George Washington Werewolf (4 page)

“Baron…” George Washington said as he executed a deep stately bow.

“General…”

“My wife, Martha…”

“Mrs. Washington…”

And as Martha Washington looked at the face of this man who was to be their savior, she couldn’t help but notice the resemblance to her husband George. Though shorter he bore a not dissimilar countenance, and could be mistaken in a certain light as perhaps a brother or a cousin. And perhaps this is why the General and the Baron instantly took a liking to each other. Both were men of wealth and privilege who chose the soldier’s life. Both had seen their share of battles and of dying men. And now General Washington hoped that this would be the first step towards ending this war and securing American independence. He saw in the Baron’s face a kind of indomitable strength and will, but yet something more as he looked deeper, as his eye aided by the many glasses of wine glimpsed something untamed and dangerous. But this was what they needed. The men had grown tired, complacent, weary of war, and filled with a longing for home. He hoped that this man would somehow make them want to fight again, and make them want to win.

“My husband has told me all about you, Baron,” said Martha Washington. “So many interesting tales!”

“And perhaps one or two are even true,” the Baron smiled.

At this one of Isaac Potts’s dogs, a large Alsatian named Romulus, trotted into the room, but it stopped abruptly as it peeled its lips and growled at Baron Von Steuben. The dog looked him right in the eye, a look of challenge and fear even, and it seemed as if it were about to attack when this well-dressed dwarf kicked the beast in the ribs and told it in no uncertain terms to be gone.

“Forgive me,” said Washington, “the owner of the house, his dog…”

“Quite all right.”

But Martha Washington looked at the Baron for a moment longer, sensing something peculiar, something odd, and suddenly she felt an unsettled feeling in her stomach.

“What is it dear?” Washington asked. “You look peaked.”

“Do I? It must be the rich food.”

“No, it’s because Mrs. Potts is nowhere
near
the cook that Mrs. Washington is!” the General said as an aside.

“Hmm, my kind sir,” Martha bowed, and then she turned to the Baron. “Well, I’m sure that you and my husband have many things to discuss,” she said, as she begged her leave.

“A charming woman,” said Von Steuben.

Martha Washington left their company and as she came into the drawing room she saw Romulus the dog, and she bent down to pet his head.

“What is it boy? What’s wrong?”

The dog nuzzled up to her, licked her face, gave its tail a wag, but then stood at attention as it stared into the other room, its eyes fixed again on the Baron. A low measured growl rumbled through the dog’s body and into her hand as she stroked its flank, and Martha Washington stared at Von Steuben with the same incredulous scrutiny.

“So I hope your quarters are to your satisfaction…” George Washington said.

“They are, General. And to ease your mind I will begin at first light to shape your men into an army.”

“I hope they weren’t too embarrassing a sight upon your arrival…”

“Not at all, General!”

But Washington saw in his expression that this was not quite true.

“But tonight let us celebrate your arrival, Baron!” Washington exclaimed.

“Yes, because from tomorrow on it will be all business. Have you met Otto?” the Baron asked. “My aide-de-camp…”

And Von Steuben motioned downward at the dwarf. And there was the marvelous moment as the six foot three General Washington bent down to shake hands with the three foot six inch dwarf.

“A pleasure, sir,” said Washington.

“The pleasure is mine,” Otto replied.

“Otto is my right hand,” said the Baron. “My confidante, my friend, my protector, my… how do you say? My confessor?”

And George Washington couldn’t help but smile that this very small person could be so many things (including the protector of such a formidable figure as Baron Friedrich Von Steuben). At this, Colonel Burr walked over.

“Baron Von Steuben, may I introduce to you one of my most valued officers, Colonel Aaron Burr…”

“Colonel Burr…”

“Baron…”

“I’m sure you will be seeing more of me than you would like over the next several months,” Von Steuben smiled.

“It will be my honor, sir.”

“But for now I must discuss things with your General…”

“Of course, sir!”

“Good night, Colonel.”

“Good night, Baron.”

“So what did you want to discuss?” Washington asked.

“Nothing,” the Baron smiled. “He just seems like a very serious man.”

“Colonel Burr? Yes he is.”

“
Tomorrow
I will be serious,” said Von Steuben. “Tonight I will be
gay!
” he emptied his glass. “This wine is excellent
mon Général!
”

“Yes, your friend Mr. Franklin sent us ten cases from Paris.”

“Ah, my good friend Ben! His taste in wine is exceeded only by his taste in young women…”

“Hmm…” Washington smiled.

And the night was spent drinking some of the finest wine in the New World. And by evening’s end when General Washington retired to his bed, he was enamored of the Baron and was convinced that this strange man, Friedrich Von Steuben, held within him the seeds of Great Britain’s defeat. Whereas Martha Washington, her eyes closed pretending to be asleep, still could not shake that feeling of disquiet and foreboding.

Out of the early morning mist rode a man who seemed larger than life, as if he were Mars, the God of War himself. Dressed in full martial regalia, polished boots, gold braided epaulettes, medals galore, pistols at his side, saber in hand, a purple plume rising from his hat, Baron Friedrich Von Steuben faced the assembled American soldiers for the first time. And what he saw came as a shock: haggard, unshaven, gaunt, tatterdemalion, with no semblance of military order, discipline, or decorum. Yet there was something about these hardy disheveled souls that deeply impressed him. They were not professional soldiers in it for the money as he was accustomed to in Europe, nor were they mercenaries like the Hessians, but rather simple volunteers. Farmers mostly, here for no other reason than the cause in which they believed. “In Europe,” he told Washington later that day, “no professional army could have been kept together under such impossible circumstances. But here in America there apparently is a different kind of man.”

The Baron believed in teaching by confrontation, as he dismounted and strode right up to one of the soldiers, an especially pathetic-looking private named Merriman. Private Mal Turner who was only a few feet away, looked on and took a deep apprehensive breath.

“WHAT’S YOUR NAME, PRIVATE?” the Baron shouted.

“Private Ambrose Patrick Merriman, Inspector General sir!”

And with his face inches away the Baron shouted at the top of his lungs, “COME TO ATTENTION, SOLDIER! HEAD UP! CHIN IN! CHEST OUT! STOMACH IN! SHOULDERS BACK!” punctuating each command with a slap of his swagger stick. And there was something in his demeanor, in his expression and his eyes that told the men that he should not be tested, that they should snap to his every command, as by now the rumors had circulated that he had once executed an entire
squad
of his own soldiers who showed cowardice in the face of the enemy, and that he had pulled out an enemy soldier’s eyeball with his own fingers during battle.

Von Steuben then directed his gaze on the men at large, and if they didn’t feel the lump rise immediately to their throats then they were no good liars or laggardly goldbricks and didn’t deserve independence either way.

The plan was simple. Drill the men like they had never been drilled before, until their feet ached and their legs were about to fall off and they cursed the day Von Steuben was born and they were all ready to collapse but didn’t; until they marched in their sleep and deployed into line of battle in their dreams; until they could fire their weapon, reload, then fire again with the effort it takes to breathe; until they moved together as a single mind, with a single purpose, of defeating the enemy.

At first the men were resistant, since Von Steuben’s method resembled torture not training. And when the Baron realized that the men didn’t understand his curses in German he appointed a bilingual aide, one Corporal Johannes Hesse, to translate his most foul and abusive German epithets into the most foul and abusive English ones, and in spite of it all by the end of the first week the soldiers were taking pride in themselves and what they had accomplished. They would even come to watch the other companies drill, hoping to look that good themselves when it was
their
company’s turn on the field. And General Washington himself could not hide his pleasure at the progress being made. It was two and a half months until May when they would re-engage the British Army. For the first time he thought there was a chance they might be ready.

The day had come for Martha Washington to return to Mount Vernon, to Virginia. Her carriage had arrived and her baggage had been stowed and now there was the matter of the tearful good-bye. She had no idea when she would see her husband again. As much as she held out hope in the new prospects for victory she held onto her suspicions. And it was with trepidation that she stood now before her husband.

“I will miss you, dear,” she said.

“And I you,” George Washington said with a soft smile. “At least the weather is fair.”

“Yes, it is quite mild this morning.”

“I will do my utmost to… to come home soon.”

“I know.”

And as they gave each other a final hug, Martha leaned over and whispered something in her husband’s ear…

“Be
careful
!” she said. “Watch out for the Baron... There’s something not right.”

“You look terrible!” said Private Solomon Bundy.

“Thanks,” said Malcolm Turner. “I have this cold.”

“Well, you’re lucky.”

“How is that lucky?”

“Because
I
feel terrible but I’m not even sick. It’s Von Steuben. All that bloody drilling. Drill, drill, drill! My legs are ready to fall off! But I did learn one thing though.
Look
…” And he took his musket with bayonet fixed and brought the long blade into the heart of a nearby bale of straw. “Take
that
, General Howe!”

Mal only had strength enough to nod his head.

“Sorry about… Lenore…”

“Thanks.”

“But you’re better off.”

“How am I better off? She’s in some nice warm house in Boston with some man who owns his own
ship!
I’m stuck
here
…”

“Well, you’re a
hero
, right? When we win this war we’ll have our
pick
of the pretty girls! So did you hear about Von Steuben?”

“What now?”

“I heard that he murdered two Redcoats while he was in Philadelphia… with his bare hands! And that they couldn’t even be identified.”

“Well I heard that Baumgartner… Do you know him?”

“Yeah, he’s a Corporal, right?”

“Yeah, I heard that he went to see Von Steuben…”

“At his private hut?”

“Yes!”

“Oh God!”

“And that the midget shot him dead!”

“You mean Baumgartner?”

“Yeah, he shot him in the head with a flintlock. And then he had his body thrown in the river.”

“Hmm. If I’ve learned anything in the two weeks that old Prussian’s been in camp, it’s to stay as far away from him as possible…” said Solomon Bundy. “And that midget too!”

Aaron Burr had always been an ambitious man. He graduated from Princeton at sixteen. Now at the age of twenty-two, a Colonel in the Continental Army, as well as a confidante of General Washington, he had his sights set on becoming General. And then after the war, who knows? And the way to advancement was never to sit around and wait, it was to get up and
do
something. And it also didn’t hurt to know the right people. He happened to have been a brilliant student, but nevertheless his own father was the President of Princeton College. And now the man to know was this Prussian Baron. So it was with this in mind that he set out through the woods, to the private hut of Friedrich Von Steuben.