will see in the morning that the rebels have been defeated, run off without a single loss of a British soldier.”
“ I hope so,” said Jake, sounding sincere.
The conversation turned to lighter matters, and by some inevitable but untraceable process, came to be dominated by van Clynne.
“ Do you know how many pigs there are in New York? Said the Dutchman, complaining about the city’s hodgepodge development. “They outnumber the people. And why? Because the English have no sense of order. They let things go willy-nilly, unlike the Dutch. When this was New Amsterdam, believe me, not a tulip row was misplaced.”
“ Are you getting tired?” interrupted Jake, seeking to put van Clynne’s mind back on the plan, which called for him to make his way to bed. “You look like you’re getting tired.”
“ Not in the least.”
“ I’m tired,” said the British captain. “It’s time to get to sleep. I’ll just check on the men.”
“ I’ll go with you,” said Herstraw, rising. They were joined by the lieutenant, who walked behind the two men a bit like a younger brother tagging along after school.
“ I think I’ll get a breath of fresh air before I turn in,” said Jake, stretching his arms as he rose — and making some desperate gestures to van Clynne in an effort to get him to arrange things with Roelff.
The Dutchman’s memory was not faulty, just highly selective. He could easily recite the names of ninety percent of the Dutch inhabitants of New York City and the northern counties. He could tell you which of them owed him money, the terms, and when it was expected to be paid back.
He could not do nearly so well, however, with the amounts he owed to the, at least not voluntarily. Likewise when it came to a plan he did not particularly endorse, his knowledge of details tended to fade.
Roelff’s upstairs rooms being relatively small, they were all equipped with only one bed. Now, van Clynne, a seasoned traveler and very much used to sharing his bed, with or without the convenience of a bed board to separate him from the fellow next to him. But he had always managed to avoid crawling between the covers with a British soldier. There was something in his constitution that found it naturally abhorrent; between his displeasure and the recent bath — let us say his mind had lapsed.
Unaware of these moral objections, Jake stretched in front of the house, made as if her were yawning, and then quietly snuck through the bushes, listening as the officers talked about the two Loyalists they had just met.
They had accepted his story to a point; Herstraw believed “that tall colonist was a definite coward, obviously running away from the rebel draft with a story weaker than his stomach.” In his opinion, “the fat one is some sort of roving thief; best keep your valuables well guarded tonight.”
It the king knew he was wasting British blood on such as these, Herstraw added, he would quickly recall his troops.
Having assured themselves that all was in order and the guard strong, the Englishmen returned to the inn and went up to bed. Jake allowed them a five-minute head start, then went inside himself, deciding there might be enough time for an interview with Miss Roelff before the way was clear to proceed to the final step of his mission.
To say he was surprised to find van Clynne in the main room would be to state the obvious. To say that Herstraw had been placed in his own room by the landlord, and that the door was subsequently discovered to be barricaded, would be equally wasteful. To describe what tortures Jake imagined as a suitable punishment for his erstwhile accomplice would undoubtedly break all rules of taste and propriety.
Thus, we skip ahead to Jake’s plan to rouse the British messenger from his bed and his room by setting the building on fire.
“ You can’t do that,” protested van Clynne. “Poor Roelff will be ruined.”
“ You should have thought of that before you failed to carry out your part of the plan.”
“ The swim in the river made me forget the plan, sir; that is a very different thing from being derelict.”
“ I didn’t think a Dutchman was capable of such a character flaw as forgetfulness.”
Jake was not, in fact, going to burn the house down, but merely make it look as if it were on fire. After alerting the innkeeper and getting him to remove his family to a safe distance (Roelff was a most obliging fellow, even condescending to accept the last of Jake’s paper money in payment for his acquiescence), Jake took a bucket of embers upstairs. He’d already gathered some leaves and pans, and now set off a series of improvised smudge pots. The hallway quickly filled with smoke.
“ Fire!” he yelled, banging first on the lieutenant’s and captain’s door. “Fire!”
The officers, who didn’t have to go through the bother of removing a barricade to get out, emerged and ran down the stairs. Herstraw took much longer, coughing from the thick smoke when he finally came out, both boots in his hand.
Jake, lying in wait with his mouth covered by a water-soaked rag, would have preferred that he left them in the room but had realized he wasn’t likely to be that lucky. The patriot had taken up a post near the door just in case of this contingency, and tripped Herstraw immediately, sending him flying across the hallway into van Clynne, who had the duplicate bullet in his hand.
Caught off balance, the Dutchman staggered backward and then fell to the floor, as did the boot and its bullet. There was considerable and commendable confusion as Jake fanned the smoke toward the tumble of men and yelled at them to seek safety. The situation was compounded as the lieutenant returned to the house armed with two buckets of water, which he promptly unloaded on Herstraw and van Clynne.
“ Goddamn it, you food!” growled Herstraw, struggling to his feet. “Give me my boots!”
“ They’re right here,” said van Clynne, groping for the bullet.
To describe what happened next, we first have to suspend this scene and turn the clock back a few short hours, joining a horse and rider on the road to Connecticut. The horse is worn almost to death, but the rider pushes on all the harder, ignoring his own pain and wounds.
The rider is Major Manley, having just realized he has gone off in the wrong direction, he is retracing his steps, inquiring after Jake at every house along the road. Finally he sees it would be more profitable to ask after Herstraw and his British escort. His horse gives way, there are various and sundry other difficulties — with no wish to make this villain seem more heroic than necessary, we join him outside Roelff’s, where he meets the soldiers assigned to accompany Herstraw. They are oblivious to the “fire” just now being lit, grumbling that they have to sleep in tents while their officers push aside soft goose feathers and ogle the proprietor’s daughter.
“ Six of you, come with me,” commanded Manley in such a presumptive tone that the men did not even think to question him. He led them straight to the house, where the alarms were just breaking out. Assuming that his quarry was somehow involved, the assassin rushed inside and up the stairs — and straight into van Clynne, tripping over the prostrate squire as he grabbed for the bullet.
The shouts, the alarms, the smoke — greater confusion had not reigned since a mouse snuck into the queen’s birthday celebration. Guns were fired over van Clynne’s head; Jake shouted and fired back. People flew through the air like witches, and there was all manner of running and disorder. It was a miracle that the Dutchman was able to pluck the two silver balls from the floor where they’d rolled together and toss one into Herstraw’s boot as the messenger grabbed it and ran outside. If luck did not clear van Clynne’s path, then the patron saint of portly Dutchmen surely did.
Jake’s timely fling of a smudge pot into Manley’s face may also have helped, as the British secret agent’s long body provided an effective barrier to the soldiers rushing behind him. They sprawled across the hall as if felled by one of those double-chained balls ship captains use to take down an opponent’s rigging.
“ I’ve found you at last,” gasped Manley.
“ Just in time,” said Jake, falling upon him. “I still owe you something from the lake.”
Everything else happening in that cramped hall melted away as the two men locked their bodies in a desperate duel. Though Manley had spent much energy arriving here, he was far from weak, and managed the first serious blow, flicking Jake off his back. He jumped to his feet and kicked at him, landing a sharp blow to Jake’s ribs.
Jake bounced up, dodged another kick, then aimed a punch at Manley’s chest. The force of the blow was dulled when the Englishman turned at the last moment. The pair exchanged a few glancing shots, then momentarily fell back against the opposing walls to catch their breaths and clear their eyes in the thick haze of smoke.
