the region until matters settled. He’d also been forced to leave Peggy behind, who had only just given birth to their first child, a son.
It was a sad story all around, and when Papa urged me to call upon her for the sake of good will, I happily agreed. How could I turn away from the opportunity to congratulate another lady on her safe delivery, and to welcome the blessing of her new baby into the world?
But when I called upon Mrs. Arnold, she appeared in low spirits, and to take little joy in her babe, who slept in a beribboned cradle beside her chair. Although she received me dressed in fashionable and costly undress—a pink silk jacket edged with fur over a quilted silk petticoat, a profusion of lace around her neck and elbows, and her hair lightly powdered—her eyes still carried the exhaustion of her recent confinement, and her entire posture drooped beneath the misery of her separation from her husband.
“Please forgive the meanness of my situation, Miss Schuyler,” she said with a weary wave of her hand. “Until my husband summons me to our new home, I am forced to remain in this place as if I were a prisoner.”
“Not at all, Mrs. Arnold,” I said. Her description surprised me. The house was hardly mean, but pleasant and well furnished. Papa had told me that with her husband away, she was residing here in the home of a friend, and while I thought this an ungrateful way to repay the friend’s hospitality, I was willing to ascribe it to the changeable nature of new mothers.
“Surely you must be in Heaven itself,” I continued, “so long as you have this little cherub at your side.”
He was a beautiful baby, with wisps of golden curls and full cheeks like his mother’s. If I were in her position, I would indeed feel blessed to have such this perfect reminder of my husband and his love, especially in the middle of a war. I’d often wondered if Alexander’s son would resemble him: would he inherit his father’s golden red hair, his smile, his blue-green eyes that were as changeable as the sea?
“My darling little Edward,” Mrs. Arnold murmured, and sighed as she glanced at the sleeping baby. “How fortunate he is that he knows not the persecutions his poor father has endured!”
“You must be brave, Mrs. Arnold, for your child’s sake and for your own.” As a soldier’s daughter, I knew the importance of being stoic. “Your husband would wish that for you.”
“Alas, my poor husband.” She drew a lace-trimmed handkerchief from her sleeve and daubed prettily at her eyes. “He has so many enemies! It wasn’t enough that he became a cripple in the service of his country. His enemies now hound him wherever he goes, and will not rest until he is completely ruined.”
I was beginning to suspect her sorrows were for effect and that she might make a better actress on the stage than a general’s wife, yet again I granted her the benefit of the doubt.
“Surely things will soon improve, Mrs. Arnold,” I said. “Now that the court-martial is over and your husband is acquitted, he can again resume his duties with the army.”
“You don’t understand my husband’s situation, Miss Schuyler,” she said with another great sigh. “The acquittal means nothing. The villains in Congress and in the army will continue to plot against him and deny his hopes for promotion and reward. If only he had friends he could trust!”
“But he does,” I said. “My father speaks of General Arnold as a hero, and he and His Excellency both wish to help your husband to restore his reputation as quickly as possible.”
She sighed again. “You father is an honorable gentleman, yes,” she admitted. “But if there were someone closer to His Excellency, someone able to sway him in favor of my husband, someone who was constantly in his company.”
She looked at me expectantly, as if I alone possessed the answer. I am glad to say I didn’t understand her meaning.
“The general is a wise and experienced gentleman,” I began. “I’m certain he’ll make a decision that shall benefit you—”
“I’d heard you share an intrigue with Colonel Hamilton,” she said. “His Excellency’s most favored aide-de-camp. That is true, yes?”
“No,” I said quickly, blushing and thinking again of how unsettling it was to be the centerpiece of idle gossip. “That is, yes, Colonel Hamilton serves as a member of the General’s Family at headquarters, and yes, I am honored to consider him a dear friend, but there is no ‘intrigue’ to our connection.”
“Yes, yes,” she said, leaning forward with more animation than before. “My husband has only the highest praise for Colonel Hamilton, for his intelligence and his cleverness, and his devotion to the general. But then, that is only to be expected, isn’t it, considering Colonel Hamilton’s illustrious patrimony.”
I frowned. “I fear you’re mistaken, Mrs. Arnold. Colonel Hamilton has achieved much, but through his own industry and the support of his friends, not his father, a Scottish gentleman long absent from his life.”
“Your reticence is admirable, Miss Schuyler,” she said with an archness that made me uneasy. “But you needn’t be so discreet with me. The truth is widely known here in Philadelphia, and explains much of the general’s fondness for Colonel Hamilton.”
“I have told you the truth as I have heard it from Colonel Hamilton himself,” I said, ready to defend Alexander in whatever way necessary. “There is no other, Mrs. Arnold.”
She smiled slyly. “But there is, isn’t it? Everyone has heard how the colonel is the general’s natural son, conceived while His Excellency was visiting the Caribbean long ago. They see the obvious resemblance in the same coppery hair, the same line to his jaw, and you cannot deny how His Excellency positively dotes upon Colonel Hamilton, favoring him as if he truly were the son he never sired with Lady Washington.”
“Hush, madam, please!” I exclaimed, not so much scandalized by what she said as shocked that she’d repeat such ill-founded gossip. “Colonel Hamilton His Excellency’s son! That goes beyond tattle to purest slander, and I will not hear another word. Good day, Mrs. Arnold.”
I rose to leave, but she caught my arm.
“Forgive me, Miss Schuyler, I beg you,” she said, her head meekly bowed and her voice so contrite that I heard the tremble of tears in it. “Please don’t leave yet. If I spoke rashly, it was from my desperate desire to assist my husband in any way that I might. Please stay, Miss Schuyler, and help me to help my husband.”
Reluctantly I sat, though I kept to the very edge of the chair. “How can I possibly help General Arnold?”
“By asking Colonel Hamilton to use his influence with General Washington on my husband’s behalf,” she begged. “All my husband desires is another command or post, another chance to serve and prove his worth. Is that so much to ask for an officer who has already given so much?”
I remembered how Papa had said that General Arnold had been so grievously injured at the Battle of Saratoga (so near to our own house) that he’d nearly lost his leg, and that he’d never fully recover from the wound to the point that he could ride or walk with ease again. That was indeed a sacrifice, and I relented.
“I can promise nothing,” I warned. “But I will share your plight with Colonel Hamilton in the event that he has the opportunity to set it before the general.”
“I cannot begin to thank you enough.” Her face relaxed, and for
