Chapter Twenty

Edwin M. Stanton stood at the windows of his spacious suite in the Senate wing of the Capitol Building, staring westwards along the sunlit expanse of the National Mall towards the partly completed Washington Monument, hands clasped behind him under the tails of his black frock coat, chest puffed up aggressively, shoulders drawn back to pull in the comfortable little paunch under the black silk waistcoat with its heavy gold watch chain, head cocked with just a touch of haughtiness and his long, wispy beard jutting out from his pudgy chin like the prow of a warship, thinking: By Gad, Stanton, the New America begins right here!

What better symbol for a renascent Union than the network of scaffolding surrounding the Washington Monument and the resumption of the work halted nearly a quarter of a century earlier by the idiotic Know-Nothing party, supposedly because of a block of granite donated by Pope Pius IX?

Stanton snorted contemptuously and shook his head; once he had put all the genuinely important affairs of Government in order, he would see to it that anyone making a public display of his religious sentiments would be horsewhipped with equally public display. Well-bred people never discussed religion in front of strangers, and this small contribution to public order would be greeted by all except the Great Unwashed.

It would take a while for the remaining 300 feet of the Monument to be completed, but when it was done it would be the tallest structure in the world, and so a fitting expression of the spirit of the United States of America—the greatest nation in the world! No thanks to that loathsome vulgarian and bully Andrew Jackson, who had done his level best to elevate all the low riff-raff of the nation to the seats of power, not to mention his disastrous sale to Russia of everything west of the Mississipi simply in order to balance the 1835 budget.

Well, all that would be changed soon enough. For too long now the American people had been sidetracked from following the beacon of their Manifest Destiny, of the unique American mission to promote and defend democracy throughout the world. And not the soi-disant “democracy” which elevated ignorance and coarseness as values representative of the “real” America, but the true, original Democracy of the Founding Fathers—a leadership of the people by a high-minded, self-sacrificing élite, devoted not to crass self-enrichment but to the high goals which would finally make Washington the New Jerusalem.

A knock came at his outer door, bringing a frown as his vision of the Millennium shimmered away.

“Yes, Elsie,” he snapped, “what in Tophet is so all-fired important?”

The door opened slightly and a mousy young woman with gold-rimmed pince-nez and her hair in a bun peeped in and cleared her throat timidly:

“So sorry to disturb you, Secretary Stanton, but you did ask me to let you know as soon as Director Pilkington arrived.”

Stanton sighed as reality flooded back. “Yes, yes, quite right. Send him in, please.”

The door opened wider and the dandyish Director of the Department of Public Safety entered, resplendent in a gray cashmere business suit with a faint darker stripe, a waistcoat so artfully cut that he almost looked slim despite the considerable length of gold watch chain draped across his middle, and a dark crimson tie patterned with tiny Harvard “Veritas” shields. He smiled widely (a sure sign that he was uneasy) and extended his hand.

“Good morning, sir, it’s a pleasure to see you again.”

“Hmph, yes,” Stanton sniffed. “You’re late.”

“I’m truly sorry, sir,” Pilkington said with a slight quaver. He was one of those men fated to regard every older man as a surrogate for his own stern and somewhat hypercritical father. “All of our Flyers are busy chasing down security threats and the trains are in total disarray, what with the strikes and sabotage. I’m sure you’ve heard about them burning down the Lebanon Valley Bridge, the one that crosses the Schuylkill at Reading?”

Stanton nodded sourly. Pilkington winced but bore on gamely:

“Well, I’ve just been told of the latest from Pittsburgh, and it seems the strikers and rioters are in control of the city. They’ve burned down two hotels, a grain elevator, the Union Depot, the Pittsburgh & St. Louis freight depot with 125 locomotives and hundreds of tons of coal …”

“Great Heavens, Willie,” Stanton groaned, dropping heavily into his desk chair and waving Pilkington to a chair across from him. “It sounds like the Apocalypse.”

Pilkington nodded gloomily. “Yes, sir …” he hesitated, swallowing painfully and longing for a large brandy and soda … “I’m just worried about what will happen if we unleash the first two Horsemen in the midst of all this unrest …”

Any good churchgoer knew that the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse were Conquest, War, Famine and Death, and Stanton’s expression darkened as his subordinate’s fearful words sank in. He leaned across his desk and wagged a reproving finger at Pilkington, who pulled out his crimson pocket square and dabbed sweat off his forehead.

“This is no time for the faint of heart, Willie. Come Horsemen, Hell or high water, we will go to war with Little Russia on the Fourth of July, and if you have to use the DPS’ airborne Gatlings to secure order, then so be it!”

Pilkington swallowed again, barely managing it this time. “Yes, sir,” he said with a faint croak, “uh, do you suppose I might ask for a glass of water?”

Stanton peered at Pilkington appraisingly. After a moment he got up and went to the bookcase, pulled back a row of false encyclopedia spines and brought out a bottle of Old Oscar Pepper bourbon and a couple of glasses. Then he returned to his desk, filled the glasses to the brim and shoved one of them wordlessly towards Willie, who took it as if were the keys to the Pearly Gates.

“Thank you, sir,” Willie said fervently, and drained half the glass at a gulp.

“Now, then, Willie,” Stanton said. “Since you choose to refer to Holy Scripture in this hour of need, allow me to refer you with equal seriousness to Profane Scripture and recommend it to your memory.”

He raised his right hand, parodying a favorite gesture of Reverend Moody’s, and intoned:

“Here beginneth the lesson according to Stanton: Calorium!

Here endeth the lesson according to Stanton: Calorium!”

He lowered his hand to pick up his glass, took a swallow of Old Oscar Pepper, and resumed in a conversational tone:

“Please disregard all other scripture until such time as our troops are bivouacked in New Petersburg, our Military Governor-General is declaring the restoration of the city’s American name, Minneapolis, and all working-class Little Russians have been put to work under American overseers at useful public works like clearing forests and building dams. And, of course, digging for pitchblende ore so that we may put our savants to work learning how to refine an all-American supply of calorium.”

“Yes, sir,” Pilkington said earnestly, “you know you can count on me, sir.”

“I know I can, Willie, I just want to make quite certain that you are keeping your eye firmly fixed on the brass ring. Because however many arduous passages we may have to traverse to get there, be it ensuring obedience to the July 4^th Declaration of a State of Emergency among all classes of Americans (Virginia plantation owners or drunken ‘bhoys’ from the shebeens of Five Points), or making it clear once for all to the leaders of Imperial Britain and Russia and Germany that their days of Empire have ended while America’s have just begun, the fact remains that the brass ring itself, the summum bonum for us as leaders of the American people, will be to set our New Jersulem on so high and impregnable a hill that no petty human contender can ever challenge us again.”

Whether it was the Old Oscar Pepper or the oratory, Pilkington was staring at Stanton so raptly that the older man hated to bring the discourse down to business.

“Right, then,” Stanton said with a brisk little smile, “keeping all that firmly in mind, how soon can you guarantee good order in New York City?”

Pilkington snapped back quickly. “With the Gatling guns and enough troops, maybe two more days. Even the Draft Riots only lasted three days, and the aerial gunfire will speed things up considerably.”

He frowned, his uneasiness abruptly flooding back. “But you know that Papa has sent a spy to New Petersburg to find the operative you had me give up to the Little Russian Okhrana. Papa’s hoping against hope to avert this war, and I’m more than a little troubled about keeping him in the dark regarding our real …”

Stanton sighed and spread his hands to quiet Willie. “Your father is a grand old man, for me a beloved and respected comrade-in-arms from the earliest days of our War against the Rebellion and deserving of the deepest respect despite his advanced years. But his vision is turned firmly backwards, he can’t understand that we must have this war against Little Russia, a war to the knives, if we are to clear away the barriers that are interfering with our progress as the first among nations. And I’m afraid that your father’s ideas of democracy are equally old-fashioned, formed—I’m sorry to say—by his struggles as an illegal union worker back in the old days in England.” Stanton shook his head sadly. “He can see the need for extraordinary measures in extraordinary times, he can see the need for suspending habeas corpus as a measure for survival, but I’m afraid he still thinks in terms of its eventual return. Dear old fuddy-duddy, he still adheres to the antiquated notion of ‘one man one vote,’ and all the rest of that tired liberal rigamarole. We must cherish your dear old pa as the apple of our eyes, Willie, but he mustn’t be allowed to succeed, and indeed if he keeps interfering I may have to insist on his retirement. Who was it that he sent to Little Russia?”

Willie’s face darkened: “Liam McCool, the criminal he recruited as an operative amongst the Mollies. McCool is a New York gangster, and I’m afraid that Becky Fox has fallen under his spell.”

Stanton recoiled sharply and his voice took on a shrill, almost panicky edge: “Are you serious, Pilkington? If that dreadful woman finds out anything about the plans that are under way, she could be more dangerous than a division of Little Russian troops! Where is she now? Where is McCool now?”

Suddenly Willie was sweating again, enough so that he could feel it running down his back in a torrent.

“Well, sir … I’m not exactly …” he spread his hands helplessly: “She disappeared last night from the house in Gramercy Square. And I’m afraid that McCool disappeared with her, after destroying one of our special Acmes. As to where they are right now …”

Pilkington threw decorum to the four winds and wiped his face with his coat sleeve. “It’s … ah … possible that she’s come here, an emergency all-night interrogation of her editor at Harper’s revealed that she means to work all of her old Washington contacts for any hint at all about the circumstances surrounding the magic-lantern announcements we arranged in New York.”

Stanton had sunk his face in his hands, groaning.

“Willie, Willie, Willie,” he said, his voice muffled by his hands. Then he snapped erect and snarled at his terrified subordinate: “You will report at once to Lt. Col. Cheney, the Commander of my security forces, and between you, you will institute a search of this city that makes the ordinary fine-tooth comb look like a garden rake! Bring me McCool and Becky Fox, do … you … understand me?”

“Yes, sir!” cried Pilkington, and unconsciously giving Secretary Stanton a sharp military salute he spun on his heel and escaped.

“What I can’t figure out,” Liam said, “is how people can just keep on swallowing Stanton’s guff about the terrible dangers threatening them on every side, when all the time the only real dangers threatening them are his army of secret police and curfew Acmes and Black Deltas and God knows what all.”

Liam and Becky were strolling along the manicured garden paths of the Duchamp estate, enjoying a few moments of peace and quiet before jumping back into the fray. The cooling air of the early evening was distilling the scents of the roses and the honeysuckles into a fragrance of almost narcotic sweetness, and Liam couldn’t help watching Becky out of the corner of his eye and daydreaming about her even as he scolded himself for losing focus.

She was wearing what she jokingly called her “working costume,” which seemed to be a castoff boy’s suit of light brown tweed over a loose, collarless shirt of white linen that concealed Becky’s figure from any casual inspection. Liam—unfortunately for his focus—could have imagined it even if she were rolled in a carpet.

“Believe it or not, I once heard Secretary Stanton say over juleps in Willard’s Hotel that if the Government wished to have people believe a flatly preposterous lie, all they needed was for some official to repeat it in public over and over again, with an air of fervent sincerity. After a while people would believe the moon was made of green cheese.” Becky smiled ruefully and shook her head. “He’s been working at it since the War, after all. From chimerical Confederate balloonists to bogus anarchist tramps, he’s been perfecting his craft relentlessly, and as dear old Phineas T. Barnum so succinctly put it …”

“There’s a sucker born every minute,” Liam finished with a grin.

Becky laughed. “And who knows?” she said, doing her best to sound fair and balanced, “he may even believe a lot of it.” Then her jaw set and her eyes flashed as the burden of saying something nice about Stanton overwhelmed her: “But that still doesn’t make it right for him to do what he’s done to President Lincoln, or to be planning the wholesale enslavement of masses of people for the benefit of the financiers and the industrial nabobs, or to be preparing to make war on Little Russia. God knows I don’t like what the Russians have done on what used to be American soil, but it doesn’t justify a treacherous attack!”

Before Liam could answer, there was a flurry of activity in a rosebush ahead of them and a half-dozen sparrow-sized yellowjackets burst into sight and zoomed past Liam and Becky with a keening whine like a band-saw cutting a heavy board, making both of them duck.

Liam crossed himself involuntarily and muttered under his breath: “Holy Mary!” He shook himself and turned to Becky: “I’m not afraid of much,” he said with a wry smile, “but bees the size of guinea-hens are right up at the top of my list. We had some queer creatures up in the coalfields these past few months, but I thought it must be some sort of freakish local epidemic …”

Becky shook her head. “You weren’t back in the city long enough to see what’s become of the cockroaches—it doesn’t bear thinking about. And one night a few weeks ago when I was walking in Gramercy Park, I saw a rat attack a dray horse and take a chunk the size of a pot roast out of its flank.”

Liam grimaced as he imagined it. Mike and the boys think all that insanity is down to Stanton somehow, but I can’t believe he pulled off a trick that big unless he’s in league with Old Nick. Anyway, what on earth would anyone do it for?”

“It’s not Stanton,” Becky said. “As for what it’s about, I have a shrewd suspicion, but it will have to wait until we meet up with Crazy Horse.”

Liam gave her an appraising look and a little half-smile. “I’ve had a suspicion or two myself, come to that. Though I can’t say I’d thought of Crazy Horse.”

Becky smiled cryptically. “I promised I’d tell you more after you retrieved his medicine bundle, but the most I can say without his permission is that he’s going to play a very important part in striking back against Stanton and the Little Russians and our returning his medicine bundle will make it possible for him to begin.” She reached into the neck of her shirt and pulled out a miniature watch on a lavaliere.

“I hate to say it, but it looks like we’re going to have to get moving.”

“Wait a minute!” Liam held up his hands warningly: “I thought we agreed that I was going to be the one that went back to Washington and got President Lincoln ready for the escape, and you would be the one that guided the Half-Delta back to the pickup point.”

Becky grinned at him. “No,” she said teasingly, “you agreed to that, I was just listening.” As he started to protest she shook her head firmly. “You can fuss and fume all you like, but I’m not going to budge. I’ve gotten into and out of scrapes that would make your hair stand on end, just to get a story. I’m certainly not going to sit at home knitting when I could be helping a President I admire and a man I quite like.”

She smiled just a little and gave him a look so level and unwavering that he felt himself slipping again into the bottomless blue of her eyes. Much as he wanted to just let himself go he wasn’t quite sure how she would feel about that, so he pulled himself back before he went over the edge.

“Very well,” he said, “but you’ll have to oblige me in one thing, then …” He reached into the pocket of his jacket and took out Maggie’s nickeled Webley. “Keep this with you from now on. Do you know how to shoot?”

She nodded. “This was Miss O’Shea’s, wasn’t it?”

Liam nodded.

“Good,” she said with a smile, “let’s go.”