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“No. This was not exactly a Garden of Eden before white men landed. We have merely given the native populations a common enemy.”
“Or the Canadians have,” Norton said, scanning the next letter and tossing it aside. He rose to pour them each another brandy.
“Prime Minister Pitt maintains that Britain wants peace.”
“But what do the Canadians want?” Norton asked as he paced to the window, his frock coat gracefully slapping his thighs. “Simcoe seems a very unstable fellow to me.”
“The governor of Upper Canada is afraid we’ll encroach on his territory, hence all the forts.”
“That’s what makes him dangerous.” Norton unrolled a map overtop of the letters. “There is even some talk of a secret agreement between the Canadians and Spanish now that Britain and Spain are allies again. With enough support they could split the country along the Appalachians and all the wealth of the interior would flow right down the river valley and out of American hands.”
Daniel limped over to the desk. “There may be some temptation there. All the frontiersmen want access to New Orleans, but it will take more support and organization than what I have heretofore seen.”
“So much for the British and the Spanish.”
Daniel took a swallow and felt a satisfying burn, along with a numbing of the pain in his leg. “Where do we stand with the French now that they have declared war on England again?”
“Citizen Genet is causing a stir. The Federalists want nothing to do with him and the Republicans fawn on him.”
“And you?”
Norton sat tiredly. “A reserved cordiality. He is, after all, the French ambassador, no matter how flamboyant. Besides, there is more to be learned from a man who does not regard you as an antagonist. Would you like to meet him? I should admire to know what you think of him.” Norton took up his pen with renewed energy.
“If you can arrange a casual introduction.”
“Come to dinner here tomorrow at seven o’clock,” the older man said, scratching a note to himself. “Brace yourself to be opportuned to contribute money toward their revolution, seeing as how they gave us so much support.”
Daniel laughed. “I will come. I am not easily imposed upon.”
“Too bad you are not married. Two of you will put the numbers out—your brother will be invited, too, of course. But Elise will manage something.”
“Something? Either a whey-faced chit who spends the whole evening blushing into her plate, or some spinster. I’ll find my own dinner companion, thank you.”
“Not another actress, Daniel.” Norton looked sharply at him. “You know what happened last time—”
“No, a lady. She is newly arrived from England. Do not look at me like that. I met her on the way over on the ship.”
“Of course, Daniel.”
“Well, she is a lady and will take the shine out of any of the women in this town—except Elise, of course.”
“I am saying nothing. Bring your paragon, by all means. I would be interested to meet a woman who has not washed her hands of you after knowing you for more than a few weeks.”
Daniel had been busy most of the day obtaining the latest news, while Trueblood tended to their warehouse. Daniel returned with scarcely enough time to wash and change into clean linens and breeches. Someone had laid out his clothes and brushed and pressed his swallowtail coat.
When Nancy walked down the stairs, Trueblood smiled knowingly and Daniel breathed a sigh of relief. She was dressed in a peach silk gown of the latest fashion, with an ivory underdress edged in lace. A tiny knot of silk roses was tucked between her breasts at the top of her stomacher, and her hair, a natural honey blond, was swept up high on her head, with two long ringlets hanging down in back to caress her neck.
“Are you disappointed, Daniel?” Trueblood drawled as he took the lace shawl she held and placed it carefully around her shoulders.
“No, I am quite satisfied,” Daniel said as he took possession of Nancy’s arm and conducted her from the house and down the street, forcing Trueblood to walk on the other side of her.
“I take it your expectations were that I would turn up in a stuff gown and a pair of brogues.”
“Now you are making game of me,” Daniel said. “I could wish you would smile rather than scowl at me. It makes you look fatigued.”
Nancy glared at him, since she had still to drag any real compliment from him. “As it happens, I am fatigued. Father invited home that Canadian, Dupree, and they played cards all night.”
“Are you sure it was Dupree? Did you see him?” Daniel asked, almost pulling her into the street in the path of a carriage.
“No,” Nancy said, hauling back on his arm until the way was clear, “but I have heard them talk together often enough on the ship to recognize his voice.”
“What did he have to say for himself?” Daniel asked casually.
“Try as I might, even by holding a glass to the wall, I could not make out the words”, Nancy said in mock seriousness.
Daniel had opened his mouth to resume his interrogation when Trueblood burst out laughing. “She really is making game of you now, Daniel.”
“Which would not be to my credit even if it were a challenge,” Nancy replied. “Sorry, Daniel.”
He shook his head. “Bad enough I have Trueblood carping at me. If you are to start as well…”
“But you interrogate me about the man for no reason. If you want me to spy on him—”
“No! I do not want you to have anything to do with him.” Daniel took a tighter grip on her arm.
“Well, I do not particularly like him. I keep thinking he is after father’s prize money, if he has not got it already.”
“Yes, so do I,” Daniel alibied. “That is the only reason I was concerned.”
Nancy slanted a skeptical look at Trueblood, who shrugged. Then she turned her innocent face to Daniel. “Then you think I have a right to keep an eye on Dupree— in a very subtle way, of course.”
“Dupree may be exactly what he appears,” Trueblood said, taking Nancy’s other arm and drawing her away from Daniel.
“Which is what?” Nancy demanded. “It strikes me as odd that such a rough man, one moreover who claims to be a fur trader, should be in England.”
Daniel glanced menacingly at Trueblood and dropped back to study Nancy from behind. He had suddenly lost all interest in Dupree and why the fellow had been in England. Even under the plumped-up side panniers of her polonaise gown, Nancy presented a trim figure and was.attracting a deal of attention on the street. One of Daniel’s acquaintances tipped his hat to her from horseback, getting a nod from Trueblood and a scowl from Daniel in return for his knowing grin.
Daniel envied the one curl that had slipped around her neck and was glad Nancy did not hold with the old style of powdering her hair. Nothing should take the sheen out of those curls. Though he had little interest in fashion, he was a purveyor of cloth and had bought and sold enough in England and America to realize her dress was expensive. She should stay in Philadelphia and go to the theater, not be dragged to some crude frontier settlement where there were few civilized women and the men were all dangerous. He must think of a way.
At Norton’s house, Daniel sprinted up the steps and was surprised to be greeted by Elise herself. Her flame red hair shone in the last rays of the sun and her green silk gown embraced her like a lover.
“Daniel, you have come alone after all,” she complained.
“No, Miss Riley is with me.” He reached down and firmly took Nancy’s arm, drawing her up the last few steps to stand beside him.
Elise invited Nancy in, making her feel welcome. Daniel cuffed Trueblood on the shoulder as they jostled each other in the doorway, but drew no more than a smirk from him.
“I hope we are not to disappoint you,” Elise said, “for Genet is not here yet and I will not hold dinner for him. Come, have some of your brandy.”
Elise, Nancy and the daughters of the house, Penelope and Mary, were intimately occupied for a time with a discussion of fashion and hair. Nancy thought both girls showed future promise as belles of the town, but that neither would surpass their mother’s beauty with her striking cast of hair. Though Nancy proclaimed herself a country dowd compared to London ladies, Elise graciously asserted she was closer to the pulse of the fashionable world than they in their backwater.
Trueblood was drawn into the conversation to give his opinion on the comparative merits of the open polonaise over the round gown, so that Daniel had a chance to convey to Norton his concerns over the Canadian, Dupree.
“I shall set a man on to follow him.”
“I can manage it for the next few days,” Daniel offered.
“You are too well known to him. If he has indeed detected your mission, your illustrious career may be at an end, Daniel.”
“In other words I had best play the blockish merchant with intensity.”
“To the hilt.”
“It will not be difficult, with both Nancy and Trueblood cutting at me.”
“I have seen that look before, Daniel.”
“What look?”
“You are like a leashed dog whose bone has rolled just beyond his reach, watching another hound about to make off with it.”
“Sorry, I will try to contain myself.”
“No, do not. Jealousy becomes you. Just do not lose your head.”
“I shall be hard put not to make a serious blunder tonight.”
Norton did ask Elise to put dinner back, resulting, Nancy thought, in Daniel having one brandy too many. Or was that a ruse? Genet made a late appearance and apologized too profusely for his tardiness. Nancy had thought he looked French, with those sensual lips of his, even before he opened his mouth. Trueblood cast a tolerant eye upon him, while Daniel consulted his watch with a blank look. It was like a mask, Nancy thought, that face Daniel put on for company. No, not company—For an enemy. It was interesting to her that the voluble Trueblood, flanked by the daughters, was seated across from Genet, who had Daniel on his right and her on his left. Mr. and Mrs. Norton observed the party from either end of the elaborately laid table.
Had Daniel been across from Genet, that might have set them against each other as opponents. A man is more apt to trust a man at his side. How Nancy knew this she did not bother to consider. She had been at enough dinner parties to draw her conclusions from observation, setting aside her considerable instinct. Daniel had all the leisure in the world to observe Genet covertly, she thought, with that half-drunken smile loosely worn to shield himself from Genet’s gaze.
Elise stirred uncomfortably, and it occurred to Nancy that the lady must think she had been looking critically at her table settings. “Such a lovely service of china, Mrs. Norton. I have been racking my mind to discover the pattern, which looks familiar. But if I ever knew it, I have forgotten.”
“Why, thank you. It is a special order from Sheffield. It was a present from Daniel and Trueblood, a rather belated wedding gift.”
“It was a rather belated wedding,” Norton put in, causing his wife to blush.
Norton was not drunk either, Nancy concluded, but he was doing a good imitation of it.
They spoke of china and other elegances, the cost of obtaining them in America, and moved thence to trade, the deficit, America’s debts to France, her apparent inability to pay. Daniel tsked over this, but could see no ready solution. He seemed such a selfish, complacent man even to Nancy, and she knew better.
If Daniel wanted to get something from Genet, she thought, he was going the long way about it. “I did particularly want to meet you,” Nancy said to Genet. “You were so late, I feared I would miss the opportunity.”
“And what a loss it would have been for both of us, Miss Riley,” Genet leaned toward her to say. “You must let me explain the reason for my tardiness. I had business at the harbor. An English merchant ship has been brought in by the Embuscade and I was inspecting her. She will be recommissioned La Petite Démocrate.” Genet raised his glass as if he were making a toast.
“I prefer the Little Sarah,” Nancy said, taking a bite of capon.
“You know the ship?” Genet asked in pleasant surprise.
“I was on it.” Nancy took another bite while Genet fumbled with his wine.
“A passenger?”
“Yes, until that pirate bore down and nearly sank us. You should speak to him about such lawlessness. It makes a very bad impression.”
Genet gaped, as though a housewife had admonished him for his son throwing rocks at her chickens, then began to spout excuses in French, which she heard with only half an ear.
Nancy saw Daniel’s eyes glitter with amusement, not brandy. He was neither drunk nor trapped. That meant Genet was here for Daniel’s benefit, not the reverse. So this Norton was involved with Daniel and Trueblood more than socially. Well, if Daniel hoped to learn something from Genet, she had to throw them together as allies.
“Vous comprendez? He is a privateer, not a pirate,” the ambassador was saying. “The ship was taken in the name of the Republic of France.”
“Privateer? Is that the French word for pirate, the way embuscade means ambush?”
“Non, non, I say. He was commissioned by my government. You must understand, we are at war with England.”
“France is always at war with England. That is no excuse for accosting civilians on the high seas. One sailor had his head taken off by a cannonball, and I would not be surprised if some of the wounded did not die from those vicious splinters. Daniel himself took a bad one. And poor Trueblood was knocked overboard.”
“Monsieurs, forgive me for any inconvenience,” Genet said over the shocked gasps of the other ladies.
“Inconvenience!” Nancy repeated in apparent astonishment.
Both Tallents made deprecating noises, as though the whole incident were forgotten.
“Mais oui, I forget, you are a woman. What do you know of such matters?”
“Apparently a great deal more than you. I was there. Even making allowance for them being French, I found your countrymen crude and offensive.”
“Making allowance?” Genet sputtered.
Elise had turned away to bite her lip. Trueblood had his face buried in his wineglass, and Nancy thought she could detect bubbles. The girls looked expectantly at their father, who seemed oblivious to Genet’s discomfort. In desperation Genet turned to Daniel, who shrugged in sympathy.
“Monsieur, you were on that ship. Surely you did not regard it as an inhumane act?”
“Why, no, luck of the draw, I would say.”
“Was any disrespect shown to this woman?”
“Now that you.mention it, the seamen did search her baggage, and you know how women are with their laces and…such.” Daniel fluttered his fingers to indicate, Nancy supposed, frilly undergarments. “I expect that is why Miss Riley has taken such a pet. To have strange hands mauling her finery…” Daniel shuddered.
The daughters gasped even more at this ugly thought.
“Dirty hands they were, as well. Not to mention the language. I am quite certain the captain made an indecent proposal to me,” Nancy said, nailing Genet with a menacing stare.
“Why, I do not comprehend how this misunderstanding could have happened. The captain said the only woman on board was a—a…”
“Yes, go on,” Nancy prompted, her lips parted in expectation.
“Non, forgive me. I am sure he misread the entire situation. But he implied you were fluent in French.”
