The Tory Widow

by Christine Blevins

  Anne scurried after him. “What is this thing you so need to print?”

  “Here . . . read it.” He tossed the paper into her hands and stepped in front of the big cabinet where the stacks of wooden treenware used for serving cakes and coffee were now stored.

  Anne unfolded the page and carried it over to better light. She read a few lines and looked up. “You either did not read this, or you are quite insane.”

  “Oh, I am quite insane, but I did read it. Besides Common Sense, I think it is the most wonderful thing I’ve ever read, and so I think everyone should read it. That’s why I need your press.” Jack dug his fingers between the plaster and the heavy cabinet and began inching it away from the wall.

  “Wait!” Anne pinched the bridge of her nose. “To hear of it is one thing, to disseminate this from my press is quite another. This is beyond sedition, Jack.” She shook the page in his face. “This is high treason. This work leads straight to the gallows.”

  “First to the gallows for a little neck stretch, then the executioner’s knife for a nice drawing and quartering.” Jack laughed and resumed his struggle with the cabinet. “They’d go easy on you, Annie—being a woman and all—treat you to a dance at the end of the noose, and then a nice toasting at the stake.”

  “Stop!” Anne grabbed hold of Jack’s arm. “This is not a joking matter . . .”

  Jack shrugged her off and the broadside fluttered to the floor. He planted his feet, took firm hold and swung the cabinet away from the wall, exposing the hidden doorway to the storage closet. Sally rescued the broadside from the floor and studied the headline.

  “Jack, please—listen to reason.” Anne measured her tone. “Even if I agreed to print this, my press is in pieces, and we’ve not a shred of paper nor a drop of ink . . .”

  “There are the makings for ink,” Sally announced, handing Titus the broadside. “At least a gallon of varnish and a pound o’ lampblack in there, stowed away with the rest of the gear.”

  Anne shot her friend a look sharp enough to slice through a hard cheese, but Sally didn’t seem to care. Opening the door to the storage closet, she dove in and came up with a corked varnish pot. “Near full,” she determined with a shake.

  Anne fumed. “There’s still the small matter of paper . . . We’ve none of that stowed, do we, Sally?”

  “Don’t fret for paper. I know where I can lay my hands on half a ream at least . . . maybe more.” Jack reached into the closet and pulled out a crate stuffed with composing sticks, quoins, leading and gutter sticks—the bits and bobs necessary for typesetting a form.

  Titus handed the broadside to Anne. “I can get the press together in no time, Mrs. Anne.”

  “No.” Anne creased the page into quarters. “Nothing is being put together—we will not be printing anything, Titus.”

  “Goddamn it, Anne!” Jack swore, dropping the heavy crate onto the composing table. “Even Titus and Sally understand. No one need know whose press printed it, the import is in getting it printed . . .”

  “Not on my press.” Anne shook her head. “I will not risk my neck.”

  “Feich!” Sally threw up her arms. “I never took ye for a coward, Annie.”

  “Have you three idiots looked out into the harbor lately? The King’s Navy and Army are on our bloody doorstep! Printing this broadside is complete and utter madness.” Anne pressed the folded sheet into Jack’s hand. “You’ve a fire within, Jack, and it burns bright and true for your cause, but I don’t share your conviction—not enough to swing for it.”

  Titus and Sally moved forward to stand beside Jack. Shoulder to shoulder, the odd threesome faced Anne forming a solid phalanx. Jack, Titus and Sally were united in cause—comrades—their faces lit with rebellion and fierce determination.

  “Help us, Annie,” Jack said, “and we’ll do this thing together—otherwise stand aside for I will use your press.”

  Left with but dread and doom for companions, Anne could not bear to be so forsaken. She closed her eyes, heaved a sigh and held out an open hand. “Let me see it again.”

  Jack snapped open the broadside and laid it lightly on her upturned palm. She took several steps toward the door, held the page in the best light and examined the copy.

  “It seems I’ve no choice but to cast my lot with your unlikely fellowship . . .” Anne said at last. She tossed the page onto her work surface and began digging through the crate for her favorite composing stick. “Break out the finest Caslon, Titus. If we’re to hang for our work here, it will be for our best.”

  Jack let out a whoop, lifted Anne from her feet and swung her through the air.

  ANNE flung off her French heels and stripped down to stays and chemise. For a moment, she considered shedding the stiff, sweat-drenched stays as well, but Jack Hampton waited down the stairs, and only the most shameless slattern would consider going without stays in the presence of a man not her husband. She struck a compromise between decency and ease, loosening the laces a touch.

  Hotter than the hinges on the gates of hell, Anne swiped the mobcap from her sweaty head and tossed it onto the bed. The heat of the day tended to collect and hover in the upper stories. She pushed open the shutters to find some relief just as the church bells began to bong the midnight hour.

  How the hours fly—

  Evening had passed into the wee hours, and but for the bells, she would never have noticed, so intent she had been on her task. One could not expect to be dexterous when setting type by candlelight, but still, she managed to complete the form for the broadside in the same time it took Titus and Jack to bolt the press together and make it ready to print.

  Being required to muster for a work detail at daybreak, Titus bid them good night and left for home as soon as the press had been assembled, assuring Jack that Anne was as fine and capable a second as he’d ever worked with. Anne could see Jack was skeptical—for in truth, she was no journeyman—and she was anxious to prove Titus’s faith in her ability.

  Digging down into her clothespress, she unearthed the utilitarian linsey blouse and brown fustian skirt she wore when working with ink. She changed into her work clothes, slipped her bare feet into a pair of comfortable, flat slippers and skipped down the stairs to help Jack finish printing the job.

  To clear the area for the press, tables, chairs and benches had been shoved harum-scarum into a confused tangle toward the dark, front end of the shop. Sally sat slumped over one of those tables, her head on her arms, snoring. Anne saw no reason to wake her, as Sally would not find a more comfortable sleep in her oven of a room up the stairs.

  A warm night was made sweltering by six lanterns hanging from the rafters over the press and a dozen near-spent candles lighting the compositing table at the rear of the shop. Both front and back doors were propped open in a vain hope of catching what breeze there was coming in off the river.

  Jack had the form in place and locked up fast upon the carriage. A ream of newsprint was stacked wet and ready to print on a tray positioned near the press. Wearing Titus’s leather apron with shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows, Jack worked within the circle of light, sifting soft, powdery lampblack onto the glob of boiled linseed oil he’d poured out onto the ink block. Anne paused on the last stairstep and leaned into the newel post, drawing in the acrid smell that had permeated her life from the very minute she’d been born. For all of her protestations, it was a pleasure to have her press back at work.

  “There is something awry with the world indeed,” Jack announced, “when a journeyman performs the work of his devil. Best don your apron, lest you spoil your clothes.”

  Anne joined him at press-side, tying the strings of a bib apron snug at the small of her back as he continued to mix the ink.

  “Mind now, Jack, don’t stint on the blacking. I cannot abide pale ink.”

  “Here, then—” Jack handed off the package of lampblack and the slice—a square metal blade attached to a wooden handle used to mix ink. “For the life of me, Annie, it’s been so long sinc
e I rubbed the black into the varnish, I’ve quite lost the knack.”

  Anne took over at the ink block while Jack moved on to knock up the ink balls, tacking the leather covers over wool stuffing. When she was happy with the consistency and color of her mixture, Anne dabbed the balls onto the block, rocking them both to and fro to coat the leather with a thin, even layer of ink.

  Starting at the top of the form and moving down-and-up, down-and-up in a steady, deliberate pattern, she beat the balls to the type. An adept and skilled beater, Anne knew exactly how to tap and not drag the leather across the type, to avoid choking the spaces between and within the letterforms with an excess amount of ink. Satisfied with the thoroughness of her coverage, she took a half step back. “There.”

  Jack positioned paper onto the points. “Let’s pull a sheet and see how it pleases us.”

  Anne nodded, but she could not peel her eyes from the freshly inked form—the raised type glistened and shone like black glass in contrast to the dull gray lead between the letters and lines—even backward, the words caused her heart to lurch, sending a rush of blood pounding in her brain.

  Anne wavered on her feet—the inkballs so heavy in her clenched fists—dizzy with sudden despair. Oh, these words will cause worlds to collide.

  The tight, ordered bits of lead formed the words and sentences that shattered any hope for peace. The might of the British Empire would no longer float patiently out in the harbor. These words would bring it crashing down upon them like a monstrous wave, to wash away every speck of rebellion, and crush the colonies into complete submission.

  “Step aside, Annie.” All smiles, Jack snapped Anne back into the moment, pounding his fist to the wooden upright. “This fine press stands ready with paper pinned up and here my second stands, gathering wool.”

  Anne shuffled aside, allowing Jack to move in. With fluid prowess, he put the press in motion—shutting the tympan and giving the rounce a turn to move the carriage under the platen. With one hard pull at the lever, the screw turned to strike the first impression. A counterclockwise turn of the rounce and flip of the tympan exposed the newly printed page. Jack peeled the damp paper from the press, and Anne followed, as he carried it over to the candlelit table. Side by side, he and Anne admired the work.

  “Beautiful.” Jack beamed. “Crisp and clean—you have as fine a hand and eye for composition as I’ve ever seen.”

  “The United States of America . . .” Anne read aloud, still incredulous she had actually set such treason into type.

  “Has a ring to it, no? Ahh . . . you see this?” Jack pointed to the second paragraph. “This here’s my favorite bit—‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.’ ” His eyes bright with hope, Jack threw an arm around Anne’s shoulders and gave her a squeeze. “Now those are words to swing from a gibbet for!”

  She leaned in to his strong body, and like a scrap of blotting paper, absorbed his courage and conviction for what she always knew to be right and true—letting it seep through skin and sinew, and soak in to strengthen her very bones.

  “If all goes well,” Jack said, “we’ll have at least two hundred fifty copies ready to hand out.”

  “What do you mean ‘if’?” Anne clapped her hands together. “Enough of this twiddle-twaddle—let’s get it done!”

  THE fife and drummer boys from each brigade banded together, blowing and beating an exuberant version of “Yankee Doodle,” as every Continental Regular posted in and around the city marched up Broad Way from the Battery. Brigade by brigade, the soldiers entered the Commons and lined up in ordered ranks along the perimeter of the green.

  By comparison, the remnants of the city’s civilian population massed to witness the parade in complete disorder, choking the streets leading up to and bordering the Commons. Jack waited under the portico at St. Paul’s with the four young lads he’d enlisted as newsboys.

  “After the announcement has been read to the troops, I want you boys to divvy up that lot there.” He pointed to the bound-in-string stack of broadsides near the church door. “Pass them out to the crowd, but don’t be handing ’em to illiterate sailors, longshoremen and the like. Be selective—and be warned—I’ll not cozen any shirkers. I was a newsboy myself, and I know every one of your lazy-arse tricks. If I find pages layin’ in the gutter or on the rubbish heap, or anywhere other than in the hands and pockets of Patriots, I will seek out each one of you and deliver a sound box to the ears you’ll not soon forget. Understood?”

  Pleased with the sincere vigor of their nodding heads, Jack called out to a passing fruit vendor and purchased five apples. Keeping one for himself, he handed the rest out to the smiling boys, and issued a final warning, “Mind, then—wipe your sticky mitts before laying hands on my sheets.”

  Jack left the newsboys to their treat and wandered to the edge of the stair. From this vantage raised above street level, he scanned the happy chaos swirling around the Commons as the bells began to toll the hour. Anne had promised to meet him under the portico at St. Paul’s at six o’ clock. He took a bite from his apple and wondered if she would be true to her word.

  Food, laundry and sexual favors—Jack prided himself on limiting his need for womankind to those necessaries he could acquire with a charming word or smile, or the simpler inducement of a few shillings. He had never entertained a desire for further entanglement, and avoided any at all cost.

  But for some reason he could not yet fathom, Anne Merrick had a hold on his attention. Sparked by the recollection of a long-ago kiss, fueled by a shared taste in literature and fanned by a chance glance down her blouse, the attraction to the young widow began that night he’d put her press to ruin. Jack was quick to deem this interest a “fleeting passion” when it was further fed by anger over her apparent Loyalism, and easily quenched by a comely whore bent over the tousled bedstead at Mother Babcock’s bawdy house on Murray Street.

  Though Jack claimed it was duty to the cause of liberty driving him to visit the widow’s coffeeshop day in and day out, he knew better. Anne Merrick was no true Tory, no threat to the cause, yet he could not control his fascination. He’d never run across a woman who’d confounded him so—at once strong and sad, independent and needy—and though he sensed the danger of digging a hole he’d have difficulty climbing free from, he found he just could not stay away.

  What the widow needed—Jack determined, after kissing her in the gangway—what would do her the most good, was a complete and thorough frolic between the sheets. Coincidentally, Jack figured such activity would also relieve the distraction this woman had interjected in his life. So, threatening and well-armed brother notwithstanding, contriving a way under Anne Merrick ’s skirts and between her legs had now become Jack ’s driving aim.

  Even if she shows, she’s bound to be dragging Sally along. Annoyed, he tore one last bite from the apple and tossed the core into the gutter. Sally . . .

  He may have made some headway in his quest the night before, if not for Sally and her damn snoring. Much to Jack’s irritation, his every smooth and subtle attempt at amorous congress was interrupted by a phlegmy, snorty, indrawn breath.

  Working the press with Anne Merrick had been both exhilarating and exasperating. Not only was she a skillful compositor, but from mixing the ink, to inking the type, she impressed him greatly with her meticulous attention to detail. As a result, not a single sheet of precious paper was wasted in their endeavor.

  But never, in all his days at Parker’s Press, did he ever have to deal with such distractions as his second’s sweat-wet breasts glistening in lantern light, or the sight of her soft, round rear bent over in reaching to beat the ink to the form. Jack had restrained an awful urge to flip the widow’s skirts up and have done with the whole business right then and there.

  Jack had envisioned capping off the night’s work by trotting hand in hand wi
th the widow up the stairs, but thwarted by Sally’s snoring, he only ended up adding, once again, to the jingle in Mother Babcock’s purse.

  Evening time had not provided any relief from the July heat—the air thick, heavy and still. Jack loosened the sweat-damp knot at the linen cravat he foolishly wore, and stuffed it into his pocket. A deep rumbling drew his eye upward to a swirling, threatening sky, and he was glad for the prospect of rain. Wiping a hand still sticky with apple against the emerald green wool of his weskit, he peered down the busy street, and smiled. For all the hustle and bustle on Broad Way, it was still easy for him to spot the Widow Merrick and Sally Tucker coming arm in arm up the brick walk.

  Like flowers on a midden heap, the two women stood distinct amid the male majority. Sally made sure to be noticed, having rigged herself a patriotic red-and-white striped sash draped over one shoulder to meet at the waistband of her bright blue skirt. Jack was happy to see Anne join in on the spirit of the day, enlivening her sedate mourning-wear with a series of red, white and blue ribbon rosettes pinned around the crown of her straw hat.

  “Anne! Sal!” Jack called and waved. “Up here!”

  The women struggled through the throng and joined him and the growing crowd of onlookers at the top of the church stair.

  “I salute you both”—Jack bent his knee in a florid bow—“the prettiest pair of Patriots in all of New York City!” His silliness drew a girlish giggle from the widow.

  “Ahh, would ye listen t’ him . . .” Sally laughed, giving Anne a poke with her elbow. “A honey-tongued devil if ever I heard one, na?”

  Together they watched as the last regiment of foot marched by. Along with the many pennants and banners snapping on the wind, a tangible excitement fluttered though the crowd as a cavalry of mounted officers came clattering up the cobblestones behind the column of infantry, led by a standard not seen before.

  “A new flag for a new country!” Jack cheered as the colors passed by. He’d never cared for the flag the Continental Army had adopted at Breed’s Hill—a design merging the British Union Jack with the red-and-white striped standard of the Sons of Liberty. This new flag still made use of the rebellious Liberty stripes, but the reviled Union Jack in the corner was replaced with a hopeful constellation of white stars on a field of blue.