Chapter 21: October 1777 Mount Vernon

The thunder of horse hooves reverberating off the ground and men yelling is heard in a dense, foggy green forest. Canons firing from all directions, blue coats either fighting or retreating, and redcoats either firing or retreating.

Lillian sits on the ground out of breath, against a tree, hidden behind shrubbery.

"Lilly!" She hears Benjamin Tallmadge call her name sounding close, but he was nowhere in sight.

It drove her mad, looking around every bit she could trying to stay hidden from enemy fire, until she finally looked up. In the tree, there was Ben, sitting on a large branch looking down at her with a pistol in his hand, firing at the enemy from above.

"You need to go get intelligence!" He shouts down at her.

"What! Are you mad?!"

"You can't stay put like this. You need to fight your way through, and get something! Anything!"

"Look who is talking!" Lillian's eyes flare with anger. "You're sitting in a tree!"

"I can't be caught, I'm the handler!"

"So am I!"

"Not the same. I'm an officer, you're but a girl. It's time you know your place," he finishes with venom in his tone as he killed a red coat near the tree.

…You're but a girl. It's time you know your place… You're but a girl. It's time you know your place…

Lillian thrashes around in her sleep.

"So are you originally from New York?" She asked Freddy.

"Yes, it is where I am from, but with the summer-fall being 'ball season' I travel to meet my appointments wherever they live. Of course there are some 'dead years' where not many events happen, especially with the war going on, so I remain in New York most of the time then."

"Which part of New York?"

"The heart of the city itself," he answered. "Are you meaning to ask me something of greater importance?" He finally asked.

"I need your help in getting intelligence from the enemy. Your position in all these parts of society and people's lives is the perfect chance to gather this information to help end this war once and for all. I need you to be my inside source, Freddy. And I'm asking you as a friend," she said.

She shoots up awake, panting heavily, and clutching her covers with her fingers tightly, catching a chill from the brisk fall weather blowing in from her opened window. It's barely even dawn.

"My monthly nightmare, scary as ever," she mumbles, continuing to sit up in bed, staring at the yellow wall across from her, thinking of her new dream…

Well, nightmare.

Noticing that once a month since she came into the Washington family after her biological mother had passed, she experiences nightmares or 'terrors', which is quite uncommon, especially for women.

Her own diagnosis of getting nightmares, is due to sleeping position, diet, or her terrible past of losing her mother— running in to see her grey, skeleton of a mother and blood staining her white bed sheets to crimson red all over.

But… she is a nurse. The doctors, who consist of men, say the cause for nightmares is because of an incubus, a mystical creature that sits on a sleeper's chest during these episodes of terror.

Now, Lillian resolves that it is only from having a lot on her mind. The Benjamin nightmare was because of her social interactions with other people (women), and for thinking a woman has limits. Untrue.

As for the Freddy nightmare, well perhaps this could be considered a regular dream; it only vivdly replayed him styling her hair for the summer ball. She worries about him ruining her name, reputation, and the spy ring.

"I got you honey!"

No. He wouldn't do that. She knew he'd keep a promise. She trusted him that much.

She sighs as she moves to stand up from her bed, and begin her day of finally doing nothing but paint, and play her harp while she thinks about how much she has changed, and has grown to trust a few more people in her life.

Looking in the mirror, Lillian ties up the strings of one of her comfier corsets where the straps and the garment itself meet at the shoulder. Instantly, her smooth bust is pushed up as high as they go, the tops rounded and perky. Then, she takes her new lilac Georgian rococo robe a l'anglaise, and slips into it with some difficulty, so used to her old one which was stretched from being worn so many times. But after pricking it, and eventually staining it permanently, she ordered a new one to be made.

Once the dress is on, it covers her bust appropriately so only a smidge is showing to present her with perfect femininity.

After brushing her hair, however, as she looks deeper into her own eyes in the reflection of the thin glass mirror, she watches her sister Patsy laugh from behind her, braiding her hair just as all sisters do, and tease each other.

Lillian then cringes as the thought of her real mother came to mind, actually remembering her mother's fingers comb through her hair, humming a song to get her happy for the day ahead. Just because her father was gone didn't mean life should cease, or shouldn't be happy.

Then anxiety sets in when she hears a yell outside. She sprints to her window, pulls back the curtain and looks out only to see some of the slave men laughing loudly. False alarm.

Shutting her window, she tells herself no one is ill, no one is hurt, and no one has written her… yet.

The mail arrives mid-day, and she thinks anxiously on reporting something useful this time around because it's been a while, a year to be exact since she last told her father something.

Lillian's POV

"Look who has a love letter…" Martha sings with a pleased grin handing a letter to me sitting across from her in the parlor, both of us sipping tea.

"From who? No one loves me," I say moving the teacup to my left hand as lazily as I take the letter from her, until my eyes read the front address on who sent it. Then I treat it as if it is a prized art piece.

"Lilly!"

"What?"

"There are people who love you!"

I roll my eyes, "Yes I know you and father do, and both of my grandmothers… "

"You take everything so literal," Martha rolls her own eyes at me.

"Freddy came through for me! Do you know what this means!" I exclaim happily.

She shakes her head, "No I don't because you haven't told me what it is yet. See, I can sound like you too. Now you know how it feels to be on the receiving end of you."

"If only we all talked so honestly," grumbling, I get up to walk towards the kitchen and tear open the letter to see a piece of writing paper covered with hair…

"What is this…" I look at the extensions and hair clippings covering the whole front, but the back is bare. "He sent me samples of hair extension colors.."

Wait. The art of concealment..

My eyes rake across the paper looking for any sign, and when I don't find any I take a letter opener, and slide the blade between the lightly glued hairs and paper to peel them off carefully. After peeling off one, there is evidence of a written letter.

Freddy you genius!

Laughing, I peel off the rest of the hair extensions, and the dried paste until the paper is for the most part bare, and it reads: Lillian: Hessian attack on Fort Mercer, New Jersey, just south of Philadelphia, is planned to happen soon. Couldn't pry out anything else. I hope you receive this in time.

Best wishes,

Freddy ~

After reading, I rush to my father's study, go to his drawers and take out a box. I fold the letter, and slip it into one of my special daggers , and I close the hilt before placing it into said box, locking it inside.

"Maria!" I call for her loudly, knowing she'll hear me somewhere in this house. "Find Derik when you can, and tell him I have an errand for him to make."

"Yes ma'am!" Her reply echoes from the parlor where my mother is.

"Seems our Culper Ring is alive and well," George Washington smiles, reading the new intelligence from Agent Culper, given to him by Benjamin Tallmadge who stands directly across from him with arms at his side, eyeing him questionably, trying to interrupt, but can't muster up the courage to.

Not only Washington has received intelligence from Abe, but Abigail (Anna's old house servant) and Lillian as well! The pride swelling in his chest of all their accomplished work so far has him in one of the most joyous moods he's been in since they crossed the Delaware, and mocked a fake rebel camp to lure in the British.

But even though both women's findings are excellent, Abigail's is even more important to pay close attention to because it is a simple shred of paper which reads: General Lee a traitor.

And it is this shred of paper his eyes linger on now, with distress and suspicion.

"Two frigates, the 32-gun Alarm and 28-gun Sybil moored at Peck's Slip along with the 18-gun sloop Tobago. The whole of the king's troops including outposts does not exceed 3,500 men."

Washington continues, moving ships on the drawing board and maps back and forth, looking up at Ben in astonishment, "Are these numbers precise?"

Ben meets his Commander's gaze, face staid like his tone, "Approximate. He had to transcribe from memory after losing the egg. Mr. Sackett is working on better means of encryption."

"The egg?"

"It's detailed in the report, sir."
"It's wonderfully detailed," Washington beams in compliment. "Please tell Mr. Culper I eagerly await his next report. And impress upon him that time is of the essence."
"Yes, sir. And what of the other intelligence?" Ben waves a hand over the shred of paper, to catch his Commander's attention once more, which is back to looking down at Abe's report and maps.

"Lilly's Hessian report has been taken under consideration by Lt. Hamilton. A far inferior force of Colonial defenders will be taking care of them in Jersey, I'm sure. As for that," he gestured back to the shred of paper before going back to Abe's report, "it's unclear, inconclusive. Eight ships anchored in the lower North River…"

"I beg your pardon, sir," Ben moves closer to the General in attempts to explain better, politely interrupting him talking to himself, "but this is clear as day. 'General Lee a traitor,' And this comes direct from enemy headquarters, from the house of their head of intelligence."

Washington looks up, straightening his posture from leaning over the table, "No, it comes from a source I have not heard of before today. The message is four words in length, lacks context, is unverified, and so cannot be trusted."
"Sir, the source is the former housemaid of our signal agent in Setauket," Ben adds for clarity.
Washington blinks before responding once more, this time in finality, making Ben's pride shatter, replaced with frustration, "The spirits of the men are lifted after our victory at Saratoga. Now is not the time to disparage a fellow general."

"Of course. Yes sir."

"Oh, calm down," Mr. Sackett shuts and opens his eyes in exasperation at the young man punching the side of a wagon, making whatever there was inside of it crashing and falling out.
"Bite that. You get angry," Caleb sits close to the ground near his boiling pot; hat tilted blocking the early morning sun.
"I lost my entire patrol to Robert Rogers," Ben marches closer to the two men, hissing every word and hands waving in all directions. "My men were butchered in that ambush. Do you know who we were on our way to rendezvous with? Charles Lee. We should have seen it earlier, yeah? Washington should see it now."

Ben clutches the hilt of his sword with a tight fist, pointing at the house the Commander is in, "The truth is staring him straight in the face and he refuses to even look. Every hour that Lee remains within our camp, the more his poison infects this army."
"Our dear general may be overly stubborn, numbingly obsessive, and downright bullheaded at times, but he is not, in this case at least, wrong. Empirically, that is," Sackett defends the head man of them all, and then proceeds to drink his cup of coffee now sour.
"I can assure you, Abigail's intelligence is not wrong," Ben exclaims, with want to prove his point further.
"No, but she is an unverified asset. Ergo, it falls to us to verify her," Sackett says while dumping the already poor tasting coffee onto the ground, then dropping his cup to gesture the two men to follow him, "Gentlemen."

"What about Lillian's intelligence, yeah? Her own father believes that at least?" Caleb asks Ben, who is following behind him, since Caleb is anxious to find out where the old man Sackett is leading them to.

"Of course, believing anything she tells him isn't a problem, but hers was more detailed then Abigail's to say the least. Lillian made a connection with someone from New York," Ben says quietly as they walk so that both men could hear.

"About time," Sackett huffs. "I would have never thought of a hairdresser though. I have to give her credit for that."
Caleb barks out laughter, "A credit for the glossy Princess."

Ben's lips quirk up into a small smirk at his friend's words, "She wrote you, Mr. Sackett?"

"No," Caleb answers, looking behind him at Ben as he walks ahead. "The Derik boy gave me her intelligence in the form of weaponry exchanging, and told me she made a friend in Virginia who lives in New York that travels to many enemy locations for events... to style their frilly locks."

"I guess so, generals need to look their best," Ben shrugs, shaking his head at the woman putting her trust into this man. "And the upper class women for those events."

"Not just generals, but civilians as well," Sackett winks back at him as he leads them to an old wooden barn. "You get what I'm silently conveying."

"Sure. Extracting information from civilians is just as good as higher regarded people."

Caleb opens the barn door, creaking in doing so, and he sucks in a breath of wonder at the dark room with tools, weapons, and gadgets littered on the tables and ground, "Sweet Jesus. What the hell is this place?"

Paradise found, Caleb jogs over to the first table and picks up a large gun and feigns pulling the trigger while aiming up at the sky, grinning like a little boy finding treasure.

"We don't have a name for it yet as Congress is suspicious of allocating monies to Secret Services.
And ever since you told me about 355, I have been working on securing a new protocol for communications," Sackett explains to Ben, who finally notices Caleb touching everything.

"Sorry, who is 355?" Ben shakes his head at Sackett's new terms.
"Abigail, our lady in Philadelphia. She requires instruction on how to operate properly. Her messages lack context. Worse still, we don't know when they will arrive and there's no way for us to message her until now," Sackett looks at Caleb who is holding up a hatchet. "That's enough."
"Right. Sorry," Caleb smirks, dropping it back where it was and going off to look around some more.

"Now, there's a hidden compartment insi-What in the name of God is this?" Sackett then looks at the carpenter, who is also in the barn carving a small wooden ship.

"Her son is supposed to have carved it. Her son is nine years old and he is not Michelangelo! Start again," Sackett tells the man who nods his head and gets right to it.
"And how long will this take?" Ben asks.

"Oh, not long. Larsen here used to carve figureheads in the Norwegian navy," Sackett answers, earning a smile from the man.
"I mean to get this to Philadelphia," Ben sighs. "It still has to go by way of Setauket first."
"Patience, Major. Rome was not built in a day," Sackett waves his hand in gesture for the young man to calm down.
"No, but it was sacked in one. I need to verify for Washington that Lee is a traitor now, not a month from now," Ben speaks until Sackett glances behind him catching Caleb lifting a black cover off of a large barrel.
"Don't touch that! It's very expensive. It's for special operations only."
"Yeah?" Caleb probes.

"Yes."
"I'm very special."
"You're useful. Learn the difference." Sackett retorts. "It's the reason you're here."
"Ah, right," Caleb nods his head, smiling as sweet as sarcasm can be. "This is about that secret mission you keep jabbering on about, isn't it?"

"Oh, your head may be empty, but hers is not," Sackett leads Caleb over to a bust of a woman, sculpted of white wax. "Now, there's a message concealed within the waxwork. Here, practice drill. Take it."

Caleb looks at the dinky drill Sackett gives him until taking it from the man's hand, knowing it's useless to say no.
"Practice drilling without damaging the bust until you can retrieve it in under two minutes," Sackett orders him.
"Is this an order?" Caleb grins goofily, taking his use of the word bust the wrong way.

Not catching his meaning, Sackett puts his hands on his hips, instead saying "It's a challenge."
"Mr. Sackett," Ben calls for the man.
"Hmm?"

"What-What does this do?" Ben touches the interesting writing contraption.

"Oh, it's Thomas Jefferson's newest toy. It allows him to write two letters at the same time and to keep a double of his correspondence. The polygraph duplicator is what he calls it."
Liking the sound of that, Ben asks further, "Now, could it—Could it duplicate something that's already been written? Such as a personal signature?"

Sackett's eyes widen, and asks in a low hush, "You wish to forge a letter?"

"No, to set a trap," Ben answers.
"This is not a trap. This is a contraption."
"No, but you see, sir, with the right signature, it's anyone we say it is," Ben continues to explain, feeling the wheels turning in his head, ignoring Sackett shaking his head in disagreement which is nothing new. "As far as Lee knows, it's someone he can trust. It's a friend."

"How bad is it?" General Benedict Arnold hisses on his cot, hair in disarray, and teeth clenched looking at his wound.

"Well, the ball is out," the doctor tells him with a relieved sigh. "But while I was digging for it, I found splinters where the bone should be. You wait any longer; your blood could be poisoned."
"Wait any longer for what?" Arnold asks, breathing heavily.

"Amputation."
Grabbing the doctor by the shirt collar, Arnold drags him down to his level with rage, "Take my leg and I take yours."

Shoving him away he mutters, "Miss Washington would have never said those words to me."

"You should count yourself lucky, Mr. Thatcher," Washington walks in, standing in front of the tent flap with hands behind his back, tricorn atop his evenly plaited hair, and cloak blowing behind him from the draft wind.

"The first time General Arnold was wounded, he kept a sword and two loaded pistols beside the bed."

"Well, apparently I've been tempered," Arnold lowers his voice, looking at his Commander with respect.

"I should hope not, for our enemy's sake," Washington's mouth curls up into the slightest of smiles.
"I come with news from Congress. You're to be appointed to major general, a distinction as well deserved as it is long overdue."

"Why is it they only ever promote me when I'm wounded?" The wounded man asks defeated.

"Well, they realize they could lose you. It makes them come to their senses."
"That's precisely why I feared it might never happen," Arnold grins with pride soon after. "I'd like to see St. Clair's face when he learns that I outrank him once again and rightly so."

"Doctor, will you excuse us?" Washington asks, soon watching the man leave to look at his fellow officer with a displeased face as one would give to their child who pushed another child into the water and laugh at them. This comparison because George has watched his stepson Jacky one too many times push Lillian into the Potomac River, and Jacky would be scolded until he became a better young man to not just treat a woman as so, but anyone.

"The promotion is in title only. You remain subordinate to those promoted in February," Washington says after dragging a chair over to the General's bedside.
"You mean to tell me that the man who defeated Burgoyne is outranked by the men who retreated from him?" Arnold snaps aloud, silencing Washington. "Stephen, St. Clair, Mifflin, Lincoln I've won more battles than all of them put together. Title only. What about pay? They are four years delinquent in reimbursing my expenses."

"The Congress is without surplus. We must all continue to make sacrifices," Washington advices in all astuteness.
"Sacrifice?" Arnold spits, feeling the pain course his whole body from his wounded leg. "What do you know of sacrifice? Remember, George, my wife did not come from means. All she left to me were three sons to care for, three mouths to feed, three men to raise strong. I would rather die before I see shame brought on them as my father did me. Something you would understand if you had any sons of your own.."

Instantly, Arnold's face crumples regretting those words.

George glowers down at the man, mouth set in a tight frown. He knew his words were never meant to slip, he was saying them out of pain and stress, but to let them slip so easily. This gives him cause to set this officer, one of his generals, straight for outright slighting his name, unintentionally.

"Do not assume what I do or do not understand, Benedict Arnold. I have a daughter I'm raising strong, in a country soon to be inhabited by strong men as you if it isn't already, and my stepson, gracing me with grandchildren while he endures the hardships of battle with me."

"I apologize, sir," the man looks down. "How is she if you don't mind me asking?"
"Answer my question first, who are you fighting now?" George narrows his eyes inquisitively.

"I'm fighting for what I deserve. And I will need your support," Arnold pleads kindly enough; this certain plead reminding Washington of Lt. Colonel Hamilton wanting his military glory on the field. A strong desire for men nowadays to achieve the highest title they aspire with heads full of fantasies dying like martyrs, and preserving their legacy with inheritance for their descendants.

Times are hard for many, especially now, yes. But there are much different paths to achieve success other than military glory.
"Yes, and it has always been there. And it will always be," Washington nods his head, promisingly, but his eyes say the complete opposite, varnished with apprehension.

"And my daughter is doing well, thank you for asking."

~ Lillian's POV

Four days later, I found myself in the city of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, a Moravian settlement known for the new Headquarters of the Hospital Department. It is where wounded soldiers are sent to be treated more effectively, but the mortality rate increased rapidly. Many have been succumbing to disease and neglect said by my father, in his letter asking for me to come here to volunteer work, and help Marquis de Lafayette recuperate from his wounds, because he is needed by my father as quick as possible.

Since August, my father had been retreating from his defeat in New York; he'd crossed over the Hudson into New Jersey. From Newark to Trenton he had been harassed by Cornwallis, leaving behind many of the sick and wounded; a hospital was set up in Hackensack and then moved to Morristown almost immediately. While originally welcomed there by the community as a means to protect them from the British, an outbreak of smallpox, spread by the sick soldiers at the hospital there, caused the deaths of many men, women, and children of the general population. One might see how that would make the community a little testy and uneasy.

I should be there… I should be everywhere at once…

"Where is everyone, sir? The other doctors and nurses?" I ask Dr. William Shippen.

"Many have grown sick from the patients spreading their illness, and there weren't many to begin with, only I and John Warren, a surgeon," the man in his early forties answers, one of the key figures in the establishment of University of Pennsylvania where I went and graduated from.

I glance to my right as we walk down the center street of the town, where many soldiers are lying off to the sides due to overcrowd inside, blending in with the pasty, brick buildings because of their ghostly skin color, and the railings because that is how thin their limbs are. I want to walk up to each of them, and help them in any way I can… But many are standing, trying to fight off their weaknesses, others are lying down, sleeping midday, and others are sending me either lustful looks or staggered looks of not seeing a woman in so long.

"What have you done so far, sir?" I ask, holding my cloak closer to me catching a chill from the late autumn breeze.

"All I could do, obviously!" He snaps. Now I'm getting a bad feel for this man and isn't the idol I thought I could look up to in this healing profession. "May I ask what you, a young lady is doing here? Did your father send you here to spy on this death pit?"

My eyes widen, and nostrils flare, "Yes and no, sir. There is no reason for this to be a death pit as you so call it! I went to the college you helped established and studied under your teachings, graduating with a bachelors. I have yet to receive any word from higher-ups on help needed at this location!"

"Are you a doctor?" He asks, curiosity piqued, and pretending he is just now coming to know of me.

"No I am a nurse."

"You can't do much."

I bite my lower lip, "But I can do what I may, and we'll have more doctors come in at once."

He laughs mirthlessly, "There is no we. Have whatever hope you want. I'll take you to who you want to see, Benjamin Rush."

"No. He will come to me when he is available. For now I am here to see a wounded soldier by the name of Marquis de Lafayette, by orders of my father," I respond back, our eyes maintaining contact until he is the first who looks away.

"The wounded Frenchmen? Very well, not someone I'd see you with."

I swallow bile at his implication and the look he sends me, not as immodest as the sick soldiers in the street getting fresh air, but close enough to be called it.

Derik walks close behind me, and his younger brother, James, as we walk through this horrible, sickly town.

"He is a family friend, sir. My business is my own, now," I tell him with narrowed eyes as we come to a building with guards who look healthy enough to function and stand. "I shall see you soon."

The man huffed as he walked away in the afternoon sun, leaving me, Derik and James, alone.

Upon entering the building one of the guards, a young man with ebony plaited hair and dark green eyes stops me.

"My lady, it is not a sight for you to witness," he warns.

"I'm Miss Lillian Washington. I am a nurse, here to see Marquis de Lafayette, help him recuperate from his wounds so he can meet with my father and return to his place on the field," I say.

He nods slowly, "Very well. I'll take you to his room. And also know Dr. Shippen never visits the sick, dresses wounds, or comforts soldiers. Do not be hurt if some are insulting you. Bethlehem is its own world of neglect."

I blink away tears as the guard leads us inside, which is full of wounded soldiers from the front door, to back, not even noticing the staircase which leads up to private rooms filled with many more.

Awfully wounded soldiers… Physical, mental, and emotional wounds. Their spirits are low.

Some soldiers silenced at my entrance, to which I looked each of them in the eyes with hope and care, and they bowed their heads, whilst the others merely glanced and continued talking loudly, or complaining. Down the way there were some… brothel women gathered in the back of the building, but a couple of them were actually dressing wounds.

A surprise for men and my own eyes to see, as I wasn't expecting to see any woman here, maybe one or two wives, but nothing like this.

The guard led us up the staircase to the second floor, a hallway with five doors on each side.

"He is in the second to last room on the right side," the young guardsmen leads us to the doorway, which is wide open and hushed talk is heard in the French language.

"Je lis, j'étudie, j'examine , je l'écoute , et hors de tout cela, j'essaie de former et de l'idée dans laquelle je mets autant de bon sens que je peux ," (« I read, I study, I look , I listen , and out of all this , I try to form and idea in which I put as much sense as I can,) a pale faced, white wigged Frenchmen says to the man asleep on the cot nearby. The talking man is lying on his cot covered with a blanket, with his head propped up on two pillows, and his right leg is propped up on a tall stack of pillows.

Immediately upon entering, however, his eyes snapped into our direction, alert, looking at the guardsmen with attention.

"Monsieur, you have an expected visitor," the guard announces my presence, gesturing to me, and the Frenchmen's eyes land on me, smiling very effectively showing his small teeth. Well, he must be Marquis de Lafayette. My father is close friends with him, but not once have I or my mother ever met him.

"Pas un autre putain, déjà," Lafayette says with an exhale of breath. ("Not another whore, already.")
"Allez-vous , je suis marié." (Go away I am married.)

My face may be heated, but I defend my honor with a clear voice, "Je ne suis pas prostituée , monsieur. Je suis Lillian Washington, envoyé ici par mon père George Washington. " « I am no whore, sir. I am Lillian Washington, sent here by my father George Washington. »

He laughs, waving me off, "Madame, I was jesting. You look nothing like one of them!"

I smirk slightly, enjoying hearing his pure French accent, "Well, thank you sir."

The guard looked to Lafayette for confirmation to leave, visibly unsure of what we just spoke in the foreign language.

"Go, it is well," Lafayette simply waves his hand and the guard leaves them in the room. "So, I am sure you heard of my wounds, petite beauté ? (little beauty), » he kindly says, pointing down to his elevated leg while removing the blanket.

"Yes. And I can imagine it to be painful, but with the right therapy I can have you walking by the end of the month. If that is well with you?"

"Indeed."

"Wonderful. And Derik and James will help you to stand or carry if needed—"

"No, no," he laughs lightly, holding up one of his hands. "No man needs to carry me."

I smile to myself, thinking this may not be harder than I thought. The French are stubborn, but they are determined people to get any job done.

"Washington is a weak and feckless leader blinded by his own arrogance," Benjamin prompts himself to think further thoughts of his Commanding General that he never thinks as he sits down in the same barn they were shown to by Mr. Sackett, who stands beside him shaking his head.
"Heh, it's too strong."
Tapping his quill on the table, Ben ponders aloud once more, "Well, what about cold and indecisive?"

"Indecisive, yes," Sackett agrees with, making Ben nod and finally dip his quill into his inkwell to begin writing, but Sackett had more to say… as always causing the major to barely stifle a sigh. "But cold is a bit too personal a modifier for Horatio Gates to use."
Ben breathes out a sniff of laughter, smirking, "What, you think I'm making this too personal?"

"Me? Heavens, no!" Sackett laughs, gesturing for the young man to continue while the words are still floating in the front of his mind. "I think you're violating the law, committing treason in a very considered and rational manner, as far as I'm concerned, but what I am curious to know is are you doing this to prove yourself right or Washington wrong?"

"I'm doing this to protect him, to expose his enemies," Ben answers with good heart. "They're the ones committing treason. I am simply gathering the proof. Now where is that letter from Gates?"

"You're forging it right now."
"No, not this one, the one to Congress - with his signature on it. Where he proclaims his victory at Saratoga."

As Sackett sifts through the papers, hatless Caleb walks in on the scene from the back of the barn with a smug face.
"Drill and extract, two minutes," he announces. "Huh? Now I haven't gotten head like that since before the war, boys!"

Sackett stares down at the paper in front of him, trying his hardest to hide his unfocussed grin as Ben merely sighs, shaking his head plainly used to such audacious innuendoes his friend comes up with.
"Here it is," Caleb places the extracted item from the carved bust onto the table in front of Sackett just as Ben approaches him.
"Good. Now you can help me," Ben holds up his forged letter to Caleb.
"What are we doing?" Caleb looks on with interest.

"Laying a trap for Charles Lee."
"Right."
Ben walks over to the polygraph duplicator and sets both pages down underneath each wooden quill equipped with the mechanism, minus the feathers. "See, in this letter I pose as General Gates and I call for Washington to be replaced. I'll intercept the reply from Lee and I'll take it straight to the commander. It will be evidence he can't ignore."
"That is genius, Tall boy, but how you gonna get that to Lee's tent?" Caleb poses a good question as Sackett looks back and forth between the papers he is reading and the two discussing men.

"It'll circulate through another general's mail. I've got that handled. What I need you for is tomorrow to help snatch the reply."
"Tomorrow?" Sackett looks up. "No. Not good. I need Mr. Brewster to set out tonight on his mission.
He's to collect intelligence from my London contact."
"I am?" Caleb smirks sarcastically as the same time Ben asks.

"You have contacts in London?"

Sackett sets his hands on his hips, looking directly at Ben, "Don't make too much of it. It's just parliamentary gossip. But every little morsel is crucial."
"I ain't going to London, all right?" Caleb refuses.

"No, you're going to New Jersey to the home of a Tory Loyalist by the name of…" unfolding a piece of paper from his pocket, forgetting the name, "Dr. Charles Hallum, Hackensack Township," Sackett tells the plucky, bearded whaler.

"Now, the intelligence is hidden inside a bust of King George. You're to extract it without its new owner knowing it was ever there."
Caleb holds up both his hands, as if claiming innocence with his not so innocent grin, "These hands are the silkiest in the colonies, my friend."

Sackett looks at the man's hands fearfully, "If the messages inside the waxwork are discovered, my London contact is dead."

Ben straightens, looking over one of his silver epaulette shoulders at the older man as Caleb loses his grin.
Caleb promises, with challenging eyes, "It'll be like I was never there."

As ironic as the words turned out to be, as Benjamin listened to his friend's pledge to get the bust safely, he never thought he'd take those seven words to heart the next night, where he would confront Washington with the forged letter.

"Washington will not go. He must be pushed," Benjamin reads the letter with a broken red wax seal aloud for his Commander to listen intently. "If the Congress will not rid us of this demigod, I pray a higher power will intervene."

"I have heard enough," Washington interrupts Ben, staring into blank space in deep thought.
Ben swallows, accepting he got his message across even if it wasn't the whole letter spoken, "Well, I wanted you to see General Lee's nature with your own eyes. That part about a higher power sounds like he's calling for your death."

"It is damning."
"I agree. And I think more than sufficient to relieve Lee of his command."
"I wasn't referring to the general," Washington utters under his breath, looking off to the side, making Ben wait in even more anticipation for the man to explain further.
"How did you obtain this?"

It felt as if the very breath was sucked out of him, in fact the higher power may have punched him right in the gut and yelled 'you didn't think this one through Benny-boy!'

Masking a lying face to one of surprise at his question, he couldn't help but stutter a response feeling guilty, "I-I forged a letter from Gates to prompt his response."
"So his reply was coerced," Washington nods his head, narrowing his eyes even more so they look like they are squinting. "You entrapped him through falsehood and created two documents which if discovered may shame this army."
"No, no, sir," Ben shakes his head negatively. "The letter I wrote as Gates contained a request to be burned upon reading. Lee's letter contains the same request. This evidence is for your eyes only. I wanted you to witness his treachery firsthand in ink."

"So that I may do what, precisely?" Washington speaks with his usual breathy tone, enough to make any conversation he has with a man or woman seem close and personal, and important. "So that I may do what?"

"This man has been working to undermine you for-"

"Since the day I was appointed," Washington sighs in his honest admission, staring down his Head of Intelligence as if 'why are you ensuing that I am blind to everything that goes on far beneath my nose.'
"And Gates and Conway and others. Would you have me court-martial them? Hang them? Stone them to death?"

"Sir, I-"

"What would you have me do?"

"I would have you defend yourself!" Ben snaps back at his Commander with the same amount of intensity, which was a brave thing to do… and rash.
"I am not in danger," Washington goes on to explaining in attempts to find peace in this discussion. "America and her future depend on this army. If we fight ourselves, we will appear to be divided and disorganized."
Ben stares at him like he is crazy, now, "We are divided, sir. We are greatly divided!"
"And the French cannot know it!" Washington yells at the young man, who steps back, blinking in shock at the patience no longer there in this moment.

Lowering his tone just a tad, the Commander and Chief looks his Major in the eye, standing a foot and a half or so below his tall height, "For the head of intelligence, you have so little understanding of what is truly at stake."
"The French?" Ben asks bewildered that the French are becoming more engrossed in their war. He was not told this. Then, maybe if he didn't give up his seat for Arnold at the dinner, there would have been some discussion.

"Only France has the arms and munitions and ships needed to defeat Howe's army and liberate our cities," Washington says while thinking back on his aide-de-camp discussing this with him. "Without France, we have no chance to succeed. Versailles is watching, waiting to see if we are a worthy ally.
Exposing treachery in our highest ranks proves that we are not."
"Sir, I-I was only trying to protect you," Ben's voice lowers to a whisper, his honesty in every word.

"It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one."
"Forgive me, sir. I did not know," Ben swallows thickly.
Washington merely looks past his apologies, "And it is not my task to teach you better sense. I'm not your father and you are not my son."

That was all. That was it. Ben took his cue to leave, bowing his head in shame and walking out of his Commander's office with regret and dishonor.

By morning, it'll be like I was never there, Ben trudges outside, back to his tent for the night, barely escaping hearing range of Washington slamming his fist on his table in frustration.

Or so he thinks it'll be that way.

A/N: Sorry Caleb, but the London contact is already dead… *cough* SPOILER ALERT *cough*.

Any whom, I'm sorry for the delay, I got busy and had no time to finish typing. This chapter may not be longer like the other ones, but its still long… haha *sigh* I have no life but thinking of this fanfic. So Lillian is helping Marquis de Lafayette recuperate from his injuries, Benedict Arnold asked about her wellbeing, her father is getting mood swings of late from being over-stressed, Ben is starting to be more focused than ever in his revenge seeking, and Caleb is good old Caleb. Poor Ben, being told he isn't Washington's son. Can't wait to see him ask for that blessing one day in time. Better stuff will happen soon, stuff like fighting, more spying, fights, and a kiss for Lillian perhaps.. Stay tuned for more! Thank you all for continuing to read, following, favoriting, and reviewing!

-BrownEyedGirl87