Mrs. Lincoln must have felt a certain sense of vindication to have her husband’s own pastor publicly confirm that Mr. Lincoln had loved her most tenderly, but even so, Mr. Herndon’s claims had dealt her a terrible blow. “There are hours of each day, that I cannot bring myself to believe, that it has not all been some hideous dream,” she lamented to Elizabeth. “In my bewildered state, I sometimes feel that my darling husband, must and will return to his sorrowing loved ones. This I know shall never be, in this World, and if not for Tad I would all too willingly join him in the Next.”
In the first few weeks of 1867, Mrs. Lincoln’s letters often alluded to her sinking fear that she would not be able to afford her home on West Washington Street much longer, and that she would be obliged to take cheap rooms for herself and Tad elsewhere, rent out the house, and live off the income. In March she wrote again to confess that her fear had become a certainty. She had struggled long enough to keep up appearances, but that mask at last had to be thrown aside, for she simply could not live on her meager allowance. “As I have many costly things which I shall never wear,” she wrote, “I might as well turn them into money, and thus add to my income, and make my circumstances easier. It is humiliating to be placed in such a position, but, as I am in the position, I must extricate myself as best I can. Now, Elizabeth,” she continued, “I want to ask a favor of you. It is imperative that I should do something for my relief, and I want you to meet me in New York, between the 30th of August and the 5th of September next, to assist me in disposing of a portion of my wardrobe.”
Elizabeth knew that Mrs. Lincoln’s income was modest, only seventeen hundred dollars a year, and that her collection of elegant gowns, packed away in boxes of trunks since her move from Washington, was of no tangible value to her any longer, since she would almost certainly never wear the dresses again. Elizabeth decided that since Mrs. Lincoln’s need was urgent, it would be prudent to dispose of the gowns quietly, and that New York would be the best place to transact such delicate business.
“Why do you take this on?” Emma asked when Elizabeth explained why she might have to leave the dressmaking business in her care or shut it down altogether while she traveled on behalf of Mrs. Lincoln. “You have already done so much for her, and she is never any better for it.”
“I think she is better for knowing she can rely on me,” Elizabeth countered. “Everyone else has betrayed or abandoned her, except her sons. The question should not be why I help her so much but why other people help her so little.” Mrs. Lincoln was the wife of the Great Emancipator, the martyred president who had done so much good for their race. How could Elizabeth refuse to do anything that would be to her benefit?
On September 15 Elizabeth received a letter from Mrs. Lincoln announcing that she would arrive in New York City on the night of the seventeenth. She instructed Elizabeth to come beforehand and secure rooms for them at the St. Denis Hotel under the name Mrs. Clarke, an alias she had sometimes employed while traveling as First Lady.
Startled, Elizabeth read the letter again to be sure she had not misunderstood it. She had never heard of the St. Denis Hotel, which suggested that it was not a first-class establishment and was unlikely to be up to Mrs. Lincoln’s standards. She also was perplexed by Mrs. Lincoln’s decision to travel without protection under an assumed name, and forgo the trust and deference due to her as the First Widow. Most dismaying of all, she knew it would be difficult if not impossible for her as a colored woman to engage rooms at a strange hotel for a person about whom the proprietors knew nothing.
“What is she thinking?” Elizabeth murmured, shaking her head as she scanned the letter. If only she could ask! Mrs. Lincoln would already be en route to Washington before a letter could reach her in Chicago, and a telegram was out of the question, because Elizabeth could not expose the delicate business to every curious operator along the line. Caught in an impossible predicament, Elizabeth’s only hope was that at the last moment, Mrs. Lincoln would send word that she had changed her mind. So Elizabeth remained in Washington, waiting for a letter or a telegram, her anxiety increasing each day. When Mrs. Lincoln sent no word by September 18, the morning after she had said she would arrive in New York, Elizabeth immediately telegraphed “Mrs. Clarke” at the St. Denis Hotel and told her she would join her there soon.
She took the next train to New York, and after an anxious ride by rail and then by stage, she arrived at the hotel, a six-story building at Broadway and East Eleventh Street. Pulling the bell at the ladies’ entrance, she inquired with the boy who answered whether a Mrs. Clarke was staying there. He did not know, but went off to check with the manager, and soon returned to reply that Mrs. Clarke was indeed their guest. “Do you want to see her?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, just walk right there.” He gestured in an indefinite direction. “She’s down here now.”
Hesitating, thinking that perhaps Mrs. Lincoln was in the parlor with company, Elizabeth gave him one of her business cards. “Take this to her, if you please,” she said, but at that moment, Mrs. Lincoln came into the hall, drawn by the sound of her familiar voice.
“My dear Elizabeth, I am so glad to see you,” she exclaimed, crossing the room and giving Elizabeth her hand. “When I arrived last night and you were not here, I was simply frantic.”
Elizabeth had not seen Mrs. Lincoln in more than two years, and her pale, haggard appearance momentarily rendered her speechless. “I sent a telegram,” she managed to say.
“Yes, but I have only just received it. It has been sitting here all day but it was never delivered until this evening. Come, and let us find out about your room.”
She led Elizabeth into the office, where the clerk, like all modern hotel clerks, was exquisitely arrayed, highly perfumed, and too self-important to be courteous. He eyed Elizabeth with disdain as Mrs. Lincoln approached. “This is the woman I told you about,” she said. “I want a good room for her.”
The clerk’s eyebrows rose. “We have no room for her, madam.”
“But she must have a room. She is a friend of mine, and I want a room for her adjoining mine.”
“We have no room for her on your floor” was his pointed reply.
Elizabeth understood his meaning perfectly, and she regarded him with steady, dignified silence. She would like nothing more than to quit his establishment and find a room for herself at a hotel run by a courteous colored proprietor, but night had fallen and she dared not venture out again, nor could she leave Mrs. Lincoln alone.
Mrs. Lincoln drew herself up, frowning. “That is strange, sir. I tell you that she is a friend of mine, and I am sure you could not give a room to a more worthy person.”
“Friend of yours or not, I tell you we have no room for her on your floor.” He paused and reluctantly added, “I can find a place for her on the fifth floor.”
“That, sir, I presume, will be a vast improvement on my room,” declared Mrs. Lincoln imperiously. “Well, if she goes to the fifth floor, I shall go too. What is good enough for her is good enough for me.”
“Very well, madam.” The clerk heaved a sigh and checked his register and room keys. “Shall I give you adjoining rooms, and send your baggage up?”
“Yes, and have it done in a hurry. Let the boy show us up. Come, Elizabeth.” Mrs. Lincoln turned away from the clerk with a haughty parting look. The boy who had met Elizabeth at the door led them to the stairs, which they climbed and climbed until Elizabeth began to suspect that they would never reach the top. When they did, and the boy opened the doors to their rooms, Elizabeth could not have said which of them was more appalled. They had been given a pair of cramped, dingy, scantily furnished, three-cornered rooms in the servants’ garret that smelled of dust and damp and sweat. Never in her life would Elizabeth have imagined a president’s widow in such humble accommodations.
“How provoking,” Mrs. Lincoln exclaimed, sinking heavily into a chair, panting from the effort of scaling the tower of stairs. “I declare, I never s
aw such unaccommodating people. Just to think of them sticking us away up here in the attic. I will give them a regular going over in the morning.”
“You forget they do not know you,” Elizabeth reminded her. “Mrs. Lincoln would be treated differently from Mrs. Clarke.”
“True, I do forget. Well, I suppose I shall have to put up with the annoyances.” Mrs. Lincoln’s expression turned woebegone. “Why did you not come to me yesterday, Elizabeth? I was almost crazy when I reached here last night, and found you had not arrived. I sat down and wrote you a note—I felt so badly—imploring you to come to me immediately.”
“I thought perhaps you would change your mind,” Elizabeth admitted. “I also knew I would have great difficulty securing rooms for ‘Mrs. Clarke.’”
“Well, based upon what we have seen so far I cannot fault you for suspecting as much.” Then she gave a little start. “You have not had your dinner, Elizabeth, and you must be hungry. I nearly forgot about it in the joy of seeing you. You must go down to the table right away.”
Elizabeth was famished, but the thought of a good meal partly revived her. Mrs. Lincoln pulled the bell rope, and when a servant appeared, she ordered him to give Elizabeth her dinner. Elizabeth followed him downstairs, where he led her into the dining room and seated her at a corner table. She was giving him her order when the steward approached. “You are in the wrong room,” he said gruffly.
Elizabeth regarded him mildly. “I was brought here by the waiter.”
“It makes no difference. I will find you another place where you can eat your dinner.”
Elizabeth’s stomach rumbled as she got up from the table and followed him from the dining room. “It is very strange,” Elizabeth said tightly when they reached the hall, “that you should permit me to be seated at the table in the dining room only for the sake of ordering me to leave it the next moment.”
The steward halted and regarded her over his shoulder. “Are you not Mrs. Clarke’s servant?”
“I am with Mrs. Clarke,” Elizabeth replied, emphasizing the distinction.
“It is all the same.” He turned back around and continued down the hall. “Servants are not allowed to eat in the large dining room. Here, this way. You must take your dinner in the servants’ hall.”
Humiliated and hungry, Elizabeth followed the steward through the rear corridors of the hotel, knowing that it was the only way she was likely to get a bite to eat. On reaching the servants’ hall, the steward tugged on the knob only to find the door locked. He left Elizabeth standing in the passage while he went to inform the clerk. A few minutes later, the obsequious clerk came blustering down the hall, the scent of his perfume preceding him. “Did you come out of the street, or from Mrs. Clarke’s room?”
“From Mrs. Clarke’s room,” she replied politely, refusing to mirror his ill temper.
“It is after the regular hour for dinner. The room is locked up, and Annie has gone out with the key.”
For a moment Elizabeth hoped that he might allow her to return to the dining room, but when he said nothing more, her pride would not allow her to stand waiting in the hall any longer. “Very well,” she said, turning toward the staircase. “I will tell Mrs. Clarke that I cannot get any dinner.”
He scowled as she began to climb the stairs. “You need not put on airs,” he called after her. “I understand the whole thing.”
“I don’t think you do,” Elizabeth muttered under her breath as she reached the first of far too many landings. “If you understood the whole thing,” she huffed as she climbed, “it is strange that you should put the widow of President Abraham Lincoln in a three-cornered room in the attic of this miserable hotel.”
Murmuring to herself what she could not say to his face only made her feel worse. When she finally reached Mrs. Lincoln’s room, tears of humiliation and frustration blurred her vision.
At the sight of her downcast expression, Mrs. Lincoln’s brow furrowed in concern. “What is the matter, Elizabeth?”
“I cannot get any dinner.”
“Cannot get any dinner? What do you mean?”
Elizabeth sank into a chair and told her all that had happened since the servant had led her downstairs. “Those insolent, overbearing people,” Mrs. Lincoln exclaimed, furious. She seized the armrests of her easy chair and pulled herself fiercely to her feet. “Never mind, Elizabeth. You shall have your dinner. Put on your bonnet and shawl.”
“What for?”
“What for?” Mrs. Lincoln put on her bonnet and stood at the mirror, tying the strings. “Why, we will go out of the hotel, and get you something to eat where they know how to behave decently.”
Warily, Elizabeth said, “Surely, Mrs. Lincoln, you do not intend to go out on the street tonight?”
“Yes I do. Do you suppose I am going to have you starve, when we can find something to eat on every corner?”
“But you forget. You are here as Mrs. Clarke and not as Mrs. Lincoln. You arrived alone, and the people here already suspect that everything is not quite as you say. If you go outside the hotel at night, they will accept that as evidence against you.”
“Nonsense. What do you suppose I care for what these low-bred people think? Put on your things.”
“No, Mrs. Lincoln,” Elizabeth said firmly, though her stomach rumbled a protest. “I shall not go outside of the hotel tonight, for I understand your situation, even if you do not. Mrs. Lincoln has no reason to care what these people may say about her, but Mrs. Clarke wishes to remain incognito, so she must be more prudent.”
With some difficulty, Elizabeth finally persuaded Mrs. Lincoln to act with caution. She was so frank and impulsive that she never gave enough thought to how her words and deeds could be misconstrued. Elizabeth bade her good night and went off to her own room, but not until she was settled in bed and had turned down the lamp did it occur to her that Mrs. Lincoln could have ordered dinner to be served to Elizabeth in her room, so that she would not have had to retire hungry.
The next morning, Mrs. Lincoln knocked on Elizabeth’s door before six o’clock. “Come, Elizabeth, get up,” she called. “I know you must be hungry. Dress yourself quickly and we will go out and get some breakfast. I was unable to sleep last night for thinking of you being forced to go to bed without anything to eat.”
Elizabeth too had slept poorly in her uncomfortable, lumpy bed, kept from restful slumber by her growling stomach. Swiftly she dressed, and before long she and Mrs. Lincoln were taking their breakfast at a restaurant on Broadway about a block away from the St. Denis Hotel. Afterward, they strolled up Broadway and entered Union Square Park, where they seated themselves on a bench beneath a canopy of trees bright with autumn colors, watched the children at play, and discussed Mrs. Lincoln’s plan to sell her wardrobe. Mrs. Lincoln soon revealed that the previous day, while Elizabeth was en route from Washington, she had called on a diamond broker after seeing an ad in the Herald at the breakfast table. “I tried to sell them a lot of jewelry,” Mrs. Lincoln said. “I gave my name as Mrs. Clarke. The first gentleman I spoke with was pleasant, but we were unable to agree on a price. He stepped back into the office to confer with another gentleman, and just as I concluded they were plotting to hurry me out the door, a third gentleman entered the store. He looked over my jewelry—he was, as I later learned, Mr. Keyes, a silent partner in the firm—and discovered my name engraved inside of one of my rings.”
“Oh, dear,” said Elizabeth.
“I had forgotten about the engraving,” Mrs. Lincoln confessed. “When I saw him looking at the ring so earnestly, I snatched it from him and put it in my pocket.”
Elizabeth smothered a laugh. “I’m sure that didn’t provoke his curiosity at all.”
“I did not want to wait around to find out. I hastily gathered up my jewelry and started to leave, but they had become much more interested in my wares, as you can imagine. I left my card, Mrs. Clarke at the St. Denis Hotel. They are to call to see me this forenoon, when I shall enter into negotiations with
them.”
“Is that wise?” Elizabeth asked carefully. “Surely they’ve figured out that you are Mrs. President Lincoln.”
“Or that I am her thieving maid.”
“Not likely, I think.” Earnestly, Elizabeth said, “With such delicate business, should you trust a firm that you have never heard of before, one that you chose only because you spied their ad in the paper? Wouldn’t it be more prudent to seek a recommendation from an acquaintance, or work through a jeweler you’ve done business with before?”
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