The Traitor's Wife: A Novel (28 page)

L
ATER THAT
night, Clara stood in the kitchen alone. She had offered to finish polishing the last of the silver so that the yawning Hannah and Mrs. Quigley might retire to their beds. They had accepted
her offer, and the rest of the servants had bid Clara a good night.

Clara now stood with the final silver cup in her hand, humming Christmas carols as she polished.

“You know what that means, Clara Bell?”

Clara looked up, startled. She hadn’t heard Caleb reenter the kitchen.

“That.” Caleb walked slowly toward her, pointing up at the mistletoe that Hannah had strung overhead.

“Yes, of course.” Clara looked from the plant back to the cup in her hand. Cal now stood just inches from her; she felt her heartbeat quicken at the thrilling yet terrifying proximity of his body to her own.

“Have you ever been kissed under the mistletoe?” He tried to sound light, yet he didn’t smile.

“No.” Her hands were trembling, even as she regretted how innocent she must appear. Never been kissed under the mistletoe. Never been kissed at all, in fact, except for that one kiss Robert Balmor had planted on her lips before she’d even known it was coming. She spoke again, mostly to fill the silence between them. “Oma called it a pagan tradition—we never hung it at the farm.”

Cal laughed, standing so close to her now that she smelled the pine bough draped around his collar. She looked up into his face, the yearning so evident in the light hazel of his eyes. “Sweet, innocent Clara Bell.”

“Cal, I . . .” Her breath was uneven.

“Yes, Clara?” His face, his earnest face, betrayed hope.

Did she want him to kiss her? Part of her did, yes, of course. Part of her thought often about kissing Cal, longed for that kiss. But a larger part of her was terrified at the idea. Hadn’t Oma always warned her against foolish notions and fickle men? Lust was
dangerous. And love was a luxury for people with the last names of Shippen, Arnold, Burd, or Chew—not for the two of them. Two penniless orphans, they were. How could she, Clara Bell, consider loving someone when she was not even the master of her own fate?

“Never mind.” She lowered her eyes, snapping the moment between them as she resumed scrubbing the cup in her hands. And then, her tone matter-of-fact, she added, “I better be finishing up this silver and getting to bed, or else I’ll never be able to rise tomorrow morning.”

B
ETSY
S
HIPPEN’S
wedding day dawned clear and cold. Clara still felt full from the Christmas feast and she did not know how she would sit down to another meal of its size.

As the wedding ceremony and the wedding feast were to be held in the Shippen home, the servants and the Shippen ladies scurried about all morning, scrubbing the floors, dusting the mantels, lighting the fires, and polishing the silver before rushing off to dress. Clara tried to convince Peggy to dress plainly on the wedding day, so as not to outshine the bride, who wore a simple dress of cream-colored silk with lace detailing around the neck. Still, Peggy looked resplendent in a gown of pine-green velvet embellished with gold. When Peggy entered the crowded Shippen drawing room with a beaming Arnold, Clara noticed how her mistress drew the attention to herself.

“Miss Peggy looks quite nice.” Caleb appeared beside Clara. He had cleaned up for the occasion, combing his light brown hair back with water so that his face looked fresh and clean. He wore his only suit, a black three-piece with a jacket, vest, and knee-breeches,
which Mrs. Quigley had sewn for him. At his collar he wore a cravat that Clara had never seen before.

“She does, doesn’t she?” Clara gazed at her mistress, who stood on the opposite side of the drawing room whispering something into Arnold’s ear. “I just hope she doesn’t take the interest away from the bride.”

“No, she won’t,” Caleb answered quietly. “But
you
might, Clara Bell.”

Clara turned to him, unsure of how best to answer. She’d worn the blue velvet Peggy had given her, and Mrs. Quigley had curled her hair. It was true that she had felt pretty as she’d allow herself to gaze, vainly, into the mirror. But the way Cal looked at her now, the way he had looked at her since Christmas night, confounded her. Like he was trying to read her thoughts.

She mumbled, “Thank you,” before Judge Shippen asked the room to quiet. Caleb stood by her throughout the wedding ceremony. And when he secured the seat beside her at the servants’ dinner, Clara did notice how her heart leapt with something that felt like joy.

N
EDDY
B
URD
had arranged for a military escort as he drove his new bride away in the carriage, so all the wedding guests gathered on the streets to wave them off.

Clara lingered in the cold. She stood there long after the carriage had clipped away and the guests had either departed or returned into the warmth of the Shippen home. She sat on the stoop of the house, her cloak pulled tightly around her neck, imagining the ways in which her daily life might change now that Betsy would be out of the house. Mrs. Shippen would have more time on her
hands, that was for certain. Would she turn a more exacting eye on the household management, specifically her servants? Or perhaps she would refocus her attention to her youngest daughter and the task of getting Peggy married. Or would the two of them, mother and daughter, maintain their frosty standoff, allowing the household to go on in a tenuous harmony? And wouldn’t Arnold be eager to have a wedding of his own now that he’d attended Betsy’s alongside Peggy? But mostly she was thinking about Cal. She was trying to understand her thorny, confused emotions. It was true that when she wasn’t with Cal, she thought about him. She longed to be in his company. And yet, when he appeared, her heart would lurch, her nerves would tighten. The sight of his face, his shaggy dark blond hair; even now on the dark front step, the thought filled Clara with waves of joy and fear. Why was it so hard for her to accept, fully, the fact that she was falling in love with him? Clara ruminated on this, alone, for a long while. Or she had thought she was alone, when she heard a familiar, gravelly voice.

“I had to leave the Penn mansion.”

A pause, and then a second voice asked, “Why?”

Clara knew who’s was the second voice, even in the pitch-dark evening. Peggy and Arnold must have wandered farther up the street to find a private place to talk. In the shadowed lane, Clara could now make out the outlines of their two figures, clutching hands, just a few feet from her. Arnold leaned heavily on his cane.

“Reed was making trouble for me, asking why a public servant in the military needed to be quartered in the grandest mansion in Philadelphia.”

Peggy was silent. If Clara was close enough to hear the grinding of teeth, she was certain she would have.

“The news is not grievous though.” Arnold continued, “Do not fret, Peggy.”

“How could I not? You’ve been forced out of your home. I
hate
that Joseph Reed!” Peggy spat.

“Peggy, please.” Arnold sounded alarmed. “You must not speak like that. Anyone could hear. Reed himself could hear.”

“Let him hear it. I hope he does.”

“I cannot bear to see you this upset. You must calm down.”

“I . . . I . . .” Peggy reined in her temper. “I’m sorry. It’s just that, I hate to see you suffer at the hands of that vile man.”

They stood in silence. When Arnold spoke next, his voice sounded upbeat. Even proud. “I tell you it’s not bad, because I’ve replaced that place with something even better.”

“What do you mean?” Peggy asked.

“Land. Lots and lots of land,” Arnold answered.

“Is it true, Benny?”

“It’s in gratitude for my service.”

“Where is it?”

“New York,” he answered.

A pause. A long silence. Clara told herself that she ought to go inside, yet she was interested to hear her mistress’s reaction to this news. After all, it would no doubt affect Clara’s life as well.

“New York is so far away, Benny. Philadelphia is my home.”

“Yes, but just wait until you hear what the offer entails, my sweet Peggy. A hundred and thirty thousand acres of land. It’s been seized from the royalist Johnson family’s estate on the Mohawk River. Peggy, I’ve seen that land, I’ve fought up there. That was where I beat St. Leger. It’s the most beautiful spot. We could raise up a beautiful mansion, and fill it with happy children and servants.”

“Oh, Benny, it is lovely to think about, but—”

“But wait, my dear girl. There’s more.”

“Oh yes?” Peggy’s voice still contained hope.

“In addition to the land tracts in New York, I’ve . . . I’ve made a purchase closer to home.”

“What sort of purchase?” Peggy was growing more intrigued, Clara could tell by the tone of her voice.

“Have you ever heard of Mount Pleasant?” Arnold asked.

“Mount Pleasant? The mansion on the Schuylkill?” Peggy knew Mount Pleasant.

So did Clara. Clara recalled their picnics on the Schuylkill. Many of them had taken place on the patch of grass right across from Mount Pleasant. Peggy had always marveled at the mansion, with its many windows, its sloping hills and rooftop balcony. Clara had always assumed that there was just as much chance that her mistress would live at Mount Pleasant as there was she’d live in King George’s palace.

“That’s it,” Arnold answered. “The place John Adams himself called the ‘most elegant seat in Pennsylvania.’ ”

“You didn’t buy it.” Peggy’s voice quivered. “You couldn’t possibly have bought Mount Pleasant.”

“I did,” Arnold replied.

“Oh, Benny!” Peggy pulled Arnold toward her in a kiss, so that their outlines joined against the backdrop of the sparsely lit street.

Clara could not watch what should be a private moment. She felt, as she had for much of her service at the Shippen home, as if she were witnessing scenes in which she had no part. She rose from her seat on the steps, turning back indoors. And then, in the quiet night, Clara heard the words that her mistress had so long withheld: “Benedict Arnold, I love you.”

“G
RAB YOUR
pots and pans and let’s go!” Mrs. Quigley threw on her wool cloak and yelled into the full kitchen for the rest of the
servants to do the same. “You think the New Year will wait until we’re all ready for it?”

“What do I grab?” Clara asked, spinning around, looking for someone to guide her in the New Year’s Eve mayhem of the Shippen kitchen. She saw Cal slip out the door for the yard, and she feared she might fall too far behind to find him again.

“Find a pot and a pan, or else a pot and a pewter spoon. Anything that’ll make a devilish noise when you bang ’em together!” Hannah’s thick frame was even wider under scarves, a cap, and a heavy wool coat as she hurried for the door.

Clara reached into the cupboard and grabbed two pewter mugs, hoping that they would serve her purpose. She retrieved her cloak and woolen hand muff from the hook and slid her cap snugly onto her head, and then she was out the door, hurrying to catch up with Cal.

Ten minutes remained until midnight, and the entire city of Philadelphia seemed to be out in the streets, all marching through the cold, snow-speckled night toward the square outside of Independence Hall.