The Color of Freedom (9 page)

Before they traveled a mile, a mounted patrol accosted them.

"Stay your wagon!" yelled a dark figure. White crisscross straps showed in the gloom, plainly marking him as an officer. Three others spilled across the road.

Meadow glared as one of the men roughly grasped Aberdeen's bridle. Two others dismounted and circled behind the wagon with a dim lantern where they rummaged beneath the canvas tarp.

"And where would you be
sneakin
' off to like rats in the dark?" asked the officer, spurring his mount close to the wagon with his hand on the hilt of a sword. "Up to no good, most likely? Along with the rest of the filth in these accursed colonies. Out of the wagon, old man. And you, too, boy. On the ground!"

Meadow's legs felt like warm butter as she leaped down and stood near
Salizar
, but her eyes flashed dangerously. How she'd like to run the haughty soldier through with the point of his own blade!

"I'm only a poor traveling merchant, sir,"
Salizar
groveled, at his meekest. "A humble servant of the king. The boy and I earn our bread selling wares to the townsfolk hereabout. We are on our way to the coast to resupply. We heard a clamor and seek the safety of a town."

"I don't believe you," the officer sneered. As his horse danced around them he brought the point of his sword up to the level of
Salizar's
neck. "And it will be your dishonest blood I spill if you prove false!"

"It's true!" Meadow yelled. "He's an old man, of no harm to you! Leave him alone!"

"Wynn, no!"
Salizar
cried.

But the officer had already narrowed his eyes and shifted his attention to Meadow. Steel caressed her neck. "Perhaps you fancy yourself a hero, boy," he mocked.

"He's a rag and bone man, all right," called one of the rummagers, "and still hauling some wares."

The officer sneered down at them in the dark. "Probably smuggled goods that haven't been properly taxed." He called to the man in the rear, "Anything in there fixing payment for his majesty's troops?"

"Aye, sir. A fine knife, and a canteen to replace the one the horse stepped on."

"Bring them around!"

The soldier carried the items to the front where the officer looked them over appreciatively beneath the glare of the lantern. He slipped the knife into the waistline of his leggings and strapped the canteen over a shoulder. "Fine wares indeed, sir. Your donation is appreciated," he taunted.

Another figure on horseback stepped into the road. "Give them back, gentlemen."

The soldiers snapped to attention. "Lieutenant Munroe, sir! We were just exacting a toll for passage down the king's road. No harm intended, sir!"

The command repeated, "Give the gentleman back his wares, corporal. We are here to keep order, not incite the colonists to wrath."

Grudgingly, the corporal stepped aside. "My apologies," he muttered, returning the merchandise with a glowering look.

"Nay, nay,"
Salizar
simpered, bowing and refusing the goods. "It's a gift - to show I hold no animosity toward good King George. Each must do his best to see there's peace in the world, sure. The knife and canteen are yours to keep."

Meadow's eyes nearly popped out of her head.
Salizar
giving away merchandise? To that arrogant, scavenging jackal?

"Very well," Lieutenant Munroe agreed, "and thank you. If all were as generous as you, the presence of royal troops would not be required here at all."

Meadow almost choked.

With a slight bow, the officer nudged his horse back into the gloom. The berated corporal sheathed his sword and wheeled his mount, spurring him in the opposite direction. The others remounted and followed. With a tinkling of pots, Aberdeen set the wagon back in motion.

Out of earshot of the troops, Meadow turned on
Salizar
. "How could you pander to the British like that? The scoundrel tried to steal from you, or worse! No telling what he would have done if that fellow hadn't stepped in."

"Wynn, my lad, a knife and a canteen and a bit of pride are small insurance for an unscathed journey."

"But how can you not hate them?" Meadow raged.

He turned to her with a calculating look. "There are no profits in taking sides. If you cannot bow when required, you threaten my business and give me cause to bid you farewell. So, will you stay or go?"

The man was a two-sided coin, she realized with distaste, playing whatever politics served his pocketbook. And his scruples, if he had any, were fashioned of porridge. If it were not so important that she reached Boston...

"I'll stay," she muttered sullenly.

The town was alive with noise and confusion. A number of pine pitch torches lit the green and flickered on the gathering of men roused from their beds. Some clustered in loose groups, broadly demonstrating their disgust for the sins of their sovereign. Others stood patient and silent, the long night of waiting evident in their strained features.

A crush of men migrated in and out of a well-lit tavern at the edge of the green, seeking heat, refreshment and information. Here and there a woman hovered, casting worried glances at the men and corralling awakened children behind closed doors.

Salizar
pulled alongside the two-story structure and handed Meadow the reins before disappearing inside. She hunched over the seat, rubbing the worn leather straps and glancing down the road to Boston. A few more men trickled onto the field.

Gray light gathered at the edge of the horizon, softening the dark faces of buildings and of men. Meadow felt her anxiety grow with the dawn. These were not soldiers before her. They were merchants and tradesmen, husbands and fathers and farmers. Clad in rough homespun and armed with ancient fowling pieces and pitchforks, how could they hope to stand against the mighty British? Stubborn pride and righteous indignation they had in abundance, but it amounted to dust beneath the feet of the royal fighting machine.

She wanted to scream at the men to go home, to return to their families before it was too late, but she bit her lip. Her warning would only place her in danger of an angry mob, so she watched with an iron weight in her chest.

A rider thundered into town, pulling up sharply near a cluster of men in the center of the green. As his mount reared, he shouted, "Captain Parker, I saw them! Half mile out!"

The commander turned gravely to his drummer. "Sound the call to arms."

Men poured onto the field. Conversations rose and fell among them like grass tumbled by the wind. When their murmurings grew quiet, the captain addressed them, "Every man of you who is equipped, follow me. Those who have no weapon, go into the meetinghouse and furnish yourselves from the magazine. Then join the company."

Less than half of the men had arrived armed. These followed Captain Parker to the far side of the green where he arranged them into a single line. There they stood defiantly, waiting for their fellows who crowded the door of the meetinghouse.

Salizar
reappeared and climbed into the wagon. "It'll do us no good to lose our merchandise now," he stated. He flicked the reins over Aberdeen's back. The old horse responded immediately, pulling the wagon out of sight behind the building.

Unable to hold her seat, Meadow leaped from the wagon and ran to the corner of the building like a moth drawn to the deadly flicker of a candle. As morbid as her curiosity felt, she had to know the outcome of the confrontation.

The town held its breath. Only the shuffle of weapons at the meetinghouse door broke the stillness. Women peered anxiously from behind dark, shuttered windows. The men held their line - forty tense faces set determinedly toward the lightening sky, toward Boston. Very young boys and very old men among them, they stood grim and stubborn.

The minutes ticked by slowly, feeling weighty and surreal. Nearby, a single bird awakened and began a noisy serenade. A lone dog trotted along the road, turning onto a narrow lane with a purposeful stride. A few more men from the meetinghouse straggled into the ranks.

Then they came.

The tramp of jackboots crunched and splashed over the road, echoing back from the fronts of the buildings.

Captain Parker paced before the militia, calling out encouragement and boosting their nerve. "Stand your ground, men," he yelled, "Don't fire first; but if they want a war, by God, let it start here!"

The regulars came quickly, wheeling to cut off three dozen men still scattered around the meetinghouse. Led by an officer on a magnificent stallion, they came stern-faced and proud, showing little sign of their all-night march.

Each wore a blood red uniform crisscrossed with straps that held weighty packs to their backs. White wigs and black hats bobbed as they came, marking time with each step. Against their shoulders rested muskets fully as tall as Meadow, affixed with bayonets that stabbed at the sky like so many needles.

She watched with wide, frightened eyes as row upon row of the king's men flooded the commons until they outnumbered the colonists nearly three to one. Then they stopped, and the world fell silent.

The stallion pranced before the colonists, and the officer brandished his sword. He called out in a voice that rang across the field like a tolling bell, "Disperse, you rebels! Lay down your arms!"

When he dropped his weapon, the first platoon fired a sudden volley at the colonists.

Meadow jumped in horror at the unexpected noise and peeked out from between splayed fingers. As the smoke wafted away toward the east, she could see the American line still intact. Too close to miss, the shots must have been charged with only powder.

The rebels shifted nervously, but they held fast. Tension flowed thick as cream as men eyed each other across the field. Meadow held her breath and leaned forward, counting each slow heartbeat.

When she felt she must scream, Captain Parker finally ordered his men to scatter.

Meadow sank to the earth with relief. To order anything less, she knew, would have meant a blood bath. But just as the ranks of colonists began to disband, a single shot rang out.

It jolted Meadow with its suddenness. Before its echoes died away, pandemonium broke out across the commons. She cowered against the building as the horror of war unfolded before her.

Guns belched smoke and fire. Militia men fired randomly, diving for any shelter they could find while the disciplined platoons, wild as demons with the heat of battle, shot volley after volley into the colonists. Then they charged, chasing the rebels from the field. Bayonets flashed and stabbed and came up red, and screams rose ghostlike from the hazy field.

The officer rode frantically among his men, waving his arms and ordering them to stop, but his voice was lost in the thunder of shots. Shapes grew slow and distorted in the dimness and the roiling smoke, and the acrid smell of powder scorched the air. After an eternity of hell, a drum roll demanded a cease-fire and the guns fell silent at last.

A west wind swept away the smoke to reveal ten Americans writhing on the ground. Eight more lay irrevocably still.

Cheers broke out among the unscathed regulars, but their officer checked them with an angry command.

In the sullen silence that followed, Meadow heard the sound of more jackboots. Another long column of red uniforms poured in from the Boston road. Her lips parted and her jaw hung slack as the number of British in the town quickly tripled.

At a stern word from their officer, the scattered regulars regrouped. The mounted man rode back to confer with his superior among the new arrivals, and within minutes, the whole army snaked through town and disappeared down the road toward Concord.

The town began to breathe. Meadow's vision blurred as family members burst from the surrounding buildings and raced across the bloodied green. She cringed at the sobs of new widows, at the puzzled expression of children too young to understand. She felt fuzzy-headed, as if she'd just set down a tragic story yet lingered still between its pages.

But there was no setting this tale aside.

Slowly, the militia returned from the woods to which they had been scattered. They tended their dead and wounded, carrying them inside houses scattered around the green. And as they worked, they looked often down the Concord road, their flinty glare solidified into hatred.

Meadow sadly shook her head. The foolish men! Didn't they know the British would run them over, trample them like rats beneath a team of horses? Why had they taken the risk?

She remembered the looks of grim determination, the stubborn stances. They
had
known, and yet they stayed, and in her heart she knew their reason. She understood it, she shared it, but would she have traded her life for it?

She turned away.

∗ ∗ ∗

"Wynn, let's go,"
Salizar
called frantically.

"Where?" Was there any place on earth they could escape the madness that had overrun them?

"North. To a farmhouse I know of. We must get off this road."

Meadow climbed into the wagon and swayed unheedingly as it bounced and shifted under her. Her heart felt burned away, like a dug-out canoe, with only a scarred shell remaining. In her mind she could still see the dead lying unmoving beneath the cloudy April sky.