My Name is Resolute (87 page)

“I will not forget your generosity, my dear friend. The schoolchildren will always know it was you they should thank. May I send my maid for the volumes later, after you have chosen them?”

“Please do. Next week will be soon enough.”

“I find I have a dreadful headache and travel is preposterous with the conditions on the road. Would you feel slighted if I am excused, then?”

I turned to find there was indeed a woman standing at the door, listening to us. She said, “Margaret, dear? We wondered if you could tell us which of your cooks made the apple pudding. I should like her to teach it to my cook before Friday.”

Margaret tittered and flapped her fan before her face. The woman wanting pudding preceded us, I followed, and Margaret in the rear. I stopped at the front door where a butler held it ajar and bowed. I looked into Margaret’s eyes and saw there a flicker of emotion that stunned me. Her lips smiled but tears filled her eyes. She kissed my cheeks. “Fare well, my friend. Godspeed.” As soon as that, she smiled her winning smile and swept her gown up with her hands to join the other women. Violins played a duet somewhere in that grand room. As I slipped out the door the chatter of careless women nearly drowned out the music.

I told Cullah what Margaret had said as I stared at the bright shilling in my palm. He turned the wagon and drove down a side street to a wooden building with no sign out front. As he pulled to a stop, he leaned against my bonnet and whispered, “This is the back of the silversmith’s shop.”

Cullah went inside and I followed him. I could barely see for the darkness. He tapped his head twice. I made as if to adjust my bonnet, and touched the brim twice, also. At last the man said, “This is a private house. Looking for someone?”

Cullah said, “A friend of liberty.”

“Have you any news?”

“A little that needs telling, tonight.”

“Aye?”

“Tonight.”

“Who declares this?” It was Dr. Warren!

Cullah looked at me. He said, “Wife, tell him where you heard this.”

I gulped. “From a Patriot in the governor’s mansion.” I handed him the silver coin.

Dr. Warren took a breath and held it. “God preserve you on your way,” he said, and ran from the room.

Cullah inclined his head toward the door, took my elbow, and escorted me to it. Then, rather more loudly, he asked, “Will you give our regards to Benjamin? Tell him his father needs him.”

Getting home to our house, beyond Lexington on the road to Concord, was never as difficult as it was that night. Everywhere, I saw women with their maids and children shopping, craftsmen at work at bellows and wood lathe, yet scores of soldiers walked the streets and it seemed as if one or more of them would stop us at every corner. They wore pistols in their belts, some carried muskets with bayonets affixed. After no less than seven times when we were bade to stop and alight while they looked fore and aft in the little wagon, the sun was down and mist rolling in from the bay made every step of the road treacherous.

At the last search, I laughed in the soldier’s face. “It is not enough room to hide a dog or a boy, this small wagon. You can see the back is empty. What do you think we are doing? Smuggling?”

Cullah sat like a statue. He seemed half asleep, but I saw the flicker of a muscle in his jaw.

“It is orders, Mistress. We have word traitors are hiding under women’s skirts to get in and out of town, and that some pockets are full of lead. Move along.”

As we drove along, I asked, “Margaret said tonight. What if it is not?”

“The minutemen would rather be called out falsely than be called not at all.”

I remembered so many years back when I had offered to carry a message, and had been soundly rebuffed by the men in Lexington, including my own husband. “A woman? It’s terrible. It’s ungodly. It’s brilliant. It’s heresy.” This night, I had done just that, in a way no man could ever have done. I wondered how many of men’s bold plans throughout history had actually turned on the passing of a shilling between two women? It was past midnight when we got to the house. Bertie and Alice came downstairs. Cullah went to the barn to fetch his musket. I heard church bells. Any joy I felt at having stayed on our mission was soon lost with the face of this boy before me, so eager to see battle.

“What is that sound, mum?” Bertie asked.

Cullah answered for me when I hesitated. “Church bells from Lexington and Concord.” He reached for his fowling piece, a pouch of shot, and a powder horn.

Bertie jumped from his seat. “Is it the call to arms?”

I took a deep breath and said, “Yes.”

Bertie jumped to his feet. “I’ll get Pa’s drum.”

I blinked back tears. “Very well, Bertie. Go with Grandpa.”

Before long, Dolly and her children came to the door. They hid downstairs by the loom. Roland fetched a musket and a lantern while Alice and I climbed the stairs to watch that dim light cross the road and descend the slight hill toward the green of town. Bells rang across the countryside. Drums sounded from every direction.

We made tea. We sat in the parlor and tried to rest, but there was no rest. Surely, surely, until there was bloodshed, there could still be peace. The answer came to me as drums echoed across the hills. I opened the window and leaned out. The night was clear, though the moon rose late, and every echo of every bell seemed to make the stars move.

And then I heard it. Dozens, perhaps, or hundreds most likely, of boots, marching in step. British soldiers marched up the road, among them, cavalrymen and officers.

“I am going,” I said to Alice. “I stayed behind before. Always waiting, wondering. Benjamin is no doubt there, Cullah and Bertie are, too. I am going.” I pulled on my bonnet and tied it under my chin.

“Mistress, you can’t go up there. Them men are going to start a war.”

“I have spent too much of my life waiting for Cullah to come home. I can be there to bring him home if such is the end.”

“I will come with you.”

We took a lantern and made for the road then into the woods until I found the old trail Cullah had shown me. We hurried to the edge of the swamp, across a stream, and over a small meadow, then on through thick maples, birch, walnut, and hemlock. I stopped at the edge of the woods where we could see the village green, for to move forward would have put us in the ranks of the British army. There looked to be hundreds of them. Our fellows gathered on the green, bonfires and torches still alight, adding heavy smoke to the scene. The regular soldiers bristled in their ranks, so precise, so practiced. Our men looked as they were, men who had just stumbled out of bed and off a farm. In the distance, horses rode at full gallop. Men called to one another.

Alice warned, “Find a big tree. Any balls come this way going to kill us, standing here.”

One of the British officers shouted at our men to disperse. Cullah, I saw, stood right out in front. I had just slipped behind a wide tree to get my footing betwixt the roots. My head was down, my sight in shadow. Clearer than the beat of my own heart I heard the hiss of a flash in a pan. A chorus of sound filled the air, the clash of metal and clatter of musket fire. I could see nothing for the smoke. I knew not whether our Bertie lived or died. Alice and I held each other in the shadow of that tree, and in a few minutes, British Regulars began to stream through the woods.

I took her hand and screamed, “Run!” I ran, pulling Alice as fast as we could move, though she and I both stumbled. We splashed through the swamp. Men ran behind us. Someone came closer and closer. I could hear him breathing, running, and then he seemed to have fallen back. I crossed the stream. Musket fire rattled behind us, and shot riddled the trees beside us.

Alice fell. “My knee,” she said.

“Are you hit?”

“I tripped.”

I pushed her and followed her into the shelter of a holly. We wrapped our arms about each other. The prickling leaves tore at my face and hands. “Be still,” I mouthed. Feet thundered past us, first one man, then a dozen. We caught our breath. I counted twenty men passing us. “Can you stand, now?”

“I will wait here. You run.”

“I cannot leave you, Alice.”

“No one will t’ink anything. I’ll tell them I am hunting berries.”

“Come on, lean on me.”

“Go, Missy. You run.”

“Not without you.”

Alice began to weep but she came when I took her hand. In a few more minutes, we were almost home. Through the trees I could see the open soil of the road, and flashes of red coats as soldiers moved upon it. “Run for the house now, and bar the door. I will come the long way around, through the barn.”

She nodded and hobbled across the road, reaching the oak on the other side just as another Regular soldier came down the road. I waited, then stepped from the shadows just after five mounted officers went barreling by. I dropped into the grass at the side of the road until the thunder of hooves passed me. I raised my head. They did not look back.

I thought of Cullah’s words about soldiers in pursuit not looking back. I ran up the road, across the field, toward the barn. Someone followed me. I heard feet, the heavier tramping of a man. A man in boots. More steps! There were two at least, I was sure. I felt I would choke, my throat so dry I could not swallow; I needed to cough. The men wore metal. Perhaps a sword. A musket or pistol or both. I ran until, breathless, I fell against the barn door and then got inside the barn. The cows and geese made a racket. Rather than going for the kitchen, which was well seen and obvious, I headed for the narrow opening hidden behind the farm implements, crept between them and a useless shock of dried cornstalks, and slid through the door. Alice went to the basement to hide with Dolly and the children.

I made my way up the steps, trying with every footfall to make no noise. When I reached the top and stepped into Gwenny’s bedroom, I tripped and fell to the floor. A chair stood by the opening where I had used it to stand upon to ring the bell. I heard a loud knock below me on the front door then another anxious knock and a voice called out, “Open the door, Ma. It’s I, Brendan. I’ve brought Bertie and a couple other ragged boys you should feed.”

I came down the stairs. Alice was panting, sitting at the table with a huge carving knife in her hand. I asked, “Are you going to open it?”

She answered, “Do you know it’s him?”

I flung wide the door, to see Bertie, hung by his collar and grinning, held by his father in full Redcoat uniform. He pulled off his hat and rushed inside.

“Brendan! What is the meaning of this?” I asked, though I was barely able to speak. On Bertie’s heels followed Benjamin and Cullah. “You are safe!” I cried.

Brendan said, “Roland went home to get his kit. Ma, Pa, don’t think me a coward. I saw what happened. I’ve turned ‘cat-in-pan’ against them. I could not fire upon my own friends, my own son, my pa and brother. The Lexington boys made good show of it, but they seemed hopeless. Unkempt, untrained, and most of them unarmed. It was meant by the Regulars to be a massacre. In the end, it was the pathetic Patriot who gave us a rout. Perhaps some of the Regulars were loath to fire, I cannot speak for them. I have fought for my country and my sovereign but I cannot go on if we are to war against our brothers. I think I scared poor Ben out of three years’ growth when I caught up to him, him thinking he was a prisoner of war.” Brendan stripped off his coat and buckler and untied his neckerchief as he spoke. “Have you a plain coat, Ma?”

Benjamin looked at his brother then and gave Brendan’s neckerchief a tug before he had it removed. “It’s the gallows for you, now.” They nudged each other then put their arms across each other’s shoulders and clasped Bertie to them.

I gasped at the word “gallows.”

“Boy!” Cullah roared. “Don’t upset your mother.”

Benjamin was a good two inches taller than his older, brawnier brother. “It is all right, husband,” I said. “I knew he was teasing. They are brothers.” I cupped my hand across my lips, fighting the urge to weep for joy. This was a bold and terrifying comradeship I saw before me.

Alice went to fetch the latest coat we had finished, made of undyed wool.

“But, Pa, where are you going?” Bertie asked.

“We’re going, the five of us. Come with me, son, and we’ll find Roland.” He picked up his musket. “Bring your drum.”

And then all of them were gone. I sat, my mouth open, my heart aching, my mind spinning in the smoke of war that filled the house. “Godspeed,” I whispered.

Alice said, “We have to get rid of that red coat he left.”

CHAPTER 39

April 19, 1775

The Tories marched on Concord. Dozens of Patriots and perhaps hundreds of Tories died, though my men were not among them. I did not know when I would see them again. Two days later, I asked Alice to return with me to Boston. I wanted to see how August was faring, though I felt confident he was away. I also wanted to see Margaret, to thank her. The houses were straight across the street from each other. I asked Alice to find out if Margaret was home while I headed for August’s house, where armed British Regulars stood at attention. The door stood ajar, and I saw that what had happened at my home—a search that felt more like an invasion—was in full force. Troops rumbled here and there, carrying boxes, crates, trunks overflowing with silks. They made a pile in the yard and another in the entry hall, where other soldiers rifled each box. Being small and dressed in black, it seemed I faded into the walls, for I moved about without question. In the parlor, a man in a uniform well decorated with gold braid fished through August’s aged and battered chest. Maps had been scattered across the table upon which he laid another stack of papers and rolls, causing many of those already there to fall on the floor. I heard voices overhead in loud argument that grew more so. I ran to the stair.

A man’s voice—it sounded like August—said, “You will not!”

Another swore, “I have you at last. They will not stop until every candlestick is turned over, every door opened, every pocket emptied. This house belongs to the king.”

I made my way up the staircase. Soldiers busied themselves in the library. Several of them came across the gallery with boxes and drawers from chests, their arms stacked high. I hurried until I reached the bedroom where Cullah and I had slept. A man blocked my view. His elbows stuck outward and his silk cloak draped across it. I heard the first slick sound of steel upon steel. August drew a cutlass in one hand and a curved Turkish sword in the other.