Paper Woman: A Mystery of the American Revolution (11 page)

"The Creek
have surrounded the garrison and number over one hundred and fifty."

Her gape
magnified.
 
So Fairfax hadn't been
fabricating the story.
 
One hundred and
fifty Creek warriors.
 
Many must have
been summoned from Red-Stick villages.
 
"What's
happened?
 
Have the colonists given
offense?"
 
Heavens, some clod of a
farmer must have flung the gauntlet and openly accused the Creek of the
murders.

"No, our
business is with the British alone."

Our
business.
 
Well, at least he was clear
about his allegiance.
 
"But King
George and the Creek have a treaty —"

"Treaty?
 
Bah!
 
What is the worth of King George's word if his soldiers will impersonate
others to kill hundreds of people?"

"What are
you talking about?"
 
Sophie
frowned.

"They've
schemed with outlaws and mercenaries to impersonate the Creek and massacre the
townspeople."

"That's a
rumor.
 
Lieutenant Fairfax spoke of it
tonight.
 
There's no logical reason for
the soldiers to do such a thing."

"Did logic
figure into 'Tarleton's Quarter?'"

"Oh, come
now, the redcoats don't usually massacre their prisoners, and I still haven't
heard how this hare-brained rumor originated."

"British
intelligence reports that Spain has launched an offensive to capture Georgia
and Florida later this summer —"

"British
intelligence?"
 
She looked askance
at him.
 
He hadn't picked up that tip
standing over an anvil.
 
What maelstrom
had Will plunged into with El Serpiente and Don Alejandro?

"Britain
is sending seven hundred more troops into Georgia with no time to expand the
barracks at local forts."

Mathias wasn't
given to flights of fancy.
 
Rather, he
had summoned the mindset of a Creek warrior.
 
"You cannot believe that Britain will butcher loyal subjects of the
Crown, just to accommodate soldiers!
 
Major Hunt would never consent to such wickedness."

"It
appears that's why he's been recalled to England."

"Recalled?
 
But he told me that — that —"

"That he'd
inherited family estates and bought his way out?"
 
Mathias ejected a short, soft laugh.
 
"Not all who wear the uniform are
warriors.
 
Major Hunt belongs on his
Hampshire estate, not on the battlefield."

Not only had
Edward burgled her house, but he'd lied to her about his reasons for returning
to England.
 
She lifted her chin to stop
her lower lip from quivering with disillusionment.

"Tonight
all hundred and fifty warriors will make sure the soldiers don't impersonate
us
for such an atrocity.
 
Let Whites
massacre each other if they must, but we won't be cast as villains."

This was
madness.
 
Her heart stammered a
beat.
 
"You're going to kill Major
Hunt!"

"Only if
he doesn't cooperate."

Sophie
reflected that Lady Beatrice had best keep her betrothal options open.
 
"I still don't know why you're
here
."

"I'm here
to ensure your safety."

"There are
two soldiers downstairs charged with that duty."

"If we
aren't satisfied with Hunt's explanation, both of them are dead, along with as
many others as we can find tonight."

For the first
time, she noticed his quiver of arrows and bow.
 
"You plan to guard me until the danger is passed.
 
Why?"

"A month
ago, Will asked me to protect you if danger ever came to Alton and he wasn't
here."
 
Ah, so her father knew at
least a month in advance that danger was coming.
 
Mathias took a step toward her.
 
"I gave him my word I would do it."

"But
why
?"
she whispered, although she knew at the core of her soul.

"In all my
life, few have given me respect.
 
Will
dealt me far more respect than my stepfather, as have you, your brother, and
sister.
 
It's a debt I can never
repay."

A solid enough
rationale, one that stood on its own, but after almost two decades, she
suspected Mathias's own agenda played into it.
 
It dawned on her then that his offer was an avenue to freedom from the
absurd house arrest.
 
"If all you
say is accurate, I'm not really safe here.
 
I must leave."

"Those two
soldiers won't let you go, and I won't attack them unless it becomes necessary
to protect you."

"We don't
have to let them know I'm leaving.
 
I
can get out the window if you help me."

He propped
fists on his hips.
 
"Where would I
take you?"

"To the
Creek village."

"That's
the first place the redcoats will look."
 
From his expression, he realized the obvious with his next breath, and
he sealed his lips briefly over scorn.
 
"Ah.
 
They'll see only what
we wish them to see."

Better still,
perhaps the redcoats wouldn't find her in the Creek village because she'd be
miles away to the south, en route to St. Augustine.
 
Now that she'd gotten that wild scheme in her head, she couldn't
turn it loose.
 
Grasping for it was far
easier than embracing the finality of her father's murder.

Somewhere in
the distance, they both heard the report of a musket, followed by others.
 
In the room below, Barrows's voice
rose.
 
"Did you hear that?
 
Zounds, it's war with the Creek!"

Sophie seized
her tote sack and threw in toiletry articles, hair ribbons, and an extra shift
and pair of stockings while Mathias climbed back out the window.
 
Ensign Baldwin stomped across the shop
floor.
 
"Shut the windows.
 
Block the doors."

Out of
intuition, she also threw the copy of
Confessions
into the tote
sack.
 
Then she diapered her petticoat
together, slung the tote over her shoulder, extinguished the lantern, and went
to the window.

Mathias clung
to the side of the house and whispered, "Crawl out like this.
 
Get your balance on your stomach the way I'm
going to show you, and then ease your legs over the side.
 
I'll wait on the ground and help you
down."
 
She watched him roll onto
his stomach, wiggle to the edge of the porch roof with his legs dangling over
the side, then drop out of sight.

Holding her
breath, she crawled outside and balanced on the roof.
 
She eased the window shut, dropped her tote over the edge, and
let out her breath.
 
Then she rolled
onto her stomach, slid her legs over the edge, and scooted backward.
 
While gripping the planks with her hands, she
heard the approaching gallop of a horse.
 
"Mathias?"
 
One of the
planks splintered.
 
She clawed the roof
for support.

He caught her
about the waist as the plank gave way, as Fairfax rode up, reined his horse
back from a gallop, and vaulted from the saddle.
 
No doubt about it, the British lieutenant saw a Creek warrior
trying to spirit away a helpless, senseless woman from Alton that he'd captured
and slung over his shoulder.
 
"The
devil — savages!
 
Baldwin!
 
Barrows!
 
To arms!"
 
Achilles and
Perseus sprang up from the porch and began barking.
 
Fairfax's infantry hanger sang with a metallic
shhhling
,
freed from its scabbard, while he sprinted toward Sophie and Mathias.

Sophie found
herself dumped hard on the ground beside the porch.
 
From inside the house, Mary screamed, and Baldwin hollered,
"Barrows, douse the light!
 
Assume
position!"
 
Sophie realized the two
soldiers had misunderstood Fairfax.
 
Rather than rushing to the lieutenant's aid outside, they prepared to
repel hoards of Creek warriors from breaking into the house.

Meanwhile, the
blacksmith staggered backward, beyond reach of Fairfax's first swing, seeking
the cover and shadow of fruit trees along the side of the house.
 
Out of sight from the front windows, Sophie
collared Achilles before he could lunge for the two men.
 
Both hounds barked and whined.

The curved
sword's second whoosh through the air curtailed when the blade embedded in a
tree trunk.
 
Growling, Fairfax yanked at
it.
 
Mathias grabbed a branch and swung
his legs around.
 
They caught Fairfax in
the chest and knocked him away from the trees and the hanger.
 
Fairfax reached for his knife.
 
Mathias slammed a fist into the pit of his
stomach.
 
Then he brought both fists
down on Fairfax's right kidney.
 
The
lieutenant landed belly down on the ground and didn't move.

Sophie rose,
her tote on her shoulder.
 
The dogs' barking
subsided, and they circled around, confused, curious, sniffing at Fairfax and
Mathias.
 
"Are you hurt?" she
whispered to Mathias when he staggered over.

Breathing hard,
he shook his head.
 
"Even better, I
doubt he recognized me."

"He knows
you were Creek."
 
She stroked both
hounds.
 
They pranced back to the porch,
toenails clicking on the boards.
 
"Taking me to the village isn't wise.
 
Hide me in the smithy."

Adjusting the
quiver, he whispered back, "I am
not
leaving you in Alton
tonight."

"Gods, but
you're stubborn."

His smile
gleamed in the starlight.
 
"The pot
calling the kettle black, eh?"

She turned back
to the dogs to hide a grin.
 
"Down," she said, her voice low.
 
Achilles and Perseus flopped down with sighs, relieved that the
activity was over.
 
"Stay."

Mathias signed
for her silence.
 
Then, hugging the
deepest shadows, they crept west, out of town and into the rolling, lush
wilderness of pines and hardwoods peopled by the Creek Confederacy.

Chapter Eight

THE FIRST TIME
she awakened, night had not yet surrendered the land.
 
Unable to see more than dark, she lay still, heart pounding with
disorientation.
 
Musty scents of deer
hide hammock and fiber blanket deepened her confusion.
 
In the distance a dog barked, competing for
nocturnes with crickets and frogs.
 
Above her, a mockingbird experimented with Monday predawn.
 
Not far away, a man snored bass to the
bird's soprano.

Sophie
recognized the interior of a wattle-and-daub house of the Creek village.
 
The snoring came from beyond a partition
near her hammock: Hawk In The Sun, who was husband of the village's ambassador
and
Isti Hogdee
— Beloved Woman — Laughing Eyes.
 
At Laughing Eyes's groggy mutter, his
snoring curtailed with a grunt.
 
He
grumbled, and they grew quiet.
 
Sophie
smiled at the familiar routine of urging a snoring husband to roll on his
side.
 
She drew the blanket over her
shoulder and eased back to sleep.

Daylight
awakened her the second time — daylight and a conversation in Creek between
Jacques le Coeuvre and Laughing Eyes.
 
Curious, she rose and pushed the window shade aside.

Outside the
lodging house, Jacques gestured east toward Alton to emphasize a point.
 
He wore a hunting shirt, trousers, tomahawk
and knife in his belt, and moccasins.
 
A
thin strip of leather held his shaggy salt-and-pepper hair in a braid down his
back.
 
Over his shoulder draped his
haversack, and he carried his musket.
 
No doubt about it, he was ready to embark on another adventure, rub
shoulders with celebrities.
 
Envy
crawled through Sophie.

Laughing Eyes
nodded to him, the creases on her face deepening.
 
Almost three decades earlier, while in her late twenties, she'd
begun taking Mathias with her on visits to the Europeans, allowing her adoptive
sister's son to absorb the art of diplomacy.
 
Ayukapeta Hokolen Econa, they soon named Mathias: Walk in Two
Worlds.
 
Naked from the waist up that
morning, the Beloved Woman wore a knee-length skirt of floral print.
 
Strands of shells and beads adorned her neck
and bosom, and a myriad of flowers twisted through the plaits of her black
hair.

All those
flowers triggered Sophie's memory of her stroll home from the swimming hole
that afternoon.
 
Mathias had stolen her
mobcap, snagged wildflowers, and twined them into her braid.
 
Silly with summer, they'd made each other
laugh by convoluting sentence structure to an approximation of Shakespearean
English.
 
A poetic side of him emerged
that she'd never expected.
 
Along the
way, the dark of his eyes had softened whenever he looked at her.