The Spymistress (40 page)

After Mr. Lohmann sealed the casket, the gentlemen solemnly conveyed it to Mr. Rowley’s wagon, where they concealed it beneath dozens of young peach trees, packed as neatly and tightly as a nursery would have done. As the Lohmann brothers set out on horseback ahead of the wagon as guides and lookouts, Mr. Rowley took the driver’s seat, gave the command to the horses, and drove away.

When they had disappeared around a bend in the road, Mrs. Rowley invited them all inside for something to eat, but none of them had much of an appetite. They spoke quietly of how well the colonel had looked, considering how long his rough, coarse coffin had lain beneath the soil, and how unlike the descriptions in the Richmond press. His face had not borne a look of agony, they all agreed, but one of firm and marvelous energy, which spoke well of his spiritual state at the time of his death.

As the afternoon waned, most of the mourners departed for their homes, but the Van Lews remained behind at Mr. Rowley’s request—in case he was prevented from returning, he had told Lizzie privately. She dared not allow herself to think too much of this possibility, although she realized that if the pickets inspected the wagon too carefully, by ordering Mr. Rowley to unpack the trees or simply by poking the load with a bayonet, he would be undone. Death would be his reward, but first torture so he would reveal his accomplices.

They spent the night in restless sleep and the next day in pensive waiting. Then, at last, an hour before dusk, they heard the wagon approaching and raced outside to meet it. Mr. Rowley was alone, for the Lohmann brothers had returned home by another route. He looked even more exhausted than he had the day before, so Lizzie and Mrs. Rowley took him inside while John and Merritt tended to the horses.

“It was the most terrifying ride of my life,” Mr. Rowley admitted as he ate a bowl of stew his wife had kept warm for him. “I tried to appear unconcerned as I approached the picket post—letting the reins fall with perfect indifference when a lieutenant ordered a guard to inspect the wagon.”

“Oh, dear,” Mother said. “What did you do?”

“I nodded to the guard in greeting,” Mr. Rowley replied, “but before he could address me, another wagon approached from the opposite direction, driven by a man with a furrowed brow and an anxious frown. The guard hesitated, looked from me to him and back, and seeing me at my leisure, he went to inspect the other driver first.”

“Did you charge through the post when his back was turned?” joked Merritt.

Mr. Rowley smiled briefly. “Of course not, son. I wouldn’t be sitting here with you if I had. Instead I sat as if I had patience in abundance, and when the guard returned his attention to me, I engaged him in an easy conversation about the cultivation of peach trees. By this time, a cart had come along, and the guard broke off to go examine it. When he returned again to me, I picked up the thread of our discussion and kept him talking until another wagon rolled up. Twice more his duties interrupted our friendly chat, and then, when we had quite exhausted the subject of peach trees, he said, ‘It would be a pity to tear those trees all up, when you have packed them there so nicely.’”

“We have the Lohmann brothers to thank for that,” said John.

“Indeed we do. The guard went on to say, but not loudly enough for his lieutenant to overhear, ‘I don’t want to hinder you any longer. I think it all right, anyway your honest face is guarantee enough for me—go on.’ And with that he waved me on through without disturbing a single twig of my cargo.”

“You do have an honest face,” Lizzie remarked.

“Did you find a peaceful spot to lay the poor boy to rest?” Mother asked.

“Yes, Madam, we did. After I reached Mr. Orrick’s farm, the brothers and I finished digging the grave he had already begun, and we buried him in the company of Mr. Orrick’s wife and two good German women, neighbors and Unionists both. We planted a peach tree over the grave.”

“A fitting memorial,” said Mrs. Rowley quietly, and they all fell into a reflective silence.

In the days that followed, Lizzie and Mr. Rowley attempted to send word to Admiral Dahlgren that devoted friends of the Union had taken possession of his son’s remains so that proper respect would be shown to them, and so that they could be conveyed to him at the earliest possible date. Evidence that the grieving father had not received their letters appeared at regular intervals in the Richmond papers in the form of updates on his ongoing campaign to convince the Confederate government to return his son’s body to him—and in mid-April, they finally agreed. On the appointed day, however, a bemused reporter for the
Examiner
noted, “The late Colonel Dahlgren’s body did not go down under the flag for the best of reasons—it could not be produced.”

“Oh, dear,” Lizzie murmured, alarmed, and then she laughed.

Chapter Twenty

APRIL–OCTOBER 1864

T
he grave in which the body was buried was opened under the direction of the officials who interred the remains,” the
Examiner
testily reported the next day, “but the grave was empty—Dahlgren has risen, or been resurrected, and the corpse was not to be found. If the facts be as stated, an explanation and apology, not the corpse, will go down to City Point by the present flag of truce.”

By the time the article appeared, Lizzie had managed to get word to General Butler that Colonel Dahlgren’s remains were safely beyond Confederate reach, but the Richmond press and the Confederate government remained ignorant, mystified, and unsettled. In distinct contrast, the incident had left the Union underground satisfied and invigorated, and they took much secret amusement from the rebels’ consternation.

Each glimmer of hope and levity, however small and fleeting, offered them much-needed encouragement in an apprehensive season. Everyone knew that as soon as the spring sunshine dried the muddy roads of Virginia enough to make them passable, the armies would be on the move. For the first time, General Lee would face General Ulysses S. Grant, who had triumphed in Tennessee and at Vicksburg but had provoked harsh criticism, including demands that President Lincoln remove him from command, for the devastating casualties taken at the Battle of Shiloh. At the time, Mr. Lincoln had famously replied, “I can’t spare this man; he fights,” and in March, the president emphasized his confidence by promoting him to lieutenant general and naming him general-in-chief of the armies of the United States. General Grant made his priorities clear by establishing his headquarters in the field with his army rather than in Washington City, and in April, he halted all prisoner exchanges.

In March, so many hundreds of Union prisoners had been shipped south or exchanged that in the last week of the month, the
Whig
reported that only eighteen hundred remained in Richmond, but Lizzie knew that number would rapidly soar with the prisoner cartel shut down. Although she was dismayed on behalf of the prisoners languishing in Libby and Belle Isle and elsewhere in the capital, she understood General Grant’s rationale. Every Confederate prisoner freed was a rebel soldier returned to the battlefield, killing more Union men and prolonging the war.

On a warm, breezy afternoon on the last day of April, Lizzie was playing with Annie and Eliza in the gardens when Mary Jane unexpectedly paid her a visit. Lizzie frequently received encoded notes from Mary Jane as well as messages conveyed by Mr. McNiven, but they had not seen each other in weeks. Delighted, Lizzie embraced her, offered her a cup of tea, and invited her to stay for supper, but Mary Jane pressed her lips together, shook her head, and said, “No, thank you. I haven’t any appetite.”

Only then did Lizzie notice that Mary Jane looked queasy and drawn. “What’s the matter?” she asked, guiding her to a chair on the piazza.

“There was a dreadful accident at the Gray House today.”

Lizzie’s first thought was that President Davis had been killed. A few scattered attempts on his life had already been made—but no, Mary Jane had called it an accident. “What happened? Is Mr. Davis—”

“Grieving but otherwise unharmed.” Mary Jane placed a hand on her abdomen and took a deep breath. “At about one o’clock, I was helping Mrs. Davis carry lunch to Mr. Davis’s office on the second floor. Sometimes he’s so preoccupied with work that he forgets to eat. Mrs. Davis had just uncovered the basket when the children’s nurse came running.”

“Oh, dear,” Lizzie murmured, sinking into a chair.

“The children had been playing in Mrs. Davis’s room, but when she left to arrange her husband’s lunch, Joseph—he’s the four-year-old—he wandered onto the rear balcony, climbed onto the railing, slipped—and fell to the brick walk below.”

“My goodness, the poor child. Is he—”

Mary Jane shook her head, her eyes filling with tears. “His brother Jeff ran down to him, but when Joseph didn’t move, he ran to find Catherine.” She paused to clear her throat. “He told her, ‘Joe wouldn’t wake up,’ and when she looked and saw him lying so still, she ran for Mrs. Davis.”

Lizzie reached out and clasped Mary Jane’s hands, unable to speak.

“We all ran down to him together, the Davises, Caroline, and I, but there was nothing we could do. He lived only a few minutes longer, cradled in his father’s arms.”

“The poor child—and the poor parents!”

“The Davises are devastated—utterly torn apart. Joseph was his father’s greatest joy and hope. Mr. Davis kept saying, ‘Not mine, oh, Lord, but thine,’ over and over again, completely distraught. A messenger brought him a dispatch—”

“He couldn’t have waited?” exclaimed Lizzie. “Has he no heart?”

“Mr. Davis held the dispatch for a moment, looking at it but not really seeing it, and then he handed the paper to an aide and said, ‘I must have this day with my little child.’ And Mrs. Davis—oh, how she screamed and screamed.”

Lizzie imagined the scene all too vividly. “Mary Jane, I’m so sorry.”

“His poor little body lying broken on the bricks—” Mary Jane shuddered. “I see it afresh every time I close my eyes.”

“Try not to think about it,” Lizzie urged. “The shock will fade. The vision won’t torment you forever.”

“No, that unhappy fate belongs to Mr. and Mrs. Davis,” said Mary Jane. “You know they’ve lost a son before, in Washington.”

“I had heard that.”

“And Mrs. Davis is with child again even now, did you know?”

“You told me,” Lizzie reminded her gently. “I do hope she takes care of herself. Such a terrible grief cannot be good for her baby. Is anyone there to look after her?”

“She has her maid, and her friend Mrs. Chesnut was immediately summoned, and other friends are coming tonight—” Mary Jane caught herself. “And Mary, John’s Mary, she came too, with Mrs. Chesnut.”

Lizzie felt a jolt. “She’s well enough to call on friends?” Not only to call, but with enough presence of mind to comfort a grief-stricken mother. Mary must be well recovered, then. Lizzie had heard nothing from her since they had given up the house on Canal Street and Mary went to stay with her widowed cousin and John returned to Church Hill. Lizzie knew she ought to be relieved that Mary had been restored to health, but instead the news filled her with trepidation.

“Apparently so. She didn’t recognize me,” Mary Jane quickly added, before Lizzie even thought to ask. “She never paid much attention to black faces, and she’s never seen me in a maid’s garb before. Her gaze slipped right past me as if we had never met.” Her tone had turned bitter. “If her visits become too frequent, though, I may have to resign.”

“Of course.” Lizzie felt a pang of regret at the thought of losing such an essential part of her intelligence network, but if Mary Jane was recognized and exposed, the entire Richmond underground could be ruined.

“But none of this is why I came to see you today.” Mary Jane shook her head as if clearing it of shock and horror. “The provost marshal’s office and the Signal Bureau are blaming spies for every setback the Confederacy has faced in recent months.”

“With good reason,” said Lizzie, thinking of the Libby Prison break and Colonel Dahlgren’s mysterious resurrection.

“They’re demanding that the president and Congress take firm, decisive, and immediate action to discover and eliminate the spies in their midst.”

“Eliminate?” Lizzie echoed warily.

Mary Jane nodded.

“So we can expect harsher measures directed toward suspected Unionists.”

Mary Jane nodded again. “You should prepare, you and all your friends.”

Lizzie thanked her for the warning and again offered her tea or perhaps coffee, and this time, Mary Jane gratefully accepted a cup of coffee. She was probably expecting the ersatz coffee that had become the beverage of last resort in the capital, but Lizzie surprised her with a cup of real, rich, robust coffee, made from freshly roasted and ground beans smuggled in from the North. Lizzie had intended to use the delicacy to win friends in influential places, but Mary Jane had been through quite an ordeal, and a good cup of coffee would brace her. There would still be enough left over for the weak-willed clerks and guards she meant to win over, low-paid staff who could hardly afford their daily bread on their pitiful salaries, what with food stores diminishing and prices inching higher day by day.

As soon as Mary Jane departed, Lizzie sent out a flurry of coded messages, warning her friends to take every precaution and not a single unnecessary risk. Jefferson Davis was distraught and grieving, and in that state of mind, he would show them no mercy.

Less than a week later, excitement surged throughout the city and many were the rumors as the Union and Confederate armies clashed in the Wilderness, north of Richmond. General Grant had conceived a new strategy, making the most of the superior manpower and resources of the North to strike multiple, simultaneous blows at the Confederacy. General Meade and the Army of the Potomac confronted General Lee, General Butler’s forces were moving up the James River to threaten Richmond from the south, and the German-born general Franz Sigel engaged the rebel troops in the Shenandoah Valley so they could not reinforce the Army of Northern Virginia. In the meantime, General Sherman moved to take on his Confederate counterpart in Georgia, and General Nathaniel Banks seemed poised to capture the vital port of Mobile, Alabama.