Prelude to Glory, Vol. 6

by Ron Carter

  He turned to Trudy, who was standing stock-still, staring at the musket, taller than she was. Billy sobered for a moment and said, “Don’t mind that thing. Help me with the bedroll. Might be something in there for you.”

  She turned from the weapon and squealed with delight as they lifted the roll onto the bed and untied the knots. Billy unrolled the doubled blanket and picked up a small wrapping of brown paper. “I wonder what this is.”

  She quickly pulled the wrapping away, and her eyes grew big in surprise. In her hand was a vanity mirror. It was plain and simple, with backing and handle made of wood, not engraved silver like some she had seen. But it was hers. From Billy. She clutched it to her chest, and turned brimming eyes to him. “Oh, Billy,” was all she could say. She started to turn to run to Dorothy with her prize when Billy stopped her.

  “Wait. There’s something here for mother, too.”

  He reached a second time into the open bedroll and brought out a second very small package in brown paper, then followed Trudy from the room back to the small kitchen.

  “Mama, look what Billy brought me.”

  She thrust the mirror into Dorothy’s hands, eyes shining. Dorothy turned grateful eyes to Billy, and he reached to hand her the second package. There was surprise in her face as she handed the mirror back to Trudy and took the package and thoughtfully pulled the wrapping open. In her hand she held a small brooch of hand-worked silver, in the shape of a rose, with a stem and petals. In her lifetime she had never owned such a delicate, personal thing, nor was it something she would ever have spent money to buy. She looked at it without speaking, carefully turned it in her hand, then raised her eyes to Billy.

  “Thank you, son. I will treasure it.”

  He saw the deep feeling and watched as the two women walked to their bedrooms to carefully place their treasures in drawers, to be taken out and examined again and again in the next few days.

  When Dorothy returned to the kitchen she heard the ring of the ax in the woodyard just outside the kitchen door, and opened it to look at her soldier son splitting kindling wood. She quietly closed the door and went back to the stove to set water to boil for vegetables, and to heat the oven to bake a small ham and blackberry tarts. Billy was home, and she would prepare the best she had.

  Supper was a time of gathering in the parlor with the warmth of the kitchen and the rich scents of baked ham and baked blackberry tarts reaching every corner. At the head of the table, Billy bowed his head to say grace, and the talk began as the food was passed. They spoke of big things, and small things, and questions were asked and answered, but neither of the women ventured questions of the battles or the deaths Billy had experienced.

  Dorothy told of Matthew’s letter; no, he was not yet home, but expected soon. Trudy asked about Caleb, and listened intently, not moving, while Billy spoke of all he knew. Billy inquired of Brigitte, and Dorothy slowed for a moment, caught by something in his voice, before she answered. Brigitte’s Captain, Richard Arlen Buchanan, had been killed at the battle of Freeman’s Farm, more than a year ago. Billy laid his fork down for a moment, searching his mind for every detail he could remember of that wild, frantic fight, but could recall nothing of Captain Buchanan being there. Brigitte? How had she received the news of his death? Devastated? Able to accept it? With Richard gone, would her heart one day mend enough to allow another man into her life? Was there a chance it could be him? He picked up his fork and said nothing of his feelings while he continued eating.

  They finished their meal and settled back in their chairs, feasting on the warmth and the joy of being together again. Talk went on for half an hour before they arose and all helped to clear the table. Dorothy poured steaming water into the wooden dishtub and washed while Billy dried and Trudy stacked the dishes away in their small cupboard.

  Talk dwindled for a time after they gathered around the hearth, staring into the fire, lost in unspoken thoughts. Then they knelt beside their chairs while Dorothy poured out her heart in brief thanks to the Almighty for delivering her son home.

  Morning brought Margaret visiting, while Brigitte and the children were in school, and she threw her arms about Billy and held him as one of her own. No, Matthew was not yet home, but they were awaiting him every hour.

  For two days the sun arose in a clear sky, and Billy spent the daylight hours splitting and stacking wood, stockpiling five cords of firewood along the back wall of the house against the cold of winter. On the third day he made needed repairs to window locks, hinges on cupboard doors, and sagging shelves in the small root cellar. Late that afternoon Prissy came banging on the door, panting, jubilant, eyes sparkling.

  “Matthew’s home! Can you come tomorrow morning? Mother says no school if you come. Please? Please?”

  Dorothy smiled, waiting for Prissy to settle long enough to listen. It was proper that Matthew’s first night be spent with his family, without visitors. “Of course we’ll come.”

  “Mama says for breakfast. Griddle cakes and sausage and cider and apple tarts.”

  Dorothy nodded and Prissy sprinted for home, filled with the sweet anticipation of a holiday with Matthew and Billy home, and Trudy coming for the whole morning, and the women bustling about the kitchen with the warmth of the stove and oven and the sweet aroma of sausages and griddle cakes and apple tarts filling the house.

  After the supper dishes were washed and shelved, Billy sat in the kitchen with scissors and a mirror to cut his beard. Then he heated water, stropped his razor, propped the mirror on the small table, and soaped the stubble with steaming water. Trudy stood to one side transfixed, dumbstruck, horrified when he took the razor and began the downward stroke on the right side of his lathered face with the razor.

  He glanced at her and realized she had never witnessed a man shaving. Carefully he made the strokes—down the right side of his face, up the left, the throat, about the mouth, with Trudy nearly holding her breath as she stared, her face moving through contortions previously unknown in the Weems’s household. He finished, wiped the razor dry, rinsed his face, and dried it on a towel.

  Trudy drew a great breath and exhaled slowly in utter relief. Billy turned to face her. “You’re next.”

  She shook her head violently, spun on her heel and was gone, and Billy heard her raise her voice. “Mama, Billy shaved his beard and his face looks funny. The top part’s brown and the bottom part’s white!”

  He looked in the mirror and chuckled. Wind and sun had burned his face brown above the beard; beneath, it was pale.

  Later, in the quiet of his room, Billy sat for a time on his bed staring at the oval braided rug beneath his feet, working with his thoughts. Tomorrow he would have time with Matthew. And Brigitte. He stepped to the small chest of drawers in the corner and lifted an oilskin packet from the bottom drawer. Thirteen letters written to Brigitte, the first few ragged and fading, and they would never be delivered to her. She would never know what was in his heart. What would he feel tomorrow as he watched her move about, listened to her chatter with the other women, saw the expressions on her face, heard her talk. Maybe her laughter? Would he tell Matthew? The one person in the world from whom he withheld nothing? Would he? Could he?

  It was half-past eight o’clock when Billy held the door for Dorothy and Trudy and they stepped out into a clear, cool Boston October morning. The trees in the yards and lining the narrow streets were awash with the colors of fall in the sparkling morning sun. Friends and neighbors called morning greetings to them in the reserved manner of proper Bostonians as they walked the two blocks to the Dunson home. Some threw aside rigid social niceties and came hurrying to throw their arms about Billy to welcome him home.

  They walked through the gate, past the large, handcarved sign declaring the premises to be that of John Phelps Dunson, Master Clockmaker and Gunsmith, and approached the front door. Billy did not knock. For him and Matthew, the home of one had been the home of the other as far back as memory reached. With Dorothy quietly protesting the impropr
iety of it, Billy opened the door and walked in, and for a moment stood still in the familiar surroundings, listening to the familiar voices in the kitchen, savoring the warmth and the aromas of the cooking.

  Adam barged through the archway into the bedroom hall, stopped in his tracks, didn’t know quite what to do, and charged into the kitchen nearly shouting, “Mama, they’re here! Billy’s here!”

  Instantly the air was filled with exclamations. Brigitte rushed through the kitchen door to throw her arms about him. For her, he was the boy she had known and loved all her life as a trusted friend and childhood companion. For Billy, her embrace was something he would lock away in his heart to revisit a thousand times. He held her close, heart pounding, fearful she would sense the truth of his feelings and it would frighten her, distance her.

  Margaret walked from the kitchen into the parlor and wrapped her arms about him, and kissed him on the cheek, then looked up into his eyes. “Our prayers are answered. You’re home, safe.” She saw him turn his head slightly, and felt him tense, and turned to look. Matthew had walked into the parlor from the bedroom hallway.

  Without a word the two men embraced each other, Matthew tall, dark, serious, Billy shorter, thick, sandy-haired. For a moment talk quieted around them as they stood without moving while deep emotions arose to fill both of them. They stepped back, looked at each other, and began to grin. Instantly the room was swamped with laughter, simultaneous conversation, movement, gestures, exclamations, pointing.

  The women went to the kitchen, Prissy and Trudy trotted down the hall to Prissy’s bedroom, and Billy and Matthew sat at the dining table. Adam came to sit beside them, quietly watching and listening, unaware how much he hungered to be around men, to learn how they talked, acted, viewed life and the affairs of the world.

  Billy gestured to the scar, prominent on Matthew’s left cheek. “Combat?”

  “Fight on Lake Champlain. With Arnold.”

  “I heard about it. What happened?”

  Matthew smiled and shook his head. “We fought it out with the British on the lake. Fifteen of ours engaged twenty-five of theirs. We had to stop the British or lose Washington’s army. It was a warm fight.” He touched the scar. “Splinter. British cannonball hit the railing and the mast. A piece got me.”

  “Might have improved your looks. Not much, but a little.”

  Matthew grinned.

  Billy continued. “What happened with Jones—John Paul Jones—over there off the English coast?”

  “With the Serapis?”

  “Was that the name of the British ship?”

  “The Serapis. A month ago we engaged her about twelve miles east of Flamborough Head. East coast of England. We were in an old French warship renamed the Bonhomme Richard. Fight didn’t start until dusk—finished in the night.” Matthew paused to shake his head in disbelief. “We were shot to pieces, sinking, when Tom Sievers threw a grenade down a hatch on the Serapis. Blew out her whole second deck. Her Captain—Pearson I think his name was—thought she was sinking and struck his colors.”

  Matthew stopped, and Billy saw a cloud fall over his face.

  “What happened? Tom?”

  Matthew nodded. “He was in the rigging when he threw the grenade. He was shot. I brought him home. I’m going to bury him in the next two days up at Marsden, next to his wife and son. Want to come along?”

  Eleven-year-old Adam was mesmerized, wide-eyed, studying every expression on their faces, trying to keep up with their conversation.

  For a moment Billy reflected. “I’ll have to think on it. Might be more appropriate if you spend that time with him alone.”

  Matthew nodded. “I wondered.” He raised his eyes back to Billy. “I heard about the thing at Saratoga. You were there?”

  “With Arnold. When he led the charge at the Breymann redoubt. Never saw anything like it in my life. Don’t know how he got through it alive. Or any of us, for that matter. Right into the British and German muskets and cannon. Got his horse shot out from under him, took a ball in his left leg—bad. We got the redoubt and broke their lines, and it was all over. Only the Almighty knows how.”

  “Mother wrote about a man named Eli Stroud.”

  “That’s a story. White man, raised Iroquois. He was at Saratoga. Tore into that redoubt right along with Arnold, and me, and the others. Knows the forest. Taught me a lot about it.” Billy stopped to smile. “Me a city boy—Bostonian—out there in the woods. General Washington’s used him as a scout. We’ve been through some things together.”

  “He’s alive?”

  “Yes. Married last July. Took a furlough and went with his wife up to New Hampshire to see his sister. Searched for her for most of his life. We found her after Saratoga.”

  Billy saw the questions in Matthew’s eyes. “It’ll take some time to explain Eli. I guess it’s enough for now that he’s a good man. I hope you meet him some day. You’ll like him.”

  Adam spoke up. “He’s part Indian?”

  Billy shook his head. “No. White. Lost his parents when he was two, and the Indians raised him. He was an Iroquois warrior before he came to fight the British. Speaks English and French and all the Iroquois languages.”

  “How did he come to be on our side?”

  “Said he wanted to find out more about George Washington and Jesus.”

  Adam’s face contorted in question.

  “I’ll tell you all about it when we have time.”

  Matthew broke in. “You came through without getting hurt?”

  “Just once. Took a Huron hatchet in my left shoulder.”

  “How bad?”

  “Opened me up pretty good—a scar maybe ten, twelve inches. Eli sewed it shut. It healed.”

  “Where did it happen?”

  “North, on the Hudson. We were sent up by General Washington to scout out Burgoyne and go over to Fort Stanwix to try to stop Joseph Brant. Heard of him?”

  “Indian leader? The one who went to England?”

  “That’s him. Great leader.”

  “What happened?”

  “Eli told Arnold how to trick him. Played on their superstitions. It worked. Brant left and took his Indians with him, and Burgoyne was left out there in the forest without guides.”

  Margaret’s voice rang from the kitchen to cut off all further explanations. “You three men get washed. Breakfast is nearly ready.”

  Adam straightened, eyes wide. Three men? There were only Matthew and Billy. Then it struck him. He had been included with the men. Suddenly he was six feet tall. He stood when they stood, and he followed them to get washed for breakfast, doing his best to walk exactly as they did.

  The house was silent as they knelt beside their chairs at the breakfast table, Matthew at the head. He bowed his head, and a sense of rightness and deep gratitude settled over them as Matthew pronounced grace:

  “Almighty God, we are gathered here this day through the benevolence of Thy kind and loving hand. Accept our thanks for the blessings of life that are ours. Bless the bounties that are upon this table to the betterment of our bodies. Bless us with wisdom to return the goodness thereof to thee by obedience to the teachings of thy beloved Son, in whose name we pray. Amen.”

  Stacks of smoking griddle cakes steadily diminished and fresh ones were brought from the kitchen. The platter of sausages was replenished twice. Three large pewter pitchers of apple cider were drained and refilled. Talk, laughter, chatter, filled the parlor. The pathos of war, the pain of lost loved ones, the fear of what was yet to come, faded and were gone as the two families reveled in the warmth and rare joy of the moment.

  Too soon it was over. Dorothy looked at the clock on the fireplace mantel and sighed.

  “Past noon. I’ve got to get back. So much to do.”

  They cleared the table and finished the dishes before they gathered in the parlor. Billy faced Matthew.

  “When do you plan to take care of Tom?”

  “Two days. I’ll get a small headstone tomorrow.”
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br />   “Where will you lay him to rest?”

  “Marsden. Near his wife and son.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “At Doctor Soderquists’s office. The ship’s surgeon prepared the body.”

  Billy spoke thoughtfully. “I’d like to come, but it seems to me Tom would be more at peace with just you. He went with you because he promised John. You were there at the last. Might be something that just you and he should handle. What do you think?”

  Margaret broke in. “Billy’s right. I’d like to go but Tom wasn’t one to be around people. I think this is something for just Matthew.”

  Matthew glanced at the floor for a moment. “Maybe you’re right. I’ll take care of it.”

  The Dunsons walked the Weemses to the front gate, and stood waving until they were out of sight before they turned back into the sanctity of their own home. They walked into the parlor feeling the glow of warmth and the bond of love and the memories that the morning had given them.

  Margaret sighed and went to the kitchen where leftover food in covered bowls waited to be taken to the root cellar.

  Relentlessly, life, and the work it demanded, moved on.

  Notes

  Sergeant Alvin Turlock, Billy Weems, and Matthew Dunson are fictional characters, as are other members of the Dunson and Weems families as herein portrayed.

  Boston

  Late October 1779

  CHAPTER XIV

  * * *

  A quiet sound aroused Margaret from dozing in her rocking chair, and she hesitated a moment while she awakened enough to see Matthew close the door and begin with the buttons on his coat. She rose in the dim light of the single lamp on the parlor table, peered at the clock, and understood it was ten minutes before one o’clock in the morning.

  “Are you all right?”

  Matthew nodded. “Good.”