Traitor to the Crown Read online

  “The young gentleman does not want to come,” the captain asserted, looking over Proctor’s shoulder at Lydia. “By His Majesty’s decree, no slave may enter France. To do so may mean the slave will be taken away.”

  Lydia tensed noticeably at this last sentence. Proctor had never heard of the decree, and wasn’t sure how they could enforce it. He knew that other Americans had taken their slaves with them to Paris. “We do not plan to stay in the country. We will enter and leave. I’m sure it will be fine.”

  The captain sighed. “I would like to help you,” he said. “But I cannot offer you the berth I possesses not. There is no place for you to sleep.”

  “There is no problem,” Proctor said. He jingled a purse full of coin. “I’ll sleep anywhere there’s a spot for me, on the deck if I must.”

  The captain raised a dark eyebrow that stood out in sharp contrast with his powdered hair. He took the purse from Proctor’s hand, peered inside, and pocketed it. “Very well.”

  Proctor realized he had made another error, revealing himself to be neither a gentleman nor a man used to owning slaves. Men of that class demanded a certain level of luxury just as a factor of their status. Proctor had reacted out of reflex—after all the hardship he’d seen soldiers endure during the war, it seemed selfish and indulgent to insist on luxuries. He tried to cover up his error by changing the subject. “If that’s settled, you could help me by directing me to Mister John Adams.”

  “I’m John Adams,” the round gentleman said. Proctor realized that the group of passengers were the men attached to his mission and other hangers-on. “I hope you’ll oblige by introducing yourself—hold on there.”

  “Yes, monsieur?” Captain Chavagne replied, caught in the act of trying to slip away.

  “We are not resolved on this question. Tomorrow is the Sabbath, and thus not a fit day for travel. Can we not delay our departure one more day and set sail on Monday?”

  The captain shrugged. “If God does not wish us to sail on the Sabbath, then He should suspend the tides.”

  Adams sighed in defeat as the Frenchman walked away, then turned back to Proctor. Proctor offered him the letter of introduction prepared by Tallmadge. Adams unfolded it and began to read. “You know the Chevalier de la Luzerne?” he asked incredulously as he scanned the page.

  “I met him but once, while I was in service to General Washington.”

  Adams folded the letter and returned it to Proctor. “And what employment do you expect to find in Paris?”

  “I was a secretary in General Washington’s headquarters during the campaign of ’seventy-six,” Proctor said. “Do you have need of one?”

  A plain man with a pinched face and a shabby suit pushed forward. “His Excellency already employs a capable and experienced secretary, and one with a whole hand I might add.”

  Adams motioned the other man to silence. “You seem like a good Massachusetts man,” he said to Proctor.

  “Born outside Concord, late of Salem, lived my whole life here,” Proctor answered.

  “Excellent,” Adams said. “You must admit that men of our state have taken the lead in the fight for freedom, from the battle at Lexington right down to today.”

  “That’s true …” Proctor wasn’t sure what Adams was getting at, but he felt confident he wouldn’t like it.

  “Perhaps you can explain this to me,” Adams said. “It does not seem to me that the passion for freedom can burn as strongly in the breasts of men who deprive their fellow men of freedom.” He held an open palm in the direction of Lydia, inviting an explanation. “What has been your experience?”

  The worst part was that Proctor shared Adams’s feelings on slavery but dared not let on. This was the crux of his problem, ever since he had been drawn into the society of witches some four years before: he was always pretending to be someone he was not.

  But he remembered Lydia’s warning and knew that now was not the time to change that.

  “I don’t know if I care for your implication,” he said, trying to sound like an affronted young man of class. “It has been my experience that the men from our southern states are every bit as ardent in their love of freedom as are we men from Massachusetts, and are as equally willing to sacrifice their all to achieve it. Or are you trying to imply otherwise? Your own words would cast doubt on men like Washington, Jefferson, and even Franklin.”

  Adams frowned. “Of course I mean to imply no such thing. We all share an ardor for our native land and its freedom. But I hope you will take no offense when I tell you that I see no position for you in this mission. Mister Dana, my secretary”—he indicated the man with the pinched face and worn suit—“is satisfactory in every regard. I have a servant I know and trust well, as does Mister Dana, and I have already engaged a tutor, Mister Thaxter, for my two sons.” He seemed to realize that he was starting to run on but proved incapable of stopping. “While it is possible to be frugal to a fault, in this instance taking on any additional expense would represent a mismanagement of the fiduciary trust placed in me by the Congress in pursuit of the goals that they’ve assigned me.” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I’m sorry.”

  That wasn’t the ideal situation. It would make things much harder. Proctor reached into his pocket and clutched his focus—a lock of Deborah’s hair tied in a gray ribbon made from the same fabric as her favorite dress.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “You won’t even know we’re here.”

  It was a simple spell of redirected attention. He could stay close to Adams, but Adams wouldn’t notice him. Adams looked at Proctor as he mouthed the words of the spell, and then through him.

  “Where did the captain escape to?” Adams asked. “We never resolved the issue of the Sabbath, and I hate to travel on the Sabbath unless I absolutely must.” He started for the quarterdeck and bumped into Proctor with his first step, startling in surprise that someone stood there. He excused himself and hurried away, followed by his mob.

  “Where did you learn that particular prayer, Master Brown?” Lydia asked in a subservient tone of voice that gave Proctor an unexpected chill. By prayer she meant “spell.”

  “Deborah taught it to me,” he said, not looking directly at her. “It was one of the first things she taught me.”

  “I would not be so quick to use it,” she said. “Miss Deborah learned it from my former mistress, and I do not think she was of good faith.”

  The spell was dangerous just because Cecily had used it? “Surely the intentions matter,” Proctor said.

  “I’m certain you know best,” Lydia said, her eyes downcast. “But I never knew my former mistress to have a good intention.” She set Proctor’s bag down at his feet. “I best go find a spot for myself in steerage.”

  “Steerage?” Proctor asked.

  “The lowest deck, with such other servants as may be on board.” She looked around at the crowded ship, which probably contained between three and four hundred sailors and passengers. “Good berths will be hard to come by. I will come up again in a little while to see if you need anything.”

  “The Covenant may try to get at Adams while he’s on board the ship,” Proctor said. “Keep an eye and an ear open down there for anything unusual.”

  “I can do that,” she said

  She stopped at a gangway and asked a negro sailor for directions. He called down the open hatch to someone below. Lydia descended below the deck.

  A voice at Proctor’s side startled him. “How much for the darky?”

  “What?” he said, turning to answer the man. A huge sailor stood behind Proctor. He had shoulders as broad as a yoke and whiskers black as coal. His sunburned skin was etched with a variety of scars, everything from the jagged cuts of splinters to the clean lines of a blade.

  “I said how much for the woman?” the man repeated.

  “She’s not for sale,” Proctor said.

  “G’wan,” the man said angrily. “I’m not trying to buy her. More in the line of I’d be interested in
renting her a time or two during the voyage.”

  “She’s not for rent, either,” Proctor said.

  “You can’t expect me to believe that you’d keep that all to yourself,” the man said. “Not really your quality. I never knew a man like you who didn’t bring dark meat to the table if he wasn’t planning to eat. But you look like you’re on hard times and could use a bit o’ coin. So I’m going to ask you one more time, how much for the woman?”

  Proctor closed the space with the man, intending to force him to back down, but the sailor just stood there until Proctor was close enough to smell the beer and onions on his breath. Proctor realized he should have tried a different tack, using words or appeals to the captain instead, but it was too late to change his decision now. “I think you should just walk away.”

  The sailor glared down at Proctor as if he could smash him at will. He was clearly not intimidated in the least by anyone he considered a gentleman. “My coin, your loss,” the sailor said. He cleared his throat and spit a big wad of phlegm at Proctor’s feet, then turned and walked away.

  Proctor grabbed one of the barefoot ship’s boys as he ran past. He pointed to the big sailor. “Who is that?”

  The boy’s eyes went wide with fright. “His name is Jacques,” the boy said in a thick French accent. “Jacques Ta r.”

  Proctor let him go and he scampered off. So the sailor’s name was Jack Tar. Very funny. British sailors were called jack tars. It seemed too obvious for him to be an agent of either the British or the Covenant with a name like that. More probably, like many sailors, he was hiding his true identity because he had committed some crime on shore.

  Proctor had undertaken this journey to find his enemy. It seemed he had already made a new one.

  They departed with the tide on Sunday, despite Adams’s reservations. By Monday morning they had sailed well north. The sails were only partially unfurled, but they were filled with the crisp wind, and the great mainmast, taller than the ship was long, strained like a horse in harness, pulling the ship forward through the waves like a plow breaking the soil.

  Proctor stood at the rail, with the wind biting his ears and the salt air already drying his skin. He watched the rocky outline of Cape Ann diminish in the distance. The port of Gloucester was situated on Cape Ann, and from Gloucester it was but a morning’s walk to Salem town. Deborah and Maggie were at home just outside Salem.

  He went to find Lydia. He needed to share that last sight of home with someone.

  As he climbed down to the lowest deck, the smell of human bodies grew more oppressive. The ceilings were much lower too, and Proctor had to duck his head not to bump it. As he reached the bottom level, the smell of seawater grew stronger, overpowering the other scents. The sound of voices echoed from another part of the hold. His eyes strained to pierce the murky darkness, but it was difficult coming straight down from the sun-glittering waves.

  “Lydia,” he called.

  “Coming, sir,” she said.

  He climbed down into a narrow passage between the barrels of biscuit, meat, and water. His feet hit water and he was soaked to his ankles. He saw Lydia coming toward him with her shoes in her hands and her dress held up to her knees. The captain and several officers sloshed along behind her, through water as deep as their shins. The captain recognized Proctor and frowned.

  “I thought the water was supposed to be on the outside of the ship,” Proctor said.

  “There is always leaking a little,” the captain said. “No thing to worry about.”

  He smiled, but his narrow face looked pained to wear the expression. He squeezed past them and climbed out of the hold, shouting orders as he went.

  “For men with nothing to worry about, they all looked a little worried,” Proctor said. “If it’s bad, they’d turn back to shore, wouldn’t they?”

  “I’m certain they would,” she said, eyes lowered.

  The tone of her voice said she was certain of no such thing. But he had to reconcile himself to the fact that she wasn’t going to speak freely to him as long as they were aboard the ship. “Come up to the deck, I want to show you something,” Proctor said.

  On their climb up, they passed the ship’s pumps. Two large elm handles, curved like the haft of an ax, were connected to pipes that pierced the deck on either side of the mast and reached down deep into the hold. Jack Tar and several other sailors worked the pumps, spraying water from the hold across the deck. Other sailors scrubbed the already pristine planks and mopped the water over the sides. Jack stared at Proctor coming up from belowdeck, and his frown said he blamed Proctor for the leak.

  “What did you want to show me?” Lydia asked.

  To the west, Cape Ann had sunk below the horizon. Protected or unprotected, his home had passed beyond his sight and his power. They were at sea. “Nothing,” he said. “I guess it was nothing.”

  Chapter 7

  The creak and slosh of the pumps sounded as regular as the ship’s bell as they sailed for several days under clear skies. Proctor asked the crewmen about it one morning. “Is it usual for a ship to be running the pumps this frequently?”

  The crewmen looked to one another to see if they should answer that kind of question from a passenger. The English-speaking crew members explained the question to those who only spoke French.

  An older crewman, a fellow with long brown streaks of tobacco juice striping his gray beard, said, “It’s not usual, but in our case it’s only sensible.”

  The crewman’s expression was dead serious and Proctor was willing to take the answer at face value. His past experience with ships had kept him close to shore, seldom out of sight of land, and he didn’t want to presume what was ordinary or not.

  But the ship’s boy swabbing the deck with the pumped water started to snicker, and Proctor finally got the pun. Only Sensible. He chuckled, and the crew nearby burst out laughing.

  The chuckle died on his lips as he realized the old sailor was implying that Sensible was a leaky ship. The crew, apparently seeing Proctor’s discomfort, laughed harder. After that, whenever Proctor paced that part of the deck, one of the crew members would repeat the phrase only sensible and they would all laugh again.

  They had the chance to do so fairly often. Proctor needed some kind of work to do. He didn’t expect to find trouble or the Covenant until they reached Paris, but he was not going to miss anything on the way. So he prowled the deck, hoping to feel that familiar tingle that told him someone nearby was performing magic. The Covenant wanted a British victory as part of their plan to build an empire that circled the globe. If they had sent an agent to wreck Adams’s mission, Proctor would find him and stop him before the ship reached French shores.

  From the first day, he began to narrow the possible choices. The ship’s officers had all been assigned to the vessel before Adams began his voyage, but the sailors were a different story. They were a mixed crew of Frenchmen and newly recruited Americans, a wicked-looking lot on the whole, scarred by sun and steel. All day long, dozens of sailors sat along the yards in the masts, their feet dangling as they rolled back and forth with the waves, an audience in the balcony to the play on the deck below. He saw their eyes follow him as he paced, and he was keenly aware that they were just as well placed to watch Adams.

  He had been observing them for a week, his eyes turned to the mast, when a voice startled him.

  “I see you spying on us,” Jack said. He was looking the other direction, as if he were talking to someone else. “Better keep your eyes in front of you, or you might fall overboard. And who’ll own your property then?”

  “Toi, là-bas, remets-toi à travailler,” the bosun yelled at Jack.

  “Oui, mon major,” Jack said as he knuckled his forehead and moved off.

  Proctor thought that would be the end of it, but the bosun eyed him suspiciously as he continued his circuit of the deck. When Proctor glanced back over his shoulder, he saw the bosun talking to the lieutenant, and both of them staring at him.

&
nbsp; The problem was that Proctor did not act like the other passengers, though he placed himself in their company as much as possible. They gathered on deck daily, a loud mob of worry merchants trading old news and rumors as if both were coin of the same weight. The war would be over before they could turn a profit. The war would drag on forever, killing trade. They all had some intention of making money off either war or peace, and this entitled them to judge how others were fighting it.

  It was the worst-kept secret on board that Adams had been named minister plenipotentiary, which gave him the full authority of the United States to negotiate with foreign countries. Opinion was divided between those who thought Adams intended further agreements with France and those who thought he meant to negotiate peace with Britain.

  Proctor thought either case unlikely. It was clear from Adams’s brusque treatment of the officers that he neither trusted nor liked the opulent French, while the British had no reason to negotiate. Henry Laurens, the former president of the Continental Congress and the American diplomat sent overseas, had been captured by the British and was currently imprisoned in London. The same fate might easily await Adams.

  And then there was the Covenant. They would go to any length to assure a British victory.

  Proctor remembered the demon attack and shuddered. He worried about Deborah and Maggie, and wondered if they were still safe. If he allowed himself to think about them too much, he grew panicky. If trouble did come for them, there was nothing he could do to help. So he told himself to stay focused: find an agent of the Covenant, follow him back to his leaders, destroy them, and return home.

  Day after day, into the second week, the ship made its way east, accompanied by the periodic creak and slosh, creak and slosh of the pumps. Proctor turned his attention to those closest to Adams.

  The diplomat was a crowd unto himself. With his secretary, both their servants, his two boys, their tutor, and several others claiming some connection to the American mission, Adams was always at the center of a dozen or more people, usually gathered at one railing or the other.