‘His name is Harry Oysterman, though that may not be the name he has given to you. He is twenty-one years of age. He is of medium height, he is as thin as a rake. He flatters himself that he is a poet, and has a great future as one, though my dog could write better verse. His crime is that he has deserted from His Majesty’s Army, which means that if you help us, your crime of being a Damned Rebel will be overlooked. Say yes, he is in your house, and we will go and get him and take him away without any more trouble to you. Say no, he is not in your house, and we will have to search every room for ourselves, just to make sure you are not lying. Being clumsy men, we cannot be held responsible for any damage we may cause whilst in pursuance of our duties. Explanation over, now answer.’
‘I am the only other person in the house apart from little Betsy, gentlemen, and as you see, I do not fit your description of a deserter, so please leave.’
Staggered to hear Sophie’s voice, I shot my head round to confirm that some sort of magic had not taken place. ‘Twas proof of the intensity of my absorption in the unfolding drama that I had not heard one rustle or footstep of her departure.
‘And who are you?’
‘My name is Nancy Griswold, and I am Abigail’s cousin, visiting for the day, though what business it is of yours I do not know. That is my wagon you doubtless saw at the front of the house. I volunteer the information only so that you may be satisfied, and leave us in peace.’
‘And what is that you are holding behind your back?’
I heard Abigail gasp at something.
‘Put Abigail down, put Timothy down, and leave us alone, or I shall blow your face off, Sir. The two others may then put me through the most vile tortures it is possible to imagine, but I shall die happy, warm in the knowledge that I have despatched you to the Sulphurous Burning Pit where you and the rest of King George’s dogs belong.’
There was a tense silence for several seconds, then the two dragoons still holding Timothy started to laugh.
‘And that’s told you, Axelrod!’
‘Aye, it has,’ said Burnley, smirkingly freeing Abigail. ‘So let the boy go.’ Abigail ran to collect the still-remonstrating Timothy and disappeared back into the house with him, leaving Sophie and Burnley in direct confrontation.
‘I admire your spirit, Madam. Easy though it would be for me to disarm you, and eat you alive, I have taken it into my fancy to spare you on this occasion. But remember the name, Madam. Axelrod. Burnley Axelrod. Because before this war is over I shall come back and give you the rogering your spirit deserves. I shall get you alone and I shall master you, my rebellious little whore. I shall father one of my legendary brats upon you, and you will be the proud owner of an Axelrod Baby, several hundred of which are in pod around the world at this very moment. I suspect you would like that, wouldn’t you, deep down inside?’
‘A pretty speech, Sir, for one who secretly trembles with the fear of Death.’
‘Do you think I am afraid of death, Madam? This is how much I am afraid of death.’
Then, to my horrified amazement, the rogue stared straight in my direction and started swaggering towards me. I could not believe it; had everything been an elaborate charade after all? Had he known all along that I was here? In the furthest extremes of Dread, convinced yet again that my days on earth were up, I dived down instinctively under the window, and squashed myself against the wall as tightly as I could, shaking and looking up wide-eyed in abject terror. The footsteps got louder and louder until they stopped right next to the window, and I could hear the rasping of Burnley’s breath. Then came an awful explosion of noise as the window was smashed in and shards of glass showered over me. Opening my eyes, I expected to see the muzzle of a pistol angled down at me, or Burnley stepping into the room to murder me with his bare hands, but what did actually enter the room astounded me even more. ‘Twas a grotesque length of gnarled manhood, supported by a fist the size of my head, which proceeded to enfilade a powerful jet of foulsmelling urine all over the dining-room floor.
‘Very manly, Mr Axelrod,’ called Sophie. ‘And very expensive for your commanding officer, to whom I shall send a bill for reparations of the damage you are now causing. Along with the bill for the cart you have already destroyed, your evening’s escapade has cost your country a pretty penny.’
Burnley gave a deafening roar of delighted laughter.
‘That’s it, Nancy, stoke the fires. ‘Twill make our session all the rougher when I come back to inseminate you. And you know what they say. Good fucks make good babies. And good babies make good adults.’
‘Some feeble old lecher must have slobbered all over your mother then,’ called Sophie.
Burnley laughed again, this time even more to my chagrin, for I did not like the repartee that was building up between the two of them. Nor did I like the drips of urine that were shaken over me before the monster was tucked and buttoned away. I felt like an oyster being seasoned with vinegar, and it made my humiliation complete. I realized that he was in the process of taking both my life and my wife off me, and I was allowing it to happen. So it was with joy that at last I felt the first stirrings of anger, and a desire for self-assertion.
But the time for revenge was not to be now, for I heard Burnley walk away and make preparations for departure. A few moments later the clop of horses’ hooves could be heard, followed shortly afterwards by the clattering sound of their spurred gallop, which diminished quickly into the distance. A few minutes of eerie silence ensued, until I heard Sophie calling me cheerily from a distant room. I stood up, wiped my face and my jacket with my handkerchief and strode around the table in an attempt to regain my composure. I was deeply ashamed of my cowardly conduct, and vowed to myself that I would star in the armed confrontation scene next time, however much my hands and knees knocked.
‘’Tis all right, Harry, they’ve gone. You can come out now.’
The pain and humiliation this remark caused me was bad enough, but ‘twas nothing compared to the actuality of having to go into the drawing room and face the happy band of fighters, who, with the addition of a sleepy Betsy and a recuperating Martha, were all ensconced on the sofa and chairs in front of the still-burning fire. Candles had been lit, and a new bottle of wine had appeared on the table.
‘Ah Harry! Come and join us in a toast to your wife. The hero of the hour!’
‘Oh yes,’ slurred Timothy, who had a definite singed and drunken look about him. ‘She was absolutely splendid. We have just been saying that without her decisive action we would all have been in a terrible pickle.’
‘Why are pickles terrible?’ piped up Betsy.
While Timothy was telling her – or trying to, given his inability to finish his sentences without laughing and falling off his chair – I took a seat and a glass, poured myself some wine, and feigned a happy toast to Sophie. Feigned, for though Sophie’s performance had indeed been admirable, and she fully deserved her plaudits, each eulogy only served to highlight my own shortcomings during the crisis. Although no-one seemed to bear a grudge against me, I was miserably conscious of my failings.
‘You did the right thing keeping hidden like that,’ said Abigail, nose twitching a little at the stale tang that had wafted in with me. ‘Your presence would only have inflamed the situation.’
‘Inflamed, Mamma,’ chortled Timothy, flush with his initiation into warfare. ‘Choice remark!’
‘Yes, don’t take it badly, Harry,’ said Sophie, obviously divining the cause of my silence, and reaching over to put her hand on mine. ‘We knew you wanted to come out and help us, and would have done so had it been practicable to do so, but as I had both of the pistols and the situation under control, what was the point?’
Sophie laughed as she stood up and mimed – not, I fancied, for the first time – the doublehanded draw of the seasoned footpad that had so shaken Burnley and his henchmen.
I smiled wanly, and inadvertently caught Betsy’s searching, sceptical eye. I could tell
that she knew, if no-one else did, the real reason for my non-appearance on the scene, and I spent the next ten minutes, whilst the others chattered gaily, brooding on ways to restore my shattered manhood. When my mind at last rejoined the conversation, it had moved on to the matter of Burnley’s sexual threats, a subject which provoked much feminine amusement.
‘And who is Nancy Griswold when she’s at home?’ laughed Abigail.
‘My arch-enemy,’ said Sophie. ‘Though Axelrod would never know the difference; women are just pieces of meat to men like that.’
‘A fine figure of a man, though, in a brutal way.’
‘Now, now, cousin, you are a congressman’s wife, remember. Your mind should be on higher things.’
Abigail sighed, and dragged her mind back to higher things.
‘The Lord works in mysterious ways, Sophie. Before tonight I feared the war so much the only way I could deal with it was by deliberately pushing it from my mind. Now I have been forced to confront it I feel an enormous weight has been lifted from my shoulders. Though far worse things may happen to us than happened tonight, I feel we can cope with it now.’
‘Hear, hear, Mamma!’ chirped Timothy, before going down again. ‘Well said!’
‘I am still sorry that we brought all this upon you, though, cousin. We will ensure it does not happen again by leaving at dawn. A case of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted, I know, but better late than never.’
A groan of disappointment went up, appetite for conflict whetted.
‘Oh no, stay here at least until we hear what the armies intend to do, otherwise you may find yourselves riding into trouble.’
‘Oh, we do that as a matter of course. Whichever decision we take is always the wrong one. So, no, we will head for Philadelphia as planned and take our chances.’
‘Then at least you must allow us to provision you for the journey, and let you have a map of the backroads route to Philadelphia. ‘Tis around fifty miles longer than it need be, but it avoids the latent dangers of the post road. Indeed ‘twas devised by my husband in case we needed such an escape route ourselves.’
‘That would be wonderful, cousin.’
‘Well,’ I said to Sophie, making an effort to speak and break the gloom that still had me in its grip, ‘at least I was not imagining things. Burnley is after my blood. As well as anybody else’s along the way.’
‘Aye, he is a monster, and no mistake.’
I looked askance at Sophie, and fancied I saw a smile of admiration playing on the corner of her lips.
‘Still, the dog will get his come-uppance. I will deal with him when the time is right to do so.’
‘Of course you will, sweetie. I never doubted it.’
This was a maddening response, because, strain as I might, I could not detect the irony I felt sure must be inherent in the remark.
‘I will practise every day with the pistols, and be ready for him the next time we meet.’
‘Good idea!’
‘I will conquer him; I will.’
‘Brave man!’
I could tell that she did not believe me, but no words could convince her of my absolute determination to make amends. I therefore let the subject drop and offered to go and clean up the mess in the dining room.
‘Oh, no need, Sir,’ said Martha quickly, putting her glass down and rising from her chair, ‘that is my job.’
‘No, no, I insist,’ I said. ‘Please sit down. I have brought my troubles into your house and I feel I need to make amends, even if ‘tis only in a small way.’
‘Well thank you, Harry,’ said Abigail. ‘I accept your offer. But Martha, while Harry is doing that, perhaps you could fetch a pitcher of water for Harry to wash himself. Then could you bring him a new set of clothes from my husband’s chest, and throw the soiled ones away. I do not want any trace of that man left around this house.’
At first I thought she meant me, but then I realized it was probably Burnley’s urine she was not so keen on. Nevertheless, I could not have complained even if she had been referring to me – my reputation was as soiled as my clothes, and no amount of water could wash away the smell of my cowardice. I may have been spared Burnley’s vindictiveness for the night, but the price had been high. My manhood, or something, was under severe bombardment.
41
To Philadelphia
Eight hours later, after a breakfast of buttered toast, porridge and coffee, we prepared to set out on our perilous trip to Philadelphia. Whilst Sophie and I had been upstairs in bed, the Bush family had been busy provisioning our wagon as if for a trip to Mars, for loaded into it, amongst other more perishable dainties, were barrels of oats, barley, sugar, tea, wine, dried pork and salted peas, as well as a map of New Jersey, a street plan of Philadelphia, letters of introduction, a compass, blankets, saddles, spades, lanterns, candles, rope, a kettle, cups, plates, knives, forks, pistols and cartridges. Overwhelmed by such generous assistance, Sophie and I took our leave with sincere declarations of love and affection. Abigail hugged and kissed us both, Betsy honoured us with her snapping crocodile wave, and Timothy – absolutely riven with remorse for his behaviour when drunk – solemnly shook our hands and said he wished he could come with us. Vowing to meet again as soon as circumstances permitted, we trundled away from the waving trio with tears in our eyes. ‘We’re making good progress, sweetie,’ I said, looking back at the tiny plume of smoke that was now Tyrannicide House, before settling down in my seat to co-ordinate the map and compass in my lap. ‘Another seven days, twenty-three hours and fifty minutes – give or take two days – and we shall be entering the promised land of Philadelphia.’
Now ‘twas Sophie’s turn to eye me.
‘And why does that prospect put you in such a good mood? The place was anathema to you yesterday.’
‘’Tis surprising what a new resolve can do for your mood and your senses. Last night, instead of sleeping, I thought and thought until I came to a decision that is perhaps long overdue. I am abandoning my ambition to be a poet.’
Sophie turned to me in astonishment, and then her eyes lit up with excitement.
‘Oh Harry, I am so glad! It always seemed a frivolous ambition to me. Even more so after the events of last night.’
‘Yes, one must be flexible, so I have decided to make the most of the opportunities that Abigail has so unexpectedly dropped in my lap. It would be foolish of me not to with a wife and no doubt a baby to support before long. I will attempt to become a good and wealthy man of trade and business in Philadelphia. And as for Burnley Axelrod, I will deal with him myself the next time we meet.’
My voice was so firm and manly, my sentences so crisp and decisive, my sentiments so rational and philistine, that for a few moments Sophie did not know what had hit her. Then she threw her arms around me and started to weep with joy.
‘My good husband! Those are the words I have been waiting so long to hear!’
I thought they were, which was one of the reasons why I said them. The other was that a sojourn of stultifying boredom in the business world of Philadelphia seemed the right thing to do for the time being. I had reasoned that progress on my Night Thoughts was an impossibility in the present circumstances, and that Hardness, not Poetic Vulnerability, was required. Exploration of Self, Motive and Soul would have to wait, for while these things strengthened me as a Poet, they weakened me as an adversary to Burnley Axelrod. Adaptability was all, and I needed a little island of security in a sea of incertitude before I could resume work on my masterpiece again. This would be created when i) the threat of Burnley Axelrod had been eliminated, ii) the outcome of the war was known iii) I was settled in some wife-pleasing sinecure of a job in Philadelphia, and iv) Sophie had a baby – preferably mine – to occupy her time and keep her out of mischief. Then, by God, ‘twould be time for the scribblers of the world to look out!
In the meantime I was content to bask in the temporary accolades due to an obedient husban
d who had miraculously seen the error of his ways.
‘Things have not been quite right between us since we got married, I think you will agree, my dear. Quite apart from the Burnley Axelrod business, I feel we have been pulling in different directions. Now we are united, our aims are one, and I am so happy. Oh, Harry, you marvellous man!’
I gave a complacent laugh, and took advantage of my state of grace to light my pipe.
‘I am happy too, my dear. Philadelphia, here we come!’
‘Philadelphia!’ gasped Sophie, as though ‘twas Paradise itself she was contemplating. ‘City of my girlhood dreams!’
‘Soon to be City of your Womanly Prime!’
‘Whoah!’ Sophie squealed with delight. ‘I can see it all now. We will live in an elegant town house in an elegant street, within spitting distance of the greatest minds in the world. I will shop and dine and meet these people, while you will work hard all day and every day for the rest of your life in order to support us. Obviously you will be exhausted in the evenings, but I will relate to you what they have had to say, so that your mind does not become old before its time. I will organize a ladies self-help group, and campaign for female suffrage as advocated by the estimable Mr Paine. Perhaps I could arrange a meeting with him in our dining room while you are at work. Oh God, Harry, the possibilities! A glorious life of intellectual stimulation, laughter and hard, hard, profitable work awaits us, my dear, if only we can seize our opportunities!’
As Sophie had so clearly outlined what my lot would be in this loathsome scenario, I simply feigned enthusiasm as best I could and said yes to everything. Secretly, of course, I was determined that the only hard work I would be involved in would be the searching of ways to avoid hard work, so while Sophie fantasized on, I puffed my pipe and eyed the countryside for signs of trouble. There were none. On the contrary, the frosty light of the departing day showed up New Jersey at its continental best. The sun was setting behind hills that may or may not have been the Watchung Mountains of my map. The fields, striped here and there in shadows, were golden, neat and ordered. The occasional crisp, smoky breeze ruffled the treetops, shaking leaves loose like brown dandruff. We could see our muddy cart-track – for ‘twas no more than that – wending its way into the distance, through a landscape alternately champaign and forest. But though the scene was undoubtedly handsome, there was no time to paint pictures of it. We needed to press on, which we did by travelling hard during the day and resting at night.
Infernal Revolutions Page 53
