Indian tribes were fighting on both sides and trying to save their land, the fighting fiercest on the frontier. Blacks, too, were fighting on both sides, both as freemen and as slaves, but the British had been first to offer freedom in exchange for service, which swayed many. The French and Spanish navies were harassing everyone, from Europe to the sugar islands. Russia was toeing toward siding with the British, while the Dutch were edging toward the Americans.

“Our challenge now isn’t only in finding new information,” Townsend said after we finished going over old intelligence. “It’s in communicating it. There’s terrible inefficiency in how our correspondence travels. It goes through Long Island and then crosses the Sound into Connecticut before even beginning to head east.”

I had suspected as much. Townsend was from Long Island. Anna Strong and Abe Woodhull, the prickly man that day at Underhill’s whose surname I’d learned from the code sheet, were as well. The problem with going through Long Island was that General Washington’s army was wintering in Morristown, New Jersey—the opposite direction. “So instead of taking a straight path west, we’re going east, north, west, and then south to reach him?”

“Yes,” Townsend said. “And what good is our information if it arrives late?”

“As good as a year-old newspaper.”

Townsend sighed. “Precisely.”

When I returned home, I found Aunt Nora stacking an assortment of trunks and valises in the entry.

“Make haste, Emmie,” she said, shutting the door behind me to keep out the swirling flurries. “We’re moving to Judge Latimer’s. There’s plenty of room for us all, and he’s gotten hold of two cords of firewood, Lord knows how. Lucy and your uncle have already gone ahead. The judge’s carriage will be back for us any moment.”

I headed up to my room, uneasiness settling in my stomach. I hadn’t seen the judge in weeks—not since the sleigh ride—and I wasn’t eager to face such a blatant reminder of Asa.

Maggie was almost finished packing my things. My shifts, gowns, stays, and shoes all lay in neat, colorful bundles inside the valise on my bed.

“How will you keep warm?” I asked her. She and Malcolm would stay behind to care for the house and deter looters.

“We’ll find a way.”

I scooped eleven shillings from my purse. “Here…maybe this will help?”

She looked up from the valise. “We’ll manage. But thank you.” Her eyes grew thoughtful as they held on me. I waited, sensing she had more to say. “I was young once, too,” she said, after a moment. “I broke a few hearts in my time. I do understand youthful abandon.”

Youthful abandon?

Then it dawned on me. This was about that morning she’d discovered Malcolm and me. Her words were an olive branch. I offered one back. “I’ve never been a mother, Maggie. But I do understand the strength of a mother’s love. I still feel my mother is with me.”