The Whiskey Rebel

“Enough!” Hamilton slammed his hand against the desk. “You would not dare.”

“Just a simple question, Colonel. Much easier that way.”

“Damn it, Saunders, what is this about?”

“It is about Fleet and about his daughter. I would think you, of all people, would understand. It was always said that you were a man for the ladies.”

His eyes narrowed in anger. “If you think-” he began to bark.

“I don’t mean you are a scoundrel, as your enemies like to cast about. I mean you understood the old ways, that a man must do what is right to protect a woman, a woman who, however incidentally, has crossed under his protection. So long as I think there is any chance of Cynthia Pearson being in danger, I will try to protect her. You may as well settle in for a long siege.”

He shook his head sadly and slumped slightly in his chair. “Very well. If it will make you go away.”

“See? Nothing simpler. My question is fairly simple. Does the name Reynolds mean anything to you?”

I had anticipated denial or obfuscation or genuine confusion. I did not anticipate what actually happened. Hamilton leaped to his feet. His heavy chair toppled behind him. Even in the poorly lit chamber I could see his face had turned red. “What do you mean by this?” he shouted. “Do you think to push my endurance to its limits?”

I exchanged a look with Leonidas, who was as confused as I. To Hamilton I affected calm, always the best way with a man in a rage. “I mean nothing, Colonel. The man who paid my landlady to cast me out said his name was Reynolds. I merely wished to see if you knew him. Apparently you do.”

Hamilton blinked at me several times and then at Leonidas. He turned around, righted his chair, and sat down again. He dusted off a spot on his desk. “I don’t know the name. It means nothing to me.”

“Just so,” I said. “I thought as much, for your ignorance of the name effectively explains your outburst. Well, I’ll just post a letter to Mr. Freneau. Perhaps he can do a bit of digging into the matter for me.”

“Oh, sit down.” Hamilton suddenly sounded tired. “I’ll tell you, but you must promise not to pursue this. And I don’t want you coming to my office and threatening me every time you have a question.”

“Absolutely,” I said, knowing full well I meant to take the information on any terms now and worry about the meaning of those terms later.

“Since you are such a close reader of Mr. Freneau’s paper,” Hamilton said, “you are undoubtedly familiar with the name William Duer.”

“From the war as well. He supplied the army, didn’t he?”

“That’s right,” said Hamilton. “He also served as my assistant for the first few months of my term at Treasury, but Duer, despite his patriotic impulses, was always looking for a better opportunity. He and I were once close friends, but things have been strained between us. I did not like the way in which he executed his duties while he served as my assistant, and he has also shown a coarse side at other times.

“As you know, the Bank of the United States launched last summer, and the price of shares soared astronomically. Duer invested heavily, but his investment became not only a sign but a symptom. He is so wealthy, he invests so much money, and his choices are of so much interest that Duer’s actions not only reflect or even moderately affect the market, they directly shape it. When he buys, everyone buys. When he sells, everyone sells. Try to understand what I am telling you. Ours is a unique economy, unlike any in the history of the world, for two reasons. In most nations trading is centralized-in London, Paris, Amsterdam. In our country, a man is used to thinking of his state as an autonomous entity, and the first reason is that trading is decentralized-in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and so on. The other reason is that the nation is new and, in terms of the number of major participants, very small. One man, a single actor, can alter the shape of the market if he is careful.”

“Or careless,” observed Leonidas.

Hamilton nodded. “Precisely. Duer, I fear, may be both. He uses his undue influence-understand me that he has an influence unlike any other single man in any single market in the history of finance as we know it-he uses this power to manipulate prices to his advantage, sending up the price of shares. He pla

“Go on,” I said.

“This Reynolds works for Duer. I believe he may have been exacting some revenge on you in order to get to me.”

“Colonel, you and I have not spoken in ten years. Why would he use me to harm you?”

“He may have made assumptions. He knows of you from the war. Perhaps he thought I would use you to conduct my inquiries, such as the one involving Mr. Pearson. He wished to thwart me for the sake of vengeance.”

I took a moment to let the silence do some work. “So, Duer is angry with you over an incident last summer and chooses to inconvenience me now as a way of extracting revenge?”

“Revenge,” said Hamilton, “or merely to push back at me and show me he still has power, yes. That is my theory, in any case. Now you need but let the matter alone, and I will see to it that you are not troubled any longer.”

“Very kind, but you know, I think I’d like to speak to Duer myself. I presume I can find him with the other speculators at the City Tavern?”

Hamilton sighed. “Duer lives in New York. He comes here on business but has not been in town for some weeks. I believe he has some business in New York that absorbs his attention. You see, there is nothing for you to do, and this matter has nothing to do with Pearson. I am asking you to let it alone.”

I stood up. “Of course. It is hardly worth a trip to New York over something like this, and I have other things to do besides hunting down Duer’s man. I am sorry to have troubled you. Good night, Colonel.”

We strolled out of the office and past the clerks stationed outside.

“Surely you did not believe any of that?” said Leonidas.

“Of course not,” I said, “but it was hardly to our advantage to push him further. He did not want to tell us more, and he would not have done so. Pressing him would have only made him angry. For now we take what he has given us and see where it leads us.”

Leonidas was about to speak when a thunderous roar erupted from inside Hamilton ’s office. “Damn it!” cried the Secretary of the Treasury. This cry was followed by the sound of glass breaking. Several of the clerks looked up from their work, hesitated nervously, and then returned to their business.

For our part, we hurried outside and toward our next destination.

T he Crooked Knight was a decidedly Jeffersonian tavern on the cusp of the Northern Liberties, a wretched place on Coats Street near the Public Landing, frequented by workingmen full of private rage masquerading as political anger. These were the sorts who read Freneau’s National Gazette aloud, jeered at each mention of Hamilton, and cheered at every reference to Jefferson. Indeed, off in one corner a spot had been roped off for a cockfight between one bird, stout and muscular and resplendent with shiny black feathers-this one called Jefferson-and another, scrawny and weak and pale-called Hamilton. Each time the larger bird attacked the lesser, the crowd cheered and cried out in praise of liberty and freedom.

This was, in other words, a tavern wholly dedicated to men of a democratic republican turn of mind. These men believed the American project to have been already tainted by venality and corruption. These were men who worshiped George Washington as a god but were willing to damn him to Hell for admitting Hamilton into his i