Thad tensed, held his breath, and listened. All of Baltimore must have held its breath with him, for the next signal came and seemed to echo through the streets, through the church without hindrance. His fingers tightened around Gwyneth’s where he held them on the pew between them.
The British were coming. They had been waiting for days for the word to spread from gun to gun, from cannon to cannon, from town to town. And there it was, echoing over them on a Sunday, of all times, when they were all at worship.
From the pulpit Reverend Gruber eased shut his Bible and waited for the final signal shot. After its report faded, silence held for a moment. Then the minister lifted a hand. “Let us pray.”
A shuffling as Bibles closed, as heads bowed. Gruber cleared his throat. “Father God, we ask every week that You will go with us as we leave these hallowed walls and head back into the world. We ask it especially today, when so many of our men must now leave this place and go to one of imminent danger.” He cleared his throat again. “The Lord bless King George, convert him…and take him to heaven, as we want no more of him!”
For the only time in Thad’s memory, laughter joined the chorus of “Amens,” and the congregation all but surged to their feet.
Thad rose more slowly, his gaze on Gwyneth’s precious face. She wore her features in a brave arrangement, lips turned in a fearless smile, eyes shining with pride. But he had felt the way her arms clung a little tighter to him each morning when he left to drill. The very same way his did to her. Because they both knew that each new day could be the one in which those signal shots rang out. They both knew each night might be their last.
She pressed to his side now, her eyes absent the tempest they so often showed but luminous. “We had better hurry home.”
He nodded and then nodded again at his parents, waiting behind Gwyneth for him to lead the way from the pew.
Already the streets outside were teeming. Families in their Sunday best spilled from every direction, all in a rush. The men Thad knew to be designated couriers tore by on horseback. And from somewhere in the distance, the drums took up their cadence, calling the men to arms.
His blood pulsed in time to each beat. By the time they reached home, it seemed the world must pulse with it too. Each footfall, each galloping horse. The creak of each of his floorboards, the click of their bedroom door.
Until Gwyneth’s arms came around him. Then the noise faded, and there was only her. “Oh, sweet.” He held her close, closer still, until he could be sure that his nose would remember her scent even when gun smoke burned it. Until he could be sure his ears would remember the sound of her breathing even when deafened by cannon fire. Until he could be sure her vision would fill his eyes even when horror rose before him. “I love you.”
“I love you.” Her fingers trailed up his cheek, into his hair, urging down his head.
How many times had he kissed her now, in their three weeks of marriage? Too many to count, but not nearly enough. Never enough. Yet none of them had felt like this. Filled not so much with passion as with prayer. Not so much with desperation as with dedication. Their lips touched, held, caressed, and filled him with a strange sort of peace when she lowered back down from her toes. A kind that made him wonder how he would have had the strength to go to his rendezvous point for his rations and ammunition if she were not there, were not his wife, had not given him that very kiss.
“Gwyn—”
“Hush.” Her eyes were still closed, her arm still resting against his chest. “I am giving you over to the hands of our Father.”
“Ah, well. I certainly do not want to interrupt that.”
She moved her lips in silent words. Then she fixed her gaze on him and rubbed a hand over his heart. “He will bring you home, safe and well. I know it.”
He had no desire to argue, especially now, with the peace eclipsing the dread that had filled him for days. Reaching for her hand, he nodded. “I had better change into my uniform.”
“I know.” She moved aside to let him, watched him draw out the dark blue jacket he so carefully brushed clean every night, the brilliant white straps that would crisscross his chest, the matching breeches and tall black boots she herself had polished twelve hours before. He heard the whoosh of the down-filled mattress as she sat upon it. “Darling?”
“Hmm?” He shrugged out of his best jacket, the one he had worn for their wedding.
“I think I am with child.”
He paused with one foot raised to remove his shoe and then hopped around so he might look at her. He told the bubble of joy threatening to burst through him to be reasonable. “You cannot possibly know that so soon.”
Her grin said otherwise. “I know I cannot be certain, but there is logical hope for it, and more besides. I had a dream last night that I was.”
The bubble nearly choked him. It made him want to laugh and shout. He lowered his foot before he fell. “We both know dreams are most often only—”
“I choose to believe, Thaddeus.” Her smile was sure, bright, and her eyes sparkling with mischief. Daring him to argue.
As if he wanted to. He strode unevenly to the bed and scooped her up, spinning her around. “Then I choose to believe with you.”
Laughing, she slapped him on the shoulder—after, that is, a longer, more exuberant kiss. “Put me down before you trip and finish getting dressed.”
“Aye, aye, Captain.” He planted her back onto the bed with another kiss and made quick work of changing. “Promise me you and my parents will do exactly as we planned. You will stay here and keep the house locked tight. If by chance you must evacuate, we will meet up at the inn in Randallstown.”
“I know. We will. And you…” She hesitated and then sighed. “You have sent the information to the congressman about my uncle?”
He nodded, flexing the hand that had cramped after so much writing. “He will see it reaches the authorities it needs to. No matter the outcome of this battle, sweet, justice will find him. Thanks to your father.”
“And to you.”
He shrugged and put his hat atop his head. Part of him had wanted to keep the evidence against Gates to himself, to see firsthand that justice would be done. But that whisper in his spirit had chastised him for his pride, and he had handed it over to Arnaud to deliver to Tallmadge yesterday.
From the street below he heard a familiar shout. “Jack and Alain are here. I believe we have a few apples left yet, which ought to help you keep the little rapscallion in good spirits.”
“We will be fine, and Emmy and Philly will likely come tomorrow.”
“Good.” They joined hands and moved together back down the stairs. They stopped in front of the open doors, where Jack had brought his usual chaos of squeals and laughter.
What was left but goodbye? But he couldn’t say that. Simply couldn’t. So when she came into his arms again, he tipped up her chin and borrowed the little one’s tactic of lightness. “Do try and get some sleep while I am gone, will you?”
Her smile would surely carry him through the battle and home again. “I will—so that I might dream of you.”
Minutes later the other farewells had been said, final kisses bestowed, and he and Arnaud walked together toward their rendezvous point. Steadily but not exactly quickly.
“Not running ahead of me today?” Despite the light words, Arnaud’s tone was flat and heavy.
“No. I intend to stay by your side until we are making this return trip together in a day or two.” Thad tried for a smile, tried to cling to that cloud of peace that had existed with Gwyneth. But it went dark and stormy again.
He looked to his dearest friend, hoping to find light in his gaze. But Arnaud wore a glower even more pronounced than usual. “You feel it too?”
Blast. “Something is going wrong.”
“The battle?”
Was it? He could not tell. And no matter how much prayer he gave it, the only impressions to come from the Lord were that he was to continue on the set course. “I do not know.”
“Well.” Arnaud dragged in a deep breath and squared his shoulders. “I suppose we do not need to know. We need only to act as we ought. And pray without ceasing.”
The drums beat out their amen.
Gwyneth flinched again at the sound of an exploding shell and the rumble beneath her feet, fumbled, again, the bread dough she was shaping into rolls, and then huffed in exasperation with herself. Shoving an annoying curl from her face with the back of her hand, she looked over to Rosie. Small consolation as it was, the woman jumped just as high as she did with each blast. “It has been six hours.”
“With a shot every five minutes.” Rosie shook her head and stirred the pot of stew simmering on the stove. “As long as I live I will never forget the thirteenth of September in eighteen fourteen. And the memories will not be fond.”
From the table filled with drying noodles, Winter sighed her agreement. “I keep telling myself that as long as they continue shelling the fort, that means it has not fallen. And yet still I wish it would stop.” She squeezed her eyes shut and balled her fists against the table. “Why could they not be stationed somewhere else? Anywhere else?”
Gwyneth shuddered. She had wondered the same from the moment Bennet had returned from his scouting trip into town with the news that it was Fort McHenry being bombarded by the British fleet. But she had felt such surety that her Thad would come home, he and Arnaud both. She must cling to that. She must trust. Must choose, as she had said to Thad about her beautiful dream of a pink-cheeked baby, to believe.
And must pray the Lord didn’t take her shaking hands as doubt.
She managed to form the final roll and tuck it into its pan, drape a damp cloth over it and set it aside to rise a second time. No sooner had she turned back toward the table than the door burst open, Emmy leaping through the opening with wild eyes.
The kitchen went silent long enough for a score of terrible possibilities to run through Gwyneth’s mind. Then Emmy turned to Winter. “It’s Philly.”
Winter straightened her spine, yet her shoulders sagged. “The baby?”
Emmy nodded as she palmed away the tears clinging to her cheeks. “She’s frightened something awful. Wants her daddy and you to come, Miss Winter.”
“Of course.” Winter spun toward the hall but then stopped, her gaze tracking upward to where Jack was, inexplicably, napping in his bed.
Gwyneth shooed her onward. “Rosie and I will stay here with Jack. You two go with Emmy.”
Wasting no time on arguments, Winter nodded and ran down the hall, calling for her husband as she went. Gwyneth moved to Emmy and grasped her hand. “Assure her we will be praying. Is it—is she sure?”
Emmy shrugged and sniffled. “’Tisn’t quite like the other times, I don’t think. But I daresay that has made it even worse for her, not knowing what is going on. You know how those Lanes like to know.”
The laugh that spilled forth felt at once misplaced and an immense relief. “They do at that.”
A moment later Winter and Bennet charged in together, and then the trio hurried out the door with a flurry of farewells and bids for prayer.
Rosie’s hands landed on her shoulders and propelled her toward the hallway. “Nothing more to do in here, child. But if you’ve a mind, you could read to us.”
“A fine idea. Let me fetch the prayer book and my Bible.” She checked on Jack while she was upstairs and smiled at the way his arm dangled off the bed, at the parting of his lips and the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest.
Another boom shuddered over them, causing Gwyneth to jump again, but the boy slept on. She shook her head and left him to his peaceful dreams, praying her own of the other night had indeed been a promise from the Lord. That come spring, she and Thad would welcome a babe into the world. Certainly it was too soon to know, to do anything more than wonder, but she would hope and believe. And if she were proven wrong, well then. She would take it instead as a promise of the future, which would require her husband returning to her.
Rosie awaited her in the drawing room, some mending already out on her lap, and Gwyneth settled in with all the calm she could muster. For the next two hours she read, pausing only a few seconds at each blast upon the fort.
Jack’s cry of “Grandmama?” came at the exact moment a knock shook the front door.
Gwyneth rose even as Rosie did. “Would you fetch Jack? I daresay it is a neighbor, perhaps one with news.”
Rosie nodded and headed for the stairs while Gwyneth walked to the front door. She paused when she spotted the musket resting beside it. Thad had left strict instructions, so she picked it up before wrenching the door open. Another shell struck, but this time she didn’t so much as flinch. This time, it seemed somehow fitting.
At the sight of the handsome man on the porch, her fingers whitened around the gun she gripped so hard. Darting a frantic gaze beyond him, she didn’t spot her uncle anywhere. And she didn’t know if that was cause for relief or alarm. “What are you doing here?”
Sir Arthur doffed his hat and bowed, his somber face giving her no answers. “Our ship departs on tomorrow’s tide. Am I not permitted a farewell?”
“Of course. Farewell, Sir Arthur.” She swung the door shut.
It caught on the boot he had wedged in the frame, and his sigh sounded exasperated. “Really, Gwyneth, do I not deserve a mere five-minute audience?” He pushed the door open again and stuck his face in, looking, now, more like the man who had caught her eye on that first turn through Hyde Park, with his golden curls falling over his forehead and that boyish grin in place.
But that didn’t change that it was the wrong grin, the wrong man for the here and now. She didn’t go so far as to point the weapon at his chest, but she raised it enough to make certain he saw it. “’Tisn’t a good time, sir.”
“’Tis the only time I have. Please, Gwyneth. I want to give you a letter I found. From your mother to your father.”
The thought of something in her mother’s hand…but she shook her head and leaned on the door. Not enough to hurt him, but to make her point. “How would you have such a thing?”
“It was in your father’s study. I found it when I was looking for some clue as to where you might be.”
He had rummaged through Papa’s things, in Papa’s study? Now she pressed harder on the door. “Then hand it to me and be on your way.”
“Please.” The word barely made it past his clenched teeth, and his eyes reflected pain. His attempt at a smile looked more like a grimace. “Much as it offends my pride to have to ask for it outright, I need to rest for a few minutes. I have ridden at a breakneck pace through a rather treacherous twenty miles, and my old injury has flared up. I need a soft seat for just a few minutes so I might stretch it out. And a glass of water. I beg you.”
She considered telling him to help himself to a porch step, but when he tried and failed at controlling a wince, compassion won out. With a heavy sigh, she lowered the musket and opened the door. “Five minutes, and I will tell you now that I am not alone.”
“Of course you are not.” He limped his way in, and she shut the door quietly behind him. Turned, jumped, and cursed her own stupidity when he tugged the gun away from her. She made a lunge for it, but the pistol in his hands stopped her cold. “You have here still the slave woman and the boy. I suggest you tell her to take him to the kitchen for a snack, my dear.”
Tears stung her eyes when she considered the or what of the situation. Never would she have thought Sir Arthur capable of harming a woman or a child, but the dark glint in his eyes shouted that she knew him very little. Dear Lord, protect us. Protect Rosie and Jack, and protect me. If Thad learns of this…
Her heart ached. She nodded when he waved the pistol at the ceiling and went to the base of the stairs. “Rosie, would you take Jack to the kitchen for a few minutes?”
“I sure will,” the woman called back, sounding that particular kind of happy that Jack always brought.
“Good. Now, a private audience, if you please.”
She gave him a wide berth as she passed him, keeping her hands fisted in the fabric of her dress lest he see her trembling, and led him toward the drawing room. “Where is my uncle?”
“He will be along shortly.” Cold metal touched her neck and then trailed down to her shoulder, sending a shiver the rest of the way down her spine. “You are looking lovelier than ever, Gwyneth. I hadn’t the chance to say so the other week.”
She stepped away from the gun barrel once she was inside the drawing room and closed the door behind them so Jack wouldn’t wander in. And she prayed her eyes shot fire enough to burn him. “It must be the glow of love.”
With the Lane musket slung over his shoulder by its strap, Sir Arthur grunted and held out a piece of paper. When she lifted her brows, he waved it. “The letter. I did not fabricate it, and I have no use for it. I took it for the sole purpose of giving it to you. I thought…I thought you would appreciate something your mother had written.”
His tone softened with that last part, but she had no intention of falling for that again. She snatched the letter from his hand without drawing any closer than she had to and nearly choked on a sob at Mama’s flowery, beautiful script. Hardly caring where Sir Arthur went, she moved to the chair at her secretaire and sank onto it as she flipped the page open. Mon amour…
“You see?” His voice came from just behind her, quiet and imploring. “My thought was only for you. For finding you and keeping you safe.”
No doubt it had been, and for that she was truly sorry. But still. She read through the letter, blinking back tears. And then she narrowed her eyes. The date. And the gap between notre and fille…
“You cannot know how I feared. Finding your father was terrible enough—”
“You found him?” That brought her gaze up and around.
He was looking at the ground as he nodded. “I feared you were next. I feared his murderer would be looking for you.”
“He was.” Hands strangely steady now, she opened the drawer and pulled out the keyhole drawing she had done for Mama. She set it down upon the letter. “And you brought him directly to me.”