The next morning André was sent, for better security, in the charge of Tallmadge to Colonel Sheldon's quarters at New Salem. Here, getting permission to walk in the door-yard in the custody of an officer named King, André revealed his name and station, and being allowed pen and paper, he made the same avowal in a letter to Washington, which, when written, he handed to Tallmadge. Its contents confirmed that officer's suspicion that the prisoner was a military man, for he had shown a soldier's habit of turning on his heel as he paced his room.
Washington, returning by the upper road, had missed Jameson's messenger, who, retracing his steps, passed through New Salem, where he was entrusted also with the letter which André had just written, and then went on towards the Robinson house, where Washington was then supposed to be.
It was now the 25th, the very day when Rodney was to come up the river with his flotilla, and Arnold sat at breakfast at this same Robinson house,[981] not knowing what the day would develop. There were with him Mrs. Arnold, who had not long before (Sept. 15) come from Philadelphia, and two of Washington's aides, who had arrived a little in advance of their chief.
It was two days earlier than Washington had been expected back, and this was a serious perplexity in the mind of the conspirator. The suspense was soon ended, for Jameson's messenger to him shortly arrived, and the letter was put in Arnold's hands before the company. He read it, showed, as was remembered afterwards, a little agitation, but only a little, and in a few minutes left the table, saying that it was necessary for him to go to West Point. It seemed natural enough to his guests; but Mrs. Arnold observed his agitation more keenly, and followed him to their chamber, where all was revealed to her. She swooned; he kissed the infant lying there; descended the stairs;[982] stopped an instant to say to the breakfast party that Mrs. Arnold was not feeling well and would not come down again; mounted a horse which he had already ordered; hurried down the steep road to the river; entered his barge and seated himself in its prow; directed his men to row to mid-stream; and then priming his pistols, which he had taken from his holster, he ordered them to hurry down the river, as he had to go with a flag to the "Vulture", and must hasten back to meet Washington, who was shortly to reach his quarters. He tied a white handkerchief to a cane, and waved it as he passed Livingston's batteries at Verplanck's Point, and that officer recognizing the barge allowed it to pass on. In a few minutes more he was under the "Vulture's" guns, and then under her flag. His boatmen resisted his offers of recompense for desertion, and were not allowed to return to shore to spread the intelligence, which they now comprehended.[983]
WEST POINT.
Reproduced from the plan in Marbois' Complot d'Arnold et de Sir Henry Clinton, Paris, 1816. A plate in the Mag. of Amer. Hist., 1879, p. 756, showing the route of André, is a portion of a map among the Simeon de Witt's maps (i. no. 66) in the library of the New York Hist. Society, and was made by Robert Erskine, the topographical engineer of the army, 1778-1780, and was for the whole length of it, from Staten Island to Newburgh, engraved for the first time in Irving's Washington, quarto ed., ii. 276.
There are other maps of the scene of the conspiracy and its attendant events in Sparks's Washington, vii. 216; Guizot's Atlas to his Washington; Irving's Washington, quarto ed., vol. iv.; Carrington's Battles, 512; Lossing's Field-Book, ii. 148; and Boynton's West Point, 104.
Not long after Arnold left the Robinson house, Washington arrived, and, learning that Arnold had gone to West Point, he passed over unsuspicious to that post, where he was surprised not to find Arnold.[984] While Washington was gone, Jameson's messenger with the captured papers and André's letter arrived, and Hamilton, left behind by Washington, opened them as his confidential aide.[985] As soon as Washington's boat approached on his return from West Point, Hamilton went towards the dock to meet his chief, whispered a word, and both later entered the house and were closeted. The plot was revealed. Hamilton was dispatched to Livingston to head off Arnold in his escape if possible, but on reaching that officer's post it was found that Arnold's boat had already passed. Before Hamilton was ready to set out on his return, a flag from the "Vulture" brought ashore a letter from Arnold, addressed to Washington, framed in lofty expressions of his own rectitude, and avowing the innocence of Smith, of his own wife, and his aides.[986] Before Hamilton's return, Washington had dined with his officers without revealing the secret, but he shortly took Knox and Lafayette into his confidence. There was naturally great uncertainty as respects the extent of the conspiracy, and of what preparations the enemy had made for an immediate onset. The anxiety of the moment was soon evinced by the great activity of aides and orderlies. Word was sent in every direction for arrangements to be made for any emergency.[987]