“I can say so in this house, Miss Abigail, because, as well as your brother, my own father is a Patriot. But while there are of course men of principle on the Patriot side, I consider most of them to be rebels and bandits. I still have a band of good men hunting Patriots down in New Jersey. And I personally should be well content to hang any we can catch.”

She didn’t think she liked him.

But young Major André was a very different matter. He was about her brother’s age, a Swiss Huguenot, whose faint French accent gave his conversation a special charm. What really delighted her, however, was that, serving on Clinton’s staff, he knew Grey Albion well. They spoke of him all evening.

“I must confess, Miss Abigail,” he told her, “that I had heard of you from Albion, who spoke about you with admiration.”

“He did?” She could not help a faint blush of pleasure.

He gave her a kindly smile. “If it is not indiscreet, Miss Abigail, I could say that he spoke of you in terms of the highest regard. And equally, if it is not impertinent, I have the impression that you think well of him too.”

“I do, Major André,” she confessed. “Very well.”

“In my judgment, you could not bestow your regard on a better fellow.” He paused. “He told me also that he had been a close friend of your brother, James …”

“I hope that one day their friendship may be resumed.”

“We shall all hope for that day,” he agreed.

“Well, Abby,” her father asked, when the guests had departed, “was that a good evening?”

“A very good evening indeed,” she answered happily.

So it came as a great shock ten days later, when her father told her: “Major André is taken, and like to be hanged.”

“How? Where?”

“Up the Hudson. Toward West Point.”

Master had the full story from Clinton the following day.

“It’s the devil of a business,” her father said. “Now I know what Clinton was up to, though he couldn’t tell me before. He’s been planning it for over a year, and young André was acting as go-between.”

“Planning what, Papa?”

“To get control of West Point. For whoever holds West Point controls the River Hudson. Get West Point from Washington, and we deal him a mortal blow. It might have been the end of the war.”

“We were going to capture West Point?”

“No. Buy it. Benedict Arnold, who’s one of Washington’s best commanders, had control of the fort. Clinton’s been working on him for more than a year, negotiating over the money, mostly, he tells me. Arnold was going to hand the place over to us.”

“A traitor.”

Her father shrugged. “A man of mixed loyalties. Unhappy with the commands the Patriots had given him. Disapproved of their bringing in the French. Wanted the money for his family. But yes, a traitor.”

“To Washington. General Clinton must like him, though.”