"Constance?" In bed beside George on that sultry Wednesday after Gettysburg, she murmured to signify she was listening. "What will I do?"
The question was one she had been expecting — dreading — for months. She heard the strain in his voice, put there during an evening quarrel with their headstrong son. William had once again absented himself from his late-afternoon dancing class and sneaked off for a game of baseball with some Georgetown boys. Although George championed the game over a quadrille, he nevertheless had to reprimand William. The reprimand led to argument, and the argument ended with shouts from the father, sullen looks of rebellion from the son.
"You mean about the department?" she asked, though it was hardly necessary.
"Yes. I can't abide the stupidity and politicking any longer. And all the money being made from death and suffering — Thank God I have nothing to do with Stanley's contracts. I'd stuff them down his throat till he choked."
A pain started in her left breast. She had experienced many such dull aches lately, in her legs, her upper body, behind her forehead. She suspected the cause was a simple one — worry. She worried about her children, her father in far-off California, her weight creeping up a pound or two each month. She worried about George most of all. Night after night, he brought his troubles home and dwelled on them all evening.
Ripley's obstinacy in particular had become too much to bear. George cited a new example at least once a week. Recently General Rosecrans, hearing that Ordnance had some of those repeating coffee-mill guns in storage, had requested them for his Western command. At first Ripley wouldn't ship a single one; he still disapproved of the design. Finally, forced, he sent ten — and Rosecrans in return sent glowing performance reports to Lincoln. The President urged Ripley to reconsider the purchase of more of the guns. Ripley buried the request.
Constance knew Ripley's crimes by heart. He continued to campaign against breechloaders and repeaters, refusing to issue them to any but the mounted service. He tried to cancel existing contracts for them and wrote No more wanted across proposals from manufacturers.
"And yet," George had raged only last night, "not forty-eight hours after poor George Pickett's men were slaughtered charging our positions, I saw a report from a captured reb who fought against Berdan's Sharpshooters at Little Round Top. In twenty minutes, with single-shot breechloaders, Berdan's men fired about a hundred rounds each. The reb said his commander thought they had run into two whole regiments."
"Had they?"
George laughed. "Berdan had one hundred men. And still that old son of a bitch writes 'rejected' or 'tabled' on every plea for better shoulder weapons."
There was nothing new about such complaints from George. What was new was the frequency and the ferocity with which he voiced them. She dated that change from about a month ago, before the fall of Vicksburg, when an angry report on faulty Parrott shells crossed his desk. On investigation, he discovered the shells were part of a shipment from a Buffalo ammunition works whose samples he had inspected and turned back. The casings were pitted with holes resulting from faulty sand casting. How vividly she remembered his rage when he came home that evening.
"The slimy wretches had the gall to try to disguise the defects. They filled the holes with putty colored to match the metal."
Next day there was another blow:
"Ripley countermanded my rejection order. He approved the shipment. Seems the manufacturer's a distant relative of his wife. God, I'd love to lob some of those shells up his rear end. It would be the biggest service anyone could do for the Union."
That was the background, the accumulating bitterness that prompted his question tonight. She lay motionless in the dark of their bed, knowing the inevitable question she was duty-bound to ask by way of reply.
"What would you like to do, George?"
"Which answer do you want, the ideal or the realistic?"
"There are two? The former first, then."
"I'd like to work for Lincoln."
"Honestly? You admire him that much?"
"I do. Since that night we met at the arsenal, I feel I've come to know him well. He's in and out of our offices several times a week, asking questions, prodding, encouraging good ideas in spite of — maybe because of — our departmental dullness. I admit the man's rough-hewn, and it's lucky that campaigns aren't won or lost on the candidate's ability to look and act presentable, or he'd never be elected to anything. He doesn't dissemble, and some say that's a flaw — he never hides his doubts or dark moods. Ward Lamon told me several months ago that Lincoln's convinced he won't live to see Springfield again. But the man has qualities that are in damn short supply in this town. Honesty. Idealism. Strength. Good Lord, Constance, considering all the burdens he bears, from national to domestic, his strength is monumental. Yes, I wish I could work for him in some capacity, but there's no place."
"You inquired?"
"Discreetly. I didn't say anything to you because I felt sure it was an impossibility."
"Then what's the realistic answer?"
"I can go with the military railroads if Herman Haupt will have me. It's a good alternative. And I'm eager."
He said it so promptly she knew he had been ready with the idea for some time. Trying to keep her voice calm, she said, "That's field duty. Close to the battle lines —"
"Sometimes, yes. But what's important is this. It's work I believe I can do and take pride in."
Silence, broken by the inevitable rumbling of the night wagons. Sensing her tension, he rolled on his side — they were sleeping without clothes, as they often did — and caressed her bosom, soft, springy, wonderfully comforting in its familiarity.
"Do you not want me to do it?"
"George, in —" she cleared her throat "— in this marriage, you know neither party ever asks or answers that kind of question."
"I'd still like to know what you —"
"Do what you must," she said, kissing him, one palm against his face. She blinked rapidly, hoping he wouldn't feel the fear-inspired tears that sprang to her eyes.
"So, Herman — will you accept a new man?"
George asked that late the next day as he and the bearded brigadier leaned on Willard's bar. Haupt looked worn out. He had been shunting back and forth to Pennsylvania to get the rail lines from Gettysburg in repair.
"You know the answer to that. Question is, will the secretary release you?"
"By God, he'd better. I can't stand working within a mile of that man." He swallowed a raw oyster from the plate in front of him. "I suppose you've heard of the Randolph scandal —"
"Who hasn't? I gather he's forbidden to write about it, but he recruits listeners and repeats the story every chance he gets."
"He damn well should. It's a disgrace."
"Well, such philosophic reflections aside, I urge you to move fast. I think Stanton wants my head. I dislike him as much as you do, and he knows it. I refuse to put up with his prejudices and arrogance —" Haupt tossed off the rest of his whiskey with a dour smile. "— since I have my own to maintain."
They divided the remaining oysters. After the last one, George belched — one more irksome sign, along with joints that ached in the morning and gray hairs in his mustache, that his time was hurrying by.
Haupt asked how he hoped to effect the transfer. "It won't work if I simply request your services."
"I know. I have an appointment with the general-in-chief in the morning."