Grenier finally nodded at the envelope. “What is that?” she asked.
“A letter from a mutual friend.”
“I have so many friends. Which one is also yours?”
“Langston Bennett of South Carolina.”
Her eyebrows arched on hearing the name. She shifted her gaze from Mazorca to the envelope. “Langston Bennett is a great man,” she said. “I will read the letter.”
Grenier took the envelope and studied it. The flap was sealed shut. She opened the drawer to a small table and pulled out a letter knife. As she thrust it in a hole at one end of the envelope, she gave Mazorca a quick look. “Please, have a seat,” she said, motioning to where her visitor had been sitting. Then she ripped open the envelope, unfolded the letter, and started reading. Mazorca already knew what it said. Before leaving Charleston he had steamed open the envelope, read the undated contents, and then resealed it.
My dear Violet,
Some weeks ago I wrote to you about an important project, whose nature we need not mention here. The man bearing this letter will execute our plans. He is a stranger to Washington and may benefit from your intimate knowledge of it. Please provide him with whatever assistance he seeks, in the interest of our vital cause.
Yours most affectionately,
Langston
Below the signature, the bottom of the letter was sheared off. Grenier set it down and left the room. Mazorca heard her open and shut a drawer. She came back with a small piece of paper in her hand. One of its edges was ripped. She held it beside the letter from Bennett. They matched perfectly. Grenier smiled and placed both pieces of the letter into the envelope.
“What is your name?” she asked with disarming sincerity.
“I’m called Mazorca,” he said.
“It is a strange name. A little mysterious, too.”
“No more strange and mysterious than a woman who reads books on infantry tactics and fortifications.”
“They are in the front windows of all the bookstores.”
“And ladies are buying them?”
“Last year I couldn’t tell the difference between a flanking maneuver and a casement carriage. Now I’m able to carry on whole conversations with federal officers about their work. I’m able to learn things which I may then pass along to others who find such information useful.”
“You sound like a spy.”
For the first time since entering, Grenier smiled. It brought warmth to her features. “We all have our secrets,” she said, circling around the tête-à-tête and sitting in the seat opposite Mazorca, even though the parlor contained several chairs.
“Perhaps, like your name, it is something we best leave a bit mysterious. I am Violet Grenier, and I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Mazorca.”
“Likewise. But I’m curious about something. An hour ago, two of you left this house, but only one of you returned.”
“You’ve been watching me?” She sounded more flattered than offended. “That was Polly, who helps out around here. She has several hours off. I had thought that I would be alone in the house. Then you turned up.”
She leaned toward Mazorca and touched his arm gently. Just by watching her look at him, Mazorca understood what Bennett meant when he called Grenier the most persuasive woman in Washington.
“Your ear is terribly scarred,” she said. “What happened?”
“It’s an old injury, acquired far from here during a disagreement.”
“Something tells me that your adversary lost more than a piece of skin.”
“He did not fare well.”
Grenier smiled. “I have entertained presidents in this very spot,” she whispered.
“What about the current one?”
She pulled away from him, as if the mere thought of Lincoln was physically repulsive. “No. Never. He is the Mammon of Unrighteousness. I believe this is a subject upon which Langston Bennett and I are in complete agreement.”
“That would seem to be the case.”
“And that is why I’m willing to help you,” she said, drawing near again.
“I would appreciate it if you simply told me what you know about Lincoln and his circle.”
“The abolitionists are pathetic. Because of them I cannot now look upon the Stars and Stripes and see anything but a symbol of murder, plunder, oppression, and shame.”
Her face had twisted into a scowl, but the expression vanished just as quickly as it had appeared. “I certainly understand the importance of consorting with them,” she continued. “I’m friendly with some—quite friendly, as a matter of fact. I receive detailed reports on cabinet meetings, troop movements, and the like. I’m often aware of what the president intends to do, and I know it before Congress or the newspapers do. It requires me to spend a considerable amount of time in the company of people whose opinions I find repellent. Yet it is all in the service of a cause greater than us. Wouldn’t you agree, Mazorca?”
“It will serve your purposes and mine if you can share some of what you know with me, Mrs. Grenier.”
She smiled sweetly and touched his arm again. “Please, call me Violet.”
“What can you tell me about the president, Violet?”
“I will try to be objective,” she said, taking a deep breath.
“I have despised him ever since he came to prominence in those debates with Stephen Douglas, when they were campaigning for the Senate three years ago. He is a buffoon from the backwoods of the far frontier. Much of Washington and even many of his supposed friends consider him a coward—first for the way he sneaked into the city in the middle of the night before his inauguration, and then for taking the oath of office under armed guard. There are soldiers everywhere nowadays. We’re used to seeing them in Washington, of course, but today they have a greater presence than ever before. The president wants more of them still. Some of my friends say he is worried about an invasion from Virginia and Maryland. He should be, considering how his policies are driving half the states to secession. By preparing for war, however, he makes it impossible for people to believe he is a man of peace. I think he wants to assemble an abolitionist army and intends to rule the Southern states with an iron fist.”
“How does he spend his time?”
“Mostly in the mansion. He has long lines of visitors seeking favors. There are cabinet meetings. You may have noticed that he has turned the place into a military camp, with those vile men from the West arriving just the other day.”
“You mean Jim Lane’s men?”
“Yes, they’re the ones—and they’re more evidence that Lincoln is yellow. If he really were a man of the people, why would he place so many soldiers between himself and the public?”
“Does he ever go out in public?”
“Not often. I actually haven’t seen much of him.”
“When he’s out, does he have guards?”
“A few. He is less secure outside the White House than in it. He’s often in a crowd, though. The man may never be alone. Yet there are fewer soldiers around him when he leaves the grounds of the mansion than when he stays inside its walls. I’m told that some of the officers on General Scott’s staff are not pleased by this state of affairs. They believe the president is vulnerable in these moments. They are so worried about his life they would rather lock Lincoln in a bank vault than so much as let him peep out a window. I have this on exceedingly good authority.”
“What does General Scott think?”
“General Scott!” she chuckled. “Have you seen him? He is the fattest man in the country. He’s a traitor too. The other sons of Virginia are rallying to defend their homes, like Robert E. Lee. But fat Scott won’t have anything to do with it. That would probably require him to get on a horse and ride south—but there’s no horse that could support his bulk.”
She laughed again and then turned serious. “Yet this is not what you asked me. I know Scott well—he has called on me here—and I know he is a spent man. His finest days are far behind him. He will
do what Lincoln tells him to do, perhaps offer a few ideas, and little more. He certainly won’t challenge any of his orders, as much as a few of the younger officers on his staff might like him to. There is a Colonel Rook who presses him to be more aggressive.”
“Do you know Rook?”
“Rook is an enigma to me. Most of the officers in Washington always worry about their prospects. They pass up no opportunity to mingle with the cabinet and Congress. They would like to win favors as much as battles. It is a wonder they find any time at all to think about war and prepare for it. Yet Rook is not like them. He avoids society. I do not predict that his career will flourish.”
“I’m less concerned about where he is in the future than what he’s doing now.”
“Of course. He may be a man to watch—and to beware. Scott put him in charge of the president’s security, so it is Rook who was responsible for that extravagant military display at the inauguration. It is hard to believe, but he apparently thinks that Lincoln is under protected.”
Grenier rose from the couch. “But enough about Rook. There is something I would like you to have, Mazorca,” she said. She walked into the other parlor and returned with a key in her hand. “This was given to me by a friend who has left the city. It is to a home located at 1745 N Street. I am to look in on it occasionally while he is gone. He has not yet decided whether to sell or rent, though it is probably impossible to do either right now. You may use it as a safe house. Do not go there unless you must—it would appear odd if you were seen to be coming and going all the time—but also know it is there for you in a time of need.”
She returned to her seat on the tête-à-tête and handed Mazorca the key. “I’m here for you too,” she said in a low voice. “Let me know if there is anything you need.” She leaned across the couch and kissed Mazorca lightly on the lips. “I mean anything.”
A moment later, she led him upstairs.
Joe and Portia had never felt so tired. Two nights had passed since leaving the Bennett plantation. The physical effort was exhausting, and the nerve-wracking knowledge of what lay in store for them if they were caught only made matters worse.
Portia even found their general direction unsettling: all her life she had understood the promise of freedom lay to the north. In the night sky, she looked for the Big Dipper—or the Drinking Gourd, as she knew it—and spotted the two stars in that constellation that pointed toward the North Star. When she gazed up at the clear sky that first night, though, she realized she was heading the opposite way. This was intentional, of course: their destination was Charleston, which lay to the south. It just seemed unnatural.
She might have banished the thought from her mind if she and Joe had avoided simple blunders and made more progress. On their first night, however, a wrong turn had cost them a substantial amount of travel time. Neither Portia nor Joe was sure how far they had gone in those first hours, but they knew it was not far enough. At daybreak they retreated to the edge of an isolated meadow and ate most of their food. They tried to sleep, but it was a fitful effort for both of them. Their horses had wandered off. They could not take the risk of searching for them, so they would have to finish their journey on foot.
After the second night, the dim light of dawn had found them near a large plantation, where they observed a few field hands beginning their chores. Portia and Joe were not sure whether any of these slaves had spotted them, but they knew for certain that they had to find a new hideout for the day. A stand of trees rose about half a mile from the plantation, and they hustled into it. Leaves and branches concealed them from view.
“Do you think we’re safe here?” asked Portia.
“Safer than if we were still on that road,” replied Joe. “As soon as a white person sees us out there, we’re done.”
They were too anxious from their journey to sleep right away. They fed themselves from the small supplies of food that remained and cleared an area for lying down. This chore was just about finished when a dry branch cracked nearby. They looked toward the noise: a slave boy was coming toward them from the general direction of the plantation. He was perhaps thirteen or fourteen years old.
Joe pulled out his knife and went right for him. The big man was swift for his size. He raced forward, grabbed the boy by his collar, and threw him to the ground.
“Who’re you?” he demanded, holding his knife in front of the boy’s face.
The boy shook with fear. “Jeremiah,” he said in a quivering voice. “My name’s Jeremiah.”
Joe patted Jeremiah’s clothes to see if the boy carried weapons. There were none.
“Where you from, Jeremiah?”
“I live on the Stark plantation.”
“Oh no!” said Portia.
Joe looked at her. “What’s the matter?”
“I’ve heard of it before. We wanted to be at least this far after the first night.”
Joe returned his attention to the slave lying on his back. “How far to Charleston?”
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t mess with me, boy,” said Joe, flashing the blade.
“I don’t know. I ain’t never been there.”
“What should I do with him, Portia?”
“Don’t say our names!” she scolded.
“Sorry.”
“Let him up,” she said.
Joe took a step back and signaled for Jeremiah to sit on a log.
“What’re you doin’ here?” she asked.
“Just lookin’ around.”
“What are you lookin’ for?”
“I saw you comin’ down the road this mornin’.”
“So?”
“You seemed real nervous, the way you kept lookin’ at Mr. Stark’s house.”
Portia forced a laugh. “And what makes you think we been nervous?”
Jeremiah did not answer immediately. Then he asked, “You’re runaways, ain’t you?”
“No, we ain’t!”
“You got passes?”
“Yeah.”
“Lemme see.”
“No.”
“I think you’re runaways, and I wanna help you.”
“You’d get yourself in big trouble for somethin’ like that.”
“Nobody knows I’m here.”
“Were you the only one who saw us?”
“I don’t know. I think so. Lemme show you a better hidin’ spot than this.”
Joe looked at Portia. She shrugged. “I say let’s go,” she said.
“OK,” agreed Joe, who then turned to Jeremiah. “But if you try anything funny, boy, I’m gonna carve you up with this knife.”
“Don’t worry,” said Jeremiah. “Just follow me.”
A smooth-running creek ran about two hundred feet from where they started. It was so quiet Portia and Joe had not even known it was there. They paused for a moment to drink.
“We’re going to walk in the water,” said Jeremiah when they were done. “It will confuse the dogs.”
Portia and Joe had not mentioned dogs to each other since leaving the Bennett plantation, but the topic was not far from their minds. Slave catchers always worked with dogs—fierce beasts the size of wolves. They were trained with meat. They would kill their quarry unless they were called off. Slaves feared the dogs far more than they feared the slave catchers. When a chase was coming to an end, it was common for runaways to consider the slave catchers not as their doom but as their salvation. They would do almost anything to keep from being mauled by the dogs.
As they waded down the knee-deep creek, Portia knew they were covering their scent. She also understood the dogs were smart enough to recognize this trick and patient enough to follow along both sides of a stream for long distances in order to pick up the smell again.
After a while, their creek ran into a slightly bigger one. Jeremiah turned into it and started heading upstream. “If the dogs come this way, they’ll go downstream first,” he said.
“How do you know your way around here?” asked Portia.
“This is where my brothers and I come lyin’ out,” he said.
“We only do it for a couple of days at a time. But we ain’t been caught yet.”
“Ain’t you whipped for that?”
“Not enough to stop us from doin’ it again.”
They walked upstream for a few minutes. Suddenly Jeremiah stopped. There was a high bank on one side of the creek. “There’s a hollow behind there,” he said, pointing.
“Anybody lookin’ for you is gonna be comin’ from the stream or the main road.” He indicated the direction of the road, on the side of the stream opposite the bank. “You’ll see ’em before they see you—and you’ll hear ’em before that.”
“This is kind of you,” said Portia. “Have you helped others like this before?”
“Yes.”
“They been caught?” asked Joe.
“I’m two for five,” said the boy, with a big smile. “Five times I’ve helped, and two times they’ve gotten away from here without being found out.”
“That makes you more of a failure than a success,” said Joe.
“It’s not always my fault,” protested Jeremiah. “One time the people I helped stayed here at night and they were dumb enough to light a fire. They got caught.”
“The runaways that weren’t caught—what made them different?” asked Portia.
“They were smart.”
“How were they smart?”
“They traveled alone.”
Portia looked at Joe.
“That’s one reason I want you to succeed,” said Jeremiah, oblivious to the effect of his words. “I want you to be the first group I’ve helped get through.”
“We’ll try not to let you down,” said Portia.
“You hungry?”
“As a matter of fact, we are.”
“Then I’ll go now and bring some food. I may be an hour or two, but I’ll be back.” Jeremiah splashed into the stream, crossed it, and then ran into the trees.
“You’re right about one thing: if we can’t trust him, we’re done,” said Joe. “It just seems to me there was one way of makin’ sure he doesn’t tell anybody about us.”
The First Assassin Page 17