“I know someone who wouldn’t betray us.” The words came from the phone, but Dr. Hennigan sensed the strain behind them.
“What are you thinking, Ms. Wilson?”
“My ex.”
Denzili let out a low whistle as her eyes widened.
“Is that best?” Hennigan asked.
“She’s the only person I trust besides the inner circle.” Hennigan knew she was referring to herself, her mother and her grandmother. Wilson didn’t even trust Denzili and Richardson. She tolerated them and had promised Hennigan not to kill them unless they deserved it.
“Have at it,” Hennigan said. “Keep me updated.”
“How long will you play house with your pets?” Ms. Wilson asked.
“Not too much longer. We’re going to go to ground. We need a secure place to hold until we know what’s happening.”
“I think I can do that. Now that I have the satphone, I can connect to the internet. I purchased three off-the-books locations after last month through a couple of shell corporations I play with. I’ll double-check their security. Give me thirty minutes.” And with that, Ms. Wilson hung up the phone.
“Who is she?” Kira asked.
“She’s the last person on earth you want to fuck with,” Denzili said with a broad smile. “You think I’m scary? This is the woman who gives me nightmares.”
“It’s a good thing she’s on our side,” Hennigan said. “Technically, she’s my research assistant. But as you just heard, she’s so much more than that. The only people who truly know her value outside my team are my mother and grandmother.”
“Tell them about your mother and grandmother,” Denzili said. “They’re also scary women you don’t want to fuck with.”
“I’m seeing a pattern here,” Blayne said flatly. “But is it just bolstered bravado?”
“Maybe,” Hennigan said, not giving anything away. “I guess this is as good a time to tell our story. As you’ve figured out, I work for an off-governmental organization called The Foundation. My ancestor, Deborah Sampson, established us after the Revolutionary War. Ever heard of her?” She looked at Blayne, Ethan and Kira’s blank faces. “I’m not too surprised. She’s not discussed in American history textbooks, which is a sad oversight. She was born on December 17, 1760, in Plympton, Massachusetts, about ten miles east of Plymouth. When she was five, her father was lost at sea, assumed shipwrecked. In reality, he’d left his wife and seven children to start a new life in Fayette, Maine. To say that being a single mother in the 1700s was difficult is an understatement. Her mother, also named Deborah, placed her children with other families when she could not afford them. At age ten, young Deborah was indentured to Deacon Benjamin Thomas, a farmer in Middleborough.”
“Wait! She was an indentured servant at ten?” Ethan asked, his eyebrows shooting up toward his hairline as his eyelids retracted slightly.
“It’s how things were done then. If you couldn’t care for your kids financially, you found someone who could. Anyway, at eighteen, she finished her indenture and went to work as a teacher. She was self-educated. Don’t think the family she worked for provided her with an education. It wasn’t part of the servitude. It’s important to remember that the Revolutionary War had been raging for three years before Deborah turned eighteen. After teaching for two years, she decided she wanted to join the war effort. She disguised herself as a man to join the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment, renaming herself Robert Shurtleff. ‘Robert’ quickly rose through the ranks and ended up at West Point, leading scouting and raiding parties. She escaped detection for two years. There were a couple of close calls, sure. Once, she had a gash on her forehead from a sword, and another time, she dug a ball bearing from her body to avoid a surgeon finding out her sex. She was ultimately discovered when she became seriously ill because of a raging epidemic in Philadelphia.”
“That’s so fucked up,” Kira mumbled. “I’m sorry, but it just is.”
“Trust me, I agree with your sentiment completely,” Hennigan said. “She was honorably discharged from the army and retired to Massachusetts, where she settled down with Benjamin Gannet in Sharon.”
“Deborah was the only woman in the Revolutionary War to receive a full pension for her service,” Denzili said. Hennigan looked at Denzili, who sat like a school child hearing her favorite story.
Hennigan nodded her agreement. “After the war, Deborah was restless. Although she loved her husband and the life she was creating, she wanted more. She missed the days of scouting and raiding, but she found it hard to take part in that world as a woman. She attended underground meetings and occasionally donned her Robert Shurtleff personality.”
“Do you think she was a transgender man?” Blayne asked.
“Not by our modern sensibilities. From her diaries, Robert Shurtleff was less who she desired to be than who she had to be. She knew that to live in a world where men dominated all aspects of public life, she had to become a man. She didn’t want tobea man.” Blayne nodded, clearly accepting the explanation. “Anyway, in her early forties, she started lecturing around the country, telling her story. She met many women who were similarly disgruntled with their station in life. She put together a network of women with similar sensibilities. By the time the US entered the war of 1812, The Foundation was firmly established in all eighteen states and five territories. Admittedly, the extent to which she was in the territories is fuzzy. By the time she died in 1827, The Foundation had its fingers in every aspect of American politics behind the scenes. When her mother passed, Deborah’s eldest daughter Mary took over the day-to-day running of The Foundation. And every generation since, Deborah’s descendants’ eldest daughter has been entrusted to run the organization. When my grandmother passes, my mother will take over. When my mother passes, the torch will be passed to me. And that’s our story.”
“That’s quite a—” Blayne started, but his phone vibrated. He didn’t recognize the number, so he handed it to Dr. Hennigan.
“Hennigan,” she answered, putting the phone on speaker mode.
“All three of the new properties are still operational. The closest to your current location is maybe fifteen miles from where you are in an old industrial park.” Hennigan hit the speaker button and held the phone to her ear as Ms. Wilson provided more information. She ‘trusted’ the people in this room but wasn’t willing to take chances with her safety and security.
“Inside the facility, you’ll find a Faraday cage, four bunks, a small kitchen, a training room and all the other accoutrements you would need to invade a small country,” Ms. Willson explained.
“You thought of everything.”
“Not quite. You’ll need to get food before you go.”
