Chapter 61
Boston to Lexington, Massachusetts
March 5, 1775
“THIS IS THE best
horse we have.” The stablemaster stopped at the stall of a brown stallion who
was moving about as much as the space allowed. “He needs some exercise.”
Not with me, James thought. The horse
was a beautiful specimen, but he could think of many reasons not to choose him
and not just because he would be too much for him to handle. With his lack of
horsemanship skills, he would never have qualified for the cavalry.
Thomas
could have brought this animal under control. The thought of his lost friend made
him forget for a moment why he was choosing a horse. He shoved the tide of
grief aside to concentrate on his mission. General Gage has ordered him to go
to Lexington and Concord to find out if the cannons were there. He was to dress
in farmer’s clothes.
A
farmer would never have such a high-quality animal. “I need a regular horse,
maybe one a little bit, but not too much, past its prime.” He wanted to add, who
is gentle and won’t mind that I’m not a very good rider, but he didn’t.
The
stable smelled of horse shit. It needed a good mucking out, James thought. The
snow had melted, but there were no buds on the trees or grass sprouting. The
horses had been mostly kept inside their stalls since November with only an
occasional outing.
The
stablemaster led James up and down the rows of stalls, citing the merits of
each beast. When he came to a stall with a mare, he said, “This is Cranberry.
She’s gentle. We’ve used her to give children rides. We were trying to convince
them lobsterbacks aren’t terrible.”
The
stablemaster spat. For the first time James noticed he’d been chewing tobacco.
Must have been a very small chunk. It was a habit he’d never taken up. He’d
tried once and found the taste not only disgusting, but it lingered the way taking
a bite of a raw onion would stay in his mouth.
“I
need a non-army saddle, bit and rein.”
“You
aren’t thinking of deserting, are you boy?” The stablemaster, James guessed,
was probably in his late fifties, if his gray hair and wrinkles were any
indicator. The man limped, which meant he wasn’t fit for active duty, although
he wore the regimental uniform, which bore the 10th Regiment of Foot
buttons and insignia. Probably his role as stablemaster kept him in the
regiment.
He
had no written orders to show the stablemaster. Gage had said that would
compromise his safety if the rebels captured him. Outside Boston was almost all
rebel territory. “Absolutely not.”
“Then
you must be on a spy mission.”
“Shh.”
******
As James rode
Cranberry through the countryside. He could hear birds singing. Perhaps they
were beginning to build their nests.
Cranberry’s
preferred speed was an amble, which James appreciated. If the General was angry
with the amount of time James took to complete this mission, James would claim he’d
taken time to talk to people although he was halfway to Lexington before he saw
anyone to talk to. Mostly he was riding through unsettled land. Farms were
outside the villages. Despite it being almost April, the ground was still too
frozen to be tilled.
He
passed a farmer fixing the stones on his wall. “Hello there.”
“I
don’t know your face,” the man said.
“Nor
I yours.”
“Not
from around here.”
“Beyond
Worcester. Heard that the militia might need some recruits.” James hoped the
man wasn’t pro-English.
“Stupid
idiots. You can’t fight the Crown.”
James
didn’t know how to answer. He had guessed wrong about which side the man was
on. He looked to the man’s house. A woman was hanging sheets on a line. Two
small children ran in circles. He would have to report the people who were
loyal to the Crown.
“Do
you know of anywhere to eat around here?”
“There’s
Howe’s Tavern, up the road in Sudbury. Big red building. If you keep on this
road for about a half hour, you can’t miss it.”
The
man was right. The two-story building had a double chimney.
James
was relieved to get off his horse. His rear and inner thighs ached.
There
were several horses tied to a hitching post. After letting Cranberry drink at
the trough, he fastened her at one end of the post.
Inside,
the inn was dark and smokey. Almost every table was filled with men deep in
conversation. He could tell by the way they were hunched toward each other.
There
was the smell of roasting chicken and beer. As James walked toward the bar at
one end, he saw Dr. Benjamin Church at the same time Church saw him. The doctor
stood. “William! Over here!”
Had
Church forgotten his name or was he talking to someone else?
The
doctor walked over to him, put his arm around James’ shoulder and led him back
to the long oak table where he’d been sitting. “Go along with what I say,” he
whispered. At the table where Church had been sitting, he said with a voice
that could be heard throughout the room. “Friends, meet William Smith. Has a
farm beyond Worcester. Used to live in Boston. I operated on his mother. How is
she?”
“As
good as new,” James said. He had no idea where the conversation was going, but
if Church wasn’t going to reveal his real identity, he wouldn’t reveal
Church’s.
“There
were six men, all dressed as farmers, sitting at the table.
“What
are you doing way out here?” the man who looked the oldest asked.
“I
want to find a wife. There are almost no unmarried women near me or if they are
I haven’t found one for me.”
“I
know someone you might find appealing. I’ll introduce you after we eat. Join
us?” Church looked at the men. “We’ve talked about everything we need to,
haven’t we?”
Four
heads nodded and two voices said, “Yes.”
“Three
men crammed together to make room for James. He swung his leg over the bench
without kicking anyone.
*****
Unlike Cranberry, Dr.
Church’s horse was a young, brown gelding. Its coat had been brushed to almost
a polish. “Follow me,” he said.
As
soon as they were out of sight of the inn, Church signaled that James should
dismount. “This is fortuitous. I need to send a letter to the General. Carry
the letter as fast as your horse can travel.” He patted Cranberry on her right
flank.
Chapter
62
Boston,
Massachusetts
February
"I DON’T BELIEVE it,” Florence DuBois said to Daphne Andrews. They were texting on
Facebook Messenger. Daphne sat at her dressing table/desk. Her bed was covered
with completed artwork for the comic book. It had been printed double size for
easier final editing.
Florence
had left the pages yesterday. “It may be useless, and we’ll have to publish
them ourselves. I thought Jason might be interested, but we haven’t heard a
peep from him, and he hasn’t answered my e-mails or taken my phone calls. And
the marketing meeting he talked about has never happened.” She sighed, “I
thought we were better friends than that. At least he could have had the guts
to tell me the others thought our work sucks.”
Daphne
couldn’t help but smile at her friend’s combination of American slang mixed
with her slight French accent. “From everything I’ve heard,” she’d said,
“getting published is harder than creating the book.”
Although
she tried to imagine Gareth coughing up the money for self-publishing: she
couldn’t.
Gareth and Yves DuBois had played squash twice
and both times he’d come home furious. Yves had bragged about his wife’s work
and how lucky she was to find a partner like Daphne.
Gareth
had taken her laptop and locked it in the storeroom closet. Daphne found it
necessary to finally tell Florence about Gareth’s attitude after their meeting
with Jason.
“Con,
prick,” Florence had said. She had told Yves, who after hearing the
problems Daphne was having, had other commitments when Gareth tried to make a
squash date. Since Gareth had little free time, he wasn’t all that upset.
What
Gareth didn’t know, there were duplicate keys to the storeroom. Each day when
Daphne was sure he was safely from the house, she would retrieve her laptop.
Her alternative was to use Boston Public Library computers, which required a
reservation and there was a ninety-minute limit. However, she had made friends
with two of the staff, who let her extend the period if no one else needed the
computer.
“I’m trying
to be a 1950s wife and have everything perfect when my husband comes home,”
she’d said to Gareth’s secretary one day when she’d gone to the embassy to have
lunch with him. He’d gone to the men’s room. “Maybe you might tell me when he
leaves?”
“I usually
leave first, but I will when I can.” She flashed a conspiratorial smile.
“Thanks,
it’s a newlywed thing, too,” Daphne had winked.
Daphne
didn’t feel like a romantic newlywed. She felt like a woman who made a huge
mistake in marrying.
When he
had locked up her laptop, she had suggested counseling. He said that if she
were more obedient, there wouldn’t be a problem.
The
word “obedient” had been the proverbial broken-backed camel from the one straw
too many. Instead of continuing the fight, Daphne had said, “I’ll try harder.”
What she didn’t say was, “I’ll try harder, until I find my way out of this
mess.”
One of
the mistakes that Daphne realized that she had made, was that she really hadn’t
known that much about his childhood other than he was unhappy at boarding
school. When she’d met his mother, she felt the need to put on a coat, hat and
gloves to survive the cold.
Her
childhood overall had been happy. Her parents were contentedly married, if not
happily. They supported whatever she wanted to do or didn’t want. They were in
the habit of giving the pros and cons of any of her ideas, then letting her
decide. She suspected sometimes their tongues might have been shortened rather
than say, “I told you so.” She still had not indicated to them that anything was
wrong.
Where
she had rejected showing up on their doorstep earlier, she now thought, in
retrospect, that that would have been the best thing to do. Gareth had canceled
her credit cards. At the time, it bothered her, but she hadn’t said anything.
She’d had three. She gave him the two he knew about. She wasn’t about to comply
and leave herself stranded financially.
The
bank account was in his name only. He had upped her allowance to $100 a week.
It had made her feel like a child. Still, much to her annoyance at herself, she
said nothing. It was a good thing that local merchants still accepted cash.
It was
a good thing that Gareth didn’t ask how she spent her allowance, which was as
little as possible. Over the last few months, she had managed to save close to
$1,500. The idea of arriving at her parents without any money bothered her.
Already she’d begun searching and applying for jobs in Edinburgh.
Academia,
such as the Universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow or St. Andrews had openings for
the spring and fall semesters, but she wasn’t sure if her experience would
qualify her to look up crime statistics in different countries or women’s laws
in China. Perhaps she could combine it with more study. Dr. Daphne … she liked
the sound of that.
She had
quickly discovered when she checked flight schedules and prices, when she went
back a second time to book, the prices had gone up. Shit!
“Are
you still there?” Florence’s voice brought Daphne back to her bedroom on Comm
Ave. in Boston.
“I’m
here. What can’t you believe?”
“Jason
FINALLY got back to me. And it’s good.”
“What
did he say.”
“It
took him a while to convince senior management, but they will publish us.”
“You’re
joking.”
“I am
not. They want it to be the beginning of a series, all with twins who
participate in different historic events. You will write it. I will do the
graphics.”
Daphne
was unable to respond for a full minute before gasping out, “How many? For what
events? How much will they pay?
“At
first he wanted to bring us on staff. The problem is visas, but they are
willing to try. If that does not work, we will be freelancers.”
Daphne
took a deep breath. “I’m going back to Scotland.”
“Merde!”
There was silence. “We can still do it. You can research and write from
Scotland. I can work from here. Maybe we can get them to give you a travel
budget if we have to visit the places, but with the internet …”
Daphne
wasn’t sure that the money would be equivalent to a full-time post, but it
would be something. Florence was gushing about the libraries and schools that
already were customers of the publisher, that would guarantee certain sales.
“We need to negotiate a lot of things. Yves already has spoken to a lawyer for
us. Or maybe we need an agent. The books
could be in print for years with royalties for years.”
Maybe
they could make it work, Daphne thought.
“I’m
sorry. You just said you were going to go back to Scotland?”
“Yes,
I’m leaving Gareth.”
“Good.
If you need to stay here temporarily, you are welcome to.”
Her
first impulse was to say, “That would be too much of an imposition,” but what
she said was, “If you’re sure, when?”
“Anytime.”
“You
may want to check with Yves.”
“I’ll
message you back.”
Daphne
sat, not sure what to do. She got up and went to the toilet. Her period had
started. Well at least she didn’t have to worry about being pregnant. When she
returned to her laptop there was a message, “Yves says welcome as long as you
need to. He also said congratulations on writing the comic book. Now when?”
“If you
really mean it, Gareth has to go to D.C. Tuesday next.”
“As
soon as he’s gone, I’ll come over, help you pack.”