“I have always been an honest man, Betsey,” he said, jabbing the poker at the coals in our fireplace for more warmth, “and I’ve been honest now. At present we are in debt, but in time, we won’t be.”
“You were hardly honest when I asked you before,” I said, standing beside him as he fussed with the fire. “I’ve seen our household account books and reckonings. Our rents and tradespersons’ bills are always paid, and we’ve been able to give to those less fortunate as well. Has it all been done with borrowed funds? Are you in danger of landing in the gaol for debt?”
“Oh, not at all,” he said, too blithely for my tastes. “I have been compelled to borrow sums from close friends familiar with our circumstances. They understand that they will be repaid in time.”
“Which friends?” I asked, though I could guess. He’d many wealthy acquaintances in New York, men who’d worked and invested and prospered along with the city since the war while Alexander had chosen to work for the government. The irony of his position was that the man who had single-handedly created the financial system of the country and the first national bank with it had been left unable to balance his own accounts.
He set the poker back into its stand. “Our most generous friend has been John Church.”
I pressed my hand to my mouth. Yet I wasn’t really shocked: there was already considerable trust between Alexander and Mr. Church, who was likely the wealthiest gentleman of our acquaintance. Even as I wondered if Angelica knew of such a loan, I suspected that she might have been behind it. At least I could be a bit more at ease with the debt, confident that they would never demand repayment from Alexander in court.
“Still and all, Alexander,” I said. “If we are paupers, as you say, then we must economize, and spend less.”
“I’m confident that we shall manage, my love,” he said, taking me by the hand. “It’s simply my responsibility to earn more, and now that I’m again a private citizen, I intend to do so. I don’t want you ever to worry on account of funds or anything else, and I’m determined to see that you don’t.”
But I soon learned that I’d every reason to worry. Because we hadn’t yet found a house to rent in New York (I now suspected because we could not yet afford one), the children and I remained for the summer in Albany with my parents, while Alexander leased a small space for himself for lodgings and for an office. Upon his return to the city, he’d almost instantly again become the top attorney in the state with more clients than he could reasonably handle, and I believed he’d be so busy that he’d little time for politics.
I was mistaken. Despite filling his days with legal work and court appearances, he now found time to write and publish even more letters and essays for publication defending the Federalists and attacking the Democratic-Republicans.
The most contentious topic in this last year of President Washington’s second term was the treaty that John Jay, a Federalist, had negotiated with Great Britain. According to Alexander, the purpose of the treaty was simple enough: to keep America from becoming entangled in the current war between Britain and France, to outline a trade agreement between America and Britain, and to resolve several remaining issues that persisted from the peace that had ended the Revolution. The points of the treaty all seemed both simple and necessary, and it had the full backing of President Washington, who hoped it would soon be approved by Congress.
But the Democratic-Republicans had attacked the treaty on every point, claiming that it conceded too much to Britain and earned nothing for America. Further, as dictated by Mr. Jefferson from his lofty Olympus at Monticello, the Democratic-Republicans believed that America should ally itself with France in the war, and pursue the madness of fighting Britain.
This time the Republican supporters weren’t far away on the frontier, but in the cities as well, and their members gathered in the streets to spew their false, destructive rhetoric and burn copies of the treaty. In Congress, Mr. Madison echoed Mr. Jefferson’s whispering voice, his attacks spreading beyond the treaty to the Constitution itself. Even worse, he and other Democratic-Republicans began to attack that most venerable of gentlemen, President Washington himself, saying he was so far in his dotage that he’d been ripe for manipulation by my conniving husband. They accused both the president and Alexander of being monarchists, which could not have been further from the truth.
It was a gauntlet that Alexander found impossible to ignore. Not only did he leap to the treaty’s defense in a series of published essays under the name Camillus, yet another ancient Roman general, but he also wrote a second series of letters as Philo Camillus, praising the work of the first series.
But far worse than any letters were the reports I heard through others that he’d impulsively attended a Democratic-Republican meeting in Wall Street not far from where our first house had stood. He’d attempted to address them, and been struck in the forehead with a thrown rock. Shouting and streaming blood, he’d first dared challenge Commodore Nicholson (the very man who’d accused him of having a secret bank account) to a duel, and then done the same with yet another Democratic-Republican, Maturin Livingstone.
Fortunately, both quarrels were resolved by their seconds before I ever learned of it. But I could scarcely believe that he’d behave so rashly, so foolishly, and so dangerously, after he’d promised me otherwise. How far removed this sordid scene along Broadway was from the parade of only a handful of years before, when crowds had cheered the float of the Federal Ship Hamilton!
When next my husband came to Albany, I saw him riding slowly up the hill, and hurried to meet him outdoors before anyone else.
“Now, this is a fine surprise,” he said as he climbed stiffly down from the saddle. “Good day to you, my love.”
I kissed him in greeting. “You’re here earlier than we expected.”
“For a change, the roads were good,” he said as one of my father’s servants came running from the stable to lead the horse away. Before Alexander handed him the reins, he reached deep into his saddlebag and withdrew a smaller cloth bag.
“For you,” he said wryly. “Other men might bring their wives jewels or gold, but I know what pleases my Betsey more.”
The bag was heavy and lumpy in my hands, and I guessed its contents before I’d even opened it.
“Lemons,” I said with happy satisfaction. “You remembered.”
“I did,” he said. “Those just came into port yesterday. Now you’ve no excuse not to bake me my favorite lemon cake.”
He took off his hat and wiped his sleeve across his forehead, and as he bared his forehead, I recalled why I’d hurried out here to speak with him.
“I know what happened here,” I said, reaching up to touch the healing cut, surrounded by a yellowing bruise, that crowned his right temple. “I heard that when you tried to address the crowd, they threw stones at you. You’re fortunate you weren’t killed.”