Chapter 66

Lexington, Massachusetts

April 20, 1775

EVERYTHING SEEMED VEILED when James opened his eyes. He couldn’t keep them open. His stomach ached as it had never ached before. He smelled bread baking and meat roasting. James heard voices as he lay in a bed.

Man: You’re crazy to help him.

Woman: He’s not going to live. He’s lost too much blood.

Man: He’s a bloody lobsterback.

Woman: He’s still Christ’s child, someone’s son, maybe brother, maybe husband, maybe father.

Man: We’ll never know. There’s no identification.

Woman: We could try and send him back to the British, when he dies.

Man: You are …

The voices faded and it sounded as if they were going down a flight of stairs.

James thought of Bess. It hurt to breathe. Then he couldn’t breathe at all.

 

 

Chapter 67

Argelès-sur-mer

I MOURN JAMES. For over a year, he has been with me almost every day in two different countries and many cities and villages. He has lived with me through a pandemic and quarantine.

I’ve tried to feel his pleasures, hopes, and fears, knowing all the time how he would die, where he would be buried in a grave marked on a battlefield of the American Revolution.

My other characters, in other books who have become real to me, can go on with their lives.

Not James.

There are real unknown soldiers buried in Lexington, not just in that one grave. Would they have been mourned by fathers, mothers, wives, sons, and brothers in faraway countries? Would not knowing what happened to their family members haunt them or would they not care?

May they all rest in peace throughout the ages.

24 July 2021

Argeles-sur-mer, France