by D. J. Butler
Poe’s eye fell on the stage in the center of the building. The stocky gentleman continued to talk and the plush chairs behind him were slowly filling with grave-faced men.
“President Young has been shot.”
A hush fell over the entire enormous throng. Poe could hear men and women breathing around him and the here-and-there cries of small children, like seabirds wheeling above the gray vista of a lonely beach.
Poe recognized the men in the chairs from Robert’s files. There was Wilford Woodruff, the obsessive diarist, and Lorenzo Snow, the vegetarian, and David Patten, bloody-handed victor of the Battle of Crooked River. These were the famous Twelve Apostles. They were taking chairs that, he now saw, must be reserved for them.
Orson Pratt was one of them. He wasn’t on the stage yet, but if he came here, that’s where he’d be headed. Poe found steps leading down to the bottom of the Tabernacle and took advantage of the stunned stillness of the crowd to push his way along them, greatcoat flapping heavy around him with the weight of the four canopic jars in its pockets.
“Good Danite men were on the scene,” the Englishman continued. George Quayle Cannon, Poe realized who the man was as he headed for the floor, the so-called Mormon Richelieu, whatever that was supposed to mean. “I have been told that Brother Orrin Porter Rockwell was also injured, defending President Young as he has done for so long, and as he defended Brother Joseph before that. The Danites removed President Young from his office to give him into the care of a physician but he could not be saved. I do not know the fate of Brother Rockwell. I understand that our men have, however, apprehended the shooter.”
Poe reached the bottom of the stair and found his way blocked. Around him, a crowd of bereft faces stared up at the stage that now loomed over his head. Two steps forward would put Poe on the lowest floor of the Tabernacle, and another six would put him at the short staircase that climbed onto the stage itself. He couldn’t take those steps, though, because a tall, heavy man in a coat and cravat, with a long pistol at his hip, barred the way with a glower.
Poe could see more of the Apostles now, the thin-lipped Orson Hyde with unruly hair and the clear-browed Heber Kimball with no hair at all, whispering solemnly to each other as they mounted the stairs to take their seats. “Excuse me, brother,” he said politely to the staring guard, “but I must speak with Apostle Pratt. May I pass?”
“Why don’t you take a seat … brother?” the big man grunted back. His voice sounded like he was one-half Danish and the other half bear.
“I regret to say,” Cannon continued from the pulpit, “that the First Presidency is therefore dissolved. The Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, I have been informed, will meet, along with other leaders, to deliberate how to reconstitute the Presidency. I understand that those meetings will begin tomorrow morning at seven, at the Lion House … so if any of the Twelve or the Seventy are in the Tabernacle and haven’t yet been informed, please join us at that hour. The Deseret Hotel has already agreed to make accommodations for those coming from out of town to participate.”
Pratt moved into view in the well of the Tabernacle, drifting from some unseen entrance towards the stage. He was bald and bearded and frayed and rumpled, looking every inch the Madman he was named. He walked with his head bowed and twitching, lips mumbling some soundless litany.
“Look,” Poe pointed him out to the Dane, “there he is. If you will just let me past—”
The Dane snorted and grabbed Poe by the front of his coat.
Poe didn’t want to hurt the big man. He also didn’t want to attract attention. But he felt his mission objectives all slipping out of his grasp, he was frustrated and desperate. So when the guard grabbed him by his coat Poe seized the big man by his thumbs and thrust them backwards without mercy.
The Dane gasped and lurched to his knees. Poe looked around quickly to see if anyone had noticed what he was doing, but the crowd was rapt, unable to take its attention off the pulpit.
The big man whimpered.
Pratt was at the foot of the stairs.
Poe was out of time.
He threw the Dane sideways, trying to get him out of the way without hurting him more than was necessary, and rushed forward.
He crossed the open floor in three long steps—
—Pratt moved up the staircase—
—Poe heard the guard scramble back to his feet, cursing, and come after him—
—Poe grabbed the Madman by the elbow, coughing. He knew he looked like a crazed gypsy himself, with his hat and his greasy hair and smoked glasses and fingerless gloves and bulky coat. He had only one chance.
“I am the Egyptian,” he hissed desperately into the Apostle’s ear as the man turned and stared at him indignantly. He tried to hold his lungs together by sheer force of will. “I come seeking the knowledge of the air.”
“You’re coming with me, you crazy beggar!” Poe felt the Dane’s big hands grab him and jerk him away.
Pratt stared, confused, uncertain.
Poe couldn’t let it end this way. He stepped backwards, close into his attacker, got a leg under the man’s instep and his body under the man’s weight—and threw him forward over his shoulder, onto the ground.
Thud!
Poe tossed his man away from the stage, planting him close in against the base of the wall, so that the angle would hide any more scuffling from most of the audience. Hopefully the distraction of the speech and the setting would do the rest.
The big man writhed as he flipped, and as he hit the plascrete the Dane was already pulling his pistol, thumbing back the hammer.
“Stop it!” Pratt commanded, and Poe and the guard both froze.
Orson Pratt scuttled forward, off the stage and back into the well. “This man is with me,” he hissed to the big guard. “Thank you … er, brother, for your caution. As we … as we heard today,” he gestured vaguely to the pulpit and George Cannon, “your care is … is valuable. Thank you.”
The big man looked dubious.
Poe braced himself to be shot.
“Please return to your post,” Pratt continued. “This man is not a danger, but … but the next one might be.”
“We profoundly regret to tell you one more thing,” Cannon continued, “but we feel that we must.” His voice echoed loud and brassy from the ceiling cones. “The man who shot President Young has been identified. His name is Samuel Clemens.”
As if this news had freed him, the Dane backed away. He glared one last time at Poe, uncocked his pistol and returned to his station. Further around the base of the stage, other guards, whose attention had been briefly caught, now looked away. The crowd above appeared not to have noticed.
Poe sighed with relief and adjusted his glasses.
Cannon wasn’t finished. “Mr. Clemens is an agent in the pay of the United States government.”
He paused.
If a silence could be thunderingly loud, Poe thought, this is it.
“Come on,” Pratt whispered, and grabbed Poe by the sleeve. He dragged the younger man down a plascrete hallway that cut underneath the lower tiers of seating, the entrance by which the Apostles had all come into the building. “Say it again,” he said. There was an excited light in his eyes, as if he were thrilled.
Poe didn’t feel thrilled. He felt off-balance, discombobulated, entirely outside of the foreseeable strands of his web of planning. Could Sam Clemens really have shot Brigham Young? What would have been the point of that? If the American government assassinated the President of the Kingdom on the eve of the outbreak of hostilities, what could that do but precipitate Deseret into the war, and on the side of the seceding Southern states?
“What?” he asked. It made no sense.
“Start over,” the Madman insisted. “Who are you?”
Are we playing a game? Poe thought, but he complied. “I am the Egyptian,” he repeated. “I come seeking the knowledge of the air.”
The old man beamed. “I am the Seer, keeper of the knowledge of the air. By
what token shall I know thee, Boatman?”
“Boatman?” Poe asked. What?
“I mean, Egyptian. By what token shall I know thee, Egyptian?” Pratt blushed.
Who was the Boatman? What kind of double game was going on here? Did Robert know there was a Boatman? “You shall know me by the four sons of Horus, which I bear,” he answered, according to the script.
“Very good.” The Madman quivered with excitement. “Do you have them here?”
Poe nodded. “Do you want them now?” What had the Boatman brought, or what was he supposed to bring—are there more mysterious canopic jars out there?
“Yes! Give them to me.” Pratt held out his hands, which trembled as if he were a drunkard with a bad case of the shakes.
“And now,” George Cannon finished, “I will turn the time over to better speakers than I am. Most of you, I suppose, know Brother John Lee, especially those of you from the southern valleys. I know that all of you know who he is.”
Poe shrugged out of his heavy coat and handed it over to Orson Pratt. The Apostle grinned to feel the weight in his hands and positively danced into the garment, smiling from ear to ear. “Thank you,” he said, patting down the bulky pockets and visibly counting them one-two-three-four. “Thanks to your Mr. Jefferson Davis, to whatever extent he knows what is going on, and to your Mr. Robert Lee, Colonel Lee, that is, and especially to your Mr. Horace Hunley and his mechanicks!”
Oh, Robert, Poe thought. What insanity have you gotten me involved in? Who is this Madman Pratt, and what is he up to?
And what infernal devices did Whitney’s boys build for him?
“You will not have forgotten that you owe me some papers as well,” he reminded Pratt.
“Schematics!” snapped the Apostle. “Of course I haven’t forgotten.” He looked around him as if suspecting eavesdroppers, then leaned in close to whisper into Poe’s ear. “Tomorrow morning at eight,” he said. “Come to the north entrance to this building. You’ll get what’s coming to you then.”
He turned to go and Poe grabbed his lapel. “You’ll understand, sir, that this makes me nervous. I expected you to give me the documents today.”
“And I expected you,” Pratt grunted fiercely, “at the water station! It’s late, do you understand? I am out of time, I could not possibly have gotten these any later! Do you imagine that I carry around airship plans in my pockets at all times, waiting for tardy secret agents, dressed all to catch the eye like Harlequin in some Italian comedy? Ha!” He snorted like a horse, shook himself free of Poe’s grasp, and shuffled away, back down the hallway and out of the Tabernacle.
Poe leaned against the cool plascrete wall, wondering what was next.
Could Sam Clemens be the Boatman? he wondered. His craft, the Jim Smiley, was amphibious, as he had neatly demonstrated at the crossing of the Bear River. And if he was the Boatman, had he traded with Pratt for the same schematics Poe sought? What had he offered in trade?
Had Sam Clemens shot Brigham Young in exchange for airship schematics?
But how would that make any sense? Was it worth deliberately getting the Kingdom of Deseret into the war on the side of the seceding states, just to be able to have the schematics of weapons now in the hands of one’s enemies? It didn’t hold together.
But Cannon had said something about the leadership succession. What had it been? He had said that the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles would meet to decide who the next President would be.
Could that be it? Clemens had killed Young to clear the way so that Orson Pratt could become President of the Kingdom of Deseret. In which case, maybe the Boatman’s trade was entirely different from Poe’s. Maybe Clemens wasn’t going to get the schematics; maybe what he got in trade was the promise of the new President to enter the war on the side of the Union and the North.
And then what? Clemens gets executed, a sacrificed pawn? He’s pardoned, or surreptitiously freed and allowed to escape in the night by the new President?
Poe shook his head. Not enough information.
“You all likely know that Brother Lee is one of the chieftains among our Danite brothers,” the speaker at the pulpit went on. “What you may not realize is that he is also the adopted son of President Young.” Cannon paused and looked down, as if struggling with emotion. “At his request, Brother Lee will now say a few words to the congregation about his father.”
George Cannon stepped back and took a seat. He sat behind the row of Apostles, Poe noticed, but three of them immediately turned back and held a brief, whispered conversation with the man.
Have we played into their hands? Poe wondered. Perhaps Whitney’s boys had devised some terrible weapon, and he, Poe, had just delivered it to the Madman, who as the Kingdom’s next President would turn that same weapon against the defenseless troops of Virginia, Alabama and South Carolina.
Perhaps if he showed up at eight o’clock the next morning, Pratt would have him killed. Perhaps Clemens would pull the trigger himself as his last act before he fled the Kingdom. Clemens or his Irish thug with the Henry rifle.
Another man took the pulpit. He had a weary smile between protruding jug ears and hadn’t shaved for a day or two. He wore a long brown overcoat, yellow waistcoat, and a red bowtie. Compared to all the long beards behind him and in the stands, he looked like an eastern dandy, but he had an animal air about him, something in his step that gave him away to Poe as a fighter and a man of action.
Poe had already seen the man; Lee and his scraggly, whiny-voiced henchman, Bill Hickman, had found Poe in the Shoshone stockade only the night before and had threatened him before being faced down by a combination of various men, including the two Englishmen and the Yankee Sam Clemens.
Lee gripped the edges of the podium firmly, as if he or it or both might collapse without the mutual support. Then he opened his mouth and spoke in a pleasant, tired baritone.
“Brothers and Sisters, everything is going to be all right.”
There was a collective sigh in the gigantic building and then the hum of murmured conversation, as if tens of thousands of bees had been holding their breaths and now, at the signal of their queen, they could again begin to buzz.
The doors through which Orson Pratt had exited were kicked open, and in walked a handful of soldiers. They wore the hats, insignia, and pistols of Virginia cavalrymen and at their head strode a paunchy man with gnarled and ludicrously overgrown reddish-brown hair climbing both jaws but stopping short of his chin and upper lip. He wore a Captain’s star and brass scales on both shoulders and as he walked his hand rode on the hilt of a long cavalry saber swinging from his belt.
Poe hesitated. The soldier was a Virginian and for a moment Poe wrestled with an impulse to approach the man, reveal his own rank and demand to know what the Captain’s instructions were.
But of course that was silly.
Poe looked down deferentially, scraped backwards, and got out of the soldiers’ path.
“Brothers and sisters,” the man Lee said again, “I do not know why the United States government decided it had to murder my father … our father … our prophet.”
Poe crept out of the hallway and looked around at the filled seats. His audience hung on Lee’s every word.
“But I know this.” He raised a warning, instructive finger, his face was stern and impassioned and patriotic. “They shall not get away with this foul crime. I will not permit it. We will not permit it.”
The soldiers marched up the stairs and onto the platform.
“Our friends will not permit it.”
He fell silent and let the import of his words sink in. The murmurs rose to a high pitch and he waited for them to fade.
The soldiers came to attention in front of the seated Apostles. Poe looked at the faces of the Kingdom’s leaders. Some of them looked stricken, some fearful, some resolute. None of them seemed surprised by the presence of the soldiers.
“Brothers and sisters,” John Lee continued. “Allow me to introduce one of our friends
. This is Captain Everett Morgan of the Third Virginia Cavalry and these are some of his men. Captain Morgan will be assisting us to maintain order in this confusing time.”
Lee stepped slightly to one side and Morgan joined him, pulling up a speaking tube and talking into it. “Good people of the Kingdom of Deseret,” he said gruffly, “the great State of Virginia greets you. At the request of your leadership, the men of my unit will be deployed in the Great Salt Lake City to keep the peace.”
Robert, Poe thought, is this your doing? Plots within plots. Is this a countermove to the Union plot of which I am unaware? Did Robert learn of Clemens’s mission after he had sent me and send in the cavalry to assist? Will Everett Morgan and his men arrest Orson Pratt along with the Union soldiers?
Or is there some other game going on here?
Not enough, not enough information. Poe banged one fist into the cup of his other hand in frustration.
“In addition,” the cavalryman continued, “please be aware that there is a regiment of Massachusetts infantry at large in the city. If you see them, please do not render them any assistance and inform your leaders of their location. You are likely to see gunfire this afternoon and maybe tonight, between us and the men of Massachusetts. Whatever you see, or think you see, I ask that you remain indoors. Defend yourself against the Massachusetts men if you are compelled, but do not attempt to render assistance to the Third Virginia or otherwise become involved in any way. Thank you.”
The Captain handed the speaking tube back to Lee and stepped away again. Murmurs rose again.
Poe wondered who could give him more information. Clemens, if he could find the man, but he must certainly be in custody. Or if not, if Cannon was lying about that, then the Union man would be in hiding.
“In order to avoid confusion,” Lee added, “immediately following this meeting, I will ensure that Captain Morgan and his men are dressed in gray uniforms. If you see men in blue military uniforms, you should assume that they are soldiers of the United States military and you should report them to your Elders or High Priests as soon as possible. I must add my voice to the urging of Captain Morgan. Brothers and sisters, I am sorry to say it, but there will be shooting tonight on the streets of the Great Salt Lake City. I must insist that you protect yourselves and your young ones. If possible, if you do not need to be in town for tomorrow morning’s meetings, I suggest that you go out to your farms, or visit family in Ogden or Provo, if you must.”