The Crafters Book Two Read Online Free

live with them. Felicity King had moved into the Boston house with her own two daughters. Gunning King, her husband, lived there too, on the few odd weeks a year he wasn’t at sea. Felicity had raised Andrew and his brother and sister as though they were her own children, never seeming to notice any difference between the pale milk of their skin and the rich brown of her own.
    Felicity had been almost as bad as Grandpa Jim about the sanctity of the Crafter blood, too. Andrew didn’t give any credence to the idea that there was some mystical Talent he should have just because of who his great-grandparents were. It was embarrassing, It was the reason Andrew had chosen such a scientific profession as astrology. The stars spun in the heavens playing their part in the destiny of men. You could read it in a book, plot it out with your pen. It was real.
    The first official meeting of the Congress wasn’t for another few days, but the delegates were to pay a visit to the State House this morning to sign the registry. A liveried carriage drew up, and out stepped, not a foot, but a stick of some sort. Andrew looked again and saw it was the peg-leg of a scowling older man with flyaway hair and a beaky nose.
    “Gouverneur Morris?” he heard. So, this was the urbane and droll Philadelphia lawyer he’d read about. The crowd began to clap, and Andrew joined in. Immediately another carriage drew up; its door opened quickly and a tall man in dark blue with a rigid soldier’s posture stepped out and hastened over to Morris. The taller man grinned, making his somewhat stem face seem almost boyish. He shook Morris’ hand and then nodded to the crowd.
    The crowd began to cheer, first raggedly, then in unison: “Wash-ing-ton, Wash-ing-ton!”
    Andrew caught his breath. This was him! This was the man who led the Continental Army and so valiantly won the Battle at Valley Forge! Why, he did look powerful and, though it was now a term rarely used by the Americans, regal. “Huzzah!” cried Andrew.
    “Pardon me,” said a small man at his elbow. Andrew was a few inches short of six feet, but this fellow barely broke five. His sparse hair was caught back in a dark ribbon, and his suit was the same light grey as his eyes. He moved and looked like a rabbit.
    “Did you want to see the Colonel?” said Andrew, turning aside.
    “Oh, I’ll greet George soon enough,” said the man, and began ascending the steps to the front door of the State House. Aware that this was a delegate, but not sure which one, Andrew stepped back, almost tripping on an older man who walked with a cane as though favoring a gouty foot.
    “Pardon,” said Andrew, one hand on the man’s elbow to steady him. He suddenly realized the crowd had formed a circle around the two of them. Someone began to clap politely. Andrew looked at the man, at the bald head and trailing grey hair, at the odd spectacles perched on his nose, at the brown worsted coat. “Mr. Franklin?” he cried. “Mr. Franklin, it’s Andrew Smithson, sir. I came all the way—”
    Ben Franklin didn’t even seem to hear Andrew. The eyes beneath his shaggy brows had a glint that Andrew associated with younger men. Andrew followed his gaze and saw a buxom middle-aged woman, rouged and powdered, smirking back. Franklin gave a gallant waggle of his cane and stepped smartly forward.
    “Mr. Franklin?” Andrew tried again, and moved to intercept him. Instead, he collided with a tall young woman wearing mustard yellow. Though slim, she seemed unusually solid, for Andrew and she both nearly lost their footing.
    “You made me lose Mr. Madison!” she cried, her dark eyes flashing fury at him. Then her expression changed, as Andrew could feel his doing also. “Andrew?” she said incredulously. “What are you doing here?”
    “Calliope?” Andrew heard his voice squeak. “Why aren’t you in Virginia?”
    Calliope King, Felicity’s daughter, Andrew’s sister by upbringing if not by blood, just rubbed her