Lincoln

by Gore Vidal

  As Seward entered, Hay withdrew; and Lincoln sat back in his chair. “I only hope, Mr. Seward, the message came by telegraph.”

  “No, sir.” Seward sat in the chair to the President’s left, the light in his face. “The telegraph is still down. But General Scott’s couriers are almost as good.”

  “Where are the troops?”

  “Apparently they landed at the Naval Academy, which they retook as well as that old frigate, the Constitution.”

  “This is all very good to know,” said Lincoln, impatiently. “But where is General Butler now?”

  “I can only read between the lines of this message from Governor Hicks.” Seward consulted the much-creased sheet of paper in his hand. “First, he replies to my answer to his proposal that we ask the British minister to mediate between Maryland and the United States in this matter.”

  Seward looked up. Lincoln was shaking his head. Gradually, Seward was beginning to read the moods if not the mind of this curious figure. The present mood was one of intense anger. “It passes all belief!” Lincoln now addressed the portrait of Andrew Jackson over the mantelpiece.

  “At least, I think the governor was properly stung when I wrote, declining on your behalf his ingenious suggestion that whatever disagreement any American has with any other American, the agent of a foreign monarchy is hardly a proper mediator.”

  “Good. What about General Butler?”

  “Apparently, both General Butler’s regiment and New York’s Seventh Regiment landed without incident.”

  Lincoln brightened. “That’s two thousand men. And Rhode Island’s just behind. But,” he turned from the Jackson portrait to Seward, “exactly where are they now?”

  “As of this morning, still in Annapolis. Naturally, the governor objects to the presence of Northern troops …”

  “Northern!”

  Seward interrupted the President; something that he had, only lately, got out of the habit of doing. “General Butler anticipated you, sir. He, very respectfully, I gather, told the governor that he was never again to refer to Union troops as Northern troops. The governor alludes, somewhat petulantly, to this.”

  Lincoln smiled for the first time. “They say he is a great actor, Ben Butler. Do you know him?”

  “I do. Butler’s easily the best trial lawyer I’ve ever seen in action.”

  Lincoln nodded. “Full of dramatic tricks, they say. With a liking for low criminals, the guiltier the better.” Lincoln chuckled. “Just think, here’s a trial lawyer, commanding troops in a state that’s trying to secede, on his way to save the capital of a country whose president was, until recently, an attorney for the Illinois Central Railroad.”

  “While, at the risk of boasting, sir, the Secretary of State is still considered the finest patent lawyer in New York State …”

  Lincoln laughed. “Here we are, practically the whole legal profession, running the Administration and now the army, trying to hold together with our fine legal minds a Union that is being torn apart by men who have spent their lives killing animals and one another in duels of honor. If you’ll forgive me, General Jackson,” Lincoln nodded to the picture on the wall, “a renowned duellist …”

  “… and lawyer,” added Seward. “Anyway, Governor Hicks, whose field appears to be divorce …”

  By now, Lincoln was laughing helplessly at the growing absurdity of the situation. When, finally, the laughter ceased, Seward thought that Lincoln looked like a man who had just taken a tonic or received the beneficial shocks of the latest patented electrical machine. But then Seward had already come to understand Lincoln’s almost physical need for laughter. “So Governor Hicks has been reprimanded. We occupy Annapolis. Now what?”

  “Part of General Butler’s troops remain. That’s what the governor is objecting to. They are repairing the railroad to the city. He wishes that they would not because of what he calls his excitable people. He also says that because of our restoration of the railroad, the legislature cannot come to Annapolis. Apparently General Butler, always one to have the last word, has said that until the railroad is repaired, our troops cannot leave the city any more than the legislature can enter it. The logic is nice.”

  “When is the legislature to convene?” Lincoln sat up in his chair, suddenly alert.

  “The twenty-sixth.”

  “This is the twenty-third. We have not much time.”

  “To do … what, sir?”

  Lincoln rose. “I’m not ready to say. So when are we to expect these mythical troops?”

  “Tomorrow or the day after.”

  It was the day after, Thursday, April 25, that the troops arrived in Washington. Although the railroad had been restored, there were sufficient cars only for the sick, the baggage and one howitzer battery. The main body of the troops departed Annapolis Wednesday morning on foot; and arrived, without incident, at the capital the next afternoon.

  The Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island regiments then proceeded down Pennsylvania Avenue, bands playing and banners unfurled, to the White House, proving to the President that there was indeed a patriotic Northern part of the Union, ready to fight for the preservation of the whole.

  Hay watched the glittering display from the front gate of the Mansion, standing just behind the President and Mrs. Lincoln and the two loud boys. The city seemed, mysteriously, to have filled up again. All sorts of people, until now invisible, lined Pennsylvania Avenue in order to cheer the troops.

  But David Herold was not one of them. He stood beside Mr. Thompson, who held a small Union flag in one hand but, out of deference to the volatile mixture of his clientele, he did not actually wave the flag. He had shut the drugstore for the day: in celebration or in mourning, depending on his customer’s predilections.

  “There sure are a lot of them New Yorkers!” Disloyally, David thought that the dark-blue uniforms of the Yankees were smarter looking than the gray Confederate uniforms that had begun to appear in Alexandria, now a foreign city, to be entered only with a military pass, which he possessed, signed by the Adjutant-General of the U. S. Army, confirming David’s status as “delivery boy for Thompson’s Drug Store.”

  Mr. Thompson tapped his foot in unison with the marchers’ tread. “I think, Davie,” he said, absently, “that we should order more sticking plaster, for feet. I think there will be a run on sticking plaster. A real run!” He chuckled at his own small joke.

  “There must be three thousand of them,” said David, glumly. “Maybe more.” He knew that the Confederate garrison at Alexandria numbered no more than five hundred men. At a distance, the Yankee soldiers looked impressive; well outfitted and sharp drilled. But when one of the companies moved in too close to the sidewalk where David was standing, he could see and smell the sweat that trickled down necks, note the imperfectly shaved cheeks, the look of strain and fatigue in every face.

  Suddenly, there was a cheer from farther down the avenue. A cavalry company was approaching, led by a splendid youthful figure wearing a yellow-plumed hat turned up at one side.

  “Who’s that?” asked David.

  “I don’t rightly know,” said Mr. Thompson. “But those are beautiful horses, which means that’s a rich man’s company.”

  “Who’s that?” asked Kate, standing between her father and Sumner at the window of Chase’s office.

  “He looks familiar.” Chase hummed these words, allowing them to replace for a moment, the gnarled verses of that old rugged cross, a favorite hymn which, in his joy at seeing the capital city succored, he had been humming as he watched the armies, plainly, of the Lord of Hosts.

  It was Sumner who identified the young man just as he came abreast the Treasury, causing the crowd in front of Willard’s to cheer excitedly. “It’s Governor William Sprague. Of Rhode Island. He raised that regiment himself. And paid for it himself.”

  “They say he is one of the wealthiest men in the country,” said Kate.

  “I am glad,” intoned Sumner, “to see that he is also one of the most
patriotic.”

  Sprague raised his plumed hat and waved it in their direction. Kate waved back. “Do you think he saw me?”

  Chase laughed; and that old rugged cross was, for the moment, put aside. “Not without his spectacles.” He turned to Kate. “Remember?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Then you both know him?”

  “Yes, Mr. Sumner.” Kate stared with some fascination at the trim figure, whose golden epaulets glittered just beneath their window. “I should’ve recognized him, too, because he was in uniform when we saw him in Cleveland. But he’s added the plume to his cap; and he’s taken off his spectacles, which could be dangerous because he’s as blind as a bat, or so he says.”

  “I cannot say that I know him at all,” said Sumner. “The family own textile mills in Providence. Since they depend on Southern cotton, I shouldn’t think that they are too happy about our blockade.”

  “All the more to his credit that he comes now to the Union’s aid.” Chase had not been particularly impressed by the young man when he had come to Cleveland to take part in a patriotic display the previous October, the last of a number of such occasions over which Chase had presided as governor of Ohio. But Kate had found Sprague intriguing, if only because of his youth; he had become governor at twenty-nine, a year younger than the law required and had been obliged to wait some months before he could take office. It was said that Sprague had bought his governorship, which Chase found absolutely enviable. But then anyone who did not have to worry about money was, for Chase, singularly blessed.

  “Who is that back of him?” asked Kate, pointing to the colonel in actual command of Sprague’s regiment, a tall, slender fellow, not yet forty, with huge whiskers.

  “I have met him,” said Chase, frowning. “He is a West Pointer, who left the army. Presumably, he was not Southern enough for General Scott. He is—or was—with one of the railroads. He lives—or lived—in Chicago.”

  For a moment, the three stared, with varying sensations of relief, as Rhode Island’s artillery battery passed beneath them, bright and shining in the warm April sun. Then Sumner turned to Chase. “I have a request, sir, from General Butler, who is still at Annapolis. Would you allow our Massachusetts men to board here at the Treasury?”

  “With pleasure, Mr. Sumner. Unless Kate would rather we take in Rhode Island?”

  “Oh, no, Father. I am devoted to General Butler.”

  “Plainly, you don’t know him.” Sumner sighed. “He is all that is despicable. He is a Democrat who voted for Breckinridge. He is an anti-abolitionist. He is a sly lawyer. He is …”

  “He is here in Washington!” exclaimed Kate. “Or at least his troops are, for which we should all be thankful.”

  “All be thankful,” were also the words that the President used, as the various commanders filled the Blue Room. Lincoln stood at the center of the room, flanked by General Scott and Gideon Welles. Hay and Nicolay stood against the wall, enjoying the scene. The entrance hall was crowded with people, mostly ladies led by Mrs. Lincoln, waiting to welcome the warriors once the President was done with them.

  Hay was one of the few spectators who had been able to identify the beplumed William Sprague. “In Rhode Island, they call him the boy-governor,” he whispered to Nicolay, as the small, imperious figure entered the Blue Room, accompanied by his tall colonel.

  “Did you know him when you were at Brown?”

  Hay nodded. “I met him. That’s all. But everyone knows of the Spragues. A. & W. Sprague & Company. That’s the family firm. They own nine cotton mills. I used to see him and his sisters at dances in Providence. In civilian clothes, he looked like a mouse.”

  “The mouse has gone to war,” said Nicolay. As Sprague put on his pince-nez in order to see the President, Nicolay added, “Now I begin to see something slightly rodentine in the face.”

  “This,” said Sprague in a loud voice, introducing his chief of staff to the President, “is Colonel Ambrose Burnside, West Point class of ’forty-seven, now commander of the First Rhode Island regiment, under me.”

  “It’s not often I get to meet a Yankee West Pointer,” said the President amiably, shaking hands.

  “Well, sir,” said Burnside, “I’m actually from Indiana, originally …”

  “That makes two of us,” said Lincoln, beaming.

  “The Ancient has more states of origin than there are stars in the flag.” Nicolay was amused.

  “At least, Nico, he’s lived in Indiana, unlike Virginia, which he used to claim.”

  Lincoln was now staring quizzically at the tall, bewhiskered officer. “I know you, don’t I, Colonel?”

  “Yes, sir. We’ve met, sir. I was with the Illinois Central, when you were our legal counsel.”

  “Another railroad man!” exclaimed Lincoln. “I feel better already.”

  Once the introductions had been made and patriotic sentiments exchanged, the ladies filled the room. Sprague proved to be magnet-in-chief. Amused, Hay watched the nearsighted young man try to keep in place his pince-nez while maintaining the Napoleonic manner. Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Grimsley never left his side, while Tad tried on his cap and Willie fingered his sabre.

  Hay turned to a young Massachusetts officer, who was wearily mopping his face with a dirty handkerchief. “You’ve had a long day, I guess.”

  “Oh, it’s been that, all right.” The voice was purest Yankee. “We thought for a while they’d fire on us. That was back in Annapolis. But old Ben, he went and put the fear of God in those rebels.” The officer chuckled. “They were also pretty flabbergasted at how fast our boys put their railroad back together for them. I expect old Ben will keep order pretty good now.”

  “He’s settled in?”

  The man nodded. “He’s at the Naval Academy, with two pistols beside his bed. When the governor told him to go, old Ben said someone has to stay on to welcome the next shipload of troops—and the next, and the next. He’s scared the governor half to death.”

  “Was there much secession talk?”

  “Mmm, yes. They talk a lot, those people, don’t they? But when we’re around, they don’t do much except talk. Even so, I reckon soon as we leave Annapolis, they leave the Union.”

  “So we should stay?”

  “Yes, sir, we should stay.”

  In the general melee of the entrance hall—to which had now been added the Kentucky volunteers from their quarters in the East Room—Hay found himself at the main entrance, face to face with the boy-governor himself, who offered his hand to be shaken as if in blessing. Hay held the soft hand for a moment in his own; and received, as it were, the benediction of the god of war. Then he let go the hand. “I’m John Hay,” he said. “We met in Providence, when I was at Brown.” Hay noted that Sprague was shorter than himself; and looked even younger than he was, with an unlined, pale face, clear gray eyes and a widow’s peak as perfect as a girl’s.

  “Never saw you before in my life,” was the hero’s abrupt answer.

  Hay felt his cheeks grow warm. “No reason why you should remember me,” he said. “I’m only the President’s private secretary,” he added, in an attempt to achieve a degree of parity. But Sprague paid no attention to him. The gray eyes looked at the door. “I want,” said the boy-governor, “a cocktail. Where can I get one?”

  “At the bar, at Willard’s.”

  “Come on,” said Sprague, and started out the door, not looking to see if Hay had obeyed him.

  More awed than not, Hay accompanied Sprague across Pennsylvania Avenue to Willard’s. As they passed the Treasury Building, Sprague said, “Where’s Chase?”

  “Home, I suppose.”

  “I met him once. He’s bald.”

  “I have noticed that, too.” Hay found amusing Sprague’s somewhat disjointed conversational style.

  “You went to Brown,” said Sprague, in an accusing tone. “I quit school at fifteen. I went into the family business. I was a bookkeeper. I liked that.”

  They were now in the lobby
of Willard’s, which had filled up as if by magic since the arrival of the troops. The boy-governor was duly recognized; and hailed by all. He paused at the cigar stand. Absently, he shook hands with everyone in sight, his eyes on Hay, who knew the way to the bar.

  At last, Hay maneuvered Sprague through the bar’s swinging doors. But not before a dozen ladies in the domed reception room had had a chance to celebrate him. Like an hereditary prince, which he was, Sprague accepted adulation as entirely his due. There was more handshaking at the bar. Senator Zach. Chandler of Michigan, tall and jovial, and Senator Hale of New Hampshire, tall and sour, each shook the hand of the small, glittering figure, who had now removed the yellow-plumed cap.

  Hay found them a table in the corner, farthest from the long, crowded, smoky bar. A waiter brought a brandy-smash for Hay and a gin-sling for Sprague. With one practised gulp, Sprague emptied half the frosted glass; dried his drooping moustaches with the back of his hand; and then, eyes considerably brighter than before, he smiled. Sprague looked, Hay thought, like a twelve-year-old boy with a moustache. “That regiment’s cost me a hundred thousand dollars so far,” said the youthful hero. “Of my own money.”

  “I know. The President is grateful …”

  “He damn well should be. Did you know I’m the first volunteer of the war? I saw to that. Got my name in first. Well, which is it going to be? Ben Butler or me?” Hay was beginning to wonder if the brandy-smash he had been carefully sipping might be having a premature effect.

  Sprague finished his gin-sling; and motioned for another. “Ben Butler’s got all the attention so far. But I paid for this regiment. I drilled ’em. I’ve been with the Rhode Island artillery volunteers since I was fifteen. I’m also a governor. Ben Butler’s just a lawyer; and a Democrat—a Southern Democrat. I was elected on what we called the Unionist ticket. Cooked up the name myself. So—Butler or me?”

  “For what, sir?” Hay found it odd addressing as “sir” a twelve-year-old with a false moustache, an illusion sustained by the blue cigar smoke that now softened the glare from the gaslit globes which illuminated the long bar. Hay kept reminding himself that Sprague was not only eight years his senior but the governor of Rhode Island—the smallest of the states, true; but then Sprague was the richest of governors—a multimillionaire, a rare breed, in Hay’s experience, which was mostly of Springfield, where a hundred thousand dollars was regarded as a sizable fortune.