At nearly twenty-five, Lysbet had declared herself a spinster, quite contentedly on the shelf, which was why she often assisted my work at the orphanage’s Bank Street headquarters, where there were now beds for two hundred of the city’s neediest children.
Lysbet reminded me of myself when I was about her age, convinced that I, too, would be a spinster. But more than me, she still resembled a more subtle Angelica, except for her unadorned hair and the spectacles she wore upon her nose whenever it was buried in a book—which was often. Lysbet was a serious and sensible young woman, without girlish caprice, so I couldn’t fathom her excitement as she hovered in the doorway, positively vibrating with giddiness.
“What visitor?” I asked, not remembering any appointments.
“See for yourself,” Lysbet said, stepping aside to reveal two distinguished-looking gentlemen. One, a middle-aged Frenchman.
The other, the last living general of the revolutionary war . . .
I rushed to my feet, and the familiar sight of him filled my eyes with tears.
Though I’d never seen the Marquis de Lafayette out of uniform before, he was instantly recognizable to me as a hero of a bygone age. And as my friend. Stouter than I remembered, and bent with age and whatever torments he’d suffered all those years he was held in a dungeon during the French Revolution, but still the slope of that forehead and that patrician nose were unmistakable.
“Madame Hamilton,” Lafayette said, making a formal bow with cane and top hat in hand.
“General Lafayette,” I whispered, rounding the desk. And that’s when I realized the taller man at his side was his son. “Georges?”
Georges smiled and stepped forward swiftly to kiss my cheeks. “How it fills my heart to see you again. I’ve never forgotten what you did for me all those years ago, when I was in hiding.” He ducked his chin, as if he couldn’t say more without being unmanned.
On instinct, my hands went to his cheeks as if he were still a boy. But in truth, his hair was shot through with silver, and I couldn’t help but think that my Philip would’ve been about his age now, if he’d lived.
Perhaps Lafayette was thinking this, too, because the general spoke to me in consolation for my losses and I returned mine for his. And finally remembering the rest of my manners, I presented my Lysbet, who tittered like such a flibbertigibbet, one might think she’d never met a general before.
But, of course, Lafayette was no mere general. The entire country was poised to give him a hero’s welcome with toasts and spectacles in honor of the forthcoming fiftieth anniversary of the revolution. It was said that in all America there wasn’t a heart that didn’t beat with joy and gratitude at the sound of Lafayette’s name.
Certainly my heart did.
Already the city of New York had greeted him with booming cannons due a conquering hero. Which was quite possibly why Lysbet nearly swooned when Lafayette kissed her hand.
“Mademoiselle Hamilton,” he said to my daughter, his world-weary, haggard eyes crinkling at the corners with his smile. “You must not be shy. Your father was more than friend to me, he was a brother. We were both very young when our friendship formed in days of peril and glory, but it suffered no diminution from time. So you must think of yourself as family to me.”
The enormity of this statement, if only for what it meant to Lysbet, melted my heart.
“And you, madame,” he said, turning to me. “You are my sister, and were before you ever met your husband, oui?”
It was a touching sentiment. One that recalled to me long-ago days in Albany. And though I had brothers of my own, by blood and marriage, I couldn’t help but return it. “I remember, and feel the same.”
So it shamed me when he nodded and said, “I worried for your health when I did not see you at the welcoming parade. Georges told me no esteemed woman of sense would jostle with a New York crowd in this heat. Mon Dieu, this heat.” Lafayette dabbed at the sweat on his forehead. “But I could not be satisfied of your well-being until I set eyes upon you, myself. As I wished to learn more about your charity work, I tracked you down here.”
I flushed at the shabby state of my crowded little office, with its decades-old desk and sagging bookshelves, but even more so because I hadn’t been invited to the official celebrations by the Republicans who now held power in government. Given how shamelessly they claimed the mantle of patriotism all for themselves, my presence would have been an inconvenient reminder to everyone of my husband. Or perhaps they’d simply forgotten me as they’d forgotten him.