On Secret Service (40 page)

The partisan battalion now had two additional companies, B and C, with plans for more. New men arrived regularly, drawn by Mosby's name and celebrity.

A few months earlier, repeal of the Partisan Ranger Act by the Confederate Congress had nearly wiped out all independent commands. Brigadier Thomas Rosser had complained to Lee about the partisans, branding them “bands of thieves” and arguing that they put an evil stamp on the whole Army. Mosby galloped to Richmond, pleaded with Lee, and won exemption from the repeal. While Grant maneuvered and hammered unsuccessfully at Lee's Army at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor during the spring and early summer, the partisans remained a presence in Loudoun and Fauquier counties—“Mosby's Confederacy,” the press and populace called it.

Captain William Smith, a confidant of Mosby's, led B Company. Familiar with Fred's background, he requested him and promoted him to sergeant. “Despite your reputation as a man overly fond of the corn,” Smith said with humorless candor.

Jeb Stuart's death at Yellow Tavern hit Fred hard. He could hardly thank the flamboyant cavalryman for banishing him to Mosby's unit, or ordering Hanna Siegel to some filthy Richmond prison. Yet neither could he dismiss Stuart's military genius and his importance to the Army. Stuart's death began a turnaround in Fred's life that was at first wholly unsuspected. An incident of low comedy brought it to the fore.

Mosby sent Fred with ten men on what was called corn patrol: the extraction of tribute from farmers suspected of Union sympathies. These were mostly Quakers; gentle people. It sickened Fred to ride into their farmyards and strip them of their remaining grain and livestock.

One man in Fred's detail aroused loathing of a kind he'd seldom felt in military service. The new recruit, tall and black-haired, hailed from Alabama. Fred guessed him to be anywhere from eighteen to twenty-one. He had the body of a Hercules and the brain of a rabbit. Having lost two brothers at Murfreesboro, he was poisoned with hate for the Yankees. He said he'd never wounded an enemy soldier. “When I shoot, I miss 'em or kill 'em.” He made the boast often, with moronic glee.

The young man's proudest moment, which he described tediously to any who would listen, was meeting John Wilkes Booth during one of the actor's Southern tours. “Mighty fine show he gave. Went backstage afterwards. Mr. Booth shook my hand and poured me a whiskey in his dressing room. We talked about how we hated the son-of-a-bitching black Republicans. Booth said he'd like to murder a few. I said I would too. We shook hands on it.”

No one knew where Lewis Powell had come from last winter. Desertion from some other unit seemed probable; he was experienced. He also seemed fearless, a quality Fred always equated with stupidity. Powell sensed Fred's dislike and made his own dislike evident with side glances and snickers, though he never disobeyed orders.

Another duty of corn patrols was destruction of stills discovered in remote areas. Mosby insisted that alcohol not only harmed a soldier, but robbed precious grain needed for food and fodder. Near the hamlet of Bluemont, within sight of the Blue Ridge, Fred's detail swooped down on a still operated by a toothless grandpa of eighty or more. They tore the coils apart and shot holes in the kettles. With Fred's permission, they helped themselves to some of the product.

Fred joined in, imbibing too generously. When the late-afternoon sun was spilling red light on the mountains, he ordered the detail back to the horses. He put his foot in Baron's stirrup and mounted so energetically, he fell off the other side. With all his men watching.

Most tried to choke back laughter, but not Lewis Powell. He whooped and pointed at Fred sitting dazed and drunk beside the black gelding.

At another time Fred might have shrugged it off; even joked about it. In his depressed state he didn't find it funny. Sitting there on a smelly horse apple on which he'd landed, he had a sudden and painful sense of what he'd become.

The detail's return to camp coincided with a visit from one of the itinerant colporteurs who roamed the countryside supplying the troops with Bibles and religious literature. Christian revivals swept the Army periodically. During the latest, General Leonidas Polk, an Episcopal bishop before the war, had baptized Generals Hood, Hardee, and Johnston in widely publicized ceremonies.

The colporteur handed out tracts. To be courteous, Fred took one, intending to throw it away later. He stuck the the four-page leaflet in his pocket and forgot it until evening, when he discovered it again. He examined it by lantern light.

Its title was “Demon Drink.” He remembered the shame of sitting in a horse turd, drunk and dizzy, and opened it. The tract's little homily posed a question. What was the point of a man fighting to throw off the yoke the Union wanted to place on the South if at the same time he willingly enslaved himself to spirits? The anonymous writer sprinkled his text with inspirational quotes. Lord Cornwallis: “A drunken night makes a cloudy morning.” Saint Paul's letter to the Romans: “Let us walk honestly, as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness.” Words of the philosopher Seneca affected Fred like a dousing of icy water: “Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.”

He read the tract a second time. No radiant light descended on him from heaven. No choir of angels sang. Yet it was an epiphany, as profound and complete as it was quiet and personal. In the farmer's barn where he slept, Fred held his canteen in his hands a long time, staring at it while he contemplated the ruin he'd made of his life the past couple of years. He walked outside, uncorked the canteen, and poured the whiskey in the dirt. Bathed in the pure white brilliance of a full moon, he filled his canteen from water in the well.

 

Late in June, Captain Smith sent Fred to Lieutenant Colonel Mosby. The commander was living in a bedroom of a farmhouse and using its dining room for headquarters. Fred saluted. “Please have a chair, Sergeant. I'll be ready to talk momentarily.” Fred was surprised by Mosby's cordiality. What was coming? A reprimand for the spectacle he had made falling off Baron? But that had happened weeks ago.

Mosby pushed his reading glasses higher on his nose and finished signing a series of orders. He laid the pen aside and fixed his pale eyes on Fred. “Captain Smith reports a remarkable change in your demeanor, Sergeant Dasher. Do you have anything to say about that?”

Fred cleared his throat. “Nothing special, sir. I've made mistakes in the past. I'm trying to correct them.”

A male cardinal landed on the sill of the open window, tipping its head as if to look in. Finding nothing of interest, it flew away. Mosby said, “You reflect favorably on yourself with that admission. It was drinking, wasn't it?”

Fred grew almost as red as the vanished bird. “Yes, sir. Drinking. Too much drinking.”

“You're sober now?”

“I haven't touched a drop for over a month.”

“Is that a burden?”

About to deny it, Fred reconsidered. “Sir, it is. I've never gotten over something that happened on the Peninsula.”

“The killing of the young girl. General Stuart described what happened. That would be a terrible burden for any man.”

“Yes, sir. It's always with me. The whiskey makes—that is, it made it easier to forget. I finally saw what it was doing to me.”

“Admirable,” Mosby said. “In light of this change, I thought of you when Richmond asked us for a volunteer. We'll be cooperating with the Signal Service on a dangerous mission. The full details haven't been revealed to me as yet, but I know the mission involves putting a volunteer in considerable jeopardy, to gather information.”

“Spy work, sir?”

“You could call it spy work. The Signal Service wants a man in Washington for a few weeks. General Stuart told me you'd spent time there, so you must know the city.” Fred said yes, he did. “Then if you're willing to hazard yourself, I'll write the order.”

Fred's mind raced. Was Hanna still in the capital? Could he find her? Mosby cleared his throat.

“Yes, sir, I'm more than willing. Will I go directly to Washington?”

“No, to Richmond first. There you'll become a Union war prisoner awaiting exchange. You'll have another name, another identity, provided by the Signal Service. Gather your gear. My orderly will deliver the papers to Captain Smith. You can leave before dark. That's all.”

Fred leaped out of the chair so violently, Mosby's thin mouth twitched in a smile, something not customary for him. He astonished Fred by offering a handshake. “I'm proud that one of my men is willing to undertake this duty. I wish you the best of luck. I would ask that our past differences be forgotten if you can find that in your heart.”

“I can, sir. Absolutely.”

Though there was little room in his heart at the moment for anything but thoughts of Hanna Siegel.

Margaret couldn't stay a hermit forever. In spite of emotional wreckage left by Donal and by Lon, her disposition compelled her to move back into the world, even the divided world of Washington. Twice a week she worked in the wards of the sprawling Armory Square Hospital near the Smithsonian. A newspaper appeal for volunteers drew her to it. She justified it on grounds that a percentage of the wounded were Confederate boys; war prisoners.

At the hospital she mingled with Yankees of every sort: pompous Army surgeons wearing green sashes; prim and efficient nurses, required to be spinsters by the first nursing superintendent, Dorothea Dix; male nurses with oddly gentle dispositions; quiet Negro orderlies; teamsters who delivered the wounded like so many pieces of cordwood, then just as indifferently hauled away the cheap pine boxes holding those the hospital couldn't save.

To her surprise, Margaret took the work in stride. The pus and blood, amputations and noxious smells, didn't bother her. When a young soldier begged for a dipper of water or a hand to hold, his allegiance no longer mattered. Blue or gray, he was simply an injured human being; another item on what the papers called the butcher's bill.

A letter arrived from Sparks & Spiderwell, Donal's New York attorneys. In prose both stilted and arcane, Mr. Spiderwell, Esq., stated what Margaret already suspected. She had no legal claim on any of Donal's property. He intended to divorce her, using the only available grounds, adultery. Since he didn't know about Lon, he'd have to invent evidence and buy witnesses, a common practice. She hoped the man who played her adulterous lover would be reasonably presentable.

Summer came on. Tulip trees and redbuds lost their blooms. Shad roe vanished from hotel menus. In Baltimore, Abraham Lincoln won renomination on a National Union ticket. The convention replaced his Vice President, Hamlin, with the military governor of Tennessee, Andrew Johnson, a man Margaret knew nothing about. Washington celebrated the nominations with a torchlight parade and illuminations at the Patent and Post Offices. The most radical Republicans, it was said, weren't eager to see Lincoln returned to office because he spoke of reunion with South, not punishment.

Militia drilled twice a week in Franklin Square. Residents took visitors to admire the statue of Armed Freedom standing atop the Capitol dome at last. The credulous consulted Washington's many spirit mediums, hoping to speak to relatives lost in battle. Hundreds of contrabands idled in the streets, jobless and hungry.

Margaret had a friend on Franklin Square; one she hadn't sought. Mrs. Fanny Fitch lived two doors away, cared for by nine servants. Early in the year, as a good neighbor, she brought Margaret a plate of apple tarts baked by her cook. Mrs. Fitch was a spry little lady with fiery red hair and a loquacious tongue. On her first visit, she informed Margaret that the late Mr. Fitch, of the Georgia Fitches, had made a fortune with a service that removed human waste from the city in a fleet of wagons. The rigors of the night-soil trade sent Mr. Fitch to an early grave but left his childless widow secure for life.

Fanny was a hundred percent secesh. When the resignation of Treasury Secretary Chase became public in late June, she crowed, “He knows the Union's bankrupt and ready to collapse!” Margaret was amused. Fanny's hopes were larger than her store of facts.

Early in July, a mixed Confederate force of cavalry and infantry invaded Maryland and captured Frederick, forty miles away. General Jubal Early demanded $200,000 or he'd burn the town. The burgers of Frederick capitulated and Early marched on Washington. Summer lassitude was immediately replaced by fear, though not among the secesh. Fanny took Margaret to her sewing room, which she unlocked with a conspiratorial flourish. On the worktable lay an unfinished Confederate battle flag.

“I'll hang it out when General Early marches into town. He was trained at West Point, you know. Class of '37.”

“Surely Stanton will call for troops from Grant,” Margaret said.

“Grant's busy trying to overrun Petersburg. Which of course he'll never do. Hasn't Bob Lee kept him chasing his tail for months? Besides, Grant is never sober long enough to win a battle.”

Early's invasion created wild excitement in Washington. Margaret went out regularly to read bulletins posted at the
Star
. Saturday, July 9, the long sheets reported that Early had met a Union force under General Lew Wallace at the Monocacy River and defeated it. Old Jube now had a straight march to the capital.

A sorry mix of adolescent boys, elderly home guards, and Invalid Corps convalescents drilled in the square on Sunday. Late that day, the bulletins warned that Early had reached Rockville. Next morning the streets overflowed with refugees streaming in from the Rockville and Seventh Street roads. They brought clothes and valuables on their backs or in handcarts and told horrific tales of the rebels burning and looting farms. A cattle herd stampeded through Franklin Square, pursued by a farmer on horseback who shouted that Early would massacre everyone.

About one-thirty that afternoon, Margaret heard cannonading from the northern forts. Made nervous by the guns, she eagerly went to tea when Fanny sent her maid with an invitation. Fanny was so excited, her hand shook as she poured. “I'll be flying my flag this time tomorrow. The tide is turning at last.”

Margaret said nothing. She'd heard that an entire Union Army Corps was coming up the Potomac to rescue the city. Later, a mulatto boy delivering groceries excitedly told her that units of General Horatio Wright's VI Corps were already piling off the boats at Sixth Street.

In the evening, Fanny's black coachman drove them out Seventh Street toward Fort Stevens. There, according to Fanny, President Lincoln had studied the enemy from a parapet and exposed his head to sharpshooters. “A missed opportunity,” she lamented.

Progress up Seventh was slow. The driver fought a flood of Marylanders fleeing into town. In cottage yards, families loaded goods in burlap sacks and wheelbarrows. The moon rose behind a heat haze reddened by fires along the northern horizon. A half mile from Fort Stevens, the crowds of refugees stalled the carriage completely. Fanny ordered the driver to turn around.

Tuesday dawned hot again. Margaret dressed in her lightest lawn, took her parasol, and set out to see what had happened overnight. Two things struck her. The first was the remarkable state of the Washington populace. Children played in dooryards and alleys as though no threat existed. Shoppers thronged the stores as on any business day. If there was panic, she saw no evidence, except for the wandering cattle, and the refugees camping in weedy lots with their heaps of belongings.

On Seventh Street she watched companies of the VI Corps marching to relieve the forts. Although young, the soldiers had the hard-bitten eyes and sunbaked faces of men far older. No two uniforms matched. These were blooded veterans. And the North had thousands more. Fanny and those like her would one day burn their battle flags or hide them away in attics.

Coughing from the dust raised by so many tramping feet, Margaret saw the companies pass, and when she walked homeward, she knew the war was lost.

 

By Wednesday, the crisis was over; Jubal Early was gone from the gates of Washington. Margaret returned to her hospital duties. On Friday night, she drove her buggy into the small stable behind the town house about half past seven. It had been a trying afternoon. Two boys in her ward, one from Mississippi, had succumbed to their wounds. The Mississippi soldier had died while Margaret sat with him, trying to finish a letter to his wife. His arm lolled suddenly and knocked the pencil from her hand. She cried.

The summer night was sticky and still. She let herself into the kitchen and pulled off her bonnet, eager to be out of her clothes and into a tepid bath. Her legs ached from standing.

Moving to the dark parlor, she struck a match. The light revealed her brother in a wing chair, a pair of white cotton gloves draped over his knee. Margaret shrieked softly and dropped the match.

“God above. How did you get in here?”

With a smile that was no more than a facial tic, he said, “I have keys that will open any door. I arrived about six. Actually it's my second visit. Oh, and kindly don't call me Cicero. For the moment I am Mr. Hiram Seth of Lower Marlboro, Maryland. Care to see my credentials?” His left hand shifted toward his lapel. Margaret's mouth and eyes rounded.

“What happened to your hand?”

He showed off the scars. “This isn't all.” He hooked a finger under the old-fashioned white silk stock that he wore in place of a cravat. Pulling the stock away from his neck, he revealed more ugly red tissue.

“Modesty forbids me from showing the rest. The scars run down my whole left side. During the New York riots, I had the misfortune to be trapped in a burning building. I escaped, though occasionally I wish I hadn't.”

“That's terrible. I'm so sorry. Are you here for more of your secret work?”

“Indeed I am.”

“You're taking huge risks coming to Washington.”

“In a good cause.”

“You said you'd been here before. Was it early today?”

“Oh, no, it was during the winter. I didn't expect you were in residence at the time. I knocked on the front door merely to be sure. No one answered. A neighbor, a tiny red-haired lady, came along and told me you were indeed living here. Not with Donal, I gather.”

“Donal and I separated. That is, I left him, right after I saw you last July. I made a dreadful mistake marrying him. He's divorcing me.”

“Well, he was a splendid catch. Too bad it didn't work out.” He sounded uninterested. “I'm afraid I can't offer you financial help, or even a great deal of brotherly support. I am evolving a scheme that has the government's highest priority. I can speak in confidence, can't I? I wouldn't want to think otherwise.”

He licked his lips. “I am doing nothing less than trying to save the Confederacy before Davis drives it into the ground.”

“Save the Confederacy? By yourself?” His staring eyes forestalled laughter.

“I can't reveal details, except to say that when the plan comes to fruition—when we strike—we will strike very high. So high, you will be astonished. That's why silence is mandatory.”

What did he mean by striking high? Did he intend to attack someone in the Lincoln cabinet? Or Lincoln himself? It was lunacy, yet there he sat, blandly making his outrageous assertions.

The house creaked in the silence. She was exhausted, wanted to rest. She was wound too tight. “Do you honestly think I'd betray you, or anything you're doing? We've drifted apart, but not that far. Now, would you like something to eat? I cook for myself, I've no servants, but I can—”

“No, thank you, I have an appointment on H Street soon. Don't mention to anyone that I've been here. The Confederacy is in desperate straits. I'll permit no one to impede my plan. A breach would be punishable. Anyone can be sacrificed if necessary.”

Though she'd worried about Cicero's mental state before, never had she been actively frightened of him. Now she was. She pulled a stool up beside him to his knee and gently touched his disfigured hand.

“I want to hear more about this. Was it accidental?”

“No. Do you remember that detective you once asked about? Price? He was responsible.”

Margaret's stomach wrenched.

“When I told you I didn't know him, I lied. I had him in prison in Richmond, but he escaped. Not before I had the pleasure of punishing him, however. I'd like to have ripped his eyes out of his head.”

She whispered, “Cicero, what's happened to you?”

“Happened?” Again that curious ticlike smile. “The war happened. Nigger-loving abolitionists happened. Our father's murder happened. A murder you seem to have conveniently forgotten, Margaret.” Her hand flew out, a stinging slap.

Instantly she regretted it. She began an apology but he interrupted. “Well, that tells me something. I'm not welcome here. I'll not call again.” He snatched the cotton gloves and fitted his scarred hand into the left one.

“Please, Cicero, I didn't mean—”

“Oh, yes, you meant to chastise me. Somehow you've grown soft, Margaret. Soft and weak, at the very hour when courage is needed most.” He lurched from his chair, stiff-backed as a military officer.

“I thought you'd support my work with enthusiasm. You don't. So let me repeat what I said before. Anyone who threatens us can be sacrificed.
Anyone
. Good evening.”

His thick left shoe scraping, he dragged himself to the front door and went out into the night. Margaret put her face in her hands, shaking with fright.