Page 53

W hen Rose woke up, she was alone. She lifted her head to look around, needing a moment to remember where she was.

The mattress was thick and soft and smelled faintly of chicken feathers, but she snuggled back down, too damned comfortable to complain or move.

The room itself was tiny, with half the space taken up by the bed.

There was a washstand in the corner, a rail-back chair, and small writing table beneath a single window with shutters and no glass.

It was obviously late afternoon, to judge by the thick beam of sunlight streaming through the window. A million floating dust motes swam up and down the length, moving with the drafts.

She rose up onto her elbows and pushed the tangle of hair off her face. Her clothes were folded neatly on the chair, her hat, sword, and gun belts hung on pegs by the door.

When she lifted her head higher, she could see a rolled chart and some papers scattered across the tabletop and beside that, two tankards half-filled with unfinished ale.

Grumbling with reluctance to leave the cozy warm bed, Rose threw off the blanket and swung her legs over the side.

It was always an odd sensation waking up in a room that was stationary and did not roll with the waves.

It generally took four or five halting steps to adjust as she made her way across the room to the chair and slowly started dressing.

A quick glance told her there was no thunderpot under the bed, but an urgent need sent her to the door to peek out.

In boots, breeches, and shirt she went down the stairs, gave a look of askance to the servant in the tavern and was directed to the door that led out back.

Returning in far more comfort, she ran back up to the room and finished dressing. She had no idea where Fonteyne had gone but another brusque encounter with the general’s valet had her hitching a ride on a wagon that was being driven out to the newly christened Jackson’s Line.

She could hear the sounds of hammering, sawing, and shouting before the wagon came around the last bend in the road.

Her eyes popped wide at the sight of all the activity: men with shovels filling flour bags with dirt they were digging out of the canal, men working with saws and awls trimming stakes and sharpening the ends into lethal points.

She thanked the wagoneer and started walking along the earthworks that had, barely ten days ago, been a crumbling fieldstone wall running alongside a dry dirt ditch.

Now she had to walk up an incline to get to the top of the rampart, which was fully wide enough to walk six men abreast. More than that, she saw cannon that had been moved from the ships placed along the top of the fortification every twelve paces with bales of hay and bags of sand beside the barrels to give the gunners protection.

Walking closer to the first gun, she peered over the edge and saw a steep drop into the newly excavated ditch below …

a ditch that was now ten feet wide and laced with crossed, sharpened stakes.

The field beyond the ditch had been cleared of any vegetation higher than a man’s ankles, giving the gunners alarmingly clear, broad sight lines.

The field itself stretched out a thousand yards or more; flat, open, barren.

Andrew Jackson’s deep baritone came over her shoulder. “Impressive, isn’t it?”

“Bloody astonishing,” she agreed. “And frankly, I wouldn’t want to be the ones coming across that field trying to attack this wall.”

“Come. Walk with me.”

Rose fell into step beside him. As they walked, he paused to point out some of the stronger and weaker points in the fortifications.

He stopped to consult with parties of men with shovels and picks and gave words of thanks and encouragement to women carrying buckets of water and trays of fish pies.

The faces they passed were sweaty and dirty, but each one smiled in response to his frequent words of encouragements.

There were even children running up and down the line carrying shot and lengths of cable, fuses, pails of nails.

“Captain Fonteyne is working at the far end of the line,” Jackson said, stopping.

“He is not happy with the slow progress so he has an extra fifty men there to help with the digging. If you are going that way, will you let him know I will send more as we can spare them? And you might mention that Lafitte has gone into the bayou again, for what reason I know not. Quite the annoying creature. I almost hope he intends to stay there.”

Rose sighed; her similar dislike of the pirate king obvious. “I will tell him.”

“On the point of being annoying,” Jackson said, “I have discussed it with Captain Lamb, whose militia will be in one of the more vulnerable positions on the right. We have spies keeping watch every which way, but not everyone can see everything under cover of darkness, and should the British attempt to move up the Menteur Road and establish a redoubt, Lamb’s battalions of militia would be in grave danger. ”

He stopped and faced her. “Captain Fonteyne suggested you and Captain Kelly move your ships back down the river, a half mile, no more, and harass the British by keeping up a steady bombardment of the road and adjoining field. He assures me that Lafitte has more than enough powder and shot to keep both ships well supplied. He also assures me that you and your crew are more than able to annoy the hell out of the British.”

Rose smiled. “Billy Burr and her guns will be delighted to oblige, General.”

A small group of men had been following them as they walked, most wanting Jackson’s attention to some detail.

He gave Rose a gentle peck on the cheek and tucked a finger under her chin.

“You are your father’s daughter, and for that we are all very grateful.

” He started to walk away but stopped again.

“I like this fellow, Fonteyne. I grant you, I’ve only known him a short time, and he has a reputation that makes grown men quake, but his first thought, after coming off the battlefield, was to go and see you to make sure you were alright.

He seems to be quite taken with you, my dear, and unless my eyes deceive me, the feeling is mutual? ”

Rose felt her cheeks warming and, noting it, Jackson smiled. “I only hope you won’t make the same mistake Alexander made.”

“Mistake?”

“The next time you see your father, ask him how long it took him to gather enough courage to tell your mother he loved her.”

Rose’s blush darkened, but he had already walked away to respond to a persistent harangue from one of the carpenters.

Rose followed the stream of men going in the direction of the distant fringe of the cypress swamp.

She found Fonteyne at the far end of the canal, where furious efforts were being made to extend and heighten the wall.

He was stripped to the waist and covered in dirt head to foot.

He was one of several dozen men working with picks and shovels, first to loosen the hard-packed earth at the bottom of the ditch, then to fill the buckets and barrows that would then be used to build up the ramparts above them.

They had already lowered the ditch by five feet and added nearly half a mile to the wall, but there was still a gap between the wall and the swamp that could present a vulnerability.

Woodcutters and carpenters had constructed stout timber foundations eight feet apart and another beehive of activity was working to fill the empty space with rocks, dirt, bales of hay, anything that would form a solid base for mounting the men and cannon.

Rose was accidentally bumped by a woman carrying two heavy buckets of dirt hanging from a wooden yolk across her shoulders.

They each apologized to one another before Rose moved hurriedly out of the way.

Behind her, there were more buckets being unloaded from carts and wagons, and without giving it much thought, she stripped off her jacket, her sword and guns, and set them aside, then dug in to help.

She was thankful, after the first three trips ferrying buckets to the wall, that her hand was wrapped in bandaging.

Even so, after two hours, the linen was stained red, her shirt and breeches were sweat-soaked and smudged brown, her boots were filthy, and she seriously thought of taking a knife to the braid hanging down her back that kept swinging forward to smack her in the face.

She also had cause to be thankful for Billy Burr’s insistence that everyone on board the Cygnet , captain included, was required to participate in arduous daily training.

Her muscles ached, but apart from short breaks to drink a ladle of water, she kept going.

Several of the women working alongside Rose carrying the buckets and dumping them into the foundation, wondered that she could work so steadily and make so many trips back and forth without gasping for breath on every turn or stopping to rest. Rose, on the other hand, wondered how so many men, women, and children could carry and dump so many buckets of dirt and rubble yet the filling in of the earthworks seemed to progress by mere inches.

When an enormous basket piled high with bread and pasties came by, Rose did finally stop. She sat on a crate with a cup of water and a pie and was inspecting the tattered condition of her bandaged hand when Fonteyne saw her and strode over. He crouched down in front of her and took her hand in his.

“Let me have a look at that.”

“It’s fine, really.”

“I can see that.” He gently unwound the strip of linen and frowned at the raw, bloodied condition of her palm.

As soon as the air hit the ravaged blisters her hand began to shake. Pain returned with a vengeance and she merely shrugged at the accusing glare in Sebastien’s eyes. “I wanted to help.”