Chains (21 page)

We wound up with eleven fellows from Kent sleeping three to a bedchamber and using the second-floor drawing room as their common area for dining and conversating.
The master and Madam moved their bedchamber to the downstairs front parlor and gave the library over to Colonel Hawkins, a high-ranking officer whose favor Lockton sought.

The cellar was turned into a barracks for five soldiers who had their wives with them. This was the Lord's blessing on me because the women were used to cooking and cleaning for their men's regiment. The new bosslady in the kitchen was named Sarah, a black-haired gal with a baby in her belly. She was not a friendly sort—none of them were—but she did not call me names nor seem inclined to hand out beatings.

I did miss Becky Berry, more than I thought possible.

It was odd sleeping in the cellar with strangers. They sure did snore, the women as bad as the men. Their bodies gave off noxious odors, too, gases so strong they made my eyes water. The night of the first frost, I woke up to a soldier pulling off my blanket. I lay in the dark, fists clenched and teeth sharp, thinking he meant to do me harm.

He did not. He was simply cold and in need of another layer of cloth.

Next morning, Sarah agreed I could move my pallet up to the kitchen hearth.

It was lonely sleeping without that fool doll.

MANY OF THE INHABITANTS ARE COME INTO TOWN;
AND MANY OTHERS WHO WERE OBLIGED TO FLY FOR
THEIR LOYALTY ARE COMING IN DAILY.
–NEW YORK MERCURY
NEWSPAPER

The autumn passed in a dogweary haze for me, with much work and little time left to ponder or breathe. Everything was cloaked in gray: oyster gray, charcoal gray, pewter gray, mold gray, storm gray, and ash. Scraps of ash floated through the air for weeks and found their way into everything, from the butter to the tea. The rains turned the ash to mud. Frost painted the ground the color of a gravestone, ashes trapped in ice.

I flaked ashy too. Momma used to rub a salve of bear fat and mint on us as winter approached so our skin would not dry and crack.

Was Ruth's skin dry? Did anyone notice?

Ashes drifted into the hollow places in my bones and silted up my brainpan. I had the fanciful notion that perhaps we had died in the fire, that we were all lost souls, forbidden to
enter heaven. When I had low thoughts like that, Curzon's voice would call from my remembery and tell me to join him, to become a rebel.

I told that voice to hush.

With the ash so thick inside and out, I had few thoughts to spare for that fool. I figured he was dug in with the troops at Fort Washington, which seemed a good place, what with the strong walls and the cannons protecting it. Folks said the British wouldn't attack the fort until spring.

The men drilled and patrolled. Sarah and the other soldierwives spent most of their days down at the campground doing the chores for the regiment—washing clothes in big iron pots and cooking whatever could be found to roast or stew. They did some tidying at the Lockton house and kept the officers fed too. The dirtiest jobs fell to me: water hauling, wood chopping, and chamber-pot emptying. On top of that, Colonel Hawkins claimed me for his errand girl, sending me out with messages for this captain or that sergeant or in search of snuff or hair powder or almonds. He was terrible fond of almonds.

By the time the apples were harvested, hundreds of ships crammed with expensive British goods crowded the docks. The price of food doubled and doubled again. This did not affect the Locktons nor the rich Loyalist refugees who streamed into the city toting bags of gold. We took delivery of enough potatoes to fill the bin in the cellar and had no trouble buying meat. But regular folks burnt out of their homes and penniless Loyalists refugees on the run from the rebels, they were forced to shelter in Canvastown, the new name for the burned-over district. They used tent canvas to make huts against the standing
chimneys and half-crumbled brick walls. They ate beans and rice when they were lucky and begged on the streets when they were not.

One day I noticed that the plants grown from Momma's seeds had been killed by the frost, the stalks dead on the ground, with shriveled paper leaves. A lump of mud stuck in my throat. I had forgotten to care for them. I collected the few seeds left from the flower heads and wrapped them in a scrap of cloth that I laid under the loose board in the pantry, where I had hidden my sliver of lead from the King's statue.

As the weather turned colder, Lady Seymour's mind cleared and her body strengthened. She could walk with help and move the crippled arm some, but her mouth still dragged at the corner and her speech was hard to follow. Madam was not entirely pleased that her husband's aunt was mending. I heard her grumble to Lockton that “the old biddy will never die, just to spite us.”

A month or so after the fire, I was setting down a clean pitcher of water in Lady Seymour's bedchamber whilst Madam read the newspaper aloud to her. I thought the Lady was dozing, but her eyes snapped open when Madam described how British soldiers had looted the City Hall library. They stole books, ruined paintings, and broke scientifical equipment stored there by the professors of King's College.

Lady Seymour made Madam repeat the entire story, then demanded pen and ink and paper, fighting her way out from the blankets with her good arm. Once dressed warmly and settled at the writing table, she composed a strongly worded letter about the library destruction to General Howe, supreme commander of the Royal forces, and called for a glass of brandy and a bowl of soup.

After that it fell to me to walk with Lady Seymour along Wall Street on days when the sun was strong. She hired three seamstresses to sew her a new wardrobe and included a heavy skirt and thick woolen cloak for me in the order. I protested that I could not pay for the clothes, but Lady Seymour simply pointed to the portrait of the yellow-haired man, her husband, on the mantel and his letters stacked next to it.

“We'll not discuss payment again,” she said slowly.

“Thank you, ma'am,” I said.

After the pigs had been slaughtered and fresh pork was for sale in the market, another wave of British officers moved in and set up their camp beds in the second-floor drawing room. The long dining table was covered end to end with maps. The men would stand over them, chins in their hands, trying to figure out how to finish off the rebels. They were now scheming to finish the war in time for the New Year. Battles and skirmishes were fought on the north part of New York Island, though the city was safe.

Whilst they plotted Washington's downfall, I dozed in a chair in the hallway in case they needed victuals or a bottle of port. Sleep was a rare and precious thing to me in those days.

The next day I was yawning hard as I trudged up to the Tea Water Pump. The November wind carried the promise of snow, and I was glad for the new cloak Lady Seymour had given me. Soon I would need rags to wrap round my hands.

My muddled head did not register the great hullabaloo at first, but then my ears awoke. Folks were shouting and
hurrying toward the Greenwich Road where it dumped out onto the Commons. I was not sure what the race was for, but I lifted my skirts and joined along with it.

“They got them!” cheered a red-faced man, throwing both of his arms into the air. “They got them all.”

By the time I made it to the Commons, I had to fight my way to the front of the cheering mob. The end of the Greenwich Road was lined with British soldiers, relaxed and laughing as their prisoners—captured American soldiers—walked three to a row between their enemies through the doors of the Bridewell Prison.

“Was there a battle?” I asked a serving girl next to me.

“Up the fort,” she answered. “Them Hessians killt lots. Blood was running like water, they say. They fired them cannons from the ships. Blew arms and legs everywhere. Heads, too.”

I nodded, unable to think what I should say. A chant started in the crowd, and singing. I did not join in, nor did I throw clods of mud as many did, including the bloodthirsty girl next to me.

The rebels kept coming in, row after filthy row, most with their heads down, some limping with a crutch or an arm in a sling. Their uniforms were torn and tattered. A few walked barefooted over the icy cobblestones, flinching when hit square with mud or a rock. They carried neither flag nor weapons. Their breath billowed like they were hard-ridden horses. It hung around their heads like smoke.

He was toward the end of the line, with the other enlisted slaves, his head bent forward, his face invisible. A bloody bandage was tied above his right knee, and it looked painful to step with his right foot.

The only way I knew him was that hat, nearer brown
than red now, with a rip through the brim, and the ring in his ear.

The guards shoved the last of the prisoners, including the boy with the red-brown hat, through the doors of the prison and closed them with a loud metal
clang.

WE HAVE NOW GOT NEAR 5000 PRISONERS IN
NEW-YORK AND MANY OF THEM ARE SUCH RAGAMUFFINS,
AS YOU NEVER SAW IN YOUR LIFE …
–LETTER OF A BRITISH OFFICER, PUBLISHED IN
THE
LONDON PACKET
NEWSPAPER

I had no time to ponder Curzon's fate. Madam commanded that a supper be thrown to celebrate the capture of Fort Washington, complete with turtle soup.

The house fair exploded with dust and activity. The junior officers cleared out their cots, clothing, and maps from the second-floor drawing room so we could scrub and polish it from ceiling to floor. The kitchen hearth was crowded with irons heating to press the tablecloths and serviettes.

Madam hired the cook from the City Tavern to prepare the meal. Folks said he had a way with turtles. She then chose the prettiest of the soldierwives to wait at the tables. The ugly ones and Sarah with her big belly were to stay in the kitchen to assist the cook, and wash up. My job was to ferry the food up the stairs and the dirty crockery down.

The food began arriving long before sunup, packed into crates and hauled by sleepy-eyed boys. Three turtles each the
size of a footstool came in a wooden pen. The sound of their flippers scratching made Sarah yelp in fright. Two of the turtles kept their heads tight against their shells. The third stretched out his neck and watched the commotion with wet, solemn eyes.

While we scurried to finish the house, and the cook butchered the turtles and plucked the pheasants, the hairdresser arrived to tend to Madam. He spent hours applying pomantum wax, padding, and lengths of brick-colored hair to fashion a high roll on Madam's head. The hair swept off her brow and soared into the air like a wave curling before a ship's prow. I thought the wave might crumble, but Madam did not ask my opinion. She wanted a pot of hot chocolate made with two handfuls of sugar, which was a shocking amount.

Sarah and the cook were exchanging heated words in the kitchen. Empty turtle shells stood drying in the corner, and the cook's assistant stirred the thick soup bubbling over the fire. I grabbed the chocolate pot and left, not wanting to see what became of the poor creatures' heads.

As I served the hot chocolate and tidied the chamber, Madam rubbed her face with Venetian Bloom Water beauty wash, said to remove wrinkles. After that came a layer of Molyneux's Italian Paste to make her skin white as bleached linen. It made her resemble a corpse.

And then, the final triumph. She used a tiny brush to paint a thin line of glue above each eye. Madam opened an envelope and shook out two gray strips of mouse fur, each cut into an arch. Leaning toward the mirror, she glued the mouse fur onto her own eyebrows, making them bushy and thick as the fashion required.

In truth, she looked like a woman with two lumps of mouse fur stuck on her face.

A delicate bell sounded overhead—Lady Seymour summoning help.

“The guests will be arriving soon,” Madam said, admiring her reflection. “Aunt Seymour wishes to be seated in advance of them. You may assist her.”

After I helped the Lady limp from her chamber to her place near the head of the long table, I placed a foot warmer filled with hot coals under her chair and spread a woolen blanket on her lap. She thanked me kindly and looked about.

“When I was young, we dined thus every night,” she said with a sigh.

I could scarce credit it. The table was covered by the finest linen tablecloth I'd ever seen. Each place had china plates, crystal glasses, and ivory-handled knives and forks. Candles were positioned every three hands. Saltcellars, each with a tiny spoon, and pepper mills were set in easy arm's reach of each place. Smaller tables and sideboards were positioned at the edges of the room to hold trays and dishes. One table was covered with wine bottles.

Candlelight reflected back and back again in the polished mirrors that hung from the walls. I caught a glimpse in the hearth mirror of a girl with a mark on her cheek that trumpeted her shame. I quickly turned my eyes away.

There was a heavy knock on the front door.

“It begins,” Lady Seymour said. “Go below, child.”

I set the tray loaded with the turtle soup bowls on the table by the door. Three more trays needed to be brought up the
stairs, but I allowed myself a quick peek at the company before I fetched them.

The table was crowded with officers wearing splendid uniforms and perfectly powdered wigs along with several of Master Lockton's business companions. Lockton wore a cardinal red satin waistcoat, black satin coat and breeches, and shoes with silver buckles. The new clothes could not hide the fact that the master was grinding himself down with work. Long hours serving the British commandant had melted off the fat from his second and third chins and created heavy black circles under his eyes. But his bags of gold grew fatter, and that was what he cared for the most.