The Glorious Cause - Jeff Shaara [51]
“Aye, he’s bringing it all tonight. Have ye got the lamp oil? There’s already one barrel under the floor here . . .”
The accents were thick, Irish perhaps. The talk moved away from the window, just low murmurs now, and he felt a new excitement. These weren’t soldiers, this was something else, talk of conspiracy. He felt a sudden stab of hopefulness. There may yet be people here who don’t favor the British at all. He tried to recall the man’s words . . . lamp oil . . . a barrel. Why would they want so much lamp oil? To sell? But the British wouldn’t pay, they’d simply take it. He focused through the darkness, the daylight completely gone, moved farther back into the hidden corner, put his hand out, felt his way. The wall was rough, rotten planks, and his hand touched something that moved. There was a sudden clatter of falling wood, and he pulled back, his heart jumping. He reached down, wrapped his fingers around a long stick, could see a bulge at the top, felt it was crowned with straw. He picked it up, could tell that it was nearly as tall as he was, the straw gathered as on a broom. Odd, no place to be sweeping anything back here. His eyes were adjusting more to the darkness, the candle from the window a faint glow. There were more brooms farther back in the corner, the same shape, the straw pointing up, out of the mud. He moved his hand through the broomsticks, counted, eight, nine, a dozen. He still held the one in his hand, turned, looked out around the corner toward the street, quiet now. Why would someone store brooms . . . he looked up, the voices still there, the windowpane over his head brighter with the light of an oil lamp. Lamp oil. He held the broom away from him, stared at the straw. It’s not a broom. It’s a torch.
THE FIRST FIRES BEGAN AFTER MIDNIGHT, TORCHES TOSSED THROUGH broken windows of homes abandoned by their owners. The men had emerged from the house like a swarm of bees, and Hale had watched from across the street, stayed back in a dark corner as the men retrieved their torches. As they spread out through the narrow streets, he had followed one man, saw the torch suddenly ignite from a candle in the man’s hand. The man thrust the torch into an open window, igniting the curtain, a sudden eruption of flame that quickly took hold of the dry wooden walls. Then the man moved on quickly, and Hale followed, the man turning into a narrow alley. As the fire spread higher, Hale grabbed a piece of wood, ripped it from the side of the house, wanted to light it with the rising flames, but he was in the open, too visible in the hard glow of firelight. He followed to where the man had disappeared, moved into the alley, then out to another street, could see men gathering around a fat barrel. More torches were handed out, each one dipped into the barrel, then ignited by a thick candle. Each man was quickly on his way, the torches coming alive in the darkness. Hale moved toward the man who stayed by the barrel, saw the face in the flickering candlelight, hard, old, and the man stared at him for a long moment, said, “I don’t know you.”
Hale held out the piece of ragged wood, said, “Does it matter? I am a patriot, sir, just as you.”
The man took the wood from Hale’s hand, dipped it in the oil, ignited it, said, “Get out of here!”
Hale ran now, was in a wide street, could see flickers of flame spreading out through the alleys. There were shouts now, and he moved quickly, saw a narrow lane, turned that way, the glow from his own torch casting a bright light between two houses. He stopped, looked both ways, houses on either side, thought, Which one . . . what should I do . . . and there was a voice above him. “What . . . who are you? I’ll kill you!”
He saw a glimpse of the man’s head, the voice unmistakably British. The house seemed to come alive with sounds, men scrambling, more curses. Hale looked up at the window, gauged