Norton, Andre - Novel 08 Read Free Page A

Crofts at his elbow with a steaming
tankard.
                   "With this under your belt, you'll even
be willing to face that mud again, sir."
                   Fitz sniffed at the fumes. "Oh, and with
a song on my lips into the bargain, no doubt?"
                   He swallowed and gasped. "What did mine
host dump into that now—the full contents of his pepper box?"
                   The Captain nodded solemnly. " 'Tis an old family recipe—or so he informed me. I
think the base must be gunpowder."
                   "Then, should I go off like a
nine-pounder, think nothing of it! But, can that be ham I see?" Fitz
watched hungrily as Crofts, taking the hint, set to work with a carving knife.
                   The Captain had sense enough not to make light
conversation and so delay the serious business of eating. It was not until Fitz
reached the stage of dallying with biscuits and cheese that his table mate
pushed back his chair and spoke.
                   "You are in Baltimore on business, Mr. Lyon?"
                   "On the business of getting
transportation north, Captain." Fitz was so content that he readily
answered this question which he might have resented an hour earlier. "It
is my intention to take ship to the Head of the Elk and then go overland to
join the army.”
                  "Oh, then you are returning from
leave?"
                   "No," Fitz was curt.
"Heretofore I have been otherwise engaged."
                   "Not by your own choice, I take it?"
                   Fitz watched the yellow flames flicker against
the sooty brick of the fireplace. He was tired, so very tired. All the
bitterness which had burned in him for years, all the tension of the past two
days, tore at his habitual reticence. He was a fencer who could no longer hold
his foil at guard. He did not try to reason what there was about Daniel Crofts
that could drag words out of him—but they simply spilled over, boiled out,
tearing his old caution to rags.
                   "My father," he addressed the fire,
"was an officer of the King. He died on the Plains of Abraham before Quebec in the French Wars. My mother had married
him against the wishes of her family, and his people never admitted the
marriage at all, for she was a colonial and beneath their notice.
                   "Her sister gave her shelter at Fairleigh
Manor. I grew up there, not as a son of the house, of course, though my aunt
was always kind to me. When the war began my uncle concerned himself with the
Assembly—now he is a member of Congress. He is much interested in public
affairs. My cousins were of an age to join the army and they did so. One is now
a major in the Maryland Line, the other has just been invalided out of the
service."
                   "But you stayed at the Manor?"
                   "In trying to be useful in return for my
daily bread I had learned my trade as bailiff too well. Someone had to oversee
the planting, and my aunt could not do it. My mother had long since withdrawn
into a world of her own; she died of a fever last year. I did what I could to
keep Fairleigh running. It was hard. Half our market was gone. We grew wheat,
and before the war Ireland took our crop for cash. Now we sell to the
army for promises. . . .
                   "A month ago my cousin returned home. His
wounds will keep him from active duty, and so he has assumed the duties of
bailiff. My presence was no longer necessary "
                   Fitz willed himself not to remember that final
interview with Ralph. That night the shell he had so painfully grown to protect
himself from cousinly spite and shafts of wit had not been strong enough. Ralph
had had ample revenge for the jealousy he had apparently long cherished.
                   "So now you go to join the army?"