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Maneuvering toward it, he heard the boat scrape its bottom. Mazorca got out and pulled the boat from the water, dragging it onto the land until it was a dozen feet from the Potomac. Behind the trunk of a large tree, he turned the boat upside down and covered it with branches and leaves. Then he walked back to the shoreline and studied his work. It was just barely possible to make out the contours of the rowboat, but only because he knew it was there. A casual observer almost certainly would not see it.

Mazorca figured that if the boat’s owner bothered to hunt for his missing craft, he would assume either that it was stolen and long gone or that it had broken loose and drifted downriver. The possibility of it being both nearby and hauled onshore just a bit upriver probably would not occur to him. Yet it was now positioned perfectly for Mazorca, who wanted to make sure he could have free access to water in reasonably short order.

Mazorca removed his shoes, rolled up his pant legs, and tossed the saddlebag over his shoulder. Then he splashed into the river and waded back to his horse. He was pleased to think that he was well ahead of schedule. There was one more thing he wanted to do before leaving Maryland.

A block from Tabard’s, Rook told Springfield about the drubbing he had just received from Scott. “I’d like to know how Grenier came to write to Scott about me and those men from the canal. We’ve been watching her, but it seems like she’s been watching us.”

“Am I supposed to quit monitoring this fellow?” asked the sergeant, gesturing in the direction of the boardinghouse.

“He ordered me to stop the surveillance of Grenier. That’s all.”

Springfield smirked. “I suspect you’re living by the letter of the law, rather than its spirit.”

“At the moment, the spirit is moving me to learn more about Grenier’s friend,” said Rook. “Tell me what you know.”

After his meeting with Rook, Springfield had walked over to Tabard’s boardinghouse. He observed it for a little while. He concluded that the tenants were at work and that Mrs. Tabard was alone.

“So I knocked on the door,” he said. “When she answered, I introduced myself as Mr. Jones and inquired about a room. She said that she had one available on the third floor and offered to show it to me. Once we had looked it over, we sat in her dining room and chatted for several minutes. I made some gentle inquiries about her boarders. Thankfully, she’s a talker. I’m convinced that our man goes by Mr. Mays-he’s a new lodger, with a room on the second floor. It’s right at the top of the steps. She was reluctant to say much about him, but I could tell that she actually craved the conversation. She allowed that Mays is quite private and keeps strange hours. Sometimes she’s not even sure whether he’s in or out.”

“Do we know where he is right now?”

“He’s definitely out. She saw him leave this morning.”

“Does she know where he went?”

“No. As I said, his movements are a mystery to her.”

“The more we learn about this man, the more he intrigues me. It’s too bad we can’t take a look at his room.”

“Colonel, you’re much too pessimistic.”

“What do you mean?”

Springfield grinned. “Well, I got her to start talking about her son, who is in the navy.”

A puzzled expression crossed Rook’s face. The sergeant continued. “She wanted to show me a picture of him. So she retrieved it from another room.” Springfield paused and smiled even wider.

“Yes?” asked Rook.

“She was gone for a minute or two. I know it doesn’t sound like a long time, but when you think about it, a minute or two can seem like quite a while.”

Rook only let a few seconds go by before he prompted Springfield. “Please go on.”

“You can get a lot done in a minute or two.”

“That’s certainly the implication. So what did you get done?”

Springfield reached into his pocket. He jingled its contents. When he took his hand out, it held a key. His smile grew wider.

Portia woke to the sound of Nat snoring in a rocking chair. She sat up, stretched her arms, and yawned. Lying in bed all day had seemed to rejuvenate her.

The room was full of shadows, cast by the dim light coming from a window. She saw Nat stir, in the last stages of sleep. He had told her that he worked nights. When he left, she would be alone again, in the dark.

Perhaps this would be a good time to make her getaway. By giving her protection and food, Nat had done plenty for her. He did it at some risk to himself, too. Portia had not told him in so many words that she was a runaway, but what else could she be? Nat had to know. Leaving now would remove a danger from his midst. The problem was that she still had to find the White House. She had no idea where to go or even what it looked like.

Nat shifted around in his chair again. Maybe he could tell her. Then Portia could leave.

She yawned again and slipped her hand into her shirt to check on the photo. She had become so accustomed to its presence that she was only half aware that she was doing it. This time, however, her hand felt nothing. The failure to touch it startled her. In an instant, she was fully awake, patting down her clothes and searching through her blankets in a panic. She looked all over the bed, under it, and on the floor nearby. The picture was missing. Her mad scramble to find it had turned up nothing.

But it did wake Nat.

“Lookin’ for somethin’?” he asked. She did not care for his tone of voice. It sounded as if he already knew the answer to his question.

“I had somethin’ here, but it ain’t here now,” she said.

Without a word, Nat reached to a table beside him and lifted the photo for Portia to see.

“Gimme that!” shouted Portia, leaping to her feet. She tried to grab the picture, but Nat pulled it away. He held it with both hands from the top, ready to rip it in half if she took a step toward him. Portia froze in place.

“Just tell me what this is,” he said.

“I can’t believe you took that from me.”

“I didn’t take nothin’ from you. All I did was pick it up from where it fell.”

“Well, it’s mine, and I want it back.” Portia held out her hand.

“Put your hand down,” snapped Nat. He spoke with an authority that reminded her of an overseer. She obeyed. “Now sit back down,” said Nat in a lower voice. She obeyed that order too.

“I brought you here knowin’ the risks,” he said. “That was my choice. I’ll also help you get on your way to wherever it is you need to go. The worst thing for me would be for you to get caught two minutes after leavin’ because you didn’t know what you were doin’. I’ll give you help, but there can’t be no secrets. You’ve been hidin’ this photograph ever since you come here. Maybe you think it ain’t my business, but when I brought you here, fed you, and let you sleep, you made it my business.”

Portia’s voice held a note of desperation. “That picture’s the whole reason I’m here. You’ve helped me this much, Nat. You gotta give it back.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Let me ask you somethin’ first.”

“Okay.”

“What do you think of the president?”

“Abe Lincoln? He’s causin’ a lot of fuss around here. Right now, nobody seems to know if there’s a war comin’ or not. I sort of wish things were back to normal.”

“Are you for him or against him?”

“I’ve never thought of it that way. Nobody has asked me. I don’t get to vote, you know.”

“Where I’m from, everybody’s against him. All the white people are, anyway. They say he’s gonna free the slaves. That makes me for him.”

“I ain’t no slave, Portia. I don’t wanna see nothing happen that’s gonna make me one. Abe Lincoln’s givin’ people worries, and I’m not sure I’ll be better off when it’s over.”

“Does that mean you’re against him?”

“No, it don’t mean that. It would be good if Lincoln freed the slaves. But it’s not somethin’ he can just do. It’s more complicated than that. He’d have to fight a war, and that ain’t in my interests. If an army from Virginia were to come marchin’ into Washington, things wouldn’t look so good for me or my kind.”