The Iron Game - Henry Francis Keenan
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But upon this uncouth stage a great drama was going on; great figures
were in action; momentous events were hourly taking form and
consequence; men, and women at their best and worst were working out the
awful ends of Fate. In the large mansion yonder, the wisest, greatest,
simplest of mankind--by times Diogenes and Cromwell, Lafayette and
Robespierre was, in jest and joke, mirth and sadness, working out his
own and a people's sublime destiny. It was to this curiously unequal
personage that Mrs. Sprague, after fruitless pleading with her husband's
friends, came finally to secure action on behalf of her son. There was
little of the ceremonial needed to gain access to the Chief Magistrate
which is now the fashion.
She found a care-worn man, deeply harassed, standing in the low-ceiled
room, in which the Cabinet had met a few moments before. A sweet, wan
smile--the instinctive, inborn sensitiveness of a noble nature-flickered
over the rugged lines of the face as the usher, retiring, said:
"Mr. President, this is Mrs. Sprague, whom you ordered to be admitted."
"I am both glad and sorry to meet you, madam. I knew your husband, the
Senator, in other and happier times. I wish that it were in my power to
do for him or his what he was always doing for the unhappy or
distressed."
"Ah! how kind you are! How--"
She was going to say different from what she expected, but bethought
herself of the ungraciousness of this form, since at that time Mr.
Lincoln was the object of almost universal misreport and caricature.
"How can I say what a mother should say?"
While she spoke he began pacing the apartment, each time, as he came to
the double window near which she sat, peering out with a yearning,
far-away look toward the river and the red lines of the hills beyond it.
Then turning back, he strode the length of the long baize-covered table,
sometimes absently picking up a document, until, facing her again as she
narrated the story of Jack's misfortunes, he would fling it hastily on
the scattered heaps and fix his mild eye upon her.
"I know all this already, dear madam. It has come to me from the boy's
friends, and"--he hesitated a second--"and from his--or from those who
are not his friends."
"Not his friends?" the mother cried, half rising. "Why, Mr. President,
Jack hasn't an enemy in the world!"
"You came through from Richmond last week? Have you heard nothing from
your son since you saw him?"
"Nothing. Oh, is there anything about him?"
"You have not even read the newspapers, I see."
"No, no; I have been so uncertain, so agitated, so constantly in
attendance upon our members, that I have had no time to read or even
talk. But, pray tell me! Your manner indicates that something has
happened. O Mr. President, think of my anxiety! My only son!"
"Ah, Mrs. Sprague! It is I that should be pitied here. You came to me
for comfort. You came in reliance on my power to restore your son, and
I--I have the burden of telling you very grievous news. No, no, your son
is not dead, have no fear of that, if in the end it prove a comfort.
Last night your townsman, Elisha Boone, came to me with his heart-broken
daughter, demanding vengeance for his son's death, whom your boy had
slain the very night you left him on the James. He shot Captain Boone in
the house you visited, and defeated a well-arranged plan to capture the
rebel chief, Davis. Not only this, but he endangered the escape of a
number of sorely-worn prisoners who had succeeded in reaching the
Rosedale place and halted only to make Davis's capture certain."
"My son shot Wesley! oh no, no; it can not be; or, if he did, it was
because his own life was in peril. Ah! no, no, Mr. President, do not
believe this. I know my son. I know the misery he endured in Wesley's
company; endured like a hero; endured like a Sprague. He must have been
in peril of his life."
"Dear madam, I feel for you. I feel with you, but these facts are all in
the possession of the Secretary of War. Mr. Boone will no doubt give you
all the details. If it can be made to seem as you say, have no fear that
I will wink at mere revenge, or make the machinery of justice an
instrument of family feuds. Get your lawyer; have the matter
investigated, and rely upon me for every proper clemency and aid in your
hard lot."
She had arisen long before, and, recognizing this as a dismissal, she
bowed, unable to speak, and, with blinded eyes, staggered toward the two
steps leading upward from the room. She would have fallen had the ready
arm of the President not been near to support her. In the anteroom he
said, huskily:
"Captain, send an orderly to accompany this lady to her carriage."
Merry was in the carriage. One glance at Mrs. Sprague's face told that
dire news had been heard. She did not ask a question, but, embracing and
supporting the sobbing mother, awaited patiently for the dreaded
revelation. When at length the miserable story came in gaspings and
sobs, the spinster exhibited an unexpected firmness.
"I don't believe a word of it. If Jack shot Wesley, it was because he
was in some sort of treacherous business. You may depend upon it, that,
when we get the true story, Jack's part will prove him in the right. I
am going this instant to Boone to learn his source of information. He
can have nothing but rumors."
"I will go. It is better for me to see Mr. Boone. He will not venture to
misrepresent to me."
At Willards, where Boone was stopping, the ladies were obliged to wait a
long time, and, in the end, it was Kate who appeared before them in deep
black, with a half-yearning, half-defiant expression in the sadly worn
face. They would never have recognized her, and, as it was, Merry
started with a slight scream as the dark figure stopped before them.
"Papa begs to be excused. He supposes that you want to hear the
particulars of the--the affair at Rosedale, and bids me tell you."
"O Kate, Kate, it is not true! it can not be true. Oh, you who knew Jack
so well, you know that he never could have--have--"
Kate had seized a chair and drawn it before the two who sat on one of
the long sofas that filled without adorning the vast hotel parlor, dim
even at noonday in its semi-subterranean light.
"Yes, Mrs. Sprague, your son shot Wesley deliberately; shot him as
deliberately as if I should draw a pistol and take your life now
and here."
"And--and killed him?"
"He never spoke again. He--he--ah! I can not, I can not! We brought him
here. His body is in the cemetery, waiting the military formalities."
"But tell us how it happened, Kate," Merry sobbed, entreatingly. "We
know nothing but what you have told us. Tell us all. It is so startling,
so awful, that we can not comprehend such a thing happening where we
left everybody in the most friendly spirit."
Kate, struggling with her tears, told the story so far as she knew it,
but of course she knew little beyond the mere fact that Wesley had come
to his death in Mrs. Atterbury's room; that Jack stood over him with the
smoking pistol, and owned that he had fired in the darkness. She told
the tale as gently as might be, her own heart secretly pleading for
everything of extenuation that might lessen Jack's guilt, but she had
insensibly taken the darker view her father had instantly adopted, that
Jack's enmity had led him to seize the chance to rid himself of a rival
and enemy under cover of defending the Atterburys. She did not hint this
to the mother, but Merry, knowing Boone, at once saw what the
President's words meant. Boone had charged Jack with deliberate murder.
Dreading the realization of this by Mrs. Sprague at this time, Merry
made a sign to Kate, who, comprehending at once, arose and begged to go
back to her father, who was in need of her.
"Oh, if Olympia were here! she has so much self-control! she would
advise so well what should he done!" the mother moaned, as she passed
down through the long, barrack-like parlor.
"But, dear Mrs. Sprague, Olympia is just where her good sense is most
needed. She is near Jack. He needs comfort and counsel. You can have
your lawyer, and you shall see the case isn't so bad as we have heard.
You must remember that the Boones are not likely to take an impartial
view. It is only human nature that they should think the worst of
the--the death of son and brother. Wait till we hear Jack's story, and
you will see that it puts a different face on the matter."
"But it's Jack's disgrace and death they want. That was what the
President meant. I didn't understand it then: I do understand it now.
They shall not murder him! I shall command him to remain in Richmond. I
shall command him to join Vincent. The North is unworthy of such men as
my son. He is too pure, too innocent, too high-minded to be understood
by the coarse natures that have come to power in the country. I shall
not let this odious Boone destroy him as he ruined your brother."
"O Mrs. Sprague, think what you are saying! Think how fatal such words
would be, if Jack were brought to trial. You see every day in the press
how all are suspected of treason who were Democrats in the old days. I
know very well that you do not mean this. Much as I love Jack, I would
rather see him in his grave with the Union flag over him than in the
rebel lines, a soldier of that bad cause. As to my poor brother, Boone
was only an accident in his ruin. If it had not been Boone, it would
have been some one else. Put the whole matter in the hands of Simon
Brodie. He is almost a Sprague. He will see that the son of his old
patron has justice."
Simon Brodie, of Warchester, was the chief advocate of the three
counties. He had studied law with the late Senator Sprague, and, at his
death, from partner succeeded to his lucrative law practice. He came at
once to Washington at Mrs. Sprague's summons, and set about learning the
status of the case. The affair was no easy matter to trace, but, after
inconceivable delays and persistent misleading, he found that Jack was
in the military archives charged with desertion, murder, and treason:
desertion in quitting his company and regiment without orders, treason
in consorting with armed rebels, and murder in joining with the enemies
of the country to take the life of his commanding officer. Meanwhile,
Mrs. Sprague and Merry had returned to Acredale, and the lawyer sent
letters to Richmond setting forth the case to Jack--letters which, by
some mysterious jugglery, never reached their address, as we have seen.
Nothing could be done until Jack was either exchanged or until his
advocate had made out a documentary case that could be presented to the
military authorities. As he surmised, every one in authority had been
prejudiced against Jack. The Congressman from Warchester dared not work
against Boone, who was potent as a Cabinet minister in the councils of
the Government. One of Senator Sprague's old friends, still in the
Senate, advised Brodie to let Jack remain at Richmond till the peace
came, "for," said he, "no Democrat nor any one identified with that
party can hope for impartial justice here."
"But what am I to do? I can get no assistance here. Every bureau
containing documents bearing on the poor boy's case is either closed to
me, or the officials so hostile that I can not work with or
through them."
"You must go about the affair as if it were a State matter. You must go
to McClellan. He is a young man of the most spotless honor, the most
generous sympathies. He is as rigid as a Prussian in discipline, but his
methods are enlightened and above board. He is the only man in authority
that has any real conception of the magnitude of the struggle the North
has entered upon. He is, however, miserably hampered. The new rulers
have come down to Washington very much in the spirit of the Goths when
they captured Rome. Every one is on the make. The contract system is
something beyond the wildest excesses I ever read of in pillage and
chicanery. Shoes by the million have been accepted that melt as soon as
they are wet; garments are stacked mountain-high in the storehouses that
blow into rags so soon as the air goes through them. Food, moldy,
filthy, is accumulated on the wharves of Washington, Baltimore, and
Alexandria that would be forbidden as infectious in any carefully
guarded port in the world. Contracts for vessels have been signed where
steamships are called for, and the contractor sends canal-boats. Lines
of ships are paid for to run to ports not known in navigation; and the
chief men in the great departments share the money with the rings--"
"But why don't you expose it?"
"Expose it? A word in the Senate against these villainies is set down as
disloyalty. All that a rascal needs to gain any scope he pleases, is to
say 'rebel sympathizer,' and Fort Warren or Lafayette is held up as
a menace."
Among the confidential aides of McClellan Brodie knew intimately a young
officer, the son of a distinguished lady, whose writings delighted
cultivated people fifty years ago. This young man, Captain Churchland,
had often been a guest at the Spragues, and to him Brodie went for
advice. Inheriting a great deal of his mother's intellect, with a droll
sense of humor, not then so well understood as the lighter school of
writers have since made it, Churchland was the delight of the
headquarters. He listened to the melancholy story of Jack's
compromising plight.
"It's a bad fix--no mistake," he said, gravely; "but I suggest that your
fiery young friend come home and shoot the father, marry the daughter,
and, as a wife can't testify against the husband, your client
is secure."
"Ah, captain, it's not a matter for joking. Think of his wretched
mother."
"That's just what I do think of--murder's no joke, though it's more of a
fine art than it was when De Quincey wrote. I'm perfectly serious. I
would shoot the scoundrel Boone. Why, do you know the man has cleared a
million dollars on rotten blankets since he came here? McClellan ordered
a report made out showing his rascalities a few weeks ago. It was
disapproved at the War Office, and the condemned blankets have gone to
Halleck's army. Doesn't that deserve shooting? Napoleon directed all the
army contractors to be hanged. I say shoot them. For every one put out
of the way a thousand soldiers' lives will be saved."
"Well, well, let Boone go. It's Sprague I'm interested in."
"So am I. It is Sprague that Boone seems to be interested in, too, for
he has filled the new Secretary with, what he himself would call,
righteous wrath against the poor boy and his friends. But make your mind
easy. The exchange of prisoners will soon begin. Sprague's turn will
come among the first, and then I will keep track of the affair. Beyond
that I can promise nothing. You may be sure, so far as purely military
men have to do with the business, there will be impartial justice. When
the politicians take hold, I can give no assurance."
And with this cold comfort the disheartened lawyer betook himself to
Acredale, where his report, guardedly given, brought no very strong hope
to the anxious mother.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE WORLD WENT VERY ILL THEN.
Acredale was not the sleepy, sylvan scene we first saw it, when Mrs.
Sprague and Merry drove through the wide main street from the station,
four months after they had quitted it in search of their soldier boys.
The stately elms still arched the highway to Warchester, but here and
there rough gaps were seen in the trim hedge-rows. Staring new edifices
jutted through these breaks upon the grassy walks, and building material
lay heaped in confusion all along the graveled walks. Merry railed at
these evidences of commercial invasion, wondering who had come to the
village to transform it into city hideousness. Mrs. Sprague did not give
much heed to her companion's speculations. Her mind was far away on the
James, wondering where her boy was. It was very hard to settle down to
the commonplaces of home life; but, even in all her distraction, Mrs.
Sprague saw that a change had come upon the people as well as the place.
With the war and its desolating sights fresh in her memory, she saw,
with sorrow and aversion, that social life was gayer than it had ever
been, that the rush for wealth had become a fever, and that the simple
ways and homely joys of the past were now remitted to the very elderly.
The story of Dick's mad pursuit of Jack and the Caribees, after the
disaster at Bull Run, was soon known in every home in the county.
Friends came from far and near to hear the exciting adventure; and the
younger boys, who had been the lad's classmates in the academy, at once
made up a company of youngsters, adorned by the name of the "Perley
Rangers," to be in readiness for the hero's command when he
should return.
The feud between the adherents of the houses of Sprague and Boone had
become acrimoniously embittered by the point of view from which each
side saw the conduct of Jack. Among the Boone feudatories he was set
down as a traitor, a spy, a murderer. The first malignant rumors that
reached the village after the battle were still maintained stoutly by
the Boone lictors. Jack had ingloriously shirked his part in the battle
with the Caribees; he had skulked in the bushes until the issue was
decided, and then had followed the sympathies of his secession family;
he had gone to the Atterburys, well known for their hatred to the North.
It was to prove his sincerity in the Southern cause that he had wormed
himself into the confidence of Wesley Boone's comrades, and in order
that he might be chief agent in the frustration of the plan of escape.
He had won high regard in the Confederacy by saving Davis from capture.
He had, with his own hand, shot Wesley Boone when the plan of capture
was on the verge of success. Could anything be clearer than his odious
treason? Hadn't he, of all the unfortunates of the battle, found favor
and luxurious quarters in Richmond? Hadn't he cunningly cajoled the
Boones into the visit to the rebel household, in order to wrest the
secrets of the Union rescue from them? It was in vain that the Perleys
and others set forth the real case. "Very likely, indeed," the Boone
side cried, "that rebels like the Atterburys would receive true
Unionists into their house, and treat them as friends! A real Unionist
would have refused hospitality from the enemies of his country." There
was talk among the more zealous patriots of having the Sprague family
expelled from Acredale. Loyal zealots looked up the law on expatriation
and attainder, and complained bitterly that no applicable provisions
were found in the statutes. Stirring addresses were sent to the member
from Warchester, imploring him to have laws enacted that would enable
the patriots to deal summarily with covert treason. It was true that the
Spragues had contributed many thousand dollars toward the equipment of
the Caribees, had endowed twenty beds in one of the city hospitals for
the wounded--but this was when Jack expected high command in the
regiment. Failing in that ignoble self-seeking, he had gone where his
heart was, while the family, to retain their property, remained among
the loyal, to insult their woe and gloat over their misfortunes.
At a great "war meeting" in the town-hall, over which Boone presided,
one thrilling orator hinted that fire, if not the law, could "relieve a
loyal community of the Copperhead's nest!" "It was an insult, as well as
a menace, to have the patrician palace of disloyalty flaunting its
grandeurs among a people loyal and devoted, whose sons and brothers were
battling for the Union. Every rebel sympathizer driven from the North
would strengthen the Union cause; ashes and salt sowed on the ground
their insolent homes had desecrated, would be a holy reminder to the
loyal, a warning to the secret foes of the Union."
There were loud expressions of approval, and a solemn "Amen" to this
intrepid plan of campaign. Lawyer Brodie, who was present, arose under a
thunder of discordant notes--"Copperhead!" "Traitor!" "Dough-face!" "We
don't want to hear from rebel sympathizers! Out with him!" and other
more opprobrious taunts. Now, Brodie was Boone's counsel, and had been
identified with him in some very difficult litigation. It would not do
to have him discredited. The chairman rapped loudly for order.
"I can vouch, my friends, for Mr. Brodie's patriotism. He is a Democrat,
it is true; but he loves the Union. I know that to be a fact. You can do
the Union no better service than listening to what he has to say."
Brodie, who had held his place, calmly smiled as Boone sat down, and,
surveying the audience from side to side, began:
"Free speech was one of the cries that aroused the North in the late
campaign, I believe in free speech. I have done my share toward securing
it, but I never was refused it before. I look among the men here and see
among you neighbors whom I have known since boyhood, neighbors who have
known me since boyhood, and when I arise here to take a citizen's part,
in a meeting called to aid and comfort the cause of the Union, I am
permitted to speak only by the personal request of one man. If that is
your idea of free speech, if that is your notion of aiding the Union
cause, and strengthening the hands of the Administration, I don't need
to be in the confidence of the rebel authorities to tell you that they
could ask no more powerful allies than you! [Sensation.]
"There are three hundred men in this hall. The light is good, and my
eyesight is not impaired; but I can not see a man among you who was not
a Democrat a year or two ago. There are not fifty men among you that
voted for Abraham Lincoln. [Murmurs.] Are the two hundred and fifty,
then, traitors? Are they rebel sympathizers? Are they Copperheads? One
thousand men marched under the Caribee flag; not a man of them voted for
Lincoln. Are they Copperheads? This township, by its vote at the last
election, was five to one Democratic. Is this a Copperhead community?
Nearly a half million dollars have been subscribed for bounties and war
measures; the tax-payers, almost to a man, are Democrats. Is it
possible, then, that the Copperheads are supplying the money to carry on
the war? You propose to burn the mansion of my old partner, Senator
Sprague! Why? Because his estate has given more to the Union cause than
any other family in the township?"
"The son has gone over to the rebels," a voice cried.
"Thank you. There--I'm glad you have given me the chance to crush that
cowardly calumny--the invention of some envious malefactor. Jack Sprague
has gone over to the rebels, just as Anderson and his men went over at
Sumter; just as fifteen hundred of his comrades went over at Bull Run;
just as some of our sons and brothers here in Acredale went over; just
as my friend, Boone's son, went over--because he was surrounded
and wounded."
"Stop a moment, if you please, friend Brodie; I protest against your
making anything in common between my son and this young man. The matter
is to be investigated, and then we can tell better."
Boone spoke in great excitement, and the audience, now feverishly
wrought up, urged the lawyer to say his say out. He continued in the
trained, impassive tones of the advocate:
"Every one in this room knows the two young men. It would be waste of
time for me to strive to make anything in common between John Sprague
and Wesley Boone. Here, where they both grew up, that is quite
unnecessary."
"I--I--referred to their conduct as soldiers," Boone cried, hoarsely.
"My son lost his life in the service of his country. I can't have his
name coupled with a--murderer's--with a traitor's."
"Ah, my friend, when hate draws your portrait it is bound to be black.
When prejudice holds the pen, your virtues stand in the shade of vice. I
will tell John Sprague's story from the day he quit Acredale to the
unhappy hour his comrade was killed in the dark, in the sleeping-room of
the mother and daughter who had nursed him from the very jaws of death.
He was in that house by his father's urgent request, though it would
have needed none to open its doors to any one in want of succor. Nor,"
he added, significantly, "can it be told who killed Wesley Boone until
all the shots fired in Mrs. Atterbury's chamber are accounted for."
Then he narrated rapidly, but tellingly, the substance of what has been
already set down in this history--the facts taken from Jack's letters
and attested by the corroboration of Barney, Dick, and the company's
officers. There was a visible revulsion in the larger part of the
audience as the tale went on; and when the lawyer wound up with the
story of Mrs. Sprague's baffled efforts in Washington to have her boy
brought North, there was an outburst of applause and a faint cheer from
the younger men for "glorious old Jack."
The factions shifted a good deal after this official rendering of the
affair. There was no longer any talk of burning the Sprague property,
and opinion was about evenly divided as to Jack's conduct. December had
come, and the township was busy packing boxes to send to the army. No
news had come North from Richmond. Active movements were looked for
every day, and in the momentous expectation such lesser incidents as
exchange were forgotten or ignored. The daily journals were filled with
details of contemplated expeditions, and one morning Mrs. Sprague read
with beating heart this paragraph in the _Herald_: