by John Smolens
He bent down and kissed her, gently, briefly, and as he began to straighten up, she withdrew her arm from beneath the sheet, put it about his neck, and pulled him down to her.
Long Wharf ran nearly a half mile out into the harbor. A year ago, it was the heart of Boston commerce; but after General Gage closed the port, the wharf had become desolate. Grass and weeds sprouted where carts and wagons had passed, laden with ships’ cargo. Many of the grog shops and chandleries were closed, and idle vessels quickly had fallen into disrepair. Benjamin walked out along the darkened wharf, which was nearly silent, save the lament of groaning dock lines.
Browne’s Sail Loft had belonged to his mother’s brother, Leander. It used to be one of Benjamin’s favorite places to go when he was small. While his father tried to get him to conjugate Greek and Latin verbs, he preferred lessons he could learn at Uncle Leander’s loft. The door was locked and the windows boarded up, but Benjamin stepped into the dark shadows and leaned against the shingle wall and waited. He could hear the current work around the pilings beneath him.
On the dock boards, James’s arrival was announced by the triple knock of his uneven gait—step, cane, step—and when he reached the front of the sail loft, Benjamin said quietly, “Here.”
James entered the shadows. His shoulders were crooked; he was carrying a satchel. “My wife sends you dinner. It’s not much, but these days that’s more than nothing.”
“You weren’t followed?”
“It took me about an hour to lose my friend, but no.”
They went to the back of the small building and sat on pulley blocks. There was salt cod, black bread, a cooked potato, still warm. “I always thought no one baked a better loaf,” Benjamin said with his mouth full.
“Soon even the ingredients for bread will be hard to come by,” James said. In the distance they could see the lights of North Battery. “I gather you eat better on the mainland.”
“Aye. There’s plenty to be had. Next time I return to Boston, perhaps I should bring a shank with me? I’d bring chickens, but their clucking would certainly alert the harbor patrols.”
“We are so hungry,” James said, “a chicken would likely alert the entire city.”
“I remember,” Benjamin said, biting into the potato, “that when Father would get too upset with me—which was often—I’d come down here. I had dreams of shipping out as a cabin boy, and Uncle Leander would humor me, keeping me preoccupied until you came and retrieved me.”
“You’ve always been good at hiding out,” James said. “But your love of salt water was a dead giveaway. Perhaps someday this harbor will be reopened and you’ll get to ship out.” After a moment, he added, “It’s too bad that Uncle Leander won’t be here to see it. He’d be proud.” He was leading up to something. Long ago, Benjamin had learned that you had to give James time—room, he really thought of it as room—to say what he was going to say. “Mother received a letter from Leander not long ago, and it sounds as though they are fairly well established now in New York. The harbor there is thriving, and his talents at sailmaking are in much demand.”
“Why is it that Boston’s misery always seems to benefit New York?”
“That is a question for the ages,” James said.
Benjamin finished the potato and the last of the salt cod.
“I have learned,” James said deliberately, “much of what transpired at Province House today. At first I thought that the way Abigail looked when she was being helped down the steps, I was sure it was because the decision had gone against her.”
“That is not the case?”
James shook his head. “She looked so weak because she collapsed during the proceedings. The heat, that had something to do with it, I’m sure, but there was something else.” He paused but continued to stare out at the lights reflected on the still water. “It has to do with Mariah.”
“Mariah?”
“I’m afraid so,” James said. “She confessed to killing that sergeant in revenge for her father’s death. She has been imprisoned.” He turned his head now, and though it was dark, Benjamin could see his right eye, which was steady and direct. “She’s in prison, Benjamin, and I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do.”
Benjamin wiped his hands on his trousers. “Nothing?”
“No. She will likely languish there for a good while, and then …”
“She will hang?”
They did not speak for a good while, but only stared out at the lights on the water. Finally, James picked up his satchel. “Have you a place to stay tonight?”
Benjamin, lost in thought, didn’t answer at first. “I’ll manage.” He then looked at James. “What do you want me to do? Am I to return to Cambridge with a message for Dr. Warren?”
“No, not now.” James got to his feet and hung the satchel from his shoulder. “I will need you here. Things are going to heat up. Soon, in a few days. I will know more tomorrow, I hope. Meet me after dark. But not here. Abigail will want to see you, so somewhere close to the house.” He hesitated a moment. “I will need both of you to help me in the next few days.”
“All right,” Benjamin said. “I’ll be in the granary graveyard after dark.”
James placed a hand on Benjamin’s shoulder, and then moved off toward the city, disappearing in the shadows.
XXII
Dark Maneuvers
ABIGAIL COULD FEEL IT. THEY ALL COULD. THE CONGREGATION at Sunday meeting seemed inattentive, distracted. Frequent glances toward the windows.
It wasn’t that the heavy air was filled with the sound of drums and officers’ commands, or that all day soldiers paraded through the streets—these were daily occurrences in Boston. But it was different now. The noise, the dust, the way a column of regulars marching down School Street would rattle the teacups in their saucers and make the pictures hanging in the hallway clatter against the wall.
After meeting, James stopped by the house briefly. He seemed more animated with Mother and Father than he’d been in some time. They were celebrating Abigail’s freedom. But she recognized that he was acting with purpose, and was not surprised that when they were alone in the dining room—Mother had gone to the kitchen, Father to his study to consult a dictionary after a minor dispute over a Latin term for justice—James leaned over the table and whispered, “Benjamin’s back. Tonight in the granary graveyard, after dark.” And before he took his leave, he made innocent arrangements with Abigail to come to his house that evening to help them rearrange the furniture in the parlor.
When Samuel came for afternoon tea, she could see that he felt it too. He ate little and barely touched his tea, claiming that the heat had put his appetite off. But there were moments when he gazed across the table at Abigail with a longing that made her cheeks flush. Could not her parents see it? Yesterday, in her room, when she had pulled him down to her, they had embraced as never before. It may have been the heat; it may have been the fact that she was lying in bed. Her nightgown was damp with perspiration, and there was a relief when his hand slid the fabric down off her shoulders. It only lasted a minute—the door, for discretion’s sake, had been left ajar—but when Samuel kissed her breasts, his mouth hot and moist as it sucked on her nipples, she arched her back, as though he might consume all of her. But then, as quickly as it happened, there was a creak of a floorboard at the bottom of the stairs, and Samuel was standing up next to the bed, saying Yes, Mrs. Lovell, I believe your patient could use some refreshment. And as quickly, while Mother’s slow steps climbed the stairs, Abigail pulled her nightgown about her shoulders and drew the sheet up to her chin.
But her parents weren’t aware of any of this. Or perhaps they were, but they didn’t let on. The veneer of formality was so thin, his gaze so indiscreet, and yet both Father and Mother seemed overjoyed by his presence. Abigail knew they had expectations. After the inquiry, they viewed Samuel as her savior, her protector. Perhaps they were willing to look the other way, hoping that all would soon be justified with a proposal
of marriage.
And then, at the front door, after they said goodbye, Mother and Father skillfully made a retreat to the kitchen. Samuel held Abigail’s hand. He had something to say, something awkward and difficult—she could always tell by the way his eyes would drift away. Finally, when she asked what it was, he said that he wouldn’t be able to see her for a while.
“It’s this,” he said, “it’s like time is tightening upon us, and that soon events will—”
“I know,” she urged. “Everything is on the brink of changing. And you—”
“I can’t say any more, but I’m sure you’ve surmised.”
“Your maneuvers.”
He merely cleared his throat, as though she had come close enough.
“How long?”
“Who knows.” He looked at her then. “I really don’t know.”
“You’ll be out of Boston.”
His silence was confirmation.
“We are at war, aren’t we?” she said.
“It is about to begin, Abigail. There will be great uncertainty. I have my orders.” He stepped out onto the stoop. “You will always be in my thoughts.” He looked at her as he had the previous afternoon, but now, here in the street, in public view, as it were, he gave her a polite bow, and then he was gone.
Benjamin waited in the graveyard, back by the granary wall. He could see across the field of headstones to the corner of Beacon and School streets. It was night and he felt invisible. The dark had always been safe, always harbored him. It was the dark that had saved him during the previous night, when, after meeting James at Long Wharf, he had made his way to Mariah’s house. He planned to spend the night in the shed in her dooryard tonight, sleeping again amid her father’s fishing gear. It tortured him, knowing that she wasn’t there in that house, knowing there was no way he could get to her. But her house, particularly the shed, was probably his only safe haven in Boston now.
Though exhausted, he had difficulty falling asleep, wondering where they were keeping her—there were numerous jails and garrisons throughout the city, and there was the Preston, the much-detested prison ship moored in the harbor. Once he did manage to close his eyes, he was soon startled awake by the sound of breaking glass. He got up and looked through the crack in the door. Lanterns had been lit inside the house, and after a moment he saw soldiers moving about, pulling out drawers, emptying crocks and jars on the floor. The kitchen door was thrown open and one of the men said, “I’ll have a look in that shed.”
“Anythin’ of value, Sergeant,” another joked, “we get to split amongst ourselves?”
“Something of value? In this fisherman’s ’ovel?” The sergeant snorted and then he crossed the dooryard. By his gait and the way the lantern swung erratically from his hand, it was clear he’d been drinking. Over his shoulder, he said, “You find that girl’s undergarments, be careful not to tear them!”
The others laughed as they continued to ransack the house. The sergeant approached the shed, and Benjamin moved back into a corner, standing next to a roll of netting that smelled of fish and brine. His shoulder pressed against something sharp, something protruding from the wall—a blade, with a finely honed edge. It was a shipwright’s adze, hanging from a nail, used to trim boards in the repair of a skiff. Benjamin had seen Anse Cole use it several times, always marveling at his skill at shaping a board that might replace a cracked plank in the lapstrake hull. Benjamin groped in the dark, finding the adze handle, and then with both hands raised it above his head, his only chance to deliver one swift blow.
The shed door was yanked open and the sergeant stepped inside.
“Found it!” one of the soldiers hollered from the house. “Sergeant, I ’ave found the shucking knife!”
Turning in the doorway, the sergeant called, “It be the right one?”
“Covered with blood, it is! It’s got to be the right fucking knife. It’s the fucking shucking knife, sir!”
All the soldiers in the house laughed.
The sergeant laughed too, but then he leaned a shoulder against the doorframe. For a moment it looked as though he was so besotted that he might simply fall back into the shed and pass out. The rum stench coming off him overwhelmed the smell of the sea in the shed.
One of the soldiers came to the open kitchen door. “Might we torch ’er, sir?”
“Whot?” the sergeant said.
“The ’ouse. Burn ’er to the ground.”
The sergeant straightened up, becoming more alert. “No, you idiot. In this heat the entire neighborhood is like to go up in flames. But what I can do is make a recommendation that this place be put on the list for demolition. Make for good kindling, this, and it’ll be like it was never ’ere.” He stepped out into the dooryard, leaving the shed door open, and made his way back toward the house.
Left in the dark, Benjamin lowered the adze to the dirt floor.
Now, it was well after dark in the granary burying ground, but still no sign of James or Abigail. Benjamin waited so long, he began to fear something had gone amiss. He began feeling watched. He moved among the headstones, until he saw a woman walking up the street. Despite the heat, she wore a full cape, with the hood up. At the entrance, she paused and then came into the graveyard. It was Abigail—her stride was as balanced and graceful as James’s was not—and she continued toward the brick wall of the granary.
Benjamin followed her, and when she suddenly stopped, he whispered, “It’s only me.” She came toward him and threw her arms around him, holding him tightly. Then she kissed him on both cheeks and then on the mouth. Her skin was hot, and she wouldn’t let go, until he finally said, “James, where’s James?”
She stepped back from him. “He isn’t here?”
“I’ve been waiting over an hour, since before nine bells.”
“He must be having difficulty getting away. Mother and Father, they kept delaying me. I said I was to go to James’s to help move furniture, and Mother wanted to accompany me, but eventually she realized how tired she was from all this heat.”
“James, they’re constantly watching him,” Benjamin said.
“I know. He won’t come unless he’s certain he’s not being followed.”
Benjamin took his sister by the arm and walked her toward the granary, where they stood amid some bushes. He could feel the heat come off the brick wall.
“Have you been well?” Abigail whispered, touching his face with her hand.
“Yes, yes.”
“How long will you be in Boston?”
“I don’t know. I thought James would send me back out with information for Dr. Warren, but last night he said he needed me to remain here. Something’s up—the redcoats are preparing for something.”
“Yes, and James is, too.” She looked toward the street. “We must wait as long as we can.” Then, turning to him, she said, “But where are you staying?”
“I shouldn’t say.”
She took hold of his forearm. “Have you eaten? I should have thought to bring—”
“Stop, please stop. I’m fine.”
“Well, tell me, where have you been? The last time I saw you was on the beach on Noddle’s Island. Mariah and I waved—oh, do you know about—”
“I was outside Province House when you left. James told me everything last night.”
“There must be something we can do for Mariah.”
Benjamin didn’t answer. He didn’t know how to, and for a moment they stared at each other in the dark. “Rachel,” he said suddenly. “I saw Rachel. They’re all in Watertown, where the Provincial Congress has been established. Rachel, the children, they’re all well cared for, staying at a fine house owned by a Mr. Van Ee.”
“You saw her?”
“Just a few nights ago. She wanted me to ask you about her money, the hundred and twenty-five pounds she sent out for Mr. Revere.”
“Yes?”
“He never got it.”
Abigail didn’t seem to comprehend what he had said, until she fi
nally said, “But I gave it to Dr. Church. I told her so before I left Boston. The clothing and the money—”
“She said so, Abigail. She’s not doubting you, but now she’s seen Mr. Revere and the money’s just disappeared. Mr. Revere never received it.”
They both leaned against the wall, lost in thought for several minutes. Once Abigail said, “How—” but she couldn’t continue.
Benjamin saw someone out in the street and, taking Abigail’s arm, he pulled her in behind a bush. It was a woman, bent over with a sack on one shoulder. She came into the graveyard and began to wander haltingly among the headstones, until she paused by a bench. Slowly, she eased her burden down to the bench, and then straightened up, revealing her overlarge belly.
Abigail suddenly whispered, “Mary.”
She stepped out from behind the bush and approached James’s wife.
“Abigail?” Mary said, slowly getting to her feet. “Benjamin?”
They rushed to her and helped her sit on the bench.
“Where’s James?” Abigail sat next to her. “Is he all right?”
Mary tried to catch her breath.
“Are you all right?” Benjamin asked.
“Benjamin,” she sighed, relieved. “It’s good to see you. We worry about you so. I’m fine, really—though you might say my condition is greater than when you last saw me.” She placed her hand over her mouth to suppress a nervous laugh. “I have not walked such a distance in a good while, and I cannot stay but a minute. General Gage’s men watch our house all the time. James went out earlier but he was unable to lose them, so he returned and then went out a second time, to lead them from the house so I could bring you this.” She stuffed her hand inside a pocket of her cloak and produced several envelopes. She gave one to Abigail. “He has learned that the British will march out the day after tomorrow and we must do what we can. I don’t know the contents of the letter, but he said you—” she looked at Abigail—“will understand that something might be possible because of your association with Colonel Cleaveland.”
After a moment, Abigail nodded once.