Shoulder-Straps: A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 Read online

  CHAPTER I.

  TWO FRIENDS--A RENCONTRE BEFORE NIBLO'S--THREE MEETINGS WITH A MAN OFMARK--MOUNT VERNON AND THE INAUGURATION--FRIEND OR FOE TO THE UNION?

  Just before the close of the performances at Niblo's Garden, where theJarrett combination was then playing, one evening in the latter part ofJune, 1862, two young men came out from the doorway of the theatre andtook their course up Broadway toward the Houston Street corner. Anyobserver who might have caught a clear view of the faces of the two asthey passed under one of the large lamps at the door, would have notedeach as being worth a second glance, but would at the same time haveobserved that two persons more dissimilar in appearance and inindication of character, could scarcely have been selected out of allthe varied thousands resident in the great city.

  The one walking on the inside as they passed on, with the right hand ofhis companion laid on his left arm in that confidential manner so commonwith intimate friends who wish to walk together in the evening withoutbeing jostled apart by hurried chance passengers, was somewhat tall infigure, dark-haired, dark side-whiskered, and sober-faced, thoughdecidedly fine-looking; and in spite of the heat of the weather hepreserved the appearance of winter dress clothing by a full suit of darkgray summer stuff that might well have been mistaken for broadcloth. Noteven in hat or boots did he make any apparent concession to the season,for his glossy round hat would have been quite as much in place inJanuary as in June, and his well-fitting and glossy patent-leather bootswould have been thought oppressively warm by a hotter-blooded and moreplethoric man. Those who should have seen the baptismal registerrecording his birth some five-and-thirty years before, would have knownhis name to be Walter Lane Harding; and those who met him in business orsociety would have become quite as well aware that he was a prosperousmerchant, doing business in one of the leading mercantile streetsrunning out of Broadway, not far from the City Hospital. So far as thesomewhat precise mercantile appearance of Harding was concerned, a truedisciple of Lavater would have judged correctly of him, for there werefew men in the city of New York who displayed more steadiness, orgreater money-making capacity in all the details of business; and yeteven the close observer would have been likely to derive a falseimpression from this very preciseness, as to the social qualities of theman. There were quite as few better or heartier laughers than Harding,when duly aroused to mirth; and those persons were very rare, making thecharacters of mankind their professional study, who saw slightindications of disposition more quickly, or better enjoyed whatever gavefood for quiet merriment. Once away from his counting-house, too, WalterHarding seemed to assume a second of his two natures that had beforebeen lying dormant, and to enter into the permitted gaieties of citylife with a zest that many a professed good fellow might have envied. Hevisited the theatre, as we have seen; went to the opera when it pleasedhim, not for fashion's sake, but because he liked music and was aconnoisseur of singing and acting; liked a stroll in the streets with acongenial companion (male or female); could smoke a good cigar withevident enjoyment; and sometimes, though rarely, sipped a glass of fineold wine, and indulged in the freer pleasures of the table; though hewas scrupulously careful of his company, and no man had ever seen hisfoot cross the threshold of a house of improper character. It issufficient, in addition, at the present moment, to say that he was stilla bachelor, occupying rooms in an up-town street, and enjoying life inthat pleasant and rational mode which seemed to promise longcontinuance.

  Harding's companion, who has already been indicated as his opposite, wasmarkedly so in personal appearance, at least. He was two or three inchesshorter than Harding, and much stouter, displaying a well-rounded legthrough the folds of his loose pants of light-gray Melton cloth, andbeing quite well aware of that advantage of person. He had a smoothlyrounded face, with a complexion that had been fair until hard work, latehours, and some exposure to the elements, had browned and roughened it;brown hair, with an evident tendency to curl, if he had not worn it soshort on account of the heat of the season, that a curl was renderedimpossible; a heavy dark brown moustache, worn without other beard; asunny hazel eye that seemed made for laughter, and a full, red,voluptuous lip that might have belonged to a sensualist; while the eyecould really do other things than laughing, and the lip was quite asoften compressed or curled in the bitterness of disdain or theearnestness of close thought, as employed to express any warmer or moresympathetic feeling.

  Tom Leslie, who might have been called by the more respectful anddignified name of "Thomas," but that no one had ever expended theadditional amount of breath necessary to extend the name into twosyllables, was a cadet of a leading family in a neighboring state, whoat home had been reckoned the black sheep of the flock, because he wouldnot settle quietly down like the rest to money-getting and the enjoymentof legislative offices; a man who at thirty had passed through muchexperience, seen a little dissipation, traveled over most States of theUnion in the search for new scenery, or the fulfilment of his avocationas a newspaper correspondent and man of letters; been twice in Europe,alternately flying about like a madman, and sitting down to study lifeand manners in Paris, Vienna, and Rome, and gathering up all kinds ofuseful and useless information; taken a short turn at war in the Crimea,in 1853, as a private in the ranks of the French army; seen service fora few months in the Brazilian navy, from which he had brought a severewound as a flattering testimonial. He was at that time located in NewYork as an editorial contributor and occasional "special correspondent"of a leading newspaper. He had seen much of life--tasted much of itspains and pleasures--perhaps thought more than either; and though with alittle too much of a propensity for late hours and those long storieswhich _would_ grow out of current events seen in the light of pastexperience, he was held to be a very pleasant companion by other menthan Walter Harding.

  Perhaps even the long stories were more a misfortune than a fault. TheAncient Mariner found it one of the saddest penalties of his crime, thathe was obliged to button-hole all his friends and be written down anincorrigible bore; and who doubts that the Wandering Jew, with theweight of twenty centuries of experience and observation upon his head,finds a deeper pang than the tropic heat or the Arctic snow could give,in the want of an occasional quiet and patient listener to the story ofhis wanderings?

  On the present occasion it may be noted, at once to complete the pictureand give additional insight of a character which did very independentand _outre_ things, that Tom Leslie had gone to Niblo's with hiscarefully-dressed and precise friend Harding, and sat conspicuously inan orchestra chair, in a gray business sack, no vest and no pretence ata collar. In other men, Harding would have noticed the dress withdisapprobation: in Leslie it seemed to be legitimately a part of the manto dress as he liked; and neither Harding, or any one else who knew him,paid any more attention to his outward appearance than they would havebestowed upon a harmless lunatic under the same circumstances. WhereverLeslie boarded, (and his places of boarding were very numerous, takingthe whole year together,) it was always noted that he filled up thehat-rack with a collection of hats of all odd and rapid styles, with a_few_ of the more sedate and respectable; and on this evening's visit toNiblo's, when there was not a shadow of occasion for a hat with any brimwhatever, he had completed his personal appearance by a fine gray beaverCalifornia soft hat, of not less than eighteen or twenty inches in thewhole circumference, which gave him somewhat the appearance of beingunder a collapsed umbrella, and yet became him as well as any thingelse could have done, and left him unmistakably a handsome fellow.

  An oddly mixed compound, certainly--even odder than Harding; and yetwhat a dull, dead world this would prove to be, if there were no odd and_outre_ characters to startle the grave people from their propriety, andthrow an occasional pebble splashing into the pool of quiet andirreproachable mediocrity!

  The two companions, whose description has occupied a much longer timethan it needed to walk from the door of Niblo's to the Houston Streetcorner, were just passing the corner of that street on their way up toBleecker, w
hen they were momentarily stopped by a very ordinaryincident. A girl, evidently of the _demi-monde_ from her bold eyes,lavish display of charms and general demeanor, was turning the cornerfrom Broadway into Houston Street immediately in front of Harding andLeslie; and as she swept around, her long dress trailing on thepavement, a careless fellow, lounging along, cigar in mouth, and eyeseverywhere else than at his feet, stepped full upon her skirt, andbefore she could check the impetus of her sudden turn, literally torethe garment from her, the dark folds of the dress falling on thepavement and leaving the under-clothing painfully exposed. The girlturned suddenly, one of those harsh oaths upon her lips which even morethan any action betray the fallen woman, and hissed out a malediction onhis brutal carelessness. The man, probably one who literally knew nobetter, instead of remembering the provocation, apologizing for theinjury he had done and offering to make any reparation in his power,replied by an oath still more shocking than that of the lost girl,hurled at her the most opprobrious epithet which man bestows upon womanin the English language, and one by far too obscene to be repeated inthese pages,--and was passing on, leaving the poor girl to gather hertorn drapery as she best could, when his course was suddenly arrested.

  A tall figure had come up from below during the altercation, unnoticedby either; and the instant after the man had disgraced his humanity bythat abuse of a fallen woman, he found himself seized by the collar witha hand that managed him as if he had been a child, and himself full offthe sidewalk into the street, and among the wheels of the passingomnibuses, with the quick sharp words ringing in his ear:

  "The devil take you! If you can't learn to walk along the pavementwithout tearing off women's dresses and afterwards abusing them, go outinto the street with the brutes, where you belong!"

  The two friends noticed, casually, that a policeman stood on the uppercorner, and at this act of violence on the part of the new-comer, theynaturally expected to see him interfere to preserve the peace, if notmake an arrest; but he was either too lazy to cross the street, (suchthings have been,) or too well satisfied that the coarse ruffian had metthe treatment he deserved, to make any step forward. The fellow, thussuddenly sent to the company of worn-out omnibus-horses and swearingstage-drivers on a slippery pavement, turned with an oath, when herecovered himself, made a movement as if to return to the sidewalk andseek satisfaction for the violence, but evidently did not like the looksof his antagonist, when he caught a fair glance of his proportions, andsolaced himself with a few more muttered oaths as he dodged across tothe other side of Broadway and disappeared in the crowd.

  The second and prudential resolve of this person seemed fully justifiedby even a hasty survey of his assailant, who happened to be thrown underthe light of the lamp at the corner, and in full view of our companions.He was perhaps six feet and an inch in height, cast in a most powerfulmodel, and evidently possessing herculean strength--with a darkcomplexion, high cheek bones, showing almost as if he had a cross of theold Indian blood in his descent, fiery dark eyes set under brows of thepent-house or Webster mould, heavy massed black curly hair worn a littlelong, and a very heavy black moustache entirely concealing the mouth,while the beard shorn away from the lower portions of the face left thesquare, strong chin in full prominence. He was dressed in dark frockcoat with white vest and pants, and wore a dark wide-brimmed slouchedhat almost the counterpart of Leslie's, except in color, whichharmonized well with his personal appearance in other regards, andwhile it left him looking the gentleman, made him the gentleman of someother locality than the city of New York.

  The new-comer, the moment he had sent the other whirling into thestreet, approached the girl, who still remained standing on the corner,her ungathered dress sweeping the pavement, and said:

  "Madame, your dress is badly torn. Allow me to offer you a few pins." Hedrew a large pin-cushion from his large vest pocket, (every thing seemedto be of a large pattern about this man,) and was handing it to thegirl, who stretched out her left hand to receive it, when he suddenlyseemed to recognize her.

  "Why, Kate!" He spoke in tones of the most unfeigned surprise--"Kate,what the deuce! I thought you were in--"

  "Yes, Deck!" answered the girl, with a coarse familiarity, "but you seeI am here! And you? I thought _you_ were in--"

  "Hush-h-h!" said the man, in a quick, sharp, decided tone, prolongedalmost to be a hiss. "That will do! Now use some of these pins--quick,fasten up your skirt, and then go with _me_!"

  He spoke as if he was in the habit of being obeyed, or as if he had somepeculiar claim that he should be obeyed in this instance. And the girlseemed fully to understand him, for only a moment served to supply somany pins to the torn gathers of the dress as enabled her to walk andhid her exposed under-clothing; and the instant that object wasaccomplished she thrust her arm into his, he making no attempt to repelthe familiarity, but walking with hasty strides and almost dragging herafter him, down into the partial gloom of Houston Street.

  When they had disappeared, and not till then, the two friends removedfrom the spot where they had been standing entirely silent, and passedon up Broadway.

  "A strange person--a very strange person, that!" said Harding, themoment after, to Leslie, who appeared to be thinking intently, and whohad not uttered a word since the affair commenced.

  "Y--a--es!" said Leslie, in that slow, abstracted tone which indicatesthat the man who uses it is doing so mechanically and without knowingwhat he says.

  "Poor devil! how the new man whirled him out into the street!" Hardingwent on, _his_ attention on the incident, as Leslie's apparently wasnot. "Just the treatment he deserved for being brutal to a woman, nomatter how lost or degraded she may be! Tearing off her dress was allright enough, however, for all the woman deserve nothing better than tohave their dresses torn into ribbons for thrusting them under our feetand sweeping the streets with them, as they do!"

  Harding was thinking, at the moment, of a little adventure of his own afew weeks before, in which, hurrying along to an appointment, early inthe evening, not far from the St. Nicholas, he had come up with a partyof theatre-goers, trodden upon the dress of one of the ladies inattempting to pass--in extricating himself from that awkwardness,trodden upon the dresses of two more--and left the whole three nearlynaked in the street; while three female voices were screaming in shameand mortification, and three male voices sending words after him thevery reverse of complimentary.

  "You think that a singular person?" at length said Leslie, as if wakingfrom a reverie, but proving at the same time that he had heard the wordsof his friend. "You are right, he is so!"

  "What! do you know him?" asked Harding, surprised.

  "I do, indeed," was the reply of Leslie; "but I should as soon havethought of meeting Schamyl or Garibaldi in the streets of New York, atthis moment, as the man we have just encountered. Fortunately, he didnot recognize me--perhaps, thanks to this hat--(it _is_ an immense hat,isn't it, Harding?) What can be his position, and what is his businesshere at the present moment, I wonder?" he went on, speaking more tohimself than to his companion, as they turned down Bleecker fromBroadway towards Leslie's lodgings, on Bleecker near Elm.

  "Well, but you have not yet told me his name, or any thing about him,while you go on tantalizing me with speculations as to how he came tobe here, and what he is doing!" said Harding.

  "True enough," answered Leslie. "Well, he is not the sort of man to talkabout loosely in the streets; so wait a moment, until I use my night-keyand we get up into my room. There we can smoke a cigar, and I will tellyou all I know of him, which is just enough to excite my wonder to amuch greater height than your own."

  Less than five minutes sufficed to fulfil the conditions prescribed; andin Leslie's little room, himself occupying the three chairs itcontained, by sitting in one, and stretching out his two legs on theothers, while Harding threw off his coat and lounged on the bed, Lesliepoured out his story, and the smoke from his cigar, with about equalrapidity.

  "The name of that singular man," he said, "is Dexter
Balston, and he isby birth a Virginian. You heard the girl call him 'Deck,' which you nodoubt took to be 'Dick,' but which she really meant as a familiarabbreviation of his name. It is a little singular that I should have methim first at a theatre, and not far from the one at which we just nowencountered him. It was in the fall of 1857, I think, going in with aparty of friends, one night, to Laura Keene's, that one of the ladies ofthe party was rudely jostled by a large man, who caught his foot in thematting of the vestibule and fell against her with such violence asnearly to throw her to the floor. He turned and apologized at once, andwith so much high-toned and gentlemanly dignity, that all the party feltalmost glad that the little accident had occurred. This made the firststep of an acquaintance between him and myself; and when, in theintermission the same evening, I met him for a few moments in a saloonnear the theatre, we drank together, held some slight conversation,exchanged cards, and each invited the other to call at his lodgings. Hiscard lies somewhere in the bureau there at this moment, and it read, Iremember, 'Dexter Ralston, Charles City, Virginia,' with 'St. Nicholas'written in pencil in the corner. He was a wealthy planter, living nearCharles City, as I afterwards gathered from conversation with him, andhad an interest in tobacco transactions at the North which kept him alarge proportion of his time in this city.

  "Of his own choice Ralston attended the theatres very frequently, as Idid from professional duty; and the consequence was that we met often,and sometimes supped together. I liked him, and he seemed to be pleasedwith me, though I should be perverting the truth to say that I everbecame very cordial or intimate with him. There was something about theman which forbade familiarity; though I remember thinking, severaltimes, that if one only _could_ penetrate beneath the crust made by thatevident pride and haughty reserve, he was a man to be liked to the deathby a man, and loved by a woman with eternal devotion. After a time, andwithout my receiving any 'P.P.C.' to say that he was going to leave thecity, he disappeared, and I saw him no more in the street or at any ofhis favorite places of amusement.

  "Well, I went down to Mount Vernon with a party of friends fromWashington, on board the steamboat George Page. Did you ever know Pagehimself, the fat old Washingtonian who invented something about thecircular-saw, and has some kind of a patent-right on all that are madeabove a certain number of inches in diameter? No? Well, he is an oddgenius, and I will some day tell you something about him. But I was justnow speaking of the steamboat named after him. The Rebels had her lastyear, you remember, using her as a gunboat somewhere up Aquia Creek,until they got scared and burned her one night,--though she was about asfit for that purpose as an Indian bark-canoe. The Page was running as anexcursion boat to Mount Vernon, and sometimes going down to Aquia Creekin connection with the railroad, in the winter and spring of 1858-9. Iwas doing some reporting, and a little lobbying, in the Senate, at thebeginning of March, and, as I have said, ran down with a party offriends to see the Tomb of Washington, curse the neglect that hung overit like a nightmare, and execrate the meanness which sold off bouquetsfrom the garden, and canes from the woods, at a quarter each, by thehands of a pack of dirty slaves, to the hands of a pack of dirtiercuriosity-hunters.

  "Going down the river I found no acquaintances on board, outside of myown party; but when we had made the due inspection, and were returningin the afternoon, just when we were off Fort Washington, an acquaintancebelonging to the capital came up, in conversation with a thin, scrawny,hard-featured man, dressed, in black, and looking like a cross between adecayed Yankee schoolmaster and a foreign Count gone into the hand-organbusiness. As we exchanged salutations he stopped, made a step backward,and astounded me by this introduction:

  "'Col. Washington, my friend, Mr. Leslie--Mr. Leslie, Col. John A.Washington, proprietor of Mount Vernon.'

  "I do not suppose that there was any merit in it, any more than therewould have been in refusing to drink a nauseous dose; but, really, Ifelt that I was fulfilling a stern duty (no pun intended) in turning myback short upon the Colonel, and saying:

  "'Much obliged to you, Mr. ----, but I have no desire whatever to knowCol. John A. Washington!'

  "I will do the Colonel (though he did afterwards die a rebel as hedeserved) the justice to say that I do not think he cared much for thecut. I noticed that his sallow face looked a shade nearer to green thanbefore, but he merely drew himself up and took no other notice of mydecidedly cavalier conduct. Not so, however, with some of thepassengers, who had been near enough to hear the words, and who seemedto think that the memory of the great dead was insulted, instead ofhonored, by this rebuff to the miserable offshoot who kept Mount Vernonas a cross between a pig-stye and a Jew old-clo' shop. Some of them, Isuppose, were Virginians, and neighbors of 'the Colonel.' At all events,I heard mutterings, and the ladies in my company (they were all ladies)looked a little alarmed.

  "Directly one of the F.F.V.'s, as I suppose them to have been, steppedforward immediately in front of me, and said:

  "'D--n it, sir, the man who insults a Washington must answer to _me_!'

  "'Must he?' I said, not much scared, I think, but a little flustered,and quite undecided whether to get into a row on the spot by strikingthe last man.

  "'He must!' replied the F.F.V., with another curse or two thrown in byway of emphasis. 'You may be some cursed Yankee, peddling buttons, andafraid to fight; but if not--'

  "'He will have no occasion to fight,' said a voice coming through thecrowd from the side of the vessel. 'I will take that little job off hishands. Eh, Leslie, is that you? They tell me you have been giving thecut-direct to that mean humbug who calls himself John A. Washington.Give me your hand, old boy; you have done nothing more than your duty. Iam a Virginian, and no d--d Yankee--does anybody want to fight me?'

  "It was Dexter Ralston. How many of the people on board knew him I haveno idea, or what they knew of him. He seemed to exercise some strangeinfluence, however, for Col. Washington turned away, with the friend whohad offered to introduce him; and the man who had offered to fight mealso disappeared. The crowd at that spot on the deck seemed to be gonein a moment. Ralston and myself exchanged a few words. I thanked him forhaving extricated me from a possible scrape, as well as for his goodopinion of my conduct, all which he waived with a 'pshaw!' He receivedan introduction to the ladies with all due courtesy, chatted with them afew moments, and then strolled off, smoking a cigar. I was engaged withmy party for the remainder of the trip, and did not see him again untilwe had reached Washington and the passengers dispersed from thesteamboat, when of course I lost him, without any inquiry being made asto his address or present residence. I went to Europe, the last time, asyou know, the summer following, and so perhaps lost him moreeffectually. Tired?"

  The latter word was especially addressed to Harding, who gave symptomsof going to sleep. Refreshed, however, by a cigar which Leslie thrustbetween his lips and insisted upon his smoking, Harding managed, even inhis recumbent position, to keep awake for what followed.

  "Confound you!" said Leslie, "you might manage to get along withoutyawning at my story, when you asked me to tell it! However, who cares!You are not the only man who does not know a good thing when he sees orhears it! Some of my best things in print have probably been received inlike manner, by people just as stupid!"

  "Very likely," said Harding, drily; and Leslie continued.

  "I came home from Europe in the winter of 1860-61, as you may likewiseremember if you are not too sleepy; and I was one of the ten thousandwho went down from this city to Washington, to attend the inaugurationof Abraham Lincoln. Nine thousand nine hundred and ninety odd went armedto the teeth, carrying each from one revolver to three, and a fewbowie-knives, in anticipation of there being a general row oninauguration morning, if not an open attempt to assassinate thePresident. One man whom I could name actually carried four revolvers anda dirk, without knowing any more about the use of either than a child often years might have done. There _was_ danger of a collision, of course,growing out of the very fact that everybody went down armed. I wa
s oneof the very few who could not borrow a revolver or did not want one--nomatter which.

  "Suffice it to say that I reached Washington on Sunday morning--the dayprevious to the inauguration--found the hotels full and took lodgings ata private house a few hundred yards from the Capitol, and spent theearly part of the day in inspecting the preparations made for theholiday show, in and about the Capitol building. The courtesy of ColonelForney, then Clerk of the House, arranged for my admission to thebuilding during the ceremonies of the next day; and that of DouglasWallach, of the _Star_, furnished me a seat in the reporters' gallery ofthe Senate for that evening when the last session of the expiringCongress was to be held and a last effort made for putting through those'compromise resolutions' which it was then believed might 'save theUnion,' but which we now know to have been as useless, even if theycould have been passed, as so much whistling against the wind.

  "Although it was Sunday, time was pressing, and the fate of the nationseemed to be hanging upon a breath; so the Senate had arranged a sessionfor five o'clock, which seemed very likely to last well into the night,and was almost certain to be crowded to suffocation. As you willremember, it _did_ last until seven the next morning--after daylight,and witnessed one of the most exciting debates in the history of thatbody,--in which Baker of Oregon flashed out even more than usual of hispatriotic eloquence; and white-haired, sad old Crittenden of Kentuckymoaned out words of fear for the nation, that have since been but tootruly realized; and Mason of Virginia showed more boldly than ever thecloven foot of the traitor who would not have reconciliation at anyprice; and Douglas rose above his short stature in alternately lashingone and the other of those whom he believed to be equally enemies to histype of conservatism. No one who sat out that session will ever forgetit--but enough of this, which should be written and not spoken.

  "Of course after dinner that day I went down to the Hotels on theAvenue, to take a peep at the political barometer and see what was theprospect for violence on the morrow. It was a dark and stormy one. Mostof the avowedly Southern element had disappeared from the street, andthere were not many of the secession cockades to be met; but a few wereflaunted by beardless young men who should that day have been arrestedand thrown into the Old Capitol; and every foot of space in Willard'sand the other leading houses was full all day long of a moving, surging,anxious and excited crowd, all talking, nobody listening, everybodyinquiring, many significant hints, a few threats, an occasional quarreland the interference of the police, but not much violence and nobloodshed. The evening shut down stormy, as to the national atmosphere,and I went home to supper impressed with the belief that the morrowcould not pass off quietly--a belief strengthened by the fears of Scott;which were shown in the calling out of the volunteer militia in largeforce,--by the tap of the drum and the challenge of the sentry, whichcould be heard all around Capitol Hill,--and by the knowledge that filesof regulars were barracked at different places on the Hill, ready forservice in the morning and so posted as to command every avenue ofingress to the inauguration.

  "One of the high winds which belong to the normal condition ofWashington began blowing at dark, and it increased to a gale during theevening, rattling shutters, creaking signs and filling the air withclouds of blinding dust which went whirling around the Capitol as ifthey would bury it. This added materially to the appearance and feelingof desolation, especially when the white stone being worked for theExtension would gleam and disappear through the cloud, and suggestgraveyards and monuments for the national greatness that seemed to befalling. Then at dusk we had the report that several hundreds of armedhorsemen had been discovered by one of Scott's scouts, lying in waitover Anacosti, and ready to make a descent upon the doomed city themoment that it should be buried in slumber. Many doubted this report,but some believed it; and I have an impression that hundreds went to bedin Washington that night with a lingering doubt whether they would notbe involved, before morning, or at all events before the noon of thenext day, in such scenes of violence and bloodshed as the continent hadnever yet witnessed.

  "I went over to the Capitol after tea, and took the place that had beenkindly kept for me in the reporters' gallery of the Senate. No matterwhat occurred there--history has made it a part of our painful record,and that is quite sufficient. It was between one and two o'clock in themorning, Crittenden had just concluded his heart-breaking appeal to theNorth to be generous and not let the Union go by default, and Baker hadjust closed his noble appeal to the new dominant party (of which he wasone) not to peril a nation by the adoption of the old Roman cry of '_VaeVictis_,'--when I left the Senate gallery for an hour, intending toreturn when I had breathed for awhile outside of that suffocatingatmosphere. I passed to the front through the entrance under thecollonade, and was just about to step out into the open air, when avoice arrested me. Surely I had heard it before.

  "'Straws against a whirlwind!' I heard it say. 'The work is alreadydone, and no human power can undo it!'

  "'I yet believe that the Union can be saved by the adoption of the planproposed by Crittenden!' said the other voice. 'Mason is right when hesays that Virginia will join the seceding States if no concession ismade; but--'

  "A laugh, deep, sonorous, and yet hollow and mocking, broke out from thelips of the first speaker, and rung through the arches--such a laugh aswe may suppose to have rung from the bearded lips of the Norse Jarl whenthe poor Viking asked his daughter's hand and the father intended tostun if not to kill him with the bitter scoff. I had heard that laughbefore, more moderately given, and minus the accompaniment of therushing wind without and the ringing of the hollow arches within. It wasthat of Dexter Ralston, and I now detected that he and his companionwere standing just within one of the embrasures, so as to be partiallysheltered from the wind, and I could trace their outlines. Ralston wasenveloped in a large cloak, and wearing his inevitable broad hat; andhis companion seemed much smaller, dressed in dark clothes, and wearingthe usual 'stovepipe.' I had no intention to play listener, but therereally did not seem to be any wish for privacy on the part of the manwho could laugh in that manner; and, at all events, I stood still in thedoorway and listened to the discussion of that topic, as I might nothave done to another.

  "'Well, what does the laugh mean?' asked the other, in a tone that didnot indicate remarkable good humor, when the sound had ceased.

  "'Excuse me, I was not laughing at _you_!' said Ralston, 'but at theblind, besotted fools who believe that they hold in their hands thedestinies of this Republic, and who really have no more power over themthan so many children playing at marbles! Hear Crittenden and Bakerbegging and pleading within there, to save what is lost; and Mason, thesly old fox, threatening them with what is already done!'

  "'What do you mean?' asked the other? 'Virginia--'

  "'Virginia has seceded!' spoke Ralston, with an accent that sounded likea hiss. I do not to this moment know whether it expressed triumph oranger.

  "'Seceded!' spoke the other, startled, as was evident from his voice.As for myself, I was trembling like a leaf, for I felt that the wordswere true, that the treason was already unfathomable, and that theCapitol was tumbling down about my ears long before it was finished.

  "'Seceded? Yes, I spoke the word!' said Ralston, 'and you are not verylikely to believe that I am mistaken.'

  "'No, no, certainly not!' replied the other, in a tone of energeticdisclaimer which showed that he knew _why_ Ralston was not deceived.'But then, if this is so, why does Mason remain, and why is the factkept in the dark?'

  "'_To gain time!_' answered Ralston, 'and to procure more arms. Virginiais a 'loyal State,' and arms may be shipped to her, while they cannot tothe States that are known to have seceded. You can guess that the armsgo further south almost as fast as they reach Richmond, and that Colt'spistols, especially, will pretty soon be beyond the reach of many menwho live north of Mason and Dixon's line. Do you understand _now_?' heconcluded.

  "'Humph! Yes, I begin to know something more than I did a while ago!'answered the other. '
Then, as you say, all that is going on in yonder isa farce, and--'

  "'And to-morrow's proceedings will be a more notable one!' Ralston brokein. 'Some of them, I believe, have been afraid of violence to-morrow. Nofear of that--the game is to be played differently, and it is not yetripe for blood. Well, I have had enough of it. Good-night!'

  "At the word Ralston stepped out from the arch, and his companionfollowed him. By the lamp-light in front I caught a view of the face asthe former went out, and saw that I had not been mistaken as to thevoice. I had intended, when I first knew it was Ralston, to accost himbefore he left, but I had now lost the desire, while my head was in thatwhirl and his own position seemed to be so ambiguous. He stepped towardthe gateway, and, I believe, entered a carriage and drove off. Theother, whose face I recognized by the lamp-light to be that of a certainNew York Congressman of more than doubtful antecedents, went back againthe moment after, and I suppose returned to the Senate Chamber.

  "As for myself, I may say that within half an hour after, late as itwas, I had placed myself in communication with a leading member of thenew party in power, with whom I happened to be well acquainted and whowas well known to have the ear of the new President, even if he did notreceive, within the next week, the portfolio of a Cabinet officer. Ineed not say, at present, whether he received the Cabinet appointment ornot, as it is a matter of no consequence to my story. Without mentioningany names, I told him what had fallen under my notice, and gave him myopinion that Government ought to act as if Virginia had already seceded.He thanked me for the trouble I had taken, and for my earnestness; saidthat if the assertion was true, it would be highly important, as guidingthe immediate policy of the administration; but, pshaw!--and the wholestory is that he did not believe it. Of course the new administrationdid not act as if Virginia had seceded; the Rebels were allowed togather arms at will and at leisure, Fortress Monroe came very near tofalling into their hands, and Norfolk Navy Yard did so, with thedestruction of half our best vessels, and ten millions of dollars worthof Government property--all which might have been avoided if they hadtaken a hint from a fool. Everybody understands now,[1] that Virginia_had_ formally seceded before the inauguration, and that she playedloyal for the very purposes indicated by Ralston.

  [Footnote 1: September, 1862.]

  "Now," Leslie concluded, "you know as much of Dexter Ralston as I do.And I think you will quite agree with me that he is one of the last menI could have expected to meet in the streets of New York at the presentmoment, when martial law is so prevalent and Fort Lafayette soconvenient."

  "Humph!" said Harding, getting up from the bed where he had lounged solong, examining his watch to see that it was nearly midnight, andlighting a fresh cigar to go home. "Humph! well, what do you make ofhim? A leading traitor, deep in the counsels of Jeff. Davis, Yancey andCompany?"

  "Humph!" said Leslie in return, "what else can he be?"

  "Or a Virginia Unionist, faithful among the faithless, and too brave tobe afraid anywhere?" suggested Harding.

  "Ah!" answered Leslie, in that tone which suggests a new idea, or thecorroboration of an old one.

  "Or a trusted agent of the Federal Government, giving up old prejudicesfor the sake of patriotism, and better acquainted with Seward thanSlidell--eh?"

  "By George!" exclaimed Leslie, "there is something in that idea! He mustbe one of the three--but which?"

  "That we may know better one of these days," said Harding, as Leslieaccompanied him out to the street. "Meanwhile he is certainly a mostsingular person, and I shall not be sorry to know more of him, whetheras friend or foe to the nation!"

  How soon and how remarkably his wish was fulfilled, to some extent, weshall see hereafter.