“Very sensible,” he said, “very sensible indeed. Customs and excise taxes being what they are, it would hardly pay to offer it commercially, save at an extortionate price—and that, of course, has its own difficulties.”

Brianna enjoyed the dinner and was delighted by the house, which had been built by a fine architect. The effort of nodding appreciatively at each of the Brumbys in turn—for both of them talked incessantly, and frequently at the same time—was wearing her down, though, and she took the entrance of cigars and brandy for the gentlemen as her cue to rise and excuse herself to go and see that the children were still where she’d put them.

They had been tucked into trundle beds that had been set up in the commodious dressing room attached to the well-appointed guest room that had been assigned to the MacKenzies, and when looked in upon, they were both clean and sound asleep, having been fed earlier by the cook, Mrs. Upton.

“I could get used to this,” Roger said, yawning as he came in later, stripping off his coat. “You wouldn’t think there was an armed siege going on outside, would you?” The Brumbys’ house stood in Reynolds Square, opposite the filature—a facility for raising silkworms—and the plentitude of trees, including the large grove of white mulberry trees required for the diet of said silkworms, gave it a sense of enclosure and pastoral peace.

“You’re keeping track of the calendar, aren’t you?” Bree pulled her sleeping shift over her head, noting from the smell that she should talk to the Brumbys’ laundress tomorrow. “How many days until all hell breaks loose?”

“Less than three weeks,” he said, more soberly. “Your father didn’t give much detail on the battle, but we know the Americans will lose. The siege will be lifted on October the eleventh.”

“And you’ll be here and safely inside, right?” She raised her eyebrows at him, and he smiled and took her hand.

“I will,” he said, and kissed it.

90

The Swamp Fox

Savannah

October 8, 1779

ROGER HAD DRESSED FOR his occasions. Luckily, the same black broadcloth suit, long-coated and pewter-buttoned, would do for both, since it was the only one he possessed. Brianna had plaited and clubbed his hair severely, and he was so clean-shaven that his jaw felt raw. A high white stock wrapped round his neck completed the picture—he hoped—of a respectable clergyman. The British sentries at the barricade on White Bluff Road had given him no more than a disinterested glance before nodding him through. He could only hope the American sentries outside the city felt the same lack of curiosity about ministers.

He rode out a good distance from the city before turning east and beginning to circle back toward the Americans’ siege lines, and it was just past noon when he came within sight of them.