Or perhaps not. The side door promptly opened to reveal Culper Junior, smiling and laughing. The rest of the company quickly joined in.
Sons of Liberty in disguise.
“ How do you like our Germans?” said Culper, clapping Jake on the back.
“ They’ve got the wrong guns.”
“ Still, they fooled you.” Culper’s amusement quickly passed when he saw that Jake wasn’t laughing. “I’m sorry for the trouble, but we have to take many precautions these days. There are Tory informers everywhere.”
“ I need your help intercepting a messenger,” said Jake. “He’s on his way to General Howe.”
“ Howe is on his brother’s flagship in the harbor.”
“ Exactly.” A look passed between them indicating there was considerably more to the story, but that it would not be made explicitly. “Can I borrow your German troop? We have to move quickly.”
“ They’re at your disposal,” said Culper. “As is my lieutenant, Mark Daltoons.”
Herstraw and his escort had passed the eight-mile stone south of Day’s Tavern on the King’s Bridge Road down to the city by the time one of Culper’s boys — the same who had led Jake to his “trap” — spotted them. That left precious little time to arrange the diversion at McGowan’s Pass, less than a mile away.
It had been at McGowan’s Pass the previous September that a stout group of American patriots held off Clinton’s advance guard, keeping them at bay while Washington and Putnam regrouped at the Harlem Heights above. The action here this afternoon was considerably less severe, but just as hotly contested — the British messenger and his escort, along with some sentries routinely posted to the area, found themselves suddenly under heavy bombardment.
The first egg hit Herstraw square in the forehead. Just as he opened his mouth to protest, it was filled with a putrid, year-old apple, half-bitten, incidentally, by one of the attacking troops, none of whom was over ten years old.
Three dozen young lads held the woods above the ravine, raining all manner of vegetable debris on the helpless redcoats. A brilliantly coordinated hammer and anvil movement had left the troop trapped in the defile. Just as the first egg was lobbed, the hammer was launched — a large cart of manure was dumped over the side of the hill behind the troop, cutting off retreat. And then the anviclass="underline" at the head of the column, two large and odiferous carcasses of former cows were deposited on signal from a trapeze like device in the trees.
The assault being made by children, the British troops found themselves frustrated to the extreme. The dared not fire, for fear of hitting one of the urchins and causing a major incident; yet they could not advance in the face of what was a rather ferocious stream of rancid fruit and vegetables, together with some rocks and miscellaneous debris.
The British formed a defensive perimeter as best they could, and once their assailants’ ammunition ran low, dispatched a party to rout out the young rebels. The boys led those on a merry chase, avoiding capture yet staying close enough to entice the soldiers onward. In this way, the messenger was delay nearly an hour until close to one p.m., and his guard force much depleted.
Herstraw was heard to complain as they marched south that never had he witnessed such a poor state of affairs as that experienced over the past few days. The colonials were harassing the whole countryside. Common thieves, such as the scoundrels who stole all of Roelff’s plate and silver before trying to set the inn on fire the night before, ran rampant. Children were able to make fools of a company of handpicked grenadiers. Perhaps, said Herstraw, the British were not preordained to win this war as he had earlier believed.
This brought strenuous objection from the captain, and the two officers were still arguing when they were met in the road by a small group of Hessians up from the harbor. Had it not been for this disagreement, the captain might not have left Herstraw; like most other British soldiers, he had no respect for the Germans, though their army was as professional as his. But his orders were only to conduct the messenger into the city, and here they were standing at the intersection of Broad and George streets, well within the precincts of the north ward. If the truth be told, Herstraw had been quite a pain the whole way; the captain was only too glad to be rid of him. With no other ceremony, he promptly turned his men around and marched northwards to reassemble his force.
Herstraw was impressed that Howe had sent out another guard, even if it were composed of foreigners. The only English speaker was a young man of thin build who hardly looked old enough to shave. Nonetheless, the young man wore the markings of a sergeant; if the promotion was due to exploits on the battlefield instead of experience, well, so much the better. The fact that the sergeant was on horseback also did not arouse suspicion, but their path through the city — down Wall and then over Queen, heading away from the fort — did.
“ The general has set up auxiliary headquarter,” explained the sergeant. He had an apologetic tone in his voice. “It has to do, well, you know of Mrs. Loring, I assume.”
Herstraw showed great restraint in not asking any further questions, and the sergeant displayed equal discretion in not volunteering further information. In fact, such discretion might be thought unparalleled — provided, of course, that the man were truly what he claimed he was. But if such were the case, he would never had conducted Herstraw to Nicoll’s mansion, which had been temporarily appropriated by the Sons of Liberty under Jake’s direction a half hour before.
Nicoll was a Tory who had fled the city some months before the British invasion and hadn’t yet found the chance to return. The house had a good view of the east ward and the harbor. The officers from one of the guard companies who occupied it had just so happened to be called out on a special assignment a few moments before Jake’s arrival.
Well, perhaps this wasn’t entirely a coincidence, since they had been called out to look specifically for Mr. Gibbs, who was now suspected of having been involved in the firing of New York the previous fall. At least that was what the warrant claimed. Considering that the warrant also described Mr. Gibbs as being five-feet-two, with black hair and brown eyes and well past his prime, perhaps the warrant should not be fully believed.
In any event, the front room of the mansion was now under the control of a lieutenant and his aide. (The lieutenant bore a remarkable resemblance to Culper Junior’s own chief lieutenant, Mark Daltoons, and the aide, if not for the mustache, looked somewhat like the real Jake Gibbs.) Herstraw was marched before them and presented by the sergeant, who snapped to attention with all the ceremony of a guard presiding at the king’s palace.
“ Very good, Sergeant, that will do,” said the lieutenant as his aide inconspicuously took up a position behind the messenger. “Mr. William Herstraw, I presume. Do you have identification?”
Herstraw took out his coin and handed it to the lieutenant, who waved it to his aide. The assistant plucked the coin from the messenger’s hand and slid it into his pocket.
“ I am given to understand you have a message for the general,” said the lieutenant. His accent made him sound as if he had come from Westminster not a week before — a remarkable achievement for Daltoons, who had never been further east than Brooklyn.
The elaborate fiction he and Jake had constructed here was aimed not at retrieving the bullet — that could be done as soon as Daltoons leaned forward, pressing the level attached to the pistol wired beneath the desk. The Sons hoped to follow Herstraw through the city after he made his delivery, thereby gathering hints about the British messenger network. Jake had let himself be persuaded on this point by Culper Junior, but in truth had some doubts about whether Herstraw would agree to hand over the bullet without a struggle.