by Lake, Deryn
“And Hancock? Where does he fit in to this?”
“He is Adams’ other half, a necessary evil. He is as fine a buck as Adams is a rumpled ascetic. Hancock dresses within an inch of his life, has a gilt carriage, custom-made in England, liveried servants, caparisoned outriders, his nickname is the ‘King’. He is proud and handsome, tall and slender. Adams on the other hand is short and portly, crumpled, with shaking hands and head. Yet one needs the other.”
“I don’t understand, Sir.”
“It’s very simple really. Sam Adams wants power, the other is after glory. Thus, they complement one another.”
“And where did Hancock get all his money?”
“Inherited the lot. From the late Thomas, husband of Mrs. Lydia. No doubt they will cultivate you because of your position in society but be on your guard with John, my friend.”
Earl Percy was quiet for a moment, then said, “I think perhaps I can learn more by becoming their associate rather than their enemy.”
“If you think that is the best way forward, then so be it. But remember that everything you say will probably be repeated back to Adams, and he is implacable in his hatred for all things British.”
“I shall say only what I want them to hear, Governor.”
“Then I wish you luck.”
There was rather an awkward silence during which Gage became aware of other sounds. People were conversing quietly in the hall, a clock was ticking nearby, somewhere outside a dog was barking frantically. He looked at the young nobleman with a brotherly affection, thinking how little he knew and how much he had to learn. But he had given his warning, the rest was up to Percy himself.
The Earl finished his cognac and stood up, his thin frame almost melting into the shadows.
“Well, Sir, if you’ll forgive me I really could do with some sleep. It’s been a long and difficult day.”
Gage also rose. “Of course, it was good of you to come. Anway, as I told you this morning, I’m glad you’re here. I’m sure your presence will make a lot of difference.”
Percy saluted. “Thank you, Sir. I’ll do my best. And I’ll heed your warning, never you fear.”
“Hancock himself is a fool. It is the power behind him that concerns me.
“I understand and I will observe,” was Percy’s parting promise.
Gage escorted him to the front door, where Robin sent Andrew on the double to fetch round the nobleman’s mount. Then he was gone into the moonlight, leaving the Governor alone in his mansion.
Wearily, Tom made his way back to the withdrawing room and settled in his chair by the fire. He closed his eyes and almost immediately fell asleep, so deeply that he did not hear the gentle knocking on the door, nor did he see it open and Sara come in.
The slave stood for a moment, looking down on the sleeping Governor, thinking how young and vulnerable he looked, how innocent somehow. Then, having gazed on him for several minutes, the girl smiled to herself and left the room as quietly as she had entered it.
Chapter Ten
August, 1774
“V, W, X,” said Thomas Gage patiently.
“V, W, X,” repeated his pupil, laboriously putting them into her copy book. “X – why that’s how I used to sign my name.”
“Well, in future you must put S, A, R, A. Can you write that?”
“I can try, Governor.”
She bent her head over her book, her tongue sticking out of the corner of her mouth, and slowly wrote the letters, each one individually, not joined up at all. Tom, meanwhile, watched her, an extraordinary expression on his face. For mixed in with his kindness to Sara was something else, an intangible element of which he was not consciously aware and would have denied vehemently if anyone had challenged him with it.
He had been teaching her for four weeks now and was pleased with the progress the girl was making. She could already write all but the last two letters of the alphabet and was longing to read, though he had explained that this skill would be more slow in coming. However, he had managed to secure a child’s primer from a local bookshop and together, phonetically, they were going through it.
Every day, at about ten o’clock in the evening, she would come to his study and there they would spend an hour working before they both went their separate ways to bed. To Tom it was like a light relief from all his troubles – which grew daily. To Sara it was the opening of a whole new world, a world in which educated people held sway and to which she, through the goodness of one man, was at last getting a glimpse.
Of course, the other servants had found out. After the first rumours that the Governor was seeing Sara, that he was sweet on her, Tom had sent for Robin.
“I think you should know, Robin, that I am giving Sara reading and writing lessons. And you can take that look off your face. There is nothing of that nature involved and I would be grateful if you could tell the other servants as much.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Tom had got up and paced from his desk to the window which looked out over the beautiful gardens of Province House.
“Why is it,” he had said, half to himself, “that people always jump to the wrong conclusions in life?”
“Who knows, Governor,” Robin answered. “I guess it be just the nature of folks.”
Tom had turned round to look at him. “Well, I won’t have any of that amongst my staff. Kindly put a stop to it at once.”
But he had been hoping for too much. The rumours, though dying down now, continued to be whispered about the place.
Now he watched her as she wrote ‘Sara’, again and again.
“That’s very good,” he said. “Very good indeed. Tell me, do you have another name?”
“No, Governor. Some slaves only have one name. Didn’t you know that?”
“I don’t believe I’d consciously thought about it.”
“Well, it’s true. Though I guess in England things might be different.”
“Probably. I can think of one chap, Jack Beef, who was servant to John Baker, a magistrate acquaintance of mine. He was considered very highly, in fact Baker said he couldn’t have run his household without him.”
Sara stood up. “Well, I think he was lucky. Anyway, Governor, it’s eleven o’clock and I got to go.”
“Stay another few minutes. I’m going to have a nightcap but can I offer you some tea?”
The slave shook her head. “No, Sir, it wouldn’t be fitting.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Tom answered irritably, “stop thinking about what is fitting and what is not. I am inviting you to have a cup of tea. Now, would you like one or wouldn’t you?”
Sara looked at him, then smiled. “Best not to cross you in this mood, Sir. Yes, I would like tea.”
“Then go to the kitchen and make it. But bring it back here, mind. No slipping up to bed.”
“I’ll do as you say, Governor.”
Something about the way she made that remark stung Tom and he sat at his desk after she had gone and wondered whether he was turning into a bully. It was probably the atmosphere of Boston, he said to himself. For a more contrary bunch of people he had yet to meet.
He was doing everything possible to bring them to order; had closed the port and sent to London for permission to enact other important regulations regarding the government of the province. But still the Bostonians resisted. He knew well that the Faction had secret meetings, knew who the ringleaders were. Yet he didn’t want to be seen openly taking measures against them. If only I could win their confidence, he thought. Yet even as he had the idea he knew it would never come to fruition. He was being forced into the role of a dictator and he detested every second of it. But duty came above everything and he had given his word to both King and country that he would make Massachusetts – and Boston in particular – come into line.
The door opened and Sara stood there with a tray. Instinctively the Governor rose to his feet and went to help her carry it through, setting it down on a side table. Then, while she poured he gave h
imself a large brandy, then settled down in a chair on one side of the fire. Sara, however, went to sit in a back seat, not the one opposite.
He glanced over. “Sara, come and sit with me, please. And before you say it’s not fitting, I am inviting you and it would be rude to refuse.”
She moved into the other chair with a certain reluctance and sat quietly, sipping her tea. And then, as if something in him gave way, he suddenly satisfied his desperate need to talk, to lay bare everything he was thinking. Tom Gage found himself telling Sara how much he wanted to succeed and how the odds were stacked against him, so that the only choice open was to fight fire with fire, to be as hard as the rebels themselves. In fact he was telling her things that he would normally only have discussed with Margaret, who continued to absent herself in New York, much to his chagrin.
He must have gone on for about half an hour but when he finally fell silent Sara looked at him and smiled. “It must be terribly difficult for you, Master Governor.”
Tom smiled back. “Yes, I’m sorry to bore you with all that, Sara. Accept my apologies. It was just that I needed to tell someone other than my fellow officers.”
“I understand, Governor. There is no need for an apology. It is very interesting.”
“You think so? So what would you do in my position?”
“Sir, how can I answer that? You must remember that even though my mother was English I was born here. I am an American. And now, Sir, if you will excuse me. I have to get up early.”
He got to his feet. “Of course. Goodnight, Sara. You have worked hard tonight.”
She lingered a moment in the door, her beautiful face earnest beneath its white cap. “Goodnight – and thank you, Sir.”
Overcoming a sudden, quite mad, desire to kiss her, Thomas turned away to the fire and stared into the dying flames.
*
In the darkness of Boston that same night, a meeting was being held in the long room above the printing office of Benjamin Edes and John Gill, publishers of the Boston Gazette, nicknamed the Dung Barge and the most influential competitor to Rupert Germain’s Boston Mirror. The print shop lay behind the Court House in Dassett Alley, a narrow, noisome bit of a street, to which several men had gone once darkness had fallen. Now they sat, wreathed in blue pipe smoke, drinking rum and listening to Samuel Adams holding forth.
John Hancock, handsome and fine, a dandy, a buck – ‘a milchcow to the Faction but whether public spirit or vanity has been his governing spirit is uncertain’, as a contemporary said of him – was leaning back in his chair, one thin white hand holding a glass, his eyelids lowered as he gazed at the floor. Next to him sat Paul Revere, a complete contrast. Dark, stocky, short, very French-looking, he had dark brows and eyes, a strong nose and a full, passionate mouth. He was already onto his second wife and his second family, his first wife having given him eight children and having died of her labours.
Sitting across the way from them was thirty-three-year-old Joseph Warren, a medical graduate from Harvard. Already a widower, he was as fair as Revere was dark, with light, bright blue eyes and mobile features. He looked amazingly alive and alert, and was currently balanced precariously on his chair as he leaned forward, taking in every word Adams had to say.
It was sad about his wife, was the consensus, but he really should remarry. In fact many of the more practical couldn’t think what he was playing at, still mourning the frail creature who had died two years ago. But Warren was a doctor and entitled to do as he wished. Nowadays he lived with a housekeeper and three young children, Elizabeth, Joseph Junior and Mary, in a handsome house near Fanueil Hall. There was absolutely no woman in his life.
There were others sitting amongst the pipe smoke, most of them Harvard graduates. Josiah Quincy, with a beautiful voice and a wall eye; the Reverend Samuel Cooper, pastor of the Brattle Street Church, handsome and intelligent; his brother William, who had been town clerk for many years; Thomas Melville, young and vigorous, with a roman nose and cheeks like a rose in snow. There was also another doctor, Benjamin Church, always short of funds, highly-strung, bombastic and keeping a mistress. These men, all so different, were united by a common bond. They were all members of that most secret society, the Long Room Club.
In the darkness below, silent for the moment, was their servant the printing press, ready to do their bidding and publish articles by their members, all under the cover of pseudonyms. Above, however, Sam Adams stopped talking, more to draw breath than anything else, and there was an inadvertent sigh of relief.
“Well, gentlemen,” said Dr. Church, rising to his feet, his face reflecting a kind of roguish charm which was instantly attractive. “I’m afraid I must away. I have an early appointment.”
Dr. Warren also stood up. “I too. My first patient is due at seven-thirty.”
Sam Adams, having had a few minutes in which to breathe, returned to the attack. “Must you go?” he said in his shaky voice, affected occasionally by palsy.
“I must for sure,” Warren answered.
“But there is much left to discuss,” Adams insisted.
“Then you will have to discuss it without me,” the doctor replied, reaching for his hat.
Church took his lead. “I must away, my dear fellow. Honestly.” Adams gave in with a bad grace. “Oh, very well. I shall leave our further plans till the next meeting.”
“Yes, do so, old boy. When will that be?”
“In a week’s time. You will be there?”
“Assuredly,” said Church, and putting his hat on his head, bowed his way out.
Revere winked an eye as the older man puffed down the stairs. “He’s off to see his mistress,” he whispered.
Warren, more serious, pulled a bit of a face. “He’s a funny one all right.”
“I think he’s rather sensible.” Revere’s unsaid thoughts hung in the air.
Warren gave him a look which forbade any further intimacy. “We are all entitled to our opinions.”
Revere grinned. “Come on, my friend, I meant no harm. I’ll walk back with you.”
The two men went silently down the staircase and through the darkened printshop, passing the silent press which lay like a sleeping dog awaiting instructions from its master. Quietly stepping out into the little alley they slipped like shadows past the unlighted Court House. Then they turned left, making their way up Corn Hill and into the darkness of Dock Square. Here they shook hands and parted company, Warren making his way to the houses close to Fanueil Hall, whereas Revere went over the drawbridge and out of Boston proper into the North End.
Inserting his key in the lock, Joseph Warren stepped inside the hall, taking off his hat and cloak and dropping his stick onto a settle. Then he went through into his study, his private place, leading from the room where he dealt with patients, empty now but for the examination couch. Shutting the door between the rooms, Joseph poured himself a small cognac, then took a book from the shelves and settled down to read. But the words floated before his eyes and he found it almost impossible to concentrate. Eventually he put the book down and stared into the dying flames of the fire, wondering what tremendous things the future held.
It was essential that he and his fellow revolutionaries should resist every attempt by the British to get them to cooperate. However hard they were ground down, however hard Gage intended to be with them, they must fight back. Yet Joseph abhorred the methods used by Sam Adams; the mob violence, the tarring and feathering, the unbridled disrespect for other people’s property. Yet, despite this, he was a member of the Sons of Liberty, a trained gang who had established a rule in Boston stronger than that of any law court.
With a sigh, Warren put down the book and closed his eyes briefly. Minutes later he was fast asleep in his chair, dreaming of a woman, a woman he could not see but who he knew he adored. This woman meant more to him than his fragile wife ever had, more than any woman before or since. Slipping into a deeper level of unconsciousness, Warren gave himself up entirely to the dream.
*
He must have dropped off before the fire because he knew he was dreaming. In the dream the door of the study opened and Sara stood there, totally naked. Gage simply sat, gazing wide-eyed at her incredible body, at the rise and fall of her breasts, at the suppleness of her waist, the narrowness of her hips, the spread of dark hair between her thighs. He did not speak and neither did she but slowly, slowly she turned so that he might admire her from every angle. Which he did, silently worshipping her loveliness. Then she closed the door again and left, as quietly as she had come.
Tom moved into another phase of sleep but when he woke and looked at his watch he saw that only a quarter of an hour had elapsed since he had last consulted it. The fire was on its last gasp and he raked it out, then made his way sleepily up to his bedroom. There was nobody about and the very quietness of the house struck him to the heart. Then he was seized by the notion to go on to his balcony. In his shirtsleeves and breeches he made his way outwards and looked across at the Old South Church.
In front of Province House the night sentries were patrolling up and down and Tom could hear their muttered conversation as they passed one another. Other than for them Boston seemed deceptively quiet, the good citizens all abed. For no reason at all Calico Joel came into Tom’s head and he wondered where the scout had gone and what he was doing. Then his thoughts turned to Margaret and he wished with fervour that she would leave New York and come to him.
And then an idea stopped him in his tracks. Would she approve of Sara, he wondered, and, even more, would Margaret let him continue to teach the slave girl? Somehow he knew the answer even before the event and Tom sighed deeply, then turned back to his bedroom where, having stripped, he flung himself into bed and immediately went to sleep.
*
It certainly was a beautiful view. To the west the Governor could see fifty miles to where rose the blue mass of Mount Wachusett; to the east the fields stretched and rolled, taking their leisure as they descended to the Neponset River, which meandered lazily into Boston Harbour. Behind the house stood gardens, very fine and formal, and then by contrast behind them, in turn, a wild orchard. Apple trees hung low with crops; plums and pears were ripe; and birds of every description flew down to attack the provender. Tom let his eyes feast on bluebird and blue jays, on the common brown thrashers who also came to eat the fruit. It truly was an earthly paradise and Tom turned to its owner with enthusiasm.