“He's pleased because Lizzy is so happy.” Katherine laid her head on Richard's chest. “He told me he can't remember when he last saw her this way. He completely supports her decision.”
“
Her
decision? When did she decide this? While I was away?”
“Yes. We were out riding one day and, well, the subject sort of came up.”
“Sort of came up?” He kissed the top of her head. “Do you really expect me to believe that? I'd wager serious money that General Cutler here has been mapping out her campaign for some time, waiting for the right moment to pounce.”
“I shan't take that wager,” Katherine said. “And you'll be interested to learn that I saw Lizzy walking with John Cushing today down by the harbor.”
“John Cushing? I hadn't thought of John for Lizzy. Now that I do, I think well of it. They have much in common.”
“They do, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. There are a lot of eligible bachelors about town. The point is, Lizzy is finally ready to find
out for herself just how many there are. She's in no hurry to get serious about anyone. The fun is in the hunt, as she's about to find out.” She snuggled up closer. “It will be nice to have her company whilst you're away. She'll be such a help with the baby.”
Richard stroked the firm flesh of her back down to the smooth silk of her buttocks. “Yes, I suppose,” he said, turning slightly, preparing to take her fully in his arms. “Though I doubt Jamie would appreciate you calling him a baby. He's three years old, after all.”
Katherine brought her lips to his ear and a whisper to her voice. “I wasn't referring to Jamie.”
It took a moment to register. “Katherine! You're with child? Are you sure?”
“Have I been wrong before?”
He embraced her with a passion born of elation abruptly tempered by a surge of guilt. He slumped back onto the pillows. “A baby, Katherine. Sweet Jesus, a baby. And here I am, leaving you when you need me the most. Just as I did before Will was born.”
She lifted her head and looked him in the eye. “You mustn't think that way, Richard,” she scolded, surprised by his reaction and wishing to relieve him of an unfair burden. “You must never, never think that way. I'll be surrounded by family and friends here, just as I was in Barbados. You needn't worry. You mustn't. What you are doing for Caleb and
Eagle
's crew is so very important.” Her voice relaxed when she added: “So you see, my love, our daughter and I will be in good hands.”
“Our daughter? What makes you so sure it's a girl?”
“It's only fair. You have your two boys. Now it's my turn.”
He took her hand and kissed her fingers. “Since you're making all the decisions here,” he said, “what do you propose to name the lass?”
“Diana.”
“Diana, is it? Why Diana?”
“No reason. Other than I happen to like the name.”
“I see. And I am to have no say in the matter?”
“None whatsoever.” She kissed him. “Any other questions you'd like to ask about the baby?”
“Yes.” He locked his eyes on hers and held them there. When she cocked her head in question he asked: “Is it mine?”
She ran the tip of her tongue along her lower lip. “Richard Cutler, you are a filthy beast with what I can only describe as very odd preferences in lovemaking. I'm onto you. You know that, don't you?”
“Of course I know that,” he grinned. “It's why you married me.”
She held his gaze for a moment before laying the side of her head gently back down on his chest. “To answer your question, I can't be absolutely certain the baby is yours. I do recall there being quite a bit of activity back then. You can imagine how difficult it is, keeping account of all the whos and whens. So let's just say I
hope
the baby's yours.”
He slapped her bottom. “You're nothing but a wanton hussy,” he declared, his voice becoming thick with rekindled desire.
“I know, my lord,” she whispered, her voice, too, becoming throaty, any lingering banter fading away as she caressed the rigid strength of his loins, felt him probe the liquid folds of hers. “Isn't that why you married me?”
She opened her mouth, her tongue dueled with his. He grasped her, turned her on her side, tossed aside the light coverlet, and brought her beneath him. He entered her easily, smoothly, blissfully, her fierce desire preparing her to receive him in a single powerful thrust. Later, after he had poured himself into her and her tremors had subsided, he lay on his back with her arm wrapped tightly around him.
Her last words before he drifted away were both soft and compelling: “I love you, Richard. I shall always love you, and I am so very, very proud of you.”
Five
At Sea, Spring 1788
I
T WAS FITTING THAT THE ARRIVAL of
Falcon
's ordnance in Boston, under sail from Baltimore, took an agonizingly long time. Such had been the case with most details since the Cutlers had settled on their course; why should the resolution of the most crucial detail be any different? Delays had heaped upon delays, some due to human error, the majority simply the result of trying to get things done in a fledgling republic where bureaucrats lacked any practical experience. Someone in higher authority had to approve each step along the way. But who? What was the protocol? Most important, who should one turn toâor away fromâto ensure that blame, if levied, could be deflected elsewhere?
Richard Dale finally managed to wade through the bureaucratic quagmire to secure the weaponry he had requested for
Falcon.
His source was
Alliance,
the last American frigate to see action in the war with England. After the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1783, she had been decommissioned and put up in ordinary in Baltimore to await her fate. Ben Franklin had advocated giving her as a gift to the dey of Algiers in lieu of ransom money, a proposal supported by, among others, the powerful Biddle family in Philadelphia. In the end, however, most of the frigate's guns were removed and she was sold off to private interests to serve in the China trade.
Even after six of
Alliance
's thirty-six guns had been officially consigned to Boston, along with eight of her swivel guns, the vessel selected to transport them would not sail from Baltimore until its master had
determined who was footing the bill. John Jay had promised American shipping entrepreneurs that Congress would help pay the cost of arming their vessels. But what, exactly, did that mean? Just how much was Congress prepared to pay? Who would approve such payments? Of greatest mystery, where would the money come from? Under the Articles of Confederation, government efficiency had been a rarity. With the Articles now cast adrift and a new ship of state under way without, as yet, a working compass to guide it, the term “government efficiency” had become an alehouse joke.
Their frustrations mounting, the Cutlers had finally decided to pay for the guns themselves and to send one of their own vessels to Baltimore to get them. Alexander Hamilton was again quick to promise that the U.S. Treasury would repay all expenditures incurred in the rescue of American sailors abroadâonce the government was able to exercise its newly granted authority to raise funds by taxing its citizenry. An increasingly skeptical Thomas Cutler had put that letter in a drawer with all the others.
By the time the last loose ends had been tied off, the thick blanket of winter snow had melted sufficiently to reveal tiny buds of the new season beneath and Diana Cutler had been welcomed into the world by a family praising God that both mother and daughter had made it through what had proved to be a difficult pregnancy.
“She will be our last child,” Richard vowed to Katherine one evening in mid-April. They were sitting side by side in their bedroom beside a wicker cradle in which Diana slept soundly at last, her tiny stomach taut with her mother's milk. “I shall not see you suffer like that again. I thank God I was not able to sail before Diana was born. I could not have without knowing that you both were safe.”
Katherine was in no mood to protest. The pregnancy had been an ordeal, with more weight gain, bloating, and sickness than she could have expected following Jamie's relatively easy birth. Unwillingly but inevitably during those difficult weeks she had revisited in her mind the fate of Cynthia's baby in England. That fearful image of a tiny, bloody corpse had consumed her waking hours and intruded upon her dreams. As much by her own desire as her doctor's urging, she had remained a-bed for much of the last two months of her pregnancy.
“I am eternally grateful for Lizzy,” she said, rocking the cradle gently with her hand. “She was a godsend, truly a godsend, especially with the boys. Your mother was a love, of course. She did what she could. And Anne and Lavinia helped out whenever they were here. But Lizzy
was
always
here. We would not have come through as we did, without her.” Wearily, sadly, she put her arm around her husband's waist and laid her head against his shoulder. “She's taking Will to see you off tomorrow in Boston, you know.”
“She'll be at Long Wharf, yes, but she'll not be there to see
me
off.”
She looked at Richard and smiled. “It's amazing, isn't it? Who would have dreamt it? They make such a handsome couple. And yet their backgrounds are so different.”
“So are ours,” he reminded her. “I was a lowly sailor from the colonies. You were English gentry, destined to become a matriarch of titled blood. Rumor has it that King George himself carried a torch for you.”
“Oh, posh,” she laughed. “Today, even his stable boy would not so much as glance at this bedraggled mass of flesh.”
He put his arm around her. “This bedraggled mass of flesh,” he said, “could arouse a dead man.”
She squeezed his hand at her waist. “Thank you for saying that, Richard, even if we both know it isn't true.” Her tone turned suddenly grave. “You
will
be careful, won't you, darling?” She was imploring him as much with her eyes as her voice. “Please, my love, be careful. I can bear the thought of you being away at sea. I'm used to that. But I cannot bear the thought of you in danger.” She forced a smile, as though reading his mind. “Don't fret. I shan't break down on the jetty tomorrow or cause a scene. I am a daughter of the Royal Navy, remember? But you must promise me that you will take no unnecessary risks and that you will do only what you must to bring everybody home safely.”
“That I can promise,” he assured her.
Â
THE NEXT DAY WAS STORMY, though not fiercely so, the cold, sleetflecked rain persisting in a blustery wind gusting to twenty knots judging by the whitecaps rolling into Boston's inner harbor. The foul weather had at least the benefit of providing a diversion from the stress of leavetaking. Will took it like a man, lingering only briefly in his father's embrace at Long Wharf as
Falcon
's crew labored with stay-tackle to transfer three heavy wooden chests from the Hingham packet into the schooner's hold, storing the $20,000 worth of specie near the munitions brought aboard earlier in the week. Thomas Cutler was thinking as much of Caleb returning as he was of Richard leaving, and his handshake in farewell was firm, encouraging.
“Go with God, Richard,” he said simply. “Bring your brother home.”
Not surprising to Richard was the fact that Agreen and Lizzy were having the hardest time saying good-bye. Agreen had spent the previous night aboard
Falcon
with the rest of the crew, making final preparations for departure. During the early weeks of the past winter, when
Falcon
had been tethered against the quays in Hingham, he had spent most nights aboard her, preferring the Spartan accommodations of his cubicle-sized cabin to the goose-down bedding available to him in the spare room on Main Street. In more recent weeks he had been lured ashore not so much by the hospitality of Richard's family as by the warmth and welcome he discovered in the company of Lizzy Cutler.
“Is she spoken for, Richard?” Agreen had asked him in Februaryâand several times sinceâand Richard was certain he would ask it again now as they sat together at the table in his cabin. The oilskins hanging on hooks on the back of the door dripped rainwater mixed with salt spray onto the deck. The coastline of Massachusetts was disappearing astern as
Falcon
knifed her way eastward through the frigid waters of the Atlantic under shortened sail and the attentive eye of her mate, Micah Lamont.
But Agreen did not ask that or any other question. He sat brooding, his eyes transfixed upon the steam curling up from the tin mug of coffee brought aft from the galley by Abel Whiton.
“You did a fine job getting her ready,” Richard said, to break the silence. “She's shipshape to satisfy an admiral. And I'm pleased to note that you haven't forgotten how to properly bowse the guns.”
Agreen gave him a grin at that, and a mock salute. “Just lookin' t' make sure you get your money's worth, Captain.”
Although Agreen was one of the highest paid employees of Cutler & Sons, Thomas Cutler had had no trouble justifying the amount. Trouble was, by Agreen's own account, he had no notion of how to spend or invest such wages. So he had asked the Cutlers simply to hold his money for him, withdrawing enough to put some coin in his pocket and to purchase, for Lizzy, a bright red woolen scarf that he gave her the evening before he sailed
Falcon
to Boston to load supplies and munitions.
“Somethin' t' remember me by,” he had told her as he handed her the gift. She had smiled at that, closing her eyes and holding the delicate fabric warm against her cheek. Then, to his surprise and that of Richard and Katherine, who were watching them, she had taken hold of the scarf by its ends and flicked the middle over Agreen's head, around his
neck. She drew him to her and kissed him, her mouth open, her lips lingering on his.