“You were ordered,” he continued, “as I recall it, to avoid your main
army in the Jerseys; you can now see why. There is no need of further
concealment.”
It was clear enough. “I owe you,” I said, “my excuses for intruding a
business so personal.”
“And why not? I am glad to serve you. It is rather a relief, sir, to
talk of something else than my own hopeless case. Is there anything
else? Pray go on; I am at your service.”
“You are most kind. I have but one word to add; Arthur Wynne was--nay,
must have been--deep in this business?”
“Ah, now you have asked too much,” he replied; “but it is I who am to
blame. I had no right to name Captain Wynne.”
“You must not feel uneasy. I owe him no love, Mr. Andre; but I will take
care that you do not suffer. His suggestion that I should be made use of
put in peril not my life, but my honour. It is not to my interest that
the matter should ever get noised abroad.”
“I see,” he said. “Your cousin must be a strange person. Do with what I
have said as seems right to you. I shall be--or rather,” and he smiled
quite cheerfully, “I _am_ content. One’s grammar forgets to-morrow
sometimes.”
His ease and quiet seemed to me amazing. But it was getting late, and I
said I must go at once.
As I was in act to leave, he took my hand and said: “There are no thanks
a man about to die can give that I do not offer you, Mr. Wynne. Be
assured your visit has helped me. It is much to see the face of a
friend. All men have been good to me and kind, and none more so than his
Excellency. If to-morrow I could see, as I go to death, one face I have
known in happier hours--it is much to ask--I may count on you, I am
sure. Ah, I see I can! And my letter--you will be sure to do your best?”
“Yes,” I said, not trusting myself to speak further, and only adding,
“Good-by,” as I wrung his hand. Then I went out into the cold October
starlight.
It was long after ten when I found Hamilton. I told him briefly of my
interview, and asked if it would be possible for me to deliver in person
to the general Mr. Andre’s letter. I had, in fact, that on my mind
which, if but a crude product of despair, I yet did wish to say where
alone it might help or be considered.
Hamilton shook his head. “I have so troubled his Excellency as to this
poor fellow that I fear I can do no more. Men who do not know my chief
cannot imagine the distress of heart this business has caused. I do
not mean, Wynne, that he has or had the least indecision concerning
the sentence; but I can tell you this--the signature of approval of the
court’s finding is tremulous and unlike his usual writing. We will talk
of this again. Will you wait at my quarters? I will do my best for you.”
I said I would take a pipe and walk on the road at the foot of the slope
below the house in which Washington resided. With this he left me.
The night was clear and beautiful; from the low hills far and near the
camp bugle-calls and the sound of horses neighing filled the air. Uneasy
and restless, I walked to and fro up and down the road below the little
farm-house. Once or twice I fancied I saw the tall figure of the chief
pass across the window-panes. A hundred yards away was the house I had
just left. There sat a gallant gentleman awaiting death. Here, in the
house above me, was he in whose hands lay his fate. I pitied him too,
and wondered if in his place I could be sternly just. At my feet the
little brook babbled in the night, while the camp noises slowly died
away. Meantime, intent on my purpose, I tried to arrange in my mind what
I would say or how plead a lost cause. I have often thus pre-arranged
the mode of saying what some serious occasion made needful. I always
get ready, but when the time comes I am apt to say things altogether
different, and to find, too, that the wisdom of the minute is apt to be
the better wisdom.
At last I saw Hamilton approaching me through the gloom. “Come,” he
said. “His Excellency will see you, but I fear it will be of no use.
He himself would agree to a change in the form of death, but Generals
Greene and Sullivan are strongly of opinion that to do so in the present
state of exasperation would be unwise and impolitic. I cannot say what
I should do were I he. I am glad, Wynne, that it is not I who have to
decide. I lose my sense of the equities of life in the face of so sad
a business. At least I would give him a gentleman’s death. The generals
who tried the case say that to condemn a man as a spy, and not at last
to deal with him as Hale was dealt with, would be impolitic, and unfair
to men who were as gallant as the poor fellow in yonder farm-house.”
“It is only too clear,” I said.
“Yes, they are right, I suppose; but it is a horrible business.”
As we discussed, I went with him past the sentinels around the old stone
house and through a hall, and to left into a large room.
“The general sleeps here,” Hamilton said, in a lowered voice. “We have
but these two apartments; across the passage is his dining-room, which
he uses as his office. Wait here,” and so saying, he left me. The room
was large, some fifteen by eighteen feet, but so low-ceiled that the
Dutch builder had need to contrive a recess in the ceiling to permit of
a place for the tall Dutch clock he had brought from Holland. Around the
chimney-piece were Dutch tiles. Black Billy, the general’s servant, sat
asleep in the corner, and two aides slumbered on the floor, tired out,
I fancy. I walked to and fro over the creaking boards, and watched the
Dutch clock. As it struck eleven the figure of Time, seated below the
dial, swung a scythe and turned a tiny hour-glass. A bell rang; an
orderly came in and woke up an aide: “Despatch for West Point, sir, in
haste.” The young fellow groaned, stuck the paper in his belt, and went
out for his long night ride.
At last my friend returned. “The general will see you presently, Wynne,
but it is a useless errand. Give me Andre’s letter.” With, this he left
me again, and I continued my impatient walk. In a quarter of an hour he
came back. “Come,” said he; “I have done my best, but I have failed as
I expected to fail. Speak your mind freely; he likes frankness.” I went
after him, and in a moment was in the farther room and alone with the
chief.
A huge fire of logs blazed on the great kitchen hearth, and at a table
covered with maps and papers, neatly set in order, the general sat
writing.
He looked up, and with quiet courtesy said, “Take a seat, Captain Wynne.
I must be held excused for a little.” I bowed and sat down, while he
continued to write.
His pen moved slowly, and he paused at times, and then went on
apparently with the utmost deliberation. I was favourably placed to
watch him without appearing to do so, his face being strongly lighted
by the candles in front of him. He was dressed with his usual care, in
a buff waistcoat and a blue-and-buff uniform, with powdered hair drawn
back to a queue and carefully tied with black ribbon.
The face, with its light-blue eyes, ruddy cheeks, and rather heavy nose
above a strong jaw, was now grave and, I thought, stern. At least a
half-hour went by before he pushed back his chair and looked up.
I am fortunate as regards this conversation, since on my return I set
it down in a diary which, however, has many gaps, and is elsewhere
incomplete.
“Captain Wynne,” he said, “I have refused to see several gentlemen in
regard to this sad business, but I learn that Mr. Andre was your friend,
and I have not forgotten your aunt’s timely aid at a moment when it was
sorely needed. For these reasons and at the earnest request of Captain
Hamilton and the marquis, I am willing to listen to you. May I ask you
to be brief?” He spoke slowly, as if weighing his words.
I replied that I was most grateful--that I owed it to Major Andre that I
had not long ago endured the fate which was now to be his.
“Permit me, sir,” he said, “to ask when this occurred.”
I replied that it was when, at his Excellency’s desire, I had entered
Philadelphia as a spy; and then I went on briefly to relate what had
happened.
“Sir,” he returned, “you owed your danger to folly, not to what your
duty brought. You were false, for the time, to that duty. But this does
not concern us now. It may have served as a lesson, and I am free to
admit that you did your country a great service. What now can I do for
you? As to this unhappy gentleman, his fate is out of my hands. I have
read the letter which Captain Hamilton gave me.” As he spoke he took it
from the table and deliberately read it again, while I watched him. Then
he laid it down and looked up. I saw that his big, patient eyes were
overfull as he spoke.
“I regret, sir, to have to refuse this most natural request; I have told
Mr. Hamilton that it is not to be thought of. Neither shall I reply. It
is not fitting that I should do so, nor is it necessary or even proper
that I assign reasons which must already be plain to every man of sense.
Is that all?”