by John Jakes
“But that kind of trade would be—” He sensed someone hovering and glanced up. “We’re not finished, boy.” He supplemented the remark with a glare at the black waiter, who left again. The table cut into Stanley’s paunch as he whispered: “It would be dangerous, Isabel. Worse than that, it would be treason.”
“It could also be the way to make not merely a profit but a fortune.” Like a mother with a slow child, she patted his pudgy hand. “Don’t rule it out, my sweet.”
He didn’t.
“Finish your eggs before they get cold.”
He did.
22
FAINT SOUNDS. FROM FAR away, he thought in the first seconds of waking in the dark. Across the tent, Ambrose emitted one of his characteristic snores, a malignant mix of whistles and buzzing.
Charles lay on his right side. His linen underdrawers were soaked with sweat. The humidity was fierce. As he thought about reaching over to poke Ambrose and silence him, the sound separated into recognizable elements: night insects and something else. Charles held his breath and didn’t move.
Even with his cheek pressed to the camp bed, he could see the tent entrance. Open. A silhouette momentarily blocked the glow of a guardpost lantern. He heard the intruder breathing.
He’s after the sword.
It lay in its oiled-paper wrapping on top of the small trunk at the foot of the bed. Should have found a safer place. He prepared himself as best he could, fear edging into him. It was a hard position from which to rise suddenly, but he did it, bolting up from the waist. As he gained his feet he let out a growl he hoped would confuse and frighten the thief.
Instead, it woke Ambrose. He uttered a wild yell as Charles lunged at the shadow-man who was picking up the sword. “Give me that, damn you.”
The thief drove an elbow into Charles’s face. Blood spurted from his left nostril. He staggered, and the thief dove into the street of neatly spaced tents and raced left, away from the picket post where the lantern shone. Bleeding and swearing, Charles went after him.
He could pick out a few details of the thief’s appearance. He was heavy and wore white gaiters. One of Rob Wheat’s Tigers, by God. Serbakovsky’s warning came to mind. That evening he dined with the prince, Charles had been feeling too good to detect or even worry about the presence of someone outside, someone who must have spied on the party through the netting, seen the saber—
His arms and legs pumped. Blood trickled down his upper lip; he spat it away. Stones and burrs hurt his bare feet, but he kept gaining. The thief looked back, his face a round blur. Charles heard Ambrose hollering just as he hurled himself forward, his feet leaving the ground a second before his hands caught the waist of the thief’s blue-and-white sultan’s bloomers.
The man screamed an obscenity; both fell. Charles landed on the back of the man’s legs, badly jarred. The thief dropped the sword and struggled to turn beneath Charles and get free, kicking all the while. A gaitered boot knocked Charles’s head back. The Tiger jumped up.
Dazed, Charles grabbed the man’s left leg and pulled him down again—along with the huge bowie knife he had yanked from a belt sheath. Charles whipped his head aside to avoid a cut that would have sliced away most of one cheek.
The Tiger pushed Charles over. His head hit a rock. “Corporal of the guard! Corporal of the guard!” Ambrose was bellowing. Charles could well be dead before help arrived; he had gotten a look at the thief, so it would be safer for the man to leave a corpse.
He dropped on Charles’s chest with both knees. He had a round face, pug nose, curly mustachios. He smelled of onions and dirt. “Fuckin’ Carolina fop,” he grunted, holding the bowie with both hands and forcing the point down toward Charles’s throat.
Frantic, Charles locked his hands under the thief’s wrist and pushed up—pushed. God, the bastard was strong. He shifted a knee into Charles’s groin and put weight on it. Blinded by sweat and the pain, Charles almost couldn’t see the knife blade as it dipped to within three inches of his chin.
Two inches.
One—
“Jesus,” Charles moaned, tears in his eyes because of the knee crushing his balls. One more moment and his throat would be slashed. He gambled he could hold the thief’s wrist with one hand, thrust the other upward—
His left hand moved. The knife edged down. Charles found the thief’s hair and pulled. The man shrieked, his attack thrown off. Slippery fingers released the bowie. Falling, it raked Charles’s left ribs lightly. As the thief tried to stand, Charles grabbed the knife and buried three inches of it in a thigh.
The Tiger screamed louder. He toppled over and crashed in the weeds some yards beyond the last tent, the knife sticking from his fine striped pantaloons.
“You all right, Captain Main?”
Rising, Charles nodded to the noncom, first to reach him; other men poured down the dark tent street and surrounded him. The thief moaned and thrashed in the weeds.
“Take him to the surgeons to have that leg tended. Make sure someone fastens a ball and chain on his other ankle so he’s around when his regiment court-martials him.”
The noncom asked, “What did he do, sir?”
Charles wiped blood from his nose with his bare wrist. “Tried to steal my dress sword.” No honor code among these recruits, he thought with bitterness. Maybe I’m a fool, hoping for a rule-book war. He picked up the scabbarded blade from where it had fallen and trudged away.
Wide awake and excited, Ambrose wanted to discuss the incident. Charles held a scrap of rag to his nose until the bleeding stopped, then insisted they turn in. He was spent. Barely asleep, he bolted up again.
“What in the name of God—”
The nature of the noise registered. Men, right outside, singing “Camptown Races” loudly enough for Richmond to hear it.
“They’re serenading you, Charlie,” Ambrose whispered. “Your own boys. If you don’t go out and listen, they’ll be insulted.”
Groggy and skeptical, Charles pushed the tent flap aside, then shivered with an unexpected emotional reaction to the tribute. A wind had sprung up, blowing from the direction of the seacoast. The mist was gone and the moon was visible; so were faces he recognized. The men must have heard of the thief’s capture. They were honoring him in a traditional way.
Some were honoring him, he amended; he counted eleven.
Ambrose danced up and down like a boy, breaking out his flute to accompany the singers. Over his shoulder, Charles said, “They’ll expect the usual reward for a serenade. Haul out our private stock of whiskey, will you?”
“Glad to, Charlie. Yes, indeed.”
The men liked him for a change. While it lasted, he might as well enjoy it.
23
ON JULY 1, A MONDAY, George arrived in Washington. He checked into his hotel, then took a hack to an area of huge homes set far apart on large lots. The driver pointed out the residence the Little Giant had occupied for such a short time. Stephen Douglas had died in June, strongly supporting the President he had opposed as a candidate last year.
Housing was scarce in Washington. Stanley and Isabel had been fortunate to hear of an ailing widow no longer able to keep up her home. She packed off to live with a relative, and Stanley signed a year-long lease. He had provided this information and the address in a recent note so stiffly worded that George felt sure Cameron had insisted Stanley write it for purposes of departmental harmony. Why had the old bandit meddled? George thought irritably. The note had forced this response—a duty call with all the charm of a tumbril ride in the French Revolution.
“Mighty fine place,” the hackman called as they drove up. “Mighty fine” hardly covered it. Stanley’s home, like those nearby, was a mansion.
A butler informed him that Mr. and Mrs. Hazard were in New England. The servant had a snide and condescending manner. Maybe Isabel gives them demonstrations, George thought with cheerful spleen.
Inside, he spied unopened packing crates. Evidently they had just moved in. George left his ca
rd and jumped in the hack again, smiling. No need to call a second time; not this trip.
He ate alone in the hotel dining room, where he overhead some speculative talk about old General Patterson, said to be ready to march from Harpers Ferry into the Shenandoah. In his room, George tried to read the latest Scientific American but couldn’t concentrate. He felt nervous about the interviews scheduled for next morning.
At half past nine, he arrived at the five-story Winder Building on the corner of Seventeenth Street across from President’s Park. The original brick had been brightened up by a coat of plaster and an ironwork balcony on the second floor. George studied this and found it wanting in style. He couldn’t manufacture every piece of iron in America, but he often wished he could.
He moved past sentries on duty to protect the important government officials headquartered here; one was General Scott. Entering the building was like diving under the sea on a sunny day. Going up the gloomy iron stairs, he noticed the bad state of the woodwork and paint peeling everywhere.
Civilians with portfolios or rolled-up plans packed the benches in the second-floor corridor. Clerks and uniformed men traveled from doorway to doorway on mysterious errands. George stopped a captain and was directed through another door into a stone-floored office of appalling disorder. At rows of desks, other clerks wrote or shuffled papers. Two lieutenants argued over a clay model of a cannon.
George and Wotherspoon had found the flaw in the casting process, and organization of the bank was proceeding smoothly, so he had a clear conscience about this visit—though at the moment he had a wild urge to flee.
A middle-aged officer approached, radiating importance. “Hazard?” George said yes. “The chief of Ordnance is not here as yet. I am Captain Maynadier. You may sit and wait—there, next to Colonel Ripley’s desk. I regret I have no time to chat. I have been in this department fifteen years and have never once caught up with my paperwork. Paper is the curse of Washington.”
He waddled off and went exploring among several mountains of it landscaping his desk. Someone had told George that Maynadier was an Academy man. Though all West Point graduates were supposed to be brothers, friends, George would be happy to make an exception.
He took a chair. After twenty minutes, he heard shouting in the hall.
“Colonel Ripley!”
“If you’ll only give me a moment—”
“May I show you this—?”
“Han’t got time.”
The irascible voice preceded an equally irascible lieutenant colonel, a sharp-featured old fellow from Connecticut, Academy class of ’14. The chief of the Ordnance Department carried his official burdens and his sixty-six years with notable displeasure.
“Hazard, is it?” he barked as George rose. “Han’t got much time for you, either. Do you want the job or not? Carries the rank of captain till we can get you a brevet. All my officers need brevets. Cameron wants you in here, so I guess it’s cut and dried if you say yes.”
Hat and dress gauntlets were slapped on the desk during the foregoing. Ripley’s verbal tantrum would have been funny to anyone not connected with the department—or thinking of being connected. A distinct silence—fear?—had descended on the high-ceilinged room the moment Ripley entered.
“Sit down, sit down,” the colonel said. “The Hazard works has a contract from this department, don’t it?”
“Yes, sir. We’ll meet it on schedule.”
“Good. Better than a lot of our suppliers can say. Well, ask me questions. Talk. We’re due in the park in half an hour. The secretary wants to see you, and since he’s the one who put me in this job two months ago, I reckon we’ll go.”
“I do have one important question, Colonel Ripley. You know I’m an ironmaker by trade. How would that help me fit in here? What would I do if I worked for you?”
“Supervise artillery contracts, for one. You also run a huge manufactory, which I presume takes organizational skill. We can use it. Look at the mess I inherited,” he cried with a sweeping gesture. Maynadier, whose desk was adjoining, renewed his attack on the paper peaks with a haste approaching frenzy.
“I’d welcome your presence, Hazard—long as you don’t bother me with newfangled proposals. Han’t got any time for those. Tested weapons are the best weapons.”
Another Stanley. Foursquare against change. That was a definite negative. George began to understand why the colonel’s critics called him Ripley Van Winkle.
They discussed pay and how soon he could report—details he considered secondary. He was in a mood as sour as Ripley’s when the colonel consulted a pocket watch and proclaimed them two minutes late to meet Cameron.
Out they dashed through the barricades of bodies. Several contract seekers followed Ripley downstairs, shrill as gulls chasing a fishing boat. One man, yelling about his “remarkable centrifugal gun” that would hurl projectiles “with the fury of a slingshot,” knocked George’s hat off with brandished plans.
“Inventors,” Ripley fumed as he crossed the avenue. “Ought to ship every last one back to the madhouses they came from—”
Another innovation no doubt infuriating to the colonel floated above the trees of President’s Park. Guy ropes secured its empty observation basket to the ground. George recognized Enterprise, the balloon featured in last month’s illustrated papers. It had been exhibited in this same location not many days ago, and Lincoln was said to have been interested in its potential for aerial observation of enemy troops.
The balloon fascinated George because he had seen only one other, at a Bethlehem fair. Enterprise was made of colorful gored sections of pongee, the whole filled with hydrogen. Farther back in the trees, beyond the crowd of mothers, children, government officials, and a few blacks, he saw the wagon with wooden tanks in which sulphuric acid and iron filings combined to produce the gas.
Ripley paraded through the crowd in a manner that said he was a person of authority. They found Simon Cameron talking with a thirtyish fellow in a long linen coat. Before introductions could be finished, the young man pumped George’s hand.
“Dr. Thaddeus Sobieski Constantine Lowe, sir. An honor to meet you! Though I’m from New Hampshire, I know your name and high standing in the world of industry. May I describe my plan for an aerial spy corps? I hope interested citizens will support it so the commanding general will be persuaded—”
“General Scott will give the scheme due consideration,” Cameron broke in. “You needn’t arrange any more exhibitions of this kind.” Behind the smile of the old pol lay a hint that they wouldn’t be tolerated on government land, either. “If you will excuse me, Doctor, I have business to discuss with our visitor.”
And he drew George away as if they had always been political partners, not opponents. Ripley dogged them as they strolled.
“Have a good chat with the colonel, George?”
“I did, Mr. Secretary.”
“Simon. We’re old friends. Look here—I know you and Stanley don’t always get along. But this is wartime. We have to set personal matters to one side. I never think of the past. Who worked and voted against me back home and who didn’t—” After that sly dig, Cameron began to preach. “Ripley urgently needs a man for artillery procurement. Someone who understands ironmakers, who talks their language—”
He faced George, squinting against the hot July light. “Unless we wish to see this nation fail, we must all shoulder part of the burden of preserving it.”
Don’t spout homilies at me, you damned crook, George thought. At the same time, curiously, he responded to the appeal. The words were true, even if the man wasn’t.
Ripley harrumphed, intruding. “Well, Hazard? Any decision?”
“You’ve been very forthcoming with practical information about the job, sir. But I’d like the rest of the day to consider everything.”
“Only fair,” Cameron agreed. “I look forward to hearing from you, George. I know your decision will be good news.” Once again he clapped the visitor on the shoulder,
then rushed off.
The fact was, George had already decided. He would come to Washington, but he would bring a load of reservations as baggage. He didn’t feel noble, merely foolish and, consequently, a little depressed.
Ripley whirled at the sound of a commotion—Dr. Lowe chasing some urchins from beneath the bobbing balloon basket. “Han’t got time for such nonsense in wartime,” Ripley complained as they left President’s Park. Whether he meant balloons or children, George didn’t bother to ask.
Later that day, George hired a horse and rode across the Potomac, following directions Brett had provided. He couldn’t find Captain Farmer’s pick-and-shovel company. Since business required that he take a 7:00 P.M. train, he reluctantly turned back. All around the fortifications he saw fields of tents and men drilling. It reminded him of Mexico, with one difference: the soldiers obliquing or clumsily marching to the rear were so young.
24
SEVERAL DAYS LATER IN the mansion on I Street, Isabel took tea in a room she had claimed for herself during their first inspection of the house. For one hour, starting at four, she forbade anyone to disturb her while she sipped and read the newspapers.
It was a daily ritual, and one she considered vital to success in this labyrinthine city. A quick study, Isabel already knew certain fundamentals of survival. It was better to be devious than forthright. Never reveal one’s true opinion; the wrong person might hear it. A sensitivity to shifting power balances was also important. Stanley was about as sensitive as a wheel of cheese; so his wife, a step removed from the daily activities of the government, relied on newspapers. One could learn only so much at balls, receptions, and salons—or from Stanley.
Today she discovered the reprinted text of the President’s Independence Day message to Congress. It was largely a reiteration of the causes of the war. Lincoln put all the blame on the South, naturally, and stated again that the Confederacy hadn’t really needed to take Fort Sumter for any strategic reason. Hotheads had created a false issue of patriotic pride, and as a consequence, the South was rashly testing whether a constitutional republic, or a democracy—a government of the people, by the same people—can, or cannot, maintain its territorial, integrity against its own foes.
