Chapter 41

The following new characters are introduced in this chapter:

Seth

Thomas's contact in the Baltimore area, 5'-8" tall, about 150 pounds, forty years old, blond hair, hazel eyes

Phebe Harper

Owner of the Turk's Head Tavern, 5'-7", a bit heavy at 150 pounds, 36C-27-37, 62 years old, gray hair, light blue eyes

We were soon ready to leave Brown's Summit, and Kell and I cast the transfer spell to take us to our Towson bookstore location. In this Reality, we appeared in a small clearing on the slope of a long hill partly covered with trees. Proceeding down the hill, we soon came to the intersection of two dirt roads where we stopped while Thomas looked around to get his bearings.

"I know this area! The road running north is the road to York, and the one running east is the Joppa Road. Joppa was the County Seat of Baltimore County for some time, but it isn't any longer. We need to go south on the York Road toward Baltimore, and we will come to Towsontown in just a bit," he told us. Towsontown turned out to be a small collection of homes and a few stores. There were fields that surrounded the town on the flatter ground and there were trees on the steeper hills that would be harder to till. We stopped at one of the more prosperous looking homes. Thomas knocked on the door while we waited on our horses. A man soon opened the door.

"Why Thomas, I haven't seen you in some time. What business brings you this far north?" the man asked. He appeared to be about 5'-8" tall and about 150 pounds or so. He was easily forty years old and had blond hair. We would later see that he had hazel colored eyes.

"I've come with some friends. We need to talk," Thomas told him in a serious manner, before indicating the six of us.

"Well, come in. Come in and welcome," the man told us and showed us around to the rear of the house where we could leave our horses temporarily. In the house, we all had a seat in the front room near the fireplace and were given a glass of ale before the questions started.

"What brings you to Maryland on a cold January day?" the man asked.

"These are the O'Connells, or I should say a part of the O'Connells, as there are quite a few more of them," Thomas started. "They are here to inspect the warehouses where the British are storing all of their supplies for this coming year's expeditions," he finished.

"And why would you be helping someone inspect British supply warehouses?" the man asked in a somewhat startled voice.

"They intend to prevent them from using those supplies," Thomas informed him to an even more startled look.

"And just how would they accomplish this feat?" the man demanded.

"By the use of Magic," Kell and I both told him to an even more surprised look.

"There is no real Magic. It's all sleight of hand," the man protested.

"There is now. Trust me on that. They intend to arrange things so that the British can see their supplies, but can't touch or use them. It will disturb them greatly!" Thomas told him with a smile before adding, "You will also need to take them to see herself, as they plan on carrying out this plan in all of the ports all of the way up the Atlantic coast. We have already been to all of the southern ports." The man was staring at him and us in utter disbelief.

"You can't be serious! What have all of you been drinking?" he demanded.

"Yes Seth, we are very serious. These people can do marvelous things. We left Lexington, Kentucky this morning and stopped at Richmond, Virginia before coming here," Thomas told the very skeptical man.

"If it were warmer, I'd say that you had all been out in the sun for too long. If you aren't drunk, you must be delusional," Seth told us.

"Is he familiar with any of the locations that we have been to?" I asked Thomas.

"Perhaps Richmond, and of course, Philadelphia," Thomas told me.

"Philadelphia is out. Our bookstore there is well outside of the city," I told him.

"Lexington," Kell suggested and his Wives nodded in agreement.

"I think that someplace that he is more familiar with would be better," I told them. "Manchester!" I suggested, and cast the transfer spell to take us to Manchester after we had moved out of the house. It was a bit warmer in Manchester this afternoon. Seth was shocked at what he saw when we appeared there.

"But ... but how did we get here?" he asked, as he obviously recognized where we were.

"By the use of a Magic spell," I told him before adding, "Shall we return before we draw the attention of the British?" Seth just nodded, and we returned to his house.

"So Seth, will we be able to see the area today?" Thomas asked when we were again settled back in Seth's parlor.

"It's not too late, we could get there today, but I'm not sure about getting back. We may need to remain in the city over night. The British don't allow anyone to travel at night. They have been very strict here since stopping the insurrection. There were a large number of their ships seized by privateers sailing out of Baltimore Port during that time," he informed us.

"Don't worry about returning. We can transfer back here when we are finished in Baltimore whatever the time," I assured him.

"We best get started then. It's a long ride into town," Seth told us. We retrieved, fed, and watered our horses but left the two pack horses in Seth's barn. We did take along some of the food from the packs, which we ate along the way. The ride from Towsontown to the commercial district in Baltimore was around fifteen miles or so. We pushed our horses a bit and made the ride in a little over two hours. We finally stopped at a building on Lombard Street in Baltimore, and Seth went inside to speak to the proprietor. Shortly a man came out and led us to an alley along the side of the buildings.

"We can borrow this wagon for our trip to the docks. It will make it look like we are making a pickup of goods," Seth told us before adding, "The ladies will have to remain here. Where we are going the only women seen there are trollops and tarts. You should leave your horses here and ride in the wagon."

"Just where are we going?" Kell asked.

"I'll take you across Pratt Street so you can see the shipping there, and then we'll work our way down to Fell's Point where most of the British supplies come in and are stored," Seth told us. "The ladies can do a little shopping while we are gone," he added.

Kell and I rode in the wagon while Seth drove. We quickly turned onto what he informed us was Pratt Street which went past the 'Basin' (Inner Harbor) as it was called here. We saw a number of small ships tied up to the piers and some brick warehouses.

"They are coastal traders. That's all the British allow us to do. We can't build any of the 'Baltimore Schooners' that were used against their shipping during the war either," he told us in an exasperated voice as we continued down Pratt Street and eventually crossed Jones Falls, a major creek that flowed into the Northwest Branch of the Patapsco River which formed Baltimore's harbor. We eventually came to a broad street that ran north and south.

"This is Market Street. It's the main street in Fell's Point," we were told, as we turned on to it. We could see down the wide street to where soldiers were blocking the way and inspecting the passing traffic.

"We're in for it now," Seth told us, looking at the obstruction ahead of us.

"Not necessarily," Kell told him. "Pull onto the next street that we pass."

"What will that accomplish?" Seth asked.

"It will allow us to make a few changes with out being seen," Kell told him with one of his big grins. We turned onto the next street and stopped after turning into a parallel way to Market Street, which Seth told us was Apple Ally, a narrow unpaved street.

"Remember when we were in Savannah and we took a wagon ride?" Kell asked me.

"You don't... ?" I started.

"I definitely do. It will be the perfect disguise," Kell told me before using the spell to create a glamour of the manure wagon that we had ridden on in Savannah. We both used the glamours that we had used there and cast the glamour of Enoch Baxter, the manure merchant, around Seth.

"What are you doing?" Seth asked, as he had seen us busy with the spells and had seen the changes in our appearance.

"We are creating an illusion to get us past the British check point. They won't be bothering us the way that we now look," I told him.

"Illusion?" he asked.

"Get down off of the wagon and look at it and at us from a short distance away," Kell told him. Seth climbed down from the driver's seat and walked around the wagon in the narrow alley. He was shocked at what he saw.

"How did you do that?" he demanded, as he returned to his seat.

"Magic, and now to add the final ingredient," Kell told him before casting a spell that created the smell of fresh, and not so fresh, manure. It made the glamours all that more effective but was an awful stench. We drove back out to Market Street and continued on to the British check point. We were quickly waved through ahead of other wagons there.

"In Savannah, we used a real manure wagon to inspect the area where the British were storing their supplies. We weren't bothered there either," I told Seth.

We drove to the end of Market Street and turned left onto what Seth told us was a part of Fell Street. We had already passed a number of large brick warehouses. There were more warehouses south of Fell Street, either end of which ran at an angle to the part of the street that we were presently on in order to accommodate the shoreline.

The entire area here was piers and new wooden warehouses mixed in with some older brick ones. There was at least two thousand feet of shoreline with piers projecting from it, and blocks and blocks of warehouses with British or German soldiers walking guard around them. This would be a major area to cover and we had allotted it to James, Jillian, and her Husband, Culann. We might need to reconsider that but would discuss it later.

Being disguised as a manure wagon turned out to have a serious drawback. We were stopped a number of times to clean up and haul away piles of manure that had accumulated. Kell and I took care of it by simply transferring the manure out into the harbor where it would eventually sink to the bottom.

After getting a good look at all of the piers and warehouses in this area, we headed back up Market Street. There was no problem leaving the port area, as Kell turned up the manure smell again. We had turned it way down in self-protection while looking around the port area.

On clearing the checkpoint, we moved up Market Street quite some distance before returning to the same alley to cancel the glamours and the smell. We made sure that there was none of the smell remaining before we set out for Lombard Street to return the wagon.

Our wives were very glad to see us. We had been gone for nearly two hours and it was now rapidly growing dark. Thomas had taken them further uptown to shop, and they had purchased a number of small things plus some extra winter clothing. The British coins that they had used got them things at good prices. Hard money was valued more highly than the paper money issued by the Maryland General Assembly.

"Did you have any trouble? You were gone for a long time," the worried proprietor asked, as his name was painted on the wagon.

"None at all," Seth told the man who we hadn't been introduced to. "We sailed right through the British check point in Fell's Point and had a nice look around," he assured him.

"But how? They stop everyone going to the port there," the merchant worried.

"A bit of sleight of hand," Seth told the man with a wink before turning serious.

"We need to leave before it gets too dark," he told us. We all said goodbye to the merchant and thanked him for the use of the wagon. In the alley leading back to Lombard Street we stopped. Our Wives had already calmed the horses, and we surrounded them plus Thomas and Seth before casting the transfer spell and disappearing.