Part 4

Lincoln’s long lips drew back and quirked up a little at one corner. “I see. And what military organization did you want to be captain of?”

“No organization, Mr. President, but I been a private in the Sixty-third Ohio a long time, sir—”

“How long a time?”

“Four months, Mr. President.”

“And you have a company organized, maybe, that you want me to make you captain of?”

“No, sir—I haven’t got any company organized. But I just want to be a captain. My mother says I should be a captain. She told me to see you about it.”

Lincoln clasped his bony hands around a knee. “What’s your name, soldier?”

“Milo, sir. Milo Potter.”

“Milo, did you ever hear the story about the farmer out in Illinois, where I was raised? Well, this fellow he was a good farmer and a dutiful son to his mother but he got up towards forty years old and he’d never married a wife. So his mother fretted at him, said she was getting too old to churn and milk and he ought to fetch a wife home to take some of the work off of her. So this farmer, call him Jim, he goes down to the church and hunts up the preacher. ‘Preacher’, says Jim ‘I got to get married. Mammy says so.’ ‘All right, Jim,’ agrees the preacher, ‘I’ll be proud to marry you. You go get your license and bring the woman here with you and I’ll give you a real good marrying.’ ‘But I haven’t got any woman, Preacher,’ Jim argues kind of dashed. ‘Well, you can’t get married without a woman, Jim’, the preacher tells him. That’s your problem, Milo. You want to be a captain and you haven’t got any organization to captain. What made you think you could be a captain, anyway?”

“Well, Mr. President,” the boy flushed unhappily, “it was that captain we got in B Company. That last battle—he made us retreat. And right there in front of us there was a hole in that Rebel line I could have drove four wagons through. There wasn’t no sense in that retreat, Mr. President. All of us boys said so. All of us was mad. So I thought I can be a better captain than that.”

“Maybe you can, Milo. You go on back to B Company and be a good soldier and likely you’ll make captain before this war is over.”

“Mr. President, I can’t do it! I run off. They’ll put me in the guardhouse!”

Lincoln scratched his chin. “That was very unwise of you, soldier. But you can’t dodge your military responsibility. I reckon you’ll just have to go to the guardhouse. If you should try to hedge out of it you’d be as poor a soldier as that captain of B Company you complain about. It won’t be too bad. Good luck to you, son.”

The boy said, “Thank you, sir,” and backed out, twisting his cap in his hands.

“Stand up straight, look the captain in the eye, and admit you ran off, son,” advised Lincoln. “You needn’t tell him you came here to get his job away from him.”

“No, sir, I sure won’t.”

John Hay came in when the young trooper had gone. “I shouldn’t have let him in perhaps, Mr. President,” he explained, “but he said he had an important message for you.”

“It was important. To Milo Potter,” smiled Lincoln. “No harm done, Johnny.”

“Your son is waiting, sir. Shall I send him in?”

“Must be Bob. Tad would have already been in.”

Robert came in, took a chair, and folded his hands, his young mouth sober. “I had to know, sir,” he began, “have they been making attempts to kill you?”

“Bob, there are several million people who think that the man who kills me should wear a hero’s crown. And there are a lot of people who yearn to be heroes,” Lincoln said calmly.

“You should be better protected. You shouldn’t take risks!”

“They’re trying to protect me now, Bob, till I can’t hardly draw my own breath.”

“That fellow who just went out. Did you even know him?” persisted the boy.

“He was harmless. I reckon Johnny even took his jackknife away from him. I have to see ’em, son. I have to hear their story. That’s why they put me here,” declared his father.

“About the Army, Papa—I’m deadly serious.”

“The trouble is, Bob, that your mother is deadly serious, too. She’s lost two boys,” Lincoln reminded him.

“So have other women.”

“I know. Give her a little more time, Bob. Till the end of this year anyway. The war isn’t going to end before New Years’ Day.”

“I shan’t wait much longer, I promise you,” threatened Robert, standing tall.

“Just promise me to the end of this school year. Then we’ll talk about it again.”

“And you’ll talk to Mama? Make her see that it’s something I have to do?”

“I’ll talk to Mama,” agreed Abraham Lincoln. “I’ll do my best, son.”

But when, he was thinking wearily after the boy had gone, had his best ever been good enough to prevail against Mary’s ready tears?

7

“Bob,” Abraham Lincoln said, when he went back to the family rooms, “I need some help. Your mother has very graciously provided some little Christmas cheer for those boys out there of Company K. The things are all here in this big box. I’ll need you to help pass ’em out.”

He bent and shouldered the heavy box that Mary had packed with small, paper-wrapped bundles.

“Oh, Papa, let me call somebody! You shouldn’t carry that,” protested Robert.

“Little enough to do for those boys.” Lincoln bent under the burden. “It will mean more to them if I fetch it to them personally.”

“Ridiculous!” fumed Mary. “It’s beneath your dignity to lug that heavy box.”

“Put my hat on, Mary, and put it on tight so I won’t knock it off.” He ignored her protest calmly.

She jammed the high hat down over his rough hair, the bony knobs of his head. “You—the President of the United States!” she exploded. “With a house full of help and you lug that heavy thing!”

“He who would be greatest among you, let him seek out the lowest place,” quoted Lincoln, solemnly and a bit inaccurately. “Not near so heavy as a good stout oak rail and I’ve shouldered many of them in my day. Come along, Bob.”

“At least let me help carry, sir,” argued Robert as they went down the stairs.

“Don’t touch it or you’ll get it unbalanced and spill all Company K’s Christmas. Little enough, but I had John Hay fetch me a roll of greenbacks. I’ll give every man a dollar. A dollar is a right substantial present, Bob, when you’re marching and fighting for thirteen dollars a month and what you can eat, when you get a chance to eat.”

“I would do it gladly,” insisted Robert. “All I ask is a chance.”

“I know, son. Maybe we can talk your mother around by spring. I did some better in the Black Hawk War.” Lincoln went on, stepping heavily down the outer steps and across the rutted yard. “They paid me eighty-five dollars for ninety days fighting in that war but part of the time I ranked a captain. We had to shoot hogs to eat, though, and then fight the farmers that owned ’em. Swampy country, too. Like Grant’s army fought over around Vicksburg.”

“But you captured Black Hawk.”

“The regular Army said they did that. I got put in the guardhouse for two days for firing a pistol in camp and they made me carry a wooden sword after that. Discipline. You couldn’t make any worse record in the army, Bob, than your father did before you.”

“You couldn’t call that a real war, Papa,” Robert said.

“It was real enough to the men who got their scalps peeled off. I helped bury twelve of them. Now, look at that lieutenant! Sending an escort up here on the double and putting all those boys in line at attention, when I just came out here on a friendly visit.”

“Even Tad!” laughed Robert. “Even the confounded goat!”

The goat wore his military hat and Tad was holding him grimly into line by his horns. Lincoln let the two soldiers who came trotting up help him ease the box down to the ground.

“At ease, men,” he ordered. “This is old Father Christmas, not the commander in chief. File by, one at a time, and get your Christmas cheer.”

Robert passed out the packages one by one while Lincoln stood thumbing bills off a roll of money, stopping to wet his thumb occasionally, saying, “Here, son, spend this on some foolishness next time you get a pass into town.”

There were yells of thanks and a lined-up cheer for the President, the goat blatting an obligato. But Tad, who had straggled at the end of the line and received nothing, glared down into the empty box, whimpering.

“I’m a soldier. I didn’t get any present,” he complained.

“You got plenty of presents at the house, Tad,” said his father. “You’ve got candy there, too. Don’t you go bumming off these boys now. You have more Christmas than any of them.”

“But I want a soldier Christmas,” persisted Tad, “and I want my nanny goat back!”

“You’ve got a goat,” scolded Robert, “a blamed nuisance of a goat. You’re getting so you even smell like him.”

“He’s clean,” fumed Tad. “Joe washed him and curried him and the corporal even put hair oil on his whiskers. Can I take Billy in the house, Papa? Can I? I want him to have some candy.”

“No, Tad, no more goats in the house. That’s your mother’s order. Last time,” Lincoln explained to Robert, “Tad drove two of them, hitched to a chair, right through the middle of one of your mother’s social shindigs. Upset a couple of ladies and spilled claret punch on their dresses. Disgraced the whole Lincoln family and busted some good crockery too.”

“It’s cold out here! Billy’s cold.” Tad hung to his father’s coattail but refused to let go the goat. “Billy will catch cold.”

“Private Bullitt,” ordered Lincoln, “will you tie up this goat in a sheltered place? Tad, you come along inside. You’ll get the sniffles and your mother will scold all of us. Corporal, if you must provide escort for this family to their door, line ’em up. We’re ready to march.” Lincoln took a military stance, between two privates, who were very rigid with importance. Tad pulled back till Robert gave him a gentle, brotherly cuff.

“You act more like a baby than a colonel,” he said. “If you want to cry, hand over that sword. You’ll disgrace the army, bawling on the march.”

“Let loose of me!” shrilled Tad, jerking away. Turning he ran pelting back to the circle of tents, dove into one and vanished.

“You’d better go after him, Bob,” worried the President. “Your Mama will worry if he’s out in this cold too long.”

“Yes, sir,” said Robert, unenthusiastically, “but If I may make a suggestion, sir, that boy needs discipline. He’s getting out of hand.”

“Yes, sir, I stand reproved, sir,” said Lincoln meekly. “Just fetch him along in. I’ll wait here,” he told the escorting privates. “Stand at ease.”

“Mr. President, I hope Tad don’t run off again,” worried one soldier. “We try not to take our eyes off him when he’s out here with us. Could be some Rebel sympathizers hangin’ round that would think it was a smart move to catch up Tad and hold him. Know you’d be mighty near be willing to surrender Washington to get that boy back, your pardon, sir, for speaking so bold.”

Panic stiffened Abraham Lincoln’s long body. He broke into a long-legged trot back toward the tents, the escort panting after him. Robert emerged, pale-faced, from one tent and, with a dozen soldiers charging after him, hurried into another. He came out again, his hands outspread, helplessly.

“He’s hiding somewhere, Papa,” he said. “We can’t find him.”

“Spread out, men!” shouted the lieutenant. “Comb the area. Six of you guard the President. Corporal Barnes, form a guard detail.”

The corporal hustled Robert into the middle of the protecting group, who faced outward bayonets alerted. Robert was angry and full of expostulations.

“I don’t have to be guarded like a prisoner,” he protested. “I want to go and help search for Tad.”

“Private Bullitt, here, has just made a rather startling suggestion, Bob,” said Lincoln worriedly. “He thinks that if some Rebel sympathizer should catch up Tad and hold him I might be pressured into surrendering Washington to get the boy back. And it might be,” he added sadly, “that I would be weak enough to do it!”

“You never would! You couldn’t—with honor!” explained Robert. “But it would be a mighty tough decision, sir. Is that,” he asked sharply, “why you won’t let me go into the Army? For fear I might be captured and held as a hostage to force some concessions out of you? I want to tell you, sir, that if I can get into the Army—and no matter how I’m treated there or what happens to me, I’ll be a United States soldier, Mr. Lincoln—you can forget that I ever was your son.”

“Very nobly said, son,” Lincoln patted his shoulder. “I’ll try to abide by your decision if the occasion ever arises. But Tad is my son. A little helpless boy. A boy I’m mighty fond of, and they know it!”

“If I may speak plainly again, sir,” said Robert, “he needs his breeches tanned. And you are the one who ought to do it.”

“He couldn’t have gone far,” fretted Lincoln. “It’s beginning to snow again.” He moved across the yard, his escort keeping rigidly in formation on either side. “Tad!” he shouted. “You, Tad—come back here!”

“He wanted to be a soldier, Mr. President,” put in one of the soldiers. “Tad was bound he was a soldier.”

“All my boys,” said Lincoln, “wanting to be soldiers!”

There was a shout presently from beyond the fenced in confines of the yard. Men started running.

“They’ve seen him,” cried Robert relieved. “The ornery little devil!” He began to run himself, and Lincoln trotted too, almost outstripping his guards.

“There he is!” exclaimed a soldier. “Up on that scaffolding again!”

“They’re going after him. They’ll get him down.” Lincoln almost forgot to breathe. The little figure looked so small against the loom of that great half-finished monument—a tiny, struggling shape swarmed over by half a dozen men in blue who clung precariously to the spidery trestles, caught him and passed him down slowly, kicking and fighting, from one to another.

They brought him up in a few minutes, a pathetic, disheveled sight, tear-stained, dragging his feet, still kicking at the shins of the men who restrained him. His military cap was over one eye, his belt half off, the toy sword dragging.

“Fetch him here!” sternly ordered the President of the United States.

Tad stumbled close, held tight by the elbows by two privates. His chin was shaking, sobs shook him.

“Oh, Papa—Oh, Papa—” he gasped, trying to fling himself at the tall man with the suddenly grim and forbidding face.

But Lincoln was unrelenting. “Thomas Lincoln! Give me that sword!” he ordered in a terrible voice.

Trembling Tad jerked the sword loose, handed it over.

“Present the hilt, in proper military order!” snapped his father.

Tad reversed the sword, his hand shaking so that almost it fell to the ground.

“Yes, sir!” His voice was very thin and small.

Solemnly Lincoln broke the sword over his knee, tossed it to one side.

“You are now reduced to the rank of private, Thomas Lincoln,” he stated, “until such time as you can conduct yourself in the proper manner and discipline of an officer of the Army of the United States. Strip off his epaulets, Corporal.”

The corporal obeyed, looking unhappy and ill at ease, handing the gold-fringed boards into the hands of the commander in chief.

“Private Thomas Lincoln, you will now escort the President of the United States back to the White House,” ordered Abraham Lincoln. “Forward march!”

Every man of Company K fell in, marched in grave formation, eyes straight ahead, chins set, weapons held ready, to the side door of the house. Lincoln entered first, turned on the doorstep, and soberly saluted the ranks.

“My deepest gratitude, men of Company K,” he said, “for labor beyond the call of duty.”

Tad marched in stiffly; then, with a frightened look backward at this stranger who had been his adored and indulgent father, flew through the hall and up the stairs. His mother came hurrying out of the sitting room but he ignored her, flying past her to the room with the great high-topped bed. There Private Thomas Lincoln dived under the bed.

When the dinner gong sounded, he refused to come out, even at his father’s stern order.

“All right,” dismissed Abraham Lincoln. “Since you’re such a craven and a coward, Private Lincoln, you may remain in durance there. I can eat two drumsticks.”

Tad rolled out, swiftly, covered with dust and lint.

“I am not a coward!” he sobbed. “I climbed most to the top of that silly ole monument!”

“You are still a disgrace to the uniform,” declared his father. “A soldier who ran away. Now go and wash yourself before your mother comes in here and scolds both of us.”

“Yes, Papa dear!” whimpered Tad, hugging the long legs and snuffling. “And you can have both drumsticks.”

8

The Christmas party was in full swing. Abraham Lincoln had shaken hands till his knuckles ached. Mary Todd Lincoln’s coral-colored satin and turbaned headdress with jaunty flowers and feathers had swished and bowed and rustled, and her round face was all aglow with pleasure and excitement. She was always vivacious at parties, and, if at times she was a bit too garrulous, Lincoln overlooked that indulgently. He had not given Mary much of happiness, and she had had her share of frustration and sorrow. Now, if she could find pleasure in the dull round of an official affair, he was content.

Some of the senators and other officials had had a few too many parties already. One judge was already asleep on a padded sofa in the hall, his gaited ankles sprawling, his mouth open. The musicians from the Marine Band played on doggedly and quietly in the screened corner of the East Room. Here and there stood men of Company K and White House guards, stony-faced, rigidly alerted. Abraham Lincoln felt his legs begin to sag a bit under him, found himself wishing wearily that this company would all go home. But at least Mary was enjoying herself.

It was nearly midnight when an aide came through the crowd, and touched the arm of the President.

“Some men of Company K at the rear door, Mr. President,” he said in a low voice. “They insist on seeing you. An officer is with them. They say they have brought a Christmas present for your son, Thomas.”

Lincoln looked about him. Mary was the animated center of a group. Servants were collecting empty glasses and picking up shattered remnants of flowers from the carpet. Secretary Seward stood in the midst of a dozen men who were arguing a trifle too loudly the question of amnesty for North Carolina. The band was playing slowly, with a few sour notes indicating that the musicians were wearying after five hours of patient tootling.

“Dismiss those Marine players,” ordered Lincoln. “They’re tired. I’ll see what those boys at the back door want.”

“Not alone, Mr. President!” protested the aide.

“Company K won’t let anything happen to me,” argued Lincoln. “How many are out there?”

“Quite a number, sir. A lieutenant is with them.”

“I’ll fetch Tad. If they’ve brought something for him it will sort of make up for this sorry Christmas he had.” Lincoln strode off up the stairs. All day since disciplining Tad his heart had ached in dull, heavy fashion. It was not easy, he was thinking, to be the son of a president. It was not even easy to be a president. He thought again wistfully of that white house in Springfield, of turkey wishbones hung to dry there above the kitchen stove when Tad and Willie were small. Honors came dear. Almost, he decided, a man could pay too much for them.

Tad was still awake, lying hunched down in the middle of the huge, high bed. A candle burned on a stand, and the flickering light made his eyes enormous and somehow lost in the round paleness of his face.

“I couldn’t get to sleep, Papa,” he explained, scrabbling into his father’s lap when Lincoln sat on the edge of the bed. “It was the drum. I could hear it all the time—bum, bum. When it stopped I waited for it to start again.”

“It’s stopped now, Tad. For good. And the boys are downstairs. Our boys. They brought you something. Come on, I’ll carry you down. Put this wrapper around you so you won’t take cold.”

“Maybe a new sword. Would you let me wear it, Papa?” asked Tad eagerly.

“I’ll see—we’ll see how you behave.”

They went down the rear stairway stealthily, through a chilly hall to the back door. But even here was an aide who sprang to open the door and two soldiers appeared out of nowhere, one desperately swallowing some thing he had been chewing on.

On the steps outside huddled a crowd of blue-clad men. Snow sifted thinly over their bent shoulders, their drawn-down caps. Every face came up, but to a man they seemed to be holding something, holding tight to a bulk that struggled a little, something that was hairy and odorous and staccato of feet and alive.

“Mr. President,” the lieutenant jerked erect, saluted anxiously, “we brought this—for Private Thomas Lincoln—for his Christmas, sir. It’s not the same one. Some of the boys chipped in and bought it off a Negro, sir—but we thought might be it would do—for the boy for his Christmas.”

Like a fish Tad was out of his father’s arms, nightshirt flying, bare feet oblivious of the cold stone step.

“A nanny goat!” he shrieked in delight. “Papa, it’s a nanny goat! My very own nanny goat!”

“Mr. President, your pardon sir, it’s kind of dirty, sir, but we’ll wash it good in the morning. And though it ain’t the same one,” pleaded the corporal, “we thought maybe it would do—for Christmas.”

“She licked my hand. She likes me!” Tad squirmed in ecstasy. “Most of anything I wanted me a nanny goat!”

“It appears,” stated Abraham Lincoln, “to be a very superior goat. Thank the boys, Tad, and let them take your nanny down to the stables and feed her. She looks a bit gaunt to me. See that she gets a good feed, Corporal, if you please. Now, back to bed, Private Lincoln. Your nanny will still be here, all cleaned up and beautiful for you, in the morning.”

Very reluctantly, with many farewell pats and hand lickings, Tad was at last persuaded to mount the stairs again in his father’s arms.

Down below, the drums had ceased but Abraham Lincoln thought wearily of all the hands he must shake again before he could lie down to rest in this wide bed.

He tucked the covers tenderly over the happy child. Tad’s eyes were starry. No more tears. All sadness forgotten. Wonderful, to be a child. Abraham Lincoln sighed as he closed the door.

“Papa!” called Tad.

Lincoln opened the door again. “Yes, son.”

“It’s the nicest Christmas I ever had!” stated young Thomas Lincoln.

Transcriber’s Notes

—Silently corrected a few typos.

—Retained publication information from the printed edition: this eBook is public-domain in the country of publication.

—In the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by _underscores_.