A Conspiracy to Murder, 1865

by T. L. B. Wood

  Twenty-Three

  I was surprised to find Mary Lincoln in residence at the cottage, as a servant opened the door to greet us. She, apparently, had insisted she meet Tad’s tutor. Mary was a protective mother and wanted to approve—or disapprove—of the new player in the life of her child. She was a notoriously jealous woman, I recalled, thinking of her yet to come disastrous encounter with the wife of General Ord and the subsequent humiliation felt by Lincoln when Mary caused an embarrassing scene. I would have to play my cards cautiously.

  “Oh, I am so glad I came with my brother today,” I gushed, giving an unnecessary curtsey to Mary. I realized she had the need to be treated like royalty. “I typically remain in Washington,” I added, “but it is so pretty here in the country.” It was important she didn’t get the notion I was lying in wait for her husband to show up. “I heard so much about your fashion and style sense, and I see it in play here in this lovely cottage.” I tried to not simper but realized I was doing so, despite my druthers. “I must believe it was your gracious hand that brought this to fruition.”

  “Okay,” Kipp grumbled, “that’s enough of that!”

  But it wasn’t, and Mary melted at my words. I think history was unkind to her in so many ways. She was raised in wealth and comfort but married a man who had little to nothing in their early days. What they shared was a fierce ambition for his political success, and she was sufficiently educated to debate the issues of the day with her husband. Their beginnings as a couple were humble, to say the least. She sewed the curtains, made their clothes, and labored about her house, not complaining over the lack of luxuries from what was recorded at the time. Maybe if she had not lost three of her four children, as well as being at her husband’s side when he was ruthlessly shot in the head, she would have evolved a bit differently? But in any case, Lincoln was completely devoted to her, and it was rare he lost patience or took a harsh tone. And maybe historians, who found his need to cater to her erratic whims and accumulate debt due to her out of control spending, just didn’t appreciate the fragile balance of their lives. I personally thought Stanton’s having her removed when she was distraught at the side of a dying Lincoln was cruel. In my mind, if she was good enough for Lincoln, then it was really no one else’s business. And who amongst us understands the way of the heart?

  But I did read her correctly, and she appreciated my subservient, fawning tone, and it immediately defused any twinge of jealousy she might have harbored. In fact, she seemed to need a female confidant, and she had few in her orbit—most women could not tolerate her unpredictable behaviors and sharp, gossipy tongue—so I was not surprised when she took me by the arm to give me the grand tour of the cottage, explaining all her efforts to beautify the interior.

  “You see here, my dear, where I chose these soft colors—almost like a watercolor—to make use of the subtle lighting from that transom,” Mary Lincoln said, lifting her hand towards the wall. As we walked from room to room, all fourteen of them, she grasped my hand, and we were like two girlhood friends as we ambled along, Kipp trailing in our wake.

  “She’s lonely,” he remarked.

  And she was, indeed, lonely. With the exception of Mary Keckley, there were only a few women in Washington who sought her counsel. Again, I felt a sting of compassion. I glanced at her, noticing how her once pretty features had become blurred with age, although her blue eyes still held the spark of intelligence that had once attracted Lincoln. Some people thought she was stupid, basing this assessment on her erratic behaviors and more than occasional unkind outbursts. But she was really bright and had been articulate in politics and current events when she and Lincoln were young and courting. No doubt, he enjoyed the fact she was a bit unusual, as she was not a conventional woman of the times. Grief and stress had changed her, as can happen to any human being. Perhaps the fact I, too, had lost a child, made me see her in a little different view than some others.

  We finally rejoined Lincoln, who was sitting in front of the fireplace, his face a mask of concentration as he stared at the fire. Not only was he dealing with the ongoing war, but also Mary had scheduled a series of White House receptions for the months of January and February. And although he was a garrulous man, he had no true desire to dress in his finest suit and shake hands all afternoon. His health, due to stress, was deteriorating, and the already slender Lincoln was losing weight, making him appear cadaverous. For a man as ambitious as was he, I was a little surprised to find he had a private longing to return to his former life, sharing a small law practice and living a quieter existence. After all, this was what he had worked for, this life of leadership. I suppose humans often find the “getting” is not always what it was thought to be.

  Lincoln’s face turned towards us as his eyes rested on Mary; his features softened as a smile pulled at his lips. “And did you enjoy showing the cottage, Mother?”

  As Mary took a seat in the flanking wing chair, I chose the loveseat and watched their interplay. Mary sat slightly forward in the chair, her eyes eagerly on his face. There was some level of anxiety there, as always. Lincoln’s thoughts revealed the dreams that haunted him, dreams of death. In short, Lincoln thought he would die before he left office. Mary, too, had similar beliefs, and she constantly worried that Lincoln would be killed. For a woman plagued by loss, her overwhelming anxiety had tipped her too far over the edge of reason. I glanced at Kipp, finding his amber eyes on me.

  “I love you,” he said, having followed my thoughts.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I replied. The loss of Kipp’s mother had left him with some of the same anxieties that plagued the Lincolns.

  “How can you, or anyone, make such a promise?” he asked, his voice soft in my mind.

  “I can and do,” I answered. “Let your mind be still, Kipp.” And it was true that both symbionts and humans might make such promises, ones of comfort, but ones with no way to be assured. These were words of love, not reason.

  We relaxed and listened to Mary Lincoln’s idle chit chat about Washington gossip. Lincoln would smile and nod, even when her comments were sharp and critical. I followed his thoughts as they returned to the war, while Mary chattered on about meaningless things and supposed offenses taken. The fireplace was a focal point of the room for me, the wavering flames dulling my senses, the sounds of the crackling fire and crumbling logs soft against Mary’s voice. With effort, I struggled to stay awake and focused.

  The rest of the evening passed pleasantly—at least for me, while Peter was in the next room struggling against a headstrong Tad Lincoln. After murmuring our goodbyes, we let the horse amble his way home, finding his way to the stable without being coaxed. During the ride, I hatched an idea, but decided to announce it over breakfast the following morning. Kipp, after we’d gone to bed, was a restless sleeper, and I followed his dreams carefully. Like Kipp, I could telepathically manipulate his dreams but always hesitated since I felt he must need to work through some things lingering like cobwebs in his subconscious mind. He whimpered a few times, paddling his legs, as he dreamt of worry after his mother left him alone to survive, if he could. His puppy heart ached in loneliness and fear at that moment. I took a deep breath and counted to ten, thinking if the dream was still plaguing him at eleven, I’d intervene. Thankfully, it passed, and he relaxed, his sides rising and falling with rhythmic breathing, the soft sound filling our tiny bedroom.

  The morning brought the return of the sun and a sky the color of an unblemished robin’s egg. The few clouds visible were just wispy, drifting pieces of lace against the blue palette. I was hungry, and while the others feasted on some dried meat that Peter warmed in the heavy iron skillet, I sawed off another piece of our Irish friend’s wonderful bread, slathering it with fresh butter and homemade pear preserves. Yes, I could eat like that all the time.

  “I want to go to the general store and buy a large brim hat as well as some trousers and a coat,” I began. As the others glanced my way, I added, “I think it is time to do a little
nighttime prowling, and I will move better and be less conspicuous dressed as a man.”

  It was a fact that, uh, decent women didn’t flit about a city after dark without an escort, and Kipp didn’t count. The time had come for us to split up in order to cover more avenues, and the need to do so and not be conspicuous was critical. We’d decided to remain at the townhouse for the most part after the last time we’d fallen under the inspection of Booth, and noted in the month of January an uptick in the gathering of men at the Surratt house. While the Lincolns were busy attending the many receptions being held at the White House, the conspirators were busy planning. We postponed our chess game, focusing instead on activity across the street that seemed to be intensifying. Kipp took the lead, although the rest of us had our radar set and were collecting any thoughts that might available.

  “Booth, John Surratt, George Atzerodt, and David Herold are there today,” Kipp intoned, settling down in front of the iron stove, sighing in comfort. It was so effortless for him while the rest of us were straining to the point that my head began to hurt. The active thoughts and busy minds of other humans between us and our targets made such focus complicated, and it was easy to follow the wrong rabbit down a hole.

  “They’re in the dining room downstairs, I think, and Mary has arrived to prepare some food for them.” Kipp paused. “She has deliberately sent Maureen from the house on errands and has banned Anna from the room.” He glanced at us. “This is the first time she has been involved; it’s clear she doesn’t want a witness in Maureen, and she needs Anna to remain ignorant in case things go badly. And for all Booth’s charm offensive, he is, after all, an actor, and Mary thinks he is an unsuitable person to be around Anna.”

  He closed his eyes and grunted, trying to remain focused. “The discussion is focused on the technical aspects of kidnapping Lincoln and having the Confederacy hold him for ransom, the deal being that all Confederate prisoners will be released, the war will end, and the South will be allowed to secede.”

  “This is our first evidence that Mary Surratt knew of the plan,” I remarked, taking a deep breath. “We wanted to find this, if it existed, and it does.”

  “So that makes her a conspirator,” Peter said. Leaning forward, he took a sip of the coffee he’d brewed on the stovetop. It was pretty rough stuff…cowboy coffee from my way of thinking. He’d tried to tempt me with it, even added a dollop of fresh cream, but I stuck to my tea instead.

  “Yes, but only to kidnapping.” Kipp was silent for a few moments. “But she doesn’t like it. She’s only involved because she thinks John is about to get into trouble, and she wants to know what he’s planning. Mary doesn’t care for Booth and thinks he is a braggart. She particularly didn’t care for the way he kissed Anna’s hand one day, since she has him correctly pegged as a womanizer. As much as she supports the South, she is only doing this because of John, not because of her own feelings about the Confederacy.”

  “So, as usual, it is about protecting her child,” Elani remarked. “Ironic, isn’t it, that if he’d come back during her trial, he could have testified and taken responsibility, and perhaps she would not have been executed.”

  “While she was willing to die for him, he was not for her. I think her loyalties were sadly misplaced,” Peter said. He replaced his mug to the battered table, sloshing some coffee over the side of the mug as he did so. “Oops,” he remarked sheepishly.

  I rousted up my companions. “Remember, I have some shopping to do,” I reminded them. As much information as we could obtain from listening in to the activities in the Surratt household, we could gather other facts from following the thoughts of the men who seemed to have hatched the notion, courtesy of some prompting by the Confederate government which bankrolled both Booth and Surratt. We decided to choose fairly, as I held the black queen chess piece behind my back in my right hand, the white in my left. If Peter chose the black queen, he would follow Surratt and I would take Booth. And that’s exactly what happened. Both men, being actively in the employment of the Confederacy, would have minds full of thoughts involving the people in their orbits. We could determine their impressions of Mary Surratt by actively monitoring them, as well as her.

  So, as darkness fell the next evening, I donned my menswear, tucking my long hair up under the slouch brim hat I’d purchased. With a bulky coat that almost brushed my knees, the hat and a muffler wound around my throat and chin, it would be hard to determine my sex or identity after dark. The challenge would be keeping the lupines hidden as we traveled about the streets in covert surveillance of our targets.

  Across the street, another brief meeting had been held at the Surratt townhouse, but this time Mary Surratt was not present. She and Anna had left to go to church and were not due back until later. This time, Booth brought the thuggish and savage Lewis Powell, a man who would terrify the household of the Seward family in just a few weeks. He was probably a sociopath, I thought darkly. Anyone who could viciously attack a helpless man, as he had Secretary of State Seward, had issues.

  Peter and I waited at the door of our street-level kitchen, the lanterns unlit, as we stood in darkness. Beside me, I felt Kipp bristling with tension, coiled like a spring ready to pop. Elani was his opposite, relaxed, and I fancy I heard her yawn as we waited. Peter’s dark eyes met mine and a smile twitched at the corners of his mouth.

  “You must enjoy dressing like a man,” he quipped. “You seem to try to take every opportunity to go in costume.”

  “Well, next time you can dress like a woman and see how it feels to wear corsets and hooped skirts…don’t forget the bustle,” I replied spiritedly. “Try sitting comfortably with a bustle hanging on your fanny.”

  “Hush, you two,” Kipp breathed. “They are leaving.”

  The door across the street opened, and for a moment we saw figures outlined in the soft yellow glow of a lit lantern in the Surratt kitchen. A man stepped out, sweeping a hat on his head as he did so. As he paused to light a cigar, the flash of the match illuminated his face. It was Booth, ready to leave, Lewis Powell at his side. After a few words and laughter, Booth swaggered away, Powell’s large body hulking next to him, as the two men headed west on H Street. A second later, the smaller form of Surratt with a man we’d not identified headed east.

  “Good luck,” Peter said, squeezing my arm. After looking carefully both ways, he slipped out, making certain to hug the sidewalks and streets as close to the hovering buildings as was possible. Elani kept between him and the walls so as to be less apparent.

  “Kipp, are you ready?”

  He blinked his amber eyes in response and nuzzled my hand.

  We shut the door silently behind us. The chill in the air struck my face; a very fine mist was falling, coating the street with dampness, and I was grateful not to contend with bulky skirts tangling around my ankles. A low lying bank of fog had consumed Washington, and I strained to catch a fleeting glimpse of Peter and Elani glide out of sight around a corner. Booth and Powell were a block ahead of us, making a shadowy outline as they paused under a gas light. Powell, tall and powerfully built, overshadowed the slighter form of Booth, but it was clear who the leader was, and it was Booth. Even from our distance, his toxic thoughts floated back to us on the cool night air. Yes, Powell shared Booth’s hatred of Lincoln and the Union, but his thoughts didn’t have the rabid, impenetrable focus of Booth. Powell was clearly a man in search of a leader.

  “I’m almost surprised Booth can have a coherent discussion with anyone,” Kipp murmured to me. “He has the same feelings of derangement that I’ve followed in other obsessed people.”

  “He’s not deranged to the point he can’t control himself when needed,” I replied. A man wearing a heavy coat approached and pretended to stumble upon a rough patch in the road, falling against me. It’s difficult for humans to surprise us symbionts, and I realized before his hand reached into my inner coat pocket, that he was a skilled pickpocket, one of those who could lift a wallet without breaking a sweat or causi
ng alarm to the victim. What he didn’t count on was Kipp, who was concealed in the shadows. I felt the man’s hand freeze against my rib cage as Kipp’s massive head rose, his lips pulling back to display his impressive teeth.

  The man’s eyes opened wide as he began to backpedal, stumbling again as he did so. The last we saw, he was running down the street, gaining momentum with every step.

  “Hee hee,” Kipp giggled, looking up at me. “Reckon he won’t grab anyone’s wallet for a while.”

  “You’re so bad,” I replied softly, tweaking his ear. “Okay, let’s get back to work.”

  We trailed behind Booth and Powell, dropping back by another block, since the two men had a pattern of walking determinedly before stopping to talk. I feared each time they stopped that they would look around to see if anyone was close enough to listen. Once, as they paused, Booth almost whipped around, and I literally fell over Kipp into an alleyway.

  “Hey, watch it,” Kipp complained. “You stepped on my toe.”

  I wasn’t too happy either, since I managed to fall into a pile of horse poo, fairly fresh but not quite steamy. As I finally got back on my feet, I glared at Kipp, daring him to laugh. “Remind me to tell Peter that this work is not all glamour,” I finally managed to say. I have to give Kipp high marks for pretending to be worried about me when what he wanted to do was to laugh.

  I peeked around the corner of the alley and was dismayed to find that Booth and Powell had disappeared. We would have to proceed with caution. Placing my hand lightly along Kipp’s back, we walked slowly, Kipp turning his head, maximizing his ability to almost throw out sonar to pick up the now familiar thoughts of the men. He paused, once, and I felt his hair rise beneath my palm, before continuing in a slow, cautious, prowling gait. After we’d gone two blocks, he paused again and motioned me into a dark recessed area that led to the doorway of a small shop that was closed for the night.