Infernal Revolutions (27 page)

Is it
? the jostlers seemed to ask mutely of Major Thunders.
It is
, Major Thunders' expression seemed grudgingly to say, so they all retreated a pace, and left me enough space to rotate my shoulder blades, flex my muscles and glare at my crowders, in a melodramatic show of Liberty Unshackled.

‘Well, ‘tis a noble sentiment,' I said, ‘if an expensive bonfire.'

‘So was New York, Mr Oysterman,' Major Thunders smirked, in the know, ‘But worth every uninsured penny in propaganda terms. If the British set ablaze a town they're meant to be defending, what will they do to one they're attacking? It makes the American blood run cold just thinking about it, and it makes the possessor of that American blood want to heat it up again by rushing out to enlist, does it not, Mr Oysterman?'

‘Do not worry on that score, Sir,' said Dick, taking pots of beer from the waiter and handing them round the thirsty militia, ‘we will enlist the moment we have finished our business in Philadelphia. But for now, my merry lads, ‘tis enough that we are here in Hackensack, while the sun in shining, and the lovely wenches are in bloom. So join me in a toast….To The Perennial Delights Of The Milk Jug, Gentlemen!'

I caught my breath when I heard these words, so sure was I that they would scandalize the Puritan farmers. But as everyone, even Major Thunders, repeated the toast heartily enough, I could only conclude that milk jugs still retained their bucolic air of innocence for Americans. For some reason, this made me feel very protective towards the militia boys, and I had an overwhelming urge to get roaring drunk with them, which I succumbed to after a nod of assurance from Dick. If we let slip we were spies, and could not laugh it off, then at least it was a good way to go.

So began an increasingly unbuttoned and enjoyable supping session. At first we were regarded with some fear while we were examined on our knowledge of the local housewives, but using all our quickly maturing deceitfulness, and money to buy them drinks, we soon had them reassured and laughing at other subjects, such as the ridiculous things New Yorkers and Philadelphians got up to in our shops. What was Quaker City like, they wanted to know. Leafy and elegant, we said. And the girls, were they really as beautiful as legend had it? Every bit, we said, licking our lips naughtily, to much Revolutionary laughter and cries of ‘roguish dogs!' ‘Twas a dangerous game we played – anyone present with a true knowledge of Philadelphia could have nailed us in an instant – and therefore a damned exciting one, but no-one in the tavern seemed to have strayed more than twenty miles from Hackensack in their whole lives. Nor, fortunately, had anyone read much. Some thought that Shakespeare had written the Bible, and no-one had ever heard of Milton, Pope or Gray. They had, however, heard of Dolly Potter, and many were the requests for her latest bestseller, which we were happy to take orders for. In return, we learnt much about topics of local concern, like the price of knobbed whelks, methods of contraception, the best preservatives for wagons, and the correct use of the moldboard plough. As the afternoon wore on it became apparent that we were sharing conviviality with a thoroughly decent bunch of lads; even our witticisms, if that's what they were, were now coming home to roost.

‘Have you not enough bullets, Sir!' suddenly laughed Destiny Looms, for a brief moment soaring like a salmon above the turbulence of his name.

‘Tell my guts that!' roared Half-Cock Henderson, holding his belly and flashing his tonsils. The tavern went mad with delight again, and our backs were slapped heartily. If their messengers could elude the coming bayonets, I fancied these words stood a fair chance of being passed down the generations till Doomsday, and becoming a permanent part of local legend.
Those two strange fellows from New York. Funny how they appeared just before the town was razed to the ground by Redcoats
. Indeed, so bonded did we become with the militia boys that we confided to them our first ill impressions of the town, based upon the continuous barrage of phlegm and verbal abuse we had received upon entry. The young Revolutionaries apologized profusely, bought us extra beer in compensation, and generally went to extraordinary lengths to sooth our long-since ruffled feathers. They said that the
Boundary People
were the American variant of the Scum of the Earth, having no money, no trade and no backbone. Though not tolerated in peacetime, in wartime they were used as a warning mechanism in case of surprise night-time attacks by the enemy – a good slotting with bayonets being highly conducive to alarm-raising squealing. Were these
Boundary People
aware of their human bagpipe role, we enquired with great good humour. No, said the Revolutionaries, they thought they were queuing for alms, an answer which quite
tickled
us.

There was only one awkward moment during the whole session, and that was when the mute we had passed earlier in the day entered the tavern and began examining faces, a desperate look of concern on his own. Eventually he noticed us and stood stock still, eyes large with horror. Then he elbowed his way through the crowd and stood in front of us going mad – pointing, gesticulating, gibbering, slobbering at the mouth, beating his chest, and making thrusting movements with his arms – indicative, I supposed, of a bayoneting Redcoat. This was embarrassing enough, but we became especially concerned when he noticed a game of darts in progress at the far end of the tavern. He looked from this to us a few times, a glint of vindictive triumph in his eyes, then made off towards the players, beckoning everyone to follow him. Everyone did, and a grip of panic seized us when we saw the purpose of his foray – a piece of chalk and a blackboard. ‘Get ready for a quick getaway, Harry,' Dick whispered in my ear, while with our new friends we feigned amusement at the trajectory of a late incoming dart, which almost pinned the mute's head to the board. After a scuffle with the dart players, who objected to their game being so disrupted, the mute picked up the chalk and began to scribble on the space below the players' scores. Hearts pounding, we strained our heads and stood on tiptoe to see what denouncement looked like in chalky script. We need not have worried – it looked like nothing on earth, not even Taylor Woodbine's alleged Russian, for with tonguebiting concentration the mute spelled out: FGGGAWQALLLGG. ‘Twas ludicrous, and we were greatly relieved. As a reward for doing his civic duty the mute was soundly beaten once more, and tossed unceremoniously out of the tavern.

‘Yet he did seem very agitated by your presence, gentlemen,' said Major Thunders, as we made our way back to our former positions. ‘He must have seen you somewhere before.'

‘Perhaps he is a frustrated poet,' I suggested, ‘and thinks we could help him become the Dolly Potter of the poetry scene.'

‘A very frustrated poet,' said Major Thunders, ‘if that was the best he could do.'

‘Or perhaps he once bought an erotic book from our shop, was struck dumb by it, and is seeking recompense,' said Dick.

Truly, the partnership Dick and I were forging was really very good.

‘Aye,' mused Major Thunders darkly, ‘another respectable man brought low by sin, no doubt. It happens too often for my liking.' He pulled a watch chain out of his pocket and peered at it a little drunkenly. ‘But anyway, I must be going now. Don't forget my proposal, gentlemen. I want those books and I want them at the best rate you can give me. Here is my card to keep. If we don't see each other again during your stay here, have a good journey to Philadelphia and write to me quoting your prices as soon as you get there. I am sure we can come to some agreement to our mutual benefit.'

A businessman's untrustworthy handshake, and he was gone. Left with his less moralistic colleagues, we were told that he was off to his fat, wriggly whore, who languished like a pupa grub in a flearidden bedroom above the town abbatoir. Five Pint Lil, they called her, because that was the amount of spruce beer which needed to be consumed before the morals of the average Puritan evaporated completely. For some reason though, the beer was having the opposite effect on my morals, and I did not want to hear this. In truth, I was feeling extraordinarily romantic and uncynical, and keen to get mingling with the local beauties. I had had just the right amount of beer: one pot less and I would still have been thirsty, one pot more and I would have been morosely drunk. So, after a visit to the overflowing privy, I announced our departure to anguished groans of militia disappointment.

‘Desist, Friends!' I called out, raising my hands as if in benediction, ‘We will meet again during the course of the evening, I am sure. And if we don't – if the British come scything through the town before then – then this afternoon has been a worthy end to our life on earth!'

A roar went up, and pots were waved deliriously.

‘To Dick and Harry!' came the salutation back, ‘the greatest booksellers the world has ever seen!'

Following Dick through the tunnel of love that formed for us, I felt like a departing hero about to claim his due reward from the grateful townspeople. If this was the life of a spy, then I wanted more. Much more.

No sooner had we stepped out into the glorious mellow sunlight than we found ourselves pestered once more by the crooked mute. Clearly not one to concede defeat gracefully, he cavorted around us gibbering like a lunatic until I was quite exasperated. It was Dick's temper that snapped first, however. Unconcerned by what others would think, he grabbed the mute by the scruff of the neck and frogmarched him around to the side of the tavern, where he addressed him sternly.

‘Look,' he hissed into the mute's cauliflower ear, ‘I'm just about sick, tired, and fed up of you, Pisspot. Yes, we are Redcoats in disguise. Yes, we are spying for General Howe, but No we are not going to recommend that Hackensack be razed to the ground. Our initial impressions of the town have changed. But no thanks to you. Now here…' Dick rummaged in his pocket and pulled out a sixpence. ‘Take this, compliments of King George, and don't pester us any more.'

The mute gurned at the coin in wonder, then at Dick in gratitude, then at me in fear (thinking, no doubt, that it was my role in this little performance to whack him in the chops, and retrieve the coin). Glancing at the light at the end of the alleyway, he finally gurned at that.

‘Yes, you can go,' said Dick. ‘Provided you don't come back.'

The mute went, assisted by a deft kick up the arse, and never once looked as though he would be coming back.

‘And learn to write!' Dick shouted after him.

‘Nice piece of work, Dick,' I conceded. ‘Forceful.'

‘Never tolerate impudence from idiots or women, Harry. That's my motto.'

‘Always translate your motto into Latin, that's my motto. Gives it a certain gravity the original English lacks.'

Dick looked at me suspiciously.

‘What's got into you all of a sudden?'

I giggled, and tottered a little against the wall of the tavern.

‘Either grace has descended, the Muse has descended, or I've drunk exactly the right amount of beer for my requirements. I just feel damned good, Dick. Can't explain why, don't want to explain why. Just want to get romancing.'

Dick gave the matter some thought, even as a parcel of drums and fifes started up that old British army song
Yankee Doodle Dandy
.

‘Perhaps ‘tis because you've confronted obstacles and overcome them. Your lying in there was exceptional. Taylor Woodbine would be proud of you.'

I glowed with pride, and returned the compliment.

‘Well,' said Dick, rubbing his hands as he surveyed the happy crowds, ‘we'd best get cracking then; ‘tis gone five o'clock now. So, what will you be wanting, ye dog – blonde, brunette, short, tall, impudent, obedient, what? Speak now and specify.'

I pondered for a while, as if about to choose a sweetmeat.

‘What are you going for, Dick?'

‘Me? The hottest whore in town. Hair colour and size irrelevant.'

‘This is rural America, Dick. I suspect you'll only have a few to choose from – and one of them, we know, is already taken by Major Thunders.'

‘I'll find one, don't you worry. And you can engage with her after me.'

I shook my head vigorously.

‘No more whores for me, Dick. Need to get a few emotions generated, with women of good breeding and fine sensibilities. Navel wriggling, if it comes at all, is only to be of the most elevated kind.'

With which credo sounding in my ears, I stepped out boldly onto the green – young, dashing, renewed, invigorated. What woman could resist me?

All of them, as it turned out. The trouble was, I was in too Ecstatic a mood for my own good. There were so many beauties flickering on the edges of my averted vision that I could not focus my attention on any particular girl for very long, and though I chatted away with a freedom and ease that delighted them and me – quite the Restoration Fop outwitting the dumb local boys – I feared to get in close and grapple with sophistries and feminine wiles. This was perhaps a legacy of my experience with Eloise De Witt; I did not want to waste the afternoon toiling in another pot of emotional glue. I was also vaguely put off by the fact that the attractive girls knew they were attractive, and consequently prized their friendship too highly. After several conversations I feared I was banging my head against a brick wall, for certainly something had caused a dull thumping to begin there. In truth, I could not turn their defences. If I tried a low remark in an attempt to break through the barrier of artificiality, backs were turned on me; if I tried an erudite remark, I was frowned upon, and considered Mad. All the effort began to wear me down, and I felt myself begin to sag in the heat. Perhaps, I thought, as another facile conversation with a smirking beauty sparkled brilliantly but hopelessly, ‘twas a whore I wanted after all.

‘Harry,' said Dick, who had been my chaperone in the proceedings, in case envious toughs set upon me. ‘Give up. Come and get a whore with me. You're getting nowhere.'

‘Just let me try ten more,' I said, a dazed fighter.

‘No point, mate. They've taken your measure by now. Word has got around. Your novelty value has worn off. We'll try again in the next town.'

He began to lead me away, but I shrugged him off, very petulant. I was damnably disappointed that my excellent mood had been ruined.

‘Don't want a whore!' I shouted, to the nodding approval of a couple of passing Quakers.

‘Better than feeling miserable,' said Dick evenly.

‘Not bloody miserable!' I sulked, scowling at the scenes of festivity around me. If this was what passed for Happiness in these small-minded colonies, I wanted none of it. ‘You'll all be dead soon!' I shouted at the revellers, before lolling back on a convenient plough, an evil smirk plastered across my face.

‘That's it,' whispered Dick hotly, exceedingly angry. ‘Shout out that we're bloody British spies, why don't you? Remember who you are. Remember what you are. One false move, one true word, and we'll be dead sooner than any of this lot.' He looked furtively around him, before continuing more coolly: ‘You're behaving like a loutish soldier, not an educated bookseller. Word will get around. People will put two and two together.'

Though I still wanted to run amuck with my pistol, this was an incisive reminder, which sank in after several minutes of brooding.

‘Yes, you're right. I'm sorry, Dick. I'm acting like a fool. I'm just so disappointed my good mood has come to nothing. I think I need a little drink.'

‘You've had enough drink.'

‘A cordial of some kind, I mean. I've seen people passing with glasses of some orange-looking liquid. Even those Quakers were drinking some, so it can't be alcoholic.'

‘Yes, they're buying them from a stall on the far side of the green. I saw it earlier. Do you want to go there then?'

‘Aye, ‘twill perhaps cool me, and restore my humour.'

Dick led the way through the crowd, and I trudged along in his wake, hands in pockets, scowling at the girls I had been smiling at only minutes earlier. They must have thought this was a new approach, for they instantly pouted, threw up a barricade of parasols and turned their backs on me. Perhaps, as Dick had said, word had got around that a prowling dandy was in their midst, and was therefore to be automatically snubbed whatever his merit. I pitied them almost as much as I pitied myself, which was saying something, and by the time I reached the cordial stall all things American had become obnoxious to me, making me seek comfort in that last refuge of the scoundrel, Patriotism. In England, I gloated to myself, the cordial stall would be deserted, no matter how hot the day, and everybody would be out of their minds on gin, acting like animals. Here was all decorum, masterful sobriety and wholesome conversation – not a spark of hedonism anywhere – which only proved to me that I was surrounded by half-wits. I hated their guts, and wondered what they had to hide by acting in so unnatural a manner; ‘twas as though they were afraid of getting honestly drunk.

But they did have something to hide, as it turned out, and this was soon revealed to me. Elbowing my way through the last few yards of obstruction (using my elbows quite gratuitously, for Dick had already made a clearing with his), we gained at last a full view of the trestle table that was the centrepiece of the stall. On it a regiment of empty pots stood ready for the filling; above it a red, white and blue banner proclaimed that this was the charitable work of the Wives Of The Revolution; behind it stood the wives of the revolution themselves – a grisly assortment of farmers' wives of the blind-mice-killing variety, with meaty sunburned forearms, starched bonnets, Resolved smiles on their indomitable faces, and arses of vast size and tonnage. There was one, however, who did not fit this description at all; on the contrary, she looked more like one of the Waifs Of The Revolution, being small, slight, pale and unbonneted. Potato-nosed, with a definite squint, she scowled furiously from beneath her mop of auburn hair at every upright citizen who bought cordial from her, as though she were giving them cups of her own blood. I was watching entranced this vision of discontent when she looked up and around, and caught my eye. The electrical shock of the connection shook me to my roots, so that I was forced to look away quickly. After a few seconds of feigned interest in my finger nails, the branches of a lime tree, a falling leaf and a perambulating pig, I ventured another look. She was still looking at me; only this time, I fancied, with more curiosity than anger. I twisted my features into the semblance of a smile, but this only made
her
look away quickly, and return to her dispensing duties. I watched her for a few moments more, then sought cover behind Dick.

‘Dick,' I announced, giving my teeth a quick rub with my handkerchief, ‘'Tis the one.'

‘What?'

‘The girl at the stall. ‘Tis the one. I can feel it.'

Dick looked.

‘They all look like wrestlers to me. Except that ratty-looking one in the middle.'

‘That's the one I mean,' I said, somewhat put out by the remark. ‘But she's not ratty, she's beautiful.'

‘Well, if that's how you feel, have a go – but wait a minute. Oh, look at the way she walks.'

Dick was alluding to the way she hobbled to the back of the waiting wagon for more pots.

‘She's gone in the legs,' said Dick. ‘A spavined nag. Rickets or something, I wouldn't be surprised. Zounds, it makes you wonder what else is wrong with her. You really do pick ‘em. I wouldn't touch her with a bargepole personally.'

‘No-one's asking you to,' I said, too entranced to take much notice of his heartless talk. ‘I like her, and that's all that matters.'

‘It might even be wooden. Christ, man – where are your senses? Probably a leg's dropped off with the clap. I know your poet's preference for underdogs, but this is ridiculous.'

‘You do not know that it is wooden,' I said, ‘nor do you know that syphilis has anything to do with her condition. But…..steady, she is coming back.' I began to tremble as I realized that I had to speak to her. The beer had given me courage, but only of the dull Dutch variety, and I could think of no interesting opening gambit.

‘Dick, what am I to say?'

‘Tush, man. Simply pay her a compliment, if you can find one to pay.'

‘But what about all those people around her?'

‘They will be fertilizing the fields in a couple of weeks' time remember. It does not greatly matter what they think.'

A citizen moved away and I was pushed by Dick into a space at the trestle table, where I found myself looking directly down on her. I was not sure if I liked her so much close up – her skin was more blemished than I first thought – but I was too committed to back away now. Unfortunately, as I was about to speak to the girl one of the biggest Revolutionary Wives elbowed her out of the picture.

‘Cordial?' she snapped.

‘Er, yes…'

‘Nothing else?'

‘No, but, er…'

‘Good God, man, say what you want! Don't stand there dithering like a Tory jelly!'

The patriotically-set citizens around us honked with laughter. I looked down yearningly at the girl, and was emboldened to see her scowling at the honkers.

‘I want to speak to the young lady,' I stated.

The scowl was turned on me.

‘What young lady where?'

‘This young lady here…'

‘Don't just nod at her,' Dick whispered in my ear. ‘Pay her a compliment.'

‘..the one with the lovely…er…scowl…'

I smiled as I said it, trying to turn it into irony, but it did not sound good. Dick groaned, the girl produced an Extra Strength scowl, and the citizens honked louder.

‘Ah, you mean Sophie. Go on, speak to her then.' The fat Revolutionary Wife folded her arms and waited intently. ‘Sophie, it seems you have an admirer at last. Listen to what the gentleman has to say to you. I'm sure we'll all be interested.'

‘'Tis war passion running hot,' murmured a citizen behind me, before everyone stopped talking to listen. The faint strains of
Yankee Doodle Dandy
and the hum of distant crowds were the only sounds left to compete with my thumping heart. The cordial stall was stilly expectant, as though I was George Washington about to deliver a patriotic address. I had no alternative but to wade in unscripted.

‘Sophie, I was wondering if you'd care to escort me to the dance this evening,' I said quietly, feeling ridiculous. Heads strained forward round my shoulders as I spoke, so that I must have appeared quite Hydra-like to the poor girl.

One or two clapped, some of the more sentimental sighed romantically, the disillusioned sneered.

‘Just say no, and thank him for the offer, Sophie,' urged the fat one, keen to get on with the cordial-slopping again. ‘Yes, Sir, what's it to be – lemon or orange?'

Not having taken her eyes off me all the while, Sophie's scowl suddenly burst like a lanced boil, and out shone a radiant smile that quite dazzled me. Her cheeks bulged like hernias, and her teeth – all her own by the looks of it – were displayed very advantageously. Even her eyes watered up for some reason.