The Whiskey Rebel

“It doesn’t matter how I was freed. I was free and you continued to hold me,” he said, rising to his feet. “It is unforgivable.”

“No, no, no, you are focusing on the wrong things. I have reformed, Leonidas. I have freed you. I understand that this is a confusing moment, but you will sort it out. Sit. Have a drink. Let us talk about your plans.”

He remained quiet, in a pose of consideration. His face returned to its more customary sable, and his eyes returned to their traditional oval shape. He blinked at me a few times. Then he said, “I am going upstairs to collect my things, and then I am leaving.”

“What?” Now I stood. “You ca

“I make no threats but a pronouncement. I ca

I opened my mouth to speak, but he had already turned and I would not demean myself by calling after him like a jilted lover. Instead I sat and poured myself some of Duer’s wine. I sat and waited. I watched as he descended the stairs once more, and I watched as he turned to the door without once looking back toward me. I watched as he walked out into the cold New York night, leaving me entirely alone on the eve of crisis.

Joan Maycott

January 1792

I’d thought to go alone and might well have done so. It was not that I did not trust the man I was to meet. In this whole affair, he seemed to me among the most honorable, perhaps curiously so. It was not a question of fear but one of power. Would it make me seem more powerful, I wondered, to go alone and thus show him how secure I felt, or to bring a man with me and show him I had more men in my orbit than he had seen? In the end, I chose the latter. The time had not yet come-if it were to come-to let him know how few we were. It hardly mattered, for we had achieved much and would, I believed, achieve all. The smallness of our numbers made us adaptable and agile, but to an outsider it might make us appear weak.

In earlier meetings, he had met Dalton and Richmond, so I brought with me Mr. Skye, who accepted the assignment with solemnity. Now it was dark, and we sat in our hired coach-I’d had Skye hire the plainest one he could find-on the side of a quiet street in an indifferent neighborhood. It was modest, but not poor, and by no means unruly. It was one of those parts of town where men labored hard for their few dollars and held to their homes with pride.

It was not yet nine, the hour of our meeting, and Skye and I sat in the dark. He sat perhaps closer to me than he ought to have, and I could smell the scent of him: leather and tobacco and the sweet hint of whiskey that clung to them all, all the whiskey rebels.

“What are his loyalties?” Skye asked, after a long silence. He spoke quietly, almost a whisper, though I did not think such discretion was necessary. I did not think he believed the question necessary either. He spoke so as to have something to say.

“Right now I think he’s loyal to himself,” I said, “which means as long as we continue to pay him, he will serve us. We have to be careful, however, not to push him too far or make him fear that anything he does will hurt someone he cares about. I suspect no amount of money will make him do harm.”

“No, of course not, else you would not have recruited him. His limitations are why you trust him.”

I laughed. “You are wise.”

“And you are impressive. More impressive than I can say.” I felt him take my hand. “Joan,” he said, “so much has happened-to both of us-and I would never imagine that you could put your grief for Andrew aside. Yet you are alive, a vibrant woman, and I should be a strange sort of man were I not moved by your courage and leadership-and, yes, beauty.”

I resisted the urge to pull my hand away from his. I could not afford to offend him, to make him feel ashamed. I must be honest also and say that his attentions were not without their appeal. Skye was older than I was, but charming and learned and attentive. He never bristled at my leadership. Andrew, for all that I loved him, had regarded me with a mixture of admiration and tolerance. He humored me as much as he admired me. Skye, though it pained me to admit it, understood me in many ways better than my husband ever could have.

Yet I could not imagine giving my heart over to another man. Something had been taken from me when Andrew was murdered, and I did not want my armor pierced. And there was more. I did not know what would come, but I knew I must be unfettered. Those around me had broken all the rules of human decency to bring me low, and I would not be bound by any rules in striking back at them. I would not be deterred, not by loyalty nor affection nor love, from doing what must be done. Most of all, I did not want him because I did not love him the way he loved me, or believed he did. I wanted his friendship and loyalty and affection, but I wanted nothing more.

“You know it ca

He removed his hand and said, after a moment of attempting to master himself, “Will revenge bring us happiness?”

I let out a bark of a laugh. “It is too late for happiness. Revenge shan’t bring it. If I am to speak honestly, I do not think it will even bring satisfaction. How can it? Revenge is the emptiest of enterprises, do you not think so? Days and weeks, perhaps years, to plan and execute, and then, once it is over, what have you? It is put together as meticulously as the artist crafts his work, but there is no painting or sculpture or poem to stand as testament to the labor. There is only the sensation, and that sensation must always be hollow.”

“Then why do you do it?” he asked. “Is it only for the money you hope to earn?”

“I should like the money,” I said, “but it ca

“Doing it may destroy us as well.”

“Yes, it may. But that sort of destruction I can accept.”

I parted the dusty curtain of the coach and saw him emerging from his little house. A few minutes sooner might have avoided the conversation with Skye, but I suppose it was well to have it done with. I had turned Skye away but not hurt him. That should keep him content for a little while.

Out the window I saw the man approach the equipage with a cold determination, a man in perfect control though full of perhaps violent emotions. His stride was easy enough, however, as though I were there to take him to an appointment he anticipated with pleasure, or at least contentment. He opened the door and folded his large body into the coach. He nodded to me and Skye, and then took a seat across from us. He was a handsome man with good teeth, perfect and easy in his ma

He looked at Skye. “Yet another associate.”

“He is with me,” I said, “but I’ll refrain from introducing him. I prefer to avoid names where I can.”

“I’m sure that is sound.” He waited a moment, then said, “I suppose it was inevitable you would come for me.”

“We do pay you, and quite well,” I said.

“And I do not complain, though I harbored the hope that I might continue to be paid well in exchange for doing nothing.”

“I must say I hoped the same,” I said, “but things are changing.”