George Washington's Ghost

“Forgive me, sir,” Sir George Walpole prefaced, not really very apologetically. “I suspect, that at present the matter of how we kept this secret for so long is not as big a problem as the fact that, contrary to all expectations, we have actually kept it secret for so long. Personally, I cannot imagine the German Empire would have acted so recklessly in the West Indies and in fomenting Mexican aggression in the New England South West, had it been aware that the new aircraft carriers were but the visible hilt of the shining new sword that we now have in our hands.”

The King stared at his old friend.

Speechless…

“I fear,” his minister sighed, “that the secret, such as it is, has been kept too long and that now, the problem is that we must reveal it to the world before,” he shrugged, tight-lipped, “the German Empire steps even closer to the edge of the abyss.”

Chapter 7

Wednesday 26th April

Imperial Airways Pier No 2, Gowanus Bay, Long Island

Maud Daventry-Jones had decided it was all very well for her best friend in the world, Leonora Fielding nee Coolidge, to tell her to ‘play it cool’ but that the advice completely ignored the present state of her hormones. Similarly, the proud attendance of her parents, dressed in all their Sunday finery, a large part – it seemed – of the population of New York, and judging by the unruly, jostling throng gathered behind the barriers, the entire press corps of the Commonwealth of New England, was not about to inhibit her one little bit.

Appearances be damned!

The man she had fallen in love with, who had recklessly gone off to war and, despite his own admirably self-effacing account of events, gallantly assisted in saving two damsels in distress – to wit, the Governor of New England’s daughter and a well-known, adopted daughter of the twin-colony, Melody Danson – not to mention an innocent four year-old-child from the wicked clutches of the Spanish Inquisition, in a purely Boy’s Own story of derring-do, was about to step back onto New England soil!

So, how on earth was she supposed to ‘play it cool?’

Maud was fidgeting like she had an itch she could not scratch.

“Well, for goodness sake,” Leonora sighed. “Try not to hug the poor man to death,” she advised. “There will be plenty of time for that later,” she added, teasingly.

Maud had no idea how her friend, so soon after giving birth to her first baby, had so swiftly recovered, apparently in every way, from the messy, traumatic experience. Leonora was her old, willowy, stylish, self-assured self and without her the last few days would have been even more intolerable than they had been!

Nevertheless, in her state of heightened existential angst, right then, Maud would have been okay with her returning hero ravishing her on the boardwalk in front of… everybody.

Not that she imagined, for a moment, that Albert Stanton, reporter extraordinaire of the Manhattan Globe, and as soon as his book about Kate and Abe Lincoln came out later that year, a sure-fire runaway best-selling author, was the sort of man who would take advantage of a girl in public.

Maud had been in a turmoil – a complete mess, really – ever since that

first telegram came through from the British Embassy in Lisbon, Portugal.

IT IS WITH GREAT PLEASURE THAT I AM ABLE TO INFORM YOU STOP AT MISTER STANTONS PARTICULAR REQUEST STOP THAT HE IS ALIVE AND WELL STOP HE SENDS YOU HIS MOST HEARTFELT FELICITATIONS AND HOPES TO BE REUNITED WITH YOU SOONEST MESSAGE ENDS.

The Ambassador would never make a half-way competent romantic novelist but Maud had got the gist of things. Her beau was alive and well and the first thing he had thought about was getting back to her!

Or rather, after he had filed his copy with The London Times and the Manhattan Globe, wholly proper and professional conduct which she was not about to take umbrage over because, after all, he was heart and soul a newspaper man.

She could no longer deny or resent that, than Leonora could rail against the man she had fallen in love with and married, Alex Fielding, being a daredevil aeronaut!

Then Albert’s letter had reached her.

I was an idiot to go to Spain…

There were so many things I never had a chance to say to you…

Will you ever forgive me?

I will be counting down the hours to when I hold you in my arms…

‘Men!’ Leonora had groaned, finally getting her hands on that first missive from Portugal. ‘Can’t kill them; you’ve got to love them!’

Which was a bit rich coming from the woman who had fallen for Major, now Acting Commander Alexander Fielding of the Royal Naval Air Service, a man who wore his fighter pilot’s soul on his sleeve and to whom, she was utterly devoted.

Whatever she said!