Lexington: Anatomy of a Novel

 

Chapter 14

Ely, England

April 1773

 

 

“YOU’RE BLOODY CRAZY!” William stopped filling the wooden trough, leaving his clothing and arms covered with white flour. The smell of the beer foam, already in the trough, hung in the air. “Alice, make him see sense.”

 

James’s sister-in-law continued handing him faggots to put into the brick oven. He thought she must have heard, but was pretending not to. His last chore here.

 

Although it was still too early to light the fire, he stopped what he was doing. There would have been no good time to make the announcement that he was joining the army. Not just joining but leaving within an hour. “When did you decide?”

 

“Last night. When I walked home from the Rooster.”

 

“LAST NIGHT? You are crazy!” William had two forms to show his anger. One was getting quieter and quieter, forcing whispers through his clenched lips. The alternative was screaming, but William used that far less. James always thought that he went quiet to maintain control because people had to lean closer to hear. When he did holler, it meant he’d lost control, allowing anger to take over his mouth and body. He hollered the words “Last Night” and whispered, “You are crazy.”

 

“I need to get my things together.” James left the room. One staircase, behind the door to the far left of the oven, led to the family living space. A second staircase from the back of the family living space ended in the small attic room where James slept.

 

The door didn’t shut tightly. He needed to jiggle the iron bar to make it line up with the hook. When he and Bess had wanted to make love, they had to fiddle with it to give themselves privacy. Then they had thrown the horsehair mattress onto the floor to keep the metal bed frame from squeaking.

 

More than once they’d wondered

 

 about William and Alice’s sex life. “I feel sorry for Alice,” Bess had said. “William probably counts his thrusts.” It had sent them into such laughter, the kind where it is next to impossible to stop, that the next morning William had complained about the racket upstairs.

So many memories in this room, James thought. As a child he had shared it with William until all their three sisters had married, freeing the third bedroom.

 

William was two years older, already working in the bakery, while James at seven, still went to school. Their parents had insisted all their children learn to read, write and do basic addition and subtraction. Math was important to tally accounts and measure recipes.

 

From the day the children had entered school, they were expected to help with the business before and after class.

 

James had preferred school to working in the bakery: he didn’t hate the work, it just seemed so repetitious. He was good at it. He never thought there were alternatives until now.

 

As he grew older and stronger, kneading the dough in the trough was a release. If he were unhappy about someone, he would imagine their face in the dough as he pounded it with his fists. When a bully beat him up, he’d written the boy’s name in the dough and pounded on the letters.

 

Shaping the dough was alright too. Too often his mind drifted and the loaves would be uneven, earning him a swat first from his parents and later from William who took over the bakery after their parents died. William had been fifteen, James thirteen.

 

The only parts James really loved about the business were sales and deliveries, allowing him to get away for the better part of the afternoon and chat with customers.

 

Now he was going away for who knew how long. He sat on the bed and wondered if he would ever be back.

 

Alice stood in the doorway. “May I come in?”

 

James would miss Alice. What William would have been like without her calming influence, he had no idea. He motioned with his hand to a place next to him.

 

She sat on the bed next to the pile of the things he was taking.

 

“I understand why you want to get away. You’re young. You’ve suffered a great sadness.” She put her hand on his arm. “Maybe you could go next month. Give William a chance to find someone else.”

 

“I’m sure one of our nephews will come. “Stephen maybe. He loves being in Ely.”

 

“It’s a good idea. I’ll miss you.”

 

“And I you.” He realized it was true.

 

“I think I’m pregnant again.”

 

“I hope this time …” He didn’t need to say more. This could be the fifth miscarriage and he knew how much Alice wanted a baby. Her friends’ wives popped out infants annually.

 

“If it is like last time, William will really need someone.”

 

James remembered. Alice had been in bed with a fever for two weeks. No one thought she would survive. When she did, she couldn’t work for another month. Bess, although she was pregnant, had taken Alice’s place as well as doing her own work. Maybe that had added to Bess’s problems. Despite thinking that, he didn’t blame Alice, just cruel fate.

 

It was what it was.

 

Now fate had swooped down to say no it wasn’t what it was. It could be different.

He threw his few clothes on top of the woolen blanket and tied it so that there was a loop to carry. He had never been away from this house overnight. It was only day trips, and even those had been infrequent.

 

William was furious when he saw the blanket holding James’s clothes. “I’ll need that blanket for the apprentice I’ll have to find thanks to your abandonment.”

 

For a moment, James thought about leaving it. It was his blanket. Bess had made it, before their wedding, using her mother’s loom.

 

“Sorry, I’m taking it.” He wasn’t the least sorry.

 

James shut the door with a clack that the neighbors must have heard. It drowned out William’s, “Don’t come back when it doesn’t work out.”

 

It would be strange not to be ruled by a schedule of bread-making and selling, a routine as regular as any clock. He had a certain amount of pride in what he did. His grandmother and then his mother always said to do your best. Perhaps that is why the bakery had been so successful for so long.

 

In his grandmother’s day they might use more rye. Now they used wheat flour, but they had never added alum like some other bakers did.

 

None of that mattered now. He was onto a new life, and he would still do his best, only he hoped he had more passion for whatever lay ahead of him.

 

 

Chapter 15

The road to Winchester, England

April 1773

 

 

THE ROUTE TO Winchester was 152 miles through farmlands, villages and forests. Travelers followed rock-strewn dirt paths. At best, the new soldiers could only make about ten miles on a good day.

 

In two villages, they stayed an extra day to recruit other young men. Corporal Carver and Serjeant Longworth increased their number from eight to ten.

 

If James Holloway found the forest route boring, the slightly bigger cities of Cambridge and Newmarket were interesting. He wondered why he had never gone to Cambridge which was close to Ely.

 

His fellow recruits, including his friend Thomas Miller, were all between eighteen and twenty-five. They bounced over the paths in a wooden cart pulled by two horses. Corporal Carver and Serjeant Longworth rode on horseback alternating with one ahead and one behind the cart as if they were afraid the men would escape.

 

One man did escape.

 

Benjamin had joined on their fourth day. It was a night when they slept on the ground in a wood near a stream after catching trout and picking wild strawberries. It was one of the best meals they had eaten since leaving Ely.

 

When the future foot soldiers woke on the fifth morning of the trek, Benjamin was gone. At first, they thought he might be in the woods relieving himself. Then they noticed his blanket and clothes had disappeared. He hadn’t taken anything not belonging to him.

 

Serjeant Longworth screamed, “This is why we don’t give anyone the sign-up money until you’re at the barracks.”

 

Corporal Carver ignored the rant as he hitched the horses to the cart. The recruits couldn’t understand why only Carver took care of the horses, especially Thomas who thought he could have done it better. All other chores—making the fire to cook the dinner from the supplies or what they had foraged, clearing an area in the woods to sleep, and guarding themselves in turns during the night — were done by the recruits.

 

No tents protected them when they went to sleep. Instead, they gathered branches for lean-tos. Fortunately, it didn’t rain during the trip.

 

April nights could still be chilly, and they’d wrapped themselves in the blankets they had brought from home. James was glad that he hadn’t left his with William. Even though Bess had made it, it was rough and scratchy. Why he thought the army would provide softer blankets, he had no idea.

 

The cart had hard wooden benches creating a pain in their bums reminded James of his father’s paddlings when he misbehaved. Sitting on his clothes bundle as they bumped along helped a little. 

 

He didn’t want to think about the splinter that embedded itself in his right hand when he grabbed the wooden seat as he was jostled about.

 

On the third day, his hand had become infected. By sucking the infection, then spitting out the pus, it began healing. James said nothing. A brave soldier would not complain.

The recruitment serjeant had promised they would see things they never thought they would see if they stayed at home.

 

In Newmarket they saw incredibly beautiful horses. “Bred for racing,” Carver said. “Big races since forever.” The ambiance was so different from their first stop in Cambridge.

In Cambridge students dominated the streets, slowing the cart’s progress. Longworth pulled up to a pub/hostel where he’d stayed with recruits on other trips. They found real beds and a bar that served food.

 

“Look around, but be back before dark,” Serjeant Longworth ordered.

 

James did just that. The streets were filled with students. A boat floated down the river carrying five students, one in the back pushing it with a stick.

 

He wasn’t sure how to describe the color of the different university building bricks: white, gray, brown, a mixture. What were the turrets for?

 

Hungry, he headed back to the place they were staying. The ground floor room was long and dark with rectangular tables and benches. The smell of burning wood and cooking meat made him hungrier.

 

He had taken enough coins from home to wolf down a good meal of beef topped off with some of the best beer he’d ever tasted. Although the bread was good, he felt his family produced better.

 

Four of his fellow recruits joined him as the room filled with students and three families until there wasn’t a free place. The noise level ebbed and flowed as people stopped talking to eat.

 

Although James had finished his meal, he wasn’t in a rush to leave. He loved the atmosphere, especially with the students. What would it be like to be a student? To roam the halls of those huge brick buildings?

 

Despite the babble, he picked up bits of conversations.

 

“Marcus Actorius Naso had to have lived during Caesar’s time.”

 

“He may have known him.”

 

Two boys to his left were speaking in another language. James didn’t understand. Maybe it was Latin. 

 

He heard students discuss a young girl in town who was more than happy to open her legs. “And very nice legs they are too.”

 

Suddenly, Serjeant Longworth stood behind him. “Go to bed. We are leaving very early in the morning.”

 

I’m in the army and have to do as I’m told, he thought. He shivered, thinking it wasn’t that different from William telling him what to do.

 

In his bed that night, James thought back on how much he had enjoyed school and again wished he could be a student here, worrying about someone named Marcus Actorius Naso and a pretty girl’s legs.

 

He rolled over, tucking his hands under his head. I’ve changed my life and I should be satisfied, he thought. I should. I will have adventures these students won’t. That should be enough. Maybe.