Jack turned. There, standing in the doorway, was a trooper in a blue coat and silver-laced hat. He was slowly lowering a tankard to his side, beer frothing over its lip. Behind him in a barn, ready saddled – and, Jack now realized, impossible to see from the hilltop – were a dozen cavalry horses.
Doughty pranced, jerking Jack’s gaze away; but not before he’d seen the trooper turn back into what could only be a barracks and begin shouting.
‘Ride, Louisa!’
‘I’m sorry, Jack, I—’
‘Ride!’
They turned in unison, hooves striking splinters from the wooden dock. Then they were on the mudded earth of the slope. As they reached the road, just before they began to gallop, Jack saw the Colonial cavalry troop running to their mounts.
Jack led them southerly, though it was distance not direction that was important. There was no worth, while in sight, of making into unfamiliar woods where paths could peter out and roots might snag at galloping fetlocks. He used the shillelagh across Doughty’s rump to speed him still more. Beside him, Louisa plied her crop. The wind of their passage took away most sound and the shouts behind them on the straight road faded but did not die entirely away. Still, Jack thought, they were pulling ahead. They had to be, for he would trust Doughty and Caspiana against any cavalry nag in Washington’s army. Soon he would begin to look for concealment.
They had just rounded a bend. She was a pace behind him so he heard first rather than saw. But he turned in an instant, in time to watch Louisa’s side-saddle slip. Caspiana slowed as she pulled on the reins but not enough. The saddle twisted and Jack could only look on in dismay as Louisa toppled to the ground.
He had reined up in a moment, was off Doughty the next and at her side one after, pulling her up. Caspiana, ever jittery, skittered away.
‘Louisa—’
‘No.’ She coughed, drew a juddering breath. ‘I am well.’
‘Then we have to go on.’ There were shouts, voices drawing closer to the corner.
‘You must.’ Her words came in gasps. ‘I cannot ride bareback in a dress. Go!’
‘I will not leave you—’
‘You must!’ She pulled herself a little up, gripping his arms. ‘I will say we thought them robbers – which they were. They will not harm an American lady. But you …’ They both looked back to the corner, both now felt the drumming on the earth. ‘And your mission … for Burgoyne, Jack! Go!’
She was right. Mission aside, he would not survive long in American hands. They were on constant lookout for spies. They would soon find the General’s dispatch, hidden in a half-hollow canteen. And he had probably killed the man at the dock.
He vaulted on to his horse. As he grabbed the reins, he looked down. ‘I promise I will find you again.’
‘I believe you.’ She smiled, though her eyes filled with tears. ‘For as we both know, you are a gentleman who keeps his word.’
He raised his fingers to his lips, saluted her with a kiss. As he drove his heels into Doughty’s flanks, the cavalry troop finally burst around the corner. They reined up slightly when they saw the fallen body, the riderless horse. Then, when Jack took off, Doughty almost instantly into a gallop, some continued their stride, while others circled the prone Louisa.
The shouts for a moment were close, closer and Jack’s shoulders instinctively hunched; then gradually they began to fade behind him. Sandy Lindsay had been right and Doughty well named. The horse would bear him over three counties!
As the road curved, at each bend, the cries lessened. They were still there but he was losing the pursuit.
As he rode, he swore. What had made Louisa pre-empt him like that with her gold coin? The impetuosity he admired in her in other situations made him curse her now. And he knew it was fear for her, laying back there surrounded by soldiers, that was driving his anger. Leaving her had been one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do and he’d only done it on the instant realization that she’d been right. If she’d been caught with him, they’d both hang.
The road went through a series of curves, thickly forested on either side. He began to look for a suitable path, one that might carry him up into the hills where he could really lose the hunters. He would trust himself in a forest over any Continental trooper. Then the road suddenly straightened … and immediately before him was a wagon drawn across it, its driver manoeuvring his team to extract it from the mud, other men heaving and pushing from the side.
Doughty was a hunter, bred for the hedgerows of England. Jack let the reins go slack, gave the beast its head, and he took the challenge majestically, clearing the wooden sides by a good foot. But Jack’s joy was cut short by the landing; by the screaming men he plunged into, who threw themselves from the flailing hooves. Doughty nearly halted and Jack was thrown forward on to the great bay neck, his own face low down and nearly level with the face of another man.
‘Aghh!’ the man screamed and fell back, and he was not the only one, others scurrying away on each side. Blue-coated men. Looking up, Jack realized he had landed in the middle of – or rather the end of – a column of Rebel troops.
There was no choice now. The forest still reached down to the roadside and he directed Doughty towards it, brushing through the thinner undergrowth and on, under the canopy. There could be no more concerns over roots. He pushed the horse to a canter, hearing the shouts behind him intensify, more screams of fear and pain, from both horses and men, as the pursuing cavalry arrived.
They were behind him soon, running men as well as mounted. Some carried weapons; he discovered this as he reined in at a fallen tree and tried to see which way to go around it. The sun was almost out of the sky and, as he squinted, a musket ball embedded in the trunk.
‘Yah!’ he cried, turning the horse’s head to the left. They cleared the fallen beech and he noticed the glimmer of a path ahead. Digging his heels in, he drove his mount along it. Another musket fired, the bullet going he knew not where.
The path widened, went downhill, then up. Doughty was struggling now yet still game, that magnificent heart pushing him on. Jack suddenly had hope, felt he could break his pursuit on this slope, both men and horses, less well bred, fading away. A smile came as he gave the horse its head again, leaving the wielding of his stick, nudging him along with the lightest tap of his heels, with whispered commands.
He could sense the slope beginning to peak. Soon he would crest it, a new world would open up, and he would lose himself in it. Near the summit, he turned to glance back through the dusky gloom …
The birch had fallen across the slope, its uprooting halted by another on the other side of the path. The trunk connected with Jack’s head and even if Doughty was no longer travelling at full gallop, he was still going spiritedly enough. Jack didn’t feel pain, didn’t remember falling, or landing. Just the world suddenly dark.
– THIRTEEN –
The Brewery
He had no sense of how much time had passed since his encounter with the tree. The dark that had taken him then, held him still; though now not in the oblivion of unconsciousness but in the deep blackness of a prison cell.
Once awake, the cold kept him so. They had removed his clothing, leaving him a thin blanket, which had little effect against the chill and smelled strongly of horse; it also appeared to move when placed against his skin and for that reason alone he was grateful to his temporary blindness. As to his injuries, though the tree had conjured a lump the size of a crab apple from his forehead and his back was sore due to his tumble from Doughty, he had sustained far worse, and often, on the playing fields of Westminster School.
Carefully, he began to feel around him, touch being his most functioning sense, though as he moved he perceived the faintest light coming from some gap high up on the wall, too high for him to reach. There was straw on the flagstone floor, and a large barrel to his left. His hand then encountered another to his right, both on their ends. Crawling, with an arm before him, he felt other such rounded shapes further a
long the cell, upright or prone. So he was in a cooperage or …
It was then his sense of smell returned. He inhaled and detected something sweet, heady.
‘Beer,’ he said out loud, and then laughed. He had been often warned in his youth that he would end up dead in a beer cellar.
Further explorations confirmed his discovery. There were sacks of grain, a large trough, some heavy wooden paddles. The whole room was about thirty feet in length, a dozen wide. It had two doors; a great double one set high up in the wall, from whose edge the light was coming in, probably used to bring the barrels in and out, and a second, smaller door in the wall opposite. Locked and very stout.
Explorations over, Jack sat facing this door and, despite his distaste, pulled the blanket tightly around himself. A little warmth allowed his abused head to function. He was a prisoner. He did not know how long he’d been unconscious or whether he was alone. Perhaps Louisa occupied another cellar nearby. He must have been taken to a township of reasonable size, for this brewery served a largeish community. He’d had worse prison cells. And he preferred this cold to the heat he’d once suffered in one in Mysore.
His speculations were interrupted by the tread of feet on a stair, the throwing of bolts. Light came in with the opening door, enough to make him wince and shade his eyes. Then the entrance was blocked by two men. One carried a tray, the other a blunderbuss.
The younger man with the tray came in and set it down before Jack, then scurried back, regarding him with a not-unfriendly interest. The older one – they could be father and son – stayed glowering in the doorway and kept his weapon levelled.
Jack looked at the tray. There was something frothy in a jug and a hunk of bread beside it. He smiled. ‘Thankee, sirs, for this kindness,’ he said, remembering to maintain his Boston tones. He had no idea yet what they knew of him.
The young man nodded and smiled back. The elder grunted and moved out through the door.
‘One other kindness, if you will, young sir. Can you tell me where I am?’
‘Pearl River,’ the fellow blurted. His elder raised a hand to him, and his son – Jack had decided they were indeed in that relation – cowered.
The man swung the wide barrel of the gun towards Jack. ‘Yous only gets this,’ he gestured to the tray, ‘so you stays alive for a little. You answers questions, not us, when the officer gets ’ere. And then yous get a rope. Spy!’
He spat with the last word, withdrew. The younger man actually shrugged at Jack, then followed.
Spy. That must mean they had discovered the canteen with its false compartment and Burgoyne’s message. Well, that was set in a newly devised cypher and would take them some days to decode. But … Pearl River? That meant he was still on the west side of the Hudson then and not far from where he’d been caught. Well, it was not much, but any knowledge was a beginning. He groped for the jug, took a sip of the beer and grimaced; it was poor and sour stuff. The bread seemed fresh enough and he ate all of it.
More footsteps came. The door was pushed in, once more the blunderbuss was levelled at him. There was no son this time but two soldiers, Militiamen in blue coats. A man was slumped between them, his arms over their shoulders. With a relieved curse, they threw the body down. The door slammed, the darkness returned.
Jack sat and listened to the raspy breathing for a moment. Then he reached forward and sought contact. Finding a shoulder, he shook it gently.
‘Fellow? Are you awake? Do you live?’
A groan, then a fit of coughing, horridly fluid. It sounded for a moment that the man was choking, and then his throat cleared and a whisper came.
‘I am, sir. No thanks to our hosts.’
There was something to the voice, an accent. English, not Colonial, for sure, though that, in itself, meant nothing in this land. While he searched for an answer, Jack said, ‘Would you sit up?’
‘I would, but I might need some help, like.’
Then it came to him. The accent was from the west, though not as far west as Cornwall. Dorset! ‘Willis? Sergeant Willis?’
Jack could hear the other man check his breath. ‘Name’s Johnson, mister. And I’m a farmer out near White Plains. Who’s there?’
It was definitely him. ‘It is Jack Absolute, Sergeant.’
A gasp then. An arm reached out to him, a hand almost exploring his face. Then it gripped his arm and Burgoyne’s other messenger was pulled into a sitting position.
‘Well, I’m sorry for you, Cap’n, and no mistake.’
‘And I for you. Here, man, would you like some beer? It’s sour but—’
‘I think not, sir. They … they beat me when they finally caught me. Drink’s the last thing on me mind. And it’s not often you’ll hear Emmanuel Willis say that.’ There was the hint of a laugh. ‘So you tried the Tarrytown ferry like I advised. I’m right sorry for that.’
‘Not your fault, Willis. I think the whole Hudson is in the hands of the Rebel.’
‘Perhaps not for long.’ He paused. ‘Are we alone in this cell?’
‘We are.’
‘Good. Then I can tell ye – General Clinton moves at last. He sets out for the Highland forts on the third of October. In four days.’
‘You reached him then?’
‘Aye, sir. I was on my way back.’
Jack whistled. ‘I thought I travelled fast. You have the speed of Perseus and the luck of the devil, man.’
‘Ran out on me, though, didn’t he, Cap’n? Knew I be pushin’ it, like.’ Willis’s hand reached forward. ‘Perhaps I will take a sip of that beer. Who knows when I’ll get that chance again? We’re to be stabbed with the Bridport Dagger, Cap’n, and no question. I’ve a wife back in Lyme Regis who cursed me when I took the shilling, saying I was born to dangle. I’ve dreaded it ever since.’
Jack placed the jug in his hand. The Sergeant drank, spat. ‘Fuck, that’s foul. The Americans call this beer? Give me a strong Dorset ale any day.’
He drank on nonetheless, and while he did, Jack thought. ‘If Clinton comes,’ he said after a while, ‘then General Burgoyne may be saved after all.’
Jack heard the jug being laid down. ‘I’d like to say that, sir, but—’
‘Come on, man.’
‘He gave me a dispatch for General Burgoyne. Being a sergeant like, he gave me no verbal message, of course—’
‘The fool.’
‘Yet I was there when he dictated the letter. He attacks up the Hudson, sure …’ Coughing took him. When it subsided, he croaked, ‘But with scarce three thousand men.’
‘Three … three thousand, you say? He’ll never force his way to Albany with so few.’
‘He don’t intend it, Cap’n. A distraction he can do, is all.’
Jack shook his head angrily in the dark. ‘And did he at least order Burgoyne to retreat?’
‘He did not. I believe the phrase was – “He cannot presume” aye, “presume to send orders to General Burgoyne”.’
‘He’s washed his hands. By God, he’s washed his bloody hands.’
‘I believe he has, sir, at that.’
Jack slumped back, remembering the desperation in Burgoyne’s eyes. If he retreated without orders he risked a court martial and ignominy. Yet he could only stand a little longer unaided before that option was cut off. He must do so now, or fight or … no, surrender was impossible. No British army had surrendered to a Colonial one in the history of the world.
‘Well, Sergeant Willis, this news must be delivered.’
That fluid cough came again. ‘I’m afraid my deliverin’ days are past, beggin’ your favour. But I’ll help you as I may. Is there escape from this room?’
‘Only through the door.’
‘And I am not well enough to overpower any. Are you?’
‘I’ll have to be,’ Jack sighed.
‘Have you a thought on it?’
Jack hadn’t. Groping around, his hands felt for anything that might be of use. Straw? A wooden paddle against a blunderbuss? An
d the man never came fully into the room. He’d have to be lured in. Then Jack’s hand rubbed against the upright barrel of beer. It was a large one, stood at least his own height, more; the brewery may have skimped on quality but it produced large quantities. From the malt smell coming off it, and the heat of the oak, it was in mid-fermentation.
‘You know, Sergeant, I may just have thought of something.’
‘Have you, Cap’n? Have you indeed?’
It was warm in the beer. He had some chemically minded friends who could probably tell him why that was. Some brewers of his acquaintance, too. They would also be able to discourse about the froth on the surface. Something to do with yeast, he presumed. Anyway, he was grateful for the little warmth it generated. He doubted he’d have been able to hide naked, in that chill cellar, in a butt of wine.
The liquid was buoyant, forcing him up to the surface where he’d created a small gap by emptying some of the beer out with his jug. But there was little breathable air up there due to the exhalations of the brew; and the hole he’d prised with an iron nail pulled from another barrel would quickly block with scum. He’d despaired, until Willis had suggested a straw. He found one hollow and thick enough, and thrust it through the air hole. Though he panicked the first time the lid was pressed down on him and struggled out again, he was calmer the second time and managed to steady his breath.
Now he waited, while spume clogged his vision; the beer made his bruised head ache and he could not help taking little sips of it whenever he shifted slightly. He could not remain in there long, he knew. The gases, the heady, noxious liquid, the confined space; he was getting drowsy. Yet he’d close his eyes and still see things. The longer he was in there, the more like a coffin it felt. Buried at sea!