Wild Rover No More: Being the Last Recorded Account of the Life & Times of Jacky Faber (35 page)

It is then that I reach for his hand, his left hand, and am about to hold it to my breast, when I feel something on his finger and realize in an instant that I must step back, I must forever step back from my gallant Cavalry Major LordRichard Allen.

It is a wedding ring.

As I release him, Clarissa holds up her own ringed hand and waves it so that there is no mistake. She wears a wide smile.

“Everybody,” I say, in as calm a tone as I am able, “may I introduce Lord Richard Allen, a very dear friend of mine?”

Bows and curtsies all around, except from Clarissa and me. We rise and face each other.

“Say it,” she says, her eyes level with mine.

“Thank you, Clarissa, for helping to save me,” I dutifully say.

An imperceptible shake of her head signals that that is not enough for her. I know what she wants, and I sigh and give it to her.

I give a low curtsy, come up, and say, “Thank you . . . Lady Allen.”

Though it sticks in my throat, that will apparently do.

“You all know my wife, Clarissa, of course. Isn't she beautiful?” Lord Allen whips off her hat and ruffles her hair. “What a pistol! You should've seen her poke that vile Boston hangman with the point of her sword. He was on his knees, crying like a baby and begging for his miserable life! Ha!”

Again Amy and I look at each other.
Ruffling the Queen's hair? We've never seen anyone do that before! Finally, could our proud Clarissa be tamed?
Well, if any male could do it, it would be Richard Allen, and I wish them both the best.

“A true feather in my cap, I must say,” he continues proudly. “And please, all of you, join us for the hunting season in Virginia. I am sure our Clarissa would agree.”

“Yes, do,” says our Clarissa. “Perhaps I shall teach you how to ride properly, Jacky.”

“Well, we must be off. Archie and the lads send regards. I am sure they are well into their plans to knock up at least half of Dovecote's domestic staff and I must set them straight. Come, Clarissa, let us go. I do outrank you, so you must obey. Cheerio, all.”

He extends his hand to his recent bride, and she dutifully rises. As he hustles her out the door, he gives me a big wink. Then he turns back and, with a final clutch around my waist, whispers in my ear, “You've got to come,Prettybottom. I can't spend all that Howe money by myself! It's enormous! And now, one last kiss, Jacky, for old time's sake.”

“Nay, you rascal,” I say, turning my face from his. “I don't have many scruples, but one of them concerns kissing married men. Go now, you beautiful rogue. We will meet again, I know.”

I put a modest kiss on his cheek, and he is gone.

I settle back down with my friends and heave a sigh for a certain bold dragoon. I have scarcely taken a breath when there is yet another commotion outside.

Oh, no! Another alarm!
There is a knock on the door and everyone suddenly falls silent. Amy is closest, and she jumps up to look out the tiny window set in the door.

“It is Sergeant Matthews,” she says, opening the door to one of the militiamen.

The soldier enters and says, “Pardon, Miss, but someone on horseback is coming. It's a British officer,” reports the soldier. “Navy, I think. Should I let him through?”

A shot of fear sends me to my feet. “I'll not be taken alive again, I won't! Higgins, my pistols! My friends, you've done all you can for me, please, save your—”

Amy pulls the curtain away from a window and peers out. “Save your concern, Sister, and come look,” she says, smiling as broadly as I have ever seen her smile. “Yes, Sergeant, please lead the Lieutenant to the front entrance, if you will.”

The militiaman salutes and leaves, while I go to the window to look out.

Oh, my God!

The Journal of Amy Trevelyne, continued . . .

Dovecote Farm

Quincy, Massachusetts

 

“Good Lord,” gasped Jacky in open-mouthed wonder as she clutched her clasped hands to her breast. “It's Jaimy! My Jaimy Fletcher! Oh, my joy!”

I stood with her at the window on that wonderful day and looked out over her trembling shoulder. It was, indeed, a very pale and drawn Mr. Fletcher out there, tying the reins of his mount to the hitching post. After doing so, he commenced to walk slowly to the front door. He had a packet of some sort under his arm.

I watched to see what my friend would do at this point, the culmination of all her dreams and aspirations. I would certainly have expected her to rush out and fling herself in his arms, but instead, she turned, her face radiant with happiness, and said, “Polly! Go meet him at the front door! You are a serving girl full of grief over my being strung up! Keep him there until you are given a signal, then send him up the hill. I need to change!” And with that, she ran out of the room. I knew Jacky was headed for my bedroom, as her seabag rested there on the floor, and I thought I knew what she had in mind.

Polly put her hands to her face and said, “All right. Give me a moment to get in character.” She took a deep, theatrical breath, then said, “There. I've got it.” She put her hands together in front of her face, and I swear a tear trickled out of each eye. We heard the expected knock on the front door and Polly exited, stage left, as it were, to go answer it.

I did not immediately follow my friend up to my room, but instead stayed back to find out what would be said in the entrance hall so that I could record it here.

“Good d-d-day to you, Sir,” stammers Polly tearfully, upon seeing James Fletcher in the doorway. “Please do come in.”

“Thank you, Miss. My . . . my name is James Fletcher and . . .”

“Oh, Mr. Fletcher!” wails Polly, falling to her knees before him and covering her face with her hands. “I know who you are, and I must tell you that the most awful thing has happened!”

A bit overly theatrical for my taste, but I let it go. Actors will be actors.

“I . . . know,” he says softly. “I saw the newspapers when I landed in Boston. I have here with me the evidence that would have spared her”—it's plain he is trying to control his emotions—“but too late . . . always too late.”

Polly rises from the floor with the utmost grace, of course, and puts her hands lightly on Mr. Fletcher's arm. She looks up at him with those huge, teary, baby-blue eyes and says, “Oh, Sir, her last words were spoken of you . . .”

I turn and hurry to my room. Jacky had best hurry or Polly will have him a total wreck.

“Why, Sister, do you wish to prolong his agony?” I ask as I enter the room where she is hurriedly undressing. “Why did you not just fly into his arms?”

“Because, Sister, I want him and me to reunite, for what I hope will be the final time,
alone,
and not in front of a roomful of people. It would not be fair to him to show myself then. It would have been a blow to his pride if he were to seem unmanly in front of others. Believe me, I know a lot about male pride. No, Amy, I want to do it this way.”

“Perhaps, dear, you could wait until we have the Preacher here before you and him . . .” I suggest as my friend strips off her clothes.

“Nay, Sister, I have waited long enough, and so has he,” she says, peeling off her black Lawson Peabody school dress and stepping out of it. “If I hesitate for even a moment, I'm sure a troop of Royal Marines will appear up over that hill with orders for him to return to his ship to sail away forever. Or Professor Tilly will show up with one of his silly kites to send me aloft again . . . or legions of black-robed Men of God will take me and hand me over to black-hooded hangmen waving their nooses . . . or Naval Intelligence will want me to spy again, or . . . 
Damn!
”

Her foot gets caught on the waistband of her drawers and she falls over on the floor in her haste to get them off. Accomplishing that task, she gets back to her feet and whips her undershirt off over her head. She lunges to her seabag and rummages impatiently through it and at last says “Ha!” as she draws out some sort of faded . . . 
Aha!
I see that it is indeed the fabled Kingston dress . . .

“. . . Or a Mike Fink, or a Constable Wiggins, or aCaptain Scroggs, or the Spanish Inquisition, or Napoleon Bonaparte himself, or any of hundreds of others who want to be done with me for good and ever. No, Sister, I must go now.”

She puts her arms through the short, puffy sleeves and flips the flimsy dress over her head. It slips over her body, covering her nakedness . . . well, at least it covers her from bottom of breastbone to top of knees.

She fluffs up her hair and sticks a leg out the open window, then turns to face me. “You see, Sister,” she says, “I gave my vows long ago in a goldsmith's shop in Kingston,Jamaica, and I have kept those vows, in my way. Give me a moment's head start and then tell Polly to send him up. And if you will be so good as to do me a great favor, Amy, I'd like you to keep everyone out of the barn for a good long while, as we'll be needin' the hayloft.”

Then she grins that oh-so-familiar open-mouthed, foxy grin of hers, and is out the window.

I go to the window and watch my dearest friend race up Daisy Hill, her hair loose and blowing in the breeze, her legs flashing under the hem of that ridiculous rag of a dress. In less than a moment she is gone from my sight.

I heave a great sigh and go back to the parlor and give the nod to Polly. She catches my eye and says, “Yes, Sir, it's at the top of the hill. In a very pretty place, I . . . I think you'll take much comfort there.”

She stifles a sob and takes her hands from Mr.Fletcher's arm, puts those same hands to her face, and collapses in tears into a nearby chair. It's a bit overdone, Gentle Reader, you will agree, but let it go, for it is just such a joyous time and all can be forgiven their excesses. Mr. Fletcher's back is to me, so I am able to slip out of the parlor and back to my room, unseen. I go again to my window and look out. In a few moments, I see the poor, bereftLieutenant James Fletcher trudging up the hill, a world of sadness on his shoulders. He will come down from that hill a much happier man, and I wish him the total and absolute joy of this day.

Well,
ahem!
There are things that must be done. First, I must go back down to see that a basket of bread and cheeses and cold meats is prepared, which will be discreetly set at the foot of the ladder to the hayloft. Several bottles of wine, too, are added, as those two will need more sustenance than just love and love only.

I'll go outside to the place where the barn is missing a few boards, the same spot where she and I, snug in the hay, used to lie side by side and look out on the green fields of late summer to dream our dreams, and I will softly call up to her that there is refreshment below. No, no, Gentle Reader, do not think me forward. I know her, and I know her appetites, and I know she will not mind that slight invasion of their privacy.

Some thin sheets and blankets will be provided, too, for the night might turn chilly, and it is entirely possible that they will not emerge till morning. Although they will be wrapped up in each other's warmth and buried deep in the hay, their cuddling might not be enough to serve them comfortable, on this, their wedding night . . . or almost wedding night.

Oh, I expect the lovers will come out tomorrow morning, sated with love, for the time being, at least. They will be disheveled, with straw poking out of their clothes, leaning into each other as they walk down the path to the house. We will take her from him to clean her up and get her into the wedding dress, and we will prepare for the ceremony and the wedding banquet. She will sparkle and be gay, but all will know that what she really wants the most is to run off to the hayloft with her Jaimy again. After all is said and done, we will let them go.

Ah, but I am getting ahead of myself. There are more things to do, for we have this wedding to plan on very short notice.

First, I must send a boy to fetch Reverend Sturgis to perform the ceremony. Though it will be a day or two late, I'm sure that even in our strict society she should still be permitted to wear white, as the act of marriage was close enough in time to the legal contract of marriage. Not that she would care one whit whether the dress be white or scarlet, but she would care very much if they succeed in putting a baby in her belly this day—and it is very possible that they will. She'll want the child to bear the father's name, no matter what she says now. So I must have our Dovecote girls put together a white gown and veil. It will be simple, with a high neck, straight front, and gathered back, I think. She may protest, but I will be firm. She will
not
be married in that Kingston rag, not in my house she won't.

I ring my little bell, and when the girl knocks and is told to come in, I say, “Charity, please tell Mrs. Grubbs that we'll be putting together a wedding and reception for, maybe, fifty . . . no, sixty people, tomorrow or the next day. Yes, we'll need all the fatted geese and turkeys, so make preparations. Yes, dear, it will, indeed, be a grand time for all. Off with you now . . .”

Oh, yes, and a man must be sent immediately on horseback to Boston to inform her friends that they will be going to her wedding and not to her funeral, which news I know will be received most joyfully. I have been informed that the
Lorelei Lee
has made port in Boston, and I am sure she will be loaded with all her Boston friends, to be brought here to Dovecote for the celebration: Peg Mooney, Sylvie and Henry Hoffman, Annie Jones, and Betsey and Ephraim Fyffe; and, of course, Joannie Nichols and the entire student body of the Lawson Peabody School for Young Girls. RebeccaAdams is still in attendance and it's entirely possible she could persuade former President and Mrs. Adams to join us in that happy celebration, as they live not far away. I know old John still enjoys a good party. And Chloe Cantrell and Solomon Freeman and Daniel Prescott and the rest of her various crews. I can just imagine the introductions . . . 
Mr.President, may I present John Thomas and Smasher McGee, both able-bodied Yankee seamen.