The Blooding. James McGee

– archive copies as well as the latest editions – and securing a seat in a corner with his back to the wall, he’d spent the morning familiarizing himself with the state of the nation. The Boston Patriot and the Washington Intelligencer had both carried a variety of dispatches, ranging from accounts of skirmishes and copies of letters from front-line commanders to the Department of War, to lists of the dead and wounded, notifications of promotions, requests for militia volunteers and even reward notices for deserters. More informative, by far, however, had been The War, the aptly titled New York broadsheet, published specifically in order to cover the conflict.

      Concentrating on the latter’s editorial, the first thing that struck him was that the tide of war had taken a much grimmer turn since he’d left France, resulting in grave consequences for both sides of the divide.

      The main build-up of forces had been along the borderland between the United States and the Province of Upper Canada, down the line of the Great Lakes, Ontario and Erie, with British and American combatants facing each other along opposite shores of the Niagara and Detroit Rivers.

      It had been the British who’d seized the initiative when, back in August, General Isaac Brock crossed the Canadian border and laid siege to Detroit, capturing the town and taking his opposite number, General William Hull, prisoner. There had been several cut-and-thrust sorties since then, with the British continuing to have the edge, culminating in the defeat of a recent American counter-invasion attempt into Canada near Queenston, during which the aforementioned General Brock had lost his life to a sniper’s bullet. But, so far, it looked as though neither side had been able to summon the troops or equipment to wage a decisive land battle.

      While the red-coated regiments had shown their superiority in the land war, the same could not be said for the waterborne operations of the Provincial Marine, the Royal Navy force that patrolled the waterways of the St Lawrence River and the northern lakes. The Americans, against all odds, had managed to seal the Marine inside its main base of operations, the port of Kingston at the eastern end of Lake Ontario.

      In sifting events into chronological order, it had soon become clear to Hawkwood that in the weeks since the debacles at Detroit and Queenston the Americans had been regrouping with a vengeance, strengthening their troop numbers along the St Lawrence and bolstering their main naval base at Sackets Harbor – across the water from Kingston – where a number of newly acquired merchant vessels had been converted into war ships and transports.

      Emboldened by their new-found confidence, the Americans had also undertaken several small but telling raids against British supply convoys and fortifications along the various river routes. Rumours had even been revived which spoke of another possible invasion attempt on Canada.

      Two maps displayed in a four-day-old edition of The War had eventually provided the information he’d been searching for: the disposition of British and American forces. One covered the operations around the Detroit River; the other reflected events that had taken place further east in New York State along the northern Canadian border and the Niagara Frontier. Studying the maps carefully while referring to the corresponding dispatches, it hadn’t taken long to deduce that if he was to try to reach the British lines, three escape routes were available to him – none of which looked in the least inviting. There was no need to make a decision there and then, however, because no matter which route he ended up taking, all roads led to one inevitable transit point:

      Albany.

      What had made him hesitate, though only for a moment, had been the fact that Albany had recently been designated the headquarters of the American Army’s Northern Command.

      Deciding that was a bridge he’d have to cross when he came to it, Hawkwood had surreptitiously extracted the New York map page from the newspaper and folded it into his pocket. As he’d left the Exchange, one thought remained uppermost in his mind.

      No one had said it was going to be easy.

      The coach had left Boston at the ungodly hour of two in the morning. His seaman’s bag having been swapped for a more convenient knapsack, Hawkwood had alighted from the coach at Albany’s State Street terminus at eight o’clock in the evening of the following day, a mere three days after his arrival on to American soil.

      And more than twenty years since his departure.

      The major caught the pot-man’s eye and raised his empty glass.

      “I’ll have the same again and another brandy for my friend.” As the order was borne away, Quade began to massage his right thigh.

      “How’s the leg?” Hawkwood asked.

      “Stiff as a board and aching like the devil, but the surgeon told me I can probably return to duty by the end of the week.”

      Quade didn’t look or sound that enthused by the prospect. From the exchanges they’d had so far, Hawkwood could understand why.

      The drinks arrived.

      “Whiskey for you, Major,” the pot-man said. “Brandy for the gentleman.”

      If you only knew, Hawkwood thought. He took a swallow, savouring the warmth of the alcohol as it passed down his throat, and watched as Quade downed half the contents of the whiskey glass in one go.

      “You were telling me about Queenston,” Hawkwood said.

      Queenston was where the major had received his wounds. Not that Hawkwood was that curious as to how Quade had come by his injuries. He was more interested in what information the major might have regarding American and British troop emplacements.

      The hamlet lay on the Canadian side of the Niagara River, as Hawkwood had discovered from his visit to the reading room. It was also home to a British garrison, one of a string of Crown fortifications that stretched from Niagara in the north, down to Fort Erie in the south, where the river began its spectacular journey to Lake Ontario. It was this length of frontier that formed the apogee to one of Hawkwood’s three possible escape routes.

      “Goddamned militia!” Quade’s knuckles gleamed white as he gripped his glass. “Citizen soldiers? Useless bastards, more like! If there’d been a regular in command instead of that fool Van Rensselaer, it would’ve been different. That’s the trouble with political appointees, they’re easily pressured. He was told he had to attack Canada before winter. He should have stood his ground, told them it was too soon. It was the same with his officers. The idiots were demanding he either launch the invasion or let their men go home for Christmas! God save us! Is that any way to run an army? Well, is it?” The major took another swig. “D’you know there weren’t even enough boats for the crossing?”

      Beads of perspiration clung to the major’s brow. Whether they were a result of his proximity to the hearth or due to the pain in his leg or the effects of the whiskey, it was hard to tell. Quade wasn’t slurring his words, so the sweat oozing from his pores could just as easily have been a physical manifestation of the resentment he was giving voice to – with scant regard for discretion. Though no one in the vicinity seemed to be paying either of them any attention.

      “Is that so?” Hawkwood said.

      “And half the vessels had lost their oars!”

      From the tone of his voice, Quade sounded as if he was just getting started. Hawkwood braced himself to endure a lengthy rant about the inadequacies of the General Staff before any useful nuggets of information could be gleaned.

      But as Quade’s story unfolded, it was difficult not to sympathize, even if he was the enemy. The newspaper accounts of the battle had made much of General Brock’s death, but now it emerged that much of the story had gone unreported. American losses had been considerable.

      “I was in the second wave,” Quade continued, the edge in his voice as sharp as a blade. “We used a fisherman’s path to gain the Heights and take their battery – though not before they’d spiked their guns, which we could have done without. Victory should have been ours. With Brock dead, we thought they’d cut and run. What we hadn’t allowed for was his aide-de-camp, Sheaffe, bringing up reinforcements from Fort George or the arrival of