The Turncoat (17 page)

Tremayne, by instinct and training, turned in the direction the bullet had come from. Thick woods on all sides. Perfect for hiding snipers.

What you wanted to do was fold yourself up no wider than one of the surrounding trees, close your eyes, and pray no one hit you. Lytton was already doing a very fine impression of a Dutch elm, but Tremayne had been a soldier long enough to know that death would find him if it was looking hard enough, and all he could control was how he met it.

Donop didn’t so much as flinch. He poked a finger through the bullet hole in his hat and nodded appreciatively. “A good shot. An excellent marksman. But we have better.” He barked a set of orders in German and his Jaegers parted like the Red Sea, dividing down the center of the road and taking up positions in the tree line on either side of the way. They were the cream of the Hessian infantry, and it showed.

More shots rang out. Lytton remained frozen in the middle of the road, asking to be hit. Tremayne could have solved a great many of his problems by leaving him there, but he pulled the boy into the tree line instead.

“He’s mad,” Lytton said, watching Donop stroll down the center of the road, a glittering target in blue silk and silver lace. It was the sort of lunatic bravado Tremayne could not help but admire. He was coming to quite like Carl Donop.

A few more shots were exchanged. The skirmish was over almost as soon as it had begun, and the march resumed. Two hours later Donop fell into step beside Tremayne once more and asked, “What do you make of our friends in the woods?”

“They are keeping pace with us, and they are being led by a professional,” he replied.

“Just so,” said Donop. “It is a pity you recruited so many colonials in your last war with the French, then denied them commissions in your army. I understand Washington is just such a man.”

“Hindsight is eagle-eyed,” Tremayne said evenly. But it was true. The tactics employed against their column were exactly right for a small band of militia facing a much larger force on home ground. The Americans knew what they were doing. Say what you liked about the Rebels, and Tremayne often said a great deal, but these particular men were well led, most likely by someone who had served with the British against the French and Indians. There was no shortage of such men in America, but most of them likely mirrored their counterparts in the British Army, and were competent if uninspired tacticians. This unseen adversary was something different. There was a keen intellect, a talent for war, at work somewhere in the Jersey woods.

Donop shared his opinion. As they talked, largely in French, Tremayne found that they had much in common. They were of a similar age, social class, and martial inclination.

But Donop possessed the autocratic arrogance of his race. He spoke now without caution or delicacy, enumerating the deficiencies of the brothers Howe. “They are Whigs. American sympathizers, Black Billy and Black Dick. When the general last stood for Parliament he stated publicly that he would refuse service in America. He is only here because your king personally persuaded him to come. He has no stomach for fighting the Americans; still holds out hopes of negotiating a peace. Only a fool like your secretary of state, Lord Germain, would send such men to prosecute this war. You also, I suspect, have Whig sympathies, Peter. Why, then, did you request service in America?”

Tremayne studied the rutted surface of the road. It was littered with sweet-gum sticker-balls, brown, spiked, and damned uncomfortable beneath his boots. “Because I thought it offered greater scope for advancement.” But what he meant was that he hated his station in Ireland, because he had no desire to uphold laws that were abhorrent to him.

At Haddonfield, Donop found quarters for himself in a trim little farmhouse and camped his men under canvas on the heights overlooking the town. It was then that they realized yet another consequence of Howe’s impulsive orders: the Hessians had no rations. Men could not trek for miles and fight on an empty stomach. Flour and apples might be purchased from the farmers of Haddonfield, but something must be done if the men were to have any meat that night.

Turkey were abundant in the Haddonfield woods, so Donop ordered his Jaeger captain, Ewald, to organize a hunting party, and retired to his quarters to confer with his battalion officers. Since Tremayne was not needed as a translator, he left Donop closeted in the cramped and smoky kitchen of the farmhouse to smoke his pipe in the orchard outside.

He was not alone for long.

“Major.” The energetic Captain Ewald, with his martial bearing and dashing eye patch, who Tremayne noted was only a few years younger than himself, came striding out of the farmhouse, the picture of Hessian professionalism. The man had somehow found time to restore the gloss of his mustache and the shine of boots after the march, no doubt with the same blacking. “The colonel presents his compliments. He wishes that you should not miss the sport.” He handed Tremayne a rifle, longer than the typical Jaeger weapon, and lighter as well.

“This is one of Ferguson’s. How did Donop get hold of it?”

Ewald’s lips twitched. It was not quite a smile. “The count is a man of resource. And he likes his hunting. You have heard of the gun?”

“I’ve heard it may be fired six times in a minute.”

“Just so. And yet your General Howe will not make use of the weapon.”

Tremayne wouldn’t touch the remark about Howe, but he wondered, not for the first time, what it must be like to be an ambitious junior officer without title or fortune, serving beneath a man like Donop, or for that matter, beneath a man like himself. “What is Donop like in the field?” Tremayne asked, flipping open the breech and admiring the smooth motion of the spring.

Ewald, he noted, did nothing so unbefitting his Hessian dignity as to turn and look into the trees behind him, but his eyes did scan the empty fields on either side before he spoke. They were quite alone. “He is as you have observed. Cool under fire. Brave to within a hairsbreadth of recklessness.”

“Just so. And?” Tremayne prompted.

“He has only two faults, Lord Sancreed, and only one of those is likely to get us killed tomorrow. He is proud, and exceedingly fond of the fair sex.”

“I’d rather thought we were here for both reasons: his pride and his amours.”

And now Ewald did turn to look at the farmhouse behind him, and did smile. “You may be interested to know that for a man who rarely denies himself pleasure when it is offered, the count has been curiously temperate these past months. He has not had a woman, that I know of, since Mount Holly.”

Ewald bowed and took his leave to organize the hunting party.

And that was how Tremayne found himself, dogged once more by Lytton, advancing with the ambitious young Jaeger captain, Ewald, and sixty hungry riflemen through the Jersey woods at dusk, the moon already up and night coming on fast.

Turkeys gobbled in the distance. The Jaegers gobbled back, attempting to draw them, but the birds would not come out, and the party was forced to drive deeper into the woods.

Tremayne needed to speak to Lytton privately, before they returned to the city, and this was likely to be his best chance. Having arrived in Philadelphia only the previous day, the young lieutenant had not yet had time to meet Caide’s fiancée and identify her as the spy of Grey Farm. The boy had to be sent back to New York, before he exposed Kate.

Tremayne stopped Lytton at the top of a ravine as the Jaegers descended, gobbling and clucking. When they had passed, Tremayne said, “Has Caide told you why he brought you to Philadelphia?”

“Yes,” the boy said, but he sounded uncertain. “To help you hunt for the spy who stole your dispatches at Grey Farm.”

Kate’s name lingered unspoken between them.

“I don’t want your help. After Mercer is taken, you’re going back to New York.” It sounded like a curt dismissal, but Tremayne couldn’t help that. He could not explain himself.

“I can’t. I was cashiered when your troop was disbanded. Your cousin allowed me to purchase a captaincy in his regiment.”

Tremayne hadn’t known, hadn’t given another thought to Lytton after the court had dismissed him. The boy had been under his command, had been his responsibility. He should have made it his business to see him clear of the whole mess. He had been callous, and now Kate would pay for it. Lytton would expose her. She would be arrested, and hanged.

“You disapproved of my morals at Grey Farm, Phillip. You’ll like my cousin’s even less. Sell your commission or transfer to another regiment before Bay puts you to the test and you find that you cannot stomach his orders, because it will come to that. You will be forced to betray yourself, or your commanding officer.”

“I’m afraid that I can no longer afford such scruples. I mean to make my career in the army, and after what happened while I was under your command, no other regiment will have me.”

And here was the crux of the matter. Tremayne was already perilously close to treason himself. He was consorting with a known spy, concealing her presence from Howe, in direct violation of orders. This, all for a woman he had once kissed fleetingly in a stifling farmhouse many months ago. He had no right to ask another man to dally with treason.

“I may be the author of your misfortune, Phillip, but I have no intention of handing a lady over to Howe for espionage, no matter what she has done. No gentleman would.”

There was something cold and brittle in Lytton’s eyes, and Tremayne recognized it as hurt pride. He recognized also that had he behaved with anything like the chivalry Lytton had unsuccessfully championed at Grey Farm, Kate would not be in danger now. But it was too late. Tremayne had stolen her letter, attempted to seduce her. He had embittered the callow boy standing before him, and placed an innocent girl at the mercy of John André.

Lytton spoke coolly now. “Miss Grey is not a lady; she is a traitor.”

“Howe isn’t looking for Miss Grey. He wants the Merry Widow, Mrs. Ferrers.”

“Then I will advance my fortunes twice as quickly by bringing Howe two spies instead of one.”

“You don’t know what you are talking about, Lytton. This thing is more complicated than you understand. Trust me. If you discover Miss Grey, you will find no friends in your current posting.” Caide would not love any man who brought him proof of his sweetheart’s treachery. Whatever else his cousin might be, Tremayne had no doubt that in his own strange, obsessive fashion, Bay was in love with Kate. But everything Bay touched, he destroyed. Tremayne would not allow him to destroy Kate.

Below in the ravine, the Jaegers whooped and huzzahed. A giant tom turkey, eyes glittering in the moonlight, breast puffed and wattle trembling, tore from the brush. The angry gobbler clucked and flapped his wings, then rushed at the Hessians. The Jaegers pointed and laughed, and the enlisted men fell back and encouraged Ewald to take his shot.

Lytton stared at the crazed turkey. “It’s attacking. Stupid bird.”

“No,” said Tremayne, understanding dawning too late, “it’s running away.”

But not from us.
It was an ambush.

Most of the Jaegers were now in the bottom of the ravine, with little or no cover. Heavy fire erupted from the trees ahead and above. Some of it was buckshot, to judge by the sound of it. Ungentlemanly, but a particularly good choice in the fading light.

The Jaegers hadn’t been following turkeys into the woods. They’d been drawn by the gobbles and clucks of the Rebels.

Clever. Very clever indeed. The Jaegers were in an indefensible position. The Americans poured their fire into the bottom of the ravine, which would soon prove a killing field.

Fortunately, Ewald was no fool. He and his men had been after turkey tonight, not Rebels. Mercer remained the real goal, and to take Mercer, Donop must get his force intact to Red Bank. The young captain ordered a hasty retreat, and the Jaegers began to scrabble, tree to tree, back the way they had come. Professionals to a man, a few paused, when a convenient tree or position permitted, to return fire—hoping to unsettle the unseen ambushers and cover the withdrawal.

Tremayne motioned for silence and led Lytton to an outcropping of rock. He lay down flat over the cold stone with the Ferguson beside him. Lytton did likewise with his own gun.

The Americans were nearly invisible in the twilit woods. Tremayne would have liked to pick off their officers, but he could find none; no gold braid or silver lace to mark his targets.

Tremayne passed the Ferguson to Lytton. “Here. Give me yours.” Muzzle-loading a rifle while prone was difficult but not impossible, and Tremayne was likelier to do it quickly than Lytton was to master the art in the next few moments.

They could hear the Rebels calling to one another. The Americans knew the Jaegers were retreating, and there was clearly some disagreement about whether or not to follow. A horse whinnied. “That is the sound of a target, Lytton. An officer. Whoever is sitting that mount is paid a good deal better than the poor bastards on the ground. Kill him, if you please.”

The boy scanned the trees. There was a single rider on a massive gray horse, his face invisible beneath a crumpled brown hat. Lytton looked through the sights of the Ferguson, and took aim. The rider removed his disreputable headgear, and for Peter Tremayne, the world stopped.

Tremayne had never set eyes on the man before, but even in the moonlight there was no mistaking the quirked mouth or the peculiar set of the stubbled jaw.

Lytton drew back the trigger. Tremayne had no time to think. He hurled himself against the boy, knocking the rifle over the rock. The gun went off and the two men tumbled down the incline together, striking every root and stone in their path and fetching up at the bottom of the ravine.

Lying on his back, the wind knocked out of him, bleeding from a dozen cuts, Tremayne heard the horse crashing through the trees, knew the rider would be on him any minute.

He climbed to his feet. He left his saber hanging at his hip, unlaced his neckcloth, and when the rider was within twenty feet, held it aloft in surrender and called out, “Colonel Grey, I have an urgent matter to discuss with you.”