A Girl Called Samson (61)

The storm had passed and the air was fresh and cold. In the growing light, without the gale to distract me, the surroundings were familiar. The cherry orchard my detachment had been chased from wasn’t far, and a large estate owned by a man named Jeroen Van Tassel was nearby. Captain Webb had hurried us through the area, claiming it was full of Dutch loyalists. I had no reason to doubt him, especially considering the secret depot and the gulch with the burned-out wagons.

I pulled the tie from my hair, smoothed it with my fingers, and refastened my queue. I’d left my hat in the barn and my canteen near my saddle. There was nothing more I could do to tidy myself, but I was stalling, dreading an embarrassing return after my mad dash into the trees. I had not been a good aide-de-camp that morning.

They were waiting for me, everyone mounted, when I stepped out from the shelter of the trees west of the barnyard. Grippy held my horse’s reins—he too had been saddled—and my hat had been tossed over the pommel. Embarrassment flooded my chest, and I paused for courage. But none of them were looking at me. Their attention was riveted on a small rise just east of the wide, empty field. Woods crowded the cleared plot on every side, and a cabin was just visible through the trees.

The horses shimmied, suddenly nervous, and lightning rumbled and cracked. A gnat whined past my ear and then another. I slapped at it, even as I rejected the notion. It was March, not July, and the storm had passed. The swarm was not bugs but bullets.

The cluster of waiting men scattered, flowering outward across the field, and I cried out, not wanting to be left behind.

“Shurtliff,” the general shouted. “Run, boy!”

But I was frozen in place, watching the drama unfold. Grippy’s horse was running full out for the trees to the north, and Common Sense followed right behind him. Sproat was trying to marshal his men, but they too were barreling for the trees, some of them shooting, most of them simply running for cover. Sproat gave up and spurred his mount forward, firing at the unknown assailants as he bowed low over his horse’s neck. One horse was hit, and his rider tumbled from the saddle. Williby was downed before reaching the trees. The general, still holding Lenox back, fired off a round with his musket and pulled the pistol from his hip and fired again.

A shot rang out and knocked his hat from his head, and I screamed, coming out of my stupor. He slumped, still clinging to his weapon, and Lenox bolted forward, feeling the slack in the reins. Halfway across the field, the general slid limply from his back.

I began to run toward him, my arms and legs pumping, but I didn’t make it very far. Two sharp cracks split the air like a whip being drawn in quick succession across my calf and then my thigh. I staggered, fell, and stayed down, my cheek pressed to the earth.

It didn’t hurt. A weird pressure reverberated in my groin, and I needed to empty my bladder again. But that was fear, not pain.

“Nothing is broken,” I comforted myself. I was fairly certain that was true. I began to crawl toward General Paterson, expecting another bullet to whistle past my head or sink into my flesh, but none did.

He was not moving, but his breath continued, and his heart was steady beneath my palm. I felt around his skull, moving my fingers through his hair. Blood obscured his face, and coated the front of his uniform, but the furrow through his hair and a goose egg–shaped lump at the back of his head were his only obvious injuries. His limbs were straight and sound, but he lay like a dead man, still clutching his pistol, and I could not move him, even had I not had a bullet—maybe two—in my left leg. It was still numb, but my boot squelched with blood when I wiggled my toes. I rose to my hands and knees and surveyed the rise where the gunfire had come from. I couldn’t go that way.

My horse was gone. The general’s horse too, and I studied the woods around me, trying to formulate a plan. I didn’t know if the attackers would return, if Sproat and the others could return, and I had nothing but what was on my person to aid me.

If I was right, Van Tassel’s estate should be just around the bend. I would go that way. It was no more than half a mile, at the most.

It might as well have been a thousand. Walking ten feet would be a challenge.

“Elizabeth,” I said. “Elizabeth, help me.” I don’t know what I expected, but I had no one else to beseech. I searched the woods again and begged the general to wake, feeling again for his breath and the beat of his heart. Hoofbeats and a mournful whinny sounded to my left, and I reloaded the general’s empty pistol and prepared for the worst. A moment later, Lenox meandered toward me, his head low and his steps sheepish.

“Oh, thank you,” I breathed, and rose, refusing to consider that my leg would not hold me. Lenox shuffled near and nuzzled at the general in apology. I took his reins, entreated him to hold steady, and raised my good foot into the stirrup, swinging myself up and onto his back in one desperate motion.

“I’ll be back,” I promised the general, and spurred the horse forward into a run, clinging to his back and my feeble plan.

It was as I thought, though each minute felt like an eternity. The large white structure among the trees, outbuildings and fields extending behind it, was just as I remembered. My regiment had paused for water and rest at a wide stream that fed into the river a mile north on our first march to the Point.

A young woman, her dress bright against the dull sky, sat atop a spotted pony as if she’d just set out for a ride. When she saw me, she spurred her mount back toward the house, shrieking with news of my approach. A feather danced against her pale cheek and dark ringlets bounced down her back as she called, “Papa!”