Chapter 34: Up River

On one of my last trips to visit with Mrs. Von R--, seeking knowledge of British intentions and a warm bed, a black woman hoeing at a kitchen garden stopped me as I walked past the back fence of her long plot.

"Ho, mistah," she cried, waving her free hand. "You shore is a big 'un. How 'bout helpin' some poor folks?" She leaned on her hoe and looked at me stony faced, a bandana covering her head and her feet bare.

I was in a hurry, eager to find a bedmate since Mrs. Von R-- usually housed an abundance of comely and comforting females. But I stopped and came to the fence, reluctantly.

"What kind of trouble?" I asked.

"They's inside there, the ladies," she said with a nod of her head. "In their own house, an' a bunch a'them Germans done come in and took over the place, 'thout even a by-your-leave or nothin'."

"They did?" I said, knowing that many large houses had been occupied by British and Hessian officers. I looked up at the dark windows of the back of this narrow, brick home and thought I saw a pale face on the top floor.

"Yassuh, and they's deviling them ladies, least they's tryin' to. Sent their men off, roped together they was, 'long wif the head man."

"How many?" I asked, feeling the blood flowing faster and wishing I had brought a pistol at least. I put my hand on the hilt of my big knife.

"Law," she said, shaking her head, "dunno, six or seben most times for supper. I has to cook for 'em. Mabbe ten some nights, sleeping everywhere, chasing them poor ladies around. Miss Jenny, she d'youngest, she jus' scream and cry when they after her."

"Rape them, did they?"

"Laws, I dunno, mebbe. They's locked in the attic mostly, but they sneaks out for food and to dump their jar and such when they think them big men is gone."

"How long have those Germans been here?"

"Bout a week, near on. They gettin' meaner, too, drinking and cussin' an' such. They wants them gals."

"If I could get the women out, where, I mean then what?"

"They got kin, rich kinfolk, lot's a'them Dutch in these parts."

I climbed over the fence. "Are there some men in the now?" I asked.

"Yassuh," she said, "three I think. One a'them was up a'pounding on the door when I come out here to weed."

A scream from inside stimulated me and helped me make up my uncertain mind.

"Thas' Jenny," the black woman said, looking sad and frightened.

I went down the cellar steps and then up into the pantry with more speed than caution. The commotion was coming from above and there was some laughter as well as cries for help. The cries were soprano, the laughs basso.

I pulled my big blade and stepped into the empty dining room, admiring the gloss on the dark furniture and the china plates displayed in their well-made cupboard. Someone with heavy feet came down the front staircase. He laughed and, in German, he said something like, "Bring her down here when you finish, Karl." I stepped quickly behind him, clamped my hand over his mustached mouth, pulled his chin up and cut his throat. Bright blood sprayed out over the front door, carpet and marble-topped table in the hall. I dropped the big, limp body and quietly mounted the stairs on the double where a girl continued to scream, "Don't, don't, please, please!" It was a steady refrain broken only by sobs.

I kicked open the door. One of Kyphausen's lieutenants was sitting on the bed, grasping the girl's arms and laughing, while another was holding up her skirts and buggering her, at least attempting to, teeth clenched in effort as she kicked her legs and howled. I pulled the rapist away from the screaming girl, smashed him against the wall and stabbed him twice in rapid succession with my hand at his throat. He slid to the floor, legs extended and spread wide, pouring blood like a fountain.

When I turned, the girl had crumpled to the floor beside her bed, weeping, and the other officer had scrambled off and recovered his sword from a nearby chair. I jumped on the bed and launched myself at him, knocking him to the floor as we both lost our weapons. Our fight was short and brutal, we kicked and gouged, elbowed and bashed at each other with our fists until I hit him in the neck and he gasped for breath. I rolled off, found his sword and ran him through as he rose to his knees, mouth gaping, hands raised in surrender or supplication. I drove his weapon in to the hilt and let him fall, kicking and groaning.

I helped the girl to her feet and sat her on the bed. She was very young and very pretty, wearing a plain, blue, scoop-necked dress and muslin apron. Her long hair was light brown and very disordered. She held her hands to her face and sobbed, her back shaking.

Footsteps in the hall brought me back to the problem, and I spun about looking for my knife as the door opened. In stepped an older woman, arms extended. "Jenny," she said as she hurried to the curled up girl on the bed, ignoring me and the bloody bodies sprawled about. The man with the sword in him still squirmed and clawed at the blood-covered floor.

"If you want to leave," I said to her, touching her on her shoulder, "we should hurry."

"Who are you?" she said, handing the girl a kerchief from her sleeve. She was also plainly dressed with a cotton neckcloth hiding her swelling bosom. Her hair was as light as the girl's and her large eyes were dark and heavy-lashed. I guessed she might have been thirty-five, mature certainly and frightened.

"A soldier," I said, "American. Your servant called me to come help."

"Yes," the woman said. "We'll run. Come, Jenny." She pulled the girl to her feet. "Let us grab a few things. You go talk to Mandy. Tell her we're leaving. We'll be right down."

They left the room, arm in arm, the girl's legs wobbly, and climbed to the third floor while I checked the bodies for money and looked for weapons. The young officer with his sword in him lay still. I found one good purse but no pistols or muskets in the second-floor rooms. I hurried down stairs and out to the garden.

The black woman was still at work, chopping weeds out of her herbs.

"Mandy," I called. "Gather up your clothes and things. Be quick."

She dropped her hoe and ran into the dark cellar. In a minute or two all three women were following me over the back fence and into the woods. Jenny, I now saw, although barely nubile, was a true beauty with an oval face, generous mouth and Grecian nose. The black women brought up the rear as we trotted along narrow trails to a stream and a small clearing. I stopped and drank while the woman stood and watched, clustered together.

When I stood, I introduced myself, and the older woman said that she was Mrs. Houton, that her husband and sons were merchants, and that her family was loyal to the king. Jenny quickly curtsied to me and said her name.

"Are you hurt bad?" I asked her.

She shook her head, tossing brown curls, and bit her lip. "I think I bled some," she said quietly, "but he only poked me twice before you, you..." She swallowed and looked away.

"Where shall we go?" I asked. "They'll find those bodies soon and raise the hue and cry."

"Most of our friends are up river," the woman said. "Many have left their town houses for the army."

"Do you know Mrs. Von R--?" I asked.

"Of course," the woman said, "but we are hardly friends. Her nephew and my cousin," she began and then stopped.

"It's not far," I said.

"I know, but," said the woman. "Well, until we can do better."

We started walking again, sticking to the woods and avoiding the highway into the city. "Where is your husband?" I asked the woman.

"We're not sure. They have some ships out in the harbor where they hold people, prison ships. I heard they arrested him for some matter."

I nodded and hoped the man was in a better place than that. From what I had learned, they were hellholes, even for his majesty's most loyal subjects.

We stuck to the alleys once we were in town and entered Mrs. Von R--'s fine home through a side door. The matron greeted me as a long-lost son and was coolly polite to Mrs. Houton and her daughter. She said again that she wanted my help on a special mission. Mandy stayed in the kitchen, and all of us were soon fed. A doctor was called for the girl, and I went on into town, ears alert for any word of dead Hessians.

I returned at dark and sat with my hostess before her fire. "They should leave," the woman said. "It's not safe here with all the Redcoats I entertain."

"Can you get them out on a stage or boat?" I asked, sipping her port.

"Perhaps," she said. "One man was here earlier with news of the murders, as he called them. You killed three grenadiers it seems, all from good families, officers, as you know. They are also looking for the women."

A young woman knocked and entered, bowed and stood waiting, her hands behind her. "This is Greta," said the old woman. "She's related to my younger brother's wife, a cousin, right?"

The girl nodded her bright-eyed head, jiggling her long curls, her hands behind her.

"I told her about you, said you might need some comfort tonight. Greta has been very useful in our work. You be nice to her. Get along now."

I bent and kissed the woman's wrinkled cheek, and then Greta and I went off to our bed. She was indeed very comforting, enthusiastically comforting, and in the morning I fully satisfied her as well as myself. We went down to breakfast hand in hand, her legs a bit wobbly I believe, my cock both sore and satisfied.

The news was all over the city. No word was out on me, but the description of Mrs. Houton and her daughter and servant made the rounds, was in the newspaper, we were told, and tacked to fences by nightfall.

"We've got to get them out of here," I told Von R-- as the four of us dined late and together.

"All the roads are blocked," the grey-haired woman said, "It'll have to be on the river. Don't I recall you found a boat before, for some hussy, before Howe arrived."

I remembered the woman's luscious body but not her name, and I recalled that her husband was a turncoat but little else. "What about the men, the lady's husband and sons?"

"No chance now, I'm afraid," said Mrs. Von R--. "They've been put on a fort-building work gang, under close guard with fifty or sixty other prisoners, mostly rebels. I'm sure this would be the wrong time. The authorities are very upset."

"Any special reason," asked the girl, looking much happier today.

"Yes," said Mrs. Von R--, "one of the men this big lout skewered was related to a German general, not his son, but a favorite nephew."

Mrs. Houton shook her head. "My poor husband," she sighed, "he has such soft hands."

Greta showed me a couple of her favorite positions, which strained my back but dropped me into a deep sleep, and I rose to enjoy her and then slip back into the city and down to the poorer section of the docks. I spread a few shillings around, and finally found a fisherman who was willing to sail up the Hudson as far as West Point. But to do it, I would have to buy his boat a new set of sails and a better anchor. We sealed the bargain with some rum, set a sailing date for Saturday night, and I returned with the good, if expensive, news.

Mrs. Von R--, who was quickly willing to bear the cost of the escape, spread her map on the dining room table, and Mrs. Houton pointed out the homes of three people she knew between Stony Point and Peekskill who might take her in. I watched Jenny lean over the map on her elbows and admired his soft hair and young body. I think her mother caught me at it; she smiled and made a "tsk" sound with her lips.

Just after sunset on Saturday, we crossed the island, just the four of us. We had found some shoes for Mandy, and each of us had a blanket roll and some dry stockings, nothing else except I had a shuttered lantern, a musket and a full cartridge pouch. It was a long and difficult walk but in about two hours we reached the river and the cove designated by the mercenary boat owner. I had paid him only half of his price, convinced he would disappear if I paid it all.

I flashed the lantern twice toward the dark river, and we waited, shivering together on the stony bank, listening to the water slap the rocks. I made two quick flashes again and was answered with an "Ahoy there." In a few minutes a rowboat appeared, and a short sailor helped the women aboard. "Be back f'you, mate," he said, and he rowed off into the dark, taking my lantern along with him.

I listened to the clunk and splash of paddles fading and primed my piece, feeling uneasy and hoping they did not plan to sail off with the females. I cursed myself for letting them out of my sight as the minutes dragged on, and then I heard the sound of creaking oars again. Just as the boat scraped the bottom and two men with long guns jumped ashore, a female voice yelled, "Run" from somewhere out in the dark.

I ran, stumbling and cursing, back into the woods and a musket flared behind me. I came to a swale, a dry creekbed, and skidded to a stop, turning to have my pursuers silhouetted against the stars. A soldier in a peaked hat appeared, and I let him get within ten paces before I fired, dropped my gun and scuttled to the side. I heard the man grunt and fall and the other Redcoat came crashing through the brush. I jumped on his back, knocked him down, rolled him over the stabbed him three times before he could squawk. Then I waited silently over his bleeding body. The woods were quiet.

I got my breathing back to normal, loaded one of the dead men's Brown Bess and my own musket and headed back toward the beach. The sailor who had rowed them ashore was sitting on the rocks smoking his pipe when I appeared out of the treeline.

"Get 'im?" the man asked, knocking out his pipe in a shower of sparks.

"No," I said, poking him with my broad bayonet. He jumped and stood.

"Who the 'ell are you?" he stammered out.

"The one they was hunting," I said. "You rather die or help me? I'll pay ye a crown or stick a foot of steel in you. Which'll it be?"

He snorted. "I ain't no fool," he said quietly, putting his pipe in his jacket pocket.

"Who's out there?" I asked, shucking off the other musket.

"Brit officer and the cap'n," he said. "They's planning to have a party with them womenfolk. Spect they's already tossed the darky over the side."

"Let's get going," I said, poking him toward his row boat. He picked up the painter and stepped into the water. I followed.

"They was gonna let the three a'us have at 'em when they was through. Said they'd put 'em in one a'their houses in the city, wear 'em out." He laughed as he sat and grabbed his oars. "Funny how things work out." He pulled and grunted.

When the rowboat bumped the dark sailboat, I held it alongside with a dangling rope. "Can you swim?" I quietly asked the man.

"Some," he said. I fished what I hoped was a crown out of my purse and handed it to him.

"Go on," I said, and he let himself silently over the side and disappeared. It was less than a hundred yards to shore.

I pulled myself abroad and found nobody on deck. A female squeal came from below, and I walked heavily toward the cabin. The door slammed open and out came the captain, asking, "Well?" before he even looked up. I stuck him with my bayonet very low, pushed him to the rail and tossed him overboard, lifting my weapon as I did. He screamed, eviscerated, and hit the black water with a heavy splash.

"What was that?" came a demand. I turned to find a British officer in flowing shirtsleeves behind me. He had a long pistol in his hand and his fancy wig was slightly awry. I dropped to one knee and fired as he was bringing his weapon to bear. My ball smashed his shoulder and his shot went down into the deck planks. I pulled the writhing man out of the cabin doorway and went quickly below. Mrs. Houton had been tied to a stanchion and her daughter lay on a bunk, her dress torn open, her arm over her face. I dismounted my bloody bayonet and cut the woman loose.

"Take care of her," I said, nodding at Jenny.

The woman mouthed thank you and went to her daughter, making comforting sounds while I went back on deck. The wounded officer had pulled himself to the mainmast and was trying to reload his pistol one handed. I kicked his weapon into the river.

"Your name?" I asked.

"Leftenant Brevers, Louis Charles Brevers," he said proudly.

"Where's the black woman?"

"He tossed her over." The man trembled.

I touched his shoulder and then tore away his shirt. My shot seemed to have gone through him, under the joint, high on the left side of his chest. "Poor shot," I said. "I aimed at your belly."

He moaned a bit as I poked at him. He was bleeding steadily. I tore the sleeves from his shirt, made two compresses of one and then tied them tightly in place with the other. By then both women were on deck, watching me in the light of the stars and my open lantern.

"If you were a German," I told the young officer, "I'd toss you overboard, but you are a soldier and my prisoner. Now I can tie you up and stow you below, or you can give your parole and I'll put you ashore. I don't think you'll bleed to death before you can find help."

"I'll swear," he said, "on my honor."

"And go back to England, fight us no more?"

He nodded. I demanded that he say it, and he did. I pulled up the anchor, let the current take us and steered for a narrow point of land. When the ship touched bottom, I turned aside, tossed the anchor back out and waited until the ship drew the line taut. I let myself over the side and touched bottom shoulder deep. The man followed, his wounded arm tucked into what was left of his shirt and held in place by his tightly buttoned coat. He went in up to his nose, and I dragged him ashore, sputtering.

We stood together in he dark. "They're going to ask you," I said, "Ask you what happened. You don't have to tell them that you were planning to rape a couple of handsome women, but if you raise the cry and they come after us, I swear I'll find you and cut your stones off and feed them to you. Understand?"

He nodded. "Thank you," he said, and stumbled off down the narrow beach, toward the city, swinging his good arm, but leaving his sword, pistol and purse behind.