Tesla's Time Travelers (12 page)

“Mr. Harrison. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is a duck, sir,” Paine replied.

I wondered how far that saying went back, Victor mused.

“The lobster backs spilled our blood at Lexington first,” John Hancock said. “Blood was spilled at Concord and Bunker Hill, Mr. Harrison. Were you from Massachusetts you would not question the use of the word ‘war’ with these red coats. Your fellow Virginian, General Washington, has no illusions about what is happening.”

Harrison, Victor thought. Two of his descendants would go on to become president, and neither one of them amounted to much. It must have been in their genes.

Franklin commented next. “I have said it for twenty years, gentlemen. They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. Congress tried with the Olive Branch Petition to come to reconciliation with Great Britain, but Britain rejected our entreaties. Gentlemen, there never was a good war or a bad peace, but we must all hang together or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

“Gallows humor, Mr. Franklin?” Thomas Paine quipped.

“King George would hang us from a Liberty Tree,” Samuel Adams said.

“Jefferson said it well in his closing remarks, gentlemen,” said Paine. “We pledge to each other our lives, our fortune and our sacred honor. Simply put, gentlemen, if we lose, we are dead men.”

There was a solemn silence around the table until John Adams spoke:

“The Revolution was affected before the war commenced,” he said. “The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people.”

“Very good, Mr. Adams,” Benjamin Franklin agreed. “But a revolution is a successful rebellion, and a rebellion is an unsuccessful revolution. Which we will truly have will play out from today onward.”

Chapter 8

Minerva was peeved. Victor had traipsed off with Thomas Jefferson and left her with the Anderson twins. Why hadn’t Victor asked her to come along with him? This was so unfair. It was as if she was back at the lunchroom losers’ table at Cassadaga Area High School, although she admitted the food at City Tavern was far beyond any cafeteria cuisine. The fish was fresh and tasty. She had never tasted anything like it in her life. Truly organic food, Minerva thought. No artificial preservatives to clog up one’s arteries.

“What’s the matter dearie?” the ghost of Mrs. Beard asked Minerva as the Anderson twins excused themselves to visit the outhouse behind the tavern. She floated down into an unoccupied seat.

“It’s not fair, Mrs. Beard. Mr. Jefferson asked Victor to join him but he didn’t ask me.”

Mrs. Beard smiled. “Had it been Dr. Franklin, the opposite would have occurred, my dear.”

“Jefferson is a…” Minerva wanted to say
sexist
but didn’t because she respected Thomas Jefferson. Mrs. Beard finished her thought:

“My dear girl, the Founding Fathers were all sexists; a woman had no rights in the 18
th
century. The Enlightenment was only for men. Men honestly thought women’s brains could not comprehend politics. In my own time it was hardly better, although I could own property, and in my later years I was able to vote. I was forty-four when I first cast a vote in 1920, for when I was born in 1876, our nation’s centennial, women did not have that right. In March of 1776 Abigail Adams wrote her husband John, asking him: ‘Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could.’ But of course John didn’t add ‘all men and women are created equal’—the women at Seneca Falls would do that in 1848. Had they been honest about it in 1776 they would have written, ‘All white male property owners are created equal.’ For black men had no rights and white males without property could not vote.”

“Mrs. Beard, you are such a cynic.”

“Who’s the lass speaking to?” said a man at the next table to his companion.

“Nobody I can see,” the other man said.

“Think she’s possessed?”

“A witch maybe?”

Oops, Minerva thought, I’m drawing attention. She forgot: Only she could see Mrs. Beard.

“People are watching us,” Minerva whispered to Mrs. Beard.

“They are watching you, dear, they can’t see me,” Mrs. Beard corrected Minerva.

But the men turned away with the first acappella notes of a ballad, sung by a young brunette barmaid. The tavern hushed as the girl sang and Mrs. Beard whispered to Minerva that the song was
The Banks of the Dee
:

“Twas summer, and softly the breezes were blowing, and sweetly the nightingale sang from the tree.”

Nightingales were in bushes, not trees, Minerva thought critically, but listened to the rest of the ballad.

“At the foot of a hill, where the river was flowing,

I sat myself down on the banks of the Dee.

“Flow on, lovely Dee, flow on thou sweet river,

Thy banks, purest stream, shall be dear to me ever,

For there I gained the affection and favor

Of Jamie, the glory and pride of the Dee.

“But now he’s gone from me, and left me thus mourning,

To quell the proud rebels, for valiant is he;

But ah! There’s no hope of his speedy returning,

To wander again on the banks of the Dee.”

When the waitress finished, a militiaman stood up and began to sing a different song. Hearing the tune, Mrs. Beard identified the piece as
The Pennsylvania Song.
Other men joined in.

“We’ll not give up our birthright; our foes shall find us men;

As good as they, in any shape,

The British troops shall ken. (
recognize)

Huzza! Brave boys; we’ll beat them

On any hostile plain;

For freedom, wives and children dear,

The battle we’ll maintain…

“And all the world shall know,

Americans are free,

Nor slaves nor cowards we will prove,

Great Britain soon shall see.”

“Huzza!” the men in the tavern shouted, and another man began yet another tune that Mrs. Beard quickly identified as
On Independence.

“Come all you brave soldiers, both valiant and free,

It’s for independence we all now agree;

Let us gird on our swords and prepare to defend

Our liberty, property, ourselves and our friends.

“In a cause that’s so righteous, come let us agree,

And from hostile invaders set America free,

The cause is so glorious we need not to fear

From merciless tyrants we’ll set ourselves clear…

The Anderson twins returned in the middle of the third song and Minerva was relieved that they were back. Mrs. Beard excused herself and floated off up the stairs to eavesdrop on the conversation among the Founding Fathers.

“They have a two-holer,” Heath said, above the singing.

“Excuse me?” Minerva said.

“Two seats in the outhouse,” Justin said.

“Lots of flies though,” Heath added. “And they could use some flowery spray.”

Minerva cringed at the images. I will hold it until we are back home, she thought. She had had one experience with an outhouse years before at summer camp, and the rank odor and the swirling flies had caused her to vomit. She was not about to repeat that experience. No, that was why she didn’t drink the Philadelphia water and merely sipped the cider. The cider, she detected, had alcohol in it. She didn’t wish to risk suspension from school by having the smell of an intoxicant on her lips. It was not behavior becoming of a future valedictorian. She was concerned about the Anderson twins, for they had switched from cider to ale and were beginning to raise their voices, which drew curious looks from men at other tables. Unfortunately, as the singing ended the Anderson twins’ voices were still at full volume, clearly audible over the normal conversation in the tavern.

“You know, Minerva, City Tavern is like the hotbed of the Patriots. This is their ‘hood,’” Heath yelled.

“Where they ‘hang’” Justin added loudly.

A sudden silence enveloped the tavern. Eyes were turned to Justin. The word “hang” had drawn the patrons’ attention. Minerva watched a man in uniform whisper to another man in uniform.

“I think we’d better get Victor and go,” Minerva said.

“Heck no,” Heath said. “Let’s have another round. Barmaid!”

The waitress appeared, but she was no longer smiling. “You want to settle your bill, sir?” she asked.

Heath handed her a silver coin and the gold sovereign with the visage of King George III. “That’s for the four meals, and here’s another piece of eight for two more ales.”

“Very good sir,” she said in a cold manner.

Minerva watched the girl as she walked away. Before she reached the bar to refill the twins’ drinks, she stopped and whispered something to the two men in uniform. Then she handed them something. It appeared to be a gold coin, for the men held it up to the light from a window. They looked at the coin and then they gave it back to the waitress. Then they looked at Minerva and the Anderson twins. Minerva sensed there was going to be trouble. The Anderson twins seemed oblivious to their surroundings and a little bit tipsy.

“I’m getting Victor,” Minerva said.

“Victor! Oh Victor!” Heath said, laughing.

“You’re drunk,” Minerva said, disgusted.

“Not yet,” Heath said. “Not yet. Getting there. Where’s the barmaid?”

Minerva didn’t say another word. She left the table and headed up the stairs to the second floor. Mrs. Beard was floating down the stairs.

“What is it, dear? You look upset?” Mary Beard asked Minerva. “I heard the boys shouting from the second floor.”

“I think we’re in trouble. Mrs. Beard, will you keep an eye on the Anderson twins for me? They’re a little intoxicated.”

“Oh my!” the ghost shouted, but only Minerva could hear and see her. “Demon rum strikes again. The scourge of many a young man. I was a member of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and we warned people about alcohol. Oh dear!”

“Please help me, Mrs. Beard.”

Mary Beard smiled. Minerva wondered if all ghosts were as pleasant as Mrs. Beard. Minerva’s mother had told her the ghosts she met were sometimes unpleasant, but maybe the dead got cranky on occasion from being called back from resting in peace. Mrs. Beard and her husband Charles seemed different, for they had been forgotten and neglected for so long that Mary was thrilled to be among the living and visiting the 18
th
century, a time period of which they had so often written.

Minerva nervously entered the large second floor room and gaped at the assemblage of the men at table.

“Barmaid,” Samuel Adams called to Minerva. “We need more ale, lass.”

“I am not a barmaid, sir,” Minerva replied indignantly.

“Minerva?” Victor called. “What are you doing here?”

Minerva bristled at Victor’s question, her feminism aroused. “Why do you say that, Victor Bridges, because I am a woman?” Minerva snapped.

“Ha!” Benjamin Franklin said with a devilish smile and a wink. “Come lass and sit by a man who appreciates women.”

Why you old flirt, Minerva thought, but she found the twinkle in the old man’s eyes inviting, even charming, and a little attention from the elderly Dr. Franklin might get the youthful Victor Bridges a bit jealous. Minerva, in her vanity, forgot momentarily the downstairs dilemma with the Anderson twins and sat down beside the original Kite Runner. She saw that Victor Bridges’ face was red. Minerva smiled at him. He frowned at her in return.

“My dear,” said Benjamin Franklin. “Let me quote from Bickerstaff’s
The Sultan
that was published just last year: ‘Let men say whatever they will, Woman a woman rules them still.’”

The other men laughed. Minerva felt uncomfortable. These are 18
th
century chauvinistic men, she reminded herself. Suddenly, she noticed the conversation seemed to have turned frivolous, as if Minerva’s presence had triggered some reaction.

“Miss Minerva,” John Adams addressed her. “I would like your opinion on a symbol for our new nation. What say you to a bald eagle?”

“Well, sir…” Minerva began, but Benjamin Franklin cut her off. It bugged Minerva when boys interrupted the conversation of girls without so much as an apology, and here was Benjamin Franklin doing the same thing as one of her teenage peers.

“The bald eagle, Mr. Adams?” Franklin said. “He is a bird of bad moral character, he does not get his living honestly; you may have seen him perched on some dead tree where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the labors of the fishing-hawk. The turkey is, in comparison, a much more respectable bird, and a true original native of America. He is—though a little vain and silly, it is true—a bird of courage, and would not hesitate to attack a grenadier of the British guards. Gentlemen,” Franklin said, standing up and raising his glass. “To the turkey!”

Everyone but John Adams, Minerva and Victor rose to their feet and echoed: “To the turkey!”

John Adams sulked. Samuel Adams chortled at his cousin’s expense.

Minerva couldn’t tell if Benjamin Franklin was serious or whether he was just trying to get John Adams’s goat, as her grandmother used to say. Mr. Greene had told her class of Adams’ prickly personality. Adams, while brilliant, was self-righteous and consequently obnoxious, and Benjamin Franklin often found John Adams annoying, yet was able to work with him in both Philadelphia and later in Paris as envoys for the new nation. Mr. Greene said David McCullough and a popular HBO series had made people find a sensitive spot for John Adams. But he was still a prig, Mr. Greene said.

Minerva sat and listened, staying in the moment, forgetting the Anderson twins. After all, hadn’t she sent the nanny-like Mrs. Beard to keep an eye on them? Besides, was it
her
job to keep track of the miscreants?
Miscreants
was an S.A.T. vocabulary word, and if she could use it in a sentence four times, it would be in her vocabulary as well, she reminded herself. Minerva, you are sitting next to Benjamin Franklin and you are thinking about the College Board Exam? What is wrong with you, girl?

“I hate war,” she mumbled to no one, but in the general direction of Dr. Franklin.