The Messenger (13 page)

Jeremiah

“What do you mean you couldn’t deliver the message? Was he not there?” Wouldn’t it be just my luck if Sgt. Addison had already died! I drew Hannah from the street over into a shadowed alley. It wouldn’t do for any to overhear our words.

She bit at her lip. “I do not know.”

“You don’t know.” The girl was beginning to exasperate me. Even more than she had in the past. “Because . . . ?”

“Because the men are separated into rooms. I asked for Robert, so they took me to his room.”

“And William Addison wasn’t in it.” I hadn’t thought of that. If I were going to be a spy, I needed to start thinking like one!

“I . . . don’t know.”

If I yelled at her the way I wanted to, I wasn’t sure I would be able to ask her to do anything at all for me again. Something about the way she held herself demanded respect. And vast reserves of patience. “All right. Fine. Let’s come at this from a different tack. What
do
you know?”

“I know that the guard who keeps the keys is a bully. I know that there are many more men in each room than there should be. They have little in the way of food, wood, or blankets.”

“The guard is a bully.” That I could have told her without ever setting foot inside the jail.

“The one who keeps the keys. And the other, the one who keeps the door, demanded that I give him the cheese I’d brought for Robert!” The flush that rode her cheeks had deepened with each word.

A man who was amenable to graft. Perhaps he could be bribed. A good thing to know, though it didn’t help at the moment. “So you don’t know if Sgt. Addison is in the same room as Robert?”

She shook her head.

“And you also don’t know where else he might—or might not—be?”

She shook her head.

“You don’t know, in fact, if he’s there at all.”

A bit of fight had come into her eyes. “And how was I to discover it? Did thee want me to ask?”

“No. Yes.” Blast it! There was a prison break being planned that the prisoners knew nothing about. And the whole of it depended upon them digging a tunnel. I closed my eyes against a worsening ache in my head. “Fine. Fine.” Everything was fine. “You’ll just have to wait a week until—”

“A week! But Robert is ill. I have to visit again tomorrow.”

“No one has visited that jail since November. How is it going to look if you suddenly begin visiting every day? And what would your parents say?”

“Do thee know what it’s like in there?”

I could guess. “Next Saturday. That’s when you should return.”

“That’s a whole—”

“Seven days. Yes. I know. You’ll go on Saturday, you’ll find out which room Sgt. Addison is in, and you’ll contrive to deliver the message.”

“Or . . . ?” The word rang with challenge.

“Or you might as well buy your brother a coffin. Unless he’s in on the escape, chances are he won’t come out of that jail alive.”

The following Saturday I walked up Walnut Street at half past four as Hannah walked down. We met at Fourth Street.

She paused just a moment as we passed. “William Addison wasn’t in Robert’s room, but I asked my brother to find out where he is. The next time I visit I will try to pass the message. But it would be easier if they were in the same room.”

And it would certainly be easier if I didn’t have to depend upon a girl to carry my messages.

“The escape will happen soon, won’t it?”

“As soon as it can.” As soon as they dug that infernal tunnel. They were already behind schedule.

“I think . . .”

“What?” Soon someone was bound to notice that we had paused.

“They don’t have much food.”

Much
food? “How much is not much?”

“They’re only being fed two or three times each week.”

“Sometimes prisoners complain—”

“And sometimes they die from starvation!” Her eyes were blazing with fire.

Starving prisoners weren’t likely to be able to dig their way to freedom. “I’ll have a bag of grain delivered to Pennington House. Can you smuggle in five pounds?”

“I can smuggle in ten.”

I rather doubted it. “I’ll have it delivered to . . . ?”

“To the stables. At half past three. Every seventh day.”

“Every Saturday, then.”

I watched her as she continued on down Walnut Street. If she weren’t so completely irritating, there might be something to admire in the lift of her chin. And in the determination that burned in her eyes.

“How is the courtship progressing?”

I started at the sound of John’s voice. “Courtship! What? Of her?”

“Come, Jonesy! Any man can see that you fancy her.”

“I don’t—” I bit back my words. If I was too convincing in my argument, then I would talk myself right out of my best ally.

“Tell Johnny what’s the matter, then.”

“Nothing’s the matter.”

“Then why are you staring at her as if she’s gone and dashed all your plans?”

Because she had.

“I’ve a way with the girls. I’m sure I could fix whatever’s gone wrong between you.”

I eyed him, wondering if perhaps he was right. Maybe he could fix everything. I let him lead me into my own tavern and then I let him order me up a drink.

“Now. Tell me the whole story.”

I shrugged as I tried to figure out how best to put him to use. Took a drink. Then another.

“Just say it, man!” Patience had never been his long suit.

“It’s her brother.”

“The rebel one?”

“The same.”

A furrow etched his brow. “She visited him, didn’t she?”

“Aye.”

“So she ought to be happy.”

“He’s complaining about this thing and that.” I tried to sound as if his complaints had no merit.

“He
is
in prison.”

“Which is what I told her. It’s not as if a man should expect to be treated as a gentleman when he betrays his King. General Howe might want to feed them now and then, though. Wouldn’t do to have the prison population die of starvation.”

“They’ll die soon enough of putrid fever or dysentery.”

My brow rose of its own volition.

“It’s going around. Again. So what has this to do with Miss Sunderland?”

“She thinks I ought to ask you to have him moved.”

“Moved? As if I were the general himself!” He smiled, seemingly bemused at the thought. I knew him well enough to know that he dreamed of being one someday.

“That’s what I told her.” I shook my head as if trying to rid myself of a disagreeable conversation. Then took another drink.

“To where?”

“To where, what?”

“Where did she want him moved?”

“Oh! Well, now. It’s rather complicated. I don’t know if I quite remember. There’s a cousin in the jail as well. Third or fourth. William something or other . . . Addison. That’s it: William Addison. Some distant relation. In any case, that’s where she’d want him to be. In this Addison’s room.”

“Why?”

“He’s a sergeant. She thinks her brother will get better treatment. But I told her . . .” I shrugged. “What can you expect if you take up arms against your King? What can any of them expect?”

“Traitors. They should all be hanged.”

“Exactly. I don’t see why she ought to have gone all peevish when I only told her the truth.” I tried to look exceedingly glum.

“That’s the problem with women. They refuse to see the truth, though it bite them on the nose.”

I shrugged. “That’s that, then.”

He eyed me over the rim of his mug. “She means that much to you?”

I held up my empty sleeve. “I don’t have many prospects.”

“Then I’ll see what I can do.”

“You don’t have to—”

“What’s the good of working for a general if you can’t intervene for a friend?” He was looking as if he might just do what I had asked. Rather, what he thought Hannah had asked.

“Just make certain—I mean—he’s not
my
brother.”

“Don’t worry. The general understands the affairs of the heart.”

Of course he did. Wasn’t he being bedded this winter by the delectable Mrs. Loring? As her husband counted the coin the arrangement had brought him? Another of the British army’s commendable traditions. Rewarding the married woman’s husband with favors. It was all so . . . respectable.

So respectably repugnant.

One more reason to despise them. Their officers and everything they stood for had gone rotten at the core.

John had fallen into the habit of supping at the King’s Arms, drinking heavily with his meal. The next Friday evening he rose from his table uncharacteristically early. “Time to be off.” He stumbled as he pushed from the table. Put a hand to it for support.

I crossed the room to steady him. “Aren’t you eating here tonight?”

“Can’t. I promised the lovely Miss Pennington that I would attend her party.”

Hannah’s cousin? Again? She didn’t need to get caught up in John’s vices. “What harm would it do to sober up a bit before you go?”

“And remember why I can’t make love to her in earnest?” He put a hand up to his wig, searching for the ribbon that bound his queue. Squared his shoulders. “Right then. Let’s be off.”

I handed him his hat.

He set it atop his curls. Glanced at me. “Where’s yours?”

“My what?”

“Your hat. We mustn’t be late. It’s not like England.”

“You’re the one who’s been invited, not I.”

“I told her we’d both come.”

“Then you told her in error and you can apologize for yourself when you see her.” If he was sober enough to remember.

“No, no. I always did best you in etiquette.”

“Though I beat you in charm.”

“Pity, ’tis true. Ah well.” He jammed his hand into the small of my back and nearly pitched me over with the gesture. “Where are your rooms, then?”

“They’re up the stair in the back. Why?”

“I’ve taken it upon myself as a challenge to see if I can’t bring the old Jeremiah Jones back to life.” He stiff-armed me toward the stair as he spoke.

“The old Jeremiah Jones is gone.”

“Bah! He’s just gone into hiding. I’m going to coax him out with some dancing and flirting. We’ll have Miss Sunderland blushing at your every glance before long.”

I had to take his arm to keep him upright. “You’re in no condition for dancing.”

“Then perhaps I shall just lure Miss Pennington into a dark corner and kiss her.”

“Her father is one of the pillars of this city.”

“Isn’t a fellow allowed to dream now and then?”

I stopped in front of my door but kept him pinned to the wall with my shoulder so he wouldn’t slide down onto his face.

“Is this it?”