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There was a time when Anna hated Major Hewlett. Just another redcoat invading her home. Sent by the king to subjugate those who would be free.
She could not, quite, hate him anymore. He was still her enemy. Still the king’s man through and through. But she had seen too much of him to think him a villain. He conducted the ugly business of war more honorably than most. He could be persuaded to listen to reason. When he had the power to do harm, he sought justice instead. And he applied that sense of justice to his own side as well. For his arrest of Captain Simcoe, for that alone, Anna would always owe the man her gratitude.
But just now, she was seeing a different side of him entirely.
Major Hewlett, as a rule, did not come to the tavern. An officer and a gentleman did not mingle with the common soldiers under his command, and besides, he had free rein of the wine cellar at Whitehall. He had no need nor inclination to frequent a place like this.
And yet, there he was, surrounded by his officers and his men and no small number of the townsfolk, looking about him in increasing bemusement as one by one they toasted his good health.
Anna went about her business, serving the ale, mopping up spills, speaking to those guests who had a friendly word for her and avoiding those soured by the drink. They kept her busy, those men, but not so busy that she couldn’t keep an eye on the soldiers by the window, and the officer in their midst.
A dangerous man. Her enemy. And yet…
It took some time for her to put her finger on what it was about him that had changed. But then it came to her, as she glanced once more in his direction in the course of her work – a group of men passed between them, and moved aside again, and she saw him caught in a beam of sunlight, his posture loose, his wig slightly askew as he rested his chin in his hand, and he saw her looking and smiled a soft, vague smile as if she were someone he thought he recognized from years ago.
The major was a stern man, at worst pompous and overbearing, at best entirely proper. She had never seen him smile. Had never imagined it possible that he would smile at her.
Anna turned her back. She had washing up to do, and no energy to spare for such foolishness. She would polish the tabletops until she could see her face reflected back at her. She would scrub the dishes until they cracked.
When she looked again, his gaze was directed elsewhere, and she told herself to be glad of it.
She was. She was glad. Of course she was. There was no reason not to be.
By closing time, most of the patrons knew to be out of the tavern and on their way. There were often one or two who lost track of the time, or found themselves too full of false cheer or weighted down by melancholy to leave on their own, or some few who could not find their feet and had to be carried out by more nearly sober friends.
This night, after Anna saw the last of the farmers out the door and home to their wives, there was no one left but Major Hewlett. She stood in the doorway, hands on her hips, uncertain what to do about him. He was the officer in authority over Setauket; she couldn’t very well give him the rough side of her tongue and throw him out facefirst into a puddle of muck. Well—she could, but she’d regret it later. And at any rate, he hadn’t made any trouble for her all day. Still wasn’t, in all honesty. He sat slumped against the window humming quietly and looking up at the stars. The worst complaint she could raise against him was the smudges he was leaving on the glass.
“Major Hewlett?” Anna said quietly.
He smiled dreamily, but did not turn to look at her. She stepped closer.
“Major.”
“Hmm? Oh!” He managed to turn her way, swaying slightly and looking less like an officer than an attentive schoolboy—but at least he was attentive.
“Your men have all gone,” she said.
“Oh, yes. So they have.” He looked about the empty room, brow furrowing in confusion. “Yes, I see. They’ve all gone.” He blinked. “Oh, yes, I see. Terribly sorry, Mrs. Strong. I b’lieve I should—should also be going, as well.” He made a grab for the table, and did not quite make it to his feet.
Anna frowned. If his men were going to bring him here, they should have known better than to leave without him. She’d watched him drink enough to incapacitate a much larger man; no one could ever say he was impolite enough to refuse a toast.
And now she very much doubted he could make it all the way back to Whitehall on his own. Well, it made no difference to her if a British officer fell down drunk in the street. His dignity was none of her concern.
“I sh’ll be going in just a moment,” the major promised.
Anna bit her lip. She had often enough seen the vilest tendencies in men’s hearts brought to the surface by too much drink. She had thought the major might have some secret lust for violence, and relish in the power he held over her and her folk. She had never expected the earnest sweetness of the look he was giving her now.
“I...I’ll send for someone to escort you home,” she offered.
“Oh, no! No need for that at all, it’s not so very far. I can—” He pushed himself upright, nearly overbalanced, and staggered a few steps sideways before she hastened to catch him by the arm. “Oh, hello!”
“Hello, Major,” Anna said, feeling a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth in spite of herself.
“I am sorry,” he said again. “Meant to be leaving ages ago, only they kept. Saying, you know.” He gestured expansively, and certainly would have fallen if she hadn’t been there beside him.
“What were they saying, Major?” Anna asked, giving him a subtle nudge to turn his stumble into a step. If she could go and get Cicero to stick by his other side, the two of them could get him to Whitehall without exciting too much gossip in town.
“Oh, things.” He shook his head. “S’all very strange, you know. No one’s ever treated me like a hero. I’m…” He wrinkled his nose in distaste. “I know what they say about me.”
Ah. He meant, of course, that his own people thought he was a man of no importance in a do-nothing job, a sentiment that was not without its truth if one valued only shots fired and battles won. But she could not help thinking of the things that she herself had thought of him, since proven untrue.
“Anyone who speaks of you should say you’re a man of courage and good sense,” Anna said in half-apology. He had muzzled a mad dog and avoided a massacre, when it would have been easier by far to let things run their course. She owed him her respect for that. A good many people on both sides owed him their lives.
“That is very kind of you, but you, you are a man of—a woman.” He stopped, turning to rest both hands on her shoulders, to look her right in the eyes, so startlingly close, she felt she might fall right into him.
“A...woman?” she echoed softly.
“You are a woman,” he said, and smiled again, as if surprised by his own words. “A woman.” He blinked once, twice, and a third time. “A woman. Of. Of very great courage, and—and—I’ve not told you how very much I admired your bravery in—in choosing to come back here—” His head dipped. She imagined the room must be spinning for him. Whatever he was trying to say, he might not remember it by morning.
“It’s all right, I understand. Just a few more steps, now,” Anna urged.
“Oh, yes!” Beaming, he allowed her to turn him and guide him out the door, out into the night.
“And now we have just a little way to walk.” Unobtrusively, she held onto his elbow, keeping him to the path when he tried to weave aimlessly away. And he allowed it, even went along cheerfully, laughing at his missteps and ever eager to please.
“You are very kind,” he said. Again. “I never meant to stay so long. I never—I don’t get drunk.”
“I’m sure you don’t,” Anna agreed.
“And you. You are so…” His voice lowered to something close to a whisper, in a register that sent a peculiar frisson through her heart. “You are a remarkable woman, Mrs. Strong.”
“Oh,” Anna said. She had been called many things, by many people, but never remarkable, in such a tone of reverence.
“And it is my very great privilege to walk with you on this beautiful night," he continued more lightly. "But sadly, sadly we must soon be parted.” Head turned up to the sky, he began to sing, “I'm lonesome since I crossed the hill, And o'er the moor and valley, Such grievous thoughts my heart do fill, Since parting with my Sally…”
“Major Hewlett!” Anna protested.
“It’s nothing inappropriate, it’s an army song! I seek no more the fine or gay, For each does but remind me How swift the hours did pass away, With the girl I left behind me.”
“Hush! It’s late,” she whispered.
The major nodded and pressed a finger to his lips, grinning broadly, then broke out just as loudly as before, “O ne'er shall I forget the night, The stars were bright above me And gently lent their silvery light When first she vowed to love me.”
“Softly,” Anna insisted. She joined him on the final verse, singing so quietly as to barely be heard, and with an effort he brought himself down to match her volume.
“But now I'm bound to Brighton camp Kind heaven, then, pray guide me And send me safely back again, To the girl I left behind me.”
He laughed, then, clutching at her arm as his balance deserted him once again. And she knew that she must harden her heart against him, for the sake of the cause. But she couldn’t imagine how to go about it. A man who looked at her the way he was now was not a man she could think of as an enemy.
The best she could do was deliver him to bed, and try not to think of him at all.
Years later, she would hear someone singing that song. What she felt about it, she kept locked deep in her heart.
O ne'er shall I forget the night,
The stars were bright above me
And gently lent their silvery light
When first she vowed to love me
She still tried not to think of him.