Paxton's War (7 page)

Charleston taken! My God, is it possible? And Brandborough? The whole colony, too?
“Eh?” Jason asked aloud. “Oh, yes. I was told.” He manufactured a smile. “What a happy coincidence.”

“Your arrival couldn't have come at a more appropriate time,” Colleen went on. “I'm certain Mr. Somerset would be honored to have you and Captain Tregoning join us in his carriage. Your family will all be there. Do say you'll accompany us.”

Jason looked at Colleen with wonder. She was almost enough to make him forget the bad news about Charleston. There was a vibrancy to her voice, a vivaciousness he found irresistible. Her transformation from child to woman was nothing less than astounding. “You'll meet Joy,” Jason told Peter. “That is, if Buckley doesn't mind our intruding upon him and his fiancée …”

“I'm not his fiancée …” Colleen began to explain before Buckley cut in.

“Mind? Why, it would be an honor to introduce the captain to our distinguished citizenry.”

“I've only to place my lieutenant in charge of the men,” Peter said, intrigued by the idea of an American picnic.

A few moments later, after Jason made arrangements for his trunks, the quartet climbed into the carriage. Buckley faced Peter and began to expound on the current local military situation. Jason faced Colleen, and though they spoke not a word, their eyes embraced as their souls sang the same sweet song of longing.

Chapter 4

Jason felt rather than saw the passing countryside. In spite of the fact that he hadn't been on American soil in four years, he was unable to look out of the carriage, unable to keep his eyes off Colleen. In her, he saw all the beauty that he associated with home, that spark of aesthetic energy that he'd missed so deeply. Her smile seemed to symbolize the vibrant innocence that old-world Europe, for all its great cultural riches, sorely lacked. Looking at her, he realized how accustomed he'd become to the world-weary attitude of the English, French, and Italians. In her fresh eyes, he felt renewed, and his heart stirred when he realized that the tune she was humming was the very same that he had heard on the
Shropshire
.

The short ride passed quickly for everyone, and soon enough the sound of boisterous, happy music signaled their arrival at the picnic grounds. The sound, yes, and the scent of spitted beefs and fresh bread and piping-hot berry cobblers. Simple, hardy fare, blending with the music of a people at play.

“I say,” Peter exclaimed as they stepped from the carriage, “these hardly seem the sounds of a people at war.”

“This is our day, good Captain,” Colleen volunteered, “to forget all that has been so harshly imposed on us. It'd be a mistake to interpret this as our customary mood.”

“Yours is a most peculiar interpretation, Colleen. One hardly fitting to be expressed in front of our honored guest, who—” But noise from the picnic diverted everyone's attention, and Buckley's reprimand was cut short.

Away for so long, hearing voices so familiar and, after his absence, so strange, Jason could barely contain his excitement. Right before his eyes, it seemed as if everything and everyone he'd forgotten were returning with a rush of fond recognition. Even the sound of the untutored band filled his heart with pleasure.

“Is this the American music of which you spoke so lovingly?” Peter asked, mopping the sweat from his forehead.

The light sarcasm didn't ruffle Jason in the least. His head was whirling with the crude, shrill notes of the piccolos and fifes, and the harsh bravado of brass. The execution was amateurish, but the feeling intoxicating. The music was utterly free-spirited, lacking in self-consciousness or pretense. This was a picnic, and here was picnic music, brash and wild as the wind, and here were well over a hundred people, most of whom he'd known since he was a child.

As word of Jason's presence spread, it seemed as if the entire picnic began to move away from its sundry activities—games and gossip, singing and dancing, and the preparation of enormous quantities of food—to greet him and separate him from Peter, Buckley, and Colleen. Farmers and artisans, school chums and teachers and friends of the family questioned him about his travels, and he asked after their welfare. The attention both delighted and embarrassed him. He grew alarmed only when old Chester Wills, a man who had worked for his father for decades, whispered in his ear, “You've come back in the nick of time, my boy. These Redcoats are running us over. If we don't strike back, and strike hard and now, we're doomed.”

Left alone, Peter was touched by the warmth of the reception given Jason, but even more by what to him was the bizarre nature of the gathering. Such an assembly, such a mixing of classes and styles, he reflected, would not be possible in England. Manual laborers in rough working clothes joked among themselves under a great weeping willow tree while, nearby, refined ladies in perfumed wigs strolled beneath dainty parasols. There were dandies and fishermen, wealthy landowners and struggling merchants, all moving about with a gaiety Peter concluded was amusingly and uniquely colonial.

And then … he saw her. Not clearly, for she was racing—now visible, now hidden—through the crowd toward Jason. Not clearly, for her features were obscured by the angle and the distance that separated them. Not clearly, for the sun was in his eyes. But clearly enough … clearly enough after months of waiting to know that her portrait hadn't misled him, and that his instincts had been right. His breath shallow and his steps so light that his feet seemed to float above the ground, he started toward her.

“Jase! Jase!”

Jason turned and was almost knocked over backward as Joy flew into his arms. “Oh, Jase, I've been so worried—afraid you'd change your mind and never come home.” Ecstatic, her eyes brimming, she wrapped her arms around him and pressed her cheek against his chest. “It is you, isn't it? Isn't it?”

Laughing, Jason moved her away, held her at arm's length and tilted her chin up. “Joy Exceeding,” he said, the rest of the crowd forgotten. “You look wonderful. You're different, and yet you seem the same.”

They both laughed at his inconsistency, the sort of easy, familiar laugh possible only between brother and sister.

Suddenly, a pair of hands covered Jason's eyes. “Have you been gone too long to recognize me?” asked a disguised voice.

“Hope Ellen!” he exclaimed as the hands dropped and he turned to face his sister.

Reluctant to interrupt their reunion, Peter stopped a few yards away. There were tears in Jason's eyes, tears he'd observed only once before, when, on a misty night in London, Jason had stood silently and listened reverently to an urchin street flautist, and then dropped sixpence into the lad's hat that lay on the pavement in front of him. The differences between his twin sisters, obviously not identical, were dramatic. Hope was the taller of the two, and there was a hardness to her dark brown eyes and plump beauty that her portrait hadn't revealed. Her hair was blond, a fact revealed by a stray wisp poking out from under her wig at the back of her neck. Her voice was strong and self-assured, the voice of a woman who knew exactly where she was going and what she was about.

But Joy! How insipid was her portrait in comparison to reality! Like a man dying of thirst, Peter drank her in. Everything about her was softly elegant. Her light green, laughing eyes set off a smile that would warm the heart of a stone. She was thin but delightfully curvaceous in a crepe gown the color of robin's egg blue. Her light brown hair—she was unwigged, curiously enough—curled about and framed her face in much the same manner as Jason's did. Her voice was tinged with a sweet, soft accent that was quietly but decidedly Southern. If he hadn't fallen in love with her as represented by her portrait, he decided, he surely should have when he saw her first in real life.

“Peter!” Jason called, noticing him and beckoning him to join them. “At long last you meet them. These are my sisters I've spoken of so often. Hope Ellen and Joy Exceeding”—his eyes flicked back and forth between Joy and Peter—“my good friend, Captain Peter Tregoning.”

“Friend?” Hope remarked with surprising sharpness as she stared at Peter's uniform.

“Yes. Peter and I were together in London for some time. He's a violinist himself and …”

“Here in the service of your king, are you, Captain?” Hope asked.

“Really, Hope,” Joy chided, compelled by some reason she didn't understand to defend him. “If he's Jase's friend, and a musician as well, he should be more than welcome to join our festivities.”

“You're kind to say so,” offered Peter, allowing his eyes to rest briefly on Joy's, “but I could scarcely call myself a musician, especially in the company of your distinguished brother. Now,
there's
a musician. He must tell you how he single-handedly conquered Europe's greatest concert halls.”

“That's a wild and irresponsible exaggeration, Peter,” Jason protested with a self-conscious laugh.

“My dear brother, you've always been far too modest. We want to hear about all your successes—every one of them,” Joy insisted, pleased that Peter seemed to admire her brother as much as she did. “Have you seen Father? He's here, you know.”

“No, I didn't know,” Jason said, a look of concern crossing his face. “That is, I assumed he would be, but—”

“Before we fetch him, Jase, there's something I'd like to tell you. Alone, if Joy and the captain won't be offended.”

Peter and Joy were pleased to be left to themselves as Hope took Jason by the arm and led him away. “So what is this?” Jason asked, in between greetings to those they passed. “A deep dark secret only half an hour after my arrival?”

Hope's stride lengthened as they broke free from the crowd. “Not really. I want you to meet my husband.”

“Husband? That's marvelous, Hope! Who is he? That Coleridge fellow you wrote me about?”

“Yes. Now hush.”

They stopped a few feet inside the shade at the edge of the forest bordering the meadow. “Allan?” Hope called in a loud whisper. “It's me. I've brought my brother, Jason, with me. He wants to meet you.”

“Over here,” a voice called in answer.

Jason followed as Hope bent aside a dogwood branch and ducked under a low redbud tree limb. “Why so mysterious?” he asked.

Hope stopped again, looked around. “Allan? Where are … Aii!” she yelped as a figure stepped out from behind a huge old hickory nut tree. “Don't do that! You want to give me an attack?”

Allan Coleridge was shorter than either Jason or Hope. Stoutly built with broad shoulders, chunky hands, arms, and legs, he had the look of a man hewn from logs. Piercing, slate-gray eyes and a shock of prematurely graying hair gave him a look of fierce determination. His clothes were of deer hide, making him blend in with the colors of the forest. “So you're Jason, eh?” he said.

“Most pleased to meet you,” Jason said, nodding in acknowledgment and shaking Allan's hand. “Hope's written me many good things about you. I'm honored to call you brother.”

When Allan spoke, he did so in spurts. “You've returned not a second too soon,” he said in an unschooled accent. “We're desperate for good men. Have you heard that Charleston's been taken?”

“I have,” Jason answered solemnly. “But not of the particulars.”

“The Green Dragoons, that's who they were. Traitors to our cause. Bloody Americans fighting on the side of Tarleton. Tarleton's a vicious son-of-a-witch who loves nothing more than murderin' his prisoners. Now he'd put Randall Embleton in charge of the city and everything to the south. Embleton! The bastard makes Tarleton look like a schoolmarm. He'd sooner skin a farmer than a cat. Well, this is one farmer he'll never catch! You see, there's the Continental Army, and bless them, 'cause they're brave boys dying for us every day, but there's also hundreds of us working alone or in small groups doing whatever damage we can by the dark of night when they least expect us, because, you see, no one knows these territories like the men who live in 'em.”

“For God's sake, Allan, keep your voice down,” Hope pleaded. “There's danger enough in your being here.”

“That's your fear, not mine,” Allan snapped peevishly. “Since I came to this colony from North Carolina some three years ago,” he went on, turning back to Jason, “I've lived my life openly, with nothing to hide. I staked out my own farm, made my own way, and if I fancy, I'll walk about this picnic area with my head as high as any man's.”

Hope paled. “You promised, Allan. Not until dark—”

“Any time I wish, woman. Any time.”

“Allan led a raid on the Crown's arsenal just outside Brand-borough two nights ago,” Hope whispered to Jason. “The arsenal's new, so the supply of guns and powder was small, but they got them all. What worries me is that we've reason to fear that Allan was spotted and recognized.”

“What reason? It's nothing but that womanly imagination of yours. We got clean away and we're going back as soon as the thievin' English resupply. What I want to know right off is,” he added, his eyes boring into Jason's and his voice as blunt as a cudgel, “are you with us?”

Caught off guard, Jason's hesitation alarmed his sister. “I … I'm a musician,” he explained lamely, “not a warrior.”

“I'm a farmer, but it's either fight or die, fight or give up all we've been working for. You can understand that, can't you?”

Seconds of silence passed. Jason's eyes fell to the soft, leaf-spongy earth underfoot. He could appreciate Allan's position, and in many ways was in complete sympathy. But their means to the same end must be different, for they themselves were cut from different bolts of cloth.

“Father said this would happen,” Hope said, disappointed. “He said they'd turn you into a Tory over there. Is it true, Jase? Tell me it isn't true.”