Jim DeFelice - The silver bullet

“ Damn. You see the troubles I have,” Howe told van Clynne. The general took three long strides to the side of the ship. In that small space, his physical bearing underwent a mighty transition; van Clynne recognized at once how he had come to command the army. His belly — smaller than the Dutchman’s, but by any other measure large — tucked up and in, his chest bolted forward, his chin jutted like an advance scout clearing the woods. Ajax had not looked so regal.

“ My boat, quickly, and send for two companies of marines,” he shouted. “We will land directly in the harbor and rally the defenses.”

Howe turned to van Clynne. “You’re best off staying here, until we have this matter under control. For your own safety.”

“ But I — “

“ It’s an order. The wrong rebel might see you in my company and endanger your future missions.”

It took van Clynne only one look into the huge swells lapping at the hull to convince him there was no sense arguing. He could stay aboard until the riot quieted — and the waves slowed.

Or darkness came on, when he wouldn’t see them.

Jake’s attempt to punch the British sergeant who was pulling him to his feet was thwarted by another soldier from the rear. Numerous hands were now clamped upon him, and he was thrust back to the ground. A crowd began to gather; if they had been slow to help the redcoats, they made up for it with threats against Jake now. He was blamed for everything from the burning of New York to the introduction I small pox. The pitch of the bystanders soon reached such proportions that the soldiers were as much protecting him as preventing his escape. Indeed, escaped would now have been difficult, as his legs and arms were clamped in chains.

A succession of officers arrived to take charge of the scene: a lieutenant relieving the sergeant, a captain the lieutenant, a major the captain. They got as far as a colonel before they felt satisfied that there was sufficient authority to take him to the fort.

It was not immediately clear what would become of him there, or at least it was not clear to Jake. He had said nothing the entire time, and they had said nothing to him; he had not been searched, except for weapons. The bullet he had snatched from Herstraw remained at the toe of his boot.

Jake was prepared to trade his life for the surety that the patriot plot remained undiscovered. But he couldn’t simply drop the bullet on the street; even if he could get it from his boot unseen, the fact that it was made of silver guaranteed that it would be quickly noticed. The best solution was to drop it in the river. Getting there, however, was a major problem. He couldn’t just ask to be taken out for a boat ride.

Or could he?

“ Now that you’ve calmed yourself,” declared Jake when his captors paused some distance from the crowd, “I demand to be taken to General Howe.”

“ You’re in no position to demand anything,” said the colonel. His eyes were set so deeply in his face that Jake wouldn’t have been surprised to learn he labored each night with a vise to drive them farther into his skull. “We caught you in the act of sedition.”

“ I’m on a mission from General Burgoyne. I demand to see Sir William Howe personally.”

“ Oh you are, are ya?” The speaker was a bulky sergeant who emerged from the knot of redcoats around him. His dress and in particular his hat immediately set him off as a member of the Scottish Black Watch. “There seems to be a run on you fellows today.”

“ Explain yourself,” directed the colonel.

“ I took one of ‘em out there myself this noon. A peculiar fat fellow. Dutch. Never saw such a bad case of sea shivers in all my time — fellow fainted before we were off the pier.”

“ I don’t know about any of that,” said Jake over the snickers. “Just take me to Howe.”

The colonel held a brief conference with the other officers. It was decided the prisoner should be presented to the general, who could sort this out for himself. He was thus led to a whaleboat for the voyage.

Jake’s idea had been to sit by the side of the boat, sneak the bullet out and drop it overboard. He would then be free to deliver a verbal message that echoed the one van Clynne had delivered.

If he ran into anyone who already knew him — or rather, thought they knew him — he would have to explain how he’d come to be in Canada, much less join General Burgoyne’s command. But that tale could be easily invented. In the worse case, he could simply leap overboard and sink down to the bottom of the river, dragged down by his manacles and leg irons, taking his secrets to a watery grave. This was just the brave sort of thing that spies and secret agents are forever doing to encourage Posterity to write their names large in the history books, inspiring generations of schoolboys and picking up the tourist trade.

Lest you think our hero incurably romantic, not that he was much more inclined toward staying alive and living to a quiet old age. But his prospects steadily dimmed as he was tightly bundled for the voyage with thick strips of woolen cloth torn from a blanket, chained to an anchor and placed between four men in the large boat. Hercules himself could not have broken free, not matter how heroic his mood.

Jake had one consolation. Considerable time had transpired since he and van Clynne had parted ways. As he had outlined the plan, van Clynne’s mission aboard ship should have lasted no more than five minutes. He interpreted van Clynne’s aversion both to water and the English as reinforcing those instructions; the Dutchman was not one to linger in disagreeable circumstances, let alone dangerous ones. The fact that a sergeant ashore reported having transported him earlier in the day added to Jake’s ease. He concluded that his compatriot’s phase of the mission had gone well — we will avoid the descriptive “swimmingly” as being in dubious taste. In Jake’s opinion, van Clynne must be halfway to Albany by now.

So consider his surprise when, upon being hauled aboard the Eagle, he looked around the deck for a place to dispose of his bullet and found Claus van Clynne instead.

His mind did not concede immediately what his eyes showed it. No, it took an eternity for these organs to agree that the rotund man walking toward him was indeed his erstwhile assistant. There was much blinking in the meantime. There was also much internal cursing.

“ Jake, it’s about time you got here,” said van Clynne, clapping him on the shoulder. “Why are you chained? Was it the only way to get you into the boat? You’ve got to overcome that fear of water, man; there’s nothing to it.”

Jake tried through certain small head and eye movements to warn van Clynne away.

“ You know the prisoner?” demanded one of the officers.

“ Know him? He’s my fellow agent.”

The guards took a great interest in that.

“ We have been trying to intercept a traitor named Herstraw,” said van Clynne. “We’ve followed him all the way from Quebec.”

“ He told us nothing of that,” said one of the officers. The soldiers who did not have their guns drawn on Jake trained them on van Clynne.

“ Of course not. The Sons of Liberty have disguised themselves as his Majesty’s subjects, and lurk everywhere. Did you capture this Herstraw fellow?”

Van Clynne looked directly at Jake. They were now committed on this path, and Jake knew he would doom not only himself and van Clynne, but the entire mission by trying to change it.

“ He escaped, but I killed one of his men.” Jake displayed a look of disgust that would have soured the milk in a cow. “These buffoons crashed in on me just as I caught him. They were so inept, I thought at first they must be rebels themselves.”