In a bedroom, Mazorca removed a blanket and sheet from a neatly made bed. He wrapped the corpse in them and decided to wait a couple of hours, when the streets would be even more desolate.
FIFTEEN
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 24, 1861
The sun’s rays had just started to touch the crane poking through the top of the half-built Capitol dome when Nat Drake heard the whistle blow. He always looked forward to the overnight train pulling in from Virginia at dawn. The load was sometimes big, and he was usually tired from hours of work, but its arrival marked the end of his shift. He could go home and sleep as soon as this last chore was done. This morning, the train was a little ahead of schedule. Nat hoped he would be walking toward his bed before the whole Capitol building was lit.
When he arrived on the platform, though, Nat frowned. Two members of his crew had not yet appeared. They were on the day shift, and they were supposed to show up in time to help unload the Virginia train. Nat knew what they were doing because they had done it plenty of times before: they were choosing to come in late. They would get away with it too, because they were white. Nat and the other night-shifters were black.
Nat understood that there was no point in complaining. He might have been a free black man, but that did not make him as free as the white people. He accepted this reality even as he did not like it. When the day shifters failed to show up on time, Nat just had to finish his job without them. He only wished they would treat him with the respect he thought he deserved as a fellow worker.
As the four members of his crew waited silently for the train to pull in, Nat remembered the morning, about two months earlier, when Abraham Lincoln had arrived. Nat was scheduled to work a double shift that day to prepare for the president-elect’s arrival in the afternoon, but the man appeared on a Baltimore train first thing in the morning. Instead of the celebration that would have greeted Lincoln later in the day, a handful of somber-looking men escorted him away from the train station and into the city without fanfare.
Nat did not know what to expect from the new president. He had heard all the talk about Lincoln freeing the slaves-it was something his neighbors discussed almost daily, though never in the presence of a white person. When Nat set his eyes on Lincoln that morning, a part of him wanted to quit what he was doing and applaud the man who had become the symbol of so much hope. But Nat kept on working, partly because he did not want to draw attention to himself and mostly because he was a natural skeptic. He worried that Lincoln was just another white man who did not show up at the station on time.
The Virginia train was fairly empty, as it had been for weeks. His crew opened a car that normally would have been full of cargo only to discover that it was mostly vacant.
“Gimme a hand with this one, Martin,” said Nat when he saw a square box in the corner. “It’s kind of bulky.”
Another man came over and they lifted the box together. Nat did not think it was too heavy, but the weight of it seemed to shift around inside. He was glad someone was helping him carry it out.
“I think this is the last one,” said Martin as they moved the box off the car. “Unloadin’ is quick when nobody wants to come to Washington. I could get used to this.”
“You could also get used to not having a job,” said Nat. “If this keeps up, there won’t even be a train station here.”
Nat thought he felt the weight of the box shift around again. “Hey, Martin, keep this thing balanced,” he said.
“What’re you talkin’ about? You’re the one who can’t hold it straight.”
“It’s not movin’ around because of me. That leaves you,” said Nat as they lowered the box onto the platform.
“Give it up, Nat.” Martin let go of his end of the box when it was still a foot off the ground. Nat could not prevent it from dropping hard onto the ground.
“Ouch!”
Nat thought the box had landed on Martin’s foot, but Martin had already stepped away. Then it occurred to him: the voice came from inside the box. He stood up and looked at it for a moment. Was he hearing things? He shook his head and started to walk off.
Then he heard a sharp knocking sound. He spun around and listened. It was definitely coming from the box. Something inside was trying to get out.
“Martin, get over here,” he yelled.
As Martin approached, he heard the knocks too. The top of the box started to budge. All of a sudden, it burst into the air. Beneath it stood a small woman in crumpled clothes. She arched her back, spread her arms, and groaned loudly.
Nat was dumbfounded by the scene in front of him. The woman squinted. “Is this Washington?” she asked.
“Yes it is,” replied Nat.
Portia smiled briefly before a look of pain crossed her face. She twisted around, trying to loosen her muscles from the long trip.
“Who are you?” demanded Martin.
Portia did not answer. She stepped out of the box, almost falling over. Her head whipped around, looking for an exit. Then she stumbled off and disappeared from view.
Nat and Martin looked around the platform, then at each other, and finally at the empty wooden box. Apparently nobody else had seen the woman. They were not even sure they had seen her themselves.
“Don’t say a word about this,” said Nat.
“I don’t think anybody would believe me if I did.”
Grenier leaned into her back door and pressed it closed. She let out a deep sigh. Finally rid of him, she thought. At least he was worth the effort. The men who came into her bedchamber were rarely there because of Grenier’s raw attraction to them. The only thing that drew her to this latest bedmate was his willingness to provide details on the inner workings of the government. This was plenty. He was an exquisitely well-placed source.
Her informant must have recognized her keen interest in his work. She was constantly asking him questions about it. The key, of course, was that he provided the answers. Sometimes it took a bit of enticing, but he never failed to give her what she wanted. He got what he wanted in return. Grenier wondered if he even knew their relationship was based on a transaction. It was conceivable that he did not know, and that his vanity kept him from understanding her actual motives. Or he could have been willfully blind-vaguely aware of his own recklessness but refusing to confront it because he enjoyed the reward so much.
Whatever awkward justifications went on inside his head were of little interest to Grenier. If he kept providing information, she would keep arranging rendezvous. As far as she was concerned, they could go on like this for as long her friends south of the Potomac found it helpful-and so far they had found it extremely helpful.
Unless somebody tried to stop them. Before last night, surveillance of her activities had been nothing more than a theory-the knowledge that it might happen. Now there was actual proof: her recent guest’s information about Rook’s interests and her own observation of the man who was watching her house.
Grenier was not a woman to ignore a problem. She locked the back door and headed for the staircase. This morning would be dedicated to solving problems, she decided.
Her cat squeaked a greeting as Grenier entered the second-floor study. The animal was on her desk, sprawled across loose papers. She rubbed his head and listened to his loud purr. With her other hand, she yanked a piece of paper from under the cat’s paws. “This letter has weighed on me all night, Calhoun,” said Grenier, glancing over the Bennett correspondence once more. “I don’t want to call off Mazorca. What good would come of that? I want him to succeed. It took months of planning to get him here, and we can’t afford to let more time pass while we search for a replacement.”