Mrs. Lincoln's Rival (50 page)

“She is no one you need concern yourself about,” William snapped.

“Brother,” exclaimed Almyra, but one sharp look silenced her again.

Suddenly Kate knew—not
who
Mrs. Anderson was, or the exact circumstances of her acquaintance with William, but she knew very well
what
Mrs. Anderson was to him, or had been, around five years before.

She was too shocked and distressed to weep. As soon as they reached Young Orchard, Kate climbed awkwardly down from the carriage without waiting for assistance and fled inside and upstairs to the room she and William shared when they visited his mother’s house. She did not know that Nettie had followed until she turned to shut the door and discovered her sister there. Unable to speak, she gestured for Nettie to enter and quickly locked the door behind them.

She flung herself on the bed, silently weeping. Nettie sat down beside her, took her head on her lap, and stroked her hair. Wordlessly, Kate clutched her other hand, tears streaming down her face, trembling and heartsick.

Kate lost track of time, so it could have been minutes or perhaps hours before a knock sounded on the door.

“Who’s there?” Nettie called.

“It is I,” said Madame Fanny, her voice muffled by the door. “May I come in?”

When Kate stiffened, Nettie squeezed her hand reassuringly. “Are you alone?”

“I am.”

Nettie raised her eyebrows in a question, and Kate took a deep breath and nodded. As Nettie went to unlock the door, Kate sat up, head spinning, and quickly dried her eyes with her handkerchief.

Madame Fanny entered; she regarded Kate sympathetically before seating herself in a chair by the window. “So, you have met Mrs. Anderson.”

Neither of the sisters replied.

Madame Fanny sighed. “I urged my son to tell you before you wed to avoid this unfortunate situation.”

“What situation,” asked Nettie clearly, “is this, precisely?”

Kate braced herself, praying that the truth would be no worse than what she imagined.

“Mrs. Anderson was born Mary Viall,” said Madame Fanny after a preamble of a long, weary sigh. “Her family is one of the most prominent in Richmond, but as a younger woman, Mary’s ideas of—what do they call it—‘free love’ put her at odds with the Vialls’ conservative ways. She fell in love with my son and, well, she was quite enticing, and he succumbed to her wiles. Eventually she was discovered to be in a delicate condition.”

At last Kate understood why the Spragues were not received in Providence society.

“Why did he not marry her?”

“As to that”—Madame Fanny shrugged—“he never had any intention of marrying her, as he had made clear to her from the very beginning, but she insisted she did not mind. Love without wedlock was perfectly in keeping with her philosophy. Her kind believes that ‘instincts of love’ are what legitimize acts of intimacy, not the law or the church.”

“Her kind?” Nettie echoed skeptically.

“Believers in free love,” Madame Fanny clarified. “I did not mean to suggest she was a fallen woman. She was a good girl from a respectable family.”

Perhaps she had been, Kate thought, until William came into her life. “He ruined her and then abandoned her.”

“He did not abandon her. He did not marry her, but he provides for her and the child.” Madame Fanny paused before adding, “Of course, we are not certain the boy is even his.”

That hair, those eyes. “Of course the child is his. I can see that. Anyone can see that. Everyone must have known.” Everyone but Kate.

“Not necessarily. When William departed for Europe soon after Miss Viall discovered her condition, her parents quickly arranged for her to marry a military officer by the name of Anderson.” A flicker of embarrassment appeared on her face before she added, defensively, “Mr. Anderson left her soon afterward, but she is properly married, and as far as the world knows, Mr. Anderson is the child’s father.”

“Why did William never tell me?” Kate fought back a sob, and Nettie held her shoulders, lending her strength. “Why did no one tell me?”

“This all happened long before my son met you. It belongs to the past.”

“And yet I still had a right to know.”

“This does not change William’s love for you.”

“Perhaps not, but it changes everything about the man I thought I married.” How could he have kept such a secret from her? Why had no kindhearted person told her?

And then memory flooded her—the spindly, white-haired woman at the reception in City Hall, leaning on her cane and studying her with sympathetic curiosity.

“What is the child’s name?” Kate asked.

Madame Fanny frowned. “What could that possibly matter?”

“I want to know.”

“He is not called William Sprague, Junior, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

Insistent, Kate said, “Tell me his name.”

“Hamlet,” Madame Fanny snapped. “His name is Hamlet Anderson. A foolish, fanciful, poetical name, bestowed upon him by a flighty, poetical mother.”

“Hamlet,” Kate echoed numbly, lying back down on the bed and wrapping her arms protectively around the child in her womb.

M
ARCH
–A
PRIL
1865

I
n the inevitable row that followed, William was by turns imploring and hostile, begging Kate’s forgiveness in one breath and in the next insisting that the affair was irrelevant, for it had begun and ended long before they met. “You do not command me,” he growled, seizing her by the upper arm and shaking her so roughly that she knew he would leave bruises.

“It has nothing to do with command,” she cried, tearing herself free of his grasp. “It’s bad enough that you sired a child out of wedlock and abandoned his mother—that is your crime against them. Your crime against me is that you concealed it. It is a lie by omission, and it was wrong, and you know it.”

“Who are you to judge me?” he snapped. “You’ve had your own indiscretions and your own lies. I know you were no virgin when you married me. You were but a seductive and licentious girl when you gave to Richard Nevins what you should have saved for me.”

“How could you even think such a thing?”

“How could you have hoped to fool me?” he countered. “You knew too much when we took to our bridal chamber, and you’ve enjoyed it more than is proper for a lady ever since. That, coupled with the liberties you allowed me before we wed, is evidence enough of your impurity.”

“I knew the little I did on our wedding night because of what you had shown me during our courtship,” she protested, deliberately omitting Mrs. Douglas’s role in her education for her friend’s sake. “I’ve enjoyed it, but with
you
, and only with you. Would you have me shrink from your embrace?”

He did not bother to respond. “The boy is none of your concern,” he snarled instead, and stormed from the room.

As soon as he left, Nettie darted back in and held her until she stopped shaking. Kate had no idea how an argument sparked by William’s sin and deception had turned into an inquisition into her sexual purity, but it was clear that there was apparently no limit to the ways her husband was able to wound her.

She wanted to go home to Washington, but William forbade it. When several days passed with no lessening of her resolve, William adopted a more conciliatory tone, encouraging her to come with him to Narragansett as they had planned, to enjoy the spring sea air and to tour the mansion, which he assured her was coming along magnificently. “We are husband and wife,” he reminded her. “That is irrevocable, so let us forget the past and think instead of our future. We could still be very happy, Kate, in our beautiful home with our precious child.”

She knew he meant to entice her with beauty and comfort, but she was too heartsick to be tempted. When he still refused to pay the train fare, she resignedly told him that she would telegraph Father and have him make travel arrangements for her and Nettie instead. At that, such a look of shock came over William’s face that Kate knew he had only just realized that Father, whom he greatly admired, would soon know of his lies and indiscretions. He attempted to bargain with her, offering to pay the sisters’ travel expenses in exchange for her promise not to tell Father about young Hamlet. “I will not conspire to conceal your secret from my father,” said Kate, astonished. “The truth will come out. You must know that.”

William looked so stricken that in any other circumstances Kate would have felt sorry for him.

Later that afternoon, he relented, and the next day when he saw Kate and Nettie off at the train station, he seemed genuinely remorseful. “I’m truly very sorry I didn’t tell you the truth from the beginning,” he said, seizing her hand as she was about to board. “My family has kept this secret so long that it didn’t occur to me to reveal it, not even to you—nor, I admit, did I see the necessity.”

Kate knew that in this he was being utterly truthful—but it was an uncomfortable truth, revealing how little honesty and frankness he thought he owed her.

Nettie had written to tell Father they were coming home early, but not why, and so soon after their arrival, they sat down together in his study and Kate revealed the whole unhappy tale. Father was greatly distressed and angry, and he was grievously sorry that he had not inquired into William’s past more thoroughly before giving his consent to the marriage. “But what is done is done,” he said resignedly. “You must find a way to reconcile with him. Your Christian forgiveness and uncomplaining submission will compel him to be a better man. I am sure of it.”

Kate was far less certain, and when her eyes met Nettie’s, she knew her sister felt the same. And yet she knew she had little choice but to make the best peace she could, for her child’s sake.

Soon after his daughters returned to Washington, Father left for Baltimore to attend to his duties on the circuit court. Baltimore was close enough that he would be able to return home from time to time, and yet Kate felt bereft, even with Nettie for company.

In the last week of March, John Hay invited her to go driving, and she gladly agreed. Even though he had confided his intentions at the Inaugural Ball, she was surprised and saddened when he told her that he had submitted his resignation to the president. “I’ve been appointed secretary of legation of the United States in Paris,” he announced proudly. “I’ll sail for France as soon as the president can spare me.”

“I hope that won’t be soon,” said Kate as the carriage rolled slowly along the riverbank. They sat on the same side, so close that John could have taken her hand if he wanted.

“June, I think,” said John. “Of course, I won’t go as long as my services here seem essential.”

Kate managed a laugh. “I suspect Mr. Lincoln would argue that your services are essential in perpetuity. Indeed, I have no doubt that they are.”

“I’m sure the Tycoon will replace me easily enough.”

“I think you underestimate how much he relies upon you. Don’t you feel even the smallest twinge of conscience for abandoning him to gad about Paris?”

“Abandoning him? Gad about?” John echoed, astonished. “I think you accuse me unfairly. Paris is indeed a pleasant place, but I go for study and observation. I shall no doubt enjoy it for a year or so—but not very long, as I don’t wish to exile myself in these important and interesting times.”

“They are certainly interesting,” agreed Kate, unable to keep the regret from her voice.

“I go away only to fit myself for more serious work when I return.” His brow furrowed; he had not missed the subtle shift in her tone. “I will come back, and when I do, I’ll call on you, and you can introduce me to your little bundle of joy, and I’ll marvel at what a wonderful, doting mother you have become.”

Tears filled her eyes, and she turned her head away. “My parlor will seem very dull to you after Paris, I think.”

“Anyplace in your company, dull?” A note of amusement in his voice compelled her to turn back to him, and the fondness and admiration in his eyes brought her both comfort and ineffable grief. “Never, Kate. Never that.”

• • •

As the Senate had adjourned
sine die
before the Spragues’ ill-fated excursion to Rhode Island, William had no compelling reason to return to Washington City except to see Kate, and to her relief, he seemed eager to establish a truce through the mail first. His letters were tentative but kind, free of the recriminations that had marked their arguments. Gradually they became warmer, more wistful and loving. Kate responded to his letters dutifully, but she wrote to him less often than he wrote to her. Her shock and anger had subsided, but a dull melancholy replaced them as she grappled with the disappointing truth that the child within her womb was
her
first, but not her husband’s. They would not share the joy and wonder of new parenthood in the way she had fondly imagined, and she could not help feeling that William and his paramour had stolen something precious from her. From time to time, William strongly hinted that he remained in Rhode Island only because she had not asked him to come home. She was not ready to do so quite yet, but she hoped that in time she could be.

While Father and William were away from the capital, so too was Mr. Lincoln. At the end of March, the president, Mrs. Lincoln, and Tad had traveled by steamer to City Point to visit General Grant and his wife, Julia. According to John Hay, the president wanted to review the troops and confer with his general in chief before what was expected to be a climactic battle. “I fancy he will do very little except satisfy his own curiosity and gratify in some measure that of the public, by sending telegrams to Stanton,” Father told Kate, with some disdain. “What little he may do besides that will be, I fear, not well done.”

Based upon the newspaper reports printed upon their departure, Kate had expected the Lincolns to remain in Virginia for a week or more, but to her surprise, Mrs. Lincoln returned a few days later without her husband and son—and rumors swirled about of an embarrassing altercation between her and another lady in the party.

Intrigued, Kate was delighted when John called on her and told her the story of “The Hellcat’s Escapade,” as he titled it, a tale he had pieced together from conversations between Mrs. Lincoln and her dressmaker and gossip shared by trusted eyewitnesses. Escorted by General Grant, Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln had gone out to review the troops with a small party of companions. The president had ridden ahead on horseback with General Grant and two officers’ wives, but Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Grant had been obliged to follow in an ambulance slowed to a crawl by a rough corduroyed road and shin-deep mud. After much delay and hassle, the carriage caught up to the horseback riders—and Mrs. Lincoln discovered that the review had begun without her and that the attractive wife of Major General Edward Ord was riding alongside Mr. Lincoln in her place. Seized by jealousy, the Hellcat gave Mrs. Ord a terrible tongue lashing, turned her fury upon the astonished Mrs. Grant when she tried to intervene, and demanded that her husband immediately relieve Major General Ord of his duties.

“How terrible,” exclaimed Kate, delighted. “Did Mr. Lincoln banish her from City Point, or did she return home out of shame on her own?”

“I’m not sure. You’d have to ask her.”

Kate laughed. “Oh, I dare not.”

When John threw back his head and laughed, she was reminded so vividly of happier times that she could almost forget her estrangement from her husband and John’s impending departure. She could almost believe that the worst had passed, and that better days yet awaited her.

Shortly after noon on April 3, Kate and Nettie were upstairs in Kate’s room making plans for the nursery and the baby’s layette when the sudden cacophony of passing artillery forced them to raise their voices to be heard. When whistles and cheers joined the ruckus outside, Kate and Nettie abandoned their conversation, and Nettie darted to the window.

“What’s going on out there?” Kate asked, waddling after her.

“An artillery salute to celebrate one achievement or another, I assume.” Nettie frowned thoughtfully as she peered outside. “The streets are filling with people, and they’re tossing their hats in the air and—oh, my goodness, embracing and kissing and weeping. For joy, I hope.”

Kate had joined her at the window, and as she watched the celebration in the street below, she remembered John’s passing remark that General Grant had been preparing for a climactic battle. “Dare we hope this celebration marks exceptionally good news?”

“Oh, I think we should dare,” said Nettie fervently.

They hurried downstairs and reached the foyer just as Will burst in, breathless from excitement. “Richmond has fallen,” he shouted, forgetting all decorum. “The Union army has taken the city!”

Nettie shrieked and flung her arms around Kate, and then, completely disregarding her sister’s delicate condition, she seized her hand and pulled her out the front door. Arm in arm, they joined the celebration already spilling over into the streets, their hearts overflowing with joy, their happiness reflected in the faces of the people they passed, ladies and gentlemen, soldiers and nurses, clerks and shopkeepers and housemaids and waiters, all rejoicing together. Citizens draped patriotic banners and bunting from their windows, and bands quickly formed on street corners and parks to play spirited marches and merry jigs. Thankful crowds gathered outside the War Department and called for Secretary Stanton to address them, and the sisters would have stayed to listen but Kate was wary of being jostled by the crowd. Nettie solicitously escorted her home, and they watched the rest of the celebration from their parlor window, drinking apple cider toasts to all the officers whose names they could remember and wishing that Father were there to enjoy the glorious moment with them.

Later they felt the roar and thunder as an eight-hundred-gun salute shook the city, three hundred booms for the fall of Petersburg, five hundred for Richmond. As the afternoon passed, Kate observed many men celebrating by indulging in too much liquor, tottering down the streets, singing and proclaiming the glory of President Lincoln, General Grant, and the Union army in loud, slurring voices. Tomorrow they would regret their overindulgence, but for the moment, nothing could diminish their rejoicing. Repulsed by the sight, too reminiscent of William at his worst, Kate left the window and went to her father’s study, where she wrote him a letter describing the scenes of merrymaking she and Nettie had observed, and expressing her heartfelt joy that the war was surely almost over.

The realization struck her with such force that she had to set down her pen and blink tears from her eyes. This time it was not an empty hope, a prayer unheard. After years of suffering and discord and thousands upon thousands of dead and maimed, the war truly was in its final hours.

The next day, word came to the capital that President Lincoln had entered Richmond early that morning, while flames of the fires the fleeing Confederates had set to destroy precious stores of cotton and liquor still flickered among the ruins. A group of colored workmen had recognized the president from a distance as he approached and, to his embarrassment, had shouted, “Glory, hallelujah!” and had fallen to their knees to kiss his feet. “Please don’t kneel to me,” President Lincoln had urged them, or so the stories told. “You must kneel only to God and thank Him for your freedom.”