Prelude to Glory, Vol. 1

by Ron Carter

  “Can you put your foot down?” the reverend asked.

  Brigitte carefully lowered it and uttered a small cry as it touched the hardwood floor. “It hurts so!” she said.

  “Bring her back to my quarters,” the reverend said. “We have hot water and salts that will help.”

  Margaret and Mercy looped Brigitte’s arms over their shoulders and carried her, while Trudy Willums herded the children behind them, down the aisle, through the small door and narrow passageway into the reverend’s quarters. Mercy took the children on out the back door, onto the back lawn of the church, and sat them down and calmed them.

  Kathleen remained behind and faced the corporal, her eyes flat, face without emotion. “I suggest, Corporal,” she said evenly, “that you take up your post at the front doors until the doctor comes. It will go much better for you if you are found at your assigned post rather than inside this church with your musket and an injured girl.”

  The soldier swallowed hard, gave the private a hand signal, and backed out the doors and closed them. Kathleen spun on her heel and raced down the aisle and through the passageway to the reverend’s chamber, where Brigitte was seated in Mattie’s rocking chair, surrounded by the women, who stood silent, white-faced, shaking.

  She grasped Brigitte’s shoulders. “Are you hurt?” she demanded.

  “No, but we can’t let anyone know it.”

  Kathleen’s eyes rolled back into her head and her shoulders sagged as she exhaled all her breath. “I saw the kick, but I thought you broke both legs the way you went down.”

  Brigitte leaned forward, eyes flashing, intense with the thrill of risk and mortal danger, now passed. “Was it good?”

  Sarah Willums finally found her voice. “Don’t ever do that again! You took ten years off my life!”

  Brigitte looked up at her. “I had to do something! He was going to open all the bundles. We’d have all been in jail.”

  Kathleen shook her head. “You were magnificent. Flawless! You convinced me, and I saw the whole thing!”

  The others had recovered from the near mortal fright and the shock, and the murmuring began, and then the words came tumbling in nervous streams.

  “It terrified me,” Margaret said. “When that soldier stopped me I thought we were all going to prison forever.”

  A heavy knock came at the door and instantly the room fell silent while the reverend called, “Who is it?”

  “Walt Soderquist. Is someone hurt in there?”

  Mattie opened the door, and Doctor Soderquist, plump and balding and sweating from his hurry, bustled in and looked at Brigitte, Phoebe right behind.

  “Are you the one that’s hurt?”

  Brigitte looked at Margaret, and Margaret spoke. “We can tell Walter.” She turned to him. “She’s not hurt. She faked an injury to save us all when we smuggled muskets into the chapel.”

  Doctor Soderquist stopped dead still and studied Margaret for several seconds. “Someone better tell me what’s going on here.”

  Five minutes later Walter Soderquist started to chuckle, and then he laughed until he wheezed and tears ran. “You mean you women brought seven muskets right past two British soldiers, faked this injury, and browbeat that corporal out front?”

  Phoebe’s eyebrows rose. “It appears we did, though I don’t yet understand how. And never, never will any of us ever try something like this again!”

  Doctor Soderquist set his black bag by Brigitte’s foot and knelt down. “I better wrap that good so it’ll look right. And I’ll send you a bill.” He laughed as he unbuttoned her shoe. “No, on second thought, I won’t send a bill.” He began wrapping a massive bandage. “This one’s free. Hearing that wild story was worth it.” He shook his head. “Nobody’s going to believe it.”

  The doctor finished and examined his work. “Take that off whenever you want. It’s only there to help your story.” He closed and picked up his black bag, then looked around at the faces of the women and shook his head. “Right under their noses,” he said to himself, and walked out the door.

  Margaret looked at the others. “The longer we stay here, the more risk. We better see if we can back out past those soldiers.” She raised a warning finger and the room fell silent. “Nobody breathe a word of what happened here. It could be our undoing!”

  Every face sobered and they all silently nodded.

  They gathered the children, and the moment they started back through the chapel Kathleen and Margaret took Brigitte’s arms around their shoulders and walked her, with her bandaged foot raised. They reached the large front doors, and Kathleen turned the knob and swung open the doors. The sunlight flooded in and they stopped in their tracks.

  A British captain and a young lieutenant filled the door frame. The lieutenant, taller than average, had blue eyes and dark hair, and a scar in his right eyebrow. He was not handsome, but striking. Brigitte stared into his face and recognition struck. She gasped and stiffened, and Kathleen’s head swivelled to look at her. The lieutenant’s eyes narrowed for a moment, searching his memory, and then he remembered. Kathleen saw it in his eyes, and he shifted his gaze to the women behind.

  “What’s the meaning of this?” the captain demanded.

  Kathleen faced him cooly. “There was an accident. Doctor Soderquist treated this young lady’s injured foot and said we must take her home and get her into bed. We’re taking her home.”

  Behind them, Silas Olmsted silently walked up the aisle and stood listening.

  “I can see that. What did you bring into the church? The corporal said you brought something in.”

  Kathleen’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “Ask him! He was told hours ago we were bringing quilting frames for a quilting bee. He didn’t believe us, so he opened a bundle to look. Ask him!”

  Behind, Sarah grasped Faith and Priscilla by the hands and watched and listened and waited.

  The captain’s forehead creased in question. “Did he inspect all the quilting frames?”

  Kathleen opened her mouth to answer when Sarah barged forward with the two children and exclaimed belligerently, “We have children here who are hungry. We have husbands coming home and supper to prepare and wash to take from the lines. Isn’t it enough that you’ve injured this girl?”

  Dorothy pushed forward, clutching the hands of Adam and Trudy. “What’s the reason for keeping these children from their homes and suppers?”

  The captain shifted his weight and licked his lips. “We have our orders. We must—”

  Dorothy cut him off, her voice loud, hot. “Did they include injuring young women and keeping children from their homes, sir?”

  “Ma’am, we are not—”

  Dorothy gave him no quarter. “You most certainly are! What is your name, sir? I’m taking your name to the Committee of Safety!”

  “Ma’am, I am only obeying—”

  Again Dorothy chopped in. “And we are only taking our children and this injured girl home, sir, and we’re leaving now.” Dorothy pushed past Kathleen and Margaret and Brigitte, and the captain and lieutenant stepped aside. Sarah followed, and Mercy Hobson came behind, herding the children. As Mercy passed the officers she tipped her nose into the air and grunted a resounding “Humph.”

  Kathleen and Margaret, with Brigitte between them, followed the others out onto the brick walkway when the young lieutenant’s voice stopped them. “One moment.” He turned to the captain. “Sir, if our troops caused this, would it be in order to have one of our physicians examine the damage?”

  Behind them, Silas Olmsted quietly closed the big doors and set the great oak bar into its brackets. He ran to the nearest bundle of quilting frames, frantically threw it over his thin, wiry shoulder, trotted down past the pulpit, jammed the bundle beneath the sacrament table, then returned for the second bundle.

  Brigitte blurted, “No! Doctor Soderquist took care of it. I just need to go home.”

  The lieutenant brought his eyes to hers, and they were penetrating, incisive. She felt
he was looking into the very depths of her soul, that there was nothing, no secret he did not comprehend, and in that brief instant she saw the slightest hint of a smile, and a look of understanding crept to linger for the briefest moment.

  He knows! He knows! Brigitte felt the blood drain from her face, and she battled to maintain a noncommittal mask.

  He dropped his eyes for a moment, then turned back to the captain. “Perhaps not.”

  Kathleen seized the moment. With Brigitte’s arm still over her shoulder, she started up the pathway. “Come on. We’ve got to catch up with the others.”

  They had gone five paces when the lieutenant called after them, “May we call for a carriage to take her home? One can be here from the base in five minutes.”

  “We’ll manage,” Kathleen answered, without looking back. They marched to the corner with shoulders squared, heads high. Margaret turned to search across the street to the north, and Matthew appeared for a brief moment beside a great oak, then disappeared.

  The five blocks from the church to the Dunson home had never seemed so brutally long. They passed one British patrol that stopped and eyed them suspiciously, then another. Brigitte counted every step, every brick, every breath, expecting the voice of the captain or the lieutenant every instant, commanding them to stop, arresting them. She was certain they had gone into the church, unwrapped the quilting frames, discovered the muskets, and gathered soldiers to arrest them. She was petrified at the thought of looking back, and she listened to every sound from behind, waiting for the pounding of countless heavy black boots as the soldiers came running.

  But there were no boots, no voices, no running soldiers, no arrest.

  Dorothy and Sarah herded the children through the front gate, up the sunken brick walkway. John threw open the door and they plunged inside, Kathleen and Margaret last with Brigitte supported between them. The women collapsed on the sofa and chairs, silent, shoulders slumped, unable to believe they had delivered the muskets and escaped arrest and capture. The children stood silent, knowing something frightening had happened but not aware what it was.

  Matthew grasped Kathleen by the shoulders, and she sagged against him for support. Caleb backed into a corner, totally confused. John lifted Brigitte into his arms, white-faced. “You’re hurt!”

  “No. I’m fine.”

  He stood rooted to the spot, Brigitte still in his arms, and faced Margaret. “What happened?” He held his breath, waiting.

  Margaret rounded her lips and blew air. “Caleb, take the children into the backyard. Give them each a gingersnap. Take the jar.”

  She waited until the door closed behind Caleb, then turned to John. “Brigitte’s not hurt. The muskets are there. I don’t know if they’ve figured it out yet.”

  John closed his eyes, and all the air drained from him as he lowered Brigitte to her feet. “Tell me.”

  Margaret started, and Brigitte broke in, and Dorothy interrupted, and it was as though the dam had burst. Sarah chuckled, and then Phoebe laughed, and then they were all laughing, nervously at first, then uproariously. For ten minutes John listened intently as the details came spewing.

  The telling played itself out, and as the voices subsided and talking settled, John sobered. “If they found the muskets, they’d be here by now. So far so good.” He looked at each of the women for a moment. “You’ve done a remarkable thing. Don’t breathe a word of this until the time is right. You’ll know when. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  The women glanced at each other. They needed no thanks. They all knew they had something, a bond, that they would share forever, because they had volunteered for something deadly and dangerous, and for the right reasons, and they had succeeded. As long as memories endured, they would have this one thing, this one bright deed, quietly shining in their hearts. It was enough.

  Dorothy stood and squared her shoulders. “I’ve got clothes on the line and supper to prepare. I must be on my way.”

  Margaret held up a hand for silence. “Not a word to anyone.”

  They all nodded. Five minutes later John and his family stood in the front yard and watched the women lead their children through the gate, and waved to them until they were all out of sight. Matthew walked to the middle of the cobblestone street and stood looking both directions while John led the others back inside.

  Matthew followed them in. “There are no British in sight.”

  Margaret served supper late, in the lengthening shadows of sunset, amid unending chatter from the children. Caleb sat bewildered, groping to understand, and Margaret and John cleared the dishes while Brigitte sat at the table with the children with a book. They knelt together for evening prayers, and Margaret tucked the children into bed.

  At ten o’clock John blew out the lamp in their bedroom and slipped beneath the thick comforter, and reached to stroke Margaret’s hair in the dark. “You did a remarkable thing this afternoon.”

  “A foolish thing, you mean.” She paused for a moment and then shuddered. “Never again. It was too close.”

  He touched her cheek. “Thank you. For everything.”

  The sharp rap at the window sounded loud in the darkness, and Margaret gasped as John rolled from the bed and reached the window in one fluid movement, where he crouched on one knee. He moved the edge of the curtain enough to see out into the silver light of a full moon, and his eyes widened for a moment.

  He was looking into the shadowy face of Tom Sievers. Tom raised a hand to point towards the kitchen door and John stood.

  “It’s Tom,” he said, and trotted barefoot in his nightshirt down the hall, through the kitchen, and to the back door, which he threw open.

  Tom’s voice came low, urgent. “There’s trouble. The British have Silas shackled and are wrecking the church searching. Warren’s headed there now.”

  “Wait.” John spun and ran silently back to his bedroom and began changing back into his street clothes.

  Margaret sat bolt upright in bed, comforter drawn to her chin, her voice strained, too high. “What’s wrong?”

  “The British are at the church searching. I’ve got to go.”

  Brigitte thrust her head inside the door. “Something’s wrong. What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” exclaimed Margaret. “What are you doing up?”

  “Couldn’t sleep. Someone’s here. What’s wrong?”

  “The British are at the church,” John said.

  Brigitte gasped and clapped both hands over her mouth, then spun and ran back into her bedroom and locked the door.

  ______

  Notes

  The details about the British military musket called the Brown Bess are correct (see French, The Day of Concord and Lexington, pp. 27–30).

  There were many colonial women who were patriots, often spying and carrying secret, important messages and performing other acts for their country. Thus, while the smuggling of the Dunson muskets into the church as described in this chapter is fictional, it is nonetheless well within reality to believe that women would volunteer, and succeed, in such an act.

  Monday, April 17, 1775

  Chapter VI

  * * *

  John turned the corner, pushed through the gathering, shouting, ugly crowd, and stopped dead in his tracks, stunned, unbelieving, chest heaving from his run. Tom stopped beside him, eyes glittering, mouth an ugly slit as he battled for breath. For long moments they stood without moving, without speaking, trying desperately to make sense of the citizens gathered across the street from the chapel, shouting, waving fists and axe handles and pitchforks.

  Fifty large torches on six-foot standards were jammed into the grass at intervals around the churchyard, and the flames cast long, dancing shadows. More than one hundred British regulars ringed the church, their red coats and white belts bright in the firelight. They faced outward, muskets in their hands, bayonets lowered and ready, shining yellow in the fire’s glow. Ten officers paced inside the ring of soldiers, sabers drawn and flashing, shouting the repea
ted order, “Fire if they step into the street!”

  The big double doors into the church stood open like a yawning entrance into a cavern. Lanterns inside the chapel lighted the high stained-glass windows and cast colored lights into the surrounding trees, while sounds of booted feet, hollow on the hardwood floors inside, echoed out into the night.

  Someone jostled through the crowd to John’s side, and he looked. It was Warren, breathless, sweating, angry. “What are they doing?” he shouted above the din.

  “I don’t know. I just got here.”

  Warren sucked air, set his jaw, and shoved his way into the street. John was at his side, Tom one step behind, his hand beneath his coat clutching the head of his tomahawk.

  A British officer pivoted, set his feet, pointed his saber at the three men, and shouted, “Halt or we fire!”

  Warren stopped in the street, turned and raised both hands to the surging crowd, and waited for them to quiet.

  “Hold your peace until I find out the meaning of this,” he called, and slowly they settled. Warren turned back to the British officer, John paced straight towards the bayonets, and Warren caught up with him and Tom.

  “Prepare to fire,” shouted the officer, and the musket muzzles levelled.

  “Sir,” Warren shouted, “I am Joseph Warren and this is John Dunson, both of us members of the Committee of Safety of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. We come in peace to determine the reason for this outrage against our house of worship. Shoot if you dare!” None of the three men slowed.

  “Cock your pieces,” the officer commanded, and the double clicks of the heavy musket hammers being drawn came loud and sharp.

  “Murder us in this street and the consequences of the bloodbath will be on your heads. If you believe your soldiers can reload in time to stop those behind us, then fire and be done with it.”

  They continued their steady pace towards the bayonets and musket muzzles of the regulars between them and the officer. The muzzles wavered.

  “Do we shoot ’em, sir?” one regular croaked, voice cracking.

  Dead silence settled in the unbearable tension. The only sound was the measured stride of the three men on the cobblestones and the hollow thump of boots drifting from inside the church. The officer’s chin trembled for a moment, but he did not speak. The three men reached the bayonet of the soldier who had spoken, and John pushed it aside. The man did not resist, and they walked past him towards the officer. They reached him and he lowered his sword and they stopped.