How Few Remain Part 37

"Exactly my point," Lincoln said. "If we go on as we have been, we are surely ruined. If, on the other hand, we make the changes in our course I have suggested, we offer the entire nation a new birth of liberty. Otherwise, I fear, government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall perish from this earth, replaced by government of the rich, by the rich, and for the rich. The free men who made the United States a beacon to the nations of the world shall be reduced to gearing in the vast capitalist engine of profit."

"I just don't see it," Senator Garfield said. "I wish I did, but I don't. No room for compromise in any of this. Without compromise, you can't have politics. The brickbats will be flying, all right, but they'll be real brickbats with real bricks. That's the direction whence cla.s.s warfare comes."

"Yes, it is," Lincoln said softly. "Do you think we can avoid it by pretending the seeds from which it springs are not already planted and growing?"

"Whether we can avoid it is one question," Hay said. "Whether we should embrace it is another question altogether."

"You mean that, John." Lincoln's voice was full of wonder, full of grief. Hay was his protege. Hay was nearly as much his son as was Robert. As far as Lincoln could see, his own course of thought had followed over the years a perfectly logical, perfectly inevitable path. And yet, the handsome young man who was now an even more handsome middle-aged man had not gone in the same direction. For that matter, neither had Robert Lincoln.

Hay said, "I think everyone here, with the possible exception of Mr. Dougla.s.s, feels the same as I do." He sounded sad, too, the way a doctor sounded sad when he had to tell a family the situation for a sick man was hopeless, and that he would soon die.

Lincoln looked around the table, silently polling the men he had asked to join him in Chicago. With him, they could have swung many in the Republican Party to his views. If they were against him, reform along the lines he desired would not come, not through the Republicans. "Gentlemen, think again, please," he said. "Can you not see that this country needs a new birth of freedom if it is to go on being the wonder and the envy of the world?" He knew he was pleading. The last man with whom he'd pleaded was Lord Lyons, the British minister to the United States during the War of Secession.

He'd failed then. After Lee's victories in Pennsylvania, the British government had recognized the Confederate States as a nation among nations and, with France, had forced the USA to do likewise. He was failing now, too. He saw that by the way his comrades would not meet his eyes.

Garfield said, "Lincoln, if we Republicans tried to go down your road, I think you would split the party not in two but in three. Some would go with you, and I expect you would gain a few among the Socialists and others who believe in notions even more radical than yours."

"Thank you so much," Lincoln murmured.

"I mean no offense. I speak the truth as I see it, as you do." Garfield was earnest, sensible, in the middle of the road. He proved as much, continuing, "Some would probably try to hold the party on the course it has now. I lean that way myself, truth to tell. And some would bolt to the Democrats."

"And," Hannibal Hamlin added, "the devil would come down with chilblains before we won another election."

Benjamin Butler said, "It occurs to me that what we may need is not more freedom but a little less. Compared to any European country, this is a land full of bomb-flinging anarchists. We're so d.a.m.ned free, we've thrown two wars away because we did not properly prepare for either of them. Take Germany, now-nothing in Germany but coal and potatoes, far as the eye can see. But they've got discipline there, by G.o.d, and they're the strongest power on the continent."

"I wouldn't go so far as Mr. Butler," Hay said, "but I am compelled to believe there is some truth in what he says." Hamlin nodded. So did Garfield.

Lincoln discovered he'd only thought he knew despair. He turned to Frederick Dougla.s.s. "What of you, Fred?" he asked.

Dougla.s.s had less political clout than any of the others, but more moral authority. After staring for a while at something only he could see, he answered, "My own people, both in the Confederate States and in the United States, need more freedom, not less. I must believe the same also holds true for white men." Had he stopped there, he would have aided Lincoln. But he went on, "Neither am I convinced that taking the Republican Party into the streets, so to speak, is the way to gain a majority for it."

"Let me ask the question another way," Lincoln said: "Other than taking the Republican Party into the streets, how is it to gain a majority? Only sixteen years of acc.u.mulated disgust at Democratic f.e.c.klessness let us win this latest election. Things being as they are now, when do you gentlemen foresee our winning another one, and by what means?"

For close to two minutes, no one answered. Then James Garfield said, "Whatever the means may be, they shall not include riots and rebellion, which would only raise enmity against us."

"Like pressure from steam in an engine, pressure for change will will rise in the United States," Lincoln said. "Whether it rises rise in the United States," Lincoln said. "Whether it rises through through the Republican Party or the Republican Party or outside outside the party remains to be seen. I would sooner see it rise through the party, that we may channel it for the nation's good and for our own." the party remains to be seen. I would sooner see it rise through the party, that we may channel it for the nation's good and for our own."

He looked around the table again. Not even Dougla.s.s looked as if he agreed with him. Ben Butler said, "If workers go into the streets, soldiers go into the streets, too. Soldiers carry more rifles. They always have. They always will."

"Unless and until they turn those rifles against the men who give them orders they cannot in good conscience obey," Lincoln said, which produced another long silence. Into it, he continued, "Gentlemen, I say this with a heavy heart, but I say it nonetheless: if, as this meeting makes it appear likely, the Republican Party cannot find room to encourage change, I shall work outside the confines of the party to encourage it. For change, sure as I live and breathe, is coming. And, though they may not be here today, there are those calling themselves Republicans who will follow me."

"You would deliberately split the party?" It was half a gasp from Hannibal Hamlin, half a wheeze.

"No, I would would not," Lincoln answered. "But I not," Lincoln answered. "But I will." will."

"If you try, we shall read you out and pretend you were never in," Butler said. "The way the Democrats have campaigned against you ever since the War of Secession, we might be better off reading you out."

"An ostrich may bury its head in the sand and pretend the lion is not there," Lincoln said. "Will that keep the lion from enjoying a supper of ostrich?"

Butler got to his feet. Since he was short and squat, drawing himself up to his full height was less impressive than it might have been otherwise, but he did his best. "I think we have heard enough," he said. "Thank you for inviting us here, Mr. Lincoln. I expect each of us can find his own way out, his own way back to his hotel, and his own way home."

One by one, the Republican leaders filed past Lincoln and toward the door. As John Hay went by, the ex-president softly asked, "Et tu "Et tu, John?"

"Et ego, Mr. Lincoln." Hay's voice was sad, but it was firm. Like the others, even Frederick Dougla.s.s, he left without a backwards glance.

Lincoln stood all alone in the room poor men had built so rich men might confer in it. "Labor first," he said, as he had so many times. "Labor first, then then capital. If they cannot remember that on their own, I shall make certain they are reminded of it." And he left, too, his back straight, his stride determined. He had been a Whig. He was-no, he had been-a Republican. Now ... capital. If they cannot remember that on their own, I shall make certain they are reminded of it." And he left, too, his back straight, his stride determined. He had been a Whig. He was-no, he had been-a Republican. Now ...

"They have lost the war," General Thomas Jackson told Major General E. Porter Alexander. "If they cannot realize that on their own, I shall make certain they are reminded of it."

"Yes, sir." Alexander was not a young man, but retained a large measure of boyish enthusiasm. "President Longstreet's tried to make 'em take their medicine. If they won't open their mouth, we'll just have to yank it open and shove the pill down their throats whether they like it or not."

"Well put." Jackson studied the dispositions on the map. "Everything appears to be in readiness."

"Everything on my end is, sir," his chief artillerist answered. "The guns await only your order to begin."

"Tomorrow morning at half past five," Jackson said. "The end of the day, if G.o.d grant victory on our arms, should see the removal from our soil of more than half the Yankees now infesting it."

"Here's hoping you're right, sir," General Alexander said. "And if you are, I'm d.a.m.ned if I can see how they'll be able to go on fighting after that."

"Do not speak so lightly of d.a.m.nation." Jackson put a rumble of reproof in his voice. "To tell the truth, though, I cannot see how they have gone on fighting so long when so little has gone right for them. Much as I hate to say it, they are braver than I reckoned."

"Hasn't done 'em much good, and that's what counts," Alexander answered.

Absently, Jackson nodded. "Courage and the goodness of one's cause, unfortunately, do not always go hand in hand."

"Yes, sir, that's a fact." His artillery chief nodded, too. "If Dougla.s.s taught us anything, he taught us that." Alexander's chuckle had a slight nervous edge. "And, looking out of the other side of the mirror, he learned the same thing from us, I reckon."

"Goodness does not depend on the position from which one observes it," Jackson said sternly. "Goodness is." is." He sounded very certain. He He sounded very certain. He was was very certain. Even so, he did his best not to think about Frederick Dougla.s.s. He also noticed that E. Porter Alexander didn't reply, which might well have meant Alexander, too, carefully wasn't thinking about the Negro. very certain. Even so, he did his best not to think about Frederick Dougla.s.s. He also noticed that E. Porter Alexander didn't reply, which might well have meant Alexander, too, carefully wasn't thinking about the Negro.

He went to bed that night with the rattle and bang of rifle fire from the trenches in Louisville and to the east of the city and the occasional rumble of artillery in his ears. Everything sounded as it had since the U.S. flank attack bogged down. Thus lulled, he fell asleep almost as soon as he finished his prayers. Neither too much noise nor too little would give the Yankees anything out of the ordinary with which to concern themselves.

An orderly shook him awake with the words, "Half past three, sir, like you ordered."

Yawning, Jackson got into his boots and stuck his hat on his head. The orderly gave him a big tin cup full of coffee strong enough to try to climb over the rim. The handle burned his fingers. The coffee burned his mouth when he gulped it down.

"Ahh," he said-a gasp of approval. "I'm ready. Now off to meet up with General Alexander."

He reached the artillerist, at batteries east of Louisville that had come to Kentucky gun by gun from all over the CSA, about half an hour before the show was scheduled to begin. "Good to see you, sir," Alexander said, saluting. In the dim gray of early dawn, he seemed as much a ghost as a man. "Everything is ready. We await only the hour."

"As it should be," Jackson said. Every so often, he would hold his watch next to a lantern. Time moved more slowly than it had any business doing. He'd seen that before. It always bemused him. At last, a little after he could see the time without putting the watch up to the light, he said, "The hour is come."

As if his words had been a signal, a great bellow of artillery rose west of him: all the guns that had defended Louisville against the flanking attack now sent their full fury against the line upon which they had halted the U.S. forces. The flashes from their muzzles lit up the horizon, as if the sun were rising from the wrong direction.

E. Porter Alexander beamed. "Isn't it bully, sir?"

In searching for a description, Jackson would sooner have found one in the Book of Revelations. Even so, he did not reprove his gayer subordinate. "It will do, General. It will do."

U.S. artillery, both in the salient east of Louisville and on the far side of the Ohio, was quick to respond. All through the fight for Louisville, the U.S. cannon had given Jackson more worry than anything else. The United States had brought a lot of guns into the fight, and handled them well. Their artillerymen might lack Porter's imagination, but they were solid professionals. Their sh.e.l.ls would punish the Confederate entrenchments.

In spite of that counterfire, the C.S. soldiers in those entrenchments opened up on the Yankees in front of them with their Tredegars: a hailstone-on-tin-roof accompaniment to the big guns' thunder. Jackson was sure Rebel yells rang out all along the line as the Confederates there went over to the attack, but the roar of the guns drowned them.

"I pity those poor fellows," Alexander said. "They can't possibly break through, and they'll pay a stiff price for trying."

"It is the price of victory," Jackson said in a voice like iron. His chief artillerist grimaced, but finally nodded.

The sun rose. Jackson waited, still as a statue, while messengers brought word of the fighting to the west. As General Alexander had predicted, the U.S. position facing Louisville was more than strong enough to keep the attacking Confederates from doing much past getting into the first couple of lines of trenches. Jackson had hoped for more, but he had not really expected it.

An hour pa.s.sed. Turning to Alexander, he asked, "Do you think they are fully engaged, reserves coming up, all their eyes turned on the fight right in front of them?"

"Sir, if they're not, they never will be," Alexander replied. With a faint hint of scorn, he added, "They have so much trouble seeing what's right in front of their noses, they sure as the devil aren't going to look any further."

Jackson considered. From the outset, he had held this moment in his hands and his hands alone. He stared eastward. His nostrils flared, like a wolf's when it takes a scent. He nodded, a sharp, almost involuntary motion. "Let it begin," he said.

E. Porter Alexander shouted an order. All the guns within the sound of his voice let loose. That roar signaled the eruption of all the guns the Confederates had a.s.sembled along the southern flank of the Yankees' salient. Up till now, nothing much had happened along that flank. Jackson had kept it strong enough to discourage U.S. forces from trying to shift direction and move against it, which hadn't been hard: the enemy's aim remained focused on Louisville alone.

Along with guns, he'd been quietly bringing men forward over the past few days. Now, as they burst from their trenches and dashed toward those of the Yankees, he did hear Rebel yells through the gunfire, a great catamount chorus of them.

"The men must go forward at all hazard, so long as any hope of success presents itself," he said aloud, as he had in the orders he'd sent to the brigade commanders south of the U.S. salient. "If we are to roll up the Yankees' strong fortified west-facing line, we can only do so by an unexpected a.s.sault from the flank and rear."

"Pour it on, boys!" Porter Alexander was yelling. "Pour it on!" Jackson tried to inspire his men to the same clear, cold despisal of the foe and certainty G.o.d was on their side as he felt himself. Alexander was warmer and earthier at the same time. "Give 'em a good boot in the a.s.s!" he shouted. "Come on, you mangy b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, work work those guns!" those guns!"

He got louder and coa.r.s.er from there. Jackson started to rebuke him, then noticed how splendidly the sweating, smoke-stained artillerymen were handling their cannon. He held his peace. After the battle was over, perhaps he would reprove Alexander for some of his more blasphemous suggestions and ask that he refrain from using them in the future. Meanwhile, the artillery commander was getting results. That counted for more.

Streams of Yankee prisoners began shambling past what had for so long been the dividing point between their army and that of the CSA. One of them, a man old enough to have fought in the War of Secession, recognized Jackson. "G.o.d d.a.m.n you, Stonewall, you sneaky son of a b.i.t.c.h!" he shouted. Jackson tipped his hat-to him, that was praise. The Confederates guarding the U.S. soldiers laughed. So did a few of the Yankees.

Some of the U.S. guns north of the Ohio shifted their fire to oppose the Confederate breakthrough. Jackson used a telescope to watch sh.e.l.ls bursting among his advancing soldiers. But, for once, the U.S. artillerymen were slower than they should have been in responding to changing conditions on the field. As an old artillerist, Jackson also realized the smoke and dust his own bombardment was kicking up hampered the foe in his choice of targets.

More prisoners came back, some of them carried on makeshift litters by their comrades. Messengers came back, too. One young man, his voice cracking with excitement, exclaimed, "General Jackson, sir, them d.a.m.nyankees is unraveling faster'n the sleeve off a two-bit shirt. They would run, only they ain't got nowheres to run to."

"G.o.d having delivered them into our hands, let us make certain we do not fail to achieve His great purpose by permitting them to slip through our fingers," Jackson said, and ordered more reinforcements forward.

General Alexander was also sending some of his guns forward so they could bear on the retreating U.S. soldiers. "You know something, sir?" he said. "This business is a lot more fun when you're moving ahead than when you're falling back."

"I believe I may have made a similar observation myself, at one time or another in my career," Jackson said.

"Yankees aren't having much fun right now," Alexander said.

Jackson smiled. It was the sort of smile that made blue-tuniced prisoners shiver as they stumbled into captivity.

A messenger ran up. "Sir," he panted, "we-uns just ran over the biggest d.a.m.n Yankee supply dump you ever did see."

"Put guards around it," Jackson ordered. "Let no one go into it. Arrest any who try. If they resist even in the least, shoot them. Do you understand me, Private?"

"Y-Y-Yes, sir," the messenger stammered, and fled.

To E. Porter Alexander, Jackson said, "During the War of Secession, we lived off Yankee plunder because we had so few goods of our own. Sometimes we foraged when we should have been fighting. Now, with a sufficiency of our own supplies, fighting shall come first, as it should."

"Telling soldiers not to plunder is like telling roosters not to tread hens," Alexander said.

"Sooner or later, the philandering rooster ends up in a stew," Jackson replied. "The plundering soldier is also likely to end up stewing, especially if he pauses to plunder when he should advance."

Before long, disarmed Confederates started coming past him: only a trickle compared to the number of Yankee prisoners, but too many to suit Jackson. Some of them called out to him in appeal. He turned his back, the better to remind them they had jeopardized his victory with their greed.

Messengers also kept coming back. They were far more welcome, since almost all the news they brought was good. Here and there, by squads and companies, the Yankees kept fighting grimly. More often, though, they gave way to the alarm that could jolt through even experienced troops when flanked, and tumbled back toward the Ohio in headlong retreat.

Slyly, Porter Alexander asked, "What do we do if we go and catch Frederick Dougla.s.s again?"

"Dear G.o.d in heaven!" Jackson clapped a hand to his forehead. "I forgot to issue any orders about him. We give him back to the United States, exactly as we did before. President Longstreet, I must say, convinced me of the urgent necessity for following that course and no other."

He shouted for runners and sent orders for the good treatment of any captured elderly Negro agitator up to the front along with orders for continued advances. No news of any such prisoner's being taken got back to him. No news of any such Negro's being conveniently found dead on the field got back to him, either. But then, such news wouldn't. If Dougla.s.s had been killed by bullet or sh.e.l.l or hasty noose, his body either lay unnoticed where it had fallen or had been flung into a ditch to make sure it stayed unnoticed.

"Maybe he was back in U.S. territory when the attack began," Jackson said hopefully. "For our sake, I pray he was. For his sake, I pray he was, too."

"You say that about Frederick Dougla.s.s, sir?" E. Porter Alexander gave him a quizzical look.

"I do," Jackson answered. "He has, I would say, already done as much damage to our cause as he is likely to do." He did not mention President Longstreet's plan for manumitting Negroes in the CSA after the close of the war. General Alexander did not need to know about that, not yet. Jackson wished he didn't need to know about it, either.

Over the months since Longstreet had broached his intentions to him, he'd reluctantly decided the president knew what he was doing. Longstreet, as far as Jackson was concerned, made a better politician than a soldier; he was full of the deviousness politics required. If he said manumitting the Negro would redound to the advantage of the Confederate States, odds were he knew whereof he spoke.

"Sir!" A messenger shattered Jackson's reverie. "Sir, we have men on the Ohio!"

"Praise G.o.d, from Whom all blessings flow," Jackson murmured.

"We won't keep 'em there," Alexander predicted. "The d.a.m.nyankees can send too many sh.e.l.ls down on 'em from across the river."

"You're likely right," Jackson said. "But that they are there spells the ruin of this salient, and all done in the s.p.a.ce of a couple of hours."

"Uh, sir, look to the sky," Alexander said. "The sun'll be going down in an hour or so."

Jackson looked, and blinked in astonishment. Where had the time gone? "Very well, General: in the s.p.a.ce of a day. I hope you are satisfied." He used words that seldom pa.s.sed his lips: "I certainly am."

"Brother Sam," Vernon Perkins said severely over breakfast, "I must tell you that I am most vexed at the way your dog gobbles everything in his bowl and then steals from the portion allotted to Rover."

"You have to remember, Vern," Sam Clemens answered, "Sutro is named for a politician, so it's in his nature to steal whatever he can grab."

"And stop calling me Vern!" His brother-in-law's voice went shrill. "Vernon is a perfectly good name, and the one by which I prefer to be known."

"All right ..." Sam was on the point of calling him Vern Vern again, as if absentmindedly, but Alexandra's warning glance persuaded him that wouldn't be a good idea. He ate the rest of his insipid, lumpy oatmeal, grabbed his hat, and fled the regimented boredom of his brother-in-law's house for the genial, congenial chaos prevailing at the again, as if absentmindedly, but Alexandra's warning glance persuaded him that wouldn't be a good idea. He ate the rest of his insipid, lumpy oatmeal, grabbed his hat, and fled the regimented boredom of his brother-in-law's house for the genial, congenial chaos prevailing at the San Francisco Morning Call San Francisco Morning Call.

Wrecking crews were still tearing down buildings the British bombardment and invasion had ruined. Already, on some sites that had been cleared, new construction was going up: pine frames of a yellow bright enough to hurt the eye. On lots still empty, signs promised resurrection almost as fervently as did the Bible. THE OTTO V. JONES INSt.i.tUTE OF PHRENOLOGY SHALL REOCCUPY THESE PREMISES THE OTTO V. JONES INSt.i.tUTE OF PHRENOLOGY SHALL REOCCUPY THESE PREMISES, one declared. "Too bad," Sam said, and walked on.

Half a block farther south, another sign in the middle of a vacant stretch of ground said, WHEN COHAN'S OPENS UP AGAIN, WE'LL HAVE A BETTER FREE LUNCH TABLE THAN EVER WHEN COHAN'S OPENS UP AGAIN, WE'LL HAVE A BETTER FREE LUNCH TABLE THAN EVER. Always a man to prefer five-cent beer and free lunch to phrenology, Clemens beamed at that. Two lots farther on again, yet another sign offered a simple promise: WE'LL BE BACK WE'LL BE BACK.

Once Sam got down to the Morning Call Morning Call offices on Market Street, he forgot about signs. "What's the story on Kentucky?" he called, walking in the door. offices on Market Street, he forgot about signs. "What's the story on Kentucky?" he called, walking in the door.

"U.S. troops still in the city of Louisville," Clay Herndon said. "General Willc.o.x says he pulled back from the salient east of town to consolidate for another push somewhere else. New York quotes Berlin quoting London quoting Richmond quoting Stonewall Jackson saying we pulled back on account of he licked the stuffing out of us."