Eric thought back quickly. Washington had asked a highly respected group from Connecticut, the Rangers, to supply a man to stay in New York to obtain information on the Brits’ position. A young man named Nathan Hale had volunteered on the second call, and he had gone in pretending to be a Dutch schoolmaster.
Washington rubbed his temple fiercely. “He couldn’t have been more than twenty-one. He was betrayed. Howe condemned him to hang.” He exhaled on a long note, looking at his sheet of correspondence again. “He gave a speech that impressed them all, ending it like this—listen, Eric, it’s amazing—‘I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country.’ One life. My God.”
“It is war,” Eric said quietly after a moment.
“It is war. We will lose many more,” Washington admitted. “But this young Hale…that such courage should be cruelly snuffed from life!”
Cruel, yes, Eric thought, riding with his troops the next day. Cruel, but something more. Nathan Hale’s words were being whispered and shouted by all men. In death Nathan Hale had given an army an inspiration. He had gained immortality.
By night the smell of powder seemed to penetrate Eric’s dreams. With his eyes opened or closed, he saw lines and lines of men, heard the screams of men and horses alike, saw the burst of cannon and heard its terrible roar. But sometimes, when the black powder faded, he would see Amanda. And she would be walking toward him through the mist and death and carnage, and her eyes would be liquid with recrimination.
They had hanged Hale, the British. Traitors are usually hanged, and that is the way that war goes.
But what if she hadn’t lied? What if her days as spy had ended? What if someone else played them all false?
Groaning, he would awaken. And with his eyes open to the dawn, he knew that he would ride and fight again—and lead men unto death.
On October 28 they fought the Battle of White Plains. The Americans fought bravely and valiantly, and with a startling skill and determination. Eventually the British regulars drove them off the field. Waving his blood-soaked sword in the air, Eric shouted the order to retreat to the men under his command.
Anne Marie and Sir Thomas were often his consolation then. Anne Marie continued to follow her father to war. On the field she loaded weapons, supplied water, and tended to the wounded. When conditions permitted, Eric ate with the two, and when the meal was over, he would often sit with Anne Marie. One night, as they walked beneath the trees, she turned into his arms. She rose up on her toes and kissed him. He responded, as he had before, his heart hammering, his body quickening. She drew his hand to her breast, and he touched her softness, but then he folded her hands together, drew away from her her, and gently touched her cheek. “I’m a married man, Anne Marie. And you are too fine a woman to be any man’s mistress.”
“What if I do not care?” she whispered.
He exhaled slowly and felt her eyes upon him in the darkness.
She smiled. “I am too late, Lord Cameron, so it seems.” She teased him, her smile gentle. “When you were wild and reckless and seemed to collect women, I was seeking a ring about my finger. And now I would have nothing more but a few nights with a hero in my bed, and it really wouldn’t matter if I were the most practiced whore on the continent. Eric, go after your wife. Bring her home. I do not believe that she would have betrayed you so completely.”
He folded her hands together. “Anne Marie, I cannot. Perhaps I should not come anymore—”
She pressed her fìnger to his lips. “No. Don’t take away your friendship. I need you and Damien.”
“Ah! My bloodthirsty young cousin-in-law. He is still scarcely speaking to me; he does so under orders only. But he is a fine young man—”
“And in love, didn’t you know?”
“No, I did not,” Eric told her.
Anne Marie dimpled prettily. “With Lady Geneva. I suppose it began long ago in Williamsburg. Now he pines for her when he cannot travel south. I believe she will come north to be with him.”
“Really? Geneva does love her comforts.”
“You know her so well?”
“I did,” he murmured. “Well, perhaps she has caught patriot’s fever herself. Only time will tell.”
“Only time.” Anne Marie kissed him chastely upon the cheek. “Go for your wife, Eric.”
“I cannot,” he said, and in such a manner that she knew their talk had come to the end. She saw the twist of his jaw and the ice in his eyes, and she fell silent.
In November Fort Washington, on northern Manhattan overlooking the Hudson, fell. Twenty-eight hundred Americans were captured. And the Americans were forced to evacuate Fort Lee, in New Jersey, with the loss of much badly needed material.
The Americans began their retreat into New Jersey, southward. Charles Lee was left behind to cover the retreat. He and four thousand men were captured near Morristown.
Washington paled at the news. Furious, he refrained from swearing. He led the remaining three thousand men of the Continental Army southward and crossed the Delaware into Pennsylvania. Congress fled from Philadelphia to Baltimore, and Washington was given dictatorial powers.
Eric changed into buckskins and slipped behind the lines to discover the British position. He kept remembering Nathan Hale, and he prayed that he could be as heroic as the younger man should he be captured. The British would dance at his hanging, he was certain.
But he was able to gain information easily enough. Howe, confident of a quick final victory in the spring, had gone into winter quarters, the bulk of his men in New York and southern New Jersey.
