Chapter 55: Paula

Late one rainy afternoon when I returned to my basement hideout, I found a woman standing at the foot of the steps, huddled in a dark, hooded coat and using her sleeve to ward off the blowing sheets of cold rain. She was tall and that was about I could tell about her except that the hem of her coat and dress were very wet and heavy.

"Help you?" I asked, huddled in my old jacket and wishing I had worn a hat. I could feel cold water running down the back of my neck.

"Does the S- family live here?" She peered up at me, raindrops dotting her face. It was a good face, strong, lively.

"Oh yes," I said, "but they're seldom home during the day. They have a shop down near the market.

"And are some officers billeted here?" she asked, her hand raised at the side of her eyes to keep off the rain.

"Three, I believe." I admired her dark eyes and confident attitude. My size tends to be offputting.

"One of them an East Surrey?" she asked. "A captain?"

"Couldn't say, ma'am. Just know they're Redcoats." I tried a smile on her despite the wet.

"Well, nobody seems to be home, and I foolishly let the carriage go." She sniffed and looked unhappy.

"Come down to my digs and get dry," I said, shaking the water from my head and offering her my hand. "You can wait there. They'll be home shortly."

She hesitated and then followed me down the steps, jumped the puddle at the door and came into my small, dingy room for which I secretly paid the home owners a pound a month. They knew what I did even if they did not know my name. I got out of my heavy coat and knelt at the hearth to start a fire in the tiny hole at the base of the chimney. The woman stood and looked around, unbuttoning. A small bit of light filtered through the high and dirty clerestory windows at street level where the cobwebs and dust made curtains and a collection of broken jars and pots stood sentinel.

She tossed back her hood, shed her long coat and got my full attention. She was certainly a woman and not a girl, all well-upholstered curves and fine carriage, standing as though she was rightfully proud of her fine body and good looks. She displayed more hair than I had seen in a long time; long, luxuriant and dark brown, it cascaded along her shoulders and down her back although much more of it was obviously pinned atop her head. Aristocratic was the first word that came to mind.

I got some of my stuff off my only chair, and she reluctantly sat while I put our coats near the small, struggling fire, pulled off my wet boots and untied my hair and dried it with a rag. She fluttered the bottom of her dress and sat up very straight, looking composed but not quite relaxed. Much of her long hair had been turned back under and was held by a series of combs to make waves of dark clouds just above her shoulders. Her hair seemed to hold the firelight.

"Where you from?" I asked her, raking back my unruly hair with my fingers and then putting some more wood on my fire. I took off my heavy belt and bayonet, hung them on the back of her chair and found some dry stockings.

"Sussex," she said. "But I've just come down from Quebec. We were stationed there, in Upper Canada."

"On a ship?" I asked.

"Oh yes, of course. Several officers' wives were with me. Lord Howe's doing. I checked at the barracks and was told my husband was billeted here."

"Then its probably true," I said, rummaging for something to offer her after I got my shoes back on. I found a bottle of local red and wiped out a glass. "Wine?" I asked, pouring it out.

She accepted, tasted, made a face and held the small glass in both hands.

"Bit raw," I said, "probably stamped out last year." I went back to hunting. "Got some applejack here someplace."

"No," she said, "this will do fine. Just get the chill off. Your fire helps." She smiled up at me and I sat on my bed after pulling up the tumbled quilt." I had slept alone the previous night as I usually did when I was there and then been out all day listening and asking questions, doing my assigned job. I found some crusty bread and a piece of orange cheese, drew my huge bayonet, sliced a bit and offered it to her on a wooden trencher.

"When do the people upstairs usually get home?"

"'Bout dark," I said. "You can wait here. You're a lot better to look at than these walls."

She smiled and took a small piece of cheese. "That's a rather large knife," she said.

"Aye, a Connecticut lady gave it to me, 'twas her husband's."

"I see," she said. "And what do you do?"

"Bit of this and that," I said, taking inventory of her charms as my eyes grew accustomed to the dimness. She was very handsome, perhaps not youthfully pretty, but mature and regal in her confidence, mid-30's I guessed. Her chin was firm and sharply defined, her neck long and her shoulders broad for a woman. Her waist was obviously constricted and her bosom swelled impressively. She was full hipped, strong backed and long legged and had a plenitude of shining, dark hair which looked like it might reach her bottom if she unloosed it all.

I wondered, of course, how she might do in bed with her heft and experience. I liked swiving women with good pelvises and some meat on their bones. I had seldom mounted any that were much older than I was, at least not since I was a boy back on the farm and the girls were teaching us and using us for their pleasure, making us squirt it out in the grass, laughing and teasing in that long-lost springtime.

"Aren't you in the army?" she said, stretching her hem again and showing me a good bit of patterned stocking, booted ankle and shapely leg.

"Oh no, not me," I said. "I work on the docks mostly."

"Isn't there a loyal militia?"

"Think so," I said. "Where's your baggage?"

"At the barracks, but..." She stopped and we both heard footsteps on the low ceiling just above our heads. She stood, handed me her half-full glass and picked up her coat, shaking it out and folding it over her arm. "Well," she said, sticking out her gloved hand, "thank you for your hospitality." I held her hand, murmured niceties and showed her the narrow steps to the first floor. She walked up, knocked and was admitted. I drank down her wine and went back to imagining her bare and begging for more.

I pulled on my other shirt, shook out my coat, found my crumpled hat, and went back to work. It was after midnight before I returned to my basement. The woman was waiting for me, sitting in the same, high-backed chair before a reasonably good fire, trying to read a week-old newspaper by its light. I had a lamp somewhere in the room but seldom used it.

"You work late," she said when I came in.

"Usually," I said after I recovered from my surprise and took my hand away from my bayonet. "What are you doing, I mean, no offense, but..."

"My husband has disappeared, vanished on patrol they tell me, but they do not seem sure of anything." She did not look sad or frightened and said that news as matter-of-fact as possible. A thought flickered across my tired brain: if I were a woman would I have nerve enough to be where she was at this hour?

"I'm sorry," I said, shaking my head and adding sticks to the fire.

"Yes, well, those two lieutenants up there, fusiliers, they were not much help except to invite me to share their bed. And the S-'s, while indulgent, didn't seem to know what to do with me. The officers are all in one room, you understand."

I glanced at my bed where there was barely room for me and certainly would have been pleasantly crowded for the pair of us. I think she saw my look for when my eyes came back to her, she was smiling with very nice crinkles beside her eyes and dimples in her cheeks.

"I don't think so," she said and I laughed, perhaps with relief of some sort, a bit of embarrassment.

"Do you have any money?" I asked.

She shook her head. "Very little with me. That's part of the problem."

"There are several good hostelries in town, but none of them's cheap."

She sighed, and I produced my purse which, at the time, was relatively heavy. "I can pay," I said, "and your husband may reimburse me at his leisure."

"You're very kind," she said. "I thought you would be. That's why I waited, because you were so considerate."

"But it's blowing a nor'easter out there. You wait, I'll fetch a carriage."

"I can walk, '" she said.

"Not tonight," I told her and grabbed my hat, uncovering my lamp, and trotted off wondering what in the world I was doing when all I wanted to do was sleep if I couldn't roger the lady. I found a hire cab, took the woman's arm and helped her up the steps and into it, both of us ducking our heads as sheets of rain blew sideways between the buildings. At the hotel, I got a raised eyebrow from the elderly clerk when I paid him, but they provided the woman with a clean room, and she insisted on thanking me profusely before I trotted home and went to bed damp and tired, feeling a fool.

The next day was gray but not so wet, just a cold drizzle. I almost forgot about my late-night guest and short ride to the hotel, but when I returned to my digs after Amamda refused to bed me, there she was again with a small basket on her arm. She followed me into my low-beamed room, and I lit the lamp and stirred up the fire. She produced a bottle, a loaf of bread and big piece of good blood sausage.

I got the cork out, she poured and I sliced. We sat as before, she on the ladder-backed chair, and ate and smiled at each other.

"My husband's not to be found," she said. "They don't know what happened to him down at the barracks, act like he vanished into thin air. I don't trust them."

"Might have been captured," I said, not choosing to suggest that my friends might have shot him dead from ambush. Officers were prime targets.

"Surely they'd have known that, if he'd been killed or captured."

"Probably, but some men are taken right out of the city by colonial agents, kidnapped if you will."

"Really, how awful," she said refilling my glass with more dark burgundy that was butter smooth and very warming. I thought of the number of officers George and I had dragged off, many of them never to return, shot while trying to escape was the usual phrase for their fate.

"I have some odd contacts, people that hear things," I said. "Perhaps I could help."

She raised an eyebrow and sipped, watching me over the rim of her glass. Her eyes were large, dark brown, velvety lashed and her nose was finely chiseled. "I thought you worked on the docks."

"Yes," I thought fast and gave it up. "But I know folks here and there, with the American forces I mean."

"Do you?" she said, arching an eyebrow and smiling, producing a dimple, only one side of her face lit by the lamp and fire. Desire mounted.

I decided to put myself in her hands as I had with an artillery colonel's wife, remembering the bedroom pleasure we had shared before I throttled her husband and threw his body down her stairs. She had, as I recalled, paid for swiving with valuable papers from her husband's desk. I had no interest in this fine woman's husband but I surely was interested in having her. I could feel my eager member creeping down my leg.

"Yes," I said, "I have some American friends, some rebels as you might call them. I might be able to find out if he was captured recently."

"Really?" she said. "I'd be most grateful. It does worry me."

"Are you staying at Mason's?"

She nodded.

"Do you need money?"

She shook her head and a long curl fell across her forehead and down by her ear. My root quivered. "They gave me some from the mess, the Surreys."

"Very well, if you're sure."

"Quite, I just wanted to repay your kindness." She finished her wine and stood.

"No need," I said, standing beside her. "It was a pleasure."

"Really?" she said again, rising on her toes, putting her hands behind my neck, her thumbs at my ears and taking my mouth with hers.

When we disengaged, with my hands on her stay-covered ribs, I said, "Really" and returned the kiss, warmly, holding her to me, enjoying the feel of her fine body from knees to nipples.

"We've been apart for months," she sighed melting into my arms, a large, firm presence. I found my hands full of her hair, my mouth filled with her tongue.

"We'll find him," I assured her, patting her smooth back.

"Don't you?" she purred, rubbing her body against mine. "Don't you want me?"

I kissed her long and gently, enjoying her taste and the surging feeling in my body. She moaned in my arms, all but panting, rubbing her groin up and down against my thigh. I was ready to strip her and mount her, exhaust us both, stay with her till dawn and then surprise her.

Someone knocked, hard.

We stood apart and she sat again, taking a deep breath, pushing at her long hair, smiling, straightening her dress.

I pulled open the door and found one of the lieutenants who roomed on the second floor above me. "Pardon," he said, looking at me as if I were a rubbish pile of some sort and smelled bad, "have you seen a woman, oh, yes, there she is." He stepped in the room, brushing past me as though I was invisible. "Mrs. McReynolds," he said, simpering, "your servant, ma'am. They tole me at the barracks, well, won' you come and dine with us. I know it's late, but, well, we'd be delighted, ma'am, yes, delighted, Sanders and me, do come." He almost pulled her up.

She rose, gave me a sad smile, said, "Thank you again," and allowed the subaltern to lead her up the steps and into a waiting carriage. I silently cursed him and then her and then myself. I knew I might have put my foot in a trap, but her invitation had certainly been clear so we both had taken a chance. I gathered up my meager belongings and notes, left that night, reporting to Foster early for a change. I asked about a killed or captured officer, an East Surrey captain, but no one had heard of any such.

When I returned to town, three or four days later, I had almost forgotten the woman and the taste of her lips, the feel of her firm body, her obvious desire. I probably assumed that some Redcoat had met her needs. I horsed Amanda soundly the first night and then went back to my routine after re-establishing myself in the S-'s basement room. When I returned to my digs the next night, there she was, the stately Mrs. McReynolds, standing down under the small porch, looking impatient, one eyebrow arched. She held my shoulders and kissed me before I could open the door and express surprise or delight.

She followed me into the room and sat where she had before, doffing her tri-corn hat, leather gloves and long coat. "Where have you been?" she asked, two deep lines atop her nose. "I've been out there for an hour or so every night since I went off to dine with that pair of randy bastards upstairs, left you notes. They even offered me money to swive them, imagine!"

"Well," I said, admiring her dark gown with its lace fringes, almost bare chest and sloping shoulders swelling above it, matching ribbon about her neck, "the British expect every woman to fall on her back and spread her legs for them, and most around here seem to do just that. The Germans don't ask, they just haul them off into the bushes and poke them, young and old alike. No woman's safe out there alone."

She laughed. "You should have seen their faces when I refused after we had a good meal and a bottle or two. You'd have thought I deceived them somehow, insulted the King."

"Any news of your husband?" I asked.

She shook her head. "I was about to ask that of you."

I smiled. "Nobody's heard of an East Surrey captain taken prisoner lately, least nobody I know."

"You're a Yankee aren't you?" she said, her hands in her lap, very calm, breathing slowly, breasts jutting out between her arms, rising and receding. Her soft dress adhered to her lush body as if had been painted on. I felt my ram begin to swell and rise.

"No'm," I said, "I'm a Marylander. But I'm in Washington's army, if that's what you meant."

"Indeed," she said, licking her lips. "I thought so. This is dangerous isn't it, what you do, illegal I mean?"

"Talking to you might be dangerous, but the rest's not, not usually. I just go about and listen. And I hope you won't betray me, ma'am."

"You're a spy then, and a soldier out of uniform." Her brow creased.

"This's my uniform, most of it," I told her building up my fire. "Have you supped?"

"No, I dined this afternoon." She smiled at me. My stalk-like member was encouraged by her tone and trembled, its head aflame.

I produced the half-full bottle of her good wine and what was left of the cheese and sausage. We ate a bit, drank a bit and then I blew out the lamp. We did not talk much after that. I could feel her impatience and knew mine. I helped her undress by the light of my small fireplace, enjoying the task of unlacing her long corset while she fingered my chest and neck, kissed my lips. We placed her clothes on the chair back. Down to shift and shirt in the dark, damp room, we embraced gently and then fell easily into my low bed with its thin mattress of old quilts atop a line of heavy planks.

She was an eager and responsive lover, enjoying every moment of our heaving, panting, strenuous congress and urging me to greater efforts as we reached toward our almost-mutual climax with her long legs wrapped about me. She inhaled when she came, shuddering, kicking and tossing the covers away with her flailing feet while she clasped my shoulders, spasming repeatedly and grunting deeply. My hands tangled in her hair as I arched above her and groaned with pleasure, thrusting with all my might and getting the same effort from her. The boards beneath us rumbled a bit; the frame creaked and I pumped out my pleasure with a long sigh. We rested with her nearly astride me, her head on my chest and knee at my ballocks, my thigh between her legs. Not very restful.