Chapter 49: Brandywine

Landenberg is just over the Line. My old commander Michael Cresap, may the Lord have mercy on his roisterous soul, would have sworn that it was in Maryland, but then he famously considered Philadelphia one of his state's prettiest towns. I am not sure whether it is Quaker or Lutheran, Tory or Patriot, but it was a fine and hospitable crossroads in September of 1777. The jovial landlord at the inn assured me that Philadelphia was still some twenty-five miles to the east and that Lancaster and York was thirty or forty miles to the west.

"If you have business with the Congress," he said ignoring the state of my beard and clothes as well as my bare feet and the raw wounds on my wrists, "I hear tell they be moveable and might light down at any one a'them sites instead of high tailin' it to Baltimore or somewhere's."

I split a rack of firewood for him, and he treated me to a good meal and all the beer I could drink. Business was slow, and we had plenty of time to talk as the dark settled in. We discussed Lord Howe and his plans, Washington and his, and decided what both should be doing. We talked about the value of money, and about the storms of recent days, and about the new flag with stars and stripes.

I told him that I needed some boots and a horse, and he produced a pair of broken-down, well-worn, high-topped boots from his back room. The boots had almost no heels left and holes in both soles, but with some leather cut from their tops and stuffed in their bottoms, they would more than do.

"Feller paid his bill with those," the inn-keeper said. "Tweren't a big bill, and it's been some time. Don' think he'll be back. They don' fit me. Too damn big."

I smiled and thanked him, putting my little knife back in my boot where I was used to its stiff and comforting feel. "Who might have a horse to lend or lease?" I asked.

"There's a smith, four or five miles up the road, near Hamorton, not far from Chadd's Ford, kind'a in between the two. He usually has a string a'wore out jades he's trying to sell."

His wife came out from the kitchen and whispered in his ear. He nodded and smiled while I praised the good lady's stew.

"Wife tells me somebody saw you out back chopping wood an' would like to hire you if you're free."

"Since I'm a lot poorer than poor Richard," I said, "lead me to him."

"It's a her. Might warn you," he said, looking to see that his wife had left the area, "she's what some call a grass widow and has a randy reputation. Don' know if its deserved, wife see's that I stays ignorant if not innocent. She paid to have that wood sawn and dumped in her yard. Guess she thought she could split it herself."

We both smiled, and I told him I would let him know and went to visit Mistress Overton, wondering how I smelled. I hoped the heavy rains had helped some. My new boots were big enough, but they were hard as stone in several places and took some breaking in. The Overton place was in sight of the tavern, but I had new sores by the time I got there. I went to the back door and knocked.

I was not prepared for the woman who opened the door. One side of her face was grossly disfigured by burn scars, and she had lost the forearm and hand on that side as well. The left side of her face was quite ordinary, even refined I suppose, graceful and fair skinned. She had donned a man's wig, a small one with a queue and ribbon, brown rather than powdered. She wore an apron over her linsey-woolsey dress and stood perhaps five-foot-five, pretty tall. Two children shyly peeked out from behind her.

"I've come about the wood," I said.

She smiled. "I can't chop much one handed. Do enough to cook."

"Suppose," I said.

"Woodpile's over yonder. You kin start now if'n you'd druther. Suppose you et?"

"I did. Light won't last much longer. How much you need?"

"Might take five or six cords to get me though the winter. My man's a prisoner, up in New York, likely on one a'them hulks and not likely to be exchanged I hear. Folks that know say I ought to count him dead right now. Two shillings a cord be all right? Woodpile's barely been touched."

"I'll do what I can. My hands ain't in the best a'shape." I went to the large woodpile and set to work. She had a maul, a good wedge, an oak block to cut on, a grindstone and a couple old axes. I found that the bigger one with the broad head was more my size, sharpened it and starting splitting. It was good wood, oak and fruitwood mostly, some apple and such, all hardwood anyhow. It did not take me long to work up a sweat. Shortly after I began the woman appeared with a lantern and began stacking what I had cut, very deft with her one hand and the ugly stump of her right arm.

After a while, as long as you are careful about where you put your feet, cutting wood like that becomes almost automatic and you can turn a major part of your mind to other things. I split logs with the maul and them cut them down with the ax to fireplace size while I wondered where Washington's army was and where Howe's was going. I guessed that they would meet somewhere around Philadelphia since there was not anything else worth fighting over down this way. I let a part of my brain dwell on Ginny's lush charms for awhile and then thought about my fine rifle.

"Ain't you done enough for now?" the woman woke me from my daydreams. "It's getting on to ten."

I finished the wood I had ready for the ax, wiped my face on my sleeve and accepted the water jug she handed me. I let the cool water run down my chin and chest and then poured what was left over my head and shook like a dog. Even though the sun had long been down, it was still warm.

"I'll pump if you want'a wash some," she said, her good eye gleaming in the lamplight. The other one had been sewed shut with big, black knots. I nodded, and we walked to the well while I stripped off my ragged shirt. She handed me a small tub of soap. I knelt, pulled off my new boots, and she pumped, grunting with effort on the first few strokes. The water gushed up, cool and sweet, and I just let it run down my back for a few minutes before I began washing myself. The water kept coming as I squatted or sat under the flow working on my feet. Finally I stood, turned my back and pulled off my soaked britches and scrubbed my privates and legs. She kept right on pumping as I turned to be rinsed. She made a point of seeking out my face to look at.

She handed me her apron and looked away while I rubbed myself. "When you're dry, come on in," she said. "There's a mat for you and a blanket near the fireplace. Don't think we'll need the blankets tonight. My kinder will be up shortly after sunrise. G'night. And thank you."

I sat on her back step and longed for something to smoke or chew or drink or have sex with. My brain was busy and my muscles and hands were sore. The trouble with chopping wood with a woman watching is that you have the tendency to do too much too fast, just showing off.

I was sitting there in the star glow, legs spread apart, letting things dry, when the back door opened quietly and she came out, sat beside me and handed me a glowing pipe of fine smelling tobacco. "I enjoy this, thought you might," she said. I pulled my knees together, looked at the scarred and distorted side of her face with it swollen ridges of discolored burns and smiled thanks while I puffed. We shared the pipe for a while in quiet.

"Ain't you gonna ask?" she said.

I thought she meant swiving since that was on my mind, as usual, but I was smart enough to hold my peace for a change and puff her long-stemmed, clay pipe.

"House we had before this one burned," she said. "Lost my first born. Not sure how it started, likely a cinder from the fireplace, always blamed myself. I was out in the field with my husband, hoeing corn, and by the time we smelled the smoke it was probably too late. I tore away from him and ran in toward the baby's cradle, and a roof beam fell on me and drove me back outside, crushed my arm, lost all my hair on this side and one eye. Guess I was lucky. We had two more children before the war. Becky's six and the boy, James, he's four now."

She put her stump with its purple, writhing scar on my bare thigh and her head on my shoulder. I unlimbered my arm and held her for a while, enjoying the mild evening and all the stars, the lightening bugs, the cricket noise, the smell of soap, her soft skin, the tobacco. My hair was just about dry. I had not noticed until then, but she was not wearing her wig. and the dark hair she had was clean and close cropped.

"I wasn't thinking about your burns," I said.

"Oh," she snuggled closer, and I slid my hand under her elbow and grasped her full breast.

"No," I said, squeezing and lifting, kissing her forehead and feeling the scar tissue with my lips.

"Harvey over at the inn warn you about me?"

"Is that his name? No, he jus' gave me some old boots. Good man, that."

"Um," she said. "I think he'd like to bed me, but his wife's like a hawk, so he tells stories about me. Makes up things. I ain't really been with a man much at all, not for a long time leastwise."

She wriggled as her nipple hardened between my fingers, and my prod rose unsteadily between my damp thighs. She turned toward me and kissed my neck, running her good hand down my hairy chest and stomach. She swung the stump of her right arm up my back. It was an odd feeling, the arm without a hand.

"Gonna ask you to pull it out when the time comes," she said, rising to her right knee and swinging her left leg over my thighs. She put her mouth on mine, and we kissed gently and then eagerly. She bent what was left of her right arm behind my neck and our bodies joined and enjoyed each other there on the back step in the starlight. She set a slow and enduring pace, stopping often, drawing me deep and then setting me free, we plowed for a good while before I felt the rising urge to go faster and harder.

She moaned as I pulled away, pushing on her shoulders, kissing her nose, but she finally dismounted and sat beside me, gasping. I stood, turned away from her and leaned against the side of her house while I squeezed out streams of creamy jism, gritting my teeth. I stumbled to the pump and washed off my shaft, enjoying the cold water on my overheated member and on my still-sore feet. I remained ax-handle hard.

She was standing by the back door when I returned, watching me with her fist to her mouth, looking at my trembling, dripping, misshapen rod. I took her shoulders in my hands and kissed her gently, pushing her back against the door. I held her ruined face with my right hand in her hair and slid my left down to lift her skirt and shift, to grasp her at the hip while I bent my knees, and slid back into her. She moaned, came off her feet and wrapped her legs about me. I stepped away from the door, bending my back and taking her weight. She threw back her head and moaned at the sky, and I turned and rested my shoulders against the wall. I rogered her until her breathing slowed and her legs slid down mine. Then I bent and kissed her, and we went inside and slept on our separate pallets.

She was right about her children. They were up early and curious. I was glad I had pulled the thin blanket up to my waist as the little boy poked me and asked, "Who dis?" The turgid stage of my happy member might have frightened him. The woman shooed them outside and handed me a fresh shirt after glancing at the deformed thing between my legs.