Even I knew that, and I was no soldier.
I wasn’t impressed or overawed by Lafayette’s titles, or wealth, or ridiculously long list of names. He didn’t know our country, our winters, or our river. He was too young and inexperienced to know better, and I wanted desperately to say so.
“Please don’t be alarmed, Miss Schuyler,” a young officer whispered as he joined me near the stove, busying himself warming a pot of coffee. “General Lafayette—well—he can be . . . most passionate in his moods.”
The fellow attempting to soothe me was a tall, hulking soldier, with gray eyes and a dimple in his chin just like mine. He tilted his head in a quick bow beneath his frosty tricorn hat, then returned to the stove and courteously poured me a cup. “My apologies, miss,” he drawled. “It seems to be the dregs without sugar. In fact, I’m not even entirely sure it is coffee. But it’s all we have.”
I took the steaming tin cup warily as my father stood before a seething Lafayette and Arnold gingerly lowered himself into a camp chair, extending his injured leg. My drink was horribly bitter, but if it was good enough for our soldiers, I would just have to choke it down. “I appreciate it just the same, Major . . .”
“Monroe,” he whispered with the kind of shy, blushing smile that men usually gave my sisters, never me. “Major James Monroe.”
In spite of our situation, I found myself smiling a little, too. And under my breath, I said, “Have you served Lafayette long, Major Monroe?”
“Not precisely. I’m only here in my capacity as an aide to General Stirling, sent to deliver some confidential missives. It was a happy coincidence that he could send someone to accompany the French who knew the land, the language, and, well, Lafayette.”
“How did you come to know our lands?”
“I served in the Hudson Highlands last year.”
“And French?” I asked.
“My family is French Huguenot stock.”
I sipped at the coffee and tried not to make a face. “And Lafayette?”
“I was with him when he took a bullet at the Battle of the Brandywine.” Monroe smiled at a memory that should have made him frown. “He fell almost at my feet but somehow got up again to lead his men to safety. I stayed with him that night while the doctor tended him. So I know Lafayette is somewhat . . . irregular . . . but I think you’ll find that he’s brave and fair-minded.”
Eyeing Lafayette, who was still gesticulating wildly at my father to articulate some point, I was not much reassured by Monroe’s faith. A frigid wind gusted through the tent’s flap, and when the major saw me shiver—this time without exaggeration—he removed his own coat and wrapped it around my shoulders. It was a small gesture, one I should have absolutely refused, since he’d already ridden so far in the cold, but one so gallant that I was charmed.
It’s strange now, after all these years, to think how easily I was won over by James Monroe’s soft southern accent and courteous manner. Stranger still to realize that if I’d been told in that moment that one of the men in that tent would betray us, another would become my enemy, and a third would win my heart forever—I not only wouldn’t have believed it but would have guessed wrong as to which man on every score.
Thumping his fist on the table, Lafayette shouted, “This makes me wish I had never set foot in America or thought of an American war! All the continent knows where I am and what I am sent for. That I am to lead a great northern army. The world now has their eyes fixed on me. If I abort this campaign, men will have a right to laugh at me.”
At this, my father’s patience came to an end, and he delivered a stiff, cold defense. “I will remind you, General Lafayette, it was not my decision to send you here. I have been against it from the start.”
Lafayette tilted his head in apparent confusion. “Oui, oui. But of course.” He waved a hand. “That is what I am saying, my dear Général Schuyler. I have read your reports. I have seen what you have been forced to endure. I wish to take into my confidence you and General Arnold. Men loyal to Washington. Men I can trust.”
I was so surprised at Lafayette’s words that I nearly spilled what remained in my cup. My father appeared equally surprised and unsure how to react.
“In coming here,” Lafayette explained, “I go very slowly, sometimes pierced by rain, sometimes covered with snow, and not thinking many handsome thoughts about the projected incursion into Canada. I think now this is a scheme to have me out of the way.”
Papa took a moment to recover.
Benedict Arnold was quicker. “A scheme?”
“This plan is too stupid to be anything else,” the marquis insisted. “I have seen such machinations in a royal court. It is an unmistakable pattern, no?” When no one answered, Lafayette went on, “It is a plot against Washington or to replace him. You cannot strike a powerful man until you first remove his allies. This is why his rivals must discredit you, Schuyler. And it is why they send me to perish on some icy ledge.”
Even with all the plotting against Papa, I was loath to believe anything so diabolical could have been envisioned. But Lafayette was a nobleman from the most sophisticated court in the world, and possibly wiser in the ways of backstabbing politics than any of us.
So I believed him when he said, “Without Washington, there is nobody who could keep the army and the revolution for six months. We must give him a victory to bring back to the Board of War. If not in Canada, then somewhere else.”
Papa agreed, renewing his invitation to dinner where a plan
