Hamilton's Battalion Read online

  “And he believed you?” She looked impressed.

  He shrugged, trying not to preen. “He didn’t have me arrested or sack me, and sometimes that’s all you can ask.”

  She shifted into a more relaxed position, her elbows resting on spread, raised knees, unselfconsciously comfortable in her breeches. Comfortable with him, even. Nathan tried not to look at her legs or where they joined.

  “How did you get the information out of the city?” she asked.

  He’d resolved not to talk too much, but maybe giving her space didn’t have to mean not talking, if she was asking him questions. He told her about his codebook, and invisible ink (which they were always out of, but it sounded thrilling), and leaving messages in secret hiding places for men he’d never met. He didn’t mention any names.

  “We have to win this war,” she said intently, chin propped on clasped fists, and for the first time she didn’t say it to argue with him. We included him now.

  He’d known, in the long years of imagining telling her, that it would feel wonderful to finally not be shut out by her fervent we. He didn’t like that it was full of unexpected small resentments too.

  “And we have to be part of it. Jews, I mean.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “You know that quarrel…I was just a baby, but you might actually remember it.” She lay on her back in the dry grass. “There was an argument about taking the window sash in the ladies’ gallery out of its frame for the Days of Repentance, sometime in the fifties.”

  What did that have to do with the war? “Who could forget? Gitlah Hays and her Christian friend got rained on during Kol Nidre and she had her husband sneak into the synagogue next morning and rehang the sash.” He stretched out gingerly beside her, carefully propping his hat over his forehead, and she didn’t inch away.

  It was growing dark and the ground was ice-cold, but high above them stars were coming out, brighter for the chill. In the near distance, British mortar shells tumbled sparkling through the twilight.

  Nathan tried not to think about how they were hollow spheres packed with powder, sealed with a protruding wooden fuse that gave them their distinctively uneven arc, but it was hard to forget when he could hear them exploding.

  “Everyone was still angry about it twenty years later,” she said. “My mother’s friends would talk over each other to tell you how hot it was that year—a good ten degrees hotter in the gallery than on the floor where the men sat—and if the parnas’s son did lay hands on Solomon Hays, it was no more than he deserved. And then Mr. Hays prosecuted the parnassim in goyish court. What a disgrace!”

  Nathan sighed. “My mother sided with the Hayses.”

  Rachel howled with laughter. They lay so close Nathan fancied he could feel the ground quivering. “I know! If you think my mother didn’t bring it up when you asked to marry me…but that’s my point. In twenty years, in thirty years, in forty years, everyone will still be talking about what everyone did in this war. They’ll hold grudges and remember who was on their side and who wasn’t. Only it will be worse, because it’s a war and not the damn gallery window. I want Patriots to remember that the Jews were on their side.”

  He felt a little sad. This was hardly the burning idealism, the passionate belief in liberty that he remembered from her. A shell burst in midair in a shower of burning shrapnel. He shivered violently and refrained with an effort from offering Rachel his coat.

  She didn’t pay the explosion any mind. “That’s why I have to be as famous as possible.”

  Nathan blinked. “What?”

  Abruptly Rachel’s existence was new again. She spoke, thought, moved, and all of it startled him—he couldn’t understand or predict it. She was flesh and blood, not the pale ghost in his mind that answered him according to his own fancy.

  She curled onto her side with sudden ardent energy, propping herself up on her elbow. There was the passion after all; war and the wide world of Christians hadn’t dulled it. “I’m going to help win this war, and then I’m going to tell everyone I’m a woman. Have you heard of Hannah Snell?”

  “The British soldier? Everyone’s heard of her. Her memoirs are in every bookshop in New York.” He remembered conversations like this in the nighttime dark: her talking animatedly, mashing her pillow with her hands, while he lay and listened happily. A breath away when their twin bed frames were pushed together, or her voice bridging the gap when her courses came and they were forbidden to touch. Sometimes he’d grown animated too, and they sat and talked half the night. Later, as war neared, they’d argued.

  Later still, he had wanted peace and quiet in his bed and turned his back to her, feigning exhaustion.

  She sat with a triumphant nod, wrapping her arms around her knees. He almost reached up to push her hair behind her ears, before he remembered it was in that tight queue.

  “I’m going to do that,” she said, trembling with enthusiasm. “I’ll give lectures, I’ll petition the government for my pension. I’ll write my memoirs, even. No one will be able to forget me, and they’ll know I’m Jewish.”

  She saved her passion for helping her people; that startled him most of all. He’d been so angry yesterday when she said, I want to be American. He’d thought she meant, I don’t want to be a Jew anymore. It had never occurred to him a person could be both.

  That was exactly what she’d been trying to say, wasn’t it? And he hadn’t been able to stretch his mind to hear her. He tried to now. A Jew and an American…

  Would Americans ever accept as one of them a Jew who didn’t leave his Jewishness behind and adopt their ways? Would they accept him even if he did? Did their acceptance interest Nathan one way or the other?

  He might not be sure, but Rachel was.

  When she used to talk eagerly of a new republic, he’d thought she pictured somewhere she could be a modern woman and forget the past—their shared Jewish past stretching back thousands of years, the accumulated stories and wisdom and tradition he loved so dearly and she found stifling. He’d suspected that by “freedom” she meant freedom from him, and everyone like him. Had he been wrong?

  Maybe she had meant it that way, and living among goyim all these years had changed her mind. Or maybe it had never been Jewishness she wanted to leave behind at all—maybe it had just been Nathan.

  But he remembered turning away from her in their bed, and wondered queasily if she was right, and he’d left her behind first.

  “But…how are you going to be a famous lecturer, when you’re pretending to be dead?” He tried to say it as if it didn’t mean anything to him. A simple, curious question.

  She made a face. “I was hoping I’d grown enough that no one would recognize me if I just changed my name.”

  I would recognize you anywhere. “Well, not many people know you as well as I do,” he said, intending to be encouraging and probably just sounding proprietary.

  She clearly decided to take it in the spirit it was offered. “You’re right, it will be tricky.” She hesitated. “I promised your mother I wouldn’t bring shame to your family. More than I had already by marrying you, anyway.”

  He rolled into a sitting position, suddenly feeling foolish and exposed lying down. He’d been trying not to think about his mother. At least Rachel had had a goal lofty enough to half justify ruthlessness. Mrs. Mendelson had only wanted to get rid of Rachel, and she hadn’t minded hurting Nathan badly to do it.

  “I’m sorry,” she said unexpectedly. “I…if I had it to do over I’d do it again, but I am sorry.”

  His breath caught. He blinked back grateful tears, a welcome relief from resentment and humiliation.

  That surprised him, too: how deeply the words touched him. He would have said the two sentiments negated each other—I’d do it again, and I’m sorry. They didn’t. He knew she meant both of them. His mother wouldn’t mean the “I’m sorry” part, if she could even bring herself to apologize instead of just insisting she’d been in the right until he grew tired of arguing about i
t.

  He thought of Mrs. Jacobs, suddenly. She’d seemed a reasonable sort of person. Even dying, she’d made an effort to think of Rachel’s feelings and spare them. He supposed Rachel had had expectations for a mother and a home that he hadn’t really understood.

  An apology meant something to her, more than this conversation is over now.

  He couldn’t quite tell her yet, “I forgive you,” or “it’s all right.” His instinct was to rush on, to make a joke, to pretend she hadn’t said it. But he’d learned to work around being a coward, hadn’t he? He dug his nail into his thumb and counted cannon fire. One, two, three, four…

  “I know.” It wasn’t much, but he meant it.

  Her arms loosened their tight grip on her knees. Her face turned towards his, briefly, and she almost smiled before she looked away.

  “Do you have another name picked out?” He made a genuine effort this time, and the words came out with cheerful unconcern, as if her leaving “Mendelson” behind didn’t drive hot spikes into his flesh. Good to know captivity hadn’t dulled his skill at subterfuge.

  “I like Esther. It sounds like Ezra, and she was a Jewish heroine who fought for her people in disguise. Besides, things rhyme with it.” She gave him a sly, self-deprecating look. A flirtatious look, even. “You know, for the ballads. ‘Test her,’ ‘None could best her’…”

  “Fester,” he suggested blandly.

  She giggled. “Nothing rhymes with Rachel,” she said mournfully.

  “Maybe if you mumbled a little you could get away with ‘catch hell.’”

  “Or ‘satchel,’ yes, very heroic.” She sighed. “I should go back.”

  She sounded reluctant, as if she would have liked to stay. That was…not progress, he chided himself. You aren’t launching a campaign to win her back.

  The words struck his heart like lightning. A campaign to win her back sounded like the best idea he’d ever had.

  “So should I,” he said, with more of that cheerful unconcern. Be here, and give her room to breathe. Start there. “Quacoe will be waiting for me.” He got to his feet with an effort.

  Her eyes went to his shackles. “Let me see your ankles.”

  He shuffled a step back. “Oh, they’re fine.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Are they?”

  “As fine as they can be after wearing irons for four days,” he said impatiently. “Don’t—” Don’t fuss. That was something a man said to his wife, so he didn’t say it. Room to breathe.

  But this was something a woman did for her husband, crouching down, pushing up the knee of his breeches and pulling down his stocking, even if she did it with a stoic soldier’s face. Even if she carefully didn’t touch his skin.

  He wanted her to touch his skin. He would die if she touched his skin.

  She peeled the stocking gently away from his ankle, taking a few hairs and a scab with the linen. “Ow,” he protested. Her mouth set in a grim line.

  He couldn’t see in this position, but he’d looked earlier and he knew he’d told her the truth: it wasn’t bad. A lot of bruises, some shallow scrapes, and a general puffy redness. Who cared?

  He should be relishing her attention, but he wanted too much for it to be real, for it to be out of love and not duty. The only reason he didn’t yank up his stocking was because their hands might brush. “It’s nothing,” he repeated. “It won’t be for much longer. I’m sure your feet have been worse after a day’s march.”

  He didn’t like that idea either. He’d heard too many tales of blood in the snow; his heart felt swollen and black-and-blue as a plum to think it had been her blood. And he hadn’t been there to frown at the damage, the way she was doing now over a few scratches.

  “I marched in order to get somewhere,” she said. “These are for nothing.”

  “What do you mean, ‘nothing’? These are keeping my secret. They’re keeping me useful and they’re keeping me safe. Is that nothing? Let them be.”

  Her frown deepened.

  What do you care? he wanted to say. It was on the tip of his tongue, jumping up and down and pushing at his lips, demanding to be let out. Not saying it was probably the hardest thing he’d ever done; he felt a fierce, hot pride when he managed it. She rocked back on her heels, and he retied his garter, and that was that.

  Chapter Five

  October 9

  The next day was fatigue duty again for Rachel’s brigade, a long day of fetching wood and water, digging new sinks, and other hard, dull labor. The only break was the cheer that went up through the camp when the first Franco-American batteries opened, accompanied by a ceremonial firing of every gun in the trenches.

  And then, when they had nearly finished their work, a last-minute order came for sixty saucissons, eighty fascines, two hundred palisades, and eight hundred pickets by five o’clock. In other words, hours of bundling brush and branches securely together, stripping and sharpening small tree trunks, and picking splinters out of men’s hands.

  We’re digging a second parallel soon, whispers went through the camp. But what about those British redoubts?

  The squat dirt towers filled with guns sat out ahead of the British defenses and fired on anything that came near. Even though the American troops had all seen the earthworks give cover to the trenches, even though the redoubts themselves were made more or less of the same stuff, it was hard to believe that some dirt thrown over these bundles of sticks they were making could really ward off cannonballs.

  Rachel breathed a sigh of relief when it was finally time for mess. The day’s rations were meager, and the beef would have to be boiled for hours to be edible, but Sarah grinned with suppressed excitement. “We’ll eat this tomorrow,” she said. “There’s plenty of food tonight. Do you want to invite your spy friend? We’ll be very careful not to let drop any state secrets.”

  Rachel wished she could honestly answer that question in the negative. She hated the eagerness that flared up in her at Sarah’s words, like breathing on a banked coal. What was wrong with her? If she did invite Nathan, in five minutes he’d embarrass her in front of her friends, and she’d remember she was glad to be rid of him.

  “Thanks, Sarah. I’ll go and fetch him.” She couldn’t wait to be rid of him again, and feel glad of it.

  Sarah’s surprise was crab, big blue ones already turned a gorgeous vivid red in the mess’s tin kettle. The steam smelled of shellfish and wine.

  Rachel’s heart sank even as her stomach rumbled and her mouth watered. “Is there bread or something for Nathan?”

  Sarah’s face fell. “Oh, I didn’t even think. Zvi asked for crab this week, and these were so fine! I…” She cast about, hands fluttering.

  Nathan looked at the crab with trepidation. He looked at Rachel’s messmates, impatient for their dinner. He took a deep breath.

  “I’ll eat it,” he declared. “Once in my life, why not?”

  Rachel’s jaw dropped. “Are you sure?”

  To her surprise and dismay, the idea discomfited her. As if it had only been all right to break every rule because Nathan had been at home keeping them for her.

  Zvi sighed heavily. “Once won’t be enough when you’ve tasted it. Even without vinegar or pepper or mustard—”

  “You don’t have pepper?” Nathan asked.

  They shook their heads mournfully.

  Smiling, he reached in his pocket and held out his closed fist palm up, as if to surprise a child with the gift of a penny. “Allow me to solve this problem for you.” He opened his fingers to reveal a flat brass spice box, double-curved like the body of a guitar. “They took my nutmeg grater, but the salt and pepper, being in an inner pocket, escaped their notice.”

  So much for her friends disliking Nathan. Judging by their expressions, any of them would henceforward gladly step into the path of a bullet for him. They gathered around the fire, and Sarah dished up dinner.

  Nathan poked dubiously at his crab, shuddering when its legs wobbled. “How hungry do you think the first pers
on to eat one of these must have been?”

  “It’s not too late to change your mind,” Rachel said.

  But her friends vied with each other to show him how to break it apart and pull out the meat, and Nathan, visibly flattered by the attention, succumbed. Rachel held her breath as he screwed up his face and put the first piece in his mouth.

  “It’s…sweet,” he said in surprise.

  Zvi sighed again. “I know…”

  Sergeant Flanagan rolled his eyes. “You sound like boys stealing communion wine. It’s just crab.”

  “Tell that to my mother.” Nathan seasoned another bite and popped it in his mouth. Grains of pepper stuck to his wet fingers.

  Rachel couldn’t bring herself to dip her fingers into his spice box, but she ate a piece of crab. It felt intimate even to taste what he was tasting, to let the sweet briny crab melt over her tongue and know that the same forbidden flavor was in his mouth.

  This was ludicrous. There was nothing intimate about sharing food. She broke bread with her messmates every day and it had never once seemed a prelude to carnal conversation.

  “Hey!” Scipio said. “Maybe Mr. Mendelson knows about the ring.”

  No. No. Damn it all to hell. Rachel’s face flushed and her heart pounded. “Shut up,” she said sharply.

  Unfortunately, that rarely had the desired effect among a group of soldiers not under one’s direct command. Flanagan smirked. “Oho, yes, let’s ask him.”

  Zvi hesitated. “Maybe we shouldn’t spoil the mystery.”

  “Pfft,” Scipio said. “Do you know whose ring Ezra is wearing, Mr. Mendelson?”

  There was no profanity terrible enough to relieve Rachel’s inner agitation, but Nathan still looked merely confused. His eyes went to her hands, sticky with crab. “He isn’t wearing any rings.”

  “Around his neck,” Sarah clarified. “Come on, Ezra. Show him.”

  “Ah, leave the kid alone,” Zvi said.

  Tench reached for Rachel’s collar. If she made a fuss now it would only be worse. There might be a scuffle; those were dangerous when you were hiding breasts.