Revolution in Time (Out of Time #10) (23 page)

It was clear that these were painful memories and seldom, if ever, spoken of.

“What happened to her?” Elizabeth asked, her curiosity getting the better of her, as usual.

Paine took his wine glass and stared down into the last of it. “She died. In childbirth. Both of them did.”

Simon’s stomach twisted at the words and he caught Elizabeth’s eye across the table. With an effort, he kept his feelings to himself.

“I’m sorry.”

Paine drank the rest of his wine and put the glass and the subject firmly aside. “There is neither manhood nor policy in grief.”

He seemed almost embarrassed now to have been caught feeling something. “It is better we look to the future than the past, is it not?”

Simon wanted to agree, but it was the future he was worried about.

D
ECEMBER
26, 1776 - S
OUTH
of Titusville, New Jersey

Jack weaved his way through the trees, trying not to lose Burgess’ tracks. Dawn was breaking, and that would help, but the snow and wind weren’t helping at all. The tracks were filling and unless the weather changed he’d lose them altogether.

He came to a small stream, surprised it hadn’t frozen over yet, and crossed it, but when he got to the other side the tracks were gone. Jack got off his horse and walked the edge of the water trying to find them again.
 

“Dammit.”

He knew this trick and it was a damned good one. Burgess must have ridden in the water. Upstream or down, though, that was the question. Jack looked both ways and each second ate away at him. Each moment put more distance between them and more snow in the tracks.

Jack patted his horse’s neck. “What do you think, Freckles?”

The horse tossed his head and Jack nodded. “I agree.”

Down, he thought. He would have gone down. With a certainty based on absolutely nothing other than a desperation to be certain, Jack got back on his horse and rode slowly down the shore of the icy cold stream.

He leaned down as his horse walked, trying to find the trail again. He didn’t have far to go. An ice dam had formed barely twenty yards downstream and the tracks, faint as they were, moved on.

Jack followed them, cursing the weather with every step. The tracks were nearly gone now. The protection of the forest was lost as he emerged into an open field. Dawn was nearly here, but the sun wouldn’t shine today. The snow and sleet cut into his eyes. He really could use a little sunshine right now. He was starting to lose feeling in his cheeks, all four of them. He was literally freezing his rear off.
 

He followed the disappearing tracks until they led to a road and then disappeared completely. Once again, Jack had to make a choice. This one wasn’t hard, though. The road appeared to head back toward the river. Burgess certainly didn’t go to all this trouble to head back there.
 

Jack turned his horse to the right and rode on. It was an all or nothing gamble, but this day was full of those, so it seemed only fitting. He gave his horse a little heel and spurred it into a canter. Well-trained and probably as anxious as Jack was to get where they were going and get out of the cold, the horse obeyed.

He rode for about ten more minutes when he realized something was wrong. He wasn’t headed toward Trenton. He was going almost due east. Trenton was to the south. Ish.

Why was Burgess going east? Jack figured he’d want to get to the Hessian garrison and warn them. But, according to the dossier, the Hessians had plenty of warnings. There was a rumor that the commander, Colonel Rall, even had a note in his pocket the day of the battle warning of Washington’s imminent arrival. He’d ignored it. He’d ignored them all. Apparently, his men were constantly attacked by New Jersey militiamen and had grown used to the idea, complacent in their superiority.
 

Surely, Burgess knew all of that. Maybe he figured that his warning would fall on the same deaf ears as well. But if he wasn’t going to warn the Hessians, where was he going?

Jack tried to remember the maps Travers had so generously included. East. What was east?

“Princeton.”

It had to be almost twice as far as Trenton, but on a good horse and with Washington’s men on foot …
 
he could get to Princeton and warn the British troops there. If those reinforcements came to Trenton, even hours before they were supposed to, Washington’s troops would be trapped before they could retreat back across the river, and everything they’d gained would be lost.

“Clever bastard,” Jack muttered.

It was hard to tell how much time Jack wasted finding the road and how far ahead Burgess was by now. There was only one way to find out.

He leaned down and rubbed his horse’s neck. “Okay, Freckles. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

~~~

It was so cold. Teddy couldn’t feel his feet anymore. He didn’t know how long they’d been walking or how far. The world around him seemed like a dreamscape in white. White trees, white stones, white everything. It was quiet and inviting. The piles of snow looked like down—soft and welcoming.

“Stay with your officers!” someone urged them.

 
Like automatons, the men continued to trudge through the gathering snow.
 

It was painfully slow going. Each little hill was a challenge that took almost everything out of them, but somehow they found more to give. Again and again.

Teddy kept his head down and thought only of putting one foot in front of the other. He stared down at the snow, icy from the footsteps of the men in front of him, and wondered how long he could go on.
 

The snow beneath his feet had long ago stopped being white. It was flecked with dirt and grease and blood. Some of the men’s feet were bleeding, and they left a trail of red blood in the snow behind them.

All he wanted to do was stop. To sit down on a log just for a moment.

He looked over at Sullivan, his ruddy face near beet red with the cold.
 

“Can’t we rest?” Teddy pleaded.

Sullivan shook his head. “If we stop, we’ll freeze to death.”

Teddy nodded, but part of him wondered if that might be better. His body ached so badly. Inside—dull burning pain, and outside—sharp as knives.
 

Just ahead of him a man stumbled and fell to his knees. A few men walked past him, unable to muster the strength to help. But someone did. He eased out of line, put his arms around the fallen man and helped him to his feet. Together, they shuffled back into place.

Teddy tried to think of something, anything else.

Three
.

He closed his eyes for a moment and concentrated.

Three point one four.

With each step, he recited another number in his head.

One. Five. Nine.

And followed the trail of blood.

~~~

Jack’s lungs burned with the cold. He knew his horse’s did, too. He’d been pushing him as hard as he dared. They’d ride hard for a few minutes then walk. Then trot, then ride hard again. In the best conditions, horses could only be asked to run at full steam for a few minutes at a time. Even then, they pushed themselves beyond endurance.

A well-trained horse and a careless rider were a recipe for disaster. A man could literally ride his horse into the ground, and the horse would let him. If Jack wanted to catch up to Burgess, he’d have to be patient and chip away at his lead. And he’d have to hope Burgess was foolish enough to either ride too fast or too slow.

Jack tried to stretch his back out when they slowed to a walk again. The forest was unnervingly quiet. Somehow, snow made the quiet even quieter. The only sound he could hear was his breathing and that of his horse and the crunching of the snow beneath his hooves.

They walked for ten minutes before Jack decided it was time to push him again. A tree limb, heavy with snow, broke, and the whole mass of it fell to the ground with a
whomp
that startled them both.

Freckles pranced unhappily on the road, and Jack leaned forward to rub his neck and calm him. The horse threw up his head. Jack spoke quietly to him and soon he was calm again.

Jack patted his neck and leaned back up in the saddle. He was just about to spur him on again when he saw something up ahead on the road, maybe a hundred yards away. A rider. It had to be Burgess.
 

Jack eased his horse off the road and into the woods. The snow was a little deeper here, but they could still manage. He urged his horse to pick up the pace as they wound their way through the woods. They rode parallel to the road. They’d catch up with him in minutes.

Unless, Jack realized, they came to a crossroads and Jack lost him.
 

“Hell.”

He had to risk it. If they stayed on the main road and Burgess saw them, it would be a race and there was no guarantee Jack would win it. Freckles was tired. He’d pushed him hard already. They needed an advantage and surprise was all they had.

He rode as quickly as he could, ducking branches and getting hit by more than he wanted. They pushed on. Through a break in the trees, Jack could see the other rider. It was definitely Burgess and his sorrel.

Jack gained ground bit by bit until they were nearly even. He eased his horse out of the woods toward the road. They were just about there when his horse’s hooves snapped a fallen branch. The sound was like a gunshot in the silence. Burgess spun around in his saddle, those damn blue eyes shooting daggers. Luckily, that was all he had to shoot. He spun back around and took off like a shot down the road.

So much for no race, Jack thought, and chased after him.

Foot by foot, he was catching up. Burgess turned back around and must have noticed the same thing. Realizing he would lose this race, Burgess led his horse off the road and into the forest.
 

Jack was right behind him. Branches whipped against him as the two of them wove in and out of the trees. The only thing louder than Jack’s panting breath was his horse’s. He was pushing him too hard, but there was no stopping now.
 

The flat land gave way to a small valley. The slope wasn’t steep, but, in the ice and snow, it was dangerous. Burgess didn’t care. He took his horse down it like a madman and Jack had no choice but to follow.
 

Like something out of an genuinely snowy
Snowy River
, Jack and Burgess plunged down the hillside. Burgess’ horse stumbled at the bottom, and Jack nearly caught up to him.

They rode almost side by side then, pushing their way through the snow until Jack saw his chance. He urged his horse to give him just a little more and steered him practically into Burgess. It had been years since he’d done any real stunt riding, but he felt it all come back to him in that moment.
 

Just before they collided he readied himself and leaped off his horse, tackling Burgess and sending them both crashing to the ground. He’d hoped the snow would cushion their fall. It didn’t.

They fell in a tangle of limbs. Jack’s back hit the ground so hard it knocked the wind out of him. They tumbled over twice before coming to a stop. Jack tried to breathe, but he couldn’t. He felt a shooting pain through his back and hoped like hell he hadn’t broken it. It felt like he’d broken everything.

Next to him, Burgess moaned and started to move. Jack managed to get a breath in and rolled over. Burgess got to his knees just before he did, though. Jack barely had time to look up before a fist collided with his chin. It rocked his head to the side, but he ignored the pain and lunged forward from his crouch.
 

He tackled Burgess again, and the two grappled in the snow, rolling over from side to side as each tried to get a steady grip. Jack felt fingers digging into his neck. He managed to pry them off and flip Burgess over. He straddled his back and shoved his face down into the snow.

Burgess struggled beneath him, his arms and legs flailing until they spasmed and stopped.

Jack hesitated and then climbed off the man’s back and rolled him over. As much as he wanted to kill him for what he and the others had wanted to do to Elizabeth and tried to do to the rest of the world, he couldn’t. Not like this.

Jack leaned down to take his pulse. But as his hands touched Burgess’ neck, those damn blue eyes opened, and his hand shot out and grabbed Jack’s wrist. He’d been playing possum.

Burgess tried to take a swing with his free hand, but he had no leverage from his position and Jack easily blocked it.

“I don’t think so,” Jack said and delivered a lights out right straight to his jaw. Burgess’ head fell back into the snow, out cold.

D
ECEMBER
5, 1777 - A
UTEUIL
, France

The small convoy of several carriages drove through the gentle countryside on their way from Passy to the neighboring village of Auteuil. It was a clear, crisp day and the sun shined brightly over the vineyards and farmland of what would soon become as built up as the rest of Paris. But for now, Peter thought, it was the image of the French countryside.

Their retinue pulled up to a large estate, one of a few they’d passed on the three-mile journey to Madame Helvétius’ salon. Franklin and several others staying at the hotel had insisted that, despite the excitement of the recent developments, Madame Helvétius’ salon could not be missed. It was a staple of some of the great men of the Enlightenment—scientists, poets, philosophers—and Franklin, who was more than a little of each.

Their carriages stopped on the gravel drive and a woman in her early sixties came out to greet them. Even under her heavy makeup, it was clear she had been a striking beauty in her youth. Although her looks had begun to surrender to the ravages of age, she was still a very handsome woman. And not ashamed to show off her assets. Her bosom nearly spilled out of the low neckline of her dress.

She smiled fondly at Franklin as she took his hands and double-kissed his cheeks. “
Helás
, Franklin!”