Prelude to Glory, Vol. 1

by Ron Carter

  “Henry Thorpe. Why? Why?” He raised tortured eyes to John and shook his head in baffled bewilderment. “Do you know why?”

  John shook his head and remained silent.

  “Matthew and Kathleen know?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Does Phoebe know?”

  “Probably not. She helped take the muskets into the church.”

  “John, I’m so sorry. So sorry. Your families are close.” Warren heaved a sigh and straightened. “We have no choice. We have to do something about it now, tonight.” Again he looked at John. “Do you want to stay out of it? want me to handle it?”

  “No. You have too much on you as it is. Tom and I can handle it.”

  “The sheriff?”

  “Yes. We’ll have to get a Massachusetts warrant for his arrest and let the law handle it. It will be better for him if he’s in custody when some of our people find out about it.”

  “Do you want your name on the papers that are used to arrest him?”

  “Better me than someone else.”

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  “I’ll go for the warrant now. Get the rest of the committee together and do what you think best. You have my support, whatever you decide.”

  “After they arrest him, come back here. The committee will probably be finished and gone, but you’ll need to know what went on.”

  John took a deep breath. “By that time both sides will be committed and moving. There’s nothing I could do to help here. I’m going to Concord.”

  Warren’s eyes opened wide in surprise. “To face the British?”

  “Yes. There’s no way to know what might happen.”

  “There’s risk.”

  John shrugged. “Tom and I better go see the magistrate and get the warrant.”

  They worked their way north, past the church, to the small office with the sign “HON. ROBERT MCMANN, MAGISTRATE, SOVEREIGN COLONY OF MASS.” above the door. Ten minutes later they sat at a table with a single lamp to their left and McMann digging sleep from his eyes, hair awry, robe wrapped tightly about his corpulent being.

  Twenty-five minutes later McMann signed his name with a flourish and raised his eyes to John. “There’s the warrant. It’s a Massachusetts warrant, and the British can overrule it if they find out.” He paused to shake his head. “Henry Thorpe and Enid Ferguson! I can hardly believe it. Before the Almighty, I would never have suspected. I don’t know of this third person, this Amos Ingersol.” He stood. “I’ll tell no one of this, but when word of the arrests gets out it will spread like wildfire. Thorpe and Enid Ferguson may be in danger.”

  John nodded. “I know. The sheriff will probably have to hide them.”

  At five minutes past one o’clock a.m. the sheriff opened his front door and held a lamp high. “Who’s there?” At one-thirty, fully dressed, he drew a deep breath and faced John and Tom. “I’ll get two deputies to make the arrests. You men stay out of it.”

  John nodded. “Will they be arrested tonight?”

  “Within the hour.”

  “Will they be protected?”

  “If there is need.”

  A hint of wind had arisen, chill and fresh from the Atlantic as they walked back into the night and moved south.

  Far to the north, Bentley and Richardson shipped their padded oars, the boat glided into the Charlestown ferry landing, and the bow thumped against the planking. The men sat silent, shoulders hunched, listening, watching, and suddenly there was slight movement and a shape appeared.

  “Revere?”

  “Conant! You got the signal?”

  “Yes. Are they moving across the Back Bay?”

  “Eight hundred and more. The horse?”

  “In Larkin’s barn. Let’s go.”

  Revere turned to Bentley and Richardson and the men shook hands. Revere stepped onto the ferry landing and in a moment disappeared into the shadows with Conant, Richard Devens, and John Larkin.

  Joshua Bentley listened for a full minute and heard no challenge, no musket crack, and with Richardson’s help he pushed off. They settled onto the wooden seat and dropped both oars into their oarlocks, pulled hard with the right oar until the boat had turned, and then began the steady, even, rhythmic stroking back towards the squadron of British fighting ships.

  Back on the Charlestown shore, the four men walked rapidly through the dark streets towards the home of John Larkin, deacon of the Charlestown First Congregational Church, in whose barn they had prepared a strong, big-boned, deep-chested mare named Brown Beauty for the ride Revere was about to make.

  “Be careful of British patrols,” Devens warned. “I met one earlier this evening—nine officers, well mounted, headed towards Concord. Keep a sharp eye.”

  Inside the barn Devens tightened the saddle cinch, then untied the reins and handed them to Revere.

  “Huuu,” Revere crooned to the mare as he accepted the reins and carefully studied her build. She moved her ears uneasily and tossed her head, unsettled at being saddled in the night and approached by strangers. Revere waited until she settled and then spoke to her again while he carefully, slowly reached to touch her jaw, then worked his hand up to her ears, where he scratched for a moment.

  He turned admiring eyes to Larkin. “She’s a fine mount.”

  Pride showed in Larkin’s eyes. “She can outrun anything the British have in Massachusetts.”

  Revere turned back to Conant. “I’m on my way. I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

  Conant nodded. “We sent riders to the outlying towns when we saw the lanterns in the church tower. Devens is right. Watch for British patrols. Three of them came across late today on the ferry. They’re out on the roads somewhere right now.”

  “I know. William, thank you. Thanks for everything.”

  Conant shook his head. “It is you we must thank. You’re the one that bears the burden tonight. God bless you, Paul.”

  Revere swung onto the mare and took a good seat and found the stirrups. He reined the horse around and angled just west of due north, avoiding the lights of Charlestown as he headed for the Medford Road where it nearly touched the Mystic River. He knew every building, every tree, and he watched and listened as he held the mare to a steady lope, feeling the rhythm of her breathing and the steady reach and pull of her stride. He held a firm rein; the nervous mount wanted to stretch her legs and run.

  Far to the south, where the Boston Peninsula narrowed to a thin neck, Dawes pulled the gelding to a trot, then a walk, and waited until it had caught its wind. The briny smell of the salt-water beach came strong on the easterly breeze as he continued. He dropped his head forward and rode loose and easy, as one exhausted, nearly asleep, and the gelding plodded on.

  Dawes watched the guard, which straddled the road at the narrowest point on the Neck, where the British had movable barricades that they used to block the road when they wanted to stop all ground traffic into and out of Boston. The barricades had been used to isolate Boston from the world after the Boston Tea Party, and again lately when Boston City rebelled against the Port Act, which stopped commerce into and out of Boston cold, dead in its tracks. With the barricades in place, and one hundred soldiers behind them with muskets, this place became a nearly impregnable fortress.

  Are the barricades up? If they are, do I pass for a miller or do I get shot for a traitor?

  One hundred yards from the lines he raised his head and leaned forward in the saddle, searching, and he saw the faint glow of a lantern and then four figures moving, and then he saw the barricades set across the road. He pulled his horse to a stop, and for long moments he sat looking at the four British guards, weighing his chances in his mind.

  He had to go on.

  He tapped spur gently to the horse and held it to a plodding walk in the darkness while he sat slumped in the saddle, head lolling forward as though he were nearly asleep.

  One hundred yards later the heavy challenge came ringing in the darkness. “Halt and declare yourself.”
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br />   Dawes jerked erect and hauled the horse to a halt. He stood in the stirrups and leaned forward as though concentrating to see in the darkness. Two of the four British soldiers moved towards him, muskets at the ready, bayonets mounted.

  “What?” Dawes blurted. “Who’s there?”

  “Dismount or be shot.”

  Dawes’s head jerked back and he called, “Don’t shoot, I’m getting down.” He dismounted awkwardly, as though inept at handling a horse. “Who are you?”

  “State your name and reason for being on this road.”

  “Martin Hoffman. I’m a miller headed for home.”

  “Advance.”

  “Are you soldiers?”

  “British grenadiers. Advance.”

  “Oh! Soldiers.” He led the horse forward and stopped six feet from the men and thrust his head forward as though studying them. “Did I do something wrong?”

  “Where is your home?”

  “Mystic. Well, just west of Mystic.”

  “What’s in the sack on your saddle?”

  “Oats. I got part of my pay in oats back at the mill.”

  “What mill?”

  “Boston. Hawkens’s mill, by the docks.”

  The soldier looked at the rough-cut shirt and the battered leather cap and the baggy trousers, then walked close to study the horse. “That’s no miller’s horse. Where did you steal it?”

  Dawes straightened. “Sir, I did not steal it. It belongs to Hawkens. I’ve got to return in two days to finish my job there, and he loaned it to me to ride. Part of our bargain.”

  The soldier looked at his companion, who shrugged and shook his head.

  “Pass,” the soldier said, “but don’t be caught out again at night. You’ll be shot.”

  “Oh, yes, sir. I’ll travel in the daylight from now on. It was my wife I was worried about. She’s been alone now for—”

  The soldier interrupted. “Just move on.”

  Dawes scrambled back onto the gelding and gathered up the reins and waited while two soldiers opened the barricade enough for him to pass through. Then he urged the horse to its plodding walk and held it for two hundred yards. He stopped and turned to look, and exhaled through rounded lips, and then raised the horse to a high lope southward towards Roxbury. He reined in at the home of the captain of the minutemen and banged on the door.

  “The British are moving north!”

  He left the Roxbury minuteman captain scrambling to get dressed and turned northwest at a run to Brookline, where he pounded on the door of the militia leader.

  “The British are crossing the Back Bay!”

  Twenty minutes later the gelding’s hooves rang hollow on the bridge over the Charles River, and Dawes slowed to a walk to let the horse blow and catch its wind before he raised it again to a run, past Harvard College to Cambridge, where he once again sought out the home of the minuteman leader and roused him.

  At that moment, on the west side of the Back Bay, at the Lechmere Point landing, Lieutenant Frederick Mackenzie swore bitterly under his breath. His Twenty-third Regiment, for which he was responsible, had arrived ninety minutes earlier with the first group to cross the Back Bay. Under his command, his men had quickly gathered at his orders and were in rank and file, ready, waiting. But they were the only ones. In the darkness four hundred fifty other grenadiers and marines in full battle dress with haversacks on their backs, now under the command of officers they had never seen in daylight nor heard at any time, were a confused, cursing, lost mass of officers bawling orders to regulars who could not hear nor understand, nor could they find any familiar faces in the darkness to gather to.

  The boats had gone back for the second group, and had just returned and beached, and just over two hundred more confused, cursing, irate regulars had jumped into the surf and mud to come ashore, piling on top of those already there. Any colonial passing within three-quarters of a mile could hear the angry tumult; any sense of secrecy had long since been lost and forgotten.

  Mackenzie, a soldier’s soldier, shook his head in angry disgust. “We were supposed to be a column moving west by now. Cambridge by two o’clock. Lexington by daybreak. Concord by nine. This mess won’t be a column for two more hours! Where are the officers? Where’s Smith?”

  Neither Mackenzie nor any British soldier could know that south of them, William Dawes had already crossed the Charles River on his run to Cambridge; he was ahead of them. North of them, Paul Revere was past Charlestown, cautiously approaching the Mystic River where the road forked, north to Mystic or west to Cambridge. He also had passed them in the night. No British patrol had yet sighted either rider as their running horses steadily ate up the dark road.

  In Boston City, Tom reached to grasp John’s arm at the front gate of the Dunson home. “You’re going to Concord?”

  John drew a heavy breath. “I think I have to.”

  Tom reflected for long moments. “You’ve risked enough. You are one of the only committeemen who been in battle. They’ll need you here to share what you know about fighting.”

  “What I know will save lives out where the shooting is. I have to go.”

  “I’ll come later and find you. There’s one thing I have to do first.”

  “What?”

  “Ingersol. He’s sly. If he hears about the arrest of Thorpe and Ferguson, he’ll run.”

  “Come in and get a warm meal.”

  Tom patted his coat pocket. “I got cheese and hardtack.” He paused and looked into John’s face. “John, you be careful. Promise me.”

  The frank expression of deep concern startled John, and he looked into the grizzled, lined face of the old Indian fighter and in an instant a hundred scenes flashed through his mind. The snowshoes—Tom pausing countless times to point at marks in the snow, teaching him to track—sitting huddled around small campfires, talking low—learning to read the stars at night—Tom patiently teaching him to lead a moving target with the musket—teaching him the knife, the tomahawk—mending worn moccasins, making new ones—snaring rabbits in the snow to stay alive—hiding in snow holes while thirty Hurons within fifty feet hunted them—the quick, devastating attacks on Huron war parties—the seven times Tom’s musket and tomahawk had saved John—the three times John’s musket had saved Tom.

  John looked into the craggy face and he grasped Tom and pulled him in, and for a moment the two men stood in an embrace they had never before shared.

  “I will, Tom. You be careful.”

  Tom turned and in a moment had disappeared in the shadows, while John once again marvelled at his ability to move silently and disappear as by magic. John rapped on the front door and it opened and Margaret stood in the lamplight. She exhaled held breath and her shoulders dropped as relief flooded.

  John hung his hat and coat and walked to the large table. Margaret went to the stove and poured steaming tea and set the cup before him and waited. He worked the hot cup between his palms for a moment while Margaret sat down opposite him and studied his face in the lamplight. She saw the flat look in his eyes and the rigid set of his jaw.

  “What’s wrong? Is it the British?”

  John continued working with the cup for several seconds while he organized his thoughts. Then he set it down and raised his eyes to hers, hating, loathing what he had to tell her. “Not the British,” he said quietly. “The man who has been telling Gage our plans is Henry Thorpe.”

  Margaret recoiled as though struck, and her face was a mask of utter disbelief. “You’re wrong!” she exclaimed. “Henry would never do such a thing.”

  “The sheriff is on the way to his home right now to arrest him on a Massachusetts warrant, along with Enid Ferguson and a man named Ingersol.”

  “Enid from the bakery? Have you lost your senses?” She stared at John, and his expression did not change. Slowly she comprehended what he had said, and her eyes dropped and she stared unseeing at the tabletop. Then her head jerked up. “What of Kathleen? Phoebe?”

  John’s shoulders sagged
. “I’m sure neither Kathleen nor Phoebe knows.” He was suddenly weary, tired, sad in the eyes. “I don’t know what to do. I’ve got to tell Matthew tonight, now.”

  Margaret felt the unbearable stab of pain it would bring to her firstborn, and for long moments she lost all reason, all control. “You can’t tell him! We’ve got to prepare him first. He’ll find out when the time comes.”

  John saw the wild, unbridled need in her eyes and the abandonment of reason, and for a moment he stared at the teacup. “You know we have to tell him.” He raised his eyes again to hers and watched her silently concede what she had known since John told her the truth. She bowed her head, and for several seconds her shoulders shook with quiet sobs.

  “There’s one more thing,” John said, and she heard the urgency in his voice and she wiped her eyes and waited.

  “I’m going on to Concord tonight.”

  Moments passed before she spoke. “Why? You’re on the committee.”

  “They’ll need men who have been in battle. They’ll lose too many otherwise.”

  “Battle? You mean twenty-five years ago, when you were with the snowshoe men?”

  He nodded in silence.

  “That was too long ago. You never fought an army, only Indians. They need you here!”

  John shook his head. “I have to go. And Matthew will have to make up his mind whether he’s coming or not.”

  “Matthew? Both of you?” She was incredulous.

  “He’ll need to make his own choice.”

  “He’s staying here!”

  “He has to decide.” John rose and started towards the archway into the bedroom wing, and Margaret lunged to her feet and stood in front of him, barring his way.

  “You can’t take him! If trouble starts here in Boston, I’ll need him.” Her eyes were wild as she jammed her open hand against John’s chest to stop him.

  John gently took her hand in his. “He’s of age. This decision is too important. We can’t rob him.”

  A door creaked in the dark hallway and Matthew’s voice came in the darkness. “What’s the matter? What’s going on?” He came squinting into the lamplight, barefoot in his nightshirt.