Revolution (18 page)

“I view the empowered admiralty court as just as pernicious a threat,” said Reisdale. “It saves the customs collectors the risk of malfeasance, because the Stamp Act allows them to pillage our trade without the necessity of sly, underhanded avarice.”

“And indemnifies them against their errors,” added Hugh. “And endorses writs of assistance and the employment and reward of spies.”

“What are we revolting against, sirs? Power, or the corruption of that power?” asked Henry Otway. “I confess the issue is muddled in my mind.”

“Against the corruption, for the time being,” answered Jack. “And, when London attempts to make its empire and policies pure and corruption-proof — and I agree with Mr. Kenrick’s assessment that this is the direction London is likely to take — then we must revolt against the power. That is in the cards. An honest tyranny is as much to be feared as a dishonest one.”

“We are not
revolting
,” objected Vishonn. “We are claiming our liberties. I will not tolerate talk of
revolt
in this house.” His companions did not know whether or not their host was jesting.

Reisdale chuckled and said, “Then if you object to such talk, sir, I recommend that you stand for burgess next year.”

Henry Otway said, “Yes. I have heard that Mr. Cullis may choose to remove himself from his incumbency.”

“Sir,” asked Hugh of his host, “did you extend an invitation to the Cullis family?”

Reece Vishonn looked innocent. “Yes, I did, sir. You see them here this evening. The father has appeared with his wife, but they asked me to excuse the son because of an
illness
.” He paused to chuckle in doubt. “I understand that you assign as much blame to your fellow burgess for the attempted smuggling of the stamps as to Captain Sterling and Mr. Mercer.”

“No, I do not,” answered Hugh. “He merely prepared the way, a way that cost Mr. Barret his life, as well. And, in consort with the House leaders, he prompted the Governor to deny us any means to protest.”

“That is a grave charge,” warned Otway.

“The charge is commensurate with the action and consequences. Mr. Cullis would not have acted alone in the matter.”

“I did not observe him cheering Colonel Mercer’s dumb show at the Capitol, that is for certain,” said Reisdale. “Many other burgesses did, but not he.”

Hugh shrugged. “Mr. Mercer? Well, he did not much warm a bench in the chamber when he was elected to it, and I doubt he will have the opportunity to ever warm it, now. As for Mr. Cullis, I cannot predict what he will do. I am not concerned.”

Henry Otway picked up a copy of the
Virginia Gazette
that lay on a side table near his chair. “Doubtless you have all read his statement here,” he said, waving the newspaper in the air. “There was a serving of kickshaw to compete with the worst plate ever prepared by the cooks at the Raleigh!”

Reisdale nodded in agreement. “Yes. Speaking of kickshaw, his feast of words left me feeling empty. There was far too much piety in them for me to purchase belief in their sincerity.”

“A half loaf of another kind,” remarked Hugh. He chuckled in contempt, and reached for the
Gazette
, which Otway handed him. He read from the column “‘Thus, gentlemen, I am circumstanced.’ What villainous blather!” he scoffed, handing the paper back to Otway. “No man journeys all the way to London in a quest for a Crown sinecure without being ‘circumstanced.’ He seeks such a circumstance.”

Reece Vishonn turned in his chair and addressed Arthur Stannard, who stood with a glass of port in the shadow in back of the circle of seated men. “Sir, we know you are full of perspective, yet we have not heard a word from you on any subject. You may speak without risk of censure here.”

“We did not see you at the pier last week,” said Otway. “Too immersed in your account books?”

Stannard shook his head. “No, sir. Frankly, I disagreed with the action taken on that day by many of you here, and decided I would not lend my presence to the protest. I still object to it. As does Reverend Acland. Even Sheriff Tippet had his reservations, and Mayor Corbin.” He paused. “Reverend Acland declined to attend, as you well know.” He smiled nervously.

Jock Frazer laughed. “It is the first ball he has ever missed!”

“Well, Mr. Corbin and Mr. Tippet certainly haven’t objected to the outcome!” laughed Vishonn. “They’re here, lapping up my punch and kickshaw! They’re welcome to it!”

“No, they haven’t objected to the outcome,” agreed Stannard. “What do you think Governor Fauquier will do about it? He is sure to learn of the event.”

Hugh shook his head. “Nothing, sir. He failed to ensure employment of the stamps. He will neither do anything about it, nor even mention it to the Board of Trade.”

“There’s another well-intentioned man,” observed Jock Frazer. “I don’t envy him his place.”

“Trapped in a political purgatory between policy and principle,” mused Hugh, “unable to reconcile the requisites of the nation with the tenets of liberty and free trade.”

Jack Frake remarked with a nod, “Yes. In the long view, the most benign minister or member of Parliament must choose between reason and force.” He smiled at Reisdale. “There is the half loaf we must never accept — the mongrel unity of the two.”

Vishonn puffed thoughtfully on his pipe for a moment, then asked, “If you were a wagering man, Mr. Frake, which would you put your money on? Reason or force?”

“Neither, sir,” said Jack. “We will see half loaves by the dozen. If the Stamp Act is nullified or even repealed, you may wager on further attempts to subject us. London has won an empire, and is determined to rule it and profit by it. I recollect saying this in this very room, years ago, gentlemen, on the occasion of General Wolfe’s triumph at Quebec.”

“Do you object to the empire?” asked Vishonn.

“Only if it treats me as its servant,” replied Jack. “That would be worth a volume of objections.”

* * *

Etáin’s last selection was the Welsh melody, “Ash Grove.” After taking her final bows for the evening, she spent time with her husband and other guests. But at one point during the ball, she took Hugh Kenrick aside. “Did you meet someone in New York?” she asked.

“Yes,” answered Hugh, startled by the question, “many of the delegates.” He smiled back at her, and saw in her green eyes that she meant
something else.

“Were there many women at the congress?”

“Of course, but not in attendance.” Then he understood the import of her question. “Oh. I see. No, Etáin, I did not meet a lady at the congress.” He smiled and conceded her powers of observation. “No, not at the congress, but in Hampton.” He paused. “But she must have been a ghost, or I had a fever.” He chuckled. “How could you guess?”

“You have looked distracted, ever since you returned from the congress.”

Hugh grinned. “Don’t you mean ‘despondent’?”

“All right. ‘Despondent.’ It darkens your gallantry.”

“I did not know I was so transparent.”

“You are not to most others, but are to me. That is because I know you too well.”

Hugh wished to change the subject. “How are your parents faring? I miss them.”

“I, too, miss them. They have settled in Edinburgh. Father is with another tobacco merchant firm, although he often travels to London and Bristol on its business.”

* * *

John Ramshaw stayed another week at Meum Hall until his business in West Point and Williamsburg was finished. Hugh did not query him again about Reverdy Brune and her brother.

The captain rode out to the fields with his host to watch the tenants dismantle the conduit and store it for the winter. He did not comfortably ride a horse, but managed to keep up with Hugh. He remarked at one point, as they stopped to rest by the water collection tower by Hove Stream, which was being repaired, “You and Jack and the others have saved me the trouble of retiring early from the sea.”

Hugh grinned in amusement, glancing at the captain’s crown of silver hair. The shocks of black had vanished now, and he had observed Ramshaw’s slight winces when he moved. Arthritis was beginning to claim the man’s joints. He guessed that his friend was now somewhere in his sixties. “How so, sir?”

“There was little chance that my artisans could have forged those damned stamps with any success, and in such quantity. And the fates have
blessed me all these years, in that no civil or naval limpet has ever rummaged my ship to discover its secret print shop. That can’t last. In a few years I shall hang up my sextant.” He paused to take a swig of port from a water flask.

Hugh knew about the two men in the captain’s crew who worked in a concealed compartment of the
Sparrowhawk
to produce false customs forms and dockets for much of the cargo that Ramshaw brought into the various ports up and down the seaboard. He also took a drink from his flask. “I understand that Jack has decided not to husband the
Sparrowhawk,
” he said.

Ramshaw sighed and shook his head. “True. All he would need to do is see to provisioning us for the return voyage. But he won’t commit his time or means to such a venture. Offered him generous terms, and he was tempted to accept them. Gave me an odd reason for declining, though.”

“What?”

“He said it was too soon, that not enough of us had caught up with him. Said something about his risking a set-to with the customs or Navy, and he would probably be clapped in irons before his time!” Ramshaw paused, then shook his head. “I can’t decide whether that is vanity or wisdom.”

“Wisdom,” answered Hugh. “You should know better, Mr. Ramshaw. Jack is the proudest man in these parts, and the least vain.” He added, as an afterthought, “He is the north.”

Ramshaw grunted. “Skelly once told me he was the future.”

“The future? The future of what?”

“He didn’t say, sir. I daresay no one could say. Only Jack.” Ramshaw grinned and shook his head. “No, it couldn’t be vanity. For as long as I’ve known him, sir, he’s known what he’s about.”

Ramshaw left Caxton on the
Sparrowhawk
two weeks after the incident at the pier. Hugh, Jack Frake, and Etáin saw him off. They expected to see him again in the spring.

Hugh returned to his routines at Meum Hall. Always in his work was a little ache of memory of Reverdy Brune, one that caused him to wonder where she was now. Was she in Norfolk? Did she and her brother journey to Charleston? To Annapolis? Had she forgotten him? Or was she afraid to see him again?

Then, one morning while he was supervising with his overlooker, William Settle, the plowing of manure and ground clamshells into the
cleared tobacco acreage that he had decided to let lie fallow for two years, he thought he heard the rattle of a carriage in the distance. He put the distraction out of his mind. Then Spears rushed over the fields to inform him that he had visitors.

His mind still half on the task at hand, he wondered: Was it Lieutenant-Governor Fauquier calling to enquire about his role in the stoppage of the stamps? Who else in Queen Anne County would visit him in a carriage? And who might have accompanied him? Peyton Randolph? Speaker John Robinson? Had they come to chastise him for having attended the Stamp Act Congress last month? He asked Spears who it was.

“A gentleman, sir,” said the valet, “and his sister. Mr. James Brune, and Mrs. Brune-McDougal, fresh from Williamsburg.” Spears paused. “They say you are an old friend, sir.”

Hugh simply stared at the valet for a moment, speechless, then remembered to instruct him to tell Mrs. Vere, the housekeeper, to make them comfortable, and the cook to prepare some refreshments. “I’ll come in after I’ve seen to some things here,” he said. “In a few minutes.”

Spears said, “Yes, sir.” He paused, then added in confidence, “I do believe they are expecting to stay for a while, sir. A wagon came with them, loaded with baggage, I noted. They did not state what their intentions were, of course.”

Hugh blinked once. “Yes. Well, then see that the extra rooms are also prepared, if that is their intention.”

“Yes, sir.” Spears turned and hurried back to the great house.

* * *

“G
orgeous country here, Hugh,” said James Brune. “Reverdy and I quite envy you the place. It is vast and pleasant enough to even stir a bit of ambition in me to perhaps come here and try my hand.”

Hugh replied, “You have just missed the summer, James. Summers here can be fatiguing and close. Sometimes, in that season, one feels as though one were struggling inside a vat of butter. Sweat sticks like cloth to one’s skin, denying it breath and providing nourishment for countless insects, foreign and familiar.”

James Brune laughed. Reverdy’s older brother had, of course, matured into reasonable good looks and had developed an amiable manner and perspective on things. The pallor that he, like other travelers, acquired during a first Atlantic crossing, had ebbed. He was a silent partner in the merchant company of McLeod and McDougal of London and Edinburgh. The financial marriage of the Brunes and McDougals had proven to be propitious and profitable for all concerned. In the place of his late brother-in-law, he had come to the colonies to scout out more trade possibilities for his firm.

James Brune and his sister had stayed with some relations of one of his partners in Norfolk. “And, some friends of Mr. McLeod also live there. I have never seen so many Scotsmen together in one place before as in Norfolk, except in Scotland! That area of the James is quite active in trade. I was particularly impressed with the shipbuilding there. It quite rivals any port in the south of England.”

They sat together on a bench at the edge of the trim, landscaped lawn that overlooked the York River on the other side of the great house of Meum Hall. The wide expanse below them was a bluish-gray today, dotted with scattered flotillas of waterfowl and ever-busy with craft of numerous sizes and purposes, sailing in the river breezes in both directions on the great commerce way.

Reverdy was in her room, taking a nap after the rigors of traveling from
Williamsburg. She was not yet accustomed to the climate, and was still recovering from the crossing.

“You put the lie to your description of these tropics, Hugh,” said James Brune. “You are an advertisement for settling here. Prosperity becomes you.”

“My prosperity has required much labor and risk, and some heartbreak,” answered Hugh. He could not forget one of the reasons he had decided to stay in the colonies to purchase and revivify the plantation: Reverdy’s marriage to Alex McDougal. He still had the letter that broke his heart those many years ago, tucked away at the bottom of forgotten correspondence, but now remembered. He wondered if Reverdy had kept his last letter in answer to her. If she had not, he would certainly understand. He had not kept a copy of it in his letter book, but he could recall its gently embittered reproach:

“Mr. McDougal is, I do not doubt, deserving of your love, as you must be of his. You both will always be what each of you expects the other to be. I feel obliged, however, to caution you that in future, you will find that love
can
be subjected to a most private and honest rational scrutiny. Perhaps, by that time, natural justice will be kind to you, and, having followed its own inexorable course, rendered you insensible to the weight and wisdom of its dutiful verdict.…”

And, he did not need to unearth the letter from her that had prompted his gentle condemnation:

“…A cargo of virtues cannot inspire love of its owner. Love springs from the inscrutable but feckful heart, it cannot be analyzed or measured or subjected to rational scrutiny, not without causing it to wither and die. Love can only be felt or observed, never judged or justified. I have tried to love you in the manner you expect me to, and cannot. I have imagined loving you in that manner, and come to know that I have not the strength to sustain that mode without regarding it in time as an unfair, cruel trial that would exhaust my endurance.…”

James Brune sat on the other side of the bench, placidly puffing on a pipe. Hugh glanced at him once. He judged the man to be too good-mannered and discreet to raise the subject of his sister’s decision to break the engagement. The subject had not come up, nor even been alluded to. He had asked Hugh if it were possible for them to stay a month or so before resuming their travels, saying that they planned to visit Philadelphia, New York and Boston before returning to the mother country.

Ann Vere, the housekeeper, dived into her rare duty of providing for the needs of Meum Hall’s houseguests. She was beside herself with delight, for Reverdy Brune and her brother were gentlefolk from England, and apparently in her employer’s best graces to be welcomed to stay for some time before resuming their tour of the colonies. Mrs. Vere and her assistant, Rachel, could not wait solely on the guests, so the housekeeper asked Hugh for assistance “from the quarter,” she suggested. Hugh subsequently drafted Dilch as servant pro tempore for the duration of the visit. “What do they fancy in the way of table?’ she asked Hugh, inquiring about the siblings’ preferences in food. “I haven’t the slightest idea, Mrs. Vere,” replied Hugh. “You will need to ask them.”

Hugh himself acted the gracious host, and thought he had succeeded in not staring at Reverdy longer than was necessary. They had not had a moment alone together. He had not yet even had the chance to show them the house. Reverdy retired almost immediately, after an exchange of formal pleasantries, pleading light-headedness and exhaustion from the ride to Meum Hall from Williamsburg. Her brother was made of more robust stuff.

James Brune asked, “I believe that you remarked that your Negroes here are not slaves. I have also learned during my short time here that one can’t free them, if one were inclined to. How did you manage that?”

Hugh shrugged. “I sold them to a Quaker friend of mine in Philadelphia, and my father bought them from him in my uncle’s name, and freed them subsequently by arrangement. In theory, my uncle owned them, but in fact they are free. Most of them elected to stay in my employ. It is of dubious legality — if one may attach any legality to laws that perpetuate slavery — but no one will challenge it here, for it would raise an issue that few here are either willing to discuss, or could argue for or against with any lasting credence. It was the only way I could see to flout the insidious law that prohibits their manumission.” He paused. “Of course, my uncle has no knowledge of the transaction, and I beg you not to communicate to him or to anyone in his coterie his former status as a benevolent slave owner.”

James Brune nodded, and thought about this for a moment, then asked, “But, how do you manage in your account books? I am assuming that you pay these people.”

“I manage,” replied Hugh. His smile did not invite further questions about the means he employed to remain solvent, when so many other planters were technically bankrupt or teetering on the brink of insolvency.

James Brune smiled in answer to the courteous but perfunctory
answer. “Have you any news of your friend Roger?”

“Roger has returned to Woolwich as an artillery instructor. He served as attaché on a number of diplomatic missions on the Continent. He wrote me not long ago that he has applied for a position in several regiments.” Hugh waited a moment, then asked, “How did Alex McDougal die, James? Captain Ramshaw, who was a guest here, spoke of several of his passengers this last voyage, and happened to mention you and Reverdy.”

“Alex?” sighed James Brune. “Very odd incident, Hugh. He and Reverdy and some of his acquaintances were riding together on Pall Mall a year ago. Two or three robbers came out of the bushes to collect their ‘toll,’ as they put it in their parlance. One of them stood directly in front of Alex’s mount, but his pistol went off accidentally, causing Alex’s mount to rear up. The hooves caught the fellow on the chin and broke his neck. Alex was thrown and broke his own neck when he tumbled to the ground. The robbers fled. Alex died instantly, and the robber expired not long afterward.”

“Tragic,” remarked Hugh. “Reverdy must have been beside herself with sorrow.”

“She was in mourning for six months, and was morose for some time after she shed her blacks. I proposed that she accompany me on this voyage, and convinced her it might do her some good. I must say I gave good advice. She has emerged from the tomb of bereavement and is quite her gay self again.”

At supper that evening, which also included Rupert Beecroft, Meum Hall’s business agent, and William Settle, its steward, the Brune siblings were the focus of attention and conversation. They deftly managed a barrage of questions about political and economic conditions in Britain, spicing much serious talk with amusing anecdotes, wistful recollections, and generous compliments for Virginia. Reverdy, to Hugh’s qualified amazement and approval, had become a particularly good conversationalist, able to hold her own in any discussion of politics and society matters.

Hugh sat at the head of the table; James and his sister on either side of him. Outwardly, Reverdy behaved more like an old acquaintance than a former fiancée. But her and Hugh’s eyes met briefly but often in the course of the supper. He read in her glances little else but a repressed desire to talk with him alone; she saw nothing in his but an intense curiosity coupled with a struggle not to let it be more than that.

It was a terrific struggle, for Reverdy was more beautiful than he could ever have imagined. Her deportment and poise were natural and unaffected,
seeming to radiate from her beauty, indelible facets of it and impossible to imagine without it. She was outspoken and well-spoken, able to contradict another’s statement or opinion with grace and without malice. She was now the kind of woman that most men desired but still feared.

She turned to Hugh now. “Hugh, James here tells me that you are now a politician of some sort.”

Hugh smiled amiably. “I am a burgess for this county in the General Assembly. That is much like a member of the Commons, but without so large a company.”

“I dared not imagine that
you
would have the time for politics.”

“It was necessary to make the time.”

“James also tells me that you have somehow freed the black folk I saw as we came in. Do other planters and burgesses feel the same way?”

Hugh shook his head. “Not all. But many do think as I do. Laws discourage them from contemplating any serious action ”

James Brune sighed. “I don’t understand why the institution still exists here, Hugh, and on so vast a scale! It is such an unsavory business. Its like is not to be seen in London!”

Hugh shrugged. “The planters and burgesses here have done what they dare to stem the importation of slaves into the colony. Bills are regularly introduced in the House that would tax the sale and import of slaves. There are those within and without the General Assembly who would abolish the institution altogether. However, everyone knows that the Crown, and especially His Majesty, derive a lucrative revenue from the trade, one that will not be relinquished easily, if ever. Even a modest proposal to abolish the institution is met with animosity in London. And the defenders of the trade are insensible to appeals to reason and right. Their ilk are likewise insensible to our own liberties and the Constitution that guarantees them. The Stamp Act is only the latest instance of their moral lethargy.”

James Brune looked pensive. “I have the notion that most planters here are slaves themselves in an insidious web. I mean, slavery is the foundation of their fortunes, yet, wish as they might for its end, they would be reduced to paupers if the system were ever corrected.”

Hugh smiled. “You express more wisdom than the Privy Council or the Commons, James. My compliments.”

William Settle said, “Mr. Kenrick here was instrumental in the passage of the Resolves that have lately roused the colonies. I wish you could both stay long enough to hear him speak in the House, next session. You won’t
hear its like in the Commons.”

Hugh dismissed the compliment with a shake of his head and a sincere smile. “Not at all, sir. It was Mr. Henry’s words that roused the colonies. I was merely his factotum.”

Settle grinned. “You are second only to Mr. Henry on the floor, sir. Do not deny it!”

Reverdy asked, “Well, why cannot your General Assembly simply pass a law that abolishes slavery? Surely it must esteem itself worthy of such a weighty action.”

Hugh shook his head again. “Such a law would most certainly be nullified by the Board of Trade and the Privy Council, with or without a suspending clause in the law itself. Governor Fauquier is continually rebuked by London for neglecting to require a suspending clause in the legislation he signs. And that particular law is one he would never sign. He knows that very likely he would be recalled and replaced with someone not nearly as friendly to the colony as he. But such a law has less chance of passage than a frost felling the sugar cane harvests of Barbados.”

James Brune remarked, “We have read some letters in the London papers, from fellows who wonder at the hypocrisy of colonials, who proclaim that their rights are violated by the Stamp Act and other Parliamentary legislation, yet voice nothing about the rights of their slaves.”

Hugh shook his head. “Those people have no grounds for making the accusation. We can hardly champion the rights of slaves when we are in a bit of a fog about what our own rights are. Until that matter is clarified, slavery, I am afraid, must remain a pot in the oven.”

“Do you know the Governor?” asked Reverdy.

“Well enough to have leave to upbraid him on occasion without risk of censure.”

Reverdy stared at him with some secret meaning. “Alex and I often sat in the Commons gallery to listen to the debates. There are many fine speakers to be heard there. Among them, Sir Dogmael Jones. I understand that he is your father’s man. Was he not the barrister who defended those freethinking friends of yours, the ones you were arrested for protecting at the Charing Cross pillory?”

Hugh nodded, but said, “Mr. Jones is his own master. He merely acts as my father’s proxy.” He paused. “And, my own, in a way. We have never disagreed with what the other has said in session on the subject of liberty.”