It was then Mary must have noticed that Mrs. Small, who sat in the salon with us, wasn’t a journalist from Godey’s.
“I suppose you’re covering this event for the Lady’s Book, Mrs. Small. Well, you can ask me all the questions you want on our clandestine ride to Baltimore.”
“Mother,” I said, “be quiet.”
Mary sat seething in her chair, while I turned to the detective.
“And what will happen when the Presidential train arrives in Baltimore with my wife and three boys on board? That barber could hold them hostage.”
“Not at all,” said Allan Pinkerton. “By that time the cat will be out of the bag.”
I had to travel in a soft felt hat, with an unfamiliar coat hunched around my shoulders. We left Harrisburg like thieves in the night, on a special two-car train, with not a single light turned on. My sleeping berth was much too small for my legs. So I had to sit up half the night with my two detectives. I learned a lot from Pinkerton. He told me that every other damn train in the area had been stalled until ours got through. And the telegraph lines going in and out of Harrisburg had been cut, so the Confederate spies would be wireless until I reached the capital.
Pinkerton and his lady detective were smoking pitch-black cigars. They cleaned all their armaments with a little rag. I could see that something was pestering Mrs. Small.
“I listened to your speech at Trenton,” she told me. “And you said you were the humble instrument in the hands of the Almighty, and his almost chosen people. Now why is it we were almost chosen?”
I could have spent half my canvassing on that single word.
“I’m not so sure. We all see ourselves as the chosen ones. And it ain’t the evil of slavery that separates us. The foul smell is in all our bones. Perhaps it will always be there, on both sides.”
WE ARRIVED IN BALTIMORE at 3½ in the morning. The sky was black as a coal bin without a bottom, but with a gray edge like the mouth of a furnace lit long ago and with a residue of ash. The Calvert Street Station was deserted, except for one man—the marshal of police. He stood there all alone, with silver notches in his uniform. He was very tall. He must have been looking for some train that had been rerouted. He was clever enough to realize we might have come in under a secret schedule.
Pinkerton didn’t panic. He sent Mrs. Small out to greet the marshal, who recognized her as one of the barber’s sweethearts. But what was she doing here at this haunted hour, stepping off a train that wasn’t even lit? He was about to blow his whistle when Mrs. Small cracked him on the head with a slung shot that was a kin to the kind Duff Armstrong liked to carry around his wrist.
That marshal dropped to the platform like a bolt. Mrs. Small hid him behind a gigantic bin. Then the barber arrived out of nowhere—in a cape, like Prince Hamlet. Cypriano Ferrandini was trussed up with pistols and knives and bullet pouches. He hadn’t come alone. He had five of his militiamen, who were also trussed up. The barber had a broad mustache. He couldn’t have been older than thirty. He pecked at his teeth with a metal pick. I’d never seen a feller with so much sauce. He bowed to Mrs. Small and clapped his hands.
“Bravo, my sweet. I took you in. I branded you, like my own little cow. None of my boys ever laid a finger on you. And this is how you reward me? You’re a government tart. I should have figured as much.”
Pinkerton clutched my arm. There was a harsh fire in his eyes.
“Don’t move,” he said. “You’ll get her killed.”
“But he’ll butcher her on the spot,” I said. “I won’t be able to bear it.”
“Lincoln, sit still!”
And he kept me there with the curious cadence of his voice. I was caught in Allan Pinkerton’s spell. He was master of this car, not the President Elect. I peered through the window. The barber had plucked a razor with a pearl handle out of his coat. Mrs. Small wasn’t under its sway. She smiled at the barber.
“Cyp,” she said with a soft growl. “It won’t be the first time I’ve been cut by a man.”
Her smile immobilized the barber and unmanned him for a minute. Then all his meanness came back. He strutted around Mrs. Small with the weaponry he was wearing. He cut her once with the razor—it was the lightest of nicks. I was mortified. I was witnessing some kind of lovers’ spat. He nicked her again. I knew the cuts would grow deeper and deeper.
I shoved Pinkerton aside and climbed out the car.
“Captain Ferrandini, I’m the feller you’re looking for.”
The barber was bewildered.
“Almost didn’t recognize you without your tall hat.”
“That little lady is a friend of mine,” I told him. “And if you touch her again, you’ll swallow your own razor before I’m finished with you.”
Mrs. Small was shivering. It wasn’t on account of the barber. She’d been paid to protect my life. And I’d come waltzing out of the car, but the barber had forgotten her—and that was fatal. He’d never even noticed the sailor’s awl cupped in her hand. I could see it flash in the dark like a silver tooth before she dug it deep into his neck. It startled him. He couldn’t seem to get rid of that silver tooth. He caressed its wooden handle and wavered in the dark while Mrs. Small whispered to me, “Get back into the car.”
I stood there. The five militiamen froze as the barber twisted about and fell. And then they ran. I got back into the car with Mrs. Small. She wouldn’t allow Allan Pinkerton to wipe the blood from her face.
“Mr. Lincoln,” he said, “you must never repeat a word of what happened here. That barber doesn’t exist.”
If anyone yapped about the plot, Pinkerton and his agents would be compromised. They’d never break into another gang. The B&O would have to admit that it couldn’t protect a President Elect along its lines. And General Scott, with all his medals, would seem like an impotent child.
Teams of horses suddenly appeared; trainmen attached them to our car.
We rode out of the Calvert Street Station in the middle of the night and traveled past houses that looked like rotting teeth. The moon was out, and Baltimore could have been a cavalcade of meandering avenues and roads. I didn’t see much sign of a mob, just trails of black mud, as we had in Springfield. One lamp was lit, but mostly we moved in the dark. We arrived at Camden Street, where a train was waiting; our own little car was hooked up to it. The ride was smooth as the Devil. I couldn’t even hear the harsh sting of the wheels. I kept thinking of that Corsican barber and the nicks he left on Mrs. Small, like crazy wounds of love.
20.
Listen to the Mockingbird
Poor, poor Buchanan.
Our bachelor President was a stout sort of feller who had his own niece at the White House, Harriet Lane, or Miss Hallie, as she was known in Washington circles. She was an orphan who had lived with her uncle since she was eleven. Miss Hallie was tall and blonde, with violet eyes and a handsome bosom that breathed like a wild bird. She’d gone with Buchanan to London, when he was our minister over there, and Queen Victoria was so taken with Miss Hallie that she called her Madame Ambassador. Harriet wasn’t much different at the White House, where everyone knew her as Buchanan’s First Lady.
It was a signally somber mansion. Miss Hallie had remodeled the whole shebang, but it was still like a cavern with a whole lot of staircases. A gaggle of young men fluttered about in soft collars and black coats. I couldn’t tell if they were Buchanan’s messengers or secretaries. They whispered in the President’s ear and wouldn’t welcome me or my Secretary of State, a little man with a long nose and rumpled gray scalp. Seward had brought me along to meet Miss Hallie and the President. Before I could introduce myself, a dog that was bigger and fatter than a prairie wolf lumbered down the stairs on monstrous paws, growled at us, and lay down next to Buchanan, with one eye open and one eye closed, just like his master.
Turns out Buchanan had a terrible squint. Seward had once sat in Congress with him, but that wasn’t much of a recommendation—the President had a Cabinet full of traitors who were
feeding arms and ammunition to the Secesh. Buchanan and Miss Hallie would have preferred Seward in my place. He was a gentleman, but Seward had much more sand in him than a President who coddled Southern Senators and let the Union slide into the wind.
The public never took to Buchanan . . . and never tired of his niece. Women named their daughters after her, copied her copious hair. They stood in line to greet Miss Hallie. That lonesome tune “Listen to the Mockingbird” had been dedicated to her.
I’m dreaming now of Hallie
Sweet Hallie, sweet Hallie . . .
Listen to the Mockingbird,
Still singing when the weeping willows wave.
Harriet Lane kept staring at me like some White House witch, with that wild bird beating under her throat. I was startled by the contempt in her violet eyes, her “gracious chill,” as others called it. She clung to Buchanan with her own big hands; the President had a sizable paunch and a shock of silver hair.
Hallie harped about my scrape in Baltimore. “Good Lord, you were nearly scalped.”
Pinkerton must have told the President and Miss Hallie about that mad barber. And she was chattering like that mockingbird in the song—sweet, sweet Hallie with the sour face. I wanted to light out of there and avoid the witch. She curtsied to me and Mr. Seward with a strange air of triumph. Then Miss Hallie whispered—in a rather loud voice.
“Mr. Lincoln, sir, be warned. The Confederates have their own sharpshooters now, and they mean to disrupt Inauguration Day—they’re coming up to the District in droves.”
My Secretary of State was furious. “That’s idle gossip.”
“Not according to General Scott.”
“Then we’ll hear it from Scott,” Seward said, scowling at Miss Hallie.
Buchanan was eager to vacate the White House, but not his Hallie. She loved the chandeliers her uncle had installed, paid for out of his own pocket. She was mistress of the levees and government balls. She got along with the Cave Dwellers—the capital’s upper crust—and must have looked down upon Mary and me as nincompoops . . .
General Scott was next on Seward’s list. We visited him at the War Department. The tallest man in Washington at six foot five, and also one of the fattest. Old Fuss & Feathers was seventy-five years old. He received us while napping on the biggest sofa I had ever seen. He snored with one eye open, like Buchanan’s great big dog. It took two of his aides to rouse him from his slumber. But he was alert as Moses once his eyes weren’t shut.
Told him how chagrined I was about having to sneak into the District in a slouch hat.
“Ah,” he said, suddenly serious, “but you couldn’t have come in any other way—alive.” He had sent his sharpshooters to Baltimore—they were crouched in the rafters when our night train arrived at the Calvert Street Station. But I can’t recall one of ’em firing a shot at the barber and his cohorts.
Seward’s bushy eyebrows commenced to twitch with alarm. “That is yesterday’s news, General Scott. What about the inauguration? There will be spies everywhere in the capital—and an abundance of lunatics who have promised their brothers that Mr. Lincoln will never be sworn in.”
“Ah,” said that oracle from his sofa. “But the President’s safety is now in my hands. I may have lost some soldiers to the Secesh, but my sharpshooters are loyal to me. I’ll bottle up Pennsylvania Avenue with our cannon, and if those Rebels raise a stink, I’ll blow them to hell.”
All his bluster couldn’t seem to calm Mr. Seward. He had sensed the danger long before I ever did. Seward did not want to see the Republic ripped apart by wolves. He was much more worried about my welfare than the bachelor President and his niece, or Old Fuss & Feathers with his cannon and his company of sharpshooters.
“Mr. Lincoln, I am not so sanguine about General Scott’s sharpshooters as he is.”
“Seward, neither am I.”
I couldn’t get Miss Hallie’s tune out of my head. We’d become a nation of mockingbirds, full of malicious chatter. I wondered if Hallie had put a hex over the White House. So I was awful curious when a cavalry officer in a blond mustache scuffled with my bodyguards outside my door at the Willard. This officer wasn’t carrying any papers—or a weapon in his sleeve. He couldn’t have been much of a sharpshooter, but my bodyguards still knocked him about. He had one of Miss Hallie’s calling cards in his possession. I sent the bodyguards away while the cavalryman commenced to tear off his mustache—it was Hallie herself. And she looked much sadder away from the President’s rooms.
“Please forgive my little masquerade. But I would have been mobbed if I hadn’t worn a mustache. And I must speak with you, Mr. President.”
I didn’t know what to think of this sudden visitation. She’d become a vagabond, dislodged by her own conspicuousness. A revenue cutter was named after her, the Harriet Lane. Songs about Buchanan’s niece were as loud as any cry for war. She was a prisoner at the White House who couldn’t go abroad without creating a stir.
“Your uncle’s still President, Miss Hallie. I’m nothing but the next sucker in line for his chair.”
I felt like a sucker. Buchanan’s incompetence, his downright disappearance from the Presidency, had encouraged the Disunionists, led them into open rebellion.
“But I had no right to be so rude,” she said. “And I was unforgivably rude.”
“What’s eating you, Miss Hallie?”
It was the Secesh. Folks blamed her Uncle for not holding the country together. She had tried, but whenever she sat Unionists and the Secesh at the same table, they flung food and crockery at each other until she and her uncle had civil war at the White House.
Better the White House than the nation.
I didn’t say that to Miss Hallie. She and Buchanan swept calamity under the rug—had their shindigs and let our Southern Sisters slip into their own masquerade of a “union.” Now we had hell to pay. And I had to stand in the dark, with blood and rain about to piss from the sky.
“I should have been more generous,” she said. “That’s my flaw. I’m much too possessive. I didn’t want to share Uncle’s abode with you and Mrs. Lincoln. You shouldn’t blame him. He can’t abide the District. I’m the one who’s happy here, minding my uncle and his store. That’s what it is, Mr. Lincoln—the nation’s store, where everything under the sun is up for grabs. And I worshiped every minute—the politics, all the little flirtations with Uncle’s generals. I am a horrible flirt.”
I wanted to shake Hallie like a rag doll. Her damn insouciance had blinded her to everything.
“You don’t have to move out, Miss Hallie. You can board with us at the White House. Mrs. Lincoln will look after all your needs.”
She didn’t understand a word I’d said. She started to laugh, and then I saw the harsh lines under her violet eyes, like a revenue cutter out of control, the Harriet Lane in hostile waters.
“Oh, I couldn’t leave Uncle to his own devices,” she said, clutching my hand. “But I wasn’t fooling about those Secesh sharpshooters.”
I promised Miss Hallie I’d be careful, not to assuage her guilt, but to let her have her little dream of destruction. She’d conjured up half those sharpshooters in her head, and there wasn’t much I could do about that other half. She put her mustache back on and her cavalryman’s cape. I kissed her hand, like some bittersweet adversary, and my bodyguards let her out the door. She hadn’t conjured up all that destruction—there was violence in the March wind, in the sway of the trees, in the blue hiss of the lamps . . .
The entire District was still a contagion of mud and dust. God help man or beast caught in the mud. And here we were supposed to have a Presidential parade. Dusters requisitioned to sweep the avenues found a quagmire instead. The army had to arrive with caissons and a company of sappers, else that mud would never have been removed in time.
The morning was overcast. I didn’t have the least notion to descend into the dusty heart of the District. A note had been slipped under our door at the Willard.
If you don’t
Resign we are going to put a spider in your Dumpling and play the Devil with you.
Mary commenced to scream. “There are assassins in the house! You will never arrive on Capitol Hill.”
“Mother, hush up! You’re scarifying the boys.”
I put Bob in charge, appointed him grand marshal of the Lincolns, and I strode downstairs in my shiny black boots and white kid gloves, my speech and spectacles in my pocket. Folks curtsied and bowed to me in the lobby. The moment I appeared on Pennsylvania Avenue, a band arrived and tootled “Hail to the Chief.” I climbed aboard a barouche and sat opposite Buchanan, who hid behind the curtains like a wizened boy. He must have known we were hurtling toward a bloodbath that none of us could escape. Coward that he was, he smoothed his own feathers and wouldn’t even wrassle with the rogue States.
The President seemed very pale. “Lincoln,” he said, “if you’re as pleased to inherit the White House as I shall feel upon returning to Wheatland”—his country manor in Pennsylvania—“you, sir, are a happy man.”
I looked up and saw riflemen crouching on the roofs along Pennsylvania Avenue. They were wearing green coats. Lincoln green—like Robin Hood.
I was startled by the boldness of these men, who hopped from roof to roof with their long rifles, and without the least fear of falling. Some of them leaned over the lip of a roof to hail the two Commanders-in-Chief in the carriage. It must have confused them some to have a pair of Presidents in the same car. I waved back with my white gloves. I couldn’t see much of the parade. Other riflemen in Lincoln green swarmed around the carriage. I espied Old Fuss & Feathers on Capitol Hill, in all the finery of a General-in-Chief, with silver tassels and gold epaulettes. He was sitting on a horse that swayed under his immensity. His own artillerymen had to clutch his saddle, else the horse might have collapsed.
I STOOD IN FRONT of the tiny speaker’s table on an enormous wooden plank that jutted out from the eastern portico of the Capitol. My boots creaked. I pulled out my spectacles, turned for an instant, and could spot sharpshooters in the Capitol’s windows, like a band of green crows.
I Am Abraham Page 17