Bunker Hill Read Free

perhaps,” said Gage. “The others have taken off. They have relatives
everywhere. They’re a close-knit lot.”
    “And
what’s left are loyal?”
    “You tell
me.”
    “They bolt
their doors and stay inside,” Burgoyne said. “I’d root them out, and damned if
I wouldn’t make them declare themselves!”
    “To what
end?” Gage asked tiredly. “It’s not a war and it’s not a peace, and I can’t say
that I know what it is.”
    “If we’re
going to talk seriously,” Clinton said, “and it’s high time that we did, we’ll
want our happy lad Howe with us, won’t we? Why the devil can’t he do his
fornicating at night?”
    “Because
he’s screwing a lady called Amanda Blaketon whose husband spends his days
plotting with the rebels and his nights at home.”
    “Why
not arrest him and make it easy for Sir William?”
    “For what? For being her husband?” Clinton asked.
    “Plotting
with the rebels,” Burgoyne suggested.
    “Good
heavens, Johnny, where do I start, and where do I finish? You really have no
idea. It’s not a simple question of loyalty or disloyalty. They regard
themselves as proper Englishmen.”
    “Proper Englishmen?” Gage
wondered aloud.
    “The
column into Concord botched it. I know that.”
    “They shot
the very hell out of us. Proper Englishmen be damned!” Gage said.
    “Then you
tell me, dear fellow. Do we start a war?”
    “It is a war,” Burgoyne snapped.
    “It’s not
a war,” Clinton said sourly.
    “My
business is war. That’s why I was sent here,” said Burgoyne. “You deal with a
war by ending it. I would have put every one of the bastards into irons.”
    “How many? A thousand? Five thousand? Ten thousand?” Gage said.
    “That
wretched seaman Merton spelled it out.”
    “I don’t follow you.”
    “He died.”
    “I haven’t
heard two sensible words about this whole mess since I have been here,” Clinton
said. “Suppose we drop it now and have a spot of tea and put our heads together
sanely. It’s quite ridiculous, you know. The best army in the world backed by
the best navy in the world bottled up here in this wretched Continental village
by a lot of hotheaded, disorganized farmers. We are supposed to be hardheaded,
intelligent military men. Or are we?”
    Then they
were at Province House, Gage’s home and executive mansion, where Mrs. Gage
greeted them almost somberly. It gave Clinton the thought that already she knew
about the disgusting mess of the flogging, but then he realized that that was
impossible.
    They had come straight from
the ship. As they entered the house, Howe joined them, mumbling something about
thinking better of the whole thing and that they ought to get down to business
after all. His big, shambling form took on the stance of a penitent little boy,
and looking at his swarthy face, Clinton realized that he was blushing.
    “I don’t
believe it,” Burgoyne said. Howe told him to shut his bloody mouth and then
apologized profusely to Mrs. Gage.
    Clinton,
watching Mrs. Gage, realized that she had apparently heard neither Howe’s oath
nor his apology. Margaret Gage was a lovely, intelligent woman, and Clinton had
fallen into the habit of flirting with her, not crudely or even noticeably but
with the smallest and gentlest of gestures and courtesies. Gage himself never
noticed, or if he did, shrugged it off as a matter of no importance. The truth
of it was that he was so utterly entrapped and frustrated by his situation that
he might hardly have noticed had Clinton and his wife embraced in front of him.
    “Is there
trouble, Margaret?” Clinton asked her. He had fallen into calling her by her
first name the first day they met, cozened it out of her with his easy manner,
and with that her permission to use it. Sir William noticed. He envied both
Clinton and Burgoyne for their easy manner with women. Arriving with them in
America a few days ago, he as a Whig had expected that his reputation as a
great friend of the colonies would have