The Tory Widow

by Christine Blevins

  “Let’s show the British bastards what we really think of them, ladies.” Mother Babcock gathered the hems of her skirts. “Royal Navy mine arse!”

  And on that command, hoisting petticoats, shifts and robes, the whores lined up along the parapet and presented their rear ends. Laughing, Sally turned to Anne with eyes flashing, and without hesitation, they both joined the row of giggling women and wriggling bare bottoms, lifting their skirts in mass contemptuous salute.

  The Rose responded with fourteen of her starboard guns. Solid shot lopped off the top of the chimney no more than twelve paces away, another smoking iron ball tore through the brick a story below. The women took off in a screaming melee, tumbling down the stairs to fall in laughing, breathy heaps onto the furnishings in the parlor on the first floor.

  Patsy Quinn caught up with Anne and Sally as they headed for the door. “You can stay with us until the streets are safe.”

  Anne retied the loose strings of her straw hat. “Those ships are moving upriver and my shop’s down near Whitehall Slip—I think we’ll be safe enough, Patsy.”

  “You know, I remember your name as well—Anne Merrick, right?” Patsy leaned against the doorframe. Clutching her dressing gown at her throat with one hand, she smoothed her hair with the other. “I see you sometimes . . . around the college.”

  Sally fidgeted, peering up and down the street. “Let’s be gone, Annie, afore anyone sees us here.”

  Anne ignored Sally and questioned the prostitute. “So will you all be leaving town now?”

  “Not us,” Patsy said with a laugh and a shake of her head. “If the Redcoats invade, we’ll make do, just as we did when the Continentals took over.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “The ol’ bitch is always sayin’ how war is nothing but good for business.”

  “Hmph,” Anne muttered. “She’s most probably right.”

  With that exchange, Sally succeeded in pulling Anne out the door and down the stoop.

  Anne called out over her shoulder, “Fare well, Patsy!”

  Patsy waved and closed the door.

  THE bombardment of the town set another panic in motion among New York’s citizenry. The Royal Navy’s foray up the Hudson resulted in hasty packing and many new refugees with bundles and carts heading northward, making their way off of the island.

  In an effort to carry on and ignore the dread and uncertainty muttering at every street corner and doorway, Anne and Sally rolled up sleeves to try their hand at producing a batch of peach cordial with the overripe peaches they’d collected over the course of the week.

  Sally brought a cauldron of water to a roiling boil in the kitchen, and they began the steamy business of scalding the fruit. The peaches were dropped into the hot bath, then scooped up one by one with a long-handled wire strainer and dumped into a tub of cool water.

  Anne transferred the scalded fruit to a large bucket, and the sweat-drenched women decided to move the cordial enterprise to the table in the garden shade. Paring knives in hand, Anne and Sally straddled the bench facing each other, and took up the tedious chore of peeling and slicing. Sally slipped off the fuzzy skin, and rolled the slippery peach into the tin bowl they’d set between them.

  “The English surely rubbed our noses in it today, na?”

  “That they did.” Anne halved the peeled peach and pried the stone out, plunking it into a tin pail. Charred peach pits ground to a powder made a decent pigment for writing ink.

  “An’ there’s surely no doubt now who owns the river,” Sally added.

  “I expect that is true.” Anne dropped the pitted peach halves back into the bowl.

  “If Howe can sail about us and land thousands of soldiers where he will, there’s no chance Washington will be able to hold this city.” Sally peeled and plopped another naked peach into the bowl. “We should think on packing it up for Peekskill, Annie.”

  “Leave for Peekskill . . .” Saying the words aloud caused Anne to shudder on the hottest day of the year—absurdly, far more frightened by the prospect of losing her own place in the world than by the notion of invading Redcoats and Hessians.

  “Leave my home to ruin? Leave Jemmy’s grave behind? Become, once again, my father’s chattel, at the mercy of his selfish intentions?” Anne shook her head. “No . . . I just can’t do it—but if you want to leave, Sally, I wouldn’t stop you.”

  “Annie! Ye know full well I willna go anywhere without ye.” Sally’s brogue tended to thicken when she was excitable.

  Anne could see the tears spring to her friend’s eyes. “You know, the British put a scare into everyone today with that run up the river. Maybe now the Congress’ll be more amenable to negotiating some sort of peace.”

  “Aye . . . and maybe the funny wee man with no arms will catch a hare.”

  Anne laughed and grabbed another peach from the bowl. “As I see it, we have two courses from which to choose. We can panic, become vagabonds on the road and let this war be the ruin of us for certain—” her blade bit into the peach flesh, the sharp edge circumnavigating the pit—“or we can show patience, and see how this game plays out.” Twisting the two halves apart, she dug a thumbnail under the stone and tore it free. “Maybe Mother Babcock has the right of it—war is good for business—maybe we should look upon the whole situation as an opportunity—”

  “Aye . . .” Sally retorted with a snort. “Never underestimate the wisdom of a rich old whore.”

  The sound of thunder rolling across the eastern horizon caused them both to look up to the cloudless blue sky.

  “What on earth . . .”

  This thunder was too regular—too rhythmic—too incessant to be the result of a distant storm at sea. Sally and Anne splashed their peach-sticky hands in water. Wiping wet hands on aprons, the women ran through the shop and out onto the lane.

  The pounding noise drew the interest of the neighbors. Armed with a long spyglass, Walter Quakenbos was already on the march to the waterfront. Anne and Sally trotted after the baker, and they all scrambled up to join the equally curious gathering along the top of the battery wall at the end of Pearl Street.

  Out on the eastern horizon, flashes of fire amid puffs of smoke accompanied the thumping bombardment, and the shouts of men cheering, “Huzzah,” carried bright and clear across the still water of the bay. Quakenbos trained his glass on the commotion coming from the fleet of ships anchored around Bedloe’s Island.

  “Hey, Annie! Sal!” Shovels on shoulders, grimy and sweat-stained Jack, accompanied by Titus, called out from the street. “What do you see up there?”

  “Looks like the lobsterbacks are giving salute,” Quakenbos answered, waving the men up onto the wall. The baker continued his report, peering through the glass. “A big ship of the line with an immense St. George’s Cross flying from the main mast has joined them.” He dropped the glass. “I’d wager pounds to pennies that’s Black Dick ’s standard they’re cheering—Admiral Howe has arrived. Have a look . . .” The baker handed Jack the spyglass.

  “Of course they cheer,” Anne said, with a sad shake of her head. “With the admiral comes a hundred more ships and thousands more soldiers.”

  “Och . . .” Sally moaned, her apron a twist in her hands. “We’ll never win without a navy.”

  “We don’t need ships. This is our country. We have but to stand our ground,” Jack said, his eye never leaving the lens, his voice solid and sure. “By cunning, daring and dark of night we will harry them—and we will win.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Nothing but heaven is impregnable to vice.

  THOMAS PAINE, Common Sense

  Thursday, August 15, 1776

  Over Darts at the Cup and Quill

  CLOSE to curfew, Sally shot the bolts home on the front door, closing the Liberty Coffeehouse for the day. Anne moved from table to table, gathering dirty dishes onto a tray and wiping down the tabletops with a damp rag.

  It had been a full month since the Phoenix and Rose sailed blithely past the Continental batteries a
nd riverfront forts, traveling twenty-five miles upriver to where the Hudson widened and formed a natural lake called the Tappan Zee. The ships dropped anchor near Tarrytown, effectively choking off a major supply route for the people of New York City and the army quartered there.

  The British incursion caused many steadfast New Yorkers—including a few of the Widow Merrick’s competitors—to close shop and leave the city, and as a result, business at the Cup and Quill flourished. After a long, busy day, Anne poured a tot of rum into her coffee, and dragged a chair over to join Sally watching Jack and Titus embroiled in a serious game of darts.

  Jack toed the chalk line that had been paced out and marked on the floorboards. Eye asquint, lower lip caught in his teeth, the wooden barrel of a turkey-feathered barb pinched just so between thumb and forefinger, he let the dart fly, hitting the edge of the smallest center circle.

  “Hah!” Jack punched Titus in the upper arm. “Your fate is sealed, my friend. Submit to my superior skill and commence to digging in your pocket—what was our wager? Five dollars?”

  “Two dollars . . .” Titus replied. Rubbing his arm, he shot a glance at the score Sally tallied up on the chalkboard. “But it’s fine by me if you want to make it five.”

  “Done.” Jack slapped a tabletop. “Five dollars to the winner.”

  The two men had developed a comfortable camaraderie over the past several weeks, spending most days together on crews building fortifications, and most evenings at the Cup and Quill, over spirits and darts.

  Boosted by the accuracy of his last throw and anxious to claim a rare victory, Jack hurried to finish his set. His rushed shot flew wide, missing the board and bouncing off the plaster to fall with a clatter to the floor.

  “There’s your chance, Titus!” Sally exclaimed.

  “No worries.” Jack gathered the three darts and handed them off to Titus for his final turn. “My last set was the death knell for ol’ Titus.”

  Titus stepped up to the line, threw his first dart, hitting the board dead center.

  “He needs to hit two more of the same to earn a draw,” Jack scoffed, pulling a chair up to sit with the girls. “The match is as good as mine.”

  Titus threw his next dart for a second bull’s-eye.

  “Ha!” Sally exclaimed. “Ye ken now, don’t ye, Jack? Titus’s been toying wi’ ye all along.”

  “A lucky throw.” Jack folded his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair, rocking on the rear legs. “The odds are against him hitting three in a row.”

  Titus took his final throw, and the front legs of Jack’s chair thumped to the floorboards as the last dart joined its mates in the center.

  “A draw!” the women clapped and cheered.

  “You’ve only managed to prolong your misery, my friend.” Jack snatched the offending darts from the board. “One last set to settle the match—three darts each.”

  Titus grinned and shrugged, stepping back to allow his opponent a position at the line. Jack took his time, making three careful throws, landing one bull’s-eye and two very respectable near misses. “Witness the steady application of skill, as opposed to plain dumb luck,” Jack proclaimed with a wide wave toward the board.

  “You’d best mind your boasting tongue, Jack Hampton,” Anne admonished. “Overconfidence can lead to a dangerous fall . . .”

  Unfazed by Jack ’s braggadocio, Titus retrieved the darts and took up his position. With a cool aplomb Sally and Anne had witnessed many times before, he threw two darts in quick succession, landing one bull’s-eye and one near miss. Titus let fly his third dart, landing the throw just within the center mark. Turning to Jack with hand outstretched he said, “You owe me five dollars.”

  Annoyed, Jack rooted about in the pocket of his weskit. He pulled forth a crumpled bit of paper and tossed it onto the tabletop. “There’s two dollars—I’ll have to owe you the rest.”

  “Continentals! No, sir—” Titus shook his head, scrunching his nose as if Jack had just served up a turd. “Our wager is in real dollars . . .”

  “We wagered ‘dollars,’ and this is the currency of the realm. It’s not only unlawful, but it’s unpatriotic to refuse it as payment.” Jack snatched up the note to read the fine print. “I don’t know why you worry; it says right here—‘This bill entitles the bearer to receive two Spanish milled dollars.’ ”

  “Dinna bother puttin’ thatch on an empty barn, Jack Hampton,” Sally snorted. “We all ken the worth of a Continental—next to nil.” She made a circle joining thumb and fingers, and peered through the negative space.

  Titus held the paper at an angle to catch the light coming in through the back door, noting the shiny mica flecks embedded in the paper stock. “Could be worse, I suppose. At least it’s not a counterfeit . . .” He slipped the note into his pocket. “Just don’t forget you owe me three.”

  “Have I ever not made good on one of our wagers? Consider yourself fortunate to have bested me, you lucky bastard.” Jack plopped down in a huff to sit beside Anne.

  “Will you ever learn?” Anne shook her head. “Vanity and conceit only breed arrogance—and arrogance can be parlayed to your foe’s advantage.”

  Sally joined in on the scolding. “Aye, yer no better than the bloody lobsterbacks out on the bay—certain of victory, and bound to lose it all in the end.”

  “If I were General Washington, I know what I’d do to beat them Redcoats.” Titus straddled a chair backward. “I’d wait for a moon on the wane and send a few small boats across the bay—set some of them Royal Navy ships alight. Those British are packed together tighter than herring in a barrel, and a little fire would go a long way.”

  Jack perked up, happy to turn the conversation from his character flaws to the flaws in Titus’s military strategy. “That would be suicide. Too much water betwixt us and the fleet—any boats crossing the bay would be sighted by the ship’s watch and blown out of the water before they could get close enough to do any harm.”

  Anne joined in the conjecture. “Well then, I’d set fire to those ships moored out on the Tappan Zee—naught but three ships, but they’ve strangled our trade and supply and do far more harm than the fleet out on the bay.”

  “You know, she’s got something there.” Jack hitched his chair to move closer to Titus. “It wouldn’t take much to wreak a bit of havoc on the Tappan Zee . . . a pair of fireboats, launched upriver—ride the current—sneak up and burn both the Phoenix and the Rose to the waterline.”

  “I’m game.” Titus gripped the finial ends on the chairback. “Daring and doing beats worrying and waiting any day.”

  Jack slapped his friend on the back. “Then let’s do it!”

  “D’ye hear, Annie?” Sally jeered. “They’re ready to take on His Majesty’s Royal Navy.”

  “Fully armed with a bottle of rum and two Continentals . . .” Anne added with a shake of her head.

  Jack and Titus ignored the women and put their heads together to hatch a daredevil scheme, making quick work of the rum. With inebriated enthusiasm, they went next door to roust Quakenbos the baker, and tap him for the lend of his big gelding and the funds required to complete their mission.

  Anne’s futile efforts to persuade the men to wait and reconsider their plan in the sober light of day fell on drunken ears. Unable to dissuade the obstinate pair from their course, and sure she’d find them both on her doorstep come morning, Anne bid the men good-bye and good riddance. Titus and Jack set forth in the dark, riding double, trotting north on Queen Street, toward the Bowery Lane.

  When drowsy Titus slipped his seat and tumbled off onto the road just before reaching the King’s Bridge, the fellows decided to take advantage of a convenient hayrick and catch a few hours of sleep. At daybreak they woke, discovering neither had bothered to hobble the baker’s horse, and they’d lost their mount. Horseless and hungover, but still determined in their quest, they begged two cups of coffee, cheese and a loaf of bread from a kind Dutch farmwife and set off on foot. By noontime they’
d reached the town of Sleepy Hollow, on the shore of the Tappan Zee, a few miles north of Tarrytown.

  In Sleepy Hollow, Jack reunited with an old friend and Liberty Boy he’d apprenticed with at Parker’s Press, a fellow by the name of Joe Bass. Joe helped them locate a pair of decrepit but somewhat seaworthy ships suitable to the purpose—a rickety single-masted sloop and an ancient two-masted schooner. Excited by the fireboat strategy, Bass volunteered to captain the schooner, and he enlisted four local Patriots to bolster the crew.

  After purchasing the necessary incendiary supplies, they moved the two ships to anchor at a point two miles upriver from the British convoy. The rest of the long, hot day was spent fashioning the ships into floating bombs.

  Yards of old canvas were ripped into strips, saturated in turpentine spirits and draped over the sails and rigging. The local boys set to work assembling foot-long bundles of straw as thick as a man’s leg and dipped in molten pitch. The decks of both ships were carpeted with these combustible faggots, leaving a narrow path of exposed decking stretching from stem to stern. Along these paths Jack traced a thick stream of gunpowder leading up to a dozen small kegs filled with flammable pine tar.

  Off in the distance, the bell from the old Dutch church in Sleepy Hollow tolled eleven o’clock, and two fireships bobbed on the current, ready for duty.

  The men gathered together on the deck of the schooner. Preparing the ships was a thirsty business on a warm August evening. Joe Bass combined a bottle of rum with a bottle of peachy, and concocted a fine punch with which to drink to a fair night’s work and the success of their mission.

  “To Liberty and the United States!” they toasted, in a knock of wooden cups.

  The assault required stealth and surprise to succeed, and fortune smiled further upon their endeavor—a heavy cloud cover masked a good amount of light from a waxing moon.

  “Pass me the blacking.” Jack scooped up a handful of lard and soot mixed in a tin pail. Stripped down to britches and bare feet, he blacked his torso, arms and face. Other than Titus, who was roundly envied for requiring no additional blacking, the rest of the crew followed suit. Joe Bass went so far as to smear a quantity over his crewmate’s head, to dull his blond hair.