Burr

by Gore Vidal

  It was on January 10—an oddly balmy day—that I stopped at Bayou Pierre just north of Natchez and went ashore to stay with an old friend who greeted me with a copy of the Natchez Messenger, and what a messenger! Not even Mercury himself ever delivered such a series of surprises. First, I read the President’s proclamation. Second, I read Wilkinson’s version of my ciphered letter. Third, I read that the acting governor of the Mississippi Territory had ordered my arrest.

  “Well,” I said to my friend, “here I was looking forward to some of your venison.”

  “You shall have it.” We dined most heartily. What else is one to do in the gallows’ shade?

  Three

  IT IS MOST ENJOYABLE.” Mr. Bryant stared at me across his book-stacked desk.

  “I hope it is not too macabre.”

  “Not for our readers.”

  “But an unsolved murder …”

  “Bad morality, perhaps, but then we are used to bad morals now-a-days.”

  “Like those of the anti-Abolitionists?” Oh, there is nothing I will not say or do to ingratiate myself with Mr. Bryant, or with any editor. I must have money.

  Mr. Bryant laughed as he was intended to do. “We shall be delighted to publish—at our usual rate.”

  I will not record the next exchange. But I managed to get five dollars more than the usual rate. As a potential father, I have become a kind of jungle animal, stalking New York editors. Last night I worked until dawn, describing the murder of Elma Sands and the defence of her supposed assassin by Burr and Hamilton. I am now using the Colonel’s memoirs as a quarry.

  We discussed other possibilities. “I wish you would take a look at the city for us, through the eyes of Old Patroon.” Old Patroon was conceived by Leggett a year ago. Since then he has become unexpectedly popular. I find it easy to write in his character, once I find a subject. Old Patroon is a thundering Tory who will try anything, after a show of reluctance.

  “But I do look at the city.”

  “I mean see it. See the ugliness we are making here. Contrast the old Dutch houses of honest stone with what is being built now, with those miles and miles of painted brick houses. Just think, Mr. Schuyler: painted brick!” He shook his head.

  I had always taken it for granted that brick houses are supposed to be painted red with each brick carefully outlined in white. Apparently not.

  “Painted brick is something modern, and peculiar to New York. Like the clothes our women wear. Those monstrous hats, the piled-up hair … Well, no, we had best not offend the ladies. But do look at our city and tell us exactly what you see. Or rather what your noble Old Patroon sees.”

  I blinked my eyes, as one who boxes might flex his arm; eager to show Mr. Bryant that I was ready to look as hard as I could, to earn my—our bread. As I rose to go, he motioned for me to stay, was sombre.

  “I have the notion that you are turning pamphleteer.”

  Who in New York does not know about my pamphlet? But then politics is the consuming passion of half the town.

  “I must tell you, Mr. Schuyler, that I am convinced that Mr. Van Buren will prove to be one of our greatest presidents.” Mr. Bryant sounded as if he were delivering a commencement day address or reciting “Thanatopsis.” “And he will certainly continue the noble work General Jackson has begun.”

  I said nothing. There was nothing to say. How explain the fact that I am living with a prostitute from Mrs. Townsend’s establishment, that the girl is pregnant, that I must now marry her while dreaming, simultaneously, of freedom in another world, on the Mediterranean, far from brick houses painted red, from talk of elections, from money-making? I am in a cage: but will get out.

  “Have you seen what I have written?” Some days ago I gave a copy of the pamphlet to Leggett. I have shown it to no one else.

  Mr. Bryant nodded. “Yes, I have read it.”

  “I am surprised Leggett gave it to you since you favour Van Buren and he does not.”

  “The situation is changed. As he will tell you.”

  I have not been able to discuss the pamphlet with Leggett; he is home sick.

  “You see, Senator Johnson is no longer a candidate. The gallant slayer of Tecumseh has privately agreed to be Mr. Van Buren’s vice-president.”

  “Then Leggett is for Van Buren?”

  “Faute de mieux. But I predict that he, that everyone will be pleasantly surprised by the Van Buren administration.”

  “If there is one.”

  “If there is one.” Mr. Bryant wiped his quill pen clean with a piece of paper. Then wiped it clean again.

  “There are other contenders,” I said, not about to concede an election I have for some time deluded myself that I alone would decide. “There’s a candidate from Tennessee, isn’t there?”

  “Hugh White. Yes, he has some western support.”

  “And there is always the Whig candidate Henry Clay.”

  “Yes, there is always Henry Clay.” For a third time, Mr. Bryant started to clean his pen; then stopped, aware of the redundancy. “Mr. Schuyler, your pamphlet can do the most extraordinary harm.”

  “That was Leggett’s intention when he asked me to write it.” Firmly, I assigned the responsibility.

  Mr. Bryant grimaced. “Yes, I suppose it was. Our friend is always too fierce, too swift in his judgements.”

  “You would prefer that I not publish it?”

  “Yes.” Mr. Bryant’s response was both swift and fierce.

  Lately desperation has made me cunning. “Mr. Bryant, I am soon to be married.”

  “My felicitations …”

  “Thank you. I have no money. I have not yet taken my examination to be admitted to the bar. Actually, I had hoped, as you know, for a career as a journalist.”

  Mr. Bryant tried to contain his alarm. “At the moment, I fear there are too many journalists and too few positions …”

  “No, Sir. I do not want a job.”

  Relief was evident. “Of course whatever you write, if it is of this quality,” he tapped The Mystery of Elma Sands, “will be published here—and proudly. After all, you have a following.” A dim smile. “Fitz-Greene Halleck has praised you to me. Because of Old Patroon he plans to eat a tomato, or so he says.”

  Ordinarily I would have been blushing and speechless with delight. This morning I hardly noticed the compliment. “To support myself, I will write all I can. But it seems to me that there ought to be something more, particularly if I …”

  “If you don’t publish?”

  “Yes. After all, I will be giving up five thousand dollars.” Cold-bloodedly I multiplied by five my fee. It was an outrageous stroke but Mr. Bryant seemed to believe me.

  “That is a very large sum.” He tugged at his side whiskers. “But then many people are desperate to destroy Mr. Van Buren.”

  “Yes, they are. But I am not. As you know, I came in here one day with a piece about Colonel Burr’s marriage and before I knew what was happening, Leggett had persuaded me to write about the Van Buren connection.”

  “I’m afraid our friend Leggett has got you—and us—into trouble. I realize it is not your fault, nor anyone’s. Simply the partisan passions of our age.” Mr. Bryant was philosophic but then how could he not be when he looks like a bust of Aristotle, with side whiskers?

  “I could abandon it, I suppose.” I paused. Looked away. Noticed on his desk Irving’s latest book, A Tour of the Prairies. A bronze paper-knife was stuck in the first chapter—like a murderer’s weapon, I thought, and wondered suddenly who did kill Elma Sands? I must ask the Colonel whom he suspected.

  “We have no influence with the Administration.” Mr. Bryant also found comforting the sight of A Tour of the Prairies.

  “If I don’t publish, and if Van Buren is elected …” I stared at him, genuinely at a loss. What to ask for?

  “I will talk to someone who might be helpful.”

  “Will it be soon? I am to see the publisher on Monday.”

  “I will do what I can for you.
For Mr. Van Buren, that is.”

  “I should warn you that I detest politics.”

  Mr. Bryant turned Irving’s book on its face. “When I was young I wanted only to be a poet of the purest kind, like Milton. No, no, like Thomas Gray. After all, Milton was political. Then I came here.” He gestured at the bound files of old newspapers that lined his cubby-hole like so many yellowed tombstones memorializing dead news. “I had to live somehow. But then, gradually, I began to care about these things.”

  “I never shall.”

  “But you are much interested in Colonel Burr.”

  “As a character …”

  “I was once a Burrite.” Mr. Bryant suddenly smiled. “At thirteen I wrote an attack on Jefferson. In verse. It was called ‘The Embargo.’ ” The voice suddenly dropped a register.

  “Go, scan, philosophist, thy Sally’s charms

  And sink supinely in her sable arms;

  But quit to abler hands the help of state.”

  He laughed; broke off. “One ought never to publish at thirteen. Nor at thirty. Nor perhaps ever!”

  “Obviously you were political from the beginning.”

  “So it would seem. But now …” Mr. Bryant turned to me. “Young man, I must confess to you that I fear Colonel Burr to this day. I fear his mind. I fear his example.”

  “I think him a great man, Mr. Bryant. Others would, too, had he not lost the game he was playing, the game Jefferson won.”

  “There! You’ve made my point. What was a game to Burr was a contest between good and evil to Jefferson.” The sententious and moralizing William Cullen Bryant suddenly replaced the practical editor. “I grant you Burr has an acute and active mind, but he did not—could not rise to intellectual greatness. As for his morality …”

  “Hardly worse than that of anyone else at the time, or now.” I rose to go.

  Mr. Bryant was taken aback. Usually it is he who terminates our interviews. He was placating. “Well, what are we anyway but so many critics in the stalls, criticising the grand performers?”

  Mr. Bryant walked me to the door. “There is,” he said, “an honest shoemaker living in Naples, on the Murgaleena” (I am guessing at these Italian spellings), “on the right hand as you go toward Poteswollee. Every morning, just as the sun comes up, his little dog runs out of the house and barks at Vesuvius.”

  Four

  I WENT UP to Fourth Street. At first Leggett’s wife did not want me to see him but when he heard my voice in the hall, he shouted down. “Come up! I die of ennui! Not to mention yellow fever, malaria …” I entered the bedroom, as he was finishing the list of his complaints. “… catarrh, and the consumption.” Leggett did look as if he might die at any moment; his face was sallow and beaded with sweat, and the room stank of quinine and the flesh’s corruption.

  I sat at some distance from him and described my interview with Mr. Bryant. Leggett laughed, coughed, wheezed, spluttered, was amused. “You seem to have got him on the defensive. Good for you. He only mentions that little dog in Naples when he’s nervous. It’s like a tic with him, that story is.” He pushed the blankets away from his chest. “Well, I got you into this and now I must get you out.”

  “I’m to meet the publisher next week.”

  “What do you want?”

  “What do you think? Money. Helen’s pregnant.”

  “Well done.” Leggett was as sympathetic as a man dying of several diseases can be. “Will you marry her?”

  “I want to.”

  “She does not?” Brows arched with surprise.

  “No. Or so she says. But whatever we do, I must start practising law, publishing more articles …”

  “You will stay in New York?”

  “What choice do I have?”

  “A government appointment might be possible.”

  “Before next week?”

  “That’s not much time.”

  “No, it is not.” Whatever I can extract from Leggett and Mr. Bryant I will, and with a clear conscience; just as I will take whatever I can obtain through Swartwout’s publisher. I mean to be as ruthless with all of them as they have been with me.

  Curious. Sitting here, watching Helen at work in front of the dress-dummy (she is now industrious), I am certain that the child will be a girl, and I am actually pleased at the thought of being so completely stopped in my tracks, of being forced to struggle like everyone else in this city while lacking the motive of everyone else which is to make money. All I ever wanted was a life to myself, inside my own head. Now I must work for two other people to the end of my days and the thought of such long servitude does not depress me; quite the contrary. I am a fool. I think my mother would have liked Helen.

  “Bryant said he would make inquiries?” Leggett dried his face with a towel.

  “Yes.”

  “That means he will do something. So will I. Between the two of us, there’s no reason why you could not get a consulate.”

  I stared at Leggett with wonder. None of my dreams had ever been so ambitious.

  “Usually a consulship is a reward for services rendered to the party, but in your case,” Leggett grinned his broken-toothed smile, “it will be for services triumphantly not rendered.”

  “You can actually get this for me?”

  “In time, yes. It is possible.”

  “Time …” I frowned.

  “For God’s sake, Charlie, don’t publish that damned thing! If you don’t, I swear to you—on the head of Bryant’s little Neapolitan dog—that we’ll get you something good. That’s a solemn oath, Charlie!” He slapped his muscular, death-riddled shield of a chest, and so I swore to him that I would not publish the pamphlet. But can I take seriously the “chaunting cherubs” of the Evening Post? Have they such power? I refuse to dream of the consulship for if I do it will pass me by.

  Five

  COLONEL BURR WAS AMUSED when I told him that Mr. Bryant had once been a Burrite. “I shall now read him with a warmth which hitherto has been lacking.” The Colonel gave a place of honour to the Evening Post on the table beside his sofa. Then: “Pour me out some claret. I’ve a chill today.”

  I poured us each a glass. The Colonel seems to be growing frailer in body but the mind is clear. At least today it was. Other days he is forgetful, puts words in the wrong order—to his own annoyance. “Old age is not to be encouraged, Charlie.”

  “Should one die young?”

  “No. Simply avoid ageing. There must be some way. I thought I had found it.”

  “And what was that?”

  “The love of women. But at a certain point not even their flesh can keep us from shrivelling up like old apples. Well!” He finished off the claret.

  “What sort of government did you have in mind for Mexico?”

  “Government?” He looked at me blankly. Shook his head. Appeared to think back. “That would have depended on what we found there.”

  “Everyone thinks you meant to be emperor.”

  “Oh, no! I was far too modest to want to appropriate the title of the great Napoleon. King would have been sufficient for my purposes. Yo el Rey as the Spanish king begins his correspondence. Bleak but to the point. ‘I the King …’ ”

  “But to what end a king?”

  “To make a civilisation on this God-forsaken continent!” Suddenly in the Colonel’s face I saw a glimpse of something I had not seen before, a kind of fury and contempt that was usually masked by the exquisite irony, the serene good humour. “Between the dishonest canting of Jefferson and the poisonous egotism of Hamilton, this state has been no good from the beginning. Now it starts to change with old Jackson. For the better, I hope. But I can assure you that that early republic of ours was no place for a man who wanted to live in a good world, who wanted to make a true civilisation and to share it with a host of choice spirits, such as I meant to establish in Mexico. Unfortunately, I was not able to be a king—though I very nearly was a president—but in my way I have been lucky for I have always been able to indulge my t
rue passion which is to teach others, to take pleasure in bringing out the best in men and women, to make them alive, and though I did not achieve any sort of kingdom in this world, I have established small human dominions along my way, proved to the doubting that women had souls, and trained a hundred boys to make the best of their life, without complaint, or dishonour.”

  For a long time after this uncharacteristic outburst (the result of swallowing too rapidly a large tumbler of claret) the Colonel was silent, staring at the coals in the stove’s grate. Then, without any preamble, he began the day’s work.

  Memoirs of Aaron Burr–Twenty

  I GLADLY SURRENDERED myself to the governor of the Mississippi Territory on January 17, 1807. I say gladly because I knew that if I were to come under Wilkinson’s jurisdiction, I would not live long enough to have my day in court, or anywhere else. The governor of Mississippi was deeply embarrassed once he discovered that the army with which I was to seize New Orleans consisted of fewer than fifty men, and no weapons beyond what settlers of a new country would use for hunting.

  “I apologize, Colonel Burr, but I fear we have been misled by the dictator of New Orleans.”

  The Governor was polite to me and contemptuous of Wilkinson whom he referred to not only as the ‘dictator’ but as the ‘pensioner.’ Apparently everyone in the west knew that Jamie was in the pay of Spain—except me.

  I rode to the town of Washington, the capital of the Mississippi Territory, and was bound over in $5,000 bail by one Judge Rodney whose claim to fame was that he had fathered Jefferson’s attorney-general and so knew his political loyalties rather better than he did his law.

  Since the grand jury did not convene until February, I rejoined my poor army and navy. For the next few weeks my principal task was to avoid being kidnapped by Wilkinson’s agents. He knew that if I got to the east alive, his part in our “conspiracy” would come to light.

  In due course the grand jury found me “not guilty of any crime or misdeameanour against the laws of the United States.” They also went out of their way to condemn both Wilkinson and Jefferson for recklessness with the law, and for putting in jeopardy the Constitution.