Time's Convert

by Deborah Harkness

  In haste,

  your devoted son,

  Matthew

  17

  Name

  SEPTEMBER 1777

  “No, Mr. Adams. It will not do,” the chevalier de Clermont said, shaking his head.

  Marcus, along with the rest of the medical corps, was standing aside and waiting for the politicians to make a decision about the expansion of the hospital. Congress had decamped north from Philadelphia to the town of Bethlehem to avoid being captured by the British. A flock of women in dark clothing, each one wearing a white ruffled cap on her head, watched the proceedings with open hostility. So, too, did the leader of Bethlehem and its Moravian religious community, Johannes Ettwein.

  “We must make sacrifices in the name of liberty, Chevalier. Each one of us, according to our station.” John Adams was as sharp-tongued as Ettwein and just as quick to anger.

  “There are four hundred sick and wounded soldiers occupying the house belonging to the single brethren.” Ettwein was puce with irritation. “You seized our wagons to transport supplies. You are eating the food from our tables. What more must we do?”

  As they stood at the corner of Main and Church Streets, Dr. Otto said something in German. One of the women snorted, then quickly disguised it with a cough. De Clermont’s lips twitched.

  The more time Marcus spent with Lafayette, the more he became fascinated by the chevalier de Clermont. There seemed to be no language the man didn’t speak—French, English, Latin, German, Dutch—and nothing he could not do, from taking care of horses to examining wounds to conducting diplomacy. But it was his air of calm authority that made him indispensible at the moment.

  “You cannot displace so many women, many of them elderly, Mr. Adams,” de Clermont pronounced, as if the decision were up to him and not Dr. Otto, the medical officers, or the members of Congress. “We will have to find another way to house the ill and the wounded.”

  “It does not seem chivalrous to discommode the ladies, Mr. Adams,” the Marquis de Lafayette said from the wheeled chair he called La Brouette. The chevalier de Clermont had constructed it out of an ordinary wooden chair he’d found in the Single Brethren’s House when it became necessary to move from the Sun Inn. De Clermont had prescribed rest and a good diet for the marquis—neither of which could be found at the tavern, which had been utterly taken over by Congress and couriers ferrying messages. The chevalier had found everything the marquis required a few doors away from the Sun Inn at the house of the Boeckel family—including skilled nurses in the form of Mrs. Boeckel and her daughter, Liesel. When not in use, La Brouette was parked by the fire in the Boeckels’ parlor, where it received more visitors than Lafayette.

  “Chivalry is dead, sir!” Adams declared.

  “Not while Gil breathes,” the chevalier de Clermont murmured.

  “We are fighting a war to loosen the grip of tradition, not to be enslaved by it further,” Adams continued, undeterred. “And if the Moravians of Bethlehem will not fight with us, they must prove their loyalty in other ways.”

  “But it is our duty to protect these women. Imagine if it were your own dear wife, Mr. Adams, or my Adrienne.” Lafayette looked genuinely pained at the prospect. He wrote at least one letter a day to his distant spouse, who though not yet eighteen was already the mother of two children.

  “Mrs. Adams would not hesitate to take in four thousand wounded soldiers if it were asked of her!” Adams, like Ettwein, did not like to be challenged.

  Mr. Hancock, who had a formidable wife of his own by all accounts, looked doubtful.

  “If I may,” Dr. Otto interjected. “Would it perhaps be better for the surgeons if the soldiers were kept closer together? Already we are stretched too thin, and running all through town for supplies. Perhaps we might use the gardens, and put up tents for the patients who are convalescing so that they might be in the fresh air, away from the fevers that are already spreading?”

  “Fevers?” A man with the distinctive drawl of the southern colonies frowned. “Not the smallpox, surely.”

  “No, sir,” Dr. Otto hastened to reply. “The general’s orders last winter have spared us from that. But camp fever, typhus . . .” His words drifted into silence.

  The members of Congress looked at each other nervously. Ettwein’s eyes met de Clermont’s, and the two exchanged a meaningful glance.

  “These common illnesses threaten the health of the entire community,” de Clermont said. “Surely the brethren and sisters must not suffer unduly. Why, Brother Ettwein’s own son is nursing the soldiers and risking his life to care for them. What greater form of patriotism can there be, than to put one’s own child at risk?”

  Marcus eyed the young man standing next to him. The younger John Ettwein was far more amiable than his father but otherwise resembled him closely, with his upturned nose and wide-set eyes. Though John was indeed a skilled nurse, Marcus suspected that Ettwein’s son had been seconded to the hospital to make sure that the brethren’s house was not harmed during the army’s occupation.

  “Let us adjourn to the inn,” Hancock said, “and deliberate further.”

  * * *

  —

  “YOU KNOW HOW TO HANDLE a hoe as well as a lancet, I see,” said young John Ettwein.

  Marcus looked up from the patch of herbs that they were cutting in anticipation of the tents that would soon spring up on the hillside overlooking the river. The apothecary, Brother Eckhardt, had ordered the two of them to harvest every medicinal simple they could before the soldiers destroyed the gardens.

  “And you don’t sound like you’re from Philadelphia,” John continued.

  Marcus resumed his task without comment. He pulled a mandrake from the earth and put it in the basket next to the snakeroot.

  “So what’s your story, Brother Chauncey?” John’s eyes were bright with unanswered questions. “We all know you’re not from around here.”

  Not for the first time, Marcus was glad he had been born on the frontier and not in Boston. Everybody knew he was from somewhere else, but no one could place his accent with any precision.

  “You needn’t worry. Most people in Bethlehem came from elsewhere,” John remarked.

  But most people hadn’t killed their fathers. Marcus had barely spoken a word around the delegates from Congress for fear someone might recognize that he was from Massachusetts and ask difficult questions.

  “Cat’s still got your tongue, I see.” John wiped the sweat from his brow and peered down at the riverside road. “Mein Gott.”

  “Wagons.” Marcus scrambled to his feet. As far as the eye could see, there were wagons. “They’ve come from Philadelphia.”

  “There are hundreds of them,” John said, thrusting his hoe into the earth. “We must find my father. And the chevalier. At once.”

  Marcus abandoned his basket of roots and leaves and followed John toward the Brethren’s House. They had not made it more than a few yards when they ran into de Clermont and Brother Ettwein. The two men were already aware of the invasion from Philadelphia.

  “There are too many of them!” Brother Ettwein was saying to de Clermont, his eyes wild. “We have already unloaded seventy wagons in just two days. The Scottish prisoners are in one of our family houses. Their guards are living in the pumping house. The army’s stores have filled the lime kilns and the oil house. The single brothers are displaced. And now more locusts descend! What are we to do?”

  The wagons from Philadelphia pulled to a stop in the fields on the southern bank of the river, one after another, flattening the buckwheat planted there. A troop of horse accompanied them.

  “So much for our peaceable village!” Ettwein continued, his voice bitter. “When Dr. Shippen wrote, he said the army would be an inconvenience—not drive us out of hearth and home.”

  Still the wagons came. Marcus had never seen so many at one time. The drivers unhi
tched their teams and led them to the water. The wagon train’s guards dismounted, allowing their horses to graze.

  “Shall I speak to them, Johannes?” The chevalier de Clermont looked grim. “There is probably little I can do, but at least we will know their plans.”

  “We settled in Bethlehem to avoid war.” Ettwein’s voice was low and intense. “We have all seen enough of it, Brother de Clermont. Religious war. War with the French. War with the Indians. Now war with the British. Do you never get tired of it?”

  For a moment, the chevalier de Clermont’s composed mask slipped, and he looked as bitter as Ettwein sounded. Marcus blinked and the Frenchman’s face became as inscrutable as it was before.

  “I am more tired of war than you know, Johannes,” de Clermont said. “Come, Chauncey.” He beckoned to Marcus.

  Marcus scrambled down the hillside in de Clermont’s wake, trying in vain to keep up so that he could reason with the man.

  “Sir.” Marcus struggled to regain his footing. “Chevalier de Clermont. Are you sure—”

  De Clermont wheeled around. “What is it, Chauncey?”

  “Are you sure you should be interfering in this matter?” Marcus asked, adding, “sir,” again as an afterthought.

  “You think the citizens of Bethlehem will fare better if John Adams argues their case?” The chevalier snorted. “That man is a menace to international relations.”

  “No, sir. It’s just—” Marcus stopped and bit his lip. “Those are Virginians, sir. I can tell from their clothes. They’re wearing buckskin, you see. Virginians don’t like being told what to do.”

  “Nobody likes to be told what to do,” de Clermont observed, his eyes narrowing.

  “Yes, but they have rifles. Very accurate rifles, sir. And swords,” Marcus continued, determined to avert disaster. “We’re not armed. And the marquis is alone at Brother Boeckel’s house.”

  “Sister Liesel is with Gil,” de Clermont said curtly, resuming his blistering descent of the hill. “She is reading to him about the Moravian missions to Greenland. He says he finds it soothing.”

  Marcus had seen the fervent glances that the marquis had bestowed on the Boeckels’ charming daughter, and was glad that Lafayette was married, as well as that Sister Liesel was a paragon of virtue.

  “Nevertheless, sir—”

  “For God’s sake, Chauncey, stop calling me sir. I’m not your commanding officer,” de Clermont said, wheeling around to face him once more. “We need to know why these wagons have arrived. Has Philadelphia fallen to the British? Are they here on Washington’s orders? Without information, we cannot determine what must be done next. Are you going to help me, or hinder me?”

  “Help.” Marcus knew this was his only real option, and followed de Clermont in silence the rest of the way.

  When they reached the southern bank of the river, all was confusion.

  A man in buff breeches and a blue tunic rode toward them on a horse that was probably worth as much as the MacNeil farm. A long Kentucky rifle—the kind used by woodsmen on the frontier—was jammed through a loop on his saddle, and a fur-trimmed helmet was strapped to his head. Marcus thought his brains must be baking inside it on such a warm day.

  “I am the chevalier de Clermont, servant to the Marquis de Lafayette. State your business.” De Clermont motioned Marcus to stay behind him.

  “I am here to see Mr. Hancock,” the man replied.

  “He’s at the inn.” De Clermont jerked his head toward the ford. “In town.”

  “Doc?” a voice cried out across the clearing. “That you?”

  Vanderslice was in one of the wagons, perched atop a pile of hay. He waved.

  “What are you doing here?” Marcus said as he approached the wagon.

  “We’ve brought the bells from Philadelphia so that those British bastards don’t melt them down and make bullets out of them,” Vanderslice explained, launching himself from the pile of hay with a mighty leap. He landed on his feet, like a cat. “I didn’t expect to see you here. Still with that French kakker and his friend, I see?”

  “Washington sent the marquis here to recover—and the rest of the army with him, it seems,” Marcus replied. He looked over at de Clermont, who was deep in conversation with a knot of cavalry officers. The chevalier wanted information, and Marcus had pledged to help him. Marcus had to at least try to keep his bargain. “Where are you all headed?”

  “Some town west of here,” Vanderslice said vaguely. “We’ve brought along everything we could haul out of Philadelphia. Even Gerty.” He looked up at the town of Bethlehem and whistled. “What kind of place is this, Doc? It seems awfully grand to be filled with religious folk. I hear the women are all unmarried and the men live in one big room, together.”

  “It’s like nowhere else I’ve ever been,” Marcus replied honestly.

  “Is the food good?” Vanderslice asked. “Are the girls pretty?”

  “Yes,” Marcus replied with a laugh. “But Congress has ordered us not to disturb the women, so you best keep your fingers in the pies.”

  * * *

  —

  THAT EVENING, John Ettwein led Marcus and Vanderslice on a tour of his town. Instead of starting with the large, imposing stone buildings in the center of Bethlehem, John headed straight for the warren of structures that were built along the Monocacy Creek.

  “This is where our people first settled,” John explained, standing before a small, low structure made of logs. The land sloped down to the water, giving a clear view to the west over the Moravians’ mills, tanneries, butchers, and waterworks. Ettwein pointed at one of the buildings. “There’s the springhouse. The water never freezes. Not even in winter. And it turns the wheel that sends the water up the hill and into the town.”

  Marcus had been amazed to discover that water flowed into the apothecary’s stillroom, and that he didn’t have to run up and down the hill to fetch clean water for the marquis’s medicine.

  “I’d show you inside,” John continued, “but your guards have taken it over.”

  Some of the colonial soldiers quartered there were congregating outside and watching while stores of ammunition were unloaded into the nearby oil mill.

  John showed them the millworks instead. As they neared the workshop, a black couple came into view, climbing the hill from the river. They were about Brother Ettwein’s age, and their arms were linked at the elbows. Both wore the dark, simple clothing of the Moravian Brethren, and the woman wore one of their crisp white caps, this one unadorned with ruffles and tied with a blue bow—the sign of a married woman. Marcus regarded the pair with curiosity, as did Vanderslice.

  “Good evening, Brother Andrew and Sister Magdalene,” John called to them. “I was showing our visitors the millworks.”

  “God sends us too many visitors,” Sister Magdalene said.

  “God sends us only what we can handle,” Brother Andrew said, giving her a comforting smile. “You must forgive us. Sister Magdalene has been hard at work for many hours, washing the sick soldiers’ clothes.”

  “They were crawling with vermin,” Sister Magdalene said, “and worn nearly to shreds. There is nothing to replace them with. If God wants to help us, He should send us breeches.”

  “We must be thankful for his mercies, wife.” Brother Andrew patted her hand. He opened his mouth to speak again, but his body was racked with a deep cough.

  “That sounds like asthma,” Marcus said with a frown. “I know a tea made of elderflower and fennel that might help your breathing.”

  “It is only the hill,” Brother Andrew replied, stooped over with the effort to clear his lungs. “It always brings on my cough. That, and the cold mornings.”

  “Doc can fix you up,” Vanderslice said. “He healed all of the Associators last winter, when we were fighting together.”

  Sister Magdalene looked at Marcus with interes
t. “My Andrew’s back aches after a coughing fit. Do you have something that might ease it?”

  Marcus nodded. “A liniment, applied with warm hands. The ingredients are all in the apothecary’s shop.”

  “There is no need to concern yourself with me, when you have so many patients already,” Brother Andrew said. “All I need is rest.”

  Brother Andrew and Sister Magdalene preceded them through the open door into the millworks. The scent of wood shavings filled the dusty air, and Brother Andrew’s coughing resumed.

  “You shouldn’t be sleeping here,” Marcus protested. “This air will make the cough worse.”

  “There is nowhere else,” Sister Magdalene said, sounding weary. “They took our house from us to accommodate the prisoners. I could go to the sisters’ house, but that would mean leaving Andrew, and we are used to being together now.”

  “Magdalene does not trust the visitors across the river, or the guards in the waterworks,” Brother Andrew explained. “She fears they will take me from the Brethren and sell me to a new master.”

  “You are not free, Andrew,” Sister Magdalene said fiercely. “Remember what happened to Sarah. The Brethren sold her quick enough.”

  “She was not a member of the congregation, as I am,” Andrew said, still wheezing. “That was different.”

  Sister Magdalene did not look convinced. She helped her husband to a chair by a tiled stove. A small mattress was in the corner behind the stove, neatly covered with a clean blanket. A few personal items—a cup, two bowls, a book—were placed nearby.

  “I will take care of my husband, Brother John,” Sister Magdalene said. “Go back to the hospital, to the sick soldiers.”

  “I will pray for you, Brother Andrew,” John said.

  “I am already in God’s care, Brother John,” Brother Andrew replied. “Pray for peace instead.”

  * * *

  —