The Rebel's Return Read Online Free Page A

boot. I can’t remember when I’ve tasted anything so good,” he added, gulping down the soup with relish.
    “You look thinner,” his mother frowned with a crease between her eyes. “We’ll need to fatten you up while you’re home, and send you back with something to keep your soul in your body, if such a thing is possible.”
    Phoebe thought her brother looked thinner too, and altered in a way that had little to do with nourishment. He seemed leaner, tougher, harder. Perhaps a soldier’s life changed a man that way.
    “Tell us about the war, George,” piped up Jonathan, and Kit added, “Did you shoot any redcoats?”
    “Not yet.” His brother gulped his mouthful of soup. “But I’ll likely have an opportunity soon enough. We’ve been digging fortifications all over Manhattan and on Brooklyn Heights, and Admiral Howe arrived with his fleet just this month. They want to blast us out of New York, and it will come to fighting within weeks, I reckon.”
    Phoebe saw a sudden look of fear cross her mother’s face.
    “Especially now that the Congress has signed that foolish Declaration of Independence. Gracious, what were they thinking of? The King will never forgive us for that.”
    “We had to do it, Mother. There’s no reconciling with England now; things have gone too far. But New York is so full of Tories, the British will no doubt feel right at home there, if they ever get in, that is.”
    Phoebe leaned toward her brother, her eyes alight. “You’ll shoot them down the same way they did at Bunker Hill.”
    “Aye, I hope so. That was a great battle to hear everyone tell about it. I wish I had been there. But I’ll surely have my own chance soon enough.”
    Alice shivered as she patted her mouth with her napkin. “I don’t understand how anyone can be excited about fighting in a war. It sounds dreadful to me.”
    George grinned at her. “That’s why women don’t go to war. You have your own battles at home.  But tell me what is happening here. Is that Ingram fellow still coming around, paying court to Alice?”
    “Alice has two beaus now,” Jonathan boasted. “Nicholas Teasdale has been tarrying with her as well.”
    “He’s not my beau,” Alice returned with dignity.
    “He’s Phoebe’s beau,” Kit said, and Phoebe started.
    “He’s no one’s beau,” their mother scolded, “just an old friend of the family. You remember the Teasdales, George; they used to live three houses down until they moved to the countryside. His mother was a friend of mine.”
    “Aye, I remember them. I’ve seen Nicholas in New York on a few occasions as well. He’s an officer, so we aren’t of the same rank, and he has a different set of friends. I believe he is connected to Lord Stirling.”
    The next several days were almost like a holiday, for Sarah Fuller found so much pleasure in her son’s company that she abandoned all work but the most necessary chores to keep her family clothed and fed.  Friends and relatives dropped by to see George, and the adults in the family went visiting more than they normally did. One day Phoebe’s aunt, uncle, and cousins came for dinner and lingered for the rest of the afternoon, reminiscing over old times, playing dominoes and cribbage. The next evening George accompanied Alice and Phoebe to a party at the home of friends, where they spent the evening singing and dancing, and returned home after midnight.
    The next day George expressed an interest in visiting the Kirby family before he returned to the army, and Phoebe offered to accompany him. As they entered the Kirby house George joined the men of the family in the parlor and Rhoda’s mother told Phoebe that Rhoda was upstairs in the girls’ bedchamber. She climbed the steep narrow stairs to the familiar room and through the open door heard voices deep in conversation.
    “I couldn’t do it, Rhoda. I just couldn’t marry someone my parents disapproved of. What do you think? What would you do in my