The Tory Widow

by Christine Blevins

  He hasn’t shaved . . . having spent the night in a brothel . . . with a prostitute . . .

  The image of Jack and Patsy entangled in each other’s arms slammed to the forefront of Anne’s mind. She twirled from his grasp and skittered away, her back pressed up against the garden wall.

  “No! I don’t believe you can regulate your libertine inclinations—and I will not be made a constant fool. I saw you with that woman.”

  Jack towered over her, his dark eyes a sudden fury. “If there is no forgiveness to be found in that cold, hard heart of yours, then perhaps I was no fool to find comfort with a sporting wench. I have offered a sincere apology for the error in my behavior, but you are mistaken if you seek to have me grovel at your feet.”

  “Please leave, Jack.”

  “With pleasure, madam.” Jack bent in a florid bow. “Good day to you, Widow Merrick.” Steps pounding on the floorboards, he stormed through the shop, the resound of the door slam accompanied by the raucous peal of the doorbell.

  Anne leaned back against the garden wall, the plain gray poplin of her skirt clutched in each white-knuckled fist. Blinking her tears back, she heaved a ragged sigh.

  “He is mistaken, if he thinks that I will cry.”

  JACK marched straight to Fraunces’s Tavern. He waved at Titus behind the bar and plopped down at an empty table. Titus pulled two pints of stout and came around to sit with Jack.

  “No picnic today?”

  “Not today . . . not any day! The widow has bid me to never darken her door again.” Jack took a deep slug from his beer. “Unknown to you and me, it seems she happened upon the scene at Mother Babcock’s this morning. The sight of me with Patsy inflicted a deep wound on what I have learned is a very jealous heart.”

  “She’s a wise woman, and deserves better than you anyway.”

  “Thank you, Titus. You’re a fine friend.”

  “Mrs. Anne’s been my friend longer than you.” Titus savored his brew. “I’ll never forget the day mean old Merrick passed on—all of us feigning sorrow, but every once in a while she and I’d exchange a quick smile, for by his dying, we were both of us set free.”

  Jack shifted in his seat, a sharp something jabbing his upper leg. He dug into his breeches pocket and came up with the broken bit from the Bowling Green fencepost. He set the piece on the table, and studied it for a long moment. Tracing a finger around the half-crown he said, “Believe it or not, Titus, I really do care for the widow.”

  “Says you after a night of drinking and whoring.”

  “I do care for her.” Jack looked up. “But I’ll not beg—that I will not.”

  “You surely have no ken of womankind. She doesn’t need or want you to beg.” Titus rose to his feet and finished the rest of his cup in one long pull. “What she needs is for you to be true.”

  Titus left to serve a group of Continental officers who’d wandered in for a drink at the bar. After collecting the coin for the round, he came back to sit with Jack.

  “Those fellows”—he said with a jerk of his head—“they tell me the Redcoats are on the move. Washington’s spies on Staten Island have reported Howe has given orders for all regiments to prepare three days’ worth of provisions. Transport ships crowded with troops have begun to embark.”

  Jack sat up. “Where to?”

  Titus shrugged. “Looks like Long Island. No one knows for certain.”

  “Can you find someone to take over for you here?”

  Titus nodded.

  Jack downed the remains of his pint. Leaning back in his chair, he shoved the cast-iron piece back into his pocket and buttoned the flap. “Let’s gather our gear and get to Long Island.”

  ANNE sat in the garden, her ledgers spread out on the tabletop. As a ruse to avoid Sally’s never-ending derision of Jack Hampton, she pretended to work on the accounts. When Sally answered a knock at the door to find David had come to pay a visit, Anne was happy for the diversion. Sally must have said something to David, for they shared a pleasant supper under the peach tree without a single mention of Jack Hampton.

  “I’m going back to my regiment in the morning,” David announced as he poured himself a glass of cider. “We have word that British ships are heading toward Long Island.”

  “They’re invading Long Island?” Anne asked.

  “All we know is the British are provisioned and on the move. The general suspects it might be a feint to draw attention away from the true invasion,” David said. “As yet, we just don’t have enough information.”

  Sally’s woeful expression compelled Anne to leave the couple their last few hours together in private. Though early in the evening and still light out, Anne pled exhaustion. Taking a candle and a copy of Gulliver’s Travels along, she dragged her sad, tired bones up the stairs. She squeezed the candledish and her reading material onto the cluttered night table beside her four-posted bed.

  Much like a knight shedding heavy armor after an arduous battle, Anne peeled off her clothes and stiff stays, and stripped down to the light freedom of her shift. She opened the shutters on her window facing the river to allow the fresh eastling wind to wash through her bedchamber.

  A dark and heavy cloud moving in with the wind began to cast a pall over a fair evening. Anne protected the flickering candle flame with a chimney glass, and climbed up to sit tailor-style on her bed. She removed pins and ribbons, and ran her fingers to loosen the tight braids wound around her head all day. Anne raked a brush through her sweat-damp hair, the boar bristles digging in to scourge her scalp. She found this nightly ritual calming, as if she were brushing her cares away—scattering them into tiny particles to be borne away on the breeze.

  Anne scooted forward to sit on the edge of the bed, legs dangling, her toes brushing floorboards. She squeezed the hairbrush onto her night table—between Gulliver’s and the candle—tipping over a half-full bottle of lavender water and knocking the keepsake Jack had given her to the floor. The little broken crown bounced and skittered about, finally settling like a ragged black wound on the timeworn oak right beneath her feet. Anne stared at the cast-iron piece for a moment, then with a swipe of her bare foot, she sent it hurtling to bang into the far corner.

  I’m better off alone.

  Lightning flashed, and rain began to tick on the clay roof tiles. A gust of wind—strong enough to pound the shutters closed and open again—whipped around the room. Anne ran to the window, and leaned over the sill, turning her face up to fat drops of warm rain.

  The sky became an inky, swirling cauldron, stirred by an invisible spoon. The air was soon charged with the smell of sulfur, and with flashes of lightning so numerous and incessant, the corresponding thunderclaps became a rolling, constant din, like that of a hundred drummers beating wild on a hundred bass drums. She held tight to the wooden sill through it all, cleansed by the cathartic wind and rain.

  The view from her storm-darkened bedchamber presented an uncommon picture. Across the dusky East River churning with white-caps, the hills of Brooklyn Heights were bathed in golden twilight. Anne ran to retrieve her spyglass from the night table. She extended the glass and scanned the horizon. In the flashing yellow cast by lightning bolts, Anne noted two men pulling oars on a skiff caught out in midriver.

  “Lord in heaven!”

  Anne fixed her scope to the scene. She could not believe her eyes. Jack and Titus manned the oars of the little boat struggling against the wind and rain.

  “Reckless fools!”

  Anne kept a long and fearful vigil at her window as the violent storm over Manhattan progressed without let up, and she tracked the boat’s progress until at last it disappeared into the smudge along the opposite shore, just beneath the Brooklyn Heights.

  With relief, she collapsed her spyglass in three snaps and moved out of the puddle collected beneath the window. Slipping weary arms through sleeve holes, she stepped out of her rain-drenched shift and kicked it to the side. She dried her skin and scrubbed her wet hair with a towel from her linen ches
t, and pulled on a dry chemise.

  I think he’s safe.

  The hope came unbidden to her brain, along with a stinging onslaught of tears. Anne curled onto her bed. Shoulders shaking, bed-cords quaking, she cried for Jack—mourned his kisses—and grieved, once again, for the happy life she imagined just beyond her grasp. At last heaving a great sigh, she flopped onto her back, threw her arms up over her head and stared at the flickering shadows dancing along the ceiling rafters.

  “What kind of an idiot am I, to think I wouldn’t cry?”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Cannon are the barristers of Crowns;

  and the sword, not of justice,

  but of war, decides the suit.

  THOMAS PAINE, Common Sense

  Thursday, August 22, 1776

  A Hilltop on Long Island

  JACK and Titus stood at the crest of a wooded hill on a bright, blue-sky morning after another stormy night. With southward-aimed spyglasses trained on Gravesend Bay and the British landing operation on the beach, they did not stray from the cover provided by the shade of the treeline.

  “By God, what order!” Jack admitted with grudging admiration.

  “Now that is discipline.” Titus whistled low. “Reminds me of working a well-tuned press with an able crew—people, parts and pieces all moving in accord . . .”

  Sails unfurled, flags and ensigns floating on a soft breeze, the transport ships sat at anchor just beyond the shoals with broadsides parallel to the shoreline, their massive firepower serving to discourage any opposing force. Besides the scattering of rifle fire that drew Jack and Titus from the road to the hilltop, there was not a Continental in sight.

  “Their flatboats are very clever,” Jack said. “That’s what they’ve been up to all this time—building those boats.”

  The wide landing craft were built with flat bows designed to hinge open and serve as ramps upon beaching, efficiently discharging cargo after cargo of soldiers, horses, ordnance, munitions and supplies. The oared flatboats ferried to and fro between the troop transports and the beach, oars dipping into the sparkling water with frightening unison.

  “One moves away, and the next moves in . . .” Titus noted. “They’ve at least a hundred of those flatboats, and nary a tussle.”

  “Their spies serve them well. This bay and beach could not be better suited to their purpose—and with good access to the roads.” Jack took a few steps back and sank down to sit on the trunk of a sweet gum tree uprooted by the recent storms. “Between flatboats and transports, I tally close to four hundred vessels swimming around out there.”

  Titus tucked his spyglass under his arm. From his pocket he produced a folded square of paper and a stubby graphite stick wrapped in jute string. After scribbling “400 vessels,” he took a seat next to Jack. Titus divided the blank side of his sheet with three vertical lines and four headings titled “red,” “black,” “green” and “blue.” He alternated between peering through the spyglass and scratching numbers for every formed regiment, categorizing his count by uniform color.

  “Break off a piece of your writing stick, and give me a scrap of that paper,” Jack said. “You count the foot soldiers, I’ll count cannon and cavalry.”

  Emptied transports moved away and were replaced by a new line of transport ships, their decks crowded with red coats. Hours passed and wave upon wave of flatboats moved between the shoals and the shore, unchallenged. When the flatboats were beached and the last man waded to shore, formed battalions with artillery in tow began marching from the plain toward the road. Jack tracked along, peering through his glass. “They’re heading to Flatbush.” He snapped his glass into its most compact form. “Let’s go.”

  Titus rolled the scraps of paper into a tight tube, slipping it and his pencil through a tear in the lining of his waistcoat. Shouldering muskets and gathering bedrolls and knapsacks, they turned back into the woods.

  TO impede forage opportunities for the British Army, Captain David Peabody spent a long day in the saddle, gathering cattle, horses and sheep from the nearby countryside to be driven to pasture under armed guard.

  David dismounted and tethered his mount to the paddock post. By his own estimation, Black Bill was one of the finest horses in the Continental Army, and no matter how saddle sore he was, David always saw to his stallion’s comfort before his own. After Bill was curried, fed and watered, David hoisted saddle to shoulder and slogged back to his tent pitched among the many on the outskirts of the village of Brooklyn.

  It was past the dinner hour, and with stomach rumbling, David hoped his messmates thought to save him a portion. On the whole, provisions available on Long Island proved fresh and varied, but these past two days—since Howe had landed his army—meals in camp had become a very haphazard affair. His heart sank a bit, spotting the pot simmering over the fire in front of his tent.

  Standard soldier’s fare tonight—boiled salt meat no doubt accompanied by wheat cakes burned on a hot iron.

  “Peabody!”

  David turned to his name, and to his surprise, he saw Jack Hampton and Titus Gilmore headed his way, waving and smiling. Taller than most men, the odd pairing was made even more incongruous by the musket on Titus’s shoulder, and the full-on beard Jack sported. David was surprised at how pleased he was to see them.

  But for his being in company with Titus Gilmore, David would not have recognized bearded Jack Hampton. The city dweller looked every bit the country yeoman dressed in a green hunting shirt and soft cowhide boots. Both Jack and Titus were fully accoutered with painted canvas packs and rolled blankets. In accordance with the general’s latest order that all soldiers without uniform distinguish themselves with a bough of greenery on their hats, these two wore holly leaf sprigs tucked into the cockades on their tricorns. Coming to a stand before him, they saluted properly, bringing their muskets to shoulder firelock position.

  David dropped his saddle and returned the salute with a sweep of his hat. “Don’t tell me you two have joined the militia!”

  Titus laughed and Jack said, “Nah! The greens and salutes just make it easier to get around on this side of the heights.”

  “This side of the heights—” David noted the distinction as he hoisted his saddle back to his shoulder. “It sounds like your army of two might be causing the British some mischief.”

  “Might be.” Titus grinned.

  “Come along with us to the Ferry House Inn for dinner,” Jack said, “and we’ll tell you all about it.”

  “The Ferry House!” David snorted. “I’m afraid my meager pay will not support a meal there.”

  “Did you forget the emolument?” Jack reached inside his shirt and pulled forth a plump purse. “C’mon, lobster dinner all around.”

  David looked over to his tent as one of his messmates pulled a steaming gray lump from the simmering pot. “Let me stow my saddle and shed my spurs.”

  The three men marched down to the gable-roofed inn flanking the ferry landing, and they were seated around a comfortable table with a fine view of the East River. Once a round of pints was pulled and dinner ordered, David asked, “So how long have you two miscreants been on the island?”

  “Six days now,” Titus answered.

  Jack added, “We came over on Monday night.”

  David unbuttoned his jacket. “Monday night? After the storm?”

  “During the storm.” Jack smiled.

  “We were halfway across the river when the storm blew in.” Titus scowled. “Took us some doing—getting across—soaked to the bone we were.”

  “That was the worse storm I’ve ever seen,” David said. “The next day we found three officers lightning-struck on Cortlandt Street. Roasted to a black crisp they were—the tips of their swords and the coin in their pockets melted.”

  “Bad omen, that,” Titus said.

  “Pish,” Jack scoffed. “Just a bad storm is all.”

  A pair of tavern maids brought over a platter piled high with steamed lobster and clams, a bowl of but
tered and parsleyed potatoes in their jackets, and a fresh green salad of spinach and cress dressed with oil and vinegar. The hungry trio fell into silence, concentrated on wresting every bit of sweet meat from the shells, calling for seconds on the potatoes and salad. Sated, they finished the meal off with glasses of rye whiskey and stubby cigars.

  David blew a cloud of smoke up to mingle with the ceiling rafters. “A grand meal. Thank you, Jack—Titus.” He savored a sip of his whiskey. “You two really ought consider joining up for the fight. We are about to give the lobsterbacks a sound drubbing—just like we did at Breed’s Hill.”

  “We lost at Breed’s Hill,” Jack reminded.

  David ignored him. “Our lines are solid and well situated—naturally fortified by the heights—and the passes through the high ground are guarded by our best troops.”

  “The King’s army has might.” Titus puffed on his cigar. “They can barrel right through one of those passes—crash through and lay siege to your works from landside and from warships on the riverside.”

  “They can try and get through.” David nodded. “And be severely bloodied in the process.”

  Jack reached into his shirtfront and handed David a folded sheet of paper. “Have you seen one of these?”

  David unfolded the page, smoothing it on the tabletop. He moved the oil lamp centered on their table a little closer, and read:

  A PROCLAMATION

  Notice is hereby given to all Persons forced into Rebellion, that on

  delivering themselves up at the HEAD QUARTERS of the Army, they

  will be received as faithful Subjects; have Permits to return peaceably

  to their respective Dwellings, and meet with full

  Protection for their Persons and Property.

  All those who choose to take up arms for the Restoration of Order

  and good Government within this Island, shall be disposed of in the