Milady at Arms/Chapter 16
ONE morning Sally sat up and looked about her blinkingly. Where was she? This was not her little room beneath the eaves at Master Todd's! Nor was it the room she had shared with one of the younger Williams children at the Tory Corners house! Then remembrance rushed upon her, and she lay down again with a smile.
She was in the built-in bed between the chimney and the wall which she had been sharing with Mistress Ball in the long room directly over the kitchen of the Ball house. The bed was like a modern Pullman car berth, partitioned off from the rest of the bedchamber by wood and entered through a narrow door which could be latched behind the occupants. A tiny window, directly over the kitchen door, through which General Washington had escaped with his horse the May evening of Sally's arrival, gave both light and air to the queer cubbyhole, while the great chimney at the girl's feet in winter time might have been very pleasant with its heat, but this rather warm autumn morning was quite superfluous, for Indian summer had come upon New Jersey.
Presently, a noise in the room outside the built-in bed seemed to indicate that Sally had overslept. She sat up and, pushing open the door, laughingly thrust out her nightcapped head. It was Rachel Ball, busily mopping up the wide, uneven floor boards, who greeted her.
"Overslept?" repeated Rachel, in answer to Sally's sleepy question. "Well, not much, my dear. 'Tis six o'clock, of course; but Mother and Uzal got up extra early—four o'clock—for Uzal be going to Morris Town this day."
"Aye?" Sally sprang out and began to dress, shivering a little when the morning breeze struck her through a window Rachel had opened to air the room.
"Aye," returned Rachel idly, eying the glorious mop of curls Sally kept thrusting impatiently up beneath her nightcap. "What hair ye have! 'Tis really a most unusual shade, Sally!"
"The Holden red!" quoted Sally ironically.
"What?" Rachel glanced at her, wrung out her wet floor cloth, and swished it briskly over the floor.
"Nothing!" exclaimed Sally hastily. "I was but jesting! Go on, Ray!"
"H'm, where was I?" Rachel bent her brow.
"Ye said Uzal was going to Morris Town," Sally reminded her.
"Oh, aye! Well, that case o' the red-coat comes up before the Council o' Safety to-day; ye know, the young red-coat who escaped and was caught i' Newark not many weeks ago. Since Master Todd be not yet home, Sheriff Carmichæl hath requested Uzal to appear as a witness against the youth. And so"
But here Rachel stopped short and stared. Sally had scrambled into her gown and had shot out of the door and down the three steps into the central hall and thence down the porch steps like a rabbit trying to escape the swoop of a hawk. Her clear young voice presently floated up to Rachel Ball's listening ears.
"Uzal! Oh, Uzal, take me wi' ye to Morris Town!"
"Well"—Rachel shook her head critically—"must say the lass lacks not boldness, forsooth!"
Downstairs, beneath the big walnut tree, Uzal, already mounted upon his horse, though still conversing with his mother, looked with amused eyes at Sally's dishevelled figure flying toward him. The Widow Ball turned in surprise and some displeasure.
"Why, Sally, whatever put such an idea i' your head?" she said reprovingly.
But Uzal came unexpectedly to Sally's help. "Let her come, Mother! The company will be pleasant for me, and I will vouch her safe return! Besides, now that I think o't, she might be needed as a witness, though the sheriff did not mention bringing her," he said.
Mistress Ball hesitated as she glanced at Sally's beseeching face. "But the lass has had no breakfast!" she protested.
Sally clasped her hands. "Give me but a little bread—'twill be more than enough!" she pleaded, and at last Mistress Ball, who had the kindest heart in the world, nodded her head.
"Best take your cape, Sally. We may return late, and these nights sometimes turn cool!" advised Uzal then. "I will go and saddle another horse while ye make ready!"
Half an hour later, they were trotting out of Millburn village, well on their way along the narrow bridle path to what is Morris turnpike at this present day. Now, when they reached it, they found it to be a country road much like the lane which led past the Ball house; but it was wider than the bridle path through the Short Hills and here they could trot side by side. Along they went, up over the Sow's Back at Summit, the ridge Washington used as a signalling station for the Continental Army, through Chatham village, over the Bottle Hill at Madison, and so on into Morris Town.
Wending their way into that lovely village, nestled among its hills, Uzal guided his horse directly to the Arnold Tavern, which had been used by General Washington for his headquarters during the previous winter. Sally, waiting outside upon her horse while Uzal entered the inn, glanced up curiously at the windows of the room used by His Excellency as a bedroom. This room, as well as a second small room he used as his office, adjoined the long assembly room over the inn kitchen—the assembly room which was to be used afterward, during the army's second winter quartering at Morris Town, for the fetes and routs planned by the gay young French and American officers stationed there.
Presently, Uzal emerged from the tavern and pointed at the windows at which Sally had been gazing. "Did ye know that, i' that modest little room. His Excellency was lying sick almost unto death last winter?" he asked. "He was so ill that 'twas rumored he had selected his successor. General Greene, when Madame Washington arrived and nursed him back to health!"
"What a good wife she must be, despite her wealth!" exclaimed Sally, staring back over her shoulder at the tavern as they trotted away toward the Morris Town green.
"Wealth has naught to do wi' it," answered Uzal, smiling. "Mayhap ye will ha' opportunity to peep into those rooms later, Sally, which some day will be famous, for I ha' made arrangements to return there for dinner wi' Master Arnold."
"Oh, that will be fun!" Sally gave an excited little bounce in her saddle. She was destined, however, as we shall see, not to visit the little tavern rooms that day.
Drawing rein before the court house upon the village green, Uzal alighted from his horse. "Ye might walk about the green while I be inside, Sally," he suggested.
Sally looked at him in keen disappointment. "Am I not going inside," she inquired dismally.
Uzal could not resist a smile at her doleful face. "Not yet," he consoled her. "I must first see an ye can be admitted."
Sally had scarcely turned away when he came to the court-house door and beckoned to her. As soon as she came up to him, having turned back and discovered his crooked finger, he spoke dryly: "'Tis well I brought ye. Your name be upon the list o' witnesses against the red-coat, Sally. My friend John Martin, who be door man here, did show me."
"Against Jerry?" Sally stopped short upon her way into the court house and looked up innocently at her escort. "Why, Uzal, be that why ye came to Morris Town?"
"Aye." Uzal looked at her keenly, but her face showed only bland surprise. Taking her by the arm, the young man led her past the doorkeeper into the court room where, seating herself upon the edge of the chair, Sally gazed about her curiously.
Five men were seated in the big room, while a sixth, clad in the uniform of a Continental officer, was upon his feet, speaking, obviously summing up orders just given verbally to him by the chairman of the council.
"This being correct. Governor Livingston, Mr. Condict, gentlemen, I bid ye good-morning," finished the officer. He bowed and was gone, and the governor, who had come from Elizabeth Town to preside at this meeting, turned to the newcomers and bowed sternly in response to Uzal, who rose to his feet and bowed respectfully in his direction.
"Master Uzal Ball"—the governor glanced down at a paper lying before him upon the table—"wilt kindly relate the circumstances surrounding the arrest o' one Gerald Lawrence listed here as Tory spy serving i' His Majesty's Army."
Uzal did so, in simple, straightforward language which Sally could not help noticing impressed his hearers. He did not, however, correct the impression that Jerry was a Tory and a spy!
"Thank you, sir," said Governor Livingston, when Uzal came to a stop. "Now, mistress, please tell me what ye know o' the case. Ye are listed as bond maid, serving i' Master Todd's family at the time o' this Tory's first arrest. Is this true?"
"Aye, sir, true enough concerning me," responded Sally in her low, clear voice, "but not true regarding Master Lawrence!" She raised her head and looked steadily at the governor. Uzal suppressed an exclamation and half arose to his feet. As the others glanced curiously at him, he flushed a dull red and reseated himself. Sally was conscious of his burning glance upon her during the rest of her recital; but she kept on, speaking slowly and distinctly and trying to marshal her facts to bring about belief in her statements, for Jerry was her friend and Jerry must not go to the sordid death of a hangman's noose on Morris Town green. "Not true about Master Lawrence, sir! He is an Englishman, sir, enlisted overseas, the ward o' Lord Holden, according to his own statement, and entitled, since he wore his uniform and was arrested as a British officer, to being treated as prisoner o' war, not as a Tory or a spy, sir!"
Governor Livingston adjusted the spectacles he wore and stared down at the paper before him. "Why, this be strange!" he exclaimed. "Here be Gerald Lawrence, Tory, and committed to the jail as such. Who escorted the prisoner to the Town by the River? Did you, Master Ball? This be your name I think, signed to these papers."
"I did escort the prisoner to Newark, in lieu o' Master Todd, who, an I remember, had to return home unexpectedly because o' an accident to his wife. But I did not commit him to jail, sir, for he escaped. Afterward, he was recaptured—'twas the battle at Newark when he was arrested by one Master Alling, sir. He was listed as Tory afterward, at my request, for I believe him to be Tory! As for his fabulous tale o' being a ward o' Lord Holden's, sir—ha, that rich, indeed! He be naught but a spy, sir, and" But here Uzal, who had leaped to his feet and ranted this out in a loud voice, was interrupted by the governor.
"I believe I ha' asked ye but the one question, which ye did answer, Master Ball," he said ironically. "What ye believe, sir, does not concern any o' this council. Have the prisoner brought before us, Master Martin, so that we may form our own beliefs!" He turned to the doorkeeper; but before Master Martin could move, Uzal's voice rang out triumphantly.
"The prisoner be lying ill unto death wi' the plague," he said.
Governor Livingston frowned. "He hath the smallpox?" he questioned.
Uzal nodded. "Aye, sir."
"Where is he confined."
"I' the Presbyterian church, sir, which the army ha' been using as a hospital for the plague wi' Parson Johnnes's permission," answered Uzal.
"How knew ye o't?" Governor Livingston looked at the young farmer quite sharply over his spectacles.
Uzal flushed, but answered readily enough. "Master Arnold told me, sir, o' the facts. I cannot say how he knew, but gossip ever makes its rounds, sir."
Governor Livingston tapped the table as he pondered, then he glanced dryly at his colleagues. "Gentlemen, 'tis strange ways we receive our information at times. Tap-room gossip is not always o' the brew! I suggest that Master Martin be sent to verify this news o' the prisoner and later report to us. Also report why we were not sooner informed o' this Lawrence's illness." He looked inquiringly at the others, who nodded. "Then, gentlemen, we are adjourned for the noon hour and will convene this afternoon at two. Master Ball, you and the young lady also are requested to appear here at that hour." And Governor Livingston arose from behind his table with an air of relief.
Sally glanced more than once at Uzal's dark, set face as they mounted their horses and rode back to the Arnold Tavern. She was sincerely sorry to have offended the young man, both on his mother's account and on his, for he had been very kind to the little bond maid during the time she had been staving at the Ball house. But her whole sense of justice cried out against what he had tried to do. She tried hard, as she rode along beside Uzal Ball, to believe that he had performed this wrong from a mistaken sense of patriotism, that he had actually believed Gerald Lawrence to have been lying when telling of his guardian, Lord Holden. Yet Sally was going to try her best to keep Uzal from performing a crime in the guise of patriotic zeal, the crime of convicting Jerry Lawrence of being a traitor against a country whose citizenship he had never claimed.
Uzal spoke shortly to her when they drew rein before the Arnold Tavern. "Stay upon your steed, Sally. I be going in to countermand my order for dinner here and go over to Dickerson's Tavern. Governor Livingston is to dine here and 'twould not be pleasant to remain, under the present circumstances."
Plainly Uzal was smarting beneath a sense of hurt, because his word had been doubted by the governor. As for Sally, the meager breakfast she had partaken of had left her ravenously hungry, and she could only hope that Captain Dickerson's cook would not keep them waiting long.
As they turned their horses' heads toward Dickerson's, on what is now Spring Street at the corner of Water Street, Sally looked with interested eyes at the fine-appearing inn, with its many large windows across the front of the building, with its beautiful door and the inevitable Colonial decoration of side lights and fan-shaped glass over the door, and with the iron railings that ran across the large stone stoop, forcing one to use the steps which had been built at one side of the stoop. A large well, with the picturesque well sweep of those days, together with the great chimneys of the inn, completed this picture of snug prosperity in 1777.
Inside the inn there was an air of cool peace in contrast to the bright sunshine and busy scene outside, and presently the unexpected guests were summoned to a bountifully spread dinner which satisfied even Sally's sharp appetite.
Captain Dickerson, a fine-looking man of about fifty-three, a member of the Provincial Congress in 1776, was present. Stealing furtive glances at him from beneath her long lashes, Sally was at last surprised in one, and she blushed when he smiled. Uzal spoke at that moment, however, and the host shifted his gaze to the young man.
"I understand," said Uzal, "that your company—the Fifth Company, Third Battalion, was it not?—was the one whose men reënlisted in a body that time last year when so many men declined to reënlist?"
Captain Dickerson smiled at this heavy compliment; but he acknowledged it with only a slight bow and then went on modestly to speak of other matters. Sally, noting how this was lost upon Uzal, who tried persistently to bring back the subject, thinking to please the other, thought at once of Jerry Lawrence and his quick, delicate perception. She sighed as she thought sadly of the young Englishman lying so sick at this moment among strangers!
Raising her glance, her eyes rested inadvertently upon a lackey who had entered just then and was bending over Captain Dickerson to deliver a message. Sally stared. There was something familiar about that back! Then, as the man turned around, their eyes met. It was Stockton!
At once the Tory leaped toward the window, but Sally was at his heels. Seizing his coat, she cried out to the astonished Captain Dickerson, who was staring at this strange behavior of his servant. It took only a second for Uzal and the host to recover their wits; but during that second Stockton slipped out of the sleeves of the coat Sally was grasping and, leaping through the open window, was away.
"A spy!" gasped Sally, half crying. "A Tory spy, sir! Oh, why," she wrung her hands bitterly, "why did not someone stop him!"
At that moment a shot down the village lane rang out. The girl's hands dropped slowly to her sides. The two men stared at each other. Then Captain Dickerson stepped to the window and looked out. "Mistress," he said then, turning around, "there is no spy left now, to our knowledge, i' Morris Town! Someone other than yourself must have suspected this servant's identity!"
"Ye mean" Sally's face whitened with horror. What the other meant seemed impossible in the sweet, bright sunshine! It could not possibly be true!
"I mean the man ye dubbed a spy has gone to his final accounting," returned Captain Dickerson soberly. "He has but now been shot by an American soldier. Wilt look?" And he stepped aside for Sally to see.
"Nay!" Sally covered her face with her hands and shrank away. "Oh, this dreadful war!" she half sobbed.
Uzal moved forward impatiently. "There be better causes for weeping than the death o' a Tory spy, Sally," he said harshly. "Come, we must be returning to the court house!"
This dreadful war! All of its somber gloom seemed invested in the court room when Sally and Uzal resumed their places there. Clouds in the blue sky through the small, many-paned windows were blotting out the sunshine; and as Governor Livingston came in and took his chair to resume the trial, a quick patter of raindrops beat in a little gust against the window glass.
Soon the name of Gerald Lawrence was called out, and the doorkeeper stepped to the front. "I beg leave to report to your honor that the statement that Gerald Lawrence be confined to the hospital wi' the plague be true, sir," he said, in a level voice.
"Then he is not able to appear before this council?" Governor Livingston scowled.
The doorkeeper shook his head. "He is dying, sir!"
There was a shocked moment of silence. Sally's eyes crept across a crack in the ceiling—what a crooked crack it was! Jerry was dying! Through a daze the words came to her. Jerry was dying—her friend! This dreadful war! All the sunshine was blotted out! But, no, that was the weather—just a shower—the sun would come out again, if not to-day, then to-morrow. But, Jerry—why, she might never see that nice smile again, that flash of white teeth and the merry brown eyes! It was Jerry, her friend, who the doorkeeper had said was dying! She turned a blank gaze upon Governor Livingston, rose mechanically to her feet when the governor briefly dismissed them, and thanked Uzal for coming from the Mountain settlement to testify.
Uzal, silently helping her upon her horse after carefully cloaking her, felt a little pang of pity at sight of her pale, set young face. She was young, after all, prone to make mistakes. His pity melted the bitterness he had felt toward her for trying to testify for instead of against the young red-coat! After all, he thought, the lad had not been half bad. He was pleasant enough, though—and here Uzal's lips thinned fanatically—he should be restrained, of course. And Sally, warm-hearted, impetuous, was only to blame as a friendly little kitten might be blamed, not sternly, certainly not punished.
So, as they plodded through Morris Town on horseback, with the rain beating down upon them, Uzal was careful to converse lightly, to point out all the places of interest. That was Parson Johnnes's house—yes, that fine-looking one—and there the orchard where he had held services for the soldiers outdoors behind his house while his church was being used as a hospital for their fellows. And here was the home o' Parson Johnnes's daughter, now Mistress. Theodocia Ford, the widow o' that wonderful officer Colonel Jacob Ford. All the winter of 1777, General Washington's bodyguard had been stationed in her mansion, fairly near to the Arnold Tavern.
Sally raised her somber glance to the Ford mansion as they passed it. It was a fine big house, typical of that period with its great chimneys upon each end and its wide center door indicative of the wide central hallway inside. It stood upon an eminence with beautiful grounds surrounding it.
But Sally's glance did not linger. Once more she fell to picturing poor Jerry lying upon a pallet, upon the floor of the Presbyterian church; and she neither noticed nor cared what Uzal was saying. What was it all about, she asked herself again? Her best friend dying without friends and poorly cared for, and a Tory spy shot before her eyes!
It was a long, tiresome trip back to the Mountain. The rain did not add to the travelers' comfort, and even the horses ambled along, mile after mile, in a discouraged manner. Uzal, never talkative at best, soon gave up his concerned efforts to arouse and interest Sally, and sank into a silence as deep as her own.
At last the gleam of candelight through his own windows drew an exclamation from him. Pointing to a couple of horses tied to the walnut tree in front of the house, he spoke: "There must be visitors here, Sally, so come, arouse yourself. Let them not see ye wi' the megrims, thus!"
"Aye, Uzal!" Sally sighed forlornly, slipped cheerlessly down her horse's side. But when she entered the kitchen door and saw the visitors gathered around Mistress Ball's supper table, her expression of gloom lifted and she went forward almost with her own happy air. "Why, Parson Chapman, 'tis you! And you, Mistress Van Houten!" She curtseyed in surprise to the latter.
"Good-even, Sally!" said Mistress Van Houten kindly.
Parson Chapman held out his hand to the girl, who placed her own shyly within it. "Sally," he began abruptly. "How would ye like to go back wi' Mistress Van Houten?"
"This night?" questioned Sally, in amazement.
"Nay," interrupted the Widow Ball hospitably, "ye must not think o' returning this rainy night!"
But Parson Chapman shook his head. "We thank ye very kindly. Mistress Ball," he responded. "We must return to the Town by the River. Ah, Uzal!" The minister broke off to greet the young man who had entered gravely, at that moment, after having put his horses away in the barn. "Nay, we cannot tarry, rain or no rain. I have an engagement to-morrow, as hath Mistress Van Houten. We do not mind the rain, and I promised Mistress Todd to return to her friend's house in Newark. We," he smiled broadly, glancing mysteriously at Sally, "we have business wi' the lady."
Rachel Ball leaned forward with a pretty gesture of excitement. "Nay, Parson Chapman, ye be too cruel to arouse our curiosity thus!" she protested with a charming pout.
Everyone glanced from the minister to Sally and back again. Even David Ball grinned with excited interest, while Uzal kept his steady gaze upon Parson Chapman's face.
"Shall I tell?" queried the minister, enjoying the fun as much as anyone. He paused tantalizingly, after Mistress Van Houten had nodded laughingly. "'Tis this!" said Parson Chapman at last. "Mistress Todd this night is to bestow her freedom upon Sally here! We are to meet in an hour or so's time to sign the articles!"
"Free!" Sally clasped her hands, staring at the minister. Slowly her eyes filled with tears. "Why, then—why, then—I shall be like other maids! I shall—shall be—like—other maids!" she said.