“The hand of your daughter in marriage.”
“Yes.”
“Well? The banns, sir. Have you arranged them? It should be quite a simple matter.”
Vionne glanced around. The butchers did not appear to be paying any attention. “Mr. Blakeman, it is most certainly not a matter that can be called simple. My daughter is very much a modern young woman. She is, I must admit, headstrong. I dare not make such a decision for her without you calling—on her, mind you, not me—and asking her yourself if she will have you.” Vionne lifted his beer and drank down half of it in one long swallow. It tasted foul, but his mouth was so dry he didn’t care.
Blakeman waited until the smith had set the tankard back on the table, then leaned forward and spoke very quietly. “In other circumstances that might be possible. As things stand now, it is not. I rely on you to make my case for me, goldsmith. I am quite sure that however—what was your word?—however modern Miss Manon may be, she is also a dutiful daughter. As I told you, sir, it suits me that the wedding take place in a fortnight’s time. See to it.”
Blakeman watched the goldsmith leave. He waited a few moments, then lifted his hand and nodded. One of the butchers got up and followed Vionne into the street. A precaution, nothing more. But if by some outside chance the goldsmith were going somewhere other than straight home, best he knew about it.
So, one bit of this night’s business concluded. Though he did not feel as satisfied with it as he might. Hang the banns, he should have demanded the wedding take place immediately. Otherwise it might be that Joyful Turner…No, not likely. If Turner were going to whisk her away without her father’s permission, he’d have done so by now. He would leave things as they were.
The door opened. “The blessing of le bon Dieu on all here. Beer, landlord! And I am to meet a gentleman…Ah, I see him. There in the back. Good evening to you, my friend.” Tintin headed toward Blakeman, passing the tapping bench and picking up his beer as he went by.
“You’ve much in common with the arse of a horse,” Blakeman said, when Tintin straddled a stool across from his own. “As I suspect you’ve been told before.”
Tintin shrugged. “Not frequently by those who wish to keep their tongues in their mouths, monsieur. But in this case I will ignore the insult. As I am ignoring your little pretense of great secrecy. If this place were not entirely safe, you would not have met me here. And I note that the one man besides ourselves who drinks at the sign of the Fife and Drum is a butcher. They tell me the butchers are entirely in your camp.”
“And who might these talkative folks be?”
“The populace of the great city of New York, mon ami. At least those with whom I have intercourse. Ha! That would make them all women, no? I love your English language. So many meanings for each word!” Tintin lifted the tankard, took a long swallow, then spat the beer onto the sawdust-covered floor. “Merde! You have brought me to a tavern where they serve cow piss. If this is to be the standard of brewers in your new nation, monsieur, I must think again about our—”
Blakeman reached across and gripped the pirate’s arm. “Hold your tongue, you ignorant bastard!”
“Let go of me.” The words were spoken very softly.
“You try my patience, pirate.”
“Let go of me.” A knife had materialized in Tintin’s free hand and was pressed against Blakeman’s wrist. “Otherwise, mon ami, you will have the same disfigurement as your rival.”
“I do not think so, pirate.” The butcher who had not followed Vionne into the street had come to stand behind Tintin. He held a cleaver above the head of the pirate. “Not unless,” Blakeman said quietly, “you believe that bandanna you wear can keep your skull from splitting in two.”
The tableau held for the space of three heartbeats. Then Blakeman released his hold on Tintin’s wrist, Tintin put his knife away, and the butcher faded into the shadows on the other side of the room. “Tell me about the others,” Blakeman said.
“What others?”
“Lafitte and the rest. Will they do business?”
“Jean Lafitte is always prepared to do business, and the others do as he suggests. But Barataria is a long distance away, mon ami. As I have said before, he is there and I am here.”
Exactly the concern. “I must be able to tell the others we have Lafitte’s agreement.”
Tintin lifted the tankard a second time, then set it down with a grimace of disapproval. “Is there nothing better than this to drink in this place?”
“Answer my question and you can go off to Rivington Street and drink Delight Higgins’s fine wines and superior ale, and gamble and whore as much as you like.”
“I do not require your permission to come or to go, mon ami.” Tintin leaned forward. “I thought we had established that.”
Blakeman nodded. The time to teach the pirate manners would come. It was not now. “I need to be able to assure the others that the ships that fly our flag will be unmolested, and that those flying the Stars and Stripes will be considered fair prey.”
“You and all the rest of the Americans call us pirates, monsieur. But we, Captain Lafitte and all the rest of us, we think of ourselves as honorable privateers. Give us letters of marque and…” Tintin spread his hands in a gesture that promised much, though he specified nothing.
Wednesday, August 24, 1814
Chapter Eighteen
New York City,
Ann Street, 9 A.M.
EVERY TIME he removed a kidney stone, Andrew thought of his ancestor, Lucas Turner, a barber-surgeon come here in 1661, when the city was Nieuw Amsterdam. Then as now, a stone was among the most painful of ailments. Those suffering with it were always the easiest to persuade to the knife. “You must stand just so, sir. On the oilcloth. Now, if you can spread your legs, and bend over and rest your elbows on this table…Yes, that’s excellent.”
The man’s moans were low and continuous, but Andrew’s patient did exactly as he was told. So had fierce old Peter Stuyvesant, according to Lucas’s journal. If the Dutch governor had been grieving with some other disease—since he couldn’t have known that Lucas Turner, Andrew’s four times great-uncle, was a surgeon of genius—he might not so readily have trusted himself to a stranger just arrived in the colony. Andrew pushed a sturdy leather bucket into position between his patient’s legs and reached for a scalpel. “Now, sir, take a deep breath and hold it as long as you can. If your lungs are in good shape, this will all be over by the time you must take another.”
In his journals Lucas claimed to be able to cut out a stone and sew the patient back up in forty-five seconds. Andrew had bested that time on one or two occasions, at least so he thought, but not in recent years. He was slowing down, whatever Joyful said. This, however, was not the time to give in to age.
He grasped the scalpel, put one hand behind the man’s hanging genitalia, spread the skin taut, and made a swift single cut from the rectum to the testes. The motion was quick enough that he’d withdrawn the knife before the patient’s howl of pain and his involuntary start could cause the blade to wander. He preferred speed to the method Lucas described, putting one arm around the patient’s waist to hold him in position, and cutting with the other. “You’re not holding your breath, sir. Try it again. That’s the worst of it over.”
Not exactly true, but a fib that comforted. Made the balance of the operation easier on both of them. Andrew used a pair of pincers to spread the wound. That drew only a muffled gasp. He could see the bladder wall now. Another cut—his patient let out a high-pitched squeal, like a cat on a hot stove—this one as fast and much shorter, and made with a smaller scalpel, hewn as they all were to razor sharpness. Good knives, as much a part of successful surgery as good cutting. He adjusted the pincers. Another yelp. There were stories of stonecutters who had inadvertently taken men’s cocks off when writhing patients twisted out of their grip. Or still worse, half off. He’d always preferred quickness and impeccable technique to strength, though either would get the job done.
&nbs
p; The ammonia reek of the man’s urine mingled with the slightly sweet smell of blood as they mixed in the bucket. A satisfactory ping followed. And Ho Charley! A second ping after the first. Two stones, both lodged in the bladder. Andrew’s belief, formulated by the hundreds of anatomies he’d performed on cadavers that came his way when he had charge of the almshouse hospital, was that the stones appeared first in the kidneys. He’d found them there during many of those explorations when he cut to know rather than to cure. He was convinced it wasn’t until the stones worked their way down to the lower regions of the waterworks that excruciating pain drove the victims to stone cutters. And this poor bastard had been suffering twice over. “Two stones, sir. You were preparing to construct a cathedral in your innards.” Damned fortunate he was as well. No need to probe. Lucas’s journal said how grateful he’d been not to have to probe to get at Governor Stuyvesant’s stone. “Only a few pricks now, sir. I’m tidying things up and stitching the wound. If you—”
A quick knock, then the door flew open. “Excuse me, Dr. Turner, sir. There’s a—”
“Not now, Bridey.” He’d never been able to break her of the habit of coming in before she was invited. This poor devil wasn’t the first to give Bridey a display of his bare hindquarters. “Go away. I’ll come when I’m done.”
The door closed. Andrew continued tying off the blood vessels. A hundred and fifty years since his ancestor did this operation, and nothing much had changed. Not likely to either. Not unless someone could solve the problem of how much pain folks could endure under the knife. Wasn’t likely to happen in his lifetime. Maybe his son’s, or Joyful’s. He’d always thought Joyful would be the one to lead the way down the paths such a transformation would make available. Opening a chest or a belly, watching the heart pump or the intestines contract, repairing—God knew what, but something—then sewing the patient back up and having him live. Bloody marvelous that would be. Make surgeons into gods.
“Only a few seconds more, sir.” He picked up another of the catgut ligatures he’d prepared in advance and began stitching the wound. Always planned to give old Lucas’s journals to Joyful. But if Joyful truly wasn’t to practice medicine as a livelihood, they should go to Christopher. Didn’t matter how unappealing he found his flesh-and-blood heir when compared to Roisin’s boy. Fair was fair. “There you are, sir. Done.” Andrew glanced at his pocket watch. “Close to two minutes.” Terrible time. He’d blame Bridey’s interruption rather than his increasing age.
Ten minutes later the man was dressed and Andrew had led him out to his waiting carriage. “Eat a portion of this bran twice a day.” He pressed a muslin bag into the man’s hands. “And drink as much as you can get down. Even water. Never mind how bad it tastes. You must not strain at the stool. And come back and see me in a week’s time.”
He stood a moment, watching the carriage drive away. Not as many soldiers on the streets as there had been a day or two ago. Perhaps New York was not to be invaded after all.
“Dr. Turner…Sir…”
Andrew turned to the sound of his name. “Absalom. So it was you Bridey tried to announce a bit ago.” His heart sank at the thought of another trip to Five Points. As usual, he knew he would go in spite of that.
“Guess it be me, sir.”
“Sorry to keep you waiting. I’d already begun that man’s surgery, and there was no way I could stop it. I take it Mother Zion calls?”
Absalom shook his head. “No sir, Dr. Turner. Not like usual. I be…” He paused and looked around.
“Come inside.” Andrew hurried his caller into the front hall and closed the door behind him. “Now, what’s this about?”
“I be lookin’ for Joshua, Dr. Turner. You remember him. Boy as helped us when you were by Mother Zion last time. Boy you sent to get your cousin, the doctor with one hand.”
“Yes, I remember. Joshua. What about him?”
“He be missing two days now. Don’t be no one knows where he’s at. Reverend Fish, he be right disturbed. Joshua be a great favorite o’ Reverend Fish.”
“I’m sorry to hear that the boy has run off, Absalom. But why tell me?”
“He was mighty taken by all your fixing and patching, Dr. Turner. Talked a fair bit about it after you left. Reverend Fish, he be thinkin’ maybe Joshua come here to you. Ask to be a ’prentice or some such.”
Andrew had to tell him that he had not seen the boy. He did not speak the word “blackbirders,” but he knew it was the explanation in his mind and Absalom’s, and no doubt in that of Zachary Fish.
Maryland, the Woods Surrounding
the Federal District, 10 A.M.
The soldiers of the Fifth Maryland Volunteer Infantry were drawn from the finest Baltimore society, and they were a sight to see. Blue jackets faced with red, white pantaloons, black gaiters, white cross-belts, and heavy leather helmets topped with two sweeping plumes, one red and the other black. They’d left Baltimore the day before—accompanied by the many nigras the individual members of the regiment had hired to look after and cook for them—marching down streets lined with cheering citizenry. A fine adventure.
It no longer felt so. They’d spent an exhausting night marching back and forth from one position to another. All, as it turned out, responses to false alarms, but no less tiring for that.
That same night another company, the Annapolis militia, pitched camp within half a mile of the British pickets at the Upper Marlboro encampment. When they discovered that, outnumbered as they were, they had all but delivered themselves into the enemy’s hands, they set about moving, and did so in such disorder that they rolled their tents too loosely to fit all of them on the wagons. Many were left behind, along with other supplies they were too much in a hurry to take. The men, mostly draftees, were told to march with a ball up their muskets. As a result one accidentally killed his closest friend, and another shot a companion in the thigh. The chaos provoked a number of desertions.
Nonetheless, one way and another six thousand American men were within thirty miles of Washington. Ready to fight and, if need be, to give their lives for their country. But as the column of just over four thousand redcoats made their final approach to the spot they’d chosen to cross the Eastern Branch of the Potomac into the Federal District—the village of Bladensburg—they faced no concentrated defending force.
“They’ll cross at Bladensburg, Mr. President. It’s the shallowest point. They can ford if they must.”
They were at the Navy Yard in Washington. Madison, God help him, was surrounded by those who felt qualified to give advice: two generals and half a dozen members of the cabinet. But only the president seemed to be paying attention to the surveyor. He was Astor’s scout, not strictly speaking theirs. That, to Madison’s mind, was a recommendation; Jacob Astor always employed the best. “Yes, very well. I’m sure you’re right.” He turned to the general on his right. “You heard?”
“The village of Bladensburg. Yes, well it’s possible. But there are two other bridges into the District before they get there. Surely they’ll take the most direct—”
It occurred to the president to inquire as to why all the bridges giving access to the Federal District had not long since been blown up, but he was weary of the man’s excuses. “General, this man and his companion”—Madison nodded in the direction of the marksman—“have been tracking the enemy for four days. Have you, sir, had any spies in such close contact for so long a period?”
“No sir, Mr. President, I cannot say that I have.”
“Very well. Bladensburg. Give the order.”
There were some thousand troops nearby. Minutes later they were on the march. President Madison himself led the charge, his horse loping out ahead of all the others, the diminutive president looking slightly silly astride the mighty beast but gallantly spurring him on.
New York City, Broadway at Barclay Street, 10:30 A.M.
“Chi le fan meiyou?” Joyful asked. Have you eaten rice today? He gave Ah Wong a wide smile.
“
Chi le. Chi le. Prease forrow me.” The butler turned abruptly from the door.
Joyful thought they had established a degree of alliance and mutual respect after the butler gave him rice for Thumbless Wu. Now it did not seem so. Maybe because this time he arrived at the front door, and he came at Astor’s summons, which Wong probably knew. He shouldn’t read too much into it. No Westerner, not even he, would ever fully comprehend the Chinese idea of face, or how you lost or saved it.
He followed Ah Wong across the vast entryway, but this time they didn’t go into Astor’s study. He was led down a long corridor into a small dining room. It faced the gardens and sun streamed through open French windows. The warm air carried the scent of the tall lilies growing close by the house, pale purple with yellow throats and the scent of heaven. The fragrance immediately transported Joyful to his mother’s garden in Canton. The lilies must have come from China as well; he’d never seen them growing in New York. “Good morning, Mr. Astor. I came as soon as I got your note.”
“Ja, I knew you would. Even if I did not send it with one of the China people. Not sensible to have them too much on the streets while the city jumps at her shadow. Anything a little bit strange and Pow!” Astor mimed holding a musket to his shoulder and firing it.
Jacob Astor playing the clown; this was something new. “I’m sure you’re right.”
“About such things, Dr. Turner, always I am right. Though I’m sure it was disappointing to you not to have another opportunity to talk China talk. You have their language, nicht wahr?”
So Astor knew about his visit to the servants’ quarters to speak with Ah Wong. Who told him? The butler himself? One of the other servants? It didn’t matter. Joyful had assumed it would be so. Hell, he’d meant it to be so. “I speak Mandarin, yes sir. And Cantonese. A few of the other dialects as well.”
“So you will be a formidable trader, Dr. Turner. A rival to be reckoned with.”
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