The Golden Flask ps-3

by Jim DeFelice

  "I'm not asking you to raise her, just to take her to Culper. He's promised to find a place for her in Westchester."

  "I must point out that it is quite impossible to govern the young where love is involved."

  "How do you know she's in love?"

  "I would think it obvious," said van Clynne, "from the way she moons about in your presence."

  "My presence?"

  "Absolutely."

  "Nonsense. There was a boy on Long Island she fell in love with. He is a year or two younger than she, but I think it an excellent match. They will be very happy together."

  Van Clynne snorted. "I tell you solemnly, sir, it's you she's interested in."

  "Impossible," said Jake.

  "No it's not!" Alison burst through the door from the other room, where she had stood listening to the entire conversation. "I'm not too young for you. Many girls my age marry."

  Never on the battlefield had Jake been taken by such surprise. He stood stunned a full minute before replying.

  "That's certainly true," he admitted gently, "but in this case, I think, it's more complicated."

  "I shall like to watch you wrestle yourself out of this one," declared van Clynne. "I only wish I had some of Smith's excellent ale to assist my appreciation."

  "Don't you have something to do, Claus?" asked Jake.

  "No. Not at all. I have already spent a full day's exertion. . but perhaps I had best be getting some fresh air." It was not the look from Jake that changed the Dutchman's mind, but a glance from Alison twice as murderous.

  The girl flew into Jake's arms as soon as the door shut.

  "I loved you from the moment you swept me up in my father's inn," she declared. "Couldn't you tell?"

  "You are beautiful and brave," said the spy, his honey-sweet tone hinting strongly at the "but" that would follow. Well-used to breaking hearts, Jake had given this species of speech many times. Yet rarely had he felt this much tenderness delivering it.

  "My heart is pledged to someone else," he told her, lightly pushing her from his chest.

  "Someone older?"

  "Yes."

  The widow Sarah Thomas would have been greatly pleased to hear this, though she would have treated the words as someone does a clipped coin, not quite at face value. Still, they were meant sincerely. Jake might have made an even more eloquent case, his words rivaling many a poet's, had he explained further that before any earthly love, his life was pledged several times over to the cause of Freedom. But even Milton's tongue would have had no more effect on Alison than the simple shake of Jake's head when she asked if she might not change his mind.

  "You must go with Claus to the city," Jake ordered. He pulled up his coat and prepared for her rebuttal and was greatly surprised when none came.

  "All right," she said meekly. "You win. Let me just go and gather my things."

  Jake narrowed his eyes as she left the kitchen to go upstairs. Nonetheless, he trusted the Dutchman would be more than a match for her. He himself had a great deal to do if he was going to finish this little puzzle.

  Chapter Forty-two

  Wherein, a happy coincidence procures a truce.

  “ Jake promised I could stay with him!”

  Van Clynne shook his head as violently as if he were warding off a bee. "At least use more art in your lies. He charged me with taking you to Culper not ten minutes ago." The Dutchman puffed out his cheeks and set his hands at his belt, standing in the middle of what passed for the small house's great room. As soon as Jake had left, Alison had run down the stairs, veering from the front hallway when she saw it filled by van Clynne. She had then installed herself in a wooden chair, obviously reluctant to accept the Dutchman as her guide.

  "I saved his life," said Alison sharply, curling her arms against the wooden Windsor chair as if van Clynne would try to physically pull her up. "And this is how I am repaid?"

  "I might make the same claim several times over," agreed the Dutchman. "Gratitude has become a lost art. Nonetheless, you and I must attend to our mission. The lieutenant colonel has charged us with our roles, and as he often says, an expedition has but one leader."

  The phrase proved considerably more persuasive than van Clynne had hoped, as the girl stopped sulking and nodded her head — slowly, to be sure, but nonetheless in the direction which indicates agreement. She unfurled her arms and rose from the chair meekly, walking across the braided rug to join him.

  "We must set out immediately," said van Clynne, suspicious but nonetheless anxious to get started. "I know of a man not far from here who will take us across the river at a quite reasonable price. Along the way, we may be able to find ourselves a better breakfast than what we have been provided."

  "I approve," said the girl so quickly you would have thought she was offered a chance to buy Manhattan for a bushel full of trinkets. "I had only a few bites of onions."

  "Consider yourself lucky," said van Clynne, turning toward the door.

  "You didn't like my cooking?"

  "There was not enough of it," he said hastily. "You see the deprivations a soldier is treated to. You will be much more comfortable with Culper at the coffeehouse; food will be plentiful, and you may get your spying done between helpings of meat and potatoes, as it were."

  "You're right," said the girl. But as she reached the threshold to the hallway foyer, she put her hand to her stomach and groaned heavily. "Oh, I think the onions are acting up."

  "Are you sick?"

  "No, I just — is there a chamber pot handy? Quickly!"

  "Of course, child. Right in the kitchen cupboard, I believe, empty and clean."

  "I will be all right in a moment," she said. "If you will excuse me."

  Van Clynne nodded but followed along back to the kitchen. He was not so unschooled as to believe the stomach ache would not disappear the moment he was out of sight.

  "You're not coming in to watch, I hope," she groaned, nearly bending.

  It was so powerful a performance that van Clynne retreated, closing the door behind him. He returned in an instant, however, setting a jar at the edge of a footstool where it would be knocked over when the door was opened. He then hurried outside to guard the room's only window.

  Nearly ten minutes passed with no sign of Alison. Worried that he had overlooked some contingency, the squire took a peek inside the window and found the room was empty. Unsure if she had made her exit or was merely hiding, he propped his hat at the bottom of the window to make it appear as if he were sitting below. Then he ran back inside to find his stool and jar precisely as he had placed them.

  "How in God's name did you manage this, child?" he asked aloud as he surveyed the empty room. "You have not gone out the door, and the window is still closed fast."

  Van Clynne spotted the pantry closet at the side of the fireplace. Smiling to himself, he tiptoed forward, undid the latch as quietly as possible, then pulled the door open with a sharp flick of his wrist.

  "A-ha," he shouted to the cobwebs.

  After considerable beard tugging, the Dutchman decided there must be some secret panel inside this cupboard, perhaps beneath the floorboards.

  "This is what comes of teaching children letters at an early age," he complained as he bent to examine them. "I have no doubt her parents were indulgent, and allowed her to read poetry at will. I would not be surprised if she had been given Shakespeare in her crib."

  No sooner had van Clynne uttered these words than he heard a distinct creaking sound behind him. He whirled and just managed to grab Alison as she tried to spring from the pie safe out the nearby door.

  "You're ripping my dress," complained Alison. "Let go."

  "You and I must reach an agreement," said the Dutchman, "whereby we are no longer enemies. Otherwise, I shall lock you in chains and have you carried on a mule all the way to the coffeehouse."

  "I won't go to the coffeehouse," she said. "They're going to pack me off to upper Westchester, where my only excitement will be counting robins in a nes
t. I shall never be of any use to the Cause." Alison placed her hands on her hips and spoke in as plaintive a voice as ever Athena used to calm her father Zeus's famous rages. "How am I to stand for our enslavement by the English? Should not everyone do his or her duty according to their ability? And if their efforts are not used, will the Cause not suffer? Are not women to be the equal of men in this new republic? Otherwise, why fight at all?"

  "Well spoken; I begin to wonder if perhaps you have some Dutch blood in you." Van Clynne stroked his beard thoughtfully. "But serving as a soldier would not be a good use of your talents, even if you could pass as a young man," he added. "You are too free-spirited for all that drilling and standing in line."

  "I can be a spy like yourself."

  "An operative, my dear. We involve ourselves in considerably more than spying, Jake and I. We are at General Washington's call for missions of every stripe. We are the upper class of agents, as it were."

  The knit of van Clynne's brow grew to such proportions that not even Alexander could have untied it as he did the rope at Gordius. Scarce ever were the times the Dutchman had given such thought to a problem without the helpful lubrication of several barrels of fine ale: How to persuade the girl with a place where she might simultaneously be safe and fight the British at the same time?

  The wheels in his head turned slowly but inevitably. For he was Dutch, after all, and the idea eventually settled into place like a great eagle landing on a treetop.

  In truth, it did not take half the effort, though he made a great show of it. For van Clynne had made this suggestion to Jake several times already. But he had long ago learned that an idea that seems to suffer a hard birth is more easily accepted than one that slides into the world with nary a grunt.

  "A friend of mine on Long Island may have need for a girl to help on her farm," he declared. "The woman is a brave patriot and often assists the Sons of Liberty. Her farm is behind the lines, and danger is always flitting past the threshold in some form or another. She is said to be Dutch by marriage only, yet has taken to the ways of the race so strongly that it is clear her ancestors found it necessary to obscure her Netherlands ancestry until now."

  "Long Island?"

  "Mrs. Hulter has lived there many years. Her husband was a soldier, but the rumor has it that he died near White Plains. As yet, his death has not been officially confirmed."

  "Professor Bebeef s sister?"

  "You know the family?"

  Alison quickly told van Clynne the story.

  "And here we once more have proof of Dutch superiority," declared the squire, who saw the coincidence not as a product of luck but of a plan he had intuitively if unknowingly placed in motion some time before. "There is a proper Dutch solution to every problem, my dear, as I'm sure the good missus will instruct. You will fight the British as fiercely as any Continental regiment. She is a fine brewer besides; you will do well to stay with her."

  "I will go there on one condition."

  "Name it," said the Dutchman.

  "We cannot abandon Jake," said the girl firmly. "We must help him this last time."

  "He has Daltoons's entire troop at his call," said the Dutchman. "They are meeting with reinforcements from Culper and will take over the farm and stand guard. Half the British army could arrive and they would be safe. We are as superfluous as a comb on a rooster."

  "Perhaps I am," suggested the girl, "but what of yourself? What would have happened at the engineer's if you were not there to rescue him?"

  "True," admitted van Clynne. "I did, after all, save the day. Many a time, I have had to pluck him from the fire just as his coat was singed."

  "He has already died once today without you. What if you are not nearby a second time?"

  The Dutchman contemplated that possibility. Actually, he did not worry so much about Jake as Egans, whom he believed would have a difficult time lying. This was a fatal flaw shared by all Iroquois, or so van Clynne believed. And the problem could, in turn, lead Jake to difficulty.

  Besides, if they were starting from two different points, it would be difficult to coordinate their rendezvous on the Jersey shore. And despite Jake's long-winded assurances, he would undoubtedly feel obliged to leave for Washington without him. Van Clynne was loath to lose his opportunity for an interview with the general a second time.

  "Perhaps we should reconnoiter the area as a reserve squadron," he suggested. "But they have already met you once; I'm not sure what pretense we can invent for your arrival."

  "They know me only as a boy. They won't recognize me as a girl."

  "Bauer saw you at the hill."

  "There is an old dress upstairs, and I will wear a hat. You, on the other hand, have already been seen in your disguise as a doctor; you will have to find a disguise or stay hidden."

  "Claus van Clynne never hides. That is a coward's way.”

  "I am warning you, girl,” said van Clynne a bit later, as he submitted, albeit reluctantly, to Alison’s barbering skills, “one nick and I will retaliate with appropriate measures. A strong paddling would do your soul good, I daresay."

  "I used to shave my father every day. Now hold your mouth still — if that is possible."

  "Impertinence. Impertinence in the young. In my time, it was unheard of."

  "I am not as young as you pretend, and you are not as old," said Alison, who now had the advantage of seeing van Clynne's face — or a quarter of it — without its customary beard. "I doubt you are beyond thirty, if that. Now be quiet or we shall never arrive in time."

  "Owww! What was your father's face made of? Iron?" Van Clynne reached up and grabbed her hand.

  "Don't be such a baby," said Alison, freeing her wrist with a snap. She dipped the long straight-edge razor in the soapy warm water and prepared for another swipe. "A little bloodletting is good for your vapors."

  "My vapors are in perfect condition, thank you. And I would expect you to show proper deference, now that I have condescended to allow you to shave me."

  "Condescended?"

  "Shaving is a sacred rite in the Dutch way of things, my dear. It is not every young woman who is accorded the privilege."

  "Honored, I'm sure," said Alison sarcastically, plucking tightly at the next hairs and ignoring the ensuing howl. "When was the last time you washed your beard? I believe I have found a bird's nest here."

  Chapter Forty-three

  Wherein, Jake again kisses danger in the face.

  The last time he had been in this mansion, Jake had arrived in a dazed condition with an armed guard at his shoulder. Still, he had enough of an idea of the layout to narrow Clayton Bauer’s office down to one of two rooms in the western corner of the house. With Bauer gone, it would be the best place to hide — and would also give him a chance to search through the spymaster’s papers.

  Both rooms had windows facing the Hudson. Jake chose the corner to try first because it was closest to him as he moved through the woods from the side.

  Though his wounds had been redressed at the Smith house, he did not want to push his battered leg harder than necessary. He walked forward slowly, glancing through the trees down toward the beach where he had washed up some days before. The disguised Libertymen had already appeared on the river; he had only a few minutes to get inside if he was to beat Egans.

  The company of redcoats assigned to Bauer had returned in foul moods from the earlier diversion sent to them by Culper's men. Roused from bed to attend a false report of rebels attacking the rocky shore upriver, all they had to show for their adventures were skinned knees and bruised shins. The sentry posted at Jake's corner of the house was having trouble keeping his eyes open as he leaned against the building.

  Jake kept the man's shiny coat in view as he half-crawled, half-trotted past a shed which housed mowing equipment. He just managed to roll against the side of the building when he heard voices approaching from the rear; the low shrubs were enough to hide him only because the two sentries were talking rather than paying attention to
their duties.

  The men were discussing whether their company's assignment would be changed now that Bauer had been killed. Neither seemed to like the "uppity colonist," but they realized the chore of guarding him had been comparatively easy. The unit headquartered up the road a quarter mile away had been put on notice to prepare for an "expedition at sea." They worried over the cryptic phrase and whether it would soon describe their fates as well.

  The talk faded as the guards called to their mate by the house. He shouted a one-word response and they reversed course, patrolling in the opposite direction. Their assignment doubtlessly called for them to walk the vast yard's perimeter in parallel, not tandem. Jake, ever the military commander, could not help but shake his head as he bolted to his feet and did his best imitation of a sprint toward the building.

  The sentry did not notice him until the patriot's knife was slitting a peephole at his throat.

  Jake propped the dead man against the house, hoping the others would not return before they were replaced by Daltoons's squad. In any event, he would look from the distance as if he were sleeping.

  The window nearby was open a crack. Jake went to it, listened a moment to make sure the room was empty, and decided he was unlikely to find a situation more inviting. He slipped inside with less care than a sparrow entering her nest.

  This was not Bauer's office, unless he had suddenly gained a very feminine side. Even if the rich yellow and pink coverlet on the bed hadn't made it clear that Lady Bauer was staying here, the room was thick with her lilac-scented perfume.

  Jake was adjusting his eyes to the dim interior light when he heard footsteps approaching from the hallway. He ducked and started to slide beneath the thick mahogany bed before realizing he couldn't squeeze in; the only other place to hide was behind the large curtain at the window he had entered. He was halfway there when the door opened behind him.

  "You?"

  Lady Patricia's voice held him suspended in midstep on the velvet rug. Jake took a breath, then turned to see her standing in her unclasped dressing gown, hair down, hands open at her sides. The hard soap of pain had scrubbed the pores of her face; rarely had mourning worn such beauty.