35

Here Comes the Groom

The Cochran Residence

Morristown, New Jersey

April 1780

“But how did you . . . I mean, you just disappeared . . . and then your horse was found with blood . . . and I wrote and no one answered . . . and Governor Livingston was just so, so—”

“It’s fine, Eliza, it’s fine.” Alex knelt on the carpet and stroked Eliza’s hand where she lay on the sofa in Aunt Gertrude’s parlor. “I’m here now. I’ll explain everything. Or, well, your mother will, because I’m afraid I don’t remember much.”

“You don’t remember?” Eliza asked, frowning. “I don’t understand.”

Catherine Schuyler’s round face slipped into her daughter’s viewpoint.

“Oh, Eliza, this poor boy was so delirious when he arrived at the Pastures that he had no idea where he was. In truth, I have no idea how he found us. It must have been God’s will that he arrive.”

“You rode all the way to Albany and back? In seven days?”

“Four days, really,” Mrs. Schuyler answered. “Three of those days were spent abed—where he should still be, if you ask me.”

“I am quite recovered, Mrs. Schuyler, all due to your good care.”

“You do look rather peaked,” Eliza said. “But please, tell me, what happened? Why did you run off? And how came you to be so ill that you were three days bedridden at my parents’ house?”

Alex shrugged and moved from the carpet to a nearby chair, though never letting go of Eliza’s hand.

“I knew that the only way you would break off the engagement to Colonel Livingston was with your parents’ permission. And I knew that the only way they would grant that permission was if they were told, clearly, and without the tact that a feminine correspondent would undoubtedly put into a letter, exactly what kind of scoundrel he was. And so I requisitioned a horse from the mail coach and made my way there. It was a rainy day, as you recall, and I had already been some six hours on horseback during the journey from Amboy, and awake for some eighteen hours, so I was rather susceptible to the effects of damp and fatigue.”

“And then you were ambushed by those British dragoons. As I said, it is a wonder you made it to us at all,” interjected Mrs. Schuyler once more.

“Ambushed!” cried Eliza.

Even if Alex were at liberty to divulge the evidence of treason he had uncovered regarding General Arnold and Major André, he couldn’t think of the words to describe it. He wasn’t entirely convinced that he hadn’t dreamed up the whole thing.

“Your father has handled it,” he said gently. “Suffice to say that the culprits will be brought to justice, and history will remember them in infamy.”

“Are you hurt?” Eliza said. “It seemed to me that you were favoring your arm earlier.”

“Just a scratch,” Alex said, releasing Eliza’s hand just long enough to rub his wound gingerly, then taking it up again. The scab pulled when he lifted it, but the muscle beneath was uninjured. In a week or two, he would likely not even remember the cut. The attack itself was a blur, too, lost behind a wall of fatigue and fever.

“So that was your blood on your horse’s saddle? But how came it to arrive at the coach station without you?”

“It was spooked by the gunshots and made its way home to the station on its own. I was able to catch one of my assailant’s horses. I rode as far as the Sloat House coach station in Pothat and on up to Albany.”

“And you slept not a wink during the entire journey!” Eliza asked incredulously.

“Not in a bed,” Alex said. “Though there were times I’m sure I dozed on horseback.”

“By the time he got to us,” Mrs. Schuyler said here, “he barely knew his own name, or why he had come. I tell you he was raving so badly that I thought the fever had gone to his brain and we would not have him back, but it seems to have been mostly the effects of three days without sleep and little food, a nagging wound, and a terrible chill.”

“They tell me I slept for two days,” Alex confessed sheepishly. “I must apologize for that, my dear Eliza.”

“Oh, nonsense,” Eliza said, stroking his hand. “I can’t believe you risked your life for me!”

“I would risk it a thousand times more, to win your heart.”

Mrs. Schuyler cleared her throat self-consciously. “While he slept, your aunt Cochran’s note came, but I confess that your father and I could not distinguish between the jitters of a reluctant bride and the malfeasance of roué. Certainly we had heard nothing suggesting that Colonel Livingston’s character was anything less than that of a gentleman, or we would have never consented to the marriage.” Alex watched as Mrs. Schuyler fixed her daughter in the eye with almost desperate earnestness. “I do hope you believe that, Daughter.”

“Henry was always a weak boy,” Eliza said in a measured voice, not forgiving, but not condemning either, “but never a roué, as you say. I gather that his time in the army has not had the character-strengthening effect it has on so many of our soldiers. But you could not have known that. He has been stationed in Connecticut and coastal Massachusetts, far from Albany, let alone New Jersey or Philadelphia.”

It was not exoneration, but Mrs. Schuyler seemed content with that.

“We thought to write you, but then Colonel Hamilton awakened and was able to give us a fuller accounting, and we were convinced that it was necessary that we travel here in person to stop the marriage. Colonel Hamilton insisted on accompanying us, but the doctor said he wasn’t well enough. We managed to keep him in bed one more day, but then he said he would return without us, so your father commissioned a carriage and we came together. We had to hope that your aunt Cochran was able to delay the marriage until word came from us, or we arrived ourselves.”

“Aunt Gertrude was remarkable,” Eliza said. “I suspect Governor Livingston will never set foot in a house occupied by her ever again.”

Alex looked over at Mrs. Cochran, twirling the small vial of smelling salts she had used to revive Eliza in the fingers of one hand. She caught his eye and winked.

Just then the front door clicked open, and a moment later General Schuyler stomped into the parlor.

“It is done,” he said, removing his hat and coat, then handing it to a servant in the hall. He shut the door behind him and took a seat on a chair close to his wife.

“I have persuaded Governor and Colonel Livingston to release you from your engagement and to keep the entire matter strictly en famille. In exchange, Colonel Livingston will not be brought before a court-martial for callously and carelessly jeopardizing the lives of seven Continental soldiers in moving them from their infirmary so that he could throw a party, and of course, his most reprehensible and disgusting actions against a lady shall remain known only to the injured party and her family.” He looked at his daughter with equal parts tenderness and anger. “Though I would prefer to shoot him myself, at least some manner of justice has been done.”

“A scoundrel like that will seek out his own justice eventually,” Alex said with disgust. “Although I, too, wish I could be the one to mete it out.”

“It is behind us now,” General Schuyler said, “and a much brighter future lies ahead. That is, if Eliza will still have you,” he added with a wink at his daughter.

“What?” Eliza said.

“There was a question on the table,” General Schuyler said, “that Colonel Hamilton put to you, before you so rudely fainted into his arms.”

“Oh, I would not call it rude,” Mrs. Schuyler admonished her husband. “I would call it charming.”

“Well, charming or rude, she shouldn’t leave the poor boy hanging!” General Schuyler managed a chuckle.

“The poor boy agrees!” Alex chimed in, looking at Eliza hopefully.

“Wh-what?” Eliza stuttered again. “I mean—” She looked nervously at her parents, but mostly her mother. “Can I? You seemed so against it before.”

“There are families whose greatness lies in their past, and in their legacies,” Mrs. Schuyler answered. “That is a quality much to be admired, for tradition is what binds us as a society. But there are some families, like some nations, whose greatness is a future development, and that quality, though harder to discern than the prestige of manor houses and coats of arms and titles of rank and office, is no less valuable, if, indeed, not more so.”

General Schuyler put his arm around his wife and drew her near.

“What Mrs. Schuyler is saying,” General Schuyler added, “is that it is the Schuylers who would be honored by a union with so brilliant and noble a personage as Colonel Hamilton.”

“So I can marry him?” Eliza said, her eyes flitting between her parents and Alex. “I can say yes?”

“You had better,” Mrs. Schuyler said, “or I shall never forgive you.”

Eliza turned to Alex. Alex felt his body fall away from him. The only thing that kept him rooted to earth was his hand in Eliza’s.

“Then, yes!” Eliza exclaimed. “Yes, yes, and yes, I will marry you! Yes! Yes! Yes!”