It was so unlike the general to complain—especially about the commander in chief—that I simply listened, sympathetic, as I scraped away at his beard.
“Kosciuszko has been plotting an open pavilion on the plain for a while. Major Villefranche, the French engineer, will be arriving sometime tomorrow morning to assist. I hope they don’t kill each other. They must finish it in ten days. We are taking all the timber and bows from the surrounding area, which will cut down on costs, but it will take a thousand men working nonstop to accomplish it.” He sighed wearily. “But at least the men will be occupied. They are less likely to revolt if they are busy.”
“I will help you,” I reassured him.
He smirked at that. “I know you will. You are my secret weapon. Who better than a woman who has worn a disguise for more than a year to turn a garrison into a great hall?”
Spring had flowered the highlands and chased off the gray of a dreary winter, but the garrison had never hosted such a party, and the work to get everything ready would be enormous. We made lists and divvied up assignments among the regiments, and the general and I, often just the two of us because no one else could be spared, traveled up and down the highlands, from New Windsor to Peekskill Hollow, trading, twisting arms, and gathering resources.
The feast would be limited to the officers, both French and American, and their wives, but that didn’t mean the support staff wouldn’t need to eat. Casks of wine and rum that we’d recovered from our raid on the depot had already been depleted, and food fit for a banquet was nigh on impossible to acquire, but the general set about making it happen.
Long tables were constructed, lanterns strung, and crates of French and American flags acquired from a sailmaker in Philadelphia. He’d begun producing the tricolor banners in great quantities after the dazzling French parade down their streets before Yorktown, and was glad to sell them in bulk.
A popular portrait artist who had painted likenesses of everyone from Washington to Thomas Paine had added Lafayette and Admiral de Grasse to his collection as well. He’d agreed to set up an exhibit near the pavilion, provided the weather held, in exchange for future commissions. A military band was scrabbled together from the officers and the ranks, and daily practices began, with surprising results.
Preparations continued from sunup to sundown, the erection of the pavilion progressing at full speed. The entire thing was being constructed of timber from the wooded hills and vales surrounding the Point. The walls on the longer sides were formed up with tree trunks spaced like columns with the shorter sides left open. The ceiling was made entirely of bows, woven together in a tight canopy. When it was completed, it would be six hundred feet long and thirty feet wide, and Major Villefranche and Colonel Kosciuszko had not yet resorted to blows, which boded well for the completion of the project.
It was only a few days before the day of the celebration when Captain Webb appeared at the Red House, asking for an audience with the general, saying it could not wait.
Mr. Allen ushered him into the general’s office, and when I rose to leave the two of them alone, as was customary any time the general conferred with his officers, Captain Webb asked that I remain.
“This concerns you as well, Private Shurtliff. I had hoped to speak with you both.”
Captain Webb was troubled and uncomfortable, and the general waved me back into my seat, though his eyes caught mine for an alarmed instant before he asked, “What is it, Webb?”
“One of the men in my company, a Private Laurence Barton, has come to me about talk of an uprising among some of the men in the Massachusetts line as well as the Connecticut line, in the Nelson’s Point encampment. He seems to believe there might be as many as two hundred men who will participate.”
“Do you know Private Barton?” the general asked me. His relief that the issue was not related to my disguise was evident, but my stomach was in knots.
“Yes, sir. We shared the same company, the same barracks, and he was in two of the scouting parties I volunteered for.”
“Private Barton claims that on one of those occasions, the men in the party talked seriously of desertion. He said you refused to participate and convinced the others to go back to the garrison.”
“As I recall, Private Barton was also not in favor of desertion. He was not vocal, but when asked, it was his disinterest that swung the balance.”
“What were the names of the other men in the party?” General Paterson asked, his face grim.
“I only knew Oliver Johnson, Laurence Barton, and Davis Dornan. The others in the party were from another company. I believe one’s name was Jones. Another was Sharpe, and there was a man they called Chuck, but the raid was unsuccessful, I kept to myself as I tend to do, and I have not been on a raid since.”