War (29 page)

“Too well, Mr. Robbins. Did Mr. Frake send you for me?”

“No, sir. Mr. Hurry and I just thought you might be able to do something.”

The Caxton jail was a separate brick structure on the side of Sheriff Tippet’s house. It contained three contiguous cells, each six feet wide and deep. A high-walled yard enclosed the cell doors. Each door had a trap at
the bottom, through which Muriel Tippet, the Sheriff’s wife, fed prisoners, usually leftovers from the Tippets’ own meals. The doors also had barred openings at head height. Each cell contained a plank bed and a chair. The floors were dirt covered with straw.

When they arrived, they saw Sheriff Tippet standing with William Hurry, Morland’s steward, and George Roane, the under-sheriff, at the gate to the jail yard. Hugh dismounted, tethered his mount to a post, and walked furiously up to Tippet, forgetting that Robbins was with him.

Tippet saw the murderous look in Hugh’s face and braced himself as though he expected to be struck. Before Hugh could say anything, the sheriff said, “It wasn’t my doing, Mr. Kenrick! The committee voted on it, and I against it, but Mr. Cullis signed a court warrant, and there’s the gun that used to stand here that’s missing, too; it’s county property, and I cannot —”

“I wish to see Mr. Frake, Mr. Tippet,” was all that Hugh said.

“Of course, sir,” said Tippet, hurriedly taking a ring of keys from his belt. He turned nervously to unlock the yard gate, then led Hugh inside to one of the cell doors. The other men followed them.

Tippet stopped before the door. Hugh glanced at him. “Open it, please.”

Tippet sighed and unlocked the cell door.

Hugh saw Jack Frake sitting on the plank bed. One of his ankles was manacled with a chain to the cell wall. The chain was long enough to allow him to move around, even outside to the yard. He wore a frock coat — the very one Hugh had seen him wear the morning he departed for Boston on the
Sparrowhawk
— and his hat sat on the bed beside him.

Jack Frake looked at the men who stood at the door. He saw Hugh Kenrick and smiled. It was not the smile of a man who was glad to see a friend. The gray eyes were fixed on the master of Meum Hall, somber, critical, and wondering.

Hugh Kenrick sensed that something was terribly wrong other than that Jack Frake was sitting in jail. He stepped inside the cell. “Leave us alone, please.”

The other men moved back into the yard. Tippet closed the door, leaving it ajar.

“Jack,” said Hugh as he stood in front of the prisoner, “I’m getting you out of here. I’ll pledge my property as bail or bond, if necessary. And if they won’t accept that, I’ll demolish these walls to free you, even if it means killing Tippet or anyone else who stands in my way! Cullis, Vishonn, anyone!”

Jack Frake looked up at his friend with sadness and nodded.

Hugh came and sat on the bed beside him. He remembered the time when Jack Frake had once called on him, the evening of the day in Williamsburg he had lied to save Patrick Henry’s resolves.

Hugh studied Jack’s demeanor. “It must have been terrible, Jack. Charlestown, I mean.”

“It was terrible,” answered Jack Frake. “But necessary. We fought well. The Sons of Liberty gave a good account of themselves.” He permitted himself a chuckle. “We’re not all pen and paper,” he mused, recalling Colonel Stark’s compliment. “We were the only Virginians there.”

“Jude Kenny,” said Hugh. “He was killed?”

Jack Frake nodded. He pronounced the names of seven other men in the Company who had died. “Two on the way back, in Maryland. We were ambushed by loyalists. Drove them off. The war is in full tilt, Hugh. There’s no going back. The Congress might try to, so I hear…. ” He shook his head and let the sentence trail off.

“Mr. Proudlocks,” asked Hugh. “He is all right? And Jock Fraser?”

“They came through without a scratch. They’re home. Cletus and Travis, too. A ball grazed Will Kenny’s violin arm. We found a surgeon at Cambridge who patched it up. He had hoped to be buried beside his brother, when the time came. But we had to leave Jude behind on the field.” Jack Frake paused, then rose and paced once in front of his friend. The chain of the manacle dragged noisily through the straw. “Hugh, you may not want to post bail for me, or kill anyone, except me, when you hear what I have to tell you.”

Hugh frowned. It was not like his friend to give warning about what he was about to say. He would simply say what was on his mind, and let his listeners wrestle with the words.

“What?” asked Hugh.

“Your friend Roger Tallmadge is dead, as well. I killed him, during the third assault, as we were retreating up the hill.”

Hugh sat still. He asked softly, “I don’t understand, Jack.”

“He was there, Hugh.” Jack Frake refused to say more, refused to justify himself, or explain the circumstances. He stood looking down on his friend, his gray eyes cruel and waiting.

Hugh sat and tried to absorb the news. He remembered Roger’s last letter. He tried to speak, but his tongue and lips seemed frozen. After a moment, he managed to whisper hoarsely, “How?”

“He was leading a charge to drive us up the hill. I aimed at his heart and shot him.”

“Did you know… it was him?”

“Not until it was too late.”

After another long moment, Hugh asked, “Did he know…it was you?”

“I think so.” Jack Frake seemed to relent. “He faced it bravely, if that is any consolation to you. I know that much. And that he died instantly.”

“He was waiting to go home,” said Hugh, more to himself than to Jack Frake. “He was detained there because he chose to defend your home from the Customsmen, Jack. He could have been court-martialed for that. He did not want to be there…. ”

“He was there, Hugh. He paid the price for aiding the Crown in our conquest. He could have resigned his commission. He couldn’t both sympathize with our cause, and help to crush it, too.” Jack Frake added, after a pause, “He was the enemy.”

“He was my…brother.”

“Am I still yours?”

Hugh did not answer.

“Think what you wish, Hugh,” said Jack Frake with a sigh of finality. “I don’t regret having killed him. Only that he was your friend.”

Hugh rose abruptly, brushed blindly past Jack Frake, and left the cell. He did not stop to speak with the men waiting in the yard. He mounted his horse and rode off at a gallop. Citizens on Queen Anne Street who saw the horseman speeding toward them stepped lively out of his way.

H
e sat in the sand near the Meum Hall pier, leaning against a boulder on the beach beneath the bluff. He had ridden here from Caxton because he could not bear to see anyone else. On one hand, he was ashamed of himself for having fled the jail; on the other, he was frankly angry with Jack Frake. He did not then trust himself in the man’s presence. He was more than angry, he admitted to himself; a peculiar kind of rage had welled up in him when the fact of Roger Tallmadge’s death found a place in his mind. He had wanted to strike Jack Frake. But the violence of that action was stayed by a violent revulsion for committing it on such a man.

The rage still gripped him, a rage as hot and glowing as an iron bar from Henry Zouch’s forge. And in the seething turmoil of his emotions he found time and energy to shed some tears for Roger Tallmadge. He was torn between grieving for his friend, and smashing everything in his path.

But now, Jack Frake’s words kept resounding in his thoughts:
He was the enemy…. He was there.…I killed him…I aimed at his heart and shot him…. He was the enemy…. He was the enemy….

He knew he should adopt a greater vision of the matter. But the pain was as shattering as what he felt when his friends the Pippins all perished, and Glorious Swain, and Dogmael Jones. And when he knew he had lost Reverdy, once and for all. The pain of loss, and the cruelty of the circumstances of Roger’s death, would not let him think clearly. He knew he must. He sat forward and covered his face with his hands. His world was unraveling. Could he forgive Jack Frake? Could he forgive his own friendship with Roger? Could he forgive Reverdy, or himself for his marriage to her? The sounds of insects, and birds, and the river breezes gradually faded from his consciousness as Hugh Kenrick reached down to the depths of his soul in a desperate effort to quench the heat of the rage.

After a timeless moment, he felt a presence near him. Startled, he glanced up and saw that John Proudlocks had appeared and was sitting beside him, resting back against the boulder. Hugh did not know how long he had been there. His friend held the stem of a licorice plant in one hand and was casually chewing on it. His mount was tethered to a post of the
pier, together with his own mount. Proudlocks tossed the licorice stem aside and smiled at Hugh with an oddly lighthearted solemnity.

“I recognized your friend before Jack did, on that hill in Charlestown,” said Proudlocks without greeting or preamble. “I was certain something like this would happen, once we returned. I have known it for many years.” He paused. “Mr. Hurry came to tell me about Jack, after you left the jail. I have spoken with Jack.”

When Hugh looked away and did not respond, Proudlocks said, “The gorget you gave him in Yorktown that morning saved his life, for I am sure the ball that struck it would have found his heart, instead, just as Jack’s shot found your friend’s. You ought to ask him to show the thing to you. I know him well enough that he will not offer to show it himself. You know he is not a boastful man. A British ball struck the hilt of his scabbard, too, smashing the catch and trapping his sword. Not that he ever had a chance to use it, that awful day. There is also a ball hole in the left cuff of the coat he wore then. He did not notice it until I pointed it out to him.”

Hugh remained silent. Proudlocks continued. “I am fond of you and Jack both, my friend, but I am fonder of him, for he gave me life. I will tell you about that someday. I do not ask you to find it in your heart to forgive him. I ask you to find it in your mind, for I have observed this in both of you and in others, and even in myself: that which resides in the heart, must first be sired in the mind.” He paused, and smiled in reflection. “He is a unique man, Mr. Kenrick. So many others carelessly shipwreck themselves on the rock of his soul. Others see the danger, and come about to flee before their own fragile souls are ruptured on its unyielding strength. I am not sure this is the right word for what he is, or what he possesses — a
soul
. Perhaps it is his spirit, or character.”

For some reason, Proudlocks’s presence was reassuring and tempering. Hugh had always envied the man’s infectious tranquility. “A spirit, or a soul, or a character,” he mused out loud, speaking slowly, choosing his words, and he spoke more to himself than for his companion’s benefit, “is a man’s cargo of virtues, uniquely and singularly framed.” He was staring at the patch of water near the pier, where Reverdy had stood and waited for him to come to her, a long time ago. He was thinking of her words, and why she had rejected him, twice.

Proudlocks laughed. “Ah! You must settle on a genus among so many examples, but there is a definition not to be found in Mr. Johnson’s
Dictionary
! My compliments, my friend!” He paused. “Do not flee him, Mr. Kenrick.
It was important to Jack that he told you about Captain Tallmadge.”

Hugh glanced at Proudlocks, and thought, “He needn’t have.” And just as he thought it, he glanced away swiftly in self-rebuke. He knew that Jack Frake was incapable of deceit or cowardice.

But Proudlocks seemed to read the thought, and shook his head. “You slander his character with the thought, my friend. And belittle yourself. Jack is no false cambist. He wishes you to remain his friend, on honest and frank terms, as you have always been. He credits you with so much, Mr. Kenrick. As do I. Please credit him with…what is that wonderful word I encountered lately in Mr. Burke’s
The Sublime and Beautiful
?… yes, credit him with the rectitude.”

“Roger represented my youth, Mr. Proudlocks.” Hugh was thinking out loud, and back to all the people who had abruptly vanished from his life. Hulton. Reverdy. Dogmael Jones. And now Roger. “We were brothers.”

Proudlocks sighed. “Many things will perish in the days ahead of us — brothers, friends, and friendships. It is an entailing risk. These are terrible but needful times.” He frowned. “I know that you considered Captain Tallmadge your brother, Mr. Kenrick, and that you shared with him a fruitful childhood. Just as I consider Jack my brother, for the same reason. But, between Jack and Captain Tallmadge, which man would you choose as a greater sibling in spirit to you? You must decide that.”

After a while, Hugh asked, “Did
he
ask you to see me?”

“No,” answered Proudlocks. “He merely related the substance of your last meeting.”

“They want to try him for treason, Mr. Proudlocks. That means a hanging.”

Proudlocks laughed in dismissal of the idea. “He will not be available long enough for them to read him the charge.”

“Does it not trouble you to see him chained to a wall, as though he were a common horse thief?”

Proudlocks shrugged. “It troubled me, at first, when I saw him like that, but not overly so.” He smiled again. His smile was disarming. Hugh could never resist it. “He will be free again.”

He did not elaborate. He seemed to reach a decision about Hugh, and rose. “Well, I must go to visit a friend.” He slapped Hugh on a shoulder once. “Yes, Mr. Kenrick. Your gorget saved his life. You would do well to think of its inscription. It will save yours, too.” And without further word he walked away to mount his horse. Then he rode back up the rolling road
of Meum Hall and disappeared behind the trees.

Hugh turned around and stared into the distance. He asked himself: Did the pain and rage come from the loss of a friend, or because a friend had caused that loss?

And Proudlocks was right. In the end, which would be the greater loss? He knew he was not meant to shipwreck himself on the soul of Jack Frake.

He remembered the inscription on the gorget:
Sapere aude. Have the courage to use your own reason
. “Have the will to think,” he mused, would be a better construction. Hugh Kenrick smiled. His tutors would have given him an argument about that translation, had he proposed it to one of them. He was remembering a day long ago and the words he had spoken then to Reverdy:
A mind can accrue honor, too, and carry its own colors, and be proud of its traditions and history…I am an ensign in our country’s most important standing army — for how secure can a country be without its thinkers?
I am a thinker, and this is a new country.

Hugh Kenrick sobbed, then cried — in relief, because he had come so close to betraying that idea, but had not betrayed it, because he knew he could not; in joy, because he had betrayed neither himself, nor his past, nor all the wonderful things in it; in pride, because he was still the owner of his life and of all its glory.

* * *

Jared Hunt was suddenly and quite astonished with the scope of his power to plan and command, once he was given leave to act. He did not think he could return to his old role of being his patron the Earl of Danvers’s secretary and factotum. Here before him, trying with only some success to repress their fear and dislike of him, were several men who were wealthier and formerly more powerful than he, sitting in guilty deference to his words and wishes.

“I shall seize Morland Hall in lieu of Mr. Frake’s armed rebellion and treason,” he announced to them. “In addition, there is the likelihood that he profited from the false documents produced by the
Sparrowhawk
’s captain. According to Mr. Geary, the former captain of that vessel was a John Ramshaw, now retired. I shall not pursue him, for that is not my object.” He stopped to grin. “My object lesson is to impart, in no uncertain terms, to all who may be tempted to emulate him, or sympathize with him, that such behavior as Mr. Frake’s will earn severe and final punishment for
deceiving and defrauding the Crown and raising one’s hand against it. I am not for deferring to judges and writs and such in the administration of justice in such matters, when the crime is so obvious.”

Around a table inn a private room of the Swan Tavern in Yorktown, sat Jared Hunt, Edgar Cullis, Reverend Albert Acland, Reece Vishonn, Carver Gramatan, and Sheriff Cabal Tippet. It was two days after Jack Frake’s arrest and incarceration. An exchange of notes by courier between Hunt in Hampton and Cullis in Caxton had caused the parties to agree to meet in the establishment, at Hunt’s tactfully strenuous suggestion. He wished to apprise the committee of safety of his appreciation and plans.

“I tell you this so that you will not be troubled when the Customs sails up the York and our men appear in your town. When do you think you can dispose of Mr. Frake?”

“We are scheduling a special trial to take place in two days, Mr. Hunt,” said Edgar Cullis.

Reece Vishonn volunteered, “He raised a militia company in defiance of my authority, Mr. Hunt. I am colonel of this county’s lawful militia. Mr. Frake’s independent company is no better than a vigilance band, organized around another illegal assembly, the Sons of Liberty. They absconded with county militia arms, powder, and equipment.”

“Much of it was expended on that band’s expedition to Boston,” remarked Carver Gramatan.

Sheriff Tippet was tempted to interject, “And they fought with all those other rebel bands in Charlestown, a month ago.” But he said nothing. Until Crown authority was restored in Williamsburg, he owed his position to Reece Vishonn and the authority of the county court.

“The hubris of him!” exclaimed Hunt. “He is deserving of the severest penalty! I shall see to it that his estate reimburses your county for the damages and costs. Excellent, gentlemen,” said Hunt.

Reverend Acland spoke up. “Sir, when you seize Morland Hall, there is an important matter of my compensation.”

Hunt nearly laughed at the idea. “Compensation? For what, dear sir?”

“You see, Mr. Hunt, for some time, years, in fact, Mr. Frake has been lax in paying our parish tithes. Neither the vestry nor the county court pressed him on the matter.” Acland threw a reproving glance at Reece Vishonn, who was both a vestryman and a magistrate, and had recommended that Morland Hall not be dunned for the taxes. Vishonn glanced away and said nothing. “That negligence apparently was on the advice of another magistrate,
the late Thomas Reisdale. Then there is the matter of Mr. Kenrick and Meum Hall. Lord Kenrick is guilty of his own passel of offences. Through some infernal legalistic trick he freed his slaves, removing them from our right to lay tithes on them. He was explicitly exempted from tithes, also by the vestry and court, and also on the advice of Mr. Reisdale.”

Hunt frowned. “How could he free his slaves, Reverend? The law in this colony is quite clear that he cannot.”

“He accomplished it through some ruse with Quakers and the Earl of Danvers. It was the Earl of Danvers who nominally owned them, and then freed them, or sold them to a Quaker, who freed them. Perhaps it was the other way round. The event caused a sensation here, but was never investigated.” Acland paused. “Mr. Kenrick is a nephew of the Earl, so I understand. He is a baron.”

For the first time in a long while, Hunt was speechless. He sat and stared at the minister for a moment, then glanced around the table to the others in silent question. All the men nodded in confirmation of the truth of the minister’s statement. Hunt remarked, “A baron, you say? Well, that is not the same thing as an earl.” He grunted once in amazement, and looked at Cullis. “Well, sir, there is a bit of twaddle my informants neglected to pass on to me.”

For a moment, Jared Hunt forgot his company. What news this was! he thought. He would write the Earl about it! Imagine what a frothy delirium it would cause in the old bastard! Hunt wondered if the Earl’s brother, Garnet Kenrick, had had a hand in the ruse. Doubtless, he had. He wished he could witness the bout between the brothers over that matter! What entertainment that would be!

Cullis replied, “There is that matter of Reverend Acland’s, sir, in addition to all the treasonous statements Mr. Kenrick has made in the House about the Crown, and His Majesty.” He paused. “If His Excellency the Governor could pronounce Patrick Henry an outlaw, I fail to see why Mr. Kenrick cannot likewise be so called. He has contributed mightily to the disaffection so evident in this colony. He has not merely spoken against the Crown, but written seditious pamphlets, as well.”