Lorenzo's Secret Mission (12 page)

Man after man said goodbye and wished me a speedy recovery.

Red, the last one out, stuck his head back through the doorway. “I know I done wrong, not following orders, but I'd do it again if I had to, Mr. Bannister. Lambs look out for other Lambs.”

William pointed toward the door. “Out.”

I savored Red's parting remark.
Lambs look out for other Lambs
. He considered me one of them.

William turned back to me and shrugged. “Red's got a good heart, but a mind of his own. If we had military discipline like the British army …”

“The British know about us,” I said, my voice taking on a sudden high-pitched tone.

He gave me a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “Yes, I know. We'll be well past the fort before British troops arrive to reinforce them.” Giving me a gentle smile, he left me alone with Calderón.

“Well, you made quite a spectacle of yourself,” Calderón remarked with an infuriating little smirk.

“What do you mean?”

“Don't you remember how you ranted on and on in the canoe about British plans to ambush us? When we returned to Fort Arkansas, you grabbed William's shirt front and shouted ‘The British are coming! The British are coming!'”

A flush of embarrassment settled over me. “You're making this up as you go along!”

“I am not!” Calderón replied indignantly. “You were like Paul Revere without the horse. You should have heard yourself. After we patched you up and reloaded the flatboats, we set out.” Calderón laced his hands behind his head and studied the ceiling. “If you don't
remember that, you probably don't recall asking me to write a letter to Eugenie.”

My embarrassment grew. I could only imagine the idiotic things I must have said. “No. What did I write to her?”

“Nothing. I composed the letter myself while the men attended to last-minute details. An epistolary masterpiece, if I say so myself. Brief and to the point.”

“Did you tell her I was hurt?”

“Oh, yes. I had to explain why I was writing in your stead. Not to worry. I portrayed you as quite the hero. Don't forget to write your fiancée as soon as you reach Virginia. That's what I promised her in the letter.”

“She isn't my fiancée.”

He tilted his head and cocked a brow. “Oh? The way letters have been flying back and forth between you two, I assumed a wedding was in the offing.”

I focused on the raccoon-skin haversack on the ledge next to my medical books. Inside were Papá's correspondence and the six letters I had received from Eugenie. She knew I planned to join the army when I turned sixteen. Would she like to be a soldier's wife? My employment as medic ended as soon as we reached Fort Pitt. I needed a steady income so I could support a wife and family.

To judge by Calderón's growing smile, he knew what I was thinking.

“Those French women are charmers who will steal your heart. Just ask Colonel De Gálvez. You and Eugenie have a lot in common. Both orphans, alone in the world, in need of companionship and a family. She isn't a blueblood, but then again, neither are you. It's the perfect match.”

“When did you become Cupid?”

“Who do you think introduced Colonel De Gálvez to the Widow De Saint Maxent? Eugenie's a pretty girl. Looking at her across the breakfast table every morning wouldn't be a chore.”

To turn the conversation to a less embarrassing topic,
I asked, “What became of the medicine I stole?”

“Only one bottle broke on the way here. The rest is over there, on the shelf. We used some of it to doctor you. Kind of funny, don't you think? You know, ‘Physician, heal thyself.'”

“Very funny,” I said in a sarcastic voice.

“Well, maybe it's not funny to you now, but someday you'll see the humor in it.”

In an odd sort of way, I could appreciate the irony. When I went for that medicine, I never imagined I'd be the first patient to use it.

Weeks and weeks went by. We didn't see a soul, not even an Indian. Little by little, my wound healed. I exercised and worked hard to regain my strength. Even so, now and then I experienced a twinge of pain.

One spring day, William shaded his eyes with his hand and called me and Calderón to the front of the flatboat. “Look, gentlemen!” He pointed to a river a thousand yards wide flowing into the Mississippi. “There's La Belle Riviere. The beautiful river. That's what the French call it. The Indians call it the Ohio.”

“What does Ohio mean?” I asked.

“River of blood.”

“I pray the name isn't an omen,” Calderón said.

Where the Mississippi and the Ohio rushed together, there were no hills or mountains, only flat and swampy country.

“Over there,” William added, “is Kentucky. Its name means the ‘dark and bloody ground.' Some of us plan to petition Governor Henry …”

“Patrick Henry?” I interrupted. “The one who said ‘Give me liberty or give me death?'”

“One and the same. We want to make Kentucky a county of Virginia. They've promised us land when the war is over. I plan to head to Kentucky with George Rogers Clark and stake out a claim. Kentucky. That's the place to be. Ole King George says we can't move any farther west, but the east is getting too crowded. You can't set foot outside your cabin without running into some
one.” He nudged me in the ribs. “Only a thousand miles before we reach Fort Fincastle.”

Calderón and I shared a look of dismay.

“No one said we would stop at Fort Fincastle!” I protested.

“We go to Fort Pitt,” Calderón said in stilted English. “My orders say to unload at Fort Pitt.”

“I'm sure they do,” William replied in an amazingly calm tone. “But first, we must stop at Fort Fincastle to see if it's safe to go to Fort Pitt. If not, we unload at Fort Fincastle.”

“God in heaven!” I exclaimed. “I have to get to Virginia.”

“Fort Fincastle
is
in Virginia,” William explained as he uncurled a map. “On the banks of the Wheeling River. It's Virginia's westernmost outpost on the Ohio.” He pointed to a triangle of land further upstream in Pennsylvania where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers met. “And here is Fort Pitt. It's the depot for most of the provisions for the western armies. Me, Gibson, and our men are posted there.”

“Where is General Washington?” I asked.

“There's no way to know for sure. Probably here.” William tapped a spot on the map. It read “Valley Forge.”

I looked up from the map with dismay. “If you don't know where he is, how are Calderón and I to find him?”

William gave me an indulgent smile. “An army on campaign leaves a trail a blind man could follow. You'll find him.”

“If I can find him so easily, won't the British track him down, too?”

William laughed. “Washington is an old fox on his own territory. The British will never catch him.”

I hoped he was right. I looked forward to handing the general the letter from Colonel De Gálvez, but the closer
we came to Virginia, the more I came to dread meeting my grandfather.

And so we traveled on. Time crept by. We caught pike, sturgeon, eels, and soft-shelled turtles with seines, baskets, trotlines, and hooks. We shot geese and ducks and roasted them over the fire. It all tasted delicious, but I longed for the shrimp and oysters of New Orleans. And I missed Eugenie.

Then one day in early April, I detected a faint roar ahead of us. The closer we drew, the louder it became. At first, it sounded like a roomful of people, all talking at the same time. Then I realized we had reached the most dangerous part of the trip. The Falls of the Ohio lay just ahead.

Swirls of water tossed the flatboat about. A wet wind slashed my face, but I couldn't wrench my gaze from the falls a half-mile away.

Rapids stretched from shore to shore and resembled a huge, wet stone staircase. Their descent was gradual, with no drop more than twenty feet, over watersmoothed rocks. Had we been going downstream, we could have shot the rapids safely. Unfortunately, we were going up that stone staircase.

No matter how hard the oarsmen rowed, the river current propelled us backwards. We ran the risk of being sucked into a whirlpool. Should that happen, it would be impossible to break free from the water's tornado-like suction.

“Pull to shore!” Calderón yelled over and over. Unable to make himself heard over the water's roar, he went from man to man, shaking their shoulders to get their attention, then jabbing his finger at the riverbank.

As soon as we touched dry land, the great portage around the falls began. While Spanish soldiers stood guard against attack, on constant lookout for Redcoats, the men unloaded the boats. Grumbling and cursing, they pushed and pulled and dragged and carried supplies to the edge of the woods.

It took two days to fell trees and fashion them into makeshift wagons. Once our lading was piled into them, the men hauled with all their strength and weight to
move everything around the falls. That took another two days.

All the while, Calderón paced the shore like a soul in purgatory. I think he sometimes dozed standing up, but in the main, fear of attack stole his sleep.

Since heavy work might break open my nearly healed wound, I stood guard with William.

Finally, it was all over. Cargo, flatboats, and men rested in a quiet cove where a creek emptied into the Ohio. I flopped down on a rocky ledge under a giant sycamore. William unslung his musket and joined me.

I gazed all around at flat, fertile land that gently descended to the river and offered an excellent harbor. I looked upstream and down, at trees lacy with new leaves, at an island thick with wild geese, at a ribbon of water shimmering in the sunlight. No wonder William thought this paradise.

“Two years ago,” he began, “I came here with a group of surveyors from Virginia. We lived over there.” He indicated an island in the middle of the river. “Set up temporary huts and built a stockade. When the war broke out, I felt duty-bound to fight for Virginia. Some day I plan to settle in this spot.”

Overhead, cardinals flitted from branch to branch. Wind tugged at my buckskin jacket. The sky was darkening fast.

“If you had a mill here,” I remarked, “you could make a fortune taking flour to New Orleans.”

“That's what I intend to do: make a fortune.” William reddened and lowered his gaze. “I've got a girl back in Virginia. Her father thinks I'm a ne'er-do-well, but I'm going to prove him wrong.” He threw a rock into the river. “She's Virginia aristocracy from one of the best families in Albemarle County.” He paused. “And I'm not.”

Not knowing what to say, I picked at the bark peeling off a giant sycamore in great scabs. “My grandfather lives in Albemarle County,” I said after a moment.

William looked straight ahead. “I know. Calderón told me.”

“Do you know my grandfather?”

William studied the ground. “Judge Bannister and I don't move in the same social circles.”

We had been on the flatboat trip for months and William hadn't mentioned this before?

“What's my grandfather like?”

William shrugged and avoided looking at me. He inched away to watch a deer dip its head in the water. Suddenly, he cocked his head.

A long brrrrrr sounded from a bush about two feet behind him. A rattlesnake was coiled and ready to strike.

“Whatever you do, William,” I said in the calmest voice I could muster, “don't move. There's a rattler behind you.”

I eased William's musket from the ground and put the butt snug against my shoulder. Carefully sighting along the barrel, I fixed the brass bead on the snake's triangular head and squeezed the trigger. The crack rang in my ear.

For several seconds, musket smoke obscured my view. Had I hit it? If I had missed and the snake had struck …

Calderón dashed over to me. “Why did you shoot? Did you see something?”

At last, the smoke cleared.

“Can I move now?” William asked over his shoulder.

“Yeah,” I croaked.

William turned, unsheathed his long knife, squatted by the snake, and began to skin it. “Look at this, Lieutenant. Lorenzo saved my life.”

Calderón took a cautious step forward.

“Blew its head clean off,” William said. “Big feller, too. Must be five feet long.” He looked up at me with a jolly grin. “Thanks, Lorenzo. I owe you. What do you want made of the skin? Belt? Hatband?”

I stood there for a moment gaping down at him without answering. Calderón and I exchanged a look of dismay. Didn't anything scare this man?

William sliced off the rattle and tossed it to me. “Here. Use this to impress the girls. Tell ‘em how you saved my life.”

I swallowed hard and stashed it in the rawhide pouch around my neck, next to the Spanish pillar dollars I'd won off William.

The last few days of the journey along the Ohio, the oarsmen, anxious to be home, rowed a little harder. William, on the other hand, grew uncharacteristically grumpy the closer we came to Pennsylvania. And civilization.

At eleven o'clock on the morning of May 2, 1777, I stood guard duty on the bow. I tensed when a dim figure on the right-hand shore came into view, but soon relaxed. It turned out to be an elderly black woman, barefoot, smoking a huge corncob pipe and fishing from the bank with a cane pole.

Our flatboat rounded the bend, and there sat Fort Fincastle on the banks of the Wheeling River. We had traveled over six hundred miles from the Falls of the Ohio.

Built of squared timbers, Fort Fincastle appeared about a quarter-acre in size. Round portholes evenly spaced along the top allowed soldiers to snipe at attackers. All around jutted tree stumps where the forest had been cleared to make room for the fort.