While he was roping down the supplies, Lizzie came out.

“Who’s your visitor?” he asked her.

“Jay’s mother, Alicia.”

“Good God! I didn’t know she was coming.”

“Nor did I.”

Mack frowned. Alicia was no threat to his plans but her husband might be. “Is Sir George coming?”

“He’s dead.”

That was a relief. “Praise be. The world is well rid of him.”

“Can we still leave?”

“I don’t see why not. Alicia can’t stop us.”

“What if she goes to the sheriff and says we’ve run away and stolen all this?” She indicated the pile of supplies on the wagon.

“Remember our story. You’re going to visit a cousin who has just started to farm in North Carolina. You’re taking gifts.”

“Even though we’re bankrupt.”

“Virginians are famous for being generous when they can’t afford it.”

Lizzie nodded. “I’ll make sure Colonel Thumson and Suzy Delahaye hear of my plans.”

“Tell them that your mother-in-law disapproves and she may try to make trouble for you.”

“Good idea. The sheriff won’t want to get involved in a family quarrel.” She paused. The look on her face made his heart race. Hesitantly she said: “When … when shall we leave?”

He smiled. “Before first light. I’ll have the wagon taken down to the quarters tonight, so that we won’t make much noise as we go. By the time Alicia wakes up we’ll be gone.”

She squeezed his arm quickly then hurried back into the house.

Mack came to Lizzie’s bed that night.

She was lying awake, full of fear and excitement, thinking of the adventure that would begin in the morning, when he came silently into the room. He kissed her lips, threw off his clothes, and slipped into bed beside her.

They made love, then lay talking in low voices about tomorrow, then made love again. As dawn approached Mack drifted into a doze, but Lizzie stayed awake, looking at his features in the firelight, thinking of the journey in space and time that had brought them from High Glen all the way to this bed.

Soon he stirred. They kissed again, a long, contented kiss, then they got up.

Mack went to the stables while Lizzie got ready. Her heart raced as she dressed. She pinned up her hair and put on breeches, riding boots, a shirt and a waistcoat. She packed a dress she could quickly slip on if she needed to revert to being a wealthy woman. She was frightened of the journey they were about to take, but she had no qualms about Mack. She felt so close to him that she would trust him with her life.

When he came for her she was sitting at the window in her coat and three-cornered hat. He smiled to see her in her favorite clothes. They held hands and tiptoed down the stairs and out of the house.

The wagon was waiting down by the road, out of sight. Peg was already sitting on the seat, wrapped in a blanket. Jimmy, the stable boy, had put four horses in harness and roped two more to the back. All the slaves were there to say good-bye. Lizzie kissed Mildred and Sarah, and Mack shook hands with Kobe and Cass. Bess, the field hand who had been injured on the night Lizzie lost her baby, threw her arms around Lizzie and sobbed. They all stood silent in the starlight and watched as Mack and Lizzie climbed on the wagon.

Mack cracked the reins and said: “Hup! Walk on!”

The horses took the strain, the wagon jerked and they moved off.

At the road Mack turned the horses in the direction of Fredericksburg. Lizzie looked back. The field hands were standing in complete silence, waving.

A moment later they were gone from sight.

Lizzie looked ahead. In the distance, dawn was breaking.

36

MATTHEW MURCHMAN WAS OUT OF TOWN WHEN JAY and Lennox reached Williamsburg. He might be back tomorrow, his servant said. Jay scribbled a note saying he needed to borrow more money and would like to see the lawyer at his earliest convenience. He left the office in a bad temper. His affairs were in a complete mess and he was impatient to do something about it.

Next day, forced to kill time, he went along to the red-and-gray-brick Capitol building. Dissolved by the governor last year, the assembly had reconvened after an election. The Hall of Burgesses was a modest, dark room with rows of benches on either side and a kind of sentry box for the speaker in the middle. Jay and a handful of other observers stood at the back, behind a rail.

He swiftly realized that the colony’s politics were in turmoil. Virginia, the oldest English settlement on the continent, seemed ready to defy its rightful king.

The burgesses were discussing the latest threat from Westminster: the British Parliament was claiming that anyone accused of treason could be forced to return to London to stand trial, under a statute that dated back to Henry VIII.

Feelings ran high in the room. Jay watched in disgust as one respectable landowner after another stood up and attacked the king. In the end they passed a resolution saying that the treason statute went contrary to the British subject’s right to trial by a jury of his peers.

They went on to the usual gripes about paying taxes while having no voice in the Westminster Parliament. “No taxation without representation” was their parrot cry. This time, however, they went farther than usual, and affirmed their right to cooperate with other colonial assemblies in opposition to royal demands.

Jay felt sure the governor could not let that pass, and he was right. Just before dinnertime, when the burgesses were discussing a lesser local topic, the sergeant-at-arms interrupted the proceedings to call out: “Mr. Speaker, a message from the governor.”

He handed a sheet of paper to the clerk, who read it and said: “Mr. Speaker, the governor commands the im mediate attendance of your House in the council chamber.”

Now they’re in trouble, Jay thought with relish.

He followed the burgesses as they trooped up the stairs and through the passage. The spectators stood in the hall outside the council chamber and looked through the open doors. Governor Botetourt, the living embodiment of the iron fist in the velvet glove, sat at the head of an oval table. He spoke very briefly. “I have heard of your resolves,” he said. “You have made it my duty to dissolve you. You are dissolved accordingly.”

There was a stunned silence.

“That will be all,” he said impatiently.

Jay concealed his glee as the burgesses slowly filed out of the chamber. They collected their papers downstairs and drifted into the courtyard.

Jay made his way to the Raleigh Tavern and sat in the bar. He ordered his midday meal and flirted with a barmaid who was falling in love with him. As he waited he was surprised to see many of the burgesses go past, heading for one of the larger rooms in the rear. He wondered if they were plotting further treason.

When he had eaten he went to investigate.

As he had guessed, the burgesses were holding a debate. They made no attempt to hide their sedition. They were blindly convinced of the lightness of their cause, and that gave them a kind of mad self-confidence. Don’t they understand, Jay asked himself, that they’re inviting the wrath of one of the world’s great monarchies? Do they suppose they can get away with this in the end? Don’t they realize that the might of the British army will sooner or later wipe them all out?

They did not, evidently, and so arrogant were they that no one protested when Jay took a seat at the back of the room, although many there knew he was loyal to the Crown.

One of the hotheads was speaking, and Jay recognized George Washington, a former army officer who had made a lot of money in land speculation. He was not much of an orator, but there was a steely determination about him that struck Jay forcibly.