How Dark the Night (5 page)

No one could argue with that perspective.

“We mustn't forget,” Caleb pointed out, “the most important consideration of all, that Great Britain is our main trading partner. More than 80 percent of America's imports come from Britain, and most of what America produces is exported to Britain. How can we ever expect to prevail in this economic war, as George correctly refers to it, if England is acting as our enemy?”

It was a rhetorical question. No one expected an answer. Jack Endicott, nevertheless, had a comment to tag onto it.

“And yet Jefferson is doing everything in his power to turn England
into
our enemy,” he stated categorically. “Dam
nation
, that man is an enigma. He touts free trade—and for that, I must applaud him—but then he trots out legislation and policies that are directly intended to rile up the British against us. Clearly he favors the French in this conflict. The
French
, by God! What has Napoléon ever done for us? Not a blasted thing! How a president so willing to sell out his country managed to be reelected to a second term is utterly beyond me.”

Jefferson was reelected, Richard thought to himself, because there are many more Republicans in the southern and western states than Federalists in the northeastern states, and Republicans everywhere continue to revere Jefferson as an icon of American idealism. As he listened to Jack Endicott, two people came to mind: his father-in-law, the recently deceased Henry Makepeace Hardcastle, a salty Royal Navy post captain who often spouted off the way Endicott had just done; and Alexander Hamilton, a longtime family friend who was one of the most intelligent and articulate statesmen to espouse Federalist ideals, including the crucial importance of the young republic maintaining strong relations with England. A year ago last July he had been shot and killed in a “duel of honor” with Aaron Burr, Jefferson's vice president at the time. His sound mind and wise counsel would be sorely missed, Richard suspected, in the upcoming regional and national debates.

“What would you have us do, Jack?” Richard asked quietly into the silence that followed the tirade. Outside, rain and sleet still pelted the window glass, although with less intensity than earlier. Inside, in the center of the large room, clerks kept up their busy pen work, seemingly oblivious to the animated conversation taking place not twenty feet from their desks.

Endicott shrugged. “I doubt there is anything we
can
do,” he said with resignation, “beyond waiting for developments to unfold and keeping ourselves informed. But mark my words: George is right: the
Essex
case marks only the first broadside aimed at us since the Peace of Amiens dissolved. Every time Britain steps up its blockade of Europe, Napoléon will step up his retaliation. And each time
that
happens, our country's prosperity and the prosperity of our families will be further jeopardized. Who knows where this all might end?”

“It would seem we're caught between the proverbial hammer and anvil,” Caleb observed gloomily, and no one could gainsay his summation.

B
Y
1805
THE
B
EACON
H
ILL
area of Boston rivaled Philadelphia and Charleston as the epicenter of high society in America. From the 1740s into the 1780s, most of Boston Neck, save for the commercial hub near Long Wharf and Faneuil Hall, was a sparsely settled backwater community kept low by the ravages of war and continuing economic stagnation. Visionaries saw the potential, however, and as New England merchant fleets took to the seas in the 1780s and 1790s, they put that potential into action. Among those spearheading the social transformation was Charles Bulfinch, who designed the gilded-domed state house and oversaw its construction in 1795 on property once owned by another visionary, John Singleton Copley. Bulfinch moved his family to Beacon Hill and formed Mount Vernon Proprietors, a group of wealthy landowners determined to develop the area in exquisite good taste. First step: raze the old wooden buildings on Beacon Hill and replace them with elegant red brick residences of Federalist and Greek Revival design. Even the towering beacon that for generations had warned Boston and neighboring communities of enemy attacks was dismantled and carted away to make way for progress. By year-end of 1805 the population of Boston had swelled to nearly thirty thousand souls. Included in its social registry, up on Beacon Hill, were some of the wealthiest and most renowned families in Massachusetts, many of them, including the Endicott family, made rich by the burgeoning overseas carrying trade.

Richard had been to the Endicott residence on Belknap Street on numerous occasions, both alone and in company with Katherine. The Endicotts were, after all, the in-laws of his son Will, and it was Will's wife, Adele, who bobbed him a respectful curtsey as she met him at the front door at the appointed hour of five o'clock.

“How very nice of you to drop by this evening,” she said, opening the door wide. “Please do come in out of the cold and damp.”

A servant dressed in fine English-style livery stepped forward. Richard handed him his bicorne hat and then shrugged out of his coat, thankful that he had swapped his well-worn oilskins for something more stylish before leaving Cutler & Sons. Arriving at the Endicott residence wearing a sailor's foul-weather gear would simply not do.

“Thank you, Adele,” Richard said as the servant closed the front door and imperiously conveyed his hat and outer garment elsewhere. He studied her for a moment. “My Lord, daughter, how lovely you look this evening. You are the very image of a Greek goddess,” he added, not without cause. Her curly ebony hair cascaded down fetchingly over the purple taffeta dress that perfectly fit the contours of her slender frame. Nor could he help but notice the sea blue of the eyes that gazed affectionately upon him. They were exactly like those of her mother, a beautiful aristocrat whom Richard had come to know intimately while serving as aide-de-camp to Capt. John Paul Jones in Paris during the war with England almost thirty years earlier. “I pity my poor son, to be called away from such beauty.”

“On family business,” she reminded him, smiling. “Nonetheless, I do so look forward to his return next week.”

Richard returned her smile and gave her a brief, appreciative once-over. “I have no doubt that he does as well,” he said. As she blushed prettily he offered his arm, and together they walked slowly down the grand hallway to the sitting room located off the far end.

“How is Frances?” he asked. “I have not seen your younger sister in a while.”

“She is doing very well these days. You will be pleased to learn that she has several beaux. One of them is becoming quite ardent in his pursuit of her. You may know him. His name is Robert Pepperell. He lives not far away, at Louisburg Square.”

Although Richard did not know the young man, he certainly was acquainted with his family. In 1745, during the War of the Austrian Succession, Robert's grandfather William Pepperell had served as commander in chief of a New England colonial militia unit that, with help from a British naval squadron, had captured the French colonial capital of Louisburg on Cape Breton Island in Canada. For services rendered to the Crown, Sir William was awarded the first American baronetcy, and Louisburg Square, where the Pepperell family still lived, was named in commemoration of the momentous victory.

“Good for Frances,” he said, then lowered his voice and whispered conspiratorially, “Do you think Jamie will be jealous?”

“I suspect he will be delighted,” she whispered back. Frances Endicott's long-standing interest in Jamie Cutler had by now become a subject of good-natured banter between Richard and his daughter-in-law.

“What are you two discussing in such secrecy?” Jack Endicott's voice boomed out into the hallway. “I trust it has nothing to do with me!”

“It
always
has something to do with you, Papa,” Adele assured him. She gave her stepfather a peck on the cheek and disappeared inside the sitting room. Endicott motioned to Richard to follow her. “I have summoned a bottle of our best Madeira,” he said, clapping a hand on Richard's shoulder, “as I do whenever you honor us with your company. I only wish your dear wife could be with us this evening.”

“As do I, Jack,” Richard agreed.

“Richard, my dear, how wonderful to see you.” Without hesitation, Anne-Marie Endicott walked up and put her arms around Richard. As was normally the case, even in Katherine's presence, she allowed her embrace and the kiss on the side of his face to linger longer than propriety might deem appropriate. As usual, Richard returned her greeting chastely. Although he realized that Katherine had long ago made peace with the affection Anne-Marie still harbored for him, her open sentiments made him uncomfortable, in part because it flouted normal social conventions, but in greater part because feeling her supple body pressed close against him inflamed memories best left forgotten. After giving her a brief kiss in kind, he backed away a half step.

Anne-Marie backed away as well but kept hold of his hands. “I am so very sorry, Richard, about Katherine. I can't imagine how terribly difficult this must have been for her, confronting such a cruel disease with you away in the Mediterranean. I wish there was something I could have done for her.”

“You did do something, Anne-Marie,” Richard said. “The very kind letter you wrote meant a lot to her. She keeps it on the table by her bedside.”

“Along with many others, I should imagine. So many people care so much about her—and with good cause. She is a warm and loving woman.”

“She
is
blessed with many friends,” Richard agreed.

Just then a servant entered the room bearing a tray and four glasses brimming with rich amber liquid. Jack Endicott distributed the glasses and raised his. “To Katherine Cutler,” he said.

“To Katherine Cutler,” the other three said in unison, and four glasses clinked together.

T
WO WEEKS LATER
, as the chill of November yielded to the cold of December, stirring reports headlined the front pages of American newspapers. A British naval fleet under the command of Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson had achieved a stunning victory against a considerably larger French and Spanish fleet under the combined command of French admiral Pierre-Charles Villeneuve and Spanish admiral Federico Gravina. For weeks the two massive fleets had been jockeying for position off the coast of Spain and across the Atlantic in the West Indies. On the twenty-first of October, Villeneuve and Gravina ventured out from the Spanish naval base at Cádiz and made a dash eastward toward the Mediterranean. Lord Nelson, however, caught wind of their intentions and was lying in wait for them off Cape Trafalgar near the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar.

Dividing his twenty-seven battle cruisers into two parallel columns—the weather column led by him in
Victory
, the lee column by Vice Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood in
Royal Sovereign
—Nelson had cast aside time-honored battle tactics by sailing his two columns at right angles against an enemy fleet strung out in traditional line-of-battle formation. Nelson's unexpected tactic shattered the enemy line and tore into 100-gun ships of the line, raking them bow and stern, pulverizing one battle cruiser after another at point-blank range while the eight ships cut off in the van struggled to come about in the fluky northwesterly breeze and bring their guns to bear on the English. Unable to do so—or perhaps despairing of their chances based on the devastation taking place behind them—the eight ships disengaged entirely and sailed off to leeward.

Reports in Boston newspapers numbered the French and Spanish ships captured or destroyed at twenty-two, or two-thirds of the entire allied fleet. The British, by contrast, lost not a single ship. The initial reports did not specify the exact number of casualties suffered by the British; but whatever the number was, the
Boston Traveler
speculated, it paled in contrast to the many thousands of casualties suffered by the French and Spanish. Editorial writers and military spokesmen alike were already calling Trafalgar “a most decisive and glorious victory,” and for good reason. The French defeat at Trafalgar ended Napoléon's dream of invading England. The French fleet that was to escort his invasion barges across the Channel had been rendered impotent. Of greater significance, the victory at Trafalgar ensured Britannia's rule of the waves for many years to come.

Richard Cutler pored over every account of the battle he could lay his hands on, and not just because of his standing as an American naval officer. A man he greatly admired had died in that battle, a victim of a sniper's bullet fired from a French fighting top as
Victory
sailed past a French
ship with her starboard guns blasting. When Richard first met Horatio Nelson as a teenager, the two young men—boys, really—had been vying for the heart of Katherine Hardcastle. Over the years, Richard's jealousy toward Nelson, which continued even after Richard had won Katherine's hand, had matured into a deep and abiding respect, both for the man and for his gifts as a brilliant naval strategist. The last time Richard had seen Nelson, on the island of Malta during America's war with Tripoli, the two men, once rivals, had met as friends.

“Poor Horatio,” Katherine mused quietly as she and her husband sat together on a sofa before the fire in their home on South Street. They were alone that evening; Diana, the only child still living with them, was having supper at the Sprague residence nearby. The joy Diana had radiated when her beau, Peter Sprague, arrived to walk her to his parents' home helped to offset Katherine's sadness over the loss of a man she too held in the highest regard.