Heaven. Perhaps they could marry sooner than she had been thinking, if ever he decided to ask. “And I love you.”
“Ahem.”
Bennet grinned even as his lips met hers for another of those brief, tantalizing kisses that he so rarely found the chance to give her. Then he put a bit of space between them. “For your sake, Freeman.”
“I do appreciate it, Mr. Lane.”
Winter heard the note of laughter in Freeman’s voice but focused instead on Bennet and the desperation that seemed to radiate from his gaze. For her? No, she didn’t think so. She lifted a hand and settled it against his cheek. “I don’t like seeing you like this.”
Amusement softened the edge of his expression. He lifted a brow. “Like what? Amorous?”
A laugh tickled its way out. “Nay, that I like quite well. But you seem…unhappy. Distressed.”
He removed a hand from her waist to rub at his neck. “’Tis thoughts of my family and all the changes to it.”
“I assumed as much. I have been praying.”
“I assumed as much. You generally are.” He dropped his other hand and took a seat on the bench.
Why was that always, always his response to the topic of prayer? Deflect or retreat. Winter turned to face him but held her place and folded her arms over her middle. “You know, Bennet, the Lord may be more apt to answer said prayers with an affirmative if you were the one to offer them up.”
His face went hard, though he seemed to try, unsuccessfully, to soften it again. “Can we discuss that later? Come, sit. I have more pressing things to speak with you about.”
“There is nothing more pressing.” The words seemed to lodge in her throat and felt like a mere murmur on her lips. “Nothing else will be resolved so long as you keep such distance between you and the Lord.”
Even the attempt at softness disappeared. “There is distance between me and the Lord—a universe of it. I fail to see how addressing myself to the Creator will change a jot or tittle of my life. He set it in motion long ago, but the future is up to us.”
Her fingers curled into her sides. “How can you say that?”
“How can you say otherwise?” He surged to his feet again and paced to a dormant rose bush and back again. “Do you think I have never uttered a prayer? That, had I seen some response, I would think as I do?”
Ever the scientist. Winter raised her chin. “You have recited prayers, I am certain. But unless they came from your heart, my love, ’tis like pouring two elements into beakers beside each other and then claiming they had no reaction when mixed. How could you possibly judge such a thing if not done properly? Just so, prayers mean nothing unless they are meant.”
He halted before her, amusement lighting his eyes again. “I appreciate you trying to put it in terms I understand, but the analogy is feeble, my love.”
Then she would try again. She caught his hands and clasped them. “Then look at me, at us. Before July I spoke to you many a time, but how often did I ever say anything with meaning?”
His answer was an indrawn breath.
She squeezed his fingers. “I gave you words but kept all feeling, all honest thought from them. Was that enough for you?”
“Nay,” he said on his exhale, low and near silent.
“And so our words, if nothing but empty syllables recited by rote, mean nothing to God. Just as you could not force me to draw near, so the Lord will respect your decision when that is all you offer Him. But He wants to know you, my love, to hear the agony of your heart so He might soothe it. Just as you have soothed mine.”
“Winter.” He leaned down until their foreheads touched in that way that never failed to wring her heart. “Compelling words, but logic forbids I accept them so easily.”
She smiled and held his hands even tighter. “Does logic alone tell you that you love me?”
His glare was at least playful. “You know it does not. And so you will say that if I will admit the heart plays a factor in my dealings with you, so I ought to try utilizing it in my dealings with Providence.”
She straightened when he did. “More, I’m saying you are no scientist at all if you do not do so, because it will mean you have judged without properly experimenting first. You will be no better than Descartes, laying out rules of motion that can be proven false with a simple demonstration.”
His chuckle seemed to combine appreciation with brooding. “And if I conduct this experiment and my hypothesis is proven rather than yours, what then? Will you relent, and leave me to my prayerful contemplation while you go about your contemplative prayer?”
She could respect that he made no suggestion that if his theory were supposedly proven, she ought to change her views. “I cannot fathom such an outcome. When we earnestly seek the Lord, He faithfully answers.”
Bennet pulled away and regarded her for a long moment. “We shall see. I have an appointment to keep, but we will have the conversation I intended soon.”
Did he mean the conversation she thought he did? Presumably, which made her smile. And if regret pulsed for a moment that she hadn’t let him initiate a proposal when he arrived, she pushed it aside. This needed to be resolved first. “I will be waiting.” And praying.
He nodded and stepped away, lifting a hand in farewell to her and then Freeman, and then he disappeared back around the corner of the house.
Winter watched him go, and then she glanced at Freeman when he came to her side. “How is Percy today?”
“Bad, Winnie. Real bad. I daresay he shan’t make it another day. The infection…” Her friend cleared his throat. “I checked on the second letter, with the heat-developed ink. It’s gone.”
Her heart threatened to pound from her chest. Freeman had at least made sure her missive to Washington had gone directly into Roe’s hand, but the fact that the one she had left as bait had been taken…
She had better hasten to her knees.
Twenty-Six
Ben had a feeling his expression was every bit as stubborn and indignant as Archie’s had been a couple of hours earlier. He hadn’t been angry when he left Winter, but with each step her words chafed a bit more.
What made her presume to know whether his prayers had always stopped at his lips? What made her so certain he had not prayed earnestly at one point, and through that had come to his conclusions? She made assumptions. Wrong assumptions.
Of course he had prayed from his heart before. What child didn’t? There was that time he had asked for a new wooden horse…which, granted, had been a purely selfish prayer, so he suspected it didn’t count. The same could undoubtedly be said of all the others from childhood. But then, when fourteen…no, that had contained a definite note of newly born cynicism. He had dared the Lord, but Winter would argue it was testament to His merciful nature that He had ignored him.
She may have a point. Both in his imagination and the one she had actually made.
Blast it all.
Ben turned the corner and wished it were as easy to turn one in his thoughts. How was he to simply engage his heart when he was none too convinced doing so, if he could manage it, would achieve anything? He could not make himself believe. Could not make faith spring up as Winter so obviously desired. Could not rewrite his perception of God to be one of a loving Father when the only evidence he had ever seen was of a distant Creator.
He sidestepped a slow-moving couple ambling past the shops and frowned. Winter would say that if he wanted evidence, he must conduct an experiment through which he had a hope to glean some. That was something, he must admit, he had never really done. He hadn’t seen the point. ’Twas illogical. It relied more on what one felt than on what one saw.
But then, had it not infuriated him that everyone dismissed Winter simply because of what they saw with their eyes, having never dug deeper?
He grumbled and scowled at the injustice of having something turned on him like that.
So be it. He would not be a hypocrite. He would at least try, and try genuinely. The worst that
could happen was nothing.
Ducking into an alley, Ben turned his back on the passersby and leaned a shoulder into the brick wall nearest at hand. He felt a bit ridiculous and more than a bit at a loss, but he was trying. Perhaps that, in the celestial scheme, counted for something.
How to even begin? All the prayers he had memorized, had heard in chapel, seemed an unwise example to follow right now because he would fall into habit and neglect to include his heart.
But he had heard Winter pray several times. God of my end. That seemed to be her favorite salutation. It had a pretty ring to it, but that could not be what he focused on. What did it really mean?
God of my end. His end. Even Bennet believed that. That at the beginning and at the end was the Creator.
He could leap off from that. God of my end, I know You are omniscient. And so You know how difficult this is for me. Winter would have me believe that is of interest to You, and though I find it difficult to believe…if it is true, I want to believe it.
The sun intensified upon his shoulders. That was something he had never considered. There was a possibility Winter was right. And if so, of course he would want to know it. Had he not spent his entire adult life seeking the truths of his world?
He squeezed his eyes shut. Lord, I do indeed want to know who You are. If I am wrong, please show me. If she is right, then reveal it in a way I cannot mistake. And while I am beseeching You…well, this business that brought me here has reached a tipping point. Lead me to the spy, Almighty Lord, before it is too late.
Unable to think of anything else to say, he rested his back against the wall and stared at the one across from him.
A wise man’s heart is at his right hand.
Ben frowned. Was it coincidence that another obscure verse came to mind, or, as Winter suggested, could it be the Lord speaking to him? Either way, he turned his head to the right.
Benedict Arnold hurried past, his attention on something in his hands. A rectangle of white fluttered to the ground, but he didn’t seem to notice. His gait didn’t so much as hitch.
Interesting. Ben moved toward the street even as a gust of wind blew the paper his way. An envelope of some kind. He picked it up, looked at both front and back, but it was unmarked.
Had he the leisure, he would have opened it. But it seemed the wiser course to pocket it and follow Arnold. He knew where he was going in general terms, but he had dreaded the thought of wandering through Holy Ground searching him out. His hope had indeed been to intercept him on his way from the barracks.
The Lord’s guidance? He wouldn’t dismiss the possibility, but he also wouldn’t be convinced by something he had already made steps to achieve himself.
He made sure to stay a goodly distance behind the general, just close enough to see at what point he turned into Holy Ground. As Fairchild had said, the chosen spot seemed to be off Barclay Street. Good. Perhaps he could hover on the outskirts and still be close enough to overhear.
Though he obviously had to be on the correct side of the street. And once across, there was no way to remain outside the village of harlots. Their tents and lean-tos and hovels crowded the church’s land. On the rare wall of brick, blackened trails still marked where the fire had rampaged through this section of town some four years ago now.
Odd how this was the one place that had been quickly rebuilt, while the rest of the city crowded into too little housing, the charred remains empty and forlorn.
At least he spotted no women displaying their wares. The few figures he saw moving seemed to be headed out of Holy Ground in the direction of the vendues and their bargains.
Arnold’s scarlet coat stood out like a cardinal among pigeons against the weather-stained canvas. The general stepped out from between two tents and surveyed the area, presumably looking for his contact.
Get thee behind me, Satan.
Ben sent a glare heavenward even as he stumbled backward. If it was the Lord sending him these verses, then the Almighty had an unexpected sense of humor.
A flap of canvas enveloped him, sending him into a dim chamber lit by a single lamp. A cough made him spin around—but the figure sitting on the pallet looked to be no threat. Indeed, she looked like little more than a child, innocent eyes fixed on him with curiosity and a strange luminosity.
Which, of course, made him realize he had intruded upon this waif’s home. “Ah…” He passed a hand over his hair, sending his tricorn tumbling to the ground. He retrieved it quickly. “So sorry to…that is I…” He motioned outside. “I am eavesdropping on someone.”
The girl’s lips turned up in the corners. “I was making tea. Would you like some while you…listen?”
He glanced from her to the one tin cup beside a dented kettle. “I thank you, miss, but no.” Instead he strained toward the wall nearest where Arnold was. Or had been. Had he left? If not, he was silent.
“As you like, sir.” The girl sprinkled a few leaves into the cup and poured steaming water over it. “I am Viney.”
He nodded but said nothing. His attention was snatched by Arnold’s low voice outside.
“You are late.”
“Mayhap you are early,” said a second voice, rough and reedy. “What is it to you, so long as I come bearing the news ye seek?”
A grumble sounded that Ben could not make out, and then, “So you have evidence enough?”
“Evidence…” The lout made it sound like a vile thing, an instrument with which to torture rather than prove truth. “I saw her man handing a note to a farmer what quickly left the city, not long after that high-bred officer of yours visited her. Otherwise the chit spent most her time with that other gent’s family.”
Arnold hummed. “’Tis hardly enough to prove anything. She has ties to many a farmer on Long Island, having grown up there. But then, if my man did his job and she is the one we seek, then that letter will prove Washington’s undoing.”
Ben squeezed his eyes shut. The words, the similarities…nay. Unthinkable. Better to focus on the other terrible realization.
He was too late. The plan had been enacted. The agent, if truly discovered, had been used against the Patriots.
“And I retrieved the other letter she had left,” Arnold went on. “I have not yet had a chance…blast. Where did I put it?”
Ben pulled it out of his pocket and stared at it for a long moment. Was there any point in looking now? Arnold had already negated his whole purpose for coming here, but perhaps there was still some hope. Somewhere.
And at the very least, curiosity got the best of him. Yet even as he broke the seal, his limbs seemed to double in weight. His chest went tight. And his eyes, after glimpsing the script on the page, slid closed. He needn’t read it to know. ’Twas Winter’s hand.
“No.” The denial slipped out on a quiet moan. All this time, he had been seeking her on two fronts without even realizing it. And why hadn’t he seen it? He knew Robert Townsend was involved, and as close as they were…all those strange glances between them he hadn’t known how to interpret…but it made no sense. Perhaps Arnold was wrong. Perhaps…
Even as he hoped it, dread certainty iced over him. He had prayed the Lord would lead him to answers. If this was the one he got, he ought never beseech Providence again.
He stroked a finger over the condemning paper while the miscreant outside made some suggestion about where Arnold may have put it. “Not you, Winter,” Ben murmured. “You cannot have put yourself in such a position.”
“Winter?” Viney’s eyes were wide in her sunken face, though she kept her voice to a whisper. “Winter Reeves?”
And why did it surprise him that his beloved was acquainted with harlots when he had just learned she was a spy? Yet he was. So much so that he could only blink at the girl.
Viney smiled. “I met her in July, when her grandfather had her struck o’er the head and dumped her here. I saw her before anyone else did and nursed her until she awoke, and then I helped her leave again before more ill could befall her.”
/>
When her grandfather what? For a long moment he stared, agape. “He…she…July…Of course, that head injury.” And why had she not told him while she confessed her inability to live without him?
That answer was obvious enough. She didn’t trust him. Not enough.
“You must be her beau.” Viney sank down to her knees again. “The way you say her name…”
“I intend to marry her.” Or did. Assuming she could avoid the noose long enough to walk up the aisle.
Blast. He looked around, wishing for a sturdy post to lean on. Or strike. He had to make do with rubbing at the back of his neck. “How could she be so stupid as to get involved in something like this? She knows the consequences.”
Viney folded her hands in her lap and regarded him evenly. “I know not what ‘this’ you mean, sir, but she would have had valid reasons. She is a good soul. One of the only people I have met in years who cared for the heart beneath the grime.”
Ben raised the letter he held, but the words were empty. Nothing but the prattle of the pseudo Winter and an odd little H in the corner. “Yes, she is all that is good. Which is why I cannot fathom this.” But then, he had not come to New York thinking the spy he sought would be a base creature like the one mumbling to Arnold outside. He had known he—and she, apparently—would be someone trustworthy and trusted if they indeed put their hands to such vital information. And Winter, through Fairchild, had overheard plenty.
But Winter. Stooping to such levels, putting herself in a position to be hanged. For a cause in which she had never given the slightest hint that she believed, not even to him.
He could not be angry over the secrets, not when he had plenty of them himself. But to think of the danger she was in, the general outside determined to see her undone…
When he suspected George of being involved, there had been fear. But not like this.
“Never mind. I will find it later,” Arnold said outside. “It hardly matters. We will know soon enough if she is guilty. And if so, she will pay the price for it.”
Ring of Secrets Page 30