Chains

The doctor visits Lady Seymour twice daily. The lady’s mind is still sharp, though she can barely move her body. Madam’s seamstress also visits often to work on the red, navy, and gold ballgown. Hannah and Mary talk incessantly about the ball. Isabel hears that at noon, guns will fire a royal salute, the warships in the harbor will respond, and the ball will start at six. At midnight, fireworks will signal the start of the banquet.

Isabel finishes Common Sense the night before the ball. The words are dangerous, and Isabel knows she should burn the book, but she can’t do it. She commits one line to memory: “For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others for ever.” She hides the book and lies down, but she can’t sleep. Why can’t she seek freedom if an entire nation can seek freedom? She could steal a pass and act free, but she’d have to sneak past guards and walk for miles. She could row across the river, but they’d shoot her and she’d sink. Isabel curses whoever decided New York should be on an island. 

Visiting Curzon at the prison and then passing by the tavern where Captain Morse works is, these days, an ordinary errand. Curzon is thin, but healing; and Captain Morse never needs Isabel. So it’s odd when, on the morning of the ball, Morse signals to Isabel and says he needs her to do him a favor: he made a bet with a Captain Farrar that the British wouldn’t hold this “ridiculous” birthday celebration. But the event is on, and officers are confined to their lodgings today—the British fear the Americans would stage an insurrection otherwise—so he needs Isabel to carry a penny to Farrar. Isabel is confused since the task seems so silly, but she figures that Madam will be too busy preparing for the ball to notice Isabel’s absence.

At midday, Isabel is peeling a turnip when cannons roar outside. She jumps in fear, but Hannah laughs that that was the royal salute. Later, Madam invites a friend for tea. When the friend accepts, Hannah sends Isabel to fetch more water. Isabel does, and she takes a detour to deliver Captain Morse’s penny. Captain Farrar laughs and accepts the penny, and Isabel leaves. But Farrar calls her back and asks her to take a note to Morse. He says it’s not a wager—it’s news. Isabel is annoyed and doesn’t have time to carry the message across town, so she fetches water and heads back to the Locktons’.

Isabel is still annoyed when she enters the kitchen and puts the water down. Just as she starts to boil water, Madam storms into the kitchen with a riding crop and hits Isabel in the face with it.