The Conqueror

V

“Alexan­der!” cried a mu­si­cal but im­pe­ri­ous voice.

Hamil­ton was walk­ing in the depths of the wood, think­ing out his fi­nan­cial pol­icy for the im­me­di­ate re­lief of the coun­try. He start­ed and faced about. Kit­ty Liv­ingston sat on her horse, a charm­ing pic­ture in the icy bril­liance of the wood. He ran to­ward her, ripped off her glove, kissed her hand, re­placed the glove, then drew back and salut­ed.

“You are a saucy boy,” said Miss Liv­ingston, “and I've a mind to box your ears. I've brought you up very bad­ly; but up­on my word, if you were a few years old­er, I be­lieve I'd mar­ry you and keep you in or­der, some­thing no oth­er wom­an will ev­er be able to do. But I've a piece of news for you--my dear lit­tle broth­er. Bet­sey Schuyler is here.”

Alexan­der, much to his an­noy­ance, blushed vivid­ly. “And how can you know that I have ev­er even seen Miss Schuyler?” he asked, rather sulk­ily.

“_She_ told me all about it, my dear. And I in­ferred from the young la­dy's man­ner that she lived but to re­new the ex­pe­ri­ence. She is down at Sur­geon-​Gen­er­al Cochraine's. Mrs. Cochraine is her aunt. Se­ri­ous­ly, I want you to be a good lit­tle beau, and keep her here as long as pos­si­ble. She is a great ad­di­tion to our so­ci­ety; for she is not on­ly one of the belles of the coun­try, ac­com­plished and ex­pe­ri­enced, but she has an amaz­ing fine char­ac­ter, and I am anx­ious to know her bet­ter. You are still too young to mar­ry, _mon en­fant_, but you are so pre­co­cious and Miss Schuyler is so charm­ing--if you will mar­ry at your ab­surd age, you could not do bet­ter; for you'll get fine par­ents as well as a wife, and I've nev­er known a youth more in need of an en­tire fam­ily.”

Hamil­ton laughed. “If I ac­cu­mu­late any more par­ents,” he said, “I shall share the fate of the cat. This morn­ing Colonel Har­ri­son--one of my fa­thers--al­most un­dressed me to see if my flan­nels were thick enough, Mrs. Wash­ing­ton gave me a fear­ful scold­ing be­cause I went out with­out a muf­fler, and even the Gen­er­al is al­ways dart­ing edged glances at the soles of my boots. Yes­ter­day, Lau­rens, who is two-​thirds En­glish, tried to force an um­brel­la in­to my hand, but at that I re­belled. If I mar­ry, it will be for the plea­sure of tak­ing care of some­one else.”

He es­cort­ed Miss Liv­ingston out to the high­road, and re­turned to Head­quar­ters, his imag­ina­tion danc­ing. He had by no means for­got­ten Miss Schuyler. That mer­ry rogu­ish high-​bred face had shone above many dark hori­zons, il­lu­mi­nat­ed many bit­ter win­ter nights at Val­ley Forge. He was ex­cit­ed at the prospect of see­ing her again, and has­tened to ar­range a din­ner, to which she must be bid­den. The young men did as they chose about en­ter­tain­ing, sure of Wash­ing­ton's ap­proval.

“Ah, I know Miss Schuyler well,” ex­claimed Tilgh­man, when Hamil­ton re­marked that they should im­me­di­ate­ly show some at­ten­tion to the daugh­ter of so il­lus­tri­ous a man as Gen­er­al Schuyler. “I've fetched and car­ried for her--in fact I once had the hon­our to be despatched by her mam­ma to buy her a pair of stays. I fell at her lit­tle feet im­me­di­ate­ly. She has the most live­ly dark good-​na­tured eyes I ev­er saw--Good God, Hamil­ton, are you go­ing to run me through?”

Hamil­ton for the mo­ment was so con­vulsed with jeal­ous rage that his very fin­gers curved, and he con­trolled them from his friend's throat with an ef­fort. Tilgh­man's words brought him to his sens­es, and he laughed hearti­ly. “I was as jeal­ous as Oth­el­lo, if you'll have the truth, and just why, I vow I don't know, for I met this young la­dy on­ly once, and that a year ago. I was much at­tract­ed, but it's not pos­si­ble I'm in love with her.”

“It's love, my dear boy,” said Tilgh­man, grave­ly. “Go and ask Steuben if I am not right. Lau­rens and I will ar­range the din­ner. You at­tend to your case im­me­di­ate­ly.”

Hamil­ton, much con­cerned, re­paired to the house of Baron Steuben. This old courtier and rake was physi­cian in or­di­nary to all the young men in their nu­mer­ous car­dia­cal com­pli­ca­tions. Hamil­ton found him in his lit­tle study, smok­ing a huge meer­schaum. His weath­er-​beat­en face grinned with de­light at the ap­pear­ance of his favourite, but he shook his head solemn­ly at the rev­ela­tion.

“I fear this time you are shot, my dear lit­tle Hamil­ton,” he said, with much con­cern. “Have you told me all?”

“All that I can think of.” Hamil­ton was sit­ting for­ward on the edge of the chair in con­sid­er­able de­jec­tion. He had not ex­pect­ed this in­tri­ca­tion, had hoped the Baron would puff it away.

“Has she a neat waist?”

Hamil­ton ad­mit­ted, with some sur­prise, that her waist was ex­cep­tion­al.

“And her eyes?--I have heard of them--benev­olent, yet sparkling;--and a daugh­ter of the Schuylers. Hamil­ton, be­lieve me, there are worse things than love.”

“But I have af­fairs of the ut­most mo­ment on hand at present. I'm re­volv­ing a whole fi­nan­cial sys­tem, and the cor­re­spon­dence grows heav­ier ev­ery day. I've no time for love.”

“My boy,” said the for­mer aide to the great Fred­er­ick, with em­pha­sis, “when you can work in the sun, why cling to the cold cor­ner of a pub­lic hearth? Your brain will spin the faster for the fire un­der­neath. You will write great words and be hap­py be­sides. Think of that. What a com­bi­na­tion! Mein Gott! You will be ter­ri­bly in love, my son, but your bal­ance is so ex­traor­di­nary that your brain will work on just the same. Oth­er­wise I would not dare give such coun­sel, for with­out you Gen­er­al Wash­ing­ton would give up, and your poor old Steuben would not have mon­ey for to­bac­co. Give me just one half-​sovereign,” he added coax­ing­ly.

Hamil­ton ex­am­ined the big to­bac­co pouch and found it two-​thirds full. “Not a pen­ny,” he said gai­ly. “The day af­ter to-​mor­row I will buy you some my­self, but I know where that last sovereign went to.”

Hamil­ton took care of the old spendthrift's mon­ey, and not on­ly then but as long as he lived. “The Sec­re­tary of the Trea­sury is my banker,” said Steuben, years af­ter. “My Hamil­ton takes care of my mon­ey when he can­not take care of his own.”

Hamil­ton re­tired in some per­tur­ba­tion, and the re­sult of much think­ing was that he spent an un­con­scionable time over his toi­let on the evening of the din­ner. In his ner­vous­ness he tore one of his lace ruf­fles. Lau­rens at­tempt­ed to mend it, and the rent waxed. Hamil­ton was forced to knock at Mrs. Wash­ing­ton's door and ask her to re­pair the in­jury. She was al­ready dressed, in a black lutestring, her hair flat and nat­ural. She looked ap­prov­ing­ly at Hamil­ton, who, not ex­cept­ing Lau­rens, was al­ways the most fault­less­ly dressed mem­ber of the fam­ily. To-​night he wore dark green vel­vet, fit­ting close­ly and exquisite­ly cut, white silk stock­ings, and a pro­fu­sion of del­icate lace. His hair was worn in a queue and pow­dered. It was not till some years lat­er that he con­formed to the pre­vail­ing fash­ion and wore a wig.

Mrs. Wash­ing­ton mend­ed the lace, retied the bow of his queue, kissed him and told him to for­get the cares of war and cor­re­spon­dence, and en­joy him­self. Hamil­ton re­tired, much com­fort­ed.

It was an im­pos­ing fam­ily which, a half-​hour lat­er, await­ed the guests in the draw­ing-​room. Wash­ing­ton was in black vel­vet and silk stock­ings, his best white wig spread­ing in two sym­met­ri­cal wings. It was a cold grave fig­ure al­ways, and threw an air of solem­ni­ty over ev­ery scene it loomed up­on, which on­ly Hamil­ton's live­ly wit could dis­pel. Lau­rens wore plum-​coloured vel­vet and much lace, a mag­nif­icent court cos­tume. His own fig­ure was no less ma­jes­tic than Wash­ing­ton's, but his brown eyes and full mouth were al­most in­vari­ably smil­ing, de­spite the canker. He wore a very close wig. Tilgh­man was in blue, the oth­er men in more sober dress. Lafayette some time since had de­part­ed for France, Hamil­ton hav­ing sug­gest­ed that the in­tro­duc­tion of a French mil­itary force of six or sev­en thou­sand troops would have a pow­er­ful ef­fect up­on the Amer­ican army and peo­ple.

La­dy Ster­ling ar­rived with La­dy Kit­ty--the bride of Colonel William Duer since Ju­ly--her undis­tin­guished home­li­ness en­hanc­ing the smart ap­pear­ance of her daugh­ter, who was one of the beau­ties of the time. La­dy Kit­ty had a long oval face, cor­rect haughty lit­tle fea­tures, and a gen­er­al air of ex­treme high breed­ing. Her pow­dered hair was in a tow­er, and she had the tini­est waist and stood up­on the high­est heels of all the belles. She wore white satin over an im­mense hoop, a flounce of Span­ish lace and a rope of pearls. Kit­ty Liv­ingston wore yel­low which out­shone the light of the can­dles. Su­san Boudinot and the oth­er girls were dressed more sim­ply. Mr. Boudinot's eyes were as keen and as kind as ev­er, his nose seemed longer, and the flesh was ac­cu­mu­lat­ing be­neath his chin.

The Cochraines and Miss Eliz­abeth Schuyler were the last to ar­rive. The north­ern belle's wardrobe had been an ob­ject of much con­cern to the young ladies now cut off from New York shops, and lament­ing the de­mor­al­ized con­di­tion of those in Philadel­phia. In Al­bany all things were still pos­si­ble. Miss Schuyler wore a pink bro­cade of the rich­est and most del­icate qual­ity, and a bertha of Brus­sels lace. The point­ed bodice and large paniers made her waist look al­most as small as Kit­ty Duer's, and her feet were the tini­est in the world. She turned them in and walked with a slight shuf­fle. Hamil­ton had nev­er seen a mo­tion so adorable. Her hair was rolled out from her face on both sides as well as above, and so thick­ly pow­dered that her eyes looked as black as Gen­er­al Wash­ing­ton's coat, while her cheeks and lips were like red wine on pale am­ber. She blushed as Hamil­ton bowed be­fore her and of­fered his arm, and then she felt his heart thump. As for Hamil­ton, he gave him­self up for lost the mo­ment she en­tered the room, and with the ad­mis­sion, his feel­ings con­cen­trat­ed with their usu­al fiery im­petu­os­ity. As it was too soon for an out­let, they rushed to his eyes and camped there, to Miss Schuyler's com­bined dis­com­fort and de­light.

For once Hamil­ton was con­tent to lis­ten, and Miss Schuyler was not loath to en­ter­tain this hand­some young aide, of whom all the world was talk­ing, and who had haunt­ed her dreams for a year. She had read Mil­ton, Shen­stone, and Dodsworth, “The Search af­ter Hap­pi­ness,” by Han­nah More, the works of Madame de Gen­lis, the “Es­say on Man,” and Shake­speare's lighter plays. Her learn­ing was not op­pres­sive, mere­ly suf­fi­cient to give dis­tinc­tion to her mind, and Hamil­ton was en­chant­ed once more; but he found her most in­ter­est­ing when re­lat­ing per­son­al anec­dotes of en­coun­ters with sav­age war­riors in that dark north­ern land where she had been born and bred, of hideous mas­sacres of which her neigh­bours had been the vic­tims, of ad­ven­tur­ous jour­neys she had tak­en with her fa­ther, of paint­ed chief­tains they had been forced to en­ter­tain. She talked with great spir­it and no waste of words, and it was ev­ident that she was both sen­si­ble and hero­ic. Hamil­ton ate lit­tle and for­got that he was in a com­pa­ny of twen­ty peo­ple. He was re­called by an abrad­ed shin.

He turned with a jump and en­coun­tered Meade's ag­onized face thrust across Su­san Liv­ingston, who sat be­tween them.

“For God's sake, Hamil­ton, come forth and talk,” said Meade, in a hoarse whis­per. “There hasn't been a word said above a mut­ter for three-​quar­ters of an hour. Tilgh­man gave out long ago. Un­less you come to the res­cue we'll all be moan­ing in each oth­er's arms in three min­utes.”

Hamil­ton glanced about the ta­ble. Wash­ing­ton, look­ing like him­self on a mon­ument, was mak­ing not a pre­tence to en­ter­tain poor La­dy Ster­ling, who was al­most snif­fling. Lord Ster­ling, hav­ing grat­ified, an hour since, Mrs. Wash­ing­ton's po­lite in­ter­est in his health, was sti­fling yawn af­ter yawn, and his chub­by lit­tle vis­age was ob­long and crim­son. Tilgh­man, look­ing guilty and un­com­fort­able,--it was his du­ty to re­lieve Hamil­ton at the ta­ble,--was flirt­ing with Miss Boudinot. La­dy Kit­ty and Baron Steuben al­ways man­aged to en­ter­tain each oth­er. Lau­rens and Kit­ty Liv­ingston were sit­ting back and star­ing at each oth­er as they had stared many times be­fore. The oth­ers were gaz­ing at their plates or at Hamil­ton. It was, in­deed, a Head­quar­ters din­ner at the worst.

It has been re­marked that Hamil­ton had a strong sense of du­ty. He felt him­self un­able, even with the most charm­ing girl on the con­ti­nent be­side him, to re­sist the ap­peal of all those mis­er­able eyes, and launched forth at once up­on the pos­si­bil­ities of Lafayette re­turn­ing with an army. Ev­ery­body re­spond­ed, and he had many sub­jects of com­mon in­ter­est to dis­course bril­liant­ly up­on un­til the long meal fin­ished. Even Wash­ing­ton gave him a grate­ful glance, and the oth­ers reat­tacked their ex­cel­lent food with a lost rel­ish, now that the aw­ful si­lence and sense of per­son­al fail­ure were dis­pelled by their “bright par­tic­ular star,” as the let­ters of the day from Mor­ris­town and the vicin­ity cleped our hero. But with Miss Schuyler he had no fur­ther word that night, and he re­tired with the con­vic­tion that there were times when there was no sat­is­fac­tion what­ev­er in do­ing one's du­ty.