“So I’m learning,” I said, immediately afraid I’d been disloyal. But how was I to save my husband from behaving with recklessness, pride, and even arrogance?
Lafayette gave a rueful smile as he leaned in. “Brilliant men are often the most stubborn, but to pick a quarrel with Washington.” He shook his head, and his amusement melted away. “Some would say this to be folies de grandeurs. But in Hamilton I know this to be a mask. And allowances must be made for his circumstances.”
“His circumstances?” I asked, fearing he might raise the issue of Alexander’s legitimacy.
Instead, he said, “Great pain and loss, madame. As I think you know.”
I did know, but I was a little amazed that Lafayette did, too. And even more so at the sudden intimacy of our conversation.
“My own father was killed when I was not yet two years old,” the Frenchman explained. “But still I had money and relations to look after me. Your husband had no one to look after him . . . small wonder he trusts no one but himself to care about his future. Not Washington. Not me. Not anyone, I think. Maybe not even you.”
I never wished to depend entirely upon any one person.
That’s what Hamilton had said. And I realized how well Lafayette understood his fears. Martha Washington had advised me to manage my husband’s self-destructive impulses. And now I hoped Lafayette might help me do that. “Maybe you could talk to him again in a few days, when he’s had time to reflect.”
“Perhaps we can conspire together to make him see reason, oui?” Lafayette replied. “I can only write him letters because I march shortly to defend Virginia, with orders to capture Benedict Arnold and hang him dead by the neck.”
With a bloodthirstiness I’d never felt before, I said, “In that endeavor I wish you very well, sir.”
Still, Lafayette spoke of his new southern command a little glumly, for we all believed the final battle would take place somewhere in New York, and he didn’t wish to miss it. “It is probable I will be in the southern wilderness until the end of the war, so if Hamilton will not return to Washington, convince him to join me. We will share our exile.”
I wasn’t certain that a loving wife should convince a husband who had dedicated six years of his life to war that he should endanger himself even one more day. But I was sensible to Lafayette’s argument that Alexander would never forgive himself if he didn’t see the war to its conclusion.
Nor was I even sure we could win this war without Alexander Hamilton, for these weeks at his side in camp had revealed to me the military side of the man. He was forever identifying weaknesses in enemy movements, formulating strategies about which he convinced the general before communicating them to the commanders in the field; haranguing Congress for what support the army received; negotiating with the French, and finding clever ways to stretch the army’s resources—all while unburdening Washington so he could focus on the whole of the war.
So I agreed to give Lafayette’s suggestion long thought. “You’re a good friend,” I told the Frenchman. “And I wish you the fondest Adieu.”
“No, no!” Lafayette cried before taking his leave. “We will say only Au revoir! Until we meet again. In the meantime, I wish you luck with your campaign to keep your husband from rashness. As for me, I would rather face the cannons.”
Chapter Twelve
April 1781
De Peyster’s Point, New York
TWO MONTHS LATER, I wondered if I would not have fared better against cannons myself.
Martha Washington’s advice had helped me to see that my soft words and touches could moderate my husband, at least a little. By making of myself a soothing presence, I’d gently persuaded Alexander to accompany the general to Rhode Island to serve as interpreter in the strategy discussions with the French officers, for Alexander’s mastery of the language exceeded that of all the other American members of Washington’s staff.
I accomplished that much.
But after that, Hamilton left Washington’s service, just as he said he would.
And now he appeared to be taunting our commander.
His Excellency had refused my husband a promotion partly on the grounds that he was indispensable at headquarters. Well, now we were gone from headquarters, but living in a little brick and stone house directly across the river from Washington’s dwellings.
Our new home at De Peyster’s Point—our first household together—was little better than a fishing shack, without so much as a dining table. It was drafty, the roof leaked, it stunk of dead fish, and the only way to get to it from headquarters was by way of a little rowboat. But it had one winning feature as far as my husband was concerned.