Hellen

Mother and I stood, stunned, in front of the interim commander. Father had never told us what happened that had ruined the Page’s reputation. To find out that he was transferring information to the spy that was hanged last year... Let’s just say it isn’t what we expected.

My mother hesitated, “Commander, there must be some sort of misunderstanding. Henry wouldn’t be found dead passing information to the enemy. He’s far too loyal to the king.”

“Well, that I have been informed by that information by two sources, Mrs. Page. Those sources consisted of my brother and the king, himself. I think those are pretty helpful people.” I looked toward my father. I opened my mouth to speak, but I couldn’t find my words.

All I could manage was, “I’m going to go....” I ran out of the tent. “We need to go. Now,” I told my siblings.

“Where must we go?” questioned my youngest brother, Simon. He looked bewildered, as did my other brothers and my sister.

“Anywhere,” I said simply. “Anywhere but here. We’ll go to America if we must, but we can’t stay here with Father. He’s a traitor to the king, and to all the loyalists in the colonies.”

“Hellen,” my sister said. “The journey to America can take weeks. Six weeks is the shortest the journey will be, and we don’t know how everyone is with the sea. Simon’s only six. He’ll probably get seasickness. We’ve never been on that long of a journey.”

“Sarah’s right, Hellen,” agreed my older brother, Philip. “Who knows if all of us will even survive the journey. We can’t predict rough seas or hurricanes. The journey’s way too long to know for sure. How will we even find a way to get there? People aren’t traveling as much anymore unless it’s for the war. We’ll never be able to get a ship to take.”

“What if we’re stowaways? We could sneak onto one. When we get there, we can go to New Haven and try to find the Turners. They live there, right? I know we’re wealthy and Sarah hates dirt, but to get away from Father; we need to leave England.”

“I’m with Hellen on this,” said my third brother, Charles. He stood and came to my side. “I know I usually avoid any type of agreement with her, but I’ve got to side with her. If Father is turning Patriotic, then we need to go. We need to join the loyalists in the colonies. If you guys don’t want to come, then don’t come with us, but I’m going. So is Hellen.”

I beamed at my brother. He could annoy me, but at times he was just—well, just my brother. I then looked back at my other siblings and waited for them to respond. They chatted quietly with one another. After a minute or two, Sarah looked up and told me the verdict: “We’ll go but on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“We bring cleaning supplies.”