The Glendower Legacy
Thomas Gifford
A MysteriousPress.com
Open Road Integrated Media
Ebook
For Rachel and Tom
I am not I;
he is not he;
they are not they.
Glendower
I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur
Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them?
Glendower
Why, I can teach you, cousin, to command
The devil.
Hotspur
And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the devil
By telling the truth; tell truth and shame the devil.
If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither,
And I’ll be sworn I have power to shame him hence.
O, while you live, tell truth and shame the devil!
Shakespeare
Henry IV, Part I
Contents
Prologue
Bucharest: December 1975
Moscow: February 1976
Boston: March 1976
Monday
Wednesday
Thursday
Saturday
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday/Thursday
Friday
Saturday
Epilogue
Cambridge
Florida
Prologue
Valley Forge: January 1778
WILLIAM DAVIS STOOD SENTRY DUTY ankle-deep in the crusty snow, watching the moon slide out from behind the clouds long enough to give the slopes above the Schuylkill River an eerie, metallic grayness—a bright, unearthly gray he’d never seen before. He shook his head: you couldn’t touch a color, he knew that, but this gray was something else, it was alive. But that was crazy. The hunger did bad things, not just to your guts but inside your head, too. He listened to his stomach rattle, empty but for the godawful firecake and rice … Firecake, invented in hell and sent by personal messenger to Valley Forge, a little flour, a lot of water, baked brittle and indigestible as a skimming stone on hot flat rocks. A bit of rice flavored with vinegar to keep away the scurvy.
Yet he knew he was one of the lucky ones: he had shoes, his feet were still feet, not bloody lumps dangling from scrawny ankles gone black with frostbite and gangrene, and he had a decent heavy coat, more new than old, sent him by his father back in Cambridge. He sighed and felt the breath crystallize on his moustache, in the hairs of his nostrils. His face felt like glass when he touched it. With the thick coat studded with heavy brass buttons he may well have been the best-dressed common soldier in the encampment, though the garment was already soaking up the thick smoke which hung impenetrably in each of the cabins built since their arrival on the bluffs above the Schuylkill … He dug his toenails into the soles of his boots until he was clenching his teeth against the pain.
God, how he hated the smoke and the cold and the firecake!
A thousand cabins had been built with axes the only tools. The thatched roofs leaked, the dirt floors never warmed, the green wood they used for fires was as bad as a smudge pot hurled by redcoats into each cabin …
But still he was not so badly off. His friend, Ben Edwards, twenty-two just like himself, had been without shoes, had stood guard with his raw feet in his hat, had fallen ill with the dysentery which had done for him a week ago … they had amputated his blackened, frozen legs before he’d died but it had been almost for practice. No way could poor old Ben have made it. The dysentery was so bad, it was everywhere, the cabins reeked of the godawful watery shit of the lads whose lives were draining right damn out of them.
The moon was gone again and the cloud cover looked suddenly thicker, permanent, making it a very dark night with only the wind shrieking against the tree line. He had to take a piss. He looked toward the thick stand of trees. He sure as hell wasn’t going to take a piss out here in the wind. He’d heard tell, in fact, of a man with a frozen thing—he’d heard tell it had just plain fallen off. He didn’t know if that was a true story but there was no point in finding out by personal test.
No, it could be worse, it was worse all around him. He had developed a case of the scabies, though, and when he scratched at himself he thought of the scabies as his war wounds. The only treatment was to have a friend rub your body with the stinking mixture of sulfur and tallow. Christ! Would he ever lie naked with a girl again? It surely seemed impossible while you were standing out in the cold feeling the sulfur and tallow half freeze on your chest and back. Yet, he smiled and heard his beard crackle, he was better off than most. You had to keep remembering that and it wasn’t always easy. Shit, there was a time at Germantown when he’d thought he was a goner for sure …
But to serve under General Washington, well, that was worth a lot of agony. That thought had gotten him through many a bad night and many a tough scrape, stories he’d someday tell his grandchildren … stories of the days he’d served in Washington’s army. What a man old George was! William had first seen him at Cambridge Common, a large, broad-bottomed, muscular figure, looking the way a soldier who would ask you to follow him into battle should look … almost a man to hide behind if the going got too tough.
He finally pushed off, sinking through the jagged snow with each step, toward the black mass of trees. The wind moaned the closer he got. He remembered how the dark forest used to frighten him as a boy back in Massachusetts. Now all it meant was shelter from the wind and a place to release himself. He grinned at the recollection of boyhood, heard his beard tinkle like breaking glass.
Oh, hell, he knew what some of his fellows said about Washington, the barbs and insults and rude behind-the-back gestures and unjust criticisms. He’d heard them all and he’d like to see them say it to old George’s face! Most of the dumb bastards couldn’t even read or write! Let ’em carp, damn fools … He’d heard other, wiser men say that no other army on earth could have stuck it out the way Washington and his men had. They’d earned the respect of the world, he’d heard them say. By jiminy, that told you all you needed to know about George Washington.
He did his business, felt his body relax out of the wind’s battering. Snow blew across the crust, rattled in the night, sifted among the trees. Nothing else moved along the tree line. He kicked a tree trunk, keeping the blood circulating. It was better sheltering there out of the wind. He felt in his pocket for his pipe, remembered he had run out of tobacco, stared into the darkness of the small forest that seemed so large. His eyes were adjusting to the deeper blue-black. Maybe a brief reconnaissance mission into the inviting shelter was called for: he wasn’t quite certain who he was guarding against out here in the cold but whoever, wouldn’t they be most likely to gather in the woods?
He picked up his musket which he’d rested against a trunk. It was like descending into a cave, the deep blue-blackness smelling only of the cold and snow closing in around him. Thirty yards into it he looked back but there was nothing to see, only darkness. Above him, glimpsed among the treetops, the clouds were only a shade or two toward gray. The fear he felt in his chest took him by surprise. He stopped, wiped clammy sweat from his forehead, and blinked. He’d heard of men getting lost in thickets, running themselves to death, hurtling wildly, breathlessly in circles until they fell and froze …
But panic wasn’t in his nature. He knew he was ten minutes from the tree line and he felt he could calmly feel his way back by following his tracks. He breathed deeply, peered around him.
That was when he first smelled smoke. He was too far from the encampment to smell those fires … He sniffed, closing his eyes. The wind that penetra
ted the woods carried the scent; as he turned, trying to judge the direction from which it came, it grew stronger. It was coming from deeper into the woods, no question of that, and his curiosity bloomed like a night flower. Who the devil could it be? Maybe one of the lads had wandered off, gotten lost, needed help. It was farfetched, but then Valley Forge was farfetched. He moved on toward the smell of smoke, forgetting the fears of a few moments before.
Another ten minutes of slow going and he stopped again. The smell was markedly stronger; William Davis was markedly tireder. He rested for a moment, then looked as determinedly as he could toward the apparent source of the smoke. Through the phalanx of trees he glimpsed for an instant a flickering flame, tiny, almost imperceptible but, yes, he was sure it was there. He was husbanding his strength, saw no reason to cry out. In any case, he was still too far away and the wind had picked up. He pushed on, the musket growing heavier with each step.
Moving closer he picked out shadows moving among the trees as the little gusts caught the fire, pushed it this way and that. Wind swirled around him as he picked his way through the snow which was softer in the woods, finer, not so deep. Next, much to his surprise, he caught snatches of conversation, voices borne on the wind, then gone, then back again … It obviously wasn’t some poor bastard who’d wandered off and gotten lost. There were several voices. He heard laughter, then the wind shifted and he was left in silence. But the glow of the fire was brighter and the trees were thinning. There was a small clearing ahead of him. He pushed closer, moving stealthily though he couldn’t have said precisely why.
He stopped at last at the edge of the clearing, still hidden in the darkness. There were three—no, four—men, large and bulky in greatcoats, standing and sitting around a fire in the shelter provided by a large lean-to. Their faces were obscured by shadow. They seemed intent on their discussion. As he watched he was conscious of sweat soaking his long underwear, turning it wet and cold against his flesh, making the damnable scabies itch like bites. He wasn’t sure what to do but he was quite sure of two things: he was inexplicably afraid and he wanted very much to find out who these men were …
All four were now seated. One of them pitched another log onto the fire. Unexpectedly the wind died. The silence brushed their voices closer, but he was concerned only with the sound of his own breathing which struck him as deafening. He held a glove to his mouth, sunk his teeth into it, half gagging. Words came to him from the men, words he could just distinguish without grasping their meaning.
He could not make out the color or markings on their greatcoats; everything looked uniformly black at this distance, in the shifting, blowing campfire light. But seeing the coats wasn’t necessary. He bit down harder on the glove, feeling his heart hammering, afraid. They were English, he’d have bet his life on it. He knew the accents: sure, the colonial gentry had that English sound when they spoke and many of them were as loyal as he was himself but the real English, from England, had a different sound. There was no mistaking it: he’d heard them all his life in Boston and he knew an Englishman’s voice. At least three of them were English but the fourth, a large squatting figure, close to the fire with his back to William, might have been anyone. He hadn’t spoken so far as William could tell, hadn’t moved except to reach forward and poke at the fire. He seemed to be listening, staring intently at the fire, while the others talked.
What in God’s name had he stumbled on? Was it the beginning of a surprise winter attack? The men had been told such a thing was impossible, that the winter was as cold for the Redcoats as for themselves … but what did a twenty-two-year-old foot soldier know about such things? It was all rumor and made-up stories and outright lies—maybe this was the beginning and, God forbid, maybe he was going to be the first victim …
He couldn’t hear the question but the squatting figure spoke, still looking at the fire. The other three stood or sat watching him, the firelight flickering on their featureless faces. He was an American.
“And how do you think the army is? Cold, starving, dying of dysentery, frightened. I am frightened myself, dealing with such as you … A knife in the back for my reward … That’s what frightens me, sir!” He spoke strongly and the words carried across the clearing, frustration and dark anger held only just in check. “You ask for information, you demand particulars—Heaven forfend! Look about you! General Winter, sir … An army of untrained citizens, without even the meagerest supplies—”
One of the Englishmen said something while another laughed. There was sympathy in the laughter, as if the man were afraid of further angering the American.
“No, damn you,” the squatting man said. “Do you think me mad? Deliver the army! Am I come so low as this, dealing with imbeciles?” He threw the log in his left hand into the fire. Sparks showered, flared. “No, I will not—cannot—deliver the Continental army! How can one man deliver an army, even such an army as this? There are great and honest men who will choose to fight to the death—brave men. Men who believe we can outlast you … And you, sirs, lead me to think they may be right, after all—”
“And you, my man,” one of the Englishmen said sharply, “are in too deep to harbor such a thought! Remember your role in this, if you please.”
“Why try to frighten me? I am well past that … all that frightens me is your treachery. The knife in the dark … I’d almost welcome it, sir, and believe me, I’m hard to kill. I’d get a hand on you, sir, and you’d be dead afore me!”
“Come, come,” a peacemaker said. “This is pointless …”
“Remember, I’m not a joking man,” the American said. “This is serious business.” He paused still without even shifting on his haunches. “Whatever you may think, I am trying to save this land—from defeat, from scoundrels and jackals. You understand me not … my motives are beyond you. We can use each other and I bear it. Only just.”
“You cannot deliver the army,” the peacemaker said. “We realize that … not even—well, no one can deliver an army.”
“The point is, it’s not worth delivering, don’t you see that? That kind of thing would only increase your problems. We must appear to fight to an honorable peace, not quite a surrender, but a peace on your terms—your generous terms. Then old King George can sleep soundly again. Not before …”
“Your own sleep will not be exactly troubled …” The harshest of the three Englishmen stood over the squatting figure. “You will be rewarded, as you damned well know—”
“It’s a dice roll. Your word means nothing to me—my reward is to see the country whole again, at peace with the crown … a crown that understands her children …”
“I daresay you will not reject our offerings.” He stalked away toward the trees where William was standing. He stood stock still, watched as the man stopped and wheeled abruptly back toward the fire. William shook with the enormity of what he was witnessing. Treason … somehow, he had to see the crouching man whose shape blotted out the fire. The army and Washington himself were being sold out by this man, this shape without a face whose voice was distorted by the shifting winds in the snowy clearing. He was torn: to get away from this place—but to see the man, the traitor.
“You must sign these papers,” the returning Englishman said. “We must have them as security—”
“Blackmail, that is the word, sir!”
“As you will. You must sign.” He spread the sheets on a campaign stool and drew a writing case from the folds of his greatcoat. The warmth of his body must have kept the ink from freezing. “Your code name—this acknowledges your code name. Glendower … Just put the signature on it. You’ve done it before.” He laughed scornfully, placing the ink and pen on the camp stool.
William willed the American to turn around, to reveal himself, though in the shadowy light he might not have been able to make out the features for future identification. In any case, the man remained hunched over.
At precisely that moment, as the pen was being handed back to the argumentative Englishman, the so
und of cracking branches and heavy footfalls reached both William Davis and the four men in the clearing. William turned too quickly to see who it might be, tripped over the musket, and fell with a gasp to his knees. The large American turned at the sound of William’s falling and the Englishmen looked off toward his right where the other sounds seemed to be coming from.
A cry came from the new arrivals who crashed and blundered through the trees and underbrush: “Hey! Who is it? Is it you, Harry?” It made no sense to William but the large man, the American, was fumbling in his coat for a pistol which came quickly to view, huge, in his hand. He was pointing it toward William who grabbed his musket, spit out the glove, and struggled to crawl behind a tree. “God damn it! We’re surrounded …” As the American spoke he fired a ball at William who heard it smash into the tree about a foot from his face, splinters flying. The angry flash from the pistol briefly illuminated the man’s face but William was ducking, saw only the pinkness of the face, none of what it signified. He felt his almost empty bladder let loose in his trousers. The man was reloading, coming toward him, but the cries of the newcomers stopped him. Two men broke into the clearing, one of the Englishmen fired point-blank into a face before him and a godawful screech pierced the heavy quiet. The man staggered back, moaning, hands to what had been his face, and fell dead in the snow, his feet jerking. The Englishmen and the traitor fled back across the clearing, kicking the fire to embers in the snow. The soldiers, encumbered by their muskets which weren’t much good at close range, stumbled clumsily after them, shouting. Another pistol shot exploded as the conspirators reached the tree line across the clearing. No one fell and the sounds of several men crashing through the underbrush filled the night. As if by magic the clearing was empty but for the dead Continental.
Reacting instinctively, William darted across the twenty-five feet of open space to the dying campfire and picked up the piece of paper from the stool, felt it catch on a splinter and tear. Afraid to wait he stuffed what he had into his pocket, turned and caught his coat on a sharp edge jutting out from the lean-to. Driven by fear he desperately yanked away, heard his coat rip, and charged back into the covering darkness of the trees. He couldn’t find his musket; he must have missed the exact spot—he heard from the darkness another explosion followed by a strangled cry and a shout, “Over here, over here!” Another explosion cut the voice, separated it from life with awesome abruptness. All of the firing had been from pistols: the Continentals were reduced by three and not a musket had been fired. He didn’t know how many of them there were but going back to look for Harry, whoever he was, had cost them their lives.
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