Mercy Leroux

(Happy New Year! Please enjoy the first extra from We Are Not Strangers… set several months before the story begins.)

The first inclination that something is amiss comes shortly after morning roll call. Captain Harris and Lieutenant Baker are summoned to Earl Percy’s, but not only they. Corporal Cheene as well.

“Not Martin?” Matthew frowns.

Fanthorp shrugs. He’s still embittered towards Cheene for arresting him last month, though anyone who knows Fanthorp knows he’s reserved his true bitterness for himself.

“Something about a publication in a newspaper,” Holmes confides.

“Which newspaper?” Green asks.

“Captain didn’t say.”

“Well. Anyone want to spend their precious pence on all the blasted newspapers in this blasted city? No?” grouses Fanthorp. “Then we wait for whatever damned word comes.”

Green opens his mouth, but thinks better of any protest. He bites his lip. 

Hatfield exchanges a concerned look with Matthew, but as usual, he says nothing. 

“I’ll inform Mrs. Cheene,” Matthew says. He and Hatfield make their way to the women and children’s tents, where Mrs. Hatfield and Sarah are already heating a kettle for laundry.

“Papa!” Katie bursts forth. Hatfield’s daughter is four years old, and more effusive than a cannon.

Hatfield sweeps her in his arms and plants a kiss on her forehead. 

“Our apologies, Mrs. Cheene. Corporal’s been called to Earl Percy’s to discuss an urgent matter,” Matthew says, ducking into the tent the Cheene brood shares with Sarah and Hannah.

“Father!” Hannah springs into his arms.

“More troubles?” Sarah approaches from behind. She raises a thick eyebrow; always a fan of mischief and gossip, that woman.

“Have they ever ended since we came?” He grins. 

“Did they ever end before that?” she retorts, pecking him on his lips. Her scent fills his nostrils. Like treacle.

“But Papa said he would come.” Four-year-old Mary is Cheene’s pride and joy.

“You saw him last night,” objects seven-year-old Thomas.

“Don’t fret. You’ll see him tonight.” Nine-year-old William Cheene is the eldest and tends to enjoy bossing anyone younger than him. Seeing as William is also more than willing to stop the other children’s mischievous conceits, he’s the only one Matthew will permit to order Hannah about. 

“Speaking of tonight.” Matthew leans in closer, murmuring in his wife’s ear, “I may have some time this evening…”

“I’ll hold you to that.” Sarah smirks, but she’s blushing from ear-to-ear, like they haven’t been wed for nigh six years.

“I expect you will.” Matthew tugs on her curls. “Hannah, we’re to Sergeant Martin’s.”

Martin has been teaching Katie and a few others their letters. Though she is but three, Hannah insists on tagging along, and Matthew is immensely proud of how readily their girl has taken to reading. Even insists on teaching her parents!

***

The posy ring is silver, real silver, its inside engraved with the words Never doubt I Love.

“This is a magnificent ring.” Josiah smiles at Asa. 

“Will she like it?” His soon-to-be brother-in-law paces around his cabin. The late September air is dry and unseasonably warm, and the foliage glitters a myriad of colors around their farm. “’Tis Shakespeare. Hamlet.”

“She’d be a fool not to.” Josiah tosses the ring; of course, Asa catches it without difficulty. “And Keziah is no fool.”

Despite the reason the two of them need to marry immediately, he declines to add. Three weeks earlier, he’d been set on punching Asa himself, because he didn’t hate the man enough to inform Father. But the man’s conscience had already done more damage than Josiah could ever hope, and so Josiah decided to help his sister instead.

“Indeed.” Asa’s shoulders straighten. He returns the smile at last.

“Susannah suggested it, didn’t she?” Josiah asks.

“I asked her to compile a list of Shakespeare quotes, but I chose the final saying.” Asa’s traveled a bit more than most men, thanks to his work as a physician. Keziah has always loved his recollections of theater, and she will delight in this quote. 

Josiah glances out the window, towards the deep blue autumn sky. “Magistrate Cuming will be here soon.” 

“Good.” Asa may be nervous, but there’s no doubt he loves Keziah more than anyone, himself included, and that is the only reason Josiah approves. His little sister deserves nothing less. 

***

As Matthew and Hatfield escort their girls and Cheene’s three to Martin’s tent, Holmes hurries up to them, rubbing his palms together. Green is on his heels. 

Hatfield stops abruptly.

“What news?” Matthew asks.  

“Ah… It’s the Massachusetts Spy. Dennis went and spent all his savings.”

On newspapers, not liquor. How very Dennis, Matthew notes. “And?”

Holmes clears his throat, as Green pulls forth the paper. “For the Massachusetts Spy, Mr. Thomas, you are requested to insert the following in your paper: Proceedings of a regimental court-martial, held in His Majesty’s 5th Regiment of Foot, by order of the commanding officer; of which Captain Jackson was president, Lieutenants Cox and Croker, and Ensigns Patrick and King, members.”

Matthew pales. That court-martial! 

“What’s wrong?” Hannah looks at him, and he tries to paste a smile for her. 

“‘The court sat on the 5th of September, 1774, to try William Fanthrop’ – ahem, they didn’t even get his name right – ‘of the grenadier company, confined by Captain Harris, for being drunk when on picket, and by the commanding officer, for attempting to take his arms from Corporal Cheene, who was ordered to disarm him, and take him prisoner to the quarter guard; both which crimes appeared to be fully and clearly proved by the evidence of Captain Harris, Lieutenant Benjamin Baker and Corporal Cheene –’”

“God in heaven,” Hatfield mutters, and that is the closest he’s come to cursing in the entire seven years Matthew has known him.

Green clears his throat. “‘And the said court martial having thought proper to pass sentence upon the prisoner for these crimes, in the following words: “The court having taken the matter into consideration, are of opinion, that the prisoner is guilty of a breach of the 5th article of the second section, and of the 5th article in the 14th section of the Articles of War, and do sentence him –’”

“‘To receive two hundred lashes in the usual manner by the drummers of the regiment,’” Matthew finishes. Aye, they all heard it, and though none were surprised, they ached inside. Fanthorp had been angry at the mistreatment by the people of Boston, but he swore the liquor was tainted, because he’d not drunk that much more than usual. He had not sobered by the time his picket arrived, yet neither Matthew nor Holmes could stop him. Captain Harris noticed his staggering in a matter of seconds, and disaster struck.

Confinement, a court-martial, a sentence of flogging. 

Then the relief had come. 

Green continues, “‘The commanding officer hereby declares his disapprobation of the said sentence, inasmuch as it directs a punishment altogether inadequate to crimes of so very heinous a nature, and tending rather to encourage in, than to deter the men from, the committing of such dangerous and atrocious offenses. The commanding officer unwilling, that so very improper and inadequate a sentence should be read in the presence of the men, orders that the prisoner, William Fanthorp, be forthwith released from his confinement.’”

That was last week, and Matthew had not felt such immense gratitude towards Earl Percy since the time Sarah reported that Hannah had tripped him. The 5th Regiment of Foot rarely needs court-martials, and though Fanthorp drinks freely, he had never done so on duty before. Even Harris had seemed concerned by the sentence, though Martin opined that two hundred lashes were light.

“Here’s the problem.” Holmes snatches the paper from Green and rushes through the rest. “‘How are military gentlemen nowadays to act? Their honor slighted, and their characters injured, by tyrannical commanders! Can officers do their duty with that spirit, becoming their character, when treated by their commanders in such an infamous manner? Were it not for the present unsettled state of this country, and serving their King, what officer would serve in a regiment to be thus scandalously abused?’”

“Abused? They’re angry he was released?” Matthew gasps.

“Even my papa was glad for that,” mutters William.

“Abused, when none of them could ever feel the cat.” Green spreads his lips in a sickening smirk. 

This reeks of a pompous subaltern, acting more a child than William.

“Has anyone told Fanthorp?” Matthew ventures. 

“That’s why I came for you.” Holmes offers a weak smile. 

Damnation. Matthew bites his tongue to keep from swearing in front of Hannah. Not that she hasn’t heard worse, but she’s too fond of imitating him, and that will never do.

“I’ll stay with these and send Martin your way.” Hatfield moves to pry Hannah from Matthew’s arms. She digs her little fingers into Matthew’s shoulder. 

“Sweetheart, Uncle Fanthorp needs us, so go with Uncle Hatfield for now,” Matthew cajoles.

Hannah narrows her eyes. 

“I’m not asking,” Matthew warns.

“Then kiss me.”

Matthew dutifully plants a kiss on her forehead, and then he’s off with Holmes. 

***

“Dr. Cuming is here.” Josiah is confounded to find Susannah perched on her bed, reading a Boston newspaper she purchased on her way home this morning. She and Asa had been away all night attending a lady who went into sudden labor.

Now, Susannah reading voraciously, even in the minutes prior to her sister’s wedding, is nothing unusual. But Susannah laughing aloud as she reads the increasingly-dreadful news? Now, that is unusual.

“Whatever happened?”

“’Tis a good omen for her marriage.” Susannah wipes the corner of her eye as she sits up and smoothes her linen gown of faded green. “More soldier misconduct, only this time, ’tis such tomfoolery I’m saddened I wasn’t there to witness it.”

“Do share.” Josiah will appreciate any levity that comes with soldiers piling into Boston for a war they definitely plan on instigating. Or else what was that seizure of powder last month that sent their militia assembling to Cambridge? 

Father had forced him to stay behind to protect his mother and sisters, but next time – and next time will come if Gage has his way – Josiah will not stay. He will fight if needed.

“To summarize, some officer have taken a drunken redcoat’s reprieve from flogging as an insult to their honor.” Susannah lilts her voice. “Their commanders are as tyrannical to them as they to us! Oh, but they cannot dare side with us – their only reason to continue to serve is the ‘present unsettled state of this country.’

“He was close to understanding, he was, and then.” Susannah chortles. “Hypocrisy has blinded them all, I tell you.”

Josiah cannot but join her laughter. “Surely not the poor prisoner. Perhaps this redcoat is soon to desert.”

“Should I ever encounter him, I shall help him to his liberty myself,” Susannah vows. “Pardon me, brother, I must laugh or else I’ll cry, and that wouldn’t do for today.”

“Keziah would have us all flogged.” Josiah cannot resist a joke.  

Though, perhaps he is laughing because deep in his heart, he doesn’t want to think about officers so petulant and determined to harm their men. If the King’s troops really are led by such fools, that does not bode well for the peace that seems to be slipping away day by day. Like the silt he would scoop from the creek bed as a child in summer, and the tighter he held it, the quicker it washed from his fingers.

***

“What is it?” Fanthorp pauses cleaning his musket when he sees the urgency on his comrades’ faces.

Matthew exchanges a look with Holmes. However to begin? “You’re infamous.” 

“We already knew that.”

“Not just in the 5th. In Boston.” He gestures to Green, who holds the paper aloft.

“That’s your name,” Holmes points it out. “Though they wrote it as Fanthrop first.”

Fanthorp has turned white as milk. “What did I do this time?”

“Nothing. Appears at least one officer on the jury felt quite slighted by Percy’s deftly-handled mercy.” Matthew crosses his arms. 

“The Earl is decried as a tyrant who scandalously abuses his officers,” Holmes says.

“Don’t neglect the language.” Green adopts a dramatic tone. “‘How are military gentlemen nowadays to act?’”

As he recites the concluding lamentations in an increasingly affected manner, Fanthorp’s countenance flickers between laughter and tears. “Are you Shakespeare, Green?”

Then he buries his head in his hands. “Shall I be flogged now?”

“Why would he? The Earl’s not rescinding his word.” Martin’s welcome voice rings forth.

***

Keziah and Asa stand before the tree she and their siblings spent so much time climbing. She wears her best dress, a deep yellow linen that Mother’d recently embroidered with a blue thread to match the sky. She looks beautiful, and though Josiah notices the gown is a little snug around his spritely sister’s midsection, he doubts Father or Dr. Cuming will notice.

Mother and Susannah stand between Father and Josiah. He hopes Father has just arranged in order of age, and not distance from Josiah. To his right are Asa’s parents, beaming as they watch their only surviving son wed the love of his life.

“Do you, Dr. Asa Dalton, agree to love and cherish Miss Keziah Cairn as wife and bonded omega?” asks Dr. Cuming.

“I do,” Asa says tightly.

“Do you, Miss Keziah Cairn, agree to love and cherish Dr. Asa Dalton as your husband and bonding alpha?”

“I do,” Keziah breathes, and Asa’s smile blooms from ear to ear.

“Congratulations. I’ve heard there are rings?” Dr. Cuming looks uncomfortable; quite likely, he’s never executed a marriage that’s incorporated such a tradition.

Asa’s parents, however, are from Roxbury and notorious for their embrace of their Anglican neighbors’ customs. They insisted on rings, Father refused, and then gave in when Asa arrived with sketches and pleas on how it meant more than material wealth and pompous display. 

“’Tis a promise. Wherever Providence takes us, never, never doubt I love,” Asa says, sliding the ring onto Keziah’s finger.

Keziah has been more emotional these days, and sure enough, she scrunches up her face to keep from weeping.

A tea slides down her cheek anyways, and Asa delicately brushes it away.

“And for you,” Keziah manages in a wobbling voice. Her ring is inscribed, Let us Love one another, for Love is of God. 

And oh, Asa’s face melts when he reads it, and he draws Keziah close to him, close enough that her stomach brushes against him. 

Mother smiles. At least he’s the honorable kind of troublemaker, she’d said when she’d heard and promptly began persuading Father to let them marry quickly.

Dr. Cuming produces a book for them to sign their names for town records, and then, just that swiftly, Josiah’s little sister is wed.

The youngest marrying first caught them all by surprise, but then, Keziah is Father’s favorite, and he could never resist her will for long.

Josiah glances to Father; he squints his eyes, a sure sign that he too battles tears.

“Now it’s to you two!” Keziah points to Josiah and Susannah, who laugh.

“’Twill be him,” Susannah asserts, prompting a frown from Father that Josiah pretends not to notice. 

Josiah is at least a man and an alpha; as a female alpha, Susannah’s prospects are severely limited, and it isn’t fair at all, because Susannah is the smartest man or woman he knows. Even Asa says as much, and he attended Harvard!

Someone will find her. Someday, and Josiah shall threaten them unless they care about Susannah precisely as much as Asa cares for Keziah.

“Dr. Cuming, we’ve some cakes and sack posset, if you’d like to partake,” Mother entreats.

Dr. Cuming smiles at Asa and Keziah. “I ought to return, but I wish you all the happiness. Those who fall in love are blessed by God.” 

Josiah notes Asa’s parents exchange grins. Clearly, the doctor’s curiosity had won out; he’d examined the rings and approved.

Watching Keziah leap on her tiptoes to kiss Asa’s cheek, Josiah has hope again. Even if they cannot have peace in their country, they can have peace in their family. 

***

Despite his confident words, Sergeant Martin’s face is bright red; clearly Hatfield informed him. “I suppose Harris, Baker, and Cheene are giving their word to Percy they didn’t author this right now, though we all know they were relieved at your release.”

Fanthorp frowns.

“It must be one of the jury.” Holmes cracks his knuckles. 

“Shall we bet on which one?” Fanthorp croaks. Even his jokes sound terribly weak. More men from their company are staring at him.

“It’s Patrick and we all know it,” Green opines. “He thinks he’s high and mighty because he’s some kind of cousin with Walcott.” 

“You’ve no proof, and if they were smart, there shan’t be any.” Martin rubs his forehead.

“If,” Fanthorp says.

“Aye, and Green is right,” Matthew mumbles. Lieutenant-Colonel Walcott is just under Percy in authority in their regiment. In soothing his ego, this ensign has humiliated their friend, and Matthew shall not forgive him anytime soon.

“Did I say he wasn’t?” Martin coughs. “Fanthorp, you were tried and sentenced. You did nothing wrong here.”

“I’ll still take the blame.” Fanthorp kicks the grass. “God damn my blood!”

“Well, you clearly didn’t author it.” Martin pats his shoulder. “Anyone troubles you, they go through me.”

“Pity you didn’t say that in August.” Fanthorp, naturally, chooses obstinacy. 

“You were the trouble then, rascal!” Martin shoves him lightly. “You shan’t make it again, and that’s what matters.” Just then, he catches sight of the paper in Green’s hands. “Christ Almighty. The Spy?”

“Aye, Sergeant.”

“They’ll find any reason to portray us as in disorder.” Martin shakes his head. “Even the lack of whipping.” 

Indeed. For the entire summer, townspeople have baited them to desert, citing the flogging as an infringement on their rights as Englishmen. But now, this paper is all too willing to declare mercy an act of tyranny, and a remittance on flogging abuse. Do these people not see their own delusion?

“I’m off to tutor your children. Don’t stray far, Fanthorp. I expect Harris will summon you whenever he returns.” Martin departs as Fanthorp’s shoulders slump.

Matthew lowers his voice. “Do you wish to talk?”

Fanthorp shrugs, like he isn’t humiliated. “Nothing to discuss.”

“And if we got you in your cups?” Matthew winks.

“Trying to get me confined again, are you? What happened to Mr. Reliable?” Fanthorp snaps his fingers to Holmes. “Mr. Responsible, what say you?”

“I say, you ought to talk with us, and if liquor is what it takes…” Holmes nibbles his lip. “Perchance we can return your bottles. Later, tonight.”

Matthew thinks of the heat he could smell on Sarah. Suppressants keep his own heats quiet, but Sarah is free not to pretend she has no carnal needs. “Or tomorrow, after things have settled.”

“So this is what it takes – Wait. Wait. Don’t you dare pity me!” Fanthorp glares suddenly. 

“We can’t. You didn’t suffer any lashes.” Matthew presses a hand to his chest and widens his eyes.

Finally, Fanthorp breaks into a smirk.

“Perhaps we all deserve pity,” Green says, “laboring under such a tyrannical commander, who confabulated a way to avoid harsh discipline.” 

“Mayhaps we can wave this article around anytime they call us bloodybacks,” Matthew quips. “Fanthorp, by God, you’ve brought peace at last!”

“I’d be honored if that were real,” Fanthorp says, in a rare moment of solemnity. But as they survey the townspeople passing by, eying the regiment’s camp with resentment and hatred, Matthew has a dark feeling that peace is far, far away.