Nancy Whiskey

“Daniel, have you ever seen the like?” Trueblood gasped. “I believe she could have had Genet on his knees if she had tried.”

“And to a sergeant’s daughter,” Daniel taunted. “A lady would have graciously accepted his apology.”

“That did cross my mind. After all, he is an ambassador. But then I remembered he is French. Even a sergeant’s daughter must have some standards.”

Daniel cracked into laughter and took her hand to draw it through his arm. “You will be wasted on the frontier, Nancy. Stay in Philadelphia.”

“I am sure it would be more amusing, but I am a person who is used to employment. On that we will never agree, I know,” she said as his grip on her arm tightened. “So it is very much better if-1 go where we cannot argue about it”.

“Would you like to go to the theater tomorrow?” Daniel asked abruptly, interrupting Trueblood and causing Nancy to shake her head in despair. “They have just built a theater on Chestnut Street.”

“I thought perhaps you were not best pleased with me tonight,” Nancy returned.

“I put you in an awkward situation,” Daniel said.

She cocked her head at him. It was not an apology. She decided if she were waiting for him to admit she had been some help to him she would wait in vain.

“You did not mind my making sport of Genet, then?”

Daniel’s eyes glittered again, but only in amusement, not conspiracy. “I want to make it up to you.”

“So tomorrow I am not to impress anyone or taunt anyone?”

“No, it will be for your pleasure alone. Do you want to take Trueblood for propriety?”

“No, you are harmless enough.”

Trueblood chuckled, but Daniel cast Nancy such a skeptical look she thought she would pay for that remark.

“And who is that?” Nancy asked for the tenth time.

“That is Ellis, a banker. He handles my affairs. That is his wife with him and his eldest daughter….” Daniel trailed off. Sitting in a chair next to Nancy, he was being distracted by her low, square-cut neckline and the way her stays displayed the tops of her breasts over the lace trim of her ivory silk gown.

“You seem very well connected in Philadelphia.”

“What? Oh, they all receive me for Trueblood’s sake.”

“You do not have to put on a performance for me.”

“Why, Nancy, I do not know what you mean.”

“You know very well—Oh, look, there is Genet. Daniel, this is too bad of him. He has the French pirate with him. And who is the other man?”

“By report, I would say it is Andre Michaux, the botanist.”

“Like Trueblood.”

“Yes, but by vocation only. What are you going to do? Looking daggers at them will only make them laugh at you.”

“I think you are right. My instinct tells me that, as well. I think I will have a wonderful time and forget all about them.”

“Not even acknowledge them?” Daniel whispered in her ear.

Nancy looked up at the men in the box, then gave a delicious laugh and turned back to Daniel. “Will he think you have mollified me?”

“They are whispering. Clearly the captain still believes you are my mistress, and Genet is trying to convince him he is a fool.”

“Oh, good, now we can enjoy the play and they cannot.”

And they did enjoy it. Nancy could not remember such an intoxicating evening in her whole life. Even the grandest of her aunt’s parties could not hold a candle to the theater, and with such an amiable companion. He took possession of her hand quite naturally and kept it cradled between his own throughout the evening. He leaned to whisper comments in her ear, making her giggle, and he breathed on her neck in the most seductive way, causing an occasional shocked gasp behind them. It did occur to her that he might only be trying to convince the French captain that they were indeed lovers, but she rather thought Daniel’s attraction to her was genuine. He was a subtle man, but she had an instinct for the genuine article and thought he was being himself tonight.

As they walked home Daniel took her fan and plied it. The warm breaths of air were like caresses. “I’m glad you came with me tonight, for I must go away for a while.”

“Away? To sea?”

“No, to Pittsburgh. I shall be gone five or six weeks, two months at the outside.”

“I was forgetting, that is your business. I expect I will be gone by the time you get back. This might be the last we see of each other for a while. I will miss you—both of you.”

“Trueblood is not coming. He has business here for the time being.” Daniel ceased his fanning.

“I see.” Nancy watched his profile as he walked arm in arm with her, trying to decide what she could say to him to let him know she wanted to see him again.

“I—I suppose you will be thrown together a great deal, especially since you have the same interests, those confounded plants.”

“Yes, I suppose we will,” she teased.

“I need not warn you—I mean he is a perfect gentleman. That is…” Daniel stopped and turned to her. His face looked dark against the white of his cravat, but his blue eyes caught the gleam of the moonlight.

“Does he come between you and many women?”

“Yes—no, not many. Hah, there is no good answer to that poser. You have a knack for asking such questions.”

“Yes, ones I already know the answer to.”

“If he wishes, he can charm any woman he chooses.” Daniel looked desperate and hungry for her.

“Not any woman.”

He dropped her fan, and when they both bent for it, they collided. She was in his arms and he was lifting her up and kissing her, suddenly, in the most ravenous way. As though in a dream, she had hold of the back of his coat and was letting him, more than letting him. He was not at all like Reverend Bently. His mouth was possessive and urgent, his arms demanding, his eyes wonderfully alive.

“Daniel, we must not,” she whispered between kisses, trying to think rationally.

“Why not?” he gasped as he bent lower to kiss her neck.

She had never felt so wonderfully vulnerable in her life. “We are in the middle of the street. We could get run over.”

“Then come into the alley.”

She laughed at his solution as he pulled her into the dark shelter of a doorway. “And in a few weeks I shall be on the frontier and you…At best we will only get to see each other a half-dozen times a year.”

“Unless you were to stay in Philadelphia,” he countered, nuzzling her earlobe to the point where she could scarcely think straight.

“Daniel, I must go with Papa, at least for a while. He has brought me all this way to be with him.”

“Promise me you will stay at Mrs. Cook’s at least until I return.”

“Daniel, I cannot. I do not know what I am doing.” He released her, nodded sadly and took her arm again in the most calm manner. There they left it. Had his impulsive lovemaking been by way of convincing her to do his bidding? Perhaps she could not read him as well as she thought. There was just the chance that he had very nearly found a way to confuse her into compliance. She would rather believe him merely impulsive. All she knew was that, if he had offered her marriage, she did not think her shortlived devotion to her father would have been proof against such a temptation. But he had not…or could not. Whatever he was doing in Pittsburgh, she thought, it had naught to do with trade goods.

The next morning Daniel was interspersing his packing with instructions for Trueblood, who made an occasional note with his pencil as he reclined on the bed reading. Even prone, he made an impressive figure.

“I have been to the docks, Daniel. They are beginning to refit Little Sarah, and Genet is openly recruiting in the newspapers.”

“Then he is trampling all over Washington’s statement of neutrality.”

“The secretary of state is lodging a protest. President Washington is going to ask to have Genet recalled.”

“That is good news, at any rate. I wonder if Genet will think our Nancy had anything to do with it?”

“Daniel?”

“Hmm?” Daniel closed one leather saddle pack and strapped it shut.

“About Nancy. She could be very useful to us.”

“I do not want her involved in this mess any further than she already is.”

“Then why did you invite her to dine with Genet?”

“I do not know. It was only that I wanted her to see that Philadelphia is civilized. I had no idea she would go on the attack.”

“What were you expecting, Daniel?”

“That Genet would be distracted enough by Nancy to ignore us.”

“He was certainly that, but you might have guessed from her performance on the docks that Nancy would not simply sit back and be an object of admiration.”

“But that was an extraordinary happening—an adventure for her. I thought that she would behave herself at an ordinary dinner.”

“I have a better reading of her character than that.”

“I had assumed she had some company manners.”

“Admit it, Daniel—you miscalculated. Consequently you ended by dragging her into a highly charged political situation.”

“Dragging her? There was no way on earth to stop her.”

“You underestimated her, Daniel,” Trueblood said, wagging a finger at him.

Daniel sighed and ceased his distracted packing to sit on the bed. “Yes, I know that now.”

“If you intend to stay in this line of work, with me assisting you, Nancy could be very helpful to us, if one of us were to marry her.”

“If you take advantage of my absence to get in her good graces—” Daniel rose to shout accusingly at his brother.

“I was going to offer to go to Pittsburgh in your stead,” Trueblood interrupted.

“No. It is my job. I should not even have let you carry that packet.”

“I was thinking of your wound.”

“A scratch. Besides, you get lost going across town. If you missed one river you would overshoot the city entirely.”

Trueblood lay back and put his hands under his head. “She reminds me a bit of the Loyalist lady. What do you think?”

“Who? Oh.” Daniel thought for a moment, his outraged expression softening to one of abstraction. “No, not at all.”

Chapter Three

Trueblood and Nancy came in the kitchen entrance to Mrs. Cook’s, Nancy carrying her basketful of lemons and packets from the apothecary shop, and Trueblood burdened with parcels from the butcher’s.

“I thought this was supposed to be a free country where a person could speak her mind,” Nancy argued. She plunked the basket on the table, tore at the ribbons on her bonnet and tossed the headgear carelessly aside.

“Not on the public street and not in front of a crowd sympathetic to Genet. Had I not been with you, I do not know what would have happened to you,” Trueblood returned.

Mrs. Cook held her finger to her lips, warning them that the ill maids were asleep.

“It is stupid, this worship for a man who is no better than a pirate himself. Fitting up privateers, indeed!” Nancy whispered urgently.

“I cannot like the way you speak out in public against Genet, not with this French mania that has seized the people of Philadelphia. Washington himself is not safe from them.”

“I give him a lot of credit for not fleeing the city,” Mrs. Cook said, wagging her head as she stirred a kettle on the huge iron crane overhanging the fire.

“Were he to do so the government itself might fall,” Trueblood said.

“Washington has the courage to stand his ground,” Nancy declared as she removed a kettle of steaming water from one of the hearth trivets.

“He is the president. It is his job to take abuse.”

“Should I rather lie and pretend to favor this stupid talk of war with England?”

“Nancy, dear,” Mrs. Cook interjected, trying to mediate. “Are you sure you do not feel this way because you have so lately come from England?”

“Well, of course, I still have loyalties to England. That is no small part of my abhorrence for the present insanity. But looking at it objectively, it is stupid for a country to be drawn into a conflict where no offense has been given to it and there is nothing to be gained from fighting.”

“Hold whatever views you like.” Trueblood shook his finger at her. “Simply do not speak of them in the street.”

Nancy shrugged and began to unload her basket. She neither wished to argue with Trueblood nor discomfit him, but she had a certain contempt for his powerless state where she was concerned. If Daniel had caught her taunting a mob of street rabble he would have…What? She contemplated the prospect of him tossing her over his shoulder and carrying her home, and was disturbed that the fantasy held so much appeal for her.

“Nancy, why are you so quiet?” Trueblood asked with foreboding.

“There is no point in talking to you while you are angry,” she said, measuring some herbs into the teapot and adding hot water.

“I am not angry with you. I am afraid for you.”

“I would not concern myself if I were you. If things go on as they have been, this Philadelphia rabble will succumb to a force more powerful than France, England and America combined.”

“Yes, the yellow fever is getting worse by the day,” Mrs. Cook agreed.

“Another reason you should keep to the house, since you are unwilling to take refuge outside the city,” Trueblood argued.

“Not if there is work to be done here.”

“Daniel would be extremely displeased.”

“What has Daniel to say in the matter?” she asked with a pretense of coldness as she began to slice the lemons.

“He left me with the admonition to take care of you.”

“I should not be your responsibility, either.”

“Nevertheless—”

“Stir this, Trueblood,” Mrs. Cook commanded as she went to check on the invalids.

Trueblood obeyed distractedly. “Nevertheless, Daniel asked it of me and I have never failed him.”

“Really? Never?”

Trueblood thought for a moment, then turned an irritated gaze upon her. “Nancy, do not try to distract me.”

“Where do you suppose he -is now?” Nancy asked aloud. As often as she posed the question to Mrs. Cook, the kitchen maids or even the wall, Trueblood never failed to answer if he was within hearing.

“He has been gone a month. Most likely he is on his way back by now.”

“You say he made it there and back in as little as a month?” Nancy asked, as though Daniel’s arrival put a time limit on how long she had to cure the yellow-fever epidemic.

“And never more than six weeks.”

She sat down on the kitchen stool and stared wistfully out the window. “Is it a very dangerous trip?”

“Not anymore.”

“I know I should not worry about him. How many times has he made the trip?”

“Not more than fifty. Whereas your father has never done it before. Here he has gone off with Dupree, and you have never asked after his safety.” Nancy turned and smiled at him. “What an unnatural daughter I am.”

“If we are speaking of unnatural, Riley wrests you from your home, dumps you on a foreign shore and leaves you to fend for yourself, and with precious little money, is my guess.”

“Oh, I have some of my own. Uncle gave me all the gold and silver coin he had by him. He reckoned it would be enough to buy my passage home if I should need to.”

“In other words he had your father’s measure. I hope you keep it in a safe place.”

“It is sewn into the hem of my best petticoat.”

“Good idea.”

“I got it from a soldier’s wife—the idea, not the petticoat. I have read over all your books again,” she said, pulling a volume across the table to her, “and there is nothing here to help with this yellow fever.”

“It would appear they either survive it or not.”

“Yes, and that there is precious little we can do.”

“So I have concluded.”

“If I should get the fever, Trueblood, I don’t wish to be bled. That is not the answer.”

“I will not let the leeches get you, Nancy girl. I still wish you would let me take you to Champfreys, in Maryland. My mother and sister would love to have you, and it would guarantee that Daniel would go home.”

“How could I leave Mrs. Cook in such a fix, with both her girls down with the fever?”

“Prudence is well nigh over it.”

“But not much use yet. If she overdoes it now, she may have a relapse, and Tibby is still in danger. Why in the summer, Trueblood?”

“What?”

“The fever. Why only in the summer?”

“Bad air from the swamps.”

“Why do we not all get it, then?”

“That may come.”

Nancy pushed the book shut in defeat, but the cover flopped open to the flyleaf. It was a gift from Sir Farnsbey at Oxford.

She wondered why Trueblood had been the one sent to school and not Daniel, until she recollected what had been going on then. The rift between Daniel and his father went as far back as ‘77, when the sixteen-year-old Daniel, according to Trueblood, had left home after a blazing argument with his father to join the rebel army. No doubt Trueblood had been shipped off to England to turn him into a staunch Loyalist and to remove him from Daniel’s influence. It had not worked, of course. For Trueblood had managed to get back into the country and rejoin Daniel by 1780. Now his greatest loyalty was to his brother, and that lent Daniel a great deal of credit in Nancy’s eyes. If only he valued himself as Trueblood did.

When Daniel wandered into the kitchen the next day, Nancy, Trueblood and Mrs. Cook were all so intently watching a kettle simmering upon a pile of coals on the hearth that they did not immediately perceive he was not the boy hired to cut wood until he did not deposit any in the box under the window.

“Daniel!” Nancy leaped up and ran to him. She had just enough command of herself to merely embrace him and pull him toward a chair at the table, rather than kiss him as she would have liked to do. “You look so tired. I have some soup hot over the fire. Sit down. Tell us about your journey.”

“Double, double toil and trouble,” Daniel chanted as he sat down tiredly. “Fire burn and cauldron bubble.”

Nancy laughed as she carried a steaming pot to the table and got down a bowl. “I suppose we do look like a trio of witches stirring a most unpromising brew.”

“I sincerely hope that is not what you are planning on feeding me, for the reek of it reached me halfway down the street.”

“Not unless you feel yourself to be coming down with the fever, for it is a rather potent purgative.”

“I was hoping this house had been spared. Trueblood, you should have taken Miss Riley away from here.” Daniel touched the chicken broth to his lips, then sipped it gratefully, looking about for bread just as Nancy pushed a loaf toward him.

“I did suggest it, little brother.”

“How could you think I would desert Mrs. Cook?”

“Not you, too, mistress?” Daniel paused to look his landlady over thoughtfully.

“Yes, but I am better now. It was Nancy and Trueblood who pulled me through it. Prudence as well.”

“Now if we can just save Tibby,” Nancy said, going to stare at the infusion in the kettle.

“Since it appears that those who survive are those through whom it passes the quickest, your idea of purging it may make the most sense,” Trueblood said. “But why intersperse the doses of rhubarb with the Peruvian bark?”

“Only because it works for the ague. And I cannot believe the two diseases are unrelated. The symptoms vary, but the causes are the same.”

“The fetid swamps,” Mrs. Cook said, drawing the great wooden spoon out and sniffing it.

“Do you mind?” Daniel asked.

“Sorry, Daniel. Are we disgusting you?” Nancy went and got a chunk of cooked beef from the larder and sliced it for him. He laid a thick piece on his bread and ate the two with one hand while he dipped up soup with the other. It made Nancy wonder how long he had gone without eating, and if he had done so to hurry back to her. She sat down to stare at him and only realized she must be smiling vacantly when he spoke with his mouth full.

“Yes. Moreover, I think you are enjoying mucking about with your herbs.”

“I am not. I would rather no one ever got sick.”

“But it gives you a great deal of importance when they do.” Daniel tore another chunk off the loaf of bread.

“That’s not true. I only want to feel useful. Someone must take care of the sick.”

“I am surprised you have not hired yourself out to the hospitals.” Since this pronouncement produced a dead silence, Daniel could only think that Nancy had been performing some such service. “If that isn’t the outside of enough.” His fist hit the table. “Well, pack your bags, Miss Riley. I am about to escort you to meet your esteemed papa.”

“I will not be hauled away like a child.”

“Even if he sent for you?”

“You have seen him?” she asked excitedly.

“Yes, and he commissioned me to take you to Pittsburgh. He has bought an inn. Not much of one, but I take it he is in need of someone to manage it.”

“Manage it? Me? But what is he doing?”

“Running the still.”

“Oh, yes, of course. When do we set out?”

“Two days, if I can manage it.”

“But that is plenty of time. By then Prudence will be able to help nurse Tibby.”

“How convenient for you.” Daniel wolfed the rest of his food and retired to his room, leaving Nancy and Trueblood in the kitchen, writing out their cures for Mrs. Cook.

“Damn!” Nancy said impatiently as she stepped out of one shoe and looked back to see it mired in the crossing. She hopped precariously on one foot, holding up her plain work skirt with the hand carrying the basket as she turned and reached down to pull the shoe free without muddying her stocking. Suddenly she was scooped up by a strong pair of arms, and was just about to raise her voice in complaint when she realized it was Daniel. She did not hit him with the muddy shoe, but wrapped her arm about his neck instead.

“When I recommended these lodgings to you, I did not think you meant to hire yourself out as a servant to Mrs. Cook.”

“What on earth do you mean? I have only been helping since the maids have been ill. You can put me down now.” Nancy stared about her to see if she knew any of the pedestrians.

“If I do you will only go on about the marketing. I am taking you back to Mrs. Cook’s.”

“But that is where I was going. I was just leaving a fever medicine at the Nortons’.”

Daniel hesitated. “Is one of them ill?”

“One of the servants. Your friend has sent Elise and the girls to his plantation. He even offered to send me there for a visit.”

“Which you declined in your high-handed way, I suppose.” Daniel continued carrying her along the pathway, oblivious to stares from what few people still dared walk the streets.

“I wish you would put me down, Daniel,” Nancy said, but without conviction. “You are causing a spectacle.”

“Nothing like the spectacle of you exposing yourself up to the knee to fetch that shoe out of the mud.”

“A gentleman would not have looked.”

“Any man would have looked, even one staggering about with the fever.”

“But what will people think?” Nancy asked, blushing at the backhanded compliment.

“That you have sprained your ankle. At least that is the story I suggest, but you are so inventive I am sure you can come up with something better.”

They were within a block of home, so she left off arguing and thought about the strong arms under her thighs and around her back. “Norton seemed surprised you had not been to see him yet,” she taunted.

“What did he say?”

“Nothing much, just raised one eyebrow in that way he has of indicating he cannot quite credit his senses.”

“I was on my way to see him now. I shall tell him you detained me.”

“I do not think that will surprise him,” Nancy said, somewhat gratified that Daniel thought her safety of more moment than reporting to Norton.

“What? Bye the bye, are you packed yet?”