Flashback Four #4

by Dan Gutman

  “How do we know they won’t mess up next time?” argued Julia. “Maybe next time they’ll send us to China by accident.”

  “I say we’re here,” Luke said. “Let’s go over to Weehawken, shoot the video, and get out of here.”

  “Won’t it be interfering with history if we take a boat?” Isabel asked. “Remember we were told that under no circumstances are we supposed to interfere with history.”

  “How is taking a boat interfering with history?” asked Julia. “We’re just getting to the place we need to be.”

  Isabel’s brain was trying hard to come up with any possible reason why it made more sense to scrap the mission.

  “Do we have time to make it across the river before the duel begins?” she asked.

  “We got here two hours early,” Luke said. “David and I can row fast. Let’s not waste time arguing. Let’s get over there ASAP, I say.”

  “Okay, okay,” Isabel finally agreed. “Aye.”

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” David said as he stepped into the boat and helped Julia aboard. “I think it was Shakespeare who said that.”

  Actually, reader, it was Hippocrates, the ancient Greek physician. But close enough. Back to the story.

  Isabel and Luke fussed with the thick rope, trying to loosen a complicated series of knots.

  “Where’s the motor on this thing?” asked Julia from the rear of the boat.

  “They didn’t have motors in 1804!” David told her. “That’s why they’re called rowboats!”

  Luke and Isabel finally untied the rope that was holding the boat to the dock. Isabel climbed in carefully. Luke put one foot into the boat, and then he heard a sound coming from behind him.

  “Excuse me,” a man’s voice said.

  “Eeeeeek!” both girls screamed.

  A young guy with a beard was standing on the dock, and he was holding a rifle in one hand and a lantern in the other. Luke turned around. When he caught a glimpse of the guy, he lost his balance. He almost tumbled into the river, but luckily tumbled into the boat instead, landing heavily on David.

  All the members of the Flashback Four put their hands in the air instinctively. The guy looked a little crazy. He put the lantern on the ground and pointed the gun menacingly at the kids.

  “Please don’t shoot, mister!” shouted David. “We’re just kids!”

  “We didn’t do anything!” Isabel yelled.

  “It looks to me like you’re stealin’ my boat,” the guy said calmly. “That’s doin’ something.”

  “We’re not stealing it,” Julia tried to explain. “We’re just . . . borrowing it.”

  “Hmmm,” the guy said, rubbing his beard with his free hand. “Where I come from, you ask somebody if you can borrow somethin’. You don’t just take it. Takin’ without askin’ is called stealin’, not borrowin’.”

  Silence. All four kids were terrified about what might happen to them, none of them more than David. He was thinking about all the things his parents had told him that African Americans had to deal with back in what some people call “the good old days.” Bigotry. Prejudice. Discrimination. Violence. David tried to make himself look invisible. Luke moved in front of him to shield David with his body.

  “You’re right, sir,” Luke said in his most polite this-is-how-I-talk-to-grown-ups voice. “We’re very sorry. May we borrow your boat?”

  The guy looked Luke up and down.

  “I don’t reckon I know you,” he said. “I don’t loan my boat out to folks I don’t know.”

  Luke leaned forward and stuck out his hand.

  “My name is Luke Borowicz. I’m from Boston. What is your name?”

  “Benjamin Franklin Washington,” he said, shaking Luke’s hand. “My parents named me after Benjamin Franklin and George Washington.”

  “I figured,” said Luke.

  “You sure are dressed funny, Luke Borowicz,” said Benjamin Franklin Washington. “Why do you have that writin’ on your shirt there?”

  Luke looked down.

  “Oh,” he said. “I like the Red Sox.”

  Benjamin Franklin Washington looked confused.

  “So why’d you write the color of yer socks on yer shirt? And why is socks spelled wrong?” he asked.

  “I knew we should have been wearing 1804 clothes,” muttered Julia under her breath.

  “The Red Sox are a baseball team,” Luke explained, “and they’re awesome.”

  “Baseball?” asked Benjamin Franklin Washington. “What’s that?”

  Baseball, as we know it, would not be played in America for forty years, reader. But that’s a story for another day.

  “It’s a game where you . . . oh, never mind,” Luke said. “Look, Ben. Can I call you Ben? We’re good kids. Can we just borrow your boat? We’ll bring it back.”

  “How do I know you’ll bring it back?” Benjamin Franklin Washington replied. “Maybe you’ll run off with my boat and I’ll never see it again. That’s what the last feller did who asked to borrow my boat.”

  “We wouldn’t do that,” Luke said lamely.

  Luke was out of ideas. It was time for somebody else to take over and turn on the charm.

  “Ben, my name is Julia,” Julia said, fluttering her eyelashes just a little. “This is one beautiful boat you have here. How much would it cost for us to rent it?”

  “What?” Isabel whispered to Julia. “We don’t have any money.”

  Isabel had forgotten about the silver dollars Ms. Gunner had given to them in case of emergency.

  “Rent it?” said Benjamin Franklin Washington. “Well, that depends on how long you’re gonna be needin’ it. If you wanna take a little joyride ’cross the river, that’s one thing. If you’re gonna be needin’ it all day, well, that’s another thing entirely.”

  “We just want to row across the river and back,” Julia explained.

  “Lemme think,” Benjamin Franklin Washington said. It looked like he was doing some calculations in his head.

  Julia took the silver dollars out of her pocket and counted them. There were only ten. It wasn’t going to be nearly enough.

  “That’ll be two dollars,” Benjamin Franklin Washington finally said.

  “Two dollars?!” Julia exclaimed. “To rent a boat?”

  Julia’s dad owned a boat, which he kept at a dock in Boston Harbor. She knew he’d paid about ten thousand dollars for it. It cost hundreds of dollars a month just to dock it.

  “Okay, okay,” Benjamin Franklin Washington said. “One dollar. But that’s as low as I can go. You kids drive a hard bargain.”

  Julia gave him all the coins.

  “Here,” she said, “keep the change.”

  Benjamin Franklin Washington’s eyes opened wide. Ten dollars was a lot of money in 1804. You could buy a pound of coffee for twenty-five cents in those days. For ten dollars, you could ship a ton of goods across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe.

  “Tell you what,” he said. “Keep the boat.”

  CHAPTER 11

  MEANWHILE, AT HAMILTON’S HOUSE . . .

  THAT EVENING HAD NOT BEEN A RESTFUL ONE for Alexander Hamilton. He knew that in a few short hours, he could very possibly be dead.

  In the middle of the night, he sat at a small wooden desk doing something that he had always loved to do—write.

  Hamilton was a short man, maybe five feet, seven inches tall, with reddish-brown hair that was just starting to turn gray. He had deep blue eyes and a fair complexion.

  I won’t bore you with his long life story, reader, but Hamilton’s was a fascinating one. He was born very poor on Nevis, a British island in the West Indies. His parents never got married, and his father walked out on the family when Alexander was ten. A few years later, his mother died. His guardian, Peter, then committed suicide, and his uncle James died a year later. Alexander was homeless. He was taken in by the parents of a friend. It was a tough way to grow up.

  But Alexander was a brilliant, hardworking, and determined you
ng man who could also be overconfident, impulsive, and arrogant at times. He came to America to go to college, and after the Boston Tea Party he joined the army to fight for American independence. By the age of twenty-one, he was a captain. He became a military leader, an aide to George Washington, and a hero at the Battle of Yorktown. He was nicknamed “the Little Lion.”

  When the war was over, George Washington appointed Hamilton to be the first secretary of the Treasury. He went on to start the United States Mint, the Bank of New York, and an early version of the coast guard. He signed the Constitution. Not yet fifty years old on this last night of his life, Alexander Hamilton was one of the most famous men in America.

  He lived with Eliza, his wife of twenty-five years, and their seven children at the Grange, a country estate he’d built in the Harlem section of New York City. But he didn’t spend this night there. He spent it nine miles to the south, in a house he rented on Cedar Street in the Wall Street area. He used it as an office, because he often had morning business in lower Manhattan. By horse-drawn carriage, it took an hour and a half to get from one home to the other. So sometimes Hamilton would spend the night at Cedar Street.

  He didn’t tell his wife or children about the “interview” he would be having with Aaron Burr the next morning in Weehawken, New Jersey. (That’s what a duel was sometimes called in those days—an interview.) They would have tried to talk him out of it. But Hamilton was a careful planner, and he wanted his family to be taken care of in case he died in the duel. Ten days earlier, he had written up a statement of his finances. Two days before the duel, he wrote his last will and testament, the document that specified who would get his money and property after he died.

  Hamilton’s eighteen-year-old son—also named Alexander—happened to be at Cedar Street the night before the duel. At three o’clock in the morning, Hamilton woke up his son and instructed him to go light a candle.

  “Your little sister has taken ill,” he told Alexander Jr. “I need you to go to the Grange to care for her.”

  “Cannot mother care for her?” asked his sleepy son.

  “She needs your help. Go to her.”

  “Must I, father?”

  “Be a good boy.”

  Hamilton didn’t want his son hanging around. Not on this night. Alexander Jr. reluctantly got up, pulled on some clothes, and went to get his horse to take him to the Grange.

  Alone in the upstairs study, Hamilton thought about his other son, Philip. Just three years earlier, Philip had learned that a lawyer named George Eacker had insulted his father. Angry words were exchanged. One thing led to another until—to defend his father’s honor—Philip challenged Eacker to a duel. They met at Weehawken, at the same spot Hamilton would be in a few hours. In the duel, Philip was shot and killed. He was just nineteen years old. Of all the tragedy Hamilton had suffered in his life, the death of his son may have been the hardest of all.

  Letter writing was a fine art in the days before email and text. Hamilton sighed as he dipped his quill into the inkwell on his desk.

  By candlelight, he began to write. . . .

  Statement on Impending Duel with Aaron Burr

  On my expected interview with Col Burr, I think it proper to make some remarks explanatory of my conduct, motives and views.

  I am certainly desirous of avoiding this interview, for the most cogent reasons.

  Hamilton went on to explain in four pages, point by point, why he really should not duel with Aaron Burr. First of all, he wrote that he was opposed to dueling, for religious and moral reasons. “It would even give me pain to be obliged to shed the blood of a fellow creature,” he wrote.

  Second, “My wife and Children are extremely dear to me.”

  Third, he wrote that he owed money to various people, and if he were to die they might not be paid.

  Fourth, he wrote that he had nothing against Aaron Burr personally. They simply had political differences.

  Despite all those reasons, Hamilton had decided to proceed with the duel. He had been challenged, and a man of honor must accept a challenge or be labeled a coward. That’s the way it was in those days.

  After that, he spelled out exactly what his strategy would be for the duel. He wrote . . .

  I have resolved, if our interview is conducted in the usual manner, and it pleases God to give me the opportunity, to reserve and throw away my first fire, and I have thoughts even of reserving my second fire—and thus giving a double opportunity to Col Burr to pause and to reflect.

  What Hamilton was saying was that he would show up at the duel, but he would not try to kill Aaron Burr. He would “throw away his fire.”

  If you saw the musical Hamilton or listened to the soundtrack, you surely remember a song called “My Shot,” in which Alexander Hamilton raps over and over again that “I am not throwing away my shot.” But in fact, when it came time to duel with Aaron Burr, Hamilton’s plan was specifically to throw away his shot. He even put it down on paper.

  I know what you’re thinking, reader. What’s the point of coming to a duel if you’re not going to try to win it? Isn’t that suicide?

  It didn’t make sense, I know. Dueling was a barbaric and strange practice, with nonsensical rules and customs. More on that later.

  There was one last letter that Hamilton needed to write. He dipped his quill in the inkwell again and wrote carefully and deliberately. . . .

  This letter, my very dear Eliza, will not be delivered to you, unless I shall first have terminated my earthly career; to begin, as I humbly hope from redeeming grace and divine mercy, a happy immortality.

  Hamilton went on to write he could not bring himself to kill another human being. . . .

  The scruples of a Christian have determined me to expose my own life to any extent rather than subject myself to the guilt of taking the life of another. This must increase my hazards and redoubles my pangs for you. But you had rather I should die innocent than live guilty.

  He finished the letter by saying he wished he could have avoided participating in the duel, but he felt that he had to.

  Adieu best of wives and best of Women. Embrace all my darling Children for me.

  Hamilton looked over the letter one more time to make sure he had said everything he intended to say. Then he signed it . . .

  Ever yours

  AH

  He sprinkled some fine powder on the paper so the ink would dry quickly. Then he shook the paper for a few seconds and blew away the excess powder. He folded the letter to his wife and slipped it into an envelope. Then he dripped some wax from a candle onto the outside of the envelope to seal it, and carefully pressed his stamp into the hot wax. Finally, he slipped the letter into a thick package of other documents to be read in case he was going to die in a few hours.

  There was a gentle knock on the door downstairs. Hamilton was expecting it. He went down the steps to open the door.

  Two well-dressed men were standing outside, friends of Hamilton. Nathaniel Pendleton was a veteran of the Revolutionary War and a Georgia district court judge. He was carrying a brown leather suitcase, about the size of a modern briefcase. The other man, David Hosack, was a doctor. Hosack, in fact, was also the doctor who cared for Hamilton’s son after his duel. It was customary to have a doctor present at a duel. Often, a duelist would get injured but not killed.

  Hamilton shook hands warmly with both men. Pendleton was courteous and dignified. He had known Hamilton since their Revolutionary War days and did not want to see his old friend risk his life over a silly disagreement with Aaron Burr.

  “There is still time to reverse course, General,” he told Hamilton in a soft Virginia accent. “If I may offer my advice to you, there is nothing to gain by proceeding with this altercation.” Dr. Hosack agreed.

  Hamilton shook his head. His mind was made up. He told Pendleton and Hosack that he planned to fire his gun into the air instead of aiming at Burr. This, he hoped, would make Burr reconsider and do the same. That way, both men would defend their
honor without either one getting hurt.

  An odd strategy, I know. But it was not uncommon in the world of nineteenth-century dueling.

  “Have you informed Colonel Burr of your intentions?” asked Nathaniel Pendleton.

  “I have not,” replied Hamilton.

  “What if he should not choose to follow that same procedure?” asked Dr. Hosack.

  “That, my friends, is the risk I have chosen to take,” said Hamilton.

  There would be no talking him out of it. Hamilton was a proud man, confident in his decisions. Up until this point, that confidence had served him well in life.

  “Then it is time,” said Nathaniel Pendleton, putting his hand on Hamilton’s shoulder.

  “Let us go,” said Hamilton.

  He handed Pendleton the package of documents he had written and ushered both men to the door, locking it on the way out. The three of them climbed into a horse-drawn carriage, which would take them a few blocks to the dock where a boat was waiting to ferry them across the Hudson River to Weehawken.

  CHAPTER 12

  OVER THE RIVER

  THE FLASHBACK FOUR SETTLED INTO THE LITTLE rowboat that would take them across the river. To distribute their weight evenly, Isabel sat in the front, Julia went to the back, and David and Luke sat in the seat that went across the middle, each of the boys taking an oar.

  “Okay, let’s go,” Julia said.

  She gave a little shove, and the boat slid away from the dock. Julia waved good-bye to Benjamin Franklin Washington and promised to bring his boat back when they were done with it, even though he said they could keep it.

  “Stroke . . . stroke . . . ,” David said as they pulled away from Manhattan. He and Luke made a good team, having rowed a lifeboat together after escaping from the sinking Titanic. This one was much easier, because it was only the four of them in a smaller, lighter boat.

  Isabel pulled the TTT out of her pocket.

  “I’d better let the Gunner know where we are,” she said, typing on the keypad . . .

  WE GOT A ROWBOAT. GOING ACROSS THE RIVER.

  A couple of seconds later, a reply arrived . . .