Mae refolded the paper, slipped it inside the ribbon’s confines, and returned it to the desk as anguish twisted inside her. Would her prayers come to naught? Rhys hadn’t mentioned the state of the army’s affairs last night. Because they’d been too busy being entranced yet distant with each other, a fact that hardly soothed her troubled heart.
She tried to lose herself in her tasks, finding some relief that afternoon amid the likeminded Liberty Ladies. She even accompanied Samantha on her rounds at the church hospital, though seeing the suffering firsthand rocked her hard-won composure. Together they dispensed handkerchiefs and tobacco among the ailing yet grateful men. The pox had taken a frightful toll, blinding some and disfiguring others, while the inoculation had saved many a great deal of misery. Mae gave thanks her own vision was spared. She’d made peace with her scarring.
They tarried in the church vestibule and studied a posted list of needs.
Wanted for the sick at Chatham. Sugar one barrel. Tea sixpounds. Chocolate twelve pounds. Wine fifteen gallons. Butter one firkin. Hogs lard. Port, if to be had, if not, Madeira.
Samantha sighed. “I’m beginning to forget what life was like before 1776.”
“I’ll be glad when the church becomes fit for a sermon again,” Pastor Heath—Phineas—said. Having returned from a burial, he removed his hat at the entrance. “Now that spring is almost here, the worst of winter is behind us.”
“The days are getting longer, thankfully. More daylight is welcome.” Samantha turned to Mae. “How is that brother of yours?”
James.Should she mention the Morristown ball? “He’s so occupied I rarely see him.”
Nor I, Samantha’s doleful expression implied.
“Thank you both for your time here today,” her brother said. “Your presence helps immensely.”
“I still need to speak with the nurses,” Samantha told him. She gave Mae a hasty peck on the cheek before excusing herself.
Phineas looked to Mae, who shivered despite her heavy wraps. “Let me walk you home since it’s almost dusk.”
Mae thanked him, sensing that something other than her safety prompted him. They trod the slippery church steps that fronted the village green, his steadying hand on her elbow. The sunset behind Chatham’s liberty pole glowered a vivid British red. Soldiers milled about the bridge and Day’s Bridge Tavern along with townspeople bent on the warmth of their homes.
“So have you quite recovered from your illness?” Phineas asked.
“I’m still rather weak but much better, thank you.”
“Odd how the variolation affects us individually. I scarcely felt it.”
“Glad I am of that. You’re too needed to be off your feet,” she told him. “You’d make a fine army chaplain.”
“I’m not soldierly material, I’m afraid. Hardy in soul, perhaps,but not body. I couldn’t withstand the rigors of a campaign.” He grimaced. “And the war, I believe, is almost done.”
Again, panic pinched her. The newspapers were declaring the same. She opened her mouth to question him when he said, “I hesitate to broach a delicate subject, but you know how congregants talk...”
“Oh, I do indeed, being a pastor’s daughter.”
He kept his eyes on the path they walked. “I need to let you know you’re being watched.”
“Go on,” she said, tamping down her impatience. Phineas never seemed to come directly to the point. It hadn’t used to bother her. Had Rhys’s candor influenced her?
“Two members said they saw a man leaving your house late last night.”
So she was being spied upon? “We do billet soldiers, as do you.”
“Indeed. But of late there have been none at your house, the concerned party said.”
“A soldier brought us salt. At twenty-six dollars a bushel I wasn’t about to deny him.”
“Generous of him. Is that all?”
She looked at him in dismay. “What do you mean?”
“He is said to have tarried awhile before leaving.”
“Well, he’s a Continental officer, not a British one, if that helps,” Mae said with more patience than she was feeling. “I fed him supper as he was cold and hungry. Would these gossips not do the same?”
