by Smith, Skye
Three long haired young women dressed in ankle length Indian cotton dresses and hiking boots stopped beside them. The one with the ring in her lip said, "You'd better get your gran away from here. Some students are going to occupy this square in a few minutes. They are coming down the street now."
"Don't you dare take me away," said Nana to Maya. "I haven't seen a good student demonstration since the seventies. Besides, isn't the Occupy Movement a pacifist movement? What's the harm in staying to watch."
"Suit yourself," said Ms. Lipring, "but don't say we didn't warn you. The police say that the march can't pass though this square because it has already been booked for a Tea Party rally. We may be pacifists but there's no saying what the police or the Tea Party may do."
"Don't look so smug, child," Nana scolded. "You know as well as I that the party rally will be the reason the students are coming here. The whole point of passive demonstrations is to spur the other guys into doing something stupid on camera. Oooh, I can't wait."
They could hear the sounds of a large crowd approaching, and the scream of sirens. Moments later the first line of police in riot gear formed up along the street, followed soon after by the arrival of a phalanx of grubby looking young men carrying hand made cardboard posters that said things like 'I am one of the 99%' and 'Eat the Rich' and 'Roofs for the Homeless' and 'Help families, not bankers' and 'Cut off Corp Welfare'.
On the other side of the square a much smaller group of well dressed people, surrounded by TV cameras, were slowly backing out of the square. They carried patriotic flags and very professional looking plastic signs that said things like 'Cut taxes' and 'Cut off welfare bums' and 'Support our boys overseas'.
The tactics of the police were obvious. They were simply slowing down one group to give the other group time to leave. The difference in numbers between the two groups was extreme. The group surrounded by TV cameras numbered thirty of forty, while there were now thousands streaming into the square from the other direction.
"I don't understand," said Nana to no one in particular. "Why are the TV cameras staying with that bunch, when the real news is the mob now coming into the square."
"Because the Tea Party is politically correct and therefore will be on the News Channels coast to coast," said a grumpy old man, who must have decided that it was safer to stay close to this group of women than to sit by himself. "They just want to help the Republicans by making trouble for the Democrats. This other bunch want a regime change to get rid of the corporate bosses that run both the Republicans and the Democrats."
"So why don't the Tea Party use the news cameras to organize a boycott of Chinese imports. That’s what they would have done in the 1770's?" Maya asked but the looks she got in reply made her stop talking.
There was now pushing and shoving between students and police and Nana began to lose her nerve. "Uhh, Maya. I think I've seen enough. Why don't I treat you to lunch and then you can run me home. Maya, Maya." She looked around.
Ms. Lipring and one of her friends were gently laying Maya out on a bench where the third woman had sat down so Maya's head would have a pillow. "She just fainted," said the Ms to the gran. Maya looked like she was a thousand miles away. In truth she was only two blocks away but two hundred and forty years out of time.
* * * * *
* * * * *
Britta was washing her wool cloak in preparation for cold weather. The cooler weather of autumn matched the mood on the streets of Boston. Sleeping out had been more plausible in warm weather than in cold. Young people who had been drawn from the farms of the countryside by the promise of the city life of Boston, and for jobs that paid cash, were now drifting back to their parents' farms.
The Caucus still had not found a replacement issue for the peoples hatred of taxes. Another issue that they could use to control on the agenda on the streets. The agenda seemed to be controlled by the free rum that the smugglers and their merchant supplied at their rallies against the Company.
John Hancock, in much improved temper because he was no longer driven to distraction by pain, was becoming a new force in the Central Committee. Unlike the others, who were mostly lawyers and idealists, Hancock owned ships and therefore had faithful crews at his beckoning. If men were needed for numbers or for muscle, he was the only one amongst them who could snap his fingers and produce them.
Although Britta had been invited by Lydia to visit her again where she was staying at the grand mansion of the governor's son, she did not like being the guest of a guest, and she did not feel at ease around Red. Lydia solved that problem by ordering some new gowns from the seamstress she had always used back when she had owned the coffee shop. The seamstress had a shop just north of the market, and an easy walk from the Anchor Coffee Shoppe.
Half of the seamstress's shop was a consignment business. Women could leave gowns that no longer fit at the shop, and the seamstress would try to sell them for a commission. It was a good business because she always made more than just the commission because she also earned from the alterations the buyer would require.
While Lydia stood for her fittings of her new gowns, Britta would browse through the racks of consignment gowns, occasionally trying one on. In her whole life, Britta had never had money to spend frivolously on herself. Now she had just a little. While other shops in Boston would hurt for business whenever there was excitement in the streets, Britta's earnings would soar because the meeting room behind the shop would become so busy.
So it was today when she got back to the coffee shop after spending a lovely two hours visiting with Lydia and day-dreaming about gowns. Jon met her at the door. "Where have you been? I've been bloody run off my feet, and we need more from the bakery."
"Visiting with Lydia at the seamstress shop. I'm sorry I was so long. Go, go now to the bakery. I will take over here." Jon disappeared upstairs while she took a survey of what was happening in the shop and the meeting room, and then went to the galley to make up some trays.
Jon walked past the galley a few moments later with his hair combed and wearing his best clothes. She smiled and hoped this meant he was keeping company with one of the baker's daughters. Only after he was out the door did she realize what was really going on. She had stupidly told him where to find Lydia. She ran after him, but he was already out of sight. She couldn't follow him, for she couldn't leave the shop. All she could do was wait.
Jon did not return for over three hours. At least he hadn't forgotten to go to the bakery on the way home. She waited for him to put the bakery box down, and then she trapped him in the galley and pushed him against the wall. He was looking so dreamily happy that she could not resist kissing his cheek. He smelled of sex and lily of the valley.
"I hope you realize that you just turned Lydia into an adulteress. She has only been married half a year," she said softly.
"I know. She is wonderful. The seamstress allowed us to use her upstairs room."
"And you do understand that if Red ever finds out, he will shoot you."
"I know. She is wonderful. I love her so much, and she loves me."
"Jon, you do understand that there is a difference between the way you love her and the way she loves you?" He just smiled back at her with a witless grin. She gave up. Lydia was an addict as sure as her first husband had been an addict. For Lydia, however, the drug was not opium, but sex. She felt frustrated and angry, but she did not know whether the feeling was because of Jon or because of Jim.
Jim was only four miles away, and yet it may as well have been four hundred miles, when he was so squirreled away with his books and his tutors. Even though she saw him a few times a month, it was never for more than an hour or two. They hadn't slept together for months because his college demanded that he sleep every night in the dorm. She was sure that was his mother's doing and not because he was having troubles with his studies.
Britta had promised Jim that she would consummate their love as soon as the third of the banns was read. The second had been read, yet he had n
ot yet asked for the third. What was he waiting for? Why was he delaying? She was sure that this was his mother's doing as well.
She added some tarts from the bakery box to the tray she was preparing, and then lifted the heavy tray and took it into the meeting room. Since Samuel and John Hancock had been getting along better, there had been less tension in the meetings. Not today.
"This is your doing Samuel Adams!" yelled John Hancock waving a poster at him. "You and your Harvard Digger communists. You're nothing but a trouble making pack of dreamers. Intellectual fops to a one. The agenda on the street has yet again changed. No longer are the merchants leading the way. Now it is the homeless that are rallying, and they are aiming their wrath at the landlords and moneylenders, rather than the governor and the Company."
"Neither I, nor any one on this committee had anything to do with it," said Sam calmly.
"I don't believe you. You have spoken against the bankers in every meeting." Mr. Hancock put the poster on the table. "The big land owners, and the landlords are blaming us, and let me warn you that they are worried and angry."
Britta purposefully put the tray down next to the poster and read it while she absent-mindedly passed out the cups.
************* OCCUPY EMPTY BUILDINGS *************
We, the people living under English Common Law, hereby claim the right of adverse possession.
If a building is not being used, and if you have a moral and just use for it,
such as for sheltering your family from winter storms, then you may take possession of it.
It must be already open, for you must not break and enter.
You must secure it.
You must stop the titled owner from using it for any purpose.
You must actively use it.
If you use it as your home, then you may defend it as your home,
with any force deemed necessary.
************* OCCUPY EMPTY BUILDINGS *************
She sat down to listen to John Hancock while she poured coffee for him and Sam.
"Last night every lock on every empty building in Boston was broken," said John. "This morning this poster was handed out to all of the families sleeping on the street. By noon every empty building was occupied and defended."
"I know nothing about that," said Sam, "but I have read the poster, and what it says is true. Those families who occupied empty buildings now have homes, and the banks and other landlords now face a long legal battle to evict them, for they are legal squatters. I have sent two of our lawyers to the courts to watch out for what the bank's lawyers will do. The good news is that a lot of dispossessed people now have roofs over their heads in good time for the winter rains."
Both Sam and Hancock stopped talking to sip their coffee. They stared at each other, but no longer in friendship. Hancock was one of the wealthiest landlords in Boston. Some of his buildings would surely have been occupied.
"This same law was how my family lost their home," said Britta as she reached over and stole a chunk of Sam's tart. "The local lord sent a man who tricked us into moving out of our home, and then he moved in and claimed it for the lord. Some of my Scottish customers have told me similar stories." The room was quiet. Everyone was listening. "All I am trying to say is that if the lords can do it, then so can the folk."
"Would Jemmy Otis, or his sister Mercy have published this?" asked Hancock. "It has the feel of their work."
"I would have heard," said Sam, "besides, I was told that students were handing them out."
"If the buildings are now claimed by legal squatters, can the owners sell them?" Britta asked.
"Of course," replied Sam, "but no one in their right minds would buy them. They cannot be used by others while they are occupied."
"And did the street people occupy only houses, or did move into shops and warehouse too?" she asked.
"Every empty building, is what I was told," said Hancock.
"Then does this ruin the governor's plans for the new Company consignees?" she asked. "I mean, weren't they looking to buy or rent empty warehouses?"
Sam looked at Hancock and whooped with joy. Hancock realized why the whoop, and laughed despite his temper.
Britta started to giggle and could not control it, so she apologized for interrupting them and left the room with her tray. She went to the galley and hugged herself and danced a little jig. It was Jim. Of course it was Jim. Jim had written that poster. He and his friends at Harvard. She knew it. He was so very much his father's son. No wonder he had been too busy to visit her this week.
* * * * *
Britta's All Saints' Day and her personal communion with her goddess Freyja were interrupted by a meeting with Lydia, who had sent word from the seamstress shop that she was there collecting her gowns, and that she and Red were going back to the farm this very day.
Lydia's message had been clearly stated. Boston was too risky of a place to stay, and certainly not a place to buy a house at this time, not with the risk of it being occupied. "If you need to flee Boston, then please flee to me," she offered.
As soon as Britta returned from a pleasant hour with Lydia, Jon left in a hurry with his hair combed and wearing his good clothes. She knew he would be disappointed but he ignored her calls to bring him back. Red and the children had picked Lydia up from the seamstress shop while she was with her. They would be across the bridge by now.
She went into the meeting room to report what Lydia had told her. She had to wait her turn. There was great excitement. In every Province except for Massachusetts Bay and Georgia, the Company consignees had either resigned or else had promised to refuse the first delivery from the Company.
"Philadelphia’s plan has worked," reported John Adams. "The consignees were afraid that if they took delivery and paid for the cargo, their own customers might refuse to buy anything from them. Nothing like the risk of losing customers to make a merchant take notice."
"What happened in Georgia?" asked John Hancock.
"It doesn't matter," Sam interrupted, "they are not a province so much as a convict colony and of no importance." He knew Britta was needing to get back to the shop, so he invited her to speak next.
"I have word," she no longer mentioned the names of spies, "that Boston's consignees have lost the backing of their bankers. The consignees do not trust that the banks can release the warehouses they need from the hands of the Occupy movement. The bankers do not trust that the consignees will ever take delivery of the cargos. Both sides wanted cash assurances. Both sides refused.
The governor and his sons have been discussing getting permission from the Customs Office to store the cargos in bond. This would temporarily wave the duty and tax that is due on Company cargoes when they are landed. They are fearful that no one will buy from them right away so they don't want to pay all of the duty right away. The bankers are demanding that the governor order the courts to hurry the legal process of clearing the occupied buildings."
"Is there anything else?"
"Yes, I no longer have a contact in the governor's son's house." Britta gave a feeble curtsey and then picked up her tray to leave but only went as far as the door. There she lingered to listen.
"If the governor's consignees cannot afford to take delivery, they must either resign or refuse the cargo. The same end that Philadelphia has already achieved," John Hancock speculated. "The difference is that here they will drag this out as long as possible hoping for a miracle."
"What miracle?" asked John Adams. "If their customers won't buy from them, they have no business. It's not as if they are selling food to starving people. The province is self-sufficient in the stuff of life."
Sam spoke up. "Do not underestimate our governor. He is devious and greedy. He may drag it out hoping for violence. If there is violence, then he wins. He will be quick to call out the navy and impose marshal law. That will be the end of us, both personally and as a group. We will be taken, jailed, and beaten."
"Umm," interrupted Britta, "I was just o
ut walking, and the streets seem much safer now that the homeless have shelter. There aren't gangs of ragged men hanging about on the corners any more."
"So, what now?" asked Hancock, "the outcome of the Occupy movement has two sides. The homeless are now fighting the landlords and banks, and are winning, but because they are winning they are no longer homeless so they are off the streets. It means that any demonstrations against the Company are going to look mighty thin from now on."
"I agree," said John Adams. "I mean, what does it really matter to the poor whether one set of rich merchants or another set of rich merchants controls the Atlantic trade? Unfortunate timing for all those smuggler merchants that formed the North End Caucus, like that twit Revere. We warned them not to give that ultimatum to the consignees. They are going to look pretty silly tomorrow when the noon gun is heard and not one of the consignees resigns from the Company."
"Unfortunately everyone assumes that the North End Caucus is a part our organization," said Sam, "instead of just a bunch of self-serving smugglers and merchants from the Saint Andrews Masons. No offence to Mr. Hancock."
John Hancock grimaced. "All right, I admit I drink with them. I will go and talk to them. An ultimatum is no good without consequences. Perhaps I can get them to pay for renting Faneuil Hall and a few barrels of rum. Nothing brings out the mob like free rum."
"Not rum. Ale is good enough. Adam's Ale." Sam offered, "I'll give them a good deal. Oh and John, if they ask that I be the moderator at the hall, say no. Our committee does not approve of what the North Enders have been doing. Feel free to volunteer if you wish."
John Hancock finished his coffee and left.
"Britta, I think you were right," said John Adams. "I think he is a spy for the North End Caucus, or for the Saint Andrew masons, or for both as I am sure they have the same members. It makes sense. They are mostly smugglers or merchants of smuggled goods, just as he is."
Sam was tapping his pencil. "I worry that everyone thinks we are connected. Hancock is one of those connections. I worry that some of their hotheads, like Revere, will cause violence. If they cause marshal law to be declared, we will all be painted with the same brush, despite our own non-violent agenda."
