No Sacrifice Too Great by William C. Hammond

Author:William C. Hammond
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: McBooks Press
Published: 2021-07-22T00:00:00+00:00

The Boston Harbor Islands had long exerted a strong pull on Richard Cutler. From an early age he and his brother Will had taken great pleasure in exploring the islands’ delightful copses and beaches, and in unearthing Indian artifacts for their collections and clams for their supper. Here, too, they had discovered young love, each on his own, together with a young lady happy to defy the social conventions against sailing alone with a young man to a deserted island. Grape, Peddocks, Spectacle, Little Brewster—these and others in the string of jewels protecting Boston and its southern shores held blissful memories for Richard, many of them involving the mind, body, and spirit of Katherine.

Today, as the single-masted Cutler & Sons packet conveyed Richard from Hingham to Boston, just as it had many times in years gone by, he let his mind wander neither to the past glory of such memories nor to hopes for the future. Since the death of his wife, Richard had given scant thought to either the present or the future unless the issue at hand involved a member of his family, particularly one of his two sons or his daughter. This, he had come to realize, was why he had repelled for so long any threat to the walls of his heart’s defenses. Today he no longer had either the will or the resolve to resist an assault. Nor did he any longer see the point of hiding behind the walls. His heart yearned instead to welcome the warm and beckoning winds of change.

Once the larboard side of the packet boat had bumped up against Long Wharf and the helmsman had secured her bow and stern to a bollard with a buntline hitch, Richard stepped up onto the pier. “Well done, Jim,” he said. “Have a safe return to Hingham. I’ll be returning tomorrow at four bells in the afternoon watch. If you need anything before you cast off, or when you return, you know to ask Mr. Hunt.”

James Matthew Parnell touched his hat. “I do know that, Captain. Thank ye kindly. I hope ye have a most pleasant evening and a good night.”

“I intend to, Jim. Please convey my kind regards to Carol.”

“I shall do that, Captain. She will be most pleased that you remembered her.”

“She’s a hard woman to forget, Jim. You have been blessed in marriage.”

After a quick word with George Hunt at the offices of Cutler & Sons, Richard walked purposefully through Faneuil Hall toward State Street and Boston Common. It was a favorite route of his regardless of his destination. Given to the city as a gift in 1736 by Peter Faneuil, who financed its construction from profits earned in the slave trade, Boston’s commercial hub was designed in the style of an English country market. Following a fire in 1766, Faneuil Hall was largely rebuilt along its original lines. In 1806 it had doubled in size under the architectural genius of Charles Bulfinch.

The hustle and bustle of The Hall, as it was widely referred to, had always fascinated Richard.

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