The Incredible William Bowles. Joseph J. Millard

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СКАЧАТЬ enter the city until the following morning. Meanwhile, the citizens were advised to organize patrols for the purpose of protecting the city through the night.

      “The arrival of the British troops,” read the notices, “will be orderly. There will be no looting or seizures. The persons and property of all citizens will be respected and protected. Any supplies required for the subsistence of the troops will be paid for promptly and generously in pound sterling notes.”

      Will, huddled under a wooden awning, heard the proclamation read to a large crowd gathered in the rain. There were scattered cheers from some loyalists, but for the most part the announcement was received in numb silence. Will headed back toward the shop, feeling as if a crushing weight was at last being lifted from his shoulders.

      He was a block from the shop when a familiar voice hissed from the darkness of a deep doorway. “Will, lad! In here—quickly.”

      Will darted into the doorway and made out the shadowy figure of Samuel Pryne. “What is it? What are you doing out here? What happened?”

      “Betrayal,” Pryne said hoarsely. “For months we have unwittingly nursed a viper in our bosom, a spy for that infernal Council of Censors. He has betrayed our whole work and they mean to wreak their vengeance tonight, before our troops arrive to protect us.”

      “Then you’re in danger every minute we stand here,” Will whispered. “We’d best get out of the city at once.”

      “Not until the others are warned, Will. I want you to deliver this letter to Adam Fenter. And take this bottle of my medicine. If you’re stopped for questioning, say you’ve been sent to deliver a healing potion for his ill wife. Afterward, make your way out the Germantown Road to where General Cornwallis and his occupation force are camped, only two miles beyond the city. Under no circumstances come anywhere near the shop again.”

      “But where will you be?”

      “I’ll join you at camp as soon as I’ve recovered some vital letters from my bedroom. Now hurry! We’ve neither of us a moment to lose if we value our lives, Will.”

      Will completed his errand without being halted or even encountering another person. The rain-washed streets were dark and empty of life. The whole city seemed paralyzed by the enormity of the disaster it had so long feared and anticipated.

      At the corner of High Street again, Will turned westward toward the Germantown Road, but after a few steps he came to a stop. His mind was still reeling from the suddenness of the calamity. He knew that, as Pryne’s assistant and intimate, he could never convince the patriots that he was not a full partner in the whole conspiracy. If caught he would face the same penalty as the others.

      But stronger than fear for his own safety was concern for the man who had become a second father to him. Pryne had flatly forbidden him to return to the vicinity of the apothecary shop. Suddenly nothing mattered but to find the gallant little druggist and see him safely to the British camp. Will whirled and went back down High Street at a grim trot.

      A block from his destination he stopped in a doorway to reconnoiter. As far as he could see, there was not a living soul on High Street and the shop looked exactly as he had left it earlier that evening. A soft, reassuring glow of light came through the small-paned window.

      After a cautious wait, Will angled across the street and peered in the window.

      His body went rigid and a cold chill raised the nape of his neck. Behind the peaceful facade, the shop was a shambles. The flickering light of a single candle glinted on piles of broken glass and dark puddles of spilled liquids. The counter and shelves had been ruthlessly smashed to splinters. Bottles of medicine had been shattered against the walls, leaving great ugly stains. A glow of candlelight came from the back room but there was no sign of life or movement.

      With ice in his veins and his heart in his throat, Will gently lifted the latch and stepped into the shop, his boots crunching loudly on the litter of broken glass. He stood for a long moment, listening and hearing no sound from either the back room or Pryne’s quarters above.

      At last he stepped cautiously toward the doorway into the back, stabbed by a gnawing fear of what he might see. He stepped through and stopped short, his breath locking in his throat.

      His eyes met the same scene of frenzied destruction, but that he had expected. What he had not anticipated was the gaunt, coarse-featured man in homespun who sat on the wreckage of his bed. A cocked musket lay across the stranger’s bony knees, its muzzle gaping straight at Will’s middle.

      “Come in, boy,” the man said in a rough voice. “Come all the way in and tell me who ye are and what you’re doin’ here. And I give ye fair warning, boy, if your story doesn’t tickle my fancy, you’re in trouble. Bad, bad trouble.”

      Chapter 7

      “Well? Well? Speak out, boy. Has the cat got your tongue, or do ye expect I’ll allow you the rest of the night to think up a good lie?”

      “I expect you’d allow me to catch my wits,” Will managed sullenly. “It’s not every night I walk in to find a shop all broken up and a stranger pointing a gun at me. I’d say you’re the one ought to be coming out with an explanation.”

      “Never you mind that, boy.” The pale, cold, suspicious eyes narrowed. “You come here to see that fat feller, Pryne, the ’pothecary. Now you start tellin’ me jest what it was you come to see him about—an’ make sure you tell it straight.”

      Will’s mind was a spinning chaos. Every nerve tingled with a realization that he faced a deadlier danger than ever before in his life. If the full extent of Pryne’s operations was known, hanging would be the least he could expect. He had to think up a plausible story, and fast.

      His hand brushed his pocket and felt the bottle of medicine Pryne had given him earlier as a cover for his errand. Suddenly a blinding flash of sheer inspiration burst in his mind.

      “All right,” he said. “Point that dinged Brown Bess in another direction for a minute and I’ll tell you who I am and what I aimed to do to that feller, Pryne. My name’s Bent Calloway and I live over in the Northern Liberties.” He dug the bottle of dark brown medicine from his pocket and held it up. “My Maw’s been poorly of late and this afternoon Pryne sold me this medicine, guaranteein’ it for a sure cure.” The gaunt man reached out for the bottle and examined it intently. He handed it back at last and grunted for Will to continue.

      “When I got it home it just didn’t somehow smell right to me. Then I remembered hearin’ that Tory druggists was poisoning their medicine to kill honest patriots. So I come back with the idea I’d make Pryne drink some of it himself, right before my eyes. If he done it and it didn’t kill him, I figured it’d be safe to give to my Maw.”

      The gaunt man uncoiled and stood up, the last trace of suspicion gone from his pale eyes. “Boy, you was smart, and luckier than you know. I wouldn’t try that there stuff on a sick dog. Pryne wasn’t only a Tory but a dirty spy to boot. Him and his kind sat up nights thinkin’ of new ways to kill decent liberty-lovin’ folks. But you might as well dump that p’ison out, now. They ain’t nobody goin’ to get any of it down Pryne’s throat, not no more they ain’t.”

      Will felt a terrible coldness close over his senses and a wracking sickness seize the pit of his stomach. With an enormous effort he forced out the question, “What happened to him?”

      “Well, now,” the gaunt man said cheerfully, “me an’ a few СКАЧАТЬ