The Lincoln Hunters

by Wilson Tucker

  A well-written, well-edited and tidily printed booklet would be his best introduction when seeking the newspaper job, and it could not hurt his future with Mr. Lincoln. After a few months, of course, his booklet would not sell. The ready market would dry up, and his and all the other versions would be disputed, challenged, and eventually ignored. History said that would happen. The speech would be truly lost and seven hundred years away some client would touch off a search.

  But in the meanwhile he would increase his stake and latch onto one or two good jobs.

  “Rich,” he mused aloud, fingering the silver dollars. “I am rich beyond the dreams of avarice.”

  Steward turned at a sound. He expected Indians.

  The actor had followed him.

  “Did you speak, sire?”

  “I spoke, Bobby. I am rich, and I am planning my invasion of Mr. Lincoln’s Whitehouse. But now I’m hungry. I can look forward to a running feud with Owen Lovejoy—and let us hope we do not share the Whitehouse together—and already I’m missing Evelyn like sin. But I’m hungry. My belly growls.”

  Bloch glanced over his shoulder. Reflections of a campfire flickered in the heart of the timber.

  “Come,” he said, “and I will sing for our supper. The aborigines have revealed a fondness for the Bard.”

  Benjamin Steward motioned him forward.

  “Lay on, Running Tongue.”