City of Glory: A Novel of War and Desire in Old Manhattan

Prologue

New York City Friday, June 19, 1812, 12:30 A.M.

It was a fine, quiet night, the balmy warmth of early summer a comfort, not the fiery curse it would become in a few weeks. There were no streetlamps in Canvastown—hard by Hudson’s River, the area got its name when it burned down at the start of the Revolution and the locals took to living in tents—but bright stars and a full moon. That plus the pair of coaching lamps swinging either side of the small black shay provided light enough for the single horse, an aging piebald, to make its way.

The two men in the rig had been playing billiards at McDermott’s Oyster House. On their way home now, cue sticks wedged either side of the shay’s single seat, they were reliving the game by talking about it. Ah, but if that last carom had succeeded, I’d have won again, making it six games to five, so you needn’t— The speaker, who held the reins, broke off. A knot of men stood some twenty yards ahead, a short distance from the intersection of Greenwich Street and George, where the shay had to make the turn to head back to the better neighborhood downtown.

There were five of them, dressed in the leather breeches and homespun shirts that marked them as laborers, and they were ominously quiet. The men stood in a tight circle, focused on something or someone in their midst.

The shay’s passenger and owner was Barnaby Carter, a coach maker by trade. Just put on a bit of speed and shoot past them, he said. Old Rufus won’t let us down. The piebald, hearing its name, snorted and tossed its head.

The driver was Joyful Patrick Turner, doctor and ship’s surgeon, due to go back to sea the following day. He heard his friend’s suggestion and later told himself it was exactly what he’d intended to do. Just shoot past the men ahead. Neither he nor Barnaby was spoiling for a fight. As for the woman standing in the men’s midst, whores—called hot-pockets in Canvastown—were one of the area’s prime attractions; this woman, though, held a small valise, the sort people packed for a journey, and a whore was unlikely to troll the streets for custom carrying a change of clothing. All of that aside, Joyful reined in because of what he heard—All right then, who’s going to be first? spoken in a tone full of menace.

He stood up, keeping the reins taut in one hand. Leave her be.

Couple o’ gents, one of the toughs muttered to his companions, looking at their cutaway coats and stovepipe hats. Your kind comes to Canvastown looking for pleasure, he said No harm in us having ours.

There’s plenty of hot pockets available. I don’t think this lady chooses to be bothered.

Ain’t no lady, the man closest to the shay offered with a nearly toothless smile. This here’s a mongrel bitch as you might find in any kennel got broken into when the master wasn’t looking. A runaway most likely. When we’re done, we’ll be takin’ her to a magistrate. See if there’s a reward. So you gents best be minding your own concerns and driving yourselves straight on by.

I don’t think we shall do exactly that. Joyful pitched his voice at the woman, hoping she would take his meaning, prepare herself. She stared straight at him. He returned her gaze for a second, then a movement at the edge of the circle caught his eye.

Barnaby had seen it as well. One of them’s got a knife, the coach maker murmured.

Probably more than one, Joyful said. Hang on. He cracked the reins over the horse’s rump. The piebald plunged forward. For a sickening moment the shay tilted dangerously to one side, then righted itself and surged ahead. The ruffians fell back, intent on avoiding the horse’s hooves; the woman stood her ground. Joyful stretched out his hand, but instead of taking it she remained motionless.

Joyful yanked on the reins, forcing the horse to pull up slightly, then leaned down and swept the woman into the shay, at which point some of the would-be rapists threw themselves at the rig. Joyful planted his boot firmly on the knuckles of one. He was conscious of Barnaby using his cue stick to fend off another. Joyful loosed the reins slightly. The horse sensed he was being given his head and charged straight ahead. Joyful kept his left arm around the woman’s waist. In seconds they had to make the turn onto Greenwich Street or drive straight into a stone fence backed by a thick stand of trees. Hang on! he shouted again, tightening his grip on the woman while using his other hand to tug the horse’s head to the right. The animal neighed loudly and half reared, confused and frightened. Joyful pulled harder. The horse gave in to the demands of the bit and changed direction, hauling the shay behind him in a sharp turn. This time the sickening lurch seemed to last forever, until finally the small carriage righted itself and they were hurtling down Greenwich Street, Joyful and Barnaby both laughing aloud in triumph.

When he finally reined in enough to slow them some and allow for getting the woman settled safely between him and Barnaby, the thing Joyful found most remarkable was not her beauty—though she was unquestionably beautiful—but that she was still staring at him. And he had the distinct impression she’d not stopped doing so since the first moment she saw him.

Late the following afternoon word reached the city that in the Federal District of Washington, on Thursday, the eighteenth of June, 1812, Congress had declared war on Great Britain. Dr. Joyful Patrick Turner gave up his berth on a merchant ship, and offered his services as surgeon to the navy of the United States.

September–November 1813

Chapter One

Lake Erie, Nine Miles from Put-in-Bay Friday, September 10, 1813, 2 P.M.

INSTEAD OF INHALING THE DEEP breath of fresh air Joyful Turner longed for when he came topside, he had to pull his neckerchief over his nose and mouth to keep from choking. The fight had been going on for two hours—six British ships against nine American, but the British far superior in tonnage and arms—and the air was black with the smoke of gunpowder and thick with the stench of death.

Dr. Turner, over here, sir!

Joyful made his way toward Commodore Perry’s voice. It was slow going, impossible to see much of anything, the decks of the Lawrence slick with blood and the brig listing dangerously to port. He had to hang onto the gunwale to keep his footing. Perry’s flagship was too close to the British lines for the enemy’s superiority in the larger long guns to be useful, but their gunners had found the range with smaller weapons. A shell from a short cannon known as a carronade landed close behind Joyful. A great gust of sparks flared for a moment, then died. The deck shivered beneath his feet and the list to port worsened. The blast had been close enough to make his ears ring. He shook his head to clear it, heard nothing at first, then, as if from a far distance, Perry’s second shout: Dr. Turner, I want you!

I’m here, Commodore.

Yes, so you are. Good Christ, man, you look a sight.

Thirty-two years old, Joyful was tall and lean, with blue eyes and red hair, now flattened with sweat. The long oilskin apron he wore during surgery was spattered with blobs of gore and splinters of bone. Joyful looked down at himself, then squinted up into the rigging. The sails were in tatters, and most of the lines and braces had been shot away. We’re none of us at our best at the moment, sir.

Perry managed a wry smile. There was another blast from the British. The flag, man! Get the flag!

The man who rushed to follow Perry’s command was an ordinary tar; the commodore was the only officer not flat on his back below decks in Joyful’s crammed hospital quarters. Joyful’s gut tightened as he watched the sailor head for the foremast. Are we striking our colors, sir? Surrendering to the British might make sense, but the thought sickened him.

"Indeed we are not, Dr. Turner. It’s my battle flag I want. Lawrence has become impossible to control, as you can see. I’m taking over Niagara. Perry nodded toward the row of American ships stretched beside them, half shrouded in the fog of the engagement. You’re to come with me, Doctor, and bring any crew who are able to come topside. I don’t care if they must crawl."

I have sixty-three severely wounded patients below—

And twenty-one corpses. I’m aware of the numbers, Doctor.

Both men knew that fewer than a hundred of the brig’s hundred-thirty-man complement had started the action fit for duty. The single rowboat being lowered over the brig’s side would easily accommodate the survivors of this experiment in close-quarters fighting on which Perry had staked his chance to defeat an enemy that, while a smaller squadron, both outgunned and outmanned him.

The man who had been sent to get the battle flag returned. Perry took the blue banner and quickly folded it. Joyful couldn’t see the words embroidered in large white letters, but he knew what they said. DON’T GIVE UP THE SHIP. Any man who can crawl, Doctor, Perry repeated. If he can haul a line, I want him. Even if it’s to be his last move. And yourself.

I will inform the men of your orders, Commodore. But few of the wounded will be able to comply, however much they want to. God alone knew how many legs he’d amputated in the last couple of hours. Joyful had stopped counting when the number went above two dozen. As for me, I can’t leave my patients.

As ship’s surgeon, he was in the employ of the navy, not a member of its armed forces; Perry could not command him. As you wish, Dr. Turner. I pray you Godspeed for the rest of the engagement and beyond.

And I you, Commodore.

Do not fear for me or our country this day, Doctor. We shall prevail, I promise you. Perry swung one leg over the side, then paused and reached for his pocket watch. I shall wait five minutes for any of the wounded as are able to join us, then we’re away.

May I ask for ten minutes, sir? Even the sick or wounded who can come topside won’t be able to move quickly.

Ten minutes then, Perry agreed.

The two-masted brigantine Niagara had been moving to the head of the line while they spoke, all the while keeping the American ships between herself and the enemy. Now she was athwart Lawrence. Perry and three sailors began clambering down to the waiting rowboat. Joyful turned and headed back to the hold. The list of the vessel was definitely worse, and the smoke thicker. One of the British ships—the Queen Charlotte, Joyful thought—was still firing. Lawrence had eighteen carronades to Charlotte’s two, but no one to man them. And for the last half hour there had been no powder monkeys to bring them shot.

Joyful found the hatch by feel and instinct. He was about to start down the ladderway when Jesse Edwards’s small blond head poked above it. What’s happening, Dr. Turner, sir?

Wonderful! There had been three powder monkeys when the action began. All boys under twelve, they did what was arguably the most dangerous job in any battle—running the ammunition to the guns—and two were in the pile of corpses below. He’d figured the third to be lying dead somewhere else. There you are, Jesse. I was just wondering about you.

The lad didn’t meet his gaze, speaking instead to some point over Joyful’s shoulder. I was down in the powder magazine, sir. Getting the charges the way I’m s’posed to, and—

Cowering in the stores most likely, God help him. "It’s all right, lad. No need to worry about that now. The Commodore and what’s left of the crew are about to row over to Niagara. They’re waiting for any others as are able to join them. Get on with you. Over there on the port side. Hurry."

The boy started to go, then turned back. What about you, Dr. Turner?

Nothing about me. Go on, Jesse. Look lively. That’s a good— The blast landed between them, knocking Joyful back against the bulkhead. At first he felt nothing, only smelled burned flesh, but he knew this time it was his own. He waited, half expecting to collapse, sensing his legs. No, they were fine. But there was pain now, and dizziness. Christ Jesus, don’t faint, you stupid bastard. You’re a dead man if you do. His heart thumped violently in his chest. Jesse! Where are you?

He tried to take a step forward and staggered. Jesse! Still nothing. Can’t hang about here. Have to tell the men below they can . . . The weakness almost overwhelmed him, but Joyful fought it off. Something not right about his left arm. He reached across his body: The upper arm was whole. So was the elbow and the forearm. No broken bones, so . . . Oh, Christ Jesus. He had no hand.

The wound was pouring blood. Joyful, trembling, felt his gorge rise. Shock. Ignore it. Must stop the hemorrhage. Finished otherwise. It seemed to take forever, but eventually he managed to untie his neckerchief.

Behind him the guns were still booming, but Lawrence, listing, and with no firepower, was no longer the target. He managed to get the neckerchief tied around his shattered wrist, but it had to be tighter if it was going to keep him from bleeding to death. He kept short wooden dowels in the pocket of his apron so his patients could bite something other than their own tongues when he cut. Damn! The fingers of his right hand were slippery with blood. He finally got a grip on one dowel, forced it into the knot of the makeshift bandage, and began to twist. Not the best tourniquet he’d ever fastened, but it would do the job. Jesse! Are you there, lad?

Still no answer, and he had no idea how much of Perry’s allotted ten minutes remained. The men below had a right to take the offer if they could.

He staggered over to the hatch and started down the ladderway. His left foot reached for the quarterdeck and made contact with Jesse’s body. The boy had been hurled backward by the blast.

Joyful was weak and dizzy, but he made himself crouch beside the crumpled figure. Jesse? Can you hear me? One quarterdeck lantern remained lit; still, it was nearly impossible to see in the gloom. Jesse. C’mon boy, answer me. The powder monkey didn’t move. Joyful pressed his ear to the boy’s chest. Thready and very rapid, but the heart was beating. His eyes finally adjusted to the half light, and he saw that the boy’s right arm had been shot off virtually at the shoulder. Got us both, the poxed English bastards, he muttered. Jesse didn’t move.

The blood coming from the boy’s shoulder was oozing, not pumping. A blessing. There was no way to make a tourniquet effective in such a position. The powder monkey’s kersey shirt had been shredded by the shot. Joyful was able to grip a piece of the fabric with his single hand and rip it free. He wadded the kersey into the wound, then got his one good arm underneath Jesse. He couldn’t heave him up the first time he tried, but he succeeded the second. Joyful slung the youngster over his right shoulder and staggered down to the hospital quarters deep in the hold.

There had been three lanterns lit when he left the sick bay, strung on a pulley stretched abaft the long, narrow cabin. Now there was only one. Grubbers! Where in hell are you? How come you let the damned lights go out?

Right here, Dr. Turner. I was just goin’ to trim those wicks and get some—

Useless, like most of the surgeon’s mates he’d been assigned over the eight years he’d been at sea. Forget it. Clear the way for another operation. No, wait. I’ll do it. You go above. The commodore’s waiting for any as can leave the ship with him. Joyful leaned forward and let Jesse’s body drop onto the operating table, ignoring the pulpy remains of the previous surgery that still dotted the canvas covering. The effort jarred his own wound and a wave of pain caught him unawares. Joyful sucked air into his lungs and waited for it to pass, then held his bandaged wrist up to the light. No fresh blood. The tourniquet was holding.

You’re wounded, Doctor. You want me to—

I don’t want you to do anything. He’d never had much patience with Grubbers’s whining. Just go topside so you can get away.

We’re surrendering, sir?

"No, Commodore Perry and any of the crew as can join him are transferring to Niagara. He raised his voice. Do you lot hear me? If you can drag yourselves topside, you can get off this floating charnel house. But you’d best be quick."

There, he’d done his duty. Joyful didn’t bother to see if any of the men were managing to turn themselves out of their hammocks, or rise off the pallets spread side by side on the floor. He bent over the operating table and carefully removed the wadding of shredded kersey he’d stuffed into Jesse’s wound.

Grubbers looked down at the unconscious boy. Shot up real bad, ain’t he, sir?

Yes, he is. I’ll deal with it. You get above while you can.

Grubbers hesitated another moment, then dashed for the ladderway. Joyful was vaguely conscious of one other seaman following behind him. The rest were too ill to move. Probably too ill to have heard him, come to that.

He put his good hand on Jesse Edwards’s forehead. Cool and clammy. The boy was in shock, but his breathing was steadier than it might have been. And when Joyful moved his hand to the lad’s chest, he still felt that regular if too-rapid beat. All right, Jesse. We’re going to do this, you and I. And if I can operate with one hand, you can bloody well live to tell the tale. You hear me, Jesse Edwards? He knew the boy was unconscious, but no matter. It made him feel better. You are going to survive this operation and this day, my reluctant young powder monkey, because you are a tough little Yankee bastard from Boston, despite creaming your britches in every battle. And I . . . well, I am the best goddamned surgeon in the goddamned United States Navy. Hell, no. I’m better than that. I’m the best goddamned surgeon in the world.

Actually, his cousin Andrew Turner back in New York was. But he’d once done just this sort of surgery with Andrew. Joyful was studying medicine at Columbia in those days, and living in Andrew’s house. A woman had been run over by a horse and carriage and brought to his cousin’s Ann Street surgery. The wheel had ripped her arm off practically at the shoulder, same as the bloody English guns had done to Jesse Edwards. Joyful had to act as his cousin’s assistant, and he remembered every step of the operation. He could hear Andrew’s voice as clearly as if the older man stood beside him in Lawrence’s fetid hospital quarters.

The wound requires amputation just below the scapula. Thing is, Joyful, there are many surgeons afraid of the procedure. Terrific danger of hemorrhage, of course. But she’s going to die if we don’t operate. And if we are very careful, very skilled, and a little bit lucky, she may survive.

Andrew had picked up the longest of his knives. Joyful turned to the instrument case on the table beside him and did the same. The scalpel he chose had a bone handle and a flexible blade six inches long and an inch wide. It was one of his favorites and stained with the blood of the many surgeries of this day. His was not a profession for the overly fastidious, he reminded himself, and clamped the instrument between his teeth while he reached overhead and pulled the single working lantern into position above the operating table.

Now, Joyful, hold what’s left of that arm horizontal.

Given the quality of tars assigned as surgeon’s mates, Joyful had long since installed a wall-mounted heavy hook fitted with a leather strap that he called the Assistant-as-Doesn’t-Talk-Back. He moved the lad’s inert body as close to the table’s edge as he dared and fixed what was left of the shot-off arm in position with his contraption. Clumsy work done one-handed, and getting the boy’s body strapped to the table was almost as difficult, but eventually it was done.

We make an incision like this, through the adipose membrane, from the upper part of the shoulder across the pectoral muscle down to the armpit.

That first swift cut brought the powder monkey around, and his scream reverberated off the cabin’s walls. There was a spate of murmured protests as the few wounded men still conscious registered the boy’s agony. Quiet, all of you! Squealed like stuck pigs yourselves when it was your turn. But the only reason some of you are still breathing is me and my knife. There were a few whispered assents, even a blessing or two, but Joyful ignored them. All his attention remained with the patient on the table.

The lad’s shout was actually a cause for celebration. A faint deep enough not to be ended by surgery might indicate a coma that would never give way. Joyful set down the scalpel, fetched another of the dowels from his apron pocket, and placed it in the boy’s mouth. Jesse’s eyes were wide open now, and staring into his. Bite down, as hard as you can, lad. You are going to get through this. So am I. Because if we don’t, you’re dead. He pinned the youngster with his gaze. Do you understand me, young Edwards? This time there’s nowhere to hide. You muster every scrap of courage you have and withstand this, or you die. Now make a choice—do I go ahead?

Tears rolled down Jesse’s cheeks, but he nodded. Good, Joyful said. Bite as hard as you can on that stick. I’ll be as quick as I can.

Now, we turn the knife with its edge upwards and divide the muscle.

Joyful concentrated on the muffled boom of the guns and ignored the strangled screams of the boy under the knife as well as the moans of the sick and the dying that surrounded him. Pray God they were American guns. What would the British do with the wounded if they boarded Lawrence? Probably return those who could live through the transfer to the Americans. As for him—most likely they’d impress him into the godrotting Royal Navy. Be a real pleasure to get some of those English bastards under his knife.

He put down the scalpel and turned to get ligatures to tie off the large artery. Oh, Christ Jesus. How was he going to thread the needles with one hand? Maybe that useless bastard Grubbers had prepared some in advance. He pawed through the things on the instrument table searching for a threaded needle. Nothing. He hadn’t really thought there would be.

Joyful found a largish needle and put the pointed end between his teeth, then teased out a length of catgut from the tangle Grubbers had left behind. He craned his head back, stretching his neck as far as he could, trying to get as much light as possible on the task. Bloody impossible to make the catgut go where he wanted it to. Might as well try to sprout wings and fly. But if that bit of arm were left attached, Jesse Edwards was guaranteed a slow and agonizing death from blood poisoning. God damn him to hell if he let a boy die because he couldn’t thread a—

Here, Doc. Let me do that. A pair of hands reached up and took the needle and the length of catgut.

Joyful peered into the gloom beyond the pool of light cast by the single lantern. Tompkins, isn’t it?

Tammy Tompkins. That’s right, Doc.

The tar had been one of those in the sick bay before the battle began. Your fever’s broken.

Looks like it, don’t it? Still some shaky on my pins, but I can do this. No harder than a bit of scrimshaw, this is.

Tompkins was one of the most adept whalebone carvers among the sailors. You’ll make a fine surgeon’s mate, Tammy. You’ve got the hands for it.

Not the stomach though, Doc. In the ordinary way o’ things, I can’t stand the sight o’ blood.

Well, control yourself. And prepare three more of those needles.

Joyful took up the scalpel and turned for one quick glance at his patient. The boy was staring at the knife. Bite down, Jesse. This is the worst of it, but it will soon be over. I was raised in Canton, that’s in China, and the Chinese would say it’s not your joss to die this day. Not your fate. Otherwise you’d be dead already.

This time the steady stream of talk was for the boy’s sake, not his own. Joyful made a swift, sure cut through the deltoid muscle; the artery began pumping blood. He dropped the scalpel and took hold of the artery, pinching it tight, issuing orders without turning his head. Put your fingers where mine are, Tompkins. Grab this tubelike thing I’m holding and squeeze. C’mon, damn it, do it! The boy’s a corpse otherwise. A tentative hand stretched above the bloody mess that was Jesse Edwards’s shoulder. Finally, Tompkins’s fingers were in position next to his own and Joyful could let go. He grabbed the threaded needle and tied off first the large artery, then the veins. Not as hard to do one-handed as he’d have expected.

The scalpel again. And Andrew’s voice calm and clear in his head: We pursue the incision through the joint, and carefully divide the vessels, then stop them with ligatures as we did the others.

Thank God Tompkins had done as he was told. The additional needles were ready. Joyful bent over his task, taking another quick look at his patient. Passed out again. He scooped the dowel out of the boy’s mouth for fear he’d swallow it, then retrieved his scalpel. He was in total control now: each step of the process as clear to him as if it were written out and held before his eyes, transported to that special place where he and the scalpel were one perfect instrument.

Minutes later the shredded stump of arm fell free. Still attached to the strap on the wall, it hung above the pile of severed limbs Joyful had been kicking below the table throughout this long day. Tompkins, watch what I’m doing. Damn it, man, I need you. Stop retching and pay attention. He carefully rolled down over the wound the skin he’d painstakingly preserved.

In any amputation the amount of skin you’re able to save is a gauge of your success, Joyful. Without enough you’ll leave an ugly lumpy scar that will fester and suppurate at worst, or be a constant irritation to the patient at best.

Hold the skin together while I stitch, Tompkins. Yes, like that. Good, you’re doing fine.

So was he. The wound was closed. Done and well done. Andrew might have given him a word of praise if he’d been there.

Jesse’s going to be all right, ain’t he, Doc?

Yes, Tompkins, he is. At least I think it’s likely. And without your help, it wouldn’t have happened.

Joyful put his hand on the powder monkey’s forehead. Not even a hint of fever, by Almighty God. You’ve good joss, Jesse Edwards. As for me, I’m a bloody genius, I am.

What about that, then? The sailor nodded toward the tourniquet still tied around Joyful’s left wrist.

Ah, yes. This. A bloody one-handed genius. I think you’d best thread me another few needles, Tammy Tompkins. Time I cleaned this up as well. You’ll have to— Listen. What he’d heard was silence.

No more guns, Doc.

Exactly. Not ours and not theirs.

What do you think, Dr. Turner? Have we surrendered or have they?

I’m afraid I’ve no idea. But, if we’re going to be boarded, I’d prefer to get this done first. Let’s have a tune, Mr. Tompkins. Tammy Tompkins was the ship’s champion whistler as well as a master of scrimshaw. Not ‘Old Zip Coon’ as usual. Something different. Something to put heart into us.

Tompkins pursed his lips and complied, doing a little in-place jig to help things along. Joyful meanwhile bit down on one of his own dowels, then used his right hand to cut the jagged bits of bone and flesh from his shattered left wrist and stitch the remaining skin in place. All to the tune of Yankee Doodle Dandy.

At 4 P.M. on that September Friday, the British fleet on Lake Erie—two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop—struck their colors. Commodore Oliver Perry, USN, now flying his blue and white battle flag aboard the Niagara, accepted the Royal Navy’s surrender and scribbled on the back of a letter a hasty message for General William Henry Harrison: We have met the enemy and he is ours.

Chapter Two

New York City Monday, November 15, 4 P.M.

THE SNOW FELL in large flakes that lasted a moment then melted to nothingness, but the air was cold and getting colder. Early for it, but there was a real storm brewing. Joyful smelled the tang of it on the afternoon air.

The smells of good cooking as well. Most folks had their dinner about now, not at three the way it was in the old days. An extra sixty minutes to work. That was always the way of things in New York. Do more, do it faster, get richer. But even here a man had to quit at some point to fill his belly. Ann Street—a jumble of shops and residences like most thoroughfares in the oldest parts of the city—was closed up tight, so silent Joyful could hear the ring of his boots on the cobbles.

The house he was headed for was at the end of the road, built of wood like most of its neighbors, and like them it was four windows wide and three stories tall, with a dormered roof and two chimneys. There was a sign beside the front door: ANDREW TURNER, M.D., PHYSICIAN. Below, in smaller letters, SURGERY ALSO PERFORMED. Joyful hesitated a moment, then lifted the knocker.

The servant who opened the door was the same woman who had let him in sixteen years before, when he was barely seventeen and newly sent home to New York from China. She had been an indenture back then, but ten years was the usual span to work off a passage; she must be earning a wage by now. Afternoon, Bridey. How are you?

All the better for seeing you, Dr. Turner.

Like most servants, Bridey knew everything. She was bound to have heard the fierce argument Joyful had with Andrew the month before when he returned from Lake Erie to the hero’s welcome New York gave the veterans of the September battle, but neither of them acknowledged it. I’m glad to see you as well, Bridey. Is he in?

Indeed, and expecting you. She held out her hands and Joyful slipped out of his greatcoat and handed it to her, along with his stovepipe hat and his right glove. Bridey waited. Will you not be after leaving the other glove as well, Dr. Turner?

No, Bridey. Joyful held up his left arm. The week before he’d had a blacksmith make him a shoulder harness attached to a black leather glove stuffed with sand. Stupid vanity. He should simply let the stump hang out and be damned.

Bridey flushed. I forgot, Dr. Turner. It’s that sorry I am.

Not to worry, sometimes I forget as well. Maybe if he said it often enough, it would be true.

The maid knocked lightly on the door to her right and opened it immediately. Dr. Joyful Turner, Dr. Turner.

Joyful stepped inside. Cousin Andrew, he said formally.

Cousin Joyful. The men nodded warily at each other. I appreciate your coming on such short notice, Andrew said. Had your dinner?

He hadn’t, but he’d eat later. Just now he was too curious to be hungry. The note that summoned him to this visit had arrived at his lodgings on Greenwich Street an hour earlier. It spoke of a matter of urgency. I’m well enough fed, sir, thank you.

Good. Leave us then, Bridey. We won’t need anything for a time.

The room they were in served as both Andrew’s study and his consulting chamber. Sometimes—spread with oiled cloths to protect the furnishings from spurting blood—it was where he performed his surgeries. Square, paneled in oak that had mellowed gold over the years, it had one wall lined with cupboards and drawers that held the medicaments, bandages, and instruments for blistering, bleeding, and cupping that were the arsenal of a physician, as well as the flutes and probes and straight and curved knives and big and small saws of the cutting trade. Andrew Turner was the only medical practitioner in the city to also advertise a surgeon’s skills, much less sometimes encourage his patients to submit to the knife. Joyful had never believed there was room for two such hybrids in the city. That’s why he went to sea.

Andrew had not quarreled with that choice. It was Joyful’s recent decision to stop doctoring altogether—God’s truth, Joyful, what will you live on?—and take a room in a boardinghouse on Greenwich Street rather than continue to lodge with his cousin as he had in the past, that caused the trouble between them.

Andrew seemed to want to pretend the argument had not happened. Perishing cold out there. He thrust a poker into the mix of logs and coals in the fireplace. A funnel of sparks rose up the chimney.

A storm coming, I think, Joyful said.

Andrew grunted. My joints say the same.

His cousin had still seemed young and vigorous when Joyful first met him. Now, seventy-three, with his hair gone entirely white, Andrew looked fragile and gaunt with age.

He gestured to a decanter of brandy on a small table between the windows. Pour us each a tot, Joyful. Then come over here and warm your bones.

Joyful covered the bottom of two bulbous snifters with spirit, but carrying two glasses at the same time was beyond him these days. He brought one to his cousin, then went back to claim the second before returning to the leaping flames and offering a toast. Your health, sir.

And yours.

Joyful took a long swallow, enjoying the flash of warmth that went from his throat to deep in his belly, then set the drink on the mantel. He had to consciously resist the urge to extend his hands over the coals. Instead he put a foot on the brass fender surrounding the hearth.

Let me see that. Andrew reached out and lifted the arm that ended in the black leather glove. Wound giving you any trouble?

None. It’s well healed.

I’d expect as much. Managed to leave plenty of skin for the final closure, eh?

Exactly as I was taught.

The glove’s clever. Andrew ran his hand along the sleeve of Joyful’s black cutaway coat. Got straps keeping it on, have you?

Yes. I had the rig made by a blacksmith a couple of weeks ago. Taking a while to get used to the weight of the thing, but all in all, it seems to work quite well.

Considered a hook? It would let you do some things. Not as good as a hand, but useful.

No hook, Joyful said. Make me feel like a pirate.

He expected Andrew to smile at the weak joke. Instead the older man frowned. Your father was a pirate for a time.

A privateer, Joyful said. That’s not exactly the same.

Perhaps, Andrew said with a shrug. Are you still determined to give up the practice of medicine?

Yes. As I’ve already said, I don’t believe I have much choice.

There’s a great deal of doctoring can be done with one hand.

But not, Joyful said, a great deal of surgery.

You took off that boy’s arm with one hand, didn’t you? And from what you tell me, that was the most difficult sort of amputation.

Yes, I did, and yes, it was. But Jesse Edwards was a captive patient. He had no choice in the matter. Convincing the gentlefolk of New York to go under the knife of a one-handed cutter is a much more daunting prospect. Particularly when they can find the best surgeon in Christendom right here on Ann Street.

You flatter me.

No, Joyful said. I do not.

This time Andrew did smile. Very well, you do not. But I shan’t be the best much longer, lad. I’m getting old.

Hold out your hands, Joyful said.

There’s no need—

Next to mine, Joyful extended his good right hand. After a moment Andrew stretched out both his beside it. Joyful let a number of seconds go by. Not a tremor, he said after almost a full minute. Rock steady as you’ve always been. And if we stayed this way for a while longer, I daresay mine would be the hand to start trembling first. I know my place in the hierarchy, Cousin Andrew. In New York, with two hands, I was the next best after you. In the service, far and away the best. Now . . . He shrugged and allowed his arm to drop to his side.

I still wish you’d reconsider, lad.

I know you do, Cousin Andrew. But I won’t.

And you won’t come home? This is your home, you know.

I know that it was my home, and I am forever grateful for that. But I can’t live off your charity— He held up his good hand to forestall Andrew’s protest. I know you’re going to say it isn’t charity. And I know you mean it. But I have to make my own way.

And that’s the end of it?

That’s the end of it.

I assumed as much, but I felt I had to make a last try. I take it then that you’re still decided on becoming a Canton trader.

I am. I was raised in the Canton trade. It’s the one thing other than medicine I know.

Have you talked to your Devrey cousin about the fact that you mean to go into competition with him? I fancy he won’t like it much.

Joyful tossed back the last of his brandy, and shook his head when Andrew motioned toward the decanter. No thanks, not just now. And word is that Bastard Devrey has too many problems of his own to be worried about me.

Yes, I’ve heard that too. But this China trade business—there’s nothing you can do until after the war is over, is there?

Nothing much, Joyful agreed.

And as I recall, you supported this misbegotten military adventure.

I thought it imperative that we not let Britain continue to treat us like a colony.

So you did. Talked about it at the time, didn’t we?

We did, sir. Joyful was well aware of Andrew’s strong Federalist leanings and that his cousin considered President Madison and the Democratic-Republicans a pack of radicals.

Thing is, Andrew’s voice was milder than his meaning, you shouldn’t start a war with incompetent officers, and an army of mostly militia who refuse to carry the fight beyond our borders.

Joyful shrugged. I’d have thought that would please you. I remember you telling me once that a standing army that answered to the president and Congress rather than the states would be a threat to civilian government.

Did I? Well, I’ve said a lot of damn fool things in my day. What’s one more? Andrew stood up and went to the window. The short winter day was ending, the dusk deepening. Come over here, Joyful. His tone had changed. Look out and tell me what you see.

Houses, Cousin Andrew. The view held no surprises and he answered before he actually reached the other man’s side, though once at the window he obediently peered into the street. The homes of upstanding Americans like yourself. But I warrant a good many of them are republicans, as they call themselves. Rabblerousers, as you would call them.

And I warrant you are correct. But beyond Ann Street what do you see? Not just with your eyes, with your mind and heart.

Ah, perhaps that was what this was about. The Manhattan forests and streams and hills you and your damnable Common Council mean to destroy with a grid of streets and avenues, Joyful said. Fit for a population as great as China’s.

Andrew chuckled. Not quite that many, but nearly.

You don’t sound upset by the prospect.

I’m not. And given your present state of mind, neither should you be. More people means more business. That’s what you’ll need for this new venture of yours, isn’t it? Andrew reached up and took hold of the curtains but didn’t pull them shut. Light that oil lamp over there, lad. And the one by the fireplace. He waited until Joyful had thrust a taper into the fireplace and did as he was bid, then the older man continued, I risked my skin for the Revolution, Joyful. Now . . ." Andrew’s voice trailed away as he pulled the curtains closed and turned to face the younger man.

Now what, Cousin Andrew? Your note said a matter of urgency. I admit I’m curious.

Yes, I expect you are. But you’ll have to be patient a few moments more. Let’s sit down. And when they were both in the chairs beside the fireplace: "Tell me what you know of the Fanciful Maiden."

Only that she was a fine sloop, and a very fortunate privateer back in the 1750s. And that my father captained her.

Nothing specific about the voyage of 1759?

Joyful thought for a moment. Nothing specific, no.

Andrew sighed. I rather hoped Morgan had told you. It would have made this easier. He reached inside his breast pocket, withdrew a small, much folded piece of paper, and put it on the low table between them. Dark now, the room full of shaded corners where the ghosts of the past could lurk, but enough light from the lamps for Joyful to see that a faint red stain indicated that once there had been a wax seal.

This is for you, Andrew said. It’s your legacy.

From you? Joyful was surprised. I’d have thought Cousin Christopher . . . Andrew had one surviving child, a son a dozen years Joyful’s senior, also a physician. Christopher lived in Providence, and father and son were not particularly close, but he’d never thought they were estranged.

My son will have what’s justly his. This belongs to you. It’s from your father.

I don’t understand. I had my father’s legacy some years past. A trunk of personal effects and a pouch containing coins worth two thousand pounds, put into his hands in 1809, seven months after Morgan Turner died, by a merchant captain called Finbar O’Toole. Fourteen years old I was when I fought in the Revolution, and if it weren’t for your da looking after me I’d o’ been dead in a month. Told him I’d bring you this. He gave it me night afore he died and t’ain’t a gram lighter now than it were then.

This bit made a detour, Andrew said. Go on, take it. It’s yours.

Joyful leaned forward and used his right hand to unfold the paper while it still lay on the table—he’d learned many such tricks over the past two months—then picked it up. The creases and the ink faded to the color of rust made it difficult to read, but there was no doubt it was written in his father’s hand.

Indulge me, Joyful, Andrew said softly. Read it aloud.

Seventy-four degrees . . . thirty minutes west of Greenwich, just south of . . . twenty-two, no, twenty-four degrees north. Twice around thrice back. He stared at the paper a moment or two longer, then looked up. The first part’s navigation coordinates, but leading to where? As for the last, it’s gibberish.

I’ve never been entirely sure where the coordinates lead, except that they’re in the Caribbean. But they’re clear enough for a clever seaman to find his way. As for the rest, if I were a younger man, I’d go after it and assume the words would make sense once I got to wherever it is.

After what?

The treasure.

You’re saying . . . this note is a sort of treasure map?

That’s what I think, yes. I can’t be certain, mind, but I believe your father wrote these directions with the intention of going back and getting what he’d buried, and that he never did.

How can you be sure?

"I said I wasn’t sure. But the Maiden was in the Caribbean in ’59, and she never again sailed there. Then there was the Revolution, and Morgan was a British prisoner for almost three years. That’s how he lost an eye."

I know. Also that Morgan Turner had been a fighting man, and that all through the war Andrew allowed everyone to believe him a Tory, while he spied for Washington in the heart of the British stronghold that was New York. My mother said my father was not the same after his time as a prisoner. He couldn’t concentrate; he forgot things.

There was a good deal worth forgetting. You’ve wanted stories since I’ve known you, Joyful. The family history, what we did when we had to choose, your father and me. Most of the tales are too black for telling. It wasn’t pretty getting to independency. You have to have lived through it to understand.

"I’ve seen battle, Cousin Andrew. I know it’s never