City of Dreams (14 page)

Gil hoped that none of them had been on New Street the night of the fire, or they might kill him right there, for all the trouble he had brought on them.

And he wondered why Loretta had not come to the grate to speak to him. Had she fled? Or had Fanny Doolin found her and forced her back to her indenture?

Those questions soon faded, however, because two Hessians came in, came straight for Gil, and dragged him out, too.

In the hallway below were two chambers. A turn to the right led into the office of Cunningham—judge, jury, and executioner. A turn to the left led into the Long Room, where guards awaited Cunningham’s bidding.

The Hessians pushed Gil into the Long Room.

And the first face he saw was beefsteak red, edged in a white wig: Cunningham himself. The burly provost was stalking toward him, looking him up and down as if he were vermin, and stalking out.

So, thought Gil, there would not even be an interrogation, only a condemnation.

He peered toward the end of the room, expecting to see the hangman holding his noose or a pair of Hessians holding truncheons. Instead, he saw Haym Salomon, a Hessian officer, and a Tory named Mr. Tongue, a small and precise man who wore no wig and dressed in the brown coat and waistcoat of a working merchant.

Tongue was reading from a report. He looked up and said to Gil, “A Corporal Morison testifies that he saw you running through the street the night of the fire. He says you assaulted him with a bag. This Jew says that you were working for him.”

Gil looked at Salomon, whose impassive expression told him that the question was no trick. So Gil said, “I work for many men. I work at the Queen’s Head, too.”

“Yes,” said Tongue. “They vouch for you.”

“Ze bag?” said the German.

Salomon said to Gil, “General Heister wants to know what was in the bag. But as I told him, you were carrying bottles of wine.”

“Yes,” said Gil, picking up on a story that he had told Salomon earlier. “I was bringing wine to the Holy Ground, so British officers would have something to . . . to tickle their palates while the girls tickle their . . . their pricks. . . . Beg pardon, sirs.”

“Pricks?” said the German general.

Salomon translated, and the general laughed.

That, thought Gil, was a good sign. No nooses, no truncheons, and a laughing officer in Hessian blue.

It seemed that General Heister had heard about the Jew who could speak their language and understood exchange rates. He had concluded that such a man would be a helpful one to work with Tongue as a purveyor of goods for the Hessians in New York.

So Salomon had been given his parole. And he had asked for an assistant, a bright young man also held in the Chain Room, one who knew where to find the fattest guinea hens, the freshest fish, and the nuttiest ale in New York, all thanks to his days in the employ of Sam Fraunces.

Since General Heister held more power than the provost marshall, it was done. The Jew would be freed, as would Gil Walker, if he agreed to work for the Jew.

iv.

The next day, Gil sat in Salomon’s kitchen while Mother Ramsey ladled a stew of codfish, bacon, and peas and told them that it had been Rooster’s favorite meal.

Gil told her that he would do what he could to honor her son’s memory by doing all that he could to help Haym Salomon.

“Well, good for you, Gilbie,” said the gray little woman, “good for you.” And her voice trailed off as she did.

Salomon tasted the stew and said how delicious it was after the awful prison soup.

“I don’t know how to thank you, sir.” Gil dipped his spoon.

“You know the roads and pathways from here to the rebel lines at Harlem?”

Gil nodded and tried the stew.

“Then we will find a way for you to thank me, but you will violate your parole—”

“Violate my parole?”

“In a good cause. And while you wait, I will teach you about money. About gold and specie and credit, too. It is what you have wanted all along, is it not?”

“I want to learn to be a broker some day. I want to do something good with my”—he caught himself before he said gold—“my future. I want to make money from money.”

Salomon nodded. “Making money from money is an honorable thing, especially here, especially now. Credit will save America.”

“Save it?”

“The American army must have food and weapons and powder and shoes. But our government has no money. We will have to borrow money from European governments that would like to see the British Lion bloodied . . . like the French.”

Gil picked a fish bone out of his mouth. “No one ever give me credit.”

“
I
just gave you credit,” said the Jew. “I gave you fish stew and you promised to pay me by rendering me a service in the future.”

Gil studied the fish flakes and bacon bits on his spoon. “I’d best enjoy this, then.”

“America will not survive unless our credit is good, unless we can borrow and build our future on our borrowings, then pay back what we owe.”

“But isn’t credit debt?”

“It is. But it is good if used properly. Credit is a lender’s faith in his fellow man and a debtor’s faith in the future. Finish your stew.”

T
HAT AFTERNOON
, G
IL
stood on the Bowling Green and scanned the devastation. Already, the dispossessed and homeless were moving back to the burnt-over ground. They used the remnants of chimneys for fireplaces. They pitched tents and raised canopies of sailcloth. They called it Canvas Town.

Gil walked north through the ruins. He went past people still sitting and staring, others who were already rebuilding. He passed men who asked for work and others who scowled at him because he wore clean clothes and did not look hungry.

He walked up Church Street, and as he came by the back fence of St. Paul’s graveyard, he heard the familiar sound of a flute playing something sad and slow. And there was the blind slave, sitting in front of a tent, a block south of where the Shiny Black Cat had burned to ashes.

Leaner McTeague was standing outside with his arms folded.

After a few moments, the tent flap opened. A British soldier stepped out, straightened his waistcoat, and hurried along Vesey Street.

Fanny stepped out of the tent and called after him, “Thanks, dearie. Don’t be a stranger.” She gave a big wave, but as soon as he was out of sight, her grin collapsed. She weighed a few coins in her hands and shook her head.

She gave the coins to Leaner and sent him off on some errand.

Then she headed toward the corner of Vesey and Church, where someone had put up a makeshift privy behind the pile of rubble that once had been her brothel. She drew a bucket of water from the pump, then she stepped into the privy.

And Gil made his move. He approached the old slave. “Afternoon, Ezekiel.”

Ezekiel stopped playing. “Mr. Walker? We thought you was dead.”

“Is Loretta here?”

“No, suh.”

“She never came back?”

“No, suh. Once the house burn, all the gals took off. It’s down to me and Leaner and Miz Fanny, tryin’ our best to drum up business. Y’interested? Miz Fanny be back from her female ablutions in a minute.”

“Female ablutions?”

“That what she call it when she go off to clean her scuttle after a customer.”

“No, thanks.” Gil pressed a shilling into the slave’s hands. “Do an old friend a favor, Ezekiel, and don’t tell Miz Fanny I was here.”

Gil left by Partition Street, south of the graveyard. As he walked along the fence, he peered in at the crypt with the sandstone top. It did not look as if it had been disturbed. But with so many people sick in New York, and so many now exposed to the elements, he knew he had to get the gold out before another member of the Lawrence family died.

The gold was his future. And it might mean something for the future of America, because as Salomon had said, a man who held gold could give credit, and credit would make America. And if he could use the gold to help America—and help himself, too—he would not have betrayed the memory of his friends. He would make something good out of his own bad deed.

So that night, he put General Heister’s safe-conduct in his pocket, took the cat’s paw, and slinked through the darkened streets.

It was raining, which was good. Those who had roofs over their heads would be enjoying them. Those who didn’t would be wishing they did. And the rain would dampen the sounds of a man at work in a small graveyard.

Again, Gil crouched low and kept out of the few shafts of light.

Again, he read the motto: “The Lord seeth all and loveth all.”

Again he pulled the cat’s paw from his pocket and pried, then pushed.

Again he reached down into the darkness where the bodies of the Lawrence family moldered toward the resurrection. And he felt . . . wood . . . and stone . . . and nothing else.

The gold was gone.

For a moment, Gil Walker thought about climbing into the crypt himself. Then he heard a British patrol on Vesey Street, and he sneaked off in the other direction.

A
LL NIGHT, THE
questions tormented him: Did she take the gold and flee? Or had she gone to Woodward Manor? Had she even gotten the clue about the Lord seeing all and loving all? Or, the worst possibility, had someone else found the gold? Had Corporal Morison been awake and watching when Gil slipped the bags into the crypt?

Gil could not venture six miles to the Woodward estate. That would violate his parole, and if he was caught, he and Salomon might both end up back in the Provost.

So he wrote to Nancy Hooley, then went to the Fly Market and found a farmer who had come in with a cart of squashes and paid him to deliver the note. It said he would wait in the market on Tuesdays and Thursdays for an answer.

Then Gil began to ask in the taverns if a big British corporal named Morison had passed any gold guinea coins. The answer everywhere was no.

That, at least, was good news.

G
IL THREW HIMSELF
into the business of procuring the best of everything for the Hessians. And he learned all that he could about bills of exchange and the movement of money. And he went with Salomon every other day to the Provost, to deliver their procurements and fulfill one of the terms of their parole.

And every Tuesday and Thursday, he went to the Fly, one of half a dozen market sheds that survived the fire, but the farmer who had taken his letter never returned.

However, hundreds of others appeared every day, now that the British were in power. The markets once again began to work. From the dairy farms of Brooklyn came milk, cheese, eggs. From the orchards of Bloomingdale came apples and pears. Chickens peered stupidly from their wooden cages. Big salt-cured hams could set a man’s mouth to watering on sight. Herbs hung drying. Tins and barrels and jars of preserved foods—pickles, jellies, honey—awaited pantry shelves. And sacks of barley, oats, and cornmeal promised that those who could pay would not go hungry . . . for now.

But how long such plenty would last Gil could not tell. The farmers in the countryside were a productive lot. Many times before the rebellion, he had heard it said that no European yeoman lived better than an American farmer. With thirty thousand British soldiers in New York, however, and more refugees arriving all the time, there would soon be shortages.

Still it was better here, thought Gil, than outside the city. Farmers were businessmen. They would sell where they would get the best price. So they would much prefer to take hard coin from British purveyors than paper money and promissory notes from American rebels.

Then, on the first Thursday of October, Gil saw the crown finial.

Nancy Hooley was wearing it around her neck. She was standing near a wagonload of cider apples. Yellow jackets swarmed in the sunlight above the apples, and the aroma of cider vinegar filled the air.

He went up to her. “You’re wearing—”

“Loretta said you’d see it from a fair distance.”

“Loretta? Is she here?”

“She come to my door about two weeks ago. Scared silly. I didn’t know what I’d do with her. But one of our scullery gals, she’d run off with the rebel army, so Loretta stepped right in. Works hard. The squire likes her.”

“Why didn’t she come to tell me?”

“She says she’s afraid to be seen in the city. She’s afraid of somebody called Miss Fanny.” Nancy reached into her cape. “But she sent this.”

The note was written in a raw, untutored hand.

Dear Gil
,

The Lord seeth all and loveth all. I remembered. I am safe and so is our future. Come soon
.

Gil Walker realized that his stomach had been clenched like a fist for two weeks, because at that moment, it released its grip. He laughed. He was so happy that if the blind slave had been there, Gil would have ordered up a tune and danced a little jig.

He sent back a message:

Work hard and be patient. I will see you soon
.

H
E WOULD SEE
her just two nights later.

It was a cool October evening with the promise of the first frost in the air.

He had returned to Salomon’s after delivering a load of haddock to the Hessian officers in the barracks behind the Provost. He stopped the wagon in the alley beside the house and heard Salomon’s voice: “Don’t unhitch.”

They went round to the front of Salomon’s shop, where he offered an inventory of sundries, dry goods, and other English imports for sale. In the corner stood two barrels of flour, which they loaded onto the cart. Then they headed back to the Provost. They arrived at seven o’clock, full dark in October, and pulled up to the loading dock.

Salomon explained to the guards that they were delivering flour and picking up empty barrels.

Under the torchlight, the Hessian soldiers took the barrels inside. Then Gil heard the rumble of the two barrels rolling along the stone floor.

He looked at Salomon, who had told him nothing, though there was plenty strange about this. Salomon didn’t usually deliver goods and never after dark. And while one of those barrels rumbled as though it were empty, the other sounded full . . . of something.