Unholy Fire (22 page)

“Val?” I whispered, gently. His eyes fluttered, and came open.

“Don't blame yourself,” I said, putting my hand on his shoulder.

He stared straight up, unseeing.

C
HAPTER
T
WELVE

Death is nothing more than a word. I had seen it in many forms since the war began, but those deaths did not begin to prepare me for what I had witnessed in the field behind the overseer's cottage. More than anything, I was left with a sense of deep disgust at the knowledge that I wore the same uniform as the base and cowardly men who had murdered Thomas and Daniel Beecham. The act was nothing less than an abomination of the soul, and the reasons why the war had originally seemed worth fighting now seemed irrelevant to me.

I spent the rest of that day and most of the evening writing a report for General Hathaway of everything that had occurred after the discovery of the girl's body. With all the news correspondents in camp, the provost marshal general was publicly vowing to undertake a complete investigation of the incident, in which five soldiers had also been killed. Eighteen more were recovering from wounds or injuries. Of the incomparably brave Lieutenant Hanks, there was no word at all.

After delivering my report, I felt near physical collapse and returned to my tent. Lying on my cot, I relived the hideous events at the overseer's cottage over and over in my mind. Some time after midnight, I finally fell into a troubled sleep, awaking shortly after dawn with a dull, pounding headache. I got up and went to the wash tent, where I examined myself in a small hand mirror. Aside from the knot on the side of my head and some badly bruised ribs, I had no lingering injuries.

Val was not so lucky. He had been unable to move his legs after regaining consciousness, and the doctors who examined him feared that in addition to the head wounds he had sustained in the fight near the farm lane, he had also suffered a broken neck.

I tried to visit him twice the next day, but on both occasions he was under sedation and unconscious. For an hour I sat by his cot, praying that he was not paralyzed. The thought that he might lose his mental faculties was something I refused to even contemplate.

From the number of staff officers and generals who were constantly coming and going at the different headquarters, it was clear that the final preparations for Burnside's attack were underway. I happened to be standing in the front hall of the mansion house waiting to meet with Sam Hathaway when General Hooker arrived for one of the conferences followed by all his division commanders. He was very angry and looked neither left nor right as he stalked down the corridor.

There had been a new development in our investigation of the defective gun carriages. It was not good news. Based on the information he had learned from Major Duval, Sam had wired Val's deputy, Ted Connell, with instructions on how and where to find the shipping manifests we needed from the file repository in the Quartermaster General's Office at the War Department in Washington. Ted had sent a wire back several hours later to say that the War Department had refused him access to any of the files without specific authorization from General Nevins.

In the meantime, a colonel on General Nevins's staff had arrived at Sam's headquarters with an order demanding the release of Major Duval to his custody. Sam refused to comply with the order.

“I don't care if Secretary Stanton himself demands his release,” he said, “I will resign first.”

From Sam's window, we could see the Confederate battle flag flying from the tops of several buildings across the river in Fredericksburg. On the heights beyond the town, all activity appeared to have ceased.

“They have everything in place over there,” said Sam, scanning the heights through his binoculars. “They're just waiting for us to come across and be slaughtered.”

Placing the binoculars in his lap, he furiously wheeled himself back to his desk.

“Sometime in the next thirty-six hours this army will attempt to cross that river,” he said, “and our attacking force will need all the artillery support they can get. We must know which carriages are defective.”

“I'm convinced that when Duval thought he was facing his own extinction, he told you the truth, Sam,” I said.

“I agree,” he said. “But as soon as he is released, the weasel will tell his friends what we have learned, and they will wire Washington to move or destroy the files.”

“If I leave for Washington immediately, I could be there by late tonight,” I said, looking at my watch.

Sam's mind was already working in the same direction.

“I will find a way to hold off releasing Duval for another twelve hours. By then you will hopefully have the shipping manifests and be on your way back.”

“I will get them, Sam,” I said, with an air of confidence I did not truly feel.

“There will be a packet boat waiting for you at Aquia Creek in two hours. It should get you to the navy yard by about eleven tonight. The packet boat will wait there with its boilers banked until you return with the files. That is our only hope.”

As I prepared to leave, he said, “Take Billy with you. He has a way of proving useful in difficult situations.”

Sergeant Osceola and I agreed to meet at the packet boat.

Before going back to my tent to pick up my bag, I walked over to the hospital encampment. Val's doctor had just completed his examination when I arrived.

“It is still too early to tell whether his neck is broken, but as a precaution I have immobilized the entire area around his head,” he told me.

“May I talk to him now?” I asked.

He looked at me with obvious relief.

“I would be very grateful if you would. Colonel Burdette seems to think he is ready to return to duty. But if he doesn't remain immobilized, he might well do permanent injury to himself. I regret to say we were forced to use confining straps on him.”

They had sequestered him in his own tent, which had a planked hardwood floor. Around the head of his cot, the doctors had erected a metal cage, its iron ribs bolted to the floor and extending upward to a point several feet above Val's upper body. He was lying on his back, his arms and torso encased in a tightly wound linen jacket that was bound with leather straps. Another metal contraption was fitted around his head, holding it rigidly against his shoulders in a rectangular nest of rods and wires. They had trimmed his hair and beard in order to stitch his head wounds. He actually looked quite distinguished.

“Get me out of this thing, Kit,” he growled, as soon as he saw me.

The sight of him reminded me of Gulliver when he was first trapped by the Lilliputians, and I couldn't help but laugh. That only made him angrier.

“These idiots are convinced I have a broken neck. The only way I can prove it isn't broken is for you to release me from this cage.”

“I had to learn how to follow the doctor's orders. Now it's your turn.”

“This is ridiculous,” he said, straining at the bonds that immobilized his upper body.

“Look, I only have a few minutes before I have to leave for Washington,” I said. “Will you listen to me, or are you just going to enjoy your tantrum?”

He stopped straining and slowly relaxed.

“Go ahead,” he said, closing his eyes.

I told him what had occurred when Ted Connell tried to get the documents in Washington without arousing suspicion, as well as our new plan. He agreed that it represented our only chance.

“Time is running out,” he said. “Hundreds, maybe thousands of lives, are riding on the success of your mission. I have but one change to propose. If you are able to retrieve the manifests, send them back with Billy on the packet boat. Then there is one more thing I want you to do while you are up there.”

From the depths of his metal cage, he fixed his slate gray eyes on me.

“I believe that the murder of that young woman intersects with our corruption investigation. From my experience, corruption goes hand in hand with prostitution and blackmail. The young woman may well have been a pawn in the larger game.… But even if she wasn't, we are honor bound to try to find her murderer. The Beechams died for a crime they did not commit. If they hadn't chosen to help, the two of them would still be alive. God help us, their blood is on our hands.”

The rage in his eyes was palpable. With his beard shorn, I could see the veins bulging out on his massive neck.

“The first thing you must do is find the young woman who was with the dead girl at the party. She holds the key to this mystery.”

The idea of finding the sad-eyed girl seemed ludicrous on its face. I remembered him saying to President Lincoln that there were more whores in Washington than Baptists. How did he expect me to locate one prostitute out of thousands?

Regardless of his head injuries, he still retained the capacity to read my mind.

“You're thinking that it is a daunting task. Well, I can narrow the chase for you. After Billy is safely on his way back here with the gun carriage files, you go straight to the asylum and track down Tim Mahoney. He has an office down the hall from mine and is in charge of rating the whorehouses.”

I wasn't sure I had heard him right.

“Don't look at me like I'm an idiot,” he said. “To protect the health of our soldiers, the provost marshal surveys the quality of every bawdy house in the city. Get that list and then cross off all the houses in Murder Bay and Hooker's Division.”

“Hooker's Division?”

“Yes. The whorehouse district is named after your favorite general. They named it for him a few months after his brigade arrived in the capital last year. His boys were quite prolific in their appetites. But you won't find our girl there. Those places are for men without the financial means to afford better.”

I pulled out my calendar book and began taking notes.

“As you know, I examined the dead girl quite carefully. From the piercing of the flesh around her genitals to the atrophic state of her annular muscle, there is no doubt that she was willing to engage in highly specialized forms of sexual gratification. Almost certainly, it would have been in a house that caters to men with expensive tastes.”

“How do you know she was German?” I asked.

“I am by no means certain,” he said, “but based on the fillings in her teeth, she is definitely foreign born. Her facial structure, complexion, and interpupilary cleft suggest either Germanic or Scandinavian origin. After the Irish, the second highest percentage of foreign-born prostitutes in Washington are German. So it's a fair assumption.”

“What if the other girl never left here?”

“On the afternoon of General Hooker's party, Burnside issued an order for all wives and family members to return to Washington. Two steam frigates were scheduled to escort them back the following day. Assuming that occurred, the chance that she is still here is very slim … unless she is dead. But if you can find her, Kit, we will learn who invited them down to Falmouth and what happened to them while they were here.”

Something nudged my brain at that moment, something that I had recently seen or heard, but I was unable to remember what it might be. He saw the look of puzzlement on my face and asked what I was thinking.

“It's probably nothing,” I said. “Anyway, I cannot recall it now.”

“You will probably find the woman we are looking for in one of the houses near Marble Alley. Mahoney maintains a full report on each of them, including a description of the services they provide. Now untie these goddamn straps.”

“I would do anything for you, but not that,” I said, “not until the doctors know it's safe.”

He must have seen the resolution in my eyes because all he said then was, “Her life is probably in danger, Kit … yours as well. Be vigilant.”

“I will,” I said. “See you tomorrow.”

Walking back to pick up my bag, I saw that my uniform was ripped in one place and stained with blood. I stripped off all my clothes, gave myself a field bath, and put on my other uniform.

An idea struck me as I was leaving. After finding out where the newspaper correspondents' tent was located, I headed over there. It was empty except for a private who was sitting behind a sawhorse-and-lumber table, idly picking at his teeth with a pocket knife. I asked him for the billet location of Philip Larrabee of the Boston
Examiner.
The boy ran down the handwritten list with his finger and said, “The stables … if he ain't sleeping it off somewhere's else.”

Phil was playing poker in one of the training stalls.

“I need your help,” I said. “It's important.”

“It would have to be now,” he complained, “I've just started getting some decent cards.”

He reluctantly followed me across the paddock to the icehouse. Inside, I lifted the sheet from the dead girl's face and said, “Could you sketch her as if she were alive?”

“Why don't you just ask me to bring her to life while I'm at it,” he said, discomfited.

“We are trying to find the man who murdered her, Phil,” I said.

He stared down again at her face.

“You'll have to open her eyes for me,” he said with a grimace.

It took him less than five minutes. When he was finished, I looked down at his sketch. He had indeed brought her back to life, at least on paper.

“This is really good, Phil,” I said to him. “Thank you.”

As I was walking away, he called after me, “Too bad you're going to miss the last great battle of the war, Kit.”

“Hope it is,” I said.

I met Billy Osceola at the wharf along Aquia Creek. He stood apart from the crowd of soldiers milling near the gangplank of the packet boat. Unlike the others, all of whom were wearing heavy winter coats, Billy wore only his thin uniform blouse. The dark sky was threatening rain, and he was carrying a rolled up rubber poncho over his shoulder. A Remington revolver hung from a handmade leather holster on his hip.