by Ron Carter
“Here, sir. I must speak to you now.”
Ulrich stepped aside and gestured, and they climbed the stairs and wiped their wet, muddy boots on the bristles of a horsehair pad. Scott gave orders to his squad, and they stopped and took up positions on the front porch, while Scott, Thompson, Eli, and Billy followed Ulrich through the parlor into a large library with a great oak table, polished, carved, surrounded by matching carved chairs upholstered with velvet. All except Eli sat down.
Ulrich glanced at him. “Have a seat.”
Eli shook his head. “I’m muddy. I’d rather not dirty the chair.”
Ulrich shrugged and turned back to Scott. “What’s so important?”
“Eli Stroud is a private in the Boston regiment. His commanding officer, Colonel Thompson, is here with him. Private Stroud has a story.” Scott gestured to Eli, and Ulrich turned in his chair to face him directly and waited.
“Sir, I think you got gunpowder in the cellar of this building, and I think it’s there to kill General Washington.”
Ulrich’s mouth dropped open and he slowly straightened in his chair, eyes wide. “Here? Now?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How do you know this?”
“I was here. I watched five men put it there two hours ago.”
“How do you know it’s gunpowder? Did you go down and look?”
“No, sir. No chance. But I think you’ll find the barrels marked ‘salt cod.’ The question is, do you believe five men are going to put two barrels of salt cod in the basement of this house at midnight in a bad storm? When I left, an Indian tried to kill me. I doubt he’d do that over two barrels of salt cod. It has to be gunpowder.”
Ulrich’s face sobered, and for ten seconds the room was silent before Ulrich spoke again. “Where were you to watch all this?”
“In a tree behind the house.”
“What were you doing there? How did you get past the pickets?”
“That don’t matter. What matters is I had to kill a man who was one of the bunch who did it, and when he doesn’t show up, the others are going to get spooked and they might set it off now and kill who they can and run.”
“You mean blow it up tonight?”
“That’s what I mean.”
“Shocking! We’ll go down there right now and prove it, one way or the other.”
“Sir, might be good to roust everybody in the house awake and bring them here while you go down there. Otherwise the guilty one is bound to know why you’re in the cellar and he’ll likely run.”
Ulrich leaned back in his chair for a moment in thought, and Eli continued. “Those three pickets in back helped, and there were two other men. I don’t know if your other pickets were in on it, but it won’t hurt to have General Scott’s squad here armed, watching your men.”
Ulrich was incredulous. “Are you suggesting we have spies, traitors, here at headquarters?”
“No, sir, I’m not suggesting that. I’m stating it as a fact. We better be ready for trouble from any man you got here.” Eli dropped the weapons belt on the table, and Ulrich stared at it.
“What’s that?”
“The weapons belt I took off the man I had to kill. Part of the blood on the knife’s mine, the rest his.”
Ulrich started. “You’re wounded?”
Eli shrugged. “On the arm.” A smile flickered and was gone. “He was hurt a little worse.”
Eli tossed the oilskin-wrapped document beside the belt, and Ulrich raised inquiring eyes.
“That’s a coded message I took from him.”
Eli turned to Billy, and Billy dropped his bundled packets on the desk.
“More?” Ulrich asked, startled.
“Yes, sir. There’s no time now, but those letters and maps are all the same, and when you put it all together, and add what I saw tonight, and that Indian trying to kill me by ambush, I doubt we’re dealing with salt cod.”
Ulrich turned back to Scott. “What do you think?”
“I think it deserves at least a hard look.”
Ulrich stood. “Lieutenant!”
The young lieutenant was instantly in the doorway.
“Assemble everyone in this library at once.”
The young man’s jaw dropped. “What?”
“Now, Lieutenant.”
“Pickets too?”
“Everyone.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Sir,” Eli said, “when all this starts, I think there’s a way to walk the guilty man into a trap.”
“How?”
“No time to explain it.” Eli gathered his thoughts, then continued. “I know this is asking a lot, but sir, could I ask for a free hand to try to trap this man?”
Ulrich looked at Scott, then Thompson. “Is this man in your command?”
“He is.”
“Would you trust him with this?”
Thompson studied Eli thoughtfully for a moment. “I would.”
Ulrich shrugged.
Eli said, “Have your people leave their arms out in the parlor.”
Lanterns came on all over the house, and men assembled in the library in twos and threes and stood silently, fearful, eyes darting in question. Eli took a place in one corner, Billy beside him, and Eli studied every man as he walked through the doors.
Ulrich spoke. “Every man is here.” He turned to the lieutenant. “Take all the firearms out into the parlor.”
Stunned silence fell over the room for a split second.
“Yes, sir.” The lieutenant gathered the muskets and pistols and laid them clattering on a table in the parlor.
Eli turned to Scott. “Could your men come in?”
Two minutes later the ten-man squad from Scott’s command stood in the crowded library, muskets in hand, bayonets mounted.
Eli looked at Ulrich. “Could you and I and General Scott and Billy—and those two men—leave now?” Eli pointed to two men under Ulrich’s command, shorter than average, about 130 or 140 pounds.
Ulrich gave orders, the two men stepped out, and Ulrich led them all out of the library and into the parlor. He turned to Eli, again waiting.
Eli spoke. “Sir, is there a broom handy?”
Ulrich’s forehead creased in wonderment. “A broom?”
“For sweeping floors.”
Two minutes later Ulrich handed Eli a broom.
“Follow me.” Carrying one lantern, and Ulrich another, Eli led them out the front door and down the side of the house, turned the corner, and stopped at the cellar. He lifted the door and said to Ulrich, “Wait here until I call.”
He eased down the stairs, opened the lower door into the cellar room, and hung his lantern on the center pole. Quickly and carefully he swept the broom over the entire dirt floor until all tracks were gone, then called up, “Come on down. Billy, you last.”
Ulrich led the other five men down, Billy last, and they ducked their heads to clear the low door frame and stood in the yellow lantern light in the dank smell of the chill cellar. The walls were cement, the ceiling was made up of the timbers supporting the first floor of the house above, and the floor was soft dirt. They stood looking at each other, mystified, struggling to understand the unexplained directions from Eli.
Eli pointed. Against the west wall were two barrels, still wet, muddy. He lifted the lantern from the center pole and held it close. Ulrich read the shipping bill tacked to the side aloud. “ ‘SALT COD. THREE HUNDRED WEIGHT AND TWENTY POUNDS. SHIPPED JUNE 12, ’76, NOVA SCOTIA. BUYER PAY AT NEW YORK.’ ”
Eli drew his hatchet from his weapons belt and knocked the seal from the top of the barrel, then pried the lid loose. He drew a great breath and motioned Ulrich to step back with the lantern. Every eye in the room glittered in the yellow light as Eli raised the lid. He thrust his hand into the top, brought it out, and raised the fine black granules to his face to smell them, then touched some to his tongue. He raised his eyes to Ulrich and poured the stuff into Ulrich’s hand. “Gunpowder.”
Ulrich gap
ed, and for three seconds total silence gripped the room. Then Ulrich murmured, “Five hundred pounds of gunpowder, directly below Washington’s bedroom.”
Eli spoke quietly. “Nobody move.”
Everyone froze while Eli took a lantern and carefully dropped to one knee. He studied the clean, clear tracks in the fresh-swept dirt floor until he sorted them out, then shifted his position to study the tracks of the two men he had asked to come with them. He stood. “Can we go back upstairs now to the library?”
As they cleared the top of the cellar stairs Eli called back to Billy, “Stay here and stop anyone who tries to go down in the cellar. Someone will relieve you soon.”
The five men climbed the front porch stairs and passed through the parlor into the library, and Eli waited for silence.
“General Scott, could you send two of our men down and have Billy come up? Tell them to shoot anybody who tries to go in the cellar.”
Scott gave orders and two men of the New York militia left.
Eli turned back to the others. “Which three of you were standing picket in the back of the house around midnight?”
Three men looked at each other and raised their hands.
Eli approached the nearest one. “What was in those barrels you took into the cellar?”
The man’s face went white. “How did you know about that?”
“It doesn’t matter. What was in them?”
The man stammered an answer. “Salt fish. Private Hickey told us salt fish for the general.”
Eli looked at the other two men and they blurted, “Salt fish. Just like he said.”
“Who’s Private Hickey?”
The man pointed and Eli turned and looked. The man was one of the two he had called out to accompany them downstairs. Shorter than average, about 130 pounds.
Eli spoke to Ulrich. “What’s this man’s duty here?”
“Personal bodyguard to General Washington.”
Eli paused for a moment, then spoke. “Does he have free run of the place?”
“Of course.”
“Now it all makes sense. He could do all this and nobody would challenge him.” Eli turned back to Hickey. “General Washington’s across the river tonight. If you’re his personal bodyguard, what are you doing here?”
Hickey stalled. “What is your authority, sir?”
Eli looked at Ulrich.
“He speaks under my authority, Private.”
Hickey answered Eli’s question. “He left me to guard General Ulrich.”
A rap came at the door and Scott opened it, and Billy entered the room.
Eli spoke to him. “Watch the door, Billy.”
Eli paused to gather his thoughts and took a stride towards Hickey. “How long ago did you break your right leg?”
Thomas Hickey’s mouth fell open and he clacked it shut. “Sir?”
“How long since you broke your right leg and got it set a little crooked?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do. I tracked you two nights ago when you walked down the street to meet that Indian and trade messages, and I read the same tracks in the cellar tonight. You come down hard on your heels like military, and your crooked leg puts the right edge of your boot down a little harder than the left. I watched you and the others put those two barrels in the cellar tonight, and your Indian followed me. When did you break your leg?”
“This is utter nonsense!”
General Ulrich interrupted. “Private Hickey, did you break your right leg?”
Silence held for a moment. “As a child.”
Eli stepped to the desk and picked up the weapons belt. “You might recognize this. It belongs to your Indian. He used that knife to try to kill me tonight. He’s dead. Part of the blood on that knife is mine, the rest is his.”
He lifted the oilskin-wrapped packet and laid it back down. “You might recognize that, too. I took it from him after he was dead.” He pointed to Billy’s bundle of packets. “We got those after your men burned the house of another one of your spies from Charlestown, trying to destroy these maps and messages. Remember the map of this house, with the ink dot on the back? Remember McMurdy? the turncoat we shot about two weeks ago?”
Hickey blanched, and Eli continued. “There was one more man, with a beard and a black seaman’s cap. Big man, maybe two hundred pounds. The pickets know. Who is he?”
Hickey swallowed, and for a split second panic glinted in his eyes. “I have no idea. He was sent to deliver the salt cod. I swear, we all thought it was salt cod.”
Eli nodded. “One more thing.” He paused, and his eyes narrowed, and his words came low, distinct. “I followed that Indian to the home of the New York mayor. He put a message in the bushes by a window at the side of the house. When we finish here, we go visit the mayor. I thought you should know that.”
Hickey clamped his mouth shut and his face was a blank.
Eli shrugged. “Where’s your quarters?”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“We’re all going to search them.”
“No, you’re not.”
Once again Eli turned to Ulrich, waiting.
“Yes, we are,” Ulrich said.
“You’ll find nothing,” Hickey said.
“I think you’re wrong,” Eli answered. “I think you exchanged messages with the Indian tonight, just like the last time, and his message said the bearded man was delivering the gunpowder tonight. I think your message told him where to deliver the rest of it. I think we’ll find it wrapped in oilskin in your room.”
Hickey spat defiantly, “Then go search!”
They left the armed militia squad on guard in the library, and the five of them escorted Hickey to his quarters next to those of George Washington. The small room was dominated by a great bed with thick, high, hand-carved oak posts on the corners. They began a systematic search, floor to ceiling, starting on one wall, moving towards the other, while Hickey stood near the center of the room, arms folded in defiance.
They came to the bed, and Thompson spread the great goose-down comforter on the floor and slit it open half a dozen times. There was nothing inside. He laid the pillows on top and slit each one open, and there was nothing.
“I told you there’s nothing here,” Hickey said.
The men worked on in silence. Ulrich ripped open the side of the mattress and found nothing, then the large box springs. With the bed stripped to the frame, Scott began knocking the sides from the great posts, when Billy saw the twitch at the corner of Hickey’s mouth. Billy raised a hand and all work stopped while everyone in the room waited in silence. “It’s somewhere in this bed frame. The only parts big enough are the four posts.”
Hickey started, then settled.
Eli drew his tomahawk while the others watched. The blade cut deep into the large knob at the top of the first post. Thirty seconds later the post was in splinters, and Eli moved to the next one and drove the blade into the large knob. On the third blow the blade sank nearly to the handle.
“Hollow?” Ulrich asked.
“Felt like it,” Eli answered. Fifteen seconds later the top of the post was gone, and Eli slipped his tomahawk back through his weapons belt. He reached into the exposed cavity and drew out an oilskin pouch. Instantly Hickey pivoted and bolted for the door. Billy caught his shirtfront in both hands, lifted him off his feet, and slammed him against the wall, and all the fight went out of Hickey and he slumped.
Ulrich unfolded the oilskin, and for twenty seconds no one moved in the silence as he read the document inside. He refolded the document and raised his head, and his face flushed with anger. His words rang loud. “Thomas Hickey, you are under military arrest for mutiny, sedition, and corresponding with the enemy. A court-martial will be convened as soon as I can as- semble the officers this morning, and you will be tried. Should you be convicted you will be hanged in public. You will have an officer to speak in your defense.” He looked at Billy. “Take him downstair
s.”
The two pickets at the library door stepped aside, and the six men entered. Everyone inside came to their feet, eyes wide, waiting.
“Hickey is under arrest,” Ulrich said. His eyes were moving, watching everyone. “Every man who was assigned to duty at this building is under house detention until further orders. You will all be questioned about this matter. If you’re innocent you have nothing to fear. If you’re guilty you will be hanged.”
He turned to Scott. “May I request that your pickets remain here until I can arrange some of my own?”
“Done.”
“Could I further request that Privates Stroud and Weems assist the two pickets guarding the cellar in removing the gunpowder from under the house?”
Men gasped and exclamations erupted. Gunpowder? Under the house? How much? Who? How?
Billy led and Eli followed as they made their way through the parlor, where Eli picked up a lantern from a table, out the front door, down the front stairs, and around to the side of the house. Eli called, “Friendly coming in. Don’t shoot.”
The pickets helped open both cellar doors, then set two planks down the stairs. They tied the barrels with ropes, and with the pickets pulling the ropes from above and Billy and Eli pushing from below, they skidded the barrels up the planks to ground level, rolled them across the yard, and tied them behind two huge maple trees. The pickets took up positions in front of the trees, and Billy and Eli walked back to the parlor. Ulrich, Scott, and Thompson were waiting.
“Are the barrels removed?”
“Tied behind two of the big trees in back. The pickets are there on this side of the trees.”
“Good.”
Eli continued. “Going after the mayor?”
“Yes. I’ll have ten men here in minutes.”
Eli’s face clouded. “I hope you get enough on him to arrest him.”
Ulrich’s eyebrows rose. “Why?”
“Unless Hickey confesses and tells it all, I doubt you’ll get the mayor. The one man who I could tie to the mayor’s house is dead.” He shook his head in frustration. “I’m sorry about it, but I had to kill him.” He looked at Ulrich, hoping. “Do you think Hickey will confess?”
Ulrich shook his head. “I doubt it. He refuses to say anything at all.”