The second day in Richmond, Charles went to visit Benedict at his invitation.
Charles was very much looking forward to the invitation from such a beautiful lady.
Because this banquet was a luncheon, Charles specifically had people prepare various gifts early in the morning and inquire about the lady's preferences, hoping to win her over.
As noon approached, he had his servants prepare a carriage and hurried towards the general's residence.
General Arnold's financial situation was clearly not very good; although the house was beautifully decorated, it was very small, occupying only the ground floor of an apartment building, with several other residents upstairs.
Upon arriving at the general's house, Charles was immediately warmly welcomed into the living room by the enthusiastic general and his wife.
Although the house was small and the interior decoration not elaborate, the room was filled with many luxurious decorative items that looked very new, clearly having been recently acquired.
Calculated by time, they must have been purchased after the general's new marriage.
Charles nodded inwardly, thinking, it seems this General Arnold truly married an extraordinary wife.
"Your Excellency Godfrey! Please have a seat. I'll go check if the kitchen's meal is ready.
Let Benedict keep you company for a while; lunch will be ready soon." The general's wife bowed apologetically, preparing to leave.
"Does the meal still require the lady to personally oversee it? Shouldn't these matters be handled by the servants?" Charles asked with thoughtful concern.
This was not Charles mocking the Arnolds for being unable to afford servants and actually making the mistress do the work.
Southern upper-class families, no matter how difficult their living conditions, would usually hire several servants, especially in an era where black slaves were readily available.
Using such black slaves was not very expensive.
Charles genuinely felt it would be better for servants to handle it, as his main reason for visiting General Arnold's house this time was to show respect to the general's wife.
"Hehe..." Mrs. Peggy let out a string of charming laughter.
Without avoiding General Arnold, she gave Charles a flirtatious look, "That's a dessert I specially prepared for Your Excellency.
I wouldn't trust those clumsy servants to handle it.
I'll be right back. Please excuse me!"
Watching the general's wife leave helplessly, Charles could only turn back and speak to General Arnold:
"General, you are truly blessed to have married such a beautiful and virtuous wife!"
"Haha! Of course.
Many people say so!" General Arnold laughed heartily, taking it for granted.
Mrs. Peggy truly hadn't lied to Charles; lunch was prepared very quickly.
After inviting Charles to the table, dishes were brought out one by one.
Although the dishes looked very rich and the various meals were exquisitely prepared, Charles ate very slowly, often exchanging glances with the general's wife and occasionally telling a few not-too-provocative jokes, which made the general's wife laugh crisply.
General Arnold, apart from heartily enjoying the food and occasionally interjecting a few words, basically paid no attention to their private interactions.
When the luncheon was halfway through, a soldier suddenly came to find General Arnold, announced by a servant, saying that General Greene wanted him to attend a meeting at the state capitol.
General Arnold was very dedicated to his duty.
Upon hearing the order, he immediately apologized to Charles, asked Mrs. Peggy to entertain Charles well, and then excused himself and left.
"Ah! What a sumptuous lunch.
It's a pity the general couldn't enjoy it all, a waste of the lady's thoughtful effort!" Charles glanced at General Arnold's departing figure.
"Hehe! Your Excellency Godfrey, are you satisfied with today's meal?" Mrs. Peggy said charmingly to Charles.
With her small hand resting on her chin, her alluring eyes continuously gazed at Charles' face, completely ignoring her recently departed husband.
"Haha! Of course, of course I'm satisfied!" Charles fiddled with the almost untouched food on his plate and said with a smile, "If only there were another sweet, oh, a dessert would be perfect!"
"Hehe! Your Excellency is truly fortunate; what I specifically prepared for you is a dessert.
Please wait!" Mrs. Peggy stood up and personally went to the kitchen.
Charles secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
This lady is truly dangerously alluring.
The beautiful general's wife soon came out carrying a silver tray with an openwork pattern, on which lay a small pile of food covered with a gauze cloth.
From a distance, Charles could smell the cream from within.
"These are pine nut butter cookies that I personally bought the ingredients for at the market this morning, then personally made and personally baked." The general's wife placed the silver tray in front of Charles, then lifted the gauze cloth and personally picked up a cookie.
The maid who had been serving at the dining table immediately bowed her head and exited the room.
"Your Excellency Godfrey! Please try one!" The general's wife, without any hesitation, used her fair, tender fingers to pick up a cookie and bring it to Charles' mouth.
Charles' expression changed.
Just as he saw the maid disappear, he immediately stood up abruptly with a look of delight, avoiding the general's wife's hand offering the cookie, and stepped forward to embrace her slender waist.
With a look of intoxication on his face, he quickly brought his mouth close to the general's wife's ear, lightly touching her earring, and said in a low, husky voice:
"My beautiful lady, do you truly not know what sweet treat I desire most?"
"Huh?" Peggy was startled by Charles' sudden movement of standing up, and she actually forgot to immediately move away.
As Charles lowered his head, her upper body instinctively arched back, allowing her slender waist to fall into Charles' hands.
It wasn't until Charles' head was almost touching her face that she realized she should have moved her entire body away.
Now, with just that slight arch, her lower body was pressed tightly against Charles'.
The weather was still warm, and neither was wearing thick clothes.
The general's wife immediately felt Charles' considerable assets below, and a flush of heat spread through her lower body where they touched, both of them letting out a soft moan simultaneously.
However, the general's wife, after all, was a seasoned veteran of romantic encounters, no match for Charles, a novice at illicit affairs.
Realizing something was wrong, she immediately bit her tongue to clear her head.
Then, with a toss of her long hair, she took advantage of Charles' momentary dodge to twist her waist and free herself from his grasp.
She pulled back a step, then panted charmingly, saying:
"Hehe, Your Excellency Godfrey, what other dessert do you want?
Come, be a good boy.
Quickly eat this cookie in my hand, and I'll give you more dessert."
One hand caressed her chest, while the other still held the cookie, pushing it towards Charles' mouth.
Watching Mrs. Peggy's single hand constantly moving, making her twin globes change shape, and her slightly parted lips emitting a soft moan from her throat, her eyes continuously casting alluring glances, Charles almost couldn't believe his eyes.
Had the * * between men and women become so open at this time, that one could touch one's own chest to entice a man in front of him?
It wasn't until his nose caught the overly strong scent of cream that Charles' expression changed.
He gently took Mrs. Peggy's hand, which had already reached his mouth, and with disdain in his eyes, said:
"Forget it, I'm not playing with you anymore.
You should put this cookie away!"
His voice was cold, completely devoid of the gentle, affectionate tone from moments before.
"Uh, Your Excellency.
Are you angry?"
Mrs. Peggy's expression also changed, but in the end, she regained her charming demeanor, her body softening and leaning directly into Charles' arms.
—
"Hmph!" Charles snorted coldly.
He exerted force with his hand, pushing her gently forward.
Mrs. Peggy immediately let out a crisp cry of "Ah," stumbled back a few steps, and landed on the chair behind her.
"You, why did you push me so hard?"
Charles ignored Mrs. Peggy's pale, angry face, picked up a wine glass, walked straight to the restaurant window, and abruptly smashed it onto the road outside the window, shouting loudly:
"All of you, come in!"
"Quick! Quick! Charge in!" Outside, there was an immediate urging sound and a rapid patter of footsteps.
With a crash, the general's front door was violently forced open from the outside.
Then, Charles' accompanying bodyguards and several Virginia state police officers rushed in, one of whom carried a cage of small white mice.
Following behind were several Virginia assembly members, General Greene, and a bewildered General Arnold.
Peggy looked at the group of people who had suddenly appeared in the room, utterly at a loss.
Her originally pale face, now turned crimson with shame.
Looking at the triumphant Charles, and then at the stern-faced intruders, the general's wife immediately became enraged and began to unleash her fury, twisting her waist to stand up abruptly, and furiously pointing at the intruders, she cursed loudly:
"What's wrong with all of you?
How dare you barge in without announcing yourselves? Don't you have any sense of gentlemanly conduct?
You're a bunch of barbarians!
And you, Arnold! Weren't you called to a meeting?
Why are you here? Are you suspecting me again...?"
Even with all her experience in romantic affairs, being caught meeting a lover by so many people still made the general's wife feel embarrassed.
"Haha!" Charles laughed from the side, interrupting the general's wife's scolding.
"If they had come in any slower, I'm afraid I would have fallen victim to your deadly hands!"
He casually used a napkin to pick up a cookie and said to Tom, the black servant who had rushed in with them:
"Tom, use those little white mice to test it; it should be it!"
The black servant Tom immediately handed over the cage of small white mice, allowing Charles to put the cookie into the cage.
General Greene and the others who had rushed in were mostly embarrassed by Mrs. Peggy's scolding, but now they immediately seized the opportunity to fix their gaze on the small white mice fighting over the cookie in the cage.
Seeing the cookie thrown into the cage of small white mice, Mrs. Peggy's face turned pale again.
Her fair, tender finger, which had been pointing at the crowd, now shifted towards the cage, and her other hand clenched, unable to speak.
The house fell silent, leaving only the sound of the small white mice fighting over the cookie.
Charles, however, noticed the general's wife's abnormality, and a cold sneer formed in his heart.
"Just wait and see what you have to say next," he thought.
"This is the first time I've encountered such an assassination attempt since I came to America."
"Mr. Godfrey! Are you certain? If your suspicions are proven wrong, I will surely make you pay for insulting my wife!" A deep voice broke the silence.
Charles glanced at General Arnold, who was full of shame and anger but still defended his wife, and sighed in his heart.
"Would I do that without absolute certainty?"
Charles did not answer the naive general's question.
Anyway, after the results came out, this general would find it difficult to stay in his original position, so there was no need to care about someone who was about to lose power.
The results came out quickly.
After the little white mice finished fighting over the cookie, they soon showed abnormal symptoms.
The poor little white mice first scurried frantically in the cage, emitting piercing squeaks, then continuously hit the cage with their paws and heads.
After screaming like this for a few minutes, silence returned.
But by then, the few little white mice in the cage had all foamed at the mouth and died.
"Phew..." Most of the onlookers breathed a sigh of relief, glad that the prominent Philadelphia figure hadn't made a huge joke.
"What a potent poison!" General Greene whispered softly.
"Ms. Peggy Shippen, you are hereby arrested by the state police for conspiring to assassinate the esteemed Chairman of the Continental Congress Military and Ordnance Committee, Your Excellency Charles Godfrey, and for conspiring to undermine the nation.
The evidence is conclusive and confirmed on site!" A state police officer stood in front of Mrs. Peggy and announced loudly.
"How could this be?" "How could this be!"
Two voices rang out simultaneously, belonging to Mrs. Peggy and General Arnold.
However, Mrs. Peggy was full of doubt, while General Arnold sighed helplessly.
"Yes, Mr. Godfrey, how could this be? Today, when you said the general's wife would poison you, we all didn't believe it, and only reluctantly came to cooperate with your action.
But now it seems the poisoning is absolutely true.
However, how did you know in advance that the general's wife would harm you? You two shouldn't have any enmity, right?" General Greene, on behalf of everyone, voiced their thoughts.