The Lost Constitution: A Peter Fallon Novel - Softcover

Martin, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0765354462 ISBN 13: 9780765354464

Publisher: Forge Books, 2008

Synopsis

Rare-book expert Peter Fallon and his girlfriend, Evangeline, the main characters from Back Bay and Harvard Yard, are back for another treasure hunt through time. They have learned of an early, annotated draft of the Constitution, stolen and smuggled out of Philadelphia. The draft's marginal notes spell out, in shocking detail, the Founders' unequivocal intentions---the unmistakable meaning of the Bill of Rights. Peddled and purloined, trafficked and concealed for over two centuries, the lost Constitution could forever change America's history---and its future.

Moreover, Congress is already at war, fighting tooth and claw over the eternally contentious Bill of Rights. When word gets out of the lost draft's existence, it launches a frenzied search, as both sides of the partisan machine believe it will reinforce their arguments. While battling politicians from both sides of the debate, Peter and Evangeline must get to the document first, because they know that if the wrong people find it, they will burn it, stripping the nation of its constitutional moorings.

The search takes Peter and Evangeline into the rich history of America and New England, from Shay's Rebellion to the birth of the American industrial revolution to the march of the legendary 20th Maine in the Civil War.

Past and present play off one another as the search for the draft heats up. It finally boils over on the first night of the World Series, at that Mecca of New England, Boston's fabled Fenway Park, and the truth is finally revealed....

About this title

About the Author:

WILLIAM MARTIN, The New York Times bestselling author of ten novels, is best known for his historical fiction, which has chronicled the lives of the great and the anonymous in American history while bringing to life legendary American locations, from Cape Cod to Annapolis to The City of Dreams. His first novel, Back Bay, introduced Boston treasure hunter Peter Fallon, who is still tracking artifacts across the landscape of our national imagination. Martin's subsequent novels, including Harvard Yard, Citizen Washington, and The Lost Constitution have established him, as a "storyteller whose smoothness matches his ambition." (Publishers Weekly) He has also written an award-winning PBS documentary and one of the cheesiest horror movies ever made. Nevertheless, he was the recipient of the 2005 New England Book Award, given to "an author whose body of work stands as a significant contribution to the culture of the region." There are now over three million copies of his books in print. He has three grown children and lives near Boston with his wife.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

THE LOST CONSTITUTION (CHAPTER ONE)August 1786

“WHERE’S YOUR MUSKET, WILL?“

“In the house.”

“It should be in your hand.”

“But it’s the sheriff and his men comin’ out of those woods.”

“It’s an unjust government comin’ to take your rights. Go get your musket.”

Will Pike stood his ground instead. He studied the woods. He glanced up at a hawk making perfect circles in a perfect blue sky.

And for a moment, he was a boy again, daydreaming that he could see what the hawk saw: the mountains of New Hampshire and Vermont to the north; the flatlands of Connecticut and Rhode Island spreading south; the steeples of Boston, tiny on the eastern horizon; and beyond them, the sharp-etched green islands in the Gulf of Maine.

Then the hawk seemed to stop in midair. Then it swooped, pouncing in a burst of feathers and fur on some hapless field mouse working its way home.

Will wiped his palms on his leather jerkin. He was as rawboned as any seventeen-year-old, but his eyes were already set in the permanent squint of one who studied the world quietly, who thought hard before he spoke and even harder before he acted.

His brother, North, was six years older and, it seemed, twice as big, over six feet tall, over two hundred pounds, big face scarred from fights, big hands scarred from fishhooks, big shoulders callused from the harness he wore when he plowed his father’s fields.

North had marched with Washington’s army. He had fished on the Grand Banks. He had cut trees in the great woods. Will had not seen much more of the world than the circle of earth beneath the circle of sky drawn by that hawk.

They stood that morning on the sloping ground in front of their father’s little house. Rock walls ran everywhere, segmenting the small farm into smaller fields, each of which looked as if it had been sown with rocks in the hope of growing more rocks.

“Where’d Pa go?” North kept his eyes on the men riding up the road.

“Inside,” said Will.

“Went to get his musket, I hope.”

Will glanced toward the house. He could not believe that his father was leaving them to face this alone.

The sheriff reined his horse and looked down at North. “Well ... the prodigal brother. When did you get back?”

“When I heard you was plannin’ to arrest my Pa.” North held his musket at his hip. “I’m loaded with ball and buck, Chauncey. I’ll take down the lot of you with one shot.”

Will wanted to slip into the house and coax his father out, but he feared that if he moved, North would start shooting. So he stayed put and hoped that no one would see his knees shaking.

“Now, boys ...” Sheriff Chauncey Yates had a big belly and a broad face better suited to grins and good spirits than the scowl he wore. “The court says your father’s to spend six months in the Hampshire County House of Correction for nonpayment of debts to Mr. Nathan Liggett of Springfield.”

“Damn the courts,” said North. “And damn Nathan Liggett. Damn you, too, Sheriff. And while we’re doin’ our damnin’, damn the damn state for taxin’ us at thirty damn percent, so we don’t have the money to pay any other damn bills.”

“It’s happenin’ to farmers all over,” said the sheriff. “The state has to tax property to pay war debts. And farmers has more real property than most.”

“But farmers don’t have hard coin,” said Will, “and the state won’t take barter.”

“Nor merchants neither,” added North.

“Because merchants is squeezed by Boston creditors,” said the sheriff, “and they’re squeezed by European suppliers.”

“So men like our Pa get squeezed by lawyers,” said North.

“Yup.” The sheriff swung a leg and dismounted. “Makes you wonder why we fought the damn Revolution in the first place.”

North gave the sheriff a grin. “Time for another uprisin’, I’d say.”

“I have a court order”—the sheriff patted his pocket—”all fit and proper-like. It’s my job to execute it.”

“I’ll die first.” North raised his musket. “And you before me.”

With a sudden clattering of wood, leather, and metal, every deputy leveled a musket at the Pikes. And for a moment, there was quiet.

The breeze rustled in the trees. A horse snorted. Another pawed the ground.

Then North said, “Seems we has a stand-off.”

And from the house came a voice: “There’ll be no stand-off. You Pike boys stand down. Nobody’ll do any dyin’ on my account.”

Will Pike turned to see his father in the doorway, and after relief poured over him, he filled with a son’s pride.

George North Pike had chosen to dress that day not in the threadbare smallclothes of a bankrupt farmer but in the uniform of a captain in the Massachusetts Artillery. It did not fit him so well as it had when the war ended, for an ague of the stomach had taken twenty pounds off his frame. But the uniform had its effect. No deputy would point a weapon at the blue-and-buff.

The elder Pike strode out of the house, as if determined to show his best face. He stopped beside his sons and said, “Sheriff, my boys think we’ve traded bad masters in Britain for worse masters in Boston.”

“Damn right,” said North, the only man still pointing a musket at anyone.

“But,” said George North Pike, “I’ll not rebel against the country I fought for.”

He lifted the musket from North’s hands, blew into the pan, and sent up a little cloud of priming powder. He tossed the gun back to his son.

Then he said, “My boys been raised right, Chauncey. They know that this is a government of laws, and laws are made by men, and men might not always be what God intended them to be, but men like you and me, we’re decent, just the same.”

“I appreciate the sentiment, Captain,” said Chauncey Yates. “Now will you mount the horse we brought for you?”

George North Pike tugged at his waistcoat and looked at his sons. “Boys, the livestock been sold off, but we still have our land. So tend to it while I’m gone.”

“We’ll go with you,” said North.

“We’ll help you get settled,” added Will.

“No.” Their father mounted the horse. “I’ll not have you see me in stripes just yet. Let me try them on first.”

And the Pike brothers watched their father ride away at the head of that little group, as though he were their leader rather than their prisoner.

Then North spat and said, “Time for an uprisin’.”

THERE WAS NOT much to the town of Pelham. On the west were rocky farms, a tavern, a Congregational meetinghouse at the crossroads. Then the east-west road dipped down to a plank bridge that crossed the Swift River, a narrow stream that lived up to its name even in the driest summers. Just beyond, the road rose toward more rocky farms. But right at the bridge was Conkey’s Tavern.

That was where the Pike brothers headed come sundown.

“A man shouldn’t go to bed dry,” said North, “especially on a day like this. So let’s wet our throats and dream of wet quims, which be a bit scarce hereabouts.”

“Is that why you went wanderin’ after the war?” asked Will. “For the quims?”

“Once you’ve marched with the Continental Army, coaxin’ corn out of a rocky hillside don’t hold much attraction. And once you’ve sampled a few of the ladies who follow an army, coaxin’ a kiss from a neighbor girl ain’t quite enough to slake your thirst for somethin’... wet and juicy.”

Will thought every night about things wet and juicy, and he envied his brother’s knowledge. He had never yet inspired any of the neighbor girls to kiss him, not that there were many.

And for certain there were none at the tavern, which was full of loud voices and strong opinions and the strong smells of men who spent their days sweating hard under a hot sun. But when the Pikes entered, it was as if the stifling air were blown off by a wind, cold and ominous.

One by one, then group by group, men fell silent and turned. None had quarrel with the Pikes. But the Pikes reminded them of what they all faced—heavy taxes, a Boston government more responsive to the needs of merchants than of self-sufficient farmers, and financial ruin.

When the room was dead quiet and all eyes were on the Pikes, North announced, “Time for an uprisin’, boys.”

In an instant, they were crowding around, offering condolences and congratulations. Word of George North Pike’s pride, even in disgrace, had already spread.

Daniel Shays, who farmed a plot as bad as the Pikes’, swept two mugs of flip from the bar and gave one to each of them. “Your pa’s a good man.”

“A good man indeed,” said Doc Hines. He set the broken bones of Pelham and, as Town Moderator, set the political discussion as well.

North looked around and asked, “So who’s to lead the uprisin’? You, Dan’l?”

“Not me.” Shays shook his head.

“We’ve asked him,” said Doc Hines “He’s been to debtor’s court himself, so he knows how humiliatin’ it is. And he went from private to captain in Washington’s army, so he knows how to lead—”

“I’ll back no rebellion ti...

About this edition

• Publisher: Forge Books
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0765354462
• ISBN 13: 9780765354464
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 640