Paper Woman: A Mystery of the American Revolution (10 page)

"Yes.
 
Inform Major Hunt that I've decoded the
cipher."

"Excellent."
 
He strode forward and shot out his
hand.
 
"I shall convey it to
him."

"I'll give
it to him when he arrives here tonight."

"Unfortunately,
he's occupied with new issues."
 
Was that worry in his tone?
 
"He's unavailable to meet you tonight.
 
Give me the translation."

She hesitated a
second too long.
 
Seizing her upper arm,
Fairfax propelled her against the wall, where he pinned her wrist.
 
With a gasp of pain and astonishment, she
released the paper.
 
He snatched it,
still restraining her.
 
"Mrs.
Barton, can it be that you don't trust me?"

Fear and anger
twisted round each other in her soul for a second or two before the same anger
that parched her of tears crushed the fear.
 
Fairfax would love to cow her.
 
Rather than yielding to her desire to jam her knee into his groin, she
glared at him.
 
"Whatever gave you
that idea?"

He released
her.
 
"I'm glad we understand each
other.
 
What have we here?
 
Ah, Gálvez.
 
Do you know who the Gálvez are?"
 
She shook her head.
 
"They've distinguished themselves in military service to the Spanish
monarchy.
 
Don Miguel: counselor of
war.
 
Don José: minister of the
Indies.
 
Don Matías: captain-general of
Guatemala.
 
Don Bernardo:
brigadier-general and thorn in our side in West Florida.
 
While I've not heard of Don Alejandro, the
family is quite large.
 
Cozying with the
powerful Gálvez.
 
How well this fits
with our anticipation of rebel activities.
 
I'm intrigued.
 
How
did
you break the code?"

He thought she
lied and was feeding the redcoats a story they expected to hear.
 
Anger firmed her jaw.
 
"My father's favorite number is
three.
 
Every letter in that message
represents the third letter in a word in
Confessions
.
 
Each word is identified in the list by page
number and word number on the page."

"Show me
an example of this scheme."

Turning about,
she exited the shop, but it was too soon to breathe relief.
 
Fairfax followed her up to her bedroom.
 
By lantern light, she opened the book to
page seventeen and brought the paper with the column of figures close while he
spread the translation open on her desk.
 
"You see, the third letter of the fourth word is a 'd,' and if you
turn to page twenty-five, the third letter of the sixteenth word is an
'o.'"

"I see
that.
 
Where is the location of the 'old
fort' specified in the translation?"

While heading
up the stairs, she'd decided it would be a cold day in hell before she let
Fairfax in on her hunch about St. Augustine.
 
"Did I receive all the cipher to translate?"

"Yes, of
course."

"Then
that's the full message.
 
I see no
destination."

Angelic
radiance transforming his expression, he stepped toward her, but she refused to
retreat.
 
His gaze tarried over her
face, as if her resistance intrigued him.
 
"Are you being honest with me?"

"Work it
out for yourself.
 
No destination is
mentioned."

He regarded her
a moment longer before sitting at the desk.
 
While he flipped pages in
Confessions
, she walked to the window
and leaned on the sill, longing to feel a breeze on her skin.
 
After a few minutes, he stood and tucked the
papers into a breast pocket.
 
"Thank you very much."
 
He swept from her room.

She descended
to the shop in time to hear him tell Baldwin and Barrows, "For no reason
must she leave the house tonight."

Eyes wide with
incredulity, she stomped toward them.
 
"I've performed my duty!
 
I'm no longer under arrest.
 
I
must pay my respects to Jacob Hale."

"You'll
stay in the house.
 
Conditions have
changed."

She balled her
fists.
 
"
What
conditions?"

"Someone
manufactured a rumor about the garrison that those idiotic savages believed and
took issue with.
 
Major Hunt's
orders.
 
You remain in the house until
he resolves the matter.
 
On the morrow,
I'm sure you'll be allowed to pay your respects."

The story was
the biggest pile of hog dung Sophie had ever smelled.
 
The Creek near Alton were of White-Stick persuasion, not
Red-Stick.
 
They'd been a peaceful
people during her whole lifetime.
 
Were
that not the case, she and other residents of Alton would never have received
invitations to join the Creek for certain festivals.
 
No, she was
still
under house arrest.
 
Fairfax had merely dressed it up in
different clothing.
 
"I must talk
with Major Hunt."

"I shall
relay your message.
 
We protect the
King's friends, Mrs. Barton.
 
Remember
that Baldwin and Barrows are here as a service to you.
 
Good night."
 
With a bow, he was out the front door, only to return in seconds,
a clay flowerpot in his hand.
 
"This was on your front porch.
 
Someone sending condolences, I presume."

"Widow
Flannery.
 
Last night she promised to
send me something for my garden."
 
Sophie retrieved the pot from him, yellow daisies in dark soil.
 
Odd, she could have sworn Mrs. Flannery had
told her she'd send
herbs
, not daisies.
 
"Thank you."
 
Then she
watched Fairfax leave again and finally let out that slow breath of relief.

Chapter Seven

MARY WAS FETCHING
water from the well out back near the kitchen building when Sophie noticed a
sliver of oiled paper protruding from the soil in the flowerpot.
 
She held the pot closer to the lantern in
the dining room, dug out the oiled paper, and unfolded it to find a strip
inside displaying a cipher similar to the one she'd just decoded.
 
Bewildered by the find, she jumped at the
sound of Mary clattering to the back step with a full bucket and jammed the
oiled paper and cipher in her pocket.
 
Her expression composed, she stretched while the maid set the bucket on
the table.
 
"I'm for bed.
 
Turn in after you've watered these
daisies."

"Are those
two soldiers spending the night?"

"Yes."

"Well,
then, at least we won't have to worry about Spaniards or Indians causing us a fright
in the wee hours of the morning."

Hearing the
clack of dice on the counter in the shop, Sophie smiled with irony.
 
"Such a comfort."

She poked her
head into the shop and bade the men goodnight before heading upstairs, feet
dragging in pretense of weariness.
 
But
behind her closed bedroom door, she rushed to the desk and spread the new
cipher open.
 
Fairfax had left
Confessions
on her desk.
 
Did the new cipher use the
same key?

Within minutes,
its message emerged:
serpent knows all old fort too dangerous leave
immediately for havana woman in black veil awaits you church of saint teresa
.
 
Her imagination leaped.

If Don
Alejandro hadn't already been diverted to Cuba for the meeting, he might still
expect to rendezvous with a messenger in St. Augustine.
 
She could pose as the messenger, meet the
Spaniard, and learn who'd murdered her father and Jonah Hale.
 
Perhaps she'd even help bring the murderer
to justice.

Ah, but
embracing such a plan required freedom, a horse, and supplies.
 
She had none of that.
 
She slumped in the chair with a ragged sigh,
admitting the crazy, reckless nature of the scheme.

Brooding, she
rose, stuffed the new cipher and translation into her pocket, dimmed the
lantern, and lay back on her bed.
 
The
night was moonless, the atmosphere heavy with moisture.
 
No breeze ventured inside her window.
 
Sweat gathered between her thighs, in the
crack of her buttocks, and in her armpits.
 
She'd have been far more comfortable undressed to her shift, but
intuition prodded her that the night wasn't over.

For the
information in the new cipher to be legitimate, the courier must have gotten
skittish at the sight of soldiers at the house and decided to drop the pot off
without drawing attention to himself.
 
The Red Rock closed at two in the afternoon on the Lord's Day, so the
courier would have had little chance to hear that the recipient of the
flowerpot was dead.
 
Therefore the
probability was good that she wasn't dealing with a false encryption, and she
could trust the cipher.

Who was El
Serpiente?
 
A Spaniard, surely, but from
his actions, no ally to rebels or redcoats.
 
She stared at the ceiling.
 
Her
imagination, stimulated by books and business, yet bound for years by scant
contact with the educated world, ran amok.
 
So many different interests collided in the American War, but she had
yet to see any nation concerned for the
people
in the colonies.
 
What sort of world were these
"interests" bequeathing to her daughter and unborn grandchild?

Uncanny quiet
held the night outside her window, crickets and frogs reluctant to complete the
melodies they started, reminding her of more immediate concerns.
 
Fairfax's story about the Creek was
absurd.
 
Knowing her discomfort with him,
Edward wouldn't have sent him to her house.
 
Something had happened to Edward.
 
Perhaps Captain Sheffield had had to assume command of the
garrison.
 
She knew nothing of
Sheffield, but she'd observed Edward's sensible leadership style contributing
to calm, fair relations between soldiers and civilians in the four months since
his arrival.
 
The repercussions for
Alton, if he proved unable to exercise his leadership, might not be pleasant.

Again she
thought of his offer from the previous night.
 
She couldn't expect a better offer anywhere.
 
She had little money and was thirty-three, a woman with gray in
her hair and autumn in her womb.
 
But
she didn't love Edward.
 
If she never
grew to love him, how satisfied would she feel with her life?

Even thornier
was the issue of class.
 
And in England,
Edward would court and marry someone Betsy's age and beget children upon
her.
 
Soon enough, Lady Hunt would
develop finesse at the non-intellectual means of taming her husband.
 
When it came right down to it, most males
responded to that non-intellectual persuasion with a predictable deficit of common
sense.
 
Did Sophie want to be in the
middle of all that?

Something
scraped her window, so she rolled over and looked out.
 
Dark as the night had grown, she discerned
an oblong blot of midnight that lifted and scratched at her window frame.

Fright ignited
in her chest, and she sprang from bed.
 
Someone had scaled the side of the house and was balanced atop the
porch, trying to enter though her window.
 
Time she took advantage of the soldiers' duty to protect her.

"Sophie!"
whispered the shadow.
 
"Sophie!"

She
hesitated.
 
Was it someone bringing
secret word of her father's murderer, perhaps?
 
She crept around the bed and flung aside the curtain, where her gaze
lodged on a Creek warrior balanced on the porch roof and clinging to the side
of the house.
 
A scream tightened her
throat, but before it could escape the man stuck his turbaned head inside.
 
"Shhhh!
 
It's me!"

Voice
recognition routed out terror.
 
"M-Mathias!"

Earrings
tinkling, the blacksmith glanced down at the ground before turning back to
her.
 
"I must speak with you.
 
You're in danger.
 
May I come in?"

She backed
away, and he crawled inside accompanied by the scent of pine straw.
 
Seldom had she seen him dressed like a
Creek, and she tried not to gape at the picture he created with feathers and shells,
turban, tomahawk and knife, breechcloth, leggings and moccasins.
 
She yanked the curtains closed.
 
"What in the world are you doing out
there?"