by Gore Vidal
“I’ll soon be gone.” The old man seemed so pleased at the prospect that David did not bother to contradict him. “But, first, I want you to promise me you won’t leave where you are.” Since Mr. Surratt was going in any event, David could not see why he was now making it a condition of his departure that David stay at Thompson’s. But he told the old man, “Of course, I’ll stay there, if that’ll help us.”
“Oh, it will help us. Don’t worry.” There was a pause, as Mr. Surratt gasped for breath. He no longer coughed. Any day now, he would, literally, lose his breath, and life. “There is a man coming tonight. He is called Henderson. From the Center Market. Been there for years. Poultry. He’ll tell you what to do.” The old man reached under the covers and withdrew a rosary, which he proceeded to drape around long yellow knotty fingers. “He’ll take my place, Henderson will.”
Mr. Surratt shut his eyes. David assumed that he was praying. In the other room, the ballad had ended; and some were in Scotland afore others. There was a good deal of laughter. Mr. Surratt opened his eyes. “Mrs. Greenhow’s a real loss to us.”
“They’re moving her to Old Capitol next week, or so Miss Duvall says.”
“She‘s good.” Mr. Surratt nodded. “Mr. Pinkerton thinks he knows all about us but we know more about him and General McClellan than they’ll ever know about us. Davie …”
“Yes, sir?”
“Right now, we got one thing to do above all others. It’s this. Feed ’em wrong figures.” Mr. Surratt chuckled. “That’s the ticket!”
David was puzzled. “Wrong figures about what?”
“Size of our army. Henderson sees to it that a pack of coded messages from Richmond comes Pinkerton’s way. They all tell about troop movements, and they all give the numbers, and every number’s wrong. That’s how we got Little Mac thinking our army’s twice the size of his, when it’s nowhere near.”
“But we got as many men as the Yanks, don’t we?” This is what every newspaper had written.
Mr. Surratt’s smile was like that of a skull whose bottom jaw had come unhinged. “We got barely half the men they got and close to no arms at all.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You didn’t hear me, neither. But that’s our game from now on. That’s orders from Richmond. Fool the fool Yankees who want to be fooled anyways, after Bull Run. Kind of hard having to admit you got whipped by a smaller army. So don’t forget that now. We double the figures.”
“Yes, sir.”
“John’s home. He’ll help. Don’t know just how.” The beads of the rosary now began to slip more rapidly through the long fingers.
At eighteen, John Surratt, Junior, looked exactly like Jefferson Davis. “Except,” said David, “you don’t have that little beard.”
“I’m doing my best to grow it,” said John, whose voice was deep and educated, and belonged to a man twice his age. The two young men sat side by side on Mrs. Surratt’s dining-room chairs, watching some thirty relatives and friends of the family, mostly from Surrattsville, celebrate the successful end of 1861. Annie played dance music; and Mrs. Surratt danced a reel with her brother Zadoc Jenkins; and John told David that he would finish up next June at St. Charles, a Catholic school in Howard County, Maryland. “I went there all set to go into the priesthood, but now that we’re at war, I think I’ll be more use to God fighting on the right side.”
“It must be nice to have so much education.” Although David knew ten times what this sheltered boy knew of the world, he felt oafish when he was with him, as he never felt, say, with Annie. But then she was a girl.
“Oh, it serves a purpose, I guess. In ordinary times, I’d have been a priest, I think—or thought. I had the vocation—or thought I had. So did the president of the college, Father Jenkins—no relation of ours either.”
“Will you fight now?”
John frowned. “It’s being useful that matters, isn’t it?”
“I think so. I do what I can.” David was pleased with himself; he had never sounded so useful or so patriotic before; but then he had not had much chance to show off. He dared not with Mr. Thompson and he could not, really, with Mrs. Greenhow and Miss Duvall, while old Mr. Surratt was the one who gave him orders and Annie was—Annie.
“That’s all any of us can do. My father says you’re worth a whole regiment of cavalry to us.”
“Does he?” David glowed; and drank more punch. As Surrattsville’s general store-owners and tavern-keepers—not to mention Roman Catholics—the Surratts were not temperance like Mrs. Herold. There was good rye whiskey in the fruit punch. The Surratts also ran the town’s post office. “I expect to take over as postmaster in July.”
“I’d like that, to be a postmaster.” David had never heard of a postmaster as young as John.
“What’s it like, riding through the Yankee lines?” John had lowered his voice. He looked at David with what David took to be piercing eyes. David had read enough novels to know that his own eyes were darkly glowing.
“You just act stupid, that’s all. You know, like a dumb ole farm boy. They don’t even search you then. Oh, I’ve had a few scares, let me tell you.” David told him of some, pleased to see the piercing eyes become palely glowing.
Then Annie asked him to dance, as her mother played. “It’s almost midnight,” she whispered. “The New Year.”
“And now you’re nineteen like me.”
“Oh, don’t remind me!”
At midnight, everyone related to Annie—half the room as well as David—kissed her. Then Mrs. Surratt raised high her glass of punch and said, “Let’s drink to victory.”
They drank to victory. Then David kept on drinking to victory for the rest of the night. But before he got drunk, he was able to talk to Mr. Henderson of the Center Market, not an easy task.
Mr. Henderson was small and round and gray, with a beaked nose and shining eyes. Like so many of the farmers at Center Market, he resembled what he sold. David had grown up in terror of the Market’s pig-lady, who came in once a week from Virginia with ham and sausage; though toothless, she was, plainly, not harmless; she seemed capable, like any formidable old sow, of eating up a child. Though Mrs. Herold would talk to her for hours at a time about mutual acquaintances in Berryville, David could never understand a word the old woman said. To his ear, it was simply the ominous sound of a pig snuffling.
Mr. Henderson did not speak; he clucked, “I know your mother, Davie. Years back, she used to buy poultry from me. In the southwest corner, that’s me. Then we went and disagreed over a pullet’s age. That was in ’fifty-one. She buys now from the Mayberrys. In the southeast corner. No hard feelings.”
“I hope not, Mr. Henderson.”
“No hard feelings,” the plump chicken repeated. “I work with Mr. Surratt, too.”
“I know. He told me. Just now.”
“Old John’s about to end, I fear. Hope all this popery”—with a wave, Henderson indicated the painting of Jesus’s heart, the crucifix on the table, the rosary—“helps. I’m Baptist. So all this is just,” Henderson literally cackled, “Pope’s nose to me!”
Dutifully, David laughed. Then said, “What’ll you want me to do?”
“Stay at Thompson’s. Keep your eyes and ears open. The McClellans ever stop by, now they’re in H Street?”
“I never saw the general. But she came one day. She’s bossy but not bad-looking. Usually, they send a soldier. They got a new baby so there’s all kinds of things they buy.”
“Try to make a delivery yourself. Get to know people at the house. The way you’ve done with Mr. Seward, who leaves papers lying around.” It was not David but Mrs. Greenhow—when at large—who had noticed the previous summer a memorandum on Seward’s desk, listing the strength of each regiment attached to the Army of the Potomac. “Pity you can’t get inside the Mansion.”
“But I can, and I have. I been there two, three times,” said David. “But the place is so big you’ve got to know where to go, which, I guess, is back o
f that funny wooden fence they got in the upstairs hall where the President and the others all work, and which they guard most of the time.”
“But not all the time.” Chicken Henderson cocked his head to one side, like a hen listening for thunder or the fox. “We have our people there, too. But not enough. Well, keep on. Stay away from Miss Duvall, fine young lady that she is.”
“They fixing to arrest her?”
“Yes. I told her to go South. But she says she won’t. I hope she will. Well, Happy New Year, Davie. I must go. I hope it’s not still raining.”
The rain had stopped; and remained stopped through most of the morning of New Year’s Day when David, for patriotic reasons, stationed himself in front of the White House, despite a head that hurt him even after a pint of his own variation of Mr. Thompson’s famed morning-after painkiller and pick-me-up. The guards were letting everyone through the main gate. In principle, David could have joined the long line of people who wanted to shake the President’s hand, but he preferred to stand at the foot of the steps to the portico and watch the invited guests descend from their carriages, take the arm of Mr. McManus or one of the ushers and cross the frozen mud to the steps.
While David was doing his best to act like a spy, an army band appeared in front of the Mansion and began to serenade the President. As the band struck up “Hail Columbia!” the great door of the White House swung open and Father Abraham himself appeared. A round of cheers filled the frosty air with steam. He lifted his hat and smiled. The sentries to the left and the right of the door came to a sharp attention. As Lincoln moved to the edge of the portico, the crowd fell back on either side of him, under the busy direction of Mr. McManus. But David was so positioned that if he were to lean forward as far as he could, he could have touched the President, who looked skinnier than ever, he thought; and somewhat yellow in the face. Nevertheless, all in all, David thought him a pleasant-looking man.
The band had now finished “Hail to the Chief.” Lincoln then spoke in a loud high voice that could be heard all the way to St. John’s Church on the far side of Lafayette Square. “I am happy to see all of you at the beginning of the New Year, a year that will bring us, I am certain, to the end of this great trouble.”
There was cheering from the crowd. Lincoln took off his hat; gave a nod of his head; then started to go inside. At that moment, the band struck up “The Star-Spangled Banner” and the President was obliged to remain standing, hatless, looking toward the band on the muddy lawn. Behind him, a small boy appeared in the White House doorway, clutching a folded flag. David recognized the famous Tad; so did McManus. But before Tad could be intercepted, he had unfurled a large Confederate flag, which he began merrily to wave. The crowd on the lawn started to laugh. Puzzled, the President turned; then he stooped down, gathered child and flag in both arms and, to the cheers of the onlookers, he marched into the White House, holding his struggling burden at arms’ length. Mr. McManus shut the door behind them.
As David walked down the White House driveway, the carriage of the Secretary of the Treasury nearly ran him down. Even so, he was able to get a quick glimpse of the famous Kate, who looked very pretty—and wonderfully clean. A younger girl was with her; and a spinster-looking woman. David decided that he should keep a commonplace book. But first he would have to learn how to write in code.
Chase led his daughters, Kate and Nettie, and his old friend Susan Walker of Cincinnati into the crowded East Room, where Lincoln stood, shaking every hand, while Mrs. Lincoln, stationed to one side, shook no hands but smiled and nodded to all—except Kate, to whom she merely nodded, and to Chase, to whom she merely pursed her lips, unaware that her expression was entirely invisible to him as he glided through his usual subaqueous element.
Lincoln shook Chase’s hand; then he said, in a low voice, “Have you seen our Young Napoleon?”
“No, sir. I called. But they would not let me in to see him.”
“I had the same experience.”
“I am told that it is typhoid. He’ll be in bed at least a month.”
“I heard the same.” Lincoln frowned. “Others have seen him.”
“Who?”
But Lincoln merely shook his head; and turned to the next visitor in line, the minister from the Hansen Republic of Bremen, Baron Schleiden, a drinking crony, Chase knew, of Seward’s. The redoing of the East Room was almost complete. Kate pointed out to her father what she took to be the most expensive highlights, beginning with the huge velvet rug. “Sea green, with roses,” she said.
“Yes, I see the green. I will take the roses on trust.”
“I rather think that’s how she got the rug,” said Kate, beaming and nodding as the diplomatic corps made the rounds of the room, wishing everyone a Happy New Year. “They say it cost two thousand five hundred dollars.”
“Does she mean to compete with the youthful mistress of Sixth and E?”
“Father! I am economical. Mrs. Lincoln is not.”
“I know. Mr. Stevens tells me she has gone so far over Congress’s budget that the President will have to pay out of his own pocket. He won’t like that. He is a frugal man.”
“Like you.”
“Oh, I am doomed to debt.”
“Shall I marry Governor Sprague, and finance the debt?”
“No, let us be poor together.”
“In debtors’ prison,” said Kate, giving her hand to Lord Lyons, who kissed it while Chase beamed and said, “Pax est perpetuo!”
“Oh, let’s hope so, Mr. Chase. Let’s hope so. We’ve done good work, all of us.”
“You and Mr. Seward, particularly,” said Chase.
“Mr. Seward has heard his name invoked.” The small roguish figure was suddenly at Chase’s side, shaking Kate’s hand with his right and Chase’s with his left, while looking at Lord Lyons, who said, “I was discussing the good work we did, you and I, to keep the hotheads from going to war.”
“Simply newspaper talk,” said Seward airily. “Also it helped my having got to know your government in the summer of ’fifty-nine when I took my grand tour of Europe, and everyone greeted me with such warmth. You see,” he said to Kate, “they thought I was going to be the next President.”
“Which is exactly what you thought, wasn’t it?” said Kate.
“Well, let’s say if I didn’t think it, I never let on. Anyway, I met the lot, from Queen Victoria, who shows slightly more than an inch of upper gum when she laughs—”
“Sir, this is casus belli.” Lyons was stern.
“Sir, in western New York a show of gum is considered the outward and visible sign of God’s especial favor.”
“War is averted. We shall not set the world aflame just yet.” Lyons enjoyed quoting Seward to Seward. “But I must remind you, we are all in mourning for Prince Albert.”
Kate turned to Lyons. “The press tells us that she is mad with grief.”
“Your press will tell you anything, Miss Chase.” Lyons was serene, as always. “The Queen is not mad. But she is in deepest mourning. Curious, isn’t it, Mr. Seward, that the Prince should have died while consulting with the ministry on the Trent Affair.”
“I suspect we are all in his debt,” said Seward, graciously. “But I have never been able to fathom just how powerful your powerless sovereigns are.”
“We have the same difficulty,” said Lyons, “trying to fathom exactly how powerful the Secretary of State is in a presidential system.”
“Touché!” Kate exclaimed. Then she asked Lyons for news of the journalist Russell. During this, Seward slipped away, having caught a glimpse of the one person whom he most wanted to see.
The short, thickset Edwin M. Stanton stood alone, royally framed by the East Room’s splendid new damask curtains. Stanton’s black frock coat, with fashionable black velvet lapels, was open to reveal a not-so-fashionable black waistcoat with, again, black velvet lapels. Stanton always reminded Seward of the Auburn, New York, bank manager who had murdered his mother. Stanton was gazing about the
room through small pebble glasses, his habitual sneer curiously accentuated by the bristly gray whiskers that appeared to be attached to his plump chin as arbitrarily as an Egyptian Pharaoh’s ornamental beard. It was rumored that Stanton kept the ashes of his first wife—or was it his daughter?—on the mantelpiece in his parlor; and that the second wife was obliged to polish, each day, this somber reliquary.
Warily, the two men greeted each other. Seward knew that, earlier in the week, Stanton had intended to resign as special legal counsel to the Secretary of War; and go to New York, where a rich law partner awaited him. But when the word began to spread that Cameron would soon be gone, and that Stanton might succeed him, Stanton had delayed his removal to New York. Presently, he was in a state of irritable limbo. The President had not yet offered him the post that was still unrelinquished by Cameron. Although Seward knew that Chase was doing everything in his power to get the War Department for Stanton, Seward took some pleasure in the fact that Chase did not know that Stanton was also Seward’s own choice. Like Lincoln, Seward wanted pro-Union Democrats in high places. Unlike Chase, he did not want abolitionists anywhere. On this burning issue, Seward tended to admire Stanton’s wonderfully righteous hypocrisy. With Chase and the radical Republicans, Stanton was an abolitionist, constantly railing at the moderate “original gorilla,” Stanton’s much-quoted description of Lincoln, in the White House. With Lincoln and Seward, Stanton simply stood for the Union and deplored radical zeal. Seward also knew something that hardly anyone else knew. It was Stanton who had not only written for Cameron the fatal recommendation to Congress that the freed Negroes be armed but it was Stanton who had convinced Cameron that in this way he could maintain his hold on the War Department, by giving pleasure to the Committee on the Conduct of the War. With Iagoesque skill, Stanton had led to destruction his chief. Now Iago stood, somewhat bleakly, in the East Room, uncertain of his own future.
