Unholy Fire (33 page)

“Well … is she spoken for?” he asked.

When I turned to look at him, I saw that he was waiting on my next words as if his future happiness depended on them.

“No,” I said. “Not by me.”

“Well, wish me luck, Kit,” he replied, with an ebullient grin.

•  •  •

Val and Amelie emerged out of the shadows through the stable door behind us, his massive body dwarfing hers.

“We're going to see your favorite general,” he said to me.

From the look on Amelie's face, it was clear she wasn't thrilled at the prospect. Phil looked devastated at the thought of even temporarily parting from her.

“I hope to see you again very soon, Miss Devereaux,” he said, extending his hand. “Guarding you has been an honor.”

“Thank you, Mr. Larrabee,” she said, accepting it in her gloved one.

Val shook his head disdainfully before calling out to one of the grooms to bring a coach around. By then it was almost ten-thirty, and the pale, watery sun was finally burning off the morning fog that swirled across the Virginia plain.

The three of us remained silent during the ten-minute carriage ride to General Hooker's headquarters. We rolled to a stop behind a caravan of other vehicles that crowded the lane in front of the three-story white mansion house. The cold wind cut through me as I helped Amelie down from the coach.

As we approached the front door, it swung open and a young woman dressed in pink taffeta came out onto the veranda. She appeared very tired and looked neither right nor left as a young sergeant escorted her to a waiting coach. The hint of a smile appeared on Amelie's lips as it rolled away down the lane.

Inside, the center hall was large and lofty. Its wainscotted walls were covered with paintings of family ancestors. The beautiful parquet floors were tracked with mud. In the dining room, four members of General Hooker's staff were sitting under a massive cut-glass chandelier, logging in messages from an unending stream of couriers. They stopped to stare at Amelie as we went past them down the hall. Val intercepted an officer who was limping toward us with a dispatch case in his hands and asked where we could find General Hooker's chief of staff.

“Colonel Sloat is along there at the end,” he replied, pointing down a dark corridor.

The room at the end of the hall had formerly been the plantation office. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves were filled with agricultural tomes on livestock breeding and soil replenishment. A harried captain was standing in front of a slant-top desk, reading out the disposition of a reserve division to two lieutenants, who were laboriously hand copying the required orders.

“Colonel Burdette to see General Hooker,” said Val.

“I'm afraid that is impossible,” said the captain, without looking up from his sheaf of dispatches.

“Impossible or not, I will see him immediately,” replied Val.

The two lieutenants looked up for the first time. Their gaze first went to Val before shifting briefly to me, and finally resting on Amelie. One of them appeared to recognize her. He poked his comrade and whispered something into his ear as another officer stepped out of the adjoining room and came toward us.

Like Val, he was a full colonel, but the similarity ended there. About half Val's height, he had wide bovine hips that gave him the physical appearance of a pear. His eyes were sharp and calculating.

“I am Colonel Sloat,” he declared in a smooth baritone. “What is this all about?”

“We need to see General Hooker on a confidential matter,” said Val.

The lieutenant who had appeared to recognize Amelie gave his friend a leering grin. I was tempted to go over and remove it with the back of my hand.

“Whose command are you attached to, Colonel?” asked Sloat. Although he was facing Val, his eyes had come to rest on Amelie, too. There was mutual recognition in her eyes before she averted them to the floor.

“I report directly to Marsena Patrick, provost marshal general,” said Val.

Sloat's eyes conveyed a flicker of surprise before he said, “Whatever the matter involves, I'm sure it can wait until after the battle. We are expecting to begin the major bombardment any minute now.”

“It cannot,” came back Val. “General Hooker will want to see us immediately.”

Colonel Sloat removed a watch from his breast pocket and briefly glanced at it before raising himself to his full height.

“Perhaps you are not aware that General Hooker is commanding the army's center. I can assure you that he has no time for disciplinary issues right now. Let me make you a promise,” he said, with a smug grin. “I will personally make time to see you after the battle is won … perhaps in a day or two.”

“Thank you for your kind offer,” interrupted Val, “but it will be General Hooker, and it will be now.”

The muscles in Colonel Sloat's face contracted.

“This interview is over,” he said. “If you don't leave immediately, I will have you arrested.”

Val gave him a condescending stare and said, “A sagacious decision, I'm sure, but please inform our beloved Fighting Joe that I will be swearing out an order for his own arrest as soon as I return to my office, that action to be carried out immediately.”

“On what charge?” demanded Colonel Sloat.

Val glanced at the two lieutenants, and then picked up one of the dispatches from the desk. Turning it over, he wrote one word on the paper before handing it back to Colonel Sloat, who stared at it for several seconds.

“Leave us,” he said to the two young officers.

“You cannot be serious,” he said, when the door closed behind them.

“Of course I am. Ignore this at your own peril.”

In the ensuing silence, I wondered which man would buckle first.

“Time is running out,” said Val. “I would suggest you give General Hooker the opportunity to decide for himself whether he wants to face a court-martial on that charge.”

The little colonel stared up at Val for fully ten seconds.

“Wait here,” he said, finally.

We heard the sound of his boots going up the servant's stairs. He was back a minute later.

“The general will see you,” said Colonel Sloat with a venomous glare.

C
HAPTER
E
IGHTEEN

He was admiring himself in front of a carved walnut-framed mirror in one of the bedrooms on the second floor. Bare chested, he wore only a tightly fitted pair of navy blue uniform pants over polished calf-length cavalry boots. Without removing his eyes from his own reflected image, he drew a starched white linen shirt over his strapping shoulders and began to button it from neck to waist.

Not a hair on his flaxen head was out of place, and the wide-set blue eyes looked stern and commanding as he continued to appraise himself in the mirror. They softened when he looked up and saw the reflection of Amelie in the glass.

“I've missed you, little one,” he said, turning to face her. “I regret that I wasn't told you were here last night.”

“She wasn't here last night,” I said coldly.

His eyes took me in as Amelie sat down at a chair next to the fire.

“Well, Kit, I understand you are here to arrest me,” he said, with a sardonic grin.

“That comes within my purview,” said Val, his eyes scanning the room.

“The notorious Colonel Burdette,” said General Hooker. “I gather every desk general in Washington quakes upon hearing that name. Your reputation is fearsome, sir.”

“Justly earned, I can assure you,” replied Val.

“Well, Sam Hathaway thinks you walk on water, and that is good enough for me,” said General Hooker, as he deftly tied a black silk cravat around the linen collar of his shirt. Retrieving a carefully pressed uniform coat from the bed, he aimed another jaunty smile at us.

“So you have concluded that I am guilty of murder,” he said. “Well, in truth I soon will be. In another hour you will have good reason to arrest the entire general staff for capital murder. I'm to say that we are about to witness the greatest corpse making of the entire war. General Burnside's stupidity is only exceeded by his stubbornness.”

He looked up at the loudly ticking clock on the marble mantle piece above the fire.

“General Hooker, I am here solely to investigate the murder of a young woman who attended a birthday party in your honor three nights ago. As you are fully aware, she was a prostitute brought down here from the capital.”

“Yes, well as Kit knows, I do not ride with God's cavalry, Colonel Burdette. If you have a moral dilemma with that, I regret it. However, I am an unmarried soldier, and can do as I please. Enjoying female comfort has been the custom of soldiers since the days of Scipio. I prefer the company of whores, principally because one doesn't have to make false promises to enjoy their favors.”

He paused to smile at Amelie.

“I have no moral qualms about your sexual preferences, General, regardless of where they may lead you,” said Val. “Our legal forbearance, however, stops at murder.”

“I only pleasure them, Colonel,” replied General Hooker, “I don't murder them. That would be a waste of the good ones. Wouldn't you agree, little one?”

Amelie sat motionless by the fire in her chaste organdy dress and said nothing. Behind her, my eyes took in a canopied bed, its sheets and blankets in complete disarray, as if a hand-to-hand skirmish had been fought upon them. A drop-leaf walnut table stood next to the bed. The carcass of a baked chicken lay in the center of it surrounded by several serving dishes. There were two place settings at the table. I remembered the girl who was leaving just as we arrived.

“The prostitute's name was Anya Hagel,” said Val.

General Hooker put on his uniform coat and began to fasten its two matching rows of gilt buttons. From outside the window, I heard the drumbeat of horses clattering up the lane toward the mansion house.

“I do not recognize that name,” he said, picking up a half-full bottle of whiskey from the table and pouring two inches into a pewter field mug. “That does not mean I didn't know her, of course. I have enjoyed the company of many women without ever discovering their names.”

I removed the drawing of Anya Hagel from my uniform blouse. Crossing the room, I handed it to him. The odor of his cologne did not mask the scent of a strong perfume that hung in the air next to him. He stared down at the sketch with the appraising eye of a horse breeder at a Thoroughbred auction.

“I assume that Amelie has already given you a full account of everything that took place that night,” he said, before taking a swallow of the whiskey. His high-bridged hawkish nose was already pink, his cheeks almost red.

“To the contrary,” said Val. “She refused to tell me anything about that night or any of the people who were there.”

As the general continued staring at Anya's face in the portrait, his eyelids seemed to become heavier, making him appear almost drowsy.

“I do appreciate your sense of loyalty, little one, but I have nothing to hide,” he said, finally looking up from the portrait. “In any event nothing occurred that night that didn't take place at a hundred other affairs I have attended. When my admirers in Washington tell me I should run for president, I remind them that I already have a district full of whorehouses in the nation's capital named in honor of me. That cools their ardor rather quickly.”

“Do you recognize her, General?” asked Val.

“I never knew her name,” he said, finishing his whiskey. “But yes, I had her that night. A very energetic girl … she thrashed around like a rabbit in a snare.”

He emerged from his reverie long enough to add, “Of course, I had Amelie that night, too. You are the best my child … absolutely the best I've ever had.”

She stared back at him without emotion, still looking prim and virginal. I knew that she hadn't even known me when she had made love to him, but it didn't matter. The thought of her in his arms, enjoying his body the same way she had seemingly enjoyed mine, made me almost crazy with jealousy. I actually hated her then. I hated her with the same level of passion that I loved her.

“You touched my heart, Johnny,” she had whispered to me when we were lying together. But General Hooker had touched every other part of her, along with dozens if not hundreds of other men. Through a black cloud of anger, I heard Val's voice again.

“When did you last see Anya Hagel?”

“I believe she was performing with some of the other guests on the balcony. Isn't that right, Amelie? Although I was somewhat the worse for spirits by that point, I seem to recall that you and I were heading upstairs to your room.”

Val glanced in her direction. Amelie nodded.

“I have no idea who might have killed her or why,” added General Hooker. “But I hope you discover who did, Colonel, and that he is punished accordingly.”

“You might be interested to know that Miss Hagel was syphillitic,” said Val.

General Hooker was pouring himself another whiskey. He took a hefty pull on it and said, “Well, that is sad. But it is not at all uncommon in her profession, I can assure you.”

Going to his field chest next to the canopied bed, he removed a small article wrapped in waxed paper from the top drawer and tossed it to Val.

“I always use the lamb myself, he said. “It cuts down on the pleasure but is always safer in the long run. You can keep that.”

Val shook his head disbelievingly and said, “Who supplied these women to you?”

General Hooker again paused before answering.

“I don't see the harm in telling,” he said. “There was certainly nothing illegal in it … simply a favor from a friend. It was Laird Hawkinshield. He told Dan Sickles that the girls were a birthday present for me.”

“Are you aware that we have solid evidence implicating Congressman Hawkinshield in the supplying of substandard equipment to the army, including the defective gun carriages?” said Val.