Abigail listened, half dozing in the cold, and pulled the two plush blankets he had provided more tightly around her shoulders. She reminded herself that this was work, and important; and that she had to stay awake.
He had just started on the history of the carriage in which they were sitting—a gift from his army, said Sickles, in gratitude for his leadership, meaning that, whatever propriety might demand, he could not insult his men by turning it down—when a second carriage drew up.
Sickles tensed. The rig was black, with fancy running lights, and pulled by a beautiful quartet of white horses.
“That isn’t Blaine,” he said, and reached for something out of sight.
From inside, two pale faces turned their way as the carriage kept going past them, vanishing into the fog until they heard only the clatter of hooves on frozen mud.
Abigail wondered sleepily whether it was the same coach she had spotted behind her the night she was out with Dinah Berryhill.
Now Sickles was detailing his crucial role in Lincoln’s re-election victory in 1864. “I was one of the organizers of Democrats for Lincoln,” he said. “You should have heard my speech at the Cooper Institute rally, just before Election Day. That was where I uttered my famous line that no man, not even the candidate, had the courage to stand on the Democratic platform. The crowd was huge. They were cheering wildly, of course—”
“Look,” she said.
She had been watching the figure for some time now, a tall man approaching through the mist, on foot. He had been waiting inside the Center Market itself, a place where no gentleman of quality would ever be found. Crossing the muddy field, he kept pausing to peer into the night. He had a hand in his jacket pocket, and either was clutching a gun or wanted to be thought to be.
Then James Blaine was beside the carriage, looking every bit as stern and censorious as when Abigail had met him at the restaurant in the Willard Hotel.
“Did you bring it?” he said.
Sickles nodded.
“And you have brought Miss Canner.”
“I have upheld my side of the bargain, Blaine.” His voice was hostile. “Now suppose you uphold yours.”
“May I see the letter?”
“See. Not keep.” He drew a slim package from his jacket, still keeping his free hand between the seats. He had not offered to climb down; Blaine had not tried to climb up.
The congressman ran his fingers lightly over the envelope. “Speaker of the House,” he said wonderingly.
Sickles was impatient. “You have your letter. Now, let’s hear the story.”
“They can’t know we spoke.”
“They won’t.”
Blaine glanced at Sickles, then looked over at Abigail. “I had an intriguing conversation, my dear Miss Canner. With an Inspector Varak. Your name was mentioned.”
“The story,” said Sickles, before Abigail could speak.
“This Varak seems to believe that his trail leads to high places. I wonder how long he will be permitted to continue.” Abruptly, he handed the envelope back, unopened. “I have changed my mind,” he said. Again he paused and squinted into the mist. “There is no conspiracy. There have been no bribes paid that I know of.” He was watching Abigail, not Sickles, as he spoke, measuring the effect of his words. “Any allegations of a conspiracy are the fruit of Mr. Lincoln’s desperate efforts to escape just punishment for his crimes.”
Not waiting for any reply, Blaine backed away, then broke into a run, and was lost in the night fog.
CHAPTER 32
Motivation
I
LINCOLN HAD CONCEDED the facts of Counts One and Two, which covered the suspension of habeas corpus, the shuttering of a handful of newspapers, and the seizure of copies of all telegrams sent within the United States. In consequence, the Senate had decided to spend a single trial day allowing both sides to argue the significance of the President’s actions. The Managers would argue Count One for an hour, followed by counsel for the respondent; then the same on Count Two. The great Thaddeus Stevens, sick as he was, would be presenting argument. Although her client’s interests were opposed to his, Abigail looked forward to hearing him speak. She had a weakness for oratory, and hoped that the great man’s words would be a tonic for the tiny waves of anxiety that rippled through her whenever she thought of last night’s adventure, and saw poor James Blaine, who hoped to be Speaker of the House in a couple of years, running terrified into the night.
Shortly after Abigail reached the office, however, Dennard called her in and told her that she would once again miss most of the trial day—this time for a very different reason.
Sickles had discovered who Corbin Yardley was, and even where he was boarding during the trial. It was Abigail’s task to try to obtain from Mr. Yardley a preview of his testimony.
“You understand why you’re getting this assignment?” asked Dennard, wise old eyes probing. A file was open on his desk.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he is a colored man.”
“He is indeed.” The lawyer waited for a response; heard none. “Mr. Sickles tells me that the gentleman is currently residing at the Metzerott Hotel.”
Abigail, standing before the desk, shifted slightly. “I know the Metzerott.”
Dennard nodded. “So I am given to understand.” He closed the folder, and began tying the green ribbon with his arthritic fingers. But he had trouble, and she took over automatically. “I am well aware that a part of you feels underused, Miss Canner. You wish to be more involved in matters. So let me be clear. What I am asking is of enormous importance. We have to know what Yardley will say in order to prepare cross-examination.” He was already turning away. “Please file that before you go.”
II
Corbin Yardley was moon-faced and sad: on his shining dark countenance she could read all the woes of his life. He was about forty, a former slave who owned a feed business in Columbia, South Carolina. His broad shoulders sagged in a suit several sizes too small, and he was ready at every moment to share tales of how badly he had been treated. He rarely made eye contact. Mostly he watched his own hands as they lay, palm upmost, on the table, the long fingers wiggling and twitching. She had sent a note up from the Metzerott lobby. In response, his sister Constance had come clumping down the stairs to inform Abigail that her brother was willing to meet, but only with her along as chaperone.
And so they sat in the lounge and talked; or tried to.
“I don’t know what you want of us,” Constance kept saying. She was wide and stolid and entirely intimidating. “We’re hardworking people trying to hold body and soul together. All we ask is to be left alone to earn a little bit of a living until the Lord in His wisdom decides to take us. That’s all.”
Abigail tried again, addressing herself to the brother. “What I would like to know, Mr. Yardley, is what you intend to say in your testimony.”
“He’ll tell the truth,” snapped Constance, with an accusing glare.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Tell her, Corbin.”
He addressed his hands. “Miss, ise gonna tell the truth. Nothin else.”
Abigail consulted her notes. “I understand, Mr. Yardley, that your testimony will be in support of the proposition that the President has not done enough to protect the freedmen—”
“He hasn’t,” said Constance. “You wouldn’t know. You’re a Northern negro. You’re pampered. Come look at the South. Come see how we live, and you’ll understand why Lincoln has to go. Isn’t that right?”
“Lincoln has to go,” Corbin echoed.
Abigail’s brief was to observe and report, nothing more. In particular, she was not supposed to argue or challenge, or in any way imply that she wished to change the witness’s mind about his testimony. But the issue between them had become too large to ignore. And so Abigail, having the rhythm of the conversation at last, addressed herself entirely to the sister.
“Isn’t Mr. Lincoln the reason
you are free?”
Constance made a spitting sound. “The Union Army is the reason we’re free.” She was becoming seriously riled. “All the other colored folk down there—they all worship him. They call him Uncle Linkum. They name their babies Abraham. Why, my cousin just named hers Abrahamina. They don’t see what’s going on. We do.” She had laid her very large hands on the table, and now she clenched them into very large fists. “We have big troubles in South Carolina, but you wouldn’t know about that, would you? Or care. We’ve heard of you, Miss Canner. Every colored person in this town is talking about you. Did you know that? My brother can’t read, but I can.” Tossing the morning’s newspaper onto the table. “There you are. Uncle Linkum is showing you off! Are you proud of yourself?”
Canner women were known throughout the Island for their tempers. Abigail’s control at that moment was almost unnatural.
“I am working on Mr. Lincoln’s behalf because I believe that he is in the right.” Her voice was calm but firm. “I am sorry that you disagree. Still. I am not trying to change your minds. I am only asking what testimony your brother will be giving before the Senate.”
“He will tell the truth.” Constance Yardley flung the words. “He will tell the world how, thanks to Uncle Linkum, our feed business was almost destroyed. All we ask is to be left alone. But the troops who are protecting us are on their way home, and the men who once enslaved us are running for office. Come.” Addressing her brother now, as she stood: “We’ve said all we have to say. Tell her.”
“I’se got nothin more to say.”
Little was waiting outside in the trap. Abigail was miserable. Not only was she missing the trial, but she had failed completely. Dennard had trusted her with a mission of great import, and she had been carried away by the need to defend herself: for Constance Yardley’s cutting words had laid bare the confusion in her own soul.
And then she remembered. Big troubles in South Carolina, Constance had said.
“Mr. Little.”
“Yes, miss?”
“Before we go to the Capitol, I need to stop home.”
Perhaps the day was not a waste after all.
III
At the house on Tenth Street, she hurried up the stairs, ignoring Nanny Pork’s demands to know why she was home in the middle of the day and what she called herself up to, making all that racket. She pulled the Chanticleer folders from their place in the closet. Then she bounded back down, kissed her aunt’s wrinkled cheek, promised to explain later.
“But right now I have to go. It’s important, Nanny.”
“Then go, child.”
As Mr. Little raced across the city, Abigail sat in the carriage studying the materials the mysterious Chanticleer had sent. She did not know who he was; but at last she understood why Mrs. McShane had made her keep the package.
She had been right; she had not failed; Dennard and Sickles would sing her praises.
Jonathan, too.
IV
Abigail slid into her seat beside Kate Sprague just as Speed was winding up his argument on habeas corpus.
“It is easy, I suppose, to forget the painful process through which that decision was reached.” Speed had a thick, dark beard, not unlike his friend Lincoln’s. His younger brother Joshua had once been Lincoln’s law partner, but had declined the offer of a government position on the ground that Washington was a hopeless cesspool. Speed’s fury as he spoke suggested that he believed the same. “How many now remember the clever rebel attack on the fort at Key West, where each soldier was brought out of the fort because a rebel judge issued a writ of habeas corpus? Then, having been brought out, he was set free by the judge, and in this way the fort was emptied of its soldiers. What should Mr. Lincoln have done? Allowed the rebellion to empty every Union fort in the South in this manner, or determine to resist, even if that resistance meant suspending the writ?”
Speed was making no effort to hide his growing fury. “And then, when the troops of the Union moved through Maryland to defend the capital of the country—this capital, gentlemen, where we now sit!—the railroad lines to Washington were severed by the secessionist traitors, and our troops—our good Union troops, volunteers all—were set upon by mobs. Many were killed. Naturally, the President ordered the arrests of those who engaged in violence, and those who incited it, but the rebel judges issued writs of habeas corpus and set them free to attack our troops once more. Gentlemen, the nation was under attack by rebels from within. Would you really have had Mr. Lincoln stand idly by? Should the right of habeas corpus be elevated to so transcendent a status that we must allow it to be used to destroy the country? No plausible reading of the Constitution requires the President to allow our forts to be taken and our troops assaulted while traitorous judges issue orders that encourage and even assist the rebellion.”
A smattering of applause greeted these words, and Abigail, still catching her breath from the rush across the city, remembered how Dennard had said that the Managers never expected a conviction on either of the first two counts. They had been included in the resolution in order to excite the press, which would publish stories stressing not the necessity that drove Lincoln but the outrage at his policies. That the country would otherwise have been lost would be forgotten in that peculiar mist that drifts into the public mind once a war is over: people seem to remember the sacrifices they made more than they remember what the sacrifices were for.
“I notice that some of Mr. Lincoln’s opponents seem happy with Mr. Speed’s speech.” Kate Sprague, reading her mind. “But wherever have you been, dear? I had about given up hope that you would be here today.”
“I … I had business.” Following Kate’s bemused gaze, Abigail saw mud splattered along the hem of her dress. “I was splashed by the horsecars,” she said, lying poorly. Actually, she had stepped in a puddle running out of the house, and decided not to take the time to change.
But perhaps Kate was not looking after all, because her mind was already back to its favorite subject: politics.
“Alas, I doubt that Mr. Speed has swayed any more votes today than he did yesterday,” she said. “Do you have a count?”
Abigail, for an instant, did not even realize that her new friend was talking about the trial. “A count?”
“A head count. On the resolution.”
The impeachment resolution, she meant. In her mind’s eye, Abigail saw the blackboard, with its six undecided votes, of which the President needed four. “I am not sure where the count stands at the moment,” she said, uneasily.
Kate chuckled. “You mean, your count is confidential.”
“Yes,” said Abigail, wondering why she had not just said that in the first place.
“Mine isn’t. I am perfectly happy to share it with you.”
The boldness of the offer made Abigail dizzy. Kate Chase Sprague possessed one of the sharpest political minds in the capital, to say nothing of contacts in every faction. There was nobody whose estimates would constitute more valuable political intelligence. And yet it was plain that she expected Abigail, in return, to divulge her side’s own numbers.
Down below, Speed took a drink from his water glass. “Gentlemen,” he said softly. “Some of you here present, sitting in judgment, endorsed the President’s actions at that time. That is to your credit, and the nation owes you a debt of thanksgiving. There were others, however, who thought Mr. Lincoln’s action unjustified, even illegal. And Mr. Lincoln, mindful of this criticism, submitted his orders suspending habeas corpus to the judgment of the Congress of the United States for ratification, lest there be any question of illegality. It is right there on pages twelve and thirteen of the Senate Journal, first session, Thirty-seventh Congress.” A thoughtful nod. “And the Congress assented.”
A hush. Kate tensed beside her.
“Now, once the President and the Congress agreed to the suspension of habeas corpus, everyone concedes that the suspension was legal. The only question, then, that the Second Article can raise is w
hether the suspension was legal before the Congress acted. The Constitution allows the suspension of habeas corpus in the case of rebellion. It is silent on who has the power to suspend it. Is it really the position of the House Managers that, when faced with a rebellion that began in April, the President should have waited to take action until Congress convened in July? Had he done nothing, this capital, and perhaps the entire war, would have been lost. Surely it cannot be an impeachable offense to do what is necessary to defend the capital when this Congress subsequently agreed to his act.”
Speed sat. No applause.
Argument was over for today. Chase asked counsel for both parties to approach. They whispered about procedural matters as the gallery began to empty. Kate said, suddenly, “Your side is losing, Abigail.”
“No evidence has been presented—”
“The evidence makes no difference. As matters stand today, the President will be convicted and removed.”
“That is not our count!” Abigail cried, also rising.
“Then count again.” Kate pointed to the emptying chamber, the Senators moving toward the exits almost languidly, as if the decision were already behind them. Abigail felt a chill. “As of this morning, the tally is forty for conviction, fourteen for acquittal.” Again the easy confidence left no room for doubt. When Katherine Sprague spoke of politics, she spoke ex cathedra. “You need to pry five votes away from Mr. Wade’s side. I am not sure there is time.”
V
Abigail lay in the bathing tub at last. The opportunity presented itself rarely; on most nights, she was too tired or too busy, or the water supply was too weak, or the pipes themselves were too noisy. But tonight she was determined to have the treat.
Kate was counting Sumner. That much was obvious. Only if Sumner and the votes he controlled were cast against the President could the count reach forty for removal. Abigail and Sickles and Jonathan had spent an hour at the office discussing the count, long after Dennard and Speed had left for the day. It was obvious, said Jonathan, that Kate had the numbers from her father. If Chase was talking to Sumner about the trial—a gross breach of ethics—their case was in serious jeopardy.
The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln Page 32
