by Paul Lussier
Finally it all made sense. But unfortunately that did nothing to help us with our little problem. We decided that I must continue pretending to take the Galloway Plan seriously, even though it was just another Clinton ruse to keep me away from what I really needed to know. He wasn’t to know that we knew. The point was to carry on our duties as spies even more diligently, to continue to support and not disabuse Clinton of his suspicions. To encourage him in his campaign of disinformation by making goddamned sure that he received all manner of confirmation that what was “leaked” to us was “spread around real good.” That every lie of his was disseminated quickly, clearly, and exactly as he’d hoped.
Why? To make sure Clinton kept us close, closer, closest. Fine, then let’s be spies he thinks he’s duping! Give him a reason to keep us around!
So now Clinton, Howe, Deborah, and I needed each other. What a war . . .
Deborah worked up a counterplan to provide proof of delivery of whatever Clinton wanted Washington to know. If Clinton issued an order to remove a siege gun or burn a barn, we’d make sure he knew ordinary folk on the street knew it, that merchants and farmers knew it (here all we had to do was spread word on the street to create gossip Redcoats would overhear and report back on). Last but not least, he was under the impression that Washington knew it and believed it. For this, we resorted to the Lexington trick of making sure “intercepted” letters of Washington’s fell into Clinton’s hands.
Meanwhile, militia captains were under strict instruction, thanks to grocery lists interlaced with messages written in that invisible lemon ink, not to move on any gossip, any missive, unless it was sealed or verbally accompanied by a secret code of Deborah’s devising.
Clinton was loving this, so much so that eventually he had me sitting in councils of war. In fact, things became so fluid, so routine, that once it only took forty-eight hours to present to him proof of Washington’s belief that Clinton’s men were estimated at twenty thousand (when in fact Washington knew they were only ten).
The problem was that none of this was putting us any closer to the news we needed in order to “finish off this war,” which Clinton seemed to be protecting with his life. We did everything we could: break into his office, lace his tea with herbs thought to have truth-telling properties. At one point, with the help of a gypsy woman, Deborah even attempted to read his mind. All to no avail. His was a secret even telepathy couldn’t crack.
Then finally, one day, after tailing Clinton’s valet down State Street, Deborah figured out what to do.
“I got it,” she said simply, careful not to reveal her meaning to André, who now, some weeks later, was putting the finishing touches on the designs for the flower centerpieces and candelabra installations for the great and glorious celebration to be held three days hence: the fabulous Mischianza, a.k.a. the Good Riddance to Howe party. Little did Howe know that what awaited him was a final hurrah before the onset of disgrace and infamy. He would be known for the rest of his life as the man who mucked up the British campaign to retain America.
Her idea, Deborah said, involved gunpowder, Clinton’s personal belongings, and getting ourselves into that Mischianza. That’s all she would allow. Claiming it would be “unlucky” to tell more because “pink and flush was the sky” when the notion came to her, and “that’s always a sign to keep mum!” Oh, well. So far, scurrying minnows, bone dust, and mystic numbers in sums ($333.33) seemed to have taken her pretty far.
Actually, she did elaborate a bit on her resistance to revealing more than I think she intended: “I just don’t want you knowing, is all—no point in you knowing something that could get you killed when only one of us needs to know to make it work.”
She was scared. Of losing Alice. Or me. I knew it when, for a brief moment, her emerald eyes lost their glimmer and the corners of her mouth turned down.
“However you wish,” I consented gently.
She bounced back. “Just get yourselves into the party and I’ll take the rest from there.” Her voice tightened. “And remember, do exactly as I say.”
She kissed Alice.
“This is our one and only chance. We can’t fail.”
She shook my hand. Hers was trembling.
Getting into the Mischianza was a cinch, since Captain Major John André, in above his head, desperately needed help with the party setup.
Eager finally to make the splash he felt was his due and that had been denied him in battle, he’d gotten more than a little carried away. What was meant to be a pretty little theme celebration along the lines of The Thousand and One Nights mushroomed into a tournament, complete with knights mock-jousting on gray chargers for the hands of fair ladies costumed in polonaises of white silk; spangled pink sashes, shoes, and stockings; towering headdresses decked with pearls; and veils edged with silver lace. A boat parade would feature men-of-war rigged with gay flags, garlands of roses, and stocked with naked soldiers done up in blackface and dressed as Nubian slaves, with silver collars and bracelets, surrounding Howe. And a military procession would pass under two triumphal arches built just for the occasion. A fireworks display would follow at ten, followed in turn by a supper of twelve hundred different dishes carried in on the backs of the Nubians at midnight. Finally, after the feasting, dancing in the great hall would commence from four to nine the following morning.
André was already tired.
“Right now, I couldn’t care if Washington himself offered a hand—I’d take it!” Alice overheard André saying to a co-worker at an all-night “work party” to weave garlands and cut menus in the shape of paper dolls.
I must admit that I felt demoted a tad, having gone from attending a council of war to designing table runners, place cards, and ladies’ fans. By comparison, the scheme to kidnap Congress felt like serious business. Still, there was much to do: eight hundred mirrors to install, three thousand candles to ensconce, poems to write for the spangled ladies to recite.
And when André discovered he was short a lady, I thought we’d lose him for sure; he was hyperventilating so much I thought he’d rise into the air and fly away.
There were to be two separate pavilions at each end of a four-acre lawn. Each would hold a total of twelve bejeweled, begowned ladies for the favors of which twelve shining knights would mock-joust. Losing a lady threatened to ruin the symmetry of the entire design.
“Everyone will think me a failure and a fool!” André whined. (Which is nothing compared to what those of us watching you pound your feet and fists on the floor over this issue began to think of you, my lad.)
The missing lady was Peggy Shippen, Philadelphia’s premiere beauty. Apparently her father, a Quaker, took one look at the low-cut gown André (and I) had designed and said he’d rather see his daughter tossed into the sea than attend.
Finally, after three rounds of smelling salts, pungent spice, and ice inserted directly up his nose, André was brought to his senses. Hard to imagine that this nervous wreck of a man was the same whom Benedict Arnold would later entrust to deliver the plans of West Point to the British.
A handsome and charming youth who bought a commission in Britain’s Seventh Foot Regiment, André, a “daddy’s boy” par excellence, hated Rebel Americans’ blood and guts with a passion exceeding anything I’d come across before. He put his disgust down to his having been captured during the Canadian campaign of 1775. Pelted with human shit, forced to sniff a hatchet his captors promised would split his skull the very next day, the dainty major was freed fourteen months later in a prisoner exchange. Yet I did not believe this to be the primary source of his ungodly wrath. This was a man born to be vexed—and born to be punished for it. Arnold would get away, but André would be hanged.
“A little loose about the waist, don’t you think?” he asked me, jabbing yet another pin into our substitute lady’s soft, pink flesh before I could respond. Deborah didn’t even say Ouch! as he yanked the silk fabric about her person, while talking of his days as an aide to Major General Charles Gr
ey at “Paoli ’77,” as he liked to call the scene of the most haunting massacre of American Rebels thus far in the war. For him, it was an all-time career high that also brought him to the brink.
“There I was, bayoneting the few Americans I had not already clubbed, stabbed, or sliced the faces and genitals off of, doing spectacular work, and where did it get me? Billeted in a tiny little Philadelphia home with this dowdy Quaker housewife—”
Deborah couldn’t help but object: “I’m saving your ass, André!”
“Stop twitching, you flat baggage!” he seethed, his pin drawing fresh blood. He shoved Deborah off the dais. “Tomorrow at dawn—be there. Pavilion A! Wear your hair up high—no less than two feet to give your otherwise squat, plebeian face a nice, rich look. Eat light, drink less—and mind you, don’t bloat!”
Deborah winked at me, as if to say, Put up with the fool. He’s our way to the happy end.
André turned, sticking his face into mine. “So, fine—they want a party. I’ll give them a party so spectacular, so grandiose, so memorable that finally I’ll be in the pantheon of greats where I belong! This will be the night of all nights! Tomorrow, for Captain André, the world begins anew!”
Was he in for a shock. I’m surprised he lived long enough afterward to be hanged.
In the middle of all this festivity the next day, I was to sneak into the gunpowder supply house, where the fireworks André had planned were stored. Not a problem. And Alice’s assignment to get hold of horses for the “escape” was made possible by her volunteering to take care of Howe’s military carriage for the procession, putting her within reach of four fine beasts, of which she would commandeer two.
May 18, 1778. Four o’clock. Midafternoon. The plot to obtain the exact date of Clinton’s evacuation is on.
Under the protection of the British warships on the Delaware River, the queens and their knights and all the notable guests, headed by Sir William Howe himself, board decorated barges while being serenaded by military music. They are then rowed from Knight’s Wharf to the landing place at Old Fort.
As soon as the guardian ship leaves the dock, I steal to the supply house for the fireworks.
Five o’clock. From Old Fort, the procession moves along an avenue one hundred yards long, lined with soldiers in gay regimentals, then passes under two triumphal arches, one featuring a gilded figure of the goddess Fame blowing her trumpet, from which a banner wafts bearing the motto, YOUR LAURELS ARE IMMORTAL.
The crowd joins a herald in proclaiming Howe’s praises in horrible verse as scripted by André. Meanwhile Alice, scheduled to water the horses attached to the now-parked military carriage, secretly releases two of Howe’s horses from their harnesses, whispering to them to remain in their positions. Deborah and Alice are to share one horse, and I will be spurring the second.
Five-thirty. The clash of arms. The knights mock-joust with lances, swords, and pistols as the fair ladies in the pavilions on either side of the four-acre field cheer, coo, and pray for their chosen knights. André must be so pleased, until . . .
Deborah, fair and bloat-free, installed in Pavilion A as ordered, suddenly faints. A mortified André tries to slap her awake. Being in a public place is the only thing deterring him from blacking her eyes in the process.
“Reviving” her (if you can call it that) fails, of course, but it preoccupies manic André sufficiently to prevent his close observation of the fireworks installation at the perimeter of the estate. Which is a good thing, because as Deborah is swooning, I’m stealing barrels of gunpowder, stowing them in the bushes, and preparing to blow them up at Deborah’s word.
Six o’clock. A tiny flare emanating from a bedroom window in which Deborah has been placed by André to recover (or else!) appears in the sky. A hopeful sign to continue as planned and for Alice to ready the horses.
Alice jumps onto one of the horses and grips the reins, wrapping them tight about her club fist like leather around a ball. Guiding them about the perimeter of the mansion court, she reaches a labyrinthine garden replete with rushing fountains, arbors of morning glory, and twisting raspberry vines. She enters it, cautiously, quietly, making her way to a spot just beneath the window of Deborah’s recovery room.
Six o’clock and two minutes past. The crowd retreats to the ballroom, made gorgeous by all those candles and garlands of roses we spent the night hanging, especially when reflected and magnified by the hundreds of mirrors we painstakingly fastened to the wall. Once the crowd is tucked inside and the pavilion strained to capacity, there is another discreet flare from another window.
That’s my cue to blow.
I ignite the barrels of gunpowder. Serially detonating all twenty kegs, I cause massive explosions and much damage to the estate’s outlying brick wall, gardens, fountains—even to the mansion itself.
Inside, terror ensues as the banquet hall turns into a rumbling, crumbling, crashing, hellish heap of horror. Candles set tablecloths, seat cushions, men’s waistcoats, and ladies’ wigs on fire.
The waiters, costumed as Egyptian slaves, slip and fall, sending 214 dinners into the air, splattering guests with bits of duck, currant sauce, and roasted boar.
Upstairs, Deborah keeps an eye peeled on the guards posted across the hall at the door of Clinton’s changing room. In the melee and ruckus, the guards can’t help running for cover, scraping and ducking their way down the hall.
Now is Deborah’s chance.
Figuring that she has less than two minutes before the pickets discover that the gunpowder explosions are neither fireworks gone awry nor enemy fire after all, she moves like lightning.
Deborah searches purposefully through Clinton’s changing room, knowing what she’s looking for, but without a clue as to whether or not it’s here. Is it on the desk? Hidden in a pile of papers? Her fingers slide across the bureau top, through a chest of drawers, in and around Clinton’s armoire, beneath his bed, inside his trunk.
Too many minutes pass. She can hear the guards returning, close on the threshold of the changing-room door.
Damn! How in heaven’s name did she come to leave the cursed door ajar?!
No place to hide. The steps draw near. But she won’t leave yet. She looks for a disguise, the valet’s work coat.
Aha! Tucked inside the pocket. Yes! The little green work diary that can turn the tide of the war.
And there it is—a homely entry, listed under the heading, JUNE 17:
“Retrieve general’s new uniform.”
She knew it! Days before, when she’d observed the valet entering the tailor’s on State Street, she’d followed him inside. Eavesdropping, she’d learned of the order for Clinton’s new battle uniform: the softest scarlet broadcloth, the finest gilt lace, the richest velvet stock. But she hadn’t caught the date it would need to be ready. That was whispered. And why? Because it was a date earmarking an event requiring the most splendid attire. Victory attire. For surely Clinton, like any self-respecting officer, foresaw triumph in his evacuation from Philadelphia and his march on New York.
June 17 was when it would all begin. By June 18 he would be across the river and deep into New Jersey, just in time for a total solar eclipse.
How divinely helpful.
How miraculously timed.
How terrifying to be staring down the barrels of two muskets. . . .
Deborah kicks one of the guards squarely in the balls and rams her head into the other’s teeth.
“Goddamn you, woman!” the first soldier gasps as he falls to the ground.
“Now!” Deborah screams, hurling herself out the second-floor window and into a ranunculus bed, where Alice and her steed are lying in wait.
“June eighteenth!” she whispers, spurring the horse. “Keep to me like I was your own backside!” she orders her daughter. “Hold on!”
She gallops off at breakneck speed, jumping hurdle after hurdle: shrubbery, statuary, and a man-made pond, clearing the estate out to open road, where there before her, atop the second of Howe
’s carriage horses, am I.
Off the road and onto a tiny trail we fly, deep into the woods.
Deborah and Alice are bound to the countryside to alert militia, Rebel boys, their children, and their wives. Well in advance, Deborah has prepared her countryside network to receive the date she is soon to bring them.
And I am headed for Valley Forge to let Washington know personally: that June 18 will be the date to intercept Clinton, to overwhelm his wagon train, to outflank him, both sides, and get him front and rear. To bring Clinton, begging, to his knees.
No.
Instead it will soon be Deborah, Alice, and me doing the begging—pleading with the Redcoats for our lives.
CHAPTER 30
Monmouth Woods
The thundering hooves followed us like a menacing storm cloud about to burst.
“Halt or we’ll shoot!”
Clear enough. We obeyed.
With an extra bounty and possible decoration undoubtedly promised the Redcoat whose bullet took our lives, these three men could have been expected to shoot us dead on the spot, no questions asked.
They didn’t.
Perhaps what deterred them was the sight of a beautiful, begowned woman still in her high heels wheeling off her horse, approaching the soldiers, reaching for the barrel of one of their guns, and bringing it directly to her heart.
“Go ahead—I dare you.”
“Step back, woman!” the soldier warned, trying to wrest his gun from her grip.
She held on.
“You reckon killing us is your duty, I know. And that’s true, if your duty’s only that of a king’s soldier, not a man, not a daddy, not a husband, not a granddaddy. If you’re just some rat who’s forgotten he was once a boy who at one time or another thought the world was piss-poor unfair—”
“For the last time, step back!” said another soldier, for the one whose gun Deborah was holding had gone quiet.
Deborah pressed on. “So shoot! And remember when you do that you’re gonna regret it like you shot one you loved. . . .”