Fiddlehead

“You can’t dismiss me like I’m some naughty child.”

“Then I’ll dismiss you like I’m the president,” he said, quicker than he meant to. Then, to soften it, he finished the last of his drink and set it aside. “I am sorry. But this is…”

Before he could offer some weak explanation or excuse, she rose. “I’ll go find Andrews myself, and have Amanda pack me a trunk,” she said on her way out the door.

“Dear, I didn’t mean…”

“I know what you meant,” she said, as she closed the door behind herself.

He sighed, refilled his glass, and continued reading.

At first, the folders mostly served to confirm what Haymes had told him. He was surprised to learn how much of what she’d said could be called true, though she had glossed over the details, and filed their edges to make them less sharp. According to a researcher for her company, the weapon’s actual range was up to a mile and three quarters square, and it would require an estimated fifteen men to successfully move and deploy it, though twenty were recommended.

But in the next dossier, he found something that confused him: lists of parts and supply chains, budget estimates, and time requirements … to make another eight weapons. Why would they need another eight weapons? The whole of her sales pitch had been that one weapon would end the war. If another eight were in the pipeline, why should she earn a pardon? Why should she be granted amnesty or asylum?

The next folder answered his questions. In it, he found a series of contracts signed by Katharine Haymes, and receipts signed by Desmond Fowler.

Military contracts.

Vast ones, the kind that would make Haymes one of the wealthiest women—nay, the wealthiest people—in the world, if she wasn’t already. A series of deals brokered by Fowler, behind Grant’s back.

“Son of a bitch,” he breathed. “They’re betting against the Union.” Or at least they were betting against a speedy victory. After all, it was entirely possible that she’d struck a similar deal with Stephens in Danville. For all he knew, she was playing both sides, selling the technology to the highest and blindest bidders.

But he wondered if the South had any money left to spend on her.

Maybe not, then. Maybe she was just throwing her lot in with the richer party, and plotting to bleed it dry.

He hated her. Deeply, vividly.

He gulped down the rest of his drink without even tasting it, without remembering what he’d filled the glass with in the first place.

One last folder. It was fastened shut with a little seal, the kind that meant it’d been classified at the highest level. Well, Grant was the highest level. “Commander in chief,” he mumbled his title, in case it meant anything to the little wax mark that spread a green stain across the paper’s seam. “It don’t get too much higher than that.” By then he was too drunk to notice that he was lying to himself again.

He briefly considered doing this the sneaky way, with a heated knife slipped carefully beneath the wax to preserve its shape. Then he thought, “To hell with it,” and snapped the thing in two. Who cared if anyone knew he’d seen it? Everyone who kept this secret found him beneath contempt anyway.

The last folder, this sleeved set of documents, fluttered open in his lap.

The top sheet was stamped: POTENTIAL TARGETS

He read. And he read. And with every line, his heart climbed another few inches up his throat. He gathered the papers and jumped to his feet, clutching the bundle to his chest and gazing wildly around the room. “I was right,” he said to no one. “Terribly right. Awfully right. She’s going to … she’s going to…”

Who could he tell? Who would believe him?

A glance at the grandfather clock said it was not late yet, only a little dark … but not too dark for the extra drinks he’d finished while he scoured his stolen files. He looked down at the papers, wishing he had something better to hold them. Then he folded the whole bundle in half and stuffed it inside his waistcoat. It looked ridiculous, but with his overcoat on, no one would notice.

Out the door he went, calling for Andrews all the way. “Andrews! Andrews, is my wife still here? Andrews?”

When the aging servant appeared, perplexed and wary, he asked, “Sir? Mrs. Grant has gone, yes. To her mother’s estate, she said?” He let the question dangle, but when Grant didn’t reply, he added, “Shall I fetch you another carriage?”

“Yes!” he said too quickly, jamming a wool hat atop his head. “As soon as possible. I have an errand to run, and it won’t wait.”

“I can drive you myself,” Andrews said solemnly, obliquely telling Grant that between Betsey’s transportation and his wife’s, there was no one else on hand to perform the task.

“Ah, I see. Yes, thank you, Andrews. Under ordinary circumstances, I wouldn’t ask it of you; but this is more important than I have time to explain. Please, if you don’t mind?”

The miles were short to the Lincoln compound; the world streaked past as Andrews rushed the horses at Grant’s insistence. Gas lamps and electric lights ribboned through the night, keeping to the roads along with everything else on the way out of the Capitol’s center. Grant held on to his hat with one hand and the inside carriage handle with the other, sometimes switching out and stopping to pat the important stuffing he kept against his belly.

When they finally arrived, skidding up the driveway, Grant didn’t give Andrews time to open the door. He flung himself out of the cab. Over his shoulder, as he ran for the main entrance, he cried, “Don’t wait for me! Go home to Helen! I’ll see you in the morning!”

Behind him, the stomping and panting of the recovering horses settled into something slower and more plodding as the carriage turned around under Andrews’s expert handling and rolled back into the street.

Grant beat his fist against the door, knocking harder than decency would really allow. But these were indecent times, and, as he told the serving girl who answered his repeated poundings, “I need to speak with Lincoln, immediately!”

“I … I … please sir, come in.” She fumbled with the door and then his coat and hat, arranging them on the rack and begging his leave awkwardly. “Just excuse me for a minute and I’ll run and get him.”

Moments later, the girl reappeared and said, “Mr. President? I’ll take you to him, if you’ll come with me. He’s in the study.”

Grant knew where the study was, but he let the girl lead. She gestured toward the open doorway and then vanished.

“Grant, what’s the calamity?” asked Lincoln. He was reclined on a settee by the fire, his chair beside him and his long legs stretched out.

“Sorry to interrupt your nap … or your early bedtime,” he tried.

Lincoln sighed. “I was reading, and then some lunatic came beating down my door, and here you are. So have out with it.”

Grant stepped quickly to his old friend’s side. Seeing no chair nearby, he seized a small stool and placed it close enough to share Fowler’s secrets. He reached into his waistcoat and retrieved the documents, all of the sheets rumpled and warmed by his body, and made a show of spreading them out, half on Lincoln’s furniture, and half across his knees.

“Good God, old man,” Lincoln asked, adjusting his spectacles and noticing the Secretary of State’s letterhead. “What is this? What have you done?”

“Only a few illegal things, and none of them immoral,” Grant assured him.

“Well, that’s a relief…”

“It’s Fowler. Or rather, it’s that woman Katharine Haymes. She’s working him like a sock puppet, her hand right up his backside, making him talk her words, and sign her papers.”

“Wait, wait, wait. Haymes? I knew of her involvement, and I knew she was in town; Mary saw her at the Senators’ Ball and was all aflutter about it. But…”

“But nothing. I’ve seen her. Spoken to her. She’s a viper in a dress, Abe. She’s the end of the world in a bonnet, is what she is. Do you know what she’s done? Have you heard?”

“Bits and pieces. She talked you into a pardon, I heard that much. You’re really going to buy that weapon of hers after all? Please tell me that’s not the case.”

“It’s not the case. Or it is the case, but it’s not me doing the buying. It’s … it’s Fowler; he’s the one. He’s got the court in his pocket and her hand up his ass. He’s the one who arranged it, structured it, and pulled the trigger. Or so I learned after the fact … well after the fact, and I’m … I’m lost, Abe. You were right about everything, and I tried to assume the best. Never again.”

“Now, let’s settle down just a moment. It can’t be as bad as all that,” Lincoln said mildly, but his good eye was racing across the pages before him.

“It’s plenty bad enough. If we try to stop that weapon the official way, it’ll go off before we can force the orders through the bureaucracy. Fowler will see to that.”

“You’re probably right,” he murmured, still reading.

“Which bit are you looking at there?” Grant asked, leaning forward and seeing the requisitions report. “Yes, that right there. You see? She’s making more of them, or planning to. It’s not just one weapon—that was never the plan.”

“I wish I could say I am surprised.” Without looking up, Lincoln asked, “Do you know if she’s approached the South? Do you think she’ll sell to both sides? She was a Southerner by birth, after all. Then again…” He shook his head.

Grant picked up the thought and said, “I doubt they have the kind of cash she’s chasing. She’s a mercenary, through and through. She’s here in D.C. because we’re the only people on the continent who can afford her. But, look. It gets worse. This one was sealed.”

“What is it?”

“A list of targets they’re considering.” ns class="adsbygoogle" style="display:block" data-ad-client="ca-pub-7451196230453695" data-ad-slot="9930101810" data-ad-format="auto" data-full-width-responsive="true">