being waged and the chance he could win a fortune. But he also could not afford to lose. His precaution against that event was to cheat, giving rise to another worse fear, of being found out.
Throughout the warm evenings of late April he had made the rounds of the gaming taverns - the “copper” halls in the less desirable parts of Philadelphia, populated by tradesmen, merchants, storeowners and warehousemen. Dressed in civilian clothes, neither too shabby nor ostentatious, he won steadily. He played cautiously so as not to draw attention to himself, honing his card counting skills. He knew from his spy network which places were fair and those where, if the decks were not rigged, the dealing boxes were. He played hazard liking the feel of the dice in the palm of his hand and dabbled at loo and piquet. However, he much preferred vingt-et-un and faro because they were fast-moving and winning depended more on skill than chance.
Once, he observed a player cheating at faro, by moving the bet to the adjacent card on the layout before the banker noticed. Another time, he was certain the man next to him had placed a bet on a losing card but astonishingly, his tokens appeared on the winning one. The stack had moved almost by a wave of the man’s hand. John watched closely and discerned a single hair, barely visible in the dim candlelight, attached to the bottom of the stack. He said nothing but remembered the trick, trying and perfecting it in his quarters using a silk black thread.
In May, confident of his abilities, he moved on to the higher stakes games at the “golden” halls - Whites, Almacks and Crockfords, all bearing the names of the more elegant clubs in London. Chatsworth assured him they were nothing like the “real thing.” John was tired of the endless comparisons by upper class officers, their condescending manner of speech, their inside knowledge of great men who had bet this estate or that fortune at one of the London lo
cations, and lost huge sums of money without any emotion. Someday, he thought, he too could lose one thousand guineas at the turn of a card and not care a shit. Right now, he thirsted to win.
Tonight, as he eagerly proceeded down Walnut Street he would try the City Tavern. It was his first time at this club, noted for its faro bank, where many of the senior officers gambled and bets of fifty pounds a round were not unknown. He heard the street watchman call seven as the lamplighter ascended his tapered ladder and a bright yellow glow illuminated the cobblestones. He smiled to himself. Superintendent Galloway had accepted John’s recommendation to restore the street lights. It gave the citizens a sense of normalcy Galloway thought would promote people’s confidence in the Loyalist administration.
John smoothed his uniform jacket and felt the pouch of coins heavy in his inner waistcoat pocket. He straightened his back and pushed his way through the boisterous crowd of officers drinking and carousing in the large main hall and walked up the stairway to the second floor. He sauntered into one of the rooms and feigned interest at several games of cribbage underway at a row of tables. In another room, he watched seven officers seated around a table playing vingt-etun against the dealer. John waited until a new deck had been shuffled and mentally began counting the cards, just to practice he told himself. A Major in the chair before him hesitated and doubled down, creating a stir around the table. The two stacks of tokens stood like lonely watchtowers protecting their owner from an assault launched from the dealing box. The first card drawn was a three on top of a nine. The second was a six on top of the other nine. Not good, John thought, for either hand, quickly recalling the number of low cards in the hands already played. The Major took a deep swallow from his tankard and indicated he wanted one more card on top of the three. The dealer put down a Queen and swept the stack into the bank, as the Major groaned. Nervously, he held his hand over the six and the dealer drew a Jack and turned over his down card - a seven. The other tower of tokens disappeared into the bank.
John smirked confidently, having correctly assessed the Major’s misfortune and moved down the hall and into the first faro room. He saw Chatsworth standing behind one of the players and before John could turn away to leave, the Captain waved him over.
“Charles here is having a good run at the table,” he said, placing his arm around John’s shoulder. “He is up more than two hundred pounds after five rounds,” indicating the Lieutenant sitting at the table with a large stack of tokens in front of him. John licked his lips enviously. When the round was over, Stoner, despite an earlier intention to keep twenty or so pounds in reserve, converted all fifty pounds in his pouch into tokens and ordered an ale. 1 These were the highest stakes he had ever played for. He took a chair at the table and tried to appear nonchalant and unperturbed. The first draw was pure guesswork simply because there were no cards to count. John placed small bets on the five and Jack on the faro board and watched where the four other players put their bets. The Lieutenant, perhaps now overconfident, put down a large stack of tokens equal to at least thirty pounds on the ten. The dealer drew the first card, the six of diamonds and discarded it, as required. He then pulled two more from the dealing box, the first a ten, eliciting a deep groan from Charles and a sympathetic one from Chatsworth. A bet on a card of the same denomination as the banker’s card lost. Luck was with John for the player’s winning card drawn was also a five and his Jack was higher than the banker’s ten. John collected his winnings and before the next two cards were drawn, decided to go high and pushed a stack on to an eight and another on to the Jack again. The banker drew a seven as his card and a nine for the winning player’s card. John collected on his high card bets.
As the game progressed, John filtered out the shouts of joy of the winners and their supporters and curses for their hard luck by the other players and the crowd behind them. He concentrated on the card count, coolly making his bets based on the knowledge that certain numbers had already been played. After several rounds, the stack of tokens in front of him was the largest among those at the table, and the group of officers was thickest behind him. He knew he had consumed at least three tankards and the heat in the room, despite the two windows being open, was making him groggy. The cautious voice inside him, urging him to leave after this round, was overwhelmed by the pleasure he felt from all the attention and the cheers of Chatsworth and others.
He now was gambling huge sums for him, twenty, thirty and even forty pounds on each two-card draw. Except for the fat Colonel two seats over, who was losing steadily, John was the biggest better at the table. By an incredible stroke of luck, which John attributed to his superior card counting, when the dealer called the turn for the final three cards, he predicted the exact order - the banker’s card a three, the winning card a King, and the Hock, a nine. Several hands reached out and clapped him on his shoulders, another tankard appeared at his right hand and there were calls of “Bravo” and “well played.” How could he leave the table now? His face flushed, whether from the accolades or alcohol he knew not. He loosened his waistcoat, rearranged his tokens and played on.
Gradually, over the course of the next few hours, he lost his touch and more significantly, his winnings and eventually his stake. When he left the faro room, just before dawn, holding on to the bannister to steady himself, he was down not only his initial fifty pounds but also four hundred plus pounds in winnings. He dragged himself to his quarters, blaming himself for letting a fortune slip through his fingers.
He came back to the City Tavern two nights later, drawn like a moth to a candle flame, vowing this time to stay sober and quit while ahead. He saw himself in his room, his strong box open, overflowing with his winnings of pound notes, guineas, Spanish dollars and pieces of eight. It never happened. He was seduced by the praise of those he knew were from aristocratic families, the ones who attended theater and belonged to gentlemen’s clubs in London and visited each other’s country estates, rode to the hounds and had coats of arms. He played on into the early morning hours, watching his stack of tokens diminish with each round. He was not even clear-headed enough to quit when he was gambling away his initial stake of another fifty pounds. He returned to his room, drunk and poorer, and fell asleep thinking of the privileges he would buy when he was rich enough. And so he returned to the faro tables over and over and lost much of the money he had carefully accumulated through theft and corruption since the beginning of the war.
John’s official salary was not enough even to cover one long evening of betting at the faro tables. His current stream of income, from merchants who paid him to look the other way when they purchased food from smugglers which they sold for exorbitant prices on the black market, was not enough to offset his losses. He knew this was undermining Galloway’s own efforts to control prices but John merely saw it as another opportunity to enrich himself. And besides, he reasoned, the Superintendent himself had promised John some extra benefits and he was only fulfilling that assurance.
In desperation, he decided to cheat. He would lose no longer. He had pocketed a token from his last miserable outing when his luck had changed for the worse. Carefully, in the privacy of his quarters, he attached a green silken thread that matched the color of the playing table to the bottom of the wooden marker. As he entered the Tavern, and went upstairs, he thought he would play in a different room, away from Chatsworth and the dragoons. Maybe the change would be for the better. In any event, there would be fewer distractions. He joined a table of five, glancing quickly at the other players, two Majors from the Light Infantry and a Lieutenant and Captain from the Grenadiers. He did reasonably well the first two rounds, carefully sipping on the claret and betting conservatively.
“My God, man,” the Grenadier Captain said with disgust from the end of the table. “You play like a timid old woman.” Several officers behind him snickered.
“It is a game of skill, not of bluster,” John replied, regretting drawing more attention to himself.
“Are you implying I do n
ot have the brains for faro,” the Captain roared, his face flushed from the heat of the room and alcohol.
John sought to defuse the situation. “No, no,” he stammered. “I only meant to explain my cautiousness.”
“Well, you can count all you want but bet with the conviction of your numbers, man” the Captain ordered.
Intimidated, John increased the amount of tokens he placed on the faro board and was rewarded with four consecutive wins before the round ended. The next two rounds also went well for him. The chair next to him vacated and the Captain moved into the seat.
“We are both favored by luck at this table,” he said, clasping John’s arm. “Let us take turns standing drinks for the others.” John could not decline and he and the Captain stood four rounds before John lost count, by which time, he recognized he was not remembering which cards had been played and which ones were still available. The Captain seemed unaffected by the alcohol he consumed and continued to win more often than not. John noticed his own pile diminishing and fingered the token with the thread in his pocket. Surreptitiously, he added it to the bottom of the pile of the large stack he pushed forward and placed on the ten. Two other players had also bet on that number. The dealer turned the first of two cards over. It was a ten. John had lost. He willed his hand to grasp the invisible thread and move the pile to the adjacent Jack, giving him a high card bet. The dealer was looking down at the second card drawn, a seven. John’s hand moved toward the faro board and then stopped. Sitting next to the large mustached Grenadier Captain, he lost his nerve. The fear of being called out and exposed as a card cheat overcame his greed for winning. He let the dealer sweep the piles of tokens, including his marked one, into the bank and realized he had lost more than two hundred pounds in the course of the evening, all of his winnings and his stake. If he had only kept his winnings and left the table all of those nights, he would have achieved his dream, with more than enough money to purchase land, or a fine home, or both.
Spies and Deserters Page 12
